“Detective Chief Inspector Skinner,” said the first man. His melancholic tone matched his appearance. He indicated his colleague. “This is D.S. Macbeth.”
“I don’t care if he’s Banquo’s bloody ghost. What’s the big idea?”
Skinner ignored the question. “You’d like to see our I.D., I imagine.”
He flipped open a card and his colleague did likewise. Harry tried to focus on the documents.
“Okay. So why… ”
“May we talk inside, please, sir?”
Skinner’s manner precluded contradiction and Harry was unable to think of a reason for not doing as the policeman asked. He couldn’t think of much at all. Leading the intruders into the lounge, he motioned them towards armchairs, more than glad to sit down himself. He saw their quick professional glances around the room, taking in the mess of books and papers, the crumpled jacket draped over the arm of a chair and the leaves of the unwatered cheese plant just beginning to yellow.
“I gather that you’re a local solicitor,” said Skinner. He spoke as if diagnosing an illness.
Harry nodded. He wasn’t acquainted with either of this pair; nothing odd about that in a large city, but why the black sergeant was glowering at him with scarcely concealed hostility was impossible to understand. Crusoe and Devlin didn’t have a bad name down at the Bridewell; they weren’t thought of as bent. Nevertheless, it wasn’t customary for the local force to pop into the homes of defence lawyers in the early hours to chat about their current caseload.
Skinner leaned forward. “I believe you are married to a Mrs. Elizabeth Devlin?”
Harry scarcely recognised the name. It must have been years since he last heard it. Anyway, it didn’t fit Liz. She had always been her own woman, never a possessed spouse. But he grunted assent.
“I am afraid I have some bad news for you, Mr. Devlin.”
Harry sensed that he was expected to respond, but the ache in his head blotted out rational thought. He glanced at Macbeth, but the dark face was now stripped of expression. Both men were studying him intently. After a short pause, Skinner coughed and spoke again.
“Mr. Devlin, I have to tell you that your wife died last night.”
Harry stared, first at one man, then at the other. Their features betrayed nothing. They were two detectives, watching him watching them. And waiting. Time passed. Seconds, minutes, hours? Harry neither knew nor cared. The silence made his head hurt more and his stomach began to churn.
Skinner cleared his throat and said, “I’m sorry.”
Harry’s shoulders twitched. “But isn’t… I mean…” He couldn’t frame what he wanted to say. He had no idea what he wanted to say.
Softly and with no emphasis, the chief inspector said, “Your wife’s body was found last night. We are treating it as a suspicious death, Mr. Devlin.”
Harry was conscious of the detectives’ unwavering gaze. Vaguely aware that there were questions which he should be asking — though if Liz was dead, how could any answers matter? — he clutched like a shipwreck victim at the first which entered his head.
“How did she die?”
Skinner said in the same flat tone, “She was stabbed, Mr. Devlin.”
Stabbed. The word twisted in Harry’s guts like the blade of a knife. He shut his eyes. A hundred memories surged into his mind, like unwelcome intruders breaking down the door.
Liz on the night of their first meeting, at a fireworks display within a stone’s throw of here at the Albert Dock. She’d told him then how much she loved to see the river lit up by the exploding showers of colour, had laughed and introduced herself: Liz Wieczarek. He couldn’t pronounce her Polish surname and she had teased him about his ineptitude.
Their wedding day when she’d promised to honour and obey, while a trace of humour had sparkled in her eyes and he’d tried not to grin at the provocative touch of her fingernails running along the back of his hand while the vicar droned on about the nature of their sacrament.
The evening when his cross-examination skills had drawn out the admission that she was sleeping with Michael Coghlan. When Harry asked if she loved the man, she had spread her arms and simply said, “I think so. But even if I don’t, I do know that I want him.”
Eventually he again became aware of the unblinking scrutiny of the policemen. Their watchfulness as they assessed his reaction to their news made him think of physicists noting the outcome of a laboratory experiment.
“I realise that this must come as a shock to you,” said Skinner. He coughed once more. “Even so, I wonder if you could help us by answering a few questions.”
Harry felt as if every muscle in his body had melted. This is the same room, he told himself, in which you talked to her thirty hours ago. That’s where she sat. Through the door is the bed in which she slept. Yesterday morning she was alive and said thank you, for making her feel safe.
“Perhaps I could start, sir, by asking when you last saw your wife.”
Harry’s lips were dry. “Yesterday. Yesterday morning.”
The policemen exchanged glances. They had not expected that reply. Macbeth seemed to be breathing harder, although he continued to hold his tongue. His superior kept the next question casual.
“At what time?”
“Shortly after eight in the morning.”
“And where was that?”
“Here, in this flat.”
Skinner scratched his nose, perhaps to conceal his surprise. “She visited you here?”
“Yes. She stayed the night.”
The chief inspector frowned. Sitting opposite, his sergeant’s eyes began to gleam with that brooding hostility which Harry could identify, but not comprehend.
“Am I right in believing,” said Skinner, “that you were separated from your wife, but not divorced?”
Harry nodded.
“An amicable arrangement?” asked the policeman softly.
There was something here which Harry didn’t understand. A secret from which he was excluded. He fumbled for a cigarette and found an old pack of Player’s in his dressing gown pocket. His hands trembled as he lit up. Instinct urged him to choose his words with care. Cautiously, he said, “Is any separation amicable?”
“That’s a lawyer’s reply, if you don’t mind my saying so, sir.” Skinner was curt. “Now — were you still on friendly terms or not?”
“I hadn’t seen her for two years. We weren’t on any terms at all.”
“Yet she called on you,” said Skinner, “and spent a whole night with you.”
“Not with me.”
Skinner’s eyebrows curved like question marks.
“I mean, we didn’t sleep together. She took the bedroom, there’s only one, you can see how tiny this place is. I had the sofa.”
“I see.”
“I doubt it,” said Harry. Anger began to surge inside him, providing an anaesthetic against pain and giving him strength to confront the puzzle. What in God’s name had happened? And what were they withholding from him?
“Tell me, then.”
Harry exhaled and with a jerky movement stubbed out the half-finished cigarette. “Liz was waiting for me the night before last. I arrived back at midnight. She’d talked the porter into letting her in.”
“Why had she come?”
“She’d started an affair with a married man. Unfortunately her other boyfriend found out. That frightened her.”
“Why?”
“The boyfriend is Mick Coghlan. Runs the gym in Brunner Street.” He moistened his lips. “Your people must have a cabinet full of files on him.”
Skinner inclined his head.
He already knows about Coghlan, thought Harry. Christ, what’s going on?
“You’re sure — I mean, you are definite that Liz is dead?” Harry looked quickly from one man to the other. “There hasn’t been — some sort of a mistake?”