‘I don’t think we’ve…’ began Jane.
‘Mr Dunbar was a colleague of George’s once upon a time,’ said Sebring’s mother before Steven could say anything.
‘It was nice of you to come, Mr Dunbar,’ said Jane. ‘Where would that have been?’
‘Porton Down,’ said Steven.
‘Ah, someone else from those days,’ said Jane, starting alarm bells in Steven’s head. ‘You must know Donald Crowe over there then?’
Steven followed Jane’s line of sight to a tall, gaunt, cadaverous-looking man who seemed to be preoccupied with examining book titles on the shelves along the back wall of the room. ‘I don’t think so,’ he said, having to think quickly. ‘Our times mustn’t have overlapped.’
‘I see,’ said Jane Sebring. ‘So you’re not here to help him make sure George didn’t leave any secrets behind. That’s why he’s really here.’
Jane moved off before Steven could respond: her comment had come out of the blue. Sebring’s mother beside him said, ‘Jane’s a remarkable woman. It would be a silly man who thought he could fool her.’
‘Quite so,’ said Steven. He didn’t dare look at her.
‘Why don’t we walk in the garden? It seems such a shame to be indoors on such a glorious day,’ suggested Sebring’s mother.
‘If you’re sure Jane wouldn’t mind?’ said Steven.
‘She won’t.’
Steven sensed that Maud Sebring — as he now knew her — needed to talk about her dead son so he was happy to let her. Apart from anything else, it kept him away from potentially embarrassing situations and, from the garden, through the French windows, he could see what was going on inside. He was interested in when people were going to start leaving.
Maud was telling him about a family picnic of long ago when he saw a large group inside begin to move towards the front door. Jane was accompanying them. She paused by the side of the door and was kissed on the cheek by each in turn. Steven could see the herd instinct take over among the remaining mourners and they all started to file out, uttering last condolences as they did so.
‘So this is where you’ve got to, Mother,’ said Jane when she finally came out into the garden. She was smiling.
‘We couldn’t resist the sun, dear,’ replied Maud. ‘I was just telling Mr Dunbar here about the time George decided he was going to live up a tree like Tarzan and then got stuck.’
‘The stuff of family legend, Mr Dunbar,’ said Jane, then, turning to her mother-in-law, she said, ‘Mother, Jimmy says he’ll give you a lift home now if you’re ready to go. It’ll save you getting a taxi later on.’
‘How very kind,’ said Maud Sebring. She disappeared indoors to find her coat, leaving Steven and Jane alone in the garden.
Jane Sebring turned to Steven and said, ‘You didn’t know my husband at all, did you Mr Dunbar?’
‘How did you know?’ asked Steven.
‘Donald Crowe was my husband’s boss at Porton; he still works there. You couldn’t have failed to have come across him had you been there yourself at any time when George was.’
‘Well spotted,’ said Steven. ‘I apologise for the deception.’
‘Who are you?’
Steven showed Jane his ID.
‘So, it’s Doctor Dunbar,’ said Jane. ‘From another government organisation full of spies and secrets that must never be revealed, no doubt.’
‘Not really,’ said Steven. ‘We’re usually quite open about things. We just tend to help out when the police might be out of their depth.’
‘And why should they be that in George’s case?’
‘It did seem possible that his death might have had something to do with his time at Porton Down, Mrs Sebring. The visit you had from the Scotsman, Maclean, seemed to suggest that, although the police no longer think that’s the case.’
‘They found Maclean?’
‘Apparently he’s a well-known Gulf War activist. He was at home in Glasgow when your husband died.’
‘The war was all such a long time ago,’ sighed Jane. ‘But Mr Maclean seemed so angry about everything — as if it happened yesterday.’
‘Did you get the impression that your husband knew him when he turned up on your doorstep?’ asked Steven.
‘Oh, yes,’ said Jane. ‘They’d clearly met before.’
‘They argued?’
Jane nodded. ‘From what I overheard, Mr Maclean seemed to think that my husband had been involved in something untoward during his time at Porton. He kept insisting that he should come clean. George insisted that he was imagining things but Mr Maclean accused him of lying.’
‘Did your husband say anything afterwards?’ asked Steven.
‘Nothing. He refused to discuss it.’
‘I take it you personally have no idea what George worked on at Porton.’
‘As I told Donald Crowe earlier, none at all.’
‘What made you think Crowe was here to check up on things?’ asked Steven.
Jane gave an involuntary laugh. ‘He told me to my face,’ she said. ‘He asked if he could go through George’s papers to make sure there was nothing there of a ‘sensitive nature’ as he so delicately put it.’
‘You don’t like Crowe,’ said Steven.
‘He gives me the creeps. You’d find more humanity in a bar of soap.’
‘Did he find anything?’
Jane shrugged and said, ‘I’ve no idea. I just told him to help himself.’
‘You told the police that there was a change in your husband after Maclean’s visit. He seemed worried? Angry?’
Jane smiled wanly and said, ‘George wasn’t really a man who ever got angry. He was very… even-tempered.’
Steven sensed that there was much more lying behind Jane’s choice of words but — although he was interested — it was not the right time to ask. ‘Worried then?’
‘Alarmed would be a better word,’ said Jane. ‘He had trouble sleeping after Maclean’s visit. I was worried about him but he wouldn’t open up to me. That was George.’
Jane looked at Steven in what he found a very strange way. He imagined there was some kind of debate going on inside her head. Eventually she said simply, ‘He called a newspaper, The Guardian. I know because I listened in. He asked to speak to a journalist who had done a number of stories on the Gulf War over the years. His name’s Martin Hendry.’
‘I know the name,’ said Steven.
‘He wasn’t there but George left word saying that he had a major story for him and that he should give him a call back. Hendry did call back, about two hours later. I answered the phone. I heard George make arrangements to meet him the following day.’
‘George didn’t tell you face to face?’ asked Steven.
Jane shook here head. ‘No,’ she said.
Steven saw the hurt in her eyes. He said, ‘As you say, he was very upset at the time.’
SEVEN
Steven drove back to London reflecting on his day. A lot had happened since the meeting that morning with Norris at Police Headquarters. He had parted company with the policeman, almost convinced that Sebring’s death had nothing to do with his work at Porton Down after the elimination of Maclean as a suspect, but now, after talking to Jane Sebring in the garden of her home, he had started to believe otherwise. In a practical sense there was only one lead to follow and that was Martin Hendry, the journalist Sebring had contacted at the Guardian. He sighed as he realised that getting anything out of a journalist about his source was going to be about as easy as getting information out of the Ministry of Defence about Sebring’s past work — or blood out of a stone. He’d have to push the murder inquiry button pretty hard to make Hendry budge.