The interview with Dora Lennox wasn’t really an interview. She was scrawny and limp and exhausted, smudged from all her weeping. Her father had grown years older in the days since his wife had died, but Dora had become like a tiny child again. She needed her mother. She needed someone to gather her up and cradle her in their arms, make all the horror go away. Frieda laid a hand on her damp, hot head. Amanda Thorne cooed and told her everything was going to be all right, seeming not to grasp the idiocy of her words. Karlsson stared at the girl, his brow furrowed. He didn’t know where to start. The house was too full of pain. You could feel it prickling against your skin. Outside, the daffodils glowed in the warm brightness of spring.
When Yvette asked Russell Lennox about the bottles he just stared at her as if he hadn’t understood a word.
‘Do you know who put them there?’
He shrugged. ‘What’s that got to do with anything?’
‘Perhaps nothing, but I need to ask. There were dozens of bottles hidden in the shed. There might be a harmless explanation, but it suggests that someone was drinking secretly.’
‘I don’t see why. The shed’s full of junk.’
‘Who uses the shed?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Who goes into it? Did your wife?’
‘It wasn’t Ruth.’
‘Or perhaps your son and his friends –’
‘No. Not Ted.’
‘Did you put the bottles there?’
The room filled with silence.
‘Mr Lennox?’
‘Yes.’ His voice rose, and he looked away from her as though he couldn’t bear to meet her gaze.
‘Would you say –’ Yvette stopped. She was no good at this. She asked questions too harshly. She didn’t know how to sound clear yet unjudgemental. She tried to imagine Karlsson asking the questions. ‘Do you have a drink problem?’ she asked abruptly.
Russell Lennox jerked his head up. ‘No, I don’t.’
‘But those bottles …’ She thought about the white cider: nobody would drink that if they didn’t have a problem.
‘People think that because you drink, you have a drink problem, and they think if you have a drink problem you have a larger problem underneath.’ He spoke rapidly, his words running together. ‘It was just a stupid phase. To help me through. I put them in the shed because I knew everyone would say what you’re saying now. Make it shameful. It was simpler to hide it. That’s all. I was going to throw them away when I got the chance.’
Yvette tried to separate out his sentences. ‘To help you through what?’ she asked.
‘It. Stuff.’ He sounded like his son.
‘When did you go through this phase?’
‘Why?’
‘Recently?’
Russell Lennox put his hand to his face, half covering his mouth. He made an indistinct sound through his fingers.
‘Are you still drinking?’
‘Are you my GP now?’ His words were muffled. ‘Do you want to tell me it’s not good for me? Do you think I don’t know that? Perhaps you want to tell me about liver damage, addiction, the need to acknowledge what I’m doing and seek help.’
‘Were you drinking because of problems in your marriage?’
He stood up. ‘Everything is evidence to you, isn’t it? My wife’s private life, my drinking too much.’
‘A murder victim doesn’t have a private life,’ said Yvette. ‘They both seem relevant to me.’
‘What do you want me to say? I drank too much for a bit. It was stupid. I didn’t want my kids to know so I hid it. I’m not proud of it.’
‘And you say it wasn’t for any particular reason?’
Russell Lennox was grey with weariness. He sat down again opposite Yvette, slumping in his chair. ‘You’re asking me to make everything neat. It wasn’t like that. I’m getting older, my life felt stale. Nothing changing. No excitement. Maybe Ruth was feeling the same thing.’
‘Perhaps,’ said Yvette. ‘But did your wife know you were drinking?’
‘What’s that got to do with her being dead? Do you think I killed her because she found out my guilty secret?’
‘Did she?’
‘She suspected. She had a nose for people’s weaknesses.’
‘So she knew.’
‘She smelled it on me. She was pretty contemptuous – that’s a bit rich, isn’t it, with what she was doing at the same time?’
‘Which you still claim you had no knowledge of.’
‘I don’t claim. I had no knowledge.’
‘And you still say you had a good marriage?’
‘Are you married?’
Yvette felt a violent blush heat her neck and face. She saw herself through his eyes – a solid, brown-haired, clumsy, lonely woman with big feet and large, ringless hands. ‘No,’ she replied shortly.
‘No marriage looks good when you start searching for the fault lines. Until now, I would have said that, although we sometimes wrangled and sometimes took each other for granted, we had a good, solid marriage.’
‘And now?’
‘Now it doesn’t make sense. It’s been smashed apart and I can’t even ask her why.’
Frieda had only just arrived home when there was a ring at the door. She opened it to find two police officers, a man and a woman.
‘Are you Dr Frieda Klein?’ said the man.
‘Did Karlsson send you?’
The two officers looked at each other.
‘I’m sorry,’ said the man. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘Well, what are you here for?’
‘Can you confirm that you are Dr Frieda Klein?’
‘Yes, I can. Is something wrong?’
The officer frowned. ‘I have to inform you that we need to interview you in connection with an alleged case of assault causing actual bodily harm.’
‘What case? Is this something I’m supposed to have witnessed?’
He shook his head. ‘We’re responding to a complaint that names you as the perpetrator.’
‘What on earth are you talking about?’
The female officer looked down at her notebook. ‘Were you present at flat four, number two Marsh Side on the seventeenth of April?’
‘What?’
‘It is currently occupied by Mr Ian Yardley.’
‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ said Frieda.
‘You admit you were present?’
‘Yes, I admit I was present but –’
‘We need to talk to you about this,’ said the man. ‘But we can’t do it on the doorstep. If you wish, we can take you to an interview room.’
‘Can’t you just come in so that we can sort it out?’
‘We can come in and put a few questions to you,’ said the man.
In their bulky uniforms, the two of them made Frieda’s house seem smaller. They sat down awkwardly, as if they were unused to being inside. Frieda sat opposite them. She waited for them to speak. The man took off his hat and laid it on the arm of the chair. He had curly red hair and pale skin.
‘It’s been reported that there was an incident,’ he said. He took a notebook from the side pocket of his jacket, slowly opened it and inspected it, as if he was seeing it for the first time. ‘I need to inform you from the outset that we are investigating a case of common assault and also a case of assault causing actual bodily harm.’
‘What actual bodily harm?’ said Frieda, trying to remain calm. At the same time she tried to remember the event. Could the woman have hit her head when she fell? The officer looked back down at his notebook.
‘A complaint has been made by Mr Ian Yardley, the owner of the flat, and by Polly Welsh. Now, at this point I need to warn you that you are not under arrest and that you are free to stop the interview at any time. And I also need to tell you that you do not have to say anything but it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something that you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.’ When he had finished this small speech, the officer’s pale skin reddened. Frieda was reminded of a small boy reciting a speech at a school assembly. ‘We always have to say that.’