Putting Borodino firmly behind them and making their way back to Hadleigh’s cottage Barnaby noticed a woman with a bicycle standing by the gate of the house next door. She had obviously been informed by someone in the crowd that they had been previously seeking her out, for she was looking in a concerned, expectant manner in their direction. Barnaby, fishing for his warrant card, approached.
‘Mrs Clapton?’
‘Yes. What is it?’ Her expression, a little alarmed but plainly anxious to be of help, was a welcome contrast to their last encounter.
‘Could we talk inside, do you think?’
‘Of course.’
The front door opened on to a tiny square of coconut matting directly behind which reared some steep and narrow stairs. The stairwell was painted Prussian blue and covered with stars. Sue showed them into an untidy sitting room where, after asking permission, Barnaby sank, swiftly and gratefully, into a deep armchair from which, when the time came, he could hardly extricate himself. Troy settled himself at a table affixed to a single barley-sugar-twist leg. The whole thing had such a severe wobble that he ended up balancing his notebook on his knee.
‘Is it about Gerald?’ She was breathing quickly and her eyes were wide with apprehension. ‘People on the pavement were saying all sorts of things. That he’d had an accident. Even that he’d ... died.’
‘I’m afraid that is the case, Mrs Clapton. But it was not an accident. Mr Hadleigh was deliberately killed.’
The colour leached from her face and flooded uncontrollably back, swoosh, a crimson tide. Then she hung her head, her expression invisible behind a fall of hair. After a few moments she sat up, appearing more composed. Her complexion stabilised at a shade resembling pale tea.
‘But we were all together - our Writers Circle. We had a lovely time.’ She sounded completely bewildered and also slightly resentful, as if the very loveliness of the time should itself have proved an amulet against disaster.
‘You met regularly, I believe?’
‘Yes. Every month.’ She was gazing now at her clogs. Clumsy things painted with little flowers and worn with woollen socks. ‘Gerald ... Gerald ...’
‘You can’t think of anyone who would wish to harm Mr Hadleigh?’
‘What do you mean?’ She looked from one man to the other in amazement. ‘Surely it was a burglar? A break-in?’
‘We are of course considering that possibility.’ Barnaby was at his most avuncular. ‘How long have you been neighbours?’
‘Since we moved here. About five years ago.’
‘You’d know Mr Hadleigh quite well, then?’
‘I wouldn’t say that. He was always polite and helpful. A good sort to live next to - cleared the snow last winter when Brian did his back in. That sort of thing. But he wasn’t what you’d call revealing.’
‘But you met socially?’
‘Only at the group. We didn’t mix otherwise. Brian wouldn’t have liked it.’
‘Why not?’
‘He just doesn’t care for ... that class of person.’
Well there’s a turn-around, thought Troy. Mindful of the recent ticking-off his voice was politely neutral as he asked, ‘What class would that be, Mrs Clapton?’
‘“Officer class” was how Brian described it. Not that Gerald had been in the Forces. I got the impression he was a retired civil servant. It’s just Brian’s way of putting things. He’s a socialist.’ She squared her shoulders slightly and lifted her chin as if bravely confessing to some shameful peccadillo as, around Midsomer Worthy, it probably was. ‘People are pretty good about it on the whole.’
‘How did your writers’ group get on together?’
‘Fine. Mainly.’
‘But there must have been likes and dislikes. The occasional disagreements. Jealousy perhaps over a member’s success.’
‘Oh no. We weren’t professionals.’
Touché, thought Barnaby, before realising the remark had been made in all innocence. ‘Were you all working on different things?’
‘Yes. Gerald wrote short stories, Amy’s working on a novel ...’
As Barnaby listened he took in his surroundings. Two walls were emulsioned a hot, sandy orange, one terracotta, the fourth the same colour as the stairwell, minus the nebulae but with the addition of a stately and rather beautiful palm tree. A black frieze, in a Greek-key pattern, had been painted beneath the picture rail. It all reminded Barnaby of a visit he and Joyce had paid to Knossos. There was a wooden clothes-horse from which depended several bunches of slowly drying flowers and herbs. The carpet was wall-to-wall muesli. Sue continued talking.
‘... Night of the Hyena. I can’t relate to it at all. Guns, bombs, rockets - that’s men’s stuff, isn’t it? Just silliness. Except in real life of course, when they go off and kill people.’
‘Did you always meet at Mr Hadleigh’s?’ asked Sergeant Troy.
‘Yes. Laura’s house is tiny, Rex’s a bit of a mess. Brian didn’t want them here and Honoria grumbled about it being too much trouble. Actually Amy said it was because she didn’t want to have to pay for the coffee and biscuits - oh! You won’t tell ...’
‘No worries on that score, Mrs Clapton,’ said Troy with a sympathetic smile.
Sue smiled shyly back. She took off her glasses, which she hated, and rested them in her lap. The lenses were thick as the bottoms of milk bottles. Sue dreamed of one day seeing a film where, after first letting her hair down, the hero remove the heroine’s glasses and says, ‘Hey ... know what? You look better with them on.’
Barnaby said, ‘I understand you had a guest speaker yesterday.’
‘A rare treat. You’d be surprised how difficult it is to get people considering we’re under an hour from central London.’
‘But this time you struck lucky?’
‘Yes. Everyone was surprised when he accepted. And he was so nice. Not a bit grand. Gave us all sorts of advice and tips. And he really listened, you know?’
‘So the evening was a success?’ She nodded vigorously.
‘No tensions or cross currents that you noticed?’
‘Only Gerald.’ Her face changed as she remembered what had momentarily been crowded out. ‘He hardly spoke, which was surprising. I thought he’d be asking lots of questions because he so much wanted to succeed. He would work over and over his writing trying to make it better.’
‘Was he any good?’ asked Troy.
Sue hesitated. Knowing it was wrong to speak ill of the dead she was certain it could not then be right to speak ill of their achievements. On the other hand she always tried to be honest and it wasn’t as if, in this case, the truth would hurt anyone. Least of all poor Gerald.
‘When Gerald read his stories out they sounded fine. He’d learned how to do it, you see, from all his books. But the minute he’d finished you couldn’t remember a word he’d said.’ This devastating indictment concluded, she suddenly got up as if remembering her manners.
‘I should have made you some tea,’ she said, plucking apologetically at the rainbow laces in her waistcoat.
‘That’s very kind of you, Mrs Clapton.’ Barnaby’s hope of a biscuit was more than realised. A cake tin arrived with the tea and it was suggested that he helped himself.
‘Why are you asking so many questions about us?’ said Sue, handing around large mugs.
‘Just background. I understand Mr Jennings didn’t leave with the rest of you.’
‘No - it was funny, that. Brian made the first move, Gerald got the coats and it looked as if there was going to be a general exodus but then, when we were all halfway out the door, Max Jennings sat down again.’
‘Did you get the impression that was a deliberate manoeuvre?’ asked Troy.
‘I don’t think so. Just one of those awkward moments.’