Colin Dexter - The Daughters of Cain

But Morse interrupted him: ‘You just asked me if I’ll miss things and I shan’t, no. Only one thing, I suppose. I shall miss you, old friend, that’s all.’

He had spoken simply, almost awkwardly, and for a little while Lewis hardly trusted himself to look up. Somewhere behind his eyes he felt a slight prickling; and somewhere — in his heart, perhaps — he felt a sadness he could barely comprehend.

‘Not getting very far sitting here, Lewis, are we? What’s the programme?’

‘That’s what I just asked you.’

‘Well, there’s this fellow from Bedford, you say?’

‘Former undergraduate, sir.’

‘Yes, well — is he at home?’

‘Dunno. I can soon find out.’

‘Do that, then. See him.’

‘When—?’

‘What’s wrong with now? The way you drive you’ll be back by teatime.’

‘Don’t you want to see him?’

Morse hesitated. ‘No. There’s something much more important for me to do this afternoon.’

‘Go to bed, you mean?’

Slowly, resignedly, Morse nodded. ‘And try to fix something up with Brooks. Time we paid him a little visit, isn’t it?’

‘Monday?’

‘What’s wrong with tomorrow? That’ll be exactly a week after he murdered McClure, won’t it?’

Brenda Brooks was in a state of considerable agitation when she went through into the kitchen to put the kettle on. But at least she was relieved to be home before him ; to have time for a cup of tea; to try to stop shaking. The anguish, the sheer misery of it all, were as strong as ever; with only her growing fear a new element in the tragedy…

After the first inevitable bewilderment — after the uncomprehending questions and the incomprehensible answers — her immediate reaction had been to wash the bloodstained clothing — shirt, trousers, cardigan; but instead, she had followed the fierce instructions given from the invalid’s bed that the clothes be carted off to the rubbish dump, and that the affair never be referred to again.

Yet there the event stood — whatever had happened, whatever it all meant — forming that terrible and terrifying secret between them, between husband and wife. No longer a proper secret, though, for she had shared that secret… those secrets; or would it not be more honest to say that she had betrayed them? Particularly, therefore, did her fear centre on his return now: the fear that when he came in he would only have to look at her — to know . And as she squeezed the tea-bag with the tongs, she could do nothing to stop the constant trembling in her hands.

Automatically almost, between sips of tea, she wiped the tongs clean of any tannin stain and replaced them in the drawer to the right of the sink, in the compartment next to the set of beautifully crafted knives which her sister Beryl had given her for her first wedding — knives of many shapes and sizes, some small and slim, some with much longer and broader blades, which lay there before her in shining and sharpened array.

The phone rang at 2.45 p.m.: the Pitt Rivers Museum.

The phone rang again just before 3 p.m.: Mrs Stevens.

‘Is he home yet?’

‘No.’

‘Good.

Now listen!’

The front door slammed at 3.20 p.m., when, miraculously as it seemed to Brenda, the shaking in her hands had ceased.

Almost invariably, whenever he came in, she would use those same three words: ‘That you, Ted?’ That afternoon, however, there was a change, subconscious perhaps, yet still significant.

‘That you?’ she asked in a firm voice. Just the two words now — as if the query had become depersonalized, as if she could be asking the information of anyone; dehumanized, as if she could be speaking to a dog.

As yet, still holding out on the battle-field, was a small fortress. It was likely to collapse very soon, of course; but there was the possibility that it might hold out for some little time, since it had been recently reinforced. And when the door had slammed shut she had been suddenly conscious — yes! — of just a little power.

‘That you?’ she repeated.

‘Who do you think it is?’

‘Cup o’ tea?’

‘You can get me a can o’ beer.’

‘The museum just rang. The lady wanted to know how you were. Kind of her, wasn’t it?’

‘Kind? Was it fuck! Only wanted to know when I’d be back, that’s all. Must be short-staffed — that’s the only reason she rung.’

‘You’d have thought people would be glad of a job like that, with all this unemployment—’

‘Would be, wouldn’t they, if they paid you decent bloody rates?’

‘They pay you reasonably well, surely?’

He glared at her viciously. ‘How do you know that? You bin lookin’ at my things when I was in ’ospital? Christ, you better not ’a bin, woman!’

‘I don’t know what they pay you. You’ve never told me.’

‘Exackly! So you know fuck-all about it, right? Look at you ! You go out for that bloody teacher and what’s ’er rates, eh? Bloody slave-labour, that’s what you are. Four quid an hour? Less? Christ, if you add up what she gets an hour — all those ’olidays and everything.’

Brenda made no answer, but the flag was still flying on the small fortress. And, oddly enough, he was right. Mrs Stevens did pay her less than £4 an hour: £10 for three hours — two mornings a week. But Brenda knew why that was, for unlike her husband her employer had told her exactly where she stood on the financial ladder: one rung from the bottom. In fact, Mrs Stevens had even been talking that lunchtime of having to get rid of her B-registration Volvo, which stood in one of the rundown garages at the end of her road, rented at £15 per calendar month.

As Brenda knew, the protection which that rusting, corrugated shack could afford to any vehicle was minimal; but it did mean that the car had a space — which was more than could be said for the length of road immediately outside Julia’s own front door, where so often some other car or van was parked, with just as much right to do so as she had (so the Council had informed her). It wasn’t that the sale of the old Volvo (‘£340, madam — no, let’s make it £350’) would materially boost her current account at Lloyds; but it would mean a huge saving on all those other wretched expenses: insurance, road tax, servicing, repairs, MOT, garaging… what, about £800 a year?

‘So why keep it?’ that’s what Julia had asked Brenda.

She would have been more honest if she had told Brenda why she was going to sell it. But that lunchtime, at least, the telling of secrets had been all one-way traffic.

After dropping off the drooping Morse, Lewis returned to Kidlington HQ, where before doing anything else he looked at the copy of the Oxford Mail that had been left on Morse’s desk. He was glad they’d managed to get the item in — at the bottom of page 1:

The police are appealing for help in their enquiries into the brutal murder of Dr Felix McClure, discovered knifed to death in his apartment in Daventry Court, North Oxford, last Sunday.

Det. Sergeant Lewis, of Thames Valley C.I.D., informed our reporter that in spite of an extensive search the murder weapon has not been discovered.

Police are asking residents in Daventry Avenue to help by searching their own properties, since it is believed the murderer may have thrown the knife away as he left the scene.

The knife may be of the sort used in the kitchen for cutting meat, probably with a blade about 2 "broad and 5–6" in length. If found it should be left untouched, and the police informed immediately.