Deborah Crombie - And Justice There Is None

"No."

"Mr. Farley, if this is the truth, you could have saved us all a good deal of time and trouble by telling us so in the first place. And you could have let your solicitor stay in his bed on Christmas Day."

"We've got confirmation from the wife," Gemma told Kincaid, looking at the report Gerry Franks had just sent up. "For whatever that's worth. Sergeant Franks has a team lined up to question the in-laws and the neighbors as soon as it's a civilized hour."

"Daybreak?" That would not be long in coming- it was almost five now.

"Right. The initial search of the house and shop, and of Farley's car, haven't revealed anything obvious. Of course, we won't know for certain until forensics has had a chance to go over things again."

They were holding Farley temporarily, pending confirmation of his alibi, but they wouldn't be able to keep him for long without something concrete.

"What about Alex Dunn?" asked Kincaid.

"Downstairs, in another interview room. They roused him out of an apparently sound sleep, and there was no visible evidence in his house or his car. They did find a silver-handled paper knife," she added, "in his coat pocket. It's apparently quite sharp, but there was no sign of its having been used. It's gone to forensics." Standing, she gathered her notebook.

"Gemma, before we go downstairs… Why don't you let me take the postmortem? You look exhausted. And it's a good division of labor."

"You just want some time alone with Kate Ling," she retorted, only half teasing. But she was too tired to feel really jealous, and besides- there was no point in their both going to the morgue, and she could be more useful directing things here. "Okay," she agreed. "That's at what- eight? I'm going to stop at the loo before we begin with Alex."

Duncan was right again, she thought as she examined herself in the mirror of the ladies' toilet. She did look exhausted, and she wasn't sure how long her reserves would hold out. This pregnancy was sapping more energy than she'd bargained for, even into the second trimester.

Turning sideways, she saw that, even in jeans and sweater, the bulge was becoming obvious. And only then did she realize that in daydreaming about the nursery the previous evening, she'd finally, truly, accepted this baby on a personal level- now she must do it on a professional one.

When Superintendent Lamb came back on Boxing Day, she would tell him first thing. As if the child had somehow sensed her resolution, she felt the faintest flutter of movement in her abdomen.

"I did go to the churchyard," Alex said immediately. He looked ghastly- pale, with dark hollows under his eyes, and his once-glossy hair unwashed. "I don't know what I was thinking- I suppose I wasn't thinking, really."

"There was a silver knife in your coat," Gemma told him. "Did you take it with you deliberately?"

"I- Yes. It's Fern's. I took it from her stall on Saturday. I should say that I stole it, shouldn't I? Except that I meant to return it."

"Why did you take the knife?"

"I thought I might kill Arrowood with it."

Gemma and Kincaid stared at him as the tape recorder whirred in the sudden silence. "And did you?" asked Gemma, recovering. "Did you kill Karl Arrowood with it?"

"No." Alex met their eyes, looked away. "I- I didn't have the nerve, in the end. I watched the house for two nights, waiting for him to come out. I felt I had to confront him, tell him who I was, what she'd meant to me. And then… then I was going to put it in the lap of the gods. That sounds absurd now, but it seemed to make sense at the time. I hadn't really imagined myself… hurting him, you know? I mean, I never even got into a fight at school, so what did I think I was going to do?"

"What happened last night?" Gemma prompted.

"I got to the house a little after eight. His Mercedes was in the drive, so I hid in the trees by the church and waited. I hadn't counted on the cold, and the snow. After a while, my hands and feet went numb, and my vision started doing funny things. I'd think the light was on inside the car, and then I'd think I'd imagined it.

"But he didn't come out of the house, and finally I crossed the street to see if I was right about the light. I can't tell you why it seemed so important to me at the time, to see if I was imagining things. And then when I reached the car and saw that the dome lamp really was on, I thought I saw something on the pavement in front of the car-" Alex rubbed the back of his hand against his brow and took a ragged breath.

"Was he dead?" asked Gemma.

"He was… cold. I don't know how I could have thought I could- His throat looked like mince. I ran. I don't mean that I decided to run- I just found myself running. And then I was sick.

"I know I should have called the police straightaway, but I wasn't… And afterwards… afterwards, I didn't know how I would explain what I'd done, or why I'd been there in the first place."

"What did you do then?"

"I went back to my flat. I had a few drinks. I suppose I must have gone to sleep." Alex met Gemma's gaze bleakly. "This means he didn't kill her, doesn't it? That all this time, I've been hating him, and hating myself because I felt responsible for what I thought he'd done… and all this time it was someone else."

"Alex, did you see anything last night?" she urged. "Anything odd or suspicious around Arrowood's house, or the church?"

"No." He looked devastated by his failure. "I didn't see anything at all."

"Nice musculature," commented Kate Ling. The corners of her eyes crinkled in a slight smile as she glanced at Kincaid. She was masked and gowned, and had Karl Arrowood's naked body laid out on her table, his mutilated throat exposed to her lamp.

"If you're trying to shock me with pathologist's humor, you won't succeed," Kincaid replied, grinning.

"Well, I am entitled to notice that he was a nice-looking man- I mean that in a professional way, of course. And it's obvious he took pride in himself. I'd say he worked out at a gym several times a week. He had regular manicures, too, which make the defense wounds on his right hand all the more obvious. See the cuts in his fingertips, and across his palm?"

"So he fought hard?"

"Very. See these blood smears in his hair? My guess is that's how the killer finally overpowered him, by getting a grip on this nice, thick hair and forcing his head back."

"What about the wounds themselves? Can you tell if they were made by the same weapon as his wife's, or by the same perpetrator?"

"The instrument was sharp and clean-edged, that I can tell you. The killer just never managed to get really good purchase. This man died from blood loss from multiple wounds, not from a complete severing of a main artery. And I'd guess that your killer was male, and of good height, and right-handed."

"Well, that rules out a certain percentage of the population, anyway. What about the chest wound? Did the killer intend the sort of mutilation performed on Dawn Arrowood?"

"You're thinking he was interrupted? That's possible. Although the psychology of inflicting that sort of injury on both women and men is beyond my scope."

"Time of death?"

"That old chestnut?"

Again he heard the suggestion of a smile in her voice. "I'm afraid so."

Ling reached up and turned off the tape recorder. "Off the record? I'd say somewhere in the vicinity of eight p.m. Officially, I'll have to be boringly vague, say, somewhere between seven and ten. Once I've done the stomach contents, you may be able to pin it down a bit more accurately."

"Thanks," he said with genuine feeling.

"Let's go outside for a minute," the pathologist suggested. "There's no need for you to stay for the icky part, organs and so forth. I'll send you a report." When they reached the hallway, she pulled off her mask and her cap, letting her glossy black hair swing loose, and stripped off her gloves. "That reminds me. I said the same thing not long ago to Gemma. I thought she might faint on me for a moment- That's not like her, is it?"