Howard Jacobson - J

‘I’m a very private man.’

‘And very unrelaxed about a number of things. Did you have an unrelaxed attitude to Mrs Morgenstern’s other lovers?’

‘I wasn’t aware of other lovers.’

‘You thought you were special, did you?’

‘No. She was known to be free and easy. Nor was I her lover. I didn’t think of myself that way.’

‘Was that because she repulsed you?’

Kevern laughed. Had he been repulsed? He remembered the bite. It hadn’t felt like a repulse.

‘It was bonfire night. A few fireworks went off. So did we. It was fun while it lasted.’

‘Did you see her go home with Ythel Weinstock that night?’

‘I did not.’

‘Were you aware that Mrs Morgenstern and Ythel Weinstock were lovers?’

‘I was not.’

‘Were you aware that he hit her?’

‘How could I have been? I didn’t know they were intimate.’

‘Were you aware that her husband was hitting her?’

‘It’s something that happens in the village. I wasn’t aware of it but I am not surprised. Life in Port Reuben has always been harsh. But now on top of the old cruelties there’s frustration. Men are living at the edge of their nerves here. They don’t know what they’re for. They used to be wreckers, now they run gift shops and say they’re sorry. The women goad them. I read that the rest of the country is not much better.’

Worse and worse: now he was painting himself as a moral zealot.

He needn’t have worried. Detective Inspector Gutkind also had a dash of moral zealotry in his nature. He believed in conspiracies. It was not permitted to believe in conspiracies (no written law against, of course) but Gutkind couldn’t help himself. Conspiracy theorising ran in families and his father had believed in them to the point where he could see nothing else. Gutkind’s grandfather had also believed in conspiracies and had lost his job in the newly formed agency Ofnow attempting to root them out. That attempting to root out conspiracies had cost him his job proved there was a conspiracy against him. And behind him was Clarence Worthing, the Wagnerian, Gutkind’s great-grandfather who had tasted betrayal to the lees. He fed his resentments and suspicions to his son who fed them to his son who fed them, nicely incubated, to Gutkind. For as far back as the family went, somebody, some group, had been out to get them. Heirlooms in their own way, just as silk Chinese rugs were, romances of family persecution at the hands of conspirators were restricted. It didn’t do for any family to be harbouring too many, or indeed any one with too much fervour. Conspiracy theories had fed the suspicion that erupted into that for which society was still having to say sorry. And how could you say sorry when some of the reasoning behind WHAT HAPPENED, IF IT HAPPENED — that conspiracies were sucking the life blood from the nation — remained compelling?

Detective Inspector Gutkind understood why there could be no going backwards in this — and was, anyway, unable to point the finger anywhere but at the odd individual malfeasant, and by its nature individual malfeasance could not amount to conspiracy — but he was a prisoner of his upbringing. He had a careworn build — dapper, the unobservant thought him — lean as though from fretting, with a round face, apoplectic eyes and an unexpectedly wet, cherubic mouth. Had there been a conspiracy to accuse Gutkind of the pederasty that exercised Densdell Kroplik, his mouth would surely have been the basis for it. He looked like someone who pressed his lips where they had no business being pressed.

He smiled at Kevern and wondered if he might be allowed to remove his coat. Kevern could not conceal his awkwardness. It was bad enough that Gutkind was here at all, but a Gutkind without his coat, in his cottage, was more than his nerves could bear. ‘Of course,’ he said, taking the coat and then not knowing what to do with it, ‘that’s rude of me.’

He was surprised to see that under his coat Gutkind wore not a jacket but a Fair Isle buttoned cardigan.

Was this to relax the unwary, Kevern wondered. But if that was so, his eyes should have not have looked so combustible as they took in Kevern’s person and darted around Kevern’s room.

‘This Biedermeier?’ he asked, running his fingers over the elaborately carved back of the sofa.

Kevern started. ‘Imitation,’ he said.

‘Made down here?’

‘Kildromy.’

‘That’s a long way to go for it.’

‘I like the best. I’m a woodworker myself. I appreciate good craftsmanship.’

‘It doesn’t really go with this cottage, though, does it,’ Gutkind went on.

Kevern wanted to say that he didn’t think the policeman’s cardigan went with his job, but it didn’t seem a good idea to antagonise him further. ‘It goes with my temperament,’ he said.

‘And how would you describe that?’

‘My temperament? Heavy, ornate and unwelcoming.’

‘And out of place?’

‘If you like.’

‘Would you call yourself a loner?’

‘I wouldn’t call myself anything. I’m a woodturner, as I think I’ve told you.’

‘Business good?’

‘I make candlesticks and lovespoons for the tourist industry. There isn’t a fortune in that, but I get by.’

‘Why have local people given you the nickname “Coco”?’

‘You’d better ask them. But I think it’s ironic. “Coco” was the name of a famous circus clown. It must be evident to you that I am not an entertainer.’

‘But you entertain women?’

Here we go again, Kevern thought. He sighed and walked to the window. Not knowing what else to do with it, he was still carrying Gutkind’s coat over his arm. Though the sea didn’t look wild, the blowhole was busy, fine spray from the great white jet of water catching what there was of sunlight. He thought of Ailinn’s whale and suddenly felt weary. ‘Get the fuck out,’ he wanted to tell the policeman. ‘Get the fuck out of my house.’ If ever there was a time to let go, let rip, let the bad language out of his constricted system, this was it. But he was who he was. Let’s get this over with, he thought. ‘Is this about the blood?’ he asked, not turning his head.

‘What blood is that?’

‘My blood. Lowenna Morgenstern bit me the night we kissed after the fireworks. She bit me hard. I don’t doubt I was seen afterwards with blood on my shirt. I assume that’s why you wanted to talk to me.’

‘You don’t still have that shirt, do you?’

‘Well I must have because I haven’t thrown any shirt away in a long time. But I’d be hard pressed to remember which shirt I was wearing that night. And whichever it was, it will have been laundered many times since then.’

Gutkind made a perfect cupid’s bow of his transgressive lips. He knew why men washed their shirts.

‘Oh, come on, Goldberg—’

‘Gutkind.’

Goldberg/Gutkind , Kevern wanted to say, who gives a damn . .

‘Oh come on,’ he said instead, ‘you’re not telling me that laundering my shirts indicates suspicious behaviour?’

‘It could be if it was Mrs Morgenstern’s blood and not yours.’

‘Aha, and if, having got a taste of spilling her blood once, I couldn’t wait to spill it again.’

‘Well that’s a theory, Mr Cohen, and I will give it consideration. But to be honest with you it’s not Mrs Morgenstern’s blood that concerns us right now.’

‘So whose is it?’

‘Mr Morgenstern’s.’

‘Ah, well I’m glad he’s back in the picture. The village gossip mill has had him down as the murderer from day one. He’s already been found guilty and sentenced at the bar of the Friendly Fisherman. All you had to do was find him.’

‘You misunderstand. It’s not Mr Morgenstern’s blood at the crime scene I’m talking about. It’s Mr Morgenstern’s blood all over Mr Morgenstern.’