Colin Dexter - Death Is Now My Neighbor

But he had no time to return (quite literally) to square one, since the phone rang. It had taken the Manager only fifteen minutes to assemble his fairly comprehensive information...

Mr. and Mrs. J. Storrs had checked into the hotel at 4 P.M. the previous afternoon, Saturday, March 2: just the one night, at the special weekend-break tariff of £125 for a double room. The purpose of the Storrs’ visit (almost certainly) had been to hear the Bath Festival Choir, since one of the reception staff had ordered a taxi for them at 7 P.M. to go along to the Abbey, where the Fauré Requiem was the centerpiece of the evening concert. The couple had been back in the hotel by about half past nine, when they had immediately gone into the restaurant for a late, prebooked dinner, the only extra being a bottle of the house red wine.

If the sergeant would like to see the itemized bill...?

No one, it appeared, had seen the couple after about 11 P.M., when they had been the last to leave the restaurant. Before retiring, however, Mr. Storrs had rung through to room service to order breakfast for the two of them, in their room, at 7:45 A.M.: a full English for himself, a Continental one for his wife.

Again, the itemized order was available if the sergeant…

Latest checkout from the hotel (as officially specified in the brochure) was noon. But the Storrs had left a good while before then. As with the other details (the Manager explained) some of the times given were just a little vague, since service personnel had changed. But things could very soon be checked. The account had been settled by Mr. Storrs himself on a Lloyds Bank Gold Card (the receptionist recalled this clearly), and one of the porters had driven the Storrs’ BMW round to the front of the hotel from the rear garage — being tipped (it appeared) quite liberally for his services.

So that was that.

Or almost so — since Lewis was very much aware that Morse would hardly be overjoyed with such findings; and he now asked a few further key questions.

“I know it’s an odd thing to ask, sir, but are you completely sure that these people were Mr. and Mrs. Storrs?”

“Well, I...” The Manager hesitated long enough for Lewis to jam a metaphoric foot inside the door.

“You knew them — know them — personally? ”

“I’ve only been Manager here for a couple of years. But, yes — they were here twelve months or so ago.”

“People change, though, don’t they? He might have changed quite a bit, Mr. Storrs, if he’d been ill or... or something?”

“Oh, it was him all right. I’m sure of that. Well, almost sure. And he signed the credit card bill, didn’t he? It should be quite easy to check up on that.”

“And you’re quite sure it was her , sir? Mrs. Storrs? Is there any possibility at all that he was spending the night with someone else?”

The laugh at the other end of the line was full of relief and conviction.

“Not — a — chance! You can be one hundred percent certain of that. I think everybody here remembers her. She’s, you know, she’s a bit sharp, if you follow my meaning. Nothing unpleasant — don’t get me wrong! But a little bit, well, severe. She dressed that way, too: white trouser-suit, hair drawn back high over the ears, beauty-parlor face. Quite the lady, really.”

Lewis drew on his salient reminiscence of Angela Storrs:

“It’s not always easy to recognize someone who’s wearing sunglasses, though.”

“But she wasn’t wearing sunglasses. Not when I saw her, anyway. I just happened to be in reception when she booked in. And it was she recognized me! You see, the last time they’d been with us, she did the signing in, while Mr. Storrs was sorting out the luggage and the parking. And I noticed the registration number of their BMW and I mentioned the coincidence that we were both ‘188J.’ She reminded me of it yesterday. She said they’d still got the same car.”

“You can swear to all this?”

“Certainly. We had quite a little chat. She told me they’d spent their honeymoon in the hotel — in the Sarah Siddons suite.”

Oh.

So that was that.

An alibi — for both of them.

Lewis thanked the Manager. “But please do keep all this to yourself, sir. It’s always a tricky business when we’re trying to eliminate suspects in a case. Not suspects , though, just... just people.”

A few minutes later Lewis again rang the Storrs’ residence in Polstead Road; again listening to Mrs. Storrs on the answer phone: “If the caller will please speak clearly after the long tone...” The voice was a little — what had the Manager said? — a little “severe,” yes. And quite certainly (Lewis thought) it was a voice likely to intimidate a few of the students if she became the new Master’s wife. But after waiting for the “long tone,” Lewis put down the phone without leaving any message. He always felt awkward and tongue-tied at such moments; and he suddenly realized that he hadn’t got a message to leave in any case.

Horse sense is something a horse has that prevents him from betting on people.

Morse was still seated at the kitchen table in Number 15 when Lewis rang through.

“So it looks,” concluded Lewis, “as if they’re in the clear.”

“Ye-es. How far is it from Oxford to Bath?”

“Seventy, seventy-five miles?”

“Sunday morning. No traffic. Do it in an hour and a half — no problem. Three hours there and back.”

“There’s a murder to commit in the middle, though.”

Morse conceded the point. “Three and a half.”

“Well, whatever happened, he didn’t use his own car. That was in the hotel garage — keys with the porter.”

“Haven’t you heard of a duplicate set of car keys, Lewis?”

“What if he was locked in — or blocked in?”

“He un locked himself, and un blocked himself, all right?”

“He must have left about four o’clock this morning then, because he was back in bed having breakfast with his missus before eight.”

“Ye-es.”

“I just wonder what Owens was doing, sir — up and about and dressed and ready to let the murderer in at half past five or so.”

“Perhaps he couldn’t sleep.”

“You’re not taking all this seriously, are you?”

“All right. Let’s cross ’em both off the list, I agree.”

“Have we got a list?”

Morse nodded. “Not too many on it, I know. But I’d like to see our other runner in the Lonsdale Stakes.”

“Do you want me to see him?”

“No. You get back here and look after the shop till the SOCOs have left — they’re nearly through.”

With which, Morse put down the phone, got to his feet, and looked cautiously through into the hallway; then walked to the front door, where a uniformed PC stood on guard.

“Has the Super gone?” asked Morse.

“Yes, sir. Five minutes ago.”

Morse walked back to the kitchen and opened the door of the refrigerator. The usual items: two pints of Co-op milk, Flora margarine, a packet of unsmoked bacon rashers, five eggs, a carton of grapefruit juice, two cans of Courage’s bitter…

Morse found a glass in the cupboard above the draining board, and poured himself a beer. The liquid was cool and sharp on his dry throat; and very soon he had opened the second can, his fingers almost sensuously feeling the cellophane-wrapped cigarettes in his pocket, still unopened.

By the time the SOCOs were ready to move into the kitchen, the glass had been dried and replaced on its shelf.

“Can we kick you out a little while, sir?” It was Andrews, the senior man.