The Paying Guests(143)

And she had just moved away from it, was just, almost complacently, picking the earth from beneath her fingernail, when she heard the clang of the garden gate, followed by unhurried footsteps across the front garden. The footsteps made their way, grittily, into the porch. There was a charged little silence, and then the knocker was lifted and dropped.

Don’t answer it! she told herself. She held her breath, and did nothing.

The knock came again. She couldn’t leave it. It might be news of Lilian. She went across, opened the door – and found herself face to face with Inspector Kemp.

He lifted his hat. ‘Good afternoon, Miss Wray.’

‘Good afternoon, Inspector.’

Her voice had no scrap of welcome in it. He took in her apron, her bare lower arms, the bits of furniture standing about behind her at random angles on the floor, and said, ‘Ah. I’m afraid I’m disturbing you.’

She tried to speak with more life. ‘It doesn’t matter. But have you come to see Mrs Barber? She isn’t here. I thought you knew that.’

‘Yes, I do. No, it isn’t Mrs Barber I’d like to speak to.’ He paused, fractionally. ‘It’s you. Do you have a few minutes?’

She would rather have done almost anything than let him into the house. But in silence, she moved back. He stepped gingerly on to the still-wet tiles, giving a grimace of apology for the dirt on his shoes. Pulling off her apron, tugging down her cuffs a little, she led him into the drawing-room.

He unbuttoned his overcoat as he sat, then drew out his notebook from an inside pocket. Eyeing the book warily, she said, ‘Have you brought news? Is that why you’re here?’

‘Well,’ he said, thumbing his way through the small pages, ‘yes and no. We’re no closer to an arrest, I’m sorry to say. But we expect to be, very soon. There’s been a development, you see, that we think significant.’

She swallowed. ‘Oh, yes?’

‘Yes, we’ve been keeping the matter quiet for the sake of the inquiry, but the newspapers have just got wind of it, so it won’t be secret for long.’ He looked up. ‘Two possible witnesses from the night of the murder…’

And he proceeded to tell her everything she’d heard already from Mrs Playfair, about the man and the girl and the scuffling in the lane. She struggled at first to arrange her features, wanting to hit just the right balance between surprise and concern. But the longer he went on, the calmer she grew. If this was all he’d come for…

‘Naturally,’ he finished, ‘the biggest puzzle for us now is Mr Wismuth’s statement. He’s quite adamant that he last saw Mr Barber at Blackfriars at ten. But —’

‘Yes,’ she said helpfully, ‘I see how that places you.’

‘And, to tell you the truth, there are one or two other things about his story that make us not quite satisfied with it.’

She paused at that, as if just getting the point. ‘But you surely don’t suspect Mr Wismuth of having anything to do with the murder?’

‘Well, we’re keeping an open mind.’

‘But Mr Wismuth – No, it couldn’t possibly have been him.’

He looked interested. ‘You don’t think so? I’ll remember that you said that. However —’ He returned to his book. ‘It’s really Mr and Mrs Barber that I’d like to talk about today. You won’t mind if I make a few notes?’

Again she eyed the little book. ‘No, I don’t mind. What is it you’d like to know?’

He brought out a pencil. ‘Oh, just general things about the couple and their routines. How well, would you say, did you and your mother know them?’

She pretended to think it over. ‘Not very well, I suppose.’

‘You didn’t tend to spend time with them?’

‘Our habits were rather different. My mother sometimes chatted with Mr Barber.’

‘Your mother got along all right with him?’

‘Yes.’

‘How about you? Did you get along with him?’

‘Yes, I suppose so.’

‘Ever see him much on his own?’

‘No, never.’

‘Not even casually, about the house?’

‘Well, of course, on the stairs and places like that…’

‘And Mrs Barber? You saw more of her, I suppose?’

She nodded. ‘A little more.’

‘At parties and so on?’

That took her by surprise. When she didn’t answer he went on, ‘I understand you accompanied Mrs Barber to the party given by her sister in July – the night, of course, that Mr Barber was first assaulted. You didn’t mention that, Miss Wray, when we talked about it at the police station.’

She made her voice very level. ‘I didn’t? It was rather hard to concentrate that day.’

‘And yet the party seems, by all accounts, to have been a memorable one. I’ve spoken to several of the other guests. They tell me that Mrs Barber was – let’s say, making the most of her husband’s absence. Taking rather a lot to drink, and so on? Dancing with a number of men?’

Now she knew what he was getting at, why he had come. Quite steadily, she said, ‘Mrs Barber danced with her cousins, as far as I recall.’

He consulted his book. ‘James Daley, Patrick Daley, Thomas Lynch —’