The Word Is Murder(10)

‘I’m not writing that,’ I said. ‘It reads like a police report.’

‘At least it’s accurate. And what’s the bell doing there?’

‘What bell?’

‘In the fourth paragraph. Right here. You say there’s a bell on a spring mechanism leading into the funeral parlour. Well, I didn’t notice any bell. And that’s because it’s not there.’

I tried to stay calm. That was something I would soon learn about Hawthorne. When he put his mind to it, he could annoy me more easily than anyone I’d ever met.

‘I put the bell in for atmosphere,’ I explained. ‘You’ve got to allow me some sort of dramatic licence. I wanted to show how traditional and old-fashioned the business was – Cornwallis and Sons – and that was a simple, effective way.’

‘Maybe. But it makes a big difference. Suppose someone followed her in there. Suppose someone overheard what she said.’

‘You’re talking about the man she had the altercation with?’ I asked, sarcastically. ‘Or maybe someone she met at the bank? Is that what you think?’

Hawthorne shrugged. ‘You’re the one saying that there was a link between Mrs Cowper arranging her funeral and her getting murdered the same day. At least, that’s what you’re suggesting to your readers.’ He lingered on the first syllable of ‘readers’, making it sound like a dirty word. ‘But you have to consider the alternatives. Maybe the timing of the funeral and the murder was just a coincidence – although I’ll be honest with you. I don’t like coincidences. I’ve been working in crime for twenty years and I’ve always found everything has its place. Or maybe Mrs Cowper knew she was going to die. She’d been threatened and she arranged the funeral because she knew there was no way out. That’s possible, but it doesn’t make a lot of sense because why didn’t she just go to the police? And a third possibility: somebody found out what she was doing. It could have been anyone. They could have followed her in off the street and listened to her making all the arrangements because there’s no sodding bell on the door. Anyone could come in or go out without being heard. But not in your version.’

‘OK,’ I said. ‘I’ll take out the bell.’

‘And the Mont Blanc pen.’

‘Why?’ I stopped him before he could answer. ‘All right. It doesn’t matter. I’ll lose that too.’

He pushed and prodded the pages as if trying to find a single sentence that he liked. ‘You’re being a bit selective with the information,’ he said, at length.

‘And what do you mean by that?’

‘Well, you say that Mrs Cowper only used public transport but you don’t explain why.’

‘I say she was eccentric!’

‘I think you’ll find there was rather more to it than that, mate. And then there’s the question of the funeral itself. You know exactly what she requested for her service but you haven’t written down what it was.’

‘A psalm! The Beatles!’

‘But which psalm? Which Beatles track? Don’t you think it might be important?’ He took out a notebook and opened it. ‘Psalm 34. I will bless the Lord at all times: his praise shall continually be in my mouth. The song was “Eleanor Rigby”. The poem was by someone called Sylvia Plath. Maybe you can help me with that one, Tony, because I read it and it didn’t make a word of bleeding sense. The classical music was the Trumpet Voluntary by Jeremiah Clarke. She wanted her son to give the main address … what do you call it?’

‘The eulogy.’

‘Whatever. And maybe you should have mentioned who she had lunch with at the Café Murano. His name is Raymond Clunes. He’s a theatrical producer.’

‘Is he a suspect?’

‘Well, she’d just lost fifty grand in a musical he’d produced. From my experience, money and murder have a way of going hand in hand.’

‘Did I miss anything else?’

‘You don’t think it’s significant that Mrs Cowper resigned from the board of the Globe Theatre that very same day? She’s been doing it for six years and the day she dies, she decides to give it all up. Then there’s Andrea Kluvánek – the cleaner. Where did you get that stuff about her tiptoeing out into the street and calling the emergency services?’

‘It came from her interview with the police.’

‘I read it too. But what makes you think she wasn’t lying?’

‘Why would she be?’

‘I don’t know, mate. But she’s got a criminal record so maybe she’s not all sweetness and light.’

‘How do you know that?’

‘I checked. And finally, there’s Damian Cowper, the son. It might have been worth pointing out that he’s just inherited two and a half million quid from his old mum, which is going to come in handy as I’m told he has money problems out there in LA.’

I fell silent. There was a sinking feeling in my stomach. ‘What money problems?’ I asked.

‘From what I understand, most of them have gone up his nose. But there’s the house in Hollywood Hills, the pool, the Porsche 911. He’s got an English girlfriend who lives with him but she can’t be too fond of him either because there’s a load of other women knocking around … knocking being the operative word.’