The Word Is Murder(76)

‘Let’s go back to the beginning,’ he went on. ‘Mary here takes the boys to Deal. Mum has a conference. Dad’s on a business trip to Manchester. She books into the Royal Hotel but she doesn’t want a family room. She wants a twin room for the kids and a double room next door. Why do you think that is?’

‘The hotel said that the family room didn’t have a sea view,’ I said.

‘It didn’t have anything to do with the view. Why don’t you tell him, Mary?’

Mary didn’t look at me. When she spoke, her voice was almost robotic. ‘We were meeting in Deal. We were going to be together.’

‘That’s right. The nanny and her boss. Having it off together. But you can’t do it in Harrow-on-the-Hill, not in the family home. So you steal a weekend on the coast. The boys go to bed at six o’clock, which leaves the whole night for you to be together.’

‘You’re disgusting,’ Godwin said. ‘You make it sound so … sordid.’

‘And it wasn’t?’ Hawthorne blew out smoke. ‘You were the mysterious man in the chemist’s shop. And what were you doing in there? It wasn’t to get a pack of six. The reason you were in there was the same reason you were crying your eyes out at Diana Cowper’s funeral.’

I had wondered why he had been so upset.

‘It was hay fever!’ Hawthorne explained. Once again, he addressed himself to me. ‘When we were in Brompton Cemetery, did you notice the plane trees?’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I made a note. They were right next to the grave.’

‘Plane trees are the worst if you get hay fever. They’ve got a pollen grain that gets right up your nose. And shall I tell you two well-known cures for hay fever?’

‘Honey,’ I said. ‘And ginger tea.’

‘And that’s exactly what Alan was buying in Pier Pharmacy.’ He turned back to Godwin. ‘It’s also the reason why you were wearing sunglasses, even though it wasn’t sunny. You’d gone down to Deal to meet your girlfriend. But then you got an attack of hay fever so you went into the chemist to get something to help. Traverton gave you some herbal stuff and you left the place seconds before the accident took place.

‘And it was you who caused the accident. The two kids were on the promenade next to the beach. They’d been told never to run across the road and anyway they could see perfectly well that the ice-cream shop was closed. But suddenly, in front of their eyes, their dad walked out of the chemist’s shop next door and even with the cap and the sunglasses they recognised you, and because they were excited they ran towards you. That was the moment when Diana Cowper turned the corner and it happened right in front of your eyes. Both your children were hit.’

Godwin groaned and put his head in his hands. Beside him, Mary sobbed quietly.

‘Timothy was killed. Jeremy was lying there and of course he called out for his dad because he’d seen him just a moment ago. I can’t imagine what you must have been feeling right then, Alan. You’d just seen your two children knocked over by a car but you couldn’t go to them because you were supposed to be in Manchester. How were you going to explain to your wife that you were actually in Deal?’

‘I didn’t realise they were so badly hurt,’ Godwin rasped. ‘There was nothing I could have done to help …’

‘You know what? I think that’s bollocks. I think you could have run into the road and cared for your children and to hell with your little subterfuge.’ Hawthorne stubbed out his cigarette, the ash sparking red. ‘But at the very moment, you and Mary came to some sort of an agreement. Traverton told us that Mary was staring into his eyes but he was wrong about that. You were staring at Alan, who was standing right next to him. You were telling him to get the hell out. Is that right?’

‘There was nothing he could do.’ Mary echoed the words that Alan had just spoken. She had a face like death, with tears glistening on both cheeks. She was staring into the mid-distance. Later on, I would be sickened that all this had happened in my home. I would wish that they had never come here.

‘I sort of understand why you’ve stayed with the family all these years, Mary,’ Hawthorne concluded. ‘It’s because you know you were responsible for what happened. Is that right? Or is it because you’re still shagging Alan?’

‘For God’s sake!’ Godwin was furious. ‘We ended that years ago. Mary is there for Jeremy. Only for Jeremy!’

‘Yeah. And Jeremy is there because of Mary. The two of you really are made for each other.’

‘What do you want from us?’ Godwin asked. ‘Do you think we haven’t been punished enough for what happened that day?’ He closed his eyes for a moment, then continued. ‘It was just bad luck. If I hadn’t come out of the shop at that moment, if the boys hadn’t seen me …’ He was speaking very slowly, his tone almost matter-of-fact. ‘All I’ve ever cared about is that Judith should never find out,’ he said. ‘It was bad enough losing Timothy. And Jeremy. But if she knew about Mary and me …’ He stopped. ‘Are you going to tell her?’

‘I’m not going to tell her anything. It’s none of my business.’

‘Then why did you bring us here?’

‘Because I needed to know I was right about the two of you. You want my advice? I’d tell your wife about what happened. She’s already thrown you out. Your marriage is over. But this thing, this secret you’ve had between you, it’s cancer. It’s eating you up. I’d cut it out.’