The Stillmans are most gracious hosts, offering more food and more drink all around, not just to the concert guests, but also to the sudden influx of uniformed police officers, who are setting up areas where they can take the details of everyone present. Hathaway locates Innocent and Lewis in the breakfast nook off of the kitchen.
"So, how are we doing this, Ma'am?" He then notices Lewis looks rather grumpier than usual. "Sir?"
Innocent flicks her eyebrows toward Lewis, and he accepts the duty of answering. "We're not 'doing this,' Sergeant. You may recall from your training that because we were all with Professor Bishop tonight, we're all suspects, especially the man who found the body and has, so far, a nonexistent explanation of his whereabouts during the time leading up to the murder."
Hathaway stares at his Chief Super. "Suspects? What, even you?"
"Even myself, Sergeant. At least until we can each be ruled out."
Hathaway stares open-mouthed, first at Lewis, then at Innocent, then back again. "Bloody hell." He thinks a moment. "So who's in charge?"
"The only DI I have to spare right now is Glover." She glares pointedly. "And I expect full cooperation. From both of you."
The two detectives glance at each other.
"Full. Cooperation. Understand? I won't say it twice." She gets up and goes to see what DI Glover has managed to organize.
"But you DID say it twice," Hathaway mutters, sotto voce, and he draws a smile from his inspector.
Lewis fingers a pen, flipping it over and over, through one finger at a time. He sighs and stares at the table. "Glover! That hack. Bloody hell, I need a drink." He gets up to see what's left of the drinks table.
Hathaway debates whether he should tell Glover to pick up Alec. And he thinks about what Laura has told him, picking through her words very carefully. He has an excellent memory, and he is fairly certain he remembers her words verbatim. Where's the part when she told me it was Alec? The crease in his forehead deepens. He decides he needs to talk this over with his inspector, even if he has to use vague terms.
George Stillman has been generous enough to provide Robbie with a large measure of cognac. Robbie takes a long swallow, closing his eyes and willing the heat that spreads through his body to loosen up all the clenched muscles that are starting to ache. It is, at least, partially effective, and he feels better. He scans the gathering for Laura Hobson, and spots her off to herself, studying a watercolor hanging on the wall. With a slight smile playing on his lips, he approaches.
"Laura?" He's keeping his distance, as though he's afraid she'll bolt like a startled doe.
She whirls, and sure enough, there is a slightly wild look in her eyes. Then she melts. "Oh, it's you, Robbie."
He comes closer, and offers his tumbler. "Something to calm you?"
She considers for only a moment, then accepts the glass and takes a small sip, shuddering a little and inhaling air as a chaser. He takes advantage of her inattention to move right next to her.
"Must have been shocking, finding a body in your garden."
"Well, James found him."
Lewis makes his next question sound casual. "He'd stayed to help you clean up?"
Her brow furrows. "Who? Walter?"
"No, James."
She considers her answer a moment, and Lewis pushes away the thought that that's what people do when they decide to lie.
"Mmm. He's good at washing up, as it turns out."
Not quite a lie, then. But an incomplete answer.
"And then he found the body when he went out to the bins?"
She stares at him now. "What is this, Robbie? Are you looking to take my statement?"
He has no desire to push against her, especially when he's not even required to do so. "I'm sorry, Laura, really. Don't mind me. It's just . . . I don't trust Glover to do this right. He's as likely to find Hathaway did it, for all he'll be able to solve this."
He fidgets, though, and she can see that, more than anything, he wants to know what happened. She sets her mouth in a firm line, but it slowly creeps upward at the corners as she talks.
"Look, Robbie, why don't I tell you what I know, alright? Then maybe you can relax a little and enjoy Denise's excellent food." She is smiling by now, and he can only smile in response.
"Thank you, Laura." He touches the back of her hand with his fingertips, then pulls them back as though he's been caught trespassing.
They sit down on the L-shaped sofa, her left knee touching his right. She takes a deep breath. "I was starting to clean up. Suddenly, I felt someone behind me put hands on my waist. I gave a bit of a shriek, but it was only Walter. I think he felt badly about startling me, and he apologized, thanked me for hosting the concert, and left. James had been collecting plates and glasses; when he heard me, he made straight for the kitchen. By that time, Walter was gone. I was too embarrassed to explain to him, and passed it off as imagination or some such. James got me some tea and finished the washing up. I'd gone upstairs to change when he came in all shaken from finding Walter." She takes one of his hands in both of hers, and looks deeply into his eyes. "And that's all there was to it."
Lewis cracks what he hopes looks like a foolish smile, the smile of a man who's made far too much mountain out of a molehill.
"Thank you, Laura," he says again, and he squeezes her hand.
But his gut instinct is screaming at him: Lies, lies, lies, lies, lies!
His attention is snapped when Innocent taps him on the shoulder: "Pathologist's preliminary report, library, NOW."
Robbie shoots a look at Laura. "Sorry. Excuse me," and he jumps up and follows his Chief Super.
The police officers gather in the library and close the door to afford the most privacy possible. DI Glover stands and clears his throat to gain the attention of the others.
"We have the initial examination report." He waves some papers and continues, his nasal accent grating on pretty much everyone's nerves.
"Walter Bishop was killed with a length of piano wire, wrapped around his neck, at approximately 8:00 p.m. It appears he was hit over the head; this would not have been enough to kill him but could have knocked him out. It is unclear at this point whether he was strangled and then his neck was severed with the wire, or if his neck was severed while he was alive and he bled to death."
"Piano wire, Christ!" one of the uniformed officers hisses.
Glover glares at the interruption. "Forensics will have more information on that after the autopsy and when the amount of blood found in Doctor Hobson's garden has been evaluated."
The senior SOCO stands up. "We recovered from the garden Professor Bishop's bag of piano repair equipment. It included spools of wire and a clipper suitable for clipping said wire. No fingerprints were found on any of this, except for Professor Bishop's own."
Glover gazes perfunctorily over the room. "Any other questions?"
Lewis stands, earning him several scowls—Glover, Innocent, and those officers who wish to make a short night of it. "Any indication whether Bishop had had sex recently?"
Hathaway looks up sharply. He had overheard the conversation between Lewis and Hobson, sneaking up and eavesdropping. He'd thought Hobson had played her part convincingly. Now it appeared perhaps Lewis had his own theories.
Glover glowers at Lewis. "What, are you trying to find out if your—" But he suddenly thinks better of it, and rephrases his comment. "SOCOs is still checking on that." But he smirks at Robbie, whose jaw—and fists—suddenly tense.
Innocent tugs Lewis to a corner. "Robbie? If you have suspicions, or if you know something, you will tell Glover, understood? You may not—I repeat, may NOT—conduct independent inquiries where you may well have a conflict of interest."
Lewis stares at her for nearly a full minute.
Then: "Right. I understand." He puffs out his cheeks. "I need a smoke." He turns, ignoring her open-mouthed astonishment, and grabs Hathaway by the elbow, piloting him toward the door. "My office, Sergeant, now," he says under his breath as they go outside.
Hathaway is on full alert, not the least due to the fact that DI Lewis accepts a cigarette from him and is pulling at it right now as though he's been a smoker all his life.
Lewis releases a stream of smoke, and opens his eyes directly into Hathaway's.
"I used to, in case you're wondering." He cracks a half-smile
James's eyes are everywhere but on his inspector's. "So . . . why are we out here?"
Lewis sucks on the fag as though he is trying to kill it. "You know the reason, Sergeant." Then when he sees Hathaway is thinking of ways to try to stretch this out as much as possible, he snaps.
"Hobson. She lied to me. What the bloody hell happened at her house, James?"
Hathaway studies the ground. "I . . . I don't know, Sir. I really don't. She wasn't honest with me, either."
"Tell me your side of things, and don't you dare leave anything out."
Hathaway can tell from the emphasis that omission would be tantamount to suicide.
"Yes, Sir." He takes a deep breath.
"I asked her if she needed help cleaning up. She said no. I left. I was a couple miles away when it dawned on me that I hadn't seen Pickman leave her place. He'd been after her the whole time. I didn't think about Walter, though. I can't say whether I saw him leave or not."
"You left, you mean, in your car?"
"Yeah. I was gone, I left."
Lewis nods, drawing again on the cigarette.
"And so you returned?" The pause is too short to let James continue. "You left. She said you were there the whole time." He looks sharply at his Sergeant.
Hathaway inhales. "I wasn't." The words—and all their implications—fall heavily between them.
"Well, bang goes your alibi," Lewis says dryly.
And hers, Hathaway thinks.
"So, you went back," Lewis prompts. It's not a question.
"Erm, yeah." He takes a last draw on the cigarette and this time flicks it away, not caring where it lands.
Lewis measures the space of the silence, twisting his mouth. Long enough.
"When I got there, I let myself in, and called to her. She was upstairs. No one else was there. She came down, seemed a bit shaken. Said she was just tired. I made her tea and cleared up the kitchen for her. Then I took the rubbish out and found Walter." Only now does he make eye contact. "And that's it."
They are both aware that the strands that bind them together are being twisted, warped. Who do you trust? is the whispered undertone. Lewis sucks in a breath. Who DO you trust, when you're certain a person you thought you could trust is lying?
Hathaway says nothing. It's his word against that of Laura Hobson. He presses his eyelids shut, willing Lewis to hear his thoughts. Please see the truth. Please see the truth.
He opens his eyes and finds that Lewis has closed his. Has drawn in a huge breath. Has pinched off the world from his calculations, has limited everything to What is the Truth of the situation here?
Lewis snaps his eyes open, fire flying from them, and Hathaway flinches from the burn.
"Sir?"
"You question her. You know what she told me is a lie. Corner her. Who is she protecting?"
Hathaway turns away, he can't face his boss with what truths and untruths he knows.
But Lewis grabs him, swivels him to front, and slams him with a left hook that leaves him gasping, spinning, and clutching at consciousness.
"Goddamn it, Hathaway!" Lewis is hissing, red-faced, furious, and far, far beyond the reach of logic or of intervening officers. "MAKE her tell you. Be hard on her, HARD on her. What the hell happened while you were gone?" His anger is fueled in part by the fact that he knows that James, too, is lying to him, that James knows what happened to Laura and won't tell him.
Stunned, Hathaway puts a tentative hand to his temple. He is bleeding, and it hurts pretty badly. He holds out his bloody fingertips, hoping the sight will sway his senior officer. "Sir? I'm bleeding." He knows it's more extensive than his temple, but this is the most dramatic showing of blood. Hathaway makes it as a statement of fact, free of complaint or defense.
Lewis stares at the blood. It takes him several beats to realize he is the cause of it. Then he gasps, and loses all momentum and rigidity, and collapses in on himself, sagging onto a chair.
"God, James, I'm so sorry. I'm . . ." he dissolves into shudders. "Are you alright? I got you with m'left, that was always m'best." He's shivering.
Hathaway is not about to succumb to the apology. He swallows the blood Lewis's fist caused to spout in his mouth, and glares, angry at the attack.
"Sod off. I'm not about to play the bastard for you. Let Glover do it." He wheels through the door, and he leaves Lewis alone in the garden, rubbing the knuckles of his left hand and staring into the darkness.
By the time Hathaway has gotten himself cleaned up in the bathroom, he feels a bit differently. After all, he was lying, too, and he knows that Lewis wasn't fooled. As he wanders through the house looking for his boss, he overhears some of the questions the PCs are asking people, and he shakes his head sadly. Glover will never sort this out.
It takes several minutes before Hathaway sees that Lewis is still in the garden, his face in his hands. James goes out and pulls up another chair. Lewis looks up at him, but says nothing, assessing the sergeant's mood.
"I'm sorry, Sir."
"You're sorry? What'd you do?"
Hathaway knows he doesn't have to answer.
At last, Lewis turns to James. "Okay, Sergeant. You heard what Laura said to me, am I right?" Without hesitation, Hathaway nods.
"Right. Then, what do you know differently?"
"I told Doctor Hobson that I wouldn't tell you anything you didn't need to know. But the thing is, I'm not sure how much I can add. She wouldn't say much, and when I think back on it, I realize she told me even less than I thought at the time."
He takes a big breath, and continues. "When I got back to the house, she was upstairs. No one else was there. She came down and it was obvious she'd been . . . assaulted." He pushes on, trying to ignore how Robbie's eyes snap up in alarm and stare at him, widening. "Her clothes were torn and she'd been crying. She said it was nothing but pawing and groping, a misunderstanding. I think it was more than that. The whole time, I assumed she was talking about Alec, but when I thought back after we got here, I realized she never said who it was."
Lewis's eyes narrow. "Meaning?"
"It could have been Walter."
Lewis releases a snort through his nose. "And Laura Hobson killed him in self-defense, is that your theory, Sergeant?" The disbelief is clear in his voice.
"No, Sir, that is not my theory." James struggles to stay calm. "She'd have been covered in blood, wouldn't she?" He says this lightly, as though the whole idea is ridiculous. But then his tone changes. "Sir, if she wasn't the last person to see Walter alive, she was most probably the second-to-last. We have to treat this seriously. Glover will, if he finds out."
Lewis cocks an eyebrow at the implication that Glover might not be told. Then he inhales, and stands up. "We have to get this sorted. We have to know who assaulted Laura. If it was Alec, maybe Walter broke it up and Alec took revenge on him. And if it was Walter . . ." He stops, not wanting to go there.
"Then maybe Alec did it, jealous of Walter's success." As soon as the words are out, he wishes he could call them back. What if it had been Walter having a bit of a grope, and Laura had allowed it? And if Alec showed up, spoiling for a fight?
Lewis is studying him. "Okay, look. Before we convince ourselves that Laura Hobson is a murderer, let's think about this. Who else has a motive?"
Hathaway snorts. "Who doesn't, with this bunch?"
Lewis frowns. "Well, let's start where we always do: the spouse."
"And their friend, Marietta. Love-triangle jealousies?"
"Pretty standard stuff. But Marietta killing because Walter won't give her what she wants, or Claire killing because he will? Do any of them have alibis?"
"Claire was here when Laura called right after I found the body. But it's my understanding Marietta wasn't, claimed she had a puncture on the way here. That's what I heard was the story."
Lewis looks thoughtful. "Has Glover's team found any outside reason? Dodgy finances or what have you?"
Hathaway smiles innocently. "I took a little peek at the stack of reports left unattended in the library when DI Glover went to have a pee. If it's not one of the people associated with this concert tonight, I'll buy you dinner tomorrow."
"Alright then. Who else? Pickman, obviously."
James refuses to rise to the bait, if bait it is, and changes tack. "Cameron? Remember he said he was going to 'do' someone."
"Giselle's father is a more likely candidate. I can't see little Cammo getting blood on his hands, can you?"
"No, you're right. But Daddy is a serious contender." James furrows his brow, thinking. "Hypatia and David seem to be cooking up something. I overheard her ask him if he was going to do something about Bishop."
Robbie gnaws on his bottom lip. "I overheard something like that, too. What would that be about?"
"Maybe we should ask them."
Robbie shakes his head. "Innocent will never let us in on the interviews. Anything more from Forensics?"
"I didn't see any new reports when I was in the library, but it's a bit early yet."
They are so focused, they don't hear the door from the house open until it is too late.
"What are you two doing out here? This has all the hallmarks of an independent investigation, which it had better not be!" The Chief Super swoops down on them, grabbing each one by an arm. "DI Glover is looking for you, seems you're the only two he hasn't interviewed yet."
But her attention is distracted when, just visible past the side of the house, a police car pulls up to the front. "And him," she adds.
"Who's that, Ma'am?" Lewis is polite.
"Alec Pickman. Someone said they saw him arguing with Walter at Laura's house, and I ordered him to be picked up. I don't suppose you saw anything like that when you were at Laura's, Sergeant?"
"Arguing, no Ma'am," he answers carefully.
Lewis takes a breath. "Look, Ma'am, I'm sorry if we were hard to find, it didn't occur to me that we'd be questioned. We'll go in right away, isn't that right, Sergeant?"
Hathaway nods in agreement, not sure where Lewis is going with this kowtowing. But Innocent smiles at his acquiescence. "Thank you. Sorry if I came flying at you just now."
Then Lewis plays his card. "Ma'am, James and I overheard a couple snatches of conversation . . . I wonder if it would be alright for us to ask a couple questions of the persons involved. If we learn anything, we'd be quick to pass it on to DI Glover. It's only, well, we don't know if it's something or nothing at this point."
She studies him a moment. Then, "Alright Lewis, but don't be keeping things to yourself, understood?"
"Ma'am."
"And James, whatever happened to the side of your head? Looks like you got hit with a rock."
Hathaway touches the abrasions left by Lewis's fist. "Yeah, a sort of a rock—a fossil, to be specific."
She frowns and turns away. She doesn't see Lewis's eyes roll.