The Remorseful Day

Chapter three

Lucky?

Morse had always believed that luck played a bigger part in life than was acknowledged by many people — certainly by those distinguished personages who saw their personal merit as the only cause of their appropriate eminence. Yet as he looked back over his own life and career Morse had never considered his own lot a particularly lucky one, not at least in what folk referred to as the affairs of the heart. Strange may have had a point though, for without doubt his record with the Thames Valley CID was the envy of most of his colleagues — his success rate the result, as Morse analyzed the matter, of all sorts of factors: a curious combination of hard thinking, hard drinking (the two, for Morse, being synonymous), hard work (usually undertaken by Sergeant Lewis), and, yes, a sprinkling here and there of good fortune. The Romans had poured their libations not only to Jupiter and Venus and their associate deities in the Pantheon, but also to Fortuna, the goddess of good luck.

Lucky, then?

Well, a bit.

It was high time Morse said something:

“Why the Lower Swinstead murder? What’s wrong with the Hampton Poyle murder, the Cowley murder...?”

“Nothing to do with me, either of ‘em.”

“That’s the only reason then? Just to leave a clean slate behind you?”

For a few moments Strange appeared uncomfortable: “It’s partly that, yes, but...”

“The Chief Constable wouldn’t look at any new investigation — not a serious investigation.”

“Not unless we had some new evidence.”

“Which in our case, as the poet said, we have not got.”

“This fellow that rang—”

“No end of people ring. We both know that, sir.”

“—rang twice. He knows something. I’m sure of it.”

“Did you speak to him yourself?”

“No. He spoke to the girl on the switchboard. Didn’t want to be put through to anybody, he said. Just wanted to leave a message.”

“For you?”

“Yes.”

“A ‘he,’ you say?”

“Not much doubt about that.”

“Surely from the recordings...?”

“We can’t record every crazy sod who rings up and asks what the bloody time is, you know that!”

“Not much to go on.”

“Twice, Morse? The first time on the anniversary of the murder? Come off it! We’ve got a moral duty to reopen the case. Can’t you understand that?”

Morse shook his head. “Two anonymous phone calls? Just isn’t worth the candle.”

And suddenly — why was this? — Strange seemed at ease again as he sank back even further in his chair:

“You’re right, of course you are. The case wouldn’t be worth re-opening — unless” (Strange paused for effect, his voice now affable and bland) “unless our caller — identity cloaked in anonymity, Morse — had presented us with some... some new evidence. And, after my appeal, my nationally reported appeal, we’re going to get some more! I’m not just thinking of another telephone call from our friend either, though I’m hopeful about that. I’m thinking of information from members of the public, people who thought the case was forgotten, people whose memories have had a jog, people who were a bit reluctant, a bit afraid, to come forward earlier on.”

“It happens,” conceded Morse.

The armchair creaked as Strange leaned forward once more, smiling semibenignly, and holding out his empty tumbler: “Lovely!”

After refilling the glasses, Morse asked the obvious question:

“Tell me this, sir. You had two DIs on the case originally—”

“Three.”

“—several DSs, God knows how many DCs and PCs and WPCs—”

“No such thing now. All the women are PCs — no sex discrimination these days. By the way, you were never guilty of sexual harassment, were you?”

“Seldom. The other way round, if anything.”

Strange grinned as he sipped his Scotch. “Go on!”

“As I say, you had all those people on the case. They studied it. They lived with it. They—”

“Got nowhere with it.”

“Perhaps it wasn’t altogether their fault. We’re never going to solve everything. It’s taken these mathematicians over three hundred years to solve Fermat’s Last Theorem.”

“Mm.” Strange waggled his tumbler in front of him, holding it up toward the light, like a judge at the Beer Festival at Olympia.

“Just like the color of my urine specimens at the Radcliffe.”

“Tastes better, though.”

“Listen. I’m not a crossword wizard like you. Sometimes I can’t even finish the Mirror coffee-break thing. But I know one thing for sure. If you get stuck over a clue—”

“As occasionally even the best of us do.”

“—there’s only one way to solve it. You go away, you leave it, you forget it, you think of the teenage Brigitte Bardot, and then you go back to it and — Eureka! It’s like trying to remember a name: the more you think about it the more the bloody thing sinks below the horizon. But once you forget about it, once you come to it a second time, fresh—”

“I’ve never come to it a first time, apart from those early couple of days — you know that. I was on another case! And not particularly in the pink either, was I? Not all that long out of hospital myself.”

“Morse! I’ve got to reopen this case. You know why.”

“Try someone else!”

“I want you to think about it.”

“Look.” A note of exasperation had crept into Morse’s voice. “I’m on furlough — I’m tired — I’m sleeping badly — I drink too much — I’m beholden to no one — I’ve no relatives left — I can’t see all that much purpose in life—”

“You’ll have me in tears in a minute.”

“I’m only trying to say one thing, sir. Count me out!”

“You won’t even think about it?”

“No.”

“You do realize that I don’t need to plead with you about this? I don’t want to pull rank on you, Morse, but just remember that I can. All right?”

“Try someone else, sir, as I say.”

“OK. Forget what I just said. Let’s put it this way. It’s a favor I’m asking, Morse — a personal favor.”

“What makes you think I’ll still be here?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

But Morse, it appeared, was barely listening as he stared out of the window on to his little patch of greenery where a small bird with a grey crown and darkish-brown bars across its back had settled beneath the diminishing column of peanuts.

“Look!” (He handed the binoculars to Strange.) “Few nuts — and some of these rare species decide to take up special residence. I shall have to check up on the plumage but...”

Strange had already focused the binoculars with, as it seemed to Morse, a practiced familiarity.

“Know anything about bird-watching, sir?”

“More than you, I shouldn’t wonder.”

“Beautiful little fellow, isn’t he?”

“She!”

“Pardon?”

“Immature female of the species.”

“What species?”

“Passer domesticus, Morse. Can’t you recognize a bloody house sparrow when you see one?”

For the fourteenth time Morse found himself reappraising the quirkily contradictory character that was Chief Superintendent Strange.

“And you’ll at least think about things? You can promise me that, surely?”

Morse nodded weakly.

And Strange smiled comfortably. “I’m glad about that. And you’ll be pleased about one thing. You’ll have Sergeant Lewis along with you. I... did have a word with him, just before I came here, and he’s—”

“You mean you’ve already...”

Strange flicked a stubby finger against his empty, expensive, cut-glass tumbler: “A little celebration, perhaps?”