The Sentence Is Death

20 Green Smoke

‘You do realise that Akira is trying to land me in it. There’s nothing she’d like more than to see me arrested for something I didn’t do. I mean, all that stuff she said about me. I don’t have a violent temper! If I did, I can tell you, I’d have done her in years ago. She was the most annoying person I ever met. She’d have tried the patience of a Shinto saint – and probably did, for all I know.

‘As for that bloody haiku of hers, yes, she showed it to me. She seemed to think it was terribly clever but I’m afraid it went right over my head. The sentence is death? What’s that meant to mean exactly? She took a great deal of pleasure in reading it to me but she might as well have been quoting from a Japanese washing-machine manual for all the sense it made.’

The strange thing about Adrian Lockwood was that even when he was in a bad mood, as he was now, he still seemed quite laid-back and jovial. The sunglasses and ponytail were still in place, along with the white shirt splayed open at the neck. His office was less extravagant than his house, a utilitarian set of suites so lacking in style that it could have belonged to one of those management companies that lease space by the month, and I suspected that he didn’t come here very often. The laptop that Lofty Pinkerman had hacked into was on the desk in front of him. He was in a padded leather chair, bent several ways to follow the contours of his body. He was sitting with his hands folded behind his head.

‘And if either of us was going to paint that number on the wall, it would have been her. What did you say it was? A hundred and eighty-two? Do you really think I’d have been able to remember that? It could just as easily have been the one about the flower blossoming in the car park or the sparrowhawk losing its feathers or any of the other rubbish she saw fit to print.’

‘The haiku was about you,’ Hawthorne said.

‘Was it?’

‘Akira told you so. And anyway, you’d have remembered the number quite easily.’

‘Why?’

‘Because it’s the date of your marriage! You told us you got married just after your birthday – on the eighteenth of February.’ Hawthorne gave Lockwood one of his dangerous smiles: ‘18/2.’

I should have seen it for myself. I had been in the room when Lockwood told us the date. I had even made a note of it. But once again I had missed the connection.

‘Look!’ Lockwood spread his hands, metaphysically embracing us, man to man. ‘The marriage was a bloody disaster. I’ve already told you that—’

‘It was your second marriage to end in disaster,’ Hawthorne interrupted. ‘Your first wife, Stephanie Brook—’

‘You can leave her out of this!’ Lockwood was red-faced. This was a side of him I hadn’t seen before. ‘That’s completely out of order. The fact is, you’re as bad as some of those scum journalists who reported it. Stephanie was a lovely girl, lovely, and for a time we were happy together. But she was a mess. She drank and she took recreational drugs and in the end she died in Barbados. But I wasn’t even on the boat when it happened. It was a tragic accident. Maybe she killed herself, like they said. I don’t know. I don’t think it makes much difference when you fool around with that stuff. At any event, it’s got nothing to do with what happened to Richard.’

‘Except that in both instances, you were involved.’

‘I wasn’t anywhere near Richard either.’

‘You were in Highgate. Not so far.’

Lockwood hesitated, knowing where this was heading. ‘That’s right. I was there.’

‘With Davina Richardson.’

Lockwood sighed loudly. ‘Yes. I told you . . . I went round for a drink.’

‘Just a drink?’

‘I don’t quite understand what you’re implying.’

‘Then let me put it more simply, Mr Lockwood. Were you and Mrs Richardson going to bed together?’

‘That’s an extremely impertinent question. Just because you’re a detective – or an ex-detective, rather – does that give you the right to poke around in my private life?’

Hawthorne looked bored. ‘It’s a yes or no question. We’re all grown-ups here.’

‘What possible difference does it make?’

‘It might tell me if she was prepared to lie to protect you.’ Hawthorne paused. ‘Or the other way round.’

Lockwood considered, but not for long. ‘All right, damn you. Yes. We’d been sleeping together for a while.’

‘While you were still married?’

‘Yes.’ He took a deep breath. ‘It wasn’t as easy as you might think. You may say we’re all adults but you’re forgetting she had a teenager in the house: her son, Colin. Obviously, we couldn’t go canoodling while he was around and I couldn’t bring her back to Edwardes Square while Akira was there. Anyway, Akira had a nose like a bloodhound. She’d have known if there had been another woman in the house. So we went to hotels – which I didn’t much care for, if you want the truth. It just felt shabby.’

‘Did Akira ever discover you were having an affair?’

‘No.’

‘How about Richard Pryce? Did you tell him?’

‘Why would I have told Richard? Do you think I had to put that in my Form E? Nobody knew.’

‘And now that you’re a free man, is she going to move in?’

Lockwood laughed out loud. ‘You’ve got to be joking. Davina’s an attractive woman, perfect for a quick squeeze. But there’s no way I’m jumping through that hoop again. My first marriage . . . well, I just told you. It was a tragedy. My second was a farce. I think that’s enough drama in one life.’

He’d had enough. I saw his mood change as abruptly as if a switch had been thrown. ‘I think I’ve told you everything you need to know,’ he said. ‘So if you don’t have any further questions . . .’

‘Actually, I have some information for you.’ Hawthorne was in no hurry to leave. ‘The person who broke into your office . . .’

‘Yes?’

‘We found him.’

By now, Lockwood had learned not to trust Hawthorne, particularly when he was at his most co-operative. ‘And . . . ?’

‘His name is Leonard Pinkerman. It turns out he’s a private investigator of sorts. You might be interested to hear that he was working for Richard Pryce.’

‘I’m sorry? He was working for Richard?’

‘You gave Mr Pryce a bottle of wine. Is that right?’

‘I already told you that.’

‘And of course you know that a bottle of wine was used to kill Mr Pryce, that he was bludgeoned to death with it.’

Lockwood was stunned. Any trace of the conviviality with which he had greeted us had been completely stripped away. ‘Are you saying it was the same bottle?’

‘A 1982 Château Lafite Rothschild, Pauillac.’ I wasn’t surprised that Hawthorne had remembered the marque and the date.

‘Yes. I gave him that.’ It took Lockwood a few moments to realise that nobody was speaking, that he was expected to offer more. ‘Richard had done an exceptional job on my behalf and I wanted to thank him. I’d paid his fees, of course, and they were considerable. But not having to go to court obviously saved me a small fortune and I thought I’d show my appreciation.’

‘With a £2,000 bottle of wine?’

‘I have a lot of wine.’

‘How much exactly?’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘You keep your wine at a company called Octavian in Corsham, in Wiltshire. How much wine do you actually have?’

A slow smile spread across Lockwood’s face but it wasn’t a pleasant one. ‘You have been busy, haven’t you, Mr Hawthorne?’

Hawthorne waited for the answer.

‘I have a collection of mainly French wine and champagne which has a market value of around two and a half million pounds. You’re going to ask me why I didn’t declare it, and obviously poor Richard was worried about it if he sent his man round to break into my office . . . Hardly very ethical, I must say!

‘Well, I didn’t declare it because the wine was actually purchased by a company of mine and can no longer be classed as an asset as I’ve used it as collateral against a very large loan. This is for a project of mine, a new housing development in Battersea. It’s all perfectly straightforward and if Richard had ever asked me about it, I’d have been happy to tell him, but I can assure you I had absolutely no idea he was concerned. He never said anything to me.’ He laid his hands, palms down, on the desk. ‘Now, is there anything else?’

This time, Hawthorne stood up. I did the same. ‘You’ve been very helpful, Mr Lockwood.’

‘I won’t say it’s been a pleasure.’ The words were carefully measured.

Hawthorne took a step towards the door, then seemed to remember something. ‘One last thing. You said you left Davina Richardson’s house at around eight fifteen. How can you be so sure of the time?’

‘I suppose I must have looked at my watch.’

‘There’s a clock in the kitchen.’

‘We weren’t in the kitchen. We were in her bedroom. I got dressed and I left. Maybe she mentioned the time. I honestly can’t remember.’

Hawthorne smiled. ‘Thank you.’

It was the gesture that gave him away. As Adrian Lockwood talked about his watch, he raised his hand to show off the heavy-duty Rolex that he had strapped on his wrist. And that was when I saw it. Not on the watch but on the sleeve of his shirt, very small, half concealed by the cufflink: a spot of green paint.

And I knew exactly what shade of green it was. I remembered the fancy name that Davina had chosen from Farrow & Ball.

Green Smoke.

It had to be.

I arrived home that evening at the same time as Jill, who came in weighed down by problems from the set. Another location had fallen through. We were now two full days behind schedule. Nothing seemed to be going right.

We had dinner together, not that you could actually call it that. Jill had a salad with a tin of tuna fish. I scouted around in the fridge but all I could find was a bottle of champagne that had been given to me by Orion when I got into the top ten, and two eggs. I scrambled the eggs and ate them with Ryvita as there wasn’t any bread.

‘So how was your day?’ Jill asked.

‘It was OK.’

‘Have you finished the rewrites?’

‘I’ll finish them tonight.’

It was quite normal for the two of us to start work again after dinner. We have a shared office and we’ll often find ourselves sitting side by side well on the way to midnight. Jill is the only person I know who works harder than me, running the company, overseeing the productions, organising our social life, managing the flat. We actually met working together in advertising. She was the account director. I was the copywriter. Two days after meeting me she asked – pleaded – to be moved to any other account in the building but somehow we began a relationship and twenty-five years later we are still together. I had written four shows for her: Foyle’s War, Injustice, Collision and Menace. She was the first person to read my books, even before Hilda Starke. It feels odd to be writing about her and the truth is she has made it clear that she’s uncomfortable being a character in my book. Unfortunately, truth is what it’s all about. She is the main character in my life.

‘You’re working with that detective again, aren’t you?’ she said as we sat there, eating.

‘Yes.’ I hadn’t wanted her to know but I never tell her lies. She can see right through me.

‘Is that a good idea?’

‘Not really. But I have a three-book deal and a case came up.’ I felt guilty. I knew she was waiting for my script. ‘I think it’s over anyway,’ I went on. ‘Hawthorne knows who did it.’

He hadn’t said as much but I could tell. There was something quite animalistic about Hawthorne. The closer he got to the truth, the more you could see it in his eyes, in the way he sat, in the very contours of his skin. He really was the dog with the bone. I’d hoped we might have a drink after our meeting with Adrian Lockwood but he couldn’t wait to get back home. I could imagine him sitting at his table, assembling his Westland Sea King with the same voracious attention to detail he brought to the solving of crime.

‘Do you know?’ she asked.

It was a depressing question. I felt sure that the solution must be obvious by now. All along, it had been my hope that I would actually work it out before Hawthorne. And yet, I was still nowhere near. It really wasn’t fair. How could I even call myself an author if I had no connection to the last chapter – the whole point of the book?

‘No,’ I admitted, then added, hopefully, ‘Not yet.’

After dinner, I went up to the office, which Jill had actually constructed for me on the roof of the flat. It’s about fifteen metres long and quite narrow with uninterrupted views towards the Old Bailey and St Paul’s. At the time, a new building was rising up, adding a streak of silver to the skyscape and completely changing my view. It would become known as the Shard. I sat at my desk, gazing out at the evening sky. Despite what I had said, I wasn’t in the mood for scriptwriting. Instead, I drew out a notepad and began to think about the case.

If Hawthorne could solve it, I could solve it. I was as clever as him. The answer was right in front of me. I went through it all one last time.

Adrian Lockwood.

He was the most obvious suspect. Despite what he’d said, it was possible that he knew Pryce was investigating his secret wine stash and might have overturned the divorce as a result.

According to Akira Anno, he had a temper. His first wife had died. And then there was the spot of green paint I had seen on his shirt. Was it the same green as the number on the wall at the scene of the crime? Of course it was, which meant that he had painted it, although I couldn’t quite see why.

The trouble was, he had a solid alibi for the time of the murder. He had been with . . .

Davina Richardson.

She couldn’t blame Pryce for her husband’s death in Long Way Hole. It had happened too long ago, he had supported her ever since, and – anyway – Gregory Taylor had accepted the responsibility.

But she and Lockwood were lovers. And what had Pryce’s husband, Stephen Spencer, told us? Pryce had got fed up with her. She was bleeding him dry. Suppose Pryce had finally pulled the financial plug on her, sending her into a murderous rage? She could have talked to Adrian Lockwood, who had his own reasons for wanting Pryce dead. They could have planned it together.

Akira Anno.

She was still my main suspect – after her ex-husband. She was the start of everything that had happened with the threat she had made in the restaurant and she had written a haiku that suggested she had murder in mind, even if she insisted it had been addressed to Adrian Lockwood. I could easily believe that she was vengeful enough to kill Richard Pryce and it wasn’t much of a stretch to see her daubing the number 182 on the wall either. It somehow reminded me of Japanese murals with their attendant calligraphy. It suited her. And yet she had an alibi too.

Dawn Adams.

Two women, both divorced, both with a grudge against the smooth-talking solicitor who had humiliated them. More than that, if Richard had discovered the truth about Mark Belladonna and Doomworld, he could have ruined both of them. Now that I thought about it, there was something quite literary about writing a message, leaving a mark at the scene of the crime. In a way, Dawn and Akira mirrored Adrian and Davina. Two sets of people with similar aims, working together.

Stephen Spencer.

He didn’t look like a murderer to me, but I couldn’t rule him out. He had lied about visiting his mother and he might well have lied about the state of his marriage. The fact was that he was being unfaithful. Richard Pryce knew and had discussed his will with one of the partners at Masefield Pryce Turnbull. If Spencer was about to lose his marriage, the house and the inheritance, he certainly had the most straightforward motive for murder.

Susan Taylor.

Nor had I forgotten Gregory Taylor’s widow. Her husband had died one day before Richard Pryce and she had actually come down to London on the day of the murder. Nobody had asked her to account for her movements but had she really been on her own, just sitting there in a cheap hotel? I remembered the curious glint of cruelty in her eyes as she had spoken: What do you think I did? Was there something about Long Way Hole that she hadn’t told us? Richard, Charles and Gregory – all stuck underground with the water rising. All three were now dead. There had to be a connection.

It had to be one of them.

One in six. But which one?

Jill came into the office and, seeing me deep in thought, slid the partition across, closing off her side. We call it the divorce door. I turned another page and began to think of all the clues that I had noted as I accompanied Hawthorne – from the broken bulrushes next to Pryce’s front door to the book that Gregory Taylor had bought at King’s Cross station to the splash of green paint on Adrian Lockwood’s sleeve. I remembered Hawthorne talking about the number painted on the wall and Richard Pryce’s last words: What are you doing here? It’s a bit late. I wrote them down and drew a circle round them. It didn’t help.

What else was there? Hawthorne had gone on about the shape of the crime. We had been sitting in his flat, talking over that glass of rum and Coke. I went back through my notes and found his exact words.

It’s not like that, Tony. You’ve got to find the shape. That’s all.

But if there was a shape, I couldn’t see it. I was still convinced that the answer must be found in a single clue, something that had been right in front of me but the significance of which I had missed.

I cast my mind back to the visit we had made to Adrian Lockwood’s house: the umbrella by the door, the vitamin pills, the bilberries. I tried to remember why I had written them down in my notes. Why had I mentioned them at all?

That was my eureka moment.

I fired up my computer and went on the internet. What a wonderful device . . . a gift to writers and detectives alike! In seconds I had the answer I needed and at that moment everything came together in a rush and I suddenly saw with blinding clarity exactly who had killed Richard Pryce. It was something I had never thought I would experience. Agatha Christie never described it, nor did any other mystery writer I can think of: that moment when the detective works it out and the truth makes itself known. Why did Poirot never twirl his moustache? Why didn’t Lord Peter Wimsey dance in the air? I would have.

I spent another hour thinking it through. I saw Jill turn off the light and heard her go to bed. I made more notes. Then I rang Hawthorne. I didn’t care that it was late.

‘Tony?’ It was almost midnight but he didn’t sound upset to hear from me.

‘I know who did it,’ I said.

There was an empty silence at the other end of the telephone. Of course he didn’t believe me. ‘Tell me,’ he said, eventually.

So I did.