The Silent World of Nicholas Quinn

CHAPTER FIVE

MORSE LOOKED DIRECTLY into the large mirror in front of him, and there surveyed the reflection of the smaller hand mirror held behind him, in which, in turn, he considered the occipital regions of what he liked to think of as a distinguished skull. He nodded impassively as the hand mirror was held behind the left side of his neck, nodded again as it was switched to the right, declined the suggested application of a white, greasy-looking hair oil which stood on the surface before him, arose, like a statue unveiled, from the chair, took the proffered tissue, rubbed his face and ears vigorously, and reached for his wallet. That felt much better! He was never happy when his hair began to grow in untidy, curly profusion just above his collar, and he wondered sadly why it now failed to sustain such luxuriance upon the top of his head. He tipped the barber generously and walked out into Summertown. Although not so cold as in recent days, it was drizzling slightly, and he decided to wait for a bus up to his bachelor flat at the top of North Oxford. It was 10.15 on Tuesday, 25th November.

It would be unlikely that anything of importance would require his immediate attention at HQ, and he had to call in home anyway. It was a ritual with Morse. As a young recruit in the army he had been driven almost mad by the service issue of prickly vests, prickly shirts, and prickly trousers. His mother had told him that he had an extremely sensitive skin; and he believed her. It was always the same after a haircut. He would take off his shirt and vest, and dip his head into a basin full of hot water. Bliss! He would shampoo his hair twice, and then flannel his face and ears thoroughly. He would then rub his back with a towel, dry his hair, wash down the short, black hairs from the sides of the basin, select a clean vest and shirt, and finally comb his hair with loving care in front of the bathroom mirror.

But this morning it wasn't quite the same. He was just about to rinse off the second application of medicated shampoo when the phone rang. He swore savagely. Who the hell?

'Hoped I might find you at home, sir. I couldn't find anyone who'd seen you at the office.'

'So what? I've had a haircut. Not a crime, is it?'

'Can you get here straightaway, sir?' Lewis's tone was suddenly grave.

'Give me five minutes. What's up?'

'We've got a body, sir.'

'Whereabouts are you?'

'I'm phoning from the station. Do you know Pinewood Close?'

'No.'

'Well, I think you'd be best to call here first anyway, sir.'

'OK. Wait for me there.'

Chief Superintendent Strange was waiting for him, too. He stood impatiently on the steps outside the Thames Valley Police HQ in Kidlington, as Morse hurriedly parked the Lancia and jumped out.

'Where have you been, Morse?'

'Sorry, sir. I've had a haircut.'

'You what?'

Morse said nothing, not the slightest flicker of guilt or annoyance betraying itself in the light-grey eyes.

'A fine advertisement, eh? Citizens under police care and protection getting themselves bumped off, and the only Chief Inspector I've got on duty is having his bloody hair cut!'

Morse said nothing.

'Look, Morse. You're in charge of this case — is that clear? You can have Lewis here if you want him.' Strange turned away, but suddenly remembered something else. 'And you won't get another haircut until you've sorted this little lot out — that's an order!'

'Perhaps I shan't need one, sir.' Morse winked happily at Lewis and led the way into his office. 'What's it look like from behind?'

'Very nice, sir. They've cut it very nicely.'

Morse sat back in his black-leather armchair and beamed at Lewis. 'Well? What have you got to tell me?'

'Chap called Quinn, sir. Lives on the ground floor of a semi-detached in Pinewood Close. He's been dead for a good while by the look of him. Poisoned, I shouldn't wonder. He works' ('worked', muttered Morse) 'at the Foreign Examinations Syndicate down the Woodstock Road somewhere; and one of his colleagues got worried about him and came out and found him. I got the call about a quarter to ten, and I went along straightaway with Dickson and had a quick look round. I left him there, and came back to call you.'

'Well, here I am, Lewis. What do you want me to do?'

'Knowing you, sir, I thought you might want me to arrest the chap who found him.'

Morse grinned. 'Is he here?'

'In the Interview Room. I've got a rough statement from him, but it'll need a bit of brushing up before he signs it. You'll want to see him, I suppose?'

'Yes, but that can wait. Got a car ready?'

'Waiting outside, sir.'

'You've not called the path, boys in yet, I hope?'

'No. I thought I ought to wait for you.'

'Good. Go and get your statement tarted up and I'll see you outside in ten minutes or so.'

Morse made two phone calls, combed his hair again, and felt inordinately happy.

Several faces peeped from behind ground-floor lace-curtained windows as the police car drove into Pinewood Close, a small, undistinguished crescent wherein eight semi-detached houses, erected some fifty years previously, stood gently fading into a semi-dignified senescence. Most of the wooden fences that bordered the properties managed to sustain only a precarious pretence to any upright posture, the slats uncreosoted and insecure, the crossrails mildewed, sodden with rain, and rotten. Only at each end of the crescent had the original builder left sufficient sideroom for the erection of any garage, and it was at the house at the extreme left that the bulky figure of Constable Dickson stood, stamping his feet on the damp concrete in front of a prefabricated unpainted garage, and talking to a woman in her early fifties, the owner of the property and rentier of some half a dozen other houses in the neighbourhood. But whatever other benefits her various incomes conferred upon her, her affluence appeared not to be reflected in her wardrobe: she wore no stockings and was pulling a shabby old coat more closely over a grubby white blouse as Morse and Lewis stepped out of the car.

' 'Ere come the brains, missus,' muttered Dickson, and stepped forward to greet the Chief Inspector. 'This is Mrs. Jardine, sir. She owns the property and she's the one who let us in.'

Morse nodded a friendly greeting, took the Yale key from Dickson, and instructed him to take Mrs. Jardine to the police car and get a statement from her. He himself stood for a while in silence with his back to the house, and looked around him. In a kerbed oval plot, a thick cluster of small trees and variagated bushes sheltered the houses from the main road and gave to the crescent the semblance of partial privacy. But the small curved stretch of road itself was poorly maintained and unevenly surfaced, with a long, irregular black scar, running parallel to the pavement, where the water mains had recently been dug up again. The gutter was full of sopping brown leaves, and the lamp-post immediately outside № 1 had been vandalized. The front door of the next house opened a few inches and a middle-aged woman directed inquisitive eyes towards the centre of activity.

'Good morning,' said Morse brightly.

The door was closed in a flash, and Morse turned round to survey the garage. Although the claw of the lock which secured the doors was not pushed home, he touched nothing, contenting himself with a quick glance through the glass panels at the top. Inside he saw a dark-blue Morris 1300 which allowed little more than a foot of space between the wall and the driver's door. He walked over to the front porch and inserted the key. 'Good job he doesn't drive a Cadillac, Lewis.'

'Didn't,' corrected Lewis quietly.

The front door of № 1 Pinewood Close opened on to a narrow hallway, with a row of clothes pegs at the foot of the staircase which climbed the wall to the left. Morse stood inside and pointed to the door immediately to his right. 'This the one?'

'Next one, sir.'

The door was closed and Morse took out his pen and depressed the handle carefully. 'I hope you haven't left your prints all over the place, Lewis?'

'I opened it the same way as you, sir.'

Inside the room the electric light was still turned on; the dull-orange curtains were drawn; the gas fire was burning low; and lying in a foetal posture on the carpet was the body of a young man. The fire was flanked by two old, but comfortable-looking armchairs; and beside the one to the right, on a low french-polished coffee table, stood a bottle of dry sherry, almost full, and a cheap-looking sherry glass, almost empty. Morse bent forward and sniffed the pale, clear liquid. 'Did you know, Lewis, that about eighteen per cent of men and about four per cent of women can't smell cyanide?'

'It is poison, then?'

'Smells like it. Peach blossom, bitter almonds — take your pick.'

The dead man's face was turned towards them, away from the fire, and Morse knelt down and looked at it. A small quantity of dry froth crusted the twisted mouth, and the bearded jaw was tightly clenched in death; the pupils of the open eyes appeared widely dilated, and the skin of the face was a morbid, blotchy blue. 'All the classic symptoms, Lewis. We hardly need a postmortem on this one. Hydrocyanic acid. Anyway the path boys should be here any minute.' He stood up and walked over to the curtains, which had obviously shrunk in a not particularly recent wash, and which gaped open slightly towards the top. Outside Morse could see the narrow garden, with its patchy, poor-quality grass, a small vegetable plot at the far end, and a section of fencing missing on the left. But the view appeared to convey little of significance to his mind, and he turned his attention back to the room itself. Along the wall opposite the fire were a dozen or so bundles of books, neatly tied with stout cord, and a dark mahogany sideboard, the left-hand door of which gaped open to reveal a small collection of assorted tumblers and glasses, and an unopened bottle of whisky. Everywhere seemed remarkably clean and tidy. A small wastepaper basket stood in the shallow alcove to the left of the fire; and inside the basket was a ball of paper, which Morse picked out and smoothed gently on the top of the sideboard:

Mr. Quinn. I can't do all the cleaning this afternoon because Mr. Evans is off sick and I've got to get him a prescription from the doctor. So I'll call back and finish just after six if that's convenient for you. A. Evans (Mrs.)

Morse handed the note over to Lewis. 'Interesting.'

'How long do you think he's been dead, sir?'

Morse looked down at Quinn once more and shrugged his shoulders. 'I dunno. Two or three days, I should think.'

'It's a wonder someone didn't find him earlier.'

'Ye-es. You say he just has these downstair rooms?'

'So Mrs. Jardine says. There's a young couple living upstairs usually, but she's in the John Radcliffe having a baby, and he works nights at Cowley and he's been staying with his parents in Oxford somewhere.'

'Mm.' Morse made as if to leave, but suddenly stopped. The bottom of the door had been amateurishly planed to enable it to ride over the carpet and a noticeable draught was coming beneath it, occasionally setting the low, blue gas jets flickering fitfully into brighter yellow flames.

'Funny, isn't it, Lewis? If I lived in this room I wouldn't choose the armchair immediately in line with the draught.'

'Looks as if he did, air.'

'I wonder, Lewis. I wonder if he did.'

The front-door bell rang and Morse sent Lewis to answer it. 'Tell 'em they can start as soon as they like.' He walked out of the room and through into the kitchen at the back of the house. Again, everywhere was tidy. On a red Formica-topped table stood a stack of recently purchased provisions: half a dozen eggs in their plastic containers ½ lb butter; ½ lb English Cheddar; two generous slices of prime steak under a cellophane wrapper; and a brown-paper bag full of mushrooms. Beside the groceries was a curling pay-out slip from the Quality supermarket, and a flicker of excitement showed in Morse's grey eyes as he looked it through.

'Lewis!'

Nothing else here looked particularly interesting: a sink unit, a gas cooker, a fridge, two kitchen stools, and by the side of the back door, filling the space under the stairs, a small larder. Lewis, who had been chatting to the police surgeon, appeared at the door. 'Sir?'

'What's going on in there?'

'Doc says he's been poisoned.'

'Amazing thing — medical science, Lewis! But we've got other things to worry about for the minute. I want you to make a complete inventory of the food in the fridge and in this larder here.'

'Oh.' Lewis was almost thinking that a man of his own rank and experience should be above such fourth-grade clerical chores; but he had worked with Morse before, and knew that whatever other faults he had the Chief Inspector seldom wasted his own or other people's time on trivial or unnecessary tasks. He heard himself say he would get on with it — immediately.

'I'm going back to the station, Lewis. You stay here until I get back.'

Outside, Morse found Dickson and Mrs. Jardine standing beside the police car. 'I want you to drive me back to HQ, Dickson.' He turned to Mrs. Jardine. 'You've been very kind and helpful. Thank you very much. You've got a car?'

The landlady nodded and walked away. In truth, she felt disappointed that her small part in the investigation seemed now to be over, and that she had warranted no more than a cursory question from the rather abrupt man who appeared to be in charge. But as she drove away from the crescent her thoughts, soon veered to other, more practical considerations. Would anyone be over-anxious to move into the rooms so lately rented by that nice young Mr. Quinn? People didn't like that sort of thing. But as she reached the outskirts of Oxford she comforted herself with the salutary thought that the dead are soon forgotten. Yes, she would soon be able to let the rooms again. Just give it a month or so.

Morse read the statement aloud to the youngish man seated rather nervously at the small table in Interview Room № 1.

I have known Nicholas Quinn for three months. He came to work at the Foreign Examinations Syndicate as an assistant secretary on 1st September this year.

On Monday, 24th November, he did not appear at the office and did not ring in to say that anything was wrong. It is not unusual for the graduates to take a day or two off when they can, but the Secretary, Dr. Bartlett, always insists that he should be kept fully informed of any such arrangement. None of my colleagues saw Mr. Quinn on Monday, and no one knew where he was. This morning, Tuesday, 25th November, Dr. Bartlett came to my office and said that Mr. Quinn had still not arrived. He said that he had tried to phone him, but that there was no reply. He then asked me to drive round to Mr. Quinn's house and I did so, arriving at about 9.30 am. The front door was locked and no one answered the doorbell. I could see that Mr. Quinn's car was still in the garage, so I proceeded to the back of the house. The light was on in the ground-floor room and the curtains were drawn; but there was a gap in the curtains and I looked inside. I could see someone lying quite still on the floor in front of the fireplace, and I knew that something was seriously wrong. I therefore rang the police immediately from the public call box in the main street, and was told to wait at the house until the police came. When Sergeant Lewis arrived with a constable, they discovered who owned the house. The landlady turned up with the key about ten minutes later. The police then proceeded into the house for a short while, and when Sergeant. Lewis came out he told me that I must prepare myself for a shock. He said that Mr. Quinn was dead.

'You happy to sign this?' Morse pushed the statement across the table.

'I didn't use the word "proceeded".'

'Ah, you must forgive us, sir. We never "go" anywhere in the force, you know. We always "proceed".'

Donald Martin accepted the explanation with a weak smile and signed the statement with nervy flourish.

'How well did you know Mr. Quinn, sir?'

'Not very well really. He's only been with us—'

'So you say in your statement. But why did the Secretary send you — not one of the others?'

'I don't know. I suppose I knew him as well as any of them.'

'What did you expect to find?'

'Well, I thought he was probably ill or something, and couldn't let us know.'

'There's a phone in the house.'

'Yes, but it could have — well, it could have been a heart attack, or something like that.'

Morse nodded. 'I see. Do you happen to know where his parents live?'

'Somewhere in Yorkshire, I think. But the office could—'

'Of course. Did he have a girlfriend?'

Martin was aware of the Inspector's hard grey eyes upon him and his mouth was suddenly very dry. 'Not that I know of.'

'No pretty fillies he fancied at the office?'

'I don't think so.' The hesitation was minimal but, for Morse, sufficient to set a few fanciful notions aflutter.

'I'm told such things are not unknown, sir. He was a bachelor, I take it?'

'Yes.'

'You a married man, sir?'

'Yes.'

'Mm. Perhaps you've forgotten what it's like to be single.' Morse would have been happier if Martin had told him not to talk such drivel. But Martin didn't.

'I don't quite see what you're getting at, Inspector.'

'Oh, don't worry about that, sir. I often don't know what I'm getting at myself.' He stood up, and Martin did the same, fastening his overcoat. 'You'd better get back to the office, or they'll be getting worried about you. Tell the Secretary I'll be in touch with him as soon as I can — and tell him to lock up Mr. Quinn's room.'

'You've no idea—?' said Martin quietly.

'Yes, I'm afraid I have, sir. He was almost certainly murdered.' The sinister word seemed to hang on the air, and the room was suddenly and eerily still.