Death of a Mystery Writer (26 page)

“Come, come, Inspector, am I the type to thrash around?”

“Well, you did silly things. Like pretending no one here could remember Miss Thorrington's name. I've just ascertained it is perfectly well remembered by the lady downstairs. You even managed to throw a few dark hints in the direction of your employer,
though why
he
any more than the family should kill the goose that laid the golden eggs is beyond comprehension. No, it was a good plan, but it needed more care.”

Mr. Simmington remained looking at him, still almost insouciant. Meredith's eyes had lost their sparkle. The murderer of Oliver Fairleigh was not going to be the criminal he was most pleased with himself for having caught. He wondered why Simmington did not take a drink, and found his eyes returning to the whisky glass as a fully formed idea suddenly pushed its way to the front of his mind.

“Well,” said Gerald Simmington finally, with a broad smile. “That's the plot outline. Now perhaps we can get on to the proof.”

“Very little so far, as I say, and mostly circumstantial,” said Meredith. “But I shall get it. I have a warrant in my pocket to search your flat. I shall search everywhere you've been in the last two weeks, very carefully. I shall get you in the end. No doubt you've destroyed anything you used to get the nicotine. But how did you get it to Wycherley Court? Have you destroyed the clothes you wore that evening?” A flicker crossed Gerald Simmington's face. “If you haven't there are sure to be traces the lab boys can pick up. There always are. I'd be willing to bet you haven't destroyed
Black Widow.
You're too good a servant of the firm of Macpherson. Habit would die too hard for you to do that. We'll find it. You may find the process slow, but it will be sure.”

“Then I suppose the kindest thing for me to do, Inspector, would be to wish you good day—if not good luck,” said Gerald Simmington, standing. Once more he was the courteous representative of a well-established publishing firm. “No doubt I shall be hearing from you again.”

But as Meredith began to get up, he seemed to make a sudden decision, and gestured him to sit again.

“One thing I will say,” he went on slowly, “strictly off the record. I hated my—my
father
—there, I've said it—for what he did to my mother. I loathed him, and everything in me screamed out against the fact that
he
was responsible for
me.
When my
mother died, my life was quite empty, quite meaningless. It has been ever since. The only thing that gave it shape, gave it an aim, was the thought of killing him. Thinking of ways to do it, that was a luxury, something that went with my profession.” He gestured at the gaudy, bloody covers dotted on the bookcases round the room. “But the essential thing, all that mattered, was to kill him. If I did that, there was the victory. If I got away with it, I still had my meaningless life. If I didn't”—he shrugged—“what did it matter?”

Gerald Simmington smiled at the inspector.

“I couldn't lose,” he said, and his hand darted to the whisky glass and he drained it down. “One way or another,” he added, as he lay dying.

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

Unholy Dying

A Murder in Mayfair

The Corpse at the Haworth Tandoori

No Place of Safety

The Habit of Widowhood

The Bad Samaritan

The Masters of the House

A Hovering of Vultures

A Fatal Attachment

A Scandal in Belgravia

A City of Strangers

Death of a Salesperson

Death and the Chaste Apprentice

At Death's Door

The Skeleton in the Grass

The Cherry Blossom Corpse

Bodies

Political Suicide

Fête Fatale

Out of the Blackout

Corpse in a Gilded Cage

School for Murder

The Case of the Missing Brontë

A Little Local Murder

Death and the Princess

Death by Sheer Torture

Death in a Cold Climate

Death of a Perfect Mother

Death of a Literary Widow

Death of a Mystery Writer

Blood Brotherhood

Death on the High C's

Death of an Old Goat

SCRIBNER

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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 1978 by Robert Barnard

All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

Originally published in Great Britain in 1978 by William Collins Sons and Co. Ltd. as
Unruly Son.

Published by arrangement with William Collins Sons and Co. Ltd.

First Scribner Crime Classics Edition 2002

S
CRIBNER
and design are trademarks of Macmillan Library Reference USA, Inc., used under license by Simon & Schuster, the publisher of this work.

eBook design by Taylor Dietrich

eBook cover design by Christopher Lin

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Barnard, Robert.

[Unruly son]

Death of a mystery writer/Robert Barnard.—1st Scribner crime classics ed.

p. cm.

First published under title: Unruly son.

1. Detective and mystery stories—Authorship—Fiction. 2. Novelists—Fiction. I. Title.

PR6052.A665 U57 2002

823'.914—dc21

2001054214

ISBN 0-7432-2934-7
ISBN 978-1-4767-3726-3 (eBook)