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“And you didn't feel any compassion or guilt?”

“No. I felt good. I thought Mrs. Southwell would probably have thanked me.”

“And what about when you got home?” asked Rani from the driving seat. “Didn't Jean Mannering want to know where you had been?”

“We don't live in each other's pockets. She'd had an evening meeting and went straight to bed when she came in. She didn't ask the next day what I'd been doing the night before, and I didn't tell her. We're two independent women.”

“And you never discussed it later, when Mrs. Southwell's death got in the papers?”

“Oh, I think we just said ‘poor woman,' or something like that.”

Rani was negotiating the Leeds traffic system, and the two women behind him lapsed into silence. Eventually he slid the car into a small space outside Millgarth Police Headquarters and darted out to open doors. Eve was already out in the queasy afternoon sunlight, but Miss Dougall waited for Rani to open her door and then got out easily and smoothly, without the creaking bones and little moans of the old. She stood erect and self-possessed, waiting for them to give her directions, and Eve was struck by the change in her. She seemed to have immense dignity, a confident composure. She was not a criminal going for a crucial interview; she was a woman of good life who was satisfied that she had an achievement to her credit—something that many might criticize or misunderstand but which she could answer for, both to herself and to God. Was this madness, Eve wondered, or an advanced and perverse case of heroine worship? Or was it a part of the role she was playing—the impression she made on Eve was of an actress playing an actress—something she had learned to do from Jean Mannering?

They went up the steps and into the outer office of the station. People were sitting around singly or in little groups, waiting to make their complaints or meet their fates. Rani put his hand on Miss Dougall's arm and was about to steer her to the door that led to the offices, interview rooms and cells of the station proper when it opened. Through it came the woman whom Eve now knew was Jean Mannering, accompanied by the keen young detective constable. For a moment all five people froze in their places. Then Jean Mannering ran forward.

“Oh, Dougie! What have you done?”

The moment of Miss Dougall's greatness passed. She put her arms around her lover, her face on her shoulder, and sobbed into it. Suddenly she was diminished to a naughty schoolgirl who had done something beastly in the playground.

“So what's your take on Dougie's version?” Rani asked Eve.

They were at home in Derwent Road, and in the middle of a standard English meal of lamb chops and boiled potatoes. It was the first time that Rani had been properly home for any length of time since the scene in the reception area of Millgarth Police Headquarters. Eve had had plenty of time alone to mull over the situation, and she replied at once.

“I think Jean Mannering is unlikely to dispute her account,” she said, with acid in her voice. “In fact she rubbed it in, or tried to, with her first words. ‘What have you done?'—my foot! Thus cutting off any impulse Dougie may have later to implicate her as well.”

Rani nodded.

“But I don't think Dougie will have any such impulse, do you?” he said. “She seemed utterly obsessed.”

“Enchanted and enchained. But, by God, I'd love to find
some
thing that brought Jean into the picture.”

“So would I. But I can't imagine her being so unwise as to commit anything to paper that we could use as evidence. She seemed streetwise to me.”

“Oh, she would never do that in a million years. A mere gesture of irritation—that was all that was needed. But you're the one who has to think about trials, the Crown Prosecution Service and all that. If I get the PR job, I'll have to think about them too, but not for this case. I'd just like to have some verbal indication that Dougie was encouraged, spurred on to do what she did.”

“I don't think we'll get it.”

“Nor do I. Because I don't think it exists. I think that they were so close, so in each other's minds, that no word needed to be spoken. So even if she wanted to, Dougie could never honestly say she was doing what Jean wanted her to do. But I'm sure she
was,
all the same . . . Don't eat any more of that lamb if you don't want to.”

“I do want to. I'm just interested in what we're talking about.”

“I must learn some Indian dishes.”

Eve didn't see the look of horror cast in her direction.

“Don't bother,” said Rani. “You couldn't cook Indian better than an Indian, however hard you tried.”

“I suppose your mother is a wonderful cook.”

“She's a vile cook, but she's still better than you would be at Indian food. Stick to English and European—they're fine by me . . . Dougie was used to doing Jean's dirty work for her. She told us that herself.”

“Oh yes. When she said that, I thought something was coming that could tie Jean in with the murder.
Instead it was the opposite. Sometimes Jean didn't even know that dirty work was being done for her by Dougie.”

“Hmmm.”

“Yes—what's the betting she had a pretty good idea? And with this relationship words didn't need to be spoken. A look of worry or apprehension, that gesture of dismissal when Evelyn Southwell's name came up, would be enough. Even if words were spoken, they didn't have to be direct. ‘I just hope she'll keep quiet' doesn't count as encouragement, but it is very close to ‘I just hope she'll be
kept
quiet.' The bond between them was so tight, so perverse—it was like Iago and Othello's. Othello does Iago's murder for him, and destroys himself utterly. Dougie does Jean's for her and goes to jail for years, and Jean speaks kindly of her, says it was an attack of madness.”

“And goes her way. And what do you think will happen when Dougie comes out of jail?”

“Jean will be in another relationship, and there will be no room for Dougie.”

“Mightn't that mean that Dougie will speak at last?”

“It could do, I suppose. Not that it will make any difference. You know more about this than I do, but no one, surely, would want to prosecute Jean on the say-so of a convict and former lover once she's got out of jail and found she's been thrown over.”

“No, of course they wouldn't prosecute.”

“She's got away with it, all right.”

“And it pains you?”

“It pains like hell.”

“You're becoming a sort of policeman already.”

“
Not
a policeman,” said Eve firmly. “I couldn't bear all the frustrations and disappointments when cases didn't get solved, or nobody got prosecuted for them . . . I keep going over in my mind the connections I had with Jean and Dougie. That time I phoned them, after I'd talked to Evelyn Southwell. They were both in Dougie's flat, because I phoned the number she gave me. Jean answered, and immediately twigged who I was and realized I needed to be handed on to Dougie, the ‘Jean' I was used to. When she took the phone she thanked the fake ‘Dougie.' It was all so smooth, so confident, so fraudulent.”

“So rehearsed?” suggested Rani.

“You would have thought so. We were told Jean was angry with Dougie for pretending to be her, but she effortlessly fit in with the falsehoods.”

“Jean had taken over Dougie, and she knew how to manipulate her. I bet your mother saw the danger because she was much more intelligent than Dougie.”

“Oh, my mother! I think I begin to understand her. What a thing to say after all those years of being close to her! But there was so much I didn't know. She married very young—eighteen. I didn't realize that until I saw the marriage certificate. She never told me, and I bet that had to be concealed from the teachers' college. Then twelve years later I came along, probably meant to cement a failing marriage but for some reason not doing so. I suppose the likeliest reason was Jean. Though my mother was so much brighter than Dougie, she must have found Jean and her way of life a real temptation. Unless there's something I'm missing.”

Later that evening, in the bed where May McNabb had
slept partnerless for all those years, Eve, happier than she had ever been in her life, said to Rani:

“Where do you want to get married?”

He looked at her quizzically.

“Where? Not when, by what rite, not in what building—the Crossley church, Windsor Castle, under the water in Lake Windermere, wherever?”

“Be serious, Omkar. You do want to get married, don't you?”

“More than you can imagine.”

“Well then: England, India, Australia—where? Maybe somewhere where we have no friends and no baggage.”

“India and Australia almost fit that bill. But why should we want a wedding with no friends? You've got practically no family, and mine will quite likely stay away. Looks like we may need friends.”

“England, then. Britain, I should say. I have Scottish connections, though all the family ones are dead. You must manage to talk my father around to coming: assure him there is not the slightest danger of prosecution.”

“I'll try. So it's Britain, probably Yorkshire, and either at a registry office or a church.”

“Perhaps we could find a registry office with spiritual overtones. Or have a service of blessing, like Prince Charles. Or maybe the new laws mean we could make up our own marriage service and vows. I'm only the vaguest sort of Christian, and you're a pretty funny sort of Hindu.”

They both giggled. But the next evening, when Rani was kept in Leeds working on the Southwell case and had phoned to say he would, with a bit of luck, be home by midnight, Eve decided she wanted to talk to her father.

“Dad?” she said, as soon as she could hear his voice. “It's early morning there, isn't it?”

“Yes. But I'm well up and my old machinery is oiled by two cups of tea and a couple of eggs, scrambled. It makes my day to hear from you.”

“What's your news?”

“Not much. Oh well—something odd has happened, though it isn't going to shake the art world. Something has told me that my landscapes are never going to be much good, and I've switched to painting portraits.”

“Not passersby in chalk on the pavement?”

“Cheeky child. Not at all. Australia is marvelous for faces, and Maconochie Harbour is full of sun-dried people with lizardlike faces and bodies, dried out but full of character and past exploits. I don't think I'm going to make a fortune, because people prefer to be flattered. This is a combination of my old cartoon skills and a switch to oils. I live in hope someone will commission me to paint the prime minister.”

“They never will.”

“No, they won't. Too scared of a demolition job, which I would be happy to provide. Whereas Kev the barman at the Ocean View thinks just getting a likeness is miraculously clever, is convinced that anything made by man knocks a mere photograph out of contention, and has absolutely no vanity. After a life of political cartooning it's a sort of liberation. So what's your news?”

“First—the murder of Evelyn Southwell. Jean Mannering's current lover and personal slave has been arrested. Jean is busy distancing herself, and the current betting is that the slave did it knowing full well this was what Jean
wanted, but without any urging or conspiring. Hey presto—Jean is in the clear.”

“What was the motive?”

“Evelyn was torturing them with the possibility of revelations about what happened thirty-odd years ago, when you were forced, persuaded, whatever, to leave the country and your wife and child.”

“But what could she reveal?”

“Evelyn was at Heathrow, monitoring your departure.”

There was a pause as he considered this.

“Well, that was an alliance made in hell. I hope my departure won't be something that is brought up at the trial.”

“If she pleads guilty—as seems pretty certain she will—very little will come out at the trial.”

“Good. And I presume the other news is your approaching marriage to Omkar?”

“It is. No great kudos in guessing that. We're planning it now.”

“Did you consider having it in Australia?”

“We did. And having it in India. Both of them had the same drawback: we don't have any friends there.”

“So you're staying in the old country,” said her father, in a disconsolate voice. “I guessed you would in the end.”

“Dad, there is no reason on earth why you shouldn't come back to the old country, as you call it. The police will probably be delighted that what Jean did back in the seventies fills in part of the picture of this present murder. There must be some part of you that wants to see the places that you knew again.”

“It's a very, very small part.”

“Only because you've got this idea you could be hauled in by the police or regarded as some kind of leper by old friends. As far as they're concerned, your marriage was breaking up, your health too, and you took off for Australia on a doctor's advice.”