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[Wexford 01] From Doon & Death by Ruth Rendell Page B
Authors: Ruth Rendell
drunk driving case downstairs. Let me think. They adjourned at one, went back at two.'
'We went into the Carousel for lunch ...'
'So did he. I saw him. But we went upstairs, Mike. He may have done too. I don't know. He was back in court by two and he didn't have the car. He walks when he's that near home ’
'Missal could do with taking a leaf out of his book,' Burden said. 'Get his weight down. He's a nasty piece of work, sir. Henchman!' he added in disgust.
'Underlin g, Mike,' Wexford grinned. 'What’ s stopp ing him telling us where he was on Tuesday?'
'God knows, but those tyres were as clean as a whistle.'
He could have left the car on the Pomfret Road.' True.'
'I suppose Mrs Missal could have got some idea into her head that Quadrant was carrying on with Mrs P.-'
Wexfordhad begun to look fretful. 'Oh, come off it,' he said. ‘D ougie Q. and Mrs P.? He's been knocking it off on the side for years. It’ s common knowledge. But have you seen the sort of things his taste runs to? I tell you, on Saturday mornings the High Street is littered with his discards, consoling themselves for their broken maidenheads or their broken marriages by showing off their new Mini-Minors. Mrs P. just wasn't his style. Anyway, Mrs Missal wouldn't have done murder for him. He was just a different way of passing a dull evening, one degree up on the telly ’
‘I thought it was only men who looked at it that way.' Burden was always startled by his chief's occasional outbursts of graphic frankness. Wexford, who was always intuitive, sometimes even lyrical, could also be coarse. 'She was risking a lot for a casual affair.'
'You want to buck your ideas up, Mike,' Wexford snapped. 'Minna's Oxford Book of Victorian Verse is just about your mark. I'm going to lend it to you for your bedtime reading.'
Burden took the book and flicked through the pages: Walter Savage Landor, Coventry Patmore, Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton ... The names seemed to come from far away, the poets long dust What possible connection could they have with dead, draggled Minna, with the strident Missals? Love, sin, pain - these were the words that sprang from almost every verse. After Quadrant's flippancies they sounded like ridiculous anachronisms.
'A connecting link, Mike ’ Wexford said. That's what we want, a connection.'
But there was none to be found that night. Wexford took three of the other books ('Just in case our Mr Doon underlined anything or put in any fancy little ticks') and they walked out into the evening air. Beyond the bridge Quadrant's car still waited.
Chapter 8
One of my cousins long ago,
A little thing the mirror said ...
James Thomson , In the Room
A bird was singing outside Wexford's office window; a blackbird, Burden supposed. He had always rather liked listening to it until one day Wexford said it sang the opening bars of The Thunder and Lightning Polka', and after that its daily reiteration annoyed him. He wanted it to go on with the tune or else vary a note or two. Besides, this morning he had had enough of blackbirds and larks and nightingales, enough of castle-bound maidens dying young and anaemic swains serenading them with lute and tabor. He had sat up half the night reading the Oxford Book and he was by no means convinced that it had had anything to do with Mrs Parsons' death.
It was going to be a beautiful day, too beautiful for an inquest. When Burden walked in Wexford was already at his desk, turning the pages of the suede-covered Swinburne. The rest of the Doon books had been removed from the house in Tabard Road and dumped on Wexford's filing cabinet.
‘Di d you get anything, sir?' Burden asked.
'Not so's you'd notice ’ Wexford said, ‘bu t I did have an idea. I'll tell you about it when you've read the report from Balham. It's just come in ’
The report was typed on a couple of sheets of foolscap. Burden sat down and began to go through it:
Margaret Iris Parsons (he read) was born Margaret Iris Godfrey to
'We went into the Carousel for lunch ...'
'So did he. I saw him. But we went upstairs, Mike. He may have done too. I don't know. He was back in court by two and he didn't have the car. He walks when he's that near home ’
'Missal could do with taking a leaf out of his book,' Burden said. 'Get his weight down. He's a nasty piece of work, sir. Henchman!' he added in disgust.
'Underlin g, Mike,' Wexford grinned. 'What’ s stopp ing him telling us where he was on Tuesday?'
'God knows, but those tyres were as clean as a whistle.'
He could have left the car on the Pomfret Road.' True.'
'I suppose Mrs Missal could have got some idea into her head that Quadrant was carrying on with Mrs P.-'
Wexfordhad begun to look fretful. 'Oh, come off it,' he said. ‘D ougie Q. and Mrs P.? He's been knocking it off on the side for years. It’ s common knowledge. But have you seen the sort of things his taste runs to? I tell you, on Saturday mornings the High Street is littered with his discards, consoling themselves for their broken maidenheads or their broken marriages by showing off their new Mini-Minors. Mrs P. just wasn't his style. Anyway, Mrs Missal wouldn't have done murder for him. He was just a different way of passing a dull evening, one degree up on the telly ’
‘I thought it was only men who looked at it that way.' Burden was always startled by his chief's occasional outbursts of graphic frankness. Wexford, who was always intuitive, sometimes even lyrical, could also be coarse. 'She was risking a lot for a casual affair.'
'You want to buck your ideas up, Mike,' Wexford snapped. 'Minna's Oxford Book of Victorian Verse is just about your mark. I'm going to lend it to you for your bedtime reading.'
Burden took the book and flicked through the pages: Walter Savage Landor, Coventry Patmore, Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton ... The names seemed to come from far away, the poets long dust What possible connection could they have with dead, draggled Minna, with the strident Missals? Love, sin, pain - these were the words that sprang from almost every verse. After Quadrant's flippancies they sounded like ridiculous anachronisms.
'A connecting link, Mike ’ Wexford said. That's what we want, a connection.'
But there was none to be found that night. Wexford took three of the other books ('Just in case our Mr Doon underlined anything or put in any fancy little ticks') and they walked out into the evening air. Beyond the bridge Quadrant's car still waited.
Chapter 8
One of my cousins long ago,
A little thing the mirror said ...
James Thomson , In the Room
A bird was singing outside Wexford's office window; a blackbird, Burden supposed. He had always rather liked listening to it until one day Wexford said it sang the opening bars of The Thunder and Lightning Polka', and after that its daily reiteration annoyed him. He wanted it to go on with the tune or else vary a note or two. Besides, this morning he had had enough of blackbirds and larks and nightingales, enough of castle-bound maidens dying young and anaemic swains serenading them with lute and tabor. He had sat up half the night reading the Oxford Book and he was by no means convinced that it had had anything to do with Mrs Parsons' death.
It was going to be a beautiful day, too beautiful for an inquest. When Burden walked in Wexford was already at his desk, turning the pages of the suede-covered Swinburne. The rest of the Doon books had been removed from the house in Tabard Road and dumped on Wexford's filing cabinet.
‘Di d you get anything, sir?' Burden asked.
'Not so's you'd notice ’ Wexford said, ‘bu t I did have an idea. I'll tell you about it when you've read the report from Balham. It's just come in ’
The report was typed on a couple of sheets of foolscap. Burden sat down and began to go through it:
Margaret Iris Parsons (he read) was born Margaret Iris Godfrey to