Part 24 (2/2)

'Except what, sir?'

'It doesn't matter. Forget it. Dress? I saw the cost that Mrs Jarman described; I saw the same sort of slacks; and Sue Widdowson was wearing them. On Friday night I showed Mrs Jarman a photograph of Sue and she recognized her immediately. No wonder the poor woman couldn't pick anybody out at the ident.i.ty parade. The girl she had seen at the bus stop just wasn't there.'

'People do make mistakes, sir.'

'If only they did, Lewis. If only they did!'

'But it's still not proof.'

'No, I suppose it isn't. But I found something else. When I called at the Radcliffe to see Crowther's body, I got his keys from the ward-sister - they'd been in his trouser pocket. I asked her if anyone from the nursing staff had been along to see him, and she said that no one had. But she said that Staff Nurse Widdowson had asked her how he was getting along and that she had stood at the top of the ward and looked for a long time at the bed where Crowther lay.'

Morse's voice was growing agitated, but he pulled himself together as quickly as he could. Once more he walked over to the window and saw the sun beginning to filter through the thinning cloud. 'I went to Lonsdale College and I looked through Crowther's room. I found only one drawer locked up in the whole place, one of the drawers in his table desk - the bottom drawer on the left, if you're interested.' He turned round and glared at Lewis, and his voice sounded harsh and fierce. 'I opened the drawer, and I found ... I found a photograph of Sue.' His voice had suddenly become very quiet and he turned again to look out of the window. 'A copy of the same photograph she gave to me.' But he spoke these last words so softly that Lewis was unable to catch them.

Epilogue.

It was done.

Lewis drove home for his lunch, hoping that his wife was feeling better. He pa.s.sed a newspaper placard with bold, large headlines: WOODSTOCK MURDER - WOMAN HELPING POLICE. He didn't stop to buy a copy.

Morse went along once more to the cell block, and spent a few minutes with Sue. 'Anything you want?'

There were tears in her eyes as she shook her head, and he stood by her in the cell, awkward and lost. 'Inspector?'

'Yes.'

'Perhaps you can't believe me, and it doesn't matter anyway. But... I loved you.'

Morse said nothing. He felt his eyes p.r.i.c.kling and he rubbed his left hand across them, and prayed that she would notice nothing. For a while he could not trust himself to speak, and when he did he looked down at his darling girl and said only, 'Goodbye, Sue.'

He walked outside and locked the door of the cell behind him. He could say no more. He tore himself away and walked along the corridor, and he heard her voice for the last time.

'Inspector?'

He turned. She stood by the bars of the cell, her face streaming with tears of anguish and despair.

'Inspector, you never did tell me your Christian name.'

It was getting dark when Morse finally left his office. He climbed into his Lancia, drove out of the yard on which the puddles now had almost dried, and turned left into the main stream of the city-bound traffic. As he pa.s.sed the ring-road roundabout, he saw two people standing on the gra.s.s verge thumbing a lift. One was a girl, a pretty girl by the look of her. Perhaps the other was a girl, too. It was difficult to tell. He drove on to his home in Oxford.

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