Did you spend the rest of the night by yourself in your room?’
She blushed deeply. Embarrassment or anger?’
‘What does that question mean?’
‘I’m sorry. I put it badly. Did you leave your room for any purpose after you returned to the hotel.’
‘No. Oh, I see. You mean did I kill David.’ Her tone was disgusted. ‘No I did not leave my room and go to David’s hotel and kill him.’
‘That wasn’t what I meant, although you are strong enough, and you might have a motive I don’t know about. We found a glass with lipstick on it in his room.’
‘Ah, you think I might have gone to make love with him?’ She relaxed and shook her head. ‘I wish I had. He might be alive now.’
‘Somebody visited him, Miss Tils. A woman.’
‘Apparently, Inspector, but not me. I haven’t worn lipstick in ten years.’ She looked interested in spite of herself, ‘I wonder who David had tucked away in Montreal?’
‘I’ll find out. Miss Tils, as a friend of Professor Summers, do you know anything about his private life that might lead to someone killing him? Women, debts, anything like that?’
She shook her head. ‘It must be something like that, I know. But I don’t know of anyone. Certainly no one here, not even Dunkley.’
‘How can you be so sure?’
‘He’s got an alibi, hasn’t he? But call it my intuition. I know Dunkley. He wouldn’t do anything like that.’
Once again the hair prickled on Salter’s scalp as he felt her withholding something. What’s going on, he wondered.
On an impulse, instead of meeting his last appointment immediately, he returned to Carrier’s office and walked in without waiting for an invitation. As he appeared, Dunkley rose from his chair and walked past him, ignoring him. Carrier sat still, saying nothing, and Salter took the vacant chair.
‘Mr Carrier. I forgot to ask you about a statement. Since you and Professor Dunkley roomed together, you will be able to confirm each other’s story, won’t you? I’ll need a statement signed. May I just check the facts again?’ Salter consulted his notebook and pretended to read back to Carrier what he had said. He continued, ‘A couple more details then. What time did you and Professor Dunkley get to your room?’
‘About ten-thirty.’
‘And you stayed all night in your room?’
‘Yes.’
‘What time did you leave it in the morning?’
‘I don’t remember. After eight.’
‘You must have been tired out. A bit drunk?’
Carrier said nothing.
‘Well; that checks, doesn’t it?’ Salter said with a smile. ‘If you can think of anything that might help me, anything at all, anything Summers said or did, for example, you’ll let me know won’t you? I’ll check all this with the hotel staff, of course, but I don’t expect they will have noticed anything, will they?’
Why are you looking so frightened, Salter wondered. Probably because you went back for a last trip to the stripjoint. Or a whorehouse. Were they legal in Montreal? Salter stared hard at the professor, wishing he knew more about interrogation techniques.
Last came Pollock. The name sounded familiar to Salter, but the man was a stranger to him. He was the first one Salter had met who looked like a proper professor. Dark suit, large bow tie, and black, old-fashioned boots which he placed at right-angles to each other as he bowed (or seemed to) his visitor through the door. Smallish and dapper, he affected a curly pipe with a lid, held in his mouth with one hand. When Salter was inside, he turned, placed his boots at right-angles again and waited for Salter to speak.
He’s trying to twinkle, Salter thought, but he’s a bit young for it. About thirty-five.
Eventually, after a long puff at his pipe, Pollock went around his desk and sat down, crossing his legs sideways to the desk and propping the elbow supporting the pipe on the desk with his head facing Salter.
He’s going to say, ‘What can I do for you, Inspector?’ thought Salter.
Pollock removed the pipe, looked at it, put it back, puffed on it, removed it again, and said, ‘What can I do for you, Inspector?’
‘I need a motive, Mr Pollock, and I might find it in Summers’s background. I am told you were his oldest friend here. First, do you know of any women in his life, apart from his wife?’ Salter felt as if he was on stage, playing ‘the policeman’ to Pollock’s ‘professor’.
Pollock considered. ‘No,’ he said decisively. ‘There have been. But not for years.’
‘You are sure of that?’
‘Certain. David never had long affairs. Over the years he fell in love once or twice; I always knew, because he told me. And his wife. That’s why they didn’t last long.’
‘His wife put a stop to them?’
‘No. Just the fact that she knew.’
‘But he was not “in love” at the moment?’
‘No.’
‘You are certain?’
‘Yes.’
‘There could have been no brief fling in Montreal with one of his colleagues, perhaps?’ I don’t usually talk like this, thought Salter wonderingly.
‘No.’
‘You are certain?’
‘Yes.’
Now it was in danger of becoming one of those nightmares on stage where a bit of dialogue keeps returning to its departure point because of a wrong cue. Salter shook himself.
‘Do you mind telling me how you are so sure of yourself?’
Pollock puffed four times and delivered his line. ‘Because he only has one female colleague, Marika Tils, and he did not have a brief fling with her.’
‘How do you know?’
‘Because I asked her.’
‘I see. And she is to be believed, is she?’
‘Absolutely.’ Puff, pause, puff. ‘You see, Inspector,’ puff, ‘Marika and I are lovers.’ Puff, puff, puff.
Jesus Christ, thought Salter. What a world these people live in. He pulled a scrap of paper from his pocket. ‘These conversations are entirely confidential, Professor, and I think I can trust you. This message was found in his mailbox in the hotel.’ He read it: ‘See you later. Wait for me. Jane.’
Pollock looked confused.
Gotcha,
