of freckles across his nose, he looked barely thirty. His baggy trousers and navy blue parka gave more the impression of a city postman than a high-ranking police investigator. Green had learned to cultivate this lack of physical presence. Like a good spy, it allowed him to move and observe unseen.
Still, at times he would have appreciated a more authoritative bearing. As now, when grieving relatives needed someone to lean on, although the relative standing before him did not appear about to crumple into his arms. The man looked in his mid forties, dark-haired and probably handsome at one time, but now baggy-eyed and gone to seed. His eyes were slightly bloodshot, but that was his only concession to grief. He frowned as if Green were a pesky vacuum salesman interrupting his busy day.
Green introduced himself briskly, apologized for the intrusion and asked to see Ruth Walker.
“Is this really necessary, Inspector? She’s resting, and she already spoke to a police officer yesterday.”
“Yes, Sergeant Sullivan. I’m just following up. Your name is?”
“What’s this for? The old man had a heart attack, he’s dead. It was quick and painless. What else is there to know?”
“Routine. Are you Donald Reid, his son-in-law?”
“I don’t see why you need to know, but yes.” He blinked several times. When Green continued to stand in the doorway, he stepped back with a scowl.
“Very well. Come in.”
Mrs. Walker took about five minutes to come downstairs, and in the meantime Green absorbed impressions about the house. It was a quiet house, not just hushed in grief, but constrained. Everything had its place. The living room was furnished in expensive woods, testimony to the family’s material success. Colour-coordinated watercolours adorned the walls, and china figurines sat on the mahogany table tops. Not a room for children, Green thought, although he had glimpsed a flash of teenage boys in the kitchen as he passed by.
When Mrs. Walker entered, she was leaning on a younger woman whom Green assumed to be her daughter. Dressed in red slacks and a red and white striped sweater, with not a strand of her cropped black hair out of place, Margaret Reid was the image of her living room. She perched emotionless on the edge of her chair.
Her mother, on the other hand, wore an old beige cardigan and ill-fitting tweed skirt. Her hair billowed in a cloud of grey curls, and her face was blotched with tears. Green had expected a broad, heavy farmer’s face, but Mrs. Walker was delicately boned, with deep-set blue eyes and a finely pointed chin.
“How do you do, Inspector? I’m Ruth Walker. How may I help you?”
Green was not an authority on British accents, but he had watched enough Masterpiece Theatre productions to recognize this one as rich, precise and public school. The tilt of her head and the grace with which she extended her hand made him feel shabby. He drew out his notebook and summoned all the dignity his cheap parka permitted.
“First of all, let me extend my condolences on the death of your husband. The way he died so unexpectedly must have been a shock.”
She eased herself stiffly into a heavy velvet chair opposite him. Her blue eyes held his, but he thought they moistened.
“Yes, it was. Although I suppose I ought to have seen it coming. I’ve known for some time he wasn’t well.”
“In what way? Dizzy spells?”
“Not exactly. More shortness of breath.”
“Had he ever fallen before?”
She hesitated, and in her instant of discomfiture, the surly son-in-law snorted. “Lots of times. He always had one bruise or another. It means nothing, detective.”
Green kept his eyes on the widow. “Had he seen a doctor recently?”
Ruth looked across the coffee table at him. Through the veil of grief, he saw a faint smile. “One didn’t take Eugene anywhere. If he chose to go, that was fine. But he didn’t choose to.”
“Why?”
“I expect because he didn’t want to hear the bad news. He was from the old country, Inspector. They’re rather more fatalistic than you are over here. When it’s time, it’s time. No use fighting it with pills and machines.”
“Do you think he was depressed?”
“No, not exactly depressed. I mean, he was ready to go. I think he had…” A spasm crossed her face but disappeared before he could analyze it. “…made his peace.”
“Almost as if he were waiting for death?”
Her eyes fixed his intently. “Exactly. It was always Eugene’s dream to retire to the country, and once he did, he rarely left the house. He spent most of his day in his chair, just looking out the window.”
He smiled. “Dreaming about Trafalgar Square, probably. Or his favourite country pub.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Green saw Margaret open her mouth, but Ruth shot her a quick glance which silenced her. “Eugene liked to say that his life began when he came to Canada,” Ruth said. “All that happened before was best put behind us. He never talked about it.”
It jarred with the picture Green had begun to paint. He thought of his own father, who also spent his days sitting in a chair, but who had his own reasons for not wanting to relive the past. Green wondered what Walker’s reasons were, and if Ruth’s glance at Margaret had been meant to silence her. “Odd,” he mused casually. “Most elderly people love to reminisce. Sometimes the old days are all they talk about, especially if, like your husband, they have little else they can do now but sit in a chair.”
She didn’t rise to the bait. “Yes, a disheartening way for a strong, proud man to spend his last days.”
There was a quiet finality to her words, as if she were closing the door. Respecting that, he moved on. “Can you run through what happened yesterday?
At this point the surly son-in-law, who had subsided in the corner, re-entered the fray. “Inspector, I really don’t see the point in this. Ruth, you don’t need to put yourself through this.”
“I don’t mind, Don. He has a job to do.”
Green admired her quiet dignity. With barely a quiver, she recounted the events of yesterday from their departure to her discovery of the body at one o’clock. Only when she described the sight of him did she falter, pressing her fingers to her lips. Green sensed Don beginning to rise, and he held up a warning hand.
“Where was he in relation to the car?”
“I’m not sure. He—” She broke off, her hands fluttering up to her face at the memory. “He…he was lying alongside the car, his head towards the front wheel, I think.”
In perfect position beneath the side mirror, he thought. “Driver’s side?”
“Oh, no, passenger’s side. Eugene hadn’t driven in years.”
“I’d like to look at the car. Is it one of the cars outside?”
“Yes, Don fetched it.”
