Gently Down the Stream by Alan Hunter

at St Giles’ Hall from the time the rehearsal commenced at seven-thirty until you left to catch your bus at twenty-past ten. Is that correct?’
    ‘Perfectly correct … you’ve only to ask John Playfair. Or anyone else who was there.’
    Gently nodded absently. ‘And what time did your bus leave?’
    ‘At ten thirty-five from Castle Paddock.’
    ‘And arrived here?’
    ‘At eleven o’clock. You get off at Wrackstead Turn.’
    ‘How about the bus going?’
    ‘I took the ten to seven.’
    ‘Then would you be kind enough to tell me, Miss Lammas, what you were doing between the time you finished your early tea served at five-thirty and ten minutes to seven?’
    There was the briefest of pauses, just sufficient to warn the alert Hansom that Gently had struck oil of some sort. Then Pauline Lammas laughed, only a fraction off-cue.
    ‘Of course, inspector … on Friday night I took the early bus!’
    ‘Why?’ fired Gently.
    ‘Why—? To do some shopping, I suppose.’
    ‘What shops are open after six o’clock?’
    ‘What shops? Oh … I don’t know! It was window shopping.’
    ‘You took an early bus, simply to window-shop?’
    ‘Yes, why not?’
    ‘When you are in town every day of the week?’
    ‘One doesn’t get much time, in business.’
    ‘Why in fact did you come home at all, Miss Lammas? Wouldn’t it have been easier for you to have had tea in the city and to have gone to the rehearsal from there?’
    Pauline Lammas laughed again, this time well on cue.
    ‘You are a detective, aren’t you, inspector? It wouldn’t do to have any secrets from you!’
    ‘This isn’t answering the question.’
    ‘But it scarcely needs answering. I came home not long after lunch. Friday afternoon is slack and I am a privileged employee … why are you trying to catch me out, inspector?’
    Gently grunted and struck a light for his extinguished pipe.
    ‘I shouldn’t have to remind you that this is a serious business, Miss Lammas … we want the truth, and not a special selection from it. I put it to you that you haven’t given me the real reason why you took the earlier bus to town on Friday evening.’
    A sullen look crept over the girl’s face. ‘And if I put it to you , inspector, that my real reason had nothing to do with my father’s death – won’t that be sufficient answer?’
    ‘You must let me be judge of that.’
    ‘I’m sorry, but I don’t propose to.’
    ‘That may be unfortunate, Miss Lammas. It may lead me to attach more importance to the circumstance than it deserves.’
    ‘Then you’ll simply have to, inspector, won’t you?’
    Gently puffed silently a few moments, aware of a delighted Hansom at his elbow. Pauline Lammas lit a second cigarette from her first. She reached forward to stub out the butt in the ashtray on the table and Gently noticed a slight tremor in her well-groomed hand.
    ‘You were very fond of your father, were you not, Miss Lammas?’
    ‘I understood Daddy. We always got on together.’
    ‘Your brother, on the other hand, was antagonistic towards him.’
    ‘Paul is a spoiled little fool. It was Mother who set him against Daddy. He’s been spoiled and pampered until he’s no good to himself or anyone else.’
    ‘There was some trouble about him refusing to enter the business, wasn’t there?’
    ‘Dear me yes! It was quite typical of Paul. He knew Daddy wanted so badly to have him in the business and to change the name to “Lammas & Son Ltd.” – he could have walked right into a partnership as soon as he left the Grammar School. But Paul do what was expected of him? Paul soil his hands with dirty commerce? Good heavens, he was a poet – he wasn’t going to waste his time in bourgeois money-grubbing!’
    ‘You supported your father, of course?’
    ‘He needed someone to support him, inspector! His life here has been hell ever since I can remember. He was nobody in this house, except an intruder. If it hadn’t been for us I feel pretty sure he would