bound to have a current passport'
Wexford said innocently: ‘I thought that might worry you, Mike, so I'm going to book a room at Th e Olive and Dove for the night A little job for Martin. He ’ ll have to sit up all night My heart bleeds for him.'
The Missals' garden was large and roughly diamond-shaped. On the north side, the side where the angle of the diamond was oblique, the garden was bounded by the Kingsbrook, and on the other a hedge of tamarisk separated it from the Kingsbrook Road. Burden unlocked the cedarwood gates to the garage and made a note of the index number of Helen Missal's car. Its rear window was almost entirely filled by a toy tiger cub.
‘I want a sample taken from those tyres, Mike,' Wexford said. 'We've got a sample from the lane by Prewett’ s farm. It's a bit of luck for us that the soil's practically solid cow dung.'
'Blimey,' Burden said, winci ng as he got to his feet He re locked the doors. This is millionaires' row, all right' He put the dried mud into an envelope and pointed towards the houses on the other side of the road: a turreted mansion, a ranch-style bungalow with two double garages and a new house built like a chalet with balconies of dark carved wood.
'Very nice if you can get it,' Wexford said. 'Come on. I'm going to get the car and have another word with Prewett, and, incidentally, the cinema manager. If you'll just drop that key in to Inge, or whatever she calls herself, you can get off home. I shall have to have a word with young Inge tomorrow.'
'When are you going to see Mrs Missal again, sir?'
‘U nless I'm very much mistaken,' Wexford said, 'shell come to me before I can get to her.'
Chapter 5
If she answer thee with No, Wilt thou bow and let her go?
W. J. Linton, Faint Heart
Sergeant Camb was talking to someone on the telephone when Wexford got to the station in the morning. He covered the mouthpiece with his hand and said to the Chief Inspector:
'A Mrs Missal for you, sir. This is the third time she's been on ’
'What does she want?'
'She says she must see you. If s very urgent ’ Camb looked embarrassed. 'She wants to know if you can go to her house ’
'She does, does she? Tell her if she wants me she'll have to come here.' He opened the door of his office. 'Oh, and. Sergeant Camb, you can tell her I won't be here after rune-thirty ’
When he had opened the windows and made his desk untidy - the way he liked it - he stuck his head out of the door again and called for tea.
'Where's Martin?'
'Still at The Olive and Dove, sir ’
'God Almighty! Does he think he's on his holidays? Get on to him and tell him he can get off home ’
It was a fine morning, June coming in like a lamb, and from his desk Wexford could see the gardens of Bury Street and the window-boxes of the Midland Bank full of blown Kaiserskroon tulips. The spring flowers were passing, the summer ones not yet in bud - except for rhododendrons. Just as the first peals of the High School bell began to toll faintly in the distance Sergeant Camb brought in the tea - and Mrs Missal.
'Well have another cup, please ’
She had done her hair up this morning and left off her glasses. The organdie blouse and the pleated skirt made her look surprisingly demure, and Wexford wondered if she had abandoned her hostile manner with the raffish shirt and trousers.
‘I’m afraid I've been rather a silly girl. Chief Inspector,' she said in a confiding voice.
Wexford took a clean piece of paper out of his drawer and began writing on it busily. He couldn't think of anything cogent to put down and as she couldn't see the paper from where she was sitting he just scribbled: Missal, Parsons; Parsons, Missal.
'You see I didn't tell you the entire truth.'
'No?' Wexford said.
‘I don't mean I actually told lies. I mean I left bits out.' 'Oh, yes?'
'Well, the thing is, I didn't actually go to the pictures by myself. I went with a friend, a man friend ’ She smiled as one sophisticate to another. There
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