The Sentence Is Death

‘I did try. Yes. But I got no answer.’ Spencer brought the handkerchief up again, screwing it into the corner of his eye. ‘He should have been with me. We’ve been together for nine years. We do everything together. We bought the house together. I can’t believe that anyone would do this to him. I mean, Richard was one of the kindest men in the world.’

‘Do you always take Monday morning off?’ Grunshaw’s voice was unemotional now. Everything about her – the way she sat, her heavy plastic spectacles, her black, pudding-basin hairstyle – could have been designed to remove any sense of empathy.

Spencer nodded. ‘We never take the A12 on a Sunday evening. There’s too much traffic. If Richard had been with me, we’d have left at the crack of dawn. He was always focused on his work. But I’m my own boss. I have an art gallery in Bury Street, just round the corner from Christie’s. We specialise in early twentieth-century art.’ That explained the Gills and the Ravilious. ‘We’re open Tuesday to Saturday so on Monday I work from home.’

‘You spoke to Mr Pryce last night.’ Grunshaw picked up the thread again.

‘Yes. I rang him at about eight o’clock.’

‘How can you be so sure of the time?’

‘It was the twenty-seventh yesterday and the clocks had gone back. I’d just finished going round the house and I rang on my mobile.’ He took it out and thumbed a few buttons, checking his call register. ‘Here you are!’ he exclaimed. ‘Eight o’clock exactly.’

‘Get a decent signal in Clacton?’ That was Hawthorne, speaking for the first time, on the edge of hostile. But there was nothing new about that.

Stephen Spencer ignored him.

‘Can you tell us what your husband said during your conversation?’ Grunshaw asked.

‘He asked me what I’d been doing. We talked about the weather and about Mum . . . the usual sort of thing. He sounded a bit down. He said he was still worried about the case he’d been working on.’

‘What case was that?’

‘It was a divorce case. I’m sure you’ve heard that Richard was a divorce lawyer, a very successful one. He had just represented a property developer called Adrian Lockwood. His wife was that writer . . . you know . . . Akira . . .’ Her second name had slipped from his mind.

‘Akira Anno,’ I said.

‘That’s right.’ His eyes widened as he suddenly remembered. ‘You know that she threatened him. She came up to him in a restaurant and she threw wine at him. I was there!’

‘What exactly happened?’

‘I should have told you immediately. I don’t know why I didn’t. But coming home this morning and finding the police here and Richard . . .’

He paused, collecting himself, then continued.

‘We were having dinner together at The Delaunay in Aldwych. This would have been last Monday, a week ago. It was Richard’s favourite restaurant and we often met there after work . . . it was sort of convenient for both of us and then we’d get a taxi home. Anyway, we’d just finished eating when I saw this woman coming over, passing between the tables. She was short, Japanese-looking, and I didn’t recognise her. There was another woman with her, just behind.

‘Anyway, she stopped at our table and Richard looked up. Of course, he knew who she was at once but he didn’t seem particularly disturbed. He muttered something polite, “Can I help you?” or something, and she looked down at him with this weird little smile on her face. She was wearing tinted glasses. “You’re a pig!” Those were her opening words. She said something about the divorce, how unfair it had been. And then she reached down and picked up my wine glass. I’d been drinking red wine and we’d finished the meal but there were still a couple of inches left. For a crazy moment, I thought she was going to drink it but instead she threw it all over his head. Richard had wine on his face and on his shirt. It was outrageous. I thought we should call the police but he didn’t want to make a scene. He just wanted to leave.’

‘What else did she say?’

‘Well, that’s the thing. Immediately after she’d thrown the wine she put the glass down and said something about how really she wished she could hit him with a bottle.’ Spencer stopped as the significance of what he had just described caught up with him. ‘Oh my God! That was how he was killed, wasn’t it!’ His hands flew out, one on each side of his head. ‘She told him she was going to do it!’

‘We’re not jumping to any conclusions, Mr Spencer,’ Grunshaw said.

‘What do you mean, you’re not jumping to conclusions? She confessed. She admitted it. There were a dozen witnesses.’

‘Did he mention her name when the two of you were on the phone on Sunday night?’