The Sentence Is Death

‘And while we’re on the subject, maybe we should be talking about her own income. She was always very cagey about how much money she was earning but I can tell you that she had plenty of spare cash stashed away under the mattress. You can’t be married to someone for three years and hide that sort of thing, even if the marriage is as useless as ours. She was loaded but here’s the funny thing. Wherever the money was coming from, it wasn’t from her writing. I happened to catch sight of one of her royalty statements from Virago Books and I can tell you, it wouldn’t have paid for a wet weekend in Torquay! For all her airs and graces, it seems there isn’t much of an audience for clinically depressed call girls surviving Hiroshima or weird Japanese poems that don’t make any sense.’

He plucked out another handful of the bilberries.

‘As a matter of fact, I was the one who suggested to Richard that he should call in Navigant and it’s just as well I did because the moment she knew we were on to her, she caved in. Suddenly she was all for coming to an agreement and forget Justice Cocklecarrot and the rest of it. That was pretty much the end of it. We settled everything outside the court. She got the house in Holland Park and I let her keep the Jag. But the actual settlement was a tenth of what she’d hoped for, and frankly, if it had meant seeing the back of her, I’d have happily paid twice as much.’

Another bark of laughter. Nobody enjoyed their own witticisms more than Adrian Lockwood.

But Hawthorne still wasn’t smiling. ‘Why do you think Richard Pryce made that call on the day he died?’ he asked. ‘There was obviously something that was worrying him.’

‘Are you certain it related to my divorce?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then I have no idea. Presumably he’d found out something about Akira, about her income – where it was coming from. If she was breaking the law, I’m sure he’d have wanted to take the matter further. But for what it’s worth, I wouldn’t have cared if she was the top hitwoman for the Mafia. I would have told him to forget it. As far as I was concerned, she was over. We’d come to an agreement. I was a single man. I never wanted to hear her name again.’

Lockwood sank back into the sofa, a smug look on his face.

‘Just out of interest, where were you when your lawyer was killed, Mr Lockwood?’ Hawthorne asked.

‘Why on earth do you want to know?’

‘Why do you think?’ Hawthorne’s voice was bleak, on the edge of rude. ‘We need to know where everyone was on Sunday evening between eight and nine o’clock.’

‘So you can eliminate them from your enquiries? That’s how you put it in police speak, I believe.’

‘That’s right.’

‘Well, let me think. Sunday evening . . . I had a drink with a friend of mine over in Highgate – Davina Richardson. I got to her house around six and left about eight fifteen. After that, I drove home. I got in about nine o’clock and watched television.’

‘What did you watch?’

‘Downton Abbey. Does that answer your question, Mr Hawthorne?’

I sat up when he mentioned the name Davina Richardson although it had taken me a moment to remember where I had heard it before. Of course. She was the woman who had been left £100,000 in Richard Pryce’s will. So she was part of the triangle that included Pryce and Lockwood! That had to mean something.

Hawthorne had certainly picked up on it. ‘Tell me about Mrs Richardson,’ he said, almost casually, as if he just needed the information to complete his notes.

‘There’s not much to tell. She’s an interior designer I happen to have met. Actually, it was Richard who introduced her to me. She worked on my place in Antibes. Did a bloody good job too.’

‘How did she first meet Richard Pryce?’

‘You should ask her.’

‘I will. But right now I’m asking you.’

‘Well, if you insist. I don’t particularly like talking about my friends behind their backs but if you really want to know, the two of them go back a long way. Richard was at university with her husband and he’s godfather to their child. He was also there when the accident happened.’

‘What accident?’

‘I would have thought you’d have known all about that before you came here, Mr Hawthorne.’ Lockwood was pleased with himself, seeing that he had taken the upper hand. ‘I’m talking about the caving accident that happened six or seven years ago now. Davina’s husband, Charles Richardson, and Richard Pryce were at university together and there was a third man too. I forget his name. Anyway, Charles got lost in the cave system – it was somewhere up in Yorkshire – and never made it out.’