By the way, I said, before we go any further, I must tell you that I havent got my aunts keys with me.
I had hardly expected that. I wanted only your permission to enter. I assure you that well do no damage.
Im afraid I cant allow it. The flat is in my charge.
It would look so much better if it ever came to a jury, Mr. Pulling, Sparrow began, but the inspector interrupted him. Sparrow. Take the next turning on the left. We will take Mr. Pulling home.
You can call on me after Christmas, I said, that is, if you have a search warrant.
Chapter 20
I had expected the inspector and Detective-Sergeant Sparrow to come and see me, but they didnt even telephone. A picture postcard turned up unexpectedly from Tooley. It was the view of a rather ugly temple in Katmandu and she had written on it, I am on a marvellous trip. Love, Tooley. I had quite forgotten that I had given her my address. There was no reference to Christmas (the season, I suppose, had passed unnoticed in Nepal), and I felt the more proud of her casual remembrance.
When Boxing Day[225] was over I drove to the Crown and Anchor a little before closing time in the afternoon. I wanted to see the flat in case the inspector turned up with his search warrant. If there were any discreditable remnants of Wordsworth still lying about the place I wanted to remove them, and I carried a small week-end case with me for the purpose. All my working life I had been strictly loyal to one establishment, the bank, but my loyalty now was drawn in quite another direction. Loyalty to a person inevitably entails loyalty to all the imperfections of a human being, even to the chicanery and immorality from which my aunt was not entirely free. I wondered whether she had ever forged a cheque or robbed a bank, and I smiled at the thought with the tenderness I might have shown in the past to a small eccentricity.
When I reached the Crown and Anchor I looked cautiously in at the window of the saloon bar. Why cautiously? I had every right to be there it was still opening time. The day was grey with a threat of snow and the customers were all pressing against the bar to get their last refill before three oclock. I could see the back of the girl, who was still in jodhpurs, and a large hairy hand laid against it. Another double, pint of best bitter, double pink. The clock stood at two minutes to three. It was as though they were whipping up their horses on the last straight before the winning post, and there was a great deal of irregular crowding. I found the right key to open the side door and climbed the stairs. On the second landing I sat down for a moment on my aunts sofa. I felt as illicit as a burglar and I listened for footsteps, but of course there was only the buzz and murmur of the bar.
When I opened the door of the flat I found everything in deep darkness. I set an occasional table rocking in the hall and something Venetian tinkled into fragments on the floor. When I drew the curtains the Venetian glasses had no glitter they had gone dead like unused pearls[226]. There was a scurf of correspondence on the floor among the broken glass, but it consisted mainly of circulars and I didnt bother to examine them for the moment. I went into my aunts bedroom with a sense of shame yet hadnt she asked me to see that all was in order? I remembered how meticulously Colonel Hakim had explored the hotel room and how easily he had been outwitted, but I could see no candles anywhere, except in the kitchen, where they were of a normal size and weight presumably a genuine precaution against an electric failure.
In Wordsworths room the bed had been stripped and the hideous Walt Disney figures had all been put into drawers. The only decoration left was a framed photograph of Freetown harbour which showed market women in bright dresses with baskets on their heads descending some old steps towards the waterfront. I hadnt noticed it when I came before perhaps my aunt had hung it there in memory of Wordsworth.
I returned to the sitting-room and began to go through the post. One day my aunt might send me a forwarding address, but in any case I wanted to save anything remotely personal from the scrutiny of Woodrow and Sparrow if they came. My old acquaintance Omo had written, and there were various bills from a laundry, a wine-merchants, a grocers. I was surprised not to find a bank statement, but remembering the gold brick and the suitcase stuffed with notes, I thought that perhaps my aunt preferred to keep her resources liquid[227]. In that case, it seemed to me wise to take a closer look among the dresses she had left behind, for it would be dangerous to leave cash about in the empty flat.
Then among the bills I came on something which interested me a picture postcard from Panama showing a French liner on a very blue sea. The card was written in French, in a tiny economic script to take full advantage of the small space. The writer signed himself with the initials A.D. and he wrote, so far as I could make out, what a concours de circonstances miraculeux[228] it had been to find my aunt on the ship after all these years of a triste séparation[229] and what a calamity it was that she had left the boat before the end of the cruise and not given him a longer chance to live over again the memories they shared. After her departure A.D.s lumbago had taken a turn for the worse and the gout had revived in his right toe.