[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.I met Mrs.Duncan briefly.She’s the candidate who was taken ill and couldn’t be here.” Narraway leaned forward, conspiratorially.“Can I give you some advice, Inspector?”Whether Robin wanted advice or not, there’d be no point in refusing; Narraway was clearly going to provide it.“I’m always ready to listen to anything helpful.”“Make sure you don’t just interview people here.Spread the net wider.”“I’m sorry?”“Mrs.Duncan’s no-show.Highly suspicious, if you ask me.”Robin wasn’t asking.Anyway, that was already on his to-do list, and he didn’t appreciate amateurs teaching him his business.He rose, indicating the interview was over.“Is that all?” Narraway appeared disappointed.“For the moment.You’ll have to sign this statement once it’s written up, but you’re free to go now.So long as you don’t flee the country or anything.” Robin grinned, the smile vanishing as rapidly as it had appeared.Oliver Narraway wasn’t amused.“Thank you, Mr.Narraway.”“My pleasure.” Narraway muttered something about offering help—and having it snubbed—under his breath as he crossed the library and opened the door.As he went out, as if on cue, someone else came in.“Excuse me, can you tell me what’s to be done with me?”“I beg your pardon?” Robin swallowed hard at the sight of the young teacher he’d spotted earlier.The one with the emerald eyes and the neatly ironed shirt.If this had been any other situation, he could have thought of at least a dozen things to do with Old Green Eyes, but at the moment, any of them would be off the agenda.“Am I to go home or make a statement or what?” Matthews rubbed his head like a schoolboy.“I thought I’d been forgotten.”Who could have forgotten a bloke who looked like him?Robin used to count just about every moment in the classrooms here as torture, but he’d have been a damned sight more enthusiastic if his teachers had a face like this bloke’s.He’d have busted his backside trying to do something good and win one of those slightly lopsided, green-eyed smiles, like the one that had come round the door with him.The inspector was bombarded with voices in his head telling him how inappropriate it would have been to have those sorts of “pupil fancies the teacher” thoughts back then.It wasn’t even right to have them now.Policeman fancies witness? Not allowed.“No, you’re right here on my list.” Robin waved the relevant paper and tried to look professional rather than libidinous.“Come and have a seat.”Matthews crossed the library with an easy stride and swung into the chair by the table.“Thank you, Inspector Bright.” The lopsided smile flashed again.Robin concentrated on taking a drink of water to ease his throat.Why had it become so difficult to speak clearly? Or think clearly, for that matter? “We’re asking everyone to tell us where they were from the end of Simon Ford’s presentation to what should have been the start of Youngs’s.”“I think I was in full public view during all that time, apart from when I nipped to the loo, but Victor was in there washing his hands so even that’s accounted for.I suppose that makes me the chief suspect?” Matthews looked more anxious than his chipper words implied.It sounded like an act, but Bright wasn’t sure which play was being performed.Nervous witness making a joke or clever double bluff?“Give the comedy a rest.” Robin didn’t have time at present for jokes, even from witnesses with bloody boyish grins.“What I want is some more detail.Not about the toilet visit—the rest of it.”He jotted down the particulars as Matthews—suitably serious now—related how he’d had lunch, gone to get a signal to make a phone call, chatted to the vicar, and worked over the data analysis.So far so good; everything checked off with what other people had said, and Robin hoped the same would happen when he and Anderson compared notes.Although.“Something doesn’t make much sense.You said you had to go out of the school to find a signal for your phone, but Youngs’s was connecting to the network all right, assuming you could hear it in the kitchen.”“He’ll be—sorry, he would have been—with O2, I guess.You can get that on the premises if you sit in the right chair.Move a yard either way.” Matthews shrugged [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]