The Burden of Doubt Read Online Free PDF Page B

spend most of my time at work. That’s the only way I can see of getting through …’ His head sank down towards his chest.
    Swift clicked his pen closed and got up. ‘We’ll leave things there, sir,’ he said, going on to offer the services of a family liaison officer if Patel so wished, even though he guessed that the doctor would decline. Which was the case. And done with a degree of sadness and dignity which both officers could only admire.
     
    ‘What do you think, sir?’ Laura had cajoled beakers of coffee from the machine and brought them into Swift’s office. Feeling peckish she took a banana and a Mars bar from the plastic boxshe had filled at the canteen earlier. She knew she should choose the healthy banana, but it had been a long hard day, and chocolate was what she needed. ‘You had the good doctor worried when you pushed him on the enemy scenario,’ she said, peeling back the Mars bar’s shiny brown wrapping. ‘He knows a lot more than he’s telling us.’
    ‘Agreed. So what is it he knows that he doesn’t want to tell us? That his wife had enemies in the family? Or maybe at work? I’d guess that being a hospital consultant could involve getting on the wrong side of a number of patients for starters, that’s before you start considering the rivalries and jealousies within the staff structure.’ Swift took a sip of his coffee and made a little grimace of distaste.
    ‘Or that she’d been playing away and Patel had a massive grudge?’ Laura offered, her mind suddenly veering away once more to her impulsive exploits with Saul the night before. But at least she wasn’t an adulterer; or not knowingly so at least. Her heart gave a rabbit’s foot thump as it occurred to her that Saul might be married. The issue had never been broached; he’d always struck her as a man with no ties.
    ‘Fair enough.’ Swift picked up his beaker and then laid it down again. ‘It was interesting that he didn’t try to provide himself an alibi. In fact, he didn’t even ask us when she died. And he didn’t appear to respond any differently to our questions about what he did after he’d left the conference than he did with the questions about what happened before he left the house.’
    ‘Which is, of course, what we’d most like to know.’
    ‘He must be tough,’ Swift said, ‘climbing Inglelborough on a day like this.’
    ‘Or indeed, any day at all,’ Laura responded with grimace, being a girl who believed in the car rather than the feet as a means of getting from one point to another. ‘And I’ll bet you don’t get many folks who could provide an alibi up there.’
    ‘Any more than you would regarding the time he left the house earlier,’ Swift mused. ‘It’s not overlooked by either of the neighbours ’ windows. Which doesn’t really matter, because ourpresent time frame for the time of death isn’t precise enough for us to be able to eliminate him, even if he was seen leaving the house.’
    Laura stretched, sensing that their discussion and the long day’s work was coming to a close. She wondered what she had in the fridge for supper. And the thought prompted her to remember that when she had left her flat, Saul had still been there. She sent up a fervent prayer that he would be nowhere in sight when she eventually arrived back. Not tonight, not ever again. ‘So, what next?’ she asked her boss.
    ‘We do the usual,’ he said. ‘House to house. Talk to the nearest and dearest. Talk to the work colleagues. Find any witnesses. Set up a fingertip search for the murder weapon. Wait for what forensics can tell us. Find out who regularly visited the household, follow them up. The old story: trace, investigate, eliminate.’
    Laura popped the final piece of Mars bar into her mouth, and looked doubtfully at the banana. Boring old footwork, she thought. She reminded herself of her Mini out there in the car park and permitted herself an inner smile.
     
    A few miles from the elegance and comfort