Final Account by Peter Robinson Page A

system and several racks of compact discs, a glass-fronted cabinet of crystalware and a small bookcase mostly full of modern fiction and books about music.
    But it was the far end of the room that caught Banks’s interest, for there stood a music stand, with some sheet music on it, and beside that, on a chair, lay what he first took to be an oversized violin, but quickly recognized as a viola.
    The woman sat on the sofa, curling her legs up beside her, and Banks and Susan took the armchairs.
    â€œAre you a musician?” Banks asked.
    â€œYes,” she said.
    â€œProfessional?”
    â€œUh-huh. I’m with the Northern Philharmonia, and I do a bit of chamber work on the side. Why?”
    â€œJust curious.” Banks was impressed. The English Northern Philharmonia played for Opera North, among other things, and was widely regarded as one of the best opera orchestras in the country. He had been to see Opera North’s superb production of La Bohème recently and must have heard Pamela Jeffreys play.
    â€œMs Jeffreys,” he began, after a brief silence. “I must admit that your phone call has us a bit confused.”
    â€œNot half as much as that rubbish in the newspaper has me confused.” She had no Indian accent at all, just West Yorkshire with a cultured, university edge.
    Banks slipped a recent good-quality photograph of Keith Rothwell from his briefcase and passed it to her. “Is this the man we’re talking about?”
    â€œYes. I think this is Robert, though he looks a bit stiff here.” She handed it back. “There’s a mistake, isn’t there? It must be someone who looks just like him, that’s it.”
    â€œWhat exactly was your relationship?”
    She fiddled with her necklace. “We’re friends. Maybe we were more than that, at one time, but now we’re just friends.”
    â€œWere you lovers?”
    â€œYes. For a while.”
    â€œFor how long?”
    â€œThree or four months.”
    â€œUntil when?”
    â€œSix months ago.”
    â€œSo you’ve known him for about ten months altogether?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œHow did you meet?”
    â€œIn a pub. The Boulevard, on Westgate, actually. I was with some friends. Robert was by himself. We just got talking, like you do.”
    â€œHave you seen him since you stopped being lovers?”
    â€œYes. I told you. We remained friends. We don’t see each other as often, of course, but we still go out every now and then, purely Platonic. I like Robert. He’s good fun to be with, even when we stopped being lovers. Look, what’s all this in—”
    â€œWhen did you last see him, Ms Jeffreys?”
    â€œPamela. Please call me Pamela. Let me see … it must have been a month or more ago. Look, is this some mistake, or what?”
    â€œWe don’t know yet, Pamela,” Susan Gay said. “We really don’t, love. You’ll help us best get it sorted out if you answer Chief Inspector Banks’s questions.”
    Pamela nodded.
    â€œWas there anything unusual about Mr … about Robert the last time you saw him?” Banks asked.
    â€œNo.”
    â€œHe didn’t say anything, tell you about anything that was worrying him?”
    â€œNo. Robert never seemed to worry about anything. Except he hated being called Bob.”
    â€œSo there was nothing at all different about him?”
    â€œWell, I wouldn’t say that.”
    â€œOh?”
    â€œIt’s just a guess, like.”
    â€œWhat was it?”
    â€œI think he’d met someone else. Another woman. I think he was in love.”
    Banks swallowed, hardly able to believe what he was hearing. This couldn’t be dull, dry, mild-mannered Keith Rothwell. Surely Rothwell wasn’t the kind of man to have a wife and children in Swainsdale and a beautiful girlfriend like Pamela Jeffreys in Leeds, whom he could simply dump for yet another