turned to page 15, and sat looking (again) at the 'ingenious suggestions'.
'Clever – clever analysis,' he remarked.
'Obviously a very clever fellow – the one who wrote that.'
'Pardon?' said Morse.
'The fellow who wrote that letter.'
Morse read the name aloud: 'Mr Lionel Regis? Don't know him myself.'
'Perhaps nobody does.'
'Pardon?'
'See the address?'
Morse looked down again, and shook his head. 'Don't know Salisbury very well myself.'
'It's my address!'
'Really? So – are you saying you wrote this?'
'Stop it!' she almost shrieked. 'You wrote it! You saw my address in the visitors' book at Lyme Regis, and you needed an address – for this letter, otherwise your – your "ingenious suggestions" wouldn’t be accepted. Am I right?'
Morse said nothing.
'You did write it, didn't you? Please tell me!'
‘Yes.'
‘Why? Why? Why go to all this silly palaver?'
‘I just – well, I just picked someone from the top of my mind, that’s all. And you – you were there, Claire. Right at the top.'
He'd spoken simply, and his eyes lifted from her legs to her face; and all the frustration, all the infuriation, suddenly drained away from her, and the tautness in her shoulders was wonderfully relaxed as she leaned back against the soft contours of the settee. For a long time neither of them spoke. Then Claire sat forward, emptied her glass, and got to her feet.
‘Have you got to go?' asked Morse quietly.
‘Fairly soon.'
‘I’ve got another bottle.'
‘Only if you promise to be nice to me.'
‘If I tell you what lovely legs you've got again?'
‘ And if you put the record on again.'
‘CD actually. Bruckner Eight.'
‘ Is that what it was? Not all that far off, was I?
'Very close, really,' said Morse. Then virtually to himself: for a minute or two, very close indeed.
It was halfway through the second movement and three-quarters of the way through the second bottle that the front doorbell rang.
‘I can’t see you for the minute, I'm afraid, sir.'
Strange sniffed, his small eyes suspicious.
‘Really? I'm a little bit surprised about that, Morse. In fact I'm suprisedyou can't see two of me!'
chapter twenty-two
In a Definition-and-Letter-Mixture puzzle, each clue consists of a sentence which contains a definition of the answer and a mixture of the letters
(Don Manley, Chambers Crossword Manual]
there were just the two of them in Strange's office the following morning, Tuesday, 14 July.
It had surprised Strange not a little to hear of Morse's quite unequivocal refusal to postpone a few days of his furlough and return immediately to HQ to take official charge of the case especially in view of the latest letter – surely the break they'd all been hoping for. On the other hand there were more things in life than a blonde damozel who might or might not have been murdrered a year ago. This bloody 'joy' (huh!)-riding, for a start – now hitting the national news and the newspaper headlines. It served, though, to put things into perspective a bit – like the letter he himself had received in the post ('Strictly Personal') that very morning:
To Chief Superintendent Strange, Kidlington Police HQ
Dear Sir,
It is naturally proper that our excellent whodunnit writers should pretend that the average criminal in the UK can boast the capacity for quite exceptional ingenuity in the commission of crime. But those of us who (like you) have given our lives to the detection of such crime should at this present juncture be reminding everyone that the vast majority of criminals are not (fortunately!) blessed with the sort of alpha-plus mentality that is commonly assumed.
Obviously if any criminal is brought to book as a result of the correspondence etc. being conducted in sections of the national press, we shall all be most grateful. But I am myself most doubtful about such an outcome, and indeed in a wider sense I am very much concerned about the precedent involved. We have all heard of trial by TV, and
'Clever – clever analysis,' he remarked.
'Obviously a very clever fellow – the one who wrote that.'
'Pardon?' said Morse.
'The fellow who wrote that letter.'
Morse read the name aloud: 'Mr Lionel Regis? Don't know him myself.'
'Perhaps nobody does.'
'Pardon?'
'See the address?'
Morse looked down again, and shook his head. 'Don't know Salisbury very well myself.'
'It's my address!'
'Really? So – are you saying you wrote this?'
'Stop it!' she almost shrieked. 'You wrote it! You saw my address in the visitors' book at Lyme Regis, and you needed an address – for this letter, otherwise your – your "ingenious suggestions" wouldn’t be accepted. Am I right?'
Morse said nothing.
'You did write it, didn't you? Please tell me!'
‘Yes.'
‘Why? Why? Why go to all this silly palaver?'
‘I just – well, I just picked someone from the top of my mind, that’s all. And you – you were there, Claire. Right at the top.'
He'd spoken simply, and his eyes lifted from her legs to her face; and all the frustration, all the infuriation, suddenly drained away from her, and the tautness in her shoulders was wonderfully relaxed as she leaned back against the soft contours of the settee. For a long time neither of them spoke. Then Claire sat forward, emptied her glass, and got to her feet.
‘Have you got to go?' asked Morse quietly.
‘Fairly soon.'
‘I’ve got another bottle.'
‘Only if you promise to be nice to me.'
‘If I tell you what lovely legs you've got again?'
‘ And if you put the record on again.'
‘CD actually. Bruckner Eight.'
‘ Is that what it was? Not all that far off, was I?
'Very close, really,' said Morse. Then virtually to himself: for a minute or two, very close indeed.
It was halfway through the second movement and three-quarters of the way through the second bottle that the front doorbell rang.
‘I can’t see you for the minute, I'm afraid, sir.'
Strange sniffed, his small eyes suspicious.
‘Really? I'm a little bit surprised about that, Morse. In fact I'm suprisedyou can't see two of me!'
chapter twenty-two
In a Definition-and-Letter-Mixture puzzle, each clue consists of a sentence which contains a definition of the answer and a mixture of the letters
(Don Manley, Chambers Crossword Manual]
there were just the two of them in Strange's office the following morning, Tuesday, 14 July.
It had surprised Strange not a little to hear of Morse's quite unequivocal refusal to postpone a few days of his furlough and return immediately to HQ to take official charge of the case especially in view of the latest letter – surely the break they'd all been hoping for. On the other hand there were more things in life than a blonde damozel who might or might not have been murdrered a year ago. This bloody 'joy' (huh!)-riding, for a start – now hitting the national news and the newspaper headlines. It served, though, to put things into perspective a bit – like the letter he himself had received in the post ('Strictly Personal') that very morning:
To Chief Superintendent Strange, Kidlington Police HQ
Dear Sir,
It is naturally proper that our excellent whodunnit writers should pretend that the average criminal in the UK can boast the capacity for quite exceptional ingenuity in the commission of crime. But those of us who (like you) have given our lives to the detection of such crime should at this present juncture be reminding everyone that the vast majority of criminals are not (fortunately!) blessed with the sort of alpha-plus mentality that is commonly assumed.
Obviously if any criminal is brought to book as a result of the correspondence etc. being conducted in sections of the national press, we shall all be most grateful. But I am myself most doubtful about such an outcome, and indeed in a wider sense I am very much concerned about the precedent involved. We have all heard of trial by TV, and
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