Sally did not answer. Her eyes were far away. She was thinking of her mother sitting in the terrible little room where she had sat for most of the last twenty years.
“Let me assure you, Sally, that never for one moment did I imagine that the killer was you. You had not the ghost of a motive save family history, and the coincidence of that history repeating itself in so exact a manner is so unlikely as to be virtually impossible. Many families have some mental disorder in their line… Why, the producer of this very show could say as much, couldn’t you, Ms Hennessy?”
“Eh?” said Geraldine. She was enjoying Coleridge’s performance hugely, but had not expected to be drawn into it.
“I gather from interviews my officers have held with your staff that on the two occasions when both Sally and Moon spoke about life inside mental hospitals you remarked quite clearly that it was not like that at all. You in fact explained clearly what it was like. I can only presume that you yourself have some experience?” Coleridge glanced once more at the studio door. No sign. Spin it out.
“Well, as it happens you’re right.” Geraldine spoke into the boom mike, which had hastily descended above her head, the studio crew having reacted according to their instincts. “My mum was a bit of a fruitcake herself, Sally, and my dad, as it happens, so believe me, I sympathize with the outrageous prejudice you have had to put up with.”
“A sentiment that does you great credit,” Coleridge said. “Particularly since medical opinion informs me that when both a person’s parents suffer serious mental instability, their offspring has a thirty-six per cent chance of inheriting their challenges.”
Geraldine did not much like having her family’s linen so publicly washed, but at two million dollars a minute she felt she could put up with it.
Coleridge turned once more to the suspects. “So, Sally, I hope that you can learn from this terrible experience that you need not fear the burden of your past. You did not kill Kelly Simpson, but you were very nearly killed yourself, as I intend to show.”
This comment was greeted with gasps from the audience, which Coleridge did his best to milk.
“Now, what about the rest of you? Did Moon kill Kelly? Well, did you, Moon? You’re a wicked liar, we know that from the tapes. The public never saw you make up a history of abuse in order to score cheap points against Sally, but I did, and it occurred to me that a woman who could invent such grotesque and insensitive deceits might lie about pretty much anything, even murder.”
The cameras turned on Moon.
“Extreme close up!” shouted Bob Fogarty from the control box.
Moon was sweating. “Now just a fookin’…”
“Please, if we could try to moderate our language,” Coleridge chided. “We are on live television, after all. Don’t upset yourself, Moon. If there were as many murderers as there are liars in this world we should all be dead by now. You did not kill Kelly.”
“Well, I know that,” said Moon.
“Nobody has really known anything during this investigation, Moon. Heavens, even Layla has come under suspicion.”
The cameras swung to face a shocked Layla.
“What?”
“Oh yes, such was the apparent impossibility of the murder that at times it seemed possible to imagine that you had wafted in through an airvent on that grim night. After all, everybody saw Kelly nominate you in that first week and then hug and kiss you goodbye. That must have hurt a proud woman like you.”
“It did,” said Layla, “and I’m ashamed to say that, when I heard about the murder, for a moment I was glad Kelly died. Isn’t that terrible? I’ve sought counselling now though, which is helping a lot.”
“Good for you,” said Coleridge. “For let us be quite clear: there is no circumstance or situation in our world today that cannot benefit from counselling. You were simply being selfish, Layla, that was all, but I’m sure that somewhere you can find somebody to tell you that you had a right to be.” Coleridge was being deeply sarcastic, but the crowd did not get it and applauded him, assuming, as did Layla, that Coleridge’s comment was a love-filled Oprah moment of support.
“Layla was long gone by the time Kelly died,” Coleridge continued, “but Garry wasn’t, were you, Gazzer? So how about you? Did you kill Kelly? You certainly wanted to kill her. After the whole country saw her teach you a few home truths about, the responsibilities of fatherhood there was no doubt you had a motive. Wounded pride has been a cause for murder many times in the past, but on the whole I suspect that you don’t care quite enough about anything to take the sort of risk this killer took. But what about you, Hamish? Only you know what passed between Kelly and yourself the night you reeled drunkenly together into that little cabin. Perhaps Kelly had a story to tell, but, if she did, fortunately for you we’ll never hear it. Did you wish her silenced as you sat together in that awful sweatbox? Did you reach out a hand to stop her mouth?”
Hamish did not answer, but just glared at Coleridge fiercely, biting his lip.
“Perhaps you did, but you didn’t kill her. Now then, what about David?” Coleridge turned his gaze to the handsome actor, whose face was still proud and haughty despite all that he’d been through. “You and Kelly also shared a secret. A secret you hoped to keep hidden, and with Kelly’s death you thought it safe.”
“For heaven’s sake, I didn’t…”
“No, I know you didn’t, David. Sadly for you, though, because of her death and the subsequent investigation, the world has discovered your secret anyway and, like her, I doubt now that you will ever achieve your dream.”
“Actually, I’ve had some very interesting offers,” said David defiantly.
“Still acting, David? I recommend you try facing up to the truth. In the long run life is easier.”
As David glared at him Coleridge looked once more at the door at the back of the studio. There was still no sign of Hooper and Patricia. How long could he keep on stalling? He was running out of suspects.
“Dervla Nolan, I have always had my doubts about you,” said Coleridge, turning to her and pointing his finger dramatically.
Once more the focus of the cameras shifted.
“Have you now, chief inspector?” Dervla replied, her green eyes flashing angry defiance. “And why would that be, I wonder.”
“Because you played the game so hard. Because you have a rogue’s courage and risked it all by communicating with the cameraman Larry Carlisle through the mirror. Because you were closest to the entrance of the sweatbox and could have left it without anybody else’s knowing. Because you needed money desperately. Because you had been told that, with Kelly dead, you would win. Not a bad circumstantial case, Ms Nolan. I think perhaps a good prosecuting lawyer could make it stick!”
“This is just madness,” said Dervla. “I loved Kelly, I really…”
“But you didn’t win, did you, Dervla?” Coleridge said firmly. “Jazz won. In the end, good old Jazz was the winner. Everybody’s friend, the comedian, the man who was also in the key position in the sweatbox and could have left it without being noticed! The man whose DNA was so prominent on the sheet that the murderer used. The man who so conveniently covered his tracks by putting the sheet back on after the murder. Tell me, Jazz, do you honestly think that you would have won if Kelly had not died?”
“Hey, just a minute,” Jazz protested. “You ain’t trying to say that…”
“Answer my question, Jason. If Kelly had survived that night, the night she brushed past you in the sweatbox and someone followed her out in order to kill her, would you have won? Would that cheque you are now holding not have had her name on it?”
“I don’t know… Maybe, but that doesn’t mean I killed her.”
“No, Jazz, you’re right. It doesn’t mean that you killed her, and of course you didn’t. Because none of you did.”