Mourn not your Dead

concave it looked as though it might have been hollowed out with an ice-cream scoop. Skin yellow as parchment stretched over the bones of his face and his balding skull. A death’s head with dandruff, thought Kincaid, for what was left of the man’s hair had liberally sprinkled the shoulders of his rusty black coat.
    “You’ll have some sherry, won’t you?” said their host. “I always do this time of day. Keeps the evening at bay, don’t you think?” He poured from a decanter as he spoke, filling three rather dusty cut-crystal glasses, so that they could hardly refuse the proffered drinks.
    Kincaid thanked him and took a tentative sip, then breathed an inward sigh of relief as the fine amontillado rolled over his tongue. At least he’d be spared having to tip his glass into a convenient aspidistra. “Mr. Bainbridge, we’d like to ask you a few—”
    “I must say you took your time. I told your constable yesterday to send someone in charge. But do sit down.” Bainbridge gestured towards an ancient brocaded sofa and took the armchair himself. “I quite understand that you are at the mercy of the bureaucracy.”
    At a loss, Kincaid glanced at Deveney, who merely gave him a blank look and a slight shake of the head. Kincaid sat down gingerly on the slippery fabric, taking time to adjust his trouser creases and finding a spot on the cluttered side table for his sherry glass. “Mr. Bainbridge,” he said carefully, “why don’t you begin by telling us exactly what you told the constable.”
    Bainbridge sat back in his chair, his gratified smile pulling at his already too-tight skin until it looked as though it must melt, like wax under a flame. He sipped at his sherry, cleared his throat, then brushed at a speck on his sleeve. It was clear, thought Kincaid, that Percy Bainbridge intended making the most of his moment in the limelight. “I’d had my tea and finished with the washing up,” he began rather anticlimactically. “I was looking forward to settling in for the evening with my beloved Shelley”— pausing, he gave Kincaid a ghastly little wink—“that’s the poet, you understand, Superintendent. I don’t hold with the television, never have. I am a firm believer in improving the mind, and it is a proven fact that one’s intellect declines in direct proportion to the number of hours spent in front of the little black box. But I digress.” He gave an airy wave of his fingers. “It is my habit to take some air in the evening, and that night was no exception.”
    Kincaid look advantage of the man’s pause for breath. “Excuse me, Mr. Bainbridge, but are you referring to Wednesday, the evening of Commander Gilbert’s death?”
    “Well, of course I am, Superintendent,” Bainbridge answered, his humor obviously ruffled. “Whatever else would I be referring to?” He took a restorative sip of his sherry. “Now, as I was telling you, although the night was quite foggy and close, I stepped outside as usual. I had gone as far as the pub when I saw a shadowy figure slipping up the lane.” His eyes darted from Kincaid to Deveney, anticipating their reaction.
    “What sort of figure, Mr. Bainbridge?” Kincaid asked matter-of-factly. “Was it male or female?”
    “I really am unable to say, Superintendent. All I can tell you is that it appeared to be moving furtively, slipping from one pool of shadow to the next, and I am unwilling to embellish my account for the sake of drama.”
    Deveney sat forwards, his notebook open. “Size? Height?”
    Bainbridge shook his head.
    “What about hair and clothing, Mr. Bainbridge?” tried Kincaid. “You may have noticed more than you realize. Think back—did any part of the figure reflect light?” Bainbridge thought for a moment, then said with less assurance than he had displayed so far, “I thought I saw the pale blur of a face, but that’s all. Everything else was dark.”
    “And where exactly was the figure in the lane?”
    “Just beyond the Gilberts’ house, moving up the lane towards the Women’s Institute,” answered Bainbridge with more confidence.
    “What time was this?” Deveney asked.
    “I’m afraid I can’t tell you.” Bainbridge’s thin lips made a regretful little moue.
    “Can’t?” Kincaid said on a note of disbelief.
    “I retired my watch when they retired me, Superintendent.” He tittered. “I lived my life a slave to the clock and the bell—I thought it time I had my freedom from such constraints. Oh, there