A Room Swept White by Sophie Hannah Read Free Book Online Page A

White drove out on to the road, there was no sign of the man. She says there wasn’t long enough for him to have gone anywhere but inside number 9. We know there was no break-in, so did Helen Yardley let him in? If so, did she know him, or did he say something plausible enough to get himself inside when she opened the door? Was he a lover, a relative, a double-glazing salesman? We need to find out.’
    ‘Did Mrs White see or hear Helen Yardley open her front door?’ someone asked.
    ‘She thinks she might have, but she’s not sure,’ said Proust. ‘Now, at number 11 Bengeo Street we’ve got eighty-three-year- old Beryl Murie, who, in spite of her partial deafness, heard a loud noise at 5 p.m. that might well have been a gunshot. She said it sounded like a firework, which is an easy mistake to make if you’re unfamiliar with the sound of an M9 Beretta 9 millimetre being discharged, as I think we can safely assume most retired piano teachers are. Miss Murie was able to be precise about the time because she was listening to the radio and the five o’clock news had just started when she heard the loud noise. She said it startled her. She also said it sounded as if it had come from Helen Yardley’s house. So, assuming we’ve got a man entering the house at 8.20 a.m. and the fatal shot fired at 5 p.m., what’s happening in between? We can’t assume the man Mrs White saw is the killer, but until we track him down and find out for certain, we have to consider the possibility that he might be. Sergeant Kombothekra?’
    ‘Still no joy, sir,’ Sam called out from the back of the room.
    Proust nodded grimly. ‘If another day passes and we haven’t found and eliminated Mr Morning Visitor, I’ll put my money on him being our man. If he is, and he was in Helen Yardley’s house with her for more than eight hours before he shot her, what was happening during those hours? Why not shoot her straight away? She wasn’t raped or tortured. Apart from being shot in the back of the head, she wasn’t injured. So, did he go there to talk to her, thinking he might or might not shoot her, depending on the outcome of the conversation?’
    Simon raised his hand. After a few seconds of pretending not to see it, Proust nodded at him.
    ‘Don’t we also have to consider the possibility that the gun belonged to the Yardleys? We can’t assume the man broughtit with him. It might already have been in the house. Given the Yardleys’ history—’
    ‘The Yardleys have no history of illegally possessing firearms,’ the Snowman cut him off. ‘There’s a thin line between exploring all reasonable avenues of possibility and squandering our resources on tosh that, in our desire to be egalitarian, we’ve elevated to the status of hypothesis. Everyone in this room needs to bear that in mind. We’re forty-eight hours into this investigation and we’re without a suspect – you all know what that means. We’ve already alibied and eliminated Helen Yardley’s friends, family and close acquaintances. This is shaping up to be a stranger murder, which, for us, is about as bad as it gets, and all the more reason to channel our efforts in the right direction.’
    ‘You were right to raise it,’ Sam muttered to Simon. ‘Better for us to focus on it and dismiss it than not to think of it at all.’
    ‘Paul Yardley returned from work at 6.10 p.m., found his wife’s body and phoned the police,’ said Proust. ‘He found no one else in the house and neither did the first officers to the scene. Some time between 5 and 6.10 p.m., the killer left 9 Bengeo Street. Someone must have seen him. You know what that means: house-to-house is top priority, and let’s extend it. Someone come up with a new mile-radius.’
    The Snowman walked over to the board where the enlarged crime scene photographs were displayed. ‘Here’s the input wound,’ he said, pointing at a picture of the back of Helen Yardley’s head. ‘Look at the scorch marks. The gun was so