He’s finished reading Donald’s reports and is right in the middle of Pamela’s when his attention is broken by a knock against the open door. Tutting, he tries to ignore it and keep reading.
There’s a louder thud. Dammit. ‘Can’t a man get any peace?’ mutters Philip.
Tutting again, he looks towards the door.
Lizzie’s standing there. She hovers just inside the doorway holding a mug. ‘I brought you coffee.’
Philip doesn’t want coffee. Even though it’s not yet noon he’s already reached his four-cup limit. But he doesn’t want to refuse it and risk upsetting Lizzie more. ‘Thanks.’
She hands the mug over without a further word, but she doesn’t need to speak for him to know how she’s feeling. Her posture is stiff, her movements jerky. And the way she looks at him as he takes the coffee makes him feel like a criminal. Philip looks away. He knows it’s all because of the retirement nonsense. Why can’t she just drop it? It was so long ago and they’ve been happy here – he doesn’t understand why she has to rake it all up again.
Bloody Golding. He caused this. Philip curses himself for telling Lizzie what the detective had said. He’d forgotten how weird she’d gone after his retirement party, how she’d hinted that there must have been something more to prompt his hasty retirement rather than just an error of judgement and his heart attack. She’d given him the cold shoulder for a few weeks, but then they’d made their trip out to Florida and things had improved, and she seemed to have forgotten about it. That’s when he knew they needed a big change – a new start, in a new environment. That’s why he’d persuaded her to move here.
‘What are you doing?’ she asks.
‘Searching through the field logs of the patrollers – looking for anything that might have been forgotten.’
‘Good idea,’ says Lizzie. Her voice is deadpan, no intonation. ‘Have you—’
The doorbell chimes. They both look out towards the hallway and the front door. Neither of them move.
‘You can get that,’ says Lizzie.
Philip looks at the patrol notes in his hand. ‘Can’t you . . .’
Lizzie sighs. Shaking her head she moves away towards the front door.
Damn and blast, thinks Philip. Setting the notes down, he gets up and follows. He catches up with her at the end of the hallway as she’s opening the door. She shoots him a frosty look and he almost retreats. Then he sees who it is at the door and puts a hand on Lizzie’s shoulder and smiles. He tries not to notice Lizzie flinching at his touch. Puts it from his mind. Presenting a good front, a united front. That’s important.
‘Morning,’ says Rick, stepping over the threshold. ‘What’s going on?’
Philip wonders for a moment if Rick’s sensed the problem between them already. Then Lizzie smiles at their friend and puts on her poker face, and Philip feels relief. If she’ll pretend things are okay with Rick, maybe in time she’ll do the same with him.
‘I’m working on the phone Moira found,’ says Lizzie. ‘And Philip’s been going back through the patrol logs.’
‘Any luck?’
‘The phone’s still a work in progress.’ Lizzie looks at Philip, but doesn’t meet his gaze.
‘I’m working through the reports,’ says Philip. ‘I’ve got a lot of pages to get through.’
Lizzie closes the door behind Rick. ‘What about you, anything new?’
‘I just got a call from my police contact. The autopsy happened yesterday. The cause of death was drowning, as we’d been thinking it could’ve been. The gunshot wound would have caused the victim to lose a lot of blood, but it didn’t have to be fatal. As things went, she must’ve bled out in the water. Lost consciousness and . . .’ Rick shakes his head.