Death of a Salesperson Read Free

factory, but the recession had closed it. And it was ICI he went to.’ She leaned forward very earnestly. ‘You do realize I’ve no evidence —’
    â€˜Oh, of course. It could be someone else entirely—someone she met on the train, for instance. It could be no one. By the way, what did he look like?’
    â€˜Dapper. Well set up, but not tall. Lively, always darting here and there. Lots and lots of jokes.’
    I’ve never been good on jokes, thought Geoffrey sadly. It seemed as though some great weight was pressing on his back, squeezing the breath out of him. How I failed her, he thought. He had known his wife had been kind, generous, considerate. Now he also knew she had craved colour, gaiety, laughter. How totally he had failed her.
    It was still early afternoon when he got back to his car. He rather thought he had enough information to track down this Roger Michaels, but first there was something else he could try, to see if he was on the right scent. Helen’s friend had been right when she said what they were talking about was an affair. The clothes were the clothes of a woman in love. But was Michaels the man? He drove to Bloomsbury, and once again drove round and round before he found a parking space. Then he marked time in Dillons and Foyles until it was four o’clock, and tea would be served at the Durward.
    It was overpoweringly genteel, like Harrogate in the ’thirties. A pianist played Gershwin and Ivor Novello, quite softly, and the sandwiches and cakes nestled in lacy doylies on silver baskets. Only the staff were wrong: a heterogeneous collection of nationalities. Geoffrey was lucky: he had a genial, pot-bellied Cypriot with an East London accent. When he was half way through his tea he fished from his wallet the photograph of Helen, taken on holiday the yearbefore in Verona, and beckoned the waiter over. His first reaction was to shake his head.
    â€˜No. No, I can’t say I have . . . Wait! Wait a minute, though. I think that must be Mrs Rogers, so called. Yes—I’d bet my bottom . . . Mind you, she looks so different there. Quite dowdy, really, as if she’d tried to de-glamourize herself. Our Mrs Rogers . . . What is this all about, mate? Private detective, are you? I suppose it’ll be the real Mrs Rogers, or whatever her name is.’
    â€˜When are you off?’
    â€˜I finish at six, thank Gawd.’
    â€˜Care for a drink?’
    â€˜I wouldn’t say no.’
    â€˜Meet you outside at six.’
    Settled into the Jug and Bottle, just off the Tottenham Court Road, and after a tenner had passed between them, the waiter told Geoffrey all he knew.
    â€˜Somehow I always had the suspicion they weren’t married. I saw him sign the register when they first stayed the night here, and he didn’t do it confident-like. What ho! I thought. Your name isn’t Michael Rogers. Since then I’ve noticed he always pays cash, never cheque or credit card.’
    â€˜But they register as husband and wife?’
    â€˜Â â€™Course they do. What do you think? Mind you, it is a bit out of the usual run of liaisons. Because when you look close you realize she is older than him. Glamorous, very smart, altogether the superior article, but older. I put her down as a lady from the provinces—and I do mean a lady, and a well-heeled one—’aving a fling in London. Though it’s more than that, too. You can see she is in love.’
    The waiter, drinking deep, did not see Geoffrey flinch.
    â€˜Do they come to the Durward every week?’
    â€˜Oh yes, they have been doing. ’Cept in the holidays. I put it down to one or other of them having kiddies home from boarding-school.’
    â€˜So they come every Thursday?’
    â€˜That’s right. Not last week, but it’s probably half term or something. Yes, they come down and have tea in the Garden Room, same as you just