Page 40 of The Mother-in-Law

‘Am I supposed to know what that means?’

‘She also had bloodshot eyes, bruising around the lips, gums and tongue.’

That, admittedly, sounds odd. Why would Diana have bruising?

Housseini looks back at his paperwork. ‘The examiner also found fibres in your mother-in-law’s hands. Thread . . . it looks like. Gold thread.’ He shuffles through some pages in the folder, plucking out one. ‘Your mother-in-law’s house indicates she was house proud. Very tidy. Everything in its place. Matchy matchy.’

I’m thrown by the sudden change in direction. ‘What doesthathave to do with anything?’

Housseini turns the piece of paper so I can see it. It’s a photo. I recoil, expecting a picture of Diana’s body. But it’s just a picture of Diana’s place, the good room.

‘Does anything look wrong to you in this picture?’ Housseini asks.

I give it a cursory glance. ‘No, nothing.’

‘Are you sure?’

I look a little closer. At the bookshelf, the coffee table, the deep, cream sofa with a matching cream cushion . . . threaded through with gold.

‘It feels like she would have a pair of these gold-threaded cushions, don’t you think?’ Housseini says. His gaze feels accusing and for a moment I wonder if he is, in fact, the good cop. ‘But we looked and looked and we could only find one.’

I look back at the picture. He’s right, thereweretwo cushions, definitely. I remember seeing them recently. I was at Diana’s with the kids and Harriet was picking at one, trying to pull out the thread so she could tie it to her hair and have long golden locks like Rapunzel. I had to snatch the cushion from her and put it back. Diana immediately straightened it. Housseini is right, Diana was house proud.

‘Well I don’t know. Maybe she spilled something on one?’ I suggest. ‘And sent it out for cleaning?’

‘We’re looking into that. We’re looking into a lot of things.’

‘Okay. But . . . wait. I thought you said you found . . . materials in Diana’s house. Suicide materials.’

‘We did.’ Housseini surveys me closely with his shiny, syrupy eyes. ‘An empty bottle of Latuben was found by your mother-in-law’s body. Latuben is a popular drug that people take to bring about a fast, painless death. Usually people drink two bottles of Latuben if they are trying to end their life, but even one bottle could be a fatal dose for someone of Diana’s size and build.’

‘So,’ I clear my throat, ‘there was only one bottle by her body?’

‘Only one.’ Housseini nods. ‘And in any case, the drug wasn’t found in her bloodstream. So we’ve been looking at alternative causes of death.’

‘Alternative causes of death?’

‘Yes. So in light of everything I’ve told you, I’d like to ask you the first question again.’ He watches me. ‘What do you think happened to your mother-in-law?’

I open my mouth and repeat the answer I gave Housseini the first time, that I think Diana killed herself. But this time it doesn’t come out with quite so much conviction.

Ollie emerges from his meeting room at the same time as I do, and Jones and Housseini walk us back down the corridor. The room that Patrick was in is now empty, and if Nettie was here, it seems she’s gone too. Housseini and Jones take us as far as the elevator, thank us for coming in and give us their business cards again. Then Jones tells us,twice, that she’ll be in touch. Probably she is just tripping over the niceties of conversation, but then again, the police TV programs I watch lead me to believe the cops don’t do anything by accident.

‘It went fine,’ Ollie says once the elevator door closes. But his face says otherwise. He has a blotchy look about him that he gets when he’s coming down with something. The elevator door pings open.

‘Are you all right?’ I ask.

We step out into the foyer. ‘Did Housseini tell you about the autopsy?’ he whispers as we walk. ‘The bruised lips?’

We cross the floor of the foyer, go through the automatic doors into the carpark.

‘Yes. And the missing cushion. And that’s not the only thing that doesn’t seem right about this.’

Ollie stops. ‘What else doesn’t seem right?’

‘The cancer. Why isn’t there any evidence of the cancer?’

Ollie opens his mouth but I get in first.