Close to Death

‘We know that Strauss was the last person to see Roderick Browne alive and that Browne invited him over. Strauss knew that Andrew Pennington played bridge every Wednesday evening, so it’s easy enough to time everything for the exact moment Pennington gets home. And what does Pennington see? Strauss says goodbye to Browne, who replies, “You’ve been very kind . . .” Words to that effect. The door closes and the light goes off. The time of death is two hours away. So, at this moment, Browne is very much alive.

‘That’s what we’re meant to think. But Strauss has been with Browne, by his own admission, for at least an hour and a half. What really happened was that he slipped a whole lot of sleeping pills into Browne’s whisky. One little mistake there. He couldn’t get hold of Felicity’s temazepam, so he used pills he must have stolen from Dr Beresford . . . which were the next best thing. Always good to point suspicion in the wrong direction. When he leaves at ten o’clock, Browne is already unconscious. How to fake the conversation on the doorstep? Easy with an iPhone and a portable speaker. Dudley here has been recording every conversation I’ve had, including this one! That’s what Pennington hears.

‘As for the lights, he said something very interesting to me. “The front door closed, the light went out and Adam walked away.” But that’s strange for all sorts of reasons. Firstly, Roderick clearly wasn’t going to bed. More to the point, think about what he said. A single light going off. The light switch by the door turns off the lights in the hallway, the stairs and the first landing. If Roderick had flicked the switch by the door, that’s what Pennington would have seen. But if it was a single light, Roderick would have had to close the door and then cross the hallway to turn off the antique lamp on the chest of drawers.’

‘So are you saying that it was Strauss who turned it off?’ Goodwin asked. She was finally entertaining the possibility that some sort of trick had been involved.

‘Exactly.’

‘How?’ Khan demanded.

‘Easy. He could have used a piece of string and pulled the plug out of the wall. But there were all sorts of electrical bits and pieces that suddenly turned up inside the garage and I think what he used was a cheap remote control he’d brought with him. In reality, Roderick Browne is sound asleep in the kitchen because of the zolpidem. Strauss plays the recording. He closes the door. He turns off the lights with the remote control, which he dumps in the garage later. No point risking the police finding it in his home. Anyway, that’s the illusion. Roderick Browne is alive and all is well. Except it isn’t.

‘Adam Strauss returns to the house. He’s left the garage open so he can get in without any trouble. First, though, he uses the ladder to climb onto the roof and remove the screws that hold down the skylight. And that, incidentally, is where Marsha Clarke enters the equation. The dear old lady in Hampton Wick! When Dudley and I stood on the garage roof, we could see just one window in the close: the room belonging to Kylie Jane, the Beresfords’ nanny. But that meant if she’d been there, she would have had a view of the garage and there was always a chance that she would look out and see what was happening. So she had to go. It was Strauss who attacked Marsha Clarke. He must have seen Kylie leaving the close with her breadcrumbs for the birds . . . he knew what was going on. He bashed the old lady, knowing Kylie would stay there and look after the cats. As for the political leaflet, that was more misdirection. It was another lie.

‘Anyway, as I was just saying, Strauss goes back into the house. My guess is that he’s already helped his old friend write the letter to his wife, maybe suggesting a phrase or two. He’s got to be sure it’ll work for him. Now he drags the unconscious man into the garage. Puts a bag over his head – making another small mistake. Roderick doesn’t shop at Tesco’s. But it’s a suicide. Who’s going to notice? He turns on the gas. And now comes the clever part. How is he going to leave Roderick in the car, with the only key fob in his pocket and with all the windows and doors locked from inside?

‘In fact, it couldn’t be easier. When I visited the garage, I had to step over a pool of water on the concrete floor and I did wonder what it was doing there. After all, it hasn’t rained for weeks – you can tell that from the state of the gardens. The answer’s built into the car that Roderick Browne drove, the Skoda Octavia. It comes with a range of accessories, but one of them is a rain sensor, located in front of the windscreen. If you’re driving and it rains, the wipers come on automatically. And if you’ve left the car parked, the windows close themselves.