Free Dr. Yes by Colin Bateman Page B

shop, and it was amongst his personal
possessions returned to me by DI Robinson.'
        'Yes.'
        'The
problem is, the cut in the cigar Augustine was smoking before he died does not
match the shape that should be made by the cutter he uses.'
        'Should
I be phoning the papers to hold their front pages?'
        'Listen
to me. There are three basic types of cigar cutter: guillotine - sometimes
called straight cut - punch cut or V-cut. Augustine used a straight cut; it's
the most common. The entire cap is cut and the maximum amount of smoke is
allowed out. With me?'
        'Yes.'
        'The
cigar he was smoking before he died was
        V-cut.
There was a wedge cut out of it rather than completely removing the cap. Some
smokers prefer it because it penetrates deeper into the filler inside the
cigar. Do you see where I'm going?'
        'If
only
        'Alison,
if he sat down, took a puff of his last cigar, and then shot himself, and the
cigar was found still in his hand, and you saw the size of the gun, then it
would have been extremely hard to do all that one- handed. But not impossible.
What is impossible is for him to inflict a V-cut with a guillotine
cutter. He didn't have a V-cut cutter. Now do you see?'
        'Nope.
I'm sure this is all fascinating to you, but I have to get up in an hour to
throw up because you got me pregnant, and then I have to go to work. And
besides, he could have cut it before he even got to your house, using a V-cut
cutter, another one he has . . . Oh, I don't even know why I'm talking . . .'
        'Alison,
no cigar smoker is going to cut in advance. The cap keeps the cigar fresh and
cutting it is almost a ceremonial act. He could not have cut the cigar in that
fashion, in that room, without using a V-cutter. Therefore he had to borrow
one. Therefore there was somebody else in the room with him. I think he had
help.'
        'Like
an assisted suicide?'
        'No,
like a murder.'
        There
was a long pause before Alison responded with: 'Do you remember the moon
landings?'
        'Yes.'
        'God,
you're old.' 'What?'
        'Do
you remember what Neil Armstrong said, one small step, et cetera?'
        'Yes.'
        'Well
I think you've just taken a leap that is even bigger, you frickin' head case.'
        And
then she hung up on me.
    ----
        

Chapter 11
        
        I am
a puller of threads. It is the nature of me. Alison maintains that I sometimes
destroy perfectly good metaphorical jumpers by completely unravelling them,
when all that was wrong with them in the first place was the loose thread.
Loose threads are not a crime, she maintains. But she is wrong. Loose threads
are an indication of a crime and if you have to pull them until the
metaphorical jumper, or civilisation itself, falls to pieces, then one must do
so. I have a moral obligation. And also, it's fascinating.
        To
say that I was distracted by my cigar-cutting discovery would be an understatement.
I could not stop thinking about it. Jeff noticed straight away. We had
customers in the shop, for once, and when they asked their pathetic, needy
questions, I just looked at them and pointed them vaguely in the right
direction where normally I would have been full of salient advice or haughty
condescension. Jeff tried to step up to the plate by offering his opinions, but
they were those of an idiot and the customers soon left. Yet I didn't chastise
him.
        Augustine,
murdered in my mother's bedroom.
        Yes,
it was a huge leap from suicide to murder based on the shape of a hole in the
end of a cigar, but the cut was impossible. That single fact altered
everything.
        'Penny
for them?'
        I
looked up, surprised, my hand already seeking the mallet. But it was only
Alison. The bell, which played the theme from The Rockford Files every
time the door opened, must have sounded, but I'd heard nothing.
        'Oh.
You. Just thinking about the great cow