Too Much of Water (32 page)

Hook stepped forward and pronounced the words of arrest. Roy Hudson nodded slowly, all resistance gone. He said, ‘Will someone look after Judith? I sent her out when I knew you were coming.' He was suddenly weary with guilt. ‘She had nothing to do with this, you know. She knew nothing about any of it.'

It wouldn't be true of most wives. But with the strange, detached Judith Hudson it probably was. And it seemed that a genuine love for his wife was the one decent quality present in this man who had caused such suffering. Lambert said stiffly, ‘Mrs Hudson will be told what has happened in due course. A woman police officer will explain things to her.'

It was over. They took him out to the police car which had eased into the drive behind them. Hudson rode in the back, handcuffed between two grim-faced uniformed officers, as the car followed Lambert's big Vauxhall back through the Forest to Oldford police station and the cells. It was a strange little procession which moved steadily through the warm summer darkness of woods in full leaf.

In Shakespeare, nature would have echoed momentous events in the world of man, with a storm shattering the heavy days of heat. But on this night, the world sweltered on, with no end yet to the heat wave which gripped the country. Perhaps the murderer of poor, innocent Clare Mills and the less worthy Ian Walker did not merit any momentous tribute from the elements.

Perhaps only Lambert and Hook and Rushton would sleep more easily, with the squalid little tale concluded.