‘Well, Mr Miller had a look round the house to make sure that the burglar really had gone.’
‘This is your neighbour, the same Sidney Miller, that you’re talking about, is it?’ I asked.
‘Yes, he and his wife Janet are very good friends of ours. Of me and poor Cliff, that is.’ Sharon stifled a sob. ‘I followed him upstairs to the master bedroom and it was then that I saw Cliff. I was sure he was dead and Sid felt his pulse and said that he was. I must admit that I screamed hysterically at the sight of my poor husband lying there covered in blood, and I fainted.’
‘You mentioned that this man took your jewellery, Sharon,’ prompted Kate impatiently.
‘When I came to, I saw that my jewellery box was on the floor near my head. It was empty.’
‘You hadn’t noticed it there when you first entered the room?’
‘No, but I didn’t really know what I was doing.’
‘Presumably you’d put on a robe before following your neighbour upstairs, Sharon.’ Kate was doing what she always did: returning to an earlier statement to see if the story had changed.
‘I think so. Yes, of course I did.’
‘Where was this robe?’
‘Er, in this room.’
‘Do you sleep in this room, then?’ Kate glanced at the undisturbed bed.
‘No, I sleep with my husband.’
‘But the robe was in this room. Is that correct?’
‘Yes, it’s a spare one I keep in here.’ Sharon plucked at the front of her robe. ‘This one.’
‘So there should be another robe in the master bedroom?’
‘Yes, I’m sure there is. Well, there must be, I’ve got more than one.’
‘So when did you come up here to get the one you’re wearing?’
It was obvious to me that Kate was interested in this business of the robes. But knowing Kate, I sensed that her interest went far deeper than that.
‘Straight after Sid untied me,’ said Sharon.
‘You didn’t look into the main bedroom to see if your husband had been disturbed or even attacked?’
‘No – well, I didn’t know whether the man was still here.’
‘Just now you said that Mr Miller had already had a look around the house and he’d told you the man had gone. Apart from which, Mr Miller told one of my officers that when he untied you, you told him that the man had gone.’
‘Did I? I must’ve got mixed up.’ Sharon started to cry again, and grabbed a handful of tissues. ‘It’s all been such a terrible shock,’ she said, ‘and you’re confusing me.’
Kate looked at the ceiling in exasperation. Sharon Gregory’s dramatic performance might’ve impressed a gullible man, but it wasn’t having any effect on Kate.
‘Did Mr Miller come up here with you?’ asked Kate, when Sharon had recovered.
‘No, he stayed downstairs until I’d got my robe and gone back down again. Then we started to look round the house together. I can’t really remember what I did or what order I did it in. I was so frightened and upset about having found that this man had murdered my poor husband that I didn’t really know what I was doing.’
‘Did you hear anything after this man had tied you up, apart from the noise of him crashing around the house? Did you, for example, hear a car starting up, or perhaps later on, after you’d recovered from your faint?’
‘No, I’m afraid not.’
‘I think that’ll do for the time being, Sharon,’ I said. ‘Now perhaps you’d carefully read the statement that Inspector Ebdon has taken down. You can make any changes you want to, and then perhaps you’d sign it.’
Kate handed over the several sheets of paper and a pen. ‘Put in your date of birth at the top of the form, Sharon. You’ll see a space for it.’
‘Do I have to?’ Sharon Gregory fluttered her eyelashes and once again assumed a coy expression. She seemed to be very good at coy expressions.
‘Yes, please,’ said Kate firmly, unmoved by the woman’s shrinking-violet artifice.
Sharon Gregory took a few minutes to read the statement. ‘I’m not sure about the bit where I said that I came up here first to get my robe. I think perhaps I was wandering around in the nude …’ She glanced at me as she said that, and smiled.
‘Let me get this straight. Are you now saying that you were walking around the house with your male neighbour, but you don’t think you had any clothes on?’ asked Kate sharply.
‘I can’t really remember. As I said, I was confused and frightened.’ Sharon shot another shy smile in my direction.
Kate took back the statement and made the necessary alteration. ‘There we are. Now perhaps you’d sign it at the bottom of each page, Sharon.’ She handed the woman the sheaf of forms and proffered a pen.