Page 231 of Murder in the Family

MAURA HOWARD

(shaking her head)

I never got that close – I told you – Iran, as soon as I saw what it was—

ALAN CANNING

So you didn’t swap the hoodie for another one? A clean one?

MAURA HOWARD

What would I do that for?

ALAN CANNING

Maybe itdidhave blood on it.Too muchblood to be explained by you merely finding the body.

MAURA HOWARD

In case you’ve forgotten, Inspector sodding Canning, your lot searched the whole bloody house.

I mean, I know they’re all fucking incompetent, but even that bunch of Keystone Cops would probably have managed to find a hoodie with a bucketload of blood all over it.

ALAN CANNING

Not if you’d stuck it in the washing machine before you called them—

MAURA HOWARD

(sarcastic)

Oh yeah? And howexactlywas I supposed to do that, Einstein? The bloody machine wasalready on—

She stops – suddenly and horribly aware of what she’s just said. Her cheeks burn red and she turns away.

ALAN CANNING

So somebody else had put the washing machine on.Beforeyou got home.

Who?

MAURA HOWARD

(not meeting his gaze)

Don’t ask me—

ALAN CANNING

Iamasking you.

MAURA HOWARD

How am I supposed to fucking know? Mum, I suppose—

ALAN CANNING

But didn’t you tell us, right at the start of all this, that your mother never did the laundry – that she hated doing it? Isn’t that why she hired Beatriz in the first place?

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