A Taste for Death (49 page)

'No. He brought it to the fiat but he didn't give it to me to read. He told me what was in it. Apparently while Theresa was nursing at Pembroke Lodge she was trans-ferred to night duty. One of the patients had been brought some bottles of champagne by her husband and they'd had a party. It's that kind of place. Anyway she was a little tipsy. She was gloating over the baby, a son after three girls, and said "thanks to darling Stephen". Then she let out that if patients wanted a child of a particular sex Lampart would do an early amniocentesis and abort an unwanted foetus. Women who hated childbirth and weren't prepared to go through with it just to get a child

of the wrong sex knew where to go.'

Kate said:

'But he was - he is - taking a terrible risk.'

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'Not really. Not if there's never anything on paper, never anything specifically said. Paul wondered if some of the pathological reports were falsified to show an abnormality in the foetus. Most of his lab work is done on the premises. Afterwards Theresa tried to get some evi-dence, but it wasn't easy. When she questioned the patient the next day she laughed and said that she was joking. But she was obviously terrified. That afternoon she discharged herself.'

So this was the explanation of those mysterious jottings which AD had found in Theresa's missal. She had been trying to collect evidence about the sex of the patients' previous children. Kate asked:

'Did Theresa speak to anyone at Pembroke Lodge?' 'She didn't dare. She knew that someone had libelled Lampart once, and been made bankrupt as a result. He was - he is - notoriously litigious. What could she hope to do, a young nurse, poor, without powerful friends, against a man like that? Who would believe her? And then she found that she was pregnant and had her own problems to think about. How could she speak against what she saw as his sin when she was about to commit mortal sin herself?. But when she was preparing to die she felt that she had to do something to put a stop to it. She thought about Paul. He wasn't weak, he had nothing to fear. He was a Minister, a powerful man. He would see that it was stopped.'

'And did he?'

'How could he? She hadn't any idea what kind of burden she was putting on him. As I said, she was an innocent. They're always the ones who do the most harm. Lampart is his wife's lover. If he tackled him it would look like blackmail or, worse, revenge. And his own guilt over her death, the lie about her being a constituent, his failure to help her, that must have seemed morally worse than

anything Lampart was doing.'

'What did he decide?'

'He tore up the letter while he was with me and flushed it down the lavatory.'

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'But he was a lawyer. Wasn't his instinct to preserve evidence?'

'Not that evidence. He said: "If I haven't the courage to use it, then I must get rid of it. There's no compromise. Either I do what Theresa wanted or I destroy the evi-dence.'' ! suppose he thought that hoarding it might be degrading, might smack of potential blackmail, carefully preserving evidence against your enemy in case you needed it in future.'

'Did he ask your advice?'

'No. Not advice. He needed to think it through and I was there to listen. That's what he usually needed me for, to listen. I realize that now. And he knew what I would say, what I wanted. I would say: "Divorce Barbara and use that letter to make sure that she and her lover make no trouble over it. Use it to get your freedom." I don't know whether I would have said it so brutally, but he knew that's what I wanted him to do. Before he destroyed

it he made me promise to say nothing.'

Kate said:

'He took absolutely no action, you're sure of that?' 'I think he may have spoken to Lampart. He told that he would, but we never discussed it again. He going to tell Lampart what he knew and admit that he no evidence. And he took his money out of Pembre Lodge. There was quite a bit, I think, originally invested by his brother.'

They began walking slowly down the path. Kite thought: Suppose Paul Berowne had spoken to Lamp With the evidence destroyed, and pathetically inadeq evidence at that, the doctor would have little to fear \ scandal could hurt Paul Berowne as much as it hart Lampart. But after Sir Paul's experience in that ve things might be very different. Perhaps the chan. Berowne, his own career thrown away, would see it as moral duty to expose and ruin Lampart, evidence oo evidence. And what of Barbara Berowne, faced on hand with a husband who had chucked away both lob and prospects, and was even proposing to sell their hc:

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and on the other with a lover who might be facing ruin. Kate decided on a blunt question which, in other circum-stances, she might have felt unwise:

'Do you think Stephen Lampart killed him, with or with-out her connivance?'

'No. He'd be a fool to involve her in anything like that. And she hasn't the courage or the wit to plan it alone. She's the kind of woman who gets a man to do her dirty work for her and then persuades herself that she knows nothing about it. But I've given you a motive, a motive for

both of them. It ought to be enough to make life un-comfortable for her.'

'Is that what you want?'

The girl turned round on her and said with sudden passion:

'No, that's not what I want. I want her to be harried and grilled and frightened. I want her disgraced. I want her arrested, imprisoned for life. I want her dead. It won't happen, none of it will happen. And the awful thing is that I've hurt myself more than I can ever hurt her. Once I'd made that call to you, once I'd said I'd be here, then I knew I had to come. But he told me in confidence, he trusted me, he always trusted me. Now there's nothing left, nothing I can remember about our loving that will ever be free of pain and guilt.'

Kate looked at her and saw that she was crying. She was making no sound, not even a sob, but from eyes fixed and staring as if in terror the tears ran in a steady stream over the drained face and the half-open quivering mouth. There was something frightening about this steady, silent grief. Kate thought: There isn't a man, any man in the world who is worth this agony. She felt a mixture of sym-pathy, helplessness and irritation which she recognized was tinged with slight contempt. But the pity won. There was nothiz.g she could find to say which might comfort, but at least she could make some practical response, ask Carole back to the flat for coffee before they parted. She was opening her mouth to speak, then checked herself. The girl wasn't a suspect. Even if it were reasonable to think of

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her in those terms, she had an alibi, a late meeting out of London for the time of death. But suppose Carole were required to give evidence in court, then any suggestion of friendship, of an understanding between them could be prejudicial to the prosecution. And more than to the prosecution; it could be prejudicial to her own career. It was the kind of sentimental error of judgement which wouldn't exactly displease Massingham if he came to hear of it. And then she heard herself saying:

'My flat is very close, just across the avenue. Come and have coffee before you go.'

In the flat Carole Washburn moved over to the window like an automaton and gazed out without speaking. Then she moved over to the sofa and stood regarding the oil painting on the wall above, three triangles, partly super-imposed, in a browny-red, clear green and white. She

aked, but not as if she greatly cared:

'Do you like modern art?'

'I like experimenting with shapes and different color, rs laid against each other. I don't like reproductions and I can't affordoriginals so I paint my own. I don't supp.e they're art, but I enjoy them.'

'Where did you learn to paint?'

'I just bought the canvas and oils and taught myself. The small bedroom is a kind of studio. I haven't had time to do much lately.'

'It's clever. I like the texture of the background.' 'Done by pressing a tissue over the paint just before it dried. Texture's the easy part, it's applying the oil smoothly that I find tricky.'

She went into the kitchen to grind coffee beans. Carole followed and stood listlessly watching from the doorway. She waited until the grinder had been switched off then suddenly asked:

'What made you choose the police?'

Kate was tempted to reply: For much the same reasons that you chose the Civil Service. I thought I could do the job. I was ambitious. I prefer order and hierarchy to muddle. Then she wondered whether Carole neede,4 to

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ask, not answer, questions, to reach out, however ten-tatively, to another's life. She said:

'I didn't want an office job. I wanted a career where I could earn well from the start, hope for promotion. I sup-pose I like pitting myself against men. And they were rather against the idea at the school I went to. That was an added inducement.'

Carole Washburn made no response but watched her for a moment then drifted back into the sitting room. Kate, hands busy with percolator, mug and saucers, tray and biscuits found herself recalling that last interview with Miss Shepherd, the careers adviser:

'We had rather hoped that you would set your sights higher, university, for example. You're safe, I'd say, for

two As and a B at A-level.'

'I want to start earning.'

'That's understandable, Kate, but you'll get a full grant, remember. You can manage.'

'I don't want to have to manage. I want a job, a place of my own. University would be three wasted years.'

ducat,on is never wasted, Kate.'

'I'm not giving up education. I can go on educating myself.'

'But a policewoman... We had rather hoped that you

would choose something more, well, socially significant.' 'You mean more useful.'

'More concerned, perhaps, with basic human prob-lems.'

'I can't think of anything more basic than helping to make sure that people can walk safely in their own city.'

'I'm afraid, Kate, that recent research shows that walking in safety has little to do with the level of policing. Why not read that pamphlet in the library, "Policing the Inner City: A Socialist Solution"? But if this is your choice, naturally we shall do what we can to help. How do you see yourself?. In the Juvenile Bureau?'

'No. I see myself as a senior detective.' She had been

i

Pted to add mischievously: 'and as the first woman e pounds Constable.' But that, she had known, was as

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unrealistic as a recruit to the WRAC seeing herself as commanding the Household Cavalry. Ambition, if it were to be savoured, let alone achieved, had to be rooted in possility. Even her childhood fantasies had been anchored to reality. The lost father would reappear, loving, prosperous, repentant, but she had never expected him to descend from a Rolls-Royce. And in the end he hadn't come, and she had known that she had never really expected him.

There were no sounds from the sitting room and when she carried in the tray of coffee she saw that Carole was sitting on a chair, stiffly upright, gazing down at her clasped hands. Kate set down the tray and at once Carolt slopped milk into her mug, then clasped both hands round it and gulped avidly, hunched in her chair like an starved woman.

It was strange, thought Kate, that the girl seemed m, distraught, less under control, than at their first when they had briefly chatted in her own kitchen. Wb, she wondered, had happened since then to prompt betrayal of Berowne's confidence, to produce this bitterness and resentment? Had she somehow learned that there was no mention of her in his will? But that, surely, was wlat she must have expected. But perhaps it mattered than she had ever thought possible, the public and fial confirmation that she had always been on the peripher?, of his life, officially non-existent after death as she had b(n in their years together. She thought that she had been indispensable to him, that he had found with her in 13at ordinary, seldom visited flat, a still centre of fulfilment peace. Maybe he had, at least for a few snatched hors. But she hadn't been indispensable to him; no one had. He had compartmentalized people as he had the rest of his over-organized life, filing them away in the recesses of his mind until he needed what they had to offer. But then, she asked herself, is that so very different from what I do with Alan?

She knew that she wouldn't be able to bring herself to ask what had brought the girl to this meeting, and it wasn't

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really important to the inquiry. What was important was

that Berowne's confidence had been broken and Lampart's

motive immensely strengthened. But how far did that

really get them? One piece of hard physical evidence was

worth a dozen motives. They were back to the old ques tion, could Lampart and Barbara Berowne really have had

the time? Someone, Berowne or his killer, had been using

the washroom at St Matthew's at eight o'clock. Three

people had seen the gush of Water, none of them could be

shaken. So either BeroWne was alive at eight or the

murderer was still on the premises. Either way it was diffi cult to see how Lampart could have driven to the Black

Swan by eight thirty.

When she had finished her coffee Carole managed a

weak smile and said:

'Thank you. I'd better go now. I suppose you want all

this on paper.'

'We'd like a statement. You could call in at the Harrow

Road station, there's 'an incident room there, or come to

the Yard.'

'I'll call in at Harrow Road. There won't be any more

questions will there?'

'There could be, but I don't think we'll want you for

long.'

At the door they stood for a moment facing each other.

Suddenly Kate thought that Carole was going to step

forward and fall into her arms, and knew that her un practised arms might even know how to hold and comfort,

that she might even be able to find the right words. But

the moment passed and she told herself that the thought

had been embarrassing and ridiculous. As soon as she

was alone she rang Dalgliesh, careful to keep any note of