Death Before Time (20 page)

He swallowed and moved on to a beautifully executed study of Edward Munch’s
The
Scream
, in the same muted colours as the beach … what made it so much worse than the original was the pram with a baby in it laughing at the woman’s torment. He moved on to the same woman, in convict’s clothing with a ball and chain attached to her leg, only the ball was the same laughing baby …

A grave, the freshly dug earth surrounded by wrought iron railings that became spearheads, while from the earth sprouted obscenely green brambles that became barbed wire as it twisted round and around the railings –

A door banged below –

“You won’t believe it but they’d found the bloody thing … Fraser?”

He moved to the door, flicked off the light, eased it shut –

“Fraser, where are you?”

“I’m up here …” Lock it - no, not enough time to find the right key …

“Oh. Well, they’d found the bloody thing by the time I’d got there,” she said as he came down the stairs. “Well, no harm done, I suppose. Why don’t you bring the wine into the sitting room?”

“Sure.”

So Jo was right all the time, he thought as he collected the wine … he didn’t know
how
he knew, only that he did.

What the hell was he going to do? He took the wine to the living room.

“Are you all right,” she asked, looking at him.

“My guts again,” he said. “I’m OK now.”

“Probably all the canteen food you eat.” She grinned. “Now, if you were to move in with me …”

“I’d be too far from the darts team,” he said, making himself grin back at her, thinking:
If
I
go
now
and
she
finds
the
unlocked
door
… but how the hell was he going to re-lock it …?

“Aren’t you going to pour me some wine?”

“Sure.”
If
I
stay
awhile
,
maybe
I’ll
get
a
chance
…

He filled the glasses, sat beside her.

“You are a bit pale,” she said.

“I daresay I’ll recover.” He drank some wine. “It seems crazy not to keep a spare key on the ward. What would happen if you were away?”

“Philip’s got one, and if the worst came to the worst, admin have a master somewhere. It
is
ridiculous, but Health and Safety insisted after an incident last year … you
are
recovering, aren’t you?”

He was nibbling her ear, running the tip of his tongue down her cheek … he didn’t think he’d be able to rise to it although he knew he had to try… She smoothed his face, unbuttoned his shirt and slid her hand in …
It’s
no
good
, he thought,
I
can’t
… then, unbidden, an image of Frances slid into his mind and he felt himself harden.

“Let’s go upstairs,” he said.

For once, the fact that she came quickly was a blessing. Afterwards, he lay beside her, willing her to sleep.

In the darkness, she said, “Do you like me, Fraser?”

“Course I do,” he said. Then: “I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.”

She held his arm, touched his shoulder with her forehead. “I’m glad you’re here, Fraser.”

“I’m glad you’re glad.”

He lay there, willing himself to be still although his nerves crawled …

After a while, he could bear it no longer. He kissed her cheek and slid out of bed. Quickly dressed. He knew she wasn’t asleep, although she didn’t say anything. He left, not daring to try and lock the unlocked door.

Chapter 23

As soon as he was out of sight of her house, he stopped and rang Tom.

“It’s Fraser, I need to see you.”

“I’ll be in my room.”

Tom let him in fifteen minutes later. “You look as though you need a drink,” he said.

“Aye, I do that. I’ll get a taxi back.”

Tom poured them both a whisky.

Fraser took a mouthful, said, “I did as you asked with Helen tonight and I now agree with Jo – she’s in this somewhere.”

“What changed your mind?”

Fraser told him about the picture gallery.

Tom lit a cheroot. “How does that make her involved?” he asked.

Fraser stared at him. “Doesn’t it make
you
think she is?”

“Sure, but I’d like to hear it from you.”

Fraser tossed back the whisky and held his glass out for a refill. “You’ll agree with me that Helen’s mother must have been unbalanced?”

“I’d say she was barking and I haven’t even seen the pictures,” Tom said as he poured.

“Well, Helen’s inherited it.”

“And that’s it, like mother like daughter, QED?”

“All right, all right … “ He drank some more of the whisky while he thought, “…OK, I think we can assume she was never married to the father – I’m thinking of the beach painting.”

Tom inclined his head.

“Well, it screwed her up,” he continued, “Made her bitter and twisted and she took it out on the baby, Helen … “

“How d’you work that out?”

“She blamed the baby – the Munch study with it laughing at her, then the one with it as a ball and chain – she blamed it for screwing up her life, took it out on it – her, Helen, I mean … “

Tom nodded thoughtfully. “You could be right,” he said, “This being before uncool unmarried mothers evolved into trendy single parents … I wonder why she didn’t have an abortion … “

“Maybe it was before the change in the law came in – whatever, I’ll bet she was obsessed with death, of both the child’s and her own. I’d hazard a guess she killed herself in the end.”

Tom looked at him interrogatively ...

“That one of the grave … “ Fraser said, “She was foretelling it, subconsciously perhaps … and there’s another thing – “ He told him about the discrepancy in the ages Helen had said she was when her mother died.

Tom thought for a moment. “I think you’re right,” he said, “But how does it make Helen a killer? Wouldn’t it tend to make her feel the opposite, that life was precious?”

“Yeah, but it could just as easily go the other way. Look at the people who abuse children, their own or others – they almost always turn out to have been abused themselves. You’d think it would make them inclined to be the opposite, but it doesn’t, does it?”

“No,” agreed Tom …

Fraser took another mouthful of whisky. “She grew up knowing she wasn’t wanted. Oh, no expense spared on schooling, but tha’s not the same thing, is it? So far as her mother was concerned, she was in the way, useless … and in the end, her very existence led to her mother’s suicide.”

“But what about the grandparents who put up the money? Wouldn’t they have wanted her? Grandparents usually do.“

“Not these necessarily, not if they were upper crust and it fucked their daughter’s marriage prospects. They’d have been an embarrassment, mother and daughter both … “

“That’s a bit cynical isn’t it?” Tom said with a smile. “Sure you’re not indulging your inverted snobbery?”

Fraser unwillingly smiled back. “What I’m trying to say is that after an upbringing like that, where unwanted people are beneath notice – disposable – she’d see nothing wrong in getting rid of those whose lives served no purpose, who were in the way.”

Tom drew on his cheroot. “I think I follow you,” he said, “Although it’s a hell of a jump. I’ll try it out on one of our tame shrinks tomorrow.”

“The thing is,” Fraser said slowly, “I’m wondering if it puts Jo in danger ... ” He told him how he’d raised the subject of the illicit injections and Helen’s reaction to it, “The way she told me about it was harmless enough, but that crack about Jo’s
Fuck
me
smile was nasty ... “

Tom nodded thoughtfully and Fraser continued, “I think she hates her, and if she also regards her as someone in the way … I’m thinking about the attacks on me in the hospital grounds.”

“I take your point.” Tom looked at his watch, then keyed a number into his mobile. “Jo, are you still in your room …? Good, stay there until we come and get you.”

Fraser caught the squawk of protest from the other end.

“Please Jo, just do as I say for once. We’ll be with you inside fifteen minutes.” He cut the connection. “Give me that card, Fraser – the taxi one.”

Fraser handed it to him. “I need a taxi, very urgently please, County Hotel … ”

It arrived a minute after they got down to the lobby.

“Nurses’ Home, Royal Infirmary please. An extra tenner if you do it in five minutes,” he added.

The driver didn’t waste any time talking.

In the back, Tom said quietly to Fraser, “It’s still best if you’re not seen with her – wait for me while I take her in.”

They didn’t say any more until they saw Jo waiting at the doorway.

“Community Hospital,” Tom said as soon as she got in. “Why didn’t you wait inside?” he asked her.

“Because I’m late – this had better be good, Tom.”

“I’ll tell you when we get there. Keep your head down, Fraser.”

The taxi came to a stop again and Jo and Tom half walked, half ran to the entrance. Tom reappeared a few minutes later.

“Where are you going?” he said to Fraser, who was getting out of the taxi.

“Back to my flat.”

“We’ve still got some talking to do.”

Fraser shrugged. “OK, we’ll do it there.”

“Sure, so long as you don’t mind my cheroots.”

Fraser did mind, but felt it was preferable to another trip downtown. Tom paid off the taxi.

“You did it in six,” he said, handing the driver a ten-pound note, “But I’m feeling generous.”

*

“The question is,“ he said when they were in Fraser’s flat, “Is she doing it on her own?”

“I wouldn’t have thought so,” Fraser said slowly. “If it
is
being done by somehow infecting them with pneumococci, I think she’d need help.”

“From a medic?”

Fraser nodded. “Almost certainly. Which means either Ranjid or Edwina.”

“Why not Armitage? He’s the boss, and he was the one who employed her, wasn’t he, because they’d worked together before?”

“But he’s worked with Edwina before as well, that’s why he employed
her
.”

“That doesn’t exactly absolve him, does it?”

“No, I just don’t think – although ... “

“Yes?”

“He is worried about something … “ He told him what Philip had been saying after the meeting, and also what George Woodvine had said today.

“D’you know what it is he’s worried about? Armitage, I mean … “

Fraser shook his head. “Although I did wonder if
he’d
begun to suspect what’s going on … “

“Mm. Well, I think it puts all three of them in the frame.” He looked up. “So which of them would you go for?”

“I don’t know … maybe this is the connection between Helen and Ranjid - and yet …”

“Yes?”

“And yet there’s the fact that both times I’ve been beaten up, it’s been just after Edwina’s found out about my snooping – the second time after she actually caught me at it ... ”

“Couldn’t you say the same for Ranjid? He found out quickly enough the first time.”

“But how would he have known about the second time? Unless Edwina told him, I suppose … then there’s the way she’s pumped me about my attitude to hopeless cases … and her detachment … “

“Yeah, you’ve mentioned that before – what exactly d’you mean by it?”

Fraser closed his eyes a moment - the whisky and stress were beginning to get to him …

“Her utter self-containment – she ignores the things that don’t concern her, seems unaware of them, and yet focuses like a flash when something does bother her … you never know where you are with her … “

“So your intuition’s telling you it’s her?” Tom said with the hint of a smirk.

Fraser gave him a sour look. “And yet it’s Ranjid that Helen’s got the relationship with,” he said. “And this isn’t the first time he’s been involved in the ill treatment of patients, is it?”

Tom’s face screwed up in thought … “Could be any of them, couldn’t it? You see, unlike you, I’m not inclined to absolve Armitage ... And yet it could just as equally be Tate - she and Helen’d have known each other if they’d both worked with Armitage before … “ He looked up – “And where, I wonder, does the ubiquitous Carrie Tucker fit in?”

“God, I’d forgotten her,” said Fraser. “The thing is, when Helen wanted to know how I’d heard about Jo, I told her that Carrie had told me …”

“So if she
is
involved, Helen would’ve known you were lying.”

“Especially if she finds that door unlocked …”

*

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Jo said as she ran into the sisters’ office at ten past midnight.

“I was about to ring you,” Sarah said reprovingly.

“I’ll make it up to you.” Jo took a breath. “Anything I should know about?”

“It’s touch and go whether Mrs Castle’ll last the night.”

“Have her family been told?”

The nearest was a daughter in London, Sarah said,“She’s going to try and get here tomorrow morning.”

Jo nodded. “Does she need anything? Mrs Castle?”

“I shouldn’t think so, she’s on a diamorphine syringe driver.” Sarah paused. “I’ll be off, then.”

“Sure. I’m sorry, Sarah.”

“It’s all right.”

Jo quickly checked all the patients, then went back to the office and sat down. She hated being late, although she appreciated why Tom and Fraser had done it. She wondered what had changed Fraser’s mind about Helen … well, doubtless she’d find out.

She realised she was hating this job already and asked herself why … it wasn’t the danger, such as it was, or even the graveyard shifts, although she didn’t care for those either – it was the overall oppressiveness of the place …

She pondered this.

It was the fact that everything was so clean and well-ordered on the surface, but underneath all the good manners and platitudes, she could sense something … not evil exactly, but corrupt – a worse corruption than any of the illnesses the patients had.

She sighed. Tom had admitted that although they were all agreed now that Helen was involved, they knew nothing else. Not how, where, when, why, not even whether anyone else was involved.

She looked in on Mrs Castle, then, on impulse, on Lily Stokes. She was sleeping peacefully. How had Saint Helen infected her? (She agreed with Tom about that). Some sort of atomiser to spray a suspension of pneumococci up her nose?

But if that
was
it, she was bound to be seen doing it sooner or later, as Jo had discovered to her cost ... unless it was done as part of something every day … innocent.

She glanced around, looking at the equipment.

The oxygen mask, could
that
be infected in some way? She picked it up, turned it over… couldn’t see how, especially as it was used
after
infection had set in, not before …

An idea pricked at the periphery of her mind; she trembled slightly with the effort of holding on to it, then walked quickly out to the courtyard and lit a cigarette to try and develop it … it flickered and caught alight …

Ye-es …

It wasn’t the complete answer, no, but it might be part of it.

Proving it would be the problem …

For a second, the flicker became a flash – Health and Safety Jo, how could you forget that? She stubbed the fag and went back to the office.