Original Sin (25 page)

'And how long were you in the room?' 'It could only have been less than a minute. It seemed longer. We were bunched together just inside the door, looking, staring, unbelieving, appalled. I don't think anyone spoke. I know I didn't. Everything in the room was extremely vivid. The shock seemed to have jarred my eyes into an extraordinary keenness of perception. I saw every detail of Gerard's body and of the room itself with astonishing clarity. Then Stilgoe spoke. He said: "I'll telephone the police. We can do nothing here. This room must be locked at once and I'll keep the key." He took over. We left together and Claudia locked the door after us. Stilgoe took the key. The rest you know.'

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During the innumerable discussions of the tragedy which were to occupy the following weeks and months, it was generally agreed by the staff of the Peverell Press that the experience of Marjorie Spenlove had been singular. Miss Spenlove, senior copy editor, had arrived at Innocent House punctually at her usual hour of 9.25. She had murmured a 'good morning' to George who, sitting stricken at his switchboard, hadn't noticed her. Lord Stilgoe, Dauntsey and de Witt were in the little archives room with the body, Mrs Demery was ministering to Blackie in the ground-floor cloakroom surrounded by the rest of the staff and the hall was for a few minutes empty. Miss Spenlove went straight up to her room, took off her jacket and settled down to work. When working she was oblivious to everything except the text before her. It was claimed by Peverell Press that no work copy-edited by Miss Spenlove ever contained an undetected error. She was at her best working on non-fiction, occasionally finding it difficult, with young modem novelists, to distinguish between grammatical mistakes and their cultivated and much-praised natural style. Her expertise went beyond details of the words; no geographi-cal or historical inaccuracy went unchecked, no inconsistencies of weather, topography or dress unnoticed. Authors valued her even though their session with her to approve the final text left them feeling that they had undergone a particularly traumatic session with an intimidating headmistress of the old school.

Sergeant Robbins and a detective constable had searched the premises soon after their arrival. The search had been a little perfunctory; no one could seriously expect that the murderer was still on the premises unless he or she was a member of the staff. But Sergeant Robbins, perhaps excusably, had neglected to look in the small lavatory on the second floor. Descending to fetch Gabriel Dauntsey, his sharp ears detected the sound of a cough from the adjoining office and, opening the door, he found himself confronting an elderly lady working at a desk. Regarding him sternly above her half-moon spectacles she enquired: 'And who may you be?'

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'Detective Sergeant Robbins of the Metropolitan Police, madam. How did you get in?'

ffhrough the door. I work here. This is my office. I am the senior copy editor of Peverell Press. As such I have a right to be here. I very much doubt whether that could be said of you.'

'I'm here on duty, madam. Mr Gerard Etienne has been found dead under suspicious circumstances.'

'ou mean someone has murdered him?' 'We can't be sure of that yet.' 'When did he die?'

'We shall know more after the forensic pathologist has reported.' 'How did he die?'

'We don't yet know the cause of death.'

'It seems to me, young man, that there is very little you do know. Perhaps you had better come back when you are better informed.'

Sergeant Robbins opened his mouth then shut it firmly, just managing to prevent himself saying, 'Yes, miss. Very good, miss.' He disappeared, closing the door behind him, and was halfway down the stairs before realizing that he hadn't asked the woman's name. He would, of course, learn it in time. It was a small omission in a brief encounter which, he admitted, hadn't gone well. Being honest and given to mild speculation, he also admitted that part of the reason was the woman's uncanny resemblance in appearance and voice to Miss Addison, who had been his first teacher when he moved up from the infants' school and who had believed that children do best and are happiest when they know from the start who is boss.

Miss Spenlove was more shaken by the news than she had let him see. After completing work on the page she telephoned the switch-board.

'George, could you find Mrs Demery for me?' In seeking informa-tion she believed in going to an expert. 'Mrs Demery? There's a young man roaming the building who claims to be a detective sergeant of the Metropolitan Police. He told me that Mr Etienne is dead, possibly murdered. If you know anything about it, perhaps you could come up and enlighten me. And I'm ready for my coffee.'

Mrs Demery, abandoning Miss Blackett to the ministrations of Mandy, was only too eager to oblige.

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Dalgliesh, with Kate, conducted the remaining interviews with the partners in Gerard Etienne's office. Daniel was occupied in the little archives room where the gas man was already at work dismantling the fire and, when this was completed and samples of any chimney debris despatched to the lab, would go on to Wapping Police Station to set up the incident room. Dalgliesh had already spoken to the station superintendent who had accepted philosophically the need for the intrusion and the temporary use of one of his offices. Dalgliesh hoped that it wouldn't be for long. If this was murder, and he now had no doubt in his own mind that it was, then the number of possible suspects was unlikely to be great.

He had no wish to sit at Etienne's desk, partly because of sensitivity to the feelings of the partners, but principally because a confrontation across four feet of pale oak invested any interview with a formality which was more likely to inhibit or antagonize a suspect than elicit helpful information. There was, however, a small con-ference table in the same wood, with six chairs, close to the windows, and they seated themselves there. The long walk from the door would be intimidating for all but the most self-possessed, but he doubted whether it would worry Claudia or James de Witt.

The room had obviously once been a dining-room but its elegance had been desecrated by the end partition which cut across the oval stucco decorations on the ceiling and bisected one of the four tall windows which looked out on Innocent Passage. The magnificent marble fireplace with its elegant carving was in Miss Blackett's office. And here in Etienne's office the furniture - desk, chairs, conference table and filing cabinets - was almost aggressively modem. They might have been chosen to be deliberately at odds with the marble pilasters and porphyry entablatures, the two magnificent chandeliers, one almost touching the partition, and the gilt of picture frames against the pale green of the walls. The pictures were conventional rural scenes, almost certainly Victorian. They were well but a little over-painted, too sentimental for his taste. He doubted whether these

were the pictures which had originally hung here and he wondered what portraits of the Peverells had once graced these walls. There was still one piece of the original furniture; a marble and bronze wine-table, obviously Regency. So one reminder of past glories, at least, was still in use. He wondered what Frances Peverell thought of the room's desecration and whether now, with Gerard Etienne dead, the partition would be taken down. He wondered, too, if Gerard Etienne had been insensitive to all architecture or only disregarding of this particular house. Was the partitioning, the discordant modern furnishing, his comment on the unsuitability of the room for his purposes, a deliberate rejection of a past which had been dominated by Peverells not Etiennes? Claudia Etienne walked across the thirty feet towards him with confident grace and seated herself as if she were conferring a favour. She was very pale, but had herself well under control, although he suspected that her hands, plunged in the pockets of her cardigan, would have been more revealing than her taut grave face. He offered his condolences simply and, he hoped, sincerely but she cut him short. 'Are you here because of Lord Stilgoe?' "No. I'm here because of your brother's death. Lord Stilgoe did get in touch with me indirectly through a mutual friend. He had received an anonymous letter which greatly upset his wife; she saw it as a threat to his life. He asked for an official assurance that the police have no suspicion of foul play in the three deaths concerned with Innocent House, two authors and Sonia Clements.' 'Which you were, of course, able to give.' 'Which the police divisions concerned were able to give. He should have received that assurance about three days ago.' 'I hope it satisfied him. Lord Stilgoe's self-absorption amounts to paranoia. Still, he can hardly suppose that Gerard's death is a deliberate attempt to sabotage his precious memoirs. I still find it strange, Commander, that you are here personally, and in such impressive force. Are you treating my brother's death as murder?' 'As an unexplained and suspicious death. That is why I need to trouble you now. I would be grateful for your co-operation, not only personally, but in explaining to your staff that some invasion of their privacy and interference with their work is inevitable.' 'I think they will understand that.' 'We shall need to take fingerprints for the purpose of elimination.

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Any not needed in evidence will be destroyed when the cas complete.' 'That will be a new experience for us. If it is necessary, of cou we must accept it. I assume that you will be requiring all of / particularly the partners, to provide an alibi.'s\e// 'I need to know what you were doing, Miss Etienne, and who were with from six o'clock last night.' She said: 'You have the unenviable task, Commander, of expl V sing sympathy at my brother's death while requiring an alibi to pr that I didn't murder him. You do it with some grace. I congratul s; you; but then you've had plenty of practice. I was on the river wit friend, Declan Cartwright, last night. When you check with him h t4 probably describe me as his fiancee. I prefer to use the word lover. Ilk a started off shortly after six-thirty when the launch returned taking staff to Charing Cross Pier. We were on the river until abt4 ten-thirty, perhaps a little later, when we returned here and I him back to his flat off Westbourne Grove. He lives above an anti...It shop which he manages for the owner. I shall, of course, give you address. I was with him until two o'clock, then drove back to Ih4 Barbican. I have a flat there on the floor beneath that of my brother. 'It was a long time to spend on the river on an October night.' \ hg 'A fine October night. We went downstream to see the Tha Barrier and then returned and put in at Greenwich Pier. We tt dinner at Le Papillon in Greenwich Church Street. We booked 'le eight o'clock and I suppose we were there for about an hour anlihd half. thn we went upstream beyond Battersea Bridge and and, as Ive said, were back here shortly after ten-thirty.' 'tI 'Did anyone see you, other, of course, than the staff of cl restaurant and the other diners?' h..'

q?he river wasn't very busy. Even so, plenty of people must seen us, but that doesn't mean they'll remember us. I was in wheelhouse and Declan was with me most of the time. We sa?t4 least two police launches on the river I dare say they will h.' h4 noticed us. That's their job, isn't it?' i a 'Did anyone see you when you embarked or on your return?'

'Not as far as I know. We saw and heard no one.' 'And you can think of no person who wished your brother dead

'You asked that question before.' 'I'm asking it again now that we're here in private.'

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'Are we? Is anything one says to a police officer really private? The answer is the same. I know of no one who hated him enough to kill him. There are probably people who won't be sorry he's dead. No

death is universally regretted. Every death advantages someone.' 'Who will be advantaged by this death?'

'I shall. I'm Gerard's heir. That would, of course, have changed once he was married. As it is I inherit his shares in the firm, his Barbican flat, the proceeds of his life insurance. I didn't know him very well, we weren't brought up to be loving siblings. We went to different schools, different universities, had different lives. My Barbican flat is underneath his but we didn't make a habit of dropping in on each other. It would have seemed an invasion of privacy. But I liked him, I respected him. I was on his side. If he was murdered I hope that his killer rots in prison for the rest of his life. He won't, of course. We're so quick to forget the dead and forgive the living. Perhaps we need to show mercy because we're uncomfortably aware that one day we may need it. Incidentally, here are his keys. You asked for a set. I've taken off his car keys and the keys to his flat.'

'Thank you,' said Dalgliesh, taking them. 'I don't need to assure you that they will stay in my possession, or be held by one of my team. Has your father been told that his son is dead?'

'Not yet. I'm going to drive down to Bradwell-on-Sea late this afternoon. He lives as a recluse and doesn't take incoming calls. In any case I would prefer to break it to him personally. Do you want to see him?'

'It's important I do. I'd be gratel if you would ask him if I could see him tomorrow at any time convenient for him.'

'I'll ask but I'm not sure whether he'll agree. He has a strong dislike of visitors. He lives with an elderly French woman who looks after him. Her son is his chauffeur. He's married to a local girl and I imagine they'll take over when Estelle dies. She certainly won't retire. She regards it as a privilege to devote her life to a hero of France. Father, as always, has his life well organized. I tell you this so that you'll know what to expect. I don't think you will be welcome. Is that all?'

'I need, too, to see the next-of-loin of Sonia Clements.'

'Sonia Clements? What possible connection can there be between her suicide and Gerard's death?'

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'None as far as I know at present. Does she have next-of-kin, or was there someone she lived with?'

'Only her sister, and they didn't live together for the last three years of her life. She's a nun, a member of a community at Kemptown outside Brighton. They run a hostel for the dying. I think it's called St Anne's Convent. I'm sure the Reverend Mother will allow you to see her. After all the police are like the VAT inspectors, aren't they? However disagreeable or inconvenient their presence, when they call on you, you have to let them in. Is there anything else you want from me?'