The Private Patient (15 page)

The prospect was clearly unwelcome, but, glancing from Kate to Dalgliesh, Mrs. Skeffington obviously decided it was wiser not to comment. Instead, she smiled at Dalgliesh and assumed the voice of a wheedling child. “And, please, may I go now? I've tried to be helpful, I really have. But it was late and I was alone and frightened and now it all seems like a terrible dream.”

But Dalgliesh hadn't yet finished with his witness. He asked, “Were you given keys to the west door when you arrived, Mrs. Skeffington?”

“Yes, I was. By Sister. I'm always given two security keys. This time it was set number one. I gave them to Mrs. Frensham when she helped me with my packing. Robert came up to carry the bags to the car. He wasn't allowed to use the lift, so he had to lug them down the stairs. Mr. Chandler-Powell ought to employ a manservant. Mog isn't really suitable to be in the Manor in any capacity.”

“Where did you put the keys during the night?”

“By my bed, I suppose. No, it was on the table in front of the television. Anyway, I gave them to Mrs. Frensham. If they're lost, that's nothing to do with me.”

Dalgliesh said, “No, they're not lost. Thank you for your help, Mrs. Skeffington.”

Now that she was at last free to leave, Mrs. Skeffington became gracious and bestowed vague thanks and insincere smiles indiscriminately on everyone present. Chandler-Powell escorted her out to the car. No doubt, Kate thought, he would take the opportunity to reassure or propitiate her, but even he could hardly hope that she would hold her tongue. She wouldn't return, of course, nor would others. Patients might enjoy a small frisson of vicarious terror at the thought of a seventeenth-century burning, but were unlikely to choose a clinic where a relatively helpless post-operative patient had been brutally done to death. If George Chandler-Powell depended on his income from the clinic to keep the Manor going, he was likely to be in trouble. There would be more than one victim of this murder.

They waited until they heard the sound of the departing Rolls-Royce, and Chandler-Powell reappeared. Dalgliesh said, “The incident room will be in the Old Police Cottage, and my officers will be staying at Wisteria House. I would be grateful if the household could be assembled in the library in half an hour's time. Meanwhile, the scene-of-crime officers will be busy in the west wing. I'm grateful to you for putting the library at my disposal for the next hour or so.”

9

By the time Dalgliesh with Kate had returned to the bedroom Rhoda Gradwyn's body had been removed. The two mortuary attendants had with practised ease zipped her into a body bag and wheeled the stretcher into the lift. Benton was below to see the departure of the ambulance, which had arrived instead of a mortuary van to collect the corpse, and to await the arrival of the scene-of-crime officers. The photographer, a large nimble-footed man of few words, had completed his work and had already left. And now, before beginning the protracted routine of interviewing the suspects, Dalgliesh returned with Kate to the empty bedroom.

When the young Dalgliesh had first been promoted to the CID, it seemed to him that the air of a murder room always changed when the corpse had been removed, and more subtly than the physical absence of the victim. The air seemed easier to breathe, voices were louder, there was a shared relief, as if an object with some mysterious power to threaten or contaminate had been robbed of its potency. Some vestige of this feeling remained. The disordered bed with the indent of the head still on the pillow looked as innocuous and normal as if the occupant had recently got up from sleep and would shortly return. It was the dropped tray of crockery just inside the door that, for Dalgliesh, imposed on the room a symbolism both dramatic and discomforting. The scene looked as if it had been set up to be photographed for the jacket of an upmarket thriller.

None of Miss Gradwyn's belongings had been touched, and her briefcase was next door, still propped against the bureau in the sitting room. A large metallic suitcase on wheels stood beside the chest of drawers. Dalgliesh placed his murder bag—a description which persisted despite the fact that it was now a fitted attaché case—on the folding baggage stool. He opened it, and he and Kate put on their search gloves.

Miss Gradwyn's handbag, made of green leather with a silver clasp and shaped like a Gladstone bag, was obviously a designer model. Inside was a set of keys, a small address book, a pocket engagement diary and a wallet with a set of credit cards attached to a purse containing four pounds in coins and sixty pounds in twenty- and ten-pound notes. There was also a handkerchief, her chequebook in a leather cover, a comb, a small bottle of perfume and a silver ballpoint pen. In the pocket designed for it they found her mobile phone.

Kate said, “Normally you would expect this to be on the bedside table. It looks as if she didn't want any calls.”

The mobile was small and a new model. Flicking it open and switching it on, Dalgliesh checked the calls and messages. The old text messages had been deleted, but there was one new one, which was listed as received from “Robin” and read:
Something very important
has cropped up. I need to consult you. Please see me, please don't shut
me out.

Dalgliesh said: “We'll need to identify the sender to see if this urgency involved his coming to the Manor. But that can wait. I just want to take a quick look at the other patients' rooms before we start the questioning. Dr. Glenister said that the killer was wearing gloves. He or she would want to get rid of them as quickly as possible. If they were surgical gloves, they could have been cut up and disposed of down one of the WCs. Anyway, it's worth a look. This oughtn't to wait for the SOCOs.”

They were lucky. In the bathroom of the suite at the far end of the corridor they found a minute fragment of latex, fragile as a piece of human skin, caught under the rim of the lavatory bowl. Dalgliesh carefully detached it with tweezers, placed it in an evidence bag and closed it, and he and Kate scribbled their initials over the seal.

Dalgliesh said, “We'll let the SOCOs know about this find when they arrive. This is the suite they need to concentrate on, particularly the walk-in cupboard in the bedroom, the only bedroom which has one. One more pointer to this being an inside job. And now I'd better telephone Miss Gradwyn's mother.”

Kate said, “Chief Inspector Whetstone told me that he arranged for a WPC to visit her. He did that soon after he arrived here. It won't be news to her. Do you want me to speak to her, sir?”

“No, thank you, Kate. She has a right to hear from me. But if she's already been told, there's no hurry. We'll get on with the group interviews. I'll see you and Benton in the library.”

10

The household was assembled and waiting with Kate and Benton when Dalgliesh entered the library with George Chandler-Powell. Benton was interested in how the group had arranged itself. Marcus Westhall had distanced himself from his sister, who was seated in an upright chair by the window, and had taken a chair next to Sister Flavia Holland, perhaps in medical solidarity. Helena Cressett had seated herself in one of the armchairs beside the fire but, perhaps sensing that an appearance of complete relaxation would be inappropriate, sat upright, hands resting loosely on the chair arms. Mogworthy, an incongruous Cerberus, had changed into a shiny blue suit and striped tie, which gave him the look of an ancient undertaker, and stood beside her, back to the fire, the only one on his feet. He turned to glare at Dalgliesh as they entered; the glare seemed to Benton more minatory than aggressive. Dean and Kimberley Bostock, seated rigidly side by side on the only sofa, made a slight movement as if uncertain whether they should rise, then, slewing their eyes quickly round, subsided into the cushions; Kimberley surreptitiously slid her hand into her husband's.

Sharon Bateman sat alone, bolt upright, a few feet from Candace Westhall. Her hands were folded in her lap, her thin legs placed side by side, and the eyes which stared briefly into his showed more wariness than fear. She was wearing a cotton dress with a blue floral pattern under a denim jacket. The dress, more appropriate to summer than to a bleak December afternoon, was too large for her, and Benton wondered if this hint of a Victorian charity child, obstinate and over-disciplined, had been contrived. Mrs. Frensham had taken a chair beside the window and from time to time glanced out, as if to remind herself that there was a world, fresh and comfortingly normal, outside this air made sour by fear and tension. All were pale and, despite the warmth of the central heating and the blaze and crackle of the fire, looked pinched with cold.

Benton was interested to see that the rest of the company had taken time to dress appropriately for an occasion on which it would be more prudent to show respect and grief than apprehension. Shirts were crisply pressed, slacks and tweeds had taken the place of country corduroy or denim. Jumpers and cardigans looked as if they had been recently unfolded. Helena Cressett was elegant in slim-fitting trousers in a fine black-and-white check topped with a black turtleneck cashmere jumper. Her face was drained of colour, so that even the soft lipstick she was wearing seemed an ostentatious mark of defiance. Trying not to fix his eyes on her, Benton thought,
That face is pure Plantagenet,
and was surprised to discover that he found her beautiful.

The three chairs at the mahogany eighteenth-century desk were empty and were obviously placed there for the police. They seated themselves, and Chandler-Powell took his stance opposite, close to Miss Cressett. All their eyes turned to him, although Benton was aware that their thoughts were with the tall dark-haired man on his right. It was he who dominated the room. But they were there with the consent of Chandler-Powell; this was his house, his library, and subtly he made this plain.

He said, his voice calm and authoritative, “Commander Dalgliesh has asked for the use of this room so that he and his officers can see and question us together. I think you've all met Mr. Dalgliesh, Detective Inspector Miskin and Detective Sergeant Benton-Smith. I'm not here to make a speech. I just want to say that what happened here last night has appalled all of us. It is now our duty to co-operate fully with the police in their investigation. Obviously we can't hope that this tragedy will remain unknown outside the Manor. Answering the press and other media enquiries will be handled by experts, and I'm asking you all now not to speak to anyone outside these walls, at least for the present. Commander Dalgliesh, would you like to take over?”

Benton got out his notebook. He had early in his career devised a distinctive if eccentric method of shorthand which, although it owed something to Mr. Pitman's ingenious system, was highly personal. His chief had almost perfect recall, but it was his job to watch, listen and record everything said or seen. He knew why AD had decided on this preliminary group interrogation. It was important to get an overall view of exactly what had taken place since Rhoda Gradwyn had entered the Manor on the afternoon of 13 December, and this could be achieved more accurately if everyone concerned was present to add comments or make corrections. Most suspects were capable of lying with some conviction when questioned alone—some, indeed, were remarkably adept at it. Benton recalled a number of occasions when tearful, apparently heart-broken lovers and relations appealed for help in solving a murder, even when they knew where they had hidden the body. But to sustain a lie in company was more difficult. A suspect might be adept at controlling his own facial expression, but the responses of his hearers could be a revelation.

Dalgliesh said, “The idea of calling you together is to get a group picture of exactly what happened to Rhoda Gradwyn from the moment she arrived here until the discovery of her body. I shall, of course, need to speak to you separately, but I hope we shall be able to make some progress in the next half-hour or so.”

There was a silence broken by Helena Cressett, who said, “The first person to see Miss Gradwyn was Mogworthy, who opened the gate for her. The reception party, consisting of Sister Holland, Mr. Westhall and myself, was waiting in the great hall.”

Her voice was calm; the words were direct and matter-of-fact. For Benton the message was clear.
If we have to go through this public charade,
for God's sake let's get on with it.

Mogworthy stared at Dalgliesh. “That's right. She was on time, more or less. Miss Helena said to expect her after tea and before dinner, and I had my eyes open for her from four o'clock. At six-forty-five she arrived. I opened the gate for her, and she parked the car herself. And she said she'd cope with her own luggage—only one case, and that on wheels. A very determined lady. I waited till she'd gone round to the front of the Manor and saw the door open and Miss Helena waiting for her. I reckoned there was no more for me to do, so I went home.”

Dalgliesh said, “You didn't go into the Manor, perhaps to carry her bag up to her room?”

“I did not. If she could wheel it from the car park, I reckoned she could get it up to the patients' floor. If not, someone would do it for her. The last I saw of her was going through the front door.”

“Did you enter the Manor at any time after you saw Miss Gradwyn arrive?”

“Why would I do that?”

Dalgliesh said, “I don't know, I'm asking if you did.”

“I did not. And since we're talking about me, I like to say things plain. No shilly-shallying. I know what you want to ask, so I'll save you the trouble. I knew where she was sleeping—on the patients' floor, where else? And I've got keys to the garden door, but I never set eyes on her dead or alive after she went through the front door. I didn't kill her and I don't know who did. If I did know, like as not I'd tell you. I don't hold with murder.”

Miss Cressett said, “Mog, no one is suspecting you.”

“You may not be, Miss Helena, others will. I know how the world wags. Just as well to speak plainly.”

Dalgliesh said, “Thank you, Mr. Mogworthy. You have spoken plainly, and it has been helpful. Is there anything else you can think of that we ought to know, anything you saw or heard after you left? For example, did you see anyone near the Manor, a stranger perhaps, someone acting suspiciously?”

Mog said stoutly, “Any stranger round the Manor after dark is suspicious to me. I never seen nobody last night. But there were a car parked in the lay-by by the stones. Not when I left; later.”

Catching Mog's quickly disciplined smirk of sly satisfaction, Benton suspected that the timing of the disclosure was less naïve than it sounded. The reception of his news was certainly gratifying. No one spoke, but in the silence Benton detected a soft hiss like the intake of breath. This was news to them all, as no doubt Mogworthy had intended. Benton watched their faces as they glanced at one another. It was a moment of shared relief, quickly concealed but unmistakable.

Dalgliesh asked, “Can you remember anything about the car? The make, colour?”

“Saloon car, darkish. Could be black or blue. The lights were out. Someone sitting in the driver's seat, but I don't know whether anyone else was there.”

“You didn't note the registration number?”

“No, I didn't. Why would I be noticing car numbers? I were just passing, cycling home from Mrs. Ada Denton's cottage, where I'd been having my Friday fish and chips, same as I always do. When I'm on the bike I keep my eyes on the road, not like some. All I know is, there were a car there.”

“At what time?”

“Before midnight. Maybe five or ten minutes before. I always reckon to get home by midnight.”

Chandler-Powell said, “This is important evidence, Mog. Why didn't you speak earlier?”

“For why? You said yourself that we weren't to gossip about Miss Gradwyn's death but wait until the police arrived. Well, the boss man is here now, so I'm telling him what I saw.”

Before anyone could respond, the door was flung open. All eyes turned towards it. A man burst in with DC Warren expostulating just behind him. His appearance was as extraordinary as his irruption was dramatic. Benton saw a pale, handsome, somewhat androgynous face, blazing blue eyes and fair hair plastered to his forehead like the marbled locks of a sculpted god. He was wearing a long black coat, almost to the floor, over pale-blue jeans, and for a moment Benton thought he was in his pyjamas and dressing gown. If his sensational entrance had been planned, he could hardly have chosen a more propitious moment, but contrived histrionics seemed unlikely. The newcomer was shaking with poorly controlled emotions, grief perhaps, but also fear and anger. He stared from face to face, seemingly confused, and before he could speak Candace Westhall spoke calmly from her seat by the window.

“Our cousin, Robin Boyton. He's staying in the guest cottage. Robin, this is Commander Dalgliesh of New Scotland Yard, and his colleagues Inspector Miskin and Sergeant Benton-Smith.”

Robin ignored her and turned his blaze of anger on Marcus. “You bastard! You cold, black-hearted bastard! My friend, a dear close friend, is dead. Murdered. And you didn't even have the decency to tell me. And here you all are, cosying up to the police, deciding together to keep all this quiet. We mustn't upset Mr. Chandler-Powell's valuable work, must we? And she's lying upstairs dead. You should have told me! Somebody should have told me. I need to see her. I want to say goodbye.”

And now he was openly weeping, his tears falling unrestrained. Dalgliesh didn't speak, but Benton, glancing at him, saw that the dark eyes were watchful.

Candace Westhall half rose as if about to comfort her cousin, then subsided. It was her brother who spoke. “I'm afraid that isn't possible, Robin. Miss Gradwyn's body has been taken to the mortuary. But I did attempt to tell you. I called at the cottage shortly before nine, but you were obviously still asleep. The curtains were drawn and the front door locked. I think you did tell us at some time that you knew Rhoda Gradwyn, but not that you were a close friend.”

Dalgliesh spoke. “Mr. Boyton, at present I'm interviewing only those people who were in this house from the time Miss Gradwyn arrived on Thursday until the discovery of her death at seven-thirty this morning. If you were among them, then please stay. If not, I or one of my officers will see you as soon as possible.”

Boyton had controlled his rage. Through the gulps of indrawn breath, his voice took on the tone of a petulant child.

“Of course I'm not among them. I haven't been inside until now. The policeman at the door wouldn't let me in.”

Dalgliesh said, “That was on my orders.”

Chandler-Powell said, “And earlier on mine. Miss Gradwyn asked for absolute privacy. I'm sorry you've been caused this distress, Mr. Boyton, but I'm afraid I was so busy here with the police officers and the pathologist that I'd overlooked the fact that you were a guest in the cottage. Have you had lunch? Dean and Kimberley can get you something to eat.”

“Of course I haven't had lunch. When have you ever fed me when I've been in Rose Cottage? And I don't want your bloody food. Don't patronise me!”

He drew himself up and, stretching out a shaking arm, pointed his finger at Chandler-Powell, then, realising perhaps that, dressed as he was, the histrionic stance made him look ridiculous, he dropped his arm and gazed round the company in mute misery.

Dalgliesh said, “Mr. Boyton, as you were a friend of Miss Gradwyn's, what you have to tell us will be helpful, but not now.”

The words, quietly spoken, were a command. Boyton turned away, his shoulders drooping. Then he swung back and spoke directly to Chandler-Powell. “She came here to have that scar removed, to make a new life for herself. She trusted you and you killed her, you murdering bastard!”

Without waiting for a response, he was gone. DC Warren, who had stood inscrutably throughout, followed him out and closed the door firmly. There were five seconds of silence, during which Benton sensed that the mood had changed. Someone at last had spoken that sonorous word. The unbelievable, the grotesque, the horrifying had at last been acknowledged.

Dalgliesh said, “Shall we get on? Miss Cressett, you received Miss Gradwyn at the door; can we take it from there?”

For the next twenty minutes, the recital proceeded smoothly, and Benton concentrated on his hieroglyphics. Helena Cressett had welcomed the new patient to the Manor and had taken her directly to her room. As she was to have an anaesthetic next morning, no dinner was served, and Miss Gradwyn had said she would like to be alone. The patient had insisted on wheeling her own case to the bedroom and was unpacking her books when Miss Cressett left. On Friday, she knew, of course, that Miss Gradwyn had had her operation and been transferred in the early evening from the recovery room to her suite in the patients' wing. This was the usual procedure. She was not concerned with patient care, nor did she visit Miss Gradwyn in her suite. She had dinner in the dining room with Sister Holland, Miss Westhall and Mrs. Frensham. She was told that Marcus Westhall was having dinner and staying the night with a consultant in London with whom he was hoping to work in Africa. She and Miss Westhall had worked together in the office until nearly seven o'clock, when pre-dinner drinks were served by Dean in the library. Afterwards she and Mrs. Frensham had played chess and talked in her private sitting room. She had been in bed by midnight and had heard nothing during the night. On Saturday she had showered and dressed when Mr. Chandler-Powell arrived to tell her that Rhoda Gradwyn was dead.