Night Visit (23 page)

I
literally ransacked the room. There was nothing there. But then it was a very bare room, surgically sterile. Even the one picture was of a white mountain, sharp, pointed. No people. I picked it off the wall to read the title. The Andes.

But
secrets can be found. And the back of this photograph could be removed—easily. Heaven knows why he had kept them there. But believing they might be hard evidence I pocketed them.

So
what did they have to do with Danny Small? Or me? Melanie. Of course. I glanced again at the photographs, sickened by all that they portrayed. The subjects were all very young, all female, all foreign. He could never have risked such dangerous tastes in this country. Except once.

And
if either the police or the British Medical Association even had a suspicion that Neil had the predilection for such rare delicacies he would be lucky to escape prison and certainly he would
never
practise medicine again.

And
although I was no nearer knowing
where
Petra had gone I knew
why
. And Sandy had inevitably followed.

So
now I wondered. Had it all started with a child in a pretty dress, meandering through the wood, on a hot, summer’s morning, early, before anyone else was about? Had that set an evil taste? Or had it all been there before?

And
what had Danny to do with it? Why had Neil killed him? To divert me or to annihilate him? I needed proof, something more than these pictures. They were, in themselves, nothing but an indicator. An offence, but a less serious one. It was only I, with a ten-year-old daughter that he had skilfully inched towards, who perceived the true malevolence behind them. I could read the fear in the children’s eyes and see in them the reflection of the depths of depravity. And I knew that if he could hide all this so cleverly, for so many years, I should fear him. You see Robin had been one person, imperfect but readable. There had been nothing cleverly hidden about my soon-to-be-ex-husband. But Neil was two people, a man to teach your daughter how to play chess, and a monster, whose face I would not recognise. And I wanted to see him convicted for both crimes. Incredibly I was rising up in Danny’s defence.
Defend
those
who
cannot
defend
themselves
.

But
I had no proof. This whole solution existed only in my imagination. I must get that proof whatever it cost me. And I would have to work to get it.

Through
inanimate objects sometimes answers come. Sometimes not. Like the child’s rucksack. Is all this also superstition, this talk of divination? Or is there truth in this particular superstition? That night I again spilled its contents out onto the dining table. In ignorance and innocence Rosie watched me. ‘Whose things are they, Mum?’

‘
A little girl’s.’

‘
Doesn’t she want them anymore?’

‘
No.’ Mercifully she did not ask anything else but she too glanced through the pile of clothes, underwear, spare shoes, socks. Even her sponge bag was there, toothbrush, Punch and Judy toothpaste, flannel with Barbie embroidered in the corner. All had been packed by loving hands. Vera’s, I guessed. Right at the bottom of the sponge bag was a tiny bottle of nasal spray. I picked it up and unscrewed the cap, recognising its contents. So little Melanie Toadstool had suffered from hay fever. I pictured her, eyes streaming in the country air, blistering pollens compared with London. The child must have reacted to the pollens blowing into the house and her grandmother had consulted a doctor.

I
sat up.
Consulted
a
doctor
. That had been how Neil had met her. As simple as that. The child had been brought to him suffering from hay fever and he had prescribed a nasal spray. It wasn’t much but it was a new line of enquiry for the police to pursue. I put it back in the rucksack and prepared to give it to Detective Inspector Angela Skilton when next she interviewed me.

21

December
23rd

It was a bad day. Because I had discounted Pritchard I had forgotten about him. It was a mistake. He gate-crashed my evening surgery. I was late finishing anyway, being on call. The run up to Christmas is a doctor’s nightmare. Everyone wants to be well for Christmas. So the slightest snuffle or feeling of vague illness is squashed in between the trips to the shops and the supermarket.

See
how
they
still
dance
around
me
?

Pritchard
began by telling me the police had called round. Two days before his first lone Christmas they had told him the results of the toxicology report, that his mother had died from ingesting a poisonous fungus,
Amanita
virosa
, the Destroying Angel.

And
he was angry. With me. ‘They said you had suggested it might have been that.’ He looked puzzled. ‘How could you know?’

I
didn’t mention the long ago doctor’s scribble. ‘It was a guess.’

He
frowned. ‘Well, why couldn’t you leave her alone? Asking all those questions. She knew what you thought. For years she had forgotten about him. Then you come along. Asking, asking, asking things you didn’t need to know. It was none of your business. He was a cruel man. We were well rid of him. He suffered no more than he deserved. I remember him and the fear he brought into our home and I was only six years old when he died. He gave us hell, my mother and I. An eye for an eye. A tooth for a tooth. It was justice. My mother and I were quite happy together till you tried to spoil it. I liked you, Harriet.’

He
didn’t even pause for breath. ‘I came specially to see you because I liked you. I saw you dropping your little girl off outside the school right at the beginning of the year. I saw how sad you looked and I thought we could be friends. I thought you
were
my friend. You always seemed so pleasant to me. I knew your husband had left you for another woman and I felt sorry for you. We both had difficulties but I still liked you. I even thought,’ he sucked in a noisy breath, ‘I thought I could have helped you.’

Had
I not been so distraught at my current circumstances I might have laughed at the thought of Pritchard helping me ‘get over’ Robin. But I didn’t feel like laughing during any part of that final day.

‘
The police told me,’ he continued, ‘that when the family doctor feels unable to issue a death certificate the usual course of events is to have a post mortem.’

I
felt bound to defend myself. ‘Look, Mr Pritchard. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. But as I’ve pointed out to you before, I was unable to issue a death certificate. Neither was the hospital. And your mother having died within twenty-four hours of admission they had no option but to authorise a post mortem, whatever my opinion. After that the coroner’s office had to take that course.’ At least part of my politeness was an apology because in one area I had misjudged him. I had been partly wrong about him.

He
hadn’t finished with me. ‘I’ll be straight with you, Harriet. I blame you for my mother’s untimely death.’

‘
Mr Pritchard!’

He
was unperturbed. ‘I do because it was you who destroyed her.’

‘
How?’

‘
You made us remember.’

‘
You mean your father’s death?’

He
nodded, used a fat forefinger to wriggle his glasses up his nose. They must be heavy with such thick lenses.

‘
My mother...’ To my amazement Pritchard’s eyes were filling. ‘She was—’ He swallowed. ‘She made a dish for my father and he ate it.’

‘
And it contained?’

‘
She gave him the Destroying Angel. It was a fungus, poison. For years we had forgotten about it, put it right to the back of our minds. Without his bullying influence our lives have been happy. And then you come along asking questions about how he’d died. No one else was interested. Even at the time of his death people might have guessed it wasn’t an accident. But they didn’t say anything. No one asked.’

‘
And your mother’s death?’

‘
The same,’ he said.

‘But
your mother was infirm. She was incapable of harvesting the fungus herself.’ I could have added that I knew where it grew at the base of a beech tree miles from Gordon’s Lane.

Pritchard
nodded. ‘She asked me to collect them for her. She didn’t tell me why.’

‘
So you gave them to her?’

‘
Oh yes,’ he said. ‘I gave them to her.’

‘
And she ate them.’

Pritchard
took his glasses off so I could see the plump eyelids sagging with grief and tiredness. ‘You can call it what you like, Doctor, but I know it was suicide. I never fed them to her. She must have eaten them when I was out at work. All I know is I came home. The dish was empty and she was ill. Very ill. Dying. I feel...’ He licked his lips. ‘I believe that she took them as a sort of atonement for what she had done. Maybe now the Lord will forgive her.’

‘
Why didn’t you tell me this when I visited her?’

Pritchard
took a long time to answer. When he did there was certain air of fatalism about him. ‘I thought if I told you what she’d taken you might know what to give her to prevent her dying. And that wasn’t what she’d wanted. She’d made her decision.’

‘
But you collected a poisonous fungus for her
knowing
she was intending suicide? You colluded with her?’

‘
I didn’t know then what she was intending. She just asked me if they still grew at the base of the beech tree towards the middle path through the wood. I told her yes and she said they’d always fascinated her and she wanted me to pick some. She never
actually
said.’

And
now we were both silent. But I did not need to shoulder the guilt for Amelia Pritchard’s death, suicide or murder.

He
did.

‘
You have to tell the coroner how it happened. Maybe he’ll record a verdict of misadventure, Mr Pritchard.’

‘
Maybe,’ he said. ‘Maybe not.’

He
put his pasty face near to mine before crossing his legs carefully. ‘There is another matter.’

My
heart sank.

‘
The headmaster told me you’d been to the school, making suggestions about me. They’re untrue. In fact nothing could be further from the truth. I tell you, Harriet. I love children. I love them. I love to be near them. What harm is there in that?’

I
couldn’t answer him—now.

‘
Don’t go there again,’ he said, ‘making trouble. It’s my job and people might start believing things.’

‘
Don’t worry,’ I said.

I
waited then for him to go but Pritchard was a strange fellow, capable of doing the most unexpected things. He fished around on the floor and drew out a badly-wrapped parcel in crumpled paper.

‘
I wanted to show you there’s no hard feelings,’ he said. ‘It’s Christmas and therefore a time for forgiveness. You are on your own with your little girl, no doubt missing your husband and I will be missing my poor mother.’

For
one awful moment I thought he was going to invite himself for Christmas dinner and held my breath to make the refusal.

Instead
he pushed the parcel across the desk. ‘I’ve brought you a present,’ he said. ‘To cheer you up, Harriet.’ His eyes were on me. ‘Go on,’ he said. ‘Open it.’

I
didn’t need to. Through the paper I could smell the stale, charity shop smell. I muttered something about waiting till Christmas but he sat and watched me and I knew he wouldn’t leave until I had opened it. Reluctantly I tore the paper. It was the navy and white Crimplene dress, carelessly folded, the one that had reminded me so forcefully of my mother.

I
thanked him and tried to hide unsuccessfully the sudden flood of depression.

*

I was on call that night, answering queries from worried parents, visiting one or two minor emergencies. I sent an old lady into hospital with heart failure. At midnight I went to bed with my pager propped up against the bedside lamp.

But
even before I had gone to sleep it bleeped. I switched the lamp on and read the message.

Melanie
Carnforth
,
aged
six
.
Needs
a
doctor
.

And
underneath was the address.

Gordon
’s
Lane
.

I
gripped the pager, reread the message. I must be having a nightmare. A terrible, terrible nightmare. The child was becoming an obsession.

I
read through the message again. It was the same.

Melanie
Carnforth
,
aged
six
.
Needs
a
doctor
Gordon’s
Lane
.

I
threw the covers off and pulled my clothes on. The child was summoning me.
Not
the
child
.
Not
the
child
.
The
child
is
dead
.

And
like the beat of a drum the words came. If not the child, then who?

I
slipped the pager into my coat pocket. This was a taunt from a murderer who thought he was safe. I could go, take the risk, learn things, or I could stay here, also safe, out of harm’s way. Would I be out of harm’s way? Would I be safe if I stayed here, knowing things? If I didn’t go I might
never
know what had happened to Melanie. Therefore I had no choice. I
must
go.

I
would
go. But not unarmed. From the knife block I selected the largest, sharpest knife. I would use it to threaten him and to defend myself. I fondly believed I would bring him in, like a bounty hunter, to confess his crime, both the murder of the child and the killing of Danny Small. And then I could claim my reward, freedom from the charge of unlawful killing.

Upstairs
Rosie was asleep. Sylvie was too. I envied them.

I
locked the front door behind me. And then I drove along the familiar route, to the south of the town, turning left into the forest. I crossed the causeway over the Heron Pool and watched my headlights glide across the water. Then I climbed. And all the time I was consumed with the fiercest hatred.

Perhaps
that was why I missed things.

I
pulled the car up in the yard. Pritchard’s house was silent and black. I switched my car headlights off and waited for my eyes to adjust. The dull mist had obliterated both stars and moon but I could see a dark shape leaning against the gate. He was waiting for me.

I
grasped the knife and memorised my anatomy class again. To kill, to maim, to protect. I would do whatever needed to be done. A flash of the waiting body, skin, blood, bone. An upwards thrust would find the heart even through the protection of the rib cage.

I
felt cold, detached and awake. The year had finally led to this. I swear I would have done it. I moved towards him.

*

I know now that he too had a knife. But I never saw it.

Yet
I smelt it. You see, cold steel has a distinctive scent to it, something metallic and pungent. Or am I still talking about the scent of fear?

When
he spoke his voice was ordinary.

‘
I knew you’d come,’ he said with grudging respect.

‘
You bastard,’ I said.

He
sighed, world-weary. ‘I want the photographs back, Harriet.’

‘
Those poor children,’ I said. ‘Tailed up like whores? In their knickers? Wearing lipstick? Frightened? You bastard, Neil. You utter bastard.’ Something snapped inside me. ‘And what plans did you have for Rosie?’

He
said nothing.

I
shrieked at him then. ‘What were you going to do with my daughter? The same as you did to Melanie? She trusted you, Neil. You were the doctor. You made her better. You abused that position of trust. You bloody well killed her.’ I felt sick with hatred, driven to continue. ‘You raped her, before you killed her, didn’t you? So was that the start of your new taste? And those vulnerable children driven by poverty, hunger. In all the countries of the world? Cheap—aren’t they? The price of a slice of bread?’