Shroud for a Nightingale (18 page)

“What problem? There’s no problem. The beaker was opaque, heat insulated. She could have put the stuff into it earlier that evening. No one would have noticed. Or she could have carried a powder in a slip of paper and flushed it down the lavatory. The container’s no problem. Incidentally, it wasn’t a corrosive this time. That much was evident when I saw the body.”

“Were you the first doctor on the scene?”

“No. I wasn’t in the hospital when they found her. Dr. Snelling saw her. He’s the general physician who looks after the nurses here. He realized at once that there was nothing to be done. I went across to have a look at the body as soon as I heard the news. I arrived at the hospital just before nine. By then the police had arrived, of course. The local people, I mean. I cant think why they weren’t left to get on with it I rang the Chief Constable to make my views known. Incidentally, Miles Honeyman tells me that she died about midnight I saw him just as he was leaving. We were at medical school together.”

“So I understand.”

“You were wise to call him in. I gather that he’s generally considered to be the best.”

He spoke complacently, success condescending to recognize success. His criteria were hardly subtle, thought Dalgliesh. Money, prestige, public recognition, power. Yes, Courtney-Briggs would always demand the best for himself, confident of his ability to pay for it.

Dalgliesh said: “She was pregnant. Did you know?”

“So Honeyman told me. No, I didn’t know. These things happen, even today when birth control is reliable and easily obtained. But I should have expected a girl of her intelligence to be on the Pill.”

Dalgliesh remembered the scene that morning in the library when Mr. Courtney-Briggs had known the girl’s age to a day. He asked his next question without apology.

“Did you know her well?”

The implication was plain and the surgeon did not reply for a moment Dalgliesh had not expected him to bluster or threaten and he did neither. There was an increased respect in the sharp look which be gave his interrogator.

“For a time, yes.” He paused. “You could say I knew her intimately.”

“Was she your mistress?”

Courtney-Briggs looked at him, impassive, considering. Then he said:

That’s putting it rather formally. We slept together fairly regularly during her first six months here. Are you objecting?“

“It’s hardly for me to object if she didn’t. Presumably she was willing?”

“You could say that.”

“When did it end?”

“I thought I told you. It lasted until the end of her first year. That’s a year and a half ago.”

“Did you quarrel?”

“No. She decided she’d, shall we say, exhausted the possibilities. Some women like variety. I do myself. I wouldn’t have taken her on if I’d thought she was the type to make trouble. And don’t get me wrong. I don’t make it a practice to sleep with student nurses. I’m reasonably fastidious.”

“Wasn’t it difficult to keep the affair secret? There’s very little privacy in a hospital.”

“You have romantic ideas, Superintendent We didn’t kiss and cuddle in tile sluice room. When I said I slept with her I meant just that I don’t use euphemisms for sex. She came to my Wimpole Street flat when she had a night off and we slept there. I haven’t a resident man there and my house is near Selborne. The porter at Wimpole Street must have known, but he can keep his mouth shut There wouldn’t be many tenants left in the building if he couldn’t. There wasn’t any risk, provided that she didn’t talk, and she wasn’t a talker. Not that I would have minded particularly. There are certain areas of private behavior in which I do as I like. You too no doubt”

“So it wasn’t your child?”

“No. I’m not careless. Besides the affair was over. But if it hadn’t been I should hardly have killed her. That kind of solution causes more embarrassment than it prevents.”

Dalgliesh asked: “What would you have done?”

“That would have depended on the circumstances. I should have had to be sure it was my child. But this particular problem is hardly uncommon and not insoluble if the woman is reasonable.”

“I’ve been told that Miss Fallon planned to get an abortion. Did she approach you?”

“No.”

“She might have done?”

“Certainly she might have done. But she didn’t.”

“Would you have helped her if she had?”

The surgeon looked at him.

“That question is hardly within your terms of reference, I should have thought.”

Dalgliesh said: “That’s for me to judge. The girl was pregnant; she apparently intended to get an abortion; she told a friend that she knew someone who would help her. I’m naturally interested to know who she had in mind.”

“You know the law. I’m a surgeon not a gynecologist. I prefer to stick to my own specialty and to practice it legally.”

“But there are other kinds of help. Referring her to an appropriate consultant, helping with the fees.”

A girl with
£,
16,000 to bequeath was hardly likely to want help with the fees for an abortion. But Miss Goodale’s legacy was not being made public and Dalgliesh was interested to learn whether Courtney-Briggs knew about Fallon’s capital. But the surgeon gave no sign.

“Well, she didn’t come to me. She may have bad me in mind but she didn’t come. And if she had, I wouldn’t have helped. I make it my business to assume my own responsibilities; but I don’t take on other people’s. If she chose to look elsewhere for her satisfaction she could look elsewhere for her help. I didn’t impregnate her. Someone did. Let him look after her.”

“That would have been your response?”

“Certainly it would. And rightly.”

His voice held a note of grim satisfaction. Looking at him, Dalgliesh saw that his face was flushed. The man was controlling his emotion with difficulty. And Dalgliesh had little doubt of the nature of that emotion. It was hate. He went on with his interrogation.

“Were you in the hospital last night?”

“Yes. I was called to operate on an emergency. One of my patients relapsed. It wasn’t altogether unexpected, but very serious. I finished operating at eleven forty-five p.m. The time will be noted in the theatre register. Then I rang Sister Brumfett at Nightingale House to ask her to be good enough to return to her ward for an hour or so. My patient was a private patient After that I rang my home to say that I would be returning that night instead of sleeping here in the medical officers’ quarters as I do occasionally after a late operation. I left the main building shortly after twelve. I intended driving out by the Winchester Road gate. I have my own key. However, it was a wild night as you probably noticed, and I discovered that there was an elm down over the path. I was lucky not to drive into it I got out of the car and knotted my white silk scarf, round one of the branches to warn anyone else who might be driving that way. It wasn’t likely that anyone would, but the tree was an obvious danger and there was no chance of getting it moved before daylight I reversed the car and left by the main entrance, reporting the fallen tree to the gate porter on my way out”

“Did you notice the time then?”

“I didn’t He may have done. But at a guess, it was probably about twelve fifteen, maybe later. I wasted a bit of time at the tree.”

“You would have had to drive past Nightingale House to reach the back gate. You didn’t go in?”

“I had no reason to go in and I didn’t go in, either to poison Nurse Fallon or for any other reason.”

“And you saw no one in the grounds?”

“After midnight and in the middle of a storm? No, I saw no one.”

Dalgliesh switched his questioning.

“You saw Nurse Pearce die, of course. I suppose there was never a real chance of saving her?”

“Never, I should say. I took pretty vigorous measures, but it isn’t easy when you don’t know what you’re treating.”

“But you knew it was poison?”

“Pretty soon. Yes. But I didn’t know what Not that it would have made any difference. You’ve seen the post-mortem report You knew what that stuff did to her.”

Dalgliesh asked: “You were in Nightingale House from eight o’clock onwards on the morning that she died?”

“You know perfectly well that I was if, as I assume, you’ve taken the trouble to read my original statement. I arrived in Nightingale House shortly after eight My contract here is for six notional halfdays a week; I’m in the hospital all day on Monday, Thursday and Friday; but if’s not uncommon for me to be called in to operate on an emergency, particularly if it’s a private patient, and I occasionally do a Saturday morning session in the theatre if the lists are long. I’d been called out shortly after eleven o’clock on Sunday night for an emergency appendicectomy—one of my private patients—and it was convenient to spend the night in the medical officers’ quarters.”

“Which are where?”

“In that deplorably designed new building near the outpatients’ department They serve breakfast at the ungodly hour of seven thirty.”

“You were here rather early surely. The demonstration wasn’t due to begin until nine.”

“I wasn’t here merely for the demonstration, Superintendent You’re really rather ignorant of hospitals, aren’t you? The Senior Consultant Surgeon doesn’t normally attend nurse training sessions unless he’s actually lecturing the students. I only attended on January 12th because the G.N.C. Inspector was to be there and I’m Vice-Chairman of the Nurse Education Committee. It was a courtesy to Miss Beale to be here to meet her. I came in early because I wanted to work on some clinical notes which I had left in Sister Rolfe’s office after a previous lecture. I also wanted to have a chat with Matron before the inspection began to be sure that I was there in time to receive Miss Beale. I went up to Matron’s flat at eight thirty-five and found her finishing breakfast And, if you’re thinking that I could have put the corrosive in the milk bottle any time between eight and eight thirty-five, you’re perfectly right As it happens, I didn’t”

He looked at his watch.

“And now if there’s nothing else you need to ask I must get my lunch. I’ve another out-patients’ session this afternoon and time’s pressing. If it’s really necessary, I can probably give you a few more minutes before I leave but I hope it won’t be. I’ve already signed one statement about Pearce’s death and I’ve nothing to add or to alter. I didn’t see Fallon yesterday. I didn’t even know she was discharged from the sick-bay. She wasn’t carrying my child, and even if she had been, I shouldn’t have been foolish enough to kill her. Incidentally, what I told you about our previous relationship was naturally in confidence.”

He looked across meaningly at Sergeant Masterson.

“Not that I care whether it’s made public. But, after all, the girl is dead. We may as well try to protect her reputation.”

Dalgliesh found it difficult to believe that Mr. Courtney-Briggs was interested in anyone’s reputation but his own. But, gravely, he gave the necessary assurance. He saw the surgeon leave without regret. An egotistical bastard whom it was agreeable, if childish, to provoke. But a murderer? He had the hubris, the nerve and the egotism of a killer. More to the point, he had had the opportunity. And the motive? Hadn’t it been a little disingenuous of him to have confessed so readily to his relationship with Josephine Fallon? Admittedly he couldn’t have hoped to keep his secret for long; a hospital was hardly the most discreet of institutions. Had he been making a virtue of necessity, ensuring that Dalgliesh heard the version of the affair before the inevitable gossip reached his ears? Or had it been merely the candor of conceit, the sexual vanity of a man who wouldn’t trouble to conceal any exploit which proclaimed his attraction and virility?

Putting his papers together, Dalgliesh became aware that he was hungry. He had made an early start to the day and it bad been a long morning. It was time to turn his mind from Stephen Courtney-Briggs and for him and Masterson to think about luncheon.

Chapter Five

TABLE TALK

I

The resident Sisters and students from Nightingale House took only their breakfast and afternoon tea in the dining-room at the school. For their main midday and evening meal they joined the rest of the staff in the hospital cafeteria where all but the consultants ate in institutionalized and noisy proximity. The food was invariably nourishing, adequately cooked, and as varied as was compatible with the need to satisfy the differing tastes of several hundred people, avoid outraging their religious or dietary susceptibilities, and keep within the catering officer’s budget The principles governing the menu planning were invariable. Liver and kidneys were never served on days when the urinary surgeon operated, and the nurses were not faced with the same menu as that which they had just served to the patients.

The cafeteria system had been introduced at the John Carpendar hospital against strong opposition from all grades of staff. Eight years ago there had been separate dining-rooms for the Sisters and nurses, one for the administrative and lay professional staff, and a canteen for the porters and artisans. The arrangements had suited everyone as making a proper distinction between grades and ensuring that people are in reasonable quietness and in the company of those with whom they preferred to spend their lunch break. But now only the senior medical staff enjoyed the peace and privacy of their own dining-room. This privilege, jealously defended, was under perpetual attack from Ministry auditors, Government catering advisers and work study experts who, armed with costing statistics, had no difficulty in proving that the system was uneconomical but so far the doctors had won. Their strongest argument was their need to discuss the patients in privacy. This suggestion that they never stopped working, even for meals, was greeted with some skepticism but was difficult to refute. The need to keep the patients affairs confidential touched on that area of patient-doctor relationship which the doctors were always quick to exploit. Before this mystique even the Treasury auditors were powerless to prevail. Furthermore, they had had the support of Matron. Miss Taylor had made it known that she considered it eminently reasonable that the senior medical staff should continue to have their own dining-room. And Miss Taylor’s influence over the Chairman of the Hospital Management Committee was so obvious and of such long standing that it had almost ceased to excite comment. Sir Marcus Cohen was a wealthy and personable widower and the only surprise now was that he and Matron hadn’t married. This, it was generally accepted, was either because Sir Marcus, an acknowledged leader of the country’s Jewish community, chose not to marry outside his faith or because Miss Taylor, wedded to her vocation, chose not to marry at all.