A Mind to Murder

by P. D. James

  “I don’t know what you mean, Nagle.”

  “Come off it. I’ve been admiring your performance for the last six months. Yes, Doctor. No, Doctor. Just as you like, Doctor. Of course, I’d like to help, Doctor, but there are certain complications here … You bet there were! She wasn’t giving up without a struggle. And now she’s dead. Very nice for you. They won’t have to look far for their new AO.”

  “Don’t be impertinent and ridiculous. And why aren’t you helping Mrs. Shorthouse with the coffee?”

  “Because I don’t choose to. You’re not the AO yet, remember.”

  “I’ve no doubt the police will be interested in knowing where you were this evening. After all, it was your chisel.”

  “I was out with the post and fetching my evening paper. Disappointing, isn’t it? And I wonder where you were at six-twenty-two.”

  “How do you know she died at six-twenty-two?”

  “I don’t. But Sister saw her going down to the basement at six-twenty and there wasn’t anything in the basement to keep her as far as I know. Not unless your dear Dr. Etherege was there, of course. But surely he wouldn’t demean himself cuddling Miss Bolam. Not quite his type I’d have said. But you know his tastes in that direction better than I do, of course.”

  Suddenly she was out of her chair and, swinging her right arm, she slapped his cheek with a force that momentarily rocked him. The sharp crack of the blow echoed in the room. Everyone looked at them. Nagle heard Jennifer Priddy’s gasp, saw Dr. Steiner’s worried frown as he looked from one to the other in puzzled inquiry, saw Fredrica Saxon’s contemptuous glance at them before her eyes fell again to her book. Mrs. Shorthouse, who was piling plates onto a tray at a side table, looked round a second too late. Her sharp little eyes darted from one to the other, frustrated at having missed something worth seeing. Mrs. Bostock, her colour heightened, sank back in her chair and picked up her book. Nagle, holding his hand to his cheek, gave a shout of laughter.

  “Is anything the matter?” asked Dr. Steiner. “What happened?”

  It was then that the door opened and a uniformed policeman put his head in and said: “The superintendent would like to see Mrs. Shorthouse now, please.”

  Mrs. Amy Shorthouse had seen no reason why she should stay in her working clothes while waiting to be interviewed so that, when called in to Dalgliesh, she was dressed ready to go home. The metamorphosis was striking. Comfortable working slippers had been replaced by a modish pair of high-heeled court shoes, white overall by a fur coat and head scarf by the latest idiocy in hats. The total effect was curiously old-fashioned. Mrs. Shorthouse looked like a relic of the gay twenties, an effect which was heightened by the shortness of her skirt and the careful curls of peroxided hair which lay cunningly arranged on forehead and cheeks. But there was nothing false about her voice and little, Dalgliesh suspected, about her personality. The little grey eyes were shrewd and amused. She was neither frightened nor distressed. He suspected that Amy Shorthouse craved more excitement than her life customarily afforded and was enjoying herself. She would not wish anyone violently dead but, since it had happened, one might as well make the most of it.

  When the preliminaries were over and they got down to the events of the evening, Mrs. Shorthouse came out with her prize piece of information.

  “No good saying I can tell you who did it, because I can’t. Not that I haven’t got my own ideas. But there’s one thing I can tell you. I was the last person to talk to her, no doubt about that. No, scrub that out! I was the last person to talk to her, face to face. Excepting the murderer, of course.”

  “You mean that she subsequently spoke on the telephone? Hadn’t you better tell me about it plainly? I’ve got enough mystery here for one evening.”

  “Smart, aren’t you?” said Mrs. Shorthouse without rancour. “Well, it was in this room. I came in at about ten past six to ask how much leave I’d got left on account of wanting a day off next week. Miss Bolam got out my dossier—leastwise it was already out, come to think of it—and we fixed that up and had a bit of a chat about the work. I was on my way out, really, just standing at the door for a few last words, as you might say, when the phone rang.”

  “I want you to think very carefully, Mrs. Shorthouse,” said Dalgliesh. “That call may be important. I wonder if you can remember what Miss Bolam said?”

  “Think someone was enticing her down to her death, do you?” said Mrs. Shorthouse with alliterative relish. “Well, could be, come to think of it.”

  Dalgliesh thought that his witness was far from being a fool. He watched while she screwed up her face in a simulated agony of effort. He had no doubt that she remembered very well what had been said.

  After a nicely judged pause for suspense, Mrs. Shorthouse said: “Well, the phone rang like I said. That would be about six-fifteen, I suppose. Miss Bolam picked up the receiver and said, ‘Administrative Officer speaking.’ She always answered like that. Very keen on her position she was. Peter Nagle used to say, ‘Who the hell does she think we’re expecting to hear? Khrushchev?’ Not that he said it to her. No fear! Anyway, that’s what she said. Then there was a little pause and she looked up at me and said: ‘Yes, I am.’ Meaning, I suppose, that she was alone, not counting me. Then there was a longer pause while the chap at the other end spoke. Then she said: ‘All right, stay where you are. I’ll be down.’ Then she asked me to show Mr. Lauder into her office if I was about when he arrived and I said I would and pushed off.”

  “You’re quite sure about her conversation on the telephone?”

  “Sure as I’m sitting here. That’s what she said all right.”

  “You talked about the chap at the other end. How could you tell it was a man?”

  “Never said I could. Just assumed it was a chap, I suppose. Mind you, if I’d been closer I might have known. You can sometimes get an idea who’s speaking from the crackly noise the phone makes. But I was standing against the door.”

  “And you couldn’t hear the other voice at all?”

  “That’s right. Suggests he was talking low.”

  “What happened then, Mrs. Shorthouse?”

  “I said cheerio and toddled off to do a bit in the general office. Peter Nagle was there, taking young Priddy’s mind off her work as usual, and Cully was in the reception kiosk, so it wasn’t them. Peter went out with the post as soon as I arrived. He always does at about a quarter past six.”

  “Did you see Miss Bolam leaving her office?”

  “No, I didn’t. I told you. I was in with Nagle and Miss Priddy. Sister saw her, though. You ask her. Sister saw her going down the hall.”

  “So I understand. I have seen Sister Ambrose. I wondered whether Miss Bolam followed you out of the room.”

  “No, she didn’t. Not at once anyway. Perhaps she thought it would do the chap good to be kept waiting.”

  “Perhaps,” said Dalgliesh. “But she would have gone down promptly I expect if a doctor had phoned for her.”

  Mrs. Shorthouse gave a shriek of laughter. “Maybe. Maybe not. You didn’t know Miss Bolam.”

  “What was she like, Mrs. Shorthouse?”

  “All right. We got on. She liked a good worker and I’m a good worker. Well—you can see how the place is kept.”

  “I can indeed.”

  “Her yea was yea and her nay, nay. I’ll say that for her. Nothing unpleasant behind your back. Mind you, quite a bit of unpleasantness in front of your face sometimes if you didn’t watch out. Still, I’d rather have it that way. She and me understood each other.”

  “Had she any enemies—anyone who bore her a grudge?”

  “Must have had, mustn’t she? That wasn’t no playful tap on the head. Carrying a grudge a bit far, if you ask me.” She planted her feet apart and leaned towards Dalgliesh confidentially.

  “Look, ducks,” she said. “Miss B put people’s backs up. Some people do. You know how it is. They can’t make no allowances. Right was right and wrong was wrong and nothing in between. Rigid. That
’s what she was. Rigid.” Mrs. Shorthouse’s tone and tightened mouth expressed the ultimate in virtuous inflexibility. “Take the little matter of the attendance book now. All the consultants are supposed to sign it so that Miss Bolam could make her monthly return to the board. All very right and proper. Well, the book used to be kept on a table in the doctors’ cloakroom and no trouble to anyone. Then Miss B gets to noticing that Dr. Steiner and Dr. McBain are coming in late so she moves the book to her office and they all have to go in there to sign. Mind you, as often as not Dr. Steiner won’t do it. ‘She knows I’m here,’ he says. ‘And I’m a consultant, not a factory hand. If she wants her stupid book signed, she can put it back in the medical cloakroom.’ The doctors have been trying to get rid of her for a year or more, I do know that.”

  “How do you know, Mrs. Shorthouse?”

  “Let’s just say that I know. Dr. Steiner couldn’t stand her. He goes in for psychotherapy. Intensive psychotherapy. Ever heard of it?”

  Dalgliesh admitted that he had. Mrs. Shorthouse gave him a look in which disbelief fought with suspicion. Then she leaned forward conspiratorially as if about to divulge one of Dr. Steiner’s less reputable idiosyncrasies.

  “He’s analytically orientated, that’s what he is. Analytically orientated. Know what that means?”

  “I’ve some idea.”

  “Then you know that he doesn’t see many patients. Two a session, three if you’re lucky, and a new patient once every eight weeks. That doesn’t push up the figures.”

  “The figures?”

  “The attendance figures. They go to the Hospital Management Committee and the Regional Board every quarter. Miss Bolam was a great one for pushing up the figures.”

  “Then she must have approved thoroughly of Dr. Baguley. I understand that his ECT sessions are usually very busy.”

  “She approved all right. Not about his divorce, though.”

  “How could that affect the figures?” asked Dalgliesh, innocently obtuse. Mrs. Shorthouse looked at him pityingly.

  “Who said anything about the figures? We were talking about the Baguleys. Getting a divorce, they were, on account of Dr. Baguley having an affair with Miss Saxon. It was in all the papers, too. Psychiatrist’s wife cites psychologist. Then suddenly Mrs. Baguley withdrew the case. Never said why. No one said why. Didn’t make any difference here, though. Dr. B and Miss Saxon went on working together easy as you please. Still do.”

  “And Dr. Baguley and his wife were reconciled?”

  “Who said anything about reconciled? They stayed married, that’s all I know. Miss Bolam couldn’t say a good word for Miss Saxon after that. Not that she ever talked about it; she wasn’t one for gossip, I’ll give her that. But she let Miss Saxon see what she felt. She was against that sort of thing, Miss Bolam was. No carrying on with her, I can tell you!”

  Dalgliesh inquired whether anyone had tried. It was a question he usually put with the maximum of tact but he felt that subtlety would be lost on Mrs. Shorthouse. She gave a scream of laughter.

  “What do you think? She wasn’t one for the men. Not as far as I know, anyway. Mind you, some of the cases they have here would put you off sex for life. Miss Bolam went to the medical director once to complain about some of the reports Miss Priddy was given to type. Said they weren’t decent. Of course, she was always a bit odd about Priddy. Tried to fuss round the kid too much, if you ask me. Priddy used to be in Miss Bolam’s Guide company or something when she was young and I suppose Bolam wanted to keep an eye on her in case she forgot what captain had taught her. You could see the kid was embarrassed by it. There wasn’t anything wrong, though. Don’t you go believing it if they hint that there was. Some of them here have dirty minds and there’s no denying it.”

  Dalgliesh asked whether Miss Bolam had approved of Miss Priddy’s friendship with Nagle.

  “Oh, you’re on to that, are you? Nothing to approve of, if you ask me. Nagle’s a cold fish and as mean as hell. Just try getting his tea money out of him! He and Priddy play around a bit and I dare say Tigger could tell a thing or two if cats could speak. I don’t think Bolam noticed though. She kept pretty much to her own office. Anyway, Nagle isn’t encouraged in the general office and the medical stenogs are kept pretty busy, so there isn’t much time for hanky-panky. Nagle took good care to keep in Miss B’s good books. Quite the little blue-eyed boy he was. Never absent, never late, that’s our Peter. Leastways, he got stuck in the Underground one Monday and wasn’t he in a state about it! Spoilt his record, you see. He even came in on May 1st when he had the flu because we had a visit from the Duke and, naturally, Peter Nagle had to be here to see everything was done proper. Temperature of 103 he had. Sister took it. Miss Bolam sent him home pretty soon, I can tell you. Dr. Steiner took him in his car.”

  “Is it generally known that Mr. Nagle keeps his tools in the porters’ duty room?”

  “Of course it is! Stands to reason. People are always wanting him to mend this or that and where else would he keep his tools? A proper old woman he is about them, too. Talk about fussy. Cully isn’t allowed to touch them. Mind you, they aren’t clinic tools. They belong to Nagle. There wasn’t half a row about six weeks ago when Dr. Steiner borrowed a screwdriver to do something to his car. Being Dr. Steiner he mucked up the job and bent the screwdriver. Talk about trouble! Nagle thought it was Cully and they had one hell of a row which brought on Cully’s bellyache again, poor old blighter. Then Nagle found out that someone had seen Dr. Steiner coming out of the porters’ duty room with the tool so he complained to Miss Bolam and she spoke to Dr. Steiner and made him buy another screwdriver. We do see life here, I can tell you. Never a dull moment. Never had a murder before, though. That’s something new. Nice goings-on, I don’t think.”

  “As you say. If you’ve any idea who did it, Mrs. Shorthouse, now’s the time to say so.”

  Mrs. Shorthouse adjusted one of the curls on her forehead with a licked finger, wriggled more comfortably into her coat and got to her feet, thus indicating that, in her opinion, the interview was over.

  “No fear! Catching murderers is your job, mate, and you’re welcome to it. I’ll say this much, though. It wasn’t one of the doctors. They haven’t the guts. These psychiatrists are a timid lot. Say what you like about this killer, the chap has nerve.”

  Dalgliesh decided to question the doctors next. He was surprised and interested by their patience, by their ready acceptance of his role. He had kept them waiting because he judged it more important to his inquiry to see other people first, even such an apparently less important witness as the domestic assistant. It looked as if they appreciated that he wasn’t trying to irritate them or keep them unnecessarily in suspense. He wouldn’t have hesitated to do either if it would have served his purpose, but it was his experience that useful information could most often be obtained when a witness hadn’t been given time to think and could be betrayed by shock or fear into garrulity and indiscretion. The doctors had not kept themselves apart. They had waited in the front consulting room with the others, quietly and without protest. They gave him the credit of knowing his job and let him get on with it. He wondered whether consultant surgeons or physicians would have been so accommodating and felt with the group secretary that there were worse people to deal with than psychiatrists.

  Dr. Mary Ingram was seen first by request of the medical director. She had three young children at home and it was important that she get back to them as soon as possible. She had been crying spasmodically while waiting, to the embarrassment of her colleagues who had difficulty in comforting a grief which seemed to them unreasonable and ill-timed. Nurse Bolam was bearing up well, after all, and she was a relative. Dr. Ingram’s tears added to the tension and provoked an irrational guilt in those whose emotions were less uncomplicated. There was a general feeling that she should be allowed to go home to her children without delay. There was little she could tell Dalgliesh. She attended the clinic only twice weekly to help with the ECT sessions and had hardly
known Miss Bolam. She had been in the ECT room with Sister Ambrose for the whole of the crucial time from six-twenty until seven. In reply to Dalgliesh’s question she admitted that Dr. Baguley might have left them for a short time after six-fifteen but she couldn’t remember when exactly or for how long.

  At the end of the interview she looked at Dalgliesh from reddened eyes and said: “You will find out who did it, won’t you? That poor, poor girl.”

  “We shall find out,” replied Dalgliesh.

  Dr. Etherege was interviewed next. He gave the necessary personal details without waiting to be asked and went on: “As regards my own movements this evening, I’m afraid I can’t be very helpful. I arrived at the clinic just before five and went into Miss Bolam’s office to speak to her before going upstairs. We had a little general conversation. She seemed perfectly all right to me and didn’t tell me that she had asked to see the group secretary. I rang the general office for Mrs. Bostock at about five-fifteen and she was with me taking dictation until about ten to six when she went downstairs with the post. She came back after ten minutes or so and we continued with the dictation, until some time before half past six, when she went next door to type material directly from a tape machine. Some of my treatment sessions are recorded and the material subsequently played back and a typescript made either for research purposes or for the medical record. I worked alone in my consulting room except for one brief visit to the medical library—I can’t remember when, but it was very shortly after Mrs. Bostock left me—until she returned to consult me on a point. That must have been just before seven because we were together when Sister rang to tell me about Miss Bolam. Miss Saxon came down from her room on the third floor to go home and caught us up on the stairs, so she and I went to the basement. You know what we found and the subsequent steps I took to ensure that no one left the clinic.”