The Private Patient

by P. D. James

  ‘Not entirely, Mr Boyton. If she was so anxious to have you here, why did she make it plain to Mr Chandler-Powell that she didn’t want any visitors? That’s what he says. Are you accusing him of lying?’

  ‘Don’t put words into my mouth, Sergeant. She may have changed her mind, although I don’t think it likely. She may not have wanted me to see her until the bandages were off and the scar healed, or the great George might have thought it medically unwise for her to have visitors and put a stop to it. How should I know what happened? I only know she asked me to come and I was going to stay here until she left.’

  ‘But you sent her a text message, didn’t you? We found it on her mobile. Something very important has cropped up. I need to consult you. Please see me, please don’t shut me out. What was this very important matter?’

  There was no reply. Boyton covered his face with his hands. The gesture might, Benton thought, be an attempt to conceal a wave of emotion, but it was also a convenient way of marshalling his thoughts. After a few moments’ silence Benton said, ‘And did you see her to discuss this important matter at any time after she arrived here?’

  Boyton spoke through his hands. ‘How could I? You know I didn’t. They wouldn’t let me into the Manor before or after the operation. And by Saturday morning she was dead.’

  ‘I have to ask you again, Mr Boyton, what was this important matter?’

  And now Boyton was looking at Benton, his voice controlled. ‘It wasn’t really important. I tried to make it sound as if it was. It was about money. My partner and I need another house for our business and a suitable one has come on the market. It would be a really good investment for Rhoda and I hoped she’d help. With the scar gone and a new life before her, she might have been interested.’

  ‘And I suppose your partner can confirm this?’

  ‘About the house? Yes, he could, but I don’t see why you should ask him. I didn’t tell him I was going to approach Rhoda. None of this is your business.’

  Benton said, ‘We’re investigating a murder, Mr Boyton. Everything is our business, and if you cared for Miss Gradwyn and want to see her killer caught, you can help best by answering our questions fully and truthfully. No doubt you’ll be anxious now to get back to London and your entrepreneurial activities?’

  ‘No, I booked for a week and I’m staying for a week. That’s what I said I’d do and I owe it to Rhoda. I want to find out what’s going on here.’

  The answer surprised Benton. Most suspects, unless they actively enjoy involvement with violent death, are anxious to put as much distance between themselves and the crime as possible. It was convenient to have Boyton here in the cottage, but he had expected his suspect to protest that they couldn’t legally hold him and that he needed to get back to London.

  He asked, ‘How long have you known Rhoda Gradwyn and how did you meet?’

  ‘We met about six years ago after a not very successful fringe theatre production of Waiting for Godot. I’d just left drama school. We met at a drinks party afterwards. A gruesome occasion, but a lucky one for me. We talked. I asked her to have dinner the following week and to my surprise she agreed. After that we met from time to time, not frequently, but always with pleasure, at least as far as I’m concerned. I’ve told you, she was my friend, a dear friend, and one of those who helped me when there was no acting job and I had no lucrative ideas. Not often and not much. She always paid for dinner when we met. I can’t make you understand and I don’t see why I should try. It’s not your business. I loved her. I don’t mean I was in love with her, I mean I loved her. I depended on seeing her. I liked to think she was in my life. I don’t think she loved me, but she usually saw me when I asked. I could talk to her. It wasn’t maternal and it wasn’t about sex, but it was love. And now one of those bastards at the Manor has killed her and I’m not leaving here until I know who. And I’m not answering any more questions about her. What we felt, we felt. It’s nothing to do with why or how she died. And if I could explain, you wouldn’t understand. You’d only laugh.’ He was beginning to cry, making no attempt to stem the flow of tears.

  Benton said, ‘Why should we laugh about love?’ and thought, Oh God, it sounds like some ghastly ditty. Why should we laugh about love? Why, oh why, should we laugh about love? He could almost hear a cheerfully banal tune insinuating itself into his brain. It might do well at the Eurovision Song Contest. Looking across at Boyton’s disintegrating face, he thought, The emotion is real enough, but what exactly is it?

  He asked more gently, ‘Can you tell us what you did from the moment you arrived at Stoke Cheverell? When was that?’

  Boyton managed to control himself, and more quickly than Benton had expected. Looking at Boyton’s face he wondered whether this swift alteration was the actor demonstrating his range of emotions. ‘On Thursday night at about ten o’clock. I drove down from London.’

  ‘So Miss Gradwyn didn’t ask you to drive her down?’

  ‘No, she didn’t, and I didn’t expect her to. She likes driving, not being driven. Anyway, she needed to be here early for examinations and so on, and I couldn’t get away until the evening. I brought some food with me for breakfast on Friday, but otherwise I thought I’d shop locally for what I needed. I rang the Manor to say I’d arrived and to enquire after Rhoda and was told she was sleeping. I asked when I could see her and I was told by Sister Holland that she had specifically asked for no visitors, so I let it rest. I did consider calling in on my cousins – they’re next door in Stone Cottage and the lights were on – but I didn’t think they’d exactly welcome me, particularly after ten at night. I watched TV for an hour and went to bed. On Friday I’m afraid I slept in, so it’s no good asking me about anything before eleven, then I phoned the Manor again and was told that the operation had gone well and Rhoda was recovering. They repeated that she didn’t want visitors. I had lunch at about two in the village pub and afterwards went for a drive and did some shopping. Then I came back here and was in all evening. On Saturday I found out about Rhoda’s murder when I saw the police cars arriving and tried to get into the Manor. In the end I managed to push past PC Plod on the door and broke into the cosy little set-up your boss had arranged. But you know all about that.’

  Benton asked, ‘Did you at any time enter the Manor before you forced your way in on Saturday afternoon?’

  ‘No. I thought I’d made that plain.’

  ‘What were your movements from four thirty on Friday afternoon until Saturday afternoon when you learnt about the murder? I’m asking in particular if you went out at any time during Friday night. It’s very important. You might have seen something or someone.’

  ‘I told you, I didn’t go out, and as I didn’t go out, I saw nothing and nobody. I was in bed by eleven.’

  ‘No cars? No one arriving late at night or early Saturday morning?’

  ‘Arriving where? I’ve told you. I was in bed by eleven. I was drunk if you must know. I suppose if a tank had crashed through the front door I might have heard it, but I doubt I could have made it downstairs.’

  ‘But then there’s Friday afternoon after you’d had a drink and lunch at the Cressett Arms. Didn’t you visit a cottage near the junction with the main road, the one set back from the road with a long front garden? It’s called Rosemary Cottage?’

  ‘Yes, I did. There was no one there. The cottage was empty with a “For Sale” board on the gate. I hoped the owners might have the address of someone I knew who used to live there. It was a small private unimportant matter. I want to send her a Christmas card – as simple as that. It’s got nothing to do with the murder. Mog was cycling past, no doubt to visit his girlfriend for a bit of anything on offer, and I suppose he handed you that titbit of gossip. Some people in this bloody village can’t keep their mouths shut. I’m telling you, it had nothing to do with Rhoda.’

  ‘We’re not suggesting it had, Mr Boyton. But you were asked for an account of what you did since arriving here. Why leave that out?’

&nbs
p; ‘Because I’d forgotten it. It wasn’t important. OK, I went to the village pub for lunch. I saw nobody and nothing happened. I can’t remember every single detail. I’m upset, confused. If you’re going to keep on badgering me I’ll have to send for a lawyer.’

  ‘You could certainly do that if you think it’s necessary. And if you seriously believe you’re being badgered, no doubt you’ll make a formal complaint. We may wish to question you again, either before you leave or in London. In the meantime I suggest that, if there’s any other fact, however unimportant, that you have omitted to mention, you let us know as soon as possible.’

  They rose to go. It was then that Benton remembered that he hadn’t asked about Miss Gradwyn’s will. To have forgotten such an instruction from AD would have been a bad mistake. Angry with himself, he spoke almost without thinking.

  ‘You say you were Miss Gradwyn’s dear friend. Did she ever confide in you about her will, hint that you might be a beneficiary? At your last meeting, perhaps. When was that?’

  ‘On November the 21st, at the Ivy. She never mentioned her will. Why should she? Wills are about death. She wasn’t expecting to die. The operation wasn’t life-threatening. Why would we talk about her will? Are you saying you’ve seen it?’

  And now, unmistakable under his tone of outrage was the half-shameful curiosity and spark of hope.

  Benton said casually, ‘No, we haven’t seen it. It was just a thought.’

  Boyton didn’t come to the door and they left him sitting at the table, head in hands. Closing the garden gate behind them, they set out to return to the Old Police Cottage.

  Benton said, ‘Well, what did you think of him?’

  ‘Not much, Sarge. Not bright is he? And spiteful with it. But I can’t see him as a killer. If he’d wanted to murder Miss Gradwyn, why follow her down here? He’d have more opportunity in London. But I don’t see how he could have done it without an accomplice.’

  Benton said, ‘Perhaps Gradwyn herself, letting him in for what she thought would be a confidential chat. But on the day of her operation? Unusual surely. He’s frightened, that’s obvious, but he’s also excited. And why is he staying on? I have a feeling he was lying about the important matter that he wanted to discuss with Rhoda Gradwyn. I agree it’s hard to see him as a murderer, but then that goes for everyone here. And I think he was lying about the will.’

  They walked on in silence. Benton wondered whether he had confided too much. It must, he thought, be difficult for DC Warren, part of the team and yet a member of another force. Only members of the special unit took part in the evening discussions, but DC Warren would probably feel more relieved than aggrieved at being excluded. He had told Benton that by seven, unless specifically needed, he drove back to Wareham to his wife and four children. Altogether he was proving his worth and Benton liked him and felt at ease with the six-foot-two of solid muscle pacing by his side. Benton had a strong interest in helping to ensure that Warren’s home life wasn’t greatly disturbed: his wife was Cornish and that morning Warren had arrived with six Cornish pasties of remarkable flavour and succulence.

  3

  Dalgliesh spoke little on the journey north. This wasn’t unusual and Kate didn’t find his taciturnity uncomfortable; to journey with Dalgliesh in companionable silence had always been a rare and private pleasure. As they approached the outskirts of Droughton Cross, she concentrated on giving precise instructions well in advance of a turning, and on contemplating the interview ahead. Dalgliesh hadn’t phoned to give the Reverend Curtis warning of their arrival. It was hardly necessary as clergymen could usually be found on a Sunday, if not in their vicarages or churches, then somewhere in the parish. And there was also advantage in a surprise visit.

  The address they were seeking was 2 Balaclava Gardens, the fifth turning off Marland Way, a wide road running to the centre of the city. Here was no Sunday calm. The traffic was heavy, cars, delivery vans and a succession of buses bunching on the glistening road. The grinding roar was a constant discordant descant to the continually repeated blare of ‘Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer’ interposed with the first verses of the better-known carols. No doubt in the city centre the ‘Winterfest’ was being appropriately celebrated by the official municipal decorations, but in this less-privileged highway the individual and uncoordinated efforts of the local shopkeepers and café owners, the rain-soaked lanterns and faded bunting, the swinging lights blinking from red to green to yellow, and the occasional meanly decorated Christmas tree seemed less a celebration than a desperate defence against despair. The faces of the shoppers seen through the rain-besmirched side windows of the car had the melting insubstantial look of disintegrating wraiths.

  Peering through the blur of the rain which had persisted throughout their journey, they could have been driving through any thoroughfare in an unprosperous inner-city suburb, not so much featureless as an amorphous mixture of the old and new, the neglected and the renovated. Terraces of small shops were broken by a series of high-rise flats set well back behind railings, and a short terrace of well-maintained and obviously eighteenth-century houses was an unexpected and incongruous contrast to the takeaway cafés, the betting shops and the garish shop signs. The people, heads hunched against the driving rain, seemed to move with no apparent purpose, or stood under the shelter of shop awnings surveying the traffic. Only the mothers pushing their baby buggies, the hoods shrouded in plastic, showed a desperate and purposeful energy.

  Kate fought off the depression tinged with guilt which always descended on her at the sight of high-rise flats. In such a grimy oblong container, monument to local authority aspiration and human desperation, had she been born and bred. From childhood her one compulsion had been to escape, to break free from the pervading smell of urine on the stairs, a lift that was always broken down, the graffiti, the vandalism, the raucous voices. And she had escaped. She told herself that life in a high-rise was probably better now, even in a city centre, but she couldn’t drive past without feeling that in her personal liberation something that was inalienably part of her had not been so much rejected as betrayed.

  No one could miss St John’s church. It stood on the left of the road, a huge Victorian building with a dominant spire on the junction with Balaclava Gardens. Kate wondered how a local congregation could possibly support this grimed architectural aberration. Apparently it was with difficulty. A tall billboard outside the gate bore a painted thermometer-like structure which proclaimed that three hundred and fifty thousand pounds remained to be raised, and underneath the words, Please help save our tower. An arrow pointing to a hundred and twenty-three thousand looked as if it had remained stationary for some time.

  Dalgliesh drew up outside the church and went over quickly to look at the notice board. Sliding back into his seat, he said, ‘Low Mass at seven, High Mass at ten thirty, Evensong and Vespers at six, confessions five to seven Mondays, Wednesday and Saturdays. With luck we’ll find him at home.’

  Kate was grateful that she and Benton weren’t facing this interview together. Years of experience in interrogation of a variety of suspects had taught her the accepted techniques and, where necessary, modification in the face of widely differing personalities. She knew when softness and sensitivity were necessary and when they were seen as weakness. She had learnt never to raise her voice or avert her gaze. But this suspect, if that’s what he proved to be, was one she wouldn’t find it easy to question. Admittedly it was difficult to see a clergyman as a suspect for murder, but there might be an embarrassing if less horrific reason for his stopping at that remote and lonely spot so late at night. And what exactly was one supposed to call him? Was he a vicar, rector, clergyman, minister, parson or priest? Should she call him father? She had heard all used at different times, but the subtleties, and indeed the orthodox belief, of the national religion were alien to her. The morning assembly at her inner-city comprehensive had been determinedly multi-faith with occasional reference to Christianity. What little she knew about the country
’s established Church had been unconsciously learnt from architecture and literature and from the pictures in the major galleries. She knew herself to be intelligent with an interest in life and people, but the job she loved had largely satisfied her intellectual curiosity. Her personal creed of honesty, kindness, courage and truth in human relationships had no mystical basis and no need of one. The grandmother who grudgingly had brought her up had given her only one piece of advice on religion which, even at the age of eight, she had found unhelpful.

  She had asked, ‘Gran, do you believe in God?’

  ‘What a daft question. You don’t want to start wondering about God at your age. Only one thing to remember about God. When you’re dying, call in a priest. He’ll see you’re all right.’

  ‘But suppose I don’t know I’m dying?’

  ‘Folk usually do. Time enough then to start bothering your head with God.’

  Well, at this moment she didn’t need to bother her head. AD was the son of a priest and had interviewed parsons before. Who better to cope with the Reverend Michael Curtis?

  They turned into Balaclava Gardens. If there had ever been gardens all that remained now were occasional trees. Many of the original Victorian terraced houses still stood, but number two, and four or five houses beyond, were square modern red-brick dwellings. Number two was the largest with a garage to the left, and a small front lawn with a central bed. The garage door was open and inside was a dark blue Ford Focus with the registration W341 UDG.

  Kate rang the bell. Before there was any response she caught the sound of a woman’s voice calling and the high shout of a child. After some delay there was the sound of keys being turned and the door opened. They saw a young woman, pretty and very fair. She was wearing trousers with a smock and was carrying a child on her right hip while two toddlers, obviously twins, pulled at both sides of her trousers. They were miniatures of their mother, each with the same round face, corn-coloured hair cut in a fringe and wide eyes which now stared at the newcomers in unblinking judgement.