Corridors of Death

by Ruth Dudley Edwards

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Inspector Gifford was in St Stephen’s Tavern when Milton arrived. He was sipping a half-pint and gazing lasciviously at a group of Scandinavian girls who were occupying half the small bar. Their lissom attractions did nothing for Milton. They all looked hyper-fit, bred for the tennis court and the après-ski disco. Perversely, he let his waistline sag as he passed them. The other half of the bar was dominated by a group of office workers out on a celebration. Their laughter had the hysterical edge that characterized ill-assorted groups bound together by bondage to a common employer. They were cementing their alliance with out-of-practice bonhomie fuelled by hasty rounds of drinks purchased from a kitty.

  ‘Let’s leave, Jack. We can’t talk here. We’ll take a walk instead.’

  Gifford downed his beer and followed Milton into the street. They walked down to the Embankment and turned east to stroll slowly along by the river.

  ‘Sorry to have dragged you away from your tube murder, Jack, but I’ve been up to my ears.’

  ‘I’ve enjoyed it, sir. It makes a nice change, a bit of sex.’

  ‘Well, I’m glad our call-girl was rewarding, but can we get Alf Shaw out of the way before you tell me about her?’

  Gifford began to laugh and Milton looked at him in bewilderment.

  ‘Sorry, sir. You’ll see the joke in a minute.’

  Alf Shaw, it emerged, had been in a distinctly grumpy mood. He was one of those aggressively plain men of the union movement, much given to phrases like ‘I speak as I find’. He had been, he said, well pissed off at being endlessly mucked about by the police. He had cut Gifford short when he began to ask questions about his relationship with Sir Nicholas, and asked if an alibi for Gladys Bradley’s murder would let him out of the whole business. Gifford had replied cautiously that it probably would, and Shaw had, with considerable embarrassment, provided a story which accounted fully for the missing two hours of Tuesday which had kept him on the list.

  ‘But he told Romford on the phone that he had spent the time walking round Hyde Park planning a speech.’

  ‘I know, but he had made that up on the spur of the moment because his secretary was in the room when he took the call. He’d thought of ringing back with the real story, but had decided to wait until he saw you.’

  ‘What was the truth?’

  Gifford stopped to savour his revelation. ‘He’d been on a protracted visit to Nixon’s lady friend—Sally.’

  ‘I don’t believe it. It’s too much of a coincidence.’

  ‘It’s not really, sir. Shaw says she’s very popular with top people. They’re very nervous about illicit sex since the Lambton and Jellicoe scandal, and Sally is known to be very discreet. It’s one of her main attractions. It seems that good mates recommend her to each other like a tailor or a restaurant. Shaw says he heard about her from some nob in the CBI he got drunk with at a conference.’

  ‘And Sally confirmed his story?’

  ‘Absolutely. And I’m sure she’s telling the truth. She’s got a very nice number going at the moment. She’d be mad to louse it up by lying to the police.’

  ‘Tell me about her.’

  Gifford had been greatly struck by Sally’s charms, though he added hastily that she was way out of his bracket. She had a luxurious flat in Knightsbridge with a concealed separate entrance, and she provided her clients not just with sex and guaranteed secrecy, but also, if they wanted it, with food, drink and companionship. She had explained that she was a university graduate who had failed to get a decent job and had given considerable thought to finding a career in which she could meet interesting people and also make a lot of money.

  ‘What was her degree in?’

  ‘Sociology,’ chuckled Gifford.

  They turned around to walk back the way they had come.

  ‘Well, I suppose she’s putting it to more practical use than a lot of her contemporaries.’

  ‘Too right. She says she wanted to do social work, but felt she’d be wasted on problem families. She’s very pretty and enjoys conversation and says she provides a terrific social service helping important people to relax from the strain of their work. Half the time, she says, they don’t even want sex. They’re too knackered. All they want is sympathetic female companionship.’

  ‘What’s wrong with their wives?’ asked Milton self-righteously.

  ‘She says a lot of them suffer from broken or failing marriages, either because they’ve risen fast and the little woman can’t keep up with them, or because they spend so much time away from home they become like strangers. She’d make you feel sorry for them, sir. Says they’ve very little fun.’

  Milton remembered what Amiss had said about the demands made on ministers’ time. He’d even repeated it himself to that creep from the Sunday rag. It all made sense. Most of the fellows in top jobs wouldn’t have the opportunity to chase girls in the usual way. Too time-consuming. And they could hardly all be expected to remain celibate.

  ‘It’s a pity the Commissioner’s going to have to hear about this,’ he said. ‘He’ll have the vice-squad on to her straight away.’

  ‘I don’t think they’ll get anywhere with Sally. She’s thought all that out too. She doesn’t charge her clients. Says they’re all friends and it’s her business if she’s a bit promiscuous.’

  ‘But money must come into it somewhere.’

  ‘No. She never takes money. They give her presents. Jewellery mostly. Or pictures. There’s one that gives her postage stamps. It’s understood between them that these are given mostly as birthday or Christmas presents. They’re nearly all regulars, you see. She says she only loses clients when they fall in love or lose their jobs and can’t afford the presents any more.’

  ‘Did she give you names?’

  ‘I didn’t press her on that. She insisted that she never told any of them about each other. We left it that we’d come back to her for names if we couldn’t find out any other way who tipped off the newspaper.’

  ‘We won’t need them now. I’m certain Sir Nicholas was the source. How long had Nixon been seeing her?’

  ‘She was very reluctant to talk about that, but she’s a sensible girl and didn’t want to get on the wrong side of us. It’s been about three years, apparently. Since a couple of years after his divorce.’

  ‘Did she say much about him?’

  ‘Just that he used to come on Sunday nights when he was in London. She says he’s one of her favourites. Called him a sweetie and said he couldn’t possibly murder anyone.’

  Milton hoped Sally was right. He wasn’t so sure himself. Much as he liked Nixon, there was no point in pretending. If he had discovered that Sir Nicholas had blown the gaff on his idyllic evenings with Sally he would have had a bloody good reason to blow his top and despatch him on the spot. Square one again: any of these people might have killed Sir Nicholas, but it would have taken a very callous one to dispose of Gladys.

  He caught himself falling back into his usual circular argument and checked it. His watch showed that it was now 2.20 and he had to try to get hold of Amiss before seeing Nixon. He thanked Gifford and set off for the short walk to the House of Commons.

  Chapter Thirty-five

  Milton sat in the resplendent lobby and waited for the Commons policeman to locate Amiss. He had taken the precaution of thinking up a question about Sir Nicholas’s movements on Friday, which would serve as an excuse for seeing Amiss. The policeman returned alone.

  ‘I’m sorry, sir, but Mr Amiss is with some other colleagues giving some last-minute briefing to the Secretary of State. I can call him out if it’s urgent.’

  ‘No, that’s quite all right. I’ve got plenty of time. When do you expect him to be free?’

  ‘Well, sir, I could ask him to come and see you when they’ve finished. Otherwise he’ll be going strai
ght into the Officials’ Box and won’t be free until the Secretary of State has finished his half hour of questions.’

  Milton thought for a moment. It would be manifestly unreasonable to take Amiss away at a time like this. Whatever he had to say could keep until after Question Time. They could have a couple of minutes together before Milton went to see Nixon. Besides, he had never seen the House in session. It would be interesting to see Nixon at work in the place where he had made his reputation. Interesting, too, to see how he was bearing up publicly when he must be under considerable private strain.

  ‘It’s not urgent, Constable. It can keep until he’s free. Can I watch from the Public Gallery?’

  ‘The Strangers’ Gallery, sir,’ said the officer automatically. ‘Certainly, sir. Come with me.’

  Milton followed him into a narrow corridor, up a flight of stairs and into a small gallery already filled with tourists. Didn’t any of the British ever come and watch their legislators at work? He supposed they waited until the tourist season was over—whenever that was. As far as he could see these days, the streets were packed with foreigners nearly all the year around. You couldn’t really blame Londoners for turning xenophobic. There were times when he found himself wanting to rant furiously at the holiday-makers who filled the pubs round Westminster full to overflowing at times when the native population only wanted a quick drink and a sandwich in peace.

  The constable produced a seat in the front row of the gallery by the simple expedient of making a crowd of Americans squash up grumblingly. The matron of the group shot a look of deep resentment at Milton and addressed her rumbling complaints to her mate in a rather piercing sotto voce. Milton took no notice: he was far too occupied in trying to spot familiar faces on the green leather benches of the amphitheatre which lay beneath his feet. It was filling up fast. Nixon was going to have a pretty good audience by Commons standards. Milton knew that M.P.s didn’t turn up in the Chamber in large numbers unless they were expecting a bit of excitement. Hadn’t he read that there were nothing like enough seats for a full turn-out and that on special occasions there was standing-room only? It seemed an eccentric way to run things, but presumably it all added to the excitement to have them jostling with each other on the staircases which led up from the floor of the Chamber to the ascending benches.

  Milton had already identified half the front bench and a sprinkling of the Shadow Cabinet when Harvey Nixon came into the Chamber and took his seat in the front row on the left. Wells followed him in a minute later and took up a place a few rows back. Did that mean the Prime Minister had had the balls to sack him or that he had seen fit to resign? Milton suddenly spotted an even more familiar face. Amiss was sitting in a sort of enclosure directly opposite him. Of course, the Officials’ Box. Milton strained his eyes to see who was with him. He recognized Sanders and Parkinson easily, but there seemed to be a couple of others he didn’t know. What was Amiss doing here, anyway, if he was just a Private Secretary? Weren’t the civil servants there to pass briefing notes on their areas of responsibility when their ministers were in trouble? Sanders must have brought him along to keep him company. But wasn’t Sanders too elevated to be sitting in a box along with his juniors? Parkinson, Milton remembered, was a mere Assistant Secretary. Presumably there was some reason to expect trouble—probably over Wells’s article.

  Milton was trying vainly to catch Amiss’s eye when a sonorous voice emitting from beneath a flowing wig indicated to the Honourable Members that it was time they got down to business. The Americans seemed mystified by his appearance. They began an audible discussion about the historical reasons for wearing silly clothes and headgear, which went on with singular disregard for the solemnity of the prayers which opened proceedings, and for the bits of miscellaneous and incomprehensible business which kept the M.P.s occupied until 2.45. To Milton’s relief they were then threatened by a constable with immediate eviction unless they shut up instantly. The Speaker announced the name of a member, who rose and said unhelpfully, ‘Number 1, Sir’. Mystique was all very well, thought Milton, but it was a bit thick if they were all going to talk in code. It reminded him of the old story about the convicts who numbered their stock of jokes because they knew them so well and used to fall about laughing when the number of their favourite was called out. No laughter this time—his timing was all off.

  Things became clearer when Nixon began to speak. He obviously was privy to the content of question number 1. He was talking glibly about the non-viability of a project designed to recycle glass in Wales. When he concluded, the burly Welshman, whose question had triggered off this response, rose and asked a real question which indicated his distress at the government’s hard-hearted lack of concern for his constituents’ employment prospects. Milton thought that Nixon handled the answer well. He seemed hardly to have to consult his notes before he delivered a stream of facts designed to prove that the Welshman’s electorate had been doing very nicely for government-assisted jobs. They had apparently been fortunate enough recently to have two electronics factories sited within their area. The Welshman wasn’t appeased. That, he pointed out, was all very well, but they provided employment mainly for women. What was Nixon doing to provide jobs for the unemployed steel workers who would be ideally suited to work in a glass-recycling plant? Could he tell the House exactly how many of them had been made redundant during the previous six months and how many had by now found jobs?

  Nixon seemed to hesitate as he flicked quickly through his notes. He looked over at the civil servants. Surely he must have the answer to that, Milton thought. It was inconceivable that the officials responsible would have neglected to provide the answer to such an obvious follow-up question. Milton scrutinized the occupants of the enclosure and saw Parkinson scribbling on a piece of paper. Nixon began to answer the question in measured tones. He was playing for time, Milton assumed, by giving annual statistics of unemployment, but he clearly didn’t have the six-monthly figures, or if he did he couldn’t find them. Presumably, if there was some particular significance in the six-monthly figures he wouldn’t get off with that. Parkinson must be busy supplementing the information.

  Milton looked again at the Box to see how Parkinson would get the note to his minister. He could hardly leap over the partition which marked his separateness from the Members. There must be a minion to do that. He saw a tail-coated attendant approach him and hover as he waited for the note to be proffered. Parkinson didn’t seem to be coming up with the goods. He had stopped writing and was leaning back in his seat clutching his stomach. Nixon was stringing out his answer with a flood of statistics about cost per job, redeployment successes and the government’s record in job creation during its term of office. Milton wasn’t listening. He was growing increasingly concerned about the kerfuffle in the Box. Parkinson had slipped off his seat and Sanders and Amiss were bent over him. The sweat was standing out on Milton’s brow. He leaped from his seat and rushed out of the gallery to find someone to take him through the labyrinth of corridors to the back of the Box. He was praying as he ran down the stairs. He didn’t know if it was for Parkinson or himself.

  Chapter Thirty-six

  By the time Milton reached them, Sanders, Amiss and a couple of attendants had carried Parkinson into the corridor. They were standing by helplessly. The carpet was spattered with vomit and the stains of uncontrollable diarrhoea. Cries of agony issued from the convulsed face below them. The horror of it had set their faces in rigid lines of sympathetic pain. As two men in uniform ran up with a stretcher and a medical kit, Milton led the two civil servants away. They would have trouble enough in banishing the image of this from their minds without seeing any more.

  He was badly shaken himself, but he was lucky in having work to do. He made the necessary arrangements for officers to follow Parkinson to hospital and be ready to pass on to Milton’s temporary headquarters at the House any news on how he was progressing, or of anything he might say.
/>   He was quickly found a room and he called in Sanders and Amiss to question them on Parkinson’s sudden illness. It was as he had feared. Parkinson had complained of indigestion and dehydration, had been perspiring heavily, and had shown signs of intensified symptoms as he sat in the Box. The convulsions had started when he fell to the floor. Sanders had tried earlier to persuade him to leave the House and go home or get medical treatment, but Parkinson had insisted that he would be all right. Milton felt sick when he realized that the poor fellow was probably trying to prove himself in front of his new Permanent Secretary.

  He chafed with impatience while he went through the motions of interviewing the others who had been sitting in the Officials’ Box. They all told the same story. He gave himself a moment alone to ring the hospital. Maybe there was still a chance that this would prove to be simply a bad case of food poisoning. There wasn’t. The doctor to whom he spoke was in no doubt. Parkinson was suffering from acute arsenic poisoning. Milton’s worst suspicions were confirmed.

  He made some more telephone calls to set enquiries in train, and then recalled Sanders and Amiss. He needed to know Parkinson’s movements. They might be able to add something to the evidence others were now getting from his secretary and staff. All they knew, they said unhappily, was that Parkinson had had a working lunch with Nixon at about 1.30. There had been so much for Sanders and Nixon to talk about in relation to Wells’s sacking that the Secretary of State hadn’t been able to keep his late-morning appointment with Parkinson. It had been Nixon’s idea that they should lunch together and go over the brief on the glass-recycling plant. All the civil servants had had ten minutes or so together with Nixon just before Question Time to clear up any problems that might have occurred to him.

  Milton sat silently contemplating the obvious inference that Nixon had had an excellent opportunity to poison Parkinson. He sent a patiently waiting sergeant to question the canteen staff. He was about to dismiss Sanders and Amiss for the time being and call in Nixon, who had finished in the Chamber and was standing by to keep their appointment, when he caught sight of Amiss gesticulating at him from behind Sanders’s back. Of course, he had wanted to see him about something. The message from Ann seemed to have come a long, long time ago. He called out as they were leaving the room.