Dying to Write

by Judith Cutler

  I tapped the door, and waited. Hugh opened it. He had to put down the Financial Times and close the door before he could gather me quite as enthusiastically as I liked, but eventually I had no complaints. He kissed with a delicacy and finesse I found quite irresistible. Fluttering, gentle caresses; passionate, even violent explorations. And then his phone yelled. Why the hell he didn’t simply ignore it, I don’t know. But he shifted me to one side, turning my face to his shoulder, pressing my ear against his neck so I could both feel the poudning of his pulse and hear his voice, strangely distorted, as he spoke into the phone. He made no attempt to continue our activities. In fact, his body became more remote; he was clearly concentrating very hard on what was being said. I wasn’t particularly interested – it was, in the most literal sense, not my business. Plant; cubic tonnes; bents and fescues: God knew what he was talking about.

  Suddenly I remembered how tired and stiff I was.

  I sat down. The Financial Times is not my usual daily, but I might as well read something. As I shuffled it about, my eye caught an advertisement. And another. And a headline. All about Japanese investment.

  I started to read. And I resolved to take the paper away accidentally when I left, purely in the interests of academic research.

  Then there was a peremptory rap on the door, and in walked Matt. Hugh nodded and then took himself off to the window to finish his call. Matt raised an eyebrow and mouthed something exaggeratedly: ‘“Mad, bad and dangerous to know.”’

  I giggled and then flushed: what if I were to be no more than a notch on Hugh’s bedpost?

  To cover the moment, I gathered up the papers and patted the seat beside me. Matt sat down and rubbed his face. The situation would have been a good deal easier if we’d all known each other properly. Perhaps Matt was thinking the same.

  ‘What we ought to do,’ he said suddenly, ‘is do what we did the other night.’

  ‘What – fall asleep?’

  ‘Probably. You look pretty knackered.’

  ‘Speak for yourself.’

  ‘I do. The Mondiale’s the poshest hotel I’m ever likely to sleep at, but sleep I did not. Haven’t slept my full uninterrupted eight hours since God knows when.’

  ‘Tuesday,’ I said, desperate not to surprise an idea that was creeping into my head.

  ‘Tuesday. The night that Nyree topped herself.’

  ‘Was topped. They still haven’t found the barbiturate bottle, as far as I know. Funny, you know – I slept like the dead (sorry, that was in bad taste) last Tuesday, too. I wonder if anyone else did.’

  ‘No idea. Why?’

  ‘Just an idea. Not even an idea. Just a wonder.’ But I would ask Chris if any of the students’ statements mentioned somnolence. Just in case.

  Then, in an altogether fraternal way, Matt grabbed me and gave me a hug. He smelled as sophisticated as Hugh – no doubt he’d liberated some up-market hotel cologne, and who could blame him? At last Hugh ended the call, and crossed the room, his hand outstretched. Matt got to his feet. And then both men abandoned their stiff upper lips, and hugged. I inserted myself as the third point of the triangle. They probably heard our laughter down in the stables.

  At the time I cursed the student who knocked at the door. And it would have to be Tabitha, enriching the day with a skimpier version of the camisole I’d thought slightly risqué even for evening wear. And a very short white cotton and Lycra skirt, the sort that stretches but not enough to be embarrassing. I thought of my scabby knees and suppressed a glower. Nodding impersonally to Hugh, I picked up the paper and raised my eyebrows. He nodded: yes, I could borrow it. Matt followed me into the corridor.

  ‘What’s that in aid of?’ he asked, pointing to the FT.

  I showed him. ‘I just wondered if it cast any light on those Japanese visitors. They were rather keen to talk to me the other day. My God! Yesterday.’ A lot seemed to have happened since. ‘Come on – let’s have a cup of coffee and you can tell me what Chris did to you.’

  But we had no sooner reached the kitchen than Toad spotted him: ‘Hey, Matt, I was wondering if you’d have another look at that paragraph you didn’t like. I don’t think you understood what I was saying …’

  I handed him his mug and watched him trudge wearily back upstairs, apparently lost in the wonders of what Toad was telling him. I took an extra couple of custard creams, picked up my mug and the FT and headed for a bench where I could bask in the sun but be in yelling range of the nearest constable.

  I would have liked a two-inch headline to guide me on my way. Japanese industry per se is not one of my main interests, despite my relationship with Kenji. But I had to read a lot of smaller print before I located anything that interested me. Japan was poised to invest in Vietnam. But even the FT didn’t say how and where.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The obvious brain to pick about Japan was Hugh’s. That would have to wait till lunchtime or a slot in his teaching. But I wanted to explore that other idea, the one about sleep, which was fluttering just outside the part of the brain where it ought to have been.

  There was no one within earshot of the public telephone so I used that. What disconcerted me was that I had to look up Carl’s number. Two months ago, it had seemed so memorable. And come to think of it, though my heart was pounding quite hard, I couldn’t attribute this to Carl. Being with Hugh, perhaps. Trying to walk quickly with bruised knees. But not the thought of Carl’s voice. And my telephone voice didn’t drop into the more tender vocal range I’d always used to him. Did I use it when I was with Hugh? No need to, of course – with Hugh I was face-to-face. The eyes and body-language would operate. But if ever I were to phone him, I was sure that, unbidden, my voice would take a Dietrich plunge.

  Carl’s wife Paula answered, on the first ring. She sounded as irritated as she always does on the phone, as if she is in the middle of something urgent and valuable. She sighed hugely when I said I wanted Carl’s advice on a murder I was supposed to be trying to write; but she agreed to call him. I heard her footsteps walking away from the phone, and listened in vain for his approaching. At last I heard voices, and fed in a further fifty pence.

  ‘What’s this about a murder, then?’ asked Carl. Presumably he’d chosen not to mention my previous phone call.

  I recapped appropriately – after all, Paula might be within earshot. ‘What about mixing sleeping tablets with someone’s drink?’ I asked at last.

  ‘Very old-fashioned. These days, most doctors are reluctant to prescribe more than a few days’ supply. Quite rightly. They only work for about a week anyway. The body gets used to them. What you might do is –’

  ‘No, hang on. Didn’t Tony Hancock die because he mixed too many sleeping pills with his booze?’

  ‘They’d be barbiturates. No one has those these days.’

  ‘No one?’ I tried to sound disappointed.

  ‘Not for helping them sleep. You have diazepam-, termazepam-related drugs. Quite a different effect.’ I could tell he was about to embark on quite invaluable information that was absolutely no use to me. If ever I did get round to writing, I would certainly pick his brain.

  ‘Hang on a minute,’ I said. There had been an emphasis on the words ‘not for helping them sleep’ I should have picked up. ‘Do people take barbiturates for anything?’

  ‘Well, they’re so old-fashioned. They taste bitter, too, so you’d notice if someone shoved them in your sherry. No good for your plot.’

  ‘Forget my plot for a minute. Do people still take them?’

  ‘Not very many these days – they have side effects.’

  ‘What do people take them for, Carl?’

  ‘One or two doctors may still prescribe them as a preventive therapy for epilepsy.’

  ‘Epilepsy!’

  He started to laugh. ‘But it’d be a bit of a give-away, Sophie. Find the character with epilepsy and there’s the one who dunnit.’

  ‘How would you find out? If you have epilepsy, you don’t have you
r forehead branded or anything.’

  ‘You don’t even have to carry a card like you do if you’re on certain forms of steroids. You don’t actually have to tell anyone. You’re supposed to, of course. But there was a case some time ago of a long-haul airline pilot who had an attack – on the ground, thank goodness! – and that was the first time it had come to light in thirty years.’ Then he dropped his voice. ‘When am I going to talk to you, Sophie? See you? It’s been ages.’

  ‘Back at college, I suppose. Only a week away.’ I infused commonsense and reality into my voice.

  ‘You know what I mean, my love. She’s having her hair done on Tuesday. Any chance we could …?’

  I’d have to face it and tell him – but to give a man the chop in the same conversation as picking his brain about murder was distinctly bad taste. I temporised: ‘I’m sorry, I’m very tied up.’ My voice must have given me away.

  ‘You mean – God, you’re not saying …? And then his voice became public again. ‘I’ll look up the dose for you. Can I call you back?’

  ‘It’s a public phone,’ I said. ‘I’ll phone you. Just as a matter of interest, how long do traces remain in your system – while you’re alive, that is? I mean, if I took a tablet today?’

  ‘About two or three days, depending on the dose.’

  ‘And – Carl, how does it make you feel? Sleepy?’

  ‘In a dose sufficient to make you sleep.’

  ‘And it gives you a hangover?’

  ‘I’ve never taken it. But I’ll check.’ His voice dropped to a furtive whisper. ‘When will you call me? Sophie?’

  ‘As soon as I get a moment. But I’m having quite a trying time, Carl. I can’t promise anything.’

  There was something wrong with me. I sat on the bed, my head in my hands. I was a grown woman. In the spring I had fancied myself in love; in June I had embarked on an affair with a married man; now I was lusting after Hugh.

  Worst of all, I realised, as I stood up and stared at myself in the mirror, I hardly knew myself.

  I should have stayed where I was, and embarked on a period of self-examination. But that would have been a luxury that perhaps others could not afford. I had to persuade my stiff and weary body to the stables, and talk to Chris, if he was still there. I suspect that if I’d asked, one of the constables on duty would have summoned him for me, but I preferred to talk business on his territory.

  By now it was very hot and unpleasant, like being in one of the Botanical Gardens’ hothouses. My jeans were sticking to me; a loose cotton skirt would have been far more comfortable. I felt for the men and women in the stables: all that blue serge must be intolerable. There was no sign of Chris, but Tina was poking a computer, apparently quite at random. When she saw me, her face lit up and she came straight over.

  ‘He’s better,’ she said. ‘They think they can take him off the critical list if he goes on like this. Soph, they reckon as how he’ll live!’

  I hugged her. After a moment, she hugged me back.

  ‘I’m going round to see him as soon as I get off this afternoon.’

  ‘Send him my love,’ I said. And meant it. Though perhaps it wasn’t the most tactful thing to say to Tina.

  ‘Was it Chris you was wanting to see, Soph? ’Cause you’ll have to watch the midday news for that.’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘TV personality, our Chris. Press conference,’ she explained.

  ‘Going to tell them what?’ I asked dourly.

  ‘Load of bullshit to shut them up.’

  Although I laughed, I was in fact quite distressed. I needed someone to act as midwife to that elusive idea, and somehow, after our close contact in the spring, I couldn’t quite cast Tina in that role. But Chris had always insisted that she was a good officer, so I ought at least to ask her.

  ‘Tina,’ I said quietly, ‘is there somewhere we can talk? There’s something niggling away at the back of my mind, and I need to bounce some ideas off you.’

  ‘Sure. Shall I bring Ian too? How d’you fancy a half down the Miner’s Lamp while we talk? Less chance of being interrupted there than here. If we take two cars, then Ian can bring you back here and I’ll hop off into town.’

  We were sitting round a cast-iron table in the lounge of the Miner’s Lamp contemplating the remains of our meal and finishing halves of mild when I decided to put forward my theory.

  If someone wanted to lay someone out cold, they could feed them something to make them sleep. If everyone shared meals, it would be almost impossible to slip anything to an individual. What you would have to do is give some to everyone. Barbiturates are bitter. So you would have to disguise the flavour in something bitter. Like chocolate pudding. We had chocolate pud for supper on Tuesday. Nyree ate a great deal. Then she hit the bottle. She died of a mixture of alcohol and barbiturate. QED.

  For two such different people, the expressions on Tina’s and Ian’s faces were so similar as to be comical. But they could not see why I should laugh.

  ‘You’re out of your mind, Sophie,’ said Ian, simply.

  ‘Been watching too much telly, if you ask me,’ said Tina, draining her glass. ‘Any road up, why should anyone want to kill Nyree?’

  I sighed. I hadn’t got that far. But when you teach you have to think on your feet. ‘Ask the person who did it, of course.’

  ‘Who is?’ asked Ian.

  ‘Whoever has to take barbiturates. Probably someone who suffers from epilepsy. So all you have to do is find out if anyone does, and there you are, Bob’s your uncle.’

  My confidence was entirely false. I think my doubts had started when Carl was so dismissive. Now I was beginning to see that the theory was simplistic to the point of being naive.

  ‘Do you seriously suppose that anyone is going to tell us if they’re epileptic if it will incriminate them to that extent?’

  ‘No. But surely you can find out? Ask their doctor,’ I said, right out of my depth now.

  ‘Whose doctor?’ Ian’s voice was getting more and more exasperated.

  ‘Well, everyone’s, I suppose.’

  Tina and Ian fell into each other’s arms in mock hilarity.

  ‘What’s the problem?’ I asked.

  ‘So I phone up your family doctor, right? And say, we’ve got this murderer who may or may not be epileptic, right, and we want you to tell us if Ms Rivers is epileptic. D’you see any problems? Like confidentiality? Or I could phone up and ask if you were on the pill or had had an abortion or had a history of mental illness. You’d like that, Sophie.’

  I flushed. There are times when I can be remarkably stupid. This was undoubtedly one of them. My theory lay in shreds.

  ‘What about documents in the public domain?’ I hazarded, faint but pursuing. ‘Like his driving licence?’

  ‘Might be worth a try. Assuming he drives. Or she.’

  ‘Just to shut you up, mind,’ said Tina, ‘when I’m back – Monday morning, that’ll be – I’ll get on to Cardiff, just to see who’s got a licence and who hasn’t. OK?’

  ‘Monday!’

  ‘We’re allowed to go home at weekends sometimes, Soph,’ she said resentfully, pushing away from the table and picking up her bag. ‘In any case, there’s one other thing you don’t seem to have thought of. It doesn’t have to be the epileptic who fed the pills to Nyree. Someone could have nicked them – that old guy said people were always leaving things in the bathroom. The owner might have been too embarrassed to own up. Got to think of everything. Can’t go jumping to conclusions. And if I were you,’ she added, with a touch of venom, ‘I wouldn’t go telling Chris all this. He’d have bloody kittens. All these theories of yours!’

  I nodded. She was referring obliquely, wasn’t she, to my belief that Courtney was gay? Apologising would only make it more awkward. And, in Courtney’s case, no less true.

  ‘You going to see that young man?’ asked Ian. ‘Send my best wishes.’

  ‘And mine,’ I added quietly.

  Ian always enjoyed
driving: when he was at the wheel his face softened and his hands were relaxed. So I felt no guilt when I asked him to take me the long way back. I wanted to see once again the corner of the grounds with the ruins of the home farm, and I didn’t see myself jogging that far for another couple of days. And the course ended after lunch tomorrow. Ian turned the car obligingly, and we followed a succession of lanes so narrow you wouldn’t believe you were within ten miles of the city centre, and two of the M5, under which we eventually plunged.

  He parked where the driver of that red car had parked on Wednesday morning.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he said, as I opened my mouth. ‘Ade and his mates have already checked on the tyre tracks. Chris thought you were panicking unnecessarily but he’s a stickler for detail. Especially where you’re concerned.’

  ‘I suppose you wouldn’t dream of telling me what sort of tyres they were and whose car they belonged to.’

  ‘No, I wouldn’t.’ Then he grinned. ‘But I dare say Chris will if you ask him.’

  ‘They do match one of the students’, then?’

  ‘Didn’t say that.’

  Inside the car, the noise was bad enough. When we got out, it enveloped us. Ian stood aside to let me over the stile first. Seeing how slow I was, he stretched out a matter-of-fact hand to help. Then he got over himself, surprisingly lightly for a man in his late forties. If he grunted with the effort no one would have heard. We walked up to the ruins as quickly as my cuts and bruises would allow. Then on to the ice house. There the noise was bearable, but still intrusive.

  Ian peered down. ‘Chris reckons they’d store ice in this for the big house.’

  He sounded doubtful.

  ‘That’s right. I’d have thought this one a bit too exposed to be successful. Perhaps there used to be trees round it but they’ve been cut down.’

  ‘They’d really keep ice back from the winter?’

  ‘No other way of getting it, I suppose.’