Her heart sank when she realized just how large a borough Harrow was; page after page of her guide seemed to be covered by it and she could see no indication in any of the little markings of small nursing homes. And she had a distinct memory of that fact; it had been a small nursing home, not a major health establishment of the sort that was indicated on the map.
She tried asking the girl behind the counter as she at last moved forwards to hand over her plastic, but the girl, never taking her eyes away from what her hands were doing, just shook her head when George inquired if she knew of any private nursing homes in the district. ‘Couldn’t say, I’m sure,’ she muttered. ‘Sign here.’
Back on the road George followed the signs and at last reached the turn she had been looking for. Harrow was indicated straight ahead; Harrow-on-the-Hill to her left. She bit her lip, tossed a mental coin, and when it came down, turned left.
Someone up there likes me, she thought as she completed the turn. Somewhere there’s an angel who is watching over me, because there, on the right just past a pair of school gates, was a well-designed entrance and in large letters on the wall, the word ‘Hospital’. She indicated and cut in under the nose of oncoming traffic, wanting to cheer.
Her luck held. The excessively charming girl in the flowerdecked reception area (Oh, thought George, the sheer luxury of the private sector!) was most forthcoming. A private nursing home? What sort? There were three she knew of for – um – psychiatric problems. One just up the Hill, another a bit further on.
George could have hugged her. ‘One of them might be what I’m looking for. And even if they’re not, they’ll know of any others, don’t you think so?’
The girl did think so and George set off again, bubbling now with real excitement. At last things were happening for her as they should.
But the first call was a disappointment. No, they had no such patient as the one she sought; no they could not suggest anywhere else. Oh, she knew about St Columba’s? Then why did she ask?
She fled, leaving the receptionist staring after her, and once outside caught her breath for a moment. It was dark now, and it was hard to see her surroundings, but she was aware of large buildings and a great many trees. It would be pleasant here in good weather, she thought, and then, with an almost physical effort, made herself think positively of the next address she had, about a mile away on the other side of the Hill.
Yes indeed, it was a private psychiatric clinic, but of course it couldn’t possibly tell her the names of any of its patients. That would never do, the woman at the desk said reprovingly. ‘I’m sure you wouldn’t like to think of failure of confidentiality if your relative were here, now would you?’
George’s spirits became even lower and as always that made her irritable. She was also feeling very patronized, a most disagreeable sensation, and it made her almost snarl at the woman. ‘I’m not asking for a failure of confidentiality. I’m just trying to find a patient I know who’s in a nursing home in Harrow, somewhere, for an addiction problem, so that I can visit her.’
‘Well, I’m sorry. If you don’t know whether she’s here or not, I can’t possibly tell you who is,’ the woman said firmly. ‘It wouldn’t be right. Now, if you’ll excuse me?’
George could have wept with rage. There was something about the woman’s behaviour made her suspect that she did have the facts that George wanted. She wondered, for a brief moment, whether a bribe would work, but dismissed the idea as unworthy. There was genuine concern here for a patient’s welfare, or so there seemed.
And then she thought, I’m a fool. I’ve got a trump card and I haven’t played it.
She reached into her pocket and pulled out her purse. Tucked into the back of it, to her immense relief (because she usually forgot to refill that section) was one of her professional cards.
She handed it over to the woman. ‘Could you please ask the doctor on duty if I could have a word,’ she said with an air of superiority. ‘As one medical colleague to another, you understand. I’m Dr George Barnabas of Old – of the Royal Eastern Hospital. And it is on a matter of great professional importance that I need to speak to him.’
The woman looked at the card and then at George and sniffed. ‘Well,’ she said. ‘I suppose I have to ask, although … Well, I’ll see if you can be fitted in.’ And she went toiling away up a flight of stairs on the other side of the rather gloomy entrance hall, carrying George’s card by one corner as though it were polluted.
She came down a couple of minutes later and scowled at George, and went back to her desk without saying anything. George opened her mouth to speak, but then behind her a voice came down from the top of the stairs, a cool and very self-assured voice.
‘Dr Barnabas? You want to see me?’ The face was a square one, framed by neat dark hair, and beautifully made up. ‘I’m Dr Susan Napper. What can I do for you? I understand you’re interested in one of our patients.’
31
George sat in a deep armchair, staring across an expanse of polished desk to where Dr Napper sat in a matching though rather more imposing chair. The room was softly lit, had three or four bowls of fresh flowers dotted around and what appeared to be original paintings on the walls. It breathed expense and George felt her ire rise; years of working in a cash-strapped NHS had given her a certain amount of contempt for what she regarded as the overly cushioned private health-care sector.
The woman was looking at her coolly, but now she smiled, a rather wintry stretching of the lips that clearly she meant to be friendly. ‘So, what can I do for you?’ She looked down at George’s card, which was lying on her desk. ‘I see you’re a pathologist. You told my receptionist you wanted to talk to me on a medical matter, but I am a psychiatrist. I’m not sure …?’ She left the question dangling.
George took a deep breath and decided to go in baldly. ‘I’m a forensic pathologist as well as holding a hospital appointment,’ she said. ‘And I’m working on the so called new Ripper case. You’ll have read about it, I imagine, or seen the coverage.’
The thin smile faded and the handsome face looked suddenly pinched. ‘I don’t have to read about it,’ she said after a moment. ‘I have a – you could call it an indirect link with it.’
George opened her eyes wide. ‘You have? How?’
Susan Napper sighed softly and lifted both hands to her face and rubbed her cheeks in a way that made her cheeks crumple, giving her a vulnerable air. ‘I knew the victims. One of them in particular, I knew very well. His wife and I are friends, have been for years. We were at school together. The others, well, my husband is a Member of Parliament, so –’
‘Oh,’ George said blankly. ‘You’re Susan Napper. You’re married to Marcus?’
‘Yes. How clever of you!’ There was a ghost of a real smile there now and George responded to it as warmly as she could.
‘I’m sorry, I didn’t connect your name when I heard it. Of course I know about you, though I never heard you were a doctor.’
Again Susan produced that thin cold smile. ‘My husband tries to keep quiet about me. He’s deeply ashamed of what I do.’
‘Ashamed? Because you’re a doctor?’ George’s irritation with this woman vanished under a flood of fellow feeling. ‘But why?’
‘Not because I’m a doctor.’ She moved her hand to indicate not just the room they were in but the whole building. ‘Because I work here. In private practice. He’s Labour, you see. And I’m not. Though we still manage to stay reasonably contented together.’
‘I see.’ George looked at her closely, not fully understanding. Could two people of such widely divergent opinions really be content together? But that was not important, she reminded herself. It was the case that she was here to discuss, not marital politics.
‘I’d heard … That is, I was told that David CWG’s wife – I’m sorry, David Caspar-Wynette-Gondor –’
‘Don’t apologize. We all used the initials. It’s a terrible name to be saddled with. He hated it, but he didn’
t think he had any right to change it. And in a way it amused him to have what he described as such an aristocratic handle to such an ordinary old tin kettle as he was. He and I got on very well, actually. He liked to tease me about my job, and I gave him a hell of a time over his politics.’ She smiled reminiscently. ‘Poor old David.’
‘Well, yes …’ George was embarrassed now but pressed on. ‘Anyway, we were told that his wife had called you the night he – the night he didn’t return when she expected him.’
Susan Napper’s face smoothed and went blank. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I’m afraid I – I –’And now the attempt to control her expression failed and her forehead creased. ‘I paid no attention. It was late. I thought she was all right really and I was a bit – brisk with her. She hung up on me, to tell the truth. But she said she hadn’t been drinking, and idiot that I suppose I must be, I believed her. I meant well, but she hung up on me, which is always so maddening and – well, there it is. I didn’t call her back. I should have done, but it was so very late and Marcus was tired and annoyed by the call, so I didn’t. And then of course when David was found she –’ She took a deep breath and seemed to recover some of her self-control. ‘Well, not surprisingly she lapsed back into quite severe illness. She drank again, though she had been largely dried out, and that caused major problems, and then she went into a fugue. You know the term?’
George looked at her sharply. ‘Oh, even pathologists know about fugues! We’re not all limited to laboratories. Some of us have had clinical experience.’
‘Sorry. It’s just that not everyone does. I’ve had GPs who’ve looked blank at the word. Consultants too, come to that. They think it means music, not taking off and wandering about.’
George decided not to allow herself to be offended after all. ‘So you think she went wandering, not knowing where or –’
‘I’m quite sure she did,’ Susan said. ‘It was here she wandered from. I agreed to take her as a patient though I’ve usually refused to in the past. I never think it is wise for a friend to be treating a friend and, as I say, we go back a long way, to our schooldays. However, the family were very anxious I take her, so I did. But we don’t operate a locked-door establishment here, and she took off in an hysterical state.’
‘I know,’ George said. ‘I remember. There was a good deal of anxiety. She was in her nightwear, barefoot, I believe.’
‘Yes. The police found her of course, eventually. In a shopping-centre doorway.’ She gave a bark of a laugh then, painful in its harshness. ‘She’d been there all night, but they’d paid no attention because they’d thought she was just one of the homeless. I ask you! Anyway, we got her back here the next morning and I did my best for her. It wasn’t easy, since she was desperately angry with me. Her anger of course was due to the loss of David who had been the centre of her life, but I was the nearest target. I had a colleague treat her, but all the same …’
She sighed deeply and again rubbed her face with what, George realized now, was a characteristic movement. ‘It was hard. I wasn’t sorry when they decided to take her away.’
‘Take her away? Who and where?’
‘Her family,’ Susan said. ‘They’d brought her to me at first because I knew her, but then she became more ill and withdrawn. I had to tell them we were not being very successful. She’d made a botched suicide attempt, using a knife on her wrists. They said at first to keep her here anyway, but then they said they wanted her nearer to them. I didn’t argue. In fact I was relieved.’
The woman’s face went smooth and blank again and George looked at her consideringly. That she was in distress over her friend was clear, but that she was trying to behave professionally was also apparent. Poor thing, George found herself thinking and then, impulsively, said as much.
‘Oh, poor you! What a lousy position to be in. It’s hell being a doctor sometimes. I remember when my ma first developed Alzheimer’s, we – well, I know how it is. I am sorry.’
Susan, who had been sitting with her eyes closed for a moment, opened them and said simply, ‘Thank you.’
There was a short silence and eventually George spoke again, a little awkwardly. ‘I don’t want to harass you, but I do really need to know where she is. I need to find out where she was and so forth on certain dates. It’s all tied up with trying to find the perpetrator of these killings.’
Susan bit her upper lip thoughtfully and looked at her for what seemed to George a long time and then said, ‘I can assure you that it’s exceedingly unlikely she can tell you anything about dates and times. When she left us, she was in a world of her own. I don’t think she even knew she was moving from here. She was so withdrawn she was practically catatonic. So there seems no real point in breaking confidence, does there?’
‘I’m also concerned for her safety,’ George said.
Again Susan Napper looked considering, and there was another pause. Eventually she said, ‘Safety? If it’s in any doubt, why aren’t the police here? Why just you? You’re the pathologist on the case and I can understand your interest, but I didn’t know pathologists got involved in anything more than autopsies and tests and the usual pathological stuff.’
George took a deep breath. Damned doctors, she thought, and then smiled at her own absurdity, and for a moment Susan smiled back, as though she knew what she was thinking.
‘Oh, blast!’ George said. ‘OK, I’m going further than my remit, I can’t deny. But I’m interested. I’ve got a couple of weeks off from the hospital and I’m so hooked into this case it’s – well, I simply have to take part. And Gus – the Superintendent in charge – is a – um, special friend.’
‘Partner?’ Susan said.
‘Yes,’ George said after a moment’s hesitation. ‘And we do work together on some cases. I’ve helped with several so far.’
‘Hmm.’ Susan sighed, a deep, rather tremulous sound. ‘Well, I don’t suppose you mean any harm. OK, tell me precisely why you’re after Marietta and I’ll see what I might be able to do to help.’
George told her. It seemed the only way. ‘We found a witness, Gus and I. A wino, homeless, saw two men go into the Spitalfields Market storeroom where the body of Lord Durleigh was found. Of course Marietta was married to his brother, and he had already been a victim. This witness said the men were whispering, and one of them was Italian and –’
‘Italian? But what has that to do with all this?’
‘Hear me out. The wino was a bright spark for all her condition, but she jumped to a conclusion: she said one was Italian and talking about wanting a smoke. And I thought, suppose what Sally – the wino – had heard was Lord Durleigh saying, “I want Marietta, where’s Marietta?” Do you see?’
Susan stared at her and then repeated the words softly under her breath in a sort of whisper, ‘I want Marietta. Where’s Marietta?’ And her face cleared. ‘I’ll be damned,’ she said. ‘Marietta, cigaretta. That really is silly.’
‘I know,’ George said. ‘But it makes sense all the same, doesn’t it? If you were an old woman who’d been abusing alcohol since God knows when so that your hearing was damaged by that as well as by age, and, no doubt, pretty filthy blocked external ears, couldn’t you jump to the conclusion that you were hearing an Italian talking about cigarettes?’
‘So have you any idea who might have been the other man?’ George looked at her and then made a small grimace. ‘I’m not sure I should say.’
‘Come off it!’ Susan suddenly grinned a wide happy smile that transformed her. George thought, I like you, and grinned back.
‘Oh, damn. All right. But for God’s sake keep stumm. If anyone ever – Oh, hell, here I go again. Talking too much.’
‘You’ll have to. I won’t tell you what I know about Marietta’s whereabouts unless you do tell me.’ Susan warmed to her theme. ‘And I’m hardly a suspect myself, am I?’ Her eyes sharpened then. ‘Unless Marcus is. But that would be nonsense. He’s more of a possible victim than a suspect. Anyway, that’s what they all think.
’ She giggled. ‘If you could hear and see them! They’re all in a blue funk over it, thinking everyone they see has a knife tucked in his underpants ready to cut their throats.’
‘Well, I suppose they’re right. But you should be safe enough.’ George was still uneasy, but the need to find Marietta was getting stronger by the moment. She had a deep conviction that in some way the woman was in danger of being the next victim. She didn’t fit the pattern, of course, but she could be a direct link with the killer; he had used her name as bait to one of his victims, her brother-in-law, and she was the wife of another. It looked more and more likely that she was the factor that tied the whole affair together. In which case the murderer would need to get rid of her to protect himself. I have to find her, she thought, I have to.
So she took a deep breath and said, ‘We’ve uncovered a criminal conspiracy as part of the investigations. A fashion scam that’s made someone a fortune. We’re not sure yet of all the people who are involved but we’ve got a pretty good idea of some of them. And I think the people in that might be after Marietta, who may be in the position of knowing things she doesn’t know she knows. If you see what I mean.’
‘I do see what you mean,’ Susan said. ‘Well, will you tell me who these people are?’
‘I don’t want to. If I’m wrong it could be – well, you can imagine. I might start a huge witch hunt if you inadvertently let it out. And if I’m right and the killer finds out in some way that you know, then it’d put you at risk too, wouldn’t it?’
‘Oh, come on!’ Susan said. ‘This is daft. It means you’re at risk yourself, if those are your criteria.’
‘Oh,’ George said, much struck. ‘I suppose you’re right. Well, so be it. That’s a risk I’m prepared to take. It’s a risk police take too, isn’t it? And I’m sort of part of the police service. But you don’t have to. Look, tell me where she is and I swear to you I’ll tell you as soon as I possibly can what’s happening. I can’t say fairer than that.’
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