by Nicci French
‘Geoff, if I didn’t know and love you as I do, I might think you were trying to insult me. Did you summon me here to give you a lecture about first principles in post-traumatic stress disorder?’
Geoff stood up and walked round his desk and sat on the corner in a posture that had probably been taught to him on a management training course.
‘I’ve just given Margaret Lessing an official warning. She’s lucky I didn’t terminate her.’
‘What do you mean, “terminate her”? What are you talking about?’
‘This trust has a strict policy on personal privacy which Margaret Lessing violated. I understand that she did so on your instructions.’
‘What is this personal privacy stuff? You’d sell copies of our records to Colonel Gaddafi if he offered money for them. What are you playing at?’
‘Dr Laschen, as you yourself insisted to me, Fiona Mackenzie was not your patient. It was quite improper of you to ask for her file.’
‘I am a doctor in this hospital and I have a right to ask for any file I want.’
‘If you read your contract and our own contract of operation, Dr Laschen, you will see that your so-called rights are based on strictly defined terms of employment.’
‘I’m a doctor, Geoff, and I will do what I think is right as a doctor. And incidentally, as a matter of curiosity, when did you start monitoring routine applications for medical files?’ I saw a hint of indecision in Geoffs expression and I realized the truth. ‘This has nothing to do with ethics, you’ve been spying on me, haven’t you?’
‘Was this file on a dead girl required as part of a course of treatment?’
I took a deep breath.
‘No.’
‘Was it in your capacity as a doctor?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Indirectly.’
‘Indirectly,’ Geoff repeated, sarcastically. ‘Can it be, is it conceivably possible, that despite my warnings, you are, on your own initiative, conducting some sort of private investigation into this case? A case, I should add, that has been closed.’
‘That’s right.’
‘And?’
‘What’s this “and”? I don’t have to answer to you.’
‘Yes, you do have to answer to me. I can’t believe this. More by luck than anything, we seem to have escaped bad publicity, and this tragic case has been closed. When I heard that you were still meddling in it, my first thought was that you had suffered a breakdown. To be frank, Dr Laschen, I’m not sure whether you require medical treatment or disciplinary action.’
I almost leaped from my chair, and stared at him, so close that I could feel his breath on my face.
‘What did you say, Geoff?’
‘You heard me.’
I reached forward and clenched the knot of his tie, firmly so that my fist pressed up against his throat. He squealed something.
‘You pompous bastard,’ I said, and let him go. I stepped back and thought for a second. There was no doubt in my mind, and I felt an immediate sense of release. ‘You’re trying to goad me to resign.’ Geoff said nothing and looked at the floor. ‘I will, anyway.’ He looked sharply, almost eagerly. This was what he had planned for, but I didn’t care. ‘Professional differences. That’s the phrase, isn’t it?’
Geoff’s eyes darted warily. Was I trapping him in some way?
‘I’ll issue a statement to that effect,’ he said.
‘You’ve probably got it in your drawer already.’
I turned to go, then remembered something.
‘Could you do me a favour?’
He looked surprised. He might have anticipated tears or a punch in the face, but not this.
‘What?’
‘Withdraw the warning against Maggie Lessing. I can look after myself, it’ll hurt her.’
‘I’ll consider it.’
‘It’s served its purpose, after all.’
‘Don’t be bitter, Sam. If you had been me, I don’t think you would have been able to deal with you any better than I did.’
‘I’ll leave straight away.’
‘That’s probably best.’
‘Has Fiona Mackenzie’s file turned up yet?’
Geoff frowned.
‘Apparently it’s lost,’ he said. ‘We’ll find it.’
I shook my head.
‘I don’t think so. I think it will stay lost.’ I thought of something and smiled. ‘But it doesn’t matter. I’ve got a drawing by my five-year-old daughter instead.’
As I shut the door, the last I saw was Geoff standing there with his mouth gaping open like a landed fish.
Thirty-Six
The estate agent looked about fourteen years old.
‘Lovely,’ he said. ‘Just lovely.’
Those were his first words as he stepped across the threshold.
‘Very saleable. Very saleable.’
I showed him around upstairs and it was all lovely and saleable in the extreme.
‘I haven’t really tackled the garden,’ I said.
He shook his head.
‘A challenge for the adventurous gardener,’ he said.
‘That sounds a bit off-putting.’
‘Joke,’ he said. ‘Estate-agent speak.’
‘As you can see, we’re only a short walk from the sea.’
‘Good point,’ he said. ‘Very attractive. Buyers like that. Sea views.’
‘Well, not exactly.’
‘Joke. Estate-agent speak again.’
‘Right. I don’t know what else I should tell you. There’s a loft and a shed. But you handled the sale last year, so you probably have the details on file.’
‘Yes, we do. But I wanted to come for a look. Sniff the air, get a feel for the property.’
‘You were going to give me a valuation.’
‘Yes, Dr Laschen. Do you remember what you paid for the property?’
‘Ninety-five.’ His eyebrows rose. ‘I was in a hurry.’
‘That’s an interesting figure,’ he said.
‘You mean it was too high. I wish you had mentioned that a year ago when you showed me round.’
‘The east Essex market is soft at the moment. Very soft.’
‘Is that a problem?’
‘An opportunity,’ he said and held out his hand. ‘Good to meet you, Dr Laschen. I’ll ring you this afternoon with the valuation. We need to price this aggressively. I’m sure that we’ll have some people to take round by next week.’
‘I won’t be here. My daughter and I are going back to London on Saturday.’
‘Just so long as we have a set of keys and a phone number. In a hurry to get away? What’s the matter? Don’t you like the countryside?’
‘Too much crime.’
He gave an uncertain laugh.
‘Joke, right?’
‘Yes. Joke.’
That week consisted of nothing but things that needed doing. I sat down with Elsie and asked her if she would like to go back to London and see her old friends.
‘No,’ she said cheerfully.
I left it at that. The rest was just a process of working my way down a list: telling Linda and Sally, who seemed inured to any more shocks, and paying them in lieu of notice; making arrangements with utility companies; getting boxes out of the attic and putting things into them that, it seemed, I had only just removed from them.
I spent too much time on the phone. When I wasn’t trying to track down somebody at the council I was being phoned once more by journalists and doctors. I said no to all the journalists and maybe to most of the doctors. I gradually thinned down the maybes into probablys and by the end of the week I had a temporary-contract consultant post in the Department of Psychology at St Clementine’s in Shoreditch. I had phone calls from Thelma asking me what the hell was going on and Sarah telling me that I’d done the right thing and that a friend of hers had gone to America for a year and did I want to borrow his flat in Stoke Newington which was just a couple of streets from the park. I did. The only problem was tha
t it was near Arsenal’s football ground and was overrun on alternate Saturdays and occasional weekends and did I mind? I didn’t.
In the gaps I kept phoning Chris Angeloglou. They were waiting for the laboratory results. Chris was out and yes, so was DI Baird. They couldn’t be reached. They were in a meeting. They were in court. They’d gone home. On Friday morning, the day before I was to move out, I rang Stamford police station once more and was put through to an assistant. Unfortunately DC Angeloglou and DI Baird were unavailable. That was all right, I said, I just wanted to leave a message. Did she have a piece of paper? Good. I wanted to warn Angeloglou and Baird that I was about to offer an interview to a national newspaper in which I would give the full story of the Mackenzie murder case as I saw it, together with my indictment of the police role in failing to reopen the case. Thank you.
I replaced the receiver and began to count. One, two, three… On twenty-seven, the phone rang.
‘Sam?’
‘Rupert, how are you?’
‘What do you want?’
‘I want to know what you’re doing.’
‘Do you think it’s constructive to make wild threats?’
‘Yes, and I’ll tell you what I really want. I want a meeting at Stamford police station.’ There was a long pause. ‘Rupert, are you there?’
‘Of course. We’d be happy to see you. I was about to ring you anyway.’
‘Apart from you and Chris, I want Philip Kale there.’
‘All right.’
‘And whoever was in charge of the case.’
‘I was.’
‘I want to talk to the organ-grinder, not his monkey.’
‘I’m not sure that the organ-grinder is available.’
‘He’d better be.’
‘Anything else?’
‘Ask Kale to bring his autopsy reports on the Mackenzie couple.’
‘I’ll see what I can do, Sam, and ring you back.’
‘Don’t bother. I’ll be with you at twelve.’
‘That’s too little time.’
‘You’ve had lots of time, Rupert.’
As soon as I identified myself at the front desk, a young WPC hustled me through the building and into an empty interview room. When she returned with coffee, Angeloglou and Baird were with her. They nodded at me and sat down. It felt as if it were my office, not theirs.
‘Where are the others?’
Baird looked questioningly at Angeloglou.
‘Kale’s on the phone,’ Chris said. ‘He’ll be along in a minute. Val just popped up for the Super.’
Baird turned to me.
‘Satisfied?’ he asked with not too much of a hint of sarcasm.
‘This isn’t some kind of game, Rupert.’
There was a knock at the door, then it opened and a man peered in. He was middle-aged, balding, obviously in charge. He held his hand out to me.
‘Dr Laschen,’ he said. ‘I’ve been looking forward to meeting you. I’m Bill Day. I’m the head of the Stamford CID. I think we owe you an apology.’
I shook his hand.
‘As I was just explaining to Rupert here,’ I said, ‘I’m not conducting some personal campaign here and I’m not interested in claiming credit. It’s just about catching a murderer.’
‘Well, that’s meant to be our job,’ Day said with a laugh that turned into a sort of cough.
‘Which is why I’m here.’
‘Good, good,’ said Day. ‘Rupert said you wanted me to be here and that’s quite understandable. Unfortunately I’ve just popped out of a very important meeting and I must pop back. But I can assure you of our full cooperation. If you are dissatisfied in any way, I want you to contact me personally. Here’s my… er…’ He rummaged in his pockets and produced a slightly dog-eared business card and handed it to me. ‘I’ll leave you in Rupert’s capable hands. Good to meet you, Dr Laschen.’ We shook hands once more and he drifted out, almost bumping into Philip Kale as he did so. The four of us sat down.
‘Well?’ said Rupert. ‘Who is going to start?’
‘I was tempted to bring a lawyer with me,’ I said.
‘Why? Are you planning to confess?’ Rupert asked cheerfully.
‘No, I thought it might be prudent to make sure that there was some independent record of this meeting.’
‘That will be quite unnecessary. We’re all on the same side. Now, what was it you wanted to see us about?’
‘Jesus, Rupert, what is this charade? All right, if you insist.’ I took out my wallet and rummaged in it until I found the blue form. ‘Last week I handed in some evidence that in my view justified reopening the Mackenzie murder case. Receipt number SD4071/A. I suggested that the blood type be established. Has that been done?’
‘It has,’ said Dr Kale.
‘What was it?’
Kale didn’t even look down at his notes.
‘The blood sample derived from the Finn initial on the drawing was type A rhesus D positive.’
‘And you have no doubt about the identity of the body in the burning car?’
Kale shook his head.
‘The dental records were unambiguous. But just to dispel any doubt, DC Angeloglou has established that over the last couple of years, Fiona Mackenzie was a blood donor.’ Kale allowed himself a thin smile. ‘A group O blood donor.’
‘Just out of interest,’ I asked, ‘what were the blood groups of the parents?’
Kale rummaged through his file.
‘Leopold Mackenzie was B.’ He rummaged somemore. ‘And his wife was A. Nice.’
I gave what must have sounded close to a witch’s cackle.
Angeloglou looked puzzled.
‘So if we’d only checked, it would have been clear that she couldn’t have been their daughter,’ he said.
I couldn’t help giving a cross sigh.
‘No, Chris,’ said Kale. ‘If one parent is A and the other B, then the children can be any of the four basic blood groups. Which Michael Daley would have known.’
There was a very long silence. I was trembling with excitement and I had to force myself to maintain my composure. I didn’t want to speak because I couldn’t trust myself not to say ‘I told you so’ in some form of words. Philip Kale ostentatiously began to put papers in order. Angeloglou and Baird looked uneasy. Finally Baird muttered something.
‘What?’ I said.
‘Why didn’t we get a sample of her blood at the scene?’
‘The only traces at the scene were those of the parents,’ said Kale. ‘It didn’t occur to me that her blood group was an issue.’
‘I had her in my bloody car,’ said Baird. ‘I had both of them in my bloody car. They’ll probably demolish this police station and plough the land. Turn it into a ceremonial park, with Chris and me as park keepers. With all his scientific skills,’ these last words were stressed viciously, ‘Phil there could operate one of those pointy things for picking up litter.’
Angeloglou mouthed an obscenity that I could lip-read from across the room. He was taking immense pains to avoid my gaze. My arms were crossed and I carefully pushed my right hand under the upper left arm and pinched the soft flesh hard, so that there was no chance of a triumphant smile.
‘What’s your version of events now?’ I asked in a studiously sombre tone, trying not to stress the word ‘now’ too much.
Rupert was drawing an interlocking grid of squares and triangles on a sheet of white paper on the table. These were then filled in with a series of shadings and cross-hatchings. As he spoke, he never once raised his eyes.
‘Michael Daley faced a double challenge,’ he said. ‘He had to murder the entire Mackenzie family and he had to obtain the money. The first was no good without the second. The second was impractical without the first. So he hit on something so simple, so out in the open, that nobody spotted it. He had a collaborator who looked a bit like Finn – only the roughest resemblance was necessary, since she would never meet anybody who had met the real Finn. And, as her doctor
, he knew better than anybody that Finn’s appearance had changed drastically. Any photograph that was published at the time of the murders would be old and of Finn before her anorexia. The collaborator – I’ll call her X – had dark hair and was about the same size, perhaps a little smaller, but that was all to the good. Michael was monitoring the actions of animal rights terrorists, so he knew about the threat to Mackenzie. It’s impossible now to establish exactly, but it is to be assumed that the real Finn was abducted and killed and stowed in the boat-house on the day or evening of the seventeenth. Her parents were of course murdered early in the morning of the following day. Fiona Mackenzie was a reasonably gregarious young woman, used to travelling. The Mackenzies wouldn’t have been surprised if she was out late. The keys obtained were used to gain entry. The couple were killed and Finn, I mean X, dressed herself in Finn’s nightie and Michael made an incision in her throat when the maid was due to arrive. Her face was gagged so the difference in appearance of the similar-looking girl in Finn’s clothes, in Finn’s bedroom, went unnoticed. That was the situation that we encountered.’
‘How could they plan something so risky?’ Angeloglou asked, shaking his head. ‘How could they possibly assume that they could get away with it?’
‘Some people would be willing to run quite a risk for, what was it, eighteen million or so? Anyway, if you have the nerve to try it, was it all that risky? The girl is under a perceived threat, so she is kept secure. Of course, she had to refuse to see anybody who knew Fiona Mackenzie, but there are no immediate family and anyway, it’s an understandable reaction from a traumatized young girl, wouldn’t you say, Dr Laschen?’
‘I believe that was the professional opinion I expressed at the time,’ I said in a hollow tone.
‘And the matter of identity is never in question because the trusty family doctor is on hand to talk to her and to offer medical details such as her blood group from a faked version of Finn’s medical file.’
‘And Finn’s, that is, X’s hospital file has gone missing,’ I added.
‘Would it have been possible for Daley to have gained access to the file?’ Baird asked.
‘I did, or would have done, if Daley hadn’t got there first.’
