Mind/Reader

by Brian Freemantle

  ‘You have my card.’

  ‘Which doesn’t designate your function.’

  ‘Security.’

  ‘Intelligence?’ challenged Claudine.

  ‘Security.’

  Claudine looked down at the pasteboard. ‘Your card gives the Home Office number and an extension. Gerald Lorimer worked for the Treasury. Which doesn’t come within Home Office jurisdiction.’

  Toomey smiled bleakly. ‘Your appointment here - which was made within Home Office jurisdiction - is politically a sensitive one. If you’ll excuse the pun, Europol and everyone connected with it is on trial. Your job - the job of every British representative here - will be difficult enough. We’re anxious there won’t be additional problems.’

  Claudine gazed steadily down at her desk for several moments, selecting the words, before looking up at the man. The safe containing the unreported suicide note was directly behind him. Claudine said: ‘Mr Toomey, I agreed to this meeting without any idea what it might be about because the message came officially, from my former employers. Who are, incidently, no longer my employers. You have been inconsiderate and deeply offensive. I am not prepared to continue - or to go on being interrogated in the convoluted manner more befitting an out-of-date spy film - without being told what this meeting is all about and why you’ve come from London to conduct it. Unless I am told, I am terminating it right now. I shall also complain directly to the Home Office and through the administration and personnel mechanisms here. Is that clear?’

  ‘Totally,’ said the man quietly, seemingly unimpressed by the tight-lipped threat. During some of her outburst he’d made notes, in his start-of-investigation book, and once checked that his tape was running. Now he sat looking at her.

  She was under investigation, Claudine accepted, astonished. She’d been present a hundred times at confrontations like this, watching clever men who worked hard to be underestimated, even dressed for the part as Toomey was dressed, perform with supposed fumbling awkwardness until a suspect made the one, damning incriminating mistake: had even played her part in such a charade. And now it was happening to her. She didn’t like it any more than she liked or accepted being patronized. But what was she suspected of? Judging from the implication of political sensitivity it might be important enough to affect her appointment. Which made her even more indignant. ‘Why am I being interrogated by an intelligence officer?’

  Instead of replying Toomey looked briefly into the briefcase, as if searching for something, but put it down beside him again. ‘I do not wish to be rude. Or offensive. But really there is no way to avoid offence. So I apologize in advance. If you wish I will suspend this interview and you may accompany me back to London, so that it can be conducted in the presence of your own representatives, although frankly I think that is unnecessary at this stage.’

  Claudine’s foremost awareness was that the man hadn’t denied being an intelligence officer, but other impressions crowded in close behind. It was clearly a threat. She would have to provide an official explanation to the Europol directorate for accompanying Toomey to London and however she phrased it the inference would be that she was being taken back under agreed arrest. ‘For Christ’s sake, man, tell me why you’re here!’ She shouldn’t lose control. Her anger could be manipulated and turned against her.

  ‘Gerald Lorimer was the deputy in a classified forward planning division within the Treasury. He had access to a large amount of restricted financial information, not just that affecting the United Kingdom but also of World Bank and International Monetary Fund intentions. It was a position which, if wrongly used, could have given unscrupulous people the opportunity to make a great deal of money - millions, in fact - by appearing to speculate in futures on the world’s currency markets when they wouldn’t have been speculating at all.’

  Claudine shook her head, still unsure. ‘Insider trading, you mean?’

  ‘That would be a definition,’ agreed the man. ‘But this would be insider trading of cosmic proportions. It really would involve millions.’

  ‘But what has this got to do with me … with Warwick, apart from the coincidence of the two suicides …?’

  The smile clicked on and off again. ‘I’m not sure it has anything to do with you. That’s what I’m here to find out.’

  Claudine recognized the qualification. ‘With my husband, then?’

  This time Toomey did extract something from the briefcase, a single sheet of photocopied paper enclosed in a plastic folder. ‘Lorimer left a suicide note,’ announced the man. ‘It starts: It’s getting too much. He wants too much. I can’t do it. So this is the way.’ Toomey looked up at her. ‘You’re a criminal psychologist, Dr Carter. What would you say that indicates?’

  Claudine didn’t immediately reply because she couldn’t, her mind blocked by the wording of another suicide note, one only she had ever seen. I wish I could explain, but I can’t. There is so much, so very much … Aware of Toomey’s quizzical, head-to-one-side attitude, Claudine said at last: ‘I don’t make assessments on single sentences. It’s an impossible question.’

  ‘Your husband didn’t leave a note?’

  ‘No,’ lied Claudine.

  ‘As a psychologist - particularly one in your very specialized field – didn’t you find that surprising?’

  ‘No. Notes are not left in a very large number of cases.’

  ‘At your husband’s inquest you_ said your husband was under great pressure from problems that had arisen in his department?’

  So Toomey had studied the transcripts. ‘Some of his legal opinions had been rejected.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  Claudine was sure Toomey understood perfectly but wanted to prod the conversation about Warwick in any direction that might produce an opening to whatever it was he wanted to know.

  ‘He specialized in European Union law: was an acknowledged expert. The United Kingdom lost three cases in a row in the European Court, arguing his legal opinions.’

  ‘Losing cases is as much a part of being a lawyer as winning them, surely?’

  The patronizing bastard was intentionally goading her. So she—Claudine abruptly stopped the response, more furious at herself for being undermined than at the anything but fumbling questioning. She quietened herself, confronting the challenge. ‘My husband was ill. A depression no one recognized. The effect upon him of the legal defeats was not what it would have been upon someone mentally fit.’ It wasn’t anyone who’d failed to recognize it, Claudine thought. It was me.

  ‘A similar mental illness to Gerald Lorimer’s, in fact?’

  ‘I’ve no idea what Gerald Lorimer’s illness or problems might have been.’

  ‘Can’t you form any opinion from what Lorimer wrote?’

  Claudine hesitated, wondering whether to refuse. She was breathing more easily and was glad. ‘Fairly typical. Over-pressured, desperate. That’s all, without knowing any more facts.’

  ‘Like your husband … although he didn’t leave a note?’

  Now the bastard was trying to manipulate the answers. With no alternative she said: ‘Yes.’

  Toomey nodded, going back to the note. Why did Warwick have to do it? He knew how much I needed him. At least our secret is safe but I can never be sure. I can’t forgive him. Hate him, in fact.’ He looked up at her again. ‘There seems to have been a very close relationship between your husband and Gerald Lorimer?’

  This time it took longer for Claudine to respond, another secret passage thrusting itself into her mind. I wish there was someone to understand, about Gerald Someone I could talk to. It took an effort of will for Claudine to say: ‘I told you they were best friends. I don’t see that what you’ve just quoted indicates anything more than that. Just part of the desperation …’ She hesitated, as the professionalism came to her. ‘Warwick’s suicide would have increased that desperation in Lorimer. Provided the idea how to kill himself, in fact. Maybe even triggered it.’ She only vaguely remembered Lorimer at Warwick’s funer
al: found it difficult - oddly - to remember much about the funeral at all.

  Toomey nodded again, as if he were putting ticks in ‘yes’ or ‘no’ boxes. ‘I have something very personal to ask you. I want to make it clear before I do that it is important. But again, I apologize for any offence.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Was your sexual relationship with your husband a normal one?’ The man coloured, slightly, with the question.

  ‘What?’ Claudine couldn’t recall ever being so verbally off-balanced: being quite as numbed, unable to form a single, cohesive thought. Not even by the discovery of Warwick’s body. Her chest hadn’t seized then.

  ‘I’m sure you don’t want me to repeat the question.’

  Claudine fought for control, determined against losing the duel. ‘I most definitely want you to explain it!’ Genuine outrage stoked the audible indignation.

  Toomey went into his briefcase again. ‘I’d rather show you these photographs.’

  There were four. Each was differently posed and showed a woman in full evening dress against an indistinguishable background in front of other unidentifiable women. And then Claudine realized the woman was Gerald, made up and bewigged and actually quite attractive. Claudine took her time, needing every second. Toomey was good but not good enough: she could - and would - out-debate him. The priority was breaking his lead in the conversation. ‘I asked you to explain a question about the sexual relationship between myself and my late husband. These are photographs of Gerald Lorimer, dressed as a woman.’

  ‘I know they are.’

  ‘I know they are,’ she echoed. ‘That’s all they are.’

  The silence filled the book-lined, new-paint-and-carpet-smelling office with its own personal safe, everything still pristine from lack of activity. Or use. Claudine would have liked finally to mop up her spilled coffee but didn’t because that would not have been the act of a person in charge and that’s what she was now, back in sufficient control, which was how she always needed to be. She hadn’t liked the sensation of being under suspicious investigation for the last thirty minutes. Or of being led instead of leading a nuance-balanced discussion.

  Toomey surrendered. ‘Could you answer my question, please.’

  The ‘please’ was a mistake, like his blushing. ‘What is your question?’

  Toomey grew redder. ‘Did you suspect your husband was homosexual?’

  The response had to be immediate and overwhelming. ‘You have no justification - no reason whatsoever - for asking that.’ She wouldn’t gain anything by exacerbating the man’s difficulties but he’d unsettled her - created too many reflections for the future - so there wasn’t any reason why she shouldn’t hang the bastard out to dry the way he’d tried to hang her out to dry. Now he’d make more mistakes than she would.

  ‘You had a normal sexual relationship with your husband?’ persisted her increasingly disconcerted inquisitor.

  ‘If you mean was our relationship totally heterosexual, the answer is yes.’ It would be wrong to demand his definition of normal sex. Instead she posed it to herself. Had she held back sexually? Or had Warwick? Claudine refused to consider those ridiculous assessments so beloved in the media about regularity. They’d made love when they’d felt like it, not to a chart or a timetable. And sufficiently, for her needs. What about his? He’d never complained. And she didn’t see anything unnatural - anything not normal - in fellatio or cunnilingus or in his anal exploration, which he hadn’t practised a lot anyway.

  ‘Did your husband belong to any clubs?’

  Claudine hesitated. ‘The Cambridge Union. You mean in London?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Several jazz clubs.’

  ‘What about the Pink Serpent?’

  Claudine sniggered. ‘What the hell’s the Pink Serpent?’

  ‘A predominantly homosexual club in Soho.’

  The membership cards of everything to which Warwick had belonged were among the things she’d kept. ‘My husband did not belong to the Pink Serpent club,’ she said.

  ‘You didn’t know about Gerald Lorimer? Your husband never told you?’

  ‘Know what about Gerald Lorimer? Told me what?’

  ‘You’re not making this easy for me, Dr Carter.’

  The capitulation, Claudine realized, her breathing easing. She had to guard against it being another interrogation ploy but she didn’t think it was. She judged Toomey to be someone who’d believed he had enough to bring about her collapse, but had faltered at the end of his prepared script when that collapse hadn’t occurred. Now was the moment to crush him. ‘You’re not making it easy for yourself, Mr Toomey. It’s fortunate I didn’t accept your invitation to return to London. I don’t think this interview would have been received particularly well before an audience. As it is, your tape recording will probably be embarrassing for you. We’ve talked for a long time. So far you’ve told me a few words from a suicide note of an unfortunate friend of my late husband and shown me four completely innocent photographs of the man wearing women’s clothes. You’ve told me nothing to justify any accusation of his being homosexual - or why it would be important if he was - and you’ve asked me offensive questions about my late husband’s sexuality, which I’ve answered because, distasteful though they were, I saw no reason not to answer …’ Claudine paused, intentionally raising her voice. ‘Throughout it all you still haven’t told me why you’re here. Do so, right now - or get out of my office!’

  Desperately Toomey tried to return to his script. Indicating the photographs he said: ‘Wouldn’t you say those photographs are incriminating?’

  Claudine looked at him in genuine astonishment. ‘No.’

  Toomey blinked. ‘What, then?’

  ‘What they obviously - but only – are: a man wearing women’s clothes.’ She hesitated, deciding to chance the question. ‘Haven’t you ever dressed up for a fancy dress party? And now have photographs that don’t look as funny as they did at the time?’

  ‘Not as a woman!’

  ‘What, then?’ demanded Claudine, determined to ridicule the idiotic hypothesis. Which had to be idiotic because if he’d had more Toomey would have produced it by now.

  ‘I don’t think it’s relevant.’

  ‘What, then?’ insisted Claudine.

  ‘A Greek warrior,’ admitted Toomey.

  Claudine came perilously close to laughing outright at the absurdity of the man’s admission; that he’d replied at all. ‘Greek warriors wore skirts; their ceremonial soldiers still do. And when Greek warriors went to war they took young boys for their brothels because the stamina of young boys - even buggered young boys - was better than women’s, on long marches. Which prompts me to ask you a question, Mr Toomey. Are you homosexual?’ He’d destroy her contempt if he openly conceded that he was. But Claudine was sure enough, from his attitude so far, not only that he wasn’t but that Peter Toomey would regard homosexuality as an aberrant illness that could be cured by cold baths or frontal lobotomies.

  ‘Of course I am not a homosexual!’

  ‘What reason have you got for accusing Gerald Lorimer of being one, apart from four innocuous photographs? Or - worse - asking me the question you have about my late husband?’

  ‘What about Paul Bickerstone?’

  Claudine shook her head, refusing the deflecting trick, totally sure of herself now. ‘Who’s Paul Bickerstone?’

  ‘You don’t know him?’ There was a tinge of triumph in the question.

  ‘No.’ Toomey had got back to his script, Claudine decided. But it was too late.

  Another photograph, turning sepia from age or sunlight exposure, was conjured from Toomey’s briefcase. ‘You’re next to him in this group.’

  Her first year in London, after moving from France, remembered Claudine: one of the Chelsea Arts Balls, her introduction to a social event everyone else thought wonderful but she’d found disappointing. A total stranger, in a gorilla suit, had his arm round her. Warwick was on her other side, dressed a
s a bishop. Lorimer, half hidden, was a policeman. Claudine couldn’t recall what she was supposed to be, in the flimsy gauze dress bedecked with flowers and with flowers in her hair. Ophelia, maybe. ‘I presume the gorilla’s Paul Bickerstone?’

  ‘A contemporary at Cambridge of your husband and Lorimer. He now heads a commodity-dealing firm, specializing in currency. Six weeks ago he formed a consortium and bought across the board in London, Hong Kong and Wall Street two hundred million pounds’ worth of sterling futures, on fourteen-day spot-price value. A week later the Government announced a six per cent guaranteed bond issue. His profit on the sterling fluctuation was twenty-five million pounds. Gerald Lorimer knew of the intended bond issue.’

  Claudine relaxed further back in her chair. ‘And in the middle of it all, he hanged himself!’

  ‘Leaving a note that said: He wants too much. I can’t do it.’

  ‘I think I’m catching up with you at last,’ said Claudine, condescending herself now. ‘But I don’t want to guess: I want you to tell me. Where’s the homosexuality come in?’

  ‘Blackmail,’ declared Toomey unconvincingly.

  Claudine frowned, shaking her head in disbelief. ‘You’re suggesting that a City financier blackmailed a Treasury official to disclose advance information with the threat of disclosing that he was gay?’

  ‘It’s a line of our inquiry,’ recited Toomey formally.

  ‘Half Whitehall’s gay and the other half doesn’t care. Nobody cares. What’s wrong with being gay?’ Damn, she thought: that final remark sounded as if she might have been condoning Warwick.

  Toomey appeared to miss it. ‘That might be the private attitude of a lot of people but Lorimer’s position would have been untenable.’

  ‘So he made it even more untenable by hanging himself!’

  ‘Men under pressure do strange things.’

  ‘Which is what I’ve been telling you almost from the moment we began talking: I’m glad you’re finally listening.’ Claudine gestured to the photographs which Toomey had put on the edge of her desk. ‘Is that all you’ve got to support your hypothesis: just those pictures and the fact that Lorimer and Bickerstone were at university together?’