Dying on Principle

by Judith Cutler

  I gaped.

  He walked away.

  ‘And may all your toenails grow in!’ I said to his departing back.

  The curry was expensive, the taxi fare home expensive, and Simon in private was not nearly as demonstrative as Simon in public. This was a relationship that would need either thought or work. And I wasn’t sure that I wanted to spare either just at the moment.

  Thursday morning found me at a loose end. I should have been in a meeting with the rest of the team, but two of them were off sick, so Sarah, an ESOL expert, and I, lamenting men’s lack of stamina, adjourned the meeting and went our various ways.

  Spring was definitely springing at last, and I felt a sudden reluctance to return to my eight-by-eight cell. Ten minutes by the little fountain would have worked wonders, but the only access was via the principal’s study – correction, the chief executive’s office – or the staff or conference room, which was currently occupied by people in conference: there was a notice on the door telling the world not to disturb the meeting.

  The temptation simply to walk out of the building and work in my garden was almost overwhelming, but even I don’t do things like that, so I decided to explore parts of the building I’d not yet had reason to visit; the drama studios, for instance, and the music rooms. Since poor William Murdock had neither, I was impressed by the plurals and by the fact they were housed in the performing arts wing.

  This lay, soundproofing notwithstanding, at the furthest edge of the complex, where the building was also at its tallest – five storeys. There were practical classes in the dance studios and in the smaller drama studio, but the main drama studio was empty. The door responded to my push, and I found myself in a small theatre. Not so small either – not much smaller than Brum Studio at the Rep. It seemed very well-equipped too. Resisting a sudden urge to play with the computerised lights and sound effects, I took centre stage and made ready to soliloquise – purely, of course, to test the acoustics. Pity a class started to trickle in.

  I pushed my way against the tide of people and set off up to the music area. This part seemed less well funded. The piano was badly out of tune, and the electronic keyboards years out of date. The last notice on the board was for aural exams in 1989.

  The shoes I fell over on the way out, however, were almost new. I put them neatly to the side of the stairs, more interested in the fact that the door to the roof was open. I’m not, to be honest, a woman for heights, but since I was exploring I might as well do it properly. I’d celebrated the tenth anniversary of my sojourn at William Murdock with a walk on its roof, and hadn’t known whether to be relieved or irritated to find I was too short to see over the parapet. Perhaps because the Muntz building was five storeys high, not fifteen, this parapet was the height you could comfortably lean your elbows on. I oriented myself and headed for the corner nearest my house, its roof strangely small and unfamiliar and – now I looked more closely – missing a ridge tile. To celebrate being in the open on such a promising day and to prove I had my vertigo under control, I decided to complete a circuit. Someone had drawn expansive yellow chalk circles around suspect-looking roof felt, and a bucket of tar steamed ready. I dodged round it, and looked over each of the corners. One had an excellent view of the playing fields – fields in the plural when poor William Murdock hadn’t so much as a bit of tarmac for kicking a ball on. The last corner was the one nearest the area occupied by the maintenance staff. I looked down at a little shed with a motor mower half out, the canteen bins and a rubbish skip.

  On top of the skip were some tar drums, some broken chairs, and a discarded life-size model from the art room. The thoughts came painfully slowly. How enlightened to use a black model. They had posed it clothed. A black young woman. And I knew, as I ran down the stairs two and three at a time, that it wasn’t a model.

  I could simply have dialled 999. I supposed I should have told someone in authority and let them do it for me: hierarchies clearly operated at George Muntz. But logic deserted me, and I ran all the way to my own office to make the call. Chris, of course. DCI Chris Groom.

  His voice was calm and efficient. ‘You’re sure it’s her?’

  ‘Without going closer and having a look—’

  ‘No, don’t do that. No point in upsetting yourself, Sophie. And you might just – you know – disturb something. Have you told anyone?’

  ‘No. And I’ve an idea I should have. But Chris, I couldn’t just invite you over here to look at the view, could I?’

  ‘Hardly. Go and tell someone, and tell them you panicked. If it really is Melina, surely they’ll have more important things to do than worry about protocol!’ He waited for me to say something. ‘Come on, Sophie, you’re not usually so shy and retiring.’

  ‘It’s being new here, Chris. And – look, shouldn’t you be putting your underpants outside your trousers and leaping into action? We can talk about my hang-ups later.’

  ‘OK. But I shall need to talk to you officially, mind, so don’t worry if you find yourself getting sent for. Take care.’

  There was another word, which he choked off. Poor Chris.

  And come to think of it, poor Sophie. Now I had time to look, something radical had happened to my room: the arrival of another chair and several boxes of someone else’s papers. And an ashtray, heavily used.

  First things first, however: whom ought I to tell? The principal, I suppose, or, failing him the less than charming Mr Curtis. On the whole, since Peggy had described him as a gentleman and he’d been charm personified at the meeting that brought me here, I’d try Mr Blake.

  When I reached the foyer it was in chaos: piles of the sort of timber I associate with other people’s home extensions, and raucous young men in overalls milling round, much to Peggy’s tight-lipped irritation. I smiled wanly at her and headed down the short corridor leading to the principal’s study. A desk impeded my progress, occupied, according to the gold-printed wooden block, by Mrs I. M. Cavendish, Secretary to the Chief Executive.

  She was speaking into the phone when I arrived and chose to continue without acknowledging me: ‘I hear what you are saying, Mrs Jeffreys. Yes. I do hear. But I cannot imagine that—’ At this point she rolled her eyes heavenwards; I too was invited to condemn her unheard interlocutor. ‘Mrs Jeffreys: you are taking antibiotics. You are teaching only a floor from the ladies’ lavatory. Surely it isn’t too much for Mr Blake to expect you to fulfil your teaching commitment.’

  There was an impassioned murmur from the other end, causing Mrs Cavendish to hold the receiver at an elegant angle from her head.

  ‘Mr Blake will expect to see you in the classroom as usual tomorrow, Mrs Jeffreys. He does not regard cystitis as a cause for hysteria.’ She replaced the receiver. Now she no longer saw me as an ally against a mischievous world, her eyes hardened.

  ‘Yes?’ she said, uninvitingly.

  ‘I have to see Mr Blake, on a matter of the most extreme urgency.’

  She picked languidly at a diary. ‘Staff, aren’t you? Mr Blake sees staff on Mondays.’

  ‘I have to see Mr Blake now.’

  ‘Monday at eleven. Miss – er—’

  ‘Now.’

  ‘Mr Blake is in a meeting.’

  ‘He would want to be interrupted.’ I expected her to get to her feet and head for the conference room, but if anything her smile was more languid.

  ‘A meeting at the Mondiale. The College without Walls Conference. Senior staff.’

  ‘Mr Curtis?’

  ‘All senior staff,’ she said firmly. There was a distinct stress on ‘senior’.

  ‘All right, if you’re holding the fort, I’ll tell you. Though I expect you’ll want to contact them and tell them the police are here.’

  To describe Mrs Cavendish’s reaction as extreme would be to indulge in understatement. I thought for a moment she was about to pass out, she went so grey so quickly. But she resumed her bored expression with commendable rapidity, touching her fingertips together in an irritating arch.<
br />
  ‘In what connection?’

  ‘With Melina. The computer technician. I don’t know her surname. Perhaps you should find it and all her other details. I’m sure the police would be grateful for anything that’ll save them time.’

  ‘They would indeed,’ came Chris’s voice from over my shoulder, ‘be very grateful.’

  He introduced himself, ID and all, to Mrs Cavendish, and prepared to be charmed. Middle-aged ladies often seemed to find Chris desirable, a fact he was rarely slow to play on.

  ‘And of course,’ he was saying, ‘if Ms Rivers has discovered something untoward, there need be no suggestion of foul play.’

  Somehow he contrived to bow himself out without permitting her to accompany him, and somehow he contrived to bow me out with him.

  ‘Ian,’ he said, raising his voice, ‘could you get a few details about the college from—’

  ‘Mrs Cavendish,’ I supplied. And winked at Ian, who responded with a flicker of a smile. Last time I’d seen Ian he’d been winning a case of amontillado in a wine tasting.

  ‘I’ll have to show you what I saw, first,’ I said, leading the way to the music and drama block, and up the stairs. ‘Because I’m not entirely sure how to get to the place from the ground.’

  By this time the door to the roof was locked.

  ‘What’s up?’

  ‘I’m sure I didn’t lock it. I’m sure I just legged it downstairs to phone you.’

  ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘I’m nearly sure.’

  He looked at me hard, but then smiled. ‘Could be important. But we’ll worry about it later. Meanwhile …’ He produced an interesting little bunch of keys and coughed gently. No, I wouldn’t tell.

  The door opened easily. The roof was still deserted but the patches had been tarred over and the buckets had gone. Presumably the workmen had locked the door when they left. Reluctantly I led Chris to the corner overlooking the skip, and pointed.

  ‘I’m afraid you could be right,’ he said quietly. He gave my shoulder the nearest he could manage to a merely friendly hug, but released me far too quickly and spoke into his phone. ‘No evidence yet to suggest foul play, of course,’ he said, more bracingly.

  ‘Trying to fly, was she?’ I asked tartly.

  ‘Might have topped herself. Or just fallen. No need to jump to – sorry – you know, no hasty conclusions. Come on, plenty to do, Sophie. But maybe you ought to take a sickie. Go and get Aggie to fuss you a bit.’

  We started back down the stairs.

  ‘No. Not until you’ve—’ I gestured. I didn’t want to mention Melina yet. ‘I’ll hang about here until you’ve got some idea of what happened to her. I’ve got a room on the second floor. Third on your left as you come upstairs.’

  ‘All to yourself?’ he asked. ‘Rather a luxury after that maelstrom you called your office at William Murdock.’

  ‘May not be all to myself any longer. But I’ll be there. Until you or Ian comes and gets me. I suppose you’ll want a statement in any case. I suppose I must be one of the last people to see her alive. Me and Dr Trevelyan. But I don’t think she’ll be able to talk at the moment.’

  The room was still unoccupied, apart from the boxes and the ashtray, so there was no one to take my mind off my part in Melina’s death. Fact: she’d wanted to talk to me. Fact: I’d been in too much of a hurry. Fact: she’d begged me to listen. Fact: I’d refused. Fact: she was dead.

  Whether it was by her own hand or by someone else’s, maybe I could have prevented her death.

  The knowledge pounded round my head like a hamster on a wheel. It changed rhythm soon enough – I could have prevented her death; I should have prevented her death.

  If I could have a hot coffee to wrap my hand round, perhaps I could have stopped shivering. But getting a coffee meant risking the canteen, and Chris would be coming for me here. I couldn’t cry, I couldn’t pace, I couldn’t do anything until he or Ian came. Nothing except listen to the voice in my head: ‘I should have prevented her death. Could have. Should have.’

  There was a sharp tap at the door, and Chris was suddenly beside me. ‘Sophie?’

  The words came out loud now: ‘I could have stopped her.’

  His voice was very cold and official: ‘Do you have any reason to believe she killed herself?’

  I told him, haltingly, about our encounter in Safeway.

  ‘If she killed herself, she made her own decision. People who kill themselves do so, as I understand it, because they think their life has become intolerable. One conversation more or less wouldn’t change that underlying belief. And if she didn’t kill herself, then someone else did. And if she’d given you information this person didn’t want passed on, you’d have been at risk too. Now, what about a coffee?’

  I pointed to the memo from Curtis about staff refreshments.

  ‘Jesus, we are into abrasive management styles, aren’t we? Well, in that case, Ms Rivers, I’ll have to ask you to accompany me to Rose Road Police Station to make your statement, aided and abetted by a cup of my coffee.’

  I smiled, if wanly: Chris prided himself on the excellence of his coffee.

  I set the button in the middle of the door handle and ushered him out, checking, as I always did, that the door had locked – not that it would keep out the owner of the ashtray of course.

  ‘Snib,’ said Chris suddenly, as we joined the staff and students milling up and down the stairs.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘That thing in the doorknob. Last conference I went to—’

  ‘Hawaii?’ I asked dryly. Chris was given to conferring in exotic places.

  ‘Newcastle. There was a notice in the room telling the occupant to set the snib before he left. Took three DCIs and two supers to work out what the hell it meant.’

  He said nothing else until we reached his car, which was surrounded by other police vehicles. A uniformed officer was sitting in the driver’s seat. Chris would have to hang on here, wouldn’t he? The constable started to get out, however, and spoke in an undertone to Chris.

  ‘Yes, perhaps,’ Chris replied. ‘No, ask Sergeant Dale to take Ms Rivers to Rose Road, will you? You’ll find him entrapped by a terrifying blue-rinse female called Cavendish. Tell him you’re the fifth cavalry.’

  ‘OK, Gaffer.’

  The young man gave a casual salute and loped off.

  Chris waited till he was out of earshot. ‘That’s another worst-case scenario: being trapped behind a desk. Can’t bear leaving things to other people.’

  ‘You never could,’ I said, thinking of searches he’d led, of other jobs he might easily have delegated.

  ‘If you finish your statement before I get back, Ian’ll take you home. No, listen: I want to talk to you, just in case—’

  I took a deep breath. ‘Do you think it was, Chris? Suicide?’

  He shook his head. ‘Until the pathologist’s had a look, and we’ve talked to other people, I really am keeping an open mind. According to young Dr Patel, the surgeon, her initial impression is that the injuries are consistent with a fall from a considerable height. The question is …’ he paused.

  I finished his question for him: ‘Did she fall or was she pushed?’

  7

  Flapping a hand in vague greeting at a couple of Rose Road’s WPCs I’d met last year, I took my seat in a newly decorated interview room and waited for the promised coffee. Ian took my statement without comment, breaking off only when I started to yawn.

  ‘Stress,’ he said tersely. ‘Hang on a bit.’

  He left me to contemplate the grim state of my nails, but was soon back bearing coffee in Chris’s china cups. He fished a couple of Kit-Kats from his pocket. I looked on temptation and succumbed.

  He was surprised when I insisted on going back to work after lunch, but accepted my explanation that I had a class with an exam in less than six weeks’ time. Chris would have to wait until I’d done my duty.

  As it happened, he had to wait a little
longer. I was leaving my classroom, without any conviction on my part that I had helped the students at all, when I ran into Phil. I locked the door and fell into step with him. He looked nearer sixty than forty and his hair drooped disconsolately behind one ear.

  ‘Bad business,’ I said quietly.

  ‘Yes, we could do with a cuppa,’ he said. ‘Such a nice kid! One of the best I’ve come across. In here,’ he said, opening the door to the technicians’ restroom, ‘and bugger this.’ He flipped a finger at the Curtis memo, which he too had stuck on the wall. He filled a kettle and shook a packet of decaffeinated teabags at me. ‘Better for you, except they say there’s something in the paper that makes you senile. But at least if you’re mad, then you don’t know anything about it.’

  ‘Unless you’re Dr Trevelyan,’ I risked.

  ‘Like I was saying, she must actually have seen Melina. It wasn’t just a figment, was it? She really did.’

  ‘I hope someone’s told her. And the hospital,’ I said.

  ‘Not my job. D’you want to give something towards her flowers?’ He shook a chinking foolscap envelope at me. ‘Don’t feel you have to: you didn’t know her, not properly. None of us did, come to think of it. Not much in here. Won’t get her more than a bunch of daffs, and goodness knows who I’ll be able to get to take them to her.’

  I fumbled some change out of my purse into the envelope, and initialled the front. No, not much of a collection.

  ‘What about flowers for Melina’s family?’ I asked.

  ‘Hang on, I was just getting – where’s that envelope? But it won’t be flowers. In some funny sect, she was. They spend a lot of time talking to God, but not on Sundays. We’re to give the money to her church to do good with. Ta.’

  ‘I suppose, when you go round with it, I couldn’t come too, could I? She was one of the few people at Muntz who I got to know at all,’ I fibbed.

  Phil nodded absently. ‘Wonder why she did it.’

  ‘Any idea?’

  ‘Well.’ He made the tea straight into mugs, and sloshed in milk. ‘The police were asking and I said no, of course, because I didn’t then. But …’