A Taste for Death

by P. D. James

  The receptionist, like the decor, had been carefully chosen to reassure, not to threaten. She was middle-aged, pleasant-looking rather than beautiful, well-groomed, immaculately coiffured. They were, of course, expected. Mr. Lampart wouldn’t keep the Commander more than a few minutes. Would they care for some coffee? No? Then perhaps they wouldn’t mind waiting in the drawing room.

  Dalgliesh looked at his watch. He estimated that Lampart would arrive in about five minutes, a nicely calculated delay, long enough to demonstrate lack of anxiety but short enough not to antagonize a man who was, after all, a senior officer of the Yard.

  The drawing room into which they were shown was large and high-ceilinged, with a central bay window and two flanking smaller ones overlooking the lawn and giving a distant view of the heath. Something of its Edwardian formality and plush comfort remained in the Axminster carpet, the heavy sofas set at right angles to the fire, and the open fire itself, in which synthetic nuggets were roasting under the carved overmantel. Stephen Lampart had resisted any temptation to combine the room’s domesticity with a consulting room. There was no couch tactfully secreted behind screens, no washbasin. This was a room where clinical realities could be, for a moment, forgotten. Only the mahogany desk reminded the visitor that it was also a room for business.

  Dalgliesh glanced at the pictures. There was a Frith over the fireplace, and he walked over to study more closely its meticulous romanticizing of Victorian life. It showed, at a London railway terminus, uniformed heroes returning from some colonial adventure. The first-class carriages were in the foreground. Richly mantled and beribboned ladies, with their decorously pantalooned daughters, decorously greeted their returning menfolk, while the more unrestrained welcomes of the common soldiery occupied the periphery of the canvas. On the opposite wall was a bank of stage designs, drawings and costumes for what looked like Shakespearean productions. Dalgliesh supposed that the stage provided some of Lampart’s most notable patients and that these were a thank-offering for services rendered. A side table was covered with signed photographs in silver frames. Two, flamboyantly signed, were from minor European ex-royalty. The rest were of impeccably groomed mothers, wistful, sentimental, triumphant or reluctant, who displayed their babies in unpractised arms. There was the unmistakable aura of nanny in the background. This phalanx of maternity in a room which otherwise was essentially male struck an incongruous note. But at least, thought Dalgliesh, the man hadn’t displayed his medical diplomas over the sideboard.

  Dalgliesh left Kate studying the Frith and walked over to the windows. The huge horse chestnut in the middle of the lawn was still heavy with its summer foliage, but the screen of beech trees which partly hid the heath was already showing the first bronze of autumn. The morning light was diffused through a sky which had at first been as opaque as thin milk but which had now lightened into silver. There was no sun, but he was aware that it shone above the gauze of clouds and the air was light. Along the path two figures were slowly walking, a nurse wearing a white cap and cloak and a woman with a helmet of yellow hair and a ponderous fur coat which looked far too heavy for a day in early autumn.

  It was six minutes precisely before Stephen Lampart arrived. He came in without hurry, apologized for the delay and greeted them with calm courtesy as if this were a social call. If he was surprised to find Dalgliesh accompanied by a woman detective, he concealed it admirably. But, as Dalgliesh introduced them and they shook hands, he caught Lampart’s sharp appraising glance. He could have been greeting a prospective patient, assessing from long experience, in this their first meeting, whether he was likely to have trouble with her.

  He was expensively but not formally dressed. The dark grey tweed with its almost invisible stripe and the immaculate blue shirt were, no doubt, designed to distance him from the more intimidating orthodoxy of the successful consultant. He could, thought Dalgliesh, have been a merchant banker, an academic, a politician. But whatever the job, he would have been good at it. His face, his clothes, the confident gaze, all bore the unmistakable imprint of success.

  Dalgliesh had expected him to seat himself at the desk with the advantage of dominance which this would give. Instead, he motioned them to the low sofa and sat opposite them in a higher and straight-backed armchair. It gave him a more subtle advantage, while reducing the interview to the level of an intimate, even cosy, discussion of a mutual problem. He said:

  “I know, of course, why you’re here. This is an appalling business.

  I still find it difficult to believe. I suppose relations and friends all tell you that. Brutal murder is the sort of thing that happens to strangers, not to the people one knows.”

  Dalgliesh said:

  “How did you learn about it?”

  “Lady Berowne telephoned me soon after your people brought the news, and as soon as I was free I called in at the house. I wanted to offer any help I could to her and Lady Ursula. I still don’t have any details. Are you any clearer yet what exactly happened?”

  “Both their throats were cut. We don’t yet know why or by whom.”

  “I understood that much from the press and television, but the reports seemed almost wilfully uncommunicative. I take it you’re treating it as murder.”

  Dalgliesh said drily:

  “There’s no evidence to suggest that it was a suicide pact.”

  “And the church door, the one leading to this vestry or wherever it was where the bodies were found, may I ask whether you found it open, or is that the sort of question that you’re not supposed to answer?”

  “It was unlocked.”

  He said:

  “Well, that at least will reassure Lady Ursula.” He didn’t elucidate. But then, he didn’t need to. After a pause he asked:

  “What do you want of me, Commander?”

  “I’d like you to talk to us about him. This murder could be what at first sight it appears. He let someone in and that person, a stranger, killed them both. But if it isn’t as simple as that, then we need to know as much about him as we can get.”

  Lampart said:

  “Including who could have known where he was yesterday night and who hated him enough to cut his throat.”

  “Including anything you can tell us which could be even remotely relevant.”

  Lampart paused as if to collect and marshal his thoughts. It was unnecessary. Both of them knew that his thoughts had been marshalled long before. Then he said:

  “I don’t think I can give much help. Nothing I know or could guess about Paul Berowne is remotely relevant to his death. If you ask about his enemies, I suppose he must have had them, political enemies. But I should suppose that Paul had fewer than most people in government and, anyway, they’re not the sort to go in for murder. The idea that this could be a political crime is absurd. Unless, of course”—again he paused and Dalgliesh waited—“unless someone on the extreme left had a personal animosity. But it seems unlikely. More than unlikely, ridiculous. Sarah, his daughter, strongly disliked his politics. But I’ve no reason to suppose that the set she’s mixed up with or even her Marxist boyfriend goes in for razor slashing.”

  “What set is that?”

  “Oh, some minor revolutionary outfit on the extreme left. I don’t suppose Labour would have them. I’d have thought you would already have known. Don’t Special Branch make it their business to keep track of these people?” His gaze was open and mildly enquiring, but Dalgliesh caught the bite of contempt and dislike in the careful voice and wondered if Kate had heard it too. He asked:

  “Who is the boyfriend?”

  “Oh really, Commander, I’m not accusing him. I’m not accusing anyone.” Dalgliesh didn’t speak. He wondered what length of silence Lampart would think convincing before he came across with the information. After a pause he said: “He’s Ivor Garrod. Banner carrier for all the fashionable shibboleths. I’ve only met him once. Sarah brought him to dinner at Campden Hill Square about five months ago, principally, I imagine, to annoy Papa. It was a me
al I prefer to forget. From the talk then, the violence he advocates is on a somewhat grander scale than merely cutting the throat of a single Tory ex-Minister.”

  Dalgliesh asked quietly:

  “When did you last see Sir Paul Berowne?” The change of questioning almost disconcerted Lampart, but he answered calmly enough:

  “About six weeks ago. We’re not as friendly as we used to be. Actually I was proposing to telephone him today and ask if he could have dinner with me tonight or tomorrow, unless, of course, religious conversion had destroyed his taste for good food and wine.”

  “Why did you want to see him?”

  “I wanted to ask him what he intended to do about his wife. You know, of course, that he’d recently resigned his seat as well as his job as junior Minister, and you probably know as much as I do why. He was proposing apparently to drop out of public life. I wanted to know if that included dropping out of his marriage. There was the question of financial provision for Lady Berowne, for Barbara. She is my cousin, I’ve known her since childhood. I have an interest.”

  “How strong an interest?”

  Lampart looked sideways over his shoulder at the fair-haired woman and her nurse still patiently circling the lawn. He seemed momentarily to transfer his interest to them, then recollected himself, a little too obviously, and turned again to Dalgliesh.

  “I’m sorry. How strong an interest? I don’t want to marry her, if that’s what you’re implying, but I am concerned about her. For the past three years I’ve been her lover as well as her cousin. You could call that a strong interest, I suppose.”

  “Did her husband know that you and she were lovers?”

  “I’ve no idea. Husbands usually do get to know these things. Paul and I didn’t see each other often enough to make it an embarrassment. We’re both busy men with little in common now. Except Barbara, of course. Anyway, he was hardly in a position to object, morally speaking. He had a mistress, as I’ve no doubt you’ve discovered. Or haven’t you grubbed out that piece of dirt yet?”

  Dalgliesh said:

  “I’m interested in knowing how you managed to grub it out.”

  “Barbara told me. She guessed, or rather she knew. She employed a private detective about eighteen months ago and had him followed. To be accurate, she told me of her suspicions, and I got hold of a suitably discreet man on her behalf. I don’t think it bothered her particularly, the infidelity. It was just that she liked to know. I don’t think she saw the woman as a serious rival. Actually, I suspect she was quite pleased. It amused her, and it gave her something to hold over Paul if the need arose. And, of course, freed her from the disagreeable necessity of sleeping with him, at least on an inconveniently regular basis. But she didn’t lock her door. Barbara liked an occasional assurance that he was still suitably enthralled.”

  He was, thought Dalgliesh, being remarkably candid, unnecessarily so. He wondered whether this apparently naive willingness to confide his own and other people’s more intimate emotions arose from over-confidence, arrogance and vanity, or whether there was a more sinister motive. Lampart wouldn’t be the first murderer to argue that if you told the police details they had no particular right to demand they would be less likely to suspect other, more dangerous secrets.

  He asked:

  “And was he still suitably enthralled?”

  “I imagine so. What a pity he isn’t here to be asked.” With a quick and surprisingly clumsy gesture he got up from the desk and walked to the window as if seized by restlessness. Dalgliesh turned in his chair and watched him. Suddenly he strode over to the desk, picked up the telephone and dialled. He said:

  “Sister, I think Mrs. Steiner has had enough outdoor exercise. It’s too cold this morning for slow walking. Tell her I’ll be along to see her again in”—he glanced at his watch—“in about fifteen minutes. Thank you.” He put down the receiver, came back to his chair and said almost roughly: “Let’s get down to it, shall we? What you want from me, I suppose, is some sort of statement. Where was I, what was I doing, who was I with when Paul got himself killed? If it was murder, I’m not naive enough to deceive myself that I’m not a suspect.”

  “It isn’t a question of suspicion. We have to ask those questions of anyone who was closely connected with Sir Paul.”

  He laughed, a sudden explosion of sound, harsh and mirthless.

  “Closely connected! You could say that, I suppose. And it’s all just a matter of routine. Isn’t that what you usually tell your victims?”

  Dalgliesh didn’t reply. The silence seemed to irritate Lampart. He said:

  “Where do I make it, this statement? Here, or at the local police station? Or are you operating from the Yard?”

  “You could make it there, in my office, if that’s convenient for you. Perhaps you could come in this evening. Or it could be taken at the local station, if that would save time. But it would be helpful to have the gist of it now.”

  Lampart said:

  “You’ve noticed, I suppose, that I haven’t asked to have my solicitor present. That shows rather a touching confidence in the police, wouldn’t you say?”

  “If you want him to be present, that, of course, is your right.”

  “I don’t want him. I don’t need him. I hope you won’t be disappointed, Commander, but I think I have an alibi. That is, if Berowne died between seven and midnight.”

  Still Dalgliesh didn’t speak. Lampart went on:

  “I was with Barbara for the whole of that time as, no doubt, you already know. You must have seen her. Earlier, from two o’clock until five, I was here operating. The list is available and theatre sister and the anaesthetist can corroborate. I know I was gloved, gowned and masked, but I can assure you that my staff recognize my work even if they don’t actually see my face. But, of course, they did see it, before I gowned up. I mention that in case you had some fanciful idea that I might have persuaded a colleague to stand in for me.”

  Dalgliesh said:

  “That might work in fiction, but hardly in real life.”

  “And afterwards, Barbara and I had tea in this room, then spent some time in my private flat, upstairs. Then I changed, and we left here together at about seven forty. The night porter saw us go and can probably confirm the time. We drove to the Black Swan at Cookham, where we had dinner together. I wasn’t particularly noticing the time, but I suppose we got there at about eight thirty. I drive a red Porsche, in case that’s significant. The table was booked for eight forty-five. Jean Paul Higgins is the manager. He’ll be able to confirm it. No doubt he’ll also confirm that it was after eleven when we left. But I’d be grateful for a little tact. I’m not over-sensitive about reputation, but I can’t afford to have half of fashionable London gossiping about my private life. And while some of my patients have their little foibles, like giving birth under water or squatting on the drawing room carpet, being delivered by a murder suspect isn’t everyone’s fancy.”

  “We’ll be discreet. When did Lady Berowne arrive here? Or did you call for her earlier at Campden Hill Square?”

  “No. I haven’t been inside number sixty-two for weeks. Barbara came by cab. She arrived shortly after four, I suppose. She was in the theatre watching me operate from about four fifteen until I finished. Did I mention that?”

  “She was with you the whole time?”

  “Most of the time. I think she slipped out for a few minutes after I’d completed the third caesarean.”

  “And she was masked and gowned too?”

  “Of course. But of what possible relevance is that? He couldn’t have died, surely, before the evening.”

  “Is that something she often does? Watch you operate?”

  “It isn’t uncommon. It’s a fancy she has …” He paused and added: “From time to time.”

  They were both silent. There were some things, thought Dalgliesh, that even Stephen Lampart, with his pose of ironic detachment and contempt for reticence, couldn’t bring himself actually to say. So that was how s
he got her kicks. That was what turned her on: watching, masked and gowned, while his hands cut into another woman’s body. The erotic charge of the medical priesthood. The attendant nurses moving in patterned ceremony about him. The grey eyes meeting the blue above the mask. And afterwards, watching, while he peeled off his gloves, held out his arms in a parody of benediction while an acolyte lifted the gown from his shoulders. The heady mixture of power, mystery, ruthlessness. The rituals of knife and blood. Where, he wondered, had they made love—his bedroom, a private sitting room? It was surprising that they didn’t couple on the operating table. Perhaps they did.

  The telephone on the desk rang. With a muttered apology, Lampart picked up the receiver. The conversation, apparently with a colleague, was highly clinical and one-sided, with Lampart doing most of the listening. But he made no attempt to cut it short. Dalgliesh gazed out over the garden while his mind busied itself with its preliminary assessment. If they had left Pembroke Lodge at seven forty it would need fast driving to get to the Black Swan by eight thirty. Time to take in a murder on the way? It was feasible, provided he could make an excuse to leave her in the car. No man in his senses would take her with him into the church on such a bloody mission, even if she knew or guessed what he had in mind. So there would have be an excuse. Someone he had briefly to see. Some business to be transacted. The car would have to be parked close to the church. That in itself would be risky. A red Porsche was conspicuous. And then what? The knock on the church door. Berowne letting him in. The rehearsed excuse for calling. How long for these preliminaries? Less than a minute perhaps. The sudden blow to knock Berowne out. Then to the washroom for the razor, which he could be sure he would find, the quick stripping off of jacket and shirt and back to the vestry, razor in hand. The careful tentative cuts followed by the final slash to the bone. He must have done some forensic medicine when a student, if not since. He would know better than any other suspect how to simulate a suicide.