Original Sin

by P. D. James

  Dalgliesh asked: ‘You haven’t a key to his flat, then? You couldn’t wait for him there?’

  ‘I do have a key and he has a key to my flat. It’s a sensible precaution in case there’s a fire or flood and we need to gain access when the other is away. But I wouldn’t dream of using it unless Gabriel had asked me.’

  Dalgliesh asked: ‘How long was it before you joined him?’

  The answer was, of course, of vital importance. It was possible for Gabriel Dauntsey to have killed Etienne before he set off for the poetry reading at 7.45. The timing would have been tight but it could have been done. But it seemed that the only chance he would have had to return to the scene was after one in the morning.

  He asked again: ‘How long was it before Mr Dauntsey rang to call you down? Can you be fairly precise?’

  ‘It can’t have been long. I suppose about eight or ten minutes, maybe a little shorter. About eight minutes I’d say, just long enough for him to have a bath. His bathroom is under mine. I can’t hear it when he runs his bath but I do hear the water running away. Yesterday I was listening for that.’

  ‘And it was about eight minutes before you heard it?’

  ‘I wasn’t watching the time. Why should I have been? But I’m sure it wasn’t unduly long.’ She said, as if the possibility had suddenly struck her: ‘But you can’t really mean that you suspect Gabriel, that you think he went back to Innocent House and killed Gerard?’

  ‘Mr Etienne was dead long before midnight. What we are considering now is the possibility that the snake was put round his neck some hours after he died.’

  ‘But that would mean that someone went up to the little archives office specially, knowing that he was dead, knowing that he was lying there. But the only person who knew that would be the murderer. You’re saying you thought the murderer went back later to the little archives room.’

  ‘If there was a murderer. We can’t be sure of that yet.’

  ‘But Gabriel was ill, he’d been mugged! And he’s old. He’s over seventy. And he’s rheumatic. He usually walks with a stick. He couldn’t possibly have done it in the time.’

  ‘Are you absolutely sure of that, Miss Peverell?’

  ‘Yes, I’m sure. Besides, he did have a bath. I heard the water running away.’

  Dalgliesh said gently: ‘But you couldn’t tell if it was his bath water.’

  ‘What else could it have been? He didn’t just leave his tap running, if that’s what you’re suggesting. If he had I should have heard it immediately. This water didn’t begin running away until about eight minutes after he rang and said he was ready for me. I went down at once. He was wearing his dressing-gown. I could tell he had had a bath. His hair and face were damp.’

  ‘And after that?’

  ‘He’d already had some whisky and didn’t want anything else, so I insisted that he went to bed. I was determined to stay the night so he told me where the clean sheets were for the spare bed. I don’t think anyone had slept in that room for years and I didn’t make up the bed. He fell asleep very quickly and I settled myself in the armchair in the sitting-room in front of the electric fire. I left the door open so that I could hear him, but he didn’t wake. I woke before him, shortly after seven, and made a cup of tea. I tried to be quiet but I think he must have heard me moving around. It was about eight o’clock when he woke. Neither of us was in a hurry. We knew that George would open Innocent House. We both had a boiled egg for breakfast and went across shortly after nine o’clock.’

  ‘And you didn’t go up to see Mr Etienne’s body?’

  ‘Gabriel did. I didn’t. I waited with the others at the bottom of the stairs. But when we heard that horrible high wailing I think I knew that Gerard was dead.’

  Dalgliesh could see that she was again becoming distressed. He had learned all he needed for the present. He thanked her gently and let her go.

  After she had left them they were silent for a moment, then Dalgliesh said: ‘Well, Kate, we’ve been presented with more disinterested and convincing alibis; Claudia Etienne’s lover, de Witt’s sick house-guest and Frances Peverell, who’s obviously incapable of believing that Gabriel Dauntsey could be guilty of a malicious act, let alone murder. She’s trying to be honest about the length of time between his coming home and calling her down. She’s an honest woman, but I’d guess that her eight minutes was an underestimate.’

  Kate said: ‘I wonder if she realized that he was giving her an alibi as well as she providing one for him. But of course it isn’t important, is it? She could have gone over to Innocent House and done that business with the snake any time before Dauntsey arrived home. And she had every opportunity to kill Etienne. She’s got no alibi for earlier yesterday evening. She was quick to pick up that point about the bath water, that he couldn’t just have turned on the tap and let it run.’

  ‘No, but there is another possibility. Think about it, Kate.’

  Kate thought, then said: ‘Of course, it could have been done that way.’

  ‘Which means that we need to know the capacity of that bath. And we need to test the timing. Don’t use Dauntsey. Robbins will have to imagine he’s a rheumatic seventy-six-year-old. See how long it takes to get from Dauntsey’s door in Innocent Lane up to the little archives room, do what had to be done there, and get back.’

  ‘Using the stairs?’

  ‘Time it using both stairs and the lift. With that lift the stairs are probably quicker.’

  As they began putting their papers together Kate thought about Frances Peverell. Dalgliesh had been gentle with her, but when was he ever brutal in interrogation? He had been sincere in that comment about the clothes of the dead. All the same it had been remarkably effective in gaining Frances Peverell’s confidence. He was probably sorry for the woman, possibly even rather liked her; but no personal feelings would influence him in his investigation. And what about me? Kate asked herself, not for the first time. Wouldn’t he show a similar detachment, a comparable ruthlessness, in all aspects of his professional life? She thought: he respects me, he’s glad to have me in the team, he trusts me, sometimes I can believe that he likes me. But if I fell down badly on the job, how long would I last?

  Dalgliesh said: ‘I need to go back to the Yard now for a couple of hours. I’ll meet you and Daniel at the mortuary for the ΡΜ but I may not be able to stay until it’s completed. I’ve a meeting with the Commissioner and the Minister in the House of Commons at eight o’clock. I don’t know when I’ll get away from that but I’ll come on straight to Wapping and we’ll review progress so far.’

  It was going to be a long night.

  29

  It was two minutes to three and Blackie was sitting alone at her desk. She was oppressed by a listlessness which was partly the result of delayed shock, partly fear, but which made any action seem an intolerable exertion. She supposed she could go home, although no one had told her so. There was filing to be done, letters which Gerard Etienne had dictated still to be typed, but it seemed somehow indecent as well as pointless to file papers for which he would now never call and type letters his hand would never sign. Mandy had left half an hour earlier, presumably told that she was no longer wanted. Blackie had watched while she took her red crash helmet from the bottom drawer of her desk and zipped up her tight leather jacket. Topped with that glittering dome, with her skinny body, the long legs clad in black ribbed leggings, she had been instantly transformed as always into the caricature of an exotic insect.

  Her last words to Blackie, spoken with a trace of embarrassed sympathy, had been: ‘Look, don’t you go losing any sleep over him. I won’t, and I quite liked him, what I saw of him. But he was a proper bastard to you. Are you going to be all right, going home I mean?’

  She had replied: ‘Yes thank you, Mandy. I’m perfectly all right now. It was the shock. After all, I was his PA. You’ve only known him for a few weeks and as a temporary typist.’

  The words, a clumsy attempt to restore her dignity, had sounded even t
o her own ears repressive and pompous. They had been greeted with a shrug and Mandy had left without another word, her loud goodbyes to Mrs Demery echoing across the hall.

  Mandy had been notably cheered by her interview with the police and had immediately gone off to discuss it with Mrs Demery, George and Amy in the kitchen. Blackie would have liked to have joined them but had felt that it would be inappropriate to her status to be found gossiping with the junior staff. She knew, too, that they wouldn’t have welcomed her intrusion into their confidences and speculations. On the other hand, she hadn’t been invited to join the partners when they were closeted in the boardroom and had been seen by no one except Mrs Demery when they rang for more coffee and sandwiches. It seemed to her that there was no place in Innocent House where she was wanted or could any longer feel at home.

  She thought about Mandy’s last words. Was that what Mandy had told the police, that Mr Gerard had treated her, Blackie, like a proper bastard? But of course she had. Why should Mandy keep quiet about anything that had happened at Innocent House, Mandy who was the outsider, who had arrived long after the series of practical jokes had begun, who could take a detached, almost pleasurable, interest in all the excitement, secure in the knowledge of her own innocence, unmoved by personal affections, untouched by personal loyalties? Mandy, whose sharp little eyes missed nothing, would have been a gift to the police. And she had been with them a long time, nearly an hour, longer, surely, than her importance in the firm could justify. Once more, and fruitlessly, since nothing now could be changed, Blackie thought over her own interview. She hadn’t been among the first to be called. She had had time to prepare herself, to think about what she would say. And she had thought about it. Fear had sharpened her mind.

  It had taken place in Miss Claudia’s office and only two of the police had been there, the woman detective inspector and a sergeant. Somehow she had expected to see Commander Dalgliesh and his absence had disconcerted her so that she had answered the first questions uncertain whether the interview had really begun, and half expecting him to come in at the door. She was surprised, too, that the interview wasn’t being tape recorded. The police almost always did that in the detective series which were her cousin’s favourite viewing at Weaver’s Cottage, but perhaps that came later, when they had a prime suspect and were questioning him or her under caution. And then, of course, she would have a lawyer present. Now she was alone. This time there had been no caution, no suggestion that this was anything but an informal preliminary chat. The woman detective inspector had asked most of the questions while the sergeant had made notes, but he had intervened from time to time without deferring to his senior officer and with the quiet assurance which suggested to her that they were used to working together. Both had been very polite, almost gentle, with her but she hadn’t been deceived. They were still interrogators and even their formal expressions of sympathy, their gentleness, were part of their technique. She was surprised, looking back on it, how she had known this and known them for the enemies they were even in the tumult of her fear.

  They had begun by asking simple preliminary questions about her length of service in the firm, the method of locking the premises at night, the people who had keys and could control the burglar alarms, the general shape of her day, even her arrangements for lunch. Answering them she had begun to feel more at ease even while she knew that they were designed for just that purpose.

  Then Detective Inspector Miskin had said: ‘You worked for Mr Henry Peverell for twenty-seven years until he died, then transferred to Mr Etienne when he took over as chairman and managing director in January this year. That must have been a difficult change for you and for the firm.’

  She was expecting that. She had her answer ready.

  ‘It was different, of course. I had worked for old Mr Peverell for so long that naturally he confided in me. Mr Gerard was younger and had different methods of working. I had to adapt to a different personality. Every PA does that when she gets a change of boss.’

  ‘You were happy to work for Mr Etienne? You liked him?’ This was the sergeant, uncompromising dark eyes compelling her own.

  She said: ‘I respected him.’

  ‘That’s not quite the same thing.’

  ‘You can’t always like your boss. I think I was getting used to him.’

  ‘And he to you? What about the rest of the firm? He was making changes, wasn’t he? Change always causes some pain, particularly in a long-established organization. We know that at the Yard. Weren’t there sackings, threats of sackings, a possible move down-river to new premises, the proposal to sell Innocent House?’

  She had said: ‘You’ll have to ask Miss Claudia. Mr Gerard didn’t discuss house policy with me.’

  ‘Unlike Mr Peverell. The change from confidante to ordinary secretary can’t have been agreeable.’

  She didn’t reply. Then Inspector Miskin leaned forward and said confidingly, almost as if they were girls together ready to share a feminine secret: ‘Tell us about the snake. Tell us about Hissing Sid.’

  So she had told them how the snake had been brought into the office about five years previously at Christmas by a temporary shorthand-typist whose name and address no one now could remember. She had left it behind after the Christmas party and it hadn’t been discovered until six months later stuffed into the back of the drawer of her desk. Blackie had used it to wind round the handles of the door between her office and that of Mr Peverell. He liked the door to be kept ajar so that he could call for her when he wanted her. Mr Peverell had never liked using the telephone. Hissing Sid had become something of a house mascot, taken on the river outing in the summer and to the Christmas party, but she no longer used the snake to keep the door ajar. Mr Etienne preferred it closed.

  The sergeant asked: ‘Where was the snake usually kept?’

  ‘Usually curled on top of the left-hand filing cabinet. Sometimes it would be hung or curled round one of the handles.’

  ‘Tell us what happened yesterday. Mr Etienne objected, didn’t he, to seeing the snake in the office?’

  She said, trying to keep her voice calm, ‘He came out of his room and saw Hissing Sid drooping from the handle of the top filing cabinet. He thought it looked inappropriate in an office and told me to get rid of it.’

  ‘And what did you do?’

  ‘I put it in my top right-hand drawer.’

  Detective Inspector Miskin said: ‘This is very important, Miss Blackett, and I’m sure you are intelligent enough to know why. Who was in the office when you put the snake into the drawer?’

  ‘Only Mandy Price who shares the office with me, Mr Dauntsey and Miss Claudia. Afterwards she went with her brother into his office. Mr Dauntsey gave Mandy a letter to type, then left.’

  ‘And no one else?’

  ‘No one else in the room but I expect some of the people who were mentioned what had happened. I don’t think that Mandy would have kept quiet. And anyone looking for the snake would probably have thought of my right-hand drawer. I mean, that was the natural place to put the snake.’

  ‘And you didn’t think of throwing it away?’

  Thinking back on it she knew now that she had reacted too forcibly to the suggestion, that there had been in her voice a note of angry resentment.

  ‘Get rid of Hissing Sid? No, why should I? Mr Peverell used to like the snake. He found it amusing. It wasn’t doing any harm in the office. After all, my office isn’t a place where the public normally come. I just put it in the top drawer. I thought perhaps I might take it home.’

  They had asked about the earlier visit of Esmé Carling and her insistence on seeing Mr Etienne. She realized that someone must have talked, that none of this was new to them, so she told the truth, or as much of the truth as she could bear to speak.

  ‘Mrs Carling isn’t one of our easiest authors and she was extremely angry. I think her agent had told her that Mr Etienne didn’t wish to publish her latest book. She was insistent on seeing him but I had to expla
in that he was in the partners’ meeting and that it was impossible to disturb them. She retaliated by being extremely offensive about Mr Peverell and our confidential relationship. I think she thought that I had exerted too much influence in the firm.’

  ‘Did she threaten to come back and see Mr Etienne later in the day?’

  ‘No, nothing like that. Of course, she might have insisted on staying until the meeting was over, but she had a signing at a bookshop in Cambridge.’

  ‘Which was, of course, cancelled by a fax from this office sent at 12.30. Did you send that fax, Miss Blackett?’

  She stared straight into the grey eyes. ‘No, I didn’t.’

  ‘Do you know who did send it?’

  ‘I have no idea. It was during our usual lunch hour. I was in the kitchen heating up a Marks & Spencer packet of spaghetti bolognese for my lunch. People were in and out all the time. I can’t remember where anyone was at 12.30 precisely. I only know I wasn’t in the office.’

  ‘And your office wasn’t locked?’

  ‘Of course not. We never lock offices during the day.’

  And so it had gone on. Questions about the previous practical jokes, questions about when she had left the office the previous night, her journey home, the time she had arrived, how she had spent the evening. None of that was difficult. Eventually Detective Inspector Miskin had brought the interview to an end but with no sense that it had really finished. When it was over, Blackie had found that her legs were trembling and she had had to grasp the side of her chair firmly for a few seconds before she could be confident of walking to the door without staggering.