Original Sin

by P. D. James

  Tonight he was reluctant to leave her but there was no choice. Rupert’s buddy, Ray, had to leave by 11.30 and Rupert was too ill to be alone even for a few hours. And there was another difficulty. He felt that he could hardly suggest that he should spend the night in her spare room without presumption. She might, after all, prefer to confront her private demons alone rather than have the inconvenience of his presence. And there was something more. He wanted to make love to her but it was too important to happen because shock and grief had made her vulnerable so that she came to his bed not from an equal desire but from the need to be comforted. He thought: What a mess we’re all in. How hard it is to know ourselves and, when we do, how difficult to change.

  But the problem solved itself when he said: ‘Are you sure you’ll be all right alone, Frances?’

  She said firmly: ‘Of course I shall. Anyway Rupert needs you at home. There’s Gabriel downstairs if I need company, but I shan’t need company. I’m used to being alone, James.’

  She rang for a taxi and he took the quickest way home, paying off the cab at the Bank and taking the Central Line to Notting Hill Gate.

  He saw the ambulance as soon as he turned out of Hillgate Street. His heart jolted. Breaking into a run he saw that the paramedics were already carrying Rupert down the front steps in a chair-stretcher. Nothing could be seen of him but his face above the blanket, a face which, even now in the extremity of weakness and stripped for death, had never for James lost its beauty. Watching the two men as they manoeuvred the stretcher with experienced hands, it seemed to him that it was his own arms that could feel the unbearable lightness of their burden.

  He said: ‘I’ll come with you.’

  But Rupert shook his head. ‘Better not. They don’t want too many people in the ambulance. Ray will come.’

  Ray said: ‘That’s right. I’m going with him.’

  They were anxious to get off. Already there were two cars waiting to pass. He climbed into the ambulance and gazed wordlessly into Rupert’s face.

  Rupert said: ‘Sorry about the mess in your sitting-room. I won’t be coming back. You’ll be able to tidy up and invite Frances now without either of you feeling the need to sterilize all the crockery.’

  James said: ‘Where are they taking you? The hospice?’

  ‘No, the Middlesex.’

  ‘I’ll come and see you tomorrow.’

  ‘Better not.’

  Ray was already sitting in the ambulance solidly and comfortably as if it were his rightful place. And it was his rightful place. And now Rupert was speaking again. James bent to hear him. He said: ‘That story, about Gerard Etienne. About me and Eric. You didn’t believe it?’

  ‘Yes Rupert, I did believe it.’

  ‘It wasn’t true. How could it be? It was a nonsense. Surely you know about incubation periods? You believed it because you needed to. Poor James! How you must have hated him. Don’t look like that. Don’t look so appalled.’

  It seemed to James that he had no voice. And when he did speak the words horrified him by their banal futility. ‘You’ll be all right, Rupert?’

  ‘Yes, I shall be all right. I shall be finally all right. Don’t worry and don’t visit. Remember what G. K. Chesterton said. “We must learn to love life without ever trusting it.” I never have.’

  He had no memory of climbing down from the ambulance but he heard the soft slam of the double doors as they were closed firmly in his face. In seconds it had turned the corner but he stood for a long time looking after it, as if it was travelling on a long straight road and he could watch it out of sight.

  50

  Mount Eagle Mansions, close to Hammersmith Bridge, revealed itself as a large red-brick Victorian block with the shabby uncared-for look of a building languishing between owners. The huge over-embellished Italianate porch, its stucco beginning to crumble, was at odds with the plain façade and gave the block an air of eccentric ambiguity as if the architect had been prevented by the failure of inspiration or money from completing his original design. Judging from the porch, Kate thought this was perhaps fortunate. But the inhabitants had obviously not given up hope of preserving the value of their property. The windows, at least at ground-floor level, were clean, the varied curtains hung in regular folds and a few of the window-sills had been fitted with boxes from which ivy and trailing geraniums hung against the grimy bricks. The letter-box and door-knocker in the form of an immense lion’s head were polished to whiteness and there was a large rush mat, obviously new, with ‘Mount Eagle Mansions’ woven into the bristles. To the right of the door was a row of doorbells, each with a name-card in the adjoining slot. The card for Flat 27, cut from a visiting card, read ‘Mrs Esmé Carling’ in an ornate script. The card for Flat 29 had the one word ‘Reed’ in printed capitals. Kate’s ring was answered after a few seconds by a female voice in which the tone of grudging resignation was clearly discerned above the crackle of the intercom.

  ‘All right, come on up.’

  There was no lift, although the size of the tessellated hall suggested that one had originally been intended. Along one wall was a double row of post boxes, clearly numbered, and against the other a heavy mahogany table, its legs elaborately carved, holding a collection of circulars, re-addressed letters and a bundle of old papers tied with string. They were neatly arranged and above them swirls of dried soapy water showed that some attempt had been made to clean the paintwork, although the result had only been to emphasize the grime. The air smelled of furniture polish and disinfectant. Neither Kate nor Dalgliesh spoke, but as they mounted the stairs, past the heavy doors with their eye-holes and double security locks, Kate was aware of a rising excitement mixed with slight apprehension, and wondered whether this was shared by the quiet figure at her shoulder. This was an important interview. By the time they came down this stairway the case could be solved.

  Kate was surprised that Esmé Carling couldn’t afford something better than a flat in this unimpressive block. It was hardly a prestigious address at which to receive interviewers or journalists, assuming, of course, that she did receive them. But the little they knew of her didn’t suggest a literary recluse and she was, after all, fairly well known. She, Kate, had heard of Esmé Carling even if she had never read her. That didn’t, of course, mean that her income from writing was large; hadn’t she read in some magazine article that, while a few very successful novelists were millionaires, the majority, even the well-regarded, had difficulty in living off their royalties. But her agent would be with them in an hour and there was little point in wasting time cogitating about Esmé Carling the crime writer when all the questions would so soon be answered by the person most qualified to know.

  Dalgliesh had chosen to see Daisy even before he examined Mrs Carling’s flat and she thought she knew why. It was the child’s information that was vital. Whatever secrets lay behind the door of number 27 could wait. The detritus of a murdered life told its own story. The evidence of the victim’s pathetic leavings, letters, bills, could be misinterpreted but artefacts didn’t lie, they didn’t change their story, they didn’t fabricate alibis. It was the living who must be interviewed while the shock of murder was still vivid in their minds. A good detective respected grief, sometimes shared it, but was never slow to exploit it, even the grief of a child.

  They had reached the door, and before she could lift her hand to the bell Dalgliesh said: ‘You do the talking, Kate.’

  She replied, ‘Yes, sir,’ but her heart leapt. Two years ago she would almost have found herself praying, ‘Oh God, let me get this right’; now, more experienced, she was confident that she would.

  She hadn’t wasted time imagining what the child’s mother, Shelley Reed, looked like. In police work it was wise not to anticipate reality by premature and manufactured prejudice. But when the chain rasped back and the door was opened she had difficulty in concealing her initial look of surprise. It was hard to believe that this chubby-faced girl, staring at them with the sulky resentment of an adol
escent, was the mother of a twelve-year-old. She could hardly have been more than sixteen when Daisy was born. Her face, naked of make-up, still held something of the unformed softness of childhood. The sulky mouth was very full and drooped at the corners. Her wide nose was pierced at one side with a glittering stud matching the studs in her small ears. Her hair, a bright yellow at odds with her heavy, dark brows, hung in a fringe almost to her eyes and framed her face in crimped curls. Her eyes were widely spaced and set at an angle under lids so heavy that they looked swollen. Only her figure hinted at maturity. Heavy breasts swung loose under a long jersey of pristine white cotton and her long, well-shaped legs were ensconced in black tights. On her feet she wore house slippers embroidered with Lurex thread. Her hard, uncompromising eyes changed as she saw Dalgliesh to a wary respect, as if she recognized a more intractable authority than that of a social worker. And when she spoke Kate detected a note of weary resignation in the ritual defiance.

  ‘You’d better come in, although I don’t know what good it’ll do. Your chaps have seen Daisy once. The kid has told you all she knows. We cooperated with the police, and what do we get for it but the bloody welfare on our backs. It’s not their business how I earn my living. OK, I’m a stripper. So what’s wrong with that? I earn a living and I keep my kid. I’m in a job and it’s legal, OK? The papers are always complaining about single mothers on social security, well I’m not on any bloody social security but I will be if I have to hang about here all day answering damn silly questions. And we don’t want any WPCs from the Juvenile Bureau. That one who came last time with that Jewish chap was a proper cow.’

  She hadn’t moved during this welcome but now at last, reluctantly, she stepped aside and they moved into a hall so small that it could hardly hold the three of them.

  Dalgliesh said: ‘I’m Commander Dalgliesh and this is Inspector Miskin who isn’t from the Juvenile Bureau. She’s a detective, we both are. We’re sorry to worry you again, Mrs Reed, but we must talk to Daisy. Does she know that Mrs Carling is dead?’

  ‘Yes, she knows. We all know, don’t we? It was on the local news. The next thing you’ll be saying is that it wasn’t suicide and we did it.’

  ‘Is Daisy distressed?’

  ‘How do I know? She isn’t laughing. I never know what that kid’s feeling anyway. She’ll be distressed all right by the time you lot have finished with her. She’s in here – I’ve rung the school to say she won’t be in till the afternoon. And, look, do me a favour. Make it quick, OK? I’ve got to get out to the shops. And the kid’ll be looked after tonight. Don’t you start fretting about Daisy. The cleaner here is coming in for the evening. After that you can bloody well ask the welfare to look after her if they’re so worried.’

  The sitting-room was narrow and gave an impression of cluttered discomfort and an odd ness which puzzled Kate until she saw that an artificial fireplace, the mantelshelf crowded with good luck cards and small china ornaments, had been fitted to the external, chimney-less wall. To the right an open door showed a double bed, partly made and strewn with clothes. Mrs Reed went over and quickly closed it. To the right of the door was fitted a curtained rail on which Kate could glimpse a row of tightly packed dresses. There was an immense television set to the left of the door with a sofa facing it and in front of the double window a square table with four chairs. The table was piled high with what looked like school textbooks. A child in a uniform of navy-blue pleated skirt and white blouse turned and faced them.

  Kate thought that she had seldom seen a plainer child. She was obviously her mother’s daughter but by some trick of the genes the maternal features had been superimposed incongruously on her frail thin face. The eyes behind the spectacles were small and too far apart, the nose broad like that of the mother, the mouth as full and its downward turn more pronounced. But her skin was delicate and an extraordinary colour, a pale greeny-gold like apples seen under water. Her hair, its colour between gold and a pale auburn, hung like strands of silk framing a face which looked more mature than childlike. Kate glanced at Dalgliesh, then turned her eyes quickly away. She knew that what he was feeling was pity and tenderness. She had seen that look before, however quickly disciplined, however fleeting. She was surprised at the surge of resentment it provoked. For all his sensitivity he was no different from any other man. His first reaction on seeing a female was an aesthetic response, pleasure in beauty and a compassionate regret at ugliness. Plain women got used to that look; they had to. But surely a child could be spared that brutal revelation of a universal human unfairness. You could legislate for every kind of discrimination but not this. In everything from jobs to sex the attractive were advantaged, the very plain denigrated and rejected. And this child hadn’t even the promise of that distinctive, sexually charged ugliness which, if accompanied by intelligence and imagination, could be so much more erotic than mere prettiness. Nothing could ever be done to turn up the downward droop of that too-heavy mouth, to bring the piggy eyes closer together. In the few seconds before she spoke Kate was aware of a tumble of emotions, not least self-disgust. If Dalgliesh had felt instinctive pity, almost as if the child was maimed, then so had she and she was a woman. She at least could have judged by different criteria. In reply to a wave of the mother’s hand, Dalgliesh sat down on the sofa and Kate took a chair opposite Daisy. Mrs Reed plonked herself belligerently at the other end of the sofa and lit a cigarette.

  ‘I’m staying. You’re not interviewing the kid without me.’

  Dalgliesh said: ‘We can’t talk to Daisy unless you do stay, Mrs Reed. There are special procedures for interviewing juveniles. It would be helpful if you didn’t interrupt, unless you feel we’re being unfair.’

  Kate took a chair at the table, immediately facing the child, and said gently: ‘We are so sorry about your friend, Daisy. Mrs Carling was your friend, wasn’t she?’

  Daisy opened one of her school books and made a pretence of reading. Without looking up she said: ‘She liked me.’

  ‘When people like us we usually like them in return, at least I do. You know that Mrs Carling is dead. She may have killed herself but we can’t yet be sure. We need to find out how and why she died. We want you to help us. Will you?’

  Then Daisy looked up at her. The small eyes, disconcertingly intelligent, were as hard as an adult’s and as judgemental as only a child’s can be. She said: ‘I don’t want to talk to you. I want to talk to the boss-man.’ She gazed across at Dalgliesh and said: ‘I want to talk to him.’

  Dalgliesh said: ‘Well, I’m here. But it’s the same, Daisy, whoever you speak to.’

  ‘I won’t talk except to you.’

  Kate, disconcerted, trying to conceal her disappointment and chagrin, rose from her seat but Dalgliesh motioned her to stay and drew up a chair beside her.

  Daisy said: ‘You think Auntie Esmé was murdered, don’t you? What will you do to him when you’ve caught him?’

  ‘If the court finds him guilty then he’ll go to prison. But we can’t be certain that Mrs Carling was murdered. We don’t yet know how or why she died.’

  ‘Mrs Summers at school says that putting people in prison doesn’t do them any good.’

  Dalgliesh said: ‘Mrs Summers is right. But people aren’t usually sent to prison to do them good. Sometimes it’s necessary to protect other people, or to deter, or because society cares deeply about what the guilty person has done and the punishment reflects that concern.’

  Oh God, thought Kate, are we expected to spend time discussing the case for custodial sentences and the philosophy of judicial punishment? But Dalgliesh was obviously prepared to be patient.

  ‘Mrs Summers says that executing people is barbaric.’

  ‘We don’t execute people any longer in this country, Daisy.’

  ‘They do in America.’

  ‘Yes, in some parts of the United States, and in other countries too, but it doesn’t happen any longer in Britain. I think you know that, Daisy.’

  The child, thought K
ate, was being deliberately obstructive. She wondered what Daisy thought she was doing, apart, of course, from playing for time. Silently she cursed Mrs Summers. She had known one or two of her kind in her old schooldays, principally Miss Crighton who had done her best to dissuade her from joining the police on the grounds that they were the oppressive fascist agents of capitalist authority. She would have liked to have asked the child what Mrs Summers would have done with Mrs Carling’s murderer, if murderer there was, apart of course from giving him sympathy, counselling him and sending him on a world cruise. Better still, it would have been agreeable to take Mrs Summers to view some of the victims of murder and to face the murder scenes she, Kate, had had to face. Irritated by the resurgence of old prejudices, old resentments which she thought she had conquered, and of memories she preferred to forget, she kept her eyes on Daisy’s face. Mrs Reed said nothing but pulled on her cigarette vigorously. The air became disagreeably smoky.

  Sitting close to the child, Dalgliesh said: ‘Daisy, we need to find out how and why Mrs Carling died. It could have been by her own hand, and it is possible, just possible, that she was murdered. If she was, we have to find out who was responsible. That is our job. That is why we are here. We’ve come because we think you can help.’

  ‘I’ve told that inspector and the woman police officer what I knew.’

  Dalgliesh didn’t reply. The silence and what it implied obviously disconcerted Daisy. After a short pause she said defensively: ‘How do I know you won’t try to pin Mr Etienne’s murder on Auntie Esmé? She said you might try, she thought you might fit her up.’

  Dalgliesh said: ‘We don’t think Mrs Carling had anything to do with Mr Etienne’s death. And we won’t pin the murder on anyone. What we’re trying to do is to find out the truth. I think I know two things about you, Daisy; that you are intelligent and that, if you promise to tell the truth, then it will be the truth. Will you promise?’