by P. D. James
Oliphant smiled as if gratified by the rebuke. He asked: “Wasn’t the scientist who killed himself, Dr. Toby Gledhill, working on the research side here with you? I thought I read something about that in one of the local papers.”
“Yes. He was my assistant here. Tobias Gledhill was a physicist who was also an exceptionally talented computer expert. He is very much missed as a colleague and a man.”
And that, thought Rickards, disposes of Toby Gledhill. From another man the tribute could have been moving in its simplicity. From Mair it sounded like a bleak dismissal. But, then, suicide was messy and embarrassing. He would find repugnant its intrusion into his neatly organized world.
Mair turned to Rickards. “I have a great deal to do this morning, Chief Inspector, and no doubt you have too. Is this really relevant?”
Rickards said stolidly: “It helps fill in the picture. I suppose you booked in when you arrived here yesterday night and subsequently booked out?”
“You saw something of the system when you arrived. Every member of the staff has a signed identity badge with a photograph and a personal number which is confidential. The number is electronically registered when the man or woman enters the site, and there is in addition a visual check of the badge by the gate staff. I have a total staff of five hundred and thirty people, working in three shifts covering the twenty-four hours. At the weekend there are two shifts—the day staff, coming on from eight-fifteen until twenty-fifteen, and the night, from twenty-fifteen until eight-fifteen.”
“And no one could enter or leave undetected, not even the Director?”
“No one, least of all, I imagine, the Director. My check-in time will be recorded, and I was seen arriving and leaving by the gate officer on duty.”
“There is no other way into the station except through the gatehouse?”
“Not unless you emulate the heroes of old war films and tunnel deep under the wire. No one was tunnelling here on Sunday night.”
Rickards said: “We shall need to know the movements of every member of the staff on the Sunday from early evening until ten-thirty, when Commander Dalgliesh discovered the body.”
“Isn’t that an unnecessarily large spread of time? Surely she was killed shortly after nine?”
“That seems the most likely time of death, and we expect to get a more accurate estimate from the post-mortem report. At present I prefer to make no assumptions. We have copies of the forms which were distributed in connection with the Whistler enquiry which we would like to issue to all the staff. I imagine that the great majority can be easily eliminated. Most people who have any family or social life can provide an alibi for Sunday evening. Perhaps you could suggest how the forms can be distributed with as little disturbance to the work here as possible.”
Mair said: “The simplest and most effective way would be to leave them in the gatehouse. Each member of staff could be given one when he or she checks in. Those staff who are off sick or on leave today will have to receive them at home. I can supply their names and addresses.” He paused and then added: “It seems to me highly unlikely that this murder has anything to do with Larksoken Power Station, but as Hilary Robarts worked here and you will be interviewing members of staff, it might be helpful if you have some idea of the layout and organization. My PA has put up a file for you with a diagram of the site, a booklet describing the operation of the reactor, which will help to give you some idea of the different functions carried out, a list of staff by name and grade and a copy of the existing managerial structure and the operations-staff shift rota. If you want to see any particular department, I can arrange for you to be escorted. Certain areas cannot, of course, be entered without protective clothing and a subsequent radiological check.”
The file was ready in his right-hand drawer, and he handed it over. Rickards took it and studied the organization chart. After a moment he said: “You have seven divisions, each with a head of department: Medical Physicist, Station Chemist, Operations Superintendent, Maintenance Superintendent, Reactor Physicist, Work Office Engineer and the station Administrative Officer, the post held by Hilary Robarts.”
“Temporarily held. The station Administrative Officer died of cancer three months ago and the post has not yet been filled. We are also about to reorganize the internal administration into three main divisions, as at Sizewell, where they have what I think is a more effective and rational system. But the future here is uncertain, as you’ve probably heard, and there may be a case for waiting until a new Director or Station Manager is in post.”
Rickards said: “And at present the station Administrative Officer is responsible to you through the Deputy Director?”
“Through Dr. James Macintosh, that is right. Dr. Macintosh is at present in the States, studying their nuclear installations, and has been for the past month.”
“And the Operations Superintendent—Op. Super., as it says here—is Miles Lessingham, who was one of the guests at Miss Mair’s dinner party on Thursday.”
Alex Mair didn’t reply.
Rickards went on: “You’ve been unfortunate, Dr. Mair. Three violent deaths of members of your staff within the space of two months. First Dr. Gledhill’s suicide, then Christine Baldwin’s murder by the Whistler and now Hilary Robarts.”
Mair asked: “Have you any doubts that Christine Baldwin was killed by the Whistler?”
“None at all. Her hair was found with that of other victims when he killed himself, and her husband, who would normally be the obvious first suspect, has an alibi. He was driven home by his friends.”
“And Toby Gledhill’s death was the subject of an inquest, ‘death while the balance of his mind was disturbed,’ that convenient sop to convention and religious orthodoxy.”
Oliphant asked: “And was the balance of his mind disturbed, sir?”
Mair turned on him his ironic and speculative gaze. “I have no way of knowing the state of his mind, Sergeant. What I am sure of is that he killed himself and that he did it unaided. No doubt at the time he felt he had sufficient reason. Dr. Gledhill was a manic depressive. He coped courageously with his disability and it rarely interfered with his work. But with that psychological make-up, suicide is always an above-average risk. And if you agree that the three deaths are unrelated, then we needn’t waste time on the first two. Or was your statement, Chief Inspector, intended as a general commiseration?”
Rickards said: “Just a comment, sir.” He went on: “One of your staff, Miles Lessingham, found Christine Baldwin’s body. He told us then that he was on his way to have dinner with you and Miss Mair. I suppose he gave you all a graphic description of his experience. Natural, I’d say. Difficult thing to keep to yourself.”
Mair said calmly: “Virtually impossible, wouldn’t you say?” He added: “Among friends.”
“Which he was, of course. All friends together, including Miss Robarts. So you got all the gory details fresh from the scene. Including the ones he’d been specifically told to keep to himself.”
“Which were they, Chief Inspector?”
Rickards didn’t reply. Instead he asked: “Could I have the names of everyone who was present in Martyr’s Cottage when Mr. Lessingham arrived?”
“My sister and I; Hilary Robarts; Mrs. Dennison, the housekeeper from the Old Rectory; and Commander Adam Dalgliesh of the Metropolitan Police. And the Blaney child—Theresa, I think she’s called—was helping my sister with the meal.” He paused and then added: “These enquiry forms which you’re proposing to issue to all members of staff: I suppose it is necessary to take up their time in this way. Isn’t it fairly plain what happened here? Surely this is what your people call a copycat murder.”
Rickards said: “It was that all right, sir. All the details correct. Very clever, very convincing. Just the two differences. This murderer knew his victim and this murderer is sane.”
Five minutes later, following Miss Amphlett down the corridor to the interviewing room, Rickards thought, “And you’re a cool customer, mate.”
No embarrassing expressions of horror and grief, which always sounded insincere. No protestations of innocence. The assumption that no one in his rational mind could suspect you of murder. He hadn’t asked for his solicitor to be present, but, then, he didn’t need one. But he was far too intelligent to have missed the significance of those questions about the dinner party. Whoever had killed Hilary Robarts had known that she would be swimming by moonlight sometime after nine o’clock yesterday, had known, too, precisely how the Whistler killed his victims. There were quite a number of people who knew one of these facts, but the number who knew both was limited. And six of them had been present at that dinner party at Martyr’s Cottage last Thursday night.
5
The interview room which had been assigned to them was a featureless little office with a view to the west dominated by the great bulk of the turbine house. It was adequately furnished for their purpose, but only just; entirely appropriate, thought Rickards sourly, to visitors whose presence was tolerated but hardly welcomed. There was a modern pedestal desk, obviously brought in from someone’s office, three upright chairs and one rather more comfortable one with arms, a small side table with an electric kettle on a tray, four cups and saucers (did Mair expect them to make coffee for the suspects?), a bowl full of wrapped sugar lumps and three caddies. Rickards said: “What have they given us, Gary?”
Gary Price busied himself with the tins. “Coffee bags and tea bags, sir. And there’s a tin of biscuits.”
Oliphant asked: “What kind of biscuits?”
“Digestive, Sarge.”
“Chocolate?”
“No, Sarge, just plain digestives.”
“Well, let’s hope they’re not radioactive. Better get the kettle on, we may as well start with the coffee. Where do they expect us to get water?”
“Miss Amphlett said there was a tap in the cloakroom at the end of the passage, Sarge. The kettle’s filled, anyway.”
Oliphant tried one of the upright chairs, stretching in it as if to assess its comfort. The wood creaked. He said: “Cold fish, wasn’t he? And clever with it. Not much out of him, sir.”
“I wouldn’t say that, Sergeant. We’ve learned more about the victim than he probably realizes. Efficient but not much liked, prone to interfere with matters outside her scope of responsibility, probably because she secretly yearned to be a scientist rather than an administrator. Aggressive, uncompromising, intolerant of criticism. Antagonized the locals and from time to time did the station a bit of no good. And, of course, the Director’s mistress, for what that was worth.”
Oliphant said: “Until three or four months ago. A natural end with no hard feelings on either side. His version.”
“And we’re never going to get hers, are we? But one thing was odd. When Mair met Mr. Dalgliesh he was on his way home from here. His sister presumably was expecting him, yet, apparently, he didn’t telephone her. It never seems to have occurred to him.”
“Shocked, sir, something else on his mind. He’s just discovered that his ex-girlfriend is the victim of a particularly vicious psychopathic killer. Tends to eclipse brotherly feelings and thoughts of your bedtime cocoa.”
“Maybe. I wonder whether Miss Mair rang here to find out why he was delayed. We’ll ask.”
Oliphant said: “If she didn’t ring, I can think of one reason why. She expected him to be late. She thought he was at Thyme Cottage with Hilary Robarts.”
“If she didn’t ring because she thought that, then she can’t have known that Robarts was dead. Right, Sergeant, let’s get started. First of all we’ll have a word with Miss Amphlett. The boss’s PA usually knows more about the organization than anyone, including her boss.”
But any information of interest that Caroline Amphlett might have she was adept at concealing. She seated herself in the armchair with the calm assurance of an applicant for a job which she has every confidence of getting, and answered Rickards’s questions calmly and without emotion except when he attempted to probe into Hilary Robarts’s relationship with the Director. Then when she permitted herself a moue of distaste that anyone could be so vulgarly inquisitive about matters which were not his concern, she answered repressively that Dr. Mair had never confided in her about his private life. She admitted that she knew Hilary Robarts made a habit of swimming at night and kept this up well into the autumn months and sometimes later. She thought the fact was generally known at Larksoken. Miss Robarts had been a strong and enthusiastic swimmer. She was not particularly interested in the Whistler except to take reasonable precautions and avoid walking alone at night, and she knew nothing about his methods except what she had read in the newspapers, that he strangled his victims. She had known about the dinner party at Martyr’s Cottage on Thursday, she thought Miles Lessingham might have mentioned it, but no one had discussed with her the events of the evening and she saw no reason why they should. As for her own movements on Sunday, she had spent the whole of the evening, from six o’clock, at her bungalow with her boyfriend, Jonathan Reeves. They had been together continually until he had left, at about 10.30. Her cool glance at Oliphant challenged him to ask her what they had been doing, and he resisted the temptation except to ask what they had drunk and eaten. Asked about her relationship with Hilary Robarts, she said that she had greatly respected her but hadn’t particularly liked or disliked her. Their professional relationship had been perfectly friendly, but she couldn’t recall ever meeting her outside the power station. As far as she knew, Miss Robarts had no enemies, and she had no idea who could have wished her dead. When the door had closed after her Rickards said: “We’ll check her alibi, of course, but there’s no hurry. Let young Reeves sweat for an hour or so. I want to check first on the staff who actually worked for Robarts.”
But the next hour was unproductive. The people who had worked directly for Hilary Robarts were more shocked than distressed, and their evidence strengthened the image of a woman more respected than liked. But none had an obvious motive, none admitted to knowing precisely how the Whistler had killed and, more to the point, all could produce an alibi for Sunday night. Rickards had hardly expected otherwise.
At the end of the sixty minutes he sent for Jonathan Reeves. He came into the room, white-faced and as stiffly controlled as if it were an execution shed, and Rickards’s first reaction was surprise that a woman as attractive as Caroline Amphlett should have chosen such an unlikely mate. It wasn’t that Reeves had a particularly unprepossessing face. You couldn’t even describe him as plain if you discounted the acne. And his features, taken individually, were good enough. It was the whole face which was somehow unremarkable, ordinary, the kind of face which defeated any attempt at an Identikit image. Rickards decided that it was best described in terms of movement rather than features: the almost continuous blinking behind the horn-rimmed spectacles, the nervous sucking of the lips, his habit of suddenly stretching his neck like a TV comedian. Rickards knew from the list Alex Mair had provided that the staff at Larksoken was predominantly male. Was this the best Amphlett could do for herself? But sexual attraction was irrational anyway. Look at him and Susie. Seeing them together, her friends probably felt an equal surprise.
He left most of the detailed questioning to Oliphant, which was a mistake. Oliphant was always at his worst with a frightened suspect, and he took his time extracting, not without pleasure, a straightforward story which confirmed Caroline Amphlett’s account.
Afterwards, when Reeves had been finally released, Oliphant said: “He was as jumpy as a cat, sir. That’s why I took my time over him. I think he’s lying.”
It was, thought Rickards, typical of Oliphant both to assume and to hope for the worst. He said curtly: “Not lying necessarily, Sergeant; just frightened and embarrassed. Tough luck when your first night of passion ends in a not particularly subtle police interrogation. But the alibi seems firm enough, and neither of them has an obvious motive. And there’s no evidence that either knew the details of the Whistler’s little habits. Let’s get on to
someone who did. Miles Lessingham.”
Rickards had last seen Lessingham at the scene of Christine Baldwin’s murder, since he hadn’t himself been at the incident room when Lessingham had called in next morning to sign his statement. He realized that the sardonic attempt at humour and the controlled detachment the man had shown at the scene were mainly due to shock and distaste, but he had sensed, too, that Lessingham had a wariness of the police amounting to dislike. It was not an uncommon phenomenon nowadays even among the middle classes, and no doubt he had his reasons. But it hadn’t made him easy to deal with then and it didn’t now. After the usual preliminaries Rickards asked: “Were you aware of the relationship between Dr. Mair and Miss Robarts?”
“He’s the Director, she was Acting Administrator.”
“I meant the sexual relationship.”
“No one told me. But, not being entirely insensitive to my fellow mortals, I thought it likely that they were lovers.”
“And you knew that it had ended?”
“I assumed so. They didn’t confide in me when it began and they didn’t confide in me when it ended. You’d better ask Dr. Mair if you want details of his personal life. I have enough trouble managing my own.”
“But you weren’t aware of any difficulties caused by the relationship: resentment, accusations of favouritism, jealousy perhaps?”
“Not from me, I assure you. My interests lie elsewhere.”
“And what about Miss Robarts? Did you get the impression that the affair ended without rancour? Did she seem upset, for example?”