She couldn’t move him, not while he was like this, he’d make far too much noise and she couldn’t risk the neighbours hearing. Instead she went back downstairs and prepared a dose of Oramorph in warm tea. She considered sedating him, but if he was lucid and not in too much pain he might be able to clean himself with minimal intervention on her part.
‘Here,’ she said, passing him the drink. She sat in silence, watching him spill some of it down the front of his pyjamas, making no attempt to wipe his chin. When he’d finished he put the mug down on the bedside table and let out a deep breath.
‘Give me a minute till it kicks in and then you can do whatever it is you’ve come up here for.’ He stared at her rubber gloves. ‘Hope those are for cleaning; it stinks in here.’ Every word came with a wince or a grimace but he was making sense and was obviously in a stubborn mood. Not the best time to persuade him to have a shower.
‘It’s you that stinks,’ Caroline said, looking at the stains on his rumpled pyjamas. ‘That’s why I’m wearing the gloves. You’re toxic.’
He sneered at her. ‘You’re a fine one to talk. Do you think what you’re doing to me is right? Keeping me doped up like this? What’s the big plan? I’m dying anyway and it’s not like you’ve got the guts to kill me. I suppose you’re trying to make me sorry? What do you want; an apology? Not going to happen, love. You were as much a part of it all as I was.’
Caroline took off one of the gloves with a snap. ‘I was nine!’ she yelled, slapping him across the face with the damp rubber. ‘How was I a part of it?’
He flinched back but his expression was unrepentant. ‘You’re as much to blame as I am.’
‘And you’ve just lost your next dose of morphine. Let’s see how you feel when you’re in agony.’
His face went paler but his expression was defiant. ‘Do your worst. See if I care.’
She grabbed at his filthy pyjama top, almost pulling him out of bed.
‘Up! Now! You’re having a shower. It’ll not get rid of the poison but at least you’ll not smell like a rotting pig.’
He shrank away from her, resisting her grasping hands.
‘Get up!’ she hissed, pulling him harder. He slipped sideways and his upper body sank to the bedroom floor, leaving his legs still under the duvet. Frustrated, Caroline grasped at his pyjama bottoms and flung his legs onto the floor to join his torso.
‘If we have to do this the hard way I can guarantee that you’ll have a night of agony,’ she whispered, leaning so close to his face that he shrank away as she sprayed him with spittle. ‘Now, at least try to get up.’
He rolled over and hauled himself onto all fours, breathing heavily. Slowly, he managed to raise his upper body so that he was kneeling up. Caroline grasped him under one arm and hauled him to his feet. He’d lost body mass since she’d been staying with him and his frail frame felt like that of a child. If she’d tried she could have probably slung him over her back and carried him to the bathroom fireman-style. They stumbled across the landing like a couple of drunks leaning on each other for support, and Caroline kicked open the bathroom door.
‘Right, sit there.’ She placed Dennis on the closed toilet lid and started to unbutton his pyjama top.
‘I can do it,’ he said, slapping her hands away.
‘Fine. Get on with it.’
His hands shook as he laboured over each button until the garment was hanging loose from his shoulders like a becalmed flag. Caroline stepped towards him and stripped it from his upper body, flinging it out onto the landing.
‘Bottoms.’
Dennis hesitated.
‘Oh, come on. It’s not like I’ve not seen it all before. Who do you think has been bathing and changing you in bed? The fucking fairies?’
He flinched at the profanity but clung to the waistband of his pyjama bottoms with a skinny claw-like hand.
‘Oh fuck this!’ Caroline said. ‘I can easily just tip you in the bath and pull them off you.’ She reached out to push him and he hurriedly let go of his pyjama bottoms, wriggling them down his hips. He eased his buttocks upwards and slipped the trousers down his wasted legs.
‘Here. Have them.’ He tried to throw them at her but they fell too short.
As she picked them up, Caroline realised that they were heavy with fresh urine. ‘You did that on purpose, you dirty bastard.’
He just laughed as she hauled him up again and held him as he stepped into the bath, leaning on the wall to keep himself upright.
She chopped at his arm with the side of her hand and he yelled and lost his balance. Caroline caught him just before he crashed into the bottom of the bath and eased him down until he was lying on his back. She wanted to let him fall, wanted him to shatter into tiny pieces but she couldn’t risk an injury that might look like she’d been neglecting him. Or worse. Caroline turned the shower on, knowing that the water would run cold for a few seconds but past caring about Dennis’s comfort. She ran it on his face, up his nose, in his hair until he was shivering and spluttering. Instead of allowing it to get warm, Caroline turned the dial into the blue zone and continued to train the water on Dennis’s prone body, running it from his face to his genitals and back again.
His jaw quivered as he struggled to stop his gums from chattering and his whole torso was a mass of goose pimples.
‘Stop it,’ he managed to croak.
‘Sorry, can’t hear you. What did you say?’
‘Stop,’ he said, louder this time. ‘Just stop. I’ll wash myself. I won’t be any trouble.’
His lips were turning blue and the shivering was starting to subside. He was dangerously cold.
‘Fine,’ Caroline said and turned the heat up full.
The first scalding drops had Dennis writhing with a new agony. ‘Stop it, Caroline. Just let me get up.’
She gave him one last blast of hot water on his groin and then turned the temperature down to something that he could tolerate.
‘Get up, you stinking pile of shit,’ she instructed. ‘And I’m staying. I’m not having you falling and breaking a hip. I’ve come too far to have you back in hospital.’
She wiped the toilet lid with tissues and sat down, half watching her father as he soaped and rinsed. He barely resembled the man that she remembered. His flesh was grey and his thinning hair was unkempt. This man that she’d been afraid of for most of her life was nothing.
When she decided that she’d had enough, she turned off the shower and bundled Dennis into a towel, almost dragging him back to his bedroom. She sat him on a chair in front of the ancient dressing table and told him to dry himself while she changed the bedding.
‘Your mum used to sit here a lot,’ he said. ‘When we were first married, she liked to make herself pretty whenever we went out. And then, after, she used to just sit, looking into the mirror like she didn’t recognise her reflection. That’s when I knew she was bad with her nerves.’
Bad with her nerves. The code he always used for depression. Her mother had been depressed for half the time that Caroline had known her. Gone were the smiles, the teasing, the little rhymes and songs that she used to sing. In their place was a shell of a person. She looked the same on the outside but she’d been hollowed out by what he’d done.
‘Put these on,’ she said, holding out a clean pair of pyjamas. She refused to be drawn into a conversation about her mother.
‘I want to go back to sleep,’ he said, struggling into the pyjama jacket. ‘I’m tired now.’ His voice was slurring, the effect of the extra morphine that Caroline had administered. She knelt in front of him and managed to get him into the pyjama bottoms without pushing him off the chair then she hauled him to his feet and pushed him towards the bed, leaving him in the position that he landed in. She threw the duvet over him, gathered the dirty bedding and left him to sleep. She added the soiled pyjamas to the bundle and went back downstairs.
The washing machine beeped as she set the programme for a hot wash that still wouldn’t make everything
properly clean – nothing could – the house and everything, everyone, in it was tainted.
It was time to end it.
JANUARY
Chapter 21
‘Doctor Kailisa,’ Kate said, answering her phone on the second ring. ‘What can I do for you?’
‘I think it’s more what I can do for you. Do you have time for a visit? Dennis Lambert’s results are back and they have shown up some interesting anomalies.’
Kate sighed. She didn’t have time for this. ‘Can’t you just tell me over the phone?’
‘I’d rather not,’ Kailisa replied. ‘There is some physical evidence that I would like you to see as well as the toxicology and fingerprint results. Can you call in today?’
‘I can do better than that,’ Kate replied, intrigued. ‘I’m in the hospital now. I’ll be down in about ten minutes.’
She explained to Hollis as they walked. It wasn’t like Kailisa to be obtuse so whatever he’d found must be interesting. They weren’t getting very far with the Maddie Cox investigation but a visit to the pathology lab might make up for the wasted time on the ward and if Kailisa said it was interesting, Kate was expecting fireworks. He was a master of understatement, making even the most outrageous injury or abnormality seem commonplace with his world-weary demeanour and his non-existent sense of humour. This could be good.
Kailisa was gowned and gloved when Kate and Hollis crashed into his domain. He gave them both a hard stare as though they were inconveniencing him even though he’d extended the invitation.
‘I didn’t realise that you’d be bringing company,’ he said, glaring at Hollis like he’d never seen him before. Kate knew that Kailisa was precious about his lab and his victims and didn’t enjoy sharing with anybody that he deemed less than worthy.
‘I’ve got to learn sometime,’ Hollis said. ‘I’ve not been to many PMs and if I’m going to pick up anything it might as well be from the best.’
Kailisa gave him a wry smile, the transparent attempt at flattery not fooling him at all. ‘Gowns and gloves, both of you. Oh, and DC Hollis?’
The DC gave him an amiable grin.
‘Observe, learn, but keep your comments to a minimum, please.’
He led the way into the dissection room where Dennis Lambert’s body was lying on a stainless steel table. Kate was surprised to see the corpse; she’d been expecting charts and numbers rather than any more physical findings. The pathologist stood at the head of the table and pointed to Lambert’s mouth where the lips looked dry and had a purplish hue which stood out against the waxy grey of the rest of the face.
‘After you left yesterday, I did further dissection of the lungs, checking for any signs of the disease having advanced further than we’d already seen. I found two tiny tumours and there was brown fluid in the upper bronchi and in the bronchioles of both lungs. A miniscule amount. I sent a sample for analysis and the results showed it to be a mixture of alcohol, probably whisky, water and an opiate.’
‘That was quick,’ Kate said. ‘It’s what Caroline Lambert said she left for him to drink. Whisky and Oramorph.’
‘And tap water. There was no evidence of there being water next to Dennis Lambert’s bed. Where did he get it from?’
‘Residue in the glass?’ Hollis suggested.
Kailisa shook his head. ‘There is too much in the mixture for it to be a few drops in the bottom of the glass. I assumed that he might have gone to the bathroom and taken water from the sink in there.’
It was a possibility.
‘However,’ Kailisa continued. ‘The blood work showed a high concentration of benzodiazepine. Enough for him to have had difficulty walking unaided.’
‘What’s–?’ Hollis began to ask but Kate nudged his foot with her own. Kailisa didn’t tolerate interruptions.
‘The benzodiazepine is most likely the Diazepam that he had on prescription. I sent off hair follicles with the blood tests and they confirmed the presence of the drug. In fact they suggested that Dennis Lambert had been using Diazepam for some weeks prior to his death. In large doses. He would have been bed-bound almost from the time his daughter took him home.’
That didn’t fit with what Brenda Powley had said. She’d definitely said that he’d been active up to his time in hospital. She’d been surprised at his sudden decline, but here was a possible explanation. Had his daughter been keeping him sedated?
‘So how did he get the water?’ Kailisa paused like a teacher expecting the correct answer from a member of his class.
‘He didn’t,’ Kate responded. ‘Somebody got it for him. Or somebody mixed the drink for him. It looks like Caroline wasn’t being completely truthful.’
The pathologist nodded.
‘Now, here.’ He beckoned them both closer to the table. Pulling back Dennis Lambert’s lips, he prised the mouth open. ‘Look.’ He shone a penlight inside the toothless cavity, scanning across the gum line. ‘See?’
Kate remained silent. She had no idea what the pathologist was indicating. All she could see was shrivelled gums and a grey tongue.
‘There is a row of tiny haemorrhages along the lower gum.’ He reached round Kate and took a magnifying glass from the counter that ran along the back of the room. ‘Try this.’
Kate leant forward, magnifying glass held up in front of her face, conscious that she looked like the stereotypical image of Sherlock Holmes, minus the deerstalker.
‘Like this,’ Kailisa said, grasping her wrist and lowering her hand towards the dead man’s mouth. ‘Lean in; he won’t bite you.’
Was that humour? More like irritation, Kate thought, glancing at Kailisa’s serious expression before leaning in further. She still couldn’t make out what Kailisa had been describing. The gums were ridged with bumps and depressions where, she assumed, the teeth would have been: small blood vessels were dark blue against the pink-grey flesh. And then she saw what Kailisa had found. Tiny asterisk shapes, nearly invisible to the naked eye.
‘You see them?’ he asked. ‘Could be from ill-fitting dentures, I’ve seen that before, but the dentures were not brought in with the body so I can’t assess them properly.’
‘Probably gathering dust in the evidence room somewhere,’ she heard Hollis mutter.
‘If I got you the dentures could you check?’ Kate asked.
Kailisa shrugged, indifferent. This was obviously just another part of his theory. ‘What else could they be?’
He picked up a glass from the counter and placed it against Dennis Lambert’s lower lip. ‘If I put pressure on the gums, there would be bruising. Even when the teeth have been absent for years, the flesh is quite tender with blood vessels close to the surface. You can make your gums bleed by brushing too hard so it’s easy to imagine pressure from a glass causing some damage.’
Kate studied the position of the glass against the lips and gums. ‘But wouldn’t the pressure be even? Wouldn’t it produce a long thin bruise rather than these pinpricks?’
Kailisa smiled, genuinely appreciative of her observation. ‘But, as you can see, the surface of the gums has peaks and troughs where the teeth would have sat and the bruising is on the peaks. Imagine pressing your hand against a comb. You get tiny marks rather than one long line. It’s the same but in reverse.’
‘So he might have been forced to drink this concoction?’
‘That would explain the liquid in the lungs. He may have choked.’
‘Or he might have done that anyway. It’s not a decision that anybody takes lightly. Isn’t it possible that he gripped the glass with his gums to make sure that he went through with it? Forcing himself to do it. If he wasn’t sitting up properly he could easily have choked on the first mouthful.’
Kate could see where he was going with this but he hadn’t come up with anything that a good defence lawyer couldn’t explain away if Caroline was formally charged with murder. At the moment the best they had was aiding and abetting under the Suicide Act but Kailisa’s findings could change that if he had something tha
t couldn’t be so readily explained.
‘I would have expected to see bruising on the top and bottom gums in that case but I understand your caution. Perhaps the fingerprint evidence will convince you.’
He leaned down, pulled out a drawer, and took out two sheets of paper and a glass bottle roughly the shape and size of a standard bottle of whisky.
‘Caroline Lambert’s fingerprints were found on the bottle and the glass. We expected that as she claims that she left them both on her father’s bedside table. Dennis Lambert’s fingerprints were also present although they were slightly smudged.’
‘Presumably he’d used the bottle a few times. It was half empty, he might have been taking nips out of it for months.’ Despite her fascination, Kate felt compelled to play Devil’s advocate until Kailisa gave her something solid.
‘I agree,’ he said. ‘But there was only one instance of each set of fingerprints. If he had been drinking from this bottle, he wiped it clean after every use.’
‘That’s ridiculous,’ Hollis interjected. ‘Who would do that? You pour a drink and put it back in the cupboard. Unless you’re seriously OCD.’
Kailisa frowned at him. ‘You’re correct. Caroline Lambert’s prints were clear but Dennis’s were slightly blurred as if the bottle might have slipped in his hand.’
He passed the empty bottle to Hollis. ‘Pour a drink please, DC Hollis.’
Hollis mimed a glass in his free hand and tilted the bottle, gripping it using the tips of his fingers and thumbs. Kailisa took the bottle, half-filled it from the tap and passed it back with a beaker for Hollis to use as a glass.
‘Again, please.’
This time the extra weight forced Hollis to tighten his grip.
‘See, this time you have to wrap your hand around the bottle to keep it steady. Dennis Lambert was frail and ill. He would have had difficulty holding the bottle, hence the smudged prints. However, there is no palm print on the glass or on the label and the fingerprints are widely spaced as in the first example of DC Hollis’s pouring.’
The Kate Fletcher Series Page 38