[DCI Neil Paget 01] - Fatal Flaw

by Frank Smith

  ‘No, thank you. Miss Crowther.’

  ‘Good,’ she said, and walked away.

  Jane Wolsey looked terrible. Her face was grey and she looked as if she hadn’t slept in days. Miss Crowther hadn’t overstated the case when she said she feared the housemistress would make herself ill.

  ‘Oh, thank heavens, it’s you,’ she said, glancing up and down the corridor. ‘I thought it was Miss Crowther again. Is there any news?’

  ‘Regarding...?’

  ‘The inquest, of course.’ She put a hand to her head and frowned. ‘No, not the inquest - I don’t mean that. I mean the post-mortem.’

  ‘According to the pathologist, the cause of death was an aneurysm,’ Paget said.

  ‘An aneurysm?’ She stared at him.

  ‘Yes. It’s a …’

  ‘Yes, yes, I know what an aneurysm is,’ she said impatiently. ‘But that’s not the point, is it? Was Monica trying to commit suicide when it happened? I must know!’

  ‘Perhaps we could go inside?’ suggested Paget.

  Miss Wolsey put her hands to her face and held them there for a long moment. ‘Yes. Yes, of course. Forgive me, Chief Inspector,’ she said distractedly. ‘Please come in.’

  The room was hot and stuffy, and Paget removed his topcoat before taking a seat farthest from the fire. Miss Wolsey perched herself on the edge of her own chair, tugged the sleeve of her blouse down over her deformed hand in what was becoming a familiar gesture, and looked at him expectantly.

  ‘It appears that Monica did inject herself with far more insulin than was good for her,’ he said, ‘and from what we’ve been able to learn, she was a very unhappy girl. What we don’t know is what she hoped to achieve. It may have been no more than a desperate bid to draw attention to herself; an attempt that went terribly wrong.’

  Paget paused and leaned forward to emphasize his next words. ‘Miss Wolsey, now that you’ve had time to think about it, was there anything Monica said when she returned from the party that, in retrospect, might suggest that she was thinking of taking her own life?’

  The housemistress looked away. ‘No,’ she said in a dead voice. ‘I have tried to think; in fact I’ve done very little else since she died.’

  ‘You said, I believe, that Monica was flushed and excited when Sally Pritchard brought her home. Do you recall anything she said? Anything at all?’

  The housemistress shook her head slowly. ‘Just that she was sorry. She kept saying she was sorry over and over again. I remember because it was so unusual.’ Jane Wolsey coloured suddenly and looked embarrassed. ‘I’m sorry,’ she apologized. ‘I shouldn’t have said that, but it wasn’t like her, you see.’

  ‘I’m not sure I follow you. What wasn’t like her. Miss Wolsey?’

  ‘Well -‘ the colour deepened - ‘Monica didn’t like to admit mistakes. She would usually try to brazen it out, but in this case I think she must have realized she’d gone too far.’

  ‘What, exactly, did Monica say she was sorry for?’ Paget asked.

  ‘For drinking too much wine, of course.’

  ‘I see. What about Miss Pritchard? What did she say?’

  Again, Miss Wolsey shook her head almost sadly. ‘Poor Sally,’ she said. ‘I felt sorry for her because she seemed to think it was all her fault. She kept apologizing, too, but it wasn’t her fault.’

  ‘Did Monica mention the party at all? Did she say whether she enjoyed it, or mention anyone by name?’

  ‘If she did, I’m afraid I don’t remember,’ the housemistress said. ‘I’m sorry. Chief Inspector, but that’s all I can tell you.’

  The quiet of the room was broken by the ringing of the telephone.

  The housemistress answered it. ‘It’s for you. Chief Inspector,’ she said listlessly. ‘A Superintendent Alcott.’

  His conversation with Alcott was short, but even so the gist was clear to Jane Wolsey. ‘There’s not going to be an inquest, is there?’ she said as he hung up.

  He shook his head. ‘No. The pathologist’s report made it quite clear that Monica died of an aneurysm. In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, the coroner is prepared to accept that Monica died of natural causes, so there is no need for an inquest.’

  ‘But what about the injections?’

  ‘Not relevant,’ he said, ‘and I’m quoting, now. The two things cannot be connected medically. In the opinion of the pathologist, it would be impossible to say whether the amount of insulin Monica injected into herself would have led to her death had the aneurysm not occurred.’

  ‘I see.’ Miss Wolsey tugged at her sleeve with nervous fingers. ‘Is that all?’ she said. ‘Doesn’t anyone care about what happened?’

  ‘It’s not a matter of not caring. Miss Wolsey,’ he said gently. ‘You see, once the coroner is satisfied that death was due to natural causes, and no crime was involved, then that’s the end of it as far as the law is concerned.’

  ‘You’re saying that no one is to blame?’ Her words were bitter.

  ‘I’m saying there was no criminal intent,’ he said quietly. ‘As for blame - I’m sure there are times when we all wish we had acted differently when someone close to us dies in such a tragic way, but there is nothing to be gained by looking back. Miss Wolsey.’

  Jane Wolsey remained silent. Was it her own sense of guilt that was gnawing at her? Was she still blaming herself for Monica’s death? Or was she simply looking for someone - anyone - to blame?

  Not that he didn’t have reservations of his own about the way Monica Shaw had died. There remained the question of where she had gone just prior to her death. What had prompted her to get dressed again and go out into the night in the middle of a snowstorm? And what part had the alleged attack played in the scheme of things, if any? These questions would remain unanswered now.

  The housemistress continued to look at him, but there was no life in her eyes. The death of Monica Shaw had affected her deeply. He put out his hand and touched her shoulder. ‘You’re not to blame,’ he said. ‘There was nothing you could have done. Miss Wolsey. Nothing.’

  She blinked. Her eyes came into focus and colour touched her cheeks. ‘I - I’m sorry,’ she apologized as she turned away. ‘I’m afraid my mind was...Thank you. Chief Inspector; you are very kind, but I’m quite all right now.’ She drew in a deep breath and let it out again. ‘I think I’ll put the kettle on,’ she said. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’

  14

  Friday, 1 January

  The entrance to the bridle-path was hard to see at night, and even harder to back into with the car. Guided only by the light of a waning moon, he eased it back a foot at a time. The snow had almost gone, washed away by the steady drizzle of the past two days, but the ground was still soaking wet and he didn’t want to risk becoming stuck in the mud. He reached the shelter of the trees; switched the engine off and set the brake.

  He yawned and stretched, then lit a cigarette and settled down to watch and wait.

  It was almost an hour later when the car appeared. It drifted slowly down the lane, without lights and almost without sound. He watched as it rolled to a stop beside a giant sycamore just beyond the stable gates. The car was light in colour. Foreign, by the look of it, but he wasn’t very good on cars, especially now that so many of the new ones looked alike.

  The moon was almost down and it was hard to see. He picked up the binoculars from the seat beside him and focused them. He swore softly beneath his breath as the moon slid behind a cloud. Was that the outline of the driver’s head he could see? Or was it just the moulded head-rest? ‘Come on, you bastard,’ he muttered to himself. ‘What the hell do you think you’re playing at? Get out of the car. Let’s see your face!’

  He swung the binoculars to the main gate, then to the second entrance farther down the road. Nothing stirred. He checked the time: 9.53, then scanned the road again. Nothing.

  He would have to get closer.

  Cautiously, he began to open the door, quickly closing it again as the over
head light came on. He reached up and moved the switch to Off, then slid out of the car and gently latched the door. He paused to listen as something rustled in the undergrowth. Silence. He bent down and felt around until his fingers touched a fallen twig. He tossed it in the direction of the sound, and was gratified to hear some small animal scurrying away.

  Cautiously, he began to move towards the road.

  The clock above the chapel struck the hour of ten, its mellow chimes wafting across the silent countryside like ripples on a pond. Miss Crowther, out walking in the grounds before going off to bed, paused to listen. She had been born to the sound of those chimes, or so her father had told her, and they were one of her earliest memories. But listening to them now she felt sad. Four generations of Crowthers had spent their lives within the shadow of the chapel tower, and she would be the last. Perhaps, if she had married...She dismissed the thought as she had so many times before. She’d never had any inclination to marry; to follow in her father’s footsteps as head of Thornton Hill School was all she’d ever wanted, and she was more than satisfied.

  Thank God this business about Monica hadn’t happened during term while all the girls were there. The publicity could have destroyed the school. Now it would be old news by the time the girls returned on Monday week. No doubt it would be the talk of the place for a day or two, but it would soon die down. It wasn’t as if Monica had been a popular girl.

  But she was going to have to do something about Jane.

  In her small room beneath the eaves, Jane Wolsey heard the chimes as from a distance, and raised her head to listen. They seemed especially slow and sonorous tonight - as indeed they had these past few nights.

  She wished she could have attended the funeral. It had all been such a jumble since that night. She didn’t even know there had been a funeral until Crowther had mentioned it in that offhanded way of hers. At the country home in Hampshire, she’d said. Very private, of course.

  The unfeeling bitch!

  The small figure at an upstairs window also heard the measured strokes, but they barely registered. Wrapped up tightly in his eiderdown, he sat in the chair beside the window, eyes glued to the faint outline of the path below, waiting, trying not to cry. The last stroke faded, and his eyes began to close. He tried to stay awake, but his eyelids were too heavy and his head fell forward on his chest.

  A shadow appeared beside the gate, paused, then moved quickly up the path towards the silent house. The back door latch made a rattling sound; the shadow froze. But the small boy in his chair beside the window did not hear the sound, for by then he’d drifted off to sleep.

  Beneath the trees, the watcher heard the distant chimes and counted every stroke. Ten o’clock. Still no movement from the car. The watcher took another cautious step.

  The final muted strokes drifted across the stable yard and died away, but the figure sprawled across the floor inside the barn did not hear them - nor ever would again.

  15

  Saturday, 2 January

  The body lay on its side just inside the door. Male, light sandy-coloured hair, slim, fortyish - all this Paget noted in the first swift glance, but his eyes kept coming back to the pitchfork half buried in the man’s chest.

  Paget swallowed hard and forced himself to breathe slowly, deeply, until at last the nausea subsided.

  At least one of the curving tines must have pierced the heart, but there was surprisingly little blood, and no sign of a struggle. The man must have dropped dead within seconds of being struck.

  ‘Victor Prescott,’ said Tregalles. ‘The new man. He was on my list. I spoke to him the other day.’

  Paget recalled the name and the man only too well. He was the same man he’d seen talking to - or had it been arguing with? - Andrea McMillan on Boxing Day. The connection, tenuous though it might be, filled him with foreboding.

  Charlie Dobbs came over to stand beside Paget as they watched one of his men take photographs. ‘Nasty,’ he observed conversationally. ‘Another inch and those prongs would be sticking out of the poor bastard’s back.’ Paget’s stomach quivered in response. ‘Better get another shot from over here,’ said Charlie to the photographer. ‘And get in closer to the chest, man. We’ll need a close-up of those wounds. He’s not going to bite you.’

  Starkie, who had moved aside to allow the photographer to work, returned to his task. ‘Let’s get this thing out of the way,’ he said, indicating the pitchfork. ‘But be careful.’

  A plastic bag was slipped over the handle and pulled down as far as it would go, then tied. Two metal clamps equipped with handles were attached with great care to the pitchfork; one to the metal ferrule just above the tines; the other half-way up the plastic-covered handle. Starkie gripped one clamp while one of Charlie’s men gripped the other.

  ‘All right, pull,’ said Starkie. The body began to move. ‘Wait a minute.’ Starkie threw a sheet of plastic across the dead man’s chest, and stuck his foot on it. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘Now pull, and don’t let the pitchfork touch the floor.’ With a sickening, sucking noise, the tines slid free, and Starkie quickly bagged the end.

  While they waited for the pathologist to complete his examination, Paget surveyed the scene.

  The position of the body suggested that the man had just come through the door when he was attacked. The tines of the pitchfork were sharp, but even so it must have taken a fair amount of thrust for them to penetrate as deeply as they had.

  As for the barn, apart from all the forensic paraphernalia, nothing appeared to have been disturbed. The swing, he saw, had been hooked up to one of the beams to keep it out of everyone’s way, but as far as he could tell, everything else looked the same. He went over to the office and looked inside. It, too, looked much as it had a few days before.

  ‘Bit of a coincidence, don’t you think, sir?’ Tregalles said. ‘I mean it’s only been a few days since we were here about that suspicious death over at Thornton Hill.’

  ‘Yes, I agree,’ said Paget absently. He sounded as if his thoughts were miles away, and Tregalles glanced at him sharply. The chief inspector, usually so sharp and precise in everything he did, seemed a bit vague. Come to think of it, he’d seemed sort of preoccupied ever since Christmas. And short-tempered.

  They watched in silence as the pathologist stripped off his gloves.

  ‘I’d say he’s been dead about eleven or twelve hours, but that could be revised after I’ve had him on the table,’ Starkie said as he joined them. ‘Died instantly. I think it’s fairly safe to assume that it was the pitchfork that killed him,’ he added drily. ‘But I’ve never seen anything quite like it before. Whoever used that on him really drove it in. One of the tines smashed right through a rib and kept on going; didn’t even slow it down. Penetrated the heart, of course. Still, the poor devil wouldn’t have had time to feel much after being hit like that.’ He began to gather his equipment together and put it away. ‘For what it’s worth. I’d say you’re looking for a powerful man who hated this fellow’s guts.’

  ‘You’re saying no woman could have done this?’

  Starkie grimaced. ‘A woman could have done it,’ he conceded, ‘but it seems more likely to me that it would have been a man. There was a lot of power in that thrust.’

  He put on his coat. ‘I’m not sure how long it will be before I can do the autopsy,’ he said. He glanced at the time and clucked his tongue. ‘Damned holidays. Mortuary always fills up on holidays. If it isn’t road accidents, it’s something like this.’ He began to gather up his things.

  Paget grunted sympathetically. ‘Still, the sooner we have the results...’

  ‘I know, I know,’ said Starkie testily, ‘but do me a favour, Paget. You managed to bugger up my Christmas, and now you’ve buggered up my long weekend. Next Saturday is our fortieth anniversary, and the family’s planning a bit of a do. I’d hate to have to hold it in the mortuary, so try to keep it free of bodies, will you? I know my wife would appreciate it.’

  Superintendent
Alcott came out to take a look for himself, smoking three cigarettes in rapid succession while he listened attentively to what everyone had to say.

  ‘Right,’ he said briskly. ‘I’ll get back to Charter Lane and have an incident room set up. Cooper can be moved in to handle that end of the operation, so I can go to him for the day-to-day situation reports. But I shall expect a daily briefing from you each morning so that I have something for Mr Brock to take to the Chief Constable.’ He looked around. ‘You’ll need a mobile unit out here as well, so I’ll get Sergeant Ormside moving on that.’

  He ground a cigarette beneath his heel, and lit another. ‘Now, Paget, I assume you want to get started on interviews out here, so I’ll leave you with it.’

  It was Sally Pritchard who had discovered the body when she came to work that morning. Now, standing well clear of the cordoned-off area, she told Paget and Tregalles that she’d arrived as usual about twenty minutes to seven. When she tried to open the door, it had stuck half-way, and she’d had to shove hard to get through. It was only when she switched on the light that she saw what lay behind the door.

  Somewhat shamefacedly, she said the sight had turned her stomach, and she’d lost her breakfast.

  ‘I forced myself to go back inside,’ she went on. ‘It seemed impossible that Victor could be alive, but I had to make sure.’ She shuddered at the memory. ‘He was so cold!’

  ‘Was it then you telephoned the police?’

  ‘Yes. I went into the office and phoned from there. Then I rang Mr Lucas up at the house and he came down straight away.’

  ‘Was anything missing or disturbed, as far as you could tell?’

  ‘I don’t think so, but I haven’t really looked. But I will as soon as...’ Sally looked as if she might be sick again.

  Tregalles said: ‘Do you have any idea who might have done this. Miss Pritchard? What can you tell us about him?’

  She shook her head quickly. ‘He was new, so I can’t tell you much about him at all. He seemed all right. Pleasant. Very quiet. Kept very much to himself. A bit shy, I thought. But he knew his way around horses. He was very good with them. I think Mr Lucas was thinking of keeping him on.’