"Roger, please, for heaven's sake. Mrs. Wilson'll hear you, and you know what she's like—"
"Heaven hasn't much to do with it, my dear Meg, except for the fact that your friend Jasmine's no nearer to it today than she was yesterday, thanks to you." The opportunity for sarcasm kept his volume down, but Margaret felt the coffee she'd gulped rise sourly in her throat.
"Roger, you can't mean that—have you gone mad? I told you she changed her mind. I'm glad she changed her mind—"
"So you can spend every spare second of your time fussing and cooing over her like some dumpy Florence Nightingale? It makes me sick. Why should I hang around? Tell me that, Meg, dear—"
"Shut up, Roger. I've told you not—"
"—to call you that. It's her pet name for you. How sweet." He took a step closer and grabbed her elbow, squeezing it between his fingers. Margaret could smell her soap on his skin, and the herbal shampoo he used on his hair, and see the light glinting off the red-brown patch of stubble he'd missed on his jaw. "Tell me why I should stick around, Margaret," he spoke softly now, almost whispering, "when you haven't any time for me, and she could hang on for months?"
Margaret jerked her arm free. "Why don't you go, then," she hissed at him, and she felt a distant surprise, as if the words came from somewhere outside herself. "Just bloody well bugger off, all right?"
They faced each other in silence for a long moment, the sound of their breathing audible over the background noise of Radio Four, and then Roger laughed. He lifted his hand and cupped it under Margaret's chin, tilting her head back. "Is that what you want, love?" Roger leaned closer, his mouth inches from hers. "Because you won't get it. I'll leave when I'm good and ready, not before, and don't you even think about clearing out on me."
The number eighty-nine bus bounced and rattled its way up the hill through Camden Town. Margaret Bellamy sat in the forward seat on the upper deck, her bulging shopping bag placed beside her as a bastion against intruders.
She needn't have worried. The only other occupant to venture climbing the stairs was a toothless old man absorbed in a racing paper. The seat's cracked upholstery stank of cigarette smoke and exhaust fumes, but Margaret found the familiar odor comforting. She gnawed her knuckle, the latest in a series of displacement behaviors designed to prevent her from biting her nails. An infantile habit, Jasmine called it. Jasmine…
Margaret's thoughts veered away, jumping to another track like a needle skipping on an old phonograph. She'd had to get out of the office, even if Mrs. Washburn had given her that fishy-eyed stare and said, "Dentist again?"
"Bitch," Margaret said aloud, then looked around to see if the smelly old man had heard her. And what if he had, she asked herself? It seemed like she'd spent her whole life trying not to offend anybody, and it had landed her in an awful bloody mess.
She should have told Jasmine about Roger, that was her first mistake. But when he'd first started asking her out she hadn't quite believed it herself, and didn't want to risk the humiliation if he dropped her as quickly as he'd picked her up. Afterwards, the right moment never seemed to materialize, and the guilt she felt for keeping it secret compounded her embarrassment. She rehearsed all sorts of "There's something I've been meaning to tell you" scenarios, and finally remained silent.
Actually, Roger hadn't really taken her out. Looking back on it, she saw that he merely had provided his presence and attention while she paid for almost everything. A small price it seemed at the time, to bask in the glow of Roger's looks, his connections, his air of knowing all the right people and the right places.
Still, it had been a small error of vanity, a forgivable mistake. The ones she had made since were not dismissed so easily. She never should have told Roger what Jasmine had asked her to do. And she never should have told him about the money.
The bus shuddered to a stop at South End Green. Balancing her bag against her hip, Margaret picked her way down the stairs and came blinking out into the sunshine. The huge, old plane trees and willows of the South Heath marched away to her right as she started up the hill. Sun sparkled on the waters of the ponds, and people flowed around her with that festive air that an unexpectedly warm spring day gives the English.
The unsettled feeling that had been nagging her since last night coiled more tightly in the pit of her stomach.
From Willow Road she turned away from the Heath and trudged up Pilgrim's Lane. Just as she reached Carlingford Road she looked up and saw the rear of an ambulance disappear as it turned left into Rosslyn Hill. Margaret's stomach spasmed and her knees threatened to give way beneath her.
Felicity stripped the bed, then straightened the spread over the bare mattress, tucking the corners with precision. Kincaid, having raised the blinds, stood staring down into the patch of garden. After a moment he shook himself and ran his fingers through his hair, then turned to face her. "Who's next of kin, do you know?"
"A brother, I think, called Theo," Felicity answered, giving the spread a final smoothing across the pillow. She surveyed the bed for a moment, gave a satisfied nod and turned to the sink. "Although I'm not sure they got on well," she continued over her shoulder as she washed her hands before filling the copper kettle from the tap. "She mentioned him several times. He lives in Surrey, or Sussex, but I never met him." Felicity nodded toward the small, inlaid secretary Jasmine had used for her papers. "I imagine you'll find his number and address in that lot."
Kincaid was a bit taken aback by her assumption that he would be responsible for notifying Jasmine's relatives, but he had no idea who else might perform the unpleasant task. He didn't relish the prospect.
"It does take them like that sometimes—suddenly, you know." Felicity turned and examined him with concern, and Kincaid marveled at the speed with which she had regained her equilibrium. A few seconds shock—eyes closed, face wiped blank—then she had taken over with brisk professional competency. A common enough occurrence for her, he supposed, the loss of a patient.
"But she didn't seem—"
"No. I'd have given her another month or two, at the least, but we're not God… our predictions aren't infallible." The kettle whistled and Felicity turned away, scooping mugs off a rack and pouring boiling water over tea bags in one smooth motion. The dark, business-like suit seemed at odds with such household proficiency, and Felicity herself, soberly neat against the welter of Jasmine's exotic belongings, reminded Kincaid of a hawk among peacocks.
"She never spoke about it… her illness, I mean," Kincaid said. "I didn't realize it was so far—"
The front door swung open and bounced against the wall. Kincaid and Felicity Howarth spun around, startled. A woman stood framed in the doorway, clutching a shopping bag to her breast.
"Where is she? Where have they taken her?" She took in the neatly made bed and their arrested postures, and the bag slipped as she swayed.
Felicity was quicker off the mark than Kincaid. She had the bag safely on the floor and her hand under the woman's elbow before Kincaid reached them.
They guided her toward a chair and she slumped into it, unresisting. Not yet thirty, Kincaid judged her, a trifle plump, with wayward brown hair and painfully fair skin, and a round face now crumpled with distress.
"Margaret? It is Margaret, isn't it?" Felicity asked gently. She glanced at Kincaid and explained, "She's a friend of Jasmine's."
"Tell me where they've taken her. She won't want to be alone. Oh, I knew I shouldn't have left her last night—" The sentence disintegrated into a wail and she turned her head from side to side as if searching for Jasmine in the flat, her hands twisting in her lap. Kincaid and Felicity looked at one another over Margaret's head.
Felicity knelt and took Margaret's hands in hers. "Margaret, look at me. Jasmine's dead. She died in her sleep last night. I'm sorry."
"No." Margaret looked at Felicity in appeal. "She can't be. She promised."
The words struck an odd note and Kincaid felt a prickle of alarm. He dropped down on one knee beside Felicity. "P
romised? What did Jasmine promise, Margaret?"
Margaret focused on Kincaid for the first time. "She changed her mind. I was so relieved. I didn't think I could go through—" A hiccupping sob interrupted her and she shivered. "Jasmine wouldn't go back on a promise. She always kept her word."
Felicity had let go of Margaret's hands and they moved restlessly again in her lap. Kincaid captured one and held it between his own. "Margaret. What exactly did Jasmine want you to do?"
She went still and blinked at him, puzzled. "She wanted me to help her kill herself, of course." She blinked again and the tears spilled over, and the words came so softly Kincaid had to strain to hear them. "Whatever will I do now?"
Felicity rose, fetched a mug of luke-warm tea from the kitchen, stirred in some sugar, and carefully wrapped both Margaret's hands around the cup. "Drink up, love. You'll feel more yourself." Margaret drank greedily until the cup was empty, unmindful of the tears slipping down her face.
Kincaid pulled up a dining chair and sat facing her, waiting as she fished a wad of tissue from her skirt pocket and mopped at her eyes. Her pale eyelashes gave her a defenseless look, like a rabbit caught in a lamp. "Tell me exactly what happened, please, Margaret. I'd like to know."
"I know who you are," she said, sniffing, studying him. "Duncan. You're much better—" Then red blotches stained her fair skin and she looked down at her hands. "I mean…"
"Did Jasmine tell you about me, then?" Jasmine had been very good at keeping her life compartmentalized, thought Kincaid. She had never mentioned Margaret to him.
"Just that you lived upstairs, and came to visit her sometimes. I used to say she'd made you up, like a child's imaginary friend, because I'd never—" the word ended on a sob and the tissues came up again, "seen you."
"Margaret" Kincaid leaned forward and touched her arm, bringing her attention back to his face. "Are you sure that Jasmine meant to kill herself? She might have just been whistling in the wind, talking about it to make herself feel she had an option."
"Oh, no." Margaret shook her head and hiccupped. "As soon as the reports came back mat her therapy wasn't successful, she wrote to Exit. She said she couldn't face the feeding tube—all pipes and plugs, she called it—said she wouldn't feel human any—" Margaret screwed up her face and pressed her fingers to her lips with the effort of holding back tears.
Kincaid leaned forward encouragingly. "It's okay. Go on."
"They sent all the information and we planned it out— how much she should take, exactly what she should do. Last night. It was to be last night."
"But she changed her mind?" Kincaid prompted when she didn't continue.
"I came as soon as I could get off work. I'd screwed myself up to tell her I couldn't go through with it, but she didn't even let me finish, it's all right, Meg," she said. "Don't worry. I've changed my mind, too." She looked… different somehow… happy. Margaret looked at him with entreaty. "I believed her. I'd never have left her if I hadn't."
Kincaid turned to Felicity. "Is it possible? Would she have been able to manage it herself?"
"Of course, with these self-medicating patients it's always a possibility," she answered matter-of-factly. "That's one of the risks you take with home care."
No one spoke for a moment. Margaret sat with her shoulders slumped, red-eyed and spent. Kincaid sighed and rubbed his face, debating. If he alone had heard Margaret's disclosure, he might have ignored it, let Jasmine go unquestioned and undisturbed. But Felicity Howarth's presence complicated matters. She would be as aware of correct procedure as he, and to ignore indications of suspicious death smacked of collusion. And although his own grief and exhaustion kept him from isolating it, a sense of unease still hovered at the edge of his consciousness.
He looked up and found Felicity watching him. "I suppose," he said reluctantly, "I had better order a post mortem."
"You?" Felicity said, her brows drawing together, and Kincaid realized what he hadn't told her.
"Sorry. I'm a policeman. Detective Superintendent, Scotland Yard." Watching Felicity, Kincaid had the same fleeting impression he'd had when they found Jasmine's body. Her face went smooth and blank, as if she'd scrubbed it free of emotion.
"Unless you'd rather do the honors?" he asked, thinking he might have offended her by usurping her authority.
Felicity's attention came back to him, and she shook her head. "No. I think it's best if you take care of it." She nodded toward Margaret, who still sat unresponsive. "I've other matters to see to." She went to Margaret and touched her shoulder. "I'll see you home, love. My car's just outside."
Margaret followed her without protest, taking the shopping bag Felicity gathered up for her and cradling it against her chest. At the door, she turned back to Kincaid. "She shouldn't have been alone," she whispered, and the words seemed almost an accusation, as if he, too, were somehow responsible.
The door closed behind them. Kincaid stood in the silent flat, suddenly remembering that he hadn't slept for almost forty-eight hours. A thread of a cry broke the stillness and he spun around, heart jumping.
The cat, of course. He had forgotten all about the cat. He dropped to his knees beside the bed and peered underneath. Green eyes shone back at him.
"Here kitty, kitty," he called coaxingly. The cat blinked, and he saw a movement which might have been a twitch of its tail. "Here kitty. Good kitty." No response. Kincaid felt like an idiot. He brushed himself off and rooted around in the kitchen until he found a tin of catfood and a tin opener. He spooned the revolting stuff into a bowl and set it on the floor. "Okay, cat. You'll have to shift for yourself. I'm going home."
Exhaustion swept over him again, but he had a few more things to do. He checked the fridge, finding two nearly-full vials of morphine. Then he pulled the rubbish bin from under the sink and sifted through it. No empties.
He found Jasmine's address book easily enough, however, neatly stowed in a slot in the secretary. Her brother was listed with a phone number and address in Surrey. He had pocketed the book and put a hand on the doorknob when a thought brought him up short.
Jasmine had been a very methodical person. Whenever he'd visited her he always heard her draw the bolt and put up the chain behind him. Would she have lain quietly down to die without securing her door? Consideration for those entering the next day, perhaps? He shook his head. Access would have been easy enough through the garden door. And yet, if she'd died naturally in her sleep she would have locked up as usual the evening before.
The doubt irritated him, and he stepped into the hall and closed the door more smartly than it warranted. It was then he realized he'd forgotten to look for a key.
Chapter Three
The midday sun poured through the uncurtained southern windows of Kincaid's flat, creating a stifling greenhouse effect. He pushed open the casements and the balcony door, shedding his jacket and tossing it over the back of the armchair in the process. Sweat broke out under his arms and beaded his upper lip, and the telephone receiver felt slippery in his fingers as he dialed the coroner's office.
Kincaid identified himself and explained the situation. Yes, the body had been sent to hospital as there was no doctor in attendance to certify death. No, he'd not questioned the cause of death at the time, but had since learned something that made it suspicious. Would the coroner ask the hospital histopathologist to do a post mortem? Yes, he supposed it was an official request. Would they please let him know the results as soon as possible?
He thanked them and hung up, satisfied that he had at least started proceedings. The paperwork could wait until tomorrow. He stood looking irresolutely around the flat, dreading the call to Jasmine's brother.
Days-old dirty dishes cluttered the kitchen sink, cups containing sticky dregs smudged the dust on the coffee table while books and clothes littered the furniture. Kincaid sighed and sank into a chair, rubbing his face absentmindedly. Even his skin felt rubbery and slack with exhaustion. Leaning back and closing his eyes, he felt a hard lump benea
th his shoulder blade—his jacket, Jasmine's address book in the breast pocket. He pulled the slender book out and sat studying it. It suited Jasmine, he thought—emerald green leather stamped with small, gold dragons, elegant and a little exotic. It crossed his mind that he must ask her where she got it, then he shook his head. He had yet to accept it.
The gilt-edged pages of the small book fluttered through his fingers like butterflies' wings and he caught glimpses of Jasmine's tiny italic script. Names jumped out at him. Margaret Bellamy, with an address in Kilburn. Felicity Howarth, Highgate. Theo he discovered under the T's, simply the first name and phone number.
He punched the numbers in more slowly this time. The repeated burring of the phone sounded tinny and distant, and he had almost given up when a man's voice said "Trifles."
"I beg your pardon?" Kincaid answered, startled.
"Trifles. Can I help you?" The voice sounded a little peevish this time.
Kincaid collected himself. "Mr. Dent?"
"Yes. What can I do for you?" Peevishness became definite annoyance.
"Mr. Dent, my name is Duncan Kincaid. I live in the same building as your sister, Jasmine. I'm sorry to have to tell you that she died last night." The hollow silence on the other end of the line lasted so long that Kincaid wondered if the man were still there. "Mr. Dent?"
"Jasmine? Are you sure?" Theo Dent sounded bewildered. "Of course, you're sure," he continued with a little more strength. "What an idiotic question. It's just that… I didn't expect—"
"I don't think anyone—"
"Was she… I mean, did she…"
Kincaid answered gently. "She seemed very peaceful. Mr. Dent, I'm afraid you'll have to come and make arrangements."
All Shall Be Well dk&gj-2 Page 2