Death at the Jesus Hospital

by David Dickinson

  A tall slim young lady in a fashionable trailing skirt brought them up to Sir Peregrine’s office on the top floor. The room was huge, with spectacular views over the City of London. Many of these captains of industry filled their walls with hunting prints or views of English cathedrals. Sir Peregrine’s walls were hung with battles. Before he sat down, Inspector Fletcher caught a glimpse of a sweaty Leonidas holding the pass at Thermopylae.

  ‘Thank you, Miss Davis,’ boomed Sir Peregrine, as the young lady ushered the policemen on to a couple of chairs. ‘Tea, Miss Davis.’ She had almost reached the door when the qualification came, ‘For one.’

  Bloody rude, thought Inspector Fletcher. Bloody rude.

  ‘Well, gentlemen, what can I do for you?’ Sir Peregrine addressed his visitors as if they were the lowest variety of office boy in his employ.

  Inspector Fletcher had agreed with Inspector Devereux that the Marlow police would confine themselves to the murder at the Jesus Hospital. The complicated questions of the authenticity of the codicil could be left to Devereux and Powerscourt. Now Inspector Fletcher could feel his nerves rising. No pauses between sentences, he said to himself. No hesitations. He thought he might start to shake quite soon if he didn’t get a grip on himself. He began taking a series of deep breaths as his wife advised.

  ‘We would like to know,’ he began hesitantly, ‘what you were doing in the Elysian Fields Hotel outside Marlow the other evening.’

  The Inspector had gained in strength as his question progressed. He felt slightly better. Maybe it was going to be all right.

  ‘Who says I was there?’ Sir Peregrine remembered Inspector Fletcher from the day of the murder at the Jesus Hospital. He had thought little of him then. He saw nothing to make him change his mind.

  ‘Your car was seen on the road leading to the hotel, Sir Peregrine. And the hotel manager confirmed your presence.’

  ‘What if I was? I’m a director of the damned hotel. Man can visit any damned hotel he likes, especially if he’s on the board.’

  ‘Could we ask who you saw when you were there, Sir Peregrine. At the hotel, I mean.’

  ‘That’s none of your damned business either.’ Sir Peregrine paused while Miss Davis placed an ornate tea tray in front of her master. As a further insult to the visitors, it was laden with scones and sandwiches and three alluring slices of cake. ‘Man can see who he likes, damn your eyes.’

  ‘I put it to you, Sir Peregrine,’ Inspector Fletcher was feeling almost confident now, ‘that the man you went to see was Thomas Monk, Warden of the Jesus Hospital which, as you know as well as I do, is run by your own livery company the Silkworkers.’

  ‘I do wish you would mind your damned business. Monk or no Monk, it’s got nothing to do with you.’ Sir Peregrine paused to eat an enormous mouthful of chocolate cake. For some reason, Fletcher was to tell his sergeant later, the sight of the chocolate cake made him very angry indeed.

  ‘I do not feel, Sir Peregrine,’ he said firmly, happy in the knowledge that he had not paused for the last five minutes or so, ‘that you are taking our questions as seriously as you should. There was a murder at the Jesus Hospital a matter of hours after your car was seen at the nearby hotel. We have no reports of anybody seeing the car leave. For all we know, it, and you, could still have been there at the time of the killing. There was a second murder at the Silkworkers Hall in the City of London. You were the last person to see the victim alive. Your position is more serious than you seem to think, Sir Peregrine.’

  ‘Are you saying that I am a murderer? Am I a suspect?’

  ‘I am not saying that you are the murderer. As to whether you are a suspect or not I leave that up to you to decide for the moment. Now, if we could return to the business in hand, perhaps you could tell us, Sir Peregrine, when you left the Elysian Fields the night before the murder?’

  ‘Are you deaf as well as stupid? It’s none of your damned business!’

  ‘Then we can assume, can we, Sir Peregrine, that you were still there on the morning of the murder?’

  Sir Peregrine made a mighty noise that sounded like a cross between a howl of pain and a yell of triumph. He rose to his feet. His face had turned purple. He was pounding his enormous fist on the table. ‘Get out! Get out now! You insult me in my own office! How dare you? A couple of failed police officers from the back of beyond! Ignorant clodhoppers! Get out! Go on! Clear off!’

  Oddly enough it was Sergeant Donaldson who had the last word in the interview. ‘Good day to you, Sir Peregrine,’ he said, opening the door. ‘So glad you enjoyed your tea.’

  Sir Peregrine sat down and took a quick swig straight from the half bottle of whisky concealed in his bottom drawer. He pressed a button underneath his desk. Miss Davis appeared as if by magic.

  ‘Get me the bloody solicitors,’ he snarled. ‘And get them now!’

  Mrs Hamilton’s spoken French classes were going well. The Lower Sixth were well advanced into ‘A Scandal in Bohemia’. They had passed the point where the King of Bohemia reveals himself to Holmes and Watson and they have made the acquaintance of Irene Adler, the well-known adventuress. Mrs Hamilton wondered if she had picked too exotic a story, if she wouldn’t have done better with some more domestic problem set in Surrey with governesses and gamekeepers. She hadn’t yet tried to change the subject to murder at Allison’s – she rather feared there was no actual murder in ‘Scandal in Bohemia’ – as she hadn’t deemed it appropriate.

  The boys read their section of the story or gazed longingly at Mrs Hamilton when they were not on duty. She had become the focus, the depository of the teenage longings and the teenage fantasies of an entire class. As she made her way back to the hotel that afternoon she checked behind herself a couple of times. It was as she thought. She was being followed. Francis had told her years before of a tingling sensation when somebody is coming after you. For Mrs Hamilton this was the second day of the pursuit. It was as she had predicted. She smiled slightly as she went into the hotel. Then she ran up the stairs and turned all the lights on in her suite of sitting room, bedroom and bathroom. After that she went out of the side door of the Crown, round the back of the green and tapped David Lewis lightly on the shoulder. ‘Come and have some tea,’ she said sweetly. ‘You’ll catch your death of cold out here.’

  David Lewis followed his new teacher into the hotel. He thought he had turned red permanently. He suspected his face might never return to its normal condition. His eyes still had the look of puppy-like devotion they had shown in class.

  Lady Lucy ordered tea and scones. The room was large with Georgian windows looking out over the green. ‘You’ll never make a detective like Sherlock Holmes if you follow people like that, David,’ she said with a smile. ‘I think you need to be more subtle, not so much sudden jumping behind trees.’

  ‘I just wanted to be close to you, Mrs Hamilton. I don’t quite know how to say this. I’ve never felt like this in my whole life, not ever …’

  Lady Lucy was saved by the arrival of the tea. The maid poured two cups and handed them round before she left. Lady Lucy had been wondering how to extricate herself from this situation which could prove so embarrassing.

  ‘My husband should be here in a minute,’ she said brightly, buttering a scone. ‘He’s on his way up from London.’ She thought that might buy some time. She watched as David’s face fell. Maybe he hadn’t thought of her with a husband at all. Lady Lucy decided to take a gamble, a huge gamble.

  ‘He’s a detective, my husband, like Sherlock Holmes, only he’s real, my husband I mean.’

  ‘Really?’ said David Lewis. ‘And is he working on a case at present?’ There had been mention in the school of a detective who had talked to the headmaster and to Inspector Grime. What was his name? David Lewis didn’t think it was Hamilton.

  Lady Lucy got there before him. ‘My married name is Powerscourt, Lady Lucy Powerscourt,’ she said. ‘Before that I was called Hamilton. And my husband’s called Francis.’

 
‘And are you detecting something up here?’ David Lewis had temporarily forgotten about love in favour of crime and investigation. This was like one of those shockers that passed round the school.

  ‘Of course we are, silly. And we’d like you to join us, to become part of our team. It depends, of course, on your being able to keep a secret.’

  ‘Of course I can keep a secret, Lady Powerscourt, Mrs Hamilton, dear me, what should I call you?’

  ‘You’d better go on calling me Mrs Hamilton, I think, David. In case the other name slips out in class.’

  David Lewis stared at Lady Lucy for a moment. ‘You’re here because of the death of the bursar, aren’t you? Mr Gill. Is that the secret?’

  ‘Part of it, David, just part of it. There are other matters I can’t tell you about just yet. Very deep, very dark matters.’

  ‘What can I do to help? I’ll do anything, Mrs Hamilton, I’m so happy to be a part of the team.’

  Lady Lucy cut him off. She thought he might be about to go back on to dangerous ground.

  ‘There is one thing,’ she said, ‘that would really help the investigation.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘You remember there was a lot of talk about the false postman who came to the school, and who was almost certainly the murderer? And how the police repeated the exercise a couple of days later, exactly like the first visit?’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘The strange thing is that nobody has come forward with a description of the fake postman. Somebody must have seen him. If you’re looking for somebody, it helps if you know something of what he looked like. Was he short, was he tall, was he clean shaven, was he bald, did he have a crutch and a parrot on his shoulder, that sort of thing.’

  David Lewis gazed helplessly into Lady Lucy’s eyes. ‘Some of us have felt badly about this for some time, Mrs Hamilton. It’s just that Inspector Grime rubbed so many of the boys up the wrong way. They decided not to cooperate.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Lady Lucy, unwilling to be drawn on the matter of the Inspector, ‘but what a way to begin your work with us, David. The information would be so very valuable. And inside our little band of investigators you would get the credit.’

  This was it, David Lewis thought to himself, he was becoming part of a secret society like the Red-Headed League in the Sherlock Holmes stories. ‘Well, I was one of three or four people who got a good look at the man on the day of the murder,’ he began. ‘He looked about thirty to thirty-five, just under six feet tall, I would say, with an enormous black beard.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Just one tiny thing. He bumped into me quite heavily and said, “I’m so sorry.” The thing is, Mrs Hamilton, I have a bit of a reputation for being a mimic which means I always listen very carefully to how people sound when they talk. This chap didn’t come from round Norfolk way. I don’t think he was English at all. And he wasn’t American either. I lived in Washington for a while when my papa was at the embassy there and I can tell a Southern drawl from the sound of New York.’

  ‘Fascinating,’ said Lady Lucy. ‘That’s really useful, David. What a way to join the team! Francis will be so pleased when I tell him.’

  ‘Would it have been easier if he had been English, Mrs Hamilton? Easier for the detecting team, I mean?’

  ‘I’m not quite sure I follow you.’

  ‘Well, if he had been English, he would be here in England, wouldn’t he? But think of all the other places he could have come from. Australia? New Zealand? South Africa? What happens if he’s going home? Or if he’s already gone home? That would make our lives very difficult.’

  Lady Lucy thought that young David Lewis might have a promising career in the detection business.

  ‘Just think of them as fresh fields to conquer, David. Fresh fields to conquer. Now then,’ she said, smiling at the boy, ‘we need to make a plan. We need to secure our communications. I think it would be best if we kept our meetings absolutely secret. You mustn’t tell anybody, not even your best friend in school.’

  ‘Of course, Mrs Hamilton. If I told anybody it wouldn’t be a secret.’

  ‘Quite right. I think we should meet here every other day. If we made it every day then somebody might notice. And there is one thing I would like you to do before our next meeting.’

  ‘What’s that, Mrs Hamilton?’

  ‘I want you to find out everything you can about the man who was killed, Roderick Gill the bursar. I know he didn’t teach you or anything like that, but there’s usually some gossip or scrap of information that might be useful.’

  As the lovestruck David Lewis returned to school, Lady Lucy wondered if she could be prosecuted for corrupting the young.

  Inspector Miles Devereux was back in the Silkworkers Hall. This time there were no bodies by the water, only a hard-working cleaning lady and a pervasive smell of floor polish. He had come to meet the Silkworkers Secretary. He would be the man, in Devereux’s judgement, most likely to know about the voting patterns and the voting timetable of the Silkworkers Company. Fletcher had informed him of his sulphurous interview with Sir Peregrine and the solitary teacup. Devereux wondered if it would be morning coffee for one on this occasion.

  The Secretary, Colonel James Horrocks, a retired military man with an enormous moustache and a faint hint of the parade ground still lingering about his person, was not alone. ‘Buckeridge, Inspector, Antony Buckeridge of Buckeridge Johnston and Forsyte, Lincoln’s Inn Fields, solicitors.’ He pronounced the word solicitors very solemnly indeed. ‘Here to keep an eye on things, don’t you know!’

  Miles Devereux shook hands with his opponent pleasantly enough, like a man before a duel. He didn’t think there was much the solicitor could do to prevent him finding out what he wanted to know. Buckeridge was in his forties, tall and slim, and he interrupted the proceedings from time to time by sneezing loudly after a pinch of snuff.

  ‘Colonel Horrocks,’ Devereux began, ‘we would like to know more details of the forthcoming ballot among the members of the Silkworkers Company.’

  Horrocks began tapping on the table with his pen. He looked over at his solicitor.

  ‘I see,’ said Buckeridge. ‘I fail to understand how the internal procedures of my client’s company can be of interest to the police.’

  Miles Devereux had seen this tactic before. You could use an interview like this one to discover how much the police knew and where they had obtained the information.

  ‘It is,’ he said with a wintry smile, ‘for us to decide what is and what is not relevant to our inquiry. I repeat, Colonel Horrocks, we would like to know more details about the forthcoming ballot of members of the Silkworkers Company.’

  ‘And it is for his legal advisers, Sergeant, to advise on when it is or is not necessary to answer questions. And I am advising him that he need not reply to your request.’

  The one thing you must never do in these situations, Miles Devereux said to himself, is to lose your temper. Much better to make the other man lose his. ‘Colonel Horrocks, could I remind you of two things? The first is that we are dealing with a murder inquiry here. And the second is that there is an offence known as obstructing the course of justice. Police officers like myself are perfectly entitled to arrest people who are actively hindering the police in the course of their inquiries. Magistrates do not look kindly on those who hinder the work of officers of the law, particularly in murder cases. I say again, we would like to know more details of the forthcoming ballot among members of the Silkworkers Company.’

  There was a pause. Buckeridge shrugged his shoulders and helped himself to some more snuff. Devereux wondered if they had a fallback plan if the initial objections failed to work.

  ‘There is to be such a ballot,’ Horrocks said finally.

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ said Inspector Devereux. ‘Thank you for cooperating. Now perhaps you could tell us when the ballot is to take place or the date when the relevant papers have to be lodged with the company.’ Devereux didn
’t know if the election was going to take place on a single day, or whether the papers were sent out beforehand to all potential electors with a date by which they must be returned.

  ‘The closing date has not yet been finalized,’ Horrocks said after another long pause.

  ‘But the voting papers have been sent out?’

  ‘They have.’

  ‘But with no fixed date for the return?’

  ‘Not exactly.’

  ‘What does not exactly mean?’

  Horrocks looked at Buckeridge once more. The solicitor shrugged. Devereux doubted if he had decided to keep quiet for long.

  ‘The papers had to be returned by the end of February or possibly a little later. That is the date not yet fixed in stone.’

  ‘Does that mean that the vote could be closed if the organizers decided it had gone the way they wanted? Even if all the votes weren’t in?’

  ‘Come, come, Sergeant,’ Buckeridge was back, snorting and sneezing, ‘that’s a question of motive or intention, not a matter of fact. I advise you not to answer it, Colonel, there is no need.’

  ‘And where are the votes kept? The ones that have been sent in?’

  ‘They’re kept here in this office,’ said Horrocks.

  ‘And who has access to the papers, the votes?’

  ‘Well, the senior members of the company, naturally. They all have keys to the safe over there by the window.’

  ‘Really, Colonel, really? So Sir Peregrine or anybody else with a key could come in and check on the votes? It’s like the cabinet checking on the ballot boxes on election day before the polls have closed.’

  ‘I object, Sergeant!’ Anthony Buckeridge was getting cross now. Inspector Devereux thought he might be on the verge of losing his temper. ‘The procedures here are all governed by ancient statute. Your assumptions are totally unwarranted and potentially slanderous.’