Death in Practice

by Hazel Holt

  “I think I saw them down at the end by the light bulbs,” I said, “though what shoelaces and electrical goods have in common I don’t know – a great leap of the imagination on someone’s part, I expect. But, June, I was very sorry to hear about Malcolm.”

  “It was quite a shock,” she replied.

  “Someone said he went into a coma,” I went on. “Was he a diabetic?”

  “As you probably know, we weren’t on very good terms so I haven’t seen him for some time. He certainly wasn’t diabetic as a young man. Of course, it is something that can develop, though that’s usually in later life – senile diabetes, several of my old people suffer from it. I suppose he could have developed it, though there’s been no tendency towards it in the family. No, as far as I know Malcolm was a perfectly healthy young man.”

  “I see.”

  “There are several other causes of death that would result in a kind of coma, or what might appear to the layman to be a coma.” June did like to air her medical knowledge. “Certain neuromuscular blocking agents such as ephedrine which might be inhaled or ingested would produce a similar sort of effect. However, I don’t imagine that would be a very likely cause of death in Malcolm’s case, do you?”

  “No,” I agreed, not having had the faintest idea what she had been talking about. “Still, I expect they’ll know after the post mortem.”

  “Exactly. Dr Porter at the hospital will probably do it – he’s in charge of forensics for our area, you know. A really excellent man, I got to know him quite well when I worked with him when we were both at the BRI in Bristol.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes. He came to Taviscombe because his wife wanted to move down here. She wanted to be near her mother – Mrs Forster, did you know her? She used to live at Brendon Lodge, that big house on the Taunton road. I always thought it was such a pity – he was quite brilliant and could have gone right to the top of the tree if he’d stayed in Bristol, but there you are, that’s life, isn’t it!” She looked at her watch. “Goodness me, is that the time? I must be getting along. Shoelaces down there, you said? See you next week at the Friends’ committee meeting.”

  “Any news?” Rosemary asked when she came to coffee next morning.

  “Bits and pieces,” I said, “but nothing positive.”

  I told her what I’d gleaned from Roger and June.

  “So it could be anything,” Rosemary said. “Not murder at all.”

  “You sound disappointed.”

  “Well, hardly that, but you must admit that if there was ever someone born to be murdered it was Malcolm Hardy – everyone hated him!”

  “True. He was totally obnoxious.”

  “I wonder when the surgery will be open again? I suppose if he died there the police will have to examine the place pretty thoroughly. Even if it’s not murder it will probably be suspicious circumstances, at least until after the post mortem and the inquest.”

  “I wonder what Diana will do now,” I said thoughtfully. “She needed Malcolm Hardy’s money to keep the place running. Who do you think inherits? There must be quite a bit; the Hardys were very well off and then there’s that large house standing in enormous grounds – that site must be worth a pretty penny. You could get a small housing estate in there!”

  “Oh you wouldn’t get planning permission for that,” Rosemary said, “but the house would make a marvellous hotel or, even better, a nursing home, and you know what gold mines they are in Taviscombe!”

  “Perhaps June will get everything,” I suggested, “and then she could turn the house into a nursing home. Unless there are any other relations – are there?”

  “I don’t know – I’ll have to ask Mother. Though, of course, Malcolm may have made a will leaving it to someone we’ve never heard of.”

  Life went on and Thea and Michael and Alice came back from their holiday. Smoke went home and Tris and Foss spend hours looking for her, Foss prising open cupboard doors in case I was hiding her away somewhere. I spent a lot of time in the garden pulling up the forest of weeds that always spring up after a rainy spell and dividing plants that had spread too far in directions I didn’t want them to. I was engaged in a struggle with a giant hosta (well it had been a perfectly normal sized hosta when I bought it) trying to prise it into two parts with a fork and a spade, and getting hotter and crosser by the minute, when Michael appeared.

  “I thought I heard you out here. What on earth are you doing?”

  “Trying to divide this wretched thing into two, but I can’t get the leverage – here, you have a go!”

  Michael eased the spade and fork more firmly under the plant, gave it a heave and split the unwieldy plant neatly into two.

  “There you are.”

  “Thank goodness – how did you do that?”

  “Brute strength and ignorance. Now put away all that stuff and make me a nice cup of tea. There’s something I want to ask you.”

  “What’s that?”

  “All in good time. Tea first. And biscuits, unless you’ve got some of that fruit cake left.”

  I made the tea and found some cake and we sat down peacefully in the living room. “Now then, what is it you want to ask me?”

  Michael took a bite out of his piece of cake and put the plate down on the arm of the sofa, something that usually irritates me greatly, but I was so anxious to hear what it was he had to ask that I didn’t say anything.

  “It’s something I want – well, we want – your opinion about,” Michael said.

  “Yes?”

  “You remember Andrew Church?”

  “That nice man who used to be with your practice? Yes, I remember him. He left to go to some high-powered place in London, didn’t he?”

  “That’s right. He was a good chap and we got on very well. Anyway, I’ve heard from him recently. He’s been incredibly successful – he always was a very good tax lawyer – and now he’s a senior partner.”

  “Good for him.”

  Michael ate some more of his cake. “The thing is, he’s asked me to join the practice.”

  “In London?”

  “Yes.”

  My heart gave a sudden lurch and I felt sick.

  “Well,” I forced myself to sound bright and interested, “what do you and Thea feel about it?”

  “It’s a lot more money,” Michael said, “and the chance of fairly rapid promotion – the firm is growing…”

  “I see.”

  “But we’d be really sorry to leave Taviscombe and all our friends.”

  “Yes.”

  “And I know you’d hate not seeing us so much and missing Alice and things, but you could always come to London as well…” His voice trailed away and he was silent for a moment. “Well, what do you think?” he asked.

  “I think,” I said slowly, “you must do what you – you and Thea – want to do. It’s your decision.”

  “It’s a chance that will probably never come again,” Michael said, “and now that we have Alice – well, there’ll be all sorts of things – expenses – children need so much these days.”

  “What does Thea say?

  Michael gave a rueful smile. “She says she’s leaving it to me to decide. She says as long as we’re together it doesn’t matter where we live.”

  “Oh dear. So it’s all up to you?”

  “Yes – so you do see I’d like to know what you think.”

  “I don’t want to prejudice you, say anything that might sway you one way or another. You have to make up your own mind. You know what you have here – the place, the people, the memories – but you also know that you’d probably have a better lifestyle with a lot more money in London. And you like London – Taviscombe hasn’t much to offer in the way of entertainment – and at work you might like the excitement of a big City office. It’s very tempting.”

  “Yes.”

  “But is it enough?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The money, the job satisfaction, the scope London
would offer you in every way. Is that what you really want? Is it enough to leave all the things you enjoy here? Or, if you stayed, would you regret it ever after if you didn’t seize the opportunity?”

  “Would you come to London with us?”

  “I don’t know – anyway, that’s not the point. This is your life, yours and Thea’s and Alice’s. What would be best for them as well as you? Theatres, museums, shops, a choice of schools – you have to think of all that.”

  “I know.”

  “Of course,” I said tentatively, “Thea’s lived and worked in London and chose to come back here, and you did once have an offer to go there and turned it down.”

  “Things were different then – we only had ourselves to think of.”

  “True.”

  Michael sighed. “Oh it’s all so difficult! I wish you’d tell me what you really think.”

  “Darling, how can I! You know perfectly well that I don’t want you to go, but I don’t want that to influence you if it would really be to your advantage.”

  We went round and round in conversational circles for a while until Michael had to go.

  “I’ve got to let them know by the beginning of next week,” he said. “I’ll ring you as soon as we decide anything.”

  I rang Rosemary straight away, badly needing her particular kind of sympathy.

  “How awful for you!” she said. “How can you possibly say what you think!”

  “I just want them to be happy really, it’s not just selfishness – well it is, of course. I’d be miserable if they went. It’s just that I honestly don’t think they would be happy in London, however much money they had. But I can’t say that, can I?”

  “I know.”

  “When I think how blithely I suggested that Kathy might move away if she was unhappy here – it’s always different when it’s your own child.”

  “In a way, it’s not so much the children as the grandchildren,” Rosemary said.

  “That’s true. I was perfectly happy when Michael was away at Oxford and I’ve been very lucky to have had him here in Taviscombe for so long. I mean, look at Judith, her only child’s in Australia! No, it’s just that it would be so hard, after longing for a grandchild, not to see Alice growing up…”

  “When Roger moved to Taunton I was terrified they’d all have to go – I mean, Taunton’s no distance, but it would have meant that the everyday contact would have been lost and I’d have hated that.”

  “That’s just it – you don’t have to see them every day, or even phone them – it’s just to know that they’re there, near at hand.”

  I didn’t expect to sleep well that night and put off going to bed at my usual time. The animals with their inbuilt clocks were getting restless, so eventually I settled them in the kitchen and was just putting the cushions straight on the sofa when the phone rang.

  “Sorry it’s so late,” Michael said “but I thought you’d like to know. We’ve decided to stay.”

  “Oh darling!”

  “We both wanted Alice to grow up in Taviscombe, where we grew up,” he said. “It sounds sentimental, but there you are. Besides,” he added, “we’d never find such an amenable babysitter in London. Good night. Sleep well.”

  Chapter Six

  * * *

  In the first flush of my relief (I found I had developed a tendency to go around the house singing, much to Tris’s disapproval) I didn’t think much about Malcolm Hardy and the causes of his death until I happened to run into Kathy one morning by the cashpoint machines in the bank. I was immediately struck by how different she looked – relaxed and smiling – quite unlike the unhappy woman I had seen down by the seafront.

  “Hello Kathy,” I said. “Fancy seeing you here. Is the surgery still shut?”

  “No, we’re open again – it’s my day off.”

  “In that case come and have a cup of coffee.”

  She hesitated and then said, “Yes, I’d love to.”

  “I’ll just get some money. That is if I can remember my PIN number – I’ve just changed my card and they’ve given me a new number.”

  I managed to extract my money (at the second attempt and after a hostile message from the machine) and we settled ourselves down at a table in the Buttery away from the noise of the coffee machine.

  “So how’s it going?” I asked. “I know I shouldn’t say it, but it must be much easier for you all without Malcolm Hardy to contend with.”

  She nodded. “That part is wonderful. But the trouble is that now the police seem to think he didn’t die from natural causes.”

  “Really? Why’s that?”

  “Something to do with the post mortem. It’s all rather complicated but apparently they found insulin in the body, even though he wasn’t a diabetic.”

  “How extraordinary – I mean, it’s not something you’d take by mistake! It must have been a massive dose to have killed him.”

  “Well no, it wasn’t. That’s the odd thing.”

  “So what did?”

  “He suffered from high blood pressure and was taking beta blockers – Propranonol, I think it was, and when that’s combined with insulin it’s often fatal. They found traces of alcohol as well and they say that that made things even worse.”

  “Good heavens! I do see what you mean about it being complicated.”

  “Well there’s got to be an inquest, of course, so perhaps they’ll sort out what actually happened then.”

  “As I said, the insulin can’t have been an accident, can it? And it would be a peculiar and very unpleasant way to commit suicide. So that leaves…”

  “Murder.” Kathy said bluntly. “Yes, we’ve all been over it again and again and that does seem to be the most likely answer.”

  “Oh dear.”

  “It’s very awkward. We all loathed him but in those circumstances we can hardly say so, even to each other.”

  “Yes, I can see that.” I stirred my coffee thoughtfully. “Does anyone know how it happened – whatever it is – or when?”

  “It was in the afternoon. He went out for lunch and came back quite early – around two, I think, anyway, quite a while before surgery at three. We usually have coffee then because most of us bring sandwiches for lunch. Alison took in his coffee about a quarter of an hour later and then, when she went to collect the cups just before three, she found him. He’d collapsed so she called Diana who tried to revive him, but she couldn’t so she called an ambulance and they took him to the hospital. They say he was in a sort of coma and he didn’t come round before he died.”

  “How dreadful. So what did you do at the surgery?”

  “We didn’t know what to do, actually. People were arriving for their appointments, so we just sort of carried on. Fortunately Malcolm didn’t have any appointments himself that afternoon so that helped a bit, but as you can imagine it was all a bit difficult. Then at about five o’clock the police came and said we had to close the surgery. They sealed off Malcolm’s room with tapes and things – there aren’t any locks on the consulting room doors – and started asking us questions.”

  “What sort of questions?”

  “Oh just ordinary things. When did we last see Malcolm, did he seem all right, did anyone call to see him – things like that. Then they sent us all home and said the surgery had to be closed and they’d let us know when it could be opened again. Diana stayed behind to check all the appointments on the computer – it would have been much easier if we’d still got the old appointment book. She was going to ring everyone and tell them not to come.”

  “I saw there was a notice on the door about emergencies,” I said.

  “Oh yes – Diana was having all those calls rerouted and she and Ben were going to cover them.”

  “How lucky Ben was still with you.”

  “Yes, we’d have been lost without him. He was marvellous.”

  “He was there, then, when it happened?”

  “Yes – he’d called in to collect some more vaccines before his nex
t call out at Exford. So he was able to help Diana get Malcolm off the floor and onto a couch and try and resuscitate him.”

  “Good for Ben. Does this mean that he won’t have to leave now?”

  “No one’s said anything, but I don’t think Diana ever wanted him to go. “

  “That’s good then. And I imagine that, in spite of the circumstances, the atmosphere is much better now?”

  “Oh yes! Almost back to what it used to be – though, of course, we’re all a bit worried about this business and what’s going to happen.”

  “About the investigation?”

  “Yes, that too, but worried about the practice. Now that Malcolm’s gone we don’t know what’s going to happen about the money. Will we be able to carry on?”

  “Oh dear, yes, that must be a worry. But, never mind, it’s a thriving practice and I’m sure there must be someone out there who’ll want to invest in it – someone nicer than Malcolm Hardy!”

  She smiled. “I think Diana will be much more wary this time, and, as you say, the practice is doing well, so there’s bound to be some interest. That is,” she said, “if all this business doesn’t frighten people off and we lose all our clients.”

  I laughed. “I think you’ll find it will work quite the other way – I predict a host of new clients all coming to gawp at the scene of the crime!”

  “And it does seem to be a crime,” I said to Thea when I went round there to tea later that afternoon. “I mean, insulin, but not enough to kill him – it’s all very peculiar.”

  “Did everyone at the practice know that he was taking these beta blockers?” Thea asked. “Someone may have given him a small dose of insulin knowing that it would react with the other drugs, but hoping that he might not be found too soon, so that people might think it was just some sort of seizure.”

  “That’s true,” I said. “Come to think of it, Kathy said that Malcolm Hardy didn’t have any appointments that afternoon and it was only because Alison went in to collect his coffee cup that he was found relatively quickly. If it hadn’t been for that he might well have been dead when they found him and they’d have thought he’d died from natural causes. With his high blood pressure I suppose it was always a possibility.”