Death in Practice

by Hazel Holt

  “Perhaps,” I suggested, “it wasn’t a very suitable place for Julie to go. In her condition, I mean.”

  “That’s what I thought, but she was so keen. Anyway, apparently they were going down that hilly bit, you know where the pavement is cobbled – quite dangerous at the best of times – and it had been raining so the cobbles were slippery, and what with so many people! Keith said someone in the crowd must have jostled her and she fell down. They thought at first she was all right, but then she started to get pains so Keith called an ambulance on his mobile.”

  “How dreadful!”

  “We’d caught up with them by then and when the ambulance arrived Keith went with her to hospital. They took her to Taunton so we went on after to bring Keith back because he’d left his car in Dunster car park.”

  “Goodness, what a night you must have had.”

  “Well, we waited with him at the hospital because of course he wanted to see how she was.”

  “She was very lucky not to lose the baby,” I said.

  “I know.” She paused for a moment and then she said, “It’s funny really, Keith seemed even more relieved about that than Julie. I mean she was pleased, but he seemed, well I don’t know, he seemed really thankful.”

  “I expect he was just pleased for her,” I suggested.

  “I suppose so, but after all, it’s not even his baby. Mind you, I think he’s quite happy about that for various reasons.”

  “Really?”

  “Well, you see, he doesn’t have any family himself.”

  “No one?”

  “No. Both his parents were killed in an accident when he was a child and he was brought up by his grandmother and she’s dead now, so he doesn’t have a soul. So I think he’ll be pleased to have a ready-made family, if you see what I mean.”

  “Poor Keith. Well, I do hope it works out for him.”

  Toby the three-legged cat suddenly materialised and leapt onto the counter between us, rubbing his head against Alison’s arm and miaowing.

  “Wants something to eat,” Alison said, “don’t you, you old fraud? Pretending to be half starved, when I know Kathy fed you before she went off only an hour ago!”

  I picked up my bill and wrote the cheque.

  “Right, and I must take Tris home. He’s been very good but there’s a limit to his patience!”

  Hearing his name Tris gave a little whine. Toby leaned over the counter, gave him a scornful stare and stalked off towards the back, presumably in search of food.

  I thought about what Alison had said while I was getting supper. The fact that Keith had been so relieved when Julie’s baby was all right. Of course, it might have been natural concern for Julie and, indeed, it probably was, and yet… Could he have known about the terms of the Hardy Trust? But, even if he did, there was no evidence that he had anything to do with Malcolm Hardy’s murder. It was odd though that he’d become engaged to Julie so soon after Malcolm’s death – a simple girl (so Kathy said) and easily influenced, with no support at home and glad to have someone to rely on. A young, attractive man (why had he not already got a girlfriend?) with a sympathetic manner; it wasn’t surprising that she had turned to him.

  I whisked the butter and sugar together vigorously as if to dispel these thoughts, but they wouldn’t go away. It could be that if Keith had known about the disposition of the Hardy fortune he was interested in the money but hadn’t been connected with the death. But then who had killed Malcolm Hardy? It all came back to that in the end, and I was no nearer than Roger was to solving that particular mystery.

  I was suddenly impatient with all my activities. I looked down at the small dariole mould that I’d filled with jam and the sponge mixture and I wondered why I was going to all this trouble to make a pudding just for myself. For a moment a feeling of depression and loneliness swept over me. Then I pulled myself together.

  “Don’t be so ridiculous!” I said out loud.

  At the sound of my voice, Tris came trotting into the kitchen, closely followed by Foss, anxious not to miss anything. They sat at my feet looking up at me hopefully and I laughed and put the mould into the steamer, gave them each a handful of treats and went to pour myself a glass of sherry.

  For the next few days I was too busy to concern myself with any sort of mystery; no time, indeed, to think of anything except the matter in hand. The editor of a journal to which I occasionally contributed unexpectedly sent me a book to review. Her usual reviewer had let her down and it was almost press day and, since I was an old friend, could I possibly help her out and she really needed it within the week. She knew that it was an impossible thing to ask anyone, but I was so good and so quick and it need only be quite a short review, just a notice really, but she did feel they had to cover it in some way and she’d be eternally grateful…

  I approached the task with some misgivings. The book was not only not in my field but was also long, turgid and crammed with information, some of which, unfortunately, was new and important, but which had to be sifted from the surrounding dross and evaluated conscientiously. To make life even more difficult it had all its footnotes at the back so I was continuously turning back and forth in the book until my patience was stretched almost to breaking point. In one chapter the author devoted several pages to the Temperance Movement and the evils of drink among the lower classes in Victorian society and, as I read it, a tiny thought leapt into my mind, but I pushed it resolutely to one side while I concentrated on my task.

  However, when I had finished the book and (with some difficulty) written the review, I did allow myself to think about it. The hip flask that Roger had recently found, surely that might have been the source of the insulin as well as the alcohol? It would surely have been possible for someone to put it in the flask. Someone outside the surgery. It opened up a whole new range of possibilities and I wondered if Roger had considered them.

  Michael came round after work – I had to send my review by e-mail and, although I could manage a short e-mail letter, I wasn’t confident of my ability to send something as complicated as that.

  “It’s perfectly simple, Ma,” Michael said. “I’ve told you heaps of times how to do it!”

  “Well, darling, don’t tell me again – just do it.”

  With a sigh and with a sort of running commentary on what he was doing he set to work.

  “You see – copy and cut – perfectly easy – then log on to your e-mail thingy and paste and then send it. We could have sent it as an attachment of course…” He looked at me watching him anxiously. “No, perhaps we’ll leave that for now. There now – log off, OK? Did you get that?”

  “Yes,” I lied, knowing perfectly well that I hadn’t been concentrating. “Michael, I’ve had an idea about the Hardy case.”

  Michael switched off the computer and sighed.

  “I knew you weren’t paying any attention to what I was saying! Go on then, what is it?”

  I told him about my idea about the hip flask. “You see, I never really thought that any of the people at the surgery could be a murderer. This means it could have been anybody!”

  “Someone we’ve never heard of, you mean?”

  “Possibly. He may have had enemies we know nothing about. Or,” I hesitated, “it could have been Claudia Drummond.”

  “Your bête noir?”

  “Well, you must admit she’s a nasty piece of work.”

  “But didn’t Roger rule her out?”

  “Only because he didn’t think Malcolm Hardy would have stopped to have a drink with her after the furious row they had. But she could have put something in the flask before they had the quarrel.”

  “How exactly?”

  “Well, let me see. I expect the flask was in his jacket pocket, he could have taken his jacket off and put it down somewhere.”

  “It’s winter, for goodness sake,” Michael protested. “Why would he want to take his jacket off?”

  “I expect the central heating would have been turned up,” I said. “A
fter all she is from South Africa. Anyway, if she wanted to do the deadly deed she wouldn’t have told him straight away that she was breaking with him, she’d have tried to make him relax, she’d have cosied up to him.”

  “What a revolting phrase – you’ve been watching too much television!”

  “So,” I continued, ignoring the interruption, “he’d have taken off his jacket and then when he was out of the room for a moment –”

  “Why would he go out of the room?”

  “I don’t know,” I snapped. “Perhaps she asked him to open a bottle of wine in the kitchen or something – don’t be difficult – then when he was out of the way she put the stuff in his hip flask. Then she started the row, to get him out of the way.”

  “Yes?”

  “And she knew that when he was all wound up he’d need to have a drink – and voilà!”

  “It’s all very well saying voilà like that,” Michael said, “but it’s all the most extreme kind of speculation.”

  “But it’s possible?”

  “Well yes, it’s possible, on a flying pig level.”

  “Even if it wasn’t Claudia,” I said, “there’s no reason why it shouldn’t be someone else – someone from outside the practice.”

  “It could be I suppose…”

  “Anyway, I think I’ll give Roger a ring and see what he thinks.”

  “He’ll probably laugh at you,” Michael said.

  But when I did ring Roger he listened carefully to what I had to say.

  “Perhaps my theory about Claudia is a bit farfetched,” I said tentatively.

  “It’s a possibility,” Roger said, “and we must consider every possibility after all. And it is possible that the hip flask may have contained more than whisky.”

  “I suppose he filled it from one of those bottles at his home,” I said. “Anthea and I were very struck by the amount and variety of alcohol there.” And I told him about our morning of labelling things for June.

  Roger laughed. “I can imagine Anthea’s reaction.”

  “And to the bedroom,” I said. “She was absolutely horrified at that – so much so that she refused to go right into the room, but only stood on the threshold, disapprovingly.”

  “It was certainly – unusual,” Roger said.

  “You checked the house, I suppose.”

  “Oh yes. Though now we’ll have to go back and check the whisky bottles more thoroughly. There should be enough traces left in the flask for the forensic people to see if it came from one of his own bottles.”

  “So anyone who was in the house could have put something into one of them.”

  “Of course.”

  “Do we know who visited him – apart from Claudia presumably and Julie before they split up.”

  “We did try to check on any visitors he may have had, but it’s difficult. That house is well set back from the road and neighbours wouldn’t be able to see who came and went.”

  “Very convenient – for Malcolm Hardy, that is.”

  “But not for us.”

  “I’ve just thought of something,” I said.

  “Yes?”

  “When I was in the house with Anthea I happened to go into the larder. The sash cord of the window in there was broken. I didn’t notice if the catch was on but it’s quite a large window, certainly large enough for someone to climb in, and it’s on the ground floor.”

  “I’ll certainly check that.”

  “Only with all the shrubs and things around it would be quite easy to get in without being seen, especially at night.”

  “Quite.”

  I laughed. “All right, I’ll stop stating the obvious and leave you in peace. What were you doing anyway?”

  “I was helping Delia with her homework, but as we were involved in a tedious mathematical problem I was probably not going to be able to solve, I was delighted to be called away. I’ll let you know what, if anything, we find at the house.”

  That night I dreamt that I was helping Claudia Drummond climb into the larder of Malcolm Hardy’s house in order to turn up the central heating there. But I didn’t feel, somehow, that my subconscious was trying to tell me anything important.

  Chapter Seventeen

  * * *

  The first real harbinger of Christmas for me is the card I receive from my cousin in Kirkby Lonsdale. I always imagine her sitting watching the clock at midnight on November 30th waiting for it to lurch over into December so that she can start sending out her Christmas cards. The card (a view of Kirkby Lonsdale church in the snow) duly arrived and I nerved myself to go into action. Shopping for presents now assumed an urgency that took away all the pleasure and left only the frustration of not being able to find things even when I’d thought of them. My eye kept being caught by enchanting little woolly animals that I was sure would delight Alice, and I had to exercise extreme self-control and limit myself to three (a lamb, a lion and a rabbit) as well as a small teddy bear wearing a t-shirt with the legend “Somerset: the Team To Watch”.

  As I approached the post office one morning, I found Rosemary eyeing in dismay the immensely long queue that had threaded its way all round the interior and was now outside in the street.

  “Oh goodness,” I said. “I don’t think I can bear to wait in that. I’ll have to come back later. I’ve got to send these today, it’s the last day for posting overseas things.”

  “I don’t believe a word of it,” Rosemary said. “They only say that to frighten you. I always leave my cards and things until after the final date and they get there much more quickly because everyone’s posted early.”

  I considered this possibly specious reasoning. “You’re probably right,” I said, “only I don’t think I’m brave enough to try.”

  “Well,” Rosemary said, “it’s no use waiting here in the freezing cold, let’s go and have a coffee.”

  Plying me with coffee (and a warming Danish pastry) Rosemary had a favour to ask.

  “I was going to ring you, actually. I know it’s an awful lot to ask, but do you think you could possibly take some papers round to Mother tomorrow? They’re things I had to sign and then she has to sign – you know, accountant’s stuff – but it has to be done tomorrow, because they’re rather urgent. The thing is, Jack and I simply have to go to this wretched lunch (something to do with one of his clients) and it’s in Salisbury so we’ll have to leave frightfully early and won’t get back until heaven knows when.”

  “Yes of course I will.”

  “Needless to say I tried to get out of it – not my idea of fun – but Jack said I must.”

  “Salisbury’s nice.”

  “Lovely, but I won’t get to see much of it!” She put two lumps of sugar in her coffee and stirred it defiantly. “Yes, I know I shouldn’t and I know I’m nearly a stone overweight already, but I do need to keep up my strength!”

  “Oh, I’ve given up worrying about all that – at least until after Christmas. So about the papers, when would you like me to collect them?”

  “I won’t have them until this evening – quite late when Jack comes back, so if we could drop them off with you on our way tomorrow. As I said, it’ll be frightfully early so we won’t disturb you, just put them through the letterbox. Then if you could ask Mother to sign them – Jack will have marked the places – and pop them back through our letterbox on your way back. Sorry it’s so complicated!”

  “That’s fine, I’ve been meaning to go and see your mother for ages now.”

  “I’ll ring and let her know you’re coming. Will it be morning or afternoon? Sorry, but you know how she is about times and things!”

  “Oh, morning I think. About eleven.”

  “Bless you. That will be a marvellous help!” She sighed. “This Christmas thing gets worse every year. I start off with all sorts of lists, terrifically organised and then after a bit the whole thing simply degenerates into a muddled mess!”

  “I wish I was more organised,” I said ruefully. “I’ve only done my ove
rseas cards so far, all the rest are lying about in drifts all over my desk. There are times when I positively resent the cards that arrive before I’ve sent out mine. And as for my cousin Margaret sitting smugly up in Kirkby Lonsdale with everything done – well!”

  Rosemary laughed, then she said, “Oh, I knew there was something I meant to tell you. Did you know that Malcolm Hardy had a cousin?”

  “No! Really?”

  “Yes, Mother was telling me about it the other day. She was going on about the murder and so forth and she said that Geraldine Hardy, you know, Malcolm’s mother, had a sister.”

  “I never knew that.”

  “No, well, she went to live in Scotland, I can’t remember where, but right up in the north somewhere, so they lost touch. Anyway, she, the sister that is, had a son, just the one, and when Geraldine died there was some sort of fuss about some heirloom that the sister said should have gone to her. Mother knows the details – of course!”

  “Of course!” I said.

  “And apparently there’s been bad blood between Malcolm and the son (I don’t remember his name), especially after his mother died.”

  “How fascinating. Where does Malcolm’s cousin live now?”

  “Oh, London I think. I gather he’s a doctor – not a GP, I don’t think – so presumably some sort of consultant and quite grand.”

  When I arrived at Mrs Dudley’s next morning she was very brisk.

  “Now,” she said, “let’s get these papers dealt with straightaway.”

  Mrs Dudley has always seen herself as ‘a good businesswoman’ and since in recent years she hasn’t had much occasion to demonstrate her powers she wasn’t going to let an occasion like this slip away from her. She made great play of getting out another pair of spectacles and putting them on, then she spread the papers over her table while I tactfully went over to the window and looked out at the garden, bare, but (of course) immaculately tidy. However, Mrs Dudley did not intend to be deprived of her audience. Accidentally or on purpose she knocked some of the papers onto the floor so that I had to go over and pick them up.