A sudden, fearful death (22 page)

"Did she?" Runcorn's
eyebrows rose and he jerked forward in his chair. "Well, man! What do we
know about this Mr. Taunton? Why didn't you tell me about this in the first
place, Jeavis?'

"Because he is a very
respectable gentleman," Jeavis defended himself, keeping his temper with
difficulty. "And he came and went again inside ten minutes or so, an' at
least one of the other nurses thinks she saw Barrymore alive after Mr. Taunton
left."

"Oh." Runcorn's face
fell. "Well, make sure of it. He might have come back again. Hospitals are
big places. You can get in and out of them easy enough. Just walk in off the
street, seems to me," he said, contradicting his earlier statement. Then
his expression sharpened. "Haven't you got anything, Jeavis? What've you
been doing with your time? There's two of you. You must have learned
something!"

Jeavis was aggrieved. "We have
learned something, sir," he said coldly. "Barrymore was a very bossy,
ambitious sort of a person, always giving orders to other people, but very good
at her job. Even them that liked her least gave her that. Seems she used to
work a lot with Dr. Beck—'that's the foreign doctor—then she switched to working
mostly with Sir Herbert Stanhope. He's the head of the place and a very fine
doctor. Has a spotless reputation both as a surgeon and as a man."

Runcorn's face twitched. "Of
course he has. I've heard of him. What about this Beck fellow? She worked with
him, you say?"

"Yes sir," Jeavis
replied, his smooth features taking on a satisfied look. "He is a
different matter altogether. Mrs. Flaherty—she's the matron, a superior sort of
person, I judged—she overheard Beck and Barrymore quarreling only a few days
ago."

"Did she indeed?" Runcorn
looked better pleased. "Can't you be more exact, Jeavis? What do you mean
a 'few days'?"

"She wasn't sure, or I'd 'ave
said," Jeavis responded sourly. "Two or three. Seems days and nights
all melt into one another in a hospital."

"So what did they quarrel
about?"

Evan was growing more and more
uncomfortable, but he could think of no reasonable protest to make, nothing
they would listen to.

"Not certain," Jeavis
replied. "But she said it was definitely a powerful difference." He
hurried on, seeing Runcorn's impatience growing. "Beck said ‘It won't get
you anywhere,' or something to that effect And she said that if there was no
other course open to her she'd have to go to the authorities. And he said
'Please don't do that! I am quite sure it will gain you nothing, in fact it
will harm you if anything.' " He ignored the smile on Evan's face at the
"he said" and "she said," but his neck grew pinker.
"And she said again as she was determined, and nothing would put her off,
and he begged her again, and then got angry and said she was a foolish and
destructive woman, that she risked ruining a fine medical career through her
waywardness, but she just shouted something at him and stormed out, slamming
the door." Jeavis finished his account and looked squarely at Runcom,
waiting to see the effect his revelation had had upon him. He totally ignored
Evan, who was keeping sober-faced with an effort.

He should have been well pleased.
Runcorn sat bolt upright, his face glowing.

"Now there you have something,
Jeavis," he said enthusiastically. "Get on with it, man! Go and see
this Beck. Pin him down. I expect an arrest within days, with all the evidence
we need for a conviction. Just don't spoil it by acting precipitately."

A flicker of uncertainty crossed
Jeavis's black eyes. "No sir. It would be precipitate, sir." Evan
felt a twinge of sympathy for Jeavis. He was almost certain he did not know
the meaning of the word. "We have no idea what the quarrel was
about—" Jeavis went on.

"Blackmail," Runcorn said
sharply. "It's obvious, man. She knew something about him which could ruin
his career, and if he didn't cough up, she was going to tell the authorities.
Nasty piece of work, all right." He snorted. "Can't say I grieve much
when a blackmailer gets killed. All the same, can't let it happen and get away
with it, not here in London! You go and find out what the blackmail was
about" His finger jabbed the desk once more. "Look to the man's
history, his patients, his qualifications, anything you can. See if he owes
money, plays fast and loose with women."

His long nose wrinkled. "Or
boys—or whatever. I want to know more about the man man he knows himself, do
you understand?"

"Yes sir," Evan said
grimly.

"Yes sir," Jeavis agreed.

"Well, get on with it
then." Runcorn leaned back in his chair, smiling. "Get to work!"

* * * * *

"Now then, Dr. Beck."
Jeavis rocked back and forth on the balls of his feet, his hands thrust deep in
his pockets. "A few questions, if you please."

Beck looked at him curiously. He
had exceptionally fine eyes, well shaped and very dark. It was a face at once
sensuous and refined, but there was something different in the shape of the
bones, something indefinably foreign.

"Yes, Inspector?" he said
politely.

Jeavis was full of confidence,
perhaps remembering Runcorn's satisfaction.

"You worked with the deceased
Nurse Barrymore, didn't you, Doctor." It was more of a statement than an
inquiry. He knew the answer and his knowledge sat on him like armor.

"I imagine she worked with all
the doctors in the hospital," Beck replied. "Although lately, I
believe she assisted Sir Herbert most often. She was extremely capable, far
more so than the average nurse." A flicker of amusement touched with anger
curled his mouth.

"Are you saying that the
deceased was different from other nurses, sir?" Jeavis asked quickly.

"Of course I am." Beck
was surprised at Jeavis's stupidity. "She was one of Miss Nightingale's
nurses from the Crimea! Most of the others are simply female employees who
clean up here rather than in some domestic establishment. Frequently because
to work in a domestic establishment of any quality you have to have references
as to character, morals, sobriety, and honesty, which many of these women could
not obtain. Miss Barrymore was a lady who chose nursing in order to serve. She
probably had no need to earn her living at all."

Jeavis was thrown off balance.

"Be that as it may," he
said dubiously. "I have a witness who overheard you quarreling with
Barrymore a couple of days before she was murdered. What do you say to that,
Doctor?"

Beck looked startled and his face
tightened minutely.

"I say that your witness is
mistaken, Inspector," he replied levelly. "I had no quarrel with
Miss Barrymore. I had a great respect for her, both personally and
professionally."

"Well you wouldn't say
different now, sir, would you, seeing as how she's been murdered!"

"Then why did you ask me,
Inspector?" Again the flash of humor crossed Beck's face, then vanished,
leaving him graver than before. "Your witness is either malicious,
frightened for himself, or else overheard part of a conversation and
misunderstood. I have no idea which."

Jeavis pinched his lip doubtfully.
"Well that could be the case, but it was a very reputable person, and I
still want a better explanation than that, sir, because from what was
overheard, it looks very like Miss Barrymore was blackmailing you and threatening
to go to the hospital authorities and tell them something, and you begged with
her not to. Would you care to explain that, sir?"

Beck looked paler.

"I can't explain it," he
confessed. "It's complete nonsense."

Jeavis grunted. "I don't think
so, sir. I don't think so at all. But we'll leave that for now." He looked
at Beck sharply. "Just don't take it into your head to go for a trip back
to France, or wherever it is you come from. Or I'll have to come after
you!"

"I have no desire whatever to
go to France, Inspector," Beck said dryly. "I shall be here, I assure
you. Now if there is nothing further, I must return to my patients." And
without waiting to see if Jeavis agreed, he walked past the two policemen and
out of the room.

"Suspicious," Jeavis said
darkly. "Marie my words, Evan, that's our man."

"Maybe." Evan did not
agree, not because he knew anything, or suspected anyone else, but out of
contrariness. "And maybe not."

* * * * *

Callandra became increasingly aware
of Jeavis's presence in the hospital, and then, with a sick fear, of his
suspicion of Kristian Beck. She did not believe for an instant that he was
guilty, but she had seen enough miscarriage of justice to know that innocence
was not always sufficient to save one even from the gallows, let alone from the
damage of suspicion, the ruin to reputation, the fear and the loss of friends
and fortune.

As she walked down the wide
corridor of the hospital she felt a peculiar breathlessness and something not
unlike a dizziness as she turned the corner, and almost bumped into Berenice
Ross Gilbert.

"Oh! Good afternoon," she
said with a gasp, regaining her balance somewhat ungracefully.

"Good afternoon,
Callandra," Berenice said with her elegant eyebrows raised. "You
look a trifle flustered, my dear. Is there something wrong?"

"Of course something is
wrong," Callandra replied testily. "Nurse Barrymore has been
murdered. Isn't that as wrong as anything can be?"

"It is fearful,
naturally," Berenice answered, adjusting the drape of her fichu. "But
to judge from your expression, I thought there must be something new. I'm
relieved there is not." She was dressed in a rich shade of brown with gold
lace. "The whole place is at sixes and sevens. Mrs. Flaherty cannot get
sense out of any of the nurses. Stupid women seem to think there is a lunatic
about and they are all in danger." Her rather long-nosed face with its
ironic amusement was full of contempt as she stared at Callandra. "Which
is ridiculous. It's obviously a personal crime— some rejected lover, as like as
not."

"Rejected suitor,
perhaps," Callandra corrected. "Not lover. Prudence was not of that
nature."

"Oh really, my dear."
Berenice laughed outright, her face full of scornful amusement. "She may
have been gauche, but of course she was of that nature. Do you suppose she
spent all that time out in the Crimea with all those soldiers out of a
religious vocation to help the sick?"

"No. I think she went out of a
sense of frustration at home," Callandra snapped back. "Adventure to
travel and see other places and people, do something useful, and above all to
learn about medicine, which had been her passion since she was a girl."

Berenice tossed her head in
laughter, a rich gurgling sound. "You are naive, my dear! But by all means
think what you will." She moved a little closer to Callandra, as if to
impart a confidence, and Callandra caught a breath of rich musky perfume.
"Have you seen that fearful little policeman? What an oily creature, like
a beetle. Have you noticed he has hardly any eyebrows, and those black eyes
like stones." She shuddered. "I swear they look just like the prune
stones I used to count to know my future. You know, tinker, tailor, and so on.
I am quite sure he thinks Dr. Beck did it."

Callandra tried to speak and had to
swallow an obstruction in her throat.

"Dr. Beck?" She should
not have been surprised. It was only her fear spoken aloud. "Why? Why on
earth should Dr. Beck have—have—killed her?"

Berenice shrugged. "Who knows?
Perhaps he pursued her and she rejected him, and he was furious and lost his
temper and strangled her?"

"Pursued her?" Callandra
stared, turmoil in her mind and a hot, sick feeling of horror rippling through
her body.

"For Heaven's sake, Callandra,
stop repeating everything I say as if you were half-witted!" Berenice said
tartly. "Why not? He is a man in the prime of life, and married to a woman
who at best is quite indifferent to him, and at worst, if I were unkind,
refuses to fulfill her conjugal duties. ..."

Callandra cringed inside. It was
inexpressibly offensive to hear Berenice speaking in such terms of Kristian and
his most personal life. It hurt more than she could have foreseen.

Berenice continued, apparently with
total unawareness of the horror she was causing.

"And Prudence Barrymore was
quite a handsome woman, in her own fashion, one has to grant that. Not really
a demure face, or traditionally pretty, but I imagine some men may have found
it interesting, and poor Dr. Beck may have been in a desperate state. Working
side by side can prove peculiarly powerful." She shrugged her elegant
shoulders. "Still, it is hardly anything we can affect, and I have too
much to do to spend more time on it. I have to find the chaplain, then I.am
invited to take tea with Lady Washbourne. Do you know her?"

"No," Callandra replied
abruptly. "But I know someone probably more interesting, whom I must see.
Good day to you." And with that she walked off smartly before Berenice
could be the one to depart first.

She had had Monk in mind when she
spoke, but actually the next person she saw was Kristian Beck himself. He came
out of one of the wards into the corridor just as she was passing. He looked
preoccupied and anxious, but he smiled when he recognized her and the candor of
it sent a warmth through her, which only sharpened her fear. She was forced to
admit she cared for him more profoundly than anyone else she could recall. She
had loved her husband, but it was a friendship, a companionship of long
familiarity and a number of shared ideals over the years, not the sharp,
strange vulnerability she felt over Kristian Beck, and not the swift elation
and the painful excitement, the inner sweetness, in spite of the pain.