All Shall Be Well (3 page)

“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 that 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
3

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 beneath 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.”

“Oh, of course.” A plan of action seemed to galvanize him into disjointed efficiency. “Where have they … where is she? I can’t come until this evening. I’ll have to close the shop. I don’t drive, you see. I’ll have to get the train in—”

Kincaid interrupted him. “I could meet you if you like, here at the flat, and give you the details then.” He didn’t want to explain over the telephone why the funeral arrangements might be delayed.

Theo gave an audible sigh of relief. “Could you? That’s very kind of you. I’ll get the five o’clock train up. Are you upstairs or down? Jasmine never—”

“Up.” Theo’s ignorance didn’t surprise Kincaid—after all, he hadn’t even known that Jasmine had a brother.

They rang off and Kincaid closed his eyes for a moment, the worst of his immediate responsibilities finished. It hadn’t been as bad as he’d expected. Jasmine’s brother sounded more bewildered than grief-stricken. Perhaps they hadn’t been close, although he was finding that Jasmine’s silence on a subject was not necessarily indicative. Feeling too fuzzy to think clearly about it, he wandered into the kitchen and peered into the refrigerator—eggs, a shriveled tomato, a suspicious bit of cheese, a few cans of beer. He popped open a beer and took a sip, grimaced and set it down again.

He had his shirt half unbuttoned and had reached the bedroom door when the knock came—sharply official, two raps. Kincaid opened his front door and blinked. He didn’t often see Major Keith dressed in anything except his gardening gear, and today he looked particularly natty—tweed suit with regimental
tie, shoes polished to a looking-glass shine, neatly creased trilby in his hand, and an anxious expression puckering his round face.

“Major?”

“I just spoke to the postman. He said he’d seen an ambulance pull away from the building when he came past earlier and I wondered—there was no answer when I knocked downstairs just now. Is she all right?”

Oh, lord! Kincaid sagged against the doorjamb. How could he have forgotten that the Major didn’t know? And they were friends, not just passing acquaintances—her comfortable afternoon visits with the Major were one thing, at least, that Jasmine had discussed. “I’m not sure you’d call them ‘chats’,” she’d said, laughing. “Mostly we just sit, like two old dogs in the sun.”

Kincaid pulled himself together, sure that his face was stamped with dismay. “Come in, Major, do.” He ushered the Major in and waved vaguely in the direction of a chair, but the Major turned and stood quietly facing him, waiting. His eyes were a surprisingly sharp, pale blue.

“You’d best tell me, then,” he said, finally.

Kincaid sighed. “She didn’t answer the door to her nurse this morning. I came along and forced the lock. We found her in bed. She seemed to have died peacefully in her sleep.”

The Major nodded, and an expression flickered across his face that Kincaid couldn’t quite place. “A good lass, in spite of—” He broke off and focused on Kincaid. “Well, never mind that now.” The remnants of his Scots burr became more pronounced. “Will you be seeing to things, then?”

Another assumption of an intimacy with Jasmine he hadn’t felt he merited, Kincaid thought curiously. “Temporarily, at least. Her brother’s coming up tonight.”

The Major merely nodded again and turned toward the door. “I’ll leave you to get on with it.”

“Major?” Kincaid stopped him as he reached the door. “Did Jasmine ever mention a brother to you?”

The Major turned in the act of jamming his hat over the thinning hair brushed across his skull. Thoughtfully, he fingered the gray bristles that lay on his upper lip like thatch on a cottage roof. “Well now, I can’t say as she did. She never said much. Remarkable for a female.” The blue eyes crinkled at the corners.

After watching the Major descend the stairs, Kincaid shut his door and leaned against the inside. Even working all night on a nasty case didn’t account for the leaden feeling in his limbs and the cotton-wool in his head. Shock, he supposed, the mind’s way of holding grief at bay.

He fastened the chain on the door, rammed home the bolt, and lifted the phone out of its cradle as he passed. Shedding clothes, he stumbled into the bedroom. Flies buzzed heavily in and out of the open window. A bar of sunlight lay diagonally across the bed, as substantial as stone. Kincaid fell into it and slept before his face touched the rumpled sheet.

The temperature dropped quickly as the sun set and Kincaid woke with the draft of cool air against his skin. The bit of southern sky he could see through the still-open window was charcoal tinged faintly with pink. He rolled over and looked at the clock, swore, and stumbled out of bed in the direction of the shower.

Fifteen minutes later he’d managed to get himself into jeans and pullover and was dragging a comb through his damp hair when the bell rang. All his expectations of a male version of Jasmine Dent vanished when he opened the door.

“Mr. Kincaid?” The man’s question was hesitant, as if he were afraid he might be rebuffed.

Kincaid examined him, taking in the oval face and small
bone structure, but there any resemblance to Jasmine ended. Theo Dent wore an extra layer of padding on his small frame, had a halo of curly brown hair shot with gray, round John Lennon specs and eyes that were blue rather than brown.

“Mr. Dent.” Kincaid held out his hand and Theo gave it a quick jerk. His palm felt damp and Kincaid had the impression that his hand trembled. “Do you have a key to your sister’s flat, Mr. Dent?”