An Indecent Obsession (26 page)

‘Does anyone know about this?’ he asked, bringing out his handkerchief and mopping his face, which was gradually returning to its normal high color.

‘The suicide, I don’t think so,’ she said, voice coolly considering. ‘Unfortunately the attempt to molest Sergeant Wilson was witnessed by Captain Parkinson and Sergeant Maynard as well as by me personally, sir.’

He clicked his tongue. ‘Most regrettable! At what time did the attempt to molest Sergeant Wilson occur?’

‘Approximately half-past one in the morning, sir.’

He stared at her in mingled suspicion and exasperation. ‘What on earth were you all doing buzzing round the bathhouse at that hour? And how did you permit any of this to happen, Sister? Why didn’t you put an orderly in the ward overnight, if not a relief nurse?’

She stared back expressionlessly. ‘If you’re referring to the attack on Sergeant Wilson, sir, I had no basis to suppose Sergeant Daggett’s intentions lay in that direction. If you’re referring to the suicide, I had absolutely no indication that such were Sergeant Daggett’s intentions regarding himself.’

‘Then you have no doubt that it’s suicide, Sister?’

‘None at all. The razor was in his own hand when the injuries were inflicted. Didn’t you see that for yourself? Holding a Bengal to cut down deeply instead of to scrape the surface of the skin is the same hold reinforced by strength.’

He resented the inference that his gorge had not permitted his staying long enough to inspect the corpse as thoroughly as apparently she had done, so he switched tactics. ‘I repeat, why did you not have someone stand guard in the ward during the night, Sister? And why did you not report Sergeant Daggett’s attack on Sergeant Wilson to me immediately?’

Her eyes opened guilelessly wide. ‘Sir! At two in the morning? I really didn’t think you’d thank me for rousing you at such an hour for something which was not a true medical emergency. We broke it up before Sergeant Wilson sustained any physical harm, and when I left Sergeant Daggett he was in full possession of his wits and his self-control. Captain Parkinson and Sergeant Maynard agreed to keep an eye on Sergeant Daggett during the night, but provided Sergeant Wilson was removed from the ward, I did not see any necessity to restrain Sergeant Daggett forcibly, nor to have him placed under arrest and taken into custody, nor to start yelling for staff assistance. In fact, sir,’ she concluded calmly, ‘I was hoping not to have to draw your attention to the incident at all. I felt that after talking to Sergeant Daggett and to Sergeant Wilson when both of them had recovered somewhat, everything might be resolved without an official fuss. At the time I left the ward I was optimistic such would prove to be the case.’

He seized upon a new item of information. ‘You say you removed Sergeant Wilson from the ward, Sister. Just what do you mean by that?’

‘Sergeant Wilson was in severe emotional shock, sir, and considering the circumstances I thought it advisable to treat him in my own quarters rather than in the ward right under Sergeant Daggett’s nose.’

‘So Sergeant Wilson was with you all night.’

She looked at him fearlessly. ‘Yes, sir. All night.’

‘All night? You’re sure it was all night?’

‘Yes, sir. He’s still in my quarters, as a matter of fact. I didn’t want to bring him back to the ward until after I had talked to Sergeant Daggett.’

‘And were you with him all night, Sister?’

A tiny horror crept into her mind. The colonel was not busy thinking salacious thoughts about her and Michael; he probably didn’t consider her the least capable of salacious activity. He was contemplating something far different than love—he was contemplating murder.

‘I did not leave Sergeant Wilson’s side until I came on duty half an hour ago, sir, and I discovered Sergeant Daggett only minutes after coming on duty. He had then been dead for several hours,’ she said, her tone brooking no argument.

‘I see,’ said Colonel Chinstrap, tight-lipped. ‘This is a pretty mess, isn’t it?’

‘I disagree, sir. It isn’t pretty at all.’

He returned to the main theme like a worrisome dog. ‘And you’re absolutely sure that Sergeant Daggett did or said nothing to indicate a suicidal state of mind?’

‘Absolutely nothing, sir,’ she said firmly. ‘In fact, that he did commit suicide staggers me. Not that it’s so inconceivable he’d take his own life. Only that he chose to do so with so much blood, so much…
ugliness
. As for the assault on his own masculinity—I can’t even begin to grasp why. But then, that’s the trouble with people. They never do what you expect them to do. I’m being quite open and honest with you, Colonel Donaldson. I could lie and say Sergeant Daggett’s state of mind was definitely suicidal. But I choose to speak the truth. My incredulity over Sergeant Daggett’s suicide doesn’t alter my conviction that it is suicide. It can’t be anything else.’

He turned and began to walk toward X, setting a sober pace which she seemed content to follow at last. By the collapsed clothesline he paused to poke about in the heaps of laundry with his swagger stick, reminding Sister Langtry of the matron of a mixed-sex teenage camp looking for suspicious stains. ‘There seems to have been a bit of a fight here,’ he said, straightening.

Her lips twitched. ‘There was, sir. Between Captain Parkinson and some shirts.’

He moved on. ‘I think I had better see Captain Parkinson and Sergeant Maynard before I send for the authorities, Sister.’

‘Of course, sir. I haven’t been back to the ward since I discovered the body, so I imagine none of them know what’s happened. Even if any of them have tried to get into the bathhouse, I locked it before I went to find you.’

‘That at least is something to be grateful for,’ he said austerely, and suddenly realized life was offering him the perfect opportunity to slap Sister Langtry down for good. A man in her quarters all night, an absolutely sordid sexual mess culminating in a killing—by the time he was finished with her, she’d be pilloried and out of the army in disgrace. Oh, God, the bliss! ‘Permit me to say, Sister, that I consider you have botched this entire affair from start to finish, and that I shall make it my personal business to see that you receive the censure you so richly deserve.’

‘Thank you, sir!’ she exclaimed, apparently without irony. ‘However, I consider that the direct cause of this entire affair was two bottles of Johnnie Walker whisky which were consumed in full last night by the patients of ward X. And if I only knew the identity of the brainless fool who was responsible for giving Captain Parkinson, an emotionally unstable patient, those two bottles yesterday, I would take great pleasure in making it
my
personal business to see that
he
receives the censure
he
so richly deserves!’

He tripped going up the steps and had to grab at the rickety banister to save himself. Brainless fool? Blithering idiot! He had forgotten all about the whisky. And she knew. Oh, she knew, all right! He would have to forget revenge. He would have to backpedal very quickly indeed. Damn the woman! That smooth and oh, so fearless insolence was bone deep; if her nursing training had not eradicated it, bloody nothing ever would.

Matt, Nugget, Benedict and Neil were sitting at the table on the verandah, looking ghastly. Poor souls, she hadn’t even given them the caffeine she had skimmed off the top of the mist APC, and she couldn’t very well dole it out to them now, with Colonel Chinstrap looking on.

At sight of the colonel they all rose to attention; he sat down heavily on one end of a bench and was obliged to make a flying leap for its middle when it tipped dangerously.

‘As you were, gentlemen,’ he said. ‘Captain Parkinson, I would greatly appreciate a cup of tea, please.’

The teapot had already gone through several refills and one remake, so the tea Neil poured with a none-too-steady hand was fairly fresh. Colonel Chinstrap took the mug without seeming to notice its ugliness, and buried his nose in it gratefully. But eventually he had to put the mug down, at which time he glared sourly at the four men and Sister Langtry.

‘I understand that Sergeants Wilson and Daggett were involved in an incident early this morning in the bathhouse?’ he asked, his manner indicating that this was what had brought him all the way down the compound to ward X so early in the day.

‘Yes, sir,’ said Neil easily. ‘Sergeant Daggett made an attempt to molest Sergeant Wilson sexually. Sister Langtry fetched us—Sergeant Maynard and myself, that is—to the bathhouse, and we broke it up.’

‘Having seen the actual incident with your own eyes, or only having heard of it from Sister Langtry?’

Neil eyed the colonel with a contempt he didn’t even bother to conceal. ‘Why, having seen it with our own eyes, of course!’ He packed his voice with the nuances of someone forced to pander to an inexplicably prurient interest. ‘Sergeant Wilson must have been surprised in the shower. He was naked, and quite wet. Sergeant Daggett was also naked, but not at all wet. He was, however, in a state of extreme sexual arousal. When Sister Langtry, Sergeant Maynard and myself entered the bathhouse, he was attempting to grapple with Sergeant Wilson, who had dropped into a defensive position to ward him off.’

Neil cleared his throat, looked carefully past the colonel’s shoulder. ‘Luckily Sergeant Wilson had not imbibed very freely of the whisky we just happened to have in our possession last night, otherwise things might have gone a lot harder for him.’

‘All right, all right, that’s quite enough!’ said the colonel sharply, feeling every nuance like a rapier, and the mention of the whisky like a club. ‘Sergeant Maynard, do you agree with Captain Parkinson’s description?’

Benedict looked up for the first time. His face had the strung and drawn weariness of someone who had reached a point of no return, and his eyes were red-rimmed from the whisky. ‘Yes, sir, that’s the way it happened,’ he said, dragging the words out as if he had been sitting there for days concentrating on nothing but those words. ‘Luce Daggett was a blot on the face of the earth. Dirty. Disgusting—’

Matt got up quickly and put his hand unerringly on Benedict’s arm, the grip pulling Benedict to his feet. ‘Come on, Ben,’ he said urgently. ‘Hurry! Take me for a walk. After all that grog last night I don’t feel well.’

Colonel Chinstrap didn’t argue, for a fresh reference to the whisky terrified him. He sat as quietly as a mouse while Benedict led Matt rapidly from the verandah, then turned to Neil again. ‘What happened after your arrival put an end to the incident. Captain?’

‘Sergeant Wilson had a bit of a reaction, sir. You know, the sort of thing that can happen after you’ve been keyed up to fight. He got the shakes, couldn’t breathe properly. It seemed to me better that he go with Sister Langtry, so I suggested to her that she remove Sergeant Wilson from the ward, somewhere like her quarters, right away from Sergeant Daggett. That left Sergeant Daggett without— ah—further temptation during the remainder of the night. It also left him in a state of considerable apprehension, which I freely confess I did rather encourage him to feel. Sergeant Daggett, sir, is not my favorite person.’

At the beginning of this speech Sister Langtry merely watched Neil courteously, but when she heard him tell the colonel it had been his idea to remove Michael from the ward, her eyes widened in surprise, then softened in gratitude. The silly, noble, wonderful man! It would never occur to the colonel to doubt that it had been Neil’s doing; he expected men to take charge and make the decisions. But it also seemed Neil knew very well where she had intended to put Michael for the night, and that gave her pause; had the latter part of the night been written even then on her face,
or
was it just an inspired guess?

‘How was Sergeant Daggett after you returned to the ward, Captain?’ asked the colonel.

‘How was Sergeant Daggett?’ Neil closed his eyes. ‘Oh, much the same as always. An acid-tongued bastard. Not a bit sorry, except for being caught. Full of his usual spite. And carrying on about getting even with us all, but especially with Sister Langtry. Luce detests her.’

So much undisguised dislike of someone dead offended the colonel, until he remembered they didn’t know Luce was dead. He pressed on toward his denouement.

‘Where is Sergeant Daggett now?’ he asked casually.

‘I neither know nor care, sir,’ said Neil. ‘As far as I’m concerned, I would be delirious with joy if he were never to set foot in ward X again.’

‘I see. Well, Captain, you’re honest.’

Everyone could see the colonel trying to make allowances for the precarious emotional balance of the men of X, but when he turned to Nugget his exasperation was beginning to show. ‘Private Jones, you’re sitting there very quietly. Have you anything to add?’

‘Who, sir, me, sir?
I
had a migraine,’ said Nugget importantly. ‘The classical pattern, sir, it really was—you would have been fascinated! A two-day prodroma of lethargy and some dysphasia, followed by an hour-long aura of scotomata in the right visual field, and then a left hemicranial headache. I was as flat as a tack, sir.’ He thought for a moment. ‘Well, flatter, really.’

‘Flashing lights are not called scotomata, Private,’ said the colonel.

‘
Mine
were scotomata,’ said Nugget decisively. ‘They were fascinating, sir! I told you, it wasn’t your minimal migraine by a long shot. If I looked at something big, I saw it all, no trouble. But if I looked at a small bit of the big thing, like a knob on a door or a knothole in the wall. I only saw the left half of the knob or knothole. The right half was—I don’t know! Just not there! Scotomata, sir.’

‘Private Jones,’ said the colonel tiredly, ‘if your knowledge of military matters even remotely equalled your knowledge of your own symptomatology, you’d be a field marshal, and we would have been marching through Tokyo in 1943. When you go back to civilian life, I strongly suggest that you consider studying medicine.’

‘Can’t, sir,’ said Nugget regretfully. ‘I’ve only got me Intermediate. But I am thinking about training as a male nurse, sir. At the Repat.’

‘Well, the world will have lost a Pasteur, perhaps, but it may gain Mister Nightingale instead. You’ll do splendidly, Private Jones.’