Death of an Expert Witness (19 page)

"You said nothing about the incident?"

"No, sir."

"Was this typical of Dr. Lorrimer's behaviour?"

"No, sir. But he hadn't been looking well in recent weeks. I think he's been under some strain."

"And you've no idea what kind of strain?"

"No, sir."

"Had he enemies?"

"Not to my knowledge, sir."

"So you've no idea who might have wanted him dead?"

"No, sir."

"After the discovery of Dr. Lorrimer's body, Dr. Howarth sent you with Miss Foley to check that his bunch of keys were in the security cupboard. Will you describe exactly what you and she did?"

"Miss Foley opened the cupboard. She and the Director are the only two people who know the combination."

"And you watched?"

"Yes, sir, but I can't remember the figures. I watched her twisting and setting the dial."

"And then?"

"She took out the metal cash box and opened it. It wasn't locked. The keys were inside."

"You were watching her closely all the time, Inspector? Are you absolutely sure that Miss Foley couldn't have replaced the keys in the box without your seeing?"

"No, sir. That would have been quite impossible."

"One last thing, Inspector. When you went up to the body Miss Pridmore was here alone. She told me that she's virtually certain that no one could have slipped out of the Laboratory during that time. Have you considered that possibility?"

"That he might have been here all night, sir? Yes. But he wasn't hiding in the Chief Liaison Officer's room because I would have seen him when I went to turn off the internal alarm. That's the room closest to the front door. I suppose he could have been in the Director's Office, but I don't see how he could have crossed the hall and opened the door without Miss Pridmore noticing even if she were in a state of shock. It isn't as if the door were ajar. He'd have had to turn the Yale lock."

"And you are absolutely certain that your own set of keys never left your possession last night?"

"I'm certain, sir."

"Thank you, Inspector. That's all for the present. Would you please ask Mr. Middlemass to come in?"

The Document Examiner strolled into the office with easy assurance, arranged his long body without invitation in Howarth's armchair, crossed his right ankle over his left knee and raised an interrogatory eyebrow at Dalgliesh like a visitor expecting nothing from his host but boredom, but politely determined not to show it. He was wearing dark-brown corduroy slacks, a fawn turtle necked sweater in fine wool and bright purple socks with leather slip-on shoes. The effect was of a de gage informality, but Dalgliesh noticed that the slacks were tailored, the sweater cashmere, and the shoes handmade. He glanced down at Middlemass's statement of his movements since seven o'clock the previous evening. Unlike the efforts of his colleagues, it was written with a pen, not a Biro, in a fine, high, italic script, which succeeded in being both decorative and virtually illegible. It was not the kind of hand he had expected. He said: "Before we get down to this, could you tell me about your quarrel with Lorrimer?"

"My version of it, you mean, as opposed to Mrs. Bidwell's?"

"The truth, as opposed to speculation."

"It wasn't a particularly edifying episode, and I can't say I'm proud of it. But it wasn't important.

I'd just started on the clunch pit murder case when I heard Lorrimer coming out of the washroom. I had a private matter I wanted a word about so I called him in. We talked, quarrelled, he struck out at me and I reacted with a punch to his nose. It bled spectacularly over my overall. I apologized. He left."

"What was the quarrel about? A woman?"

"Well, hardly, Commander, not with Lorrimer. I think Lorrimer knew that there were two sexes but I doubt whether he approved of the arrangement. It was a small private matter, something which happened a couple of years ago. Nothing to do with this Lab."

"So we have the picture of your settling down to work on an exhibit from a murder case, an important exhibit since you chose to examine it yourself. You are not, however, so absorbed in this task that you can't listen to footsteps passing the door and identify those of Lorrimer. It seems to you a convenient moment to call him in and discuss something which happened two years ago, something which you've apparently been content to forget in the interim, but which now so incenses you both that you end by trying to knock each other down."

"Put like that, it sounds eccentric."

"Put like that, it sounds absurd."

"I suppose it was absurd in a way. It was about a cousin of my wife's, Peter Ennalls. He left school with two "A' levels in science and seemed keen on coming into the Service. He came to me for advice and I told him how to go about it. He ended up as an S.O. under Lorrimer in the Southern Lab. It wasn't a success. I don't suppose it was entirely Lorrimer's fault, but he hasn't got the gift of managing young staff. Ennalls ended up with a failed career, a broken engagement and what is euphemistically described as a nervous breakdown. He drowned himself. We heard rumours about what had happened at the Southern.

It's a small service and these things get around. I didn't really know the boy; my wife was fond of him.

"I'm not blaming Lorrimer for Peter's death. A suicide is always ultimately responsible for his own destruction. But my wife believes that Lorrimer could have done more to help him. I telephoned her after lunch yesterday to explain that I'd be late home and our conversation reminded me that I'd always meant to speak to Lorrimer about Peter. By coincidence I heard his footsteps. So I called him in with the result that Mrs. Bidwell has no doubt graphically described. Mrs. Bidwell, I don't doubt, detects a woman at the bottom of any male quarrel. And if she did talk about a woman or a telephone call, then the woman was my wife and the telephone call was the one I've told you about."

It sounded plausible, thought Dalgliesh. It might even be the truth.

The Peter Ennalls story would have to be checked. It was just another chore when they were already hard-pressed and the truth of it was hardly in doubt. But Middlemass had spoken in the present tense:

"Lorrimer hasn't got the gift of managing junior staff." Were there, perhaps, junior staff closer to home who had suffered at his hands? But he decided to leave it for now. Paul Middlemass was an intelligent man. Before he made a more formal statement he would have time to ponder about the effect on his career of putting his signature to a lie. Dalgliesh said:

"According to this statement you were playing the part of a hobby-horse for the morris dancers at yesterday evening's village concert. Despite this, you say you can't give the name of anyone who could vouch for you. Presumably both the dancers and the audience could see the hobbyhorse galumphing around, but not you inside it. But wasn't anyone there when you arrived at the hall, or when you left?"

"No one who saw me to recognize me. It's a nuisance but it can't be helped. It happened rather oddly. I'm not a morris-dancer. I don't normally go in for these rustic rites and village concerts aren't my idea of entertainment. It was the Senior Liaison Officer's show, Chief Inspector Martin, but he had the chance of this U.S.A.

visit unexpectedly and asked me to deputize. We're about the same size and I suppose he thought that the outfit would fit me. He needed someone fairly broad in the shoulders and strong enough to take the weight of the head: I owed him a favour--he had a tactful word with one of his mates on highway patrol when I was caught speeding a month ago--so I couldn't very well not oblige.

"I went to a rehearsal last week and all it amounted to was, as you say, galumphing round the dancers after they'd done their stuff, snapping my jaws at the audience, frisking my tail and generally making a fool of myself. That hardly seemed to matter since no one could recognize me. I'd no intention of spending the whole evening at the concert, so I asked Bob Gotobed, he's the leader of the troupe, to give me a ring from the hall about fifteen minutes before we were due to go on. We were scheduled to appear after the interval and they reckoned that that would be about eight thirty. The concert, as you've probably been told, started at seven-thirty."

"And you stayed working in your lab until the call came?"

"That's right. My S.O. went out and got me a couple of beef and chutney sandwiches and I ate them at my desk. Bob phoned at eight-fifteen to say that they were running a bit ahead of time and that I'd better come over. The lads were dressed and were proposing to have a beer in the Moonraker. The hall hasn't a licence, so all the audience get in the interval is coffee or tea served by the Mothers' Union. I left the Lab at, I suppose, about eight-twenty."

"You say here that Lorrimer was alive then as far as you know?"

"We know that he was alive twenty-five minutes later, if his dad is right about the telephone call. But actually I think I saw him. I went out of the front door because that's the only exit but I had to go round the back to the garages to get my car. The light was on then in the Biology Department and I saw a figure in a white coat move briefly across the window. I can't swear that it was Lorrimer. I can only say that it never occurred to me at the time that it wasn't. And I knew, of course, that he must be in the building. He was responsible for locking up and he was excessively tedious about security. He wouldn't have left without checking on all the departments, including Document Examination."

"How was the front door locked?"

"Only with the Yale and a single bolt. That's what I expected. I let myself out."

"What happened when you got to the hall?"

"To explain that I'll have to describe the architectural oddities of the place. It was put up cheaply five years ago by the village builder and the committee thought they'd save money by not employing an architect. They merely told the chap that they wanted a rectangular hall with a stage and two dressing rooms and lavatories at one end, and a reception hall, cloakroom and a room for refreshments ai the other. It was built by Harry Gotobed and his sons. Harry is a pillar of the Chapel and a model of Nonconformist rectitude. He doesn't hold with the theatre, amateur or otherwise, and I think they had some difficulty in persuading him even to build a stage. But he certainly didn't intend to have any communicating door between the male and female dressing rooms. As a result what we've got is a stage with two rooms behind, each with its separate lavatory. There's an exit at each side into the graveyard, and two doors on to the stage, but there's literally no common space behind the stage. As a result the men dress in the right-hand dressing-room and come on to the stage from the prompt side, and the women from the left. Anyone who wants to enter from the opposite side has to leave the dressing-room, scurry in their costume and probably in the rain through the graveyard and, if they don't trip over a gravestone, break their ankle, or fall into an open grave, finally make a triumphant, if damp, appearance on the proper side."

Suddenly he threw back his head and gave a shout of laughter, then recovered himself and said:

"Sorry, poor taste. It's just that I was remembering last year's performance by the dramatic society. They'd chosen one of those dated domestic comedies where the characters spend most of their time in evening dress making snappy small talk. Young Bridie Corrigan from the general store played the maid. Scurrying through the churchyard she thought she saw old Maggie Gotobed's ghost. She made her entrance screaming, cap awry, but remembered her part sufficiently to gasp:

"Holy Mother of God, dinner is served!" Whereat the cast trooped dutifully off stage, the men to one side and the women to the other.

Our hall adds considerably to the interest of the performances I can tell you."

"So you went to the right-hand dressing room?"

"That's right. It was a complete shambles. The cast have to hang up their outdoor coats as well as keeping the costumes there. There's a row of coat hooks and a bench down the middle of the room, one rather small mirror and space for two people only to make up simultaneously.

The single hand basin is in the lavatory. Well, no doubt you'll be looking at the place for yourself. Last night it was chaotic with outdoor coats, costumes, boxes and props piled on the bench and overflowing on to the floor. The hobby-horse costume was hanging on one of the pegs, so I put it on."

"There was no one there when you arrived?"

"No one in the room, but I could hear someone in the lavatory. I knew that most of the troupe were over at the Moonraker. When I had got myself into the costume the lavatory door opened and Harry Sprogg, he's a member of the troupe, came out. He was wearing his costume."

Massingham made a note of the name: Harry Sprogg. Dalgliesh asked:

"Did you speak?"

"I didn't. He said something about being glad I'd made it and that the chaps were over at the Moonraker. He said he was just going to dig them out. He's the only tee totaller of the party so I suppose that's why he didn't go over with them. He left and I followed him out into the cemetery."

"Without having spoken to him?"

"I can't remember that I said anything. We were only together for about a couple of seconds. I followed him out because the dressing-room was stuffy--actually it stank--and the costume was extraordinarily heavy and hot. I thought I'd wait outside where I could join the boys when they came across from the pub. And that's what I did."