Take My Life (5 page)

He began to swear and cry out, waving his hands as if there was someone to see, while in there he knew the flames were crackling at him – leaping and vanishing in smoke, and licking and leaping again.

Then his wits returned and he swung round and plunged back clumsily into the blazing room.

Nick Talbot had been walking for hours – or so it seemed. The mist was a bit thicker and he had lost his bearings. The cut on his forehead had dried for a while, but now it had broken out afresh. He had thought several times of going home, but each time his feelings had stopped him. Now, when he would gladly have gone home and put an end to the quarrel, he could not find his way. He had wandered into a poor district and as usual when one was wanted there was not a sigh of a taxi.

Under the white vapour of a street light he stared at the handkerchief with which he had been dabbing his forehead and saw fresh blood on it.

A few yards back he had passed a small chemist's shop with a lighted sign on the door. He turned back and went in.

The shop bell clanged, and after a moment a thin, spectacled, furtive man stood up behind the counter dusting cigarette ash off his sleeves.

‘Yes?' he said in an uncharitable voice.

‘I want you to look at my forehead. I've had a slight accident.'

The chemist came round on creaking shoes.

‘Hm. Bend down. Under the light, will you?'

He examined the cut, sniffing for the smell of whisky on his customer's breath.

‘I cant do anything to
that
. Did you fall?'

‘Er – yes. This mist, you know.'

The man smiled humourlessly.

‘Well, it's more than I can manage. You'll need a stitch or two.'

Nick shifted. ‘Can't you make it stop bleeding?'

‘Sorry, no. I wouldn't touch it. You'd be left with a nasty scar. It's not in my line. The Fitzroy Street Hospital is just around the corner. There's always a night staff there.'

‘Which way do I go?'

‘First on the left, and first on the left again. Two minutes' walk, that's all.'

‘Thank you,' Talbot said, picking up his hat.

The fire had been out twenty minutes, but there was still a thin ceiling of smoke in the room. The acrid smell of burnt blankets and leather was not quite strong enough to drown a more unpleasant smell. Everything was disordered, ornaments lay in the fireplace, chairs were overturned. There were people about the room, Mike Grieve sitting in a corner telling it all a third time to a sergeant of police with a bad cold, another policeman by the half-open door. Something still lay on the bed covered by a half-burnt sheet.

Through the door came the voice of Ma Grieve on a monotonous note of complaint.

‘Always when I go out. Why wasn't I 'ere? Why wasn't I 'ere? If you leave
'im
in charge, well, you can always depend on it … Always somefing. Only last week Mr Allisotti overflowed the bath …'

A second constable came into the room, a littie short of breath with the stairs.

‘Inspector Archer's here, Sergeant And the Divisional Surgeon. They've made quick time.'

‘Good,' said the sergeant, pushing back his big hat, and blew his nose.

Footsteps sounded, and Inspector Archer came in with Dr Frederick at his heels. Archer was a big tidy man going grey, he looked like a respectable merchant with a wife and five children in Hammersmith. He had deep-set eyes and rather small soft hands with the nails cut close.

The sergeant got up, putting away his handkerchief. ‘ 'Morning, sir. 'Morning. We've been careful to touch nothing. Beyond, that is, what we were forced to handle making sure the fire was out. And the corpse …'

‘All through the blitz,' came Mrs Grieve's voice. ‘ Not a window broke. Only one perishin' fire-bomb on the roof. An' now this. It makes you curdle …'

Archer said: ‘Who's this man?'

‘The landlord. He says he was out at the time.'

‘ 'Course I was out,' Grieve said sulkily. ‘There's twenty people at the White Horse can prove it.'

‘Get the stairs cleared, will you,' said Archer. ‘ People back in their own rooms and onlookers out of the house.'

They moved over to the bed. Delicately, with finger and thumb, Archer pulled back a corner of the sheet. He pursed his lips a little with a moue of distaste. Dr Frederick pulled the sheet right back. They bent to examine the body.

There was silence for a time.

Then Grieve shifted in his seat and said: ‘He'd mebbe be about six foot, this man. ‘‘ 'Night,'' I says to him, me being civil. ‘‘ 'Night,'' he says. That's all. Then out he goes with his 'and to his 'ead.'

Archer turned from the body and glanced at Grieve with narrowed assessing eyes. He seemed to take the speaker in from head to foot.

‘What's this about a man?'

The sergeant told him.

Archer continued to stare at Grieve. ‘What's wrong with your hands?'

‘Scorched 'em putting out the fire. So has my missus. She came in just as I was putting it out.'

‘Did she see this man?'

‘Lord, no. He was gone afore ever I come up the stairs.'

‘Would you recognize him again?'

‘Mebbe. I didn't see'is face all that plain: but mebbe I'd reckernize him if I was to see 'im close.'

The inspector took a deep thoughtful breath and allowed it slowly to escape as his glance came back to the notes the sergeant had offered him. Then he turned to the doctor, who had straightened up.

‘Well, Frederick?'

‘She's been dead about half an hour,' Frederick said in a low voice. ‘I think she's been strangled.'

Archer's eyes wandered round the room. ‘Looks as if there was a bit of a struggle, eh?'

‘Lucky the fire was put out. In another ten minutes it would have destroyed everything.'

Archer's eyes rested again on Grieve, then passed on.

‘Badly burned, isn't she?'

‘Features and hair, yes. She might be difficult to identify.'

‘Fortunately that will only be a formality. Hm, Mr Grieve, how long has this Miss Rusman been with you?'

‘Three weeks last Friday. That's all. Never seen her afore then. Never seen her. Don't know where she comes from nor nothing.'

‘Is there a telephone near here?'

‘Next door, sir,' said one of the constables. ‘ That's where I telephoned from.'

‘Well, take this description, have it circulated, see. Get it round as soon as possible to all hospitals, etc. There's just a chance it might help … It's a long chance, but still …'

‘Yes, sir.' The constable went out. Archer plucked at his lip.

‘Where's her case?' he said. ‘Her belongings and things.'

‘Most of them have been burnt,' the sergeant said, pointing to a mass of ashes and charred material behind the bed.

‘Wonder if they went by accident or design. Sergeant, you'd better get this man out of here.'

‘There's this,' said Dr Frederick. ‘ It was round her neck. It looks as if it might open.'

Archer stared at the little gold heart-shaped locket. He tried to get his broad thumbnail into a possible nick. Then he saw a press-catch as small as a pin-head and squeezed it. The locket swung open on hinges.

Inside was a small photograph of the head and shoulders of a man. It was not very clear, but quite clear enough to be circulated and to be recognized if by any chance the police should catch up with him.

He had found the ‘ night staff', and the worst was over. At least the two stitches were in, and this harsh stinging would stop in time.

An elderly porter with a stiff leg had let him in, grudgingly, through a very-slow-widening crack in the door, and then had led him in a cloud of strong tobacco smoke up a long stone passage and into a room where they had found a young nurse and a younger doctor just finishing a meal of scrambled eggs and coffee. The doctor, called Harris, and the nurse, called Green, had quickly put on a professional manner, through which their youth and inexperience continued to stick out like bones through an ill-fitting coat.

While the business was in process he had refrained, in the interests of his own peace of mind, from asking too many questions – it was better not to know than to know what he wryly suspected – but at this stage he said:

‘Done this job before?'

‘What?' said the doctor, looking up quickly. ‘What d'you mean?'

‘This your first accident casualty?'

‘Good Lord, no. What makes you think that?'

Nick said: ‘You're very young. I thought you couldn't have been at the job long.'

‘Over six weeks now.'

Nick winced slightiy. ‘Think you've made a nice neat darn of it?'

‘Lovely,' said Dr Harris, and glanced idly at the nurse as she left the room. ‘ Couldn't have done it better if I'd got my fellowship. As pretty a job as I ever saw. There was no glass in the wound, by the way. Did you say it was a car accident?'

Talbot had mumbled the first excuse that had come into his head.

‘Taxi skidded into a lamp standard,' he said discouragingly.

But the young doctor was not curious. ‘Lucky you didn't overturn, I was in a little MG sports once on the Brighton road. We were taking a corner at about sixty-eight when a tyre burst. Lucky for us –'

Nurse Green had come back. ‘You're wanted on the phone.'

‘Who, me?' said the doctor. ‘Who wants me?'

‘They didn't say.'

‘Lucky for us there were no cars ahead,' said Harris, retreating towards the door. ‘We skidded twice round without taking a wheel off the road, went through a gate and ran into a cow. It stopped us dead. A good piece of driving, you know.'

‘What happened to the cow?' asked Nick.

‘Oh, the farmer was insured,' said the young man as he disappeared.

Nick was left to think about Philippa for a few moments. Fitzroy Street was not really so far from the flat and he could be home in under ten minutes. Put an end to this silly squabble once and for all …

‘Can I pay for this job?' he said to the nurse, who was tidying up on the table.

‘No, thanks, it's on the house.' She smiled. ‘But there's a box for the Waifs and Strays at the door as you go out – that's if you feel inclined.'

Talbot smiled back at her. ‘Right. Thank you.'

Harris came back. He came slowly in, shutting the door after him, and slowly across in the direction of Nick.

‘Anything important?' asked the nurse.

‘Um? Oh … er – no. No, nothing much.' The young man looked absent-minded. In a queer voice he said to Talbot: ‘ Let's see; where was I?'

‘You'd just killed a cow,' Nick said.

‘Yes … Ha, ha! Yes, I had, hadn't I? Well, I tell you we were – er – lucky, don't you think, to get off without even – er – a cut finger. Luckier than you, and I expect – er – our crash was much more of a crash than yours.' He gazed hopefully at Nurse Green, who gazed back at him.

There was a moment's unproductive silence.

‘Yes, we were certainly lucky,' said Harris, clinching the matter.

‘Suppose you finish this bandage,' Nick reminded him gently.

‘Yes. Oh, yes.' The young surgeon moved over to him and seemed somehow more confident now that he had his fingers on his patient's head. ‘Let me see. Better put on a bit more to keep it quite dry. Pass me the bandage, nurse.'

‘Don't you think –'

But he interrupted her. ‘Pass me the bandage, please.'

Patiently, and with no more said, Nick accepted another wrapping.

But if Dr Harris had seemed faintly uncertain before, now his fingers were really clumsy and unprofessional. First he got the bandage on and then apparently did not like the look of it, for he unwound it again and began afresh. Even this did not satisfy him, and presently Talbot began to stir under his treatment. What did it matter whether the thing was just so? Philippa herself would make a better job of it when he got home: she had done lots of such work in the camp where she had been interned so long.

‘Don't forget I want to get my hat on,' he said, rising at last. ‘Thank you very much for all your help.' He glanced at Nurse Green's flushed face. ‘What's the matter?'

‘Nothing,' she said. ‘Nothing at all.'

‘Best thing we can do,' Harris said, ‘ is to telephone for a taxi for you. Then you can be driven straight home.'

Nick felt his bandages. It seemed a good job after all. ‘ Thanks, I'll walk. The rain has stopped.'

‘Oh, you shouldn't do that. Worst thing possible after shock.'

‘I'll risk it.'

He was moving towards the door when the doctor said: ‘ Just a moment. There's a frayed end to the bandage. I'll cut it off.'

Impatiently Nick suffered this last attention; and while it was being done there was the sound of a car drawing up outside. Because they were so close together he caught a curious effect of the doctor's breathing, as if breath which had been held was being slowly let out.

‘Another casualty?' Nick asked, gingerly trying on his hat.

The question was met with a cautious smile. ‘Perhaps it's going to be a busy night.'

Nick said: ‘Well, I'll make way for the next case. Thanks a lot for your help.'

He went to the door and turned into the long stone passage. As he did so the door opened at the other end and the porter came limping along in company with two other men. One was a uniformed policeman.

They met half-way down and seemed to fill the passage.

‘Good evening,' said one man, looking beyond Nick, ‘Are you Dr Harris?'

Nick half turned and saw that the young surgeon had followed him.

‘Yes,' said Harris. ‘Yes. I … you telephoned and I thought …'

‘Very good of you. Thanks. Pardon me a moment, sir.'