Detective-Inspector Jeckels didn’t much care for hospitals, not even one as celebrated as the Fulham Cross. It was the smell of the places that upset him, of cigarette smoke in the loos and dead flowers in the corridors. He still associated smells with his first and last visit to a hospital as a patient. As a small boy, in acute pain, he had been rushed to a country infirmary in the middle of the night where his appendix had been removed promptly by an over-eager junior surgeon, all because the patient had not dared to admit to anyone simply that he had been eating unripe and, even more pertinently, stolen cherries. Though the experience had later helped to make Jeckels a better policeman—and in particular a patient, careful interrogator of frightened subjects—it had done nothing to minimize his dread of hospitals.
He had reached the third floor of the Fulham Cross by the stairways, taking the steps two at a time. This had not only demonstrated his marathon-standard fitness, but had also saved his having to suffer the inevitable whiff of hot dinners in the lift. The Night Sister had made him wait for five minutes before allowing him to go to Lilian Bodworski’s bedside. He had used the interval first to review the all too brief comments passed on by WPC Celia Coates after her own earlier and truncated confrontation with Mrs Bodworski. With time still in hand, he had next gone over his own notes on the evening’s interviews so far, in preparation for typing them out later.
Jeckels may have lacked colour, as well as the fire and sociability that could have improved his chances of further promotion. But he made up for these things, in part at least, with his much to be commended sense of application. As an example, the careful reappraisal of his own notes made at this point so affected the line of questioning he later followed with Mrs Bodworski that it completely altered the police perception of how Ray Bims had come to die.
It was only unfortunate that that perception was inaccurate.
‘Feeling better, are you, Mrs Bodworski?’ the Inspector asked, pulling the plastic and metal chair closer to the bed in the interests of security—although the patient in the next bed appeared to him to be dead, and the one on the other side was wearing earphones. The six-bed side ward had been the first door to the right after he had left the landing and lift area. The nursing station, where Jeckels had been made to wait, was several paces further along the wide central ward corridor.
The side ward had two rows of three beds facing each other. Mrs Bodworski was in a centre bed. The bed across from hers was the only one unoccupied. The walls were painted apple green: Jeckels could have guessed they would be. ‘You look fine,’ he next assured her, and not going strictly by present appearances, except the undamaged parts of her had made him conscious of her attractions—the eyes, the Garboesque face, the perfection of the bare arms, the promise in the outline of her breasts, under the hospital nightgown. He shifted the chair even closer, and caught his breath when he drove his knee against the metal underside of the bed.
‘Let’s hope I’ll be back in one piece soon,’ the patient answered, half smiling, optimism coming through in the tone as strongly as the soft Highland accent. ‘Is there any news of my husband?’ Her hand went to touch the adhesive bandage on her forehead, the palm briefly but purposely shading her eyes. She supposed he could see she had been crying. ‘It wasn’t Stan, you know. Who did this.’ It was why she had consented to see him. She was anxious to put her husband in the clear. She owed him that. She was sure now it couldn’t have been Stan, even if he had found out about Ray Bims. At first, in her confusion, she had thought it could have been him, which is why she had earlier tried to disguise from the doctor how her injuries had been caused.
Less than an hour ago, Dr Fitzmount had told Mrs Bodworski about Bims’s death. It had felt like another blow to her body, as bad as the one that had fractured two of her ribs. That she and Ray had been making passionate love so recently had been the first and illogical reason why she had not been able to credit that he was dead. Later, when she had come to terms with what had happened, it had been just as hard for her to accept that he had taken his own life. Indeed, she felt she knew for certain that it couldn’t have been suicide, even though she had no way of proving it—or had no reason to think that she had.
‘No, I’m afraid there’s nothing yet on Mr Bodworski. But he’ll turn up all right, you’ll see,’ said the Inspector with forced conviction. ‘Most likely he just misunderstood about being in the team tonight. Anyway, we’re doing our best to locate him.’ He noted the dissatisfaction in her face, but before she could express it verbally he continued: ‘Now then, can you tell us who did this to you?’
‘No. No, I can’t. It was dark most of the time. And he … he was wearing a stocking over his face.’
‘And you didn’t recognize him? By his voice? His shape? The way he moved?’
She shook her head.
‘I see. So how did he get in? There’s no sign of a break-in at the flat. Did you open the door to him?’
‘Yes.’
He waited for her to elaborate, but she didn’t. ‘Both doors?’ he questioned, spacing out the two words, while surreptitiously massaging his bruised knee under the bed. ‘Your flat’s on the second floor, and there’s an entryphone on the street door, isn’t there?’ He knew there was. He’d checked again on his way back here, following his call at the Hans Tower Hotel. The flat was in a large block, close to South Kensington tube station.
‘I didn’t hear the voice on the entryphone. Only the buzzer. I … I thought he was someone else. My husband. He’s always losing his keys.’ In truth she had thought it was Ray Bims. He seldom came to the flat, but he could have done this evening. She had been waiting for him to phone, but in the circumstances he might have decided to come in person. If Stan had been playing in the match, he’d have been at Hugon Road by six. He had treatment on his leg from the physiotherapist before every game. Ray knew that.
‘And you opened the door to the flat to him also because you thought it was your husband?’
She nodded, remembering well enough how she hadn’t wanted to keep Ray waiting in the corridor.
‘So what happened next? No rush, Mrs Bodworski.’ He was pleased at the way the interview was going. The woman police constable had put her failure to elicit information down to the victim’s state of shock. Jeckels accepted that, to an extent, except he had read somewhere that a woman in distress was more likely to unburden to a male than to a female police officer.
‘The … oh!’ Mrs Bodworski winced. She had tried to take a deep breath after she started speaking, but the pain to her ribs had prevented her. ‘The … the corridor was nearly dark,’ she began again, then paused for a second, her hand holding her ribcage. ‘He must have taken a bulb out. There’s … there’s usually a light just outside the door. A wall bracket.’ She was breathing more deeply now, but slower. ‘When I opened the door he rushed me. Slammed the door, and pulled me towards him. He held my face to his chest. To stop me screaming, I suppose. And … and I couldn’t see anything after that.’
Jeckels showed surprise. ‘You mean he kept you like that? Close to him?’
‘No. Not after he’d put the hall lights out. The switch is next to the door. Then it was pitch dark. He still had hold of me. I was scared stiff. I didn’t know whether he was going to …’ She stopped again and swallowed. ‘What he was going to do. Then he hit me on the forehead. He was wearing gloves.’
‘Were they wool or—?’
‘Leather with thick ribbing, I think. I’m not sure, though.’
‘What else was he wearing? Besides the stocking and the gloves?’
‘I didn’t have a chance to see.’ She looked puzzled. ‘There was no time.’ Then her expression changed a little. ‘I think he may have been wearing a dark jacket.’
‘Suit jacket or a topcoat of some kind?’
‘Er … topcoat, I should think. But shortish. About knee length. It had a hard feel to it … like oilskin.’
‘Oilskin? Or waxed, was it?’
‘Yes. That’s it. A waxed jacket,’ she came back promptly. ‘With a zip down the front.’
‘Good. Did you notice his shoes?’
‘No. I felt them all right. One of them. When he kicked me. That’s all.’
‘So after he hit you on the forehead?’
‘I screamed. I … I felt then I was falling. That was when he slammed his knee into my ribs. Then I was on the floor. It was after that he kicked me.’
‘So it was three single blows? To your head, your ribs, then the kick to your thigh?’
‘Yes. It was enough too, I can tell you.’
‘I’m sure.’ Inwardly, though, he still wondered why the assailant had stopped when he had. ‘And it all happened while you were still in the hall?’
‘Yes. And then … then he just left. I remember he had to fumble to find the latch. I was praying he’d go. I’d expected …’ She broke off in mid-sentence.
‘What did you expect, Mrs Bodworski?’ Jeckels pressed.
‘I don’t know. That … that he’d hurt me some more. That he’d burgle the flat. Or try to take me with him. It was terrible. Awful.’ Suddenly her words were becoming hurried, her heightened pitch hinting that she was on the verge of an hysterical outburst.
‘Take your time. You’re doing fine,’ Jeckels offered with a smile. ‘So he left without doing anything else?’
She nodded, and reached for a paper tissue to dry the edges of her eyes. ‘I was so relieved. He banged the door after him. I didn’t try to follow. Well, I couldn’t move. I was hurting so much.’
The Night Sister had just appeared from her office opposite the work station in the corridor outside. She was a big, middle-aged, motherly woman with apple-red cheeks and two wedding rings. ‘All right, dear? Not wearing you out, is he?’ she asked Mrs Bodworski brightly, and giving Jeckels a fairly disapproving glance in passing. When the patient responded with a smile the Sister turned her attention to another patient, the one Jeckels thought had probably passed away. ‘That’s all right, then,’ she said, a moment later, more or less to herself after very gently feeling the woman’s pulse. The inert figure hadn’t reacted in any observable way—but the Sister’s action and comment gave the watching Jeckels consolation.
‘There’s a panic button by your front door,’ he said to Mrs Bodworski as the Sister moved to the other side of the ward.
‘I know. But I couldn’t reach it. It was too high up.’
‘I see. And didn’t he speak at all?’
‘No. Not the whole time. Well, I suppose it didn’t take very long. It just seemed like for ever when it was happening.’ She caught her breath.
‘You OK?’ he asked. ‘We can stop if you want, you know?’
‘No. I’d rather get this bit over.’
He leaned forward towards her. ‘Can you tell me, are you sure he didn’t try to … to interfere with you? In any way?’
She smiled in genuine amusement at his embarrassment and his tact. ‘You mean, did he try to rape me? No. Nor even grope me. Nothing like that. It was just … well, hit and run.’
‘And you don’t know yet, of course, whether he stole anything?’
‘No, but I don’t believe he could have. He never left the hall, and there’s nothing much to steal there.’
‘Did something frighten him off, do you think?’
She thought before answering. ‘My hollering maybe?’
‘Nothing else?’ Mrs Bodworski shook her head. ‘And could you judge his height and weight?’ he continued.
‘About the same height as my hus—About five feet nine or ten,’ she corrected herself. ‘But it’s only a guess. I can’t be sure. As for his weight, I’ve really no idea.’
‘When he overpowered you at the start, did he do it by sheer strength, do you think, or more because he took you by surprise?’
‘Both. But more by the surprise, probably. I’ve been thinking about that. About all the things I should have done. I was so scared. He may not have been all that strong. I don’t know.’
‘But you’re sure it was a man?’
‘Of course I’m …’ She stopped in mid-sentence, her face clouding with doubt. ‘No, come to think of it, I suppose I can’t be absolutely sure. I’m just pretty certain it was a man.’
The Inspector nodded. ‘It seems most likely it was.’ He watched her expression carefully as he went on: ‘So is there anyone you can think of who’d want to hurt you? Someone with a big grudge?’
‘Not so far as I know,’ she answered, but her eyes had dropped to study her clenched hands on top of the bedcover. ‘You think it was someone who came intending to beat me up? Not a burglar.’
‘Difficult to say, madam.’ He glanced at his notebook. ‘Well, thanks very much for your help. It must have been a very nasty experience. We’re doing everything we can to find whoever it was. Forensic may turn up with something yet, and it’s more than possible someone saw him.’
‘Thank you.’ She took a painful breath, then rearranged herself on the bed. ‘So is that it?’
‘Yes. On the assault, anyway.’ He ran his tongue around his lips. ‘I was just wondering, though, could you help us as well by answering just a few questions relating to Sir Ray Bims’s death.’ He took her silence to mean consent, and added: ‘I believe you were good friends.’
‘Oh? Who told you that?’ she demanded, evidently on her guard.
‘Quite a few people, as a matter of fact.’
‘He was my boss. I’m Marketing Director of the Eels.’
‘I know that, Mrs Bodworski, yes.’ He turned back several pages of the notebook. ‘I gather you were in Birmingham this morning. On business. Although you’d been expected back at Hugon Road later on.’
‘That’s right. I was at the trade fair. At the opening lunch. It went on a bit. I missed the return train I’d intended to catch. I’d meant to be in the office late afternoon but I didn’t make it. And … and I didn’t ring in to say so because I’d left my telephone behind. I got to the flat around five-thirty.’
‘You originally planned to travel up yesterday evening. To spend the night?’
‘Well, yes, but I—’
‘But you stayed in London instead,’ he interrupted again firmly.
‘Yes.’ She had hesitated before answering.
‘And you spent the night in Room 529 at the Hans Tower Hotel, where you checked in around six last evening. A room was reserved by fax yesterday afternoon for EBR Enterprises, that’s the Eel Bridge Rovers exploitation division, isn’t it? Which you operate as the head of marketing?’
‘That’s right,’ she answered quietly. ‘We use the Hans Tower for business meetings, and for putting up visiting VIPs. Look, I was held up in London last evening. That’s why—’
‘Please understand it’s not your movements we’re interested in, Mrs Bodworski. Honestly it’s not,’ Jeckels broke in once again, anxious, as he had been throughout, not to give her the opportunity to lie to him, because her lying would be counter-productive for both of them, but more especially for him.
‘But my husband will be interested, even if you’re not,’ she answered stonily. ‘He thinks I was in Birmingham.’
‘Well, there’s no reason why we should necessarily have to tell him where you were. It’s Sir Ray’s whereabouts we need to confirm.’ He paused. ‘He was supposed to be in Birmingham last evening too, for a dinner, also to do with the fair. Except he cancelled. We know he went to the Hans Tower directly from Hugon Road and that he was in Room 529 from approximately six-forty, although he wasn’t registered as the occupant. You were.’ When she didn’t respond he went on: ‘There are plenty of other likely witnesses to his movements we can call on, except some of them would be witnesses to the movements of both of you, if you follow me? I’d rather restrict it to you. That way we can keep the whole thing—’
‘Confidential?’ she broke in quickly.
‘For the time being, madam. Perhaps permanently. I can’t promise.’
There was a long pause before she replied. ‘All right. We were there together. But if you knew that already why are you asking me?’
‘You had dinner for two served in the room last night, but you didn’t order breakfast this morning,’ he said, ignoring her question. ‘You signed the bill and checked out of the hotel just before eight, but you left your car in the hotel car park. You’d ordered a taxi to take you to Euston to catch the 8.40 Intercity. That got you to Birmingham International at 10.01. Just as the fair opened. Sir Ray entered the hotel restaurant alone at seven-thirty, and he was joined there by another man shortly after that. They had breakfast together.’
‘The other man was his lawyer,’ she said. ‘Ray had to see him first thing this morning. It’s why he cancelled going to Birmingham yesterday. Why … why we both did,’ she ended, staring blankly into space.
‘Thank you. What we need you to confirm is that Sir Ray was with you in the room from the time he arrived at the hotel last evening till he left you there at seven-thirty this morning.’
‘Oh God.’ She closed her hands over her face, then opened them again. ‘Yes, he was. And his car was in the hotel garage.’
‘We know that, madam, yes. But it’s still possible he could have left the hotel and returned again without using the car.’
‘Well, he didn’t. We were together … the whole time.’ There were tears welling in her eyes. ‘You’re not going to tell my husband any of this?’
‘Not unless it becomes absolutely necessary, Mrs Bodworski, and I don’t believe it should be.’ He was embarrassed as she began to weep, but grateful at least that she did so silently—otherwise it might have alerted the Night Sister and got him into trouble. ‘Speaking about your husband, were you aware that Sir Ray Bims had instructed he should be dropped from the Eels? Put on the transfer list?’
She stopped sobbing and her face was suffused by a look of shock and total disbelief. ‘That’s a lie,’ she uttered. ‘A dirty lie. Who told you that?’