Dying in the Wool (26 page)

‘Dunno about that. Is he likely to play the good Samaritan if I topple off my bike in front of him?’

I smiled at the image. Sykes would do it too, in the line of duty. ‘If you come a cropper on your bike, he might put it down to the demon drink. All right. I’ll have another go, perhaps I’ll pay a social call on the Wilsons and see whether I can’t draw him out. You might have another word with the dyeworkers, since you’ve chummed up with them.’

I didn’t know how I would fit in my interviews in the short time available before I had to leave the Braithwaites, go home, and pack a trunk – ready to travel to London with my mother for Aunt Berta’s party. Investigation or not, my life wouldn’t be worth living if I absented myself from that most important of annual engagements.

*

Dr Alex Fraser was a short man with a kindly lived-in face. His wavy dark hair was parted in the centre and reached almost to the collar of his white coat. We discovered that he and Gerald once met at a medical conference, and he was sorry to hear that Gerald had not survived the war. However, this did not make him inclined to accede to my request for information.

The coroner had ordered a post mortem on Kellett. Dr Fraser, as the local pathologist, had completed that post mortem.

He tapped his pencil on the desk and said, ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Shackleton. I pass on my findings to the coroner. What he does then is up to him.’

There was blunt Scottish stubbornness in his manner, a reluctance to break the rules. If I did not tread carefully, he would suddenly find an immediate pressing engagement and I would be out on my ear. I tried for fellow-feeling and sympathy.

‘I’m acting for the widow. It was to me she confided her fears about poisoning after she described her husband’s last moments. Having been married to a doctor, I know you have to follow procedures, but she hasn’t slept since his death. If I could have some information …’

He shook his head. ‘The widow can attend the inquest.’

‘That won’t be before Easter. In her state of health, I fear for her if I can’t put her mind at rest.’

There was a slight relaxing around his eyes. ‘You’re not related to the Kelletts are you?’

That’s what I should have claimed, but I did not look or sound like the daughter of a dyeworker.

Keep pushing.

I summoned my most tragic look. ‘I have a letter of authorisation from Mrs Kellett, saying that I am acting on her behalf.’

‘May I see it?’

‘Of course.’ I looked in my bag. I put my hands in my pockets, and tutted. ‘It’s in the car.’

He waited.

Damn him.

‘I’ll get it.’

I walked along the corridor and turned towards the way out, knowing I had no writing paper with me. A door opened and a nurse emerged. The room beyond her exhaled the whiff of stale tobacco and stewed tea. I went in. A young nurse sat turning the pages of a magazine.

Mustering my best hospital manner, I asked her for a pen and paper. ‘I need to write a note for matron.’

The nurse obligingly found me pen and paper. In for a penny. Mrs Kellett, in her clear round hand, asked that Mrs Kate Shackleton be allowed to view the body, and to know the cause of death, was it poison?

I shivered as Dr Fraser and I entered the mortuary, passing tables where bodies lay covered with white sheets.

He shot me a quizzical look. ‘You understand this is in confidence, and for the widow’s information only?’

‘Of course.’

‘So was it you raised the alert over the stomach contents?’

‘Mrs Kellett had suspicions. Mr Kellett was good at his job. She couldn’t credit that lapse of attention. She also smelled something unfamiliar on his breath. His last breath, poor man.’

‘And the widow told you, and you told the police.’

‘Yes.’

We reached the farthest table. Fraser hesitated, his hand on the sheet.

‘Dr Fraser, I was in the VAD for four years.’

‘Yes. I guessed you were. Funny how one can always tell.’

He lifted the sheet as far as Kellett’s stomach. A long scar marked where the scalpel had cut. Large, untidy stitches put him together again.

I looked at the body that had been Paul Kellett. His dark hair was matted, his eyes mercifully closed. It did not seem like him at all, this sculpted shape, the colour of dark moss. In my photograph, he had held pride of place among the dyeworkers, important and full of life.

‘Was he taking anything for toothache do you know?’ Fraser asked.

The question seemed ludicrous. This poor husk of a man was so far beyond a mere toothache.

‘I don’t know. Why do you ask?’

‘With a body in this state, I may not have done an analysis of stomach contents, except to try and establish the time of death, digested food and so on.’

He drew the sheet to Kellett’s chin, paused for a moment then covered his head, almost as if it would prevent the dead man hearing his pronouncement. ‘He’d eaten a cheese and pickle sandwich and a pork pie, drunk beer – difficult to say how much. I also found a quantity of morphia, and of
Gelseminum sempervirens
.’

There was a neat darn in the sheet at the level of Kellett’s chin. I had the absurd feeling that I ought to make some gesture, touch his arm, or say something. Sorry you never got to Bradford-on-Sea.

We walked back across the tiled floor. I waited until the mortuary doors swung closed behind us before asking, ‘What is
Gelseminum sempervirens
? Why might he have taken that, and morphia?’

‘Come back to my office and I’ll explain.’

We returned to the windowless room. He pulled out a chair for me. ‘Haven’t written my report for the coroner yet, so when you speak to the widow, tell her that the smell on his breath may have been … Tell her that her suspicions will be taken note of. I expect she’ll know what he was taking. Why I asked you if he’d had toothache – some people take
gel sem
as a pain relief for neuralgia or toothache.’

‘What is it?’

‘Tincture of
Gelseminum sempervirens
– it’s the dried root and rhizome of yellow jasmine. The effects resemble those of nicotine, but with a stronger depression of the nervous system. Usually a patient would take the dose incrementally. I would prescribe forty minims. I’d say there was about two hundred minims in Mr Kellett’s gut. He’s not a giant of a man. People’s tolerance to drugs is variable, but combining
gel sem
with morphia wasn’t the smartest thing he ever did.’

‘And what would be the effects – of the
gel sem
?’

‘Giddiness, difficult eye accommodation, headaches, diarrhoea, and possibly severe depression. Now if you combine that with morphia …’ He shook his head. ‘He’d probably dropped off to sleep. The miracle is he came to at all.’

I took the photograph of him and his fellow dyeworkers from my brief case. ‘There he is – just days ago. Full of life. Why would he have taken morphia?’

He picked up the photograph and looked at it closely. ‘My guess is that he had a good deal of pain from the amputation.’

‘Poor Kellett.’

‘Foolish Kellett, if he overdosed himself.’

‘Is that likely?’

He slid the photograph back to me. ‘Some people can bear pain more easily than others. It can be intermittent too. That injury to his left arm, and his claw of a hand, there’s no knowing how much gyp that gave him. It could be that he dosed himself on morphia, when it gave him trouble. A lot of old soldiers do. Now if on top of that he had jaw ache and someone said “try this”, and gave him a twist of
gel sem,
he might well have taken it. But that will be for the coroner and an inquest to decide. Mine’s the easy part of analysis and report. The drugs aren’t the cause of death. That was the scalding from the exploding dye in the tank, the shock of cold water afterwards and heart failure.
It’s a blessed relief for him he died. There wouldn’t have been much anyone could have done for him in that state.’

My mouth felt dry. For a moment we were silent.

‘Regarding the morphia, Dr Fraser. Do you believe he may have been an addict?’

‘It’s possible. I can’t see it from his eyes in the photograph, but it’s possible.’

‘Would that be an expensive habit?’

He nodded. ‘Could be.’

‘So Mrs Kellett could be right. Someone may have laced his food or drink, knowing what effect it would have, and hoping the death would be passed off as a tragic accident.’

‘That’s not for me to say. I only report my findings. It’s possible it was self-administered. Though if the wifey’s right, she might have to answer awkward questions as to who made him the cheese and pickle sandwich and who drew the beer for him.’

I put the photograph back in my bag.

He gave me a curious glance. ‘How do you come to know Mrs Kellett?’

‘It’s a long story.’

‘I’ve time for a short break, if you’d like to tell it.’

I took a seat in the canteen while Dr Fraser went up to the counter.

He came back with a tray. ‘This was the only cake they had I’m afraid.’

‘It’s fine. I like seedcake. Tell me, would a person know if he had been slipped a drug?’

‘Taste. Though that could be disguised in food. Of course if he lies there unable to move and at the mercy of whoever administered it, he might begin to guess.’

‘The symptoms you mentioned, headache, not focusing and so on, they could easily be mistaken for something else?’

Fraser nodded. ‘Inebriation, concussion … What do you have in mind?’

He broke off a piece of seedcake and popped it in his mouth.

‘I’m not sure.’

‘You’re not just a friend of the family are you?’

‘Not only that, no.’

‘What?’

‘I’m a private investigator.’

That was the first time I had said the words aloud. It felt good. But for how long would it feel good if I couldn’t come up with more answers than questions?

Shedding, picking, beating-up. – three primary motions in weaving.

Saturday. Time for me to depart. I had to go home, pack my finery and be ready to travel with my mother to London. Sykes had tried to reassure me, saying I would see matters with a fresh eye on my return. I was not convinced.

Long before the Braithwaite household stirred, I drew the Indian shawl around my shoulders and sat in the window seat looking out over the fells. The more I found out, the less I knew about what might have happened to Joshua Braithwaite. The pieces of the jigsaw just did not fit. What was I missing?

Yesterday evening, I had intended to speak to Lizzie Kellett, but she had more visitors offering their condolences. This morning might be the best time to see her, before any more neighbours called to pay their respects. I would run the risk of waking her, but would take that chance.

Soon enough police officers from HQ would be calling on her with questions about the morphia and
Gelseminum sempervirens
. I preferred to get there first, before they frightened her out of her wits.

Lizzie’s curtains were still drawn, but that didn’t signify she slept. She would keep her curtains closed until after her husband’s burial. I tapped on the door.

The cat came scurrying from further down the beck, carrying something in its mouth that wriggled. It waited for the door to open. After a moment, the cat gave up and stalked off in disgust. I tapped again, and then pushed the door gently. It opened just a little. Something was stopping it.

That ‘something’ was Lizzie Kellett.

She lay at the bottom of the steep stone stairs, her legs on the first step, as if she had tripped. She rested on her front, her head turned sideways, left cheek resting against the flagged floor. Because of her position, the right side of her face was pushed into a contorted leer. All colour had gone from her. Her face had the alabaster hue of a figure on a church tomb. Pale-blue veins mapped her hands and wrists. Her clenched left fist made a claw. The fingers of her right hand splayed flat. She looked more human than any of us could ever be, in that way that an unformed fledgling fallen from its nest is more a bird than some faraway eagle.

The long black skirt was rucked up above her knees, revealing wrinkled brown lisle stockings.

Slowly, I closed the door and retraced my steps along the path.

Constable Mitchell looked his age that morning. He was hastily buttoning himself into his jacket after hearing my news. ‘Are you sure she’s dead?’

‘Quite sure, otherwise I would have pushed the door further open and gone in to see whether I could revive her. You’ll see for yourself.’

‘I’ll be there straight away. There is something you could do for me, Mrs Shackleton.’

‘Anything at all.’

‘Could you bear to take her photograph?’

‘Yes of course.’

‘Then would you bring your camera to the cottage?’

‘I’ll go for it straight away and meet you there.’