The sergeant stole a look at his watch. Strictly speaking, he was at the disposal of the deputy coroner, but Thompson seemed to lack courage to break away from the reminiscences of his elderly colleague. That was the trouble with doctors, Malley told himself. They’d cheerfully knife one another at a safe distance, but as long as an outsider was looking on they were too busy being mutually respectful to bloody breathe.
“Shocking business, young Meadow passing away like that,” observed Dr James. It was the fourth time he had made the remark since he had held a mirror that morning to the lips of the peaceful and still handsome corpse in the hospital morgue and murmured: “Gone, by Jove—not a glimmer.”
Dr Thompson’s sigh was a fraction too vigorous to have been prompted by sympathy, but old James did not appear to notice.
“Better than lingering after a stroke, though, some might say. I don’t know. Very difficult question. My word —what a cramped little office this is. Don’t you find it cramped, eh? I’ll bet the sergeant here does.” Unexpectedly, the old man grinned.
Malley smiled back and seized his opportunity.
“I rather think they’ll be expecting me back at Fen Street,” he said quietly to Thompson, “but there is just one thing, sir, I’d like to be clear about when I see the inspector.”
“And what is that, sergeant?”
The deputy coroner, too, had lowered his voice. He was nervous lest anything they said should elicit further reminiscence from old James.
“I take it as definitely your opinion that there shouldn’t be an inquest. Is that right, sir?”
Thompson stiffened. “Of course it’s right. Why shouldn’t it be?”
“I just wanted to be sure, sir.”
Dr James glanced sharply across at them.
“Sure about what?”
“Nothing, doctor. The sergeant was only asking if we had any other cases to be dealt with today.”
“He said something about an inquest,” persisted the old man. “Why should there be an inquest? I’ve signed a certificate, haven’t I?” His head was rocking gently up and down, as if he had some machinery inside him.
“As long as you’re satisfied, doctor,” said Malley, easily.
He peered inside his cap, adjusted its shape a little, and put it on. The cap was not quite big enough and he had to pull it well forward and down to conform with the Chief Constable’s dictum that no policeman could do his job properly unless the tip of his cap peak were in line with, and equidistant from his ear lobes.
Dr James stared at the result and mistook for insolent indifference the sergeant’s resemblance to a patient, blinkered carthorse.
“I should like to know just what you are insinuating, officer. If it is suggested that after fifty-two years in general practice...”
“Oh, come now, doctor,” Thompson interjected. “I’m sure my officer would not dream of calling your judgment into doubt. He simply has to report the facts to his inspector, and he wishes to be absolutely accurate. Isn’t that so, Malley?”
“Of course, sir.” said the horse.
Dr James simmered silently a few moments longer, then made a determined effort to stop nodding.
“Very well, then. But don’t let us hear any more talk about inquests. That won’t do anybody any good. It’s a sad enough business as it is. Great loss to the profession. And to the town.”
He stared out once more through the small, dusty panes of the window, as though to see how the town was taking it.
“Indeed yes,” murmured Dr Thompson. Surreptitiously he gave Malley a nudge to signify that he’d better go while the going was good.
In another lawyer’s office, Inspector Purbright was cheerfully telling Mr Scorpe that he proposed to be so shamelessly unethical as to try and pick that gentleman’s brains.
Since his talk over the telephone with Pauline Sutton, Purbright had been feeling a good deal more energetic. New hope engendered a pleasant recklessness.
Mr Scorpe at first looked startled. Then he lowered the angle of his long wooden face and gazed over his spectacles with a touch of amusement.
“You are being very frank, inspector.”
“Not frank. Downright impertinent. I want you to tell me what the analyst found in that sample of herbs you sent off to him.”
Scorpe pulled a tray of letters across the desk top and began sorting through them.
“Go away,” he said.
“Come along, you can afford to do me a favour. And this one won’t cost you anything.”
“What gives you the idea”—Scorpe did not raise his eyes—“that I should have wanted something analysing? This isn’t a forensic science agency.”
“No, but you’re acting for the Winges, and we all know
“Really, inspector! That is a most improper suggestion!”
“Yes, isn’t it?”
