Saracen told him.
“Ye gods Saracen, you certainly have some kind of professional death wish don’t you.”
“What would you have done?”
“The same…I hope.”
“Do you think she’s going to be all right?”
“If nothing else happens she’ll be fine and if the parents should ask how she got it I’ll tell them the ways of the Lord are strange.”
“Thanks, I owe you.”
Saracen left A amp;E at seven. He stopped at an Off License on the way home to pick up some wine and found the experience less than cheering for he always found such places depressing at night. After a slow saunter along the wine shelves he decided on a litre of Valpolicella and joined the check-out queue behind a man in dungarees carrying a six pack of beer and a very small woman, almost lost inside a purple mohair coat. The woman hugged a half bottle of port to her breast as she counted out the exact amount from the clutches of her purse and paid without comment. Saracen hard to work hard to stop himself imagining the woman’s life. For the moment he had enough troubles of his own.
He felt better after a bath and a change of clothing and made a conscious effort to free his mind from thoughts of the hospital before setting out to have dinner with Jill. He was pleasantly surprised that the prospect of spending the evening with Jill made him feel so good and wondered about it as he drove. What were his feelings about Jill Rawlings? It was something he hadn’t given much thought to until the night they had dined with Alan Tremaine and his sister. After that evening he had found himself thinking about her quite a lot. There was something about her that disturbed him but not in an unpleasant way. It wasn’t just that she was attractive and fun to be with. There was something more, a feeling that he was reluctant to define for the moment but it made him think of his days with Marion.
Saracen slowed as he arrived at the street and crawled along the kerb till he came to the right number. Jill answered the door and kissed him on the cheek. Had he come by car? she asked. Saracen said that he had and was scolded. “You should have left it. What you need is to relax and have a few drinks. Still, you can always leave it and get a taxi home if you feel inclined. I’ll bring it to the hospital in the morning.”
Saracen settled himself on the sofa and said with a smile, “I offer no argument.”
Jill poured the drinks and joined Saracen on the sofa. “I take it it’s this Myra Archer business that’s getting you down?” she said.
Saracen nodded.
“Would you like to talk about it? A trouble shared and all that.”
“Everything?”
“Everything.”
Saracen told her all that was on his mind.
“You’re convinced that Myra Archer’s death and Leonard Cohen’s are linked?”
“Absolutely. I must have disturbed the men who had been sent to move Myra Archer’s body on the night I got clobbered.
Jill sighed and shook her head.
Saracen shrugged and said, “So there you have it, two dead on arrival, both bodies transferred out of the hospital as quickly as possible on the pretext of the refrigeration having broken down. Chenhui Tang knows what has been going on but she has a nervous breakdown and finishes up in Morley Grange on Heminevrin. Any ideas?”
“Did the patients have anything in common?” asked Jill.
“Not that I can see. A woman in her late fifties who has spent the last twenty years in Africa and a man in his sixties who has never been out of the country. It’s hard to spot a connection.”
Jill nodded and said, “How about blood and tissue types?”
Saracen smiled as he followed the line of Jill’s thoughts. “Are you going to suggest that Garten has been selling bodies for spare parts?” he asked.
“Just an idea,” said Jill. “Not on huh?”
“Not on,” agreed Saracen. Cohen had been dead for some hours before he was brought in. Transplant organs have to be fresh and, apart from that, Myra Archer had a Salmonella infection; that would have ruled her out. Besides, removing organs is a job for experts not butchers in Dolman’s cellars.
“So who else would want the corpses?”
“No one,” replied Saracen. “I think Garten was trying to cover up something about their deaths.”
Jill looked sceptical and said, “Possibly with the Archer woman, because of the ambulance nonsense, but not with Leonard Cohen. You said yourself that he had been dead for several hours before he was brought in? What could Garten possibly have to cover-up?”
“I don’t know,” Saracen confessed. “But I want to take a look at the death certificates, particularly Myra Archer’s.”
“Do you think Garten signed it without a PM being done?”
“Who else?”
“How will you get your hands on it?”
“Timothy Archer.”
“Her husband? But won’t that upset him all over again?”
“Could do,” agreed Saracen. “I thought I might play it by ear, go see the man, find out how he is before I start prying.”
“I have another suggestion to make,” said Jill.
“Go on.”
“I suggest that we forget all about it for the rest of the evening and start by having another drink?”
“Agreed.”
“Take your jacket off,” said Jill as she got up to re-fill their glasses. Saracen did so and loosened his tie before resting his head on the back of the couch and closing his eyes for a moment. He hadn’t realised how tired he was. Jill came back and smoothed the hair along his forehead before sitting down.
Saracen looked up at her and smiled.
“Dinner won’t be long,” she said. “I hope you are hungry.”
“Ravenous.”
The meal was interspersed with a lot of laughter; the wine was good and the food delicious. Saracen knew that it had been a very long time since he had felt so much at ease and said so. “I’m glad,” said Jill softly. When they had finished he offered to help with the washing-up but Jill insisted that they leave it and have more coffee. Once again Saracen didn’t argue and let out a sigh of contentment as he sat down on the sofa again. “That was the best meal I’ve eaten in ages,” he said.
“Where do you usually eat James?” Jill asked.
“At the flat.”
“What?”
“Tins of this, packets of that, you know.”
“Fast and easy, I know. There’s not much incentive to cook when you live on your own.”
“Have you always lived on your own?”
“I was married once,” replied Jill.
“I didn’t know.”
“No reason why you should. We were divorced five years ago.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. Getting divorced was like being reborn.”
“That bad?”
“Looking back I think our marriage was doomed from the start, in fact, I can’t think why Jeff ever married me in the first place. He came from what’s laughingly called a ‘good family’ i.e. his father was a solicitor meaning he was making a fortune out of other people’s misery. My dad worked in the steel mill. His mother always made it plain
