Десмонд Бэгли - The Spoilers

‘Practically nothing. Addicts resent probing — so I don’t probe.’

‘Nothing about her father?’

‘Nothing beyond the fact that she had a father. She mentioned him a couple of times.’

‘When did she come to you for drugs?’

‘She came to me for treatment about a year and a half ago. For treatment, Inspector.’

‘Of course,’ said Stephens ironically, and produced a folded sheet of paper from his pocket. ‘You might like to look at this.’

Warren took the sheet and unfolded it, noting the worn creases. ‘Where did you get it?’

‘It was in her handbag.’

It was a letter typed in executive face on high quality paper and bore the embossed heading: REGENT FILM COMPANY, with a Wardour Street address. It was dated six months earlier, and ran:

Dear Miss Hellier,

On the instructions of your father I write to tell you that he will be unable to see you on Friday next because he is leaving for America the same afternoon. He expects to be away for some time, how long exactly I am unable to say at this moment.

He assures you that he will write to you as soon as his more pressing business is completed, and he hopes you will not regret his absence too much.

Yours sincerely,

Warren said quietly, ‘This explains a lot.’ He looked up. ‘Did he write?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Stephens. ‘There’s nothing here.’

Warren tapped the letter with a finger-nail. ‘I don’t think he did. June wouldn’t keep a secondhand letter like this and destroy the real thing.’ He looked down at the shrouded body. ‘The poor girl.’

‘You’d better be thinking of yourself, Doctor,’ said Stephens sardonically. ‘Take a look at the list of directors at the head of that letter.’

Warren glanced at it and saw: Sir Robert Hellier (Chairman). With a grimace he passed it to Pomray.

‘My God!’ said Pomray. ‘ That Hellier.’

‘Yes, that Hellier,’ said Stephens. ‘I think this one is going to be a stinker. Don’t you agree, Dr Warren?’ There was an unconcealed satisfaction in his voice and a dislike in his eyes as he stared at Warren.

Warren sat at his desk in his consulting-room. He was between patients and using the precious minutes to catch up on the mountain of paperwork imposed by the Welfare State. He disliked the bureaucratic aspect of medicine as much as any doctor and so, in an odd way, he was relieved to be interrupted by the telephone. But his relief soon evaporated when he heard his receptionist say, ‘Sir Robert Hellier wishes to speak to you, Doctor.’

He sighed. This was a call he had been expecting. ‘Put him through, Mary.’

There was a click and a different buzz on the line. ‘Hellier here.’

‘Nicholas Warren speaking.’

The tinniness of the telephone could not disguise the rasp of authority in Hellier’s voice. ‘I want to see you, Warren.’

‘I thought you might, Sir Robert.’

‘I shall be at my office at two-thirty this afternoon. Do you know where it is?’

‘That will be quite impossible,’ said Warren firmly. ‘I’m a very busy man. I suggest I find time for an appointment with you here at my rooms.’

There was a pause tinged with incredulity, then a splutter. ‘Now, look here...’

‘I’m sorry, Sir Robert,’ Warren cut in. ‘I suggest you come to see me at five o’clock today. I shall be free then, I think.’

Hellier made his decision. ‘Very well,’ he said brusquely, and Warren winced as the telephone was slammed down at the other end. He laid down his handset gently and flicked a switch on his intercom. ‘Mary, Sir Robert Hellier will be seeing me at five. You might have to rearrange things a bit. I expect it to be a long consultation, so he must be the last patient.’

‘Yes, Doctor.’

‘Oh, Mary: as soon as Sir Robert arrives you may leave.’

‘Thank you, Doctor.’

Warren released the switch and gazed pensively across the room, but after a few moments he applied himself once more to his papers.

Sir Robert Hellier was a big man and handled himself in such a way as to appear even bigger. The Savile Row suiting did not tone down his muscular movements by its suavity, and his voice was that of a man unaccustomed to brooking opposition. As soon as he entered Warren’s room he said curtly and without preamble, ‘You know why I’m here.’

‘Yes; you’ve come to see me about your daughter. Won’t you sit down?’

Hellier took the chair on the other side of the desk. ‘I’ll come to the point. My daughter is dead. The police have given me information which I consider incredible. They tell me that she was a drug addict — that she took heroin.’

‘She did.’

‘Heroin which you supplied.’

‘Heroin which I prescribed,’ corrected Warren.

Hellier was momentarily taken aback. ‘I did not expect you to admit it so easily.’

‘Why not?’ said Warren. ‘I was your daughter’s physician.’

‘Of all the bare-faced effrontery!’ burst out Hellier. He leaned forward and his powerful shoulders hunched under his suit. ‘That a doctor should prescribe hard drugs for a young girl is disgraceful.’

‘My prescription was...’

‘I’ll see you in jail,’ yelled Hellier.

‘...entirely necessary in my opinion.’

‘You’re nothing but a drug pedlar.’

Warren stood up and his voice cut coldly through Hellier’s tirade. ‘If you repeat that statement outside this room I shall sue you for slander. If you will not listen to what I have to say then I must ask you to leave, since further communication on your part is pointless. And if you want to complain about my ethics you must do so to the Disciplinary Committee of the General Medical Council.’

Hellier looked up in astonishment. ‘Are you trying to tell me that the General Medical Council would condone such conduct?’

‘I am,’ said Warren wryly, and sat down again. ‘And so would the British Government — they legislated for it.’

Hellier seemed out of his depth. ‘All right,’ he said uncertainly. ‘I suppose I should hear what you have to say. That’s why I came here.’

Warren regarded him thoughtfully. ‘June came to see me about eighteen months ago. At that time she had been taking heroin for nearly two years.’

Hellier flared again. ‘Impossible!’

‘What’s so impossible about it?’

‘I would have known.’

‘How would you have known?’

‘Well, I’d have recognized the...the symptoms.’

‘I see. What are the symptoms, Sir Robert?’

Hellier began to speak, then checked himself and was silent. Warren said, ‘A heroin addict doesn’t walk about with palsied hands, you know. The symptoms are much subtler than that — and addicts are adept at disguising them. But you might have noticed something. Tell me, did she appear to have money troubles at that time?’

Hellier looked at the back of his hands. ‘I can’t remember the time when she didn’t have money troubles,’ he said broodingly. ‘I was getting pretty tired of it and I put my foot down hard. I told her I hadn’t raised her to be an idle spendthrift.’ He looked up. ‘I found her a job, installed her in her own flat and cut her allowance by half.’

‘I see,’ said Warren. ‘How long did she keep the job?’

Hellier shook his head. ‘I don’t know — only that she lost it.’ His hands tightened on the edge of the desk so that the knuckles showed white. ‘She robbed me, you know — she stole from her own father.’

‘How did that happen?’ asked Warren gently.

‘I have a country house in Berkshire,’ said Hellier. ‘She went down there and looted it — literally looted it. There was a lot of Georgian silver, among other things. She had the nerve to leave a note saying that she was responsible — she even gave me the name of the dealer she’d sold the stuff to. I got it all back, but it cost me a hell of a lot of money.’