“Dr Gule,” tried Purbright once more.
The woman in belted blue made a sudden U-turn, leaving the cavalcade to pursue its own way. She drew up beside Purbright, red-faced and vibrant. “What is it you want?” she whispered angrily.
Bradley leaned toward her in an attitude of confidentiality. “I think,” he said, “that you’ve left your engine running, madam.”
There was a moment of paralysis.
“Who are you?”
Before Bradley could exacerbate the situation, which he appeared eager to do, Purbright took control
“You know very well who I am, sister. This is Detective Inspector Bradley. We are here on official business and we wish to have a word with the doctor.”
Outrage was gradually replaced by doubt. “He’s a very busy man, Mr Purbright. Is it something important?”
“It is.”
She pondered, then pointed herself in the direction taken by the cavalcade. “Stay here. I’ll find out if he can see you for a momentt.”
“Might I suggest you simply whisper the word ‘fee’ to him, madam?” was Bradley’s parting advice. Purbright saw the sister’s sternum jerk with indignation. “I devoutly trust,” he said to Bradley, “that you will never need to enter here as a patient.”
They stood waiting. A young nurse went by. She eyed them without curiosity and walked away up the long corridor, her shoes clacking loosely upon the gleaming floor. A male orderly, coming from the opposite direction, danced a few steps around the nurse and slapped her bottom. He was wearing white rubber boots and a Wild West marshal moustache. He winked ferociously as he passed the policemen.
The sister returned.
“Doctor will see you in a few minutes.” She indicated the corridor junction. “Just go round the corner and wait. There are some seats there.”
The seats proved to be a plastic-covered bench against the corridor wall. There were several doors nearby, unidentified except by numbers. “Which is the Vatican, I wonder,” mused Bradley. He went from one to another, listening against their panels, then shrugged and sat down.
Five minutes went by. Then another five. Traffic was not heavy. It consisted mainly of women patients, on their way, Purbright surmised, to a lavatory or a washroom. All seemed very old. Tented within the too-big, striped, hospital-issue dressing gowns, they looked incredibly tiny, with gentle, anxious eyes and brown, frond-like hands. They replied to his greeting with timid courtesy, as if uncertain whether they might have to pay.
At the end of quarter of an hour, Bradley went back to the doors. This time he began knocking on them and trying their handles. The first two revealed empty consulting rooms. He was about to broach the third.
“Whatever are you doing?”
It was the sister. She appeared genuinely surprised. Purbright spoke to her.
“Will you kindly tell Dr Gule that we insist on speaking to him at once.”
She looked from one to the other.
“Have you not seen him?”
Neither replied. She gave a little shake of the head.
“I’m afraid Doctor has left. He’s gone home.”
There was a long pause.
Then, as Purbright, grim-faced, was about to speak, Bradley gave him a meaningful glance before addressing the sister with an air of grave solicitude: “You understand, don’t you, sister, that we cannot divulge the reason for our wishing to interview Dr Gule?”
“Naturally.” Brusque. On her dignity. But curious.
Bradley smiled, nodded, turned away; then, as if on afterthought, back again.
“At least you might be able to help in a matter of perfectly innocent male inquisitiveness. When a lady—one of your nurses, say—leaves her handbag in a changing room or a ladies’ lavatory, would she leave money in it?”
The sister, almost too awed by the question’s implications to attempt an answer, said she supposed it would all depend.
“Ah,” said Bradley.
They took the Chalmsbury road after Purbright had telephoned Fen Street from a public box in the hospital grounds and told Love that until his return he might be reached at the Century Service Station, Benstone Road, Chalmsbury, or, later, at the home of Dr D. Gule, Mill Lane, Chalmsbury.
It was sunny still and warm when they reached the southern outskirts of Chalmsbury. From Brocklestone and the coast, twenty miles further on, the cars of holiday-makers were returning in a steady stream. Through the approaching windscreens could be caught glimpses of angry men clad in vests and women half-turned in their seats to shout at tired, tear-streaked children. One, Purbright noticed, had commandeered and was wielding in the interests of discipline her infant’s wooden seaside spade.
The Century Service Station had a twin forecourt on each side of the road. A queue of a dozen or so cars had formed at the pumps opposite, but the nearside station was doing no business. In a glass cabin an old man sat reading a page of newspaper. When he saw Purbright’s car draw up, he folded the page very small and slipped it under a mug of tea. He went outside and stood by the nearest pump. “Which one, mester?”
On hearing that information and not petrol was being sought, the old man looked relieved. He ushered both visitors into his cabin. “The smell gets on your stomach. This weather ’specially.” Asked, he said his name was Walker, Tom Walker.
“Are you on all night, Mr Walker?” Purbright inquired.
Aye, he was. Five nights a week. Until seven in the morning.
Was he here last Thursday night? Thursday?—yes, that’s right, he was.
And had he, that night, served this gentleman in the photo? Indeed he had. The one with a car like a colander. Gordamitey, he needed his own private oil well, that fellow.
“Funny you should ask about him,” added Mr Walker.
“Oh?” Purbright let him wonder it out. The old man helped his thought processes by pulling the end of his nose and twisting it, like a dial that needed delicate adjustment. But “No,” he said at last. “It’s no good.”
“You mean, you think you know this man?” prompted Bradley.
“Not to say know him. But that face. I reckon I ought to be able to place it.”
They asked him other questions.
“What time did you serve him, do you remember?”
“Not real late. Ten-ish, p’raps. Or a bit after.”
“Was there anything unusual about him? Any marks? Did he seem to be trying to hide anything?”
“I think he’d cut his hand.”
“His hand?” Purbright was frowning.
“I thought there was some blood on it. And there was a cloth beside him, on the seat.”