He cleared his throat, adjusted his position on the chair and fixed his eyes on Kathy.
‘In my statements to you, Sergeant, at the beginning, I made certain simplifications, which in retrospect were counter-productive. I see that now, although at the time it seemed prudent to gloss over some matters which could stain the otherwise impeccable reputation of Stanhope Clinic. The fact is that Geoffrey Parsons and I did not call the police immediately after Mr Parsons found Alex Petrou’s body. At my instigation — and it was entirely my responsibility — we delayed in order to make certain adjustments to the circumstances in which we found him, which were, frankly, of an unpleasant and compromising nature.’
Kathy thought what a good salesman he was. He was immensely persuasive, using everything — his voice, his hands, his body and, above all, his eyes — to engage his audience and make them believe. The phrases were carefully prepared but delivered with an intensity that seemed spontaneous, straight from his soul.
‘When we found him, Petrou was wearing — I hesitate to call it “clothing” — a bizarre costume composed of straps and belts and the like. It apparently had some sort of perverse erotic significance — his genitals were exposed — although I must say we found it difficult to make that association at the time. The effect was quite grotesque and made more so by the fact that a leather hood covered his head, so that at first we didn’t know who it was, hanging there.
‘I simply felt that I couldn’t leave him to be discovered and exposed in that condition. One need only reflect upon the distress to his family and the unmerited taint upon the clinic if the tabloid press were to get hold of such a thing. I decided that it was my responsibility to save his, and our, reputation, even if I could not save his life. Together, Mr Parsons and I lowered his body to the floor and removed the things he was wearing. In the pocket of his tracksuit, which was lying on the floor with his sports shoes, I found his keys. I returned to the house and went to his room, to see if he had left a note. There was none, but I did find other things which I felt should be removed. There were a number of pornographic magazines — German, I think — showing pictures of people dressed much as Mr Petrou had been when we found him. I gathered all this together and put it into a sports bag which I found there in his room. Then I returned to the temple, where Mr Parsons had remained guarding the body. We redressed the body in the tracksuit and shoes and hanged him again, as best we could in the position we had found him in. It was an unpleasant task and we were in a hurry, anxious to get it over. I packed all the incriminating material into the bag, and when we had finished I put it in the boot of my car until we could dispose of it with the general refuse collection on the Tuesday. I returned to the house and called the police.’
He paused and looked around at his audience. ‘I realize we were wrong to do what we did, but I believe any normal, decent person would understand our motives and would have done the same.’
Kathy watched the Deputy Chief Constable nod sagely. Tanner’s expression said nothing.
Beamish-Newell spoke again. ‘There is something else. On the day before this tragedy, I became aware that Mr Petrou might be bringing drugs into the clinic for his own use. You can understand how shocked I was to learn of this. The whole purpose of the clinic is to promote natural therapies, health without medical drugs of any kind. To discover the possibility of narcotics being brought on to the premises was appalling. When I confronted Petrou with my suspicions on Sunday morning, he was quite open about it and unrepentant. He was in many ways naive to the point of childishness, and seemed oblivious to the legal and other repercussions of his folly. He told me the name of the person from whom he had obtained the drugs, which he described as an “amusement”. I contacted that person and went to see them late on Sunday afternoon in order to ensure that the supply was terminated and that no other members of my staff were involved.
‘Again, Sergeant, I omitted information to you in describing my movements for that afternoon, in order to avoid having to implicate my dead employee in another unfortunate … vice. What didn’t occur to me until today was the possibility that his two peccadilloes might be connected — that his bizarre appearance in the temple and his accidental death by hanging might both have been the result of his being under the influence of drugs.
‘I should like to make a sincere apology to you, Sergeant, as I have to the Deputy Chief Constable, for any possible prolongation of your investigation which may have resulted from my reticence. As I said at the beginning, I had no idea that a straightforward case of suicide would be pursued in such a … may I say, obsessive manner.’
He leaned back in his chair, erect, and looked at Long, who nodded.
‘Thank you, doctor,’ he murmured. ‘I rather think we can let you retire at this point. Is there anything you would like to raise before the doctor leaves, Sergeant?’
Kathy hesitated, then looked Beamish-Newell in the eye.
‘Were you and Petrou lovers, doctor?’ she said.
There was a snort from Tanner, a stutter of protest from Long. Beamish-Newell’s eyes widened.
‘There’s no need to respond to that,’ Long said quickly, getting to his feet. He indicated the door and led Beamish-Newell away.
Kathy sat motionless, feeling numb.
When he returned, Long took his seat behind his desk, rather than with Kathy and Gordon around the coffee table. His eye-level was now eighteen inches above theirs. With his slender pink fingers he straightened two files on his otherwise empty desk, one the case file for Petrou, the other a green file from Personnel and Training.
The sense of unreality which had gripped Kathy from the moment she had seen Beamish-Newell sitting in the Deputy Chief Constable’s office intensified as Long now launched into a monologue that appeared to have no connection whatsoever to the Petrou case. Listening for some cue to link his words with what had just occurred, she found herself losing track of their meaning. She was conscious of the emphasis placed on certain phrases, best practice policing, quality assessment procedures and quality audits, desirable outcomes, client satisfaction and institutional goals, though quite what all this had to do with the body of a young man hanging in a deserted building in the middle of the night, with a hood over his head and semen stains on his legs, was not immediately obvious. Only at the words facilitated counselling did a small alarm bell begin to go off in her head.
Suddenly she realized that he was talking about Petrou. ‘Inspector Tanner and I are satisfied, however, that the account of events now tendered by Dr Beamish-Newell provides a complete and adequate explanation for the circumstances of his death.’
Kathy seized upon this glimpse of something solid through the verbal fog. ‘Well, I’m not satisfied, sir. Dr Beamish-Newell has now lied to us on at least four occasions — concerning the removal of keys from the body, concerning his search of Petrou’s room, concerning his movements on Sunday, and concerning his actions when the body was found. He is completely unreliable. His statement does not provide a complete, let alone adequate, explanation of Petrou’s death at all. It is highly improbable, for example, that Petrou died alone, whether his death was accidental or, as seems more likely, given the amount of covering-up that’s been going on, murder. Then there’s the forensic evidence — ’