The Murder Room (46 page)

And now Lord Martlesham lifted his head and met Dalgliesh's eyes. It was a look of utter despair. He said, “I didn't kill her. I didn't love her and I never told her I did. Our affair was a folly and I did her harm. She thought she'd found in me what she needed—father, lover, friend, support, security. I gave her none of these things. She wouldn't be dead if it weren't for me, but I didn't kill her and I don't know who did.”

Dalgliesh said, “Why the Dupayne Museum? And you didn't make love in the car-park, did you? Why on earth should you have sex in discomfort when you had her flat and the whole of London available to you? I'm suggesting to you that you met in Caroline Dupayne's flat. I shall ask Miss Dupayne for her explanation, but now I'd like yours. Have you been in touch with Miss Dupayne since Celia Mellock died?”

He said, “Yes, I phoned her when the news broke. I told her what I would say to you if I were identified. She was derisive. She said I'd never get away with it. She wasn't worried. She sounded harshly, almost cynically, amused. But I told her that, if pressed, I would have to come out with the whole truth.”

Dalgliesh asked almost gently, “And what is the whole truth, Lord Martlesham?”

“Yes, I suppose I'd better tell you. We did meet occasionally in the flat over the museum. Caroline Dupayne got two sets of keys for us.”

Dalgliesh asked, “Although Celia had a flat of her own?”

“I did go there once, yes. It was only once. I didn't feel secure and Celia didn't like using her flat.”

“How long have you been an intimate friend of Caroline Dupayne?”

Lord Martlesham said unhappily, “I wouldn't say that we were intimate.”

“But you must be, surely. She's a very private woman, yet she lends you her flat and hands out keys to you and to Celia Mellock. Miss Dupayne told me that she had never met Celia since the girl left Swathling's College in 2001. Are you saying that she's lying?”

And now Martlesham looked up. He paused and said with a brief rueful smile, “No, she isn't lying. I'm not very good at this, am I? Not much of a match for a skilled interrogator.”

“We're not playing games, Lord Martlesham. Celia Mellock is dead. So is Neville Dupayne. Did you know him, intimately or otherwise?”

“I've never met him. I hadn't heard of him until I read of his murder.”

“So we go back to my question. What is the truth, Lord Martlesham?”

And now, at last, he was ready to speak. There was a carafe of water and a glass on the table. He tried to pour a glass but his hands were shaking. Piers leaned over and poured it for him. They waited while Lord Martlesham drank slowly, but when at last he began speaking his voice was steady.

“We were both members of a club which meets in Caroline Dupayne's flat. It's called the 96 Club. We go there for sex. I think it was founded by her husband but I'm not sure. Everything is secret about it, even the membership. We can introduce one other member, and that's the only other person whose identity we know. The meetings are arranged on the Internet and the website is encrypted. We went there for that one reason, to enjoy sex. Sex with one woman, two, group sex, it didn't matter. It was—or seemed—so joyous, so free of anxiety. Everything fell away. The problems we can't avoid, the ones we impose on ourselves, the occasional blackness of despair when you realize that the England you knew, the England my father fought for, is dying and you're dying with it, the knowledge that your life is based on a lie. I don't suppose I can make you understand. No one was being exploited or used, no one was doing it for money, no one was under-age or vulnerable, no one had to pretend. We were like children—naughty children, if you like. But there was a kind of innocence there.”

Dalgliesh didn't speak. The flat, of course, had been ideal. The concealed entrance to the drive, the trees and bushes, the space for parking, the separate entrance to the flat, the total privacy. He asked, “How did Celia Mellock become a member?”

“Not through me. I don't know. That's what I've been trying to explain. It was the whole point of the club. No one knows except the member who first brought her.”

“And you have no idea who that was?”

“None. We broke all the rules, Celia and I. She fell in love. The 96 Club doesn't cater for that dangerous indulgence. We met for sex outside the club and that is forbidden. We used the museum for a private meeting. That, too, is against the rules.”

Dalgliesh said, “I find it strange that Celia Mellock was taken on. She was nineteen. You can hardly expect discretion from a girl of that age. Had she the maturity or the sexual sophistication to deal with that kind of setup? Wasn't she seen as a risk? And was it precisely because she was a risk that she had to die?”

This time the protest was vehement. “No! No, it wasn't that kind of club. None of them ever felt at risk.”

No, thought Dalgliesh, probably they didn't. It wasn't only the convenience of the flat, the sophistication of the arrangements and the mutual trust that made them feel secure. These were men and women who were used to power and the manipulation of power, who would never willingly believe that they could be in danger.

He said, “Celia was two months pregnant. Could she have believed that she was carrying your child?”

“She may have believed that. Perhaps that's why she wanted to see me urgently. But I couldn't have made her pregnant. I can't make any woman pregnant. I had a bad attack of mumps when I was an adolescent. I can never father a child.”

The look he gave Dalgliesh was full of pain. He said, “I think that fact has influenced my attitude to sex. I'm not making excuses, but the purpose of sex is procreation. If that isn't possible, never could be possible, then somehow the sexual act ceases to be important except as a necessary relief. That's all I asked of the 96 Club, a necessary relief.”

Dalgliesh didn't reply. They sat for a moment in silence, then Lord Martlesham said, “There are words and actions which define a man. Once spoken, once done, there is no possible excuse or justification, no acceptable explanation. They tell you, this is what you are. You can't pretend any longer. Now you know. They stand unalterable and unforgettable.”

Dalgliesh said, “But not necessarily unforgivable.”

“Not forgivable by other people who get to know. Not forgivable by oneself. Maybe forgivable by God but as someone said,
C'est son métier.
I had such a moment when I drove away from that fire. I knew it wasn't a bonfire. How could it be? I knew that someone could be at risk, someone who might be saved. I panicked and I drove away.”

“You stopped to make sure Mrs. Clutton was all right.”

“Are you putting that forward in mitigation, Commander?”

“No, merely stating it as a fact.”

There was silence. Dalgliesh asked, “Before you drove away, did you enter Miss Dupayne's flat?”

“Only to unlock the door. The hall was in darkness and the lift was on the ground floor.”

“You're quite sure of that? The lift had been brought down to the ground floor?”

“Quite sure. That convinced me that Celia wasn't in the flat.”

After another silence Martlesham said, “Like a sleepwalker, I seem to have followed a path others have set out for me. I founded a charity because I saw a need and a way to meet it. It was obvious really. Thousands of people driven to financial despair, even suicide, because they can't get credit except from sharks who set out to exploit them. But the ones who need money most are those who can't get it. And there are thousands of people with money to spare—not much, just pocket money to them—who are prepared to provide funds at a moment's notice, interest-free but with a guarantee that they will get the capital back. And it works. We organize it with volunteers. Hardly any of the money goes on administration and gradually, because people are grateful, they start treating you as if you're some kind of secular saint. They need to believe that goodness is possible, that not everyone is driven by greed. They long for a virtuous hero. I never believed I was good, but I did believe I was doing good. I made the speeches, the appeals, expected of me. And now I've been shown the truth about myself, what I really am, and it appals me. It can't be concealed, I suppose? Not for my sake, but I'm thinking of Celia's parents. Nothing could be worse than her death but I wish they could be spared some of the truth. Will they have to be told about the club? And there's my wife. I know it's rather late to be thinking of her but she isn't well and I should like to spare her pain.”

Dalgliesh said, “If it becomes part of the evidence before the court, then they will know.”

“As will everyone else. The tabloids will see to that even if I'm not the one in the dock. I didn't kill her but I am responsible for her death. If she hadn't met me she'd be alive today. I take it I'm not under arrest? You haven't cautioned me.”

“You're not under arrest. We need a statement from you and my colleagues will take that now. I shall need to talk to you again. That second interview will be recorded under the provisions of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act.”

“I suppose you would advise me at this stage to get myself a lawyer.”

Dalgliesh said, “That's for you to decide. I think it would be wise.”

3

Despite the heavy traffic, Kate, with Caroline Dupayne, got back to the Yard within two hours of Kate setting out. Caroline Dupayne had spent the afternoon riding in the country and her car had turned into the Swathling drive a minute before Kate's arrival. She had not waited to change and was still wearing her jodhpurs. Dalgliesh reflected that, had she brought her whip, the impression of a dominatrix would have been complete.

Kate had told her nothing on the journey and she heard of Tally's identification of Lord Martlesham with no more emotion than a brief rueful smile. She said, “Charles Martlesham rang me after Celia's body was discovered. He told me that, if he were identified, he would try to dissemble, but in the end he thought he'd have to tell the truth both about what he was doing at the Dupayne last Friday and about the 96 Club. Frankly I didn't think you'd find him but, if you did, I knew he'd be an ineffectual liar. It's a pity Tally Clutton didn't confine her political education to the House of Commons.”

Dalgliesh asked, “How did the 96 Club start?”

“Six years ago with my husband. He set it up. He killed himself in his Mercedes four years ago. But you know that, of course. I don't suppose there's much about us you haven't snouted out. The club was his idea. He said that you make money by looking for a need not catered for. People are motivated by money, power, celebrity and sex. The people who get power and celebrity usually have the money too. Getting sex, safe sex, isn't so easy. Successful and ambitious men need sex; they need it regularly and they like variety. You can buy it from a prostitute and end up seeing your picture in the tabloids or fighting a libel case in court. You can pick it up by cruising round King's Cross in your car, if risk is what turns you on. You can sleep around with the wives of friends if you're prepared for emotional and matrimonial complications. Raymond said that what a powerful man needed was guilt-free sex with women who enjoyed the activity as much as he did and had as much to lose. Mostly they would be women in marriages they valued, but who are bored, sexually unsatisfied or needing something with an edge of secrecy and slight risk. So he set up the club. By then my father had died and I had taken over the flat.”

He said, “And Celia Mellock was one of the group? For how long?”

“I can't tell you. I didn't even know she belonged. That's how the club was run. Nobody—and that includes me—knows who the members are. We have a website so that members can check the date of the next meeting, whether the premises are still safe, but of course they always are. After Neville's death all I needed to do was put a message on the website that all meetings were suspended. It's no use asking me for a list of members. There is no list. The whole point was total secrecy.”

Dalgliesh said, “Unless they recognized each other.”

“They wore masks. It was theatrical, but Raymond thought that added to the attraction.”

“A mask isn't concealing enough to hide an identity when people are having sex.”

“All right, one or two of them may have suspected who their temporary partners were. They come from much the same world after all. But you're not going to be able to find out who any of them are.”

Dalgliesh sat in silence. She seemed to find it oppressive and suddenly burst out, “For God's sake, I'm not talking to the local vicar! You're a policeman, you've seen all this before. People get together for group sex and the Internet is one way of arranging it, more sophisticated than tossing your car keys into the middle of the floor. Group consensual sex. It happens. What we were doing isn't illegal. Can't we keep a sense of proportion? You haven't even got the police resources to cope with paedophilia on the Internet. How many men are there—thousands? tens of thousands?—paying to see young children sexually tortured? What about the people who provide the images? Are you seriously proposing to waste time and money hunting down the members of a private club for consenting adults held on private premises?”

Dalgliesh said, “Except that here one of the participants has been murdered. Nothing about murder is private. Nothing.”

She had told him what he needed to know and he let her go. He felt no particular disapprobation. What right had he to be judgemental? Until now, hadn't his own sexual life, conducted with more fastidiousness, been a careful separation of physical satisfaction from the commitment of love?

4

Ryan said, “You'll be all right won't you, Mrs. Tally? I mean, you're used to being here. You don't think I ought to stay?”