‘Not a neighbour? A relative?’
He shook his head.
King went on. ‘Who cares for your grandfather while you’re at work?’
‘Well, Dad was, mostly. He doesn’t work because he’s got emphysema.’ He stopped and grimaced. ‘Had emphysema. But most days he gets up and comes downstairs to watch TV or whatever . . . Make soup or something.’
‘So normally he’d be out of bed?’
‘Yeah. Most days he gets up.’
‘But not today?’
‘Suppose not.’
‘And you do what you can before and after work?’
‘That’s all I seem to do,’ said Reggie. ‘Work at work and then work at home. I mean, a Macmillan nurse comes in a couple of times a month, but I do pretty much everything! Dad says he helps, but it’s not help. Like, he’ll make a meal but he won’t clean up. Leaves everything out on the side or in the sink and thinks he’s done me a favour. Or Skip’ll try to get up and come downstairs and I’m like, Just stay in bed for fuck’s sake – you’re dying of cancer!’
He stopped and there was an awkward silence. He sighed deeply. ‘Sorry. It’s just, I come home for lunch and my house is full of police and my father’s dead . . .’
‘Of course,’ said King. And then, after a moment, ‘So nobody else comes in to help? Social services?’
‘No,’ said Reggie. ‘The cleaner will make them a sandwich or something.’
‘The cleaner?’ Kirsty King somehow resisted looking around at the chaotic room. ‘Does she have a key?’
‘I leave one for her.’
‘Where?’
‘Under the mat.’
King didn’t roll her eyes but even from his post in the doorway Calvin Bridge could tell she wanted to. But she could roll her eyes all she liked. It wouldn’t change the fact that this was Devon and people left their homes and cars unlocked, and keys under doormats.
‘What’s her name?’
‘Hayley.’
King glanced at Shapland, who wrote it down. ‘Do you know her last name?’
Reggie frowned. ‘I don’t know. I just got her from a card in the Co-op.’
‘That’s all right.’
But Reggie was distracted. ‘I never even asked . . .’ he muttered. Calvin knew it was the shock, surfacing inappropriately.
‘Doesn’t matter,’ said King. ‘When does she come?’
Reggie took a moment of staring at nothing to remember. ‘Mondays and Fridays.’
‘So yesterday?’
Today was Tuesday. He nodded.
‘Do you have her number?’
‘Yeah, sure,’ he said, and took out his phone and scrolled through while they all waited. Finally he showed it to King, who jotted it down, then tapped the briefcase that lay on the coffee table.
‘Is this yours?’
‘No. Why?’
‘It was on the landing,’ said King, and opened it. She was wearing shiny latex gloves and took out the items one by one. ‘So . . . we’ve got a thermos flask, and a . . . sandwich, and we’ve got this . . .’
She took out a slim steel cylinder with a rubber mask attached. ‘You know what’s in this?’
‘Uh . . . Oxygen?’
‘It’s not a guessing game.’
‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Then no.’
‘It’s almost certainly nitrous oxide,’ she said.
‘What’s that?’
‘N2O. Laughing gas.’
‘Oh. OK. Don’t dentists use that?’
‘Yes. In low concentrations, nitrogen is used as an anaesthetic. But kids fill balloons to huff it, and in high concentrations it’s lethal. Fast, painless and untraceable. Unless you leave it at the scene, of course.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Your grandfather – Skipper – told us he was supposed to die today.’
‘I don’t understand,’ said Reggie.
‘It seems he had planned to commit suicide.’
‘Suicide!’ Reggie looked about wildly at Shapland and then at Calvin, as if King must be joking and one of them might wink. Nobody did.
‘Seems he’d been in contact with a group who support the right to die. He says they call themselves the Exiteers.’ She watched Reggie’s face carefully.
‘Never heard of them,’ he said. ‘I mean . . . he’s been sick for so long and I know it’s getting on top of him. You can’t blame him, can you? I mean . . . but bloody hell!’
‘So you don’t know anything about this?’
‘No! He never said a thing!’
‘What about these?’ She unfolded two documents on the coffee table in front of him.
‘What are they?’
‘His will and what looks like a waiver.’
‘Skipper’s will?’
‘Yes.’
‘Where was it?’
‘Also in the briefcase.’
She tapped the document. ‘Is that your granddad’s signature?’
‘It looks like it, yes. But I’ve never seen Skipper’s will. Didn’t know he’d made one.’
‘Well, he’s very old,’ said King, ‘and he does have terminal cancer.’
‘I just never thought about it, I suppose.’
King moved her finger to the waiver. ‘Have you seen this before?’
‘No.’
‘It appears to be a waiver absolving the Exiteers from culpability in his death.’
Reggie
