Dalgliesh

Shit!

I've read it properly this time.

I'll find you later.

Training demonstration, girls. Details on the noticeboard. And because Matron's away,

Mr. Courtney-Briggs will be assessing you. I'd like your best work, please.

Morning.

Don't linger, girls.

Oh! Look who's playing the patient.

Bad luck, Pearce.

Two chairs over there, not too close.

Have any of you been in my room?

Course not.

Have any of you taken something from under my pillow?

Stop it, will you?

Five minutes, girls.

So, in such cases, we have to organise... what?

Introgastric feeding by the nose or mouth, Sister.

Please continue, Sister Gearing.

Good. Yes.

Nurse...

Dakers, please recap on our patient's history.

Our patient is...

called Mrs. Stoakes.

She's a 50-year-old mother of four children.

Yesterday, she had a laryngectomy

because of a cancer of the mouth and she...

So we have a patient who's already seriously undernourished,

who is unable to take food by mouth. Right.

Explain your equipment, please.

Sodium bicarbonate mixture for cleaning the mouth or nose.

Funnel, connector.

Lubricant.

And we have a tongue spatula, forceps

and a gag.

And the oesophageal tube.

Now the feed. What are you giving her?

Actually, it's just warm milk.

Yes, but if we were dealing with a real patient?

We could add soluble protein, eggs, vitamin preparations

and sugar.

Good.

At what temperature are we giving the feed?

Body temperature, 37 degrees Centigrade.

Now, explain carefully to your patient what you're going to do.

Hello, Mrs. Stoakes.

We're feeding you through this tube today.

It won't hurt.

If you could help by guiding this to the back of your throat

and when it reaches the back of your throat, please swallow it.

It won't hurt.

I'm just going to aspirate the tube to make sure it's reached your stomach.

So, that must be gastric juice,

which means it's reached her stomach.

- Oh, my God! - Get out, now!

Get it out!

- How do we get it out? - No, leave it in!

- Christ... - Do something!

Hold her hip.

Clear the airway. Out, everyone!

When Mrs. Thatcher announced her leadership bid last week,

her chances were seen as minimal, given widespread

support for Mr. Heath, particularly from Conservative peers.

However, with growing discontent on the party's back benches,

Mrs. Thatcher's bid is gaining momentum

and it's now thought unlikely that the first ballot will...

... Whether Mr. Heath will eventually emerge as the winner.

...head a British political party.

The MP for North Finchley since 1959...

- What kept you? - What kept you, sir?

Yeah... DS Masterson. Charles...

- We did actually meet once, last year on the... - Yes, I remember.

Yeah.

But that was my first job on the team, so...

- I've learned a lot since then. - Have you got the scene secured?

Well, not yet, sir, I was waiting for you to get here.

Hare and the tortoise, Sergeant.

You what?

I'm not a bloody tortoise!

Don't be distracted by the blood.

They tried to open her chest. Clumsy attempt to save her, I assume.

Rohan Chopra.

Adam Dalgliesh.

Pending the PM, cause of death was almost certainly some

sort of strong corrosive substance, which she ingested.

Right, her name was Heather Pearce, 19, student nurse.

Not local. She's from Kent.

Some sort of training demonstration that went wrong.

Oh, and one of the nurses has noticed a disinfectant bottle

missing from the toilets, but uniform are looking for it.

- Time of death? - 9:41, precisely.

- No further, please. - Chief Inspector Dalgliesh?

Stephen Courtney-Briggs, lead surgeon.

- I called your boss. - I'm Sister Gearing.

I'm the senior nurse tutor in charge of Nightingale House.

I need to get back to the hospital. I was due in surgery two hours ago.

I won't keep you any longer than necessary.

I want everyone who was present at the demonstration in the same room.

Yes, sir.

I take it that it was you who tried to open her chest?

- I wonder what you hoped to achieve by that. - I beg your pardon?

The only possible course of action would have been an emetic,

administered immediately, preferably through the tube itself.

- Sister Gearing pulled the tube out. - I was trying to...

I was trying to massage her heart.

It was an entirely appropriate response.

Ah, well, we are all wise after the event.

I shall avail myself of your mortuary facilities, sir.

- Has next of kin been informed? - We were waiting for Matron.

She's been away at a conference in Leeds, but she's on her way back.

I assume the Commissioner filled you in about the end of the month.

Yes.

He assures me that you have a reputation for working quickly

and quietly. I don't want things messed up

because of a stupid prank that backfired.

Well, it can't have been a prank... surely?

They're third year students. I can't believe they'd be so foolish.

DS Masterson and I will be taking a witness statement from each of you.

We'll also be requesting your fingerprints.

Until we know more, we're treating this as an unexplained death.

Who was it who noticed the disinfectant is

- missing from the toilets? - Me.

Dakers needed to be sick after, so I took her to the toilets

and then we wanted to clean up...

It's very important that we find the missing bottle.

Please, sit down.

There are officers searching the house, including bedrooms.

Maybe it was meant for Fallon. The disinfectant.

She was meant to be the patient today.

Nurse Fallon was taken ill in the night.

She's on Sister Brumfett's ward,

- in the private wing of the hospital. - But she was here this morning.

- I saw her walking away from the house. - She can't have been.

Concentrate on your own recollection of events, nobody else's.

No detail is too small.

Shall we split the statements, then, sir?

No, I want to speak to all of them.

Courtney-Briggs can go, but he remains on the hospital site.

All right, then.

Marty Taylor, Matron.

If you're interviewing the girls, I'll need to be present.

We're taking witness statements, that's all.

I consider myself in loco parentis .

And you'll be the first to know if I suspect any of them

of involvement in Nurse Pearce's death.

I assume you'd prefer to inform the next of kin.

- I'd be grateful if you'd do that as soon... - I'll do that now.

And I'd like to speak to you as soon as you're finished here. Second floor.

The Burt twins are refusing to be seen separately, sir.

We'll make an exception, Sergeant.

And after you got dressed?

We went down to the kitchen to get the milk for the demonstration.

Time?

About... ten past seven?

- Did you take it from the fridge? - Miss Collins did. She's...

The housekeeper.

We took it to the demonstration room and we opened it and measured out

the amount we need into a beaker, half a pint.

And we put the beaker on the trolley

and then we started to get the other things that we'd need.

Were you alone in there?

- Yes. - Yes.

Then it was about quarter to eight, so we went for breakfast.

- Who else was at breakfast? - Everyone, really.

Not Fallon.

Goodale, Dakers,

Pearce, the Sisters.

Pardoe came a bit late.

- How late? - About 15 minutes.

And what time did you leave the dining room?

About 20 past. Then we went to our rooms and brushed our teeth.

Went to the toilet.

They don't need to know that!

And then we went back to the demonstration room.

- At about 8:40. - Had anything changed?

Anything about the equipment, the milk?

- No. - No.

We didn't notice anything different.

You say you saw Nurse Fallon leaving the building. When was that?

I was getting my things and I looked out of the window

and I saw her walking away from the house.

It was definitely her.

- She was wearing her red suede coat. - We love that coat.

What did you think of Nurse Pearce?

Presumably, this is a young woman you've known for over two years,

and now, she's dead,

in the most horrific of circumstances.

- She was very religious. - She didn't really talk to us much.

What happened to the milk next?

My first porno was twins. Had me seeing double for weeks.

There was a large window of opportunity for someone

to have tampered with the milk between 7:45 and 8:40.

- Anyone had access to it. - Well, if it wasn't them, they're pretty stupid.

How could they not notice something odd about the stuff?

All that business they had to do with it? Checking the temperature...

That whole room smells strongly of cleaning fluid, carbolic.

And if the liquid poured like milk, why would they think it wasn't?

So, what's happening at the end of the month, then, sir?

Or am I not allowed to know?

The private wing.

A member of the Cabinet's booked in there for a routine operation.