Psycho by the Sea

by Lynne Truss

  ‘Really? Did you hear that, Twitten?’ Quickly dabbing his brow with a handkerchief, Brunswick indicated his constable. ‘You, er – you remember Constable Twitten, of course?’

  She ignored the prompt. Twitten shrugged. He had forgotten what a seductive voice she had: sweet and feminine but husky – curiously, yet another word that you might associate with nuts.

  ‘And I wanted so much to see you again, Sergeant,’ she was saying now, ‘to tell you how sorry I am for hurting you, however inadvertently. I heard you received a bullet in the leg. Do tell me you’ve forgiven me. I explained everything but you never replied to my letters.’

  Letters? ‘Hold on a moment … ’ said Brunswick, flustered, scratching his head.

  ‘I’ve been so worried!’

  ‘I didn’t receive any letters from you, Miss Vine.’

  ‘You didn’t?’ she wailed.

  At this point, a man approached. ‘Harold Gosling,’ he said, holding out a hand to shake.

  ‘I see you’ve met my assistant. She’s very upset about my finding the body in the listening booth, but if you leave her to get over it, she’ll probably recover more efficiently. The poor dead man is over here, and the shop is due to open in fifteen minutes. Time is money, you know! All the staff have arrived. Constable, perhaps you could … ?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Twitten. He tugged at Brunswick’s sleeve. ‘We really should go and inspect the body now, sir. Look, the others are already here.’ He indicated the police pathologist and his photographer, who had spotted their arrival and were impatiently gesturing.

  ‘They’ve been here nearly an hour,’ said Mister Harold.

  ‘Yes, and I’m very sorry, Mr Gosling,’ said Twitten. ‘The sergeant and I had to brief Inspector Steine before setting out this morning. He’s been away, and there was … well, there was a lot to tell him.’ He lowered his voice. ‘How long has Miss Vine worked here, by the way, sir?’

  ‘Three or four weeks. Why?’

  Twitten lowered his voice even more. ‘I don’t suppose you’ve discovered during that time that she is closely related to you?’

  Mister Harold frowned, and looked across to Adelaide. ‘Why on earth do you say that?’ he whispered.

  ‘You are a wealthy man, I assume, sir?’

  ‘Well, it’s mostly tied up in the shop.’

  ‘But she hasn’t told you yet that she’s your long-lost sister?’

  ‘I’m sorry. I don’t understand.’

  ‘Good.’ Twitten pulled a face. ‘It was just a thought, sir. But please be aware: Miss Vine can sometimes have a hidden agenda. Although I have to say,’ he added, mostly to himself, ‘it’s not particularly well hidden at the moment.’

  ‘What did these letters say, Miss Vine?’ Brunswick was asking, his knees bending as if he were about to genuflect at her feet, while Adelaide was – rather cleverly – just too overcome by emotion to give a coherent answer.

  What a curse it was to see the weaknesses of others so clearly! One look at the sergeant’s slavish expression confirmed to Twitten that any internal struggle was over. In the matter of Adelaide Vine, Brunswick’s inner prudence had been no match at all for those primitive urges of his. It was as if a kitten had tried to wrestle with a wolf.

  Twitten tugged again at Brunswick’s coat-sleeve. ‘Sir? The body, sir?’

  ‘Of course. Yes. I’m coming.’

  Brunswick reached out a hand towards Adelaide.

  ‘Ooh, please don’t do that, sir,’ said Twitten quickly.

  But Brunswick did it anyway. He touched Miss Vine lightly on the shoulder and leaned close. Impressively, all this had taken less than three minutes.

  ‘Are you going to be all right, Miss Vine?’ he said quietly.

  ‘Of course,’ she said, smiling bravely. ‘You’re here as a policeman, after all, not as a man with feelings.’

  Twitten rolled his eyes.

  ‘Please don’t distress yourself any further, Miss Vine,’ said Brunswick.

  ‘Thank you,’ she breathed.

  ‘Well,’ said Twitten flatly, ‘at least she’s stopped crying, sir. Can we press on now, please?’

  Having already quizzed his staff as they arrived for work, Mister Harold could provide useful information about Professor Milhouse’s movements the day before.

  At two o’clock, the professor had come in. At half-past four, a reporter from the Argus had shown up late to meet him – but at that point, curiously, he couldn’t be found. The professor had been conducting research in the store for the past three weeks, and was very well known to the staff. His original letter requesting permission from Mr Gosling – and outlining his project – gave his temporary address as the Windsor Hotel in Russell Place, near the old wax museum (now closed and awaiting demolition). Mister Harold produced the letter and Twitten made a note.

  ‘That’s very helpful, sir,’ he said. Mr Gosling was the sort of sensible, clear-thinking witness that Sergeant Brunswick liked best, so it was a shame he was missing this. The sergeant – aware of Twitten shooting him judgmental looks – had chosen to examine the body instead, and was currently squashed into Listening Booth F with both the body and the pathologist (although glancing from time to time through the glass to check on the emotional state of Adelaide Vine).

  ‘I like these listening booths, sir,’ remarked Twitten, looking round the department. ‘They’re very modern. In fact, the whole store reminds me of Richard Hamilton’s recent collage Just what is it that makes today’s homes so different, so appealing? Do you know that image, sir? It’s about modern consumerism and it’s insanely crowded with brand names and domestic appliances with a sort of Mister Universe in the middle and a naked woman to the side wearing a lampshade on her head.’

  ‘I don’t think I’ve seen it, no. What’s it called again?’

  ‘Just what is it that makes today’s homes so different, so appealing? ’

  ‘That’s a terrible title for a work of art.’

  Twitten assumed an expression of weary intellectual despair, indicative (to those who knew him well) of, You are so bally wrong that it would be a waste of my time to argue with you. ‘I suppose it depends how you look at it, sir,’ he said politely. ‘Now, about Professor Milhouse. Did he conduct interviews in the record department much?’

  ‘Not particularly, no. Would you like to sit down, Constable?’

  In Booth E, they settled themselves on the hard leatherette-covered bench, which was, presumably by design, just a bit too narrow to be comfortable.

  ‘So,’ said Twitten. ‘Professor Milhouse. What was his research exactly?’

  ‘I didn’t understand what he was getting at, to be honest,’ said Mister Harold. ‘He would put words to the customers and write down what they said in response. It seemed more like a game. But it was popular. It actually brought people in, and kept them in the store longer, so of course I welcomed it. I just wished he’d got the Argus involved earlier. It would have been even better for business.’

  Twitten looked at his notes.

  ‘So the professor was conducting word-association experiments with people out shopping?’

  ‘Yes. I suppose that’s what you’d call them.’

  ‘Well, I have to say, Mr Gosling, I find that jolly interesting.’

  ‘You do? Why?’

  Twitten was a little unsure how to take Mister Harold. The man had happily declared himself a total philistine in regard to new movements in modern art, yet now he was apparently inviting Twitten to expound on a fascinating new branch of sociology.

  ‘Well, sir, I’ve been reading recently about the new, up-to-the-minute science of “motivation research”. In books and journals and so on. About how American advertisers are increasingly taking advantage of psychological findings. Sociologists are following it all very closely, too. It seems that when consumers choose to purchase certain products over others, you see, their motivations are quite deep-seated. The professor’s word-association experiments would be an effo
rt to add to the understanding of their buying choices.’

  Twitten paused, embarrassed. He was rarely permitted to ‘harp on’. By this point, in the office, he would have been shouted down or at least pooh-poohed. ‘But I apologise, sir,’ he added hurriedly. ‘I don’t suppose you want to hear about this: no one else bally does!’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Oh, gosh, no. I have been pooh-poohed mercilessly at the station whenever I’ve tried even to bring it up. Between you and me, sir, I am pooh-poohed automatically by my colleagues just for uttering the bally word “interesting”! But I think we should return instead to the events of yesterday. I wonder if the professor had an umbrella with him when he came in? There doesn’t seem to be one with the body, and significantly there’s no hat.’

  But Mister Harold didn’t care about umbrellas. ‘Tell me more about this motivation … this, what did you call it?’

  ‘Motivation research, sir. Those who are “in the know” call it MR for short. Look, are you really interested, sir? You’re not just being polite?’

  ‘I run a large department store, Constable.’

  ‘So you’re not intending to pooh-pooh me?’

  ‘Constable, I don’t mind admitting it, I don’t even know what pooh-poohing is.’

  ‘Oh. Well, in that case … gosh, this seat isn’t very comfortable, is it, sir? But basically, as I understand it, MR is bally interesting. Today’s unscrupulous advertisers have realised that when customers choose what to buy, their true impulses come from beneath their level of awareness.’

  Twitten paused to check that Mister Harold was truly not bored. But far from it. There was a positive gleam in his eye.

  ‘Do you think other major retailers would know about this?’ he asked. ‘Would … ?’ He paused as if it were difficult to think of an example of another major retailer in the area. ‘Would, um, Hannington’s, for example?’

  ‘I shouldn’t bally think so, sir!’ snorted Twitten. ‘No, this research is fresh from Madison Avenue! And it’s quite shocking. I can lend you the latest study if you like: it’s called The Hidden Persuaders. You see, the newer advertising no longer bothers to aim its sales pitch at the parts of our brains that make rational decisions. Because what they’ve found is that while people might claim they care only about value for money, or aren’t influenced by fashions – and they might even believe these claims themselves – they actually buy items whose purchase boosts their self-esteem, or that they think will make them fit in better with others.’

  Twitten sat back. He felt he had summarised the contents of The Hidden Persuaders pretty well, while also keeping the grammar on track.

  ‘And why is that shocking?’

  ‘Oh, because this knowledge is used cynically to persuade people to buy things they don’t need or can’t afford, sir! Or things that aren’t worth having in the first place. Take cigarettes. All cigarettes are fundamentally the same, and although the so-called “cancer scare” of a few years ago has apparently passed, they are obviously not good for you. So smokers are encouraged to identify, at some deep level, with a certain brand, and it keeps them hooked. It’s like legal brainwashing. The advertisers can exploit all our unspoken insecurities or unacknowledged desires, and all in the cynical pursuit of profit!’

  Mister Harold frowned. He still couldn’t see the problem. He raised an eyebrow as if to say ‘Go on.’

  So Twitten did. He knew he ought to exercise restraint, but he couldn’t. This was too glorious. He saw his past as a track littered with the bodies of exploded pooh-poohs, scorched and shrivelled.

  ‘So while the psychologists are experimenting with “subliminal advertising”, which is jolly controversial and entails flashing persuasive images at people too quickly for them to see them consciously, what the sociologists are explaining is that, increasingly, people are guided less by their inner values, more by appearance. It’s this that I find more interesting, to be honest. The book mentions a Professor Riesman in Chicago who has suggested that we are actually on the cusp between two types of people in society: people of the industrial age with more traditional values who consult – as he puts it – their inner gyroscope, and people of the new consumer society who consult their inner radar. And it’s such an elegant idea, sir, that I just can’t stop bally well thinking about it!’

  ‘What’s the difference? They sound the same.’

  ‘Oh, the difference is enormous, sir. They are opposites, in fact. The gyroscope revolves within, you see, to maintain a steady core of personality, whereas the radar sweeps round all the time, checking for external blips, and the personality adapts accordingly. One sort of person looks in for, say, moral guidance, and the other looks out. For example, I would say that I am a gyroscope sort of person, whereas Sergeant Brunswick is more of a radar. But, oh, look, they’re taking the body away and I really should stop talking about this, even though you must admit you positively encouraged me so it’s arguably all your fault.’

  Twitten stood up hastily. He felt ashamed – even a bit dirty. But if he judged himself harshly, he did it alone. Mister Harold had long since forgotten about the corpse, the inquiry, and everything else. He produced the packet of Puffin cigarettes from his pocket and showed it to Twitten, as he stood up.

  ‘So this was what Professor Milhouse was doing? Explaining why I choose to buy these?’

  ‘It sounds like he was trying to, sir.’

  ‘Or why people buy the Pye Continental instead of the new Murphy Swing-screen?’

  ‘Um, yes. I expect so.’

  ‘I wish I’d realised. So why did he kill himself?’

  ‘We don’t know yet that he did, sir.’

  ‘Oh, but—’

  ‘I must get on now, I’m afraid. The sergeant and I ought to start interviewing the staff.’

  Twitten closed his notebook and slipped it back into the breast pocket of his tunic.

  ‘We’ll need to preserve the actual crime scene for a few hours but the shop can be open otherwise. And I do apologise again for talking so much.’

  ‘Constable, there’s no need.’

  ‘Really?’ Still unsure, Twitten bit his lip.

  ‘Yes! Really!’ said Mister Harold, with feeling. ‘And if you still don’t believe me, I’m going straight out now to buy that fascinating book of yours.’

  An hour later, Twitten and Brunswick convened in the bedroom furniture department on the third floor (between the coach excursion booking office and the fitting room for abdominal appliances) to share the results of their interviews.

  The known facts were as follows. Professor Milhouse had spoken to Sid the Doorman at just after two o’clock, leaving a message for Ben Oliver of the Argus.

  ‘Did the professor have an umbrella with him, sir?’ Twitten asked the doorman, expecting him not to have noticed – but Sid said, yes, the professor always carried a very distinctive umbrella, with a silver buffalo head on the handle.

  ‘What excellent observational skills you people have in this shop,’ Twitten remarked, looking up from his notebook. ‘Untrained civilians such as yourself usually fail to spot anything useful. At Hendon Police College they taught us a handy mnemonic: UCANAHAFAWSG, which stands for Untrained Civilians Are Nearly Always Hopeless As Far As Witness Statements Go.’ He paused. ‘It wasn’t one of the best ones.’

  The professor had then made a beeline for the household products section on the ground floor, where he had positioned himself next to a pyramid display of Fairy Snow, a popular boxed soap powder, which had recently, for no discernible reason, been outselling all the other brands with such appealing names as Omo (‘Adds Brightness to Whiteness’), Daz (‘It’s New! It’s Blue!’), and Rinso (‘Extra Soapy’). He spent an hour chatting to customers, principally about the bizarre illustration of the baby on the Fairy Snow box, who was marching purposefully from left to right, arms swinging like a sergeant major.

  ‘Have you ever seen a baby walk like that?’ the professor had asked the regular sales assistan
t, Janice, and she had laughed.

  ‘He made you notice things you see every day and don’t think about,’ Janice told Sergeant Brunswick. ‘We all liked him down here in Household, although what he was doing was obviously an awful waste of time for a grown man. You should speak to the girls in Mantle, though—’

  ‘Mantle?’

  ‘Coats and dresses.’

  ‘Oh.’ Mantle?

  ‘He really got in the way up there! He talked to them every day about popular colours – guessing which ones they had been especially asked for. It was a different colour every day, you see, but he always guessed right. It drove them crazy. They couldn’t work out how he knew!’

  Brunswick pulled a face. It irked him to think that this so-called professor from Nebraska probably made a very decent salary from guessing daft dress colours in a daft shop 5,000 miles from home – a better salary than an oft-wounded ex-paratrooper detective sergeant in the Brighton Police, anyway.

  ‘One more thing,’ Brunswick said to Janice. ‘Did he have an umbrella with him? My constable thinks it might be important, so I promised I’d ask everyone who saw him. Did he leave it here?’

  ‘No, I’m sure he took it with him. It had a buffalo head on the handle. I’ve never seen one like it.’

  At around 3.15, the professor had purchased a cup of tea in the staff’s subsidised cafeteria and made notes. He had stayed around fifteen minutes, and eaten his usual strawberry jam omelette, declaring it to be delicious. And then, still with his umbrella, he had vanished. No more sightings. When Ben Oliver arrived at half-past four, he was directed upstairs and down, from one end of the store to the other, but Professor Milhouse could not be found.

  ‘I wonder what the story was with the dress colours, sir,’ said Twitten. ‘That’s very interesting.’

  Brunswick huffed and wordlessly shook his head. He never encouraged Twitten to enlarge upon the remark ‘That’s very interesting’, for fear of hearing a blooming lecture.

  So he changed the subject. ‘He doesn’t sound much like a man getting ready to shoot himself, that’s for sure.’