The Old Success

by Martha Grimes

  Zoe barely stopped in her stream of description and lowered her voice. “We went down to the water’s edge. We were collecting shells like we always do and it was dusk—you know, dusk.”

  (Here was a word she apparently liked for its dark implications.)

  “And the waves were really crashing on the rocks. And then I saw this … thing. Not up close yet, and I thought maybe it was a seal or something because the thing was so pale. Closer, paler still, like a ghost.”

  There was a movement on the stair and Macalvie looked towards it. Was Zillah shaking her head in mute protest?

  “And I grabbed Zillah’s hand and said we’d got to run to the hotel and tell them.”

  “Where you should have run is straight home.”

  Zoe didn’t bother to comment here. “We told the woman there, the one in charge.”

  “Emily Gray,” put in her aunt. “Emily’s a sensible woman; it’s good she was there.”

  “She gave us cocoa,” said Zoe.

  The cocoa apparently ended the discourse. Zoe picked up the cat and sat down, the cat not at all pleased with this maneuver. He didn’t claw the air, but merely wrestled himself out of her arms and slid down to resume his position on the hearth.

  Macalvie sat forward, arms on knees. “You didn’t see anyone else about?”

  “Well, if I did I’d’ve said, wouldn’t I?”

  “Yes, I expect you would.” Macalvie looked over at Zillah, who again scooted away from the bannister dowels to sit back against the wall. “What happened to your sister?”

  Again, Hilda Noyes tried to take over. “She won’t say anything. They were out this evening going to—”

  Macalvie stomped on this. “Let Zoe tell it, please.” Witnesses hadn’t a clue, had they?

  Hilda dropped back in her chair, chastened. “It’s just that Zoe likes to add things on so much—”

  “I do not. I just say.”

  “Well, sometimes, dear, what you say is not the unvarnished truth.”

  Macalvie said, “I’ll take it varnished.” He looked again at Zoe.

  She was looking pleased as punch, legs crossed, hands hooked round her knee. “It’s Zillah’s birthday soon and we were walking over to this little shop that sells everything and I was going to let Zillah pick out what she wanted as long as it wasn’t more than two pounds forty. It was—nearly dark. I knew night would come soon, but I didn’t want to scare Zillah, so I didn’t mention it—”

  Macalvie bet.

  “—the shop is over near Hangman’s Island—”

  Another succulent name. Macalvie thought he heard a whimper coming from the stairs.

  “You’re upsetting Zillah,” said her aunt.

  Tons Zoe cared.

  “That’s enough,” said Hilda. “It’s past their bedtime, Mr. Macalvie—”

  “Wait,” he said, sitting forward in his chair. “Just one more question.”

  Hilda sighed, but sat back, resigned.

  “Doesn’t it surprise you that Zillah would just remain silent after seeing, or partly seeing, this body on the beach? Something else happened, didn’t it?”

  Zoe’s eyes widened; her look at Macalvie was apprehensive.

  Hilda was on her feet now and mad as a hornet. “Now, you go. Please go because you’re just scaring my Zoe to death.”

  Macalvie got to his feet. “Frankly, Mrs. Noyes, your Zoe was scaring me.” He tried on a smile, but that didn’t placate her. “Anyway, thank you, Zoe.”

  As he walked to the door, he put his hand on her shoulder. But as he crossed the doorsill, Zoe came after him.

  “Wait. Wait a minute.”

  “Zoe!” her aunt called.

  But Zoe pulled the door shut and they were standing outside in the dark. “Don’t pay any attention to Zillah. She’s all right.”

  Macalvie thought this a strange injunction. “Why—?”

  “Zoe!” Hilda had come outside. “You’ve got to come in. I’m sure the police can speak to us tomorrow if they have to.” She herded Zoe through the door.

  When Zoe looked back over her shoulder at Macalvie, he had a good taste of those arctic eyes. They looked, he thought, hunted.

  The door closed but he stood there looking at the cottage for a moment.

  Zoe with her wild black hair (and possibly wilder imagination); Zillah, shocked into speechlessness.

  Just what he needed in this investigation: two little girls.

  “We’ve questioned all of them, boss—staff who’re here right now and four guests. No one seemed to know anything about the vic—”

  “She has a name, now, Cody,” said Macalvie, snappish enough to make Cody Platt look up from his notebook.

  “Sorry. Manon Vinet. Strange name. French, the manager said. They all had exchanges with her, but not about her history, that sort of thing. She didn’t talk about herself.” Cody stopped, looking rueful. “Failing that, they gave me nothing—nada, nil. Nothing.”

  “Failing that” being one of Cody’s favorite phrases. Macalvie chewed a stick of gum Cody had given him and looked at him. “That’s it?”

  “’Fraid so.”

  “How many staff?”

  “Four on site.”

  “So out of those four and four guests you got nothing helpful?” Macalvie wasn’t really being critical; he simply found it strange that eight versions of the hotel stay of the victim yielded nothing.

  “Nothing beyond the fact they all found her quite pleasant. ‘Pleasant’ was the operative term.”

  “Cody, there must be variations on that theme.”

  “I hear you.” Cody thumbed up page after page of notes, shrugged again and said, “I’ve got it all here, boss. But I can go back to them again—?”

  Macalvie shook his head. It fascinated him that Cody never took offense, or if he did, he hid it well. “No, not tonight. It’s nearly ten-thirty.” He knew the notes were not only copious, but accurate. DS Platt might not have eliciting information down to an art, but his transcript of what was said, well, you could take it to the bank. None better. For all of Cody’s apparent (and sometimes real) lethargy, he had an uncanny knack for picking out the bullshit in witnesses’ statements.

  They were seated at one of the tables in the Hell Bay Hotel dining room, looking out on darkness total enough to be oblivion, and listening to water smashing up against rock. Whitten had returned to St. Mary’s with what forensic evidence they’d collected that night; his men were still prowling the rim of Hell Bay.

  “Where’s Gilly?”

  Cody looked ceilingward. “Up in the vic’s—sorry, up in Manon Vinet’s room.”

  Macalvie sat for another minute staring at the black glass of the window. Then he rose, saying, “OK. Tell them they can go to bed; tell them not to leave the premises. Get in touch with Whitten and tell him we’ll need the helicopter.”

  Macalvie was through the door when Cody called, “We leaving?”

  Over his shoulder Macalvie called back, “Let the DC who brought us over know we want to leave in twenty minutes.”

  Gilly (Gillian, real name, but she hated it) Thwaite was on her knees, back turned to the door so that she didn’t see Macalvie come in. She held a small brush in her plastic-gloved hand and was dusting the squat leg of a heavy bureau.

  The door was open; Macalvie rapped on the doorjamb. “What’ve you got? I hope more than Platt. He’s got sod all.”

  Without even turning, she said, “Are you on his back again? He’s good; Cody’s very good.”

  “He may be good, but he’s still got sod all.”

  Gilly stood up and peeled off the gloves. “Which is about what I’ve got so far, too. Trouble is, I don’t think there’s much to ‘get,’ at least not here in her room.”

  “Okay, come on, pack up. We’re leaving in fifteen minutes. Time for bed.”

  “Thanks to whatever powers may be.”

  “Who’re the others?”

  As he turned, she said, “God, what conceit.”


  Macalvie didn’t respond. She was always saying that.

  Whatever he had said about going to bed, Macalvie had not gone. Instead, he thought again about interviewing the two girls. He was no good with children anymore. Fortunately, he rarely had to deal with a child as a witness. He had grown increasingly poor at handling them since that summer in Scotland. And if time is the great healer, why was it becoming more painful, rather than less, to deal with them? It was owing to no talent of his that Zoe had told her story at such length. He had not even found out why the girls were living with an aunt instead of parents.

  Well, it wasn’t his case; it was Whitten’s. But he had agreed to help and he didn’t want simply to drop it back in DCI Whitten’s lap.

  Maybe he would hand the next round of questioning the girls over to DS Cody Platt.

  Or better yet, to Richard Jury. Whom he was supposed to have met an hour ago in the Old Success.

  3

  Richard Jury thought for a moment as he looked out over the formless water of the cove, then said to the man with whom he’d been sharing a table, “Brownell. That name sounds familiar.”

  As his silence suggested Jury was really trying to chase the name down, Tom Brownell said, “Only if you were police.”

  “I am police. Wait a minute. You’re not the Thomas Brownell, are you? Of the Metropolitan Police? London?”

  “London is definitely the location. You really know the Met, don’t you?”

  “Very funny. You’re Sir Thomas Brownell?”

  “I try to avoid that.”

  Jury laughed. “May I buy you another whisky, Tom? Your clear-up rate is legendary. A hundred percent.”

  “No. More like ninety.”

  Jury laughed. “Where did you go wrong?”

  “Get me that drink and I might tell you. So, are you buying because I have a title?”

  “Not at all. Because you don’t like it. You remind me of a friend. Once titled. Now not.”

  “Oh? He did something terrible and got stripped of it?” Brownell sounded hopeful.

  “Of them. Earl, viscount, baron, et cetera. No, he simply took advantage of the Peerage Act. He gave them back. He didn’t like being called ‘lord.’”

  “Chap after my own heart. I’m profiling him: canny, straightforward, no-nonsense type.”

  “That’s about right.”

  “Tell me more about this untitled friend of yours.”

  “Let me get you that drink, first.” Jury collected both glasses and headed for the bar, thinking about Tom Brownell’s reputation. Perhaps the man had missed solving one or two cases, but he was a legend. Retired several years ago; Jury wondered why. He took the refills back to the table.

  Tom nodded toward the door to the bar. “This pub seems suddenly full of police,” he said, looking at the two approaching their table. “Friends of yours?”

  “No.”

  “Superintendent Jury?” said DCI Whitten. “Commander Macalvie regrets he’s not here.”

  “Hell, he could have just rung me.”

  Whitten laughed. “He sent me to take you to him.”

  “That sounds ominous. Why?”

  “Bit of trouble on one of the islands. He’d appreciate it if you’d helicopter over to St. Mary’s.”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “He’d like your help.”

  “Get him on the phone.”

  Whitten pulled out his mobile, punched in a number. In a few moments he held the mobile out for Jury.

  Jury said into it, “This was your reason for meeting me, Macalvie?”

  “It is now,” said Macalvie.

  4

  Whitten had shown him the police photos of Manon Vinet, and Jury had looked at them for longer than necessary. He was taken with the symmetry of a face that might have been constructed by a master architect.

  They crossed the launchpad and got into a police vehicle driven by a constable. “They’re still organizing the boat trip to Bryher.”

  As they pulled away, Jury asked, “Why not the helicopter?”

  “Because St. Mary’s and Tresco are the only islands where a helicopter can land. To travel between the islands, it takes a boat. One usually leaves around early evening, but not today. Today, we requested that nobody leave.”

  “How was that request received?”

  “By the people who live there, with their unflagging equanimity.”

  Jury smiled. “There’s a message there somewhere. What is it?”

  Whitten said, “We live fairly undisturbed lives here. Especially those on Bryher. It’s the smallest of the lot and has the smallest population. Seventy-five, somewhere around there. Here we are,” he added, as the car pulled up by a ferry.

  “Add the number of tourists to that.”

  “We counted about a dozen. Only four at the Hell Bay, the others visiting residents.”

  “You could monitor any private craft?”

  “Oh, yes. There are very few of those, and remember, this is the Atlantic we’re talking about, which is not the main venue for pleasure craft. But I’ve made a note of those who do maintain private boats; they’re in the folder. Those people are in the bulb business.” To Jury’s inquiring look, Whitten said, “Tulips, narcissi. We do a lot of business in that line. It’s the perfect climate. Flowers and tourists, those are our industries here.” He added, “A murder won’t do a lot to bolster Bryher’s tourist trade, will it?” His smile was tight.

  Jury said, “That can work both ways. I’d predict you might have a run of tourists. People are extremely curious when it comes to sex and murder. And the crime passionnel can sell a lot of tickets.”

  “What makes you think this is one?”

  “Nothing at all except she’s a beautiful woman, and beautiful women often ignite murderous feelings—jealousy, rage—in husbands and lovers. Was she here alone?”

  As Whitten opened his mouth to reply, a police constable came up to them. “Boat’s ready. Let’s go.”

  As the boat lunged along, slapping at the sea, Jury had to agree with Whitten that this wasn’t a venue for pleasure boating. And when they approached the northwest corner of the island, Jury decided it wasn’t a venue for pleasure, period.

  Yet in its own way, and depending on who was looking at it, Hell Bay was beautiful, if you could take nature unchained, untrammeled and with one hell of an undertow. Pitch-black, the steep, high face of the rocks rose on each side of the bay, and the sound of water crashing against them made it hard to speak in a normal tone. They had to raise their voices.

  “Scylla and Charybdis,” said Jury. “Monsters in the sea in the Odyssey. An impossible passage for a ship.”

  “Sounds about right,” said Whitten.

  “Body’s here,” said Macalvie, looking down at the body of Manon Vinet. Sand had now been swept into small hillocks around her. “Of course, the sand has been swept by wind, so it’s not the same. But you get the idea.”

  “‘You get the idea’ has never made much of a crime scene, Macalvie.” Jury knelt down beside the body. “Gunshot. What kind?”

  “Service revolver. Something like a Webley, Smith & Wesson. Probably .38. Close range. We haven’t found it. No prints either—I mean, the sand.”

  “‘Something like’ and ‘probably’ … I get the idea.”

  “Oh, come on, Jury. We didn’t bring the forensic lab with us. And the scene tells you something, doesn’t it? Anything would have been washed away by incoming tides. I expect the shooter knew that.”

  “It must have been some kind of meeting. Two people wouldn’t have been strolling along the beach and just happened on one another. Not with a gun in one of their hands. Pretty odd place for a rendezvous, nevertheless. Who called this in?”

  “Manager of the Hell Bay Hotel. Just along there.”

  “So she was the one out for the stroll?”

  “Not exactly. It was a couple of kids.”

  Jury sighed. “Is this your blood-out-of-a-turnip turn, Macalvie? Why
don’t you just give me the information instead of me having to pry it out of your mouth like a rotten tooth? You asked for my help, remember?”

  “You bet. Only this stuff you don’t need to know right at the moment. We’re on our way back to Land’s End and Exeter. On the boat you just—”

  “Then why in the bloody hell didn’t you just leave me on Land’s End?”

  “I should have thought that obvious, Jury.” He actually sounded hurt. “I wanted you to see the crime scene.” Macalvie started to turn away. “Oh, and—”

  Jury levelled a look at him. “‘Oh, and’ what?”

  “Maybe interview the ones who found her.”

  5

  When Jury got back to Land’s End, the bar of the Old Success appeared to be closed or closing.

  Yet Tom Brownell was still sitting at the same table, still drinking what looked like the same drink.

  “You waited for me?”

  Tom nodded. “Knowing Brian, I figured he’d toss you off that island when he was through with you. Me, I looked for a place to eat, since this one is closing down. How about it? There’s a crummy little caff just along the street I’ve been to several times when I’m tired of the Land’s End cachet. I’m starving.”

  “Great. And thanks for waiting.”

  “So what was the trouble on the island?”

  “Woman got shot on the beach at Hell Bay.”

  “My God, I guess that is trouble. Any details you can give me? Or is this what we call an ‘ongoing investigation’?”

  “Well, it’s not mine, in any event. It’s Macalvie’s. But it is ongoing—”

  “Say no more. Let’s eat. Come on. My car’s out in the vast car park.”

  Which held about five cars, of which Tom’s Ford Cortina looked to be the oldest.

  The “crummy little caff” lived up to its description—cold, Naugahyde booth seats and unpeopled by anyone but a group of up-all-night teenagers playing the jukebox, smoking God only knew what and occasionally taking passes at the snooker table in a small side room.

  The single waitress was caff-unhappy, taking their order in surly silence before bringing back tea in thick, chipped mugs.