by L. C. Tyler
I shook my head.
‘Shake your head all you like,’ said Elsie, ‘but it won’t change the facts. Anyway, there are others who could have done it. Gerald Smith, for example.’
‘Based on what?’ I asked.
‘Well, Shagger had been sleeping with his wife.’
‘But a long time ago,’ I pointed out.
‘True enough. Shagger’s affair with Jane Smith was over long before Gerald met her. It’s not much of a motive, unless there was more to it than we know. Still, the Smiths would have had an opportunity like the others. Maybe it was Jane Smith who harboured the grudge?’
‘Or maybe it wasn’t one of the guests at all. What about Mrs Michie?’
‘She and Dave Peart confirm they were together in the kitchen when Shagger popped his clogs. Mrs Michie would cover for Dave up to a point, but I don’t think her loyalty would extend to covering up a murder. I’m not sure Dave Peart would cover up for anyone, unless they were paying him double time plus expenses.’
‘I think we can rule out the MacIntoshes,’ I said.
‘Colin McIntosh was one of the few people who knew Shagger was dying. It would hardly have been worth the risk of killing him, even if he wanted to. The same applies to Fiona, I guess, whatever Robert’s reasons for meeting up with her. Which leaves Annabelle – and don’t say she couldn’t have – wives do kill husbands sometimes. She too had her chance. And then there is the business of the secret passage. She knew it was there but, when Robert was killed, she didn’t suggest we should try to get into the room that way.’
‘You can’t get in that way,’ I reminded her. ‘The mechanism is broken. You can use the passage only to get out.’
‘Good point. Even so, Annabelle didn’t mention the passage to the police,’ said Elsie, ‘even though the main argument for suicide was that there was no way out of the room. The following day, though, she was quite happy for you to “discover” it. That doesn’t make sense.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘It doesn’t. So, it confirms that she didn’t know the passage was there.’
‘Or,’ said Elsie, ‘it confirms that there was a good reason why she didn’t want anyone snooping around the passage straight away. So what, or who, was in the passage that evening?’
‘But we were all there outside the library. By the time the police arrived, none of us could have been in the passage.’
‘True.’
‘The man in the blue suit?’ I ventured, though I didn’t quite believe it.
‘No,’ said Elsie, with a sigh. ‘He doesn’t exist. Clive and John were both lying. John wouldn’t have let some random stranger wander round the garden. Clive added in that detail of the beanie, then planted that black hat, probably bought for the purpose, shortly before we found it.’
‘And the cigarette butts?’
‘Could be anyone – Dave Peart having a crafty drag, like as not.’
‘And the scrap of blue cloth?’
‘Yes, that’s odd,’ admitted Elsie, ‘unless Clive planted that too.’
‘So, if there was no man in a blue suit, who or what was in the passage?’
‘I don’t know, but I can’t help feeling that almost everybody so far has lied to us and that Gillian Maggs is the one person who might have been able to tell us why they were lying.’
‘And she’s in the West Indies,’ I said.
‘Only if her daughter is telling the truth. And on the basis of our track record to date, what would you say the chances of that are?’
Eighteen
We were driving up to Muntham Court again.
We had earlier lunched at the Village House, one of my local pubs. I had had a steak sandwich. Elsie had said that she would have a light meal of poached salmon, but had defeated the object of the exercise by ordering triple chips. The chocolate pudding that she followed it with was also advertised as low-calorie, but that was presumably if you ate only one of them.
‘All that red meat isn’t good for you,’ she said, gathering up a large spoonful of custard.
‘Do you want me to drop you at the station after lunch or do you want to walk some of that off first? We could take a stroll up to Cissbury Ring, if you like – or to Chanctonbury if you’re really feeling fit.’
‘I’ve been thinking,’ she said, wagging her spoon at me. ‘The key to it all is that secret passage and why Annabelle was lying.’
‘She wasn’t lying,’ I said, wiping the spots of custard off my jacket with a napkin. ‘It’s possible that she really didn’t know the passage was there. Maybe the previous owners hadn’t mentioned it.’
‘Oh, yes, right,’ said Elsie. ‘That’s really likely, that is.’
‘I’ll go and ask her then.’
‘I’d better come too.’
‘I thought you had important things to do in London?’
‘They can wait.’
‘It may not be a convenient time for her.’
‘It’s a convenient time for me.’
‘I can manage on my own.’
Elsie did not even bother to contradict me. ‘Let’s go,’ she said.
So, we went.
I apologized profusely for the intrusion, but Annabelle graciously assured me that she wanted in any case to know whether I yet felt able to go to the police. So, over coffee in the conservatory, I told her about the morning’s phone calls (tactfully skating over the detail of Robert’s relationship with Felicity Hooper) and explained why I thought that the beanie might have been planted.
‘I suppose anyone could have dropped the beanie there,’ said Annabelle. ‘Even if it has nothing to do with the murder, it doesn’t mean that it was deliberately planted. The piece of cloth that Elsie so cleverly found is pretty clear evidence that there was somebody in the garden wearing a blue suit – or a blue pair of trousers anyway.’
‘Did you know Gillian Maggs was planning a trip, by the way?’ I asked.
‘Is she?’
‘Her daughter says she’s gone to Barbados.’
‘I think she did say something . . . I hadn’t realized it was this week. It may have been an anniversary or something.’
I nodded. ‘I guess that’s about all then,’ I said.
‘So, about this secret passage then,’ said Elsie, putting her cup down. ‘You hadn’t come across it before?’
‘No, not until Ethelred found it for us. You’ve both been really smart.’
‘The previous owners didn’t mention it?’
‘Not to me. I never met them. It was also done through agents. We had somebody looking for suitable properties for us; they, of course, had agents selling on their behalf. It wasn’t mentioned on the survey report.’
‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘Well, it’s good to have cleared that up, not that it was an important point . . .’
‘So it wasn’t in the property details from the agent either?’ asked Elsie. ‘Strange, that. Interesting thing like a secret passage. Bit of a selling point really, unless you’ve got a totally crap agent.’
‘Our own agent was alerted to the property before it went onto the market. I don’t think a brochure was ever printed. Sorry – I can’t see what you’re getting at.’
‘I think Elsie is asking if anyone else could have known about the secret passage,’ I said. ‘Presumably not?’
‘No, not really,’ said Annabelle.
‘Not Gillian Maggs?’ demanded Elsie.
‘It’s possible,’ said Annabelle. ‘She had worked for the previous owners. But as I’ve said, she wasn’t there when Robert . . . died. I don’t think she’s at all important in any of this.’
‘Her daughter was worried,’ said Elsie.
‘Worried? In what way?’
‘She didn’t want to tell me very much,’ said Elsie.
‘Surprise, surprise,’ said Annabelle, glancing across at me. ‘Well, don’t be too concerned, either of you. I’ll give her daughter a call and reassure her that Gillian is not in any way caught up in this case.’
‘So, there you are,’ I said to Elsie, as we walked across the gravel drive and back to the car. ‘We have resolved that little problem. Annabelle has clearly been telling us the truth. Let’s focus on this intruder in the blue suit.’
‘Were you listening to nothing that she said?’ asked Elsie.
‘Yes,’ I said.
‘Then you will know that she is clearly lying through her teeth with every word,’ said Elsie. ‘Do I really have to explain everything to you?’
‘Possibly,’ I sighed. ‘Possibly.’
‘OK,’ she said. ‘Let’s start again from lunch-time.’
Nineteen
We had lunched at the Village House. Ethelred had said that he felt like a change and that they did a good steak sandwich there. I wasn’t that hungry and settled for a little snack of poached salmon and the merest suggestion of a sweet.
I really needed to get back to London, but Ethelred more or less insisted I went with him to Muntham Court. It was a good job that I did.
You could tell Annabelle was pretty pissed off that we had shown up out of the blue, but she put a good face on it (not too much of a problem if you have more than one face available to you) and made us coffee.
Ethelred then footled about as usual.
‘I’m sorry to raise this with you, Annabelle, but were you aware that Robert knew Felicity at Oxford?’
‘I think he may have mentioned it.’
‘They were quite good friends.’
‘Possibly He always said he had lots of good chums at Oxford – including you, of course.’
‘I think he was better friends with Felicity than he was with me.’
‘Yes, he said he didn’t see that much of you in those days. You didn’t play rugby?’
‘No, I didn’t play rugby.’
‘That would explain it.’
‘That wasn’t quite what I meant. Felicity didn’t play rugby either.’
‘I should think not indeed.’ Annabelle tilted her head to one side as if to say she hadn’t the faintest idea where all this was going. Since I hadn’t the faintest idea either, I hoped Ethelred was working to some sort of plan and was about to be all manly and decisive.
‘Er, yes, quite, absolutely . . .’ he said decisively. ‘Did Robert say that Felicity had been in touch with him?’
‘They met up again recently’ said Annabelle.
‘Yes, they did,’ said Ethelred, leaning forwards in his chair. Perhaps he was about to spring his trap? ‘He didn’t say if they had talked about their time at Oxford and . . . just after?’
‘I suppose they would have done. That’s what you do when you meet somebody you haven’t seen since university, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, indeed,’ said Ethelred, sitting back again with a sigh. ‘That’s what you do.’
Well, I was glad Ethelred had broached the subject of the abortion so directly. That one was cleared up then.
He was equally good about the beanie, amiably agreeing that it might have floated down from heaven or somewhere; and he was willing to accept that Gillian Maggs really had taken it into her head to go off to the West Indies.
Somebody had to get a grip on proceedings.
‘So, about this secret passage then,’ I said, putting my cup down. ‘You hadn’t come across it before?’
Annabelle’s jaw dropped. Eventually she managed to mumble: ‘No, Eventually she managed to mumbleelred found it for us. You’ve both been really smart.’ She smiled weakly at me.
‘The previous owners didn’t mention it?’ I asked.
Annabelle now looked like a rabbit caught in (my) powerful head-lights.
‘Not to me,’ she said. ‘I never met them. It was also done through . . . agents. Yes, that’s right – I remember now – we had agents looking for suitable properties for us. So we never . . . met them . . .’
She was floundering so much that Ethelred tried to intervene but I was having none of that.
‘So it wasn’t in the property details from the selling agent either?’ I asked.
‘Our own agent was alerted to the property before it went onto the market. I don’t think a brochure was ever printed. Sorry . . . I can’t see what you’re getting at [gulp].’
But she could. Her bluff was being called.
‘I think Elsie is asking if anyone else could have known about the secret passage,’ said Ethelred, offering a massive get-out.
‘No, not really’ said Annabelle, gratefully.
‘Not Gillian Maggs?’ I asked.
Annabelle looked at me as though she was trying to weigh up the odds. How close to the truth would she go?
‘It’s possible,’ said Annabelle eventually. ‘She had worked for the previous owners. But as I’ve said, she wasn’t there when Robert . . . died. I don’t think she’s at all important in any of this.’ Another pleading smile.
‘Her daughter was worried,’ I said.
The jaw, which had assumed a normal sort of position for a while, dropped again. I was not supposed to have contacted the Maggs household. But I had.
‘Worried? In what way?’ she asked.
‘She didn’t want to tell me very much,’ I said.
Annabelle briefly tried sarcasm, then thought better of it and offered to give the daughter a reassuring call, though I doubted myself that the daughter would be answering the phone.
‘Thank you,’ said Ethelred, after a fierce glance in my direction. ‘That’s very kind of you. Now, I think Elsie needs to get back to London, so we’ll leave you in peace.’
‘All right,’ said Ethelred, when I had explained a few things to him as we sat in the car on the gravel drive. ‘Maybe she could have known about the passage, but I really don’t think she did.’
‘If Gillian Maggs knew about the passage, why would she keep quiet about it?’
‘We’ve no evidence that either of them knew.’
‘Well, somebody knew, or else that was a self-cleaning passage. Self-cleaning houses and something that tastes in every way like chocolate but has no calories at all – those are the two inventions that mankind needs, but I don’t think we have either of them yet. The daughter was edgy. Who made her edgy, and why?’
We drove back to Greypoint House and made more coffee, prior to my departure for London.
‘Let’s phone the daughter again,’ I said. ‘But this time, you do it.’
Ethelred shrugged. He pressed the redial button on the phone. The ringing tone came through loud and clear, even where I was sitting on the far side of the room. It buzzed away for a minute or so.
‘She’s not in,’ said Ethelred, putting the phone back.
‘Try again in a while,’ I suggested. ‘I’ll get a later train.’
We tried at hourly intervals until ten o’clock.
‘She’s there but not picking up,’ I said. ‘Let’s go round.’
‘It wouldn’t be fair . . .’
‘Bollocks,’ I pointed out.
We checked the address in the phone book and then drove through the village and onto the bypass. After a bit, we turned off the main road and drew up in front of a nondescript sixties bungalow. It was like all the other bungalows in the road except that the place was in darkness. Complete darkness. And silent as the grave.
We stayed in the car outside the house until midnight. Nobody came. Nobody went. The lights stayed off. By that time the other bungalows in the road had joined in the lights-off thing, making the Maggs place absolutely identical with the rest, except its lace curtains were not twitching as people got a good look at us hanging around in a suspicious manner.
‘They don’t seem to be in,’ said Ethelred.
‘That’s right,’ What do you thinkI said. All the people who might have known about the existence of the passage have coincidenta
lly vanished, one after the other. Of course, somebody else must have known too.’
‘Who?’
‘The person who made them vanish,’ I said.
We drove back to Ethelred’s. Once we were in the flat Ethelred locked the door. Then he bolted it. Then he double-checked he had bolted it.
‘What now?’ I asked.
‘Go to bed,’ he said. ‘I’m going to stay up and see if I can write another chapter or so of the Master Thomas book.’
‘Is it going well?’
‘For some people,’ he said.
A Clerk of London
‘That doesn’t tell us much,’ said the Prioress, as Thomas finished his account. ‘It could have been anyone really. A whole bunch of people knew you were coming down here. If we could just establish who wanted Sir Edmund dead . . .’
‘Have you read Genesis lately?’ asked Thomas.
‘Maybe, maybe not,’ said the Prioress. ‘What’s that got to do with anything?’
‘The fruit of the Tree of Knowledge is dangerous,’ said Thomas. ‘The best plan is to eat of it only when you are sure it’s yours to eat. Whoever wanted Sir Edmund dead is a great deal more powerful than I am. Sometimes it’s easier not to know things.’
‘I thought you were braver than that.’
‘No, that’s precisely how brave I am. I have got out of a dungeon, with some cleverness I should add, and now I plan to return, with equal cleverness, to my family in London. I have no idea whose innocence the Sheriff wished to establish using my testimony, but it makes no difference to me whatsoever.’
‘And your conscience?’
‘Is as clear as it needs to be. I had no choice but to sign. I also got a reasonably good breakfast (and lunch). When you became a nun, you signed up to do God’s work and fight Evil. I am against Evil in principle too – I’m just not contractually obliged in the way that you are.’
‘That’s despicable.’
‘No, that’s how you survive in the real world that most of us have to live in.’
‘What’s that?’
