Lessons for Suspicious Minds

by Charlie Cochrane

  “And the Livingstone case? What raised your suspicions about that?” Jonty earned himself a dirty look. Why couldn’t the man keep to one investigative strand at a time?

  “Nothing, at the time. Men—and women—do drown themselves and everything at the inquest seemed aboveboard, although I wondered why he’d left the note in his pocket.”

  Orlando produced his own investigative notebook. “As do we. Was that asked about?”

  “It was. Our coroner’s not daft. Livingstone’s friends said he was a bit absentminded, always putting things in his pocket and finding them later when it seemed they’d been lost.”

  Jonty wrinkled his nose. “That sounds awfully thin. Was the coroner convinced?”

  “He seemed to be. The evidence was consistent enough otherwise. And I wouldn’t have given the case a second thought if it hadn’t been for your enquiry. I hadn’t even realised there was any connection until I looked at my notes.”

  “A connection?” Orlando couldn’t quite believe their luck.

  “Oh yes. Tuffnell had been at the earlier inquest, giving evidence about Livingstone’s state of mind.”

  “Ronnie Tuffnell? That is interesting.” Luck indeed.

  “No, not Ronnie. Reggie Tuffnell.”

  “Hold on.” Jonty looked bemused. “I know I’m being dim, but indulge me in getting this absolutely clear. Reggie Tuffnell knew Charles Livingstone?”

  “Yes. Livingstone’s father had known Reggie Tuffnell at Oxford. Not the same college, but they’d played sport together or something of the kind.” Strevens tapped his notebooks. “All in here.”

  “Blimey.” Jonty blew out his cheeks.

  “He was a clerk in a solicitor’s office, training to enter the profession. Very respectable. That’s one of the reasons why much of the inquest was taken up with ensuring he hadn’t somehow been accessing the clients’ money and killed himself before his fraud could be exposed. And before you ask, he hadn’t. Or if he had, he’d done it so cleverly that nobody had noticed.” Strevens drained the last of his beer, almost triumphantly.

  “This opens up several new avenues of enquiry,” Orlando said eagerly.

  “Avenues? It’s a whole maze.” Jonty held up his hand to stop Orlando going off down any of them. “First, though, we need to know what evidence Reggie gave.”

  Strevens nodded. “Quite right. Reggie Tuffnell said he’d heard Livingstone threaten to end his own life on several separate occasions. Once because he felt he was getting in too deep with the wrong crowd—people took that to mean gambling, although Tuffnell never made it clear. I suppose that’s another reason they wanted to check the company accounts were all square.”

  Orlando jotted all this down. “And the other times?”

  “One was about a woman. Unrequited love. She was there at the inquest, looking suitably sad and being comforted by the successful suitor, Bernard Goode. That’s not an assumption on my part. It came out in evidence, Goode corroborating Tuffnell’s story. As did another person”—Strevens tapped his notebook—“so I see no reason to doubt the state of Livingstone’s mind. At least at times. Tuffnell seemed upset at having been out of the country—that holiday his brother took him on—so unable to speak to Livingstone in the days preceding his death.”

  Orlando nodded, trying not to let on how much this hurt him. “He wanted to talk him out of it?”

  “Yes. He said there’d been another young man, one he’d known at his club in London, who took his own life a few months previously. It had upset him greatly, and when he saw the warning signs in Livingstone, he feared the worst.” Strevens took a drink. “Which is ironic, given that it wasn’t long until he took his own life.”

  Ironic—and possibly suggestive that suicide wasn’t a path Reggie Tuffnell would pursue?

  “Do you remember a young man called Covington giving evidence?” Jonty asked. “The one who found the body.”

  Strevens consulted his notes. “I do. He answered the questions put to him very well. Got a bit agitated about the note, though.”

  Jonty raised his eyebrows. “Please elaborate, Mr. Strevens.”

  “There’s little doubt it was Livingstone’s hand that wrote the note, but Covington wasn’t happy with Livingstone’s friends explaining the fact of it being on his body simply by his absentmindedness. The coroner had to tell him to behave or he’d be slung out.”

  “I didn’t realise he was quite so determined, young Covington.” Jonty gave Orlando a look that meant We need to reconsider this.

  “Did Livingstone leave a will? No secret inheritance somebody’s sitting back and gloating over?” Orlando frowned. Was there nothing tangible, like good old-fashioned greed, to get their hands on?

  “No. If he had, my boss would have been on to it like a shot. He’s got a bee in his bonnet about matching up wills and court cases. Brought at least one case of ‘natural causes which were actually murder’ to light, and he’s itching for a repeat performance. And before you ask”—Strevens wagged an admonitory finger—“he’s checked on your man Tuffnell too. All the money goes to the brother, after one or two minor bequests to the Missions to Seamen and the like.”

  “No weeping women at Tuffnell’s inquest?” Jonty, looking thoughtful, his hands steepled to his chin, appeared more confident than Orlando felt.

  “Not as far as I could see. The coroner asked if he left a wife or issue, but the brother made it plain that he hadn’t been the marrying type.” Strevens glanced sidelong at Orlando. “Not in that way. No touch of the Oscar Wilde. Rather, one would have described him as a ladies’ man.”

  “Did that come out at the inquest?” Orlando felt relieved that there seemed to be nothing in Strevens’s tone to suggest he thought they might be that way.

  “Yes. One of the other men from the duke’s party—Rodgers—not only confirmed that he had gambling debts but that he might have had some similar monetary issues in the past, when he kept up an establishment for a lady friend.” Strevens tapped his nose. “And you know, now I come to think of it, Rodgers had that same matter-of-fact tone about his testimony. Odd.”

  Odd indeed, but Orlando didn’t see where it would get them.

  “Mr. Strevens,” Jonty suddenly cut in, smiling sweetly. Orlando had seen that smile before, when his lover was going for a witness’s jugular. “Ignore the inquest. Has there been any other gossip, either in the paper or in the pub, about any of the principals in these cases?”

  Strevens narrowed his eyes. “Now, gents, do you want the whole truth and nothing but?”

  “Of course we do.” The smile disappeared. “And if we’ve had any less so far, I’d ask you to rectify that matter.”

  “Oh, you can be assured on that. I may not be on oath, but I don’t believe in lying. It’s all been accurate.” The reporter leaned across the table. “You may not want to hear this, but there’s always been talk about the duke and his cronies. Yes, I know that Maidenhead’s got a bit of a reputation for things, but I don’t mean dalliances. That motley bunch of his—the St. Sebastian’s mob.”

  “St. Sebastian’s?” Orlando stopped, midway through writing a sentence in his notepad. “Are we talking about the Ambrosians?”

  “We are,” Strevens said drily.

  Jonty looked bewildered. “Should that name mean something to me?”

  “It’s the St. Sebastian’s dining society.” Orlando rolled his eyes. “Although the term ‘dining society’ is slightly euphemistic.”

  “Euphemistic? Is that what they’re calling it now?” Strevens’s eyebrows shot up almost into his hairline. “They used to come here in force when the old duke was alive—got up to all sorts of pranks. Some were turned a blind eye to—high spirits, euphemism again—but some of them went too far. People don’t forget.”

  “Do you think somebody remembered and held a grudge against Reggie Tuffnell because of it?” A sniff of a motive, at last.

  “Maybe. He was certainly always one of the more inventive ones when it came to l
ocal pranks. You may have to look close to home on this case—Fyfield had a reputation in those days and the duke’s entourage was at the centre of it.”

  The carriage had just turned into the main gate at Fyfield when Orlando asked the driver to stop.

  “Let’s walk the last mile up to the house. It seems too lovely an afternoon to miss the chance.”

  “Excellent idea.” Jonty wasn’t entirely sure that his friend wanted simply to admire the grounds. “Marler, can you make sure my mother knows we’re dawdling and haven’t been kidnapped by a pack of marauding savages?”

  “Will do, sir.” The driver nudged the horses on.

  “You don’t mind walking?”

  “Not at all. I need to work up an appetite for dinner.” They walked on, but as whatever Orlando wanted to talk about didn’t seem forthcoming, Jonty felt he had to fill the vacuum. “Is it true what you said about right angles? None in nature?”

  “Absolutely. In the animal and plant kingdom, at least. It’s something I’ve thought about often. The Golden Ratio is there, but no right angles, no sharp planes or the like.” Orlando stopped, knelt on his haunches, plucked a daisy from the grass, then sprung up again. “Am I wrong to spend so long exploring and investigating Euclid when it’s meaningless?”

  “It isn’t meaningless to bridge builders or the men who whipped up the Crystal Palace. The right angle’s meat and drink to them, Orlando. The stuff of life, even if nature’s turned her fussy nose up at it.” Jonty had heard Orlando in despondent mood before, but never so dejected about his beloved mathematics.

  “What you study’s the stuff of life, Jonty. Love, jealousy, the pursuit of power, vengeance. I didn’t realise it before I met you, of course.”

  “Because I’m such an expert on jealousy and the pursuit of power?” Jonty put his arm across his lover’s shoulders. “What’s this all about, old thing? Not like you to be so morose. Not for a long time, anyway.”

  “Can’t you guess? I thought you could read my mind.”

  “Only sometimes.” Jonty moved in step with him. “In this instance I’m struggling. Is it this wretched suicide business? Memories of your father?”

  “No. Yes. Sort of.” Orlando sighed. “Go back a generation. His father. The mysterious ancestor we’ll never pin down. The great mystery I’ll never solve. Who my grandfather was and what was so bad about him that my grandmother wouldn’t marry him, though it led to her disgrace. No.” He tapped Jonty’s shoulder. “Don’t argue. We have to accept that there’s no way of finding out who he was. That generation of people has gone and taken their stories to the grave with them.”

  “If you’re sure . . .” Jonty squeezed Orlando’s hand.

  “I’m positive. If I keep trying and keep hitting my head against a brick wall, I’ll go mad. There are more important things to deal with.” Orlando returned the squeeze.

  “That’s a shame.” Jonty kept his eyes fixed straight ahead. “I rather fancied going out to Italy later this year and trying to find out more about the family Artigiano del Rame. You’ve been given chapter and verse about the Stewart history until you must be sick of it. I’d love to learn more about your illustrious and mysterious ancestors. Italy, in summer. Imagine it.”

  “I can imagine it very well. But I’ll only be imagining it until we’ve sorted out this business.” Orlando smiled. “I suspect I’d never have had the gumption to do anything more than dream about Italy without you providing some sort of catalyst.”

  “Catalyst, that’s me.” Some note in Jonty’s voice, one he hadn’t quite managed to hide, made Orlando stop in midstride, and turn to him.

  “Now we’ll have the rest.”

  Jonty tried to look innocent. “Rest?”

  “The rest of the story. There’s something else you’re not telling me.”

  “Am I so easy to read?”

  “Oh, yes,” Orlando replied, not without satisfaction. Time was when he’d been the only one with a window on his soul.

  “I might, possibly, have been doing a bit of research. Not about sonnets.” Jonty felt a flush creep up his cheeks. “Do you really want to know the rest?”

  “I do. And we won’t leave this spot until I know it.”

  Jonty took a deep breath, then came clean. “I thought I’d try my hand at locating your grandfather.”

  Orlando’s mouth worked up and down, but nothing came out for what seemed an age. “That’s an impossible task.”

  “I thought nothing was impossible for Stewart and Coppersmith?”

  “Coppersmith and Stewart. And you can’t solve a mystery without any clues. Are you proposing we waste more time on a wild-goose chase?”

  “No. I just don’t think we’ve explored all the avenues.” Jonty took his lover’s arm. “Are you cross with me?”

  “No more than usual. Once I’ve murdered you, I’ll feel better. Even if you won’t,” Orlando added, clearly trying to repress a grin. “What did you do, then? Consult a medium?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.” That grin was enough to show he’d been forgiven. “I got in touch with your grandmother’s solicitor. He knows all about her need to keep secrets. And her fondness for puzzles. That’s where you get it from. Alas, he had sod all to say. But he’s going to have a dig for us.”

  “He won’t get anywhere.” Orlando made a face. “It’s not been easy to admit it, but this case is beyond solving. The great mystery which will hang over me for the rest of my life. I have to face it or ignore it, and I’d rather try to live in blissful ignorance.”

  “If that’s really what you want, then so be it.” Jonty wasn’t sure Orlando was really ready to be so stoical, but there was no point in arguing.

  “Thank you.” Orlando patted Jonty’s shoulder. “It’s neither the time nor place to say it, but in case it might have slipped your mind, I love you. You’re possibly the most annoying person in the whole of Christendom, but the fact remains.”

  “Daft beggar.” So what if the words weren’t the kind Romeo and Juliet might have uttered? For this pair of lovers they were the stuff of real passion—and maybe just a bit too passionate for the setting, given there was no chance of putting them into action. The grass was too wet, for one thing. “Mind back on the case. Right now.”

  Not just to get away from mawkish thoughts; bedroom thoughts needed holding in abeyance too. They walked on.

  Orlando took a deep, steadying breath. “I need to clear up Archdeacon Gray. The mysterious campanology on exactly the same night as Tuffnell died. Is it possible he might have heard something in his sleep—the murderer running back to his own room, or Tuffnell crying out? The rooms aren’t that far apart diagonally, and if they both had their windows open, noise could have carried. Whatever it was might have triggered a subconscious reaction to summon help, so he rang the bell in his sleep.”

  Jonty snorted. “You’ve been listening to Dr. Panesar’s psychological claptrap again.”

  Orlando drew himself up to his full height, so he could—literally—look down on Jonty. “What if I have? Can you come up with a better explanation?”

  “Of course I can. Our old friend coincidence, never to be underestimated but always overlooked.” Jonty swished at the long grass with a stick he’d acquired as they walked. “Look, if it’ll make you feel happier, we’ll go and see Gray and let him add his twopenn’orth. He may have manufactured all that malarkey with his bell to distract the staff while an accomplice did the deed.”

  “The accomplice being?”

  “Ronnie. The Ronnie who lives locally.” Jonty made the noise that might have been spelled pfft again.

  “You say that as if living locally was against the law.”

  “It’s against the law to kill your brother so you can take all the inheritance.” Jonty grinned.

  “Ah. So you’ve got there too?”

  “I have. And it’s an obvious place to get to. Except Ronnie wasn’t here, was he? On the night Reggie died.” Unless the supplier of the guest list had lie
d to them. Given that it was the duchess herself, that seemed unlikely; Beatrice had a reputation for not putting up with any nonsense.

  “Ronnie needs to be on our visiting list, as he seems the only person to have definitely benefitted from his brother’s death.” Orlando waved his hand, as though signing QED under a piece of work. “Whereas Reggie’s debtors would have wanted to keep him alive, so he could pay up when the uncle died.”

  “I wish I knew if there was anybody who benefitted from Livingstone’s death. Nothing apparent at the inquest, except for the chap Goode, assuming this girl’s worth killing for.”

  “But if Strevens told us the truth—and if the witnesses did the same at the inquest—Livingstone hadn’t lost her. He’d never won her in the first place.” They’d finished their time with the reporter by looking through all his notes, and read the original newspaper reports. Nothing had sprung out from between the lines.

  “Where next? Down the other turns of that maze, I suppose.” Jonty swished his stick again, beheading a convenient patch of dandelions. “Talk to Derek and see if he knew Livingstone. Ask him if any of his—what did Strevens call them?—motley bunch had blotted his copybook enough in the past to make a lifelong enemy.”

  “Not all the bunch, surely? Just Reggie Tuffnell?”

  “Dangerous to make assumptions, you know that. Which means we should talk to Goode, as well. And young Covington about why he got so uppity with the coroner.” Jonty swished so hard his stick broke against a small bush. “I wish we could just ask, ‘Did you kill either of these chaps and why? Was it for the money or for revenge or to get a rival out of the way? Or did you just get the taste for killing and want to carry on savouring the sensation?’ I’m not sure we’d get any answer other than a punch on the nose.”