by Jilly Cooper
Hermione was so carried away, she didn’t notice Karen doubled up with helpless laughter as she fled from the room. Gablecross, chewing his lip, just managed to keep a straight face. ‘But Cosmo was sending these pictures to the Sun, Dame Hermione.’
‘Very enterprising. I told Cosmo he wouldn’t get a penny until probate came through. I know Higgy will adore them. We could even try Charles Moore on the Telegraph, such a charmer. That one of me on my own is so lovely, Serena could use it on the next CD. Bravo, Cosmo.’
‘You’re the kiss of death,’ Gerry Portland chided Karen and Gablecross, as they gathered round his office table later that morning to admire the Live Sexton Show, as it was now called.
‘Moment you start interviewing a perfectly legit suspect – Tristan, Rupert, Hermione – an alibi comes jumping out of the woodwork. I suppose we can assume she was unlikely to have jumped out of bedstraw to murder Rannaldini.’
‘It would have taken her at least a quarter of an hour even to run from River House,’ said Gablecross, ‘and if she’d been out of breath, she couldn’t have sung Elisabetta’s last aria so beautifully.’
‘She’s got a marvellous body,’ said Portland, ‘and knows a few tricks for an old ’un.’
‘Hermione agrees with you,’ said Karen, who was still laughing.
‘I hope the lad isn’t too traumatized.’
‘Camera’s only thing likely to be upset,’ said Gablecross. ‘That boy’s more evil than his father.’
As a result Gablecross and Karen didn’t reach Mallowfield until teatime.
Having admired the grandeurs of River House earlier, Gablecross’s first angry impression was that Rozzy, as a well-known and much beloved singer, ought to be living in a better house.
Clearly no-one had been watering the garden during the drought or washed the milk bottles, sour and queuing up outside the door. The carpets were threadbare, the paint peeling. Flowers Rozzy had obviously arranged beautifully for Glyn’s party the Sunday before last had shed their petals on dusty surfaces. There were no portraits or photographs of Rozzy, even in her radiant youth. Any cups or awards she’d won over the years had been hidden away. The colours were beautiful, but Gablecross had the feeling, looking at shelves denuded except for cards, that most things of value had been hocked.
He was further irritated to find he quite liked Glyn, who had an unlined face, a beer gut, and who was eating pizza, drinking his way down a pint mug of red, and watching Rutshire bowl out Oxfordshire. Half rising to his feet, he apologized, but without much conviction, for the bottles still littering the place from his party.
‘Know I ought to make a trip to the bottle bank but it’s easier to bung the dustmen, and they always come before I get up. Tend to let things slide when Rozzy’s away. But Syl will have the place like a new pin for when she comes home – on Wednesday, isn’t it?’
Sylvia, the housekeeper, was extremely pretty with big blue eyes, a shiny red bob and a regulo-nine smile, which could be turned off as quickly. She was obviously better at keeping herself beautiful than the house. Karen understood why poor Rozzy had sleepless nights over Sylvia.
‘Have a drink,’ urged Glyn. ‘Both of you can’t be driving. Get some glasses, Syl, love. How’s it going at Valhalla?’
‘Must be spooky,’ shuddered Sylvia, as she reluctantly left the room.
‘I gather you had a wonderful birthday party,’ beamed Karen, who found herself sitting very far forward in an armchair stuffed with tapestry cushions.
‘Wonderful,’ agreed Glyn. ‘Syl wanted to help. But Roz insisted on doing everything. Loves to feel needed. I wanted to get in caterers,’ added Glyn expansively. ‘Roz wouldn’t hear of it. We never save any money. Ex-wife costs a bomb, two kids at boarding-school.’
‘When do they come home?’ asked Gablecross.
‘Wednesday,’ said Sylvia, without enthusiasm, as she returned with a jug of orange juice, cans of iced beer and another bottle of red.
So Rozzy’ll be back to look after them, thought Karen crossly. You wouldn’t put yourself out for anyone.
‘Did Rozzy enjoy the party?’ she asked.
‘Frankly, the old girl has been working so hard on Don Carlos, and worrying about the film’s budget and our budget, and tidying and cooking, she retired to bed with a migraine.’
Bet that was diplomatic, thought Karen, accepting a glass of orange juice. Perhaps Rozzy’d caught hers from Tristan.
‘What time did she go to bed?’ she asked, getting out her notebook.
‘Ooo, if we’re going on record, we’d better check our facts,’ said Sylvia skittishly. ‘Around, er . . .’ She glanced at Glyn.
‘Eight thirty,’ said Glyn. ‘Loads of people were still here. I checked she was asleep at nine thirty. Syl checked her at ten, I put my head round the door about ten thirty and eleven.’
Those up to no good check all the time, thought Gablecross.
‘I finally went to bed around midnight,’ boasted Glyn, reaching for the corkscrew to open the red. ‘Tripped over the landing carpet, woke Rozzy up. She came out looking all in.’
Sylvia got up to put on a record.
‘What did Rozzy give you for your birthday, apart from the party?’ asked Karen.
‘She got me a signed copy of Georgie Maguire’s latest album, and a signed photo,’ said Glyn. ‘Syl loves Georgie too, don’t you, Syl?’
‘S’wonderful, s’marvellous,’ sang the record player.
‘Lovely single, isn’t it?’ said Glyn fondly. ‘We played this and Georgie’s album all day.’
‘When did you cut your cake?’
‘Around eight, I should think. There were still people here at midnight – I left them to it.’
‘Your wife made two calls to Valhalla during the evening.’
Glyn laughed. ‘She likes to check up, always checking up on me.’ He winked at Karen who didn’t wink back.
‘Why didn’t she use the house phone?’
‘She was in the spare room – doesn’t have a phone. We often sleep in separate rooms. I tend to snore, particularly when I’ve had a few. The spare room looks north over the back of the house so it was a bit quieter during the party.’
‘You ever meet Rannaldini?’
‘Sir Roberto? Only after performances in the old days. Charismatic bloke.’
‘Think of any reason why anyone should kill him?’
‘I could have done a few years ago – he was always jumping on Rozzy.’
‘You didn’t tell me that,’ snapped Syl.
‘Why should Rannaldini have made a note to ring you the day he died?’ asked Gablecross.
‘Me!’ said Glyn somewhat flattered. ‘I’ve no idea. Perhaps Rozzy’s singing hadn’t been up to scratch, or she might have overtired herself. She’s always been delicate.’
She obviously hasn’t told Glyn about the throat cancer, thought Gablecross. He ought to mention it, instead he said, ‘Perhaps her GP could shed some light. Can you let me have his name?’
‘Of course. I know she was worried about the young chappie directing it.’
‘That is the most loathsome creep,’ stormed Karen, as she drove through the dripping dusk. ‘Bernard would make Rozzy much happier.’
But Gablecross was talking on his mobile to the incident room.
‘Interpol had a tip-off that Rupert was staying in Montvert,’ he told Karen as he switched it off. ‘Casing the Montigny joint presumably, but when they rolled up at the hotel early this morning the bird had flown. Another couple who sound suspiciously like Wolfie and Lucy, who also stayed there, gave them the slip. Rannaldini’s Gulf, on the other hand, has been clamped at Toulouse airport. Now, what the hell can that mean?’
‘That at least Lucy’s safe, Sarge,’ said Karen, patting his arm.
Very early that Monday morning, Lucy had been woken by a telephone call from Wolfie.
‘We gotta move it. Two plain-clothes men are downstairs looking for Rupert. Madame didn’t tell them we were h
ere, but suggests we leg it as soon as possible out through the back garden.’
Wolfie was just gathering speed down the high street, when a loitering gendarme mistook his blond hair and suntanned face for Rupert’s, and whistled up his mate to give chase. Wolfie, who drove almost as fast as he flew, had no difficulty shaking them off. The airport was in sight, they could see Rannaldini’s Gulf jet merging into the heat-haze on the runway, when Lucy’s mobile rang. When she switched it off thirty seconds later she was as pale and trembling as a white poplar.
‘Hortense has changed her mind, but we’ve got to hurry. Dupont and the rellies are expected back before lunch.’
Lucy’s heart sank when a waiting Florence said Hortense didn’t want to see them. She led them upstairs and, with a lot of cursing, unlocked a bedroom door. As the door creaked reluctantly open, she stood back.
‘Madame said you’ll find all the information you need in here. You’re to be locked in for security reasons. Press that bell when you want to be let out.’
At first it was a question of not choking to death. As their eyes grew accustomed to the dark, it was plain that nothing had been touched for years, possibly centuries. By yanking open the shutters, Wolfie triggered off an avalanche of dust. Cobwebs, woven on top of cobwebs and dotted with flies and wasps, formed net curtains across windows and in corners.
On the walls, a little Van Gogh and several of Étienne’s enchanting drawings of dogs fought for space with school and army photographs and peeling posters of Jane Birkin, Juliette Greco and Bardot. Astérix leered up at them from the yellowing duvet covering the bed in the corner.
A half-full bottle of brandy, Roget et Gallet cologne, LPs of Sergeant Pepper, the Stones and Manfred Mann, hairbrushes, their silver backs blackened, Esquire and Playboy, Paris-Match and Shooting Times were all jumbled together on the shelves. Newspapers on the table, faded to the colour of weak tea, were all dated 1967.
‘What the hell’s all this about?’ asked Wolfie, trying to open a window.
‘Must be Laurent’s room,’ pondered Lucy. ‘Florence said Étienne never allowed anyone in here after his death. But I still don’t see.’
Leaning against the wall was a gold-framed portrait. Wiping away the dust and grime with her T-shirt, Lucy gave a gasp because a younger, happier, bolder Tristan smiled back at her. Then her heart stopped as she noticed the now-towering trees of the lime walk then only reached his shoulders, and that he was the same young man who’d been staring down at the girl whose long dark hair was tied back with a scarlet ribbon.
‘This must be Laurent painted by Étienne,’ she said, in excitement. ‘God, he’s good-looking.’
Wolfie, rooting round a desk, had found a pile of letters.
‘These must have been sent him when he was in the army in Chad. “My darling, darling Laurent,”’ read Wolfie. ‘Sounds exciting. And here’s another pile with West African stamps on them.’
Swinging round Lucy knew, even before she saw them, that the letters would be tied together with scarlet ribbon.
‘Give them here.’ She snatched the package with a shaking hand, and, tearing open the top one, read, ‘“My darling angelic Delphine,”’ and knew everything.
‘Oh, my God, listen, Wolfie. “Don’t be frightened,” Laurent writes. “I’ll be home in two months to take care of you. Is our baby still kicking in your beautiful belly? If it’s a boy let’s call him Tristan, but he’s not going to be destined for tragedy, only joy.” God, they got that wrong. Then Laurent goes on, “I love you so desperately. Don’t worry about Papa. I just can’t bear to think of you in the same bed as him or even that he’s your husband. I know it’s important not to humiliate him, that this should never have happened, but the fact that you and I love each other is all that matters.”
‘Oh, God, Wolfie.’ Lucy looked up in horror. ‘Poor Étienne, cuckolded by his own son.’
‘Like Philip and Carlos.’ Wolfie shook his head in bewilderment.
Lucy skimmed the rest of the letter. Laurent had been full of plans for the new life he and Delphine would start in Australia with their baby. He’d get a job, and they’d have love to live on.
‘Here’s a letter from Delphine to him,’ said Wolfie, ‘dated November the fourteenth. That must have been just after Tristan was born. She’s enclosed a little pencil drawing of the baby, look.’
‘Oh, how sweet.’ Lucy mopped her eyes. On the back she recognized Étienne’s elegant handwriting: ‘Tristan Laurent Blaize, a beautiful boy, one hour old.’
‘I thought you’d like to see your son and heir,’ Delphine had written. ‘Isn’t he adorable? Étienne is so proud of his imagined offspring. I feel so guilty. Oh, Laurent, please come home, he’s nagging me to have sex again. I can’t bear him to touch me.’
‘Here’s an even earlier one,’ interrupted Wolfie.
‘“Darling Delphine, it’s the best news in the world you’re pregnant. It seals everything. Let me finish my stint here, there are things I must do.”’ Wolfie looked up at Lucy. ‘That must have been for the rebels. “Then I’ll come home and take you away, you will divorce Papa and marry me. Everything will be very simple.” Christ, little did he know.’
‘Here’s another horrible one,’ cried Lucy, in distress, smoothing out the letter, holding it up to the dim light from the windows. ‘Must be early in her pregnancy, she sounds just like Elisabetta. “Étienne made love to me outside today. I noticed his grey eyebrows and chest hair, the liver spots on his hands, the pleats in his flesh, when he raised himself on his wrinkled arms. Oh, Laurie, I know he’s your father but he revolts me.”
‘I can’t read any more.’ Lucy thrust aside the letter. ‘Étienne was a vain old goat, but he must have been crucified by the son he adored, then constantly reminded of this betrayal as Tristan grew more and more like Laurent. And that’, Lucy choked on the swirling dust in the excitement of her discovery, ‘was what he was rambling on about on his deathbed, trying to tell Tristan that he was his grandfather not his father.’
Wolfie was neatly stacking the letters and tying up Laurent’s with their scarlet ribbon.
‘If Tristan is Laurent and Delphine’s son,’ he said soberly, ‘he’s not only a Montigny, but can marry and have children by whoever he likes.’
Lucy’s hair was white with dust, her face filthy and streaked with tears. ‘So we found out what we came here for,’ she said slowly, then realizing the full implications: ‘Oh, Wolfie, I hope it works out for you.’
Hortense burst out laughing when she saw Lucy’s dusty hair. ‘You look older than I do. I hope you were surprised by what you discovered.’
‘Stunned.’ Sitting on the bed, Lucy took Hortense’s hands. ‘I’m sorry I was so horrible yesterday. I’m terribly glad for Tristan, but those letters are appalling. I understand totally why you didn’t want it to come out. Poor Étienne. But why did someone as gorgeous as Delphine marry such an old man in the first place?’
‘Rannaldini encouraged her,’ said Hortense. ‘She was a bit of a “raver”, I think it’s called, and wanted to escape from her strait-laced family. Maxim detested Rannaldini and that’s why, in revenge, Rannaldini reinvented him as a sex-crazed rapist. Rannaldini persuaded Delphine of the doors Étienne would open, of the exciting life she would lead among the famous, how she’d be immortalized in his paintings.’
‘But what about Maxim?’
‘I always suspected’, Hortense lowered her voice conspiratorially, ‘that he wasn’t Delphine’s father. Her mother had an affaire with some actor called Sammy somebody. They were all Bohemians,’ she added with a sniff. ‘Maxim certainly doted on Delphine and immediately recognized Rannaldini as a rotter. He was even more distraught when she married Étienne, a notorious womanizer, even older than himself.’
‘So he wasn’t sectioned as a mad psychopath?’
‘Certainly not, he went a bit dotty at the end, as we all do, and died in a perfectly respectable nursing home.’
Thank goodness Wolf
ie was downstairs, not hearing more evidence of his father’s fearful lies.
‘What happened to Laurent’s mother?’
Hortense stroked her little greyhound reflectively.
‘She was Étienne’s third or fourth wife. Played bridge all day and, when Étienne pushed off, graduated to gin. Tripped over a black Labrador coming out of her bedroom in the dark one night and broke her neck falling down the stairs. Wonderful way to go.’
‘So that disposed of one granny,’ giggled Lucy. ‘I don’t mean to laugh, the whole thing must have been terrible.’
‘Terrible. Étienne was so excited about his new baby, then a fortnight later we heard Laurent had died in some explosion – friendly fire, it’s called. Étienne was inconsolable, so was Delphine, naturally, which touched Étienne because he felt she was sharing his unhappiness and at least they had a new life to look forward to together.
‘Then Laurent’s things were sent home, with all Delphine’s letters and, cruellest of all, Étienne’s little drawing. Étienne went on the rampage, found all Laurent’s letters locked in her jewel case, and nearly killed her. Next day she took an overdose, sent me a note begging my forgiveness and asking me to bring up Tristan.’
A farm dog bayed down in the valley. The little greyhound pricked up its velvet ears and stretched.
‘Everything was locked in Laurent’s room just as it was when he went off to Chad. Everyone thought Étienne was heartbroken, but it was the far more painful heartbreak of betrayal.’ Hortense lay back exhausted, her face very grey. ‘I probably shouldn’t have told you.’
‘You should. Tristan has to know, so he can understand Étienne and forgive him.’ Then, as she heard wheels on the gravel, banging doors and voices outside, ‘I must go.’
‘Dupont et cetera must be here,’ grumbled Hortense. ‘They’ll be devastated I’m not worse. You’d better escape out the back.’
