I thrust the piece of paper into the pocket of my slacks and headed down to the phone. On the lower staircase I heard a murmur of voices. It suited me fine if Pearl was occupied with a customer. I’d be able to talk to Ben without her listening to every word.
But the man with Pearl was Peter Kemp. As I opened the door at the foot of the stairs they broke off talking abruptly, almost guiltily, I thought.
Peter stammered, “Oh hallo, Tess. I... I just dropped in to see how things were going.”
With no wish to waste time chatting to Peter, my response was decidedly less than friendly. “Everything’s fine. Why not?”
“Well, I thought... settling-in problems, you know ...” I didn’t give him any help, and Peter went on awkwardly, “How about popping round to The Druid’s Head for a drink? I’m sure Mrs. Ratcliffe will look after the shop for you.”
“But of course. You two go off and stay out as long as you like.” Such heartiness coming from Pearl sounded pseudo. It wasn’t her style at all. “Why not take Tess out for lunch while you’re about it?” she added.
“I don’t want to go out,” I retorted, uneasily aware that I sounded peevish. “It might come as a surprise to you, Pearl, but I’m quite capable of making my own decisions.”
She held her temper and smiled sweetly. “I was merely trying to be helpful. But if that’s how you feel, I shall say no more.”
Peter said, frowning, “You’re in a mood, Tess. Is it me? What have I done?”
“Nothing, as far as I know. But I’m busy, surely you can see that.”
Pearl’s mellow laugh underscored the fact that I’d spent most of the morning upstairs and done nothing in the shop. She further made her point by continuing with the task that Peter, presumably, had interrupted ... going round with the stock book in her hand relabelling each item on the shelves with the asking price, according to my new dictate. But, I reminded myself, I was the boss—so Pearl could like it or lump it.
Peter had come over to the desk. He muttered puzzledly, “Tess, why have you suddenly gone all prickly? What’s happened to upset you?”
“What do you suppose could have happened?”
“How should I know? That’s why I’m asking. We seemed to get on so well together over dinner, I was hoping that...”
“Just go away, Peter, and leave me in peace.” He had his mouth open to protest some more, and I added with greater emphasis, “Please.”
“Okay, okay.” He made a sulky retreat to the door, then glanced back with a parting shot. “I’m warning you, I won’t give up easily.”
Pearl remarked, as I picked up the phone to dial, “I’d think twice about giving Peter Kemp the brush-off. Men as attractive as him aren’t all that thick on the ground.”
“Oh, for pity’s sake,” I snapped. “Are you trying to organise my private life as well?”
Even that didn’t get under her skin. I’d been half hoping, I suspect, that she’d flare up and hand in her notice there and then. But she just shrugged, and said over her shoulder, “There’s no need to be so touchy.”
My call was through, and I asked if Ben Wyland was available. He came on the line at once.
“Tess, does this mean you’ve found it?”
“No, but... well, could we meet?”
“You’re on to something, then?”
“I think so.”
“Shall I come straight round?”
“No, don’t do that.” I hadn’t given this proper thought. “I know ... I’ll meet you on the seafront. The nearest point to here. You can pick me up as you drive past.”
“Fifteen minutes?”
“Right.” I wondered what Pearl had made of what she’d overheard, and told myself that I didn’t care a damn. “I’ve got to go out for a while,” I informed her brusquely.
Going upstairs to get ready, I decided on the spur of the moment to change out of my slacks into a rather pretty full-skirted cotton print dress. When I came down a few minutes later, Pearl looked me over with amused eyes.
“So? Ben gets the full treatment. Is that Ben Wyland of Wyland and Partners?”
I gave her a curt nod that asked what the hell it had to do with her. “I’ll be as quick as I can.”
“Don’t hurry on my account,” she said.
In almost no time, by slipping through back ways, I reached the broad thoroughfare that runs for miles along Brighton’s seafront. It took me as long again waiting for the lights to halt the several lanes of traffic that streamed in each direction.
Once I’d crossed to the promenade, I took up position by the green railings. Below me the beach was crowded for the tide was high, and the sun-spangled water was a mass of laughing, splashing bathers. Farther out a speedboat swooped impudently close to Palace Pier, whose long length stretched seawards like some weird silver-backed creature with a thousand spindly legs. I kept a careful watch for Ben, not sure which car he’d be driving today.
He came along dead on time in the same blue Ford, and I ran across the wide pavement and dodged between two parked cars. Ben leant across and threw open the door for me.
“So what’s this all about, Tess?” he asked, as he swung back into the traffic stream.
“Stop as soon as you can, will you? I’ve got something to show you.”
It was some way on, past West Pier, before Ben found a vacant parking place.
“Well?” he demanded.
I took the crumpled billhead from my shoulderbag. “What do you make of that, Ben?”
He glanced at the printed side, turned it over and frowned at the jotted notes. “Where did you find this?”
“In Uncle Maynard’s wallet, half an hour ago. Do you think that list could be ... ?”
“Of course. I take it this is his handwriting?”
“The list is.”
“And the address? Pearl Ratcliffe, do you think?”
I shook my head, “Unlikely. Her style is much more elegant.”
“So. He was given this address by someone we can’t yet identify. Only part of an address-presumably because it was all he needed. Which suggests it’s somewhere local. This Miss Willoughby either had in her possession, or knew something about, the October Cabaret. Otherwise, why this complete list of its pieces? Which I imagine your uncle checked out in some reference book much as we did last night.”
“But we’ve agreed that Uncle Maynard already had the sugar box - at least for long enough to take those photographs. How did he come by it, Ben, and what about the rest of the set?”
“The way to find that out is to talk to Miss Willoughby herself. Let’s see if we can get her full address.”
There was a phone box just across from us, and we went to consult the local directory. Only a dozen or so Willoughbys were listed, and we soon found the one we wanted. Ruth Willoughby, Malt House Cott, Plyming.
“Where’s Plyming, Ben?”
“It’s a village just over the Downs. Not more than seven or eight miles from here. Come on, let’s get going.”
“I’d better ring Pearl first,” I said, “and warn her that I won’t be back yet awhile.”
Chapter Eight
Plyming was one of Sussex’s secret villages. It lay in a hollow of the South Downs, so enfolded by trees that only a few gabled rooftops were visible from the byroad that wound down serpent-like between fields of ripening corn. Ben halted at the village green, and the tranquility of it all came seeping through to us, sun-warm and friendly. The church was built of flintstone with a buttressed tower, and its clock stood stopped at - no, I just didn’t believe it! - ten to three. (And is there honey still for tea?). In the middle of the road outside the lychgate a ginger cat and a collie dog lay flopped together in a lazy heap.
Ben called to a boy on a bicycle several sizes too large for him, and he slid off the saddle to get one foot on the ground.
“Do you know Malt House Cottage? Can you tell us where it is?”
The boy stared blankly, his mouth wide open. Then he pointed in s
ilence. We saw that a small lane led off just past the ivy-covered churchyard wall. Ben nodded thanks and we turned there between neatly clipped yew trees on the one side, and a sprawling apple orchard on the other.
A hundred yards further and there it was, a picture postcard of an English cottage; thatch-roofed, half-timbered, the front porch festooned with climbing roses. The wicket gate hung askew on its hinges, the name in peeling letters that were scarcely legible. Beneath our feet as we walked up the flagstone path, creeping camomile and thyme released their homely scents, and all around us was a tangle of summer flowers.
The door stood invitingly open, as also the French windows to its left. We had worked out what to say; not to reveal too much yet, we were only putting out feelers at this stage. Ben rapped on the door with his knuckles, and the incongruous sound of pop music was abruptly cut off.
“Half a mo’, I’m just coming.”
The woman was not Miss Willoughby, I somehow felt quite certain of that - and besides, she wore a wedding ring. She was in her thirties, big and busty with arms like hams, and blonded hair that fell in a happy-go-lucky bunch over one shoulder.
“Good morning,” I greeted her with a bright smile. “Is Miss Willoughby at home?”
“No she isn’t, nor ever will be again,” she said, her face suddenly solemn. “The poor old soul has passed on.”
I gaped, so totally unprepared for this, and so bitterly disappointed. Ben took over smoothly. “We’re very sorry to hear that. When did it happen?”
“Fortnight ago. No, tell a lie ... it’ll be exactly three weeks come Monday morning that she was found dead.”
“Is there ... is there someone we could talk to?” I said foolishly.
“You’re talking to me, aren’t you, love? What is it you want to know, then?”
Hastily I jettisoned our prepared story and improvised. “I promised my mother that I’d look Miss Willoughby up while I’m in England. I’m from Canada, you see...”
“Thought so. Leastways, somewhere or other.”
“Mother will be sad to hear that she’s dead,” I went on. “She knew Miss Willoughby way back, years ago before she emigrated. Before I was even born.”
“Taught her to play the piano, I expect, like she did lots of young girls round hereabouts.”
“Er yes ... that’s right.” I breathed a disappointed sigh. “Well, at least I’ll be able to tell my mother that I saw the outside of Malt House Cottage. It’s a really beautiful old place, isn’t it?”
The woman stepped back invitingly. “Come on in and have a proper look round, if you like. It was lucky you caught me here, actually, I only popped in this morning because the solicitor chap asked me to get the place straight for some dealers who are coming tomorrow to give him a quote for the furniture and stuff - for what it’s worth! I suppose her piano should raise a few quid, but there’s not much else. I don’t go for all this old-fashioned stuff myself. Do you?”
“Still, it fetches good prices these days,” said Ben noncommittally, glancing round without any hint of the shrewd assessment that I knew must be going on in his mind.
It was a tasteless room, which wasn’t to say there weren’t several nice pieces besides the baby grand piano. An ebony and gilt card table, something in the Louis Quinze style, for instance; a small oak bureau with carved legs; a couple of Victorian spoon-back chairs and various vases and ornaments... but all so cluttered and ill-arranged that the woman could hardly be blamed for thinking it was just a load of junk.
“The way the old girl used to carry on about her things, you’d have thought they was fit for the Queen herself,” she said. “Always nagging at me to be careful, and I never broke a blessed thing... well, hardly. I used to do for her, you see, a couple of hours a morning, though many’s the time I nearly packed it in when she turned on me with that sharp tongue of hers. Still, I couldn’t help feeling sorry for her - she hadn’t a soul in the world to call her own, you know, ’cos she’d had a silly daft quarrel with her twin sister and never a word spoke between them since.”
“Does her sister live in the village?” I enquired.
“No, she moved away when she got married. That’s what the row was all about—Ruth wanted him, and Doris hooked him. The old story! Mind you,” she added, “I only know about this from what I’ve heard tell. I was just a kid when it all happened.”
Ben glanced in my direction and said, “I expect you’d like to have the sister’s address, wouldn’t you, Tess?”
I grabbed the hint. “Yes, please, if you happen to know it.”
“I’ll fetch it for you,” the woman said obligingly. “I remember where she kept her address book.” She went to the oak bureau and started rummaging in a pigeonhole, then tried one of the drawers. “Leastways, things didn’t always get put back in their proper place ... not with her the way she was, if you get my meaning.”
“A bit forgetful in her old age?” Ben suggested.
She gave him a sly glance over her shoulder. “A bit too fond of the bottle, that was our Miss Willoughby’s little weakness. That’s how she met her end, falling headlong down the stairs in her nightie. Must’ve woke up and felt like a nip, I suppose, only she was still a bit tiddly from all the nips she’d had earlier on. Not that she’d got much to live for, mind you, so perhaps it was a blessing in disguise. Ah, here we are.” She drew a small red book from a drawer and began to turn the pages. “I don’t know her sister’s married name, but let’s hope she put it in under Doris. Yes, Mrs. Doris Lambert, that’ll be her. Have you got a bit of paper to write it down?”
Ben jotted the address on the back of his chequebook. It was in London ... Highgate, and sounded like a block of flats.
“Thanks for your trouble,” he said.
“You’re welcome.” She slipped the address book back in the drawer. “I’m going to miss this job, you know. It was handy, with me living just up the road. And I didn’t dislike the old girl, for all she was a rum old stick.”
“Perhaps the new owner will be glad to keep you on,” Ben said. “I expect the cottage will sell for quite a packet. Who gets that—the sister?”
“Not her... not so much as a penny piece. It’ll all go to charity, just out of spite. Miss Willoughby made her will long ago, all signed and sealed and everything. ‘That sister of mine isn’t going to get her greedy hands on my things if I go first, Maggie,’ she said to me once. ‘We divided up Father’s things between us when he died, all fair and square, and it’s no use Doris trying to make out she’s got any claim to what’s mine.’ ”
I was content to leave most of the talking to Ben. From the way the woman kept looking him up and down, it couldn’t be clearer that he was far better placed than me to pump her.
He said now, oh so casually, “Did they inherit much, then, from their father?”
“Well, they both got a tidy sum of money ... that’s what bought this cottage for Miss Willoughby. But apart from that, some of the furniture was his, I believe ... that weird brass dock on the mantelpiece, and that black table over there. Oh, and her famous china.”
I held my breath. Ben said, “China? Which do you mean ... those plates on the wall?”
“Well, yes... but mostly it was her tea set in the glass cabinet over there in the alcove. The way she kept on about it, saying how beautiful it was, and much prettier than her sister’s because, being the oldest twin-by half an hour, she told me—she insisted on getting her pick of the two. But it gets me what use they are to anybody. I mean to say, just two cups and saucers, and such soppy little things, too. I can just imagine what my Harry would say if I was to give him one of them for his tea.”
Ben chuckled. “I know what you mean—one of those fancy, fragile sort of services?”
“Oh lor, yes. All pink and gold, with little coloured pictures. I got a plate like it once that I won at the fair. It’s quite pretty, really, I use it for cakes and things when my mum comes round, but if it got smashed I wouldn’t cry my eyes out. But her...
she treated that blessed china, like it was made of pure eighteen-carat gold. I was never allowed to touch it, never. It’s always been kept locked up in the cabinet and the key on a ribbon round her neck.” She jerked her head invitingly. “Go and have a look.”
As if in amusement, Ben strolled over to the alcove, bending his head to miss the low beams. I followed him, forcing myself not to hurry. The none-too-clean, diamond-leaded panes of the cabinet didn’t give a very good view of the contents, especially here in this dim corner. It was very evident, though, that it held nothing remotely like a Sèvres cabaret.
Ben said lightly - and I could feel the effort it cost him – “It doesn’t seem to be here now.”
“What d’you mean, not there? ” Maggie scurried across to join us, and gasped in amazement. “Well, I never! What’s happened to it?” She looked at us uneasily. “I hope that Mr. Phelps doesn’t get the idea I’ve pinched it or anything.”
“Mr. Phelps?”
“The lawyer chap.”
“Oh, I’m sure he won’t.” Ben smiled a reassuring smile, and suggested helpfully, “Perhaps Miss Willoughby sold it shortly before she died.”
Maggie shook her head. “I can’t imagine her doing that. Besides, she’d been laid up with a cold for a week or two beforehand and she’d not seen anyone, only me.”
“When was the last time you saw the china?”
She put a lot of effort into remembering, frowning fiercely. “Hard to say, really. Leastways, it would’ve been the Saturday morning just before she passed away. I was going round all them beams with the feather duster... they do get cobwebby if you don’t do them regular. I can’t swear to it, of course, but I’m sure I’d have noticed if her tea set wasn’t there then.”
No one could have guessed from Ben’s voice that it mattered to him one way or another. “I’d just keep quiet if I were you.”
Maggie looked grateful to have her conscience cleared by someone who should surely know what was right and proper. “Yes, that’s the best thing, isn’t it? My Harry always says it’s only fools who go out looking for trouble.”
The October Cabaret Page 7
