Clubbed to Death

by Ruth Edwards

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ said Milton dispiritedly. ‘I think we’ll leave it at that for now.’

  Amiss responded to the bell almost immediately. He looked at them and smirked. ‘How did you get on?’

  ‘I suppose you could say that we got a lot of interesting, philosophical reflections on national characteristics, the inadequacy of police methods, his own probity and old-fashioned virtues. Oh, yes. He did finger the most likely murderer.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Robert O’Amiss. Piece of unimpeachable logic. He knows it’s bound to be a Paddy: we say it must be an insider. Since he can point to no Irish employees, there must be somebody English who’s second-generation Irish and passing for English. You follow me?’

  ‘Just about.’

  ‘So among what you might call the floating waiting population, there’s really only you.’

  ‘I knew that some day it would come out about my Irish grandmother,’ said Amiss. ‘Mind you, she was a Belfast Protestant, but I don’t suppose that would cut much ice with Colonel Fagg. Well, before you clap the handcuffs on me, would you like me to procure you some tea?’

  ‘What I could really do with,’ said Milton, ‘is a very stiff drink. But being a martyr to duty I’ll settle for tea. We have got absolutely nowhere.’

  ‘But it’s a day of softening them up, sir, really, isn’t it?’ said Pooley.

  ‘I know, I know, Ellis, but Christ, what a crew. What a bloody crew.’

  ‘I think I’d better provide you with toasted teacakes as well,’ said Amiss sympathetically. ‘You don’t sound to me to be in the right condition to spend time with Fishbane.’ With a low snigger, he bowed and left.

  Chapter Nineteen

  ‘OK, Ellis, take out the tray and bring on the sex maniac.’ Milton took a last bite of teacake and a last gulp of tea and lay back in his chair and closed his eyes. Pooley deposited the tray in the Coffee Room and went up to the gallery where Fishbane was awaiting a summons. From the bottom of the staircase he could hear Fagg’s angry voice bellowing ‘damn cheek’. By the time he reached the table where Fishbane was listening in silence to his enraged colleague, with splendid timing the Colonel had got on to ‘bloody young whipper-snappers’.

  Normally, Pooley was concerned to hide his upper-class origins from the general public as well as from his police confrères, but occasionally Eton came in useful when he wanted to discomfit a member of the public who was treating him like PC Plod. He summoned up from the past the accent he had spent years discarding and bowed to the two men.

  ‘Colonel Fagg. Mr. Fishbane. I beg your pardon, gentlemen. I am sorry to disturb you, but Detective Chief Superintendent Milton has asked me to tell you, Mr. Fishbane, that he would be grateful if you would be so kind as to spare him a little of your time. Would you care to accompany me now or follow in a couple of minutes when you have finished your conversation?’

  ‘I’ll come now,’ said Fishbane. Pooley thought he sounded rather relieved.

  They walked down the first flight of stairs in silence. Then Fishbane asked, ‘Have you been a policeman long…Detective Sergeant? Have I got that right?’

  ‘Yes, that’s right, sir. A few years.’

  ‘And before that?’

  ‘I was at university and then in the Home Office for a time.’

  ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Pooley, sir.’

  ‘You’re not by any chance related to the Worcestershire Pooleys, are you?’

  Pooley cursed himself for letting his vanity give him away. ‘Yes I am, sir,’ he said, throwing open the door of the Rochester Room thankfully. ‘Mr. Fishbane, sir.’ He scuttled round the table hoping there would be no further genealogical scrutiny.

  ‘Good afternoon, Detective Chief Superintendent,’ said Fishbane affably. ‘I gather that your sergeant is related to my old friend Reggie Pooley. How close are you, Sergeant?’

  Pooley gazed fixedly at the table. ‘He’s my father, sir.’

  ‘Well, well. How extraordinary,’ said Fishbane, somewhat tactlessly. ‘But of course, now that I look at you, you have his colouring. How is he these days? I haven’t seen him since school, I think.’

  ‘He’s fine, sir.’

  Milton took pity on his embarrassed friend. ‘Do sit down, Mr. Fishbane,’ he said. ‘Can I order you some coffee or tea?’

  ‘No thank you. I’ve just had tea, with Fagg actually. You seemed to have upset him rather. Gave him a frightful grilling, he said.’

  ‘Well, I can assure you, sir, it is not my desire to upset anybody. But Colonel Fagg didn’t appear to take kindly to the idea of helping us.’

  ‘Poor old Fagg. I shouldn’t pay too much attention to him, Mr. Milton. Is it acceptable to call you that? Detective Chief Superintendent seems a terrible mouthful.’

  ‘Yes of course, sir.’

  ‘Good. Well Fagg is…I mean, perhaps I shouldn’t say this about a chum, but he does lose his rag very easily. In fact, he’s in a pretty permanent state of rage about everything. Indeed, come to think of it, about nothing. You are merely the latest grievance, especially since you, I understand, are insisting that the murder of Con Meredith-Lee was not the work of freedom fighters from the neighbouring island.’

  ‘That is correct, sir.’

  ‘Well, of course, dear old Fagg is a great man for believing whatever suits him and obviously the notion that this was an inside job is unlikely to appeal. How many suspects do you have, Mr. Milton?’

  ‘That’s a somewhat leading question, Mr. Fishbane. We don’t have any suspects, but it has to be said that as far as I can see the people with the best motive were the five permanent residents of the club.’

  ‘You are, of course, absolutely right. Had the victim been old Fagg himself, the suspect list would have been much longer and more colourful, in every sense of the word. But while I think it intrinsically unlikely that any of my co-habitees, if I may so describe them, should have committed murder, and I know that I didn’t, I don’t know that I can help you very much.’

  ‘Perhaps you could tell us about your connection with the club and how you felt about the Admiral.’

  ‘You mean my personal history? Hmmm! I joined some time in the late thirties when I was a young member of the Foreign Office.’

  ‘Isn’t this an unusual club for a diplomat?’

  ‘For the usual kind of diplomat, yes. Let’s say I was prone to a certain amount of raffishness which would have been frowned upon by my more sober colleagues. So though I was a member of the Travellers’ and did my serious entertaining there, for socialising I infinitely preferred ffeatherstonehaugh’s.’

  ‘What aspects of the club most appealed to you, sir?’

  ‘Oh, the lot. It was a bloody marvellous place. None of that wretched English puritanism about sex. No, ffeatherstonehaugh’s understood the point of women all right. Knew they weren’t for gracing suburban dinner-tables, but for having fun with.’

  ‘When you say “fun,” sir?’

  ‘Oh, come on, Mr. Milton. You’ve been round this club now for long enough to have learned something of my reputation. Perhaps you’ve even heard that my nickname among the older servants is “the satyr?”’

  ‘No, sir.’ Milton was taken aback as much by Fishbane’s obvious pride in his priapic reputation as by the literacy of the nickname. It must, he concluded, have been a Gooseneck invention. ‘I hadn’t heard that. So did you remain an active member?’

  ‘Oh, very witty, Mr. Milton. Very witty indeed.’

  ‘I’m sorry, sir. The pun was inadvertent.’

  ‘You disappoint me. There was a period of about twenty years when I had little to do with the club. My lady wife would not have approved.’

  ‘I didn’t realise you were married, sir.’

  ‘Was. Bachelors were rather frowned on in the FCO. It was felt that they might get into all sorts of trouble abroad, so we were, informally, encouraged to marry rather than burn, as it were. And of course, to marry somebody who woul
d grace an ambassadorial drawing-room in due course. So foolishly I married someone from an impeccable diplomatic background who knew about servants, flower arranging and how to address the third wife of an African monarch.’

  ‘Foolishly?’

  ‘Foolishly. She was frigid and strait-laced and therefore somewhat ill-equipped to keep me on the straight and narrow. Oh, I was reasonably discreet and fortunately I was in a job where the hours were irregular—thus maximising the chance of getting away with dalliance.

  ‘It was rather more difficult when I was based in London between foreign postings. Then Hilda could control the social life much more. Between keeping up with opera, theatre, art exhibitions and all the other things that the upper middle classes go in for, my playtime was severely limited. When I could, I frequented an excellent little establishment—now, alas, long gone—in Pimlico, where the ladies were both agreeable and comparatively inexpensive.’ He smiled at the memory.

  ‘Then we were sent to Moscow and the roof fell in. I speak metaphorically of course. Had a bit of difficulty in finding my feet, sexually, as it were, in that although prostitutes were twenty a penny, the kind of up-market lovelies that I favoured were harder to locate. So I suppose it was frustration that led me to break the cardinal rule of any diplomat behind the Iron Curtain in the good old days. I got involved with one of the filing clerks in the office. A local girl and very nice too.’ He paused to remember. ‘Perhaps she was a touch stocky, but she hadn’t run to fat the way that most of them do. And there were definitely Slav genes, which gave her a rather exotic look. Yes, we had some good times together.’

  Milton thought briefly about trying to speed up this self-indulgent narrative and decided to do nothing.

  ‘That is, I had some good times. She, however, was on duty throughout, and she set us up for the KGB photographers. Next thing I knew there was old Boris sitting opposite me at my desk showing me a range of snaps that might, even now, command some good prices in the appropriate journals. Actually, I’ve kept a few: I enjoy nostalgia.

  ‘The object, of course, was blackmail, but I wasn’t prepared to play. I wouldn’t say I’m a great patriot, but I wouldn’t actually sell out my country. So I told Boris to forget it, broke the news to Hilda and to the ambassador and was transferred instantly back to London. I wasn’t fired—nothing as ungentlemanly as that. Merely persuaded that resignation was in my best interests. All very civilised of course, and they were relatively generous with a pension, that sort of thing. But out I went and out of my life went my wife and children. Daddy having recently popped it, my wife was comfortably off in her own right, and she did a deal by which, in exchange for her making no financial demands on me, I would make no attempt to see my daughters ever again: the corrupting influence was to be kept away. I gave in because I had no cards to play. She was an implacable bitch and she would have poisoned their minds against me anyway. I got a job which just about produced enough money for me to live here.’

  ‘What was the job, sir?’

  ‘Secretary of a trade association—widgets and gaskets, that sort of thing. Absolutely ghastly. My members were the worst representatives of the then-prevailing largely rotten British management. They liked me because I told them dirty jokes, made good after-dinner speeches, did a reasonable job for them in terms of links with government and that kind of thing, and had a bit of class. Oh, God, it was frightful. They spent all the time just complaining about fair competition.

  ‘So, since work yielded neither stimulation nor serious reward, I concentrated on my hobby. Never was much interested in anything except sex, despite my wife’s efforts to civilise me. Essentially that’s how I’ve spent the rest of my life, to date. Since I retired I’ve had more time on my hands and I pass it, you might say, in reading and reflection on my area of interest. The library here is particularly good for a man of my tastes.’

  ‘So I’ve observed, sir.’

  ‘Please don’t become bourgeois about it and send the vice squad round: we’ve enough troubles. My predecessor as librarian did, I admit, go in for some rather unpleasant stuff towards which I have no inclination, but being a libertarian I’m certainly not going to act as censor. The perpetrator of the offence, as no doubt you would describe it, was called to account by his maker some time ago.’

  ‘I’m grateful to you for being so frank, Mr. Fishbane.’

  ‘I’m not an idiot and clearly neither are you, so there isn’t much to be gained by concealing from you that which you can easily find out, is there, Mr. Milton?’

  ‘Indeed not, sir. Perhaps we could now move on to the question of Sir Conrad’s recent involvement in the club’s affairs?’

  ‘Well, I’m a bit torn on that. I’m not as much of a self-deluder as my fellow committee members. We have, of course, latterly been essentially running the club for our own benefit. In my own defence I can say only that I went along for the ride, as it were, if you’ll forgive the expression, Mr. Milton.’ Milton managed a weak smile. ‘Fagg and Chatterton were the leading lights and, of course, Blenkinsop was putty in their hands. I’m very happy to take whatever goodies are going. So, on the one hand I couldn’t pretend to myself that Meredith-Lee wasn’t justified in doing something to put things right, on the other hand I didn’t want my comfortable life messed up. Hence the ambivalence. In some ways I remain permanently a diplomat, allegedly detached but with a tendency to go native, which, of course, is what I did here. However, I’m sure you’ll agree that a bit of feathering one’s nest is a long way away from murder. None of us is in that league of venality.’

  ‘But didn’t people feel very threatened?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know about threatened. It’s not as if they were going to be chucked out. Trueman might have done that if he’d had his way, but Meredith-Lee wasn’t such an idiot.’

  ‘But the quality of life would certainly have suffered,’ said Milton. ‘And surely to a serious degree?’

  ‘Ah! The seven-course meals and the champagne and all that. I suppose people have murdered for less. I just can’t see it. Chatterton’s the only one I would have thought had the nerve, but then even if he hadn’t been crippled, he wouldn’t have the skill.’

  ‘Easy enough to pick up I think, sir.’

  ‘You’d have to have some experience with explosives—surely?’

  ‘Did you acquire such skills during the war?’

  ‘I was serving my country at my desk, Mr. Milton.’

  ‘Well, have you any theories, Mr. Fishbane?’

  ‘Just keep looking for a more credible suspect with a motive you haven’t found yet, I suggest.’

  ‘Do you believe there to have been illegality in the running of the club affairs?’

  ‘I really don’t think so. Chatterton’s a very smart man and he understands small print. And one of the codgers on the committee when he and Fagg took over was a lawyer who was very thick with them. They pored over everything. Doubt that you’ll find a loophole easily.’

  ‘Didn’t Mr. Trueman?’

  ‘Ah, now there was a man whom we all had a really good reason to murder. There was a rule no one had thought to have changed, to the effect that members might reside in the club indefinitely if the butler was agreeable. Well, of course, the secretary is technically the butler. There wasn’t any problem with old Pinkie Blenkinsop, but when the matter came up Trueman refused to give a promise that we could all stay here until we were carried out feet first. “What happens if someone becomes incontinent or needs nursing?” he asked.

  ‘Well, none of us has got enough money to go into a high-class nursing home—at least as far as I know—so of course the wind was up all of us. However, whether or not someone might have bumped him off is mercifully a hypothetical question, seeing that he had the decency to do the job himself. What a stroke of luck.’ He stood up. ‘I don’t envy you your job, Mr. Milton, but I hope you’re having some fun out of ffeatherstonehaugh’s. At least we’re more interesting than the Athenaeum.’

 
‘Thank you, Mr. Fishbane. You’ve been most helpful.’

  ‘Any time,’ said Fishbane. ‘Oh, by the way, Sergeant Pooley, give my regards to his lordship. Or rather, on second thoughts, perhaps you shouldn’t. It might remind him of a few school episodes he will have made sure to forget.’ With a charming smile Fishbane left them.

  ‘What d’you think he might be talking about?’ asked Milton innocently. ‘Stealing sweets from the tuck-shop?’

  Pooley had gone pink. ‘You know bloody well what sort of thing he’s likely to be referring to, Jim.’

  ‘Ellis,’ said Milton, ‘I’m shocked. That is no way to address your superior officer. Now go and fetch Glastonbury and let’s get these farcical interviews wrapped up for the afternoon.’

  Chapter Twenty

  Pooley was expecting to find his quarry in deep slumber. In fact, he found him in a state of positive animation, in conversation with Chatterton about the dangers of travelling by public transport.

  ‘No, no, my dear fellow. It’s the germs, it’s the germs. Those tube trains are full of them,’ he was saying agitatedly as Pooley arrived at the table at which they were having tea.

  ‘Excuse me, sir.’ This time Pooley didn’t resurrect his old accent. ‘I’m sorry to disturb you, but could you perhaps spare a little time to come and talk to the Chief Superintendent?’

  Glastonbury looked at him blankly. ‘I’m sorry, young man. I’m sure I should know you. Have we been introduced?’

  ‘We met briefly yesterday, sir. I’m Detective Sergeant Pooley.’

  ‘Oh, I’m so sorry, my dear boy. Unforgivable of me. Hopeless memory for faces and names and everything else really these days. But you want to talk to me. Yes, yes, of course. Will you forgive me, my dear Cully. I don’t want to keep this nice young man waiting.’

  ‘Yes, of course, Boy. Off you go.’

  ‘You might have an opinion on this, Mr…’ Glastonbury stopped and looked worriedly at Pooley. ‘I’m sorry, what did you say your name was?’