The Riviera Express

by TP Fielden

  But not for much longer! Soon, oh let it be soon, she would be in Fleet Street!

  Just then Terry appeared behind the desk and whispered in Judy Dimont’s ear. The pair of them left Betty to finish her report and stepped together out of the newsroom.

  ‘You heard what Topham’s gone and done?’ said the reporter as they stood at the top of the stairs.

  ‘Got the wrong man,’ said the photographer.

  That was Terry for you – no information, yet he came up with the right answer. It infuriated her.

  ‘I think the old inspector was nobbled by Prudence Aubrey,’ she said crossly. ‘He’s sweet on her.’

  ‘We’re all sweet on her. That twirl!’

  ‘Oh pipe down, Terry!’

  ‘Don’t see too many like her around this parish,’ he said, waggling his eyebrows.

  ‘Concentrate!’ ordered Miss Dim crossly. ‘She was dropped by Radford because her career was stalling. This is her revenge, her chance to plant it on someone else.’

  ‘Not necessarily,’ he said, but he seemed more interested in polishing his camera lens than in the conversation.

  ‘Well, all I can say is we’re going to look pretty stupid tomorrow when our paper points the finger of suspicion at the wrong man. We’ll have Fleet Street down here again, pulling the story apart, coming up with the real murderer.’

  ‘We’re going to the town hall now,’ said Terry, changing the subject. ‘You taking Herbert, or coming in the Minor?’

  Miss Dimont sighed in a frazzled sort of way.

  ‘Come with me,’ said Terry kindly, sensing her frustration, ‘we can pop into the Grand afterwards. A nice gin and tonic.’

  The couple sailed down the stairs, steeling themselves for the task ahead – of finding a new way to tell the town, for the umpteenth time, how magnificent it was.

  The town hall was a bit like a wedding cake – built a hundred years ago by city fathers who dreamed one day all Temple Regis would look like this. Its crenellations, stained glass, over-elaborate door handles and wealth of plasterwork were a grim reminder of Victorian grandiloquence at its maddest, but Terry and Judy, immune to its excesses, strolled through its elaborate doorway and headed for the council chamber where a party was being held to celebrate the end of the holiday season. The high point of the evening would be when the mayor revealed how successfully Temple Regis had seen off all competition to be the county’s favourite seaside resort. It was the same story every year.

  Terry and Judy were there out of duty, not interest, and readily accepted a glass of sherry each while they awaited the speeches.

  ‘Hear you and the memsahib had a bit of a dust-up,’ said a voice in her ear. She turned to find Patrick Marchbank, the chairman of the Rural District Council, looking down with an amused smile on his face.

  ‘Well, you know . . .’ said Miss Dimont, somewhat at a loss. Lord Mount Regis’s younger brother was an old charmer, and she had written many paragraphs extolling his even-handed management of the Watch Committee. She liked Mr March just as much as she cordially disliked his wife, but she was far too polite to make any criticism.

  Marchbank elegantly smoothed back his silver hair and gave her a grin. ‘She’s been having a rough time of it lately,’ he said. ‘Not quite herself.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear it,’ said Miss Dim, not really very sorry.

  ‘You’re a writer,’ said Marchbank, ‘what do you know of biographies?’

  ‘I’ve always liked Boswell’s Life of Samuel Johnson.’

  ‘History as biography, hmm. But what I meant was – when people decide to tell their life-story. Memoirs, d’you know what I mean?’

  ‘People who tell their own story usually leave the best bits out,’ said Miss Dimont. ‘People who write someone else’s life never really get the whole story. Neither is very satisfactory. You’re better off with a novel.’

  ‘Ah, yes. Well, I see your point.’

  Terry had wandered off. This was not his kind of conversation at all.

  ‘It’s just – I think Mrs Marchbank has been overly worried about the death of a cousin and oh, I don’t know, the possibility of some things being said. She’s a very sensitive woman, you know.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Miss Dimont, uncaring of Mrs March’s frailty.

  ‘Her cousin – he was impetuous, you know. Looked solid as a rock but very impetuous. You couldn’t be certain what he would do next.’

  ‘Mm.’

  ‘And then when he said he was going to write his memoirs, there was no knowing what he might say. I mean,’ added Patrick Marchbank, ‘he was always very nice to me. But he and Adelaide . . .’ His voice trailed off as the mayor’s sergeant rapped his gavel and prayed silence for His Worship.

  The proceedings took their usual course – long, self-congratulatory, repetitive. Temple Regis was indeed the jewel of the English Riviera, etc., etc., and Miss Dimont’s shorthand flew across the page. But while she scribbled her mind was elsewhere – looking, searching, teasing out hidden facts and long-lost scraps of information. When the speeches were over, she went in search of Mr March, now deep in conversation with a large lady in a black hat (so inappropriate on a sunny day, thought Miss Dimont) and begged a further word.

  ‘Mrs Marchbank’s cousin. May I ask who that is?’

  ‘Was. He’s dead now. It was all over your front page.’

  ‘Not . . .?’

  ‘Gerald Hennessy.’

  Miss Dimont went white. Terry arrived just in time to grip her elbow and guide her towards fresh air.

  ‘I’ve been stupid, so stupid,’ she gasped, as he found her a glass of water.

  ‘Not for the first time,’ said Terry blandly. ‘Remember the time you—’

  ‘Pipe down, Terry. I’ve been heading in the wrong direction all this time. Come on.’

  ‘The Grand? Or would you prefer the Fortescue?’

  ‘No, no, no,’ said Miss Dimont impatiently. ‘You come with me!’

  Terry unlocked the Minor and they drove off. Miss Dimont did not stop talking.

  *

  Lummacombe Manor stood at the far end of the Mount Regis estate, occupying a breathtaking position on top of a small knoll looking far out to sea. Its drive led up from the hamlet of Lummacombe past fields newly harvested and ploughed, the red Devon earth like blood spilled profligately across the landscape.

  At the cattle grid, where Terry slowed the Minor, Judy Dimont captured a glimpse of the seascape below. Clouds, which had momentarily shrouded the sun, allowed enough of its rays through to cast a brilliant shaft of light on the water below, turning the surface into an iridescent mirror which sent the sun’s rays back upwards as if returning a lover’s glance. The broad estuary was filled with small boats at anchor, still but animated, like dogs patiently awaiting a walk with their master.

  Across the valley the church bell struck seven and seagulls chattered in the air, diving and swooping for no good reason. There could be no more heavenly place.

  The manor house stood low and sturdy ahead, and as the Minor crunched its way into the large gravel circle laid out before it, a grey cat ran across its path. Otherwise there was silence.

  ‘Go round the side,’ said Terry, who had an instinct on such occasions.

  ‘I think we have to be firm,’ said Judy, and Terry nodded. He knew what she meant.

  As they turned the corner of the old stone house there stretched before them a perfectly shorn greensward which seemed to end in infinity, its furthermost edge disappearing into the greying horizon. At a wooden table on a small terrace sat Adelaide Marchbank, perfectly still, her features partly obscured by large dark glasses.

  ‘Don’t you know this is private property,’ she said, a statement rather than a question. She had not even turned her head. ‘Go away.’

  It was difficult to judge whether Mrs March was looking at them or at the sheaf of papers in front of her. Terry and Judy continued their advance towards the table.

  ‘Go away,’
snarled Mrs March, ‘or I shall call the police.’

  ‘They’re on their way,’ said Miss Dimont quite curtly. ‘I think you may have some clue as to why.’

  ‘Those . . . hobbledehoys who came to Temple Regis looking for a fight. Maybe they will get out on bail, but a short sharp shock is what they needed. I have no regrets.’

  ‘No,’ said Miss Dimont. ‘This is about something else.’

  ‘Their solicitors could have appealed at the time. I think they were happy to see their clients go to jail. Now that National Service is coming to an end, they have to learn discipline somehow.’

  Miss Dimont ignored this. ‘Can you tell me why you weren’t in court this afternoon for the remand hearing?’

  Mrs March did not look at her. ‘There is no obligation for the Chairman of Magistrates to be present at every sitting. Colonel de Saumarez is a very competent man.’

  ‘The remand was on account of the murder of Gerald Hennessy.’

  ‘I am perfectly aware of that.’

  ‘Your cousin.’

  There was a long silence. ‘Yes,’ said Mrs March finally, cautiously, as if opening a door on a dark night to see who was there.

  ‘You might have said that you could not sit on the Bench because of a family involvement.’

  ‘I might, but I didn’t. It’s really none of your business. You know, people always complain about press intrusion . . . I have never taken their side. But now I begin to see what they mean. Has your editor, that Mr . . .’

  ‘Rhys.’

  ‘Has Mr Rhys sent you here to harass me?’

  ‘No. He doesn’t know I’m here.’

  Mrs Marchbank took off her dark glasses. Her eyes were hard. ‘Then I shall telephone him and tell him to instruct you to leave my property. I will not be harassed by . . . a court reporter who quite clearly has a personal animus against me. You’ve got a bee in your bonnet. She’s got a bee in her bonnet!’ she railed, turning to Terry for support.

  ‘That’s not true.’

  ‘Yes it is. Look at your behaviour yesterday in Mr Thurlestone’s room. All those critical pieces in you opinion pages. Quite inaccurate. Quite contemptible!’

  ‘There is such a thing as fair comment,’ said Miss Dimont, unmoved by the magistrate’s chilly hauteur. ‘But I am here to ask you questions about the death of Gerald Hennessy.’

  ‘That’s quite improper. I am a magistrate. I know the law. And I know that you are trespassing. If you don’t leave now, I shall—’

  The clear air was punctured by the sound of car tyres on the gravel.

  ‘Topham,’ said Miss Dimont. Terry nodded and wandered off.

  For a moment the two women eyed each other combatively, but before anything untoward could occur Terry returned accompanied not only by Inspector Topham and his two anonymous henchmen but by Mrs March’s husband, wiping his brow with a silk handkerchief.

  ‘What is this?’ panted Patrick Marchbank as he approached, more in alarm than anger. ‘I tell you my wife isn’t well and you come all the way out here and start badgering her. It really won’t do!’

  Miss Dimont turned her back to the horizon and addressed the small group gathered round the old oak table. ‘I regret to say, Mr Marchbank, that I asked Inspector Topham to come here to arrest Mrs Marchbank for the murder of Gerald Hennessy. And of Arthur Shrimsley.’

  Topham blinked. He already had his man. As far as he was concerned Radford was on his way to the gallows. ‘I don’t really think, you know . . .’ he started, but then stopped. This was not the first time he and Miss Dimont had found themselves in such a situation.

  ‘Mrs Marchbank murdered her cousin because of the book he was about to write. She then murdered Shrimsley, the book’s ghostwriter, because he knew what was in the book and could very well cash in on Mr Hennessy’s death.’

  Miss Dimont turned to Mrs Marchbank. ‘You have spent half a lifetime in Temple Regis living on a knife-edge, knowing that your grandfather, William Pithers, could at any time claim you as his own. You had built up a reputation as the town’s leading light and you did not want it known that your grandfather was a fat-renderer and, let’s be honest, one of the least attractive characters Devon has ever known.’

  Mrs Marchbank reached for her husband’s hand.

  ‘You have lived in perpetual fear of exposure, yet people would have judged you by your works, not because of who your grandfather was. You have given a huge amount to Temple Regis and people have reason to be grateful for all you’ve done.’

  ‘Huh!’ said Mrs Marchbank, and lit a cigarette.

  ‘For the past year you have known that with the death of your grandfather things were likely to change. You and Gerald were his only remaining relatives – your mother, and Gerald’s mother, are both dead. You were to share Mr Pithers’ substantial fortune.’

  ‘How do you know all this?’ said Mr Marchbank, who seemed less surprised than perhaps he should.

  ‘I’ll come to that,’ said Miss Dim. ‘But I think you’ll confirm that when you both had dinner with Mr Hennessy in London to discuss the will, he told you of the intended change in direction insofar as his career was concerned. And that to help people to look at him a new way, he was going to write his memoirs.

  ‘The new audience he was seeking – the kitchen-sink lot, I think he called them, the people who like the plays of John Osborne and Arnold Wesker – would be thrilled to learn that he wasn’t so upper-crust after all. That despite playing all those public-school types in the cinema, his grandfather was in fact a fat-renderer.’

  ‘I can’t see why . . .’ said Mr Marchbank, with genuine puzzlement.

  ‘The memoirs would inevitably involve the tale of his mother and her sister, who fled the family home after a childhood of abuse and horror. That sister,’ said Miss Dimont, ‘was your mother, Mrs Marchbank.’

  Inspector Topham looked embarrassed. He couldn’t yet see where this was going.

  ‘As if the worry about your origins weren’t enough, you were concerned about your husband’s family too. Lord Mount Regis has no children, and Mr Marchbank will inherit the title. That would make you Lady Mount Regis, and the joint head of an ancient family. You did not want them all knowing about Mr Pithers and his fat-rendering business.’

  ‘My husband knows everything about my family,’ retorted Mrs March. ‘I have never tried to conceal my origins from him.’

  ‘Not from him, but you never wanted anyone else to know. Gerry Hennessy was about to blow that secret sky-high.’

  ‘That doesn’t mean I murdered him. What a ridiculous idea!’

  ‘The night before he died, he had a row with Prudence – over the way he was conducting his personal life, but also about this wretched book. He walked out – and came to stay with you in your London flat.’

  Mr Marchbank shot his wife a sharp look.

  ‘He told you that night he was coming down to see Mr Shrimsley to get going on the first chapter and – let me guess – he said he was going to start off with his childhood memories of running around the fat-rendering factory amongst all the dead carcasses and entrails and boiling fat with his cousin – you.’

  ‘You can’t possibly know that.’

  She didn’t – she was taking a chance. ‘In the morning you said you’d make him a sandwich for the journey and nipped across the road to Fortnum’s to buy not only the smoked salmon, but the salmon caviar. You went back to the flat, made him the sandwich, then left and caught an early train back to Temple Regis. I know that,’ said Miss Dimont, cutting short an interjection from Mrs Marchbank, ‘because Mr Mudge kindly told me.

  ‘There was only half a chance your plan would work. He might not have wanted the sandwiches. You may not have concealed the caviar well enough. He may have eaten them and suffered no more than a blackout. But I suspect if he survived that first attempt on his life, you had other plans.

  ‘As it is, you were successful. Gerald Hennessy ate the sandwiches and almost immediately suffered anaphylacti
c shock. The pathologist was too lazy – or too much in awe of this public figure he had under the knife – to analyse the contents of his stomach and draw a proper conclusion.’

  She turned to Topham. ‘Inspector, I think we have our murderer.’

  The inspector nodded, for though Mrs Marchbank remained rigid and aloof, no words of protest or denial were issuing from her lips. ‘But Shrimsley?’ he said.

  ‘Ah, yes, Shrimsley. I will say this for Mrs Marchbank, she is resolute. When she decides upon a course of action, she gets on and does it. She had telephoned Shrimsley from the London flat on the morning of his death and presumably told him some tale which might add spice to the fat-rendering anecdotage. She asked him to meet her off the train and she drove him in her car to Mudford Cliffs.

  ‘They went for a walk along the cliff edge – we’d had a big story in the Express the week before about how dangerous they were – and my guess is Mrs Marchbank encouraged him behind the barrier so they were out of sight of any dog-walkers who might come by.

  ‘With it being so unstable underfoot, it wouldn’t have taken much of a push to send him over. Shrimsley tried to cling on, but it was lunchtime and he’d already had some drinks. He managed to grab hold of Mrs Marchbank’s scarf and—’ she turned to Terry ‘—that’s what we saw in the photograph you took. It wasn’t a letter, it was a piece of Mrs Marchbank’s scarf. What was left was found by Captain Hulton.’

  Mrs Marchbank put a hand to her throat. ‘Yes,’ said Miss Dimont, ‘the scarf was round your neck. It must have been a difficult struggle before the cliff gave way under him.’ Mrs Marchbank looked up, glanced around hysterically at her husband, reached out to him, then started to sob.

  ‘Mrs, er, Marchbank,’ started Inspector Topham, unsure of the correct etiquette when collaring the sister-in-law of a peer – does one use Honourable? Or is what she has done so dishonourable the title is superfluous? – but he forged manfully ahead. ‘Mrs Marchbank, I am arresting you on suspicion of causing the unlawful deaths of Gerald Hennessy and Arthur Shrimsley. Anything you say may be taken down and used in evidence.’