by TP Fielden
Flushed with triumph she stared at Cyril Normandy. ‘You’re evil, you, you’re a user. Look at us all here! We’re practically starving and you’re drinking champagne!’
‘I’ve promised you double expenses, what more do you want?’
‘A kind heart!’ cried Molly with passion and the others, still bewildered, murmured their assent. Eve Berry burst into tears.
‘You killed her?’ said Miss Dimont, turning to face the accused. Normally, her questions would be less direct, more forensic, more detailed, but a sixth sense told her when to pounce.
Normandy looked as if the air had been pushed out of him. His strength lay in his being on top – once he became the underdog, he was weak and confused. The girls knew too much and he’d only bought their silence by the promise of fame; now they were turning against him, he was stripped of his armour and there was nothing left to save him.
‘Of … course … I … didn’t … kill … her,’ he wheezed. ‘Look at me. Do I look like the kind of person to kill anything?’
‘Anybody can kill,’ said Miss Dimont, unrelenting, ‘if the circumstances demand it. If they’re desperate enough, if there are enough secrets there, if enough bad deeds have been done – yes, they can kill. Did you? Did you kill Faye Addams?’
Normandy took out a handkerchief and wiped his eyes. He senses, thought Miss Dimont, that this is the end – that his beauty pageant business is over, that his money-making machine has churned out its final pound note.
‘How could I? I’m not a strong man, I have a weak heart. I heard from the police that someone put her in a boat and took the body round to that beach – I’ve never been in a boat in my life. Lifting a body and dumping it in the sand? Look at me!’
And with that he limped out – the girls knew where. He always kept a flask of brandy in the glove compartment for moments when he, or his lady companion, was in need of a restorative.
The queens, sensing she knew more than they, gathered round Miss Dimont. Eve Berry spoke for them all when she said: ‘So, do you know who killed Faye?’
‘I think I do,’ said Miss Dimont. ‘But I need to be clearer about some other things before I finally make up my mind. And you can help.’
This was more exciting even than being told they could have double expenses and a free pair of nylons.
‘When there was that fracas at Paignton,’ she started, ‘what actually happened?’
‘Those Sisters of Treason?’ asked Molly brightly. ‘What a hopeless bunch! Honestly, they couldn’t organise a …’
‘Did any of them look violent? Try to remember, this is important.’
Eve Berry thought about it. ‘It was like they were back at school being forced to cheer on the hockey team,’ she said. ‘They came in, looked around, then started chanting away, but you could tell their heart wasn’t in it. There was a mannish-looking woman at the back pushing them forward to get between us contestants and the crowd sitting by the pool, but they didn’t want to do it. Weedy-looking lot.’
‘Yes,’ said Molly gathering together her memories of the day which were still surprisingly clear. ‘There was one of them called Valerie who tripped over and started crying. The others forgot they were supposed to be protesting and gathered round to help her. Then there was a woman called Ann something who raced over to where Mr Normandy was standing and I thought she was going to grab the microphone, but when she got there, it looked like she’d forgotten what she was supposed to do. It was pretty comical really.’
‘And it got the crowd on our side,’ agreed Eve. ‘There were a few boos and catcalls, and some men said some very nasty things about the protestors preferring women, y’know. Just what they would say,’ she added.
‘That one at the back, though,’ said Molly, and raised her eyebrows. The others nodded.
‘I think you must be talking about Ursula Guedella,’ said Miss Dimont. ‘She’s rather famous, you know.’
‘Has she been to jail? She’d like that!’ asked one of the queens pointedly, and the others laughed.
‘Seriously,’ said Miss Dimont, ‘did any of you get a close look at how she was behaving?’
‘I did,’ said one of the young women. ‘I was late getting onto the stand and got caught behind them and I was standing right next to her. It looked to me like she was goading them on, like you do at school when two people start a fight – but she stood well back, she didn’t want to be part of the pushing and shoving, More a sort of “do as I say” rather than “do as I do” type. Shouted a lot but kept well back herself.’
‘Mm,’ said Miss Dimont. ‘You know these people have a good cause – they don’t want ladies like you being exploited by people like Normandy.’
‘Yeah, but they don’t want us to have fun, either,’ said Molly.
‘That’s as maybe. But none of you was frightened by the protest, you didn’t sense they wanted to do you any harm?’
‘When they burst in it was frightening,’ said Eve, ‘but I think they were so surprised they’d managed to get that far they didn’t know what to do next.’
‘Mm,’ said Judy again. ‘So we can pretty well discount Ursula and the Sisters from Faye’s murder – none of them had the guts to do it. I think your Mr Normandy has talked himself out of the list of suspects. And Boots McGuigan apparently didn’t even know Faye was down here.
‘There are no other suspects,’ she said, as she viewed the assembled pulchritude before her.
‘It looks as if Faye Addams must have been killed by a ghost.’
TWENTY-SIX
The two faceless men who never seemed to be far from Frank Topham’s side were standing very close to Gus Wetherby as the Inspector enumerated the reasons why the young man should be detained while further investigations continued. Wetherby smirked and started to light a cigarette before both cigarette and lighter were brusquely whipped away.
‘I think you’ll find where you’re going is not quite so comfortable as here,’ said Topham unkindly. It wasn’t part of accepted police procedure to describe the privations of being detained, but he hadn’t liked Wetherby’s supercilious tone.
‘This is the army, Mr Jones,’ he half-sang the old song, ‘no private rooms or telephones. You’ve had your breakfast in bed before, but you won’t have it there any more.’
Wetherby looked grim. ‘A big mistake you’re making,’ he said stonily. ‘I’ve given you my alibi. My lawyer …’
‘I’ve already told you,’ said Topham, ‘I don’t believe you, and I’m not going to give you the chance to skip the country.’
‘Wrongful arrest,’ snapped Wetherby. ‘It’s shameful! This is my stepfather we’re talking about! Me? Kill him?’
‘Precisely,’ said Topham crisply. ‘Take him away.’
Pernilla Larsson was sitting on a sofa underneath a small painting by Degas, her husband’s prize possession; the blue of the dancers’ dresses almost matched that of her eyes. ‘I don’t know what to do,’ she said inconsolably as her son was led away. ‘My husband gone, and now you’re taking my son.’
‘It’s a well-worn old saying, but justice has to be done,’ said Topham. ‘However painful.’ He looked down, not unkindly. ‘If what he says is true, he’ll be back later today. I’m not a cruel man, Mrs Larsson.’
She did not reply immediately. Then: ‘I suppose I should tell you, Inspector. It can’t go on like this.’
Topham sat down. ‘Yes, madam,’ he said gently.
‘We had reached a crisis, Ben and I. The problem with the Rejuvenator was far worse than I told you – we’d started to get legal letters, and from some quite prominent people. It would be fair to say that in a week or two – certainly before too long – the whole thing would have blown wide open. Writs, court cases, accusations of murder.’
‘Murder?’ prompted Topham.
‘That piece in the Daily Herald started the avalanche. People suddenly realised that the Rejuvenator, which may have had some virtues, was not what they thought. My husband ha
d got carried away by it – he was just a chemist, you know, when he invented it, no great future ahead of him. Then suddenly, this huge crest of a wave just before the war, everybody wanting relief from their ills, both physical and imagined.
‘The book he wrote – A New Electronic Theory of Life – just seemed to add to the momentum. And it made him very rich. But he was a prickly man and could not bear any criticism – so when people complained he shut it out.’
‘I see.’
‘Now, finally, in those last few days, he woke up to what was coming. That’s when he received a call from that man Rhys – the editor chap – and Ben told Rhys he was going to make public his part in Operation Tailcoat. A kind of plea-bargain, do you see, to try to win some public support before the guillotine dropped.’
‘I gather Mr Rhys was forced to remind him of the Official Secrets Act.’
‘He did more than that, Inspector. Ben told me Rhys blackmailed him out of going public because he’d be arrested if he did. What he didn’t tell me – but Rhys explained after Ben died – was that my husband wasn’t quite such a war hero after all. That actually it was Ben’s handling of the agents in Berlin that went wrong and lost them their lives, not Rhys’s.
‘Rhys covered for him then, and took the blame on himself. Very gallant he seems to have been – I have no idea why. He wasn’t trying to cover his own back when he shut Ben up, he was trying to stop Tailcoat from being re-examined because it could only bring more anger and criticism on my husband. Rhys liked Ben, rather admired him, and all was forgiven when the war ended. He used to come up here quite often for a drink and was quite friendly. I honestly think he was trying to help, but it ended up in a terrible fight between them – I think because Ben wouldn’t see reason.’
‘What are you saying, Mrs Larsson?’ asked Topham slowly.
‘I think Ben killed himself.’
‘Do you?’
‘Yes, I do. He was proud, defiant, king of the hill. He had made his name and made his fortune, and left his mark on the landscape. His proudest day was when he was included in Who’s Who. And so, Inspector, like all self-made men, he saw himself as being perhaps bigger than he was. All this—’ she waved her arm elegantly ‘—he couldn’t quite believe he’d acquired all this from a little box he invented in his bedroom in Hull.
‘But having climbed to the top of the hill, he was not about to be pushed down. He was too proud, Inspector, too proud. I think in the end he couldn’t bear the shame of it all so he killed himself.’
‘You’re not saying all this because we have your son in custody?’ Topham was no fool.
‘Of course not! It’s what I truly believe!’
‘I wonder if you do. You loved two men who sadly did not love each other. You’ve lost one, you don’t want to lose the other. That’s understandable.’
Pernilla Larsson looked away.
‘Your son killed your husband, Mrs Larsson. I know that to be true.’
The blue eyes filled with tears. ‘Don’t take him away from me, please,’ she whispered. ‘Take anything, but don’t take him …’
‘His alibi may stand up, though I doubt it. If it does, like I say, he’ll be home this afternoon. But I think you must prepare yourself for the alternative. Do you have someone who can come in and be with you?’
There was a blank look on Mrs Larsson’s face. ‘I don’t really have a lot of … you know I lived only for Ben … and of course Gus … perhaps Mrs Lamb would come in.’
‘I thought you’d fired the Lambs.’
‘Oh, yes,’ she said. She’d forgotten. ‘Gus did. But if Gus is to … then maybe she’ll be kind and come back, just for a little while …’
Miss Dimont and Auriol Hedley sat on a bench watching two motorboats chase each other, churning up white foam from the indigo water. The promenade was quite busy, it being Saturday morning, with children wafting by on their scooters and the occasional cyclist weaving their way slowly towards the bandstand. The two women had fixed expressions on their faces.
‘I must say it would’ve been helpful if Valentine was here,’ said Auriol discontentedly. ‘After all, he knows these people.’
‘Not his fault,’ said Judy. ‘He wasn’t to know we’d make the breakthrough. He’s on his way to Gloucestershire now for that party.’
‘Well it’s not helpful,’ said the former spy boss, who liked her troops around her when the action was about to happen. ‘He’ll never get anywhere if he takes his eye off the ball.’
‘Auriol, he’s a reporter, and a very junior one at that. He’s bright but he’s too inexperienced in investigations like this to be of real use.’
‘He likes to think he is.’
‘Well, I suppose you’re right. He has been a great help. If he hadn’t left that note, we shouldn’t be where we are now.’
Auriol was keen to get the business over and done with. ‘Well, never mind about him,’ she said. ‘I’ll come along.’
‘I should have told Topham.’
‘Oh,’ said Auriol dismissively, ‘he’d be no use. I mean, look at him – old and clapped out – and that’s just his brain I’m talking about.’
‘Sometimes,’ said Judy, ‘you can be so critical, Auriol. He’s a decent chap. In many ways just what the police force needs. Not like those two horrors who trail around after him.’
As if in agreement, the two women rose as one and walked towards the Pavilion Theatre. The doors to the foyer were open and the cleaners were swabbing down the floor. Judy smiled at them and, stepping around their work, made for the management office halfway down the left-hand aisle.
‘Geraldine!’ she greeted the old soubrette warmly but with an unaccustomed formality. ‘Just come to have a word.’
‘Not more nonsense about Danny and his Trouble?’ chirped Mrs Phipps. ‘I never met such a mummy’s boy, he’s wretched being away from home. I had to give him his lunch yesterday. He’s never had to fend for himself and the way Gavin keeps them locked up in that van, I really think it’s too bad. As for that poor boy Boots – heartbroken, he is.’
‘No, this isn’t about the group. Well, in a manner of speaking it is. Is Gavin around?’
‘Cooking up something or another no doubt. I’ve made him take up residence in one of the dressing rooms, he made such a nuisance of himself in my office.’
‘Which one?’
‘The one with the star on the door, dear, of course.’
Judy and Auriol followed a cramped corridor down towards the backstage area and the No 1 dressing room. Inside, Gavin Armstrong was thumping away on an old portable typewriter.
‘Can you spare a minute, Mr Armstrong? Judy Dimont, Riviera Express. This is Miss Hedley.’
‘You do me an honour,’ said Gavin lazily without looking up from his work. ‘But I had your chap Val Whatsit in yesterday. He’s got all the latest guff. I’m just writing up a press release now for the national newspapers, but he’s got the scoop.’
‘I think,’ said Judy, sidling round the desk so that he was forced to look up at her, ‘that it is I who have the scoop.’
Gavin carried on typing.
‘I wonder if you’d mind paying attention for a moment,’ said Judy, her tone coming not from the newsroom now but from the quarterdeck, ‘I have a few questions to ask.’
The fledgling impresario looked up, startled. He’d become used to being the one issuing the orders. Now he was being told what to do, and by a woman?
‘I’m rather busy as you see,’ he snapped, but Miss Dimont took no notice.
‘Danny and The Urge,’ she said. ‘How successful are they?’
‘If you don’t mind me saying so, that’s a pretty stupid question. They’re the nation’s No 1 beat group. They’ve had five hit records and they are about to break it big on television. I’ve got Jack Good, the producer of Oh Boy!, coming down here next week with a view to having them as his resident band on his new show starting in the autumn.
‘That means they will be b
eamed into millions and millions of homes every Saturday night, and will become the most famous musicians since, since …’
‘Are they millionaires yet? The boys?’
Gavin finally wrested his eyes away from the typewriter and focused on the reporter. It was as if he’d only just woken up.
‘Millionaires? Whadd’you mean?’
‘Have you made them all sufficient money so that when the bubble bursts, they can retire at the age of twenty-one with a nice little nest egg?’
‘You obviously don’t know this business,’ said Gavin patronisingly. ‘It takes time and investment to reap the rewards from this caper. Everybody thinks these chaps are driving around in brand-new Rolls-Royces whereas …’
‘Whereas they’re living in a broken-down van in a car park,’ said Judy. ‘I wouldn’t describe that as success.’
‘As I say, it takes time and investment …’
‘Would some of your investment include buying airtime for your group?’
Gavin looked startled. ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about,’ he said slowly. There was a nasty edge to his voice.
‘I think the technical term is “payola”. You pay disc jockeys to play the records and talk favourably about them, and then you buy the records in bulk from the stores which you know supply their sales figures to the people who compile the best-selling charts.’
‘I …’
‘In other words, you create a climate in which the public feel they’ve helped create a new star or stars, whereas the truth is they’ve been manipulated. Hoodwinked. Duped.’
‘This is nonsense!’ snapped Gavin. ‘Those boys are hugely talented. They’re hard-working and dedicated. Their records are good and people buy them because they admire them! And now they’re going to be household names to people who don’t even listen to beat music because they’ll be on TV on Saturday nights when everybody’s watching!’
‘You know,’ said Miss Dimont, ‘I have the feeling that may turn out to be not the case.’
‘Jack Good! He’s coming down to see them!’
