No Laughing Matter

by Dorothy Simpson

  ‘Didn’t your husband tell you about Mr Randish?’

  She shook her head. ‘I was asleep when he got home last night. And when he left this morning.’

  Her voice had lost its hoarseness and Thanet suddenly realised why. It had been the roughness not of illness but of disuse. With a sudden flash of comprehension he glimpsed what this woman’s life was like. By the sound of its cry the baby was very young and therefore very demanding. The first weeks of a child’s life were always exhausting for the mother, a time when she herself was not fully restored to health and needed help to cope with the extra demands upon her time and energy. Vintage had told them that the harvest was the busiest time of year, that for weeks now he had been rising very early and not getting to bed until two or three in the morning. During that period he had probably hardly even spoken to his wife. Mrs Vintage had had to cope alone and clearly the task had been too much for her. Thanet guessed too that there was more to it than that. She was, he was willing to bet, suffering from post-natal depression and had been given tranquillisers to help her cope. Vintage must know that something was wrong, but fully stretched as he was he had probably shut his eyes to the extent of the problem. It was he, probably, who had prepared those bottles for the baby and done that washing-up before leaving this morning.

  This, Thanet was sure, was the reason for Vintage’s unease when speaking about his marriage. They would have to look elsewhere for Randish’s mistress, if he’d had one. Meanwhile, what was to be done about this situation? Theoretically, nothing. It certainly wasn’t his responsibility to sort out suspects’ domestic problems. On the other hand, there was the child to consider.

  Lineham was giving Mrs Vintage a brief account of Randish’s death. Outside a car drew up, a door slammed. Thanet rose to look out of the window: Vintage. Here, perhaps, was his opportunity. Unobtrusively, he withdrew to the kitchen. Vintage was just coming in through the back door. He was scowling.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ But there was no real aggression in his tone, just a weary acceptance.

  No wonder the man looked so exhausted, Thanet thought. He must feel as though his life was completely out of control. ‘I’m afraid we turn up everywhere in this sort of inquiry.’

  Vintage had registered the baby’s frantic crying. He glanced at the cooker, took in the three untouched bottles of baby feed, moved at once to turn on the heat beneath the one in the saucepan of water.

  ‘Where’s my wife?’

  ‘In the sitting room, with Sergeant Lineham.’

  ‘Excuse me.’

  Before Thanet could say anything Vintage left the room and Thanet heard him trudge upstairs. Briefly, the crying stopped, then started again. He was, Thanet guessed, changing the child’s nappy. A few minutes later he returned to the kitchen cradling the baby. It was indeed very young, less than eight weeks old, Thanet guessed. It was scarlet with frustration, its scrap of hair wet with perspiration, its face screwed up in agonised appeal as it continued to wail with every ounce of energy it still possessed. Not for the first time Thanet marvelled that something so small could make so much noise and cause so much disruption.

  With his free hand Vintage snatched the bottle out of the saucepan, sprinkled a few drops of milk on the back of his other hand to test the temperature and shoved the teat into the baby’s gaping mouth. Its lips clamped around the rubber and it began to suck with desperate urgency. Vintage hooked his foot around one of the chairs, dragged it away from the cluttered table and sat down.

  There was a blissful silence.

  Both men watched the child without speaking for a few moments. Then Thanet also pulled out a chair and sat down. There would never be a better time to say this, he thought.

  ‘You realise your wife is ill, Mr Vintage.’

  Vintage glanced up, briefly. ‘It’s none of your business.’

  ‘Maybe not. But a child at risk is.’

  ‘She’s seen a doctor.’

  ‘Where? Here?’ Thanet’s glance underlined the chaos in the room. ‘Or at the surgery?’ He did not add, where she and the baby would have been dressed and tidied up for public inspection. The implication was obvious.

  ‘Yes,’ admitted Vintage reluctantly.

  ‘Then it’s up to you to spell out to him just how bad things are, so that he can keep a close eye on her. Oh, I do realise how difficult it must have been for you, over the last few weeks. But all the same, it can’t go on, you must see that.’

  Vintage put the bottle down and laid the baby gently against his shoulder, patted its back to bring up the wind. He sighed, a long slow sigh of capitulation. ‘I know. You’re right. I suppose I didn’t want to admit how serious the problem was. I kept saying to myself, if she can just hang on until harvest is finished … As it is, I just don’t see how I can cope. And this business with Zak has just made things ten times worse, if that’s possible.’

  ‘Is there no one who could come and stay, to help look after the baby?’ Vintage’s mother, Thanet remembered, was dead. ‘Your wife’s mother, perhaps?’

  ‘She couldn’t even begin to manage. She’s just out of hospital after a hysterectomy.’

  ‘Brothers, sisters?’

  ‘I haven’t got any.’ The baby burped obligingly and Vintage set the teat to its mouth again. ‘Beth has a sister, but she lives up north and has four children of her own. I don’t see how she could possibly leave them for any period of time.’

  ‘There must be someone.’

  ‘That’s, the trouble,’ said Vintage. ‘There isn’t. Only me.’ This time the look he directed at Thanet was one of despair. ‘What am I going to do?’

  Thanet thought. ‘Is there any chance of hiring a nanny for a while, until your wife is on her feet again?’

  ‘We can’t afford it. The doctor said it could take months.’

  ‘I appreciate that, but can you afford not to? I’m not sure if you realise just how serious this is. If it were my wife I’d be prepared if not to steal at least to beg or borrow, to help her through it. You may not like the idea, but desperate situations demand desperate remedies. Perhaps you could arrange a loan from the bank. Or would your father lend you the money?’

  ‘He might. But I’d hate to ask. He was so generous in setting us up here that I’ve spent the last four years trying to prove how independent I can be.’

  ‘Have you actually discussed the situation with him?’

  Vintage shook his head. ‘No. Anyway, he’s been away on business for the last fortnight, in Thailand, and it’s only during that period that things have got so bad.’

  ‘When’s he due back?’

  ‘Monday.’

  ‘Well, I suggest you swallow your pride and see what he can do. I would have thought that if he appreciates it’s a question of his grandchild’s welfare, he’d be more than willing to lend a hand.’

  Vintage sighed again. ‘You’re right.’

  The teat had slipped out of the baby’s mouth and it slept, exhausted and replete. Vintage pushed aside a plate on the table to make room for the bottle and looked down at the child. ‘We’ll manage something, won’t we?’ he murmured.

  Thanet stood up. ‘Good.’

  On cue, he heard the sitting-room door open and Lineham appeared.

  ‘All finished?’ he asked the sergeant.

  Lineham nodded.

  Vintage watched them go. ‘Thanks, Inspector.’

  Thanet grinned. ‘All in a day’s work!’ he said.

  TEN

  ‘Did Vintage tell you what the doctor’s diagnosis was?’ said Lineham.

  On their way to Chasing Manor vineyard they had been discussing what they had learnt at Vintage’s house. Not a lot, they had decided, and had been silent for a while mulling things over.

  ‘Not in so many words, no. But it’s obvious, isn’t it?’

  ‘Post-natal depression. Yes. But what I’m wondering is if it’s too obvious.’

  ‘What do you mean, Mike?’

  ‘Well, you take on
e look at Mrs Vintage and the set-up there and immediately that’s the conclusion you jump to.’

  ‘I still don’t see what you’re getting at.’

  ‘What if her illness has a completely different cause? What if the reason she’s depressed is because she was having an affair with Randish and when she discovered she was pregnant he threw her over? What if the baby is Randish’s? Just think what a motive that would give her husband!’

  Thanet remembered Vintage’s concern for the child, the tenderness with which he had handled it. ‘I can’t believe that.’ He didn’t want to believe it, he realised. He was sorry for Vintage and sympathetic to the difficult situation in which he found himself. He would have to be careful. He mustn’t allow bias to warp his judgement. ‘If you’d seen him with the baby …’

  ‘All right. Perhaps I’m wrong about the baby. Or perhaps I’m right and he just doesn’t realise it isn’t his. But in any case I could still be right about the affair – I say “I”, but it was you who suggested it in the first place!’

  ‘I know that. But having seen Mrs Randish I’m not so sure.’

  ‘That’s because you’re thinking of her as she is now. At her worst. But while I was talking to her I was trying to visualise what she’d look like in good health, with make-up on and so on, and I bet she’d turn heads any day of the week.’

  ‘Maybe. All right. Let’s say she and Randish were having an affair. What, exactly, are you suggesting, Mike? That Vintage has known about it all along? In which case, why do nothing until last night? Or are you suggesting he’s only just found out?’

  ‘That he’s only just found out.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘No idea. Perhaps someone told him. Perhaps something was said which made him put two and two together.’

  ‘And come up with five, most likely! No, sorry, Mike, I’m still sceptical. In any case, there’s one big objection to the idea that his wife might have been Randish’s mistress.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘When we told her Randish was dead, don’t you think we would have got more of a reaction?’

  ‘But she was doped up to the eyeballs, we could both see that! All her reactions were about as low-key as they could get! And if Vintage did somehow find out last night, he would fit the bill perfectly. For one thing, he was there alone most of the evening, and for another, whoever killed Randish just exploded with rage, didn’t he? Just think about it! Vintage was very tired, exhausted in fact, which means his self-control would be at its lowest. Also, because of Randish he’d just lost a substantial portion of the very special wine he was hoping would launch him on the road to success. Then he learns his wife had been having an affair with the man! It’s enough to make anyone snap!’

  ‘Mike, this is pure speculation and you know it.’ Thanet’s tone was indulgent. Lincham’s enthusiasm was one of his more endearing qualities and Thanet was used to the fact that the sergeant sometimes got carried away.

  ‘That doesn’t mean it can’t be true.’

  ‘No, just that we have to wait until we have some hard evidence to support the idea before we can take it any further. So let’s drop it for the moment, shall we? Anyway, isn’t this the vineyard coming up?’

  Lineham slowed down. ‘Looks like it.’

  The signboard for Chasing Manor vineyard had been designed to look like a wine label, the label which no doubt was put on their bottles. In the centre was a cameo of the vineyard, a sketch of a classic Georgian house set in well-ordered rows of vines.

  ‘I’m beginning to feel as though we’re on a tour of the vineyards of Kent,’ said Thanet. ‘I never knew there were so many.’

  ‘Oh yes, there are dozens of them. There’s one at Tenterden, one at Biddenden, one at Frittenden, one at Leeds, one at Bearsted …’

  ‘All right, Mike. I didn’t ask for a catalogue. Anyway, how do you know so much about it?’

  ‘I’ve got a neighbour who’s a wine buff. His favourite pastime at weekends is touring vineyards. This one doesn’t look as though it’s doing too badly.’

  Thanet looked around. Over to his right, set well back behind a brick wall and a generous front garden, was the house on the signboard, translated into bricks and mortar. It was a classic example of Georgian architecture: front door in the centre, two sash windows to right and left, five above. For once the architect had got the proportions exactly right and not even the grey light of a damp October afternoon could dim the beauty which had mellowed through the centuries. Sitting serenely in its setting of well-kept lawns and flowerbeds it seemed to encapsulate so much of what people envisage when they think of the beauty of rural England. What must it be like to live in a house like that? Thanet wondered.

  ‘A real hive of activity, in fact,’ said Lineham.

  Thanet tore his eyes away from the house. The sergeant was right. There was a coach in the car park and a number of cars. Machinery hummed and there were people moving about. As they walked towards the buildings ahead the noise got louder and they met a group of people leaving the shop, carrying bottles and packs of wine. The coach party, probably, thought Thanet, and by the laughter and chatter he guessed that they had probably attended a wine-tasting session before making their purchases.

  The noise intensified. It sounded like the spin on a giant washing machine. It was emanating, they discovered, from a cylindrical stainless-steel wine press identical to the one at Sturrenden.

  Lineham raised his voice to make himself heard. ‘That must be what Vintage meant, when he talked about the noise the press makes when the compressor comes on.’

  Thanet nodded. ‘Probably.’

  There were in fact two presses, one on each side of a wide covered area, but only one was working at the moment. Preparations were in progress for starting off another batch in the other press: a man on a tractor was backing a trailer-load of grapes up to a smaller bin-shaped trailer of sturdy green plastic which had been connected to the press by a thick corrugated hose about 5 inches in diameter. Another man was standing by, watching, and a third man was hosing out a huge black plastic barrel. As they approached he picked up a broom and began to sweep the water towards a runnel leading to a drain.

  Although Benton had retired Thanet guessed that in the circumstances the former winemaker would have stepped in to do Randish’s job. He picked out the man watching as the most likely candidate. He had an air of authority about him. Thanet raised his voice to make himself heard. ‘Mr Benton?’

  The man turned. ‘Yes?’

  Warm brown eyes regarded him with affable curiosity. If Benton was in his early sixties he was very well preserved, with thick brown curly hair untouched by grey and a luxuriant beard.

  ‘Mr James Benton?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  Thanet introduced himself and Lineham, watching the bleakness creep into Benton’s eyes.

  Benton half turned, spoke to the man on the tractor. ‘Can you manage for a while, Mark?’

  ‘Is that your son, sir?’

  Benton nodded. ‘Yes, why?’

  Randish’s childhood friend, now an accountant, according to Vintage. What a bit of luck, thought Thanet. He certainly hadn’t expected to find him here today. Presumably the younger Benton had also stepped in to help out in the emergency. With two presses in operation this vineyard must have double the workload of Sturrenden to cope with. ‘I’d like him to join us, please.’

  Benton frowned. ‘We’re rather behind here. Would you mind waiting a few minutes while we start this batch off? Then we’ll be free for a while.’

  ‘Fine.’

  Thanet and Lineham watched with interest. The trailer connected to the press, they discovered, had a huge stainless-steel screw running across the bottom inside, from front to back. When it started to revolve it would feed the grapes into the hose leading to the press. They watched while the grapes were emptied in and the process started, then Benton led the way across the yard and up an outside staircase to an office on the upper floor
of one of the barns. He sat down behind the desk and offered Thanet the only other chair. Mark Benton perched on the desk edge and Lineham went to lean against the window-sill.

  ‘We still can’t believe it,’ said Benton. ‘Murder is something you read about in the newspapers or hear about on the radio or television. You just don’t think it could ever happen to someone you know.’

  Thanet nodded sympathetically. He’d heard this said so many times before, and he could believe it.

  ‘I mean, here we are, perfectly ordinary people leading perfectly ordinary lives and then wham … I suppose until now we’ve been lucky.’ He glanced at his son. ‘It’s just that we’ve known Zak since he was in his teens.’

  ‘You were fond of him?’ Thanet was intrigued. Apart from Alice Randish this was the first time he’d heard anyone speak of the dead man with anything approaching affection.

  Benton hesitated. ‘I wouldn’t say “fond” was the right word. He’d been around so long he was practically one of the family, wasn’t he, Mark? And I suppose my attitude to him was pretty much what it would be to one of ray own children. I took his faults for granted.’

  Mark Benton grinned. ‘Thanks, Dad!’

  Mark Benton must take after his mother, Thanet thought. He was shorter than his father and much less robust in appearance, with straight floppy brown hair and gold-rimmed spectacles which gave him a studious look.

  Benton waved a hand. ‘You know perfectly well what I mean.’

  ‘So what were his faults, would you say?’ said Thanet.

  Benton frowned, ran his hand through his thick hair, then leaned forward to ease his waxed jacket off. He tossed it on to the floor beside him. ‘That’s tricky. You never sit down and actually list people’s characteristics in your mind, do you? I mean, what usually occurs is that something happens and you think, God, he’s an impatient beggar, or he’s a heartless blighter, or he’d trample over anyone who got in his way, and so on. D’you see what I mean?’

  ‘Yes. Were you thinking of Mr Randish just then, when you were speaking? Was he in fact impatient, heartless, ruthless?’