Mad About the Boy?

by Dolores Gordon-Smith

  Haldean winced as the General took the pistol from Preston’s hand, casually holding it in his palm.

  ‘This is a pretty little toy of a thing, isn’t it, Rivers?’ said General Flint. He snapped out the chamber. ‘One bullet fired, I see. It doesn’t look like a real gun and yet it’s obviously deadly enough.’ He held the glittering gun under the light on the desk. ‘It’s got something engraved on the handle. The initials V. L. and what looks like a coat of arms. There’s a maker’s name too. Sparkbrook.’

  ‘That’s Lyvenden’s firm,’ said Haldean. ‘The Sparkbrook Armouries and Munitions Company Limited, to give it its full title. He was telling us about it at lunch. I bet it’s his pistol.’

  ‘You’re probably right,’ agreed the General. ‘I imagine he kept it in his desk drawer. I know a lot of businessmen do so. Makes them feel safer, I suppose.’ He put the gun back on the desk. ‘We’d better move the body. Perhaps you’d give us a hand, Major?’

  Overcoming his reluctance, Haldean took Preston underneath the shoulders and with Sir Philip’s help placed the body reverently on the bed. Funnily enough he was conscious of a feeling of relief after doing it. Preston felt like every other dead body he’d had to carry and looked a great deal better than most.

  Sir Philip stepped back and sighed. ‘I’ll have to ask Alice which other room we’ve got free and get it made up for Lyvenden. What happens next, Flint?’

  Flint clicked his tongue. ‘There’s nothing much we can do until tomorrow. I’ll send one of the local men round to take some statements and after that it’s simply a case of waiting for the inquest. There’ll have to be an inquest but I wouldn’t concern yourself unduly about it, Rivers. It’s only a formality. Did he have any family?’

  ‘He had a sister and there was an uncle who acted as his trustee,’ said Haldean.

  General Flint looked at Sir Philip. ‘You’ll have to get in touch with them to see what they want to do about the body.’

  ‘Yes, I’ll do that.’ Sir Philip looked horribly tired. ‘Jack, would you mind staying here until I can get someone to come and get Lyvenden’s things?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘I’d better go and sort something out with Alice. God, what a business!’

  Haldean waited until his uncle and General Flint left, then walked over to the desk. He’d had to bite his tongue when General Flint had picked up the gun but really, even if it had been fingerprinted properly, what could he expect it to tell him? It would certainly have Tim’s prints on it as it’d been in Tim’s hand, and Lyvenden’s too if it was his gun. He looked at the weapon with its silver barrel and mother-of-pearl handle. It was an ostentatious little gun, he thought, just the sort of gun Lyvenden would have.

  The door opened and he looked up, expecting to see one of the servants, but it was Malcolm Smith-Fennimore.

  ‘Hello, Haldean. I had to come back. I couldn’t credit it was really true.’

  ‘How is everyone?’ asked Haldean. ‘How’s Bubble Robiceux?’

  Smith-Fennimore shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’ He wandered over to the fireplace and leaned against the mantel, resting his forehead on his hand. ‘This is a rotten show,’ he said eventually. ‘I never dreamed that Tim would pull a stunt like this.’ He walked over to the bed and sighed. ‘I can’t believe he did it. Shouldn’t we put a sheet over him or something?’

  Haldean went to stand beside him by the bed. ‘I suppose we should, really. If the servants have got to come in here, it’ll give them a nasty shock. I haven’t a clue where the sheets are, but if you can lift him out of the way, I can get the bedspread . . . Thanks, Fennimore.’ He made to put the cover over the body, but Smith-Fennimore stopped him.

  ‘Wait.’ He leaned forward and closed Preston’s eyes, then stepped back with a grimace. ‘I never thought I’d have to do that for Tim,’ he said softly. ‘What a bloody life! I need a drink. Want to join me?’

  Haldean shook his head. ‘I’ve got to wait until someone comes for Lyvenden’s things.’

  As he opened the door to leave, the music of the ball sounded loudly up the stairs. Haldean winced. It was all still going on down there. And up here? The ball was over. For Tim it had finished far too soon. All the weary mechanisms of sudden death would have to begin, the inquest, the statements, the questions . . . The ball was well and truly over.

  Haldean sat warming his back in the sun on the windowsill of Lord Lyvenden’s former bedroom. He looked at Arthur Stanton thoughtfully. It was Sunday morning and nearly everyone else had gone to church. The house was very quiet. He had asked Stanton to stay behind because he badly wanted to talk things over with him. He really wanted to find out what Isabelle thought, but Isabelle, still pale after the tragedy of last night, was devoting all her time to Bubble and Squeak and had gone off to church with them and the others.

  Preston’s body had been moved to a spare bedroom on the third floor until it could be taken away, for which fact Haldean was sincerely grateful.

  Stanton moved restlessly. ‘Do we really have to be in here, Jack? I can’t say I like it much.’

  Haldean looked at him wryly. ‘I’m sorry, Arthur. I can’t say I like it much either, but I thought it’d be a good chance to talk about things while the house was more or less deserted.’

  ‘Talk?’ asked Stanton. ‘What’s there to talk about?’

  Haldean ran a hand through his hair. ‘Look, I don’t know how you’re going to take this, but I’ve been thinking about last night. Do you honestly believe Tim was suicidal?’

  ‘I suppose I’ve got to believe it, haven’t I?’

  ‘Have you, Arthur? I don’t know if I do.’ He got off the windowsill and wandered round the room, eventually stopping by the bed. The depression made by Preston’s body was still visible. ‘What if Tim didn’t commit suicide at all?’

  Stanton looked at him with puzzled hazel eyes. ‘He must have done, Jack. It couldn’t have been an accident. He left a note.’

  Haldean shook his head. ‘No, it couldn’t have been an accident.’ He spoke very hesitantly. ‘I was wondering if he’d been murdered.’

  ‘Murdered?’ Stanton half laughed, then stopped as he saw his friend’s serious face. He drew a deep breath. ‘Of course he wasn’t murdered,’ he said patiently. ‘He committed suicide. The Chief Constable said so.’

  ‘And you think Major-General Flint is infallible?’

  ‘He should know what he’s talking about.’ Stanton wriggled in irritation. ‘After all, Jack, he must have seen dozens of suicides.’

  Haldean raised his eyebrows. ‘Dozens? I doubt it.’

  ‘All right, perhaps not dozens, then,’ agreed Stanton, ‘but he’ll have seen enough.’ He paused, choosing his words with obvious tact. ‘Look, old man, be honest with yourself. Are you sure you’re not thinking of murder because of the sort of stories you write? I mean, they’re all about murders and so on, aren’t they? You know you love inventing mysteries.’

  Haldean acknowledged Stanton’s point with a rueful smile. ‘I might be. I thought as much myself, but I think we owe it to Tim to investigate it as best we can.’

  ‘I think we owe it to Tim to not monkey around.’ He looked very uncomfortable. ‘Drop it, Jack. It’s . . . It’s . . . Well, it’s in pretty poor taste.’

  Haldean was about to answer when the door opened and Smith-Fennimore came into the room. He looked surprised to see them.

  ‘I heard voices. What are you doing in here? Come to that, how did you get in? I thought this room had been locked up.’

  ‘It had, but my key fitted the lock,’ said Haldean with a smile. ‘All the locks here are pretty feeble.’ He took a deep breath. ‘We’re trying to see if we can find anything out of the way. I know this may sound odd, Fennimore, but I find it damn nearly impossible to believe that Tim killed himself.’

  ‘What else could have happened?’

  Stanton’s response had warned Haldean that what seemed so likely to him was far from obvious to anyone else. Beside
s that, it was one thing talking it over with Arthur, it was quite another bringing it up with Smith-Fennimore. He had been knocked sideways last night and the last thing Haldean wanted to do was make it worse for him. When he spoke his voice was quiet. ‘He could have been murdered.’

  Smith-Fennimore’s shoulders stiffened and he raised his head. The warning in his eyes made Haldean step back. ‘Are you playing around with this? Because if you are, Haldean, I’m telling you to stop it now. I’m damned if you’re going to use Tim’s death as some sort of entertainment. Writing fiction is one thing. This is real.’

  ‘I know it’s real.’ Haldean’s voice was still quiet. ‘I cared about Tim, too.’

  His sincerity carried weight. Smith-Fennimore’s shoulders relaxed and the anger in his eyes gave way to bewilderment. ‘But you can’t mean it, man. You just can’t. What do you know – what can you know? – that the police and the doctor don’t?’

  ‘I knew Tim.’

  Smith-Fennimore stared at him. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Well, think,’ said Haldean impatiently. ‘Think for yourself. You spoke to Tim last night. We all did. What would you say his mood was?’

  ‘His mood? He must have been feeling awful.’

  ‘Forget what happened. I mean from what you saw with your own eyes, how would you describe his mood?’

  Smith-Fennimore started to speak then stopped and frowned in concentration. ‘The trouble was I didn’t see much of Tim,’ he said eventually. ‘To be honest, he seemed okay. He was pretty down in the mouth a couple of weeks ago, but he was fine the next time I saw him.’ Stanton moved as if he was about to speak, then motioned for Smith-Fennimore to carry on. ‘As far as last night goes,’ continued Smith-Fennimore with a look at Stanton, ‘he was a bit cheesed off about all the running around he was doing for Lyvenden, but apart from that he was all right.’ He pulled a face. ‘He’d been dancing with Bubble Robiceux and we talked about which car we were going to use for the Isle of Man. He was excited about that.’

  Haldean nodded. ‘So his mood wasn’t depressed. How did he strike you, Arthur?’

  Stanton shrugged. ‘About the same, I suppose. I hardly spoke to him.’

  ‘I spoke to him,’ said Haldean, lighting a cigarette. ‘I had quite a long conversation with him. He didn’t strike me as remotely depressed. He was impatient and annoyed with Lyvenden – as you say, Fennimore, cheesed off – but not depressed. Now that was at the start of the evening, I grant you, but not so very long afterwards we’re meant to believe that he became so desperate he scribbled a note, picked up a gun and shot himself. He’d have had to be a bit more than cheesed off to do that, no matter how many errands Lord Lyvenden had sent him on.’

  Smith-Fennimore sat down on the arm of the chair and rested his chin in his hand. Haldean could see the thought take root in his mind. ‘His note said he was worried about money,’ he said slowly. ‘He’d never said anything to me, but I’d wondered a couple of times if he was all right. I tried to speak to him seriously once or twice but he laughed it off.’ He looked at Haldean. ‘I’d like to know if he was stuck for money.’

  Stanton stirred uneasily. ‘He was.’

  Both Haldean and Smith-Fennimore looked at him. ‘I know he was,’ said Stanton. ‘He was up against the wall. What he said in that note was true. He came to see me about a fortnight ago. You said he struck you as down in the mouth, Smith-Fennimore. When he turned up at my flat he was in a hell of a state. He’d run through his allowance and his salary and was up to his ears in debt. He owed about three hundred pounds altogether.’

  Haldean whistled involuntarily. ‘My God! What did you tell him to do?’

  ‘I told him to stop running round with the Brooklands crowd. And . . .’ He shrugged. ‘I lent him the money. I didn’t expect to get it back.’

  Haldean’s eyebrows rose. ‘You gave Tim Preston three hundred quid?’

  Stanton put his hands wide. ‘What else could I do? He said it was either that or the river and, God help me, Jack, I honestly thought he meant it. He was grateful, I’ll say that for him.’

  ‘I should damn well think he was,’ muttered Haldean. He shook his head thoughtfully ‘Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe he did top himself.’

  ‘Why?’ said Smith-Fennimore in a strained voice. ‘If Stanton gave him the money, why should he kill himself? After all, even if he got into trouble again he must have known I’d have helped him. I wish he’d talked to me.’ He looked at Stanton. ‘Why did he go to you? I’d have made it all right for him. I thought he trusted me.’

  Haldean shifted, moved to sympathy for the big fair-haired man in front of him, but it was Stanton who spoke.

  ‘He told me why He thought a great deal too much of you to tell you what a fool he’d been.’

  Smith-Fennimore drew a deep breath. ‘Idiot,’ he murmured. ‘I couldn’t have given a damn.’ He shook himself and stood up. ‘Does that change things, Haldean?’

  Haldean let out a deep breath. ‘I don’t know. Knowing that Tim really was stuck makes a difference.’

  ‘Does it?’ Smith-Fennimore stood up restlessly. ‘Does it really? What made you think of murder in the first place? His sudden change of mood?’

  ‘That’s it,’ said Haldean.

  ‘But that’s still as valid as before.’ He walked to the window and, standing with his back to them, stuck his hands in his pockets. His shoulders were rigid with tension. ‘Do we tell the police?’

  Haldean shook his head. ‘I’d like to, but we need something a bit more definite to tell them. You see, now General Flint has decided it’s suicide, we’ll have to have something more concrete than unfounded suspicions to make him investigate the case properly.’ He blew out a mouthful of smoke in an irritated sigh. ‘I wish Superintendent Ashley was here but he’s on holiday. I got to know him last year. There was a murder over in Breedenbrook.’

  Smith-Fennimore turned round. ‘Was that the business the newspapers called The Fortune Teller’s Tent Mystery? You were caught up in it, weren’t you?’

  Haldean nodded. ‘That’s the one. After that, I know Ashley would take me seriously. As it is . . .’ He shrugged. ‘If there’s anything to find, we’ll have to find it.’

  ‘Us?’ Smith-Fennimore looked startled. ‘What do you want us to do? I don’t know what to look for. I’m not a detective.’

  Haldean gave a faint grin. ‘It’s not so very complicated.’ He walked across the room and propped himself against the mantelpiece. ‘The first thing we do is to go back to last night. Arthur, when was the last time you saw Tim?’

  ‘Crikey, Jack, I don’t know what time it was. I didn’t look at my watch.’

  ‘Well, how soon before the fireworks was it?’

  Stanton frowned. ‘It can’t have been long. I came in from the terrace to the hall and saw Tim going up the stairs. He told me Lyvenden wanted his cigarette case.’ His face cleared. ‘That’s right. Then I went back to the ballroom, saw you and we stood together to watch the fireworks.’

  ‘And neither of us saw him again. Did you see him, Fennimore?’

  Smith-Fennimore shook his head. ‘I saw him earlier in the evening, but I was talking to Sir Philip for quite a while before the fireworks started. I certainly didn’t see Tim then. Mind you, I wasn’t looking for him especially.’

  ‘He didn’t watch the fireworks,’ said Haldean thoughtfully. ‘Do you remember when Lord Lyvenden was making his speech? He suddenly decided Lady Harriet needed her shawl. He looked round the crowd and I thought he was looking for Tim.’

  ‘That’s right, Haldean,’ agreed Smith-Fennimore. ‘Now you mention it, I thought much the same thing. He sent Lady Harriet’s maid, didn’t he?’

  ‘That’s right. So, as Arthur saw Tim go upstairs just before the fireworks and as he wasn’t there during the fireworks, let’s assume for the time being that’s when it happened. It certainly fits in with what the doctor said. Now, if Tim was murdered, the murderer came into the room with him. Did they leave any traces?�
�

  Smith-Fennimore raised an eyebrow. ‘Cigar ash and footprints, you mean? This is Sherlock Holmes and no mistake.’

  ‘Perhaps it is,’ said Haldean with a fleeting smile. ‘Let’s look. Incidentally, Fennimore, do you know anything about this gun?’ He picked it up from the desk and handed it to him. ‘General Flint had a good look at it last night so even if there were any useful fingerprints on it, they won’t be there now.’

  Smith-Fennimore reached his hand out for the gun. ‘It’s Lyvenden’s,’ he said. ‘I’ve seen it before. He always kept it in his desk.’ He pulled a face. ‘I remember Tim commenting on it. The poor beggar knew it was there all right. Doesn’t that scupper your murder theory, Haldean?’

  ‘Not necessarily. The gun could have been on the desk or if the drawer was open it could have been visible.’ He smiled deprecatingly. ‘There’s another fairly obvious explanation but the great thing in this game is not to jump to conclusions too early and to collect what evidence we can.’ He looked at Stanton and Smith-Fennimore. ‘Er . . . shall we start?’

  The three men began to look round the room.

  Stanton stood by the fireplace. For Jack’s sake he’d go through with this charade, but it was a charade. He glanced along the mantelpiece. What on earth was he meant to be looking for? Jack might know what he was doing but he certainly didn’t. There was a clock, an ashtray, china figures of a shepherd and shepherdess . . . What could he get out of them? Nothing. This was a waste of time. Still, he supposed he’d better look as if he were doing something if Jack was so set on it. He bent down and moved the fire screen surrounding the hearth. There was a scattering of soot in the empty grate. A discarded and charred packet of Goldflake lay to one side. ‘The chimney needs cleaning,’ he announced. ‘Is that significant?’

  ‘I wouldn’t have thought so,’ said Haldean absently. He looked up as Smith-Fennimore gave a stifled exclamation. ‘What is it?’