The Old Fox Deceived

by Martha Grimes

  “Bogside,” said Jury, smiling at his plum tart.

  “He gets credits for resourcefulness, certainly. People do have a way of disappearing around here. It’s like the Bermuda Triangle.”

  “Mary Siddons, for instance. Lily Siddons’s mother, who was supposed to have drowned by accident.”

  “Yes, I heard about that. The Colonel is worried about Lily’s having turned inward. Her mother drowned not long after Lady Margaret and Rolfe Crael were killed in that motor accident. It mustn’t have been a very happy time, all round, for the Craels.”

  “Rackmoor does not seem a very happy place, take it all together.”

  • • •

  Melrose insisted on paying for the meal and Jury excused himself to have a few words with Kitty. Putting on his coat, Melrose said to Bertie, “The excellence of the food was only exceeded by the superior service. I’ve not had better at Simpson’s.” Bertie was flailing the table with his napkin, de-crumbing it. Arnold, seeing a flutter of activity sat up, ears pricked.

  Melrose stuffed a five-pound note in Bertie’s pocket, saying, “There, Copperfield. That’ll help you out of Salem House.”

  12

  Percy Blythe was still sitting at the library table when Melrose peered in through the window. And as far as Melrose could tell, he was also still sorting through the seashells.

  “Well, Inspector, shall we go in. I just hope you can get a word in edgewise.”

  Jury only smiled.

  • • •

  Nor did Jury wait for introductions. Once inside, he simply strode across the room, darker, surely by three shades since last Melrose had seen it, stuck out his hand and said, “Hullo, Percy. My name’s Jury. I’m with Scotland Yard.”

  Melrose smirked as Jury’s hand hung, unshaken, stuck in midair. It did not appear to disconcert the inspector, however, who merely withdrew it, shoved a stack of books from a stool, dragged it over to the library table and sat down, hitching his feet in the rungs. Melrose was himself dusting off a window ledge so he would have a place to sit. Grudgingly, he admired Jury’s gall. But what was that he had just taken out of his pocket and tossed on Percy’s table?

  “Have some, Percy.”

  Curious, Melrose crept over to the shelves and pretended to be examining the black, dead-looking blob in the bowl of water. He looked over at the table as Percy Blythe picked up what Jury had thrown down, and now was strangling it with his teeth, or his gums, whichever he had. Tobacco? Melrose looked at Jury. Chief Inspector Jury chewing tobacco? But there he was, chomping away. They were both of them chomping away. Now Percy Blythe was toeing a spittoon closer to Jury. The dead blob moved. Melrose looked down and quickly replaced the bowl.

  “Hear you’re a thatcher, Percy,” said Jury. “A lost art that is. You’re from Swaledale, aren’t you?”

  Melrose watched Percy Blythe gum the tobacco, his face working like an accordion, collapsing and stretching, collapsing and stretching.

  “Swardill, aye. Ah be thatcher and hedger forty year.”

  “Don’t see much of it any more.”

  “Pssh! Woant trooble theirsen t’do it proper. They chiggles t’branches, nor cuts away t’leirs. No on does it t’right way na more. They cracks t’ bark and t’heads die; they drive t’gibs too close.” He shook his head sadly. “Hedger and thatcher and besom-maker, ah was t’best in Swardill, ah was. There be me flayin’ spade on t’wall.” He hooked his thumb over his shoulder towards some tools, hung on the wall like pictures, all neatly arranged. “Cud bray t’hazel sticks faster’n spit, and cut spelks, too. Cud tie threaves o’ ling, verra near a fieldful in a day.”

  Melrose stared across the sea urchin at Jury, who was chomping merrily away, apparently transported by all of this, his chin in his hands, elbows on desk.

  “Ah made t’black thack roofs they’n lasten fifty year. Ah was besom-maker, too, ah was. Hand me mah besom needle.” This was directed at Melrose, as if commanding him to be of some use rather than standing about like a stick.

  “Besom needle?”

  “On t’wall.” Percy Blythe jabbed his finger impatiently toward the tools. Melrose moved over to the spot and the odd tools hanging there. He had never seen any like them. They were carefully labeled. Easing knife. Twister. And what in hell was a “whittling hook”? He found the besom needle and separated it from its nail. It was a long rodlike thing with a looped handle, something a giant might stitch with.

  Percy Blythe neglected to thank him for his trouble when he handed it over. “Yes, one of t’best, if ah do say it, ah was. An me Dad afore me, best mower ever was. Oncet he mew tree acre in a day. ‘E cud mow and ’e cud wap fast as he walked. An’ ‘e cud walk cross t’field wid sixpence on t’blade. Teached me t’stob, ‘e did. Ah stob an’ ah stob an’ ah stob all t’day long when ah was t’lad. Got to walk up to t’corn, ya knoow. ‘E use t’say, Go by t’sway. O, ’twas a grand sight ’twas, t’see t’field a corn stooked. ’Twas owd Bob Fishpool, gallock-’anded, ‘e were, near as good as me Dad. Mew, stooked and nagged it afore ‘e went t’bed. They’ll coom nae mair, t’ones like that.”

  Melrose felt the darkling glance flung his way as if to say it were his breed which had risen to trample other and better men than he would ever be.

  “A bit a gale beer for yer, lad?” said Percy Blythe to Jury. “Or mebbe a wee bit a’ botchet?” He creaked up, not waiting for Jury’s answer, and took a jug down from the shelf. “D’ya niver get ’lowance time in the po-lice?” He giggled as if he thought that were rich. Jury laughed and drank what he was poured.

  Melrose wondered what it was; since he hadn’t been included in the festivities, he guessed he would never know.

  “Delicious,” said Jury, wiping his hand across his mouth. “Never had any.”

  “No one makes it na more. Ya floats t’toast and yeast on t’top.”

  Melrose was just as glad he’d been left out.

  Percy Blythe hooked his thumb over his shoulder and said, “Guesst ya coom aboot thet gurhl. T’dead one.”

  “That’s right, Percy. Do you know anything that might help?”

  “Mebbe do, mebbe don’t.” Silence.

  “Bertie Makepiece seems to think you knew this woman years ago.”

  “Ah’d nowt say ah didn’t. Seen ’er in the Ould Fox an’ thowt ’twas a ghost. Fifteen year it be since her up and left.”

  “You’re talking about Dillys March?”

  “Aye. A bad ’un, she be.”

  “Bad? In what way?”

  But Percy Blythe merely shut his eyes against the sins of youth and went back to drinking.

  “You told Mr. Plant here to see someone named Evelyn.”

  Percy Blythe swiveled his head in Melrose’s direction and gave him a look like a fist in the face. “Well, you did, you know,” said Melrose across a fossilized starfish. “Not two hours ago. You said to ask her about this March girl.”

  Percy Blythe spat. “Not her, ya crazy fool! Him. Tom Evelyn.” He turned back to Jury as if he were the only one with any sense. “ ‘E be huntsman. T’Colonel’s pack, the Pitlochary. Tom lives up t’kennels, Pitlochary-way.”

  “He knew Dillys March.”

  But Percy Blythe wouldn’t expound on the subject. He just drank his beer.

  “Did you know Lily Siddons’s mother, Mary?”

  “ ’Er as was Cook up t’Ould House. Ah knew ’er. Drownded. Sad, ’twas.” He shook his head.

  “And Lily. You know her, too.”

  “Ah do. She come ’ere and we look at t’crystal. Ah taught ’er all she knoows. Summer folk like their fort’oons told. But Lily —” He tapped his head. “Ah think sees things.”

  “What things?”

  Inscrutably, he shook his head.

  Melrose, under close surveillance by the rough-looking cat, which had only one eye, was inspecting Percy Blythe’s assortment of tools. He decided the cat had a face like the flaying spade.

  “Percy,” Jury said, “do you think maybe Lily
might know something about someone in Rackmoor, something that might be dangerous?”

  “Ah don’t know, man. Cud be.” A long silence fell as Percy Blythe set to fingering his seashells again. Melrose was vastly relieved to see Jury rise.

  “I guess we’ve taken up enough of your time. We’ll be off. Thanks for all your help, Percy.”

  “Ya coom back, lad, fer another bit a’gale beer.”

  Melrose noticed he had not been included in that invitation.

  • • •

  Outside, Jury blew on his hands. “Garrulous chap, isn’t he?”

  Melrose regarded Jury out of the corner of his eye. “Black twist, hedging, flaying spades. You hadn’t even heard of the man until I told you about him. How in hell did you know all that?”

  “Simple. I asked Kitty before we left the Fox.” Jury looked at his watch “Well, I guess I’ll pick up Wiggins. There’s one more person I have to see: Maud Brixenham.”

  “I’ve met her. Puts me in mind of an antelope.”

  “Care to come along?”

  “No. I think I’ll write up my notes.”

  • • •

  Wiggins was none too happy about being dragged from the warmth of his room in the Fox to go walking round in the fog.

  As they left the pub, he was telling Jury that although several of the servants had vague recollections of Dillys March, they also had cast-iron alibis for the night of the murder. “Except for Olive Manning, that is. She went upstairs about the same time Julian Crael did, somewhere around ten o’clock, she says. And as her room’s in the other wing, well, she could easily have slipped out and no one been the wiser. And she’s very bitter about Dillys March, about all the trouble she caused her son, Leo.”

  “Yes, I know. I’ll have to talk to Mrs. Manning.” They were on the other side of the cove and Jury said, “Where’s Lead Street?”

  Wiggins pointed up a narrow little crescent of a street, scarcely wide enough to admit two walking abreast. “Just there, sir. Converted fishermen’s cottages.”

  “How goddamned chic,” Jury said.

  13

  Maud Brixenham walked through life scattering veils and pins.

  Or so it seemed to Jury as he watched the gray tulle scarf drift like a wave to the floor as her angular body moved between couch and credenza. He wondered if it had been draped there to conceal the signs of aging — the veins in the neck, the tiny lines.

  “Sherry?” she asked, over her shoulder.

  Jury and Wiggins, both seated on the couch, declined.

  “I’ll just have one if you don’t mind.” Her voice floated back to them like her scarf. She was pouring from a bottle which Jury could not see. He observed the handkerchief which had dropped from pocket or sleeve as she bent to replace the bottle, and the porcupinelike bristle of hairpins sticking out from the brown bun wound loosely at the base of her neck. The hairpins seemed to hold little in place, for small licks of hair stuck out from around the bun like chicken feathers.

  Maud Brixenham returned to sit opposite them, her hand held beneath her sherry glass like a small plate. She sighed. “I suppose you’ve come about that odd young woman.”

  Jury smiled slightly. Not “unhappy” nor “poor” young woman. Maud Brixenham didn’t waste time feigning sympathy. She drank some of the sherry and set the fluted glass on the table. Jury noticed it was very pale for sherry. Was it gin? “Odd in what way, Miss Brixenham?”

  “Actually, I was being polite. ‘Conniving’ is what I meant.”

  “ ‘Conniving’?”

  “Why, yes. That whole Dillys March act.”

  “ ‘Act’?”

  She just looked at him. “Do you always play Little Sir Echo, Inspector? You’re worse than my psychiatrist, and he’s a treat. Very well, I’ll pretend you know nothing about it and elucidate. This Temple woman turns up at Old House, announces herself as Titus’s long-lost ward, and more or less plumps herself down in the midst of the gilt and crystal expecting to be drawn to the family bosom.” She waved a deprecating hand and picked up her glass.

  “You didn’t believe the story?”

  “Not for a moment. Do you?” She took a cigarette from the japanned box and plugged it into a foot-long onyx holder. Her fingers were much-beringed.

  “But Sir Titus did.”

  “Although he is my dearest friend, I must admit to his being rather gullible. The thing is he quite doted on the girl when she was a child and you know he’s horribly disappointed he’s got no grandchildren. Julian will never give him any, it seems.”

  “You’re fond of Sir Titus?”

  His answer came in the two bright spots which flared up in her large, squarish face. Maud Brixenham was no beauty, but she had quality. The Colonel would have appreciated it; it was the sort of horse-breeding which runs to winners.

  “You went to this Twelfth Night party, did you?”

  “Yes. Nearly everyone in Rackmoor goes. It’s an annual event. A lavish costume party — but, of course, you know that. She was wearing that costume when she was killed. It was striking, the black and white. Lily thought it up. Awfully original, and very strange, rather like a Picasso drawing, you know, where one gets that distorted half-and-half effect. . . . Well, I went as Sebastian. I thought that would be appropriate. And Lily went as Viola. I must say she made a handsomer twin than I, but then she’s quite a handsome young woman. Les — that’s my nephew — went as himself. He’s always in costume. Cowboy hat, boots, fringed jacket or jean suit. T-shirts with awful pictures on them like tongues sticking out or inscrutable messages like Frizday. I simply refuse to ask him what it means. Do you know what it means?”

  “Frisbee,” said Wiggins. They both looked at him. “You know, that plastic plate-thing they toss about.”

  Wiggins could be a mine of incidental information, Jury had found.

  “How very clever of you, Sergeant.” She looked ceiling-ward. “He’s up there now. I can’t think why the music isn’t playing.”

  “You were telling us about the party, Miss Brixenham.”

  “Oh, yes, sorry. Well, there must have been forty or fifty people there. Enormous buffet. It started sometime after nine, I believe. Most of the guests were in the Bracewood Room — Titus names the rooms after his horses, isn’t that quaint? — but there were people all over the house, really. There were even the musicians he got in to play up on the landing. It looks a bit like a minstrel gallery, you know. And they certainly resembled minstrels. Strolled about some of the time. In costume, too. And he had it catered by . . . oh, I don’t know who. Waiters running about all over. And such costumes the villagers got up to. There was Miss Cavendish from the library looking completely out of character as Madame DuBarry. Can you imagine? Then the Steeds, a young couple that live in Scroop Street, as Henry the Eighth and one of the wives, I can’t remember which. Tedious combination. And the Honeybuns —”

  “What time did you arrive?”

  “About nine-thirty. I’m not absolutely sure. Les might remember. No, he wouldn’t. He can’t remember anything. Lily might. We stopped and picked her up.”

  “And what time did you leave?”

  “Quite soon after. Not much after ten, I’d say. Lily didn’t feel at all well; she’d eaten something that didn’t agree with her. I came back with her and stayed for a bit.”

  “Did you see Gemma Temple that night?”

  “Why, no. As I told Inspector Hawkins —”

  “Harkins.”

  “Yes. Gemma Temple never arrived.” She looked from Jury to Wiggins as if she’d just thought of something. “It occurs to me that it would have been a good night to do someone in. Nearly everyone in the village would be up at Old House. Except perhaps the regulars at the Fox and the Bell. Hard to drag them out.”

  “Which way did you and Miss Siddons — and Les, is it? — return to her cottage?”

  “Lily and I. Les went off through the woods, I think. At any rate, Lily and I came by way of the seawall. It’s a bit
longer, but that other path, the one Les took, is so dark and creepy. . . . ” She shuddered slightly and reached for her drink.

  “So you weren’t near the Angel steps?”

  “No.”

  “And did you pass anyone on your way here?”

  “No.”

  There was a brief silence while they regarded one another coolly and Maud drank off what was left of the water-clear sherry.

  “You did talk with Miss Temple in the Fox Deceiv’d?”

  “Yes, I did. I spend a good deal of time at the Fox, actually. Many a blighted hour when I can’t seem to put words on paper, when the writing’s not going well. Also I like to soak up the local atmosphere. I wish I were a mystery writer, let me tell you. I could jolly well do something with this whole affair.”

  Wiggins looked up from his notebook, startled into speech. “You’re a writer, miss?” His glance round the room then was the one he might have cast round Merlin’s cave. “What sorts of things do you write, then?”

  “Oh, the usual tripe: flesh-pots of Europe, white slavery, bosom-rippers — all short on character, long on four-letter words. Rosalind van Renseleer. That’s my pen-name.”

  “I’ve seen your books — haven’t you, sir?”

  Jury hadn’t, but he smiled and nodded. “What did you and Miss Temple talk about in the Fox?”

  “Nothing significant. She certainly didn’t look like Rackmoor, I’ll tell you. Fake fur coat down to her ankles nearly. Very Carnaby Street. Fashion boots which wouldn’t do a thing for you in this weather. She talked about London and the awful weather here and the sea, that sort of thing. If you want to know more, I suggest you see Adrian Rees.” Casually, Maud Brixenham picked a bit of lint from her blouse.

  “Rees?”

  “The thing is, I saw them together one night.” Pointedly, she looked at Jury. “Walking up the High. On the way, I presume, to his place.”

  Jury said nothing.

  “It was the night before Titus’s little dinner party. Funny, he gave no sign he knew her. It was a small party. Just Titus, Lily Siddons, Adrian, and this Temple person. We were in the Bracewood Room. I recall Miss Temple was sitting before the fire. Julian and I were standing about with our sherry. I believe that’s when Lily came in. She seemed terribly shocked, I mean by this Temple woman’s presence. She just froze in the doorway, staring at her.”