‘Mrs S—‘ In that instant, as he registered the tall, painted, blue-rinsed presence in the doorway, and married it with the legend on the painted sign (THE ELSTREE GUEST HOUSE—Proprietress: Mrs Basil Champeney-Smythe), Ian amended the question ‘—Mrs Champeney-Smythe?’
‘Yahss.’ The blue-rinsed presence looked down on him from the great height made up of two steps and her own extra inches. ‘I am Mrs Basil Champeney-Smythe—yahss.’
‘Robinson, Mrs Champeney-Smythe—‘ He had somehow expected an unobtrusive lodging-house in a back-street, not this genteel four-storey Edwardian yellow-brick survival, with its ancient genteel landlady (Dame Edith Evans playing Lady Bracknell, to the life). But now plain Mr Robinson wasn’t good enough, anyway ‘—Ian Drury Robinson, of Fielding-ffulke, Robinson, Mrs Champeney-Smythe—Fielding-ffulke, Robinson, of Chancery Lane—?’ He repeated the contents of his card as he offered it to her as though he expected everyone to recall it from the legal columns of The Times.
Mrs Basil Champeney-Smythe (alias ‘Old Mrs Smith’) accepted the card with one skeletal hand while raising a monocle on a gold chain to her eye with her other claw.
And … this wasn’t going to be so easy, thought Ian, considering his various scenarios: how the hell did Marilyn Francis, either as a blonde man-eater or an expert on General Custer’s Last Stand, fit in with The Importance of Being Earnest?
‘Yahss?’ She returned the card, wrinkling her nose at the pronounced smell of curry which emanated from the Indian restaurant-cum-takeaway just across the road behind them.
Ian decided to acknowledge the smell by wrinkling his nose back at her. ‘If you could spare a few minutes of your time, Mrs Champeney-Smythe—on a matter which really only involves you indirectly—‘ This was important, he remembered: ordinary folk always felt threatened by strange solicitors on their doorstep ‘—in fact, in a legal sense, doesn’t involve you at all … But you could be of great help to one of my clients. So … perhaps I might step inside, for a moment—?’ He sniffed again, and glanced deliberately over his shoulder at the source of the nuisance, which must be wafting in through her open front-door even now.
She considered him through her spy-glass for a moment, and he was glad that he had selected his best charcoal-grey pin-striped Fielding-ffulke, Robinson suit and Bristol University tie. Then she drew back, leaving an opening for him into the darkness beyond. ‘Yahss … ’
That was the first hurdle. Long before, in the old days, he could well remember trying to get past the porter of a minor Oxford college to interview the Master about an alleged sex-and-drugs scandal for the Daily Mail, only to be rebuffed by the loyal college porter with ‘You just fuck off! We know your sort!’ (And, actually, he had been wearing a decent suit and his Bristol tie on that occasion, also.)
The darkness dissolved slowly, and the curry-smell was repelled by a mixture of furniture-linoleum polish, Mrs Champeney-Smythe’s face powder and the steak-and-kidney-pie-and-cabbage, which had presumably been the Elstree Guest House residents’ lunch not so long ago.
‘If you would be so good as to ascend the stairs,’ Mrs Champeney-Smythe indicated his route, but then pushed ahead of him after closing out the Indian invasion.
Ian followed her dutifully, up the stair and across the landing, into what was obviously the best room in the house; which, in commercial terms, meant that she wasn’t down on her uppers for money, if she could keep it as her own sitting room.
And the tall windows let in the light, so that he could instantly make out all Mrs Champeney-Smythe’s lifetime accretion of memorabilia and bric-a-brac, which was consciously arranged around him on occasional tables, and sideboards, and bookcases, and windowsills: silver-framed pictures, and little boxes, and brasses, and paperweights, and innumerable meaningless objects which meant so much to her.
It was the pictures which always told the most, and quickest: no children, naked on rugs, or self-conscious in shirts-and-ties and party-dresses, or gowned for graduation; only an extremely handsome man, posed again and again in carefully-lit situations, always immaculate and cool, and once with a cigarette in hand, the smoke curling up past his nonchalant profile, in a Noel Coward pose.
‘You may recall my late husband.’ Mrs Champeney-Smythe observed his interest with satisfaction as he bent over the cigarette advertisement. ‘That is my favourite—the one Gabby Pascal gave me. But he always preferred Arthur’s favourite—‘ She pointed, ‘—that one … which was taken for The Dark Stranger … Basil had only a small part. But he had all the best lines, Arthur said—J. Arthur Rank, of course.’
‘Basil Champeney as Harry de Vere’, Ian read dutifully. So he was in the presence of late pre-war and early postwar British cinema, not in 1978, but over forty years—maybe even half-a-century—ago!
‘Yes!’ He lied enthusiastically. ‘Yes—of course!’
‘Indeed?’ She frowned at him suddenly, as though she had seen through his enthusiasm, to its insincere foundation. ‘But that was … before you were born, Mr Robertson—?’
‘Robinson.’ He smiled at her desperately, and played for time while he took out his spectacles again, peering through them round the room. ‘Yes. But those were the great days of British cinema, Mrs Champeney-Smythe—‘ He saw her more clearly now: the ancient remains of past splendour, plundered and weathered by time, like the Parthenon: or, if not an old Bluebell Girl, she had the height for the front row of the chorus, certainly. So all he had to remember now was the list of those old films, hoping for the best. ‘The Private Life of Henry VIII … and Things to Come … and Rembrandt—‘ He cudgelled his brains, between Gabriel Pascal, and Alexander Korda, and J. Arthur Rank ‘—and The Four Feathers, with Ralph Richardson … and Pygmalion … and, after the war—I have many of those films on video now, Mrs Champeney-Smythe: those were the great days—‘ He bent towards Basil’s picture, as though to a shrine ‘—I never expected … The Dark Stranger—of course!’ He sat back, nodding at her, and terrified lest she quiz him further. ‘But—I am imposing on you—‘ At all costs, he had to get away from the Great Days of British Cinema ‘—you see, it’s about one of your former … guests … a young lady—a young lady—?’
‘A young lady?’ She had sat down, into her favourite chair, beside the table which carried the Radio Times and the TV Times, and her copy of the Daily Mail. ‘Which young lady, Mr Robertson?’
He adjusted his spectacles, solicitorly. ‘It was some years ago—nine or ten, perhaps … a Miss Francis, Mrs Champeney-Smythe—Miss Marilyn Francis—?’
She frowned at him again. And in that second he threw away all his planned explanations, on instinct. And put nothing in their place.
The frown cleared slightly. ‘I remember Miss Francis—yahss … ’
Yahss: they all remembered Miss Marilyn Francis. And, at a guess, Mrs Champeney-Smythe had once disapproved of Marilyn’s appearance quite as much as Mrs Simmonds … Or, with her own chorus-line memories, maybe not quite as much? Mrs Champeney-Smythe in her time must have seen other bright butterflies and moths fluttering around flames; so Marilyn Francis might not have seemed quite so outrageous after all.
‘Yahss—‘ Other memories intruded: Mrs Champeney-Smythe had read her Daily Mail back in 1978, and the recollection of her reading, which she must have shared with her other lodgers with shock-horror all those years ago, showed in her face now. ‘Yes, Mr Robertson. I remember Miss Francis.’
A gentle smile was called for. ‘You wouldn’t, by any chance, have any record of a forwarding address—if your records go so far back—?’
‘No, Mr Robertson.’ She fingered the strings of costume jewellery which accompanied the monocle’s gold chain, and waited for him to continue.
She was time-biding, Ian decided. She must be all of seventy years old (with all that paint and powder, it was hard to say: she could be nearer eighty for all he could tell: a relic of the twenties, even!). But, just as with Gary, it would be a mistake to underrate her; and he’d already made th
e elementary mistake of combining two questions into one, so that he didn’t know which one that ‘no’ applied to. ‘Your records don’t go back—?’
‘My records go back to June 1960, when my husband and I bought this property, on our retirement from the profession, Mr Robertson.’
‘So she didn’t leave any address?’ He chose to interpret her answer. ‘Isn’t that unusual—not to have an address?’
‘Not if you do not have an address. Miss Francis left one place, where she was lodging, and came to me. That is all.’
It wasn’t all. She remembered Marilyn Francis very well—so well, that even with Marilyn nine years dead she wasn’t going to give any Tom, Dick or Harry … or Robertson, of Fielding-ffulke, Robertson … easy answers. ‘Didn’t she receive any mail?’ He remembered Mrs Simmonds had let slip about Marilyn’s hurried midweek departure, with £5 out of the petty cash in her pocket. But perhaps she’d just been playing her part to the last. ‘After she left, I mean—?’
‘Miss Francis did not receive any mail.’
Well, that rang true, however uninformatively. But at this rate he’d be here all day, and still not be much the wiser. So he must push harder. ‘But she did have callers, Mrs Champeney-Smythe.’ He made this a statement, not a question. ‘There was a boyfriend, I believe?’
‘There was no boyfriend.’ She rejected his ploy almost contemptuously. ‘And there were no callers.’
They stared at each other like evenly-matched duellists.
‘I find that hard to believe, Mrs Champeney-Smythe.’ He allowed an edge of irritation into his voice.
‘Then … you must believe what suits you, Mr Robertson.’ She parried the first thrust easily.
‘But she was an attractive young woman.’ In their different ways, Mrs Simmonds and Gary had both been agreed on that.
‘She was, yahss.’ A hint of distaste: Mrs Champeney-Smythe would incline more towards Mrs Simmonds there, having no interest in General Custer and firearms and recruitment to the British Army. But she still refused to be drawn any further.
Another thrust, then. ‘She left you rather suddenly, I believe—?’ Once on the attack, he had to go forward. ‘Just before her very tragic death, that would have been, of course … And you read about that, in the newspapers, naturally—?’
The mask didn’t crack. But this time he received only the slightest of nods, and no ‘yahss’. Yet that concealed pain, he judged.
Suddenly he saw a gap in her defences—or, if not a gap, then at least the faintest impossible hope of one. ‘Did she come back to you, to say goodbye?’
No reaction at all.
Wait—or attack harder? The possible dividend of success was great, but so was the penalty of failure. Then, even though the mask still didn’t crack, he knew that she was old and frail behind it, and he was young and strong. ‘She didn’t come back—did she?’ And there had been no forwarding address: she had already admitted that! And how many suitcases, and other minor pathetic luggage, were up there in the attic—or down there in the cellar—belonging to other ‘guests’ who had made the proverbial ‘midnight flit’, rather than settle their accounts? Belongings which were either festooned with cobwebs up above, or mouldy-green with damp down below—? ‘So her things are still here, then?’
She looked away from him, towards one bric-a-brac-choked table over which Basil Champeney (without the plebeian ‘Smythe’) presided out of another silver frame.
But he could see nothing on it which was of the slightest interest—a wooden ashtray, with a mouse carved on it; a brass frog grinning foolishly; a crude rhomboid First World War tank in seaside souvenir china (which was probably worth a tidy sum in any auction!); a hideous piece of Venetian glass, from Murano Island … none of which had ‘Marilyn Francis’ imprinted on it. And then the washed out eyes (which, for a guess, had once been ingenue china-blue) came back to him.
‘Tell me, Mr Robertson … what is all this about?’
He had won. Or, if he was careful now, and gentle with it, he could win. ‘I am concerned with a legacy, Mrs Champeney-Smythe—‘ He touched his spectacles, as though slightly embarrassed ‘—one of those difficult next-of-kin family affairs, which could go on for years … which could swallow up most of the money in legal fees, and all the other costs. But, you know, I don’t believe that’s what my job ought to be about, you see—?’ He gave her his most innocent look, which Jenny always said almost melted her heart. Only now, when he came up against all Marilyn Francis’s contradictions, he found to his surprise that he was no longer quite pretending, even in the midst of this elaborate tapestry of lies. Because, if he’d been in the law and clever little Marilyn had had a blue-eyed Mills-and-Boon offspring, he really would have been fighting for its inheritance. ‘Do you see—?’
She frowned so hard that the make-up on her forehead cracked. ‘No.’
He was surprised as well as disappointed. Because she didn’t seem to be rejecting his appeal. ‘No?’
‘Her brother took all her things … afterwards, Mr Robertson.’
‘Her—?’ Damn! He should have expected that. ‘Her brother?’
She shook her head. ‘She telephoned me—of course … But that was the next day, after she didn’t come back from work. She said how sorry she was … She always phoned me, when she was working late, or when she had to go away—she was always thoughtful … Because she knew that I worried about her, when she was late … But she didn’t phone that time—when she went away, the last time. Not until the next day, very late—‘ She stared at him, and then through him. And then at him. ‘Such a lovely girl, she was—in spite of all appearances to the contrary—‘ The stare fixed him, demanding his agreement ‘—so intelligent—so thoughtful … She knew I worried. Especially when it was dark, at night.’
The image of Marilyn-in-the-dark jolted him. Because Gary had worried also for his darling Miss Francis, when she worked late. He had even followed her all the way back here, one late October evening when the mist was up, to make sure she got home safe: that had been how Gary knew about ‘old Mrs Smith’.
‘She phoned you—? The next day?’ They had both loved her: in quite different ways they had both loved her.
‘Yes.’ She nodded. ‘After her dinner—or, if she was late, after her supper, which she’d often take with me, in this room … after that she’d often stay, and we’d talk … About her day at work, sometimes. Or about what was on the nine o’clock news, or in the papers—she was always very well-informed, about what was going on … And then we would read our books, until it was time to go to bed—‘ She inclined her head upwards ‘—her room was right at the top of the house, and not really very comfortable—not for reading, anyway. So she’d stay down here with me. And we’d have a cup of cocoa—so much better than coffee, or tea, which are stimulants.’
From getting nothing, now he was almost getting too much. Or … cocoa and reading before bed-time mixed as inappropriately with see-through blouses and ‘anything in trousers’ as with Red Indians and the army’s new rifles. But there was something much more important than all of that. ‘She had a brother—? He took her things, you said.’
Her mask tightened. ‘That was unfortunate.’
‘How—unfortunate?’
‘He came when I was out, Mr Robertson.’
‘When—?’ But, then, it wasn’t unfortunate, of course: it figured exactly, that Marilyn’s ‘brother’ would have watched for his moment.
‘When I was out. She said he would be coming—‘ The mask softened ‘—and that she would be coming back to see me, some time. But she’d obtained this new position, up north—not a temporary one, but a permanent post, with a pension and opportunities for promotion, you see-‘
Ian nodded. There had been no pension, and no opportunities. But it had certainly been up north. And it had been permanent, too. But, in those last hours of her life, Marilyn Francis had been nothing if not professional, sewing up all her loose ends tightly.
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��My maid—my house-keeper—was here.’ Mrs Champeney-Smythe corrected herself. ‘Her brother cleared everything out … And, of course, she—Miss Francis … she was paid up to the end of the month—she always insisted on that, even though it was quite unnecessary—‘ She stopped suddenly, as she saw his face fall.
Dead end! thought Ian. Just when he had thought he was there, too. But … it had happened before, and it would happen again. And maybe Reg Buller would still come up with something, from ‘up north’, where someone might have been careless—now that he knew, anyway, that there really was something to be careless about with the real Marilyn Francis, who didn’t exist in Somerset House, or anywhere else except here, in the Elstree Guest House, and in the sad recollections of Gary and his ‘old Mrs Smith’.
‘Well … ’ He smiled at her sadly, and sat up in his chair. When one lost, one cut one’s losses gracefully. And, in any case, he hadn’t wholly lost. ‘Well, I’m most grateful to you, Mrs Champeney-Smythe—for your time, and your help.’ On impulse he decided to give her more than that, as he stood up. ‘I’m glad … Miss Francis had such a happy time, before … before the tragedy occurred.’
She stared at him without replying, as though she hadn’t heard what he had said. Then she turned away, looking again towards the table with its incongruous collection of souvenirs.
He coughed politely. ‘Mrs Champeney-Smythe—?’
She pointed. ‘There is something. You can’t have it. But you can look at it, Mr Robertson. They belonged to her.’
He looked at all of it, already defeated: wooden mouse, or brass frog? China tank or spindly glass horse (minus its tail)? Old ginger beer bottle, advertising ‘Burbank’, a ‘High Class Chemist’ of Oxford? Unless Marilyn had left a message in the bottle, it was all rubbish. But he had to humour her. ‘Which object do you mean?’
‘Not the table—‘ The thin finger stabbed irritably towards the table ‘—the bookcase, Mr Robertson, the bookcase.’
There was indeed a bookcase behind the table, its mathematically aligned contents also part of the room’s ornamentation: she had been looking at that all the time, not the bric-a-brac.
A Prospect of Vengeance Page 12
