I heard the front doorbell ring as I closed it behind me.
The Rising Moon stood at the corner of a couple of side streets just off Lewes Road.
We made our way there through a back alley which led behind a laundry and a builder’s yard. I didn’t want to run into a frustrated Houghton stomping back down the road after he’d discovered Clarence wasn’t at home.
The Rising Moon was several steps up the hospitality scale from Prinny’s Pleasure. Which wasn’t saying much. The place had tables topped with oak-patterned Formica and upright chairs upholstered in faux red leather. A dedicated boozer nursed a pint at the bar. A young couple held hands discreetly under the table and whispered into each other’s ears. A blowsy matron in a blue Crimplene suit sipped a schooner of sherry and flipped the pages of The Lady.
I turned to Clarence: “Place seems to have become less popular since I was last here. Why don’t you take a seat on that table over in the corner and I’ll get the lunch and drinks.”
He scowled. “Whisky. No ice.”
I walked over to the bar. A middle-aged bloke with chubby chops wearing a tight tee-shirt and jeans folded up his Morning Advertiser and said: “What’s yours?”
I said: “Is the steak-and-kidney pie on today?”
“It’s off.”
“Since when?”
“Nineteen-fifty-seven.”
“What other delights are on the lunch menu?”
Chubby chops scratched his chin. “Crisps. Salt and vinegar flavour.”
“How about rustling up some sandwiches?”
“Cost you.”
“Last of the big spenders, that’s me.”
“Ham or fish paste?”
“Make it four rounds of ham. And don’t spare the mustard.”
I ordered the drinks and carried them over to the table. Put the large scotch down in front of Clarence.
“Do you like ham sandwiches?” I asked him.
“I can take them or leave them.”
“Today, you’ll be taking them. Apparently, the Kate and Sidney is off.”
Clarence shrugged. Picked up his glass. Took a generous swig of scotch. Let out a deep sigh. Relaxed a little.
“Hit the spot?” I asked.
“Just about.”
I said: “One thing that puzzles me is why your mother reverted to her maiden name when she retired.”
Clarence took another pull at his whisky. “I think she realised that when she’d been Marie Richmond, she’d always been playing a part. When she stopped being her in the films, she wanted to stop being her in real life.”
“And what did you think about that?”
“‘Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more…’”
We were back in the dictionary of quotations. It was as though the man couldn’t think for himself. Relied on other people to provide things for him to say. I was thinking what to make of that when the sandwiches arrived.
Clarence took one. Had a bite. Chewed thoughtfully.
I picked up a sandwich and bit into it. Stale bread. Tasteless ham. Lumpy mustard. I washed it down with a swig of G and T. I signalled to the barman to bring fresh drinks.
Clarence chewed on morosely. Put his sandwich back on the plate.
“I’d rather have had the steak-and-kidney pie,” he said.
I nodded. “Me, too.”
He drank some whisky. I sensed it was getting to him.
“The accident must have come as a dreadful shock to you,” I said.
“Mumsie had gone round the corner to the phone box. She said she had an important call to make. If only she’d not gone. But ‘when fate summons, monarchs must obey.’ Retired actresses, too.”
“And Marie was hit by a car, I understand.”
“A baker’s van.”
The barman arrived with fresh drinks. I handed him a ten-bob note. Told him to keep the change.
“I gather your mother died in the Royal Sussex County hospital,” I said.
“An ambulance rushed her there. A neighbour came round to tell me what had happened. I took a taxi straight away. Mumsie was still conscious. Just. A nurse – Trish, I think her name was – said Mumsie had been clinging desperately to consciousness waiting for me to arrive.”
“That must’ve been devastating for you.”
“Trish helped me – even though her shift had finished and she was supposed to be at her sister Marjorie’s birthday party. She told me my mother had a message for me.”
He took a good pull at his fresh whisky.
“What was the message?” I asked.
He frowned. “Private.”
“I understand.”
Clarence scowled at me. “They were the last words Mumsie ever spoke to me. To me. Not to anyone else. And certainly not to titivate newspaper readers.”
“We will respect your privacy,” I said.
Clarence sat back. His lips were pursed and eyebrows drawn together. He clenched and unclenched his right hand. He was living on his nerves.
I said: “Had you heard that pictures of a film featuring your mother were stolen from a What the Butler Saw machine on Place Pier four nights ago?”
“And what of it?” he snapped. “Do you think I equate the loss of pictures with the loss of Mumsie. I’d rather lose all the pictures of her in the world if she could still be here. ‘Thou art lost and gone for ever…’”
For a horrible moment, I thought he was going to sing My Darling Clementine. Instead, his head slumped forward as though he were too upset to continue.
I said: “I guess the theft must have been an awful coincidence.”
“Yes. That’s what it was. An awful coincidence.”
I changed the subject. “I expect you’ll observe a period of mourning before resuming your work,” I said.
“A period of mourning, certainly. But I don’t work.”
“You’re between jobs?”
“No. Mumsie always said that as we had enough money to live quietly, there was no need for me to seek a career. She made a joke of it – that we could both live in retirement together.”
“And you’ve never felt you wanted to work?”
“No. Whichever career I’d chosen, I’d never have been known for myself – only as my mother’s son. If I were accepted, it would be because of my mother. If I were rejected, it would be my fault. I couldn’t bear that.”
“So a life of ease.”
“Living with Mumsie was never a life of ease,” he said.
He picked up his glass, drained it. Stood up. “And, now, I’ve got no more to say to you.”
“Not even a quotation?”
“Never mock others’ words of wisdom,” Clarence said loftily.
I needed to preserve Clarence as a contact. So I said: “Let me give you my card. If you want to get in touch, don’t hesitate.”
I fished out a card and said: “I’ll write my home address on the back so you can contact me at any time.”
Clarence took the card. Studied it with a look of distaste on his face. For a moment, I thought he was going to hand it back. But he thrust it into his jacket pocket.
He gestured at the sandwiches and smirked. “I suppose I should thank you for a delicious lunch.” He turned and strode out of the pub.
I glared after him. Perhaps there’d be a large doberman pinscher outside hungry for a bite.
But there’s never a dog around when you need one.
Chapter 10
Back at the Chronicle, I went straight to the newsroom.
But I’d barely had time to roll copy paper into my typewriter before Figgis appeared alongside my desk.
He scowled. “Have you seen this?” He tossed the latest edition of the Evening Argus onto my desk.
A screamer headline on the front page read:
PIER MURDER: ARREST SOON
Under it, Jim Houghton’s breathless prose informed us that the police were close to nailin
g Fred Snout’s killer. The piece quoted “informed police sources”. He meant, of course, Tomkins. The pair were still intent on keeping me in the dark.
Figgis said: “While you’re touring the town chasing theories, the opposition is scoring one scoop after another before our very eyes. I don’t like it.”
“Neither do I,” I said. “Can we talk?”
“We are.”
“I mean in private.”
We trooped through the newsroom and went into Figgis’s office. I closed the door carefully behind me.
Figgis sat down behind his desk. The Weights he’d dropped in the Pavilion Gardens were lined up on his windowsill, drying in the sun.
I pointed at them. “If the sun stays out they should be dry soon.”
“I’m gasping for a fag.”
“Everything comes to those who Weight,” I said.
“It’s going to take more than one of your cracks to satisfy me, young Crampton. This is the second day running we’ve been beaten by the Argus. People are starting to think I’m news-editing a parish magazine. In fact, I’ve already had His Holiness on the phone asking why we’re not leading on this story.”
Gerald Pope – His Holiness behind his back – was the Evening Chronicle’s editor. He spent his time penning wordy editorials that nobody read and looking for minute errors in the cricket scores.
“And to ignore a Pope would be a cardinal error,” I said.
Figgis harrumphed. “Never mind what His Holiness thinks. It’s my opinion you need to worry about. I’ve given you your head on this because you’ve proved in the past that your instincts are good. But, now, I’m not so sure. I think we need to take the police line on the murder seriously. Otherwise we’re going to be running behind Houghton until the story finally folds.”
“In that case, why is Houghton running behind us?” I said.
“What do you mean?”
I told Figgis how I’d seen Houghton heading for Clarence’s house.
“At the police station this morning, Houghton was clearly delighted when Tomkins rubbished my theory that Snout’s murder was linked to the theft of Milady’s Bath Night. Yet a few hours later, he’s hustling round to interview Marie Richmond’s son.”
“Classic misdirection,” Figgis said. “Experienced journalists do it all the time when they’re hoping to put rivals on the wrong scent.”
“There’s more to it than that,” I said. “I mentioned Marie Richmond by name in my piece in last night’s paper. What I didn’t mention was that many years ago she’d reverted to her maiden name of Sybil Clackett.”
“Distinctive.”
“Maybe, but you’d need to know enough about Marie to be aware of that. And very few do. Certainly not Houghton, I’ll wager. But it gets more mysterious, because Marie’s son goes under her married name of Bulstrode. Marie didn’t have a telephone. I checked when I interviewed Clarence. And even if Houghton spent hours trawling through the electoral register, he’d only have seen the names of Sybil Clackett and Clarence Bulstrode – and there would’ve been no way to link them with the late Marie Richmond.”
“So you’re suggesting that all the while Houghton was dismissing the connection between Snout and Milady’s Bath Night, he was getting information about it elsewhere?”
“Must have been. And it wouldn’t be Superintendent Tomkins – because I’m convinced he really does believe there’s no connection between the theft and the murder.”
Figgis leaned back in his chair, glanced at the Weights.
We fell silent.
After a moment, I said: “I think there’s only one conclusion.”
“A snitch?”
“In the newsroom.”
Figgis rubbed his forehead.
“Tricky to deal with. Last time we had a snitch, it was one of the subs. Ernie Stebbings. Before you joined the paper. He’d been slipping some of our best stuff to one of the regional television news programmes. Of all the low dirty tricks – television. Our sworn enemy.”
“You fired him?”
“Too simple. I discredited him. I fed him a piece of fiction I’d concocted about a gang that were rustling sheep on the Downs and had two hundred of the animals hidden in a barn out Henfield way.”
“Great story had it been true.”
“I even watched Ernie as he made some excuse to leave the building and scurry to the box over the road to phone the tip-off through. Apparently, the TV people sent a full crew up to film the barn. They weren’t pleased when they found it was stacked with straw. Nor was the farmer when the crew started poking around. Ernie resigned a couple of days later. Couldn’t stand the strain that the TV people were going to out him. Of course, they never did. Had too many red faces themselves.”
“But finding a snitch in the newsroom won’t be so easy,” I said.
“Thirty-two of you out there – forty-one if you include the sports desk.”
“The jock-strap brigade may have the balls to play double agent, but they don’t have the brains.”
“You may be right. Any thoughts on the culprit?” Figgis asked.
“None. At the moment. I haven’t made a secret of what I’m working on. I guess it’s common knowledge throughout the newsroom.”
“Could be one of the subs – or even the feature writers,” Figgis said.
The subs occupied a squalid paper-strewn garret on the top floor. The feature writers had been moved out of the newsroom a couple of years earlier when more general reporters were hired. Now the feature team – the leader writer, gardening editor, theatre critic and other one-subject obsessives – worked in their own room downstairs, next to the advertising department.
“I don’t think so,” I said. “They don’t get to hear the day-to-day gossip in the newsroom.”
Figgis stood up, walked over to the windowsill and picked up one of the Weights.
“Still feels too damp,” he said.
He went back to his desk and sat down.
“I’ll give it some thought. You should, too. Meanwhile, we still haven’t decided what we’re going to do about the Argus lead on this story,” he said.
I said: “I don’t accept the Argus has a lead. At the moment, they’re printing what the police tell them, which is fair enough – but it doesn’t mean the police are right. This case is a lot more complex than Tomkins realises. My own police insider confirms that.”
Figgis nodded. “As we reported in the Midday Special.”
“We’d look foolish if we changed direction now – just when it looks as though we may be onto something. Houghton wouldn’t be sniffing around Clarence if that wasn’t true.”
Figgis shrugged. “Very well. I’ll give you until tomorrow to come up with some concrete progress or I’ll be handing the story over to another reporter. I’ll keep His Holiness quiet in the meantime.”
I stood up, moved towards the door, turned back to Figgis. “Perhaps you could persuade him to join the Trappists,” I said.
I went through the door before Figgis had time to reply.
I strode back into the newsroom and sat down at my desk.
I looked around the room. No one was taking any notice of me. My fellow journos had their heads over typewriters batting out last-minute copy or were bellowing down telephones trying to tease quotes out of contacts who didn’t want to talk.
It was hard to believe any of them could be the snitch.
I put the matter out of my mind. The Afternoon Extra deadline was just fifteen minutes away and I had to write a story about my interview with Clarence.
Even making allowances for his grief, I hadn’t liked the man. Yet if I was going to pursue the Milady’s Bath Night angle, I might need his help in the future. So I decided to go easy on him in the story.
I started typing:
“The son of Marie Richmond, the silent-movie star who died following a motor accident on Friday, has spoken of his grief.
“Clarence Bulstrode, 54, was at his mother’s bedside in the Royal
Sussex County Hospital when she died.
“Mr Bulstrode told the Chronicle how his mother had chosen to retire from the silver screen and live a private life in a small flat in Brighton.”
I carried on for another twelve pars and wrapped up:
“Police are still puzzled by the theft of a What the Butler Saw film of Marie Richmond three days before her death.”
I rolled the last folio out of the typewriter, called for Cedric and handed him the copy.
“Another exclusive, Mr Crampton?” he said.
“Let’s hope so,” I said.
He shuffled off reading the top folio of the piece.
I sat back and thought about it. As an episode in a running story, it was inconclusive. I’d admit that privately. Even to Figgis. But it kept the story alive. And now I had to find a way to take it forward.
There was one thought that had been hiding at the back of my mind like a rat skulking behind a dustbin. It was about as ugly, too.
I already believed that Fred Snout’s killing was linked to the theft of Milady’s Bath Night. What if Marie Richmond’s death was also connected?
It wasn’t the kind of question I could raise with Clarence. In his present volatile state it could send him climbing the walls with despair or smashing the furniture with rage. I needed to know more about the accident.
I reached for the telephone and dialled a number.
A voice said: “Wilson.”
I said: “Can you talk for a minute?”
“No. I’m busy.”
“For how long?”
“Let’s say the next twenty years.”
I said: “You’ve seen the Chronicle Midday Special.”
“Everyone in the station’s seen it.”
“I understand.”
“Including Tomkins.”
“Not happy?”
“No one here’s happy. Including me.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “Especially with that bit about a senior source saying the Snout murder team would eventually have to consider a link with the Milady’s Bath Night theft. You set me up.”
“I didn’t mention you by name.”
Ted snorted. “Big deal. There aren’t that many senior sources in Brighton police station. Tomkins has been eyeing me like I’m some festering jetsam that’s been washed up on the beach.”
Stop Press Murder Page 10
