Miss Seeton Flies High (A Miss Seeton Mystery Book 23)

by Hamilton Crane

  “Lonk,” echoed Miss Seeton. “Beulah Speckled-face. Nigel, really?”

  “Really. But they’re upland breeds, and because much of our land is barely six inches above sea level it wouldn’t suit them. Besides, Romney Marsh farms ought to farm Romney sheep. It wouldn’t be right not to, when people have spent generations breeding them to suit our unusual—no, unique—conditions.”

  Nigel in full farming flow was an entirely different person from the light-hearted young man Miss Seeton had known for so long. She heard further gems of agricultural wisdom (“Catch any shepherd culling a sheep that’s blind, no matter how old she is!”) and was listening, enthralled, to a lecture on the habits of spiders in autumn, when the telephone rang and she had to tear herself away, urging the last piece of cake on her guest while she left him alone.

  “Why, Chief Superintendent, what a delightful surprise,” he heard her say.

  Chapter Four

  Plummergen opinion on Miss Seeton has ever been mixed. There are many who regard her as nothing but an asset to the village. Others see her ostensible dealings with the police as camouflage for something—upon the exact nature of which nobody can agree—rather more sinister, probably criminal in intent, surely indicative of corruption (at least) at the highest level, and definitely nothing whatsoever to do with sketching, painting, or drawing.

  “Such a feeble excuse,” scoffed Miss Nuttel.

  “Unbelievable,” agreed Mrs. Blaine, “even if she really did teach art before she retired.”

  “If,” echoed Miss Nuttel. “No proving it after so long, of course.”

  Mrs. Blaine uttered a regretful sigh before returning to her theme. “It’s obvious that photographs would be far more helpful to the authorities than anything man-made—”

  “Or woman-made, Bunny.”

  Mrs. Blaine tittered. “Too clever of you, Eric—but aren’t I right? A photo always looks exactly like what it’s of, which simply has to be a better clue that any drawing, because with a drawing you can’t be sure. Suppose your hand were to shake? Besides, with an india-rubber it can too easily be altered. A photograph is a fact.”

  “Say anything to cover their real reason for meeting her,” said Miss Nuttel. “Think we’ll swallow it, of course. Messages in code,” she concluded, inspired.

  Chief Superintendent Delphick had long ago realised that nothing he or his colleagues—not even Sergeant Ranger, adopted son of Plummergen through his marriage to the doctor’s daughter—might say would ever wholly eradicate the doubts of the suspicious. While doing his best to rouse as little comment, and stir up as little trouble as possible each time he had cause to consult the Yard’s retained consultant, the Oracle’s lurking unease was always soothed by the reassuring knowledge that Miss Seeton herself never knew what people said of her, and that even if she did, any true-blue English gentlewoman must disapprove of, and ignore as vulgar, any public discussion of her very private life.

  For this particular consultation Delphick had travelled by train, and by taxi, alone.

  Bob voiced regret at missing the chance to see his adopted aunt, and perhaps his in-laws if there was time, but Delphick reminded him that should both of them go to Plummergen it would have far too official an appearance.

  “We’re trying to keep the lid on this kidnap, remember,” he warned. “Plummergen will always add two and two and make fifty with no effort whatever.”

  Bob seized the darts metaphor, and hurried on with it. “Only sometimes the bull’s-eye they hit is the wrong one, sir.”

  “Too often, it is, but there’s always the risk that for once it will be correct. Miss Seeton is a friend, remember, as well as a colleague. Isn’t her birthday some time around now?”

  “September the eleventh,” supplied Bob at once. “Martha made a cake.”

  “Courtesy requires that I deliver her card in person rather than entrust it to the post, as an apology for my forgetfulness.”

  “Take a box of chocolates too,” suggested the adopted nephew promptly. “She’s not that keen on the milk, so you could bring them back with you to swap for plain.”

  “How your mind seems to run on food, Sergeant Ranger. Can it be that your enthusiasm for joining me in this flying visit is prompted by thoughts of gingerbread?”

  Miss Seeton, knowing that Mr. Delphick was less keen on gingerbread than was dear Bob, had begged a Victoria sponge from Martha as more suitable than rich fruit cake for a morning visitor. Delphick expressed pleasure at this kindly thought, and commended the jam upon being told that it was from Miss Seeton’s own fruit, last year’s crop, and Martha had made that, too.

  “Which she enjoys so much,” explained Miss Seeton, “partly on account of waste—she wishes to avoid it, of course—and also because it does taste better than much of what can be bought in the shops, not at all from any need to make financial savings.” She smiled. “Indeed, Mr. Delphick, at present I feel almost rolling in wealth.”

  “I’ve never won tuppence with my Premium Bonds,” lamented the chief superintendent, as she finished explaining. “Congratulations, Miss Seeton. I hope this doesn’t mean you will allow your contract with Scotland Yard to lapse. Your services to the forces of law and order would be a sad loss.”

  Miss Seeton, turning pink, assured him that she knew her duty, and her contract would be honoured for so long as the police might ask it of her.

  “I had, however,” she went on, “thought of spending a few days in the West Country. Plummergen Amateur Dramatic Society is considering a Christmas play about King Arthur, and they have asked me to design the scenery, which will take time as I know so little about it, although the stories are of course familiar. One does like to be accurate, and Mr. Jessyp assures me there is no need to go as far west as Cornwall, for Tintagel is merely where he was born and Somerset is far more suitable. Glastonbury, you see. The Isle of Avalon.”

  Delphick had stiffened at the unexpected coincidence of this West Country connection, and swiftly changed his mind about asking her to look, immediately after their tea and cake, at the photographs of Christy Garth hidden in the birthday parcel. On first arriving at Sweetbriars he had warned that the milk chocolate selection was a deliberate mistake, and that her proper present would arrive in the post later. Miss Seeton, blushing discreetly, had assured him no present was necessary; and thanked him, with a little chuckle, when he said that Sergeant Ranger would never forgive him if he paid insufficient attention to young Gideon’s fellow godparent.

  The West Country. He had often felt Miss Seeton might be psychic. He pressed now for further details of her proposed break, and her reasons for taking it.

  “Mr. Jessyp is to write the script,” she enlarged, after Camelot and the confusion over Monty Python and the ambitions of Emmy Putts had been explained. “It is so much cheaper than rights, he tells me, and so few Padders apparently can sing.” Delphick’s brain spelled through this statement twice, in the end making sense of her homonyms. “He has kept back his Malory,” she added, “but he sent several books, with illustrations, and I have my own Tennyson, or rather, Cousin Flora’s. So very kind of him. But of course it is to the benefit of the whole village, and there are few photographs except in Geoffrey Ashe. An excellent book and most interesting, from the little I have so far had time to study. One can trust it because it is all really there, you see.”

  Delphick picked up The Quest for Arthur’s Britain and searched the index for Camelot. He smiled. “Now I understand why you’re going to Somerset. Glastonbury, where he sailed in that mysterious barge to be healed of his fatal wound. South Cadbury, where in real life he would have lived in the hill fort that became the Camelot of legend. The scenery, as far as one can judge from photographs, might be called almost inspirational.”

  “It would be possible,” conceded Miss Seeton, “to invent some appropriate background, or even—” she twinkled at him—“to appropriate a castle or other scenery from a different part of the country, but I feel strongly, knowing as I do
that the real places are there to be seen, that I should. Don’t you? See them. It is of course unlikely that an audience would notice, and indeed one hopes their concentration would be on the performance rather than the background, but one does like to be accurate. Which going to the West Country is sure to help me to be.”

  Delphick wondered secretly whether library books might save his hostess some degree of inconvenience and expenditure. Not for the first time in their acquaintance, Miss Seeton seemed to forestall him. “I had thought,” she went on, “about the library. There is, you may know, such a thing as an inter-library loan, books on Somerset being few in Kent, even if King Arthur himself is known throughout the country. Only, with the weather at this time of year being so variable, and just now so temperate, a short holiday would be a pleasure as well as an obligation. And inter-library loans take time.”

  “Talking of time—” regretfully, Delphick interrupted her train of thought—“I should like, before my return to the Yard, to have your opinion—your impression—of the young man in these photographs, Miss Seeton.”

  Miss Seeton was all apology. The chief superintendent had explained yesterday the professional reason for today’s visit. She had duly set out sketchbook and pencils on a side table—and then she had distracted him with tea and cake ...

  “After a train journey from London to Brettenden, and the excitement of Mr. Baxter’s taxi, I was very glad of the rest and the refreshment, Miss Seeton.” These days Mr. Baxter plied his trade more or less on a whim, depending on how much he had recently won (or lost) on the horses. It was an unlucky passenger who found him at the front of the Brettenden taxi-rank. His previously asthmatic car had developed near-terminal bronchitis. While the route to Plummergen was safely downhill, the Oracle resolved that any future visit by train would see either Headcorn or Ashford as the railway station of choice. A telephone booking with Jack Crabbe of Plummergen’s garage would arouse too much village speculation for his liking, well though he knew how Jack himself could be discreet.

  Discretion. Yes. As he reassured his hostess, he was taking the envelope of photos from the swirl of wrapping paper. An English gentlewoman could be trusted, he knew. “This poor chap,” he said, “has gone missing. It isn’t generally known, and we don’t wish it to be, but it seems he could have been kidnapped.”

  “Oh, dear.” Miss Seeton was shocked. “How very distressing for his poor family, and how extremely unpleasant for him. Oh.” She contemplated the first photograph. “Dear me, I may be wrong. He gives the distinct impression of reckless youth, does he not? Adventurous, as of course the young should be, enquiring, experimenting, taking risks—but he seems to be one who is over-adventurous. Being young, he would pay little heed to the future.” She recalled some of her fellow students at art college, so many years ago. “Such persons rarely do. Yet one would not call them heedless or irresponsible, exactly ...” She shuffled through the other photos. “More, living for the moment,” she concluded. “He might even, for a short while, find the whole experience something of a joke.”

  “Spot on, Miss Seeton. I doubt if his picture ever appears in your paper, but the tabloid press all too frequently snaps him being thrown out of nightclubs or involving himself in other disreputable antics. I’d say ‘irresponsible’ is a generous description. Far too much money for his own good, lacking the brains to make sensible use of it—or of his time. He drinks, he drugs, he gets into fights at the slightest provocation, and of course he drives too fast under the influence, though mercifully he hasn’t yet done any serious damage to anyone.” He smiled grimly. “No doubt it’s only a matter of time, the young idiot. And it goes without saying that he womanises, which explains quite a few of the fights. Some of these snaps are mug-shots, as you probably guessed. I can’t recall how many times he’s been arrested, but it’s well into double figures.”

  Miss Seeton sighed. “A spoiled child,” she suggested, regretting the waste.

  “In the sense of being damaged, yes. He’s the eldest of three, and while he was growing up his parents concentrated so hard on establishing the business they tended to neglect him. Once they were established, they appear to have over-compensated for their earlier neglect and he was smart enough to take advantage. His younger brother and sister aren’t, apparently, in the same league of wild child craziness—the brother has joined the business, the sister does a lot of charity work.”

  “One must hope the good example of his siblings will bring him to his senses,” said the retired teacher, almost sternly. “It should, of course, be for the older ones to set an example to the younger, but there are always exceptions and this kidnapping may be just the shock required to make him think for once about the sort of life he has hitherto led.” She looked again at the half-dozen photographs on the table. “But do tell me, in what way can I assist you, Chief Superintendent?”

  Delphick hesitated. He had, in the anticipation of one of her special drawings, asked Miss Seeton for her impression of Christy Garth; but she had without prompting sketched the young tearaway very neatly in words. “None of these photos is more than a rigid likeness,” he said slowly. “Static. I’d like some sort of handle on the young man as he really is—the chance for a guess at what he might have been doing when the whole affair began. All we’ve been told is that he was heading west, which covers a lot of this country and might even refer to a trip across the Atlantic, although Superintendent Kebby, who’s in charge of the case—oh, I am merely the humble messenger,” he added as she looked surprised. “Superintendent Kebby has checked every airline booking and ocean-going liner in the past month, and the young man appears to have made no plans to go abroad, whether bound for the west or, indeed, the east.”

  Again Miss Seeton looked surprised.

  “Kebby wondered, you see, if he might have crossed to the continent in order to start for North America from a European air- or sea-port. However, the most diligent search found no bookings registered anywhere in his name.”

  Miss Seeton noted the chief superintendent’s caution. If the matter was to be kept secret, of course he must not let slip the identity of the unfortunate young man whose face—sullen, sneering, reckless—gazed up at her in glossy black and white. She gazed back at that face for several long moments.

  “His family’s wealth seems to have bought him little happiness,” she said at last, and indicated two photographs rather more blurred than the others. “These, I suspect, are not ... official pictures.” She was unable to speak of mug-shots with Mr. Delphick’s assurance. “Perhaps from one of the tabloid newspapers to which you referred?” Delphick, smiling, nodded. She sighed. “He does not give the impression of having gained any pleasure from his way of life, no matter how much money he may have spent in its pursuit. One always supposes that playboys must relish the excesses of a lifestyle with few worries, but this young man seems, if it is not too fanciful, almost crushed under a burden of discontent and, indeed, of boredom.” She sighed again. “How wise of his brother and sister to have found some gainful occupation. And how fortunate. And how very sad for his parents.”

  “Poor little rich boy, you mean?”

  Miss Seeton agreed, adding quickly that while she felt some sympathy for this young man it must be limited, because people had to take responsibility for their actions and the impression these photographs gave was that he was both irresponsible and thoroughly spoiled, when he was certainly old enough to know better. As for his parents, so were they—old enough, she meant—and it was a matter for their consciences as to how far neglect of their eldest child might have contributed to his problems. Although, of course, one could hardly blame him for having been kidnapped. “Unless he was foolish enough to put himself in the way of temptation—of tempting someone else, that is, to take advantage of his weakness. You say he drinks, and takes drugs?”

  “He does. On an almost heroic scale, some would say.”

  Miss Seeton contemplated the surly face of Christy Garth. “A sad waste. When one thinks
of the artists—writers—musicians who have at least created something worthwhile from their excesses ...”

  “For others apart from themselves to enjoy? Yes, indeed. We may, thanks to that untimely person from Porlock, have only half the poem, but think how many people admire what there is of Kubla Khan.”

  She nodded. “As I used to tell my pupils, to experience and to keep it entirely to one’s self is—well, selfish, when there can be so much pleasure in sharing and even, perhaps, encouraging others to see not only the same, but something extra. This young man seems to have won no pleasure at all from his experiences. Although,” a sense of fairness made her add, “he may have no particular creative instinct, which could explain it.”

  Delphick smiled. “Not everyone has your talent, Miss Seeton.” He rose to his feet, and collected her sketchbook and pencils. “A talent I now ask you to use on behalf of this young man, by giving me—and Superintendent Kebby—some idea of what he might have been planning to do, and where he was planning to go. I’ll tidy the tea-things into the kitchen to clear some space for you.”

  He ignored her faint protest, set down the drawing materials and whisked plates, cups and tea-pot from the table even as her hand instinctively moved to bring the tools of her profession within reach. He watched her push the mug-shots, posed and stiff, aside, leaving the two newspaper photographs as the focus of her attention. He heard her sigh, saw her sadly shake her head—that wasted life still worrying her, of course ...

  “Please don’t.” He had stood silently watching, and guessed what she meant to do.

  Miss Seeton turned a guilty face towards him. The hand that had been prepared to rip her finished sketch from the block and crumple it, or perhaps tear it in pieces, wavered and fell. She blushed. “I’m so sorry,” she murmured. “I quite forgot.”

  Delphick smiled kindly at her. She always “forgot”, hoping he would not notice until it was too late. He knew that Miss Seeton’s disapproval of those cartoons, doodles, sketches she produced by instinct rather than by painstaking skill was marked, and tempered always by embarrassment. She felt that one should draw only what was there—unless, of course, one had sufficient talent, which she freely acknowledged she had not—and most certainly no genius, which could excuse almost anything—and it was only by stern reminders that she was under contract to Scotland Yard, who had first refusal on any, repeat any, of her work, that Delphick managed to prevent her concealing, or even destroying, what she had drawn when that drawing was what he particularly wished to see.