by Simon Brett
‘Except, of course, the exhibition didn’t run its full course.’
‘So?’
As interrogations went, this one hadn’t got off to a very good start. And it didn’t get any further, because at that moment Denzil Willoughby’s feet in their toe-curled cowboy boots appeared at the top of the spiral staircase, quickly followed by the rest of his body as he descended. His dreadlocks looked more than ever like knotted string, and he was dressed in jeans and T-shirt. He stopped halfway down as he saw Carole and Jude. ‘Good God,’ he exclaimed. ‘Ladies of Fethering.’
Carole was surprised that he’d even registered their presence at the Private View.
‘Good morning,’ said Jude.
‘And to what do I owe this pleasure?’ The sneer was still there, but the mock-formality took his voice back to its public school origins.
‘We saw on your website that anyone is free to come and watch the “Artist at Work”.’
As Denzil Willoughby reached ground level, he gestured around his workshop. ‘Well, here you see it. The “Artist at Work”.’
‘We haven’t yet seen much evidence of you doing anything,’ Carole observed tartly.
He looked at her pityingly. ‘You just don’t get it, do you, Carole?’ Again she was surprised that he knew her name. ‘You still think art is one guy sitting there with his pots of paint and brushes, “painting things that look like things”.’
That was even more of a shock, Denzil quoting her own lines back at her. It raised the possibility that he had been talking about them to someone else, a possibility that was both intriguing and mildly disturbing.
‘God, my brain’s not working yet,’ the artist announced to the workshop at large. ‘I need coffee.’
The girl immediately rose from her Obama poster and walked towards one of the doors at the back of the warehouse. In the alternative world of Denzil Willoughby, it seemed, male chauvinism still ruled. The other assistant hadn’t looked up from his re-crucifixion of Christ.
‘Make a cafetière,’ Denzil called after the girl. ‘My visitors may want some too. And bring it out on to the terrace.’
No ‘pleases’, no blandishments of that kind. He crossed towards the other door at the back, gesturing Carole and Jude to follow him.
They found themselves in a surprisingly well-tended yard, whose red-brick walls were animated by colourful pot plants and hanging baskets. A wrought-iron spiral staircase led to the upper storey. White-painted Victorian cast-iron chairs stood around an equally white circular cast-iron pub table with Britannia designs on the legs.
Denzil indicated that they should sit down, and he joined them. Beneath his customary sneering manner, Jude could detect tension. And his next words explained the reason for that tension. ‘Presumably,’ he said, ‘you’ve come to talk about Fennel Whittaker’s death.’
TWENTY-ONE
‘What makes you think that?’ said Carole.
‘Because Giles Green had told me all about you,’ Denzil Willoughby replied.
‘Oh. I wasn’t aware he knew anything about us.’
‘He’s heard it from his mother. Apparently Bonita knows everything that goes on in Fethering.’
‘So what has Giles told you about us?’ asked Jude.
‘That you’re nosey, like most people down there.’
Jude spread her hands wide in a gesture of mock-innocence. ‘So little happens in a place like Fethering. The only growth industry in a village is gossip.’
Denzil Willoughby smiled, acknowledging her humour, but it was an uneasy smile. Both Carole and Jude sensed that he was at least as keen to find out things from them as they were from him. Or maybe he just wanted to find out how much they knew. Either way, from the point of view of their investigation his behaviour was very encouraging. It suggested that Denzil Willoughby had something to hide.
They were interrupted by the appearance of the girl with the tray of coffee. This too was produced with unexpected elegance, green, gold-rimmed bistro-style cups and saucers beside the cafetière. It was another detail at odds with the shabbiness of the adjacent workshop.
Denzil said no word of thanks to the girl, and she was silent too. He waited till she had gone before politely asking his guests how they would like their coffee and pouring it. Then he sat back and looked at the two women. ‘Giles heard from his mother that your particular style of nosiness takes the form of imagining murders and attempting to investigate them.’
Instinctively they both remained silent, waiting to see where his questioning would lead next. Appearing even more uncomfortable, Denzil took an iPhone out of the back pocket of his jeans and checked its display. Whatever he was expecting to see wasn’t there. For the rest of their conversation he continued fiddling with the phone.
‘According to Bonita – via Giles – there’s been talk in Fethering that Fennel’s death wasn’t the suicide that it appeared to be. That in fact it was murder.’
Still they let him squirm.
‘And apparently gossiping tongues have even suggested that because Fennel bawled me out at the Private View down there, my name’s in the frame as her murderer.’
‘Well, it’s a thought, isn’t it?’ said Jude with what her neighbour considered to be inappropriate levity.
‘It may be a thought, but it’s not true,’ protested Denzil Willoughby.
‘I’m sure it’s not,’ said Jude with a reassuring smile. ‘So maybe you could tell us why it’s not true?
‘For starters I don’t think Fennel was murdered. If you knew her history of depression, you’d—’
‘I do know her history of depression,’ Jude interposed. ‘I had been treating her for it.’
‘Oh? Are you a doctor?’
‘No, I’m a healer.’
The expression on Denzil Willoughby’s face suggested to Carole that, unlikely though it might seem, there could be at least one subject on which she and the artist might agree.
‘So,’ Denzil went on, ‘you’ll know that Fennel had made a previous suicide attempt. She was all messed up in her head. She talked a lot about topping herself. It was only a matter of time before it happened.’
‘And if it was suicide, would you feel any guilt?’ asked Carole, at her most magisterial.
‘Guilt? Why should I feel guilt?’ He genuinely did not seem to understand.
‘From all accounts, during your relationship you didn’t treat her that well.’
‘Look, hell, I can’t do anything about it if women fall in love with me,’ said Denzil Willoughby. ‘I try to reciprocate, but I admit it isn’t the highest priority in my life. I’m an artist.’
At that point both Carole and Jude would quite happily have knocked the young man’s block off, but they both realized it wasn’t the moment and restrained themselves.
‘At the Private View,’ said Carole beadily, ‘Fennel accused you of only being interested in her money.’
‘That wasn’t true.’
‘But you didn’t mind accepting money from her?’
‘Look, her parents are loaded. If she wanted to give some of it to me, surely that was her decision.’
‘So long as it was her decision,’ said Carole, still in inquisitorial mode. ‘So long as you didn’t pressure her.’
‘Look, I’m an artist,’ said Denzil Willoughby, again prompting block-knocking-off urges in both his listeners. ‘My art’s the most important thing in my life. That has to be funded; that’s the main priority. Where the money comes from to fund it isn’t important.’
‘Are you saying you’d do anything to get money?’ asked Carole.
‘Pretty much, yes.’
‘I thought your father was also loaded,’ said Jude, causing her friend to look at her in some surprise. The secrets of Jude’s healing sessions remained sacrosanct. Except for mentioning to Carole the rumour of Denzil Willoughby’s violence to women, she hadn’t reported any other details of her conversation with Sam Torino in the treatment yurt at Walden. ‘He’s a big shot
in advertising, isn’t he?’
‘Yes, he’s loaded all right,’ Denzil admitted. ‘Just he doesn’t always feel like sharing his goodies with his son. He’s never forgiven me, you see, for becoming an artist. My Dad – the great Addison Willoughby – he did all his training at the Slade and everything, and then prostituted his talents for the rest of his life in an ad agency. How commercial can you get? He’s jealous as hell of what I’ve done, jealous of me not having made any compromises in my life, and that jealousy is quite frequently expressed in a tightening of the purse strings.’
Carole decided to set out on another tack. ‘Since you’ve cast us as the snoopers of Fethering, we’d be failing in our duty if we didn’t interrogate you about Fennel’s death.’
Denzil Willoughby shrugged. ‘You can interrogate away to your heart’s content. You’ll find I have nothing to tell you on the subject. I didn’t see Fennel after she stormed out of the Private View having given me that right royal bollocking.’
‘You didn’t see her again on the Friday night?’
‘Of course I bloody didn’t.’
‘So where were you? Did you stay in Bonita Green’s flat?’
‘No way. It’s tiny. Cramped enough with her and Giles there. Not that I wanted to stay there, anyway. Bonita’s not really my type of person.’
‘Oh?’
‘Another of those who’s frittered away her talents. She trained at the Slade, like my Dad, and like him, she never tried being a proper artist. Just set up that mimsy-pimsy gallery to sell Toulouse-Lautrec fridge magnets to people who wouldn’t recognize a work of art if it came up and bit them on the shin.’
‘She did have two small children to bring up on her own,’ Jude interceded on Bonita Green’s behalf.
‘So what? A true artist wouldn’t let considerations like that get in the way of their work.’
‘Right.’ Carole picked up her interrogation. ‘So where did you go after the Private View?’
‘Back to the hotel they’d booked me into. Place called the Dauncey. Fairly primitive, but probably as state of the art as hotels get in a backwater like Fethering.’ Carole curbed the instinct to defend her home village against the allegation. ‘I spent the whole night there.’
‘Do you have someone who can vouch for that?’ asked Carole.
He smiled at her infuriatingly. ‘My, oh my. You’ve completed the full Amateur Sleuths’ Correspondence Course and passed with distinction. Know all the questions about alibis, don’t you?’
‘I asked if anyone could vouch for the fact that you’d spent all of Friday night at the Dauncey Hotel,’ Carole continued implacably.
‘So you did. And the answer, I am glad to tell you, is yes.’
‘Was it someone you’d picked up at the Private View?’
He smiled lazily. ‘I’m glad my reputation as a babe magnet has spread as far as Fethering. But no, on this occasion I wasn’t working my magic for some fortunate and grateful woman. I was with someone of my own gender.’
‘Oh?’
The disapproval in Carole’s tone clearly communicated itself, because with another lazy smile, he said, ‘No, not that. I know you expect artists to be capable of any depravity, but to my chagrin I’ve never fancied boys. Sure I’m missing a lot, but there you go . . . No, I actually spent the night drinking with my old mucker Giles.’
‘Giles Green?’
‘I didn’t notice any other Gileses around at the Private View.’
‘So the two of you were drinking all night in the bar of the Dauncey Hotel?’
‘Not the bar, no. The hotel manager had rather old-fashioned ideas about licensing hours; he seemed to believe that no one in Fethering ever wanted a drink after nine in the evening. So Giles and I bought a couple of bottles of Scotch and retired with them to my room to drink the night away.’
‘And in the course of that night,’ asked Jude, ‘did you talk about Fennel Whittaker?’
‘We may have done. My recollections of the occasion are necessarily somewhat hazy.’
‘But you probably did?’
‘Probably. Giles and I have always tended to talk about women. We’ve known each other for a long time.’
‘From your time at Lancing,’ said Carole.
‘Ooh, you have been doing your research.’
‘And has there been rivalry between you when it comes to women?’
‘A bit. Benign rivalry, I’d say.’
‘Never come to conflict?’
‘Good God, no. The woman hasn’t been born who’s worth spoiling a male friendship for.’ This was said with a challenging smile. Denzil Willoughby was fully aware of the effect his words were having. It was almost as if he were trying to goad his two visitors into some reaction, but they were determined not to give him the satisfaction.
‘So that night after the Private View,’ asked Carole, ‘did you talk about Giles’s relationship with Chervil Whittaker?’
‘It probably came up.’ He grinned complacently. ‘Though there wasn’t really much he could tell me there.’
Jude was quicker to pick up the implication than Carole. ‘You mean you’d already had a relationship with Chervil yourself?’
‘Spot on.’
‘Recently?’
‘Fairly. It was when I got bored with the younger sister that I moved on to the older one.’
‘And Giles picked up with Chervil?’
‘Exactly. We’ve always kind of shared girlfriends.’
‘At the same time?’
‘Not very often.’ He sniggered. ‘Wouldn’t have worried us, but girls can be funny about that kind of thing.’
‘And what about Fennel?’ asked Jude.
‘What about Fennel?’
‘Was she another girlfriend you shared? Did Giles have a relationship with her as well as you?’
Denzil Willoughby was silent, assessing his reply. Though there was an insolent pleasure in his manner, enjoying telling his visitors what a bad boy he was, an undercurrent of anxiety remained. The iPhone still moved restlessly around between his hands. Both women got the impression he was deliberately extending the conversation, that he still hadn’t got from them what he wanted to know.
He made his decision. ‘Yes, Giles had a bit of a fling with Fennel.’
‘Before you did?’
‘Yes.’
‘While he was still with his wife?’
‘Sure. Giles always thought that he and Nikki had an open marriage.’
‘There are a lot of husbands who think that,’ said Carole with some bitterness, ‘but quite a few of them forget to explain the situation to their wives.’
Denzil Willoughby did another of his infuriating shrugs. ‘Having never been married, I wouldn’t know,’ he said in a voice of assumed piety.
‘But this is rather important,’ announced Jude. ‘Now we know that Giles also had a relationship with Fennel, the whole situation becomes—’
‘It doesn’t change anything if you’re looking for a murderer,’ Denzil pointed out. ‘Because if Giles is my alibi for the relevant time, then I’m also his.’
‘But surely—’
Carole didn’t get beyond the two words, as Denzil suddenly reacted to a beep from his iPhone. Maybe it announced the text he’s been expecting all morning, but the news it brought certainly gave him a shock.
With a cry of, ‘Oh my God, no!’ he leapt to his feet and rushed back into the workshop.
TWENTY-TWO
On the assumption that when he had done whatever the text demanded of him, Denzil Willoughby would return either to pick up the conversation or end their meeting, Carole and Jude stayed out on the terrace. The cafetière retained enough warmth for them to refill their cups.
They talked casually, about anything except the death of Fennel Whittaker. Though both women were full of new ideas relating to their investigation, on Denzil Willoughby’s home territory they felt somehow under surveillance.
Some twenty minutes passed before the convict
ion hardened in both of them that he wasn’t coming back, so they ventured into the workshop. There nothing seemed to have changed. The young man had found a new area of Christ’s carved wooden flesh into which to bang galvanized nails, and the girl was still laying her meticulous lines of Christmas tape over President Obama. There was no sign of Denzil Willoughby.
Neither of the assistants so much as looked up from their work, so Carole and Jude reckoned they were capable of seeing themselves out. They had almost reached the small door to the street when they heard the sound of feet descending the spiral staircase.
This pair of legs was also wearing jeans, but they fitted the more shapely contours of a woman. A few seconds more descent and Carole and Jude found themselves facing Nikki, Giles Green’s wife.
She seemed unfazed to see them. ‘Ah. Denzil said you’d been here. I thought you might have gone.’
‘Good morning. I’m Carole and—’
‘We met at the Cornelian Gallery.’ There was something strikingly direct about Nikki Green.
‘Yes, of course we did. I wasn’t sure you’d remember.’
The two assistants on the floor showed no more interest in this exchange than they had in anything else that had happened that morning. Maybe they were under orders to make no response, or just too preoccupied in realizing the ‘concepts’ vouchsafed to them by the genius who was their employer.
‘I’d better explain what’s happened,’ said Nikki Green as she reached ground level. She looked around the workshop and seemed to dismiss it as a venue. ‘Let’s go out and get a coffee. There’s a Starbucks just down the road.’
Jude saw Carole about to say that they’d actually just had downed the contents of a cafetière, but managed to stop her with a look.
The three of them didn’t speak until they were sitting in the café with yet more coffee in front of them. Then Nikki Green said, ‘Apologies for Denzil not saying goodbye to you. He’d just received some bad news.’
‘Oh? We saw he’d just had a text that—’
‘Yes. That was it. His mother’s just died.’
Jude said she was sorry and Carole came up with the customary elaborate expressions of regret that people in Fethering always produced at the news of the death of someone they’d never met.
