An Amateur Corpse

by Simon Brett

  Then he started his timed walk. He reckoned Geoffrey must have allowed a maximum of forty minutes. I, Claudius lasted fifty, but he could only get forty-five minutes of The Winter’s Tale on one side of the tape. Five minutes would be a buffer to allow for the unexpected.

  Charles set off at a brisk walk. If Geoffrey had run, the timing would have been different, but Charles thought that was unlikely. A man running after dark attracts attention, while a man walking passes unnoticed.

  The alley behind the houses came out on to the main road exactly opposite the footpath up to the common. There was a ‘No Cycling’ notice at the entrance. The path was paved until it opened out onto the common.

  It was the first time Charles had seen this open expanse in daylight. In the centre were a couple of football pitches, which were reasonably well maintained, but the fringes of the common were ill-tended and untidy and had been used as a dumping ground by the nice people of Breckton. Superannuated fridges and rusty buckets looked almost dignified beside the more modern detritus of garish plastic and shredded polythene. It was an eyesore, the sort of mess about which aggrieved ratepayers no doubt wrote righteous letters to the local paper. To Charles it seemed a necessary part of the suburban, scene, the secret vice which made the outward rectitude supportable.

  The half-burnt crater of the bonfire doused by the fire brigade at sour Reggie’s behest gave the dumping ground an even untidier and more melancholy appearance.

  The bonfire had been built where the footpath divided into two. The right-hand fork went up towards the Backstagers’ club-rooms and the Hobbses’ house. Charles took the other path which led towards the Meckens’.

  He was feeling the need for another pee, but resolutely hung on, because any unscheduled stop would ruin his timing. He wished he had got a stopwatch, so that he could suspend time long enough to make himself comfortable. But he hadn’t.

  Even on a Sunday afternoon there were not many people up on the common. A few bored fathers trying to feign interest in their toddlers, one or two pensioners pretending they had somewhere to go. Breckton boasted other, more attractive parklands, equipped with such delights as swings and duck-ponds, and most of the inhabitants were there for their exercise.

  It had rained during the week, but the path had dried out and was firm underfoot as Charles continued his brisk stroll. When he got to the other side of the common, the footpath once again had a proper surface of dark tarmac. His desert boot soles sounded dully as he trod.

  To maintain his excitement he made a point of not looking at his watch until the journey was complete. He didn’t stop when he got to Hugo’s house. His memories of the new curtain snooper made him unwilling to draw attention to himself.

  When he had gone one house-length beyond (which he reckoned would allow for going over the gravel drive to the front door), he looked at his watch.

  Sixteen minutes. Geoffrey, with his longer stride, might have done it in fifteen. Say the same time each way. That gave eight to ten minutes in the house. Charlotte would have recognized him and let him in immediately, so there would have been no delay.

  And eight or ten minutes was plenty of time for a determined man to strangle a woman.

  If, of course, the murder weapon was to hand. On that kind of schedule, Geoffrey couldn’t afford time to look for a scarf. He must have known where it was or . . . no, there was something missing there.

  Charles tried to focus his mind on the problem. He summoned up the image of Charlotte in the coal shed, surprised untidily by the torch beam. He remembered her face. The red hair that framed it had looked unnatural, as if it were dyed, against the horrible greyness of her flesh. And that thin knotted Indian print scarf which couldn’t hide the trickle of dried blood and the purply-brown bruises on her neck. Bruises almost like love-bites. He remembered what he had thought at the time, how she had looked so young, embarrassingly unsophisticated, like a teenager with a scarf inadequately hiding the evidence of a heavy petting session.

  Good God – maybe that’s what it had been. After all, she had seen Geoffrey at lunch time. By then he must have planned the murder. It would be typical of the man’s mind if he had deliberately marked her neck, knowing that, respectable married woman that she was, she would be bound to put on a scarf to cover the bruising.

  Then Geoffrey could go round in the evening, confident that the murder weapon would be to hand. Under the circumstances, he did not have to leave long for the strangling.

  Charles shivered as he thought of the cold-bloodedness with which the crime had been planned.

  He felt like an athlete in training for a major event. Everything was moving towards a confrontation with Geoffrey Winter. It was going to be risky to confront the villain with what he had deduced, but he couldn’t see any way round it. The evidence he had was minimal and certainly not enough to persuade the police to change their tack. So his only hope was to elicit some admission of guilt from Geoffrey.

  The fear of the man was building inside Charles. He felt increasingly certain that Geoffrey had read his suspicions and he wanted to keep the advantage by going to see his adversary rather than waiting for his adversary to search him out.

  Within the next twenty-four hours, Charles knew, something conclusive was going to happen.

  He went back to Hereford Road on the Sunday evening and rang Sally Radford. He had the sensation of a condemned man deserving a final treat.

  But he didn’t get his treat. Sally was glad to hear from him, but, sorry, she’d got a friend coming round that evening. Yes, maybe another time.

  It shouldn’t have hurt him. They’d agreed no strings, but it did cause a pang. The idea of a completely casual encounter with no obligations had always appealed to him, but now it had happened he was full of the need to establish continuity, to keep it going, to make something of it.

  When he’d rung off from Sally, he contemplated ringing Frances, but procrastinated once again. He wrote off the idea of female company for the evening and went back to the Montrose. If he could keep on topping up his alcohol level, he might retain his mood of confidence and face the ordeal ahead without too much introspection.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  IN SPITE OF the knowledge of inevitable confrontation, Charles still had a career to pursue. Whatever the outcome of his meeting with Geoffrey Winter, he was still meant to be recording the second batch of Bland radio commercials on the Tuesday morning. The events of the week had pushed that from his mind.

  It was only when he thought about it on the Monday morning that he realized he had better check the details. After all, it was Hugo Mecken’s campaign and Hugo would not be able to conduct it from the remand wing of Brixton Prison.

  He rang through to Mills Brown Mazzini and asked for Ian Compton. It turned out to be the right choice. Ian told him with no little complacency that he had taken over the Bland account. Charles wondered how much more of Hugo’s authority the young wheeler-dealer had managed to annex since the Creative Director had been off the scene.

  ‘I was just ringing to check that tomorrow’s still on as per arrangement. Eleven o’clock at the same studio for the rest of the radios.’

  ‘Yes, I should think that’ll stand, though there’s a slight question mark over it. May need some time for reworking of the copy. I’m having a meeting with Farrow this afternoon. Won’t really know for sure till after that. Can I ring you in the morning?’

  ‘Not quite sure of my movements.’

  ‘You should be. Got to always be on call in the voice-over business.’

  Charles ignored the young man’s patronizing tone. ‘I’ll ring you. Either at the office in the morning or – have you a home number where I can get you this evening?’

  ‘Won’t be in. Got a film dubbing session at Spectrum Studios.’

  ‘For the Bland campaign?’ Charles pricked up his ears. Was Ian Compton getting some other voice-over work done on Bland behind his back?

  ‘No, no. It’s a private film production I’m
working on. Doing a session with Diccon, just dubbing the voice.’

  ‘Oh, I see.’ It was hard to know whether to believe it or not. Ian Compton wouldn’t hesitate to lie if it served his ends. On the other hand, he did work on a lot of other projects apart from Bland. ‘How is Diccon?’

  ‘Oh, he’s in a pretty lousy mood at the moment.’

  ‘What, not getting work?’

  ‘You must be joking. That cookie is one of the busiest voices in the business. Clears twenty grand a year easy. No, he seems very cut up about Hugo’s wife. I think he had quite a thing for her.’

  ‘She was a very nice lady.’

  ‘So I hear. It seems everyone thought so except Hugo.’ Ian did not attempt to disguise the note of triumph in his voice. He was giving a reminder that Hugo Mechen was no longer a challenge to the bright young whiz-kid of Mills Brown Mazzini.

  Charles decided that the confrontation should take place in Geoffrey’s office. It would be quiet, no danger of interruptions. He told Gerald what he was going to do. Gerald disapproved, but Charles wanted someone to know in case he didn’t return from the interview.

  It was about a quarter to eleven on the Monday morning when he entered the building in Villiers Street. He mounted the stairs with one part of his mind immobilized by fright and the other irreverently providing sound track music and offering Sydney Carton’s dramatic lines for use when mounting scaffolds to the sneers of unruly mobs.

  All of which build-up was somewhat wasted when he found the door of Geoffrey Winter Associates firmly locked.

  There was no light on inside. His mind, still running on romantic rails, summoned up the image of Geoffrey Winter sprawled over his desk, the smoking revolver clutched in his hand, his brains spattered on the wall behind. The villain who knew he had been found out and who had done the decent thing.

  Wisely recognizing that this image was a little fanciful, he started knocking on the door to attract attention. A light tap produced nothing from inside, so he tried a more robust blow and then heavy hammering.

  The last did raise a reaction, but it came from the floor below. An aggrieved young man with elastic bands holding up his shirt sleeves came and complained. So far as he knew, Mr. Winter wasn’t in. He hadn’t heard him coming up the stairs that morning. And surely the fact that there had been no reply to ‘that bloody awful din you’re making’ indicated that there was nobody in the office.

  Charles apologized and left the building. But he was too keyed up to drop it there. He had steeled himself to a meeting with Geoffrey Winter that day and somehow he had to arrange it.

  He went into Charing Cross Station and rang the Winters’ number from a call-box.

  Vee answered. That in itself was strange. If she was a teacher, she should surely be in class at that time. Also she sounded even tenser and more emotional than usual. She had snatched up the phone on the first ring.

  ‘Could I. speak to Geoffrey, please? It’s Charles Paris.’

  ‘No, I’m sorry, he’s not here.’ She sounded near to tears.

  ‘Do you know when he’s likely to be back? I’ve been to his office and I couldn’t find him there.’

  ‘No, I’ve no idea. He’s . . .’ She stopped, leaving the word dramatically in the air. Charles was conscious of her acting instincts vying with genuine emotion.

  ‘Is he likely to be in this evening? Do you know?’

  ‘No. I don’t. I –’ Again she cut short, uncertain whether to confide more. Charles felt a new panic. Had Geoffrey done a bunk?

  But Vee could not keep her secrets to herself. In the same way that she had confided Geoffrey’s supposed infertility to Charles, she couldn’t resist the dramatic and martyring implications of her latest piece of news. ‘Oh, what the hell. I might as well tell you. The whole country will no doubt know soon enough. Geoffrey’s been arrested.’

  ‘Arrested?’

  ‘Yes, the police came round this morning before he left for work.’

  Charles murmured some suitable words about how sorry he was and how sure he was that it would soon all be cleared up and how it must all be a ghastly mistake, but he had stopped thinking what he was saying. He concluded the conversation and then walked slowly, numbly, down to the Embankment.

  He looked into the murky, swirling Thames. He tried to tell himself all kinds of other things, but ultimately he couldn’t deny that he felt profoundly disappointed.

  So that was it. The police must have been following his investigations in exact parallel. They must have worked out in just the same way how Geoffrey had contrived his alibi and managed to leave his room for the vital forty minutes.

  Or no, perhaps he was flattering himself. The police had probably far outstripped his feeble investigations. They must have done. They wouldn’t make an arrest without convincing evidence. He felt diminished and unnecessary.

  He tried to argue himself out of this selfish mood. After all, what did it matter who had found the truth, so long as it had been revealed? Hugo could now go free, that was the main thing.

  It didn’t help. Depressingly he thought how little Hugo cared whether he was free or not. The release might well be a licence for him to commit suicide or, more slowly, drink himself to death.

  Still, right had triumphed. He tried to feel glad about it.

  With an effort he drew himself away from the river and started back to the station. Better ring Gerald and bring him up to date. Though if charges against his client were about to be dropped, he’d probably know already.

  He didn’t. He reacted strongly when Charles told him. But the reaction was not that of Gerald Venables the amateur sleuth; it was all solicitor. This new development changed circumstances for his client. He would get on to the Breckton police immediately.

  ‘Okay,’ said Charles dismally. ‘Well. I’m going back to Hereford Road. So if there’s any interesting development, just let me know.’

  But he didn’t really think any new development would concern him. He felt excluded, the one boy in the class without a party invitation.

  He bought a new bottle of Bell’s on the way back to Hereford Road. He was going to drink himself into a stupor. After the tension of the last week, this sudden anti-climax had let him down like a punctured air-bed.

  The phone was ringing when he entered the house. He ran up to the landing and picked it up.

  It was Gerald. Very cross. ‘Are you trying to make me look like a complete fool? I’ve just spoken to the Superintendent at Breckton. He must think I’m a bloody lunatic. And you’re not the most popular person down at the station either.

  ‘Geoffrey Winter has been arrested, yes. But it has nothing to do with the Mecken murder at all. He’s been arrested for stealing some jewellery from a couple called Hobbs.’

  ‘Oh my God.’ Charles saw the bottom card being withdrawn from the great edifice he had built up.

  ‘So you were right, Charles. Geoffrey Winter did have something to hide about what he was doing last Monday night. But it wasn’t what your fertile imagination gave him to do.’

  ‘But –’

  ‘And what’s more – just for your information – I’ve heard about the postmortem. Charlotte Mecken was not pregnant.’

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  LIKE THE CAT in a Tom and Jerry cartoon, Charles Paris continued running after the ground had crumbled away beneath his feet, before the inevitable realization and the windmill-armed plummeting descent to the depths.

  Geoffrey Winter must be guilty of Charlotte’s murder. All the motivation fitted; Charles couldn’t start again the laborious reconstruction of emotion and opportunity with another subject. He refused to accept it.

  But like the cat, he became increasingly aware that he was running on air. Whichever way he worked it, Geoffrey could not have committed both crimes on the Monday evening.

  Unwilling to relinquish his theory, Charles went down to Breckton to time it all out again. He felt none of the elation of the previous day; as time passed he saw his logic fa
lling apart.

  He tried the trip from the Winters’ house to the Meckens’ via the Hobbses’, he tried it the other way round, going to the Meckens’ first, but there was just not enough time for anyone to have committed the two crimes.

  Visiting the two houses added another five minutes to the round trip. Which left five or less for murder. Which was cutting it fine by the standards of the most experienced assassin. He tried adding the extra five minutes which he had reckoned Geoffrey would have left as a safety margin, but the sums still seemed pretty unlikely.

  They seemed even unlikelier when he remembered that he had not allowed any time for the actual theft from the Hobbses’ house. He had only timed the round trip of going past the house. If that were all that had been involved, the murder might have been possible. But even if Geoffrey knew the house well and knew exactly where Mary Hobbs kept her jewellery, it was still going to take him some time to break in, get through the house in the dark armed only with a torch and grab the loot. The absolute minimum was four minutes. In fact, considering the care with which Geoffrey had covered his tracks, it must have been six or eight.

  Which left very little time to murder Charlotte Mecken.

  Charles sat down on a bench on the common as it started to get dark. He was furious. There was no way it would work.

  It wasn’t just the timing. If Charlotte hadn’t been pregnant, then none of his complex sequence of motivation worked either.

  Depression took over. So everything was as obvious as it seemed. Hugo Mecken had killed his wife and Geoffrey Winter, in desperate financial straits because of his failing architect’s business, had stolen some jewellery from the richest people he knew. The fact that the two incidents had taken place on the same evening had been mere coincidence.

  The new turn of events changed his opinion of Geoffrey. While he had thought of the architect as Charlotte’s murderer, he had had a kind of respect for him, for the cold blooded intellect that could plan such a crime. But now he knew that all that planning had been for a petty theft, a mean robbery from some supposed friends.