by Jilly Cooper
Despite Rupert’s antagonism, Tristan, having heard hideous rumours about Rannaldini and Tab, had returned to his caravan and was taking a huge bunch of freesias from a bucket. Wrapping them in the only pages of yesterday’s Le Figaro not devoted to the murder, he caught up with his new executive producer as Rupert was leaving the canteen.
‘Would you please take these to Tabitha and give her, er, my love?’
Suddenly, in front of the entire unit, Rupert’s rage boiled over. ‘Not after the way you fucked her up, dumping her the moment you pulled her.’
Tristan was greyer than the pre-dawn sky but he held his ground. ‘It is not as you think.’
‘Don’t tell me what I think, you fucking Frog. I may have made it possible for you to finish your poxy film, because Tab put so much work into the horses, but, believe me, sunshine, it has nothing to do with you. Back off and leave her alone.’
Lucy couldn’t bear to look at Tristan, she had never hated anyone as much as Rupert, particularly when he snatched Tristan’s flowers to chuck them on the barbecue. But suddenly Rozzy erupted from nowhere.
‘Shut up, you fucking bully!’ she screamed, grabbing the flowers from him.
Oscar choked on his half pint of red, Bernard on his bread and butter pudding. Everyone who had turned away in embarrassment turned back in amazement. Rozzy swearing?
‘You shouldn’t judge without knowing the facts,’ she shouted. ‘If Tristan hadn’t risked his life dragging Tab from the fire she wouldn’t be alive today. Naturally Tab was terrified, and Tristan comforted her. You ought to go down on your knees with gratitude you’ve still got a daughter, you loathsome brute.’
Rupert looked at Rozzy incredulously. ‘My God, the mouse has roared.’
‘And how d’you know he seduced Tab?’ said Rozzy furiously. ‘You’ve only got her word for it, just as you’ve only got her word that Rannaldini—’
‘Shut up, you bitch.’ Wolfie was shaking Rozzy like a rat. ‘Take that back.’
Instantly Bernard moved in to separate them, and Rozzy collapsed sobbing in his arms.
‘Much more exciting than Verdi,’ said Meredith, selecting another spicy sausage. ‘Why don’t you film this instead, Tristan?’
A piercing shriek from the direction of Wardrobe stopped everyone in their tracks. Wearily putting clothes back on their hangers, Griselda discovered Hermione’s new willow-green rose-lined cloak had been delivered from Paris during the night. Assuming someone had signed for it, Griselda had picked up the receipt. On the dotted line in unmistakable emerald-green ink was scrawled the word ‘Rannaldini’.
‘I know he’s alive,’ gibbered Griselda as, with purple turban askew, she lumbered elephantine and quaking into the canteen.
‘Pissed again,’ muttered Ogborne.
But as everyone crowded round, the signature on the receipt, which Gablecross promptly pocketed, was agreed to be perfect.
‘Perhaps Bussage is getting her revenge for being fired,’ said Wolfie, who’d gone as green as his father’s signature. ‘She faked Papa’s name on enough fan photos and documents.’
But when Bernard rang the messenger, who was speeding towards Dover, he insisted that a gentleman, smelling very strongly of scent and wearing a long black cloak with a turned-up collar, had signed for the parcel. It had been very dark. He had assumed it was one of the cast.
‘It must have been the cloak Rannaldini wore to sweep on to the rostrum on Friday night,’ whispered a terrified Griselda.
‘There’s obviously a perfectly simple explanation,’ said Rupert, escaping to his helicopter and the safety of Penscombe.
All the birds were singing, the grumbling of the crows in the beeches providing the fauxbourdon, as Simone, Baby and Lucy trailed wearily back to their beds.
‘I don’t know which is worse,’ shivered Lucy, ‘a murderer mad enough to dress up as Rannaldini, or the return of Rannaldini himself.’
‘I’m sure I saw him yesterday at that blocked-up window.’ Simone’s pointing finger trembled.
‘Well, he made a copy of everything else,’ drawled Baby. ‘Why not of himself?’
Thank God the sun was rising, shining cheerfully into their faces. Lucy fell into bed but not to sleep. How wonderful Rozzy had been. Oh, why hadn’t she been brave enough to stick up for Tristan?
51
Having drawn a blank with Rupert, Gablecross was driving wearily out of Valhalla in the hope of a couple of hours’ sleep when he noticed lights on in Clive’s flat over the stables. Remembering his conversation yesterday with Miss Cricklade, he pulled in.
Miss Cricklade, the local busybody, lived on the west side of Paradise High Street. Between training her binoculars on Valhalla and watching Pride and Prejudice on Sunday night, she had seen Clive, Rannaldini’s dreaded éminence grise, calling on Nicky Willard next door around eight o’clock. He had only stayed ten minutes but, during this time, a little white mongrel had been yapping continually in his car.
‘If she went on like that,’ Miss Cricklade had told Gablecross indignantly, ‘she would have lost her bark, like my Judy did when she went into kennels. I was about to complain when Clive came out and drove off.
‘But he was back to see Nicky around nine thirty,’ Miss Cricklade had gone on. ‘Nicky’s mum and dad had gone to Bath for the evening. I gave a scream when I saw Valhalla going up in flames. Next moment, Clive came out of Willard’s house like a bat out of hell. I don’t think George and Grace Willard would have liked him being there. I don’t trust that Clive.’
Nor did Gablecross. He had waived sentences against him in the past in return for information. Now it was time to call in the marker — particularly as Bussage had implied that Clive knew where Rannaldini’s safe, containing a second set of memoirs, was hidden.
He had to lean on the bell for five minutes before he was let in by Clive, clearly furious at the interruption. There was not a speck of dust in the upstairs flat, which was furnished with chrome and black leather. Sadomasochistic literature and videos filled the bookshelves. Posters of muscular youths on motorbikes with tufts of blond hair emerging under bikers’ caps adorned the walls. On the mantelpiece was a photograph of a young Clive and a middle-aged woman with pigeons on their shoulders in Trafalgar Square.
Even though it was five o’clock in the morning, Clive was fully dressed in leather trousers and a very white vest, showing off tattoos of bleeding hearts and black widow spiders.
Gablecross realized he must keep his wits about him if this especially slippery fish wasn’t to slide through his fingers, and baldly kicked off with the fact that several independent witnesses had reported Clive spending several hours at Nicky Willard’s house on Sunday night. Nicky Willard was only sixteen going on forty-five. Unless Clive wanted to be banged up for five years, he had better sing to the rooftops.
Clive promptly played, then handed over the tape he’d stolen from the answering-machine at Valhalla on Sunday night. No wonder Wolfie had wanted to kill his father, thought Gablecross. No wonder Rupert had wanted to kill everyone.
‘Where does the little dog come in?’ he asked sternly.
Clive displayed uncharacteristic shame. He admitted stealing Gertrude, but hadn’t realized Rannaldini would use her as bait.
‘Rupert will kill me if he finds out. I want a safe house,’ he whined.
‘He’ll certainly rearrange your features. Where are Rannaldini’s keys? There was no sign of them in the ashes.’
‘The murderer must have whipped them, which means he’s got the master key to every bedroom.’
‘Good God!’
‘More than that. Every room — including the dressing rooms, the caravans and the cottages — was bugged for sound. There were hidden cameras everywhere so he could watch people, or video their goings-on. He had a stranglehold like the Spanish Inquisition.’
Suddenly Gablecross didn’t feel tired any more.
‘What exactly were your movements on Sunday night?’ he asked, as Clive made h
im a cup of black coffee.
‘I delivered Taggie’s dog to the watch-tower around eight fifteen, brought Tabloid back here, walked him and Rannaldini’s other Rotties and gave them their dinner. Then I went over to watch the box with Nicky around nine thirty. Around eleven thirty we saw flames coming out of the watch-tower so I drove back to see if I could rescue Rannaldini or anything.’
‘What’s happened to the safe?’
‘Dunno. Rannaldini was always movin’ it around.’
‘Come on. Stealing that little dog, consorting with a minor, d’you want to be banged up for seven years?’
Clive didn’t. By that time, Nicky Willard would be twenty-three and have lost his bloom. On the other hand, he didn’t reveal all his cards. He had failed to flog the memoirs to Beattie Johnson on the night of the murder because she’d obviously had an offer from Bussage. Unable to get into the safe without Rannaldini’s keys, Clive had subsequently ransacked Bussage’s files, substituted the blank disks and fan photographs and flogged her set of the memoirs for two hundred thousand to Beattie, with a further eight hundred thousand promised on publication. None of this did he tell Gablecross. But, feeling flush, he admitted, ‘quite by chance’, that Rannaldini’s safe was currently hidden in the priest-hole behind the mantelpiece.
‘See? It’s ’ollow.’ Clive banged a panel, which swung open to reveal a large cupboard containing lots of cobwebs and a large steel box. ‘Rannaldini kept it in his indoor school — didn’t entirely trust Bussage. I moved it ’ere after the murder.
‘It’s funny.’ Clive poured Gablecross more coffee. ‘Since it’s been ’ere, I keep thinking the bugger’s alive.’ With a shiver, he glanced around the flat. ‘I’m sure I saw him outside the chapel last night.’
‘What did you intend to do with the safe?’
‘Hand it in when I got a moment.’
‘Very commendable,’ said Gablecross sardonically.
Particularly when the bell rang again, and Clive, sulkily, had to admit Bobby Clintock, another of Gablecross’s contacts and the best safecracker in Rutshire, armed with rugs and explosives.
At five thirty-five, a loud thud set the horses neighing and the Rottweilers barking in their quarters below.
‘Shit,’ muttered Clive, peering through the smoke. ‘The Montigny’s not there, nor the Picasso. Must have been torched in the fire. That’s five million up the spout.’
Otherwise they found a lot of foreign currency, enough cocaine to make a snow-dwarf, a print-out of three hundred pages of the memoirs, and a pile of videos and photographs. Pushy Galore straddling a sofa didn’t do much for Clive and neither did Bussage roped to the table. Then he saw Chloe.
‘Jesus! Expect the goat’ll sell its story to Farmer’s Weekly.’
Poor old Granville Hastings. Gablecross picked up a photo of a devastated-looking Granny. No wonder he didn’t want the police called.
Rannaldini must have locked this stuff away on the Sunday afternoon before he died. There was even a copy of his last will, dated 8 July, leaving everything to Cecilia and her children, except for four million each to Hermione and Little Cosmo and a hundred thousand to Clive and Miss Bussage. Nothing to Helen or Wolfie.
No wonder Wolfie had been going to kill his father.
Flicking through a yellow memo pad, Gablecross found notes that Rozzy Pringle had throat cancer, the poor lady, and reminders to contact Rozzy’s husband Glyn and also Tristan’s aunt Hortense in the Tarn. In a Bible, he discovered a letter in French, on writing paper headed with a crest of a snake and a drawing of two lovers, and shoved it in his inside pocket to read later. Turning, he found Bobby Clintock salivating over Hermione’s naked body and Clive drooling over a book of medieval tortures with many of the pages turned down.
‘What was it with this guy?’ asked Gablecross in disgust.
‘He was bored with normal pleasure,’ said Clive flatly.
‘Where was his famous torture chamber?’
‘Didn’t exist.’ Clive’s pale eyes flickered.
‘Did you take that Rottie away from the watch-tower earlier so you could kill him without it barking?’
‘You’ll have to take my word on that.’
‘Thanks for your co-operation,’ said Gablecross, as Clive and Bobby, albeit with great reluctance, helped him to carry the safe to his car.
52
Gerry Portland was outraged when Gablecross emptied the contents of the safe on to his desk.
‘Tim-out-on-a-limb again. How dare you go off intimidating suspects and blowing safes? Nothing has been printed.’
‘There were two of them, and Bobby Clintock’s much bigger than me.’
‘You could have torched the evidence. What’s the defence going to say to this?’ Having bollocked him, however, Portland was soon immersed in the material. ‘Jesus! Jesus. How the hell did Rannaldini pull birds like that?’
As a result, the morning’s briefing was lively, excited and often ribald.
‘If you see steam coming out of my ears,’ announced Portland, ‘it’s because Tim’s got hold of a copy of the memoirs. We also have the missing tape from the answering-machine at Valhalla.’ He pressed the play button. ‘Oh, Wolfie, help me! Rannaldini’s just raped me, and he’s killed Gertrude. Oh, please get Sharon from the cottage!’
Tab’s clipped, breathless voice faltered as tears took over.
Despite the sun streaming through the window, a shiver went through the room.
‘It was after hearing this tape’, went on Portland, ‘that young Wolfgang announced he was going to kill his father. If he’d gone to the watch-tower and read the draft will, he’d have had the added incentive that he’d been disinherited. Rupert also received a phone call from Tabitha a few minutes later.’
‘Rupert looked capable of murder last night,’ admitted Gablecross.
Fanshawe, who was livid about Gablecross’s latest coup, and Debbie Miller had been to Magpie Cottage yesterday. The only unusual thing on Monday morning, Betty had told them, was that Tab’s and Isa’s double bed had been neatly made. On the other hand, the bathroom had been a shambles. Fanshawe had pocketed a pale coral lipstick, Lancôme’s Brilliant Beige, Clinique blusher, base and powder, and a hairbrush full of blonde hairs. Kicked under the bath, perhaps so Isa shouldn’t see it, had been the packaging from a newly opened bottle of scent called Quercus.
‘Perhaps she didn’t want her husband to know she was on the pull,’ said Debbie.
Gablecross reported on his and Karen’s visit to Miss Bussage. ‘The lady was very bitter about her sacking and unashamedly confessed she had meant to steal a copy of the memoirs and photographs. Said she was protecting Rannaldini’s reputation.’
‘I reckon she was going to flog them,’ piped up Karen.
‘Certainly enjoyed being flogged,’ said Portland, grinning down at the photo of Bussage roped to the kitchen table.
‘Disgusting,’ chuntered DC Smithson.
‘Anyway,’ went on Gablecross, ‘she reckons everything, including the draft will, was switched in the files before she put it in her briefcase, which she did immediately after Wolfie sacked her on Monday afternoon. He allowed her only an hour to pack because she’d slagged off Tab, and she had the key to the briefcase on her. Bussage suspects Wolfie and Lady Rannaldini, because they were both disinherited — and, of course, Clive. But no-one featured in those memoirs would be too happy to have them floating about.’
‘The riveting thing she told us’, said Karen in excitement, ‘was that Rannaldini visited James Benson on Friday to discuss having his vasectomy reversed.’
This made everyone sit up.
‘Not the most pleasant or successful of operations,’ observed Portland. ‘Rannaldini must have been thinking of having more children. Any idea who with?’
‘Hardly Lady Rannaldini,’ said Fanshawe, who was desperate to regain the ascendancy. ‘That marriage was into injury time. Gloria Prescott claims he proposed marriage to her.’
‘He
was clearly closer to Harriet Bussage than her unprepossessing appearance would suggest,’ said Gablecross, ‘and he was cuckoo about Tabitha.’
‘He was shooting blanks on Sunday night,’ mused Fanshawe. ‘But one way to torture Lady Rannaldini, Wolfgang, Dame Hermione and Rupert Campbell-Black in one stroke would have been to have got Tabitha pregnant.’
As he talked Sergeant Fanshawe was edging backwards so he could look at the photographs over Portland’s shoulder. His jaw dropped at the sight of a naked Tab.
‘Christ, she’s beautiful. Any man would kill for her. Although,’ he edged closer, ‘judging from that pickie, she and Rannaldini must have been familiar for a long time — the leaves are off the trees. Perhaps she’s lying about the rape.’
‘May not have known the photograph was being taken,’ said Gablecross, and he explained about Rannaldini having every room fitted with bugs, hidden cameras and two-way mirrors. ‘Every night he watched his guests in bed on television monitors.’
‘Did they know and perform?’ mused Portland.
‘Can I have a seat in the stalls?’ pleaded DC Lightfoot, and was kicked by DC Smithson.
‘So the murderer’s not only got the keys to every bedroom but the code to every safe, secret cache and priest-hole in Valhalla,’ said Gablecross.
‘What we’ve got to establish is, was Rannaldini the murderer’s only target? Did he or she kill to stop the memoirs? Christ.’ Portland shuddered at a hideously humiliating photograph of an emaciated Helen Campbell-Black. ‘Or to steal them from the watch-tower and flog them to the press for some vast sum? Also, with a second set on the loose, stolen from Bussage’s briefcase, the murderer may kill again to get hold of them.’
There had been another sighting on Sunday night of Tristan de Montigny, said DC Lightfoot.
‘Janice, Rannaldini’s groom, saw him sneaking into the south wing in a dark green polo shirt and white chinos around nine ten. But he rolled up at Valhalla the next day in jeans and a peacock-blue shirt, so he changed his clothes for some reason.’
