A Customs officer — young, hard-faced, coldly polite — said: “Would you take your luggage in to the hut, please. And make certain you leave the boot unlocked.”
He carried his single suitcase and plastic shopping-bag of presents into the hut. The Customs officer followed and carefully shut the door so that the car was no longer visible, then went behind a trestle-table which, except for two institutional wooden chairs, was the only furniture. “Put your things down on here, please.”
Sterne set the suitcase and bag on the table. The Customs officer picked up a clipboard on which was a single printed page and held this out. “Please read the regulations concerning the importation of goods and chattels brought abroad…”
“Thanks, but I know ’em.”
The Customs officer put the clipboard down on the trestle table. “Your passport, please.”
Sterne handed this over.
“You’re quite certain, Mr. Sterne, that you do understand that you have to declare everything you’ve brought abroad or aboard the ship?”
“Yes, I am. The suitcase is full of clothes. A couple of the T-shirts were bought in France some months ago, the rest of the stuff comes from this country. In the plastic shopping-bag are a bottle of whisky, two bottles of red wine, a small bottle of very expensive scent, and a doll which walks and talks and needs its nappies changed after you’ve pressed its tummy.”
The Customs officer did not smile. He handed the passport back, pressed the catches of the suitcase to open the lid: “Where have you come from?”
“Cagnes. That’s a little place a bit back from the sea. Renoir once lived and worked there…”
“I do know it.”
Sterne realised he was talking too much. Would he now be asked for the car’s papers…?
The door of the shed opened and a second Customs officer, with two gold rings on the sleeves of his reefer jacket, entered. A considerably older man, his craggy face possessed lines of tolerance and good humour. “Is everything going all right?” It was not until later that Sterne realised that the words had been a coded message.
The first man nodded. “We’re trying to move things as quickly as we can.”
“Good.” The second man turned to Sterne; “Sorry about this delay. I know just how frustrating it must be. The holiday’s over and all you want to do is get back home, but here we are, holding everything up. Doesn’t take us very far up the popularity charts, does it?”
Sterne smiled. “I’m afraid your job probably keeps you out of those altogether.”
“Oh, well, I suppose I could find some consolation in the fact that someone has to do the job… Nearly finished, Basil?”
“Just about, sir.” The first man closed the lid of the suitcase.
Reassured by the senior man’s friendliness, Sterne said: “Is something up that you’re carrying out a search of all the cars?”
“Nothing special. But now and then we have to have a bit of a blitz, just to remind everyone that it can happen. You know how some people are. Unless they reckon there could be a stiff search, they’ll try and import a whole brewery.”
“That’s all right, then, Mr Sterne,” said the younger Customs officer, still very correct and showing none of the friendliness of his superior.
Sterne left the hut and returned to the car. He settled behind the wheel, switched on the engine, and engaged drive. The further pole barrier lifted.
He drove to Folkestone and then cut through the back of the town to continue on the A20, ignoring the quicker motorway. At Newingreen, he turned into the forecourt of the motel. It would take at least a couple of good stiff drinks to remove the effects of the tension he’d suffered back in Dover.
*
Sterne looked at his watch for the third time in under a quarter of an hour. Twenty past two and still no one had contacted him. He thought back to Lençon and recalled what the woman had said. Someone would be in touch with him at the motel in Newingreen. So had something gone wrong with their arrangements?
He left the building and stood out in the weak sun and stared at the Mercedes which he’d had to move from the cabin’s garage before noon. Did he continue to wait? If there had been some sort of a cock-up, he could be left waiting for the rest of the day. They’d got Ralph’s address, so they knew how to get hold of him…
He drove up the A20 to the Canterbury road, turned on, to this and continued northwards to Crampington Without. Without what? No one really knew. Immediately beyond Crampington Without a winding lane finally brought him to Rackington — a crossroads, a pub, a general store, and eight cottages — and a mile beyond, Parsonage Farm.
The parish church was over a mile and a quarter away and as far as was known Parsonage Farm had never belonged to the church, so that the origin of its name was as obscure as that of Crampington Without. It was a typical Kentish farmhouse — blue/red bricks, made locally, peg-tile roof, low, beamed ceilings, two central back-to-back inglenook fireplaces, and an atmosphere of quiet contentment. It was surrounded by a large garden and two acres of paddocks, while beyond these was the farm land which had been sold off years before.
Sterne drove in and parked the Mercedes to the side of the wooden double garage, then walked along the macadamed surface to the garden gate. Beyond, the path was made from bricks and it led round to the front door which faced the woods and not the road.
Angela stepped out of the house. “Angus! …For heaven’s sake, Angus!” She hugged him. “What a wonderful surprise. Where on earth have you sprung from? I must phone Ralph and tell him you’re here. It’s only last night he was wondering how you were getting on… Are you hungry? Can I get you something?” She was a tall woman, thin from rigid dieting: her hair was a rich chestnut and naturally curly, her face was oval, regularly featured, and very photogenic. Before her marriage, she’d worked for a fashion magazine and several times she’d acted as a model. Had she wished, she could probably have made a very good career of modelling. It had been no surprise to those who knew her well that she had not so wished.
They went indoors and a Pekinese came out of the sitting room, having finally realised there was a visitor, and began to bark hysterically. Then it suddenly quietened and snuffled up to Sterne, feathered tail waving wildly. He bent down and stroked it.
“Lu always remembers you,” she said. “It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been away.”
“It’s because I secretly give him titbits.”
“Secretly!” She laughed. “When Lu eats he makes so much noise the whole neighbourhood knows about it… But you’ve never told me — do you want a meal? I can very quickly knock something up.”
“Thanks, I had lunch on the way.”
“Then how about a coffee?”
“That would be great.”
“Come into the kitchen and tell me all your news while I make it.”
They drank the coffee in the sitting room, dark because of the low, beamed ceiling, single small window, and the fact that it faced north. After a while, she looked at the jewelled wristwatch that Ralph had given her on their first wedding anniversary. “I must be off to fetch one daughter from playschool and take her to a friend for tea.”
“How is Penny?”
“Penelope’s very well, very noisy, and more stubborn than ever. The woman at the playschool who does afternoons says she’s never met anyone so very determined.”
He must remember, he thought, not to call his niece Penny. Angela did not approve of the diminutive.
“Your bed’s not made up, of course, but I’ll see to that as soon as I get back. And if Mrs Lawson should ring whilst I’m out, will you tell her I’ll bring the papers round as soon as I can. She’s the new secretary of the WI. Quite a pleasant woman, but rather feather-brained. I have to spend half my time making certain she doesn’t confuse everything… Oh, that reminds me — Madge may ring as well. I’ll be able to do the meals-on-wheels on Thursday for her.”
“Still as busy as ever, then?”
�
�Of course.” Her father had taught her that rank carried duty. A major in the regular army who had failed to make lieutenant-colonel, he had been forcibly retired to civilian life which he had then organised with all the dedicated preciseness with which his service life had previously been run. It had probably never occurred to him that an occasional and timely relaxation from such certainty might have ensured the promotion which he had so coveted and which, on the face of things, he had been so well qualified to receive.
Angela drove away in her Datsun and Sterne, who’d accompanied her out of the house, brought from the Mercedes the suitcase and plastic bag. He left the bag on one of the occasional tables in the sitting room, carried the suitcase up to the bedroom on the right-hand side of the small landing.
As soon as Angela and Ralph had moved into the house, she’d made a point of telling him that this was his bedroom, to be used whenever he wanted. A couple of his mother’s primitive but attractive paintings hung on a wall, as did a framed prep-school photograph. He often looked at the four rows of boys and wondered how many of the one hundred and seventy-five were now pillars of society and how many were rebels, outcasts, or just plain wanderers? From now on, he could no longer be a wanderer. He must conform. Angela would be glad. On the day he started work, she’d be able to refer to her brother-in-law without a hint of an apology in her voice.
*
Ralph Sterne was remarkably similar in appearance to his brother. The same light brown hair with a rolling curl at the front, the same light blue eyes, the same square jaw with a slight cleft. Even though there were nine years between them, each had at times been mistaken for the other: only when they were together was it obvious that Ralph’s face was thicker, his colouring darker, his neck shorter, his body stockier.
“When I saw the car I thought it must be someone else important calling,” said Ralph, as he stood in the hall. “Then it turns out to be only you.”
“For heaven’s sake, Ralph, you might be a bit more welcoming after Angus has been away for so long.”
Ralph looked briefly at his wife, then grinned at his brother. Even after six years of marriage, Angela had never learned to understand their companionable joshing of each other. “Well, how are things? And what’s brought you back? The last time you wrote, you said you were remaining in Spain for at least the next three months.”
“I was dealt three kings and they never lose. Only this time they did.”
“You’re saying you lost everything on a poker hand?”
“That’s right.”
Angela was shocked. Even Ralph was surprised. Drawn into premature responsibility by the tragic death of his parents, he had learned to regard money as something one treated with great respect. Had he gambled — which he did not — he could no more have wagered a very large sum on one hand of cards than swindle one of his clients. “If you’re that broke, how come you arrive here in a Mercedes?”
“Simple — it’s not mine. I was asked if I’d like to drive it back to the UK and as it offered a free trip here I jumped at the chance.”
“It’s a nice-looking car,” said Angela, who was trying hard not to think that Angus had surely once again proved himself to have a weak character.
Ralph, who could guess how his wife’s mind was working, hurriedly changed the conversation. “What on earth are we doing standing here in the hall, when it’s drinking time? Let’s move into the sitting room… Angy, what are you going to have to celebrate Angus’s return?”
“Just my usual small sherry.”
“What’s yours, Angus?”
“A large Scotch on the rocks.”
Ralph took one step, then came to a stop. “I’ve just realised there’s no sound of destruction going on in the house. So where’s Penelope?”
“She’s having tea with Brenda,” replied Angela.
“Sooner her than me. Even at her early age, Brenda gives every indication of growing up like her mother.”
“I’ve told you before, that’s not being fair to Joyce.”
“Who’s trying to be fair?” He went into the sitting room and across to the small passageway which ran behind the massive central back-to-back fireplaces and chimneys — around which the house had been built — and opened the cocktail cabinet he kept there.
Angela had one glass of medium sweet sherry and then said she must go and fetch Penelope or Joyce would begin to worry. After she’d left, Ralph refilled Sterne’s and his own glass and it was not by chance that his drink was stronger than before. Angela did not approve of drinking except as a social convention and Ralph had long since got into the habit of serving weak drinks when she was around even though she usually could have little idea of how much alcohol he’d given himself.
Twenty minutes later, Angela returned with her daughter. Penelope, not yet old enough to have learned restraint, threw herself on to Angus’s lap and demanded her present, ignoring her mother’s admonition that a well-brought-up girl did not ask for presents. She was given the doll and, grinning with a delight too great for words, switched it on. It walked with jerky strides and said ‘Mama’ in an irritatingly husky, corncrake voice. Lu immediately saw it as a potential rival and circled it, yapping wildly.
“That’s enough for the moment,” Angela said, after a couple of minutes of near-bedlam.
“But Mummy…”
“It’s upsetting Lu.”
“Then put beastly Lu in the kitchen.”
“You don’t supplant an old friend with a new one.”
“What’s supplant mean?”
“Just switch the doll off,” said Angela, who found any loud noise physically painful.
Penelope switched off the doll and very carefully carried it over to the box and laid it down in its polystyrene bed. Then she stood in front of Angus and asked if he’d brought her anything else.
Sterne, cutting off a fresh homily from Angela on the behaviour of young ladies, said no, he hadn’t, because he’d thought she might prefer to go for a trip to Canterbury to choose something herself. She snuggled up to him by way of answer. He knew a sudden ambivalence: a warm happiness at being with the family and a quick annoyance that this should mean so much to him.
Chapter 7
The phone rang at a quarter past ten on Saturday morning and Ralph took the call in the hall. When he replaced the receiver, he said: “That’s odd.”
“What’s odd?” asked Angela.
He ducked under the lintel — the house had been built when few men were taller than five foot nine — to enter the kitchen and crossed to the working surface where she was stirring a mixture in a bowl. “That looks good.”
“It should be. Apart from anything else, there’s a pint of cream in there.”
“What’s that going to do to our cholesterol count: put it in the stratosphere?”
“But I thought you’d like a special meal since Angus is back.”
“Can’t think of anything nicer,” he replied, then kissed her on the back of her neck. He briefly wondered why she nearly always took life so seriously? “So what’s this exotic concoction called?”
“Angel’s kiss. It’s a recipe which comes from San Francisco.”
“Really? I thought all the angels had left there and only the fairies remained… What’s in it besides cream?”
“Bananas, ground almonds, avocado pear, and a touch of ginger… Who was the phone call from?”
He reached out to the bowl, right forefinger extended. “No you don’t,” she said, raising the wooden spoon.
“Yes I do.” He scooped his forefinger into the mixture and then licked it. “Delicious!”
“Just you try to steal any more… Now, will you please tell me who the phone call was from?”
“Jock McCall.”
“Who’s he?”
“You know — the chap who works for Marston and Hall.”
“That common little man who never shaves properly?”
He answered easily. “He has a skin complaint which often preve
nts him shaving all of his face.”
“But presumably it wouldn’t stop him using a pair of scissors if he wanted to?”
He didn’t argue. His work had taught him that human nature cut across all social boundaries; her father had taught her that human nature was irrevocably bounded by them. “Anyway, he’s friendly with one of the inspectors in the local police force who told him in casual conversation that a watch is being kept from May House on orders from county HQ.”
“May House up the road?”
“Apparently.”
“What on earth could the police be watching for from there?”
“You tell me… That’s why I said it was so odd.”
“He must have got things all mixed up.”
He was inclined to agree with her even though Jock McCall was a man who seldom made a mistake.
*
“May House?” said Sterne. “But didn’t I see a ‘For Sale’ board on the top road?”
Across the dining room table, Ralph nodded. “Been up for sale for over a year now. They’re asking forty-five thousand and won’t come down a penny, even though two of the outside walls are cracked, so it’s small wonder no one’s bought it.”
“Angus, would you like a little more?” asked Angela.
“I would,” said Penelope.
“Young lady, it’s very rich and you’ve had enough.”
“No, I haven’t, ’cause I’m still roomy.”
Sterne chuckled. “Then you’d better fill up the spare room.”
Angela was about to complain that Angus was countenancing gluttony, when she checked the words. If she admonished him, she’d probably upset Ralph who was always hoping they’d get on better together. But much as she liked Angus as a person, she could not prevent herself despising him for a drifter. She gave Penelope half a spoonful more of Angel’s Kiss, then divided what remained in the bowl between Ralph and Angus.
“What d’you think’s meant by keeping watch on May House?” asked Sterne. “If the house is empty, it can’t be on anyone in it. And surely they can’t be using the place to watch someone on the other side of the lane?”
Presumption of Guilt Page 5
