Mrs Pargeter 01; A Nice Class of Corpse mp-1

by Simon Brett

“Kipper?”

  “Yes. Who is this?”

  “It’s Melita Pargeter.”

  “Mrs Pargeter! Oh, what a pleasure to hear your voice, Madam. May I say, Madam, that I think of you a great deal. You and, of course, poor Mr Pargeter. I know it’s been over five years since he passed on, but I do find I still miss him, you know.”

  “Yes,” said Mrs Pargeter wistfully. “I know.” Then, warding off introspection, she asked, “What on earth are you doing in a Bishop’s Palace?”

  “I work here,” Kipper Hollingberry replied with dignity.

  “Oh?”

  “I am his Lordship’s chauffeur.”

  “I didn’t know that was your line of country, Kipper.”

  “I have always,” he said rather primly, “aspired to the quiet of a Cathedral Close. That is where I always wished to spend my later years. An ambition perhaps deriving from an early affection for the works of Trollope.”

  “Oh. Well, perhaps if you’ve changed direction so completely, you won’t be able to help me…”

  “Mrs Pargeter, I would always help you. I can never forget yours and Mr Pargeter’s kindness to me on so many occasions. Any service to repay a little of my debt of gratitude I will gladly perform.”

  “I know that, Kipper. I was only thinking that, now you’re out of the swing, you probably won’t have the information I require.”

  “I am by no means ‘out of the swing’, Madam.”

  “What, you’re still in business?”

  “In a smaller way. My service is now, let’s say…a consultancy.”

  “And you run it from the Bishop’s Palace?”

  “Yes. Only for selected clients, of course.”

  “Hmm. You’ve still got the Directory?”

  “Certainly. And I pride myself on keeping the information in it right up to date.”

  The pips went. Mrs Pargeter put in more money.

  “Give me the number,” said Kipper. “Next time that happens I’ll call you back.”

  “What about the Bishop’s telephone bill?”

  “His Lordship trusts me implicitly.” There was a note of reproof in Kipper’s voice. “Now what can I do for you?”

  “It’s a safe.”

  “Yes?” he sounded unsurprised. “What make?”

  “Clissold and Fry – Excalibur Two.”

  “Hmm. They’re pretty straightforward. Plastic explosives. Doesn’t need much, they’re not very robust.”

  “No, no. I don’t want any sign that it’s been opened.”

  “Ah. Combination job. Right.”

  “That’s the sort of information you’d have on the Directory, isn’t it?”

  “Should do, certainly. Depend a bit when the safe was sold. My contact at Clissold & Fry got, er, a little careless. I’m afraid he’s been…um, away for the last three years and I haven’t as yet been able to replace him. But, if it’s more than three years ago, I’ll have copies of the lot…sales invoice, combination.”

  “I should think it probably has been there three years. Doesn’t look very new.”

  “Well, where is the safe?”

  “The Devereux Hotel, South Terrace, Littlehampton.”

  “Any idea of the name of the purchaser?”

  “The current proprietress’s name is Miss Naismith.”

  “Splendid. I’ll check it out for you, Madam.”

  “How long’s it likely to take, Kipper?”

  “Five minutes maximum. Shall I call you back on that number?”

  “If you wouldn’t mind.”

  “Of course not. I must say, Mrs Pargeter, it’s a real tonic to hear from you again. And I’m delighted to be able to help you. Even a tiny thing like this. Please remember, if there’s ever anything more I can do for you…you know, anything bigger…don’t hesitate to ask.”

  “That’s very kind of you, Kipper.”

  “My pleasure. Not that I wouldn’t have done it anyway, but you know, before he went, Mr Pargeter asked me to look after you, help out if you ever needed anything.”

  “Oh. I didn’t know that.”

  “Well, he did. He was a good man, Mr Pargeter.”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ll ring you back.”

  After she had put the phone down, Mrs Pargeter allowed herself the rare indulgence of a tear. It was true, he had been a good man. How many widows, she wondered, were as well looked after in such varied, unexpected ways?

  ♦

  Kipper Hollingberry rang back two and a half minutes later.

  “Invoice dated the seventh of May 1975.”

  “Quite a long time ago.”

  “Thought it would be. That Excalibur’s pretty out of date, been superseded.”

  “And have you got the combination?”

  “Of course,” said Kipper, and gave her the number.

  ∨ A Nice Class of Corpse ∧

  30

  When she got back to the Devereux, she was interested to see a red Porsche parked untidily outside the main entrance. As soon as she entered the Schooner Bar just after twelve for a pre-lunch drink, she was introduced to its owner.

  Though the word ‘introduce’ was perhaps inadequate to describe the production Lady Ridgleigh made of showing off the young man with her to the Devereux’s newest resident.

  “Mrs Pargeter,” she gushed, “I don’t believe you’ve had the pleasure of meeting my son, Miles.”

  “No, I haven’t. How do you do?”

  The young man who took her hand was tall like his mother, but in him the bony outline took on an adolescent gawkiness, which was at odds with his receding gingerish hair and the tight nets of lines around his pale blue eyes. He must have been at least thirty-five.

  “How do you do? Delighted to meet you.” His voice had the vacuous resonance of a public-school education not backed up by native intelligence.

  “Can I get you a drink?”

  His hand moved towards the inside pocket of his blazer, but it was a half-hearted gesture, like that of the average husband offering to help with the washing-up; it expected to be stopped.

  And indeed it was. Lady Ridgleigh came in smartly on her cue. “No, no, Miles, please. Down here you’re my guest.”

  “Oh, very well, old thing,” he said, conceding without even the pretence of a struggle.

  Lady Ridgleigh reached into a crocodile-skin handbag, produced a monogrammed purse and gave Newth the order. She was drinking a Martini, Mrs Pargeter noticed, wondering whether this was a regular Sunday indulgence or just in honour of her visitor.

  The visitor in question took a long swill from his pint of beer, winced, and gave Mrs Pargeter a weak smile.

  “Irrigating the old system, you know. Got a bit cheteaued last night. Some damned hop at the Grosvenor House. When will I ever learn?” he asked in the voice of someone who had no intention of ever learning.

  “Your car outside, is it?” asked Mrs Pargeter.

  “The old Porky Porsche? Yes. Goes all right, this one.”

  “You mean you’ve got more than one?”

  Miles Ridgleigh guffawed. “That’ll be the day. No, I’ve had more than one, though. Have a nasty habit of wrapping them round lamp-posts – don’t I, Mums?”

  He appealed to his mother for approbation and was rewarded by an indulgent ‘boys will be boys’ smile. Lady Ridgleigh was totally transformed by her son’s presence. She looked radiant, almost skittish. She beamed fatuously like a young girl in love. Mrs Pargeter wondered whether this was how she had behaved in the company of the late lamented Froggie. She thought, on balance, it was unlikely.

  “You work in London, then, do you, Miles?”

  This suggestion was greeted by another empty guffaw. “Well, I live in London, anyway. Most of my chums are up there. Though, as you see, I’m not above coming down to the old Costa Geriatrica to do the dutiful son bit.”

  Lady Ridgleigh looked disproportionately grateful for this magnanimity.

  Mrs Pargeter watched Miles continuing to do
his ‘dutiful son bit’ throughout Sunday lunch. It seemed to consist largely of telling loud, unresolved anecdotes and of drinking a great deal. The Ridgleighs had two bottles of wine with the meal, and the mother could not have drunk more than a couple of glasses.

  With coffee in the Seaview Lounge Miles downed a couple of hasty brandies, then rose abruptly and announced, “Got to be off, old thing. Promised to drop in on some chums Hay wards Heath way.”

  Lady Ridgleigh’s face dropped. Clearly she had not expected this exquisite visit to be so suddenly curtailed.

  But Miles either didn’t notice or ignored her expression. “So got to dash. But don’t worry, I’ll be down again soon to salve the old social conscience.”

  “Oh, well, Miles –”

  “Not a word of thanks. Won’t hear of it, old thing. My pleasure.” Then his tone changed. “Perhaps you’d like to see me out…?”

  The intonation on the last words clearly had some private meaning for them both.

  “Oh. Oh yes,” said Lady Ridgleigh, and started for the door.

  “Mustn’t forget this, must we?” Miles lifted up her crocodile handbag with what was almost a leer.

  “No. No. Of course not.”

  It was nearly five minutes before Miles could be seen from the windows of the Seaview Lounge approaching his Porsche. Mrs Pargeter felt fairly sure that she knew the nature of the transaction that had delayed him.

  With a cheery wave, he folded his long body into the driving seat, and the Porsche scorched off erratically down South Terrace.

  ♦

  But Mrs Pargeter soon forgot about Miles Ridgleigh. As she seemed to read the Sunday papers, she thought about what she had to do.

  It would have to be another middle-of-the-night mission, she decided. There were too many people in and out of the Hall during the day for her to risk going into the Office then. So she continued to read the Sunday papers, ate a large tea and a light supper, played Scrabble in the evening with Eulalie Vance, and contained her excitement.

  If the Office safe yielded what she hoped, it would represent the most significant advance since she had started her investigation.

  Mrs Pargeter went to bed at half-past ten, programming herself to wake four hours later.

  ∨ A Nice Class of Corpse ∧

  31

  The routine was by now familiar. She got out of bed, put on her dressing gown, gloves and sheepskin slippers. In her pockets she put the late Mr Pargeter’s skeleton keys, pencil torch and eye-glass. Then she slipped out on to the landing.

  She was now accustomed to the creaky stairs of the main flights and avoided them expertly. She glanced at the other residents’ bedroom doors as she went down, but all appeared to be safely closed. When she reached the Entrance Hall, the door down to Newth’s domain was also shut.

  She trod gently in the Hall, although she had checked that there were no pressure pads except in front of the main doors. During the day she had taken an unobtrusive look at the lock on the Office door and she had the right skeleton key ready.

  It slipped in and turned silently as if it had been cut specifically for that lock. Mrs Pargeter went inside and closed the Office door behind her.

  She switched on the late Mr Pargeter’s torch and moved across to the safe. She memorised the exact setting of the dials and then her gloved fingers expertly twiddled them to the numbers Kipper Hollingberry had provided. The safe door swung open easily and silently.

  There was quite a lot of money on the top shelf, piles of large denomination notes held by rubber bands, but she ignored this. She also ignored her own jewellery, and homed in on a pile of jewel cases on the bottom shelf.

  She took them out of the safe and saw with satisfaction that on the top of each Lady Ridgleigh’s monogram was impressed in gold.

  She removed the contents of the first box, matching necklace, bracelet and ear-rings of emeralds set in silver. She examined these minutely with the late Mr Pargeter’s eye-glass.

  She replaced them and moved on to the next box. An opal necklace. This was subjected to the same intense scrutiny.

  She thought she heard a noise and froze. The irreverent thought occurred to her that to be discovered now would not be good for her image. If Miss Naismith wanted confirmation of the suspicions she had had about the theft of Mrs Selsby’s jewellery…

  There was no further noise. Perhaps she’d imagined it.

  She continued to work through all of Lady Ridgleigh’s jewellery. When she had finished, with a little sigh of satisfaction, she replaced the boxes on the bottom shelf exactly as she had found them. She closed the safe door and reset the dials exactly as they had been before. Then she left the Office and carefully relocked the door.

  She felt euphoric as she returned silently to her room. She had been right.

  The settings of Lady Ridgleigh’s jewellery were real silver and gold. But all of the stones were well-made imitations.

  Just as all of Mrs Selsby’s had been.

  ♦

  So euphoric was she, so delighted to have had her suspicion proved right, that Mrs Pargeter did not look around on her way from the Entrance Hall up to her bedroom on the second floor.

  So she did not notice a door opened a crack, or see through it the gleam of the diarist’s eye.

  ∨ A Nice Class of Corpse ∧

  32

  Mrs Pargeter woke at seven-thirty the next morning and lay luxuriously in bed, feeling pleased with herself. The revelation about Lady Ridgleigh’s jewels had cleared an obstruction in the logic of her thinking about the crimes at the Devereux Hotel.

  She had known for some time why Mrs Selsby’s jewels had been stolen the night after her murder. When she had examined them just before the theft, she had seen that they were all fakes. According to Mr Holland, Mrs Selsby had plenty of money, so she was unlikely to have made the substitution herself. But she was a short-sighted old lady and would not have been able to tell the false stones and settings from real ones. The copies had been well done, and Mrs Pargeter wasn’t certain whether she herself would have been able to tell they were imitations without her late husband’s eyeglass.

  So someone other than Mrs Selsby had made the substitution. It was quite a neat crime, given a wealthy absent-minded old lady who was in the habit of leaving her jewellery lying around. All the criminal had to do was to borrow one item at a time, take it to a specialist in such work, and have a replica made. The expertise would no doubt be expensive, but a small investment compared to the resale value of the stolen jewels. The item would then be returned before its owner had missed it, and Mrs Selsby would have been far too short-sighted to realise that anything had changed. The crime could then be repeated at will for as long as the jewellery lasted.

  But with Mrs Selsby’s death, suddenly the doctored jewellery became incriminating evidence, which had to be removed and destroyed. One of the first actions of a Mr Holland (or whoever else might be appointed to look after the old lady’s affairs) would be to have the jewellery valued. And it would take a skilled jeweller a matter of seconds to recognise the fakes. Then very unpleasant enquiries might ensue.

  Realising this, the criminal must have decided that, since some sort of enquiry was inevitable, an investigation of a straightforward robbery would be the safest. Theft of valuable items was a commonplace crime. The thief could not have predicted that Miss Naismith’s gentility would delay the announcement of the robbery, but, even without that bonus, he or she was safe in assuming that a police search would concentrate on places where valuable objects might be protected, rather than where worthless objects might be destroyed.

  It was only because she had examined the jewels before the theft that Mrs Pargeter had been able to make this leap of logic and search the boiler room.

  That, then, was the crime. The question that remained was: Who had perpetrated it?

  Mrs Pargeter still felt convinced it was Newth. He had easy access to Mrs Selsby’s room with his pass key; the evidence had been destroy
ed down in the boiler room, which was his domain; and his purchase of the new bungalow showed that he had an unexplained source of income.

  But was Newth acting on his own or in league with someone else?

  That question still remained to be investigated.

  As did the matter of the fake stones in Lady Ridgleigh’s jewellery. Had Newth done the same thing with them? Was he slowly working through the jewellery of all the lady residents of the Devereux? Would he in time turn his attention to all the beautiful stuff that the late Mr Pargeter had so generously bestowed on his wife?

  Not if Mrs Pargeter had anything to do with it.

  She decided she should consult another expert from the late Mr Pargeter’s address book.

  ♦

  “Hello. Byrom House Girls’ School.”

  “Oh. Really? I wonder, would it be possible to speak to Mr Melchett, please?”

  “Just a moment. I’ll see if the Bursar is in his office.”

  “Bursar?” murmured Mrs Pargeter weakly. She was in the same public call box, and once again she had been referred to a number different from the one in the address book.

  “Good morning.” The voice was brisk and military, but still comfortingly recognisable.

  “Fancy?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Is that Fancy Melchett?”

  “Major Melchett here. The Bursar. Are you a parent?”

  “No.”

  “Oh.” The voice became uncertain. “To whom am I speaking?”

  “This is Melita Pargeter.”

  “Mrs Pargeter! Good heavens!” All the reserve had gone, and the voice now flooded with warmth. “How wonderful to hear from you. I was really afraid that we’d lost touch, you know, after dear Mr Pargeter…”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, this is wonderful. Really cheered up my morning.”

  “What’s with this ‘Major’ business?”

  “Ah. Well, can’t really have the Bursar of a girls’ boarding school called ‘Fancy’, can you?”

  “Come to that, what’s with all this ‘Bursar’ business?”

  “Well, to be quite honest, I’d been thinking for some time of going str – ” He stopped himself, thinking perhaps of listeners on the school switchboard “…of, er, giving up the sort of work I had been doing, and when I saw this job advertised, it seemed to be just the ticket.” His voice became more confidential. “Quite honestly, once Mr Pargeter wasn’t there, the fun seemed to have gone out of the other business. He really made it seem exciting. Oh, I continued for a bit, working with other people, but it just wasn’t the same without him…”