It's Murder with Dover

by Joyce Porter

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  Contents

  Joyce Porter

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Joyce Porter

  It's Murder with Dover

  Joyce Porter was born in Marple, Cheshire, and educated at King’s College, London. In 1949 she joined the Women’s Royal Air Force, and, on the strength of an intensive course in Russian, qualified for confidential work in intelligence. When she left the service in 1963 she had completed three detective novels.

  Porter is best known for her series of novels featuring Detective Inspector Wilfred Dover. Dover One appeared in 1964, followed by nine more in a highly successful series. Porter also created the reluctant spy Eddie Brown, and the “Hon-Con”, the aristocratic gentlewoman-detective Constance Ethel Morrison Burke.

  Chapter One

  ‘It might perhaps be an idea to call Scotland Yard in?’

  On the other side of the exquisite Early Empire desk the Chief Constable winced. Talk about an iron command in a velvet question! ‘Oh, do you think so?’ he asked, failing to keep the resentment out of his voice.

  Lord Crouch did think so but, being a man of few words and enormous influence, he didn’t have to keep saying so. He smiled a deprecatory smile.

  The Chief Constable got his handkerchief out and blew his nose. ‘My chaps could cope perfectly well, you know,’ he muttered. ‘They’d be very discreet, too.’

  ‘I am not asking for any preferential treatment,’ said Lord Crouch in a tone which almost took the sting out of the rebuke.

  Not bloody much! thought the Chief Constable. He stuffed his handkerchief back in his pocket and tried to work out what His Nibs was up to this time. Why on earth did he want Scotland Yard brought in to deal with a murder which, whatever else it was, was certainly a purely local affair?

  From outside the door came another sequence of those muted sounds which punctuated life at Beltour. First there was the rather hesitant trampling of many feet. Then a lot of shuffling. When this died down, a solo voice could be heard, rattling monotonously through its recitation.

  Lord Crouch took no notice but the Chief Constable’s eyes flickered as light dawned. So that was it! He glanced at Lord Crouch with grudging admiration. Well, you had to hand it to him!

  Where the promotion of his ancestral home was concerned, he never missed a trick.

  The Chief Constable ventured a sly dig. ‘There’ll be a lot more publicity if we call the Yard in.’

  If this observation had scored a palpable hit, Lord Crouch didn’t show it. He merely raised his eyebrows, as he did everything else, very, very slowly. ‘We all have our crosses to bear, Mr Pinkham.’

  You old devil! thought the Chief Constable. Some village lad gets himself battered to death in the grounds of Beltour and all his flipping lordship can think about is how to cash in on it! Free publicity? He’d sell his grandmother for it! Give him half a chance and he’d blow up this routine rural slaying into the crime of the century. Oh, Mr Pinkham could see it all now! The newspaper headlines, Lord Crouch’s long face on every television screen in the country, and another 5p on top of your entrance fee to view the murder spot. It would make a nice additional attraction for the kids who’d already seen the boa constrictors and the miniature Chinese torture chamber.

  The Chief Constable made his final effort. ‘We can ask for help from the Yard, of course,’ he allowed gloomily, ‘but that doesn’t say we’ll get it. They may well think that this is a case we should handle ourselves.’

  You didn’t put a spoke in Lord Crouch’s wheel that easily. ‘Just mention my name to the Commissioner,’ he murmured.

  The Chief Constable stood up. He should have taken a stronger line, he knew that. Told old Crouch to stuff it. Pointed out that, far from him sitting there calling the tune, he should by rights be down in the Interview Room at the nick answering a few searching questions about his own role in the drama. The Chief Constable sighed. He should never have come cap-in-hand to Beltour in the first place. Wouldn’t have done if it hadn’t been for Mrs Pinkham and her social ambitions. She’d never let him hear the last of it if he didn’t keep in with Lord Crouch. Ah, me – the lengths some women would go to for the sake of that invitation to the Annual Sherry and Cheese Biscuit Party!

  ‘Well, I suppose I’d better go and get on with it,’ he said. ‘ No,’ – as a thin, bony hand began to move towards the bell push – ‘there’s no need to disturb anybody, my lord. I can see myself out.’

  Lord Crouch remained seated behind his magnificent desk. It wasn’t that he wished to be discourteous to Mr Pinkham; it was merely that, at six foot seven in his socks, he didn’t care much for standing in close proximity to anybody. It made, he felt, both parties look ridiculous. His little foible was well known throughout the county and the Chief Constable, touchy as he was about the respect due to his office, didn’t give it a second thought.

  Lord Crouch let his visitor get right to the door before firing his final shot, if that isn’t too violent an expression for the gentle statement which wafted down the entire length of the Malplaquet Library. ‘The Scotland Yard detective will, of course, stay here at Beltour as my guest.’

  That brought the Chief Constable up with a jerk and, not being too skilled in the art of conversation down the length of a cricket pitch, he came back a few yards. ‘Here in the house, sir? Well, I don’t know that they’ll be too keen on that. I’ll ask ’em, of course, but…’ His voice trailed away, lost in the famous vaulted ceiling and the decidedly cool silence in which his objections were being received. He tried again. ‘There’s likely to be two of them, sir.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘There’ll be an assistant, sir. A sergeant.’

  Lord Crouch had no intention of extending his hospitality to cover the entire Metropolitan Police Force. ‘He can stay in the village. At The Bull Reborn. You’ll see to that, will you?’

  ‘Certainly, my Lord,’ said the Chief Constable miserably, and withdrew in poor order.

  Now, the trouble with pulling strings is that one can never be absolutely sure what is on the other end and Lord Crouch’s experience may serve as a warning to all those who are tempted to manipulate the system for their own ignoble purposes. The old-boy network can, on occasion, trawl up some very queer fish.

  Not that Lord Crouch’s name was really cutting much ice by the time the request for assistance in the Beltour murder descended on the right desk in Scotland Yard. The Commander in charge of the Murder Squad had heard of Beltour, of course. He’d taken his kids there for the day a couple of years ago and reckoned he’d been swindled.

  ‘Why can’t these country bumpkins do their own dirty work?’ he demanded, tossing the very high level memo across to his secretary. ‘Well, I can’t spare anybody
. We’re stretched to the limit as it is.’

  The secretary slid the memo back in front of his master and tempted him. ‘Detective Chief Inspector Dover is due back from sick leave tomorrow, sir.’

  ‘Dover? I’d forgotten about him – thank God!’ An evil grin spread over the Commander’s face. ‘Do you think we dare?’

  ‘I don’t see that he can object to being recalled a few hours early, sir. After all, he fiddles more time off with that disgusting stomach of his than the rest of the squad put together.’

  ‘Good God!’ exploded the Commander. I’m not worried about Dover’s bloody feelings! If he doesn’t like it, he can do the other – and welcome. No, it’s this Lord Crouch I’m wondering about. I mean, how big a stink is he capable of kicking up?’

  ‘Oh, not much,’ said the secretary, already reaching for the telephone. ‘What’s a peer of the realm these days? Besides, he’s the one who’s asked for our help, isn’t he? He ought to be grateful he’s getting anybody.’

  ‘True,’ agreed the Commander doubtfully as his secretary picked up the receiver. ‘ But Dover’s not a proper member of the Murder Squad, you know. I mean, we’ve only been lumbered with the fat old layabout because nobody else’ll have him, not even as a holiday relief. I should have threatened to hand in my resignation like everybody else did,’ he added sorrowfully. ‘I would have done, too, if I’d known what I was in for.’

  The secretary, who was twice as decisive as the Commander could ever hope to be, began to dial. ‘Chief Inspector Dover is attached to the Murder Squad as a supernumerary,’ he pointed out. ‘No civilian’s ever going to know the difference.’

  ‘I don’t know why you think that makes it any better,’ grumbled the Commander. ‘I mean, suppose they think we’re all like him?’

  The secretary stayed his finger. At times one couldn’t help wishing for a little more backbone. ‘Well, what do you want me to do, sir?’ he asked. ‘ Ship Dover off into the wilds or have him hanging around here making the place look untidy?’

  Faced with a Hobson’s choice like that, even the Commander managed to make up his mind and his secretary finished dialling Dover’s number. When it was ringing out he offered the receiver to the Commander. ‘ Do you want to break the glad tidings to him, sir, or shall I?’

  As the Commander suddenly remembered an urgent engagement elsewhere, Detective Chief Inspector Dover was obliged to hear the painful news that he was expected to do some work for his money from the mouth of a mere underling.

  Not that Dover submitted to either indignity without protest. For a man supposedly still on his sick bed, he displayed a remarkable vigour – arguing, whining, cajoling and threatening. It was all to no avail. The secretary blandly insisted that he was just a messenger boy, powerless to alter the instructions, and that the Commander was simply not available and wouldn’t rescind his orders if he were.

  Dover cursed the Commander’s forebears back to the fourth and fifth generation and then made the fatal mistake of pausing for breath before starting on the secretary’s equally suspect ancestry.

  The secretary seized his chance. ‘Well, I’m sorry, sir,’ he said with cheerful callousness, ‘but you know how it is. When you’ve gotta go, you’ve gotta go! The best of luck!’ He hung up.

  By the time, early the following morning, Dover had been loaded on to the train which was to take him as near to his destination as British Rail could manage these days, he had got his second wind and a new audience. His assistant, whipping boy and general dog’s-body – Detective Sergeant MacGregor – sat and suffered on the opposite seat in the compartment. Young, elegant and fed-up to the back teeth, he had heard all Dover’s grievances many times before and he found them just as boring on this occasion as he had done in the past. Long before the dreary London suburbs had been left behind, MacGregor found his mind wandering to pleasanter pastures. Take reincarnation, now! That was an interesting idea. There was probably something in it, too. MacGregor glanced at the scruffy, bowler-hatted hulk grizzling away in its comer and suppressed a deep sigh of self pity. What other explanation except reincarnation could there be for the unholy alliance into which he had been forced with Dover? Only some vile and unspeakable wickedness in an earlier existence could possibly have earned such a fearful punishment in this one.

  The journey took two hours but Dover was still going great guns as he reluctantly deposited his unwieldy seventeen and a quarter stone on the station platform. It was raining heavily and, while he stood waiting impatiently for Sergeant MacGregor to struggle out with the baggage, steady trickles of water began dripping off the brim of his bowler onto his overcoat. Within seconds the generous sprinkling of dandruff on the shoulders had been churned into an unsavoury, muddy slime. Dover scowled bleakly and looked round for a new victim on whom to vent his spite. One came, all unknowing, speeding down the platform towards him.

  Now that the calling in of Scotland Yard was fait accompli, Mr Pinkham, the Chief Constable, had determined to make the best of it. It was no good crying over spilt milk and they were all working towards the same end, weren’t they? Heaven only knew, the local police force was bedevilled enough with internecine vendettas of its own without adding a major feud with Scotland Yard to their number. No, Mr Pinkham’s mind was quite made up: total cooperation and all shoulders to the wheel! That way they’d see the back of these stuck-up, interfering bastards from London all the quicker.

  Mr Pinkham splashed to a halt, composed his face into a frank and sincerely welcoming smile, and held out his hand.

  Dover glared at the proffered limb with undisguised loathing. ‘I’ve been dragged from a bed of suffering to come here!’ he snarled.

  The Chief Constable’s mouth flapped like a newly washed shirt in a stiff breeze. God knows, he’d not expected to be embraced warmly on both cheeks but this was.… ‘Are you Detective Chief Inspector Dover?’ he spluttered.

  ‘No!’ sneered Dover, turning away to head for the station exit and, hopefully, somewhere to sit down. ‘I’m little bloody Lord Fauntleroy!’

  This unceremonious departure left Mr Pinkham and MacGregor to amuse each other.

  ‘He’s not been feeling very well lately,’ explained MacGregor, somewhat inadequately.

  ‘Oh,’ said the Chief Constable.

  ‘Er – should we perhaps move out of the rain, sir? There’s no point in standing here and getting drenched, is there?’

  ‘No,’ said the Chief Constable, though his mind was on other things. He made an effort and pulled himself together. ‘Well, come on then!’ he said.

  Dover was already ensconced in the waiting police car, occupying without effort the whole of the back seat. After a moment’s hesitation Mr Pinkham got in front with the driver and left MacGregor to squeeze as best he could into one of the tip-up seats.

  Now that he’d got the weight off his poor old feet again, Dover was in a better humour. ‘Does it always rain like this in this crummy dump?’ he asked.

  Mr Pinkham’s sharp intake of breath was clearly audible but, with his police driver a highly intrigued witness, he hardly felt he could start giving back as good as he got. He sought for the soft answer and forced it out through clenched teeth. ‘No,’ he said.

  Dover examined the passing scenery and pronounced his considered verdict. ‘’ Strewth, what a lousy hole!’

  ‘Ah, but I think you’ll be pretty impressed when you see Beltour,’ said the Chief Constable, all but rupturing himself in the effort to speak calmly.

  ‘Beltour?’ demanded Dover. ‘What’s Beltour when it’s at home?’

  Mr Pinkham was beginning to feel that he’d strayed into a nightmare. ‘Beltour’s the place where the murder happened.’

  ‘Oh, that!’ Dover’s interest in the conversation evaporated and with a grunt he burrowed back even deeper into the folds of his overcoat. ‘Wake me when we get there!’

  For the next quarter of an hour nobody spoke. There was, after all, nothing much to say and the snorts, groans an
d snores coming from the back seat would have made any exchange of small talk rather difficult. In the end, however, Mr Pinkham was obliged to break the impasse. He turned round gingerly in his seat and addressed himself to MacGregor.

  ‘What will he want to do first, do you think?’ he whispered. ‘Visit our murder headquarters or get himself settled in?’

  MacGregor knew the answer to that one, all right.

  The Chief Constable sighed and nodded to his driver. ‘You’d better go straight to Beltour House, then.’

  MacGregor raised his eyebrows. ‘Beltour House, sir?’

  ‘Lord Crouch has very kindly offered your chief inspector accommodation there. Unfortunately there isn’t room for you as well so we’ve booked you in at the village pub.’

  MacGregor closed the file in which he had been trying to mug up on the case. ‘I’m afraid that’s quite out of the question, sir!’

  They were speaking as softly as they could but Dover, never one to be caught napping where his personal comfort was concerned, was already cocking an attentive ear.

  ‘Well, I’m not saying that The Bull Reborn is exactly a five star establishment, sergeant, but I’m sure you’ll be quite…’

  MacGregor shook his head impatiently and tapped the file on his knees. ‘According to your own initial investigations, sir, Lord Crouch could be personally involved in this case. Chief Inspector Dover cannot possibly compromise his position by accepting his Lordship’s hospitality.’

  ‘Ho, can’t he?’

  Dover, wide awake, was heaving himself upright on the back seat and gawping in pop-eyed wonder through the streaming windows. The car had just swung off the main road into the two-mile drive which swept up to Beltour and the house itself was now coming into view.

  ‘’Strewth!’ gasped Dover with that native vulgarity which never failed to make MacGregor cringe. ‘ Get a load of that! Blimey, it must be bigger than Buckingham Palace!’

  ‘Not only bigger,’ put in the Chief Constable with touching local chauvinism, ‘but better, too. In every way. Beltour is one of the finest gems of our national heritage.’