Murder in the Museum (Fethering Mysteries)

by Brett, Simon

  ‘You went straight away? You left the grounds immediately? You didn’t do anything else?’

  ‘For Christ’s sake, you’re just like the bloody police!’

  ‘I’m sorry. But there’s something else that needs explaining. Did you go to the kitchen garden?’

  Mervyn Hunter let out a long sigh, and nodded. ‘I knew where there was a spare set of keys in the Admin Office. Easy to break in there, without anyone noticing. That’s how I’d got into the main house. And just when I was leaving, I remembered there was a key to the kitchen garden on the bunch too, and I . . . I wanted to have a look at where the skeleton was found. So I unlocked the gates.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I don’t know why. It was . . . something . . . A dead body . . . something about seeing a dead body . . .’

  Jude remembered Carole’s description of how he’d reacted when the skull had first been uncovered. ‘But of course there was nothing there,’ she said.

  ‘No. Don’t know why I thought there would be. I knew there wouldn’t be . . .’ He shook his head, and turned it despairingly against the wall, in exactly the same posture that Jude had first encountered him in the Visiting Hall at Austen.

  ‘Mervyn . . .’ she said very softly. ‘All of this . . . this fascination with the dead . . . this fear of what you might do to women . . . this . . . fear of women . . .’ She had hesitated before she spoke the last three words, but he did not contest her analysis. ‘It all goes back to Lee-Anne Rogers, doesn’t it?’

  The silence was so long she began to fear he’d never break it, but finally he spoke. ‘I was very young, young for my age. Immature probably, a bit stupid. I’d never been with a girl, though all my mates – well, people I knew, didn’t have that many close mates – they all talked about it, and everything on television talked about it, and how you had to get your end away and . . . I was in this club, and this girl come on to me very strong, and I’d been drinking – wasn’t used to that either – and . . . Anyway, I thought this was it, I thought I’d hit the jackpot. And then she wants me to go out with her in her car, and I’m still thinking this is good . . . And she stops in this lay-by, and she gets in the back of the car and invites me to join her. She knew what she was doing, been through the routine lots of times before . . . So I get in the back with her and . . .’ The tension within him was now so strong he could hardly get the words out. ‘And she starts telling me what to do . . . Not loving, not caring, just greedy. She starts telling me what to do . . . She starts telling me what to do . . .’

  ‘Just,’ Jude suggested very gently, ‘like your mother used to tell you what to do?’

  He nodded slowly, then suddenly averted his head, not to let his eyes betray his emotion. ‘I don’t remember exactly what happened next. But I know I killed her. I must have killed her.’

  ‘Yes.’

  There was a long silence, isolated amidst the mutter of other prisoners and visitors.

  Then Jude spoke. ‘Not all women are the same, Mervyn. Not all women want to bully you.’

  ‘No?’ He sounded sceptical.

  ‘No. The psychiatrists have said it, and I’m saying it too. You are not a danger to all women.’

  ‘I must be.’

  ‘No. Look, we’re talking all right, you and me, aren’t we? I don’t feel you’re a danger to me.’

  ‘No, but we’re not alone. There’s people here.’

  ‘When you finally are released, Mervyn . . .’ Jude said slowly, ‘I want you come and see me . . . on my own . . .’

  ‘But I . . . I mean, if you want me to . . .’

  ‘I don’t want you to do anything. I just want you to come and talk to me.’

  ‘I wouldn’t trust myself to—’

  ‘You’re the one who’s afraid of yourself, Mervyn. I’m not afraid of you.’

  He let out a short, bitter laugh. ‘Then you bloody should be.’

  ‘No, Mervyn. I trust you.’

  He turned his face to look at her. In his eye there glinted a tear, but also a tiny glimmer of hope.

  Chapter Forty-Three

  The story that Laurence Hawker’s researches unearthed was a grim one, and a tribute to the strength of will of one man, Felix Chadleigh. He it was who had masterminded a cover-up of enormous proportions, who had forced the complicity in the subterfuge of one of his closest friends, Lieutenant Hugo Strider, and of his entire family, stretching down for generations beyond his death.

  It was the power of Felix Chadleigh’s personality that had turned Belinda Chadleigh into a murderer, and blighted the entire life of his great-grandson, Graham Chadleigh-Bewes.

  Graham Chadleigh was at the heart of it, Graham Chadleigh the golden boy, killed, as everyone knew, on 26 October 1917 at Passchendaele within days of arriving on the continent. He was the hero celebrated in ‘Threnody for the Lost’, his brother’s most famous poem.

  It was the date of that poem’s publication which got Laurence Hawker thinking. Vases of Dead Flowers came out in 1935 and, though the ‘Threnody’ might have been written some time before that, it still seemed an odd time for war poetry.

  And it was only a year or so before that Hugo Strider had been writing letters of impassioned guilt to his Catholic confidant, Father Gerard Hidebourne. In one of them he’d referred to a ‘vow he’d made to F’, and in another he wrote:

  I had a big argument with F last night, or my equivalent of an argument, which involves writing down a lot of points and waiting for F to shout them down. I asked him to release me from the oath I swore to him. I do not feel I will last much longer and I would like to face my Maker with at least some sense of absolution for my sins. F, as I might have anticipated, refused to listen to me. He’s getting very anxious, frightened others are going to find out our secret, and I believe he has been putting pressure on Esmond to do something about it.

  Do something about what, Laurence Hawker wondered. What could Esmond do? Well, he was a writer. He could write something. If there was some cloud over the memory of his brother, what better way to dissipate it than by writing a celebration with the power of ‘Threnody for the Lost’

  But what was the cloud over Graham Chadleigh? Hugo Strider had spoken of his guilt over his ‘involvement’ in the boy’s death. Miss Hidebourne had even hinted the Lieutenant might have been responsible for the death, murdering his junior in the hell of Passchendaele.

  But that didn’t fit. Whatever Lieutenant Strider had done, it was something Felix Chadleigh had known about, possibly even forced him into. And what kind of man would offer a home for life to someone he knew to be the murderer of his precious son?

  Laurence Hawker then wondered whether the cloud hung over the boy himself, whether Graham Chadleigh had committed murder. The only candidate as victim was Pat Heggarty, the boy who had apparently run away to avoid conscription. If it could be proved that the body unearthed in the Bracketts kitchen garden had belonged to Pat Heggarty . . . But it hadn’t been proved, and the police were, as ever, reticent in spreading the results of their forensic investigations.

  Still, Laurence now had a thread to follow, and follow it he did, through the piles of dusty papers (which didn’t do his cough any good at all). And eventually he found what he was looking for.

  The first clue appeared in the document that Carole had looked at in the secret cell beneath the Priest’s Hole. It was definitely in Esmond’s handwriting and it began: ‘I’m writing to you at the request of my commanding officer who had a request from Lieutenant Strider for anyone who witnessed what happened to his men . . .’

  Laurence knew he’d read those words before, and it didn’t take long to uncover the photocopies which Graham Chadleigh-Bewes had prepared for Professor Marla Teischbaum. There was exactly the same text, though now written in the uneducated hand of a common soldier. J. T. Hodges (Private).

  Yet Esmond Chadleigh’s version was full of changes and crossings-out. In fact, his had been written before the soldier’s letter. In other words, he had
faked an eye-witness account of his brother’s death.

  With this doubt sown in his mind, Laurence Hawker cast a sceptical eye over some of the other documentation of Graham Chadleigh’s time at the Front. And, though some of the accounts from fellow-soldiers had no rough drafts by Esmond, a sufficient number did to cast doubt on his brother’s ever having been at Passchendaele.

  Supposing Lieutenant Strider had supported that subterfuge, had lied about the boy’s presence by his side in battle . . . then that surely would have justified his later paroxysms of guilt.

  So if Graham Chadleigh wasn’t on the Ypres Salient in October 1917, where was he?

  Laurence Hawker found the truth in two devastating documents.

  The first was a letter written to Esmond by his mother in 1921. He was then an undergraduate at Oxford and apparently worrying about work pressures.

  I know how hard it is for you, my dear boy, and for all of your generation, for whom life is opening up and yet remains shadowed by the knowledge of the many men not much older than you for whom life has closed for ever. I know how particularly hard it is for you, Esmond, after what happened to Graham. But do not give in to despair. Do not believe that there is “bad blood” in the Chadleigh family. (I dare not imagine what your father would say if he knew I was writing to you in these terms!)

  You must not think that because you are Graham’s brother, the same fate awaits you. He was under terrible pressure at the time, and was not thinking sensibly. By 1917 the glory had gone out of the War. Young men knew the likely fate that awaited them, and it was not a comforting one. Graham had not enjoyed his training, and the knowledge that he had to leave for the Front on the Monday caused him great anxiety that last weekend he was with us.

  I wish I had been aware of how serious a state he was in, but it is always easy to be wise in retrospect. I was busy with the family and guests, and did not realize how much the talk of your father and Hugo Strider was upsetting him. Mrs Heg-garty’s boy had just run off to escape his duty, and your father had much to say on the subject of cowardice. I think it was that which troubled Graham most. He doubted his own bravery; he feared that, in the heat of battle, he might turn out to be a coward.

  And some would say he took the coward’s way out. Afraid he wouldn’t live up to the expectations everyone – especially his father – had for him, Graham evaded the challenge of proving himself in battle. And yet, although I can never condone what he did, it too must have taken a kind of courage. To put a revolver in your mouth and . . . I am sorry, I should not write such things, but, Esmond, I know you are old enough for me to share my weaknesses with you, as you share yours with me.

  You speak of doubts about your father’s course of action after Graham’s death. I cannot comment on that, only say that your father is an honourable man and did what he thought right, according to his lights.

  But, please, dear boy, do not brood on Graham’s fate. It will not be yours. As children, you were always different, he a nervy, sickly boy, you always a cheerful little soul. Please, do not even speak of such thoughts. To have lost one of my darling boys is sometimes more than I can bear. Even the idea of losing another is sufficient to freeze the blood in my veins . . .

  So, thought Laurence Hawker, that was it. Someone should have realized, from the fact that Graham Chadleigh’s service revolver stayed at Bracketts. If he had been so thoroughly blown up at Passchendaele that no trace of his body was found, then what were the chances of his gun turning up?

  Everything else fitted, though. There was no place for cowards in any household run by Felix Chadleigh. No son of his could be known to have ducked out of his duty to King and Country in such a shabby way.

  There was the religious dimension too. For a Catholic, suicide is the ultimate sin. The boy’s body must have been secretly buried, without benefit of any funeral rite, in the kitchen garden, there to stay for more than eighty years, until accidentally uncovered by the spade of Jonny Tyson.

  For his father, the reality of what Graham Chadleigh had done was too appalling ever to be made public. An alternative, more pleasing, truth would have to be invented.

  So Felix Chadleigh had invented it. And by God only knew what amount of bullying and persuasion, he had forced his family and friend to endorse that new truth.

  There was one document Laurence Hawker found more chilling than all the others. It was written in 1919 to his wife by Felix Chadleigh, when he was away from Bracketts shooting in Scotland. The part that shocked Laurence read as follows:

  Do not lose heart, my dearest. We have much to be thankful for. We have each other, we have Bracketts, we still have three children. God has given us reverses, but He has also looked after us. God is on our side. Even at Passchendaele, He was on our side. He saw to it that none of the men with Hugo survived the shelling, and thus made our lives so much the easier.

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Sheila Cartwright’s funeral duly took place, and was duly attended by all the Great and the Good of West Sussex. Lord Beniston recycled the bland appreciation that he had wheeled out for many similar occasions. Sheila’s close friend, the Chief Constable, also spoke. Tributes were paid to her enormous energy and achievements.

  And Gina Locke was introduced to some very useful potential sponsors.

  An overlooked figure, Sheila’s husband, was, needless to say, present at the ceremony and the reception that followed. He was so ineffectual a figure, however, that the other guests kept forgetting he was there.

  But the one or two who did look at him by mistake, noticed on his face an expression that looked not unlike relief.

  Laurence Hawker delivered his report well in time for the next meeting of the Bracketts Trustees. In the interim Gina Locke had organized replacements to fill the missing seats on the Board. (Josie Freeman had also tendered her resignation. This had nothing to do with recent events at Bracketts; it had been motivated solely by her masterplan for the social advancement of her husband. She had been offered a position on the Board of the Royal Opera House, where her presence would be much more valuable to his profile. A few more moves of that kind, continuing carefully targeted – and carefully leaked – philanthropy to the right charities, donations to the right political party, and Josie Freeman felt quietly confident of upgrading her husband’s OBE to a knighthood within a couple of years. The only other important thing she had to do was somehow stop him talking about car-parts all the time.)

  Of course Gina Locke could not appoint new Trustees herself. But she could suggest suitable names to Lord Beniston, and he could invite them to join the Board. With little knowledge of anyone in West Sussex outside his own circle, and always liking to have his work done for him, the noble Lord had accepted all of Gina’s suggestions without argument. As a result the new Board had a much lower average age than its predecessor, and contained more members who saw the leisure industry exactly the same way as Gina Locke saw it. None of her apprenticeship under Sheila Cartwright had been wasted.

  (In fact, approving the new Trustees was Lord Beni-ston’s last action for Bracketts. Confident that he had done his bit during the two years of his involvement, he resigned, quickly to join the board of another, rather more prestigious, heritage property. For him the change had three advantages: first, the patron of the new organization was a minor member of the Royal Family, so he was mixing with his own sort of people; second, it had been agreed that, so long as his name appeared on the letterhead, he wouldn’t have to attend any meetings; and third, he got free membership of the adjacent golf club.)

  The reconstituted Board approved Laurence Hawker’s report and accepted Gina’s proposal that the research material should all be handed over to Professor Marla Teischbaum, who was to be given all cooperation in future with her biography of Esmond Chadleigh. (There was only one dissenting voice; unsurprisingly, it belonged to George Ferris.) The hope was that the book would be ready for publication to coincide with the centenary of Esmond’s birth in 2004.

  As
it turned out, that objective was achieved. The book made a great stir when it came out, was serialized in a Sunday newspaper, and sold in large quantities. Professor Marla Teischbaum became a media celebrity and on her frequent visits to England dished up her vigorous opinions on every available arts programme and chat-show.

  And the evidence of his complicity in a major deception revived interest in Esmond Chadleigh.

  Gina Locke’s pet project, the Bracketts Museum, funded by one exclusive donor, was also completed in time for the centenary. Though at first just a shrine to Esmond Chadleigh, within two years it had been made over and reopened. In homage to the writer’s new notoriety, it was then called ‘The Bracketts Museum of Fakes and Fraudsters’, and contained the largest collection of confidence tricks and scams this side of the Atlantic. (Graham Chadleigh-Bewes might have been obscurely gratified, had he known that there was a whole display devoted to ‘The Tichborne Claimant’.)

  In its new incarnation the Museum did much better than it ever had before. At the beginning of the twenty-first century deviousness and cynicism were much more marketable commodities than faith and honesty.

  Having turned around the fortunes of Bracketts, Gina Locke was headhunted for a senior job at the Arts Council, and settled down to a career of dispensing public money to the wrong causes.

  Almost all of Esmond Chadleigh’s books went out of print. One exception was Vases of Dead Flowers. ‘Threnody for the Lost’ remained one of the nation’s favourite poems, though the notes that accompanied it in anthologies changed considerably.

  The other surprising survivor of the Chadleigh oeuvre was The Demesnes of Eregonne. The book had become a minor cult in California amongst the members of an even more minor cult, who tried to live their lives according to its rather flaky principles. They self-published an edition of two hundred.