Headline Murder

by Peter Bartram

  I said: “My name’s Colin Crampton. I’m from the Evening Chronicle. I’m a reporter. I was wondering whether you could help me. It’s about a story I’m working on. Mrs…”

  “Sturgess. But everyone calls me Harriet. A story, you say? How interesting.”

  Her eyes narrowed as she looked at me. It was a natural reaction when people were deciding whether they should ask a journalist into their homes. The eyes widened again. She’d taken her decision.

  “Perhaps you’d better come in.”

  She led me up a dark hall and into a small sitting room. It had regency stripe wallpaper and a worn red carpet. Knitting – something in dark blue wool – rested on the arm of an easy chair by the fireplace. On the radio, Franklin Englemann had reached a pottery factory in Stoke-on-Trent. He was asking a worker how to put the spout on a teapot. “And the way to stop the spout dripping is to…”

  Harriet turned off the radio. She had probably consigned me to a lifetime of dripping teapots.

  She gestured me to a chair on the other side of the fireplace, picked up her knitting and sat down.

  “You don’t mind if I carry on with this while we talk?”

  “Not at all.”

  The knitting needles started.

  Clackety-clack.

  “I wanted to ask you about your neighbour, Arnold Trumper,” I said.

  “More questions about poor Arnold.”

  “Someone’s already been here asking questions?”

  “Yes.”

  Clackety-clack.

  “Recently?”

  “Good gracious, no. In nineteen forty. I won’t ever forget. It was the year my Charlie went away to France.”

  “Charlie being your husband?”

  “Yes.”

  Clackety-clack.

  “And he left to fight?”

  “Yes.” She stopped knitting. Her gaze strayed to a photo in a frame on a side table. It showed a handsome young man in uniform. “And he never came back,” she said.

  I stayed quiet for a moment while she remembered her Charlie who never came back. Then I said: “I’m sorry.”

  “It was a long time ago.”

  She started knitting again.

  Clackety-clack.

  “So you were questioned about the murder of Arnold’s wife? About Mildred?” I said.

  “A police officer asked me what I knew about her.”

  Clackety-clack.

  “What did you tell him?”

  “That I never got on with the woman. You could tell what she was like. Flighty. Chased after anything in trousers.”

  Clackety-clack.

  “What did Arnold think of that?”

  “I don’t think he knew. He was so wrapped up in setting up his business. It wasn’t easy at the start of the war.”

  She finished a row of her knitting and rummaged in a bag at the side of the chair. She pulled out a skein of wool.

  “I need to wind another ball. Would you?”

  I looped the wool over my hands and held them apart as she started to wind.

  “How did Arnold take Mildred’s killing?” I asked.

  “Badly at first. It was the second blow he’d had in a few days.”

  “The first being his discovery that Mildred had been having an affair?”

  “Yes.”

  “Not a marriage made in heaven, then?”

  “They’d never really got on. Lived separate lives. Simply different temperaments. She was all for fun. He was all for work. Oil and water. Didn’t mix,” she said.

  The wool winding flagged.

  “Keep your arms apart, please, Colin.”

  “Sorry.”

  The winding restarted, even faster. The strand on the skein raced from one hand to another.

  “Did you see much of Arnold in those days?”

  “A little. But I had my own troubles when my Charlie went missing.”

  “Of course.”

  “Arnold had a sister,” she said. “Dorothy, I believe. She came to see him quite a bit in those days. Cooked the odd meal. Did a bit of housework. That sort of thing. But then she got married and the visits dwindled.”

  “When did she marry?”

  “I’m not sure. It was either in the closing months of the war or in the four or five years immediately after the war.”

  “Who did Dorothy marry?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. As I say, I had my own troubles.”

  “You can’t remember his name?”

  “No.”

  “When did you last see Dorothy?”

  “I’ve not seen her for two years – since her husband died. I had thought about going to the funeral, but didn’t in the end. We were never close friends. Little more than acquaintances. You know how it is?”

  “I do,” I said.

  Harriet finished winding the wool.

  “Was Arnold friendly with any of his other neighbours?” I asked.

  “He kept himself to himself most of the time. For the past few years, we’ve only been on nodding terms. Not more.”

  “One last question,” I said. “Have you any idea why Arnold should suddenly disappear?”

  She stuffed the ball of wool into her bag. Followed it with the needles and knitting. Looked at me over the top of her half-moon glasses with those intelligent grey eyes.

  “I don’t think Arnold has been a contented man ever since the unhappy events with Mildred,” she said. “To find his wife was unfaithful and then that she’d been murdered by her lover must have been a shattering blow for him. He seemed haunted by it. He never spoke to me much afterwards.”

  I thought about that for a moment, then said: “Thank you. You’ve been most helpful.”

  I put my notebook back in my pocket and stood up.

  She said: “I have to disagree with you on one point.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I don’t think the radio is the best company there is.”

  “You don’t?”

  “I find yours much more congenial.”

  “Too kind.”

  She grinned at me and there was a crafty look in her eye that made me sense what was coming next.

  She said: “I made a fresh cherry cake today. You’ll have a cup of tea with your slice?”

  I sat down again. “Milk and one sugar,” I said.

  Chapter 5

  An hour later, I left Harriet Sturgess’s house awash with tea and stuffed with cherry cake.

  I levered myself into the MGB and drove back into town. I had a lot to think about. From what I’d seen, it was clear that Trumper had left his house suddenly. He surely would have taken his Agatha Christie bedtime reading if he’d been planning to leave on an extended trip. And why should he order so many vegetables that were now rotting in his kitchen if he knew he was going away? But it was impossible to say whether he’d gone for good or was coming back. I’d picked up some useful backstory from Harriet. But, on a newspaper, a backstory is only useful when you have a peg to hang it on. And I had nothing that would stand any kind of scrutiny.

  In the morning, I’d hoped to present Figgis with the first instalment of a running story that we could develop in the days ahead. He’d been adamant he wanted a splash. But I needed hard facts. I needed that peg. And there was one man who might provide it.

  Septimus Darke.

  The Golden Kiss nightclub was exclusive in much the same way as Lewes Prison. Not many people got in there and those who did were mostly crooks.

  The place was one of Septimus Darke’s business ventures. It was supposed to show that he wasn’t just a property racketeer, but a businessman who could mingle at ease in respectable company.

  But there were two groups he definitely didn’t want sitting on his faux leopard skin-covered stools at his purple-velvet fascia bar – police and journalists. He employed a small group of muscled thugs with short tempers and small IQs to act as doormen. So if I wanted to get into the place, I would need to employ some of those journalist skills
that have served the profession so well down the years – deceit and subterfuge.

  I swung the MGB through the traffic lights at the Old Steine and drove past the Golden Kiss for a quick reconnaissance. The door was being patrolled by Fat Arthur. He looked like a man with a barrel for a body and a pumpkin for a head. I already knew him. He’d entertained the readers of the Chronicle when his career as a heavyweight boxer came to an abrupt close. The dolt had stepped into the ring and whacked the ref by mistake.

  I accelerated past the club and drove towards Kemp Town. I was heading for a late-night shop which sold one or two items I needed for the evening’s assignment.

  Twenty minutes later I was back in the mews behind the club with my purchases in a cardboard box.

  There were several doors leading from the mews into buildings. It wasn’t difficult to tell which belonged to the Golden Kiss. There was a sign on the door which read: Strictly no admittance except to accredited tradesmen.

  I hefted the box out of the car and walked over to the door. I used my back to push my way in. There was a short corridor lit by a bare light bulb. I walked down the corridor and entered the club’s kitchen through double swing doors.

  I took in the room in a moment. A chef held a spoon to his lips, tasting a sauce from a pan on a stove. A sous-chef chopped carrots. A kitchen porter at a sink, up to his elbows in greasy water, was working his way through a pile of dirty dishes. Their eyes swivelled towards me. At first, curious. Then hostile.

  I marched across to a low deal table on the other side of the room and plonked the box down on it.

  “There’s the special order,” I said. “As required – onions, green beans, and two extra caulis.”

  The chef looked surprised, then angry. He put down the spoon. Took the pan off the stove. Advanced on the box. Peered in it. I expected him to speak with a French accent. Instead, it was straight off the Mile End Road.

  “What the effing blazes is this? I didn’t order no more veggies.”

  “Order came in from the office,” I said.

  “But they don’t effing place orders for my effing kitchen.”

  “And I don’t normally have to deliver them. Extra delivery, at Mr Darke’s very special request.”

  The mention of the feared name calmed tempers.

  “He don’t effing tell me nothing.”

  “Bosses, eh? Same the world over,” I said.

  I waved a piece of paper from my notebook.

  “I’ll just pop through to the office and get the paperwork signed off.”

  Without waiting for a reply, I pushed through the nearest door, hoping it was the right one.

  I found myself in another corridor, this one better lit and with a thick red carpet.

  Music was coming from the far end of the corridor. Somebody was doing an impression of Frankie Vaughan singing Something’s Gotta Give. It sounded as though it might be the singer’s vocal cords. I walked towards the music, opened the door and entered what was clearly the club restaurant.

  The room was lit by a couple of chandeliers that would have looked extravagant at Versailles. There was a small dance floor in the middle of the room with tables arranged around it. A short man with a bald head and stomach the size of Beachy Head manoeuvred a young woman with bleach blonde hair and a look of professional boredom on her face around the dance floor. I couldn’t tell whether they were dancing the foxtrot or the rumba. He looked as though he was pushing a wheelbarrow to music.

  The singer was strutting his stuff on a small stage at the far end of the room. He was backed by a four-man combo. Three were routine session musicians but the double bass player plucked a mean string.

  I walked up to the bar, sat on one of the leopard skin-covered stools and ordered a large gin, small tonic, one ice cube and two slices of lemon. It came just as I wanted, served on a little paper doily with a bowl of peanuts on the side.

  I looked round the room. There was no sign of Darke. I’d heard there were few evenings when he didn’t visit the place. I took a swig of my drink and decided to sit it out.

  I didn’t have to wait long. I was scarcely halfway into the G&T when Darke walked in. He was a good couple of inches over six feet with broad shoulders and a muscular body. He had a full head of thick black hair. He had high cheekbones and a Roman nose. His eyes were too close together. He was wearing a grey mohair suit that must have left a herd of angora goats with a few chilly nights. He moved with the confidence of a man used to getting his own way.

  Darke had a girl on each arm.

  On his right, a tall blonde had corn-coloured hair cascading over bare shoulders. On his left, a short brunette had curly hair, a tough little face and a voluptuous figure that looked as though it had been especially inflated for the evening.

  A waiter bustled up to Darke and showed him to a table near the band. A bottle of Krug and a tray of canapés appeared. The waiter poured the drinks. Darke took a good pull at his champagne and joked with the girls.

  I finished my G&T, ordered another and considered how to approach the situation. The barman brought the fresh drink. The singer had started on Frankie Vaughan’s Green Door. It was hanging by a hinge. I took a bracing swig of G&T, slid off the stool and walked across to Darke’s table.

  I said: “Mind if I join you, Mr Darke?” and sat down before he could say “no”. He looked surprised more than angry.

  So I said: “Why are you buying properties on the seafront?”

  “Who the hell are you to be asking questions about my private business?” he said. He had a cold voice which rasped when he got angry.

  I pulled out a card and flicked it across the table.

  “Crampton. Colin Crampton. Evening Chronicle.”

  He looked at the card without picking it up. “And who invited you in?”

  “I came uninvited. But I thought you’d want to talk to me.”

  “Why should I want to talk to you?”

  “So I can print your side of the story.”

  “What story?”

  “The story I’m writing about the mystery.”

  “What mystery?”

  “Why you’re buying up seafront properties.”

  Darke leaned forward in his chair. He reached for his glass and drained it. A waiter hurried forward to pour a refill. The temperature in the room seemed to have dropped.

  “Give me one reason why I shouldn’t have you thrown out,” he said. “The hard way.”

  “Because it wouldn’t look good in the Chronicle,” I said. “Local businessman on assault charge.”

  He laughed. Reached for his glass. Drained it again. The waiter did the honours a second time.

  I said: “I already have a story that you’re buying seafront properties.”

  “You know nothing.”

  “And I know why.”

  “Don’t bluff me. You said it was a mystery.”

  “Just a turn of phrase,” I said. “There’s no mystery about the fact that you’re planning a seafront development. All I want to know is what it is.” I leaned forward. “Why are you trying to buy the Krazy Kat?”

  “That’s my business.”

  “Have you met Arnold Trumper?”

  “Go to blazes.”

  “Do you know where he is?”

  “I’ve warned you, newspaperman.”

  “Getting under your skin am I, Septimus?”

  Darke’s fist crashed down on the table. Heads turned. Fat Arthur materialised in the room. The band’s number ended in a discord of bum notes. The blonde twisted her hair. The brunette looked as though she’d sprung a puncture. The temperature in the room headed towards freezing point.

  “Only my…only certain people call me that,” Darke said.

  “Call you, what? Septimus. It’s your name, isn’t it?”

  “It’s my name,” he said.

  “Because you were your mother’s seventh child.”

  “As I said, you know nothing.”

  I was curious. Why was Darke s
o touchy about his name?

  “Runt of the litter, were you? Got an inferiority complex as a result?”

  “Fat Arthur.” Darke summoned his heavy. “Mr Crampton, is leaving. By the back door. Be a shame if he tripped over the step and broke his leg on the way out.”

  “I understand, boss. Could be he also breaks an arm in his fall.”

  Darke laughed. “Excellent thinking.”

  Fat Arthur preened himself. I gave him a withering look. I hate a crawler.

  “Don’t hurt him. Not tonight.” It was the blonde. She’d grabbed Darke’s arm and was looking into his eyes.

  “What’s it to you?” Darke asked.

  “Nothing. Really, nothing. It’s just that he’s kind of cute,” she said. “Not as cute as you, Septimussy Pussy,” she added hastily.

  Darke lounged back in his chair thinking. I could see the clockwork ticking over in his brain.

  “But this man has insulted me, Myrtle,” he said finally.

  “Please, Pussy,” she said. “It’s just that I don’t want to be thinking about it later when we’re…you know.”

  The clockwork ticked some more.

  “So I’ll give him a chance.”

  “Thank you, Pussy.” She planted a red lipstick kiss on his cheek.

  Darke turned back to me. “Sporting man are you?”

  “I played a bit of cricket at school. Useful middle-order batsman and occasional leg spinner.”

  Darke laughed. “Not the kind of sport I had in mind.”

  “So what were you thinking of?”

  “You think I was called Septimus because I was my mother’s seventh son.”

  “Seems I was wrong.”

  “So I give you three chances to guess why I was called Septimus.”

  “Surely in view of your name, I should have seven chances.”

  “Seven, then.”

  “And why should I want to play this game?”

  “You win and you get to walk out of the front door.”

  “And if I lose?”

  “You leave by the back door. With Fat Arthur.”

  Darke had relaxed again. He was enjoying this. He meant it, too. I didn’t like it one little bit. Despite his size, Fat Arthur still looked as though he could handle himself. It seemed as though I had no choice but to play Darke’s game.

  “Very well,” I said.