The Sinking Admiral

by The Detection Club

  She opened the door fully and jerked her head to let them know they could enter.

  ‘Are you the barmaid?’ DI Cole asked.

  She eyed him as if he were something the dog had coughed up. ‘Bar manager.’

  ‘The table by the window will do us nicely.’

  ‘For the time being,’ said DC Chesterton. ‘We’ll need to set up an Incident Room in here soon. Is there anywhere suitable?’

  Cole’s look at his subordinate showed that he didn’t think an Incident Room would be necessary for such an obvious case of suicide, but Amy’s presence stopped him from voicing his objection. It wouldn’t do to let her know yet that he’d already decided what had happened. Perhaps they would have to go through the charade of setting up an Incident Room anyway.

  ‘Well, there’s the Bridge,’ Amy replied. ‘Fitz used it as an office. That’d probably be the best place for you.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Chesterton politely.

  Cole thought he had been silent for quite long enough. ‘You don’t have to offer us a drink, but a coffee wouldn’t come amiss.’

  ‘The machine isn’t on,’ Amy said. She could have boiled a kettle and given them instant, but she wasn’t feeling hospitable.

  ‘And isn’t that fried bacon I can smell?’

  ‘Breakfasts have to be booked.’

  ‘You could make an exception for Suffolk’s finest, couldn’t you?’

  ‘We cater for our guests, not casual callers.’

  ‘Ooh! That was below the belt,’ Cole said. They’d already seated themselves at the table. ‘Let’s see if we can soften your heart. Why don’t you join us, my love?’

  ‘Let’s get one thing clear,’ Amy said, remaining standing. ‘Call me Miss Walpole, if you wish. Anything else is offensive or patronising.’

  ‘Whatever you wish,’ he said. ‘We know a lady manager when we meet one.’

  Amy took this as compliance, and drew up a chair.

  ‘Are we speaking to the same Miss Walpole who reported the incident on the beach last night?’

  ‘You are. After I found him I came up here directly and dialled 999.’

  The younger of the two, DC Chesterton, had produced a notebook and was writing in it. ‘This was at what time, Miss Walpole?’ They were the first words he’d spoken, and he had a voice that went down warmly, like the breakfast Amy hadn’t provided.

  ‘Late, after midnight, towards one a.m. I’d closed the bar and was on my way back to my cottage.’

  ‘Hold on,’ Cole said, eager to regain control. ‘We’ll do this from the beginning. You were here in the pub all evening, I take it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Quiet, was it?’

  ‘Actually, no,’ Amy said. ‘The place was packed.’

  ‘On a perishing Monday night in March?’

  ‘We had the TV people in, making a documentary, and the locals got wind of it and wanted their five minutes of fame – well, five seconds more likely – so just about everyone was in, and some we never normally see.’

  ‘And was Mr Fitzsimmons present?’

  ‘No one calls him that,’ Amy said. ‘“Fitz” or “The Admiral”.’

  ‘Served in the Navy, did he?’

  ‘I can’t say for sure. He’d been to sea, that’s certain, and once owned a schooner. He was full of stories, but I got the impression they improved in the telling. He was at it last night for the TV, going on about lost treasure in the West Indies, or some such.’

  ‘So he didn’t appear unduly depressed?’

  ‘Quite the opposite. He was in his element, buying drinks and playing to the crowd. You had to admire him. He could work an audience like a professional, and he was making mischief, too.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘He talked about “treasure closer to home” and said they could look forward to all kinds of revelations the next day.’ She sighed. ‘That would have been today’

  ‘What did he mean by that?’

  ‘I’ve no idea. Earlier he’d been holding court upstairs in his private apartment that we call the Bridge, receiving a steady stream of visitors. He wanted to see me as well, but my turn was coming today.’

  ‘You don’t know what it was about?’

  She shook her head. ‘I can only speculate, and you don’t want that.’

  DC Chesterton said, ‘We don’t mind you speculating, Miss Walpole. You must have known him better than anyone else.’

  She glanced across the table. Young Chesterton’s eyes were as remarkable as his voice, the colour of the sea off Crabwell on a bright May morning, and he didn’t seem aware of their power. She was willing to speculate for Chesterton. She wouldn’t need much urging to speculate about him. ‘I wondered if he’d decided to sell up. We’ve had falling sales all winter. Until this week.’

  ‘Familiar story, sadly,’ Chesterton said.

  ‘So he was depressed,’ Cole butted in.

  ‘Not at all,’ Amy said. ‘He obviously had plans for some new project. He was one of life’s survivors.’

  Cole said with a leer. ‘“Was” is the operative word.’

  Amy said, ‘I was asked for my opinion. You seem to have made up your mind he took his own life. I’m not so sure. I’ve known him three years.’

  Now Cole blinked and straightened up. ‘Do you have any evidence that he didn’t kill himself?’

  ‘Quite a bit,’ Amy said. ‘Earlier in the evening I went for a breath of fresh air along the beach. I’d been run off my feet until then, but it had gone quiet in the pub because the TV people were on a three-hour break. I happened to meet the Admiral. He was beside his boat, checking the cover, I think.’

  ‘Really? And did you speak?’

  ‘Of course. I enquired what he was doing and he said there had been too many thefts from boats. I remarked that he’d been extra busy with the visitors to the Bridge all day, and I asked if he’d spoken to Ben Milne, the TV man. He said ironically that he was reserving that pleasure for tomorrow.’

  ‘Ironically?’

  ‘He called Mr Milne a cocky young man, and he was right. Then he added that he wanted a long talk with me, but it would have to wait till the next day because he planned to get extremely drunk.’

  Cole held up a finger. ‘Got you. You’re thinking he drank himself to death.’

  ‘Not at all. I’ve seen him drunk before and he was always fine the next day. My point is that he had definite plans for today. He wasn’t suicidal.’

  ‘The facts prove otherwise,’ Cole said. ‘There was a suicide note in the boat.’

  ‘I know,’ Amy said calmly. ‘I found it and showed it to the policeman who answered the 999 call.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So I don’t believe the Admiral wrote it.’

  ‘Oh, come on,’ Cole said. ‘It’s the clincher. What are you going to tell me now – that he was illiterate?’

  ‘Couldn’t use a computer,’ Amy said. ‘The envelope was printed – “TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN” – and Fitz hadn’t the faintest idea how to work the printer. Have you seen the note?’

  ‘It’s in an evidence bag in the car. We picked it up this morning,’ Chesterton said. ‘Both the note and the envelope were computer-generated.’

  For that, he got a glare from his superior.

  ‘It’s no big deal,’ Cole said. ‘Any fool can learn how to use a computer.’

  ‘And print off a page – and an envelope as well?’ Amy said. ‘The Admiral was no fool, but he wasn’t capable of that.’

  ‘The wording couldn’t be more clear,’ Cole insisted, and did a rapid recap. ‘All the pressures getting too much, he’d had his “Last Hurrah” and was going out on a high, with apologies to anyone upset by his death. No arguing with that.’

  ‘If he actually wrote it,’ Amy said. ‘If he didn’t, your so-called clincher is a busted flush.’

  ‘We’ll see about that, Miss Walpole. We need to speak to the people who were called up to the Bridge. Did any of them tell y
ou what the Admiral wanted?’

  ‘Not one. They were remarkably tight-lipped, almost as if he’d asked them to keep a secret.’

  ‘We’ll winkle out the truth, don’t you worry. That’s our job. I’d like you to make a list of those concerned.’

  ‘I didn’t see them all. I was busy serving while it was going on.’

  ‘Jot down any you remember.’ His eyes slid upwards. ‘What was that?’

  A sound had come from upstairs.

  ‘A guest, I expect. We do let rooms, you know.’

  Ben Milne appeared at the top of the stairs. ‘How’s my breakfast coming along?’

  Amy called back, ‘I’ll tell Meriel. Is it the full works, Ben?’

  ‘With a large mug of black coffee.’

  ‘No problem.’ She turned back to the policemen. ‘That’s the TV guy, Ben Milne. Excuse me a moment.’ And she was off to the kitchen.

  Cole looked at Chesterton and muttered, ‘No problem, my arse. What about “the full works” for you and me, then?’

  Ben had come downstairs and walked straight to their table. ‘Have we met? I don’t think so. Ben Milne. Are you from the village?’

  ‘Police,’ Cole said, ‘enquiring into the death of the landlord.’

  ‘Dire, yes. Woke me up, all the comings and goings in the small hours. Why did he do that, do you suppose?’

  ‘That’s what we’re in process of finding out, sir. You’re making a TV show, I understand.’

  Ben winced as if he’d been stung. ‘A “show” it is not. This is for real. Documentary filming. We point the cameras and go with the flow. You never know what you’ll get. So far, it’s been better than I could have hoped, and now we’ve struck gold with the Admiral dying.’

  ‘Struck gold?’ Even Cole’s jaw dropped.

  ‘Put yourself in my position, filming a failing business just at the moment the head honcho tops himself. A tragedy played out as we watch. I just wish my dozy cameraman had been here last night to shoot the beach scene. We might do a mock-up, now I think about it. The boat’s still there, isn’t it?’

  Chesterton nodded. ‘But if this is a reality programme—’

  Ben was too hyped up to listen. ‘The networks will break their balls to buy this. I see world-wide sales. It’s got Emmy written all over it.’

  ‘Who’s Emmy?’ Cole asked.

  Chesterton saved him from embarrassment by saying, ‘There may be legal complications.’

  ‘How come?’ Ben asked, frowning.

  ‘If – for the sake of argument – a court case ensued from this, they could stop you from airing the programme.’

  ‘What are you on about – a court case?’

  ‘You could prejudice the legal process.’

  ‘Bugger that,’ Ben said. ‘I’m on a roll. I’m not stopping for anything. Are you going to question the witnesses? I need it all on film.’

  And now Cole waded in. ‘You can get stuffed. You’re not filming us.’

  ‘However,’ Chesterton added in an inspired moment, ‘we need a copy of every frame you’ve shot up to now. It could be crucial evidence.’

  ‘No way,’ Milne said.

  ‘No? Obstructing the police is an offence under section 66 of the Police Act, punishable with six months’ imprisonment. We need that film by noon tomorrow.’

  Cole eyed his assistant with surprise. There was more to the young man than he’d supposed.

  Ben looked at his watch. ‘You’ve buggered my schedule.’

  Amy returned with a tray bearing Ben’s breakfast: a large mug of coffee, orange juice, toast, marmalade, and a plate stacked high with bacon, egg, sausages, mushrooms, tomatoes fried bread.

  ‘I don’t have time for this,’ the TV man said. ‘I’ve just been given a whole new heap of work.’

  For a moment Amy stood holding the tray, at a loss.

  But Cole said, ‘Leave it with us, Miss Walpole. It mustn’t go to waste. Are you off the coffee as well, Mr Milne?’

  Feeling better after their fortuitous breakfast, the two detectives went upstairs to look at the Bridge, the function room adjacent to the owner’s living quarters. Presumably all the private consultations had taken place here the previous day. Dusty pictures of sailing ships crowded the walls. A dusty glass cabinet was filled with a collection of razor shells, conches, scallops, and clams. Lines of small dusty flags were suspended from the ceiling like Christmas decorations. At the far end, a huge desk that could have doubled as a poop deck was filled with as many bottles as the bar downstairs, but most were empty. There were some unwashed glasses as well. Beneath them, acting as coasters, were numerous sealed letters, some heavily stained.

  ‘From his energy supplier,’ Chesterton said, picking several up and leafing through them. ‘Gas, the bank, a brewery. Most of these look like unopened bills.’

  Cole was sitting behind the desk in the Admiral’s padded armchair under a ship’s figurehead of a topless blonde woman. ‘It just confirms the obvious. He’d given up. He was desperate.’

  ‘There’s no computer up here, and no printer. There isn’t even a filing system.’

  ‘An old-fashioned phone,’ Cole said, lifting an upturned waste-paper basket to show what was underneath. He opened the desk drawer and saw that it contained one item: a corkscrew. ‘Even his bottle-opener is out of the ark.’

  ‘Makes you wonder if Miss Walpole had a point about him being technophobic,’ Chesterton said.

  ‘Techno what?’

  ‘Unable to use a computer.’

  ‘We’ve only got her word for that,’ Cole said with irritation. ‘She told us herself his stories grew in the telling. The man was living a lie, pretending he’d spent his whole life at sea. Bloody fantasist, if you ask me. All this seaside tat around us – the stuffed swordfish and the old lamps and the ships in bottles – is just props. Anyone can pick them up in local junkshops and furnish a pub with them. In reality, I reckon he was a failed businessman or a bloody civil servant, perfectly capable of printing that suicide note. You may be sure there’s a computer somewhere in this pub.’

  ‘I spotted one downstairs, in the little office behind the bar,’ Chesterton said. ‘They’d need it to bill the overnight guests.’

  ‘There you are, then.’

  ‘But I was impressed by Miss Walpole. She’s worked with the guy for three years, and she doesn’t buy the suicide theory.’

  ‘It’s more than a theory, sunshine,’ Cole said. ‘It’s what happened. And you’d better stop being impressed with that bimbo. I saw the way she was batting her eyelashes at you. She’s the sort who picks up DCs and drops them from a great height. I’ll show you how to deal with a woman like that. Watch me when we go downstairs.’

  ‘Should we look at his living quarters first?’

  ‘If you like, but I don’t expect to find much.’

  Up a small flight of stairs they found a sitting room filled with more maritime objects (or seaside tat), as well as a sofa and armchairs. A bookcase was lined with dog-eared paperbacks by C .S. Forester and Patrick O’Brian. Beyond that was the bedroom and a small en suite.

  ‘Take a look in the medicine cabinet,’ Cole said.

  ‘What am I looking for?’

  ‘Dangerous drugs, barbiturates, sleeping tablets, anything he could overdose on.’

  After a few minutes of searching, Chesterton said. ‘Nothing at all like that.’

  ‘Proves my point,’ Cole said at once.

  ‘How?’

  ‘Obvious. He must have swallowed the bleeding lot.’

  They returned downstairs to the bar, where the sole occupant was a woman at breakfast wearing a white bathrobe and slippers and with her hair in a plastic shower cap. She stared at them in horror. ‘Oh my God, don’t look at me. I’m undressed, not made up, not for viewing. I thought it was safe to eat my scrambled egg while my hair was drying. Go away, whoever you are.’

  ‘It’s a public bar, ma’am,’ Cole informed her.

  ‘Residents o
nly at this hour.’

  ‘Do you live here, then?’

  ‘A paying guest. Go away. Vamoose. Shoo.’

  ‘We’re on an investigation.’

  ‘You’re not the…?’

  ‘We are, following up the tragic event of last night.’

  ‘Oh my God! Then if you won’t leave, I will. Don’t you dare try and stop me.’

  With that, she got up, dashed across the room and upstairs, leaving a slipper on the lowest step.

  ‘There’s your chance, Prince Charming,’ Cole said with an evil grin. ‘Why don’t you go up and see if it fits?’

  Chesterton rolled his eyes and said nothing.

  In a moment Amy Walpole returned. ‘Didn’t Ianthe finish her breakfast either? You two won’t be popular with Meriel, our cook.’

  ‘Is that who she was – Ianthe?’ Cole asked. ‘Ianthe who?’

  ‘Berkeley. Another guest. Publishing person.’

  ‘Were she and the TV man sharing a room?’

  She frowned. ‘Not unless…’ Then she reddened. ‘Is that what she told you?’

  Cole shook his head. ‘Deduction. First the man appears from upstairs, looking like the cat who found the cream, then the woman in a state of disarray.’

  ‘That’s observation, not deduction, and they had very good reasons for looking like that, unconnected with each other. Anyway, all the guest rooms are on the same landing.’

  ‘I’m broad-minded,’ Cole said. ‘The only thing that interests me is that they were both here yesterday, when the Admiral was still alive. We’ll need to question them about his state of mind.’

  ‘I keep telling you he was in excellent spirits.’

  ‘Yes, eighteen-year-old malt. There are some empties on his desk. Did he take anything to help him sleep?’

  ‘He never mentioned it.’

  ‘It makes a deadly mix, alcohol and sleeping tablets.’

  ‘He wouldn’t do that.’

  ‘There’s no denying he ended up dead, Miss Walpole. We weren’t informed that he shot himself, and I doubt if he drowned in a few inches of water.’

  ‘He might have, if he was already unconscious.’

  ‘True.’

  ‘Is concussion a possibility?’