Murder by the Sea - Libby Sarjeant Murder Mystery Series

by Lesley Cookman

  ‘Handy for the attacker. Wonder if he knew that.’

  ‘Knew that Terry wouldn’t remember?’ Jane looked startled.

  ‘Well, even I knew about post-traumatic amnesia,’ said Libby.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘I think this kind is called retrograde,’ explained Libby. ‘And if Terry remembers walking up the road, it isn’t too bad. It means he can remember events only a few minutes before the attack. Isn’t that right, Terry?’

  Terry started to nod, and winced. ‘Yeah. I saw the other kind in the army. Nasty.’

  ‘The other kind?’ Jane turned towards him.

  ‘Don’t remember anything after the attack. You get guys doing all sorts of things they wouldn’t do normally. We had one who took all his clothes off and kept calling for his mum. He didn’t know anything about it afterwards. But he couldn’t work, either.’

  Jane looked appalled. ‘I never knew.’

  ‘Most people don’t know that bit,’ said Libby, ‘but a lot of people know about the ordinary sort, where you lose the memory of what actually happened.’

  ‘What’s your point, exactly?’

  ‘Well, whoever did it, could rely on Terry not being able to give evidence about it.’

  ‘But I should remember eventually,’ said Terry. ‘The doc said.’

  ‘When it’s too late, though,’ said Libby. ‘What have the police said?’

  ‘That’s a bit odd, actually.’ Terry tried to push himself up against the pillows and Jane rushed to help. ‘This flat was searched.’

  ‘I know,’ said Jane. ‘I gave them my key.’

  ‘Not by the police,’ said Terry.

  ‘You mean –?’ Jane was shocked.

  ‘They’d already used your keys before Mike came along, then.’ Libby nodded to herself. ‘But what about Mrs Finch? She’d only just been out with her bin, Jane tells me, and you weren’t on the steps then.’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Terry’s face was losing colour. ‘But someone searched my flat.’

  ‘Was anything taken?’

  ‘Don’t know.’ Terry closed his eyes and Jane frowned at Libby.

  ‘OK.’ Libby stood up. ‘Can I do anything else for you, Jane? If not, I’ll be off home before it gets dark.’

  Jane smiled in relief. ‘No, nothing, thanks, Libby. It was so good of you to come.’

  ‘Yeah, thanks,’ said Terry, briefly opening his eyes.

  ‘There’s something odd about this,’ said Libby quietly, as Jane saw her to the front door.

  Jane nodded. ‘I know. I’ll see if he knows anything else in the morning. He needs to rest now.’ She looked down at her hands. ‘Um – you’re suspicious of Mike, aren’t you?’

  ‘Perhaps I shouldn’t be, but it all strikes me as a bit odd and coincidental,’ said Libby. ‘Although I can’t for the life of me think why Mike should steal from Terry, or what he might want to find in his flat.’

  ‘But you think he took the flat deliberately?’

  ‘Well, maybe. But that would mean he knew Terry already, and that he lived here. If so, why hadn’t he tried to burgle him before?’

  Jane looked up quickly. ‘There was a burglary before,’ she said.

  ‘Really? When?’

  ‘Ages ago. Before I moved in here. I should have said attempted burglary, because no one actually got in. The front door had been jemmied, but that was it. The police thought whoever it was had been disturbed.’

  ‘So only Mrs Finch and Terry were here, then?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So it looks as though it’s Terry they’re after?’

  ‘They?’

  ‘Whoever it is, then,’ said Libby impatiently. ‘Have you told the police about this?’

  Jane shrugged her shoulders and spread her hands. ‘Tell them what? This is pure speculation, Libby.’ She looked uncomfortable as she said this, and Libby realised belatedly that she was doing it again. Pushing her nose in where it wasn’t wanted and putting two and two together and making a hundred and five.

  ‘Yes, you’re right.’ She sighed. ‘It’s the amateur detective in me. I can’t seem to stop.’

  ‘If I had my newspaper hat on, I’d be after that story like a jack-rabbit,’ said Jane, with a little laugh, ‘but in real life, I’d have to say it looks like complete fantasy.’

  ‘And it’s how rumours start,’ agreed Libby, nodding. ‘Say that to anybody else, and it turns into Chinese whispers, and the next thing you know is poor Mike being hounded out of town.’

  ‘Exactly.’ Jane leaned forward and gave Libby an unexpected kiss on the cheek. ‘Thanks so much for coming. I promise I’ll ask Terry if he knows anything else in the morning and let you know.’

  ‘If you’re sure,’ said Libby. ‘And now I’d better go.’

  She walked back up to the car park, now almost empty in the gathering twilight, and looked out over Nethergate bay. From here, she could see The Alexandria just below and to her left, then further down The Swan on the town square, then Harbour Street, and The Sloop overlooking the harbour itself. To her right, where the open fields of the Tops used to be, the edge of the new estate and the beginning of Canongate Drive, where Ben’s friend old Jim lived.

  Libby peered down at the people strolling along the promenade and Harbour Street, lit by the fairy lights, and wondered if Guy and Fran were down there. She had a sudden desire for normality and safety, turned hurriedly and got into the car.

  ‘What’s the name of Jane’s house?’ Fran asked Libby over the phone on Sunday morning.

  ‘The name? Has it got one?’

  ‘It’s only a short terrace, and each one has a name on the stone lintel above the door. Didn’t you notice?’

  ‘No, can’t say I did. Why do you want to know?’

  ‘If I said I wanted to send flowers you wouldn’t believe me, would you?’

  ‘No,’ said Libby baldly.

  ‘I thought not,’ said Fran with a sigh. ‘I wanted to look it up on the internet, that’s all.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘To find out why I’ve got this feeling about it.’

  ‘Perhaps you were doing what’s-it-called, precognition? About Terry’s accident?’

  ‘No. I’d have seen it, wouldn’t I? Or felt something about him, rather than the house.’

  ‘Right,’ said Libby, grudgingly. ‘So you’re going to investigate this, rather than our body?’

  Fran sighed again. ‘No, Libby. I just want to know if the house has a history, that’s all. But if you don’t know, I’ll take a walk up there and see what the name is myself.’

  ‘Will you see Jane?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so. She’ll have her hands full with Terry, won’t she? How was he?’

  Libby told her what had happened the previous day, reluctantly including her own suspicions, and eventual retractions. Fran laughed.

  ‘You’re learning,’ she said.

  Switching off the phone, Libby looked thoughtfully at her own computer. If Fran was going to do it, so could she.

  She was checking emails before searching for any reference to Cliff Terrace when her phone rang again.

  ‘Libby, it’s Jane.’

  ‘Hello,’ said Libby, surprised that after yesterday Jane would have called, despite her promise. ‘How’s Terry?’

  ‘Much better,’ said Jane, and Libby wondered if she was blushing. ‘Mind you, he was awake at six. Hospital conditioning.’ She gave a little laugh.

  ‘Good job you stayed down there, then,’ said Libby.

  ‘Er, yes.’ Jane cleared her throat and Libby grinned. ‘What I wanted to tell you, though, was that one of the policemen came round earlier. Terry asked if I could stay while they talked, and afterwards I told Terry I wanted to tell you. He didn’t mind.’

  ‘Oh, right.’ Now Libby was even more surprised.

  ‘Apparently, it turns out that they think Terry was mugged much earlier than when Mike found him.’

  ‘How could that be?’ asked
Libby. ‘Why didn’t Mrs Finch see him?’

  ‘They seem to think he was in the hall. They found traces of blood. Then he was dumped outside on the steps.’

  ‘And his flat was searched while he was unconscious in the hall?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So do they think he was dragged outside to make it look like a random mugging?’ said Libby.

  ‘Yes, that’s it exactly, but listen, that’s not all.’ Jane paused and Libby bit her lip in frustration.

  ‘Well, what?’ she said.

  ‘It was searched again this week!’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I know. Unbelievable, or what? It must have happened when everyone except Mrs Finch was out. Well, obviously Terry was, but when Mike and I were at work, or maybe when I was at the hospital and Mike was out. I know he goes to The Swan to eat most evenings. That’s where he’d been on Monday night.’

  ‘So how do they know?’

  ‘They’d secured the door, they had to come and unlock it yesterday for Terry to come home and that’s when they discovered it.’

  ‘But discovered what, exactly? Was the room trashed, or what?’

  ‘No, this detective said that both times you would hardly know anything was wrong, except that the first time a couple of drawers and cupboards had been forced – and window frames, oddly. Then yesterday, obviously their own arrangements had been disturbed and there were other tell-tale signs in the flat.’ Jane sighed. ‘So it looks like you were right, after all.’

  ‘That someone’s after Terry, you mean?’

  ‘Yes. That seems to be the way the police are thinking, anyway. But they can’t find out why, and Terry doesn’t know. He hasn’t got a record, he was in the army and had nothing to do with this area until he got his job.’

  ‘Did you find out why he came here?’

  ‘I think,’ said Jane slowly, ‘that he came here with a girl.’

  ‘Ah.’

  ‘Yes. I don’t want to question him about it, though. It’s not my place.’

  ‘No, of course not,’ said Libby, grinning.

  ‘Anyway, I thought you’d like to know,’ said Jane. ‘If Terry thinks of anything else, he says I can tell you.’

  ‘That’s good of him, but why?’

  ‘He knows all about your other cases. I told him. And he likes you.’

  ‘Does he?’ Libby found herself smiling. ‘That’s nice.’

  ‘He said –’ Libby heard Jane take a deep breath ‘– you’d brought us together.’

  ‘Aaah!’ Wisely, Libby refrained from making a triumphant comment, but saved it up to repeat to Fran. ‘Well, that’s lovely, and now I mustn’t keep you from him.’

  ‘Oh, it’s OK, he’s sleeping. He’s going to get up when he wakes, and I’m going to do a proper Sunday roast.’ Jane sounded so cheerful, Libby could hardly reconcile her with the rather mousey creature she’d met a couple of weeks earlier.

  ‘What number Cliff Terrace are you, by the way? I think Fran was thinking of sending flowers? Or has the house got a name?’ Libby privately congratulated herself on this strategy.

  ‘There’s really no need,’ said Jane, ‘but it’s very nice of her. It’s got both actually, number two and Peel House. Melbourne, Peel, Palmerston and Disraeli, all Victorian prime ministers. They were built while Disraeli was in office I think, or there might have been one more – Gladstone.’

  ‘Or Salisbury,’ said Libby, ‘and even Russell. He was before Peel, wasn’t he?’

  ‘Oh, goodness, I don’t know,’ said Jane. ‘Anyway. That’s it. I think there’s even a piece about it in an online magazine about Nethergate.’

  After ringing off, Libby could hardly wait to track down the magazine article Jane mentioned. Peel House itself was slightly more difficult, as there seemed to be a plethora of Peel Houses all over the web, but eventually Libby found the Nethergate online magazine, and sure enough, a short article about Cliff Terrace, which had originally been called Victoria Place, apparently. When the town expanded, the promenade, being more important, was renamed Victoria Place, and Cliff Terrace given its new name.

  The phone rang again.

  ‘Found it,’ said Fran.

  ‘So have I,’ said Libby.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’ve found Peel House on the internet. Jane just called to tell me something about Terry and his accident and told me the name so I looked it up. I’ve got it in front of me.’

  ‘What, exactly?’

  ‘Peel House second in a terrace of four named Cliff Terrace.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Well, that’s more or less all,’ said Libby. ‘Why? What have you found?’

  ‘Peel House was owned by Jessica Maurice –’

  ‘We know that,’ interrupted Libby, ‘she was Jane’s aunt.’

  ‘Jessica Maurice,’ continued Fran, ‘the wartime mistress of Fascist sympathiser and Mosley follower Simon Madderling.’

  Chapter Nineteen

  LIBBY GASPED. ‘GOLLY,’ SHE said.

  ‘Do you know anything about him?’ asked Fran.

  ‘No, but I know about Mosley, obviously. Must have been famous, this Simon – what did you say? – Madeleine?’

  ‘Madderling. Yes, he was. At the time, anyway. I’d heard of him vaguely, but there’s a whole potted history of him on the net. You can look him up yourself.’

  ‘Hold on,’ said Libby, and typed the name into the search engine with one hand. Sure enough, pages of results came up.

  ‘If you go to the second site listed, you’ll see,’ said Fran. ‘That’s the one that mentions Jane’s aunt, but it looks as though this wasn’t made public until very recently.’

  Libby, scanning the article quickly, said, ‘How did you come up with the connection to the house? I mean, does it say anywhere “Jessica Maurice, owner of Peel House, mistress of etc etc.”?’

  ‘No. I put in Peel House followed by Jessica Maurice and came up with various hits, but none together. It’s easy enough to follow, though, if you happen to want to know.’

  ‘And you did?’

  ‘Well, of course.’ Fran sounded much happier than she had for some time, thought Libby. ‘I knew there was something about that house, and this is it. I would bet that Madderling bought that house for Jessica during the war. I was also sure, and this is actually what I found out about Jessica herself, that she was some sort of government agent. Madderling disappeared in ’43, I think, and was never traced. The popular theories were that he’d been disposed of by the British government or the fascist fraternity.’

  ‘But I thought the fascists were all imprisoned during the war?’ said Libby.

  ‘Not all of them. The high flyers, were, of course, like Oswald and Diana Mosley and the members of the Right Club.’

  ‘The Right Club? What was that?’

  ‘Hang on – here we are – “The main object of the Right Club was to oppose and expose the activities of Organized Jewry”.’

  ‘Good God!’ gasped Libby.

  ‘That’s what Fascism was, basically. Extreme right. Anyway, you know enough about Fascism to know about Cable Street and William Joyce and stuff –’

  ‘Lord Haw Haw?’

  ‘Yes. Anyway, it turns out that Madderling was an MI5 agent who infiltrated the Right Club. There were others, Joan Miller for one.’

  ‘Who she?’

  ‘A former deb. There were lots of them working for the government in one capacity or other. From what I can piece together, she and Jessica were friends.’

  ‘So that’s why you think she was an agent, too?’

  ‘It seems logical, doesn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, it does. Jane doesn’t know any of this, does she?’

  ‘No, I’m pretty sure she doesn’t,’ said Fran. ‘I told you when I asked her what her aunt did and how did she afford the house, she said she’d never thought about it. She said there’d been some talk in the family about a man during the war, but that was it.’

  ‘And t
his man was what’s-his-name?’

  ‘Simon Madderling.’

  ‘Well.’ Libby sat back in her chair and drummed her fingers on the table. ‘That’s all very interesting, but why do you think that’s why you had one of your moments about the house?’

  ‘I’m not quite sure yet, but it stands to reason, doesn’t it, that a house with that sort of history will have some kind of event attached to it?’

  ‘Ye-es,’ said Libby slowly.

  ‘Well, it does,’ said Fran firmly.

  ‘Have an event?’

  ‘I’m certain of it,’ said Fran, once again sounding so much like her old self that Libby almost cheered.

  ‘That’s a definite, then,’ said Libby. ‘And does it link with the attack on Terry?’

  ‘Ah, now that I’m not sure about. It certainly wasn’t the event that drew me to the house, but it doesn’t exactly feel out of kilter.’

  ‘I’m not sure I understood all that,’ said Libby. ‘Was it a yes or no?’

  ‘A maybe,’ said Fran.

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Anyway,’ said Fran, ‘what about Terry? You said Jane called this morning?’

  Libby recounted the conversation with Jane, adding her own questions to Terry from the previous evening. She also included the positive comments on her matchmaking.

  ‘Told you so,’ she concluded. ‘Matchmaker extraordinaire, that’s me!’

  ‘You said there was an attempted burglary before?’ asked Fran, ignoring this.

  ‘Yes,’ Libby sighed. ‘That’s why I thought – and so do the police, apparently – it must have something to do with Terry.’

  ‘Hmm,’ said Fran.

  ‘Hmm what?’

  ‘I don’t know. Let me work on it.’

  ‘You’ve obviously been working on it for some time already.’

  ‘Since yesterday evening,’ said Fran.

  ‘Wow. But you only asked me about Peel House this morning.’

  ‘I started researching Jessica last night.’

  ‘So you got all that stuff about the Right Club then?’

  ‘Some of it,’ said Fran.

  ‘Right. Oh, and by the way, in order to obtain the information you didn’t want –’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘The name of Peel House.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Fran.