Shades of Murder

by Ann Granger

  'So you didn't like him and he caused trouble,' Markby said, heavy-hearted. 'He was a threat.'

  'We disliked him intensely and he was trouble from the moment we first heard about him. However,' Damaris added with an unexpected note of humour in her voice, 'we didn't bump him off.'

  Markby passed over this and said, 'The cause of death appears to be poisoning. At the moment, no one is suggesting it was anything other than accidental. Still, we need to find the source of it. Probably we'll have to search the house.'

  SHADES OF MURDER

  Both his listeners looked stunned.

  It was Florence who asked in a shaky voice, 'What sort of poison, Alan?'

  'We don't know yet. Dr Painter is still conducting tests. So we ask you not to broadcast the fact for now.'

  'We're hardly likely to!' riposted Damaris drily, rallying.

  'Would it be possible to see his room?' Markby asked her.

  'Of course. I'll take you up there. It's the turret room.'

  'I'll stay here,' said Florence. 'I don't like that room. I never go in there. It's where our grandmother, poor Cora, died, you know.'

  Markby, who'd started to walk to the door, turned in surprise. 'Cora Oakley? That was her room?'

  'Yes. Some say it's haunted. It's certainly always very cold in there. We've never seen anything, of course.'

  'Right. ..' said Markby faintly.

  He followed Damaris up the creaking old staircase, taking a good look around him as he did. Juliet Painter had made a shrewd judgement on the saleability of Fourways. It was in a dismal state. Apart from the electrical wiring which would want replacing, he was sure the roof must leak. He sniffed. There might be dry rot. Dust, dampness, decay. He wondered what Jan had thought when he first saw it.

  'Here!' said Damaris baldly, throwing open a door.

  Markby stepped inside. Florence had been right. It was cold in here despite the sunshine outside. A scattering of spent matches in the grate by the gasfire testified to Jan's efforts to warm the place up. In the centre of the floor was a blue and red Turkey carpet. In the gap between carpet and walls the floor was covered with ancient cracked linoleum. There was a brass bedstead neatly made up, presumably, by Jan himself. There was a chest of drawers, an old-fashioned marble-topped washstand, but no jug or basin, a chair and a large wardrobe designed to house the voluminous garments of another age. A dressing table didn't match the rest. It was kidney shaped with a cretonne frill in front of it and a 1940s' Utility look to it. He suspected it had been brought in here from elsewhere in the house for Jan's benefit. On it, some of the bottles lying on their sides, was a jumble of men's toiletries. He picked one up and saw it was an expensive brand. Perhaps, after all, Jan had been into black-marketeering in Poland.

  Markby turned round. Damaris was standing patiently in the doorway. He gave her an apologetic smile and went to the wardrobe. Inside hung a meagre collection of clothes. He searched briefly through pockets. He

  ANN GRANGER

  found a Polish passport, an identity card, one of those cheaply printed little paper slips showing a luridly coloured picture of the Virgin and a few lines of prayer in Polish, some loose change and a wallet with English paper money, amounting in all to about sixty pounds. It seemed likely it was all Jan had.

  'Do you mind?' he asked Damaris. 'I need to take all this away. I'll give you a receipt and in due course, you'll get it back.'

  'We don't want it. We don't want any of it,' she said stonily.

  Markby tried the drawers of the chest. In the top left-hand one was Jan's return air ticket to Poland. Jan had given himself a month to achieve his aims. He probably reckoned that was as long as the sisters would allow him to impose on them. In a stiffened envelope of the sort used to send photographs by mail, he found a sepia portrait of a handsome, moustached gentleman standing with his hand on the shoulder of a well-corseted female whose silk dress couldn't disguise her peasant ancestry. Her features were coarse, her gaze sharp and bigoted. The man's gaze both mocked and challenged the photographer. 'I know what you are thinking,' it said. 'But I care nothing for you. I have what I want.' His stance, hand on shoulder of the woman, held no affection only triumphant possession. Across the corner of the stiff card was stamped, in letters once gilded but now dull brown, Photographien Hable, Krakau. Otherwise the drawers held a few items of underclothing and socks. Jan had travelled light. Markby glanced round and located the rucksack described by Meredith, poking out above the carved wooden pediment of the wardrobe. He pulled it down, dislodging a good deal of dust. It was empty but for one of those sealed packets of scented wipes airlines hand out to passengers to clean themselves up.

  All in all, these were the belongings of a poor man, yet a man vain enough to want luxury toiletries and spending more on them than he could afford. The whole confirmed what Markby already suspected. Jan hadn't been any kind of mafioso. Jan had been a man seeking his fortune, a poor man persuaded that he might obtain riches. Or at least, enough money to enable him to return to Poland a good deal better off than when he left it.

  Only one thing remained unexplored in the room. That was a curious item. It was a picture, hanging on the wall above the fireplace but covered with an embroidered strip of cloth.

  Markby looked at Damaris. 'May I?'

  She nodded. He went to it and pulled the cloth away. The face in the oil painting leapt to view, larger, in full colour, but essentially the same

  SHADES OF MURDER

  as the face in the photograph. A sardonic painted gaze met his, set in a handsome, untrustworthy face. The mouth and chin, he thought, were cruel. The sitter could only be one person.

  'Is this a portrait of William Oakley?'

  'That's him,' said Damaris. T put it there for Jan. I thought they ought to be together.' Again an unexpected flicker of amusement. 'It was the one thing in the entire house which I might have given him. He could have had that, taken it back to Poland, with pleasure.'

  Markby peered closely at the portrait. William's left hand lay on a book. He hoped it wasn't the Bible, which would have been a detail of high hypocrisy. It wasn't a Bible. Whatever it was, the title was painted in brief strokes on the spine. Markby squinted and distinguished, through the varnish, BR-D—W.

  'Bradshaw!' he exclaimed. 'Did you realise that?' he asked Damaris. 'Your grandfather's hand is resting on a compendium of railway timetables.'

  'Is it, indeed?' returned Damaris. T hope William took it with him when he left here. He'll have needed it.'

  Markby stepped outside the house and breathed in deeply. He felt chilled and was grateful for the midday sun playing on his face. The interior of Fourways was as oppressive as it had ever been, or perhaps it had been the turret room which had affected him like this. He didn't believe in ghosts but there had been a definite feeling of unhappiness in that room. He looked around him.

  As Juliet had told them, the garden was in a better state of upkeep than the interior of the house. The lawns were mown, hedges clipped. Flowerbeds near the house were in good order. Markby's gardener's soul appreciated all of this. One day, he thought wistfully, he'd have a garden like this. At the moment he was restricted to a patio and a greenhouse and had little enough time to attend to those. He set off on a voyage of exploration. Turning the corner of a yew hedge clipped into castellations - a labour of love if ever there was one - he found himself face to face with a neat oldish man wearing a cardigan, well-pressed trousers and, incongruously, gumboots.

  For a moment they stared at one another. Then the man announced, 'Gladstone!'

  'Victorian Prime Minister,' said Markby promptly.

  'No, I'm Gladstone!' snapped the other. 'Ron Gladstone. I take care of the garden.'

  ANN GRANGER

  'Ah yes, of course. I congratulate you. It looks splendid.'

  Gladstone looked mollified but still asked sharply, 'Who are you?'

  'Superintendent Markby,' Alan obligingly fished out his warrant card and passed it over.

&
nbsp; The gardener took it and inspected it closely before returning it. 'I have to ask who strangers are,' he said. 'We get all sorts wandering in and out here, you know.'

  'Do you, indeed?' said Markby, showing interest. 'What do they want?'

  'Half of them are just curious. The other half are up to no good, I dare say. I've caught that fellow Newman prowling round here a few times.'

  'Dudley Newman?' Markby asked in surprise. The man was a well-known local builder.

  'I could guess his game,' said Ron sourly.

  So could Markby. He looked round him and felt a spurt of anger. Was it necessary to build over everything? No doubt Newman had got wind of the impending sale and scented profit. If he could buy the land cheap, he could cover it with little brick boxes.

  'There are no gates, you see,' Ron was saying. 'Some people seem to think this is a public park. I've had people in here walking their dogs!' The gardener's face grew red at the memory. T caught a woman here only the other day with a poodle. It was fouling the grass. I had a few words with her, you can believe! I told her to be off and take the dog's mess with her. I gave her a paper bag and my trowel and made her scrape it up. Sometimes, you know,' Ron went on confidentially, 'they're abusive, are dog owners. But I don't stand no nonsense.'

  'Quite right, too. I'd like to see the garden, if you don't mind.'

  Ron was only too pleased to show him around and they set off across the lower lawn.

  'There's a lot I could do here, but well, the ladies won't have it. They're very conservative in gardening matters. You'll have noticed that eyesore in front of the house? That stone basin with a statue in it?'

  'The fountain? Yes.'

  'It's not a fountain if it doesn't work,' argued Ron. 'And it doesn't work. I said to them, "I'll make you a nice new water feature. A nice little pond with an electric pump sending up a jet." If they wanted a fat baby in the middle of it, they could have one. You can get them in plaster or even better, in fibreglass. You can clean up that easier. But they won't hear of it.' He shook his head sadly.

  Markby murmured sympathetically and they walked on for a moment or two in silence. Eventually Ron cleared his throat.

  SHADES OF MURDER

  T can't say I'm surprised to see you. The police, I mean.'

  'Oh? Why is that?'

  'It'll be to do with that fellow who called himself Jan Oakley, won't it? Something funny about his death, I dare say. It wouldn't surprise me. He was up to no good, I saw that the minute I set eyes on him. Strange sort of chap. Bit dotty, if you ask me.'

  Markby did ask him.

  'Why?' Ron snorted. 'Because he kept saying he owned the house or part of the house. How could he?'

  'And what makes you so certain he was up to no good?'

  Ron hesitated. 'Because he snooped. As a matter of fact, I'd like to tell you about it. It's been on my mind. I don't like to mention it to the ladies, you see. Upset them.'

  'Tell me,' Markby invited.

  They had stopped near a ramshackle stone building, apparently some kind of potting shed or garden store. Ron cleared his throat and took a moment to sort out his words. 'It was the day he was took sick and carted off to hospital. It was Saturday and normally I don't come at the weekend but since he turned up I've been uneasy in my mind about those two women here on their own with him. In the early afternoon, the ladies went shopping. Kenny Joss came and fetched them in his taxi. He comes once a week regularly and takes them into town. Off they went and I was here in the garden. As it happens, I was tidying up the yew hedge by the gate where I met you just now. I needed to oil my shears Ron told Markby how he had spied Jan, through the study window, tinkering with the roll-top desk and searching through its contents.

  T didn't want to upset the ladies so I thought I'd have a strong word with the fellow myself when I got the chance. You might say I had the chance almost at once because he came down the drive not long after. He'd smartened himself up, not before time. He said he was going out to tea with some woman. He was probably making that up. Anyhow, I hadn't worked out what I wanted to say to him so I let him go on by. Never saw him alive again, of course, so I was saved the trouble.'

  'So you weren't here when he returned?'

  Ron blinked and shook his head vigorously. 'What did he die of?' he asked. 'Drink and drugs, was it?'

  'We haven't released the details yet. Why do you think drink and drugs?'

  'That's what it always seems to be these days, in my newspaper, anyway.'

  ANN GRANGER

  Markby knew he'd have to go back to the house and tell the sisters straight away of Jan's interest in the study. He was sorry for it because he knew Ron was right in saying it would upset them. But it couldn't be helped. He had to know what Jan was after - supposing that he was looking for something in particular and not just being nosy. Perhaps he'd been searching for something which might support his extraordinary claim to a share in the house? At least the sisters' opinion of Jan wouldn't suffer. He was already as low in their estimation as he could sink.

  'However he died, he's no loss!' said Ron Gladstone briskly, summing up the general view.

  Markby thanked him for his information and the tour of the garden and set off back towards the house.

  He thought, as he approached, that the best way to come upon it was from the garden. Seen like this, it had a quaint, theatrical air to it with its Gothic windows and carved waterspouts. The Oakleys were surprised to see him again so soon and took his explanation with some dismay but otherwise stoically. Damaris took him to the study without delay.

  Markby, as Damaris searched through her keyring, inspected the dusty shelves. Leather-bound copies of the classics jostled county histories, once-popular novels by writers long forgotten, tales of travel throughout the world and adventures in the British Empire, bound copies of the Strand magazine and Punch together with other, defunct magazines. No one had arranged or, presumably, catalogued the books. Amongst them might lurk a few treasures. Diffidently, he mentioned this to Damaris.

  As he'd expected, she showed little interest. 'I doubt it, Alan. Most of it is old stuff belonging to my father. He was a great reader, especially after he became wheelchair-bound.'

  She'd found the key she needed and pushed it into the lock of the roll-top desk. This was my grandfather's desk, William - the cause of all our troubles! His initials are on it here, see? In gilt, a bit knocked about, but you can just make out WPO - William Price Oakley. It doesn't surprise me to learn that Jan was prying into things in here. It is the sort of behaviour I'd have expected of him. I doubt he could have found anything of interest, though, unless he wanted to read old letters or check old household bills.'

  The top rolled back with a protesting squeak. 'It's typical of Ron Gladstone to keep it to himself in case we were upset,' Damaris went on. 'He's a kind man even if he does have wild ideas about the garden. We have to keep him in check or I don't know what he'd create out there. Has he told you about the water feature he wants to install?'

  SHADES OF MURDER

  Markby admitted this.

  'He tells everyone!' said Damans. 'Well, there you are.'

  Markby gazed at the higgledy-piggledy contents revealed. 'Is this as it was when you last saw it?'

  'More or less,' Damaris said. 'Half of this stuff could be thrown out but you know how it is, one just goes on stuffing things in.' She reached out and picked up a package of tattered envelopes tied together with red ribbon. 'These are my brother Arthur's last letters. My parents kept them and so we kept them. But no one will be interested after we're gone. Perhaps I should burn them.'

  'Don't be hasty,' Markby urged her. 'Sometimes old letters are of interest to a museum.'

  He had said the wrong thing. Damaris stiffened. 'I don't think I'd care to have our family's private correspondence read by all and sundry, thank you!'

  He didn't point out that Jan might have read them. Instead, Markby said, 'Perhaps you could check through and see if anything is missing or
shows signs of being tampered with.'

  Damaris pulled out the chair and gazed baffled at the assortment of papers.

  'Take your time,' he urged her. Til just sit over here, if I may, and wait.'

  He settled on the chesterfield as Damaris began to work methodically through the pigeonholes, pausing now and then to peer at something or occasionally just lose herself in thought as some old memory was prompted. Eventually she had finished. She had put aside two long envelopes and now turned to him with these in her hand.

  T think he may have looked at these. The envelopes were unsealed, but now they're sealed. He probably read the contents and then stuck the flaps down so that if he were tackled, he could deny it.'

  'May I ask what they contain?' Markby got up and came to join her. 'Just generally.'

  'I've no objection to your knowing and I dare say Florence won't have, either. They contain our wills. Your sister drew them up for us a few years ago. They're very simple, nothing to interest Jan. We each leave everything to the surviving one. If I go first, Florence has it all. If Florence precedes me, then her share becomes mine. We have no one else.' She looked up, doubt in her face. 'That would have been of very little interest to Jan, wouldn't it? After all, he surely didn't think we would change our wills to accommodate him?'

  ANN GRANGER

  'He may have been planning to try and persuade you . . . yes, I think it very likely. He would first need to find out exactly what the present provisions were - whether anyone else were a beneficiary and likely to protest if the wills were changed. I dare say he was satisfied to find out there was no one else in his way.' Markby felt a pang of contrition. Tm sorry to speak about your relative like this. It can't make things any easier for you.'