Change For The Worse

by Elizabeth Lemarchand

  ‘What a ghastly story,’ Pollard said with feeling, his mind assimilating the facts and reaching out to their possible relevance to the present. ‘And Alix has been brought up by her grandparents. I suppose she’s about eighteen now?’

  ‘Eighteen in August. All this happened in 1960. The Ridleys hushed it up as far as they could, of course, but I’m a very old friend. The ironic part is that although they tried hard to avoid the same mistake over Alix, and have given her a comparatively democratic upbringing, she’s showing unmistakeable signs of kicking over the traces in her turn, only in the opposite direction. The contemporary social conscience, you know. And the child’s quite obviously in love with the nice but rather dull Kit Peck. He teaches in a slum school and didn’t go to a public school himself, although he won a scholarship to Oxford. Poor Katharine is distraught. She’s coming over to lunch with me today to pour out her troubles. She’s just as static as ever, poor darling, without realising it for a moment... I’m afraid I haven’t been very much help to you, have I?’

  ‘On the contrary, you’ve done valuable filling-in for me,’ Pollard assured her. ‘It was only last Monday that I first heard of the people we’ve been talking about. I’m grateful to you.’

  ‘I don’t know that it’ll get you much further,’ Lady Boyd-Calthrop replied bluntly. ‘However, I’m glad to have been of some little use. I simply cannot stomach Francis Peck’s death.’

  On leaving the Dower House Pollard drove through Clearwell St Philip and on to the next village. Here he stopped at a telephone kiosk and put through a call to Scotland Yard. He asked for immediate enquiries to be made from the Paris police about the death of Geoffrey Parr in May or June 1960.

  ‘The essential thing I want to get on to,’ he explained, ‘is who identified his body. My information is that he was yanked out of the Seine. I’ll ring you back after lunch.’

  Back on the road again he experienced a sense of anti-climax. Even if I can make Mrs Ridley admit that she was being blackmailed by Geoffrey Parr alias George Palmer, he thought, will it turn out to be completely irrelevant to this bloody case?

  Chapter 9

  Toye had spent the period of Pollard’s visit to Lady Boyd-Calthrop in systematically checking and rearranging the contents of the case file. He now sat listening to the account of the interview with head slightly inclined, an attentive owl in his large horn-rims.

  ‘If it was Helen Parr who identified the body,’ Pollard summed up, ‘all things considered, it strikes me as just possible that it wasn’t her husband’s, and that George Palmer could have been Geoffrey Parr. If somebody else identified it, it probably was Parr’s all right. Reverting to Palmer, his passport showed that he’d been in South Africa. If he was Parr, he may not even have known that Helen was dead, having walked out on her a couple of months before she died, according to Lady B-C. The fact that he went to the Wellchester Information Bureau and got a pamphlet about Fairlynch suggests that he’d heard something about its now being open to the public, and wanted to check up. Add to this his cross-examination of Alix, it seems to me conclusive that he’d been out of touch at any rate for a considerable time. Therefore he can’t have had a local buddy who’d be prepared to muck up “Pictures for Pleasure” at the drop of a hat. On the other hand, a resurrected Geoffrey Parr would have had scope for blackmailing Mrs Ridley.’

  ‘Are you going to tackle her about Palmer’s identity?’ Toye asked.

  Pollard hesitated. ‘If somebody other than Helen identified the body, no. If she did — well, I haven’t decided yet that Palmer’s identity isn’t relevant to our case as far as I can see. I’ll put it to the AC, of course, but I think he’ll agree that there wouldn’t be much point in stirring up ancient mud, now that both Helen Parr and Palmer are dead.’

  Toye remarked that the late Detective Chief Superintendent Crowe, Pollard’s first mentor in the CID, and something of a legend at the Yard, always used to say that you couldn’t hope to get to the bottom of a difficult case until you’d cleared the ground.

  ‘This is it,’ Pollard said. ‘I’ve never been able to get that dictum of the old boy’s out of my system. All the same, we’ll shelve Palmer-Parr pro tem, and concentrate on our two remaining leads: unsupported statements from Tom Basing and Hugo Rossiter about their movements last Saturday night. Did you ring the landlord of the Spireford pub?’

  Toye had. A snack would be laid on in the landlord’s quarters if Superintendent Pollard cared to call in.

  ‘How about Rossiter?’ he asked.

  ‘I wish I knew,’ Pollard sat scowling heavily. ‘We know motive’s a dirty word in our shop, but unless the chap’s round the bend and no one’s even noticed it, what conceivable motive could he have for mucking up “Pictures for Pleasure”? As to opportunity, I suppose he could have got back to Spireford far enough ahead of Gilmore and the others to dump his car somewhere and arrive at the Manor at the same time or soon after, and slip in by making a row in the garden or something which would bring Peck out again after Gilmore had gone. But even then, there’s the library key problem.’

  ‘He’d been working there a lot hanging the pictures. Mrs Peck said her husband never let the key out of his possession, but there might have been the odd chance of taking an impression, don’t you think?’

  ‘The argument against that is that it suggests the job was carefully worked out in advance,’ Pollard said, ‘while it seems much more like something done almost on the spur of the moment. Hence the Peck tragedy. Look here, I suppose Gilmore wasn’t involved too? Suppose he called out to Peck just as he was driving off, and got him to come across to the car, leaving the front door open? Rossiter could have slipped in then. It wouldn’t have taken more than a minute, and Gilmore could still have passed the lodge and got home when he had witnesses to say he did... This is pure theorising without a vestige of data, isn’t it? Old Man Crowe would have hit the roof. What we could do, after researching into Basing’s activities on Saturday night, is to see how long it would have taken Rossiter to get up to the front door of the Manor after arriving home from the party. There’s a door on to the road from the bottom of the Fairlynch garden: I remember noticing it. You go out that way to the water garden on the other side. We’d better push off to the pub now.’

  They arrived at The Waggoner in Spireford at half-past one. The bar was crowded, and curious eyes followed their progress in the wake of the landlord, Bob Pedlar, to a door at the rear. He escorted them to a small room with a table laid for a meal, and promised to return shortly with a couple of pints of Waggoner Special.

  ‘The Scotland Yard gentlemen for a bit of lunch, Elsie,’ he shouted in the direction of the open kitchen door before disappearing.

  Mrs Pedlar, a fair woman with rosy cheeks hurried in to say that she would have a dish of ham and eggs on the table in two twos if the gentlemen would take a seat. Pollard recognised something familiar in her face, but for the moment could not place her. Before he could consult Toye, Bob Pedlar was back with the Special, announcing that he’d be glad to tell them anything he could when he had cleared everyone out at two o’clock. All Spireford was up in arms about poor Mr Peck.

  The ham and eggs were whisked on to the table, and they were instructed to give her a shout when they were ready for their afters.

  ‘I should think it’s about a hundred to one that Basing’s a non-starter, but anyway we’re getting some decent country grub,’ Pollard remarked, helping himself liberally. ‘I’m sure I’ve seen Mrs Pedlar before somewhere. Does she ring a bell with you?’

  Toye agreed that she had a look of somebody, but he could not place her either. They ate heartily, the ham and eggs being followed by rhubarb pie and cream and a pot of tea. A door slammed and sounds of revving up came from the car park. Finally Bob Pedlar’s head came round the door.

  ‘You gentlemen mind if I bring my plate in along o’ you?’ he asked.

  ‘We’d be glad,’ Pollard assured him. Bring yourself a pint of the Special with it. Wh
at about Mrs Pedlar?’

  ‘She’ll be along presently.’

  ‘Well, bring something for her, then.’

  As soon as Bob Pedlar was installed at the table, Pollard announced that he would come to the point.

  ‘I don’t want to take up more of your time off than I must,’ he said. ‘It’s about last Saturday night, of course. You were pretty busy, I expect?’

  Bob Pedlar agreed that there had been a good crowd in. There always was on a Saturday night.

  ‘You’ve probably been asked all this before,’ Pollard went on, ‘but we Yard blokes do like to get information at first hand. Were there any strangers in?’

  ‘Not what you could rightly call strangers, sir. What there was had been brought by regulars. Their relatives and friends, see?’

  ‘We’re especially interested in the hour between ten and eleven. You have a Saturday night extension, I expect.’

  ‘Closing time’s ten-thirty Saturday nights. Matter of fact we didn’t pack it in till half-past twelve last Saturday. Private party, o’course,’ he added hastily. ‘’Twas the wife’s brother’s birthday.’

  ‘That’s right,’ confirmed Mrs Pedlar, who had come in and joined them. ‘I’m sister to Tom Basing, who’s head gardener up at Fairlynch.’

  Pollard instantly saw the family likeness, while reflecting that he had never extracted information that he wanted quite so painlessly.

  ‘I’m sure it was a good party,’ he said. ‘The fact that it didn’t break up until half-past twelve could be useful to us. Did the guests go home on foot or by car?’

  He learnt that everyone present was from the village. Tom Basing, his wife Rosie, and her sister who was on a visit to them had only to go a few doors down the street. Tom’s married daughter and her husband and two boys were from the council estate further on, but it was no distance to go and not worth getting out a car.

  ‘The Wellchester police came round asking if anybody’d seen a car go through the village late that night,’ Bob Pedlar added, ‘but nobody had. Somebody heard one pass at about half-past three, but it turned out to be the vet, going back from Manor Farm. Farmer Hayes was having a bit of trouble with a calving cow.’

  Pollard marvelled once again at the efficacy of village grapevines. It seemed advisable to keep the conversation going in order not to let it appear that the birthday party had provided all the information he wanted. This was no problem. Reference to the events at the Manor brought a stream of comments from both the Pedlars, in which local residents featured prominently. He learnt nothing new, however, beyond the fact that there was much interested speculation about Hugo Rossiter’s fairly frequent absences from home.

  ‘Gives out he’s going on painting trips,’ Bob Pedlar said with a broad grin. ‘Going on the tiles into the bargain, that’s my guess.’

  Elise Pedlar clicked her tongue, but in merely token disapproval. Apparently Hugo Rossiter’s obvious failings as described by Lady Boyd-Calthrop did not prevent him from being persona grata at The Waggoner.

  After a discreet interval Pollard decided that he could bring the interview to an end, and extricated Toye and himself with thanks for some useful, it unspecified information, and reiterated praise of Elsie Pedlar’s cooking and Waggoner beer.

  ‘Well, that’s that,’ he remarked as they stepped out into the village street. ‘The end of the Basing road. You’d better go and look at the church with the critical eye of a sidesman, while I ring the Yard to see if anything’s come through from Paris.’

  He strode down the street to the telephone kiosk by the Post Office, aware of interested scrutiny from behind curtains. A small boy sucking a lolly took up a vantage point by the letterbox. Pollard saluted him gravely and entered the kiosk.

  Ten minutes later he emerged and went in search of Toye, whom he found in the church studying the inscriptions on the tombs of members of the Ridley family. Toye jerked his head in the direction of the vestry from which sounds of vigorous sweeping were coming, and they went out into the afternoon sunshine.

  ‘All very cut and dried,’ Pollard told him as they walked back to the car. ‘On June the eleventh 1960 the body of an unknown man was retrieved from the Seine. He’d been stripped of everything but his vest and pants and beaten up. Descriptions were posted, and on June the twentieth he was identified as her husband by Mrs Helen Parr, who stated that he had left her two months previously. Both were British subjects. Enquiries established that the deceased was wanted by the British police in connection with a fraudulent company prospectus.’

  ‘If the dead chap wasn’t Parr, you’d hardly think she could have got away with it,’ Toye commented.

  ‘There must have been enquiries over here, of course. My guess is that “Parr” was an alias, and that he had a faked passport, and the police drew a blank when they checked up on the application for it. It all suggests that he was an unimportant figure in shady circles here, and bit off more than he could chew in the Paris underworld... All theory, of course.’

  Toye switched on the engine and looked round enquiringly.

  ‘The Manor, to re-enact Rossiter’s possible movements after leaving Weatherwise Farm last Saturday night. I can’t think of anything else at the moment that seems even remotely useful, can you?’

  They found the drive gates closed and a notice announcing that Fairlynch Gardens would reopen on the following Monday, 10th April 1978 at 2.00 pm.

  ‘We’ll leave the car here,’ Pollard decided. ‘Less ostentatious. Pull in behind that mini.’

  ‘It’s that chap’s again,’ Toye said, as he parked neatly. ‘The fatty with ginger hair who was at the window.’

  ‘As usual you’re right where a car’s concerned,’ Pollard said, getting out and inspecting the mini. ‘So what? Mrs Ridley’s over at Clearwell St Philip, lunching with the Dowager. I hope Fatty isn’t making a nuisance of himself to young Alix. We’ll keep a look out for him.’

  The lodge was apparently deserted, and they walked up the drive towards the Manor. The warm still air was heady with the scent of daffodils and narcissi, and the only sound was the cooing of wood pigeons overhead. Quite suddenly as they approached the house the front door burst open, and Kit Peck hurried purposefully in the direction of the steps leading down to the car park.

  ‘What goes on?’ Pollard said, at the same time quickening his pace. ‘Let’s follow discreetly.’

  At the top of the steps they both stopped dead at the sight of the young man standing beside the ticket office and listening intently. The next moment Kit sensed their approach and beckoned urgently, at the same time making a gesture enjoining silence. Moving swiftly and soundlessly they reached him within a couple of seconds.

  ‘You’re talking absolute rot,’ Alix Parr was saying indignantly. ‘What’s it got to do with my grandmother, anyway?’

  In spite of her vehemence Pollard detected underlying anxiety.

  ‘I’m not talking rot,’ replied the flat nasal voice of the encounter outside the lodge, but with an unmistakeably gloating note. ‘Anything but, so you’d better listen. You’ve seen it in the paper about that chap who pinched a car in Wellchester last Saturday night, drove it to Brynsworthy, pinched another, crashed it and killed himself? A criminal on the run all right, and the fuzz are trying to find out who he was. He had a tenner on him, and they’ve published its number. Now then, I’m a careful sort of bloke. When I pay out tenners I note down the numbers. You never know when it might come in useful: help towards promotion or whatever. I paid out that tenner myself, see? To your high and mighty grandmother.’

  The voice ended on a triumphant note. There was a short tense silence.

  ‘You’re nuts,’ Alix said briefly. ‘Dozens of people must have had it between Gran and the man. And don’t talk about her in that beastly rude way, you rotten little twit.’

  ‘Easy,’ the voice replied unpleasantly, ‘seeing I hold the trumps. I paid it out at our Wellchester branch just as we were closing, a week ago yesterday. In she
came and cashed a cheque, pretending not to know who I was. Then the manager came out and was all over her — Mrs Ridley this and Mrs Ridley that — and she told him she was on her way home, and wanted some cash as she’d been doing a lot of shopping and cleared herself out.’

  ‘Anybody who isn’t a complete nit would see that she must have filled up with petrol on the way home. What are you trying to prove? That she’s in with criminals?’ Alix demanded contemptuously.

  ‘I don’t need to prove anything. Just give the Press a story. They’ll do the rest. Might even pay me.’

  ‘Even you couldn’t do such a — a filthy low-down thing as that.’

  ‘Couldn’t I? A worm’ll turn, you know. There’s a way out, though, if you don’t want grandma all over the cheap papers. Like to know what it is?’

  As tension built up inside the ticket office the pungent smell of recently applied creosote made Pollard’s nose tickle violently. He rubbed it hard with the back of his hand and buried it in his handkerchief. Toye glanced at him solicitously.