The Tango School Mystery

by Peter Bartram

  And there was something else about Felix's approach. The date was important - but so was the location. Why include a photograph of the exact spot where the poor girl drowned? This whole thing was taking on the gruesome features of a ritual killing. And Felix was an historian with an expert knowledge of mediaeval witchcraft. How did they kill witches? I'd read enough books, seen enough Hammer horror films to know the answer to that. They burnt them to death at the stake.

  I reached my car, took out the key, and unlocked the door. I climbed inside and sat staring out of the windscreen.

  I wasn't sure what I should do next. I could go to the cop shop and tell them what I knew - a local fascist was about to be burnt at the stake by a witch fancier. They'd laugh so much the place would sound like the Palace of Varieties.

  I could return to the office and pursue my day job - reporting crime stories rather than chasing my editor's brother. But that would place me in line for months of revenge from His Holiness. It would make my life a misery.

  Or I could drive to the supposed location where, if my deductions were correct, the denouement to this whole grisly business would take place. I didn't expect to find anything. There'd be no sign of Gervase. But at least I could report back to Figgis that I'd tried.

  I rummaged in the back of my car for the Ordnance Survey map of East Sussex. The exact spot - Barcombe Reach on the river Ouse - had been mentioned in the coroner's report of Harriet's inquest. From the map, it looked like a lonely spot, far from the nearest village. I folded the map so I could see it on the passenger seat beside me.

  Then I pressed the starter button, revved the engine a couple of times, and pulled out into the traffic.

  The sun was low in the west by the time I pulled the MGB into a passing place on a narrow country track.

  There were thick woods on either side of the track - tall trees like larch and birch, with an undergrowth of holly and brambles. The trees grew so thickly I couldn't see more than ten yards into the wood.

  I picked up the Ordnance Survey and applied my map-reading skills to the problem. (Thank you, Brian Alner, geography teacher.) If Mr Alner had taught me correctly, the river Ouse lay about five hundred yards to the east, through the woods. The map showed another small stream coming down from the higher ground. The stream seemed to flow into a pool which then connected to the main river through a thin tributary. The map indicated that the stream and pool lay in the thickly-wooded country.

  The track on which I'd parked the car forked about three hundred yards ahead, round a bend. The right fork continued to re-join the main Lewes to Uckfield road. The left fork ran past the stream-fed pool and then continued on to the village of Chailey. When Gervase and Harriet set off to their fancy-dress party forty years ago, this would have been the route they'd taken. But since then a new road had been built to the west, so these tracks were now little used. They'd become overgrown, like an untended garden.

  I debated driving down the left-hand fork, but dismissed the idea. If Felix were lurking by the pool - with or without Gervase - the sound of the car would alert him. Better, I decided, to risk snagging my trousers on the brambles and sneak through the woods. If my trousers were ruined, I'd claim for a new pair on expenses. And if Figgis jibbed at that, I'd go to His Holiness's tailors and order a pair on his account. And maybe a pair of spats to go with them.

  Fifty yards into the wood, I decided I would need a new pair of shoes and a jacket as well. The ground was covered with thick leaf mould. The leaves disguised marshy hollows filled with brackish water. The first one I stepped into filled my right shoe so I squelched as I walked. Every time I put my right foot to the ground it sounded like a plunger unblocking a drain.

  It was difficult to keep a sense of direction among the trees. I must have drifted off to the left because when I came into a small clearing I could see the pool through the trees about seventy yards to my right.

  I couldn't see anyone - and I strained my ear to hear voices. But all I heard were the squawks of squabbling pigeons in the tree canopy above me. I crept forward as quietly as my squelching shoe would allow. I positioned myself behind the thick trunk of a sycamore about five yards from the edge of the pool.

  Trees surrounded the pool except for a grassed area where the route of the track had created a small clearing. I peered around the edge of the tree and almost let out an involuntary gasp. I pulled back out of sight and put my back to the tree for support. I was breathing like a fell runner. My heart was pounding like a steam-hammer. And my legs wobbled like the raspberry blancmange my Aunt Tilda used to serve on birthdays.

  I took a couple of deep breaths to steady myself. Balled my fists and flexed my shoulders. Felt a bit calmer. Took another peep around the tree.

  On the far side, one of the trees on the bank of the pool had been cut down. A stump of trunk about three feet high had been left in the ground. Across the stump a thick crossbeam of some rough wood had been balanced, like a see-saw. One end of the beam was lashed to the ground with a rope. The other end of the beam hung over the pool. The seat and back of a wooden chair had been lashed to the beam at the pool end.

  And I should have known.

  I cursed myself for being so slow. I should have made the connection as soon as I discovered Felix was an expert in witchcraft.

  And now I knew where Felix had obtained this contraption. From Unity Box-Hartley, the queen of reproduction antiques. The clue had been staring me in the face ever since I'd visited her shop. I'd taken a peek in her day's to-do list and seen a reference to "Delivery. Cucking St." I'd taken that to mean she had something to deliver in Cucking Street. That the St abbreviation was short for Street.

  But St wasn't short for Street at all.

  It was short for "stool".

  Unity Box-Hartley was delivering a cucking stool.

  And there it was on the far side of the pool balanced across the tree stump. It was a nasty implement, used in the Middle Ages to punish - and often drown - witches. What was I thinking? There were no witches - never had been - just unfortunate women who for one reason or another didn't fit in and so were picked on by bullies. And as for cucking stools - better call them ducking stools, because that's how they worked.

  The poor girl who'd been fingered as a witch was sat on the chair end and plunged into water. If she floated she must be a witch - because she was in league with the Devil. She'd rejected the water that baptises a true believer in God. If she sank, she'd embraced the baptism and must be innocent.

  But usually she drowned.

  So this was how Felix planned to kill Gervase.

  His sister had died dressed as a witch. And now Gervase would die as one.

  As if to confirm it, Gervase appeared from among the trees on the far side of the clearing. I recognised him from photos I'd seen at his apartment. There was the shock of wild hair, brown in the photos but now traced with grey. There were the haughty arched eyebrows, the beaky nose, the thin lips permanently compressed into a sneer. Gervase was wearing a brown seersucker suit and a light blue shirt, open at the collar. The suit was the kind of gear I imagined he'd turn up in at Henley or Goodwood or one of those posh summer events. Except that today he was turning up to his death.

  That was clear because his hands were bound behind his back. Gervase turned away from me to follow the path and I saw they'd been fastened with a neck tie. The tie was a dark blue number with a double stripe pattern. I'd bet his old school tie.

  Gervase was stumbling along with hunched shoulders. He glanced behind him with the look of a man who knows there's nothing good there. And within a couple of seconds I saw what it was.

  Or rather who it was. A tall man with a rangy figure carried a shotgun. The breech was closed. I was willing to bet the thing was loaded with two cartridges. And it was pointing at Gervase's back. The man had to be Felix Delaunay. He had the weathered complexion of a man who spends much of his time outdoors. He was wearing a checked jacket and brown corduroy trousers. He had a moleskin flat c
ap on his head. He wasn't dressed like your typical executioner. But, then, he wasn't your typical executioner. He was a man with a grudge he'd nurtured for a lifetime.

  Which, in this situation, made him more dangerous than your average executioner - who's under orders to top his victim swiftly and pick up his fee. Felix was out for revenge. He'd be deaf to orders - or reason.

  Gervase said over his shoulder: "I understand your pain, Felix." His voice quavered like his voice box was wobbling.

  Felix raised the shotgun so that it pointed at the base of Gervase's neck. "You understand nothing about how I feel," he said. "You never have."

  "Can't we talk about this?"

  "We've done all the talking that's needed."

  Gervase stopped. Turned round and faced Felix. Took a step closer, but Felix raised the gun and Gervase stepped back.

  "I tried to save Harriet that night," Gervase pleaded. "I really did."

  "How could you? Your clothes were dry."

  "I tried to keep the car from falling into the water. But I wasn't strong enough. It kept dipping in. I managed to pull it back twice, but on the third time it just fell."

  "And Harriet with it. Why didn't you pull her out of the car? You got yourself out."

  "I was on the landward side, Harriet was closest to the river."

  "You should have jumped into the river and pulled Harriet out after the car fell in."

  "But Harriet was under the car. I knew I couldn't move it without help."

  "You should have tried."

  Gervase fell to his knees. "Please, Felix. It doesn't have to be like this. I can't bring Harriet back and I regret that every day. Genuinely, I do. But I can make amends. I'll pay you anything you ask."

  Felix threw back his head in a scornful laugh. "There's no amount of money can compensate the loss of a sister like Harriet. What is it the Good Book says? 'An eye for an eye.'"

  "You don't have to shoot me."

  "I'm not going to shoot you." Felix pointed at the ducking stool.

  Gervase swivelled on his knees. I saw his mouth drop open. He scrambled to his feet. He turned back to Felix, like he was about to beg for mercy.

  Felix gave a dry little laugh. "Harriet lost her life dressed as a witch. Now you'll die as one. Climb on the seat, Gervase."

  "No," Gervase screamed.

  "Climb on the seat or I shall shoot you in the legs and load you onto it."

  Events were getting out of hand.

  It was time someone tried to lower the temperature.

  I looked around. There wasn't anyone.

  So, as usual, it was going to be me.

  I stepped out from behind the tree and walked into the clearing. I sauntered along like a country type out for an evening stroll.

  "Good evening, gents, lovely evening," I said. As though coming across a mad gunman and his tied-up victim was part of the simple country life.

  The pair of them looked at me like a caveman from the stone-age had just appeared on the scene. Gervase's eyes lit with hope. Felix turned the shotgun on me.

  "Is this some ancient country custom or are you making a film?" I said.

  I twizzled my head about a bit as though looking for a film crew. "I don't see any cameras."

  Felix's eyebrows beetled together. "We're not making a film. And you're on private land. You should leave immediately. That is unless you want to feel the prickle of lead shot in your backside."

  "I know it's the open season for grouse and pheasant, but I didn't know journalists were also fair game."

  "You're a journalist?" Gervase blurted.

  "Colin Crampton, Evening Chronicle. And I have a feeling this is a David Livingstone moment."

  "What do you mean?" Felix said.

  "I can just imagine the scene somewhere in Africa when Henry Stanley - he was a journalist too, you know, working for the New York Herald - stumbles into a clearing, sees the man he's been searching for, and utters those immortal words."

  "What immortal words?" Felix asked testily.

  "'Dr Livingstone, I presume?' Except in my case, I have to say, 'Gervase Pope, I presume?'" I turned to Gervase as I said it.

  He stepped towards me, but Felix raised his gun, twitched it towards Gervase as a signal he should move back.

  I said: "This has gone too far. You're behaving like a mad man."

  "No, like a brother who loved his sister dearly," Felix said. "You know nothing about me."

  "I know enough to realise that what you're planning is crazy."

  I tried sweet reason. "I can understand you want revenge on the man you blame for Harriet's death. I can understand the weird logic that makes you want to extract that revenge on the anniversary of the tragedy. I can even understand the desire to kill Gervase the same way Harriet died. But do you really have to make a freak show out of it? I mean, what's with the cucking stool? If you use the damn contraption the way you intend, you'll end up in Broadmoor, the high security psychiatric hospital. You'll spend the rest of your life bouncing off the walls of your padded cell and swapping gothic fantasies with the craziest goons in England."

  Felix said: "I've had enough of your interference. You have unfortunately arrived on a scene that does not concern you. I had hoped to send you on your way none the wiser, but it's clear that you know this man." He twitched a thumb at Gervase. "I can't discount that you know about my purpose. As you're a journalist, I can't have you writing about it for your rag, so I must kill you as well."

  In one swift movement, he swung the gun back towards me and fired.

  Chapter 21

  At first, I thought the bells ringing meant I was dead.

  Perhaps they were the church bells pealing for my funeral. Or perhaps they were celestial bells welcoming me through the Pearly Gates. Or maybe it was the bell you ring to summon the boatman who ferries you across the river Styx, when you turn up at the entrance to the Underworld.

  No.

  It was none of them.

  It was a ringing in my ears. It sounded like my brain had become a set of cymbals pounded by a demented drummer.

  I clapped my hand hard against the side of my head and the bells toned down a few decibels.

  And then I realised what had just happened. Felix had tried to shoot me. He had a shotgun with two barrels. He'd missed first time but he'd make sure it was second time lucky.

  I looked around confused. I couldn't see him.

  Gervase stumbled towards me, his hands still tied behind his back.

  He nodded his head towards the ground. I followed his gaze. Felix was lying on the grass looking dazed.

  Gervase said: "I shoulder-charged him as he fired. Just like I used to do playing rugby at Harrow. The shot went loose in the trees. I saved your life."

  The arrogance of the man!

  I squared up to him. Let him see there wouldn't be any gratitude from me.

  "I didn't come here to pick flowers," I said. "Where do you suppose you'd be now if I hadn't pitched up? I'll tell you: doing an impression of Lloyd Bridges but without the snorkel."

  Gervase shrugged. Not easy with hands tied behind his back. It made him look like a duck about to lay a difficult egg.

  I stepped over and undid the tie binding his wrists. He rubbed them to get the blood circulating again. Stuffed the tie in his pocket. Didn't bother to thank me.

  I said: "Besides, we're not out of trouble." I pointed at Felix. "He's still got the shotgun."

  Felix was lying on the ground with the shotgun tightly gripped in one hand. He scrambled up on one knee and pointed the gun at us. It wavered between Gervase and me as though he couldn't decide who to shoot first. But he'd only pot one of us because he hadn't reloaded the empty barrel.

  He said: "I gired the fun."

  I said: "What?"

  He said: "I mean, I fired the gun."

  "I had noticed. It's not something I recommend."

  Felix stood up unsteadily. He crouched in front of us with knees half bent. He waddled towards Gervase.
Kept the shotgun pointed at his chest.

  He came right up to Gervase and swayed a bit. He looked straight into Gervase's eyes and said: "I'm going to kill your friend first."

  Gervase said: "He's not my friend."

  "Then that will make it easier for you."

  "But not for me," I said. "Don't I get a say in this?"

  Felix turned to me. His head drooped and his eyelids looked heavy.

  He said: "Only got one…"

  "One thought," I said. "To end this madness."

  "No. One cart."

  "You mean cartridge."

  "So I've got to use my stool." He gestured with the gun towards the contraption. "Go over there or I'll shoot you in the bells."

  "Bells?"

  "I mean balls."

  Felix briefly pointed the gun at Gervase. "You'll tie him in the chair," he said. "Follow him."

  "Or he'll shoot the clappers out of your bells, too," I said.

  We trooped across to the ducking stool. On the business end, the chair was suspended over the pool. The other end was fastened to a peg in the ground by a short rope. Closer up, I could see that the main crossbeam was pivoted on a peg which stuck vertically out of the tree stump.

  Felix turned to Gervase "I want you to release the rope on the land end of the crossbeam but keep hold of it."

  Gervase gave me a quick glance. Like he didn't really want to, but knew he had no choice.

  Felix stumbled a bit and his knees wobbled. I thought he was going to fall over, but he regained his balance. But he stepped back and pointed the gun at Gervase.

  "Now rotate the crossbeam so the end with chair is over the ground," Felix ordered.

  Gervase moved away from me on the other side of the tree stump as the chair moved towards me.

  "Now let out the rope so that the chair is lowered to the ground," Felix said.

  Gervase shrugged, like he couldn't be bothered not to, and the chair came down in front of me.