Murder for Treasure

by David Williams

  If the coach driver had been slowing for the turn before the church, if the German car had not been moving so fast, if the road had really widened instead of narrowed at the bend, but if—above all—the yellow-clad motor-cyclist appearing from nowhere had not vacillated between a left or right direction with the machine on the crown of the High Street, an accident might have been avoided.

  Treasure, still on foot, was only fifty yards from the scene. He had kept running between the parked cars. He had expected the fugitive to reappear from that gate. He saw the front of the coach hit the light machine, catapulting its rider sideways under the wheels of the Mercedes, an instant before the two big vehicles locked with a reverberating crunch of metal, and a sickening squeal of brakes.

  The banker swallowed back the nausea. ‘God help you, Lewin,’ he whispered aloud: there was no one else to hear.

  CHAPTER 21

  ‘More tea, darling?’ Molly Treasure refilled her husband’s cup without waiting for a reply. Then she returned to studying the Cassatt sketch that had arrived carefully packaged at their breakfast table along with the letter from Henry Nott-Herbert that Treasure had just set aside.

  It was Saturday, they were in their Chelsea home, and it was two weeks on from the weekend the banker had spent at Panty. Both plays in which Molly was performing at Chichester were out of the repertory for a few days: she had driven home late the night before. He had been in the USA for more than a week: they felt they had deserved each other’s company—and a lingering breakfast.

  Molly’s consuming interest had been in the Panty episode even before Mrs Pink had brought in the mail.

  ‘Your nice Judge must be immensely grateful to have sent you this.’

  Treasure glanced again at the drawing. He had finished debating whether they could accept it: he had decided they should. ‘He knows I fell in love with it—and it happens to have an absolutely impeccable provenance,’ he added defensively, as though someone might have protested otherwise. ‘By the way, Henry says he and Anna are getting married next month. Quietly.’

  ‘And you think that’s the right thing?’

  ‘There’s no cause or impediment . . .’

  ‘You mean now her husband’s gone for good,’ Molly offered brightly—too brightly—before seeming to ponder for a moment. He had so far given her only a very incomplete outline of the story. They had few secrets from each other but he had pressed the need for a total and permanent seal on this one. ‘And you’ve given the money back to her insurance company in New York. Wasn’t that tricky?’

  He smiled. ‘Even eminently respectable insurance companies will take money back without too much questioning. It’s a fallacy to assume—’

  ‘Especially from an even more respectable intermediary?’

  ‘Something like that, yes. It happens this particular company—’

  ‘Is the kind to take the money and run.’ She spread more butter than seemed necessary or desirable on a small wedge of toast, considered it, covered it with marmalade, smiled at it forgivingly and transferred it to her mouth in a delicate gesture. ‘And Hutstacker’s now own Rigley and Whatsit?’

  ‘Since last Thursday. Edgar Crabthorne nearly had a fit when one of Henry’s widowed cousins claimed at the last minute she’d lost her share certificates—in a Zeppelin raid in nineteen-sixteen. That really got the Telexes buzzing. Actually the shares were in a bank.’ He contemplated the solitary boiled egg set before him. He still thought back wistfully to Mrs Evans’s breakfast extravaganzas.

  ‘The Crabthornes left in a terrible hurry. Patience telephoned from the airport on the Sunday morning.’ Molly eyed another piece of toast but decided to resist it. There was luck in being 37 and still naturally slim and lithe as well as unwrinkled, but one didn’t push it too far.

  ‘Their leaving reduced the numbers of people here who could or would identify that body.’

  ‘You said Patience—’

  ‘Told me she was certain it was Spring after we came from the hospital mortuary. But she told no one else except her husband, and that was after Lewin’s death. That was why they went home next day. You don’t extradite people to identify corpses.’ He sipped his tea.

  ‘Apparently Crutt only thought he’d seen Spring in the hotel corridor. Didn’t remember who it might have been till later, and wasn’t sure even then. He told Crabthorne though, who knew it must have been Spring—’

  ‘Because he’d seen him outside the cathedral with you?’

  ‘And chased after him. But Crutt wouldn’t swear it was Spring he saw, and he certainly doesn’t know the man he did see is dead.’

  Molly looked puzzled. ‘But he may still think Spring could be alive?’

  Treasure nodded. ‘Except he has a nice fat contract and pension scheme to remind him he’s forgotten the whole incident—which, incidentally, he may have done anyway.’

  ‘Did you . . . ?’

  ‘No, I wasn’t privy to that little deal but I’m certain that’s what happened.’ He grimaced. ‘Earlier I’d had the idea there was something fishy about the time Crutt had taken to park his car that evening. I was quite wrong. That’s exactly what he was doing.’

  ‘And at the inquest the verdict was accidental death.’

  ‘Mm. Despite the medical evidence, which could have suggested something different. It was death by misadventure on an unidentified body. Two taxi-drivers and three employees of the Sunfun Hotel recognized Spring as a visitor they’d served, but that was all. He was registered in the name of Brown.’

  ‘And people don’t go rushing round to morgues looking for loose relatives unless they’ve actually lost one,’ Molly continued more casually. ‘Anna Spring might—’

  ‘Anna would have identified her husband if we hadn’t known the murderer himself had died. There was no point.’ He paused. ‘I’m sure Inspector Iffley would have done the same. That is, ex-Detective-Inspector Iffley.’

  ‘ “And then there were none,” ’ quoted Molly. ‘Except of course Constable Lewin. I still don’t see how you were so certain he’d killed Spring. I mean, sending Patience to watch his house that afternoon, and getting the Vicar to block the lane.’

  Treasure chuckled. ‘Actually I thought he might be sending a woman on a push-bike to coast home down that farm track. There was no money in the case, of course, nor passport—that was destroyed.’ He felt for his afterbreakfast pipe before remembering again he didn’t smoke. ‘It was Spring who gave Lewin away by not wearing his disguise after the train business. He’d figured he was less likely to be recognized without disguise by people he needed to avoid or who meant him harm.’

  ‘What about the Crabthornes and Crutt?’

  ‘He had no idea they’d be in Panty and I don’t believe he remembered Crutt. He thought Iffley and his hoodlums might be gunning for him, though. They’d be looking for a clergyman. Running into me might have complicated things too after what happened on the train. He’d been too dazed at the time to know I’d—how do they say?—penetrated his disguise. It wasn’t me he ran from at the cathedral. It was the unexpected Crabthornes.’

  ‘He wouldn’t think Mrs Spring would be out to harm him?’ Molly was as yet uncertain about Anna Spring in a number of contexts.

  ‘His own wife? Certainly not,’ Treasure replied with more vehemence than seemed quite necessary. ‘So Lewin was the only one left—’

  ‘Who’d seen him before without make-up, or whatever he was wearing.’

  ‘Exactly, and it didn’t bother him because he thought of Lewin as an ally—or at least a paid helper. Lewin knew who he was from the night of Ogmore-Davies’s death. Next day he used his initiative . . .’

  ‘Was he so much brighter than people thought?’

  ‘Much. He got hold of Spring’s London ’phone number . . .’

  ‘How? Surely he’s not in the book.’

  ‘Lewin got the number the same way I did. By looking for it in Anna’s address book. He’d have had plenty of opportunities the mornin
g after the Captain’s death while she was in the kitchen or the bedroom. It was listed beside the single letter R in the S section. The only London number in that section and one of the few in the book without a full name and address attached.’

  ‘How amateur of Mrs Spring.’

  ‘I figured that was the way you’d have done it.’

  ‘Pig!’ Molly pretended outrage, then added thoughtfully, ‘I suppose I might have too.’ She pulled a face. ‘More poisoned tea?’

  He nodded, smiling. ‘It couldn’t have taken long for Lewin to see the situation—that Iffley was cutting Spring out with his wife . . .’

  ‘But there had to be insurance money . . .’

  ‘Right. I think Lewin was playing both sides all through. Iffley was paying him but Spring was his big fish from the time he had ’phone contact. Since Iffley was getting Anna . . .’

  ‘And Anna was getting the Judge,’ Molly put in lightly, ‘it followed that Spring would get most of the money. Did Lewin know the date of the fatal visit?’

  ‘Probably not the actual date in advance. Spring doesn’t seem to have trusted anyone that much.’ He remembered the now evident fiction of the note to Scotland Yard. ‘Like the others, Lewin probably knew Spring was due soon and that when he left it would be with his share of the money.’

  ‘Perhaps Spring hoped he’d be able to come and go without Lewin knowing . . . without his having to pay him anything before disappearing for ever.’

  ‘Quite possibly. But the episode on the train spoiled all that. After deciding to press on, I mean not to turn back, Spring felt he needed someone to protect him once he’d got the money. So he rang Lewin, I expect from the hotel, and arranged to have a real policeman pick him up after the pay-off in the cathedral. And that was his fatal error. He probably told Lewin exactly what was happening and offered him a percentage of the money. He could hardly appreciate the chap was planning to get the lot. To Lewin it must have looked like the perfect crime.’

  ‘But there was no pay-off. You said . . .’

  ‘Anna also rang Lewin in desperation. She told him to head off Spring if he could find him because of the Crabthornes. She even left her car with the key in at the closest point so he could whisk her husband away.’

  ‘But he didn’t find him. I mean, Spring ran away of his own accord when he saw Edgar.’

  ‘Right. Lewin made no effort to find him. He decided to take the chance Spring wouldn’t be recognized by anyone. He stuck by his own original plan . . .’

  ‘You mean to pick up Spring after he’d collected the money, drive him away and . . . and push him over a cliff.’

  ‘Hit him over the head and then push him over a cliff into a cove—there are about a dozen perfect ones close by. He had the bonus too that he didn’t need to do his dirty work in his Panda police car. Oh, and he made time to burgle Mrs Ogmore-Davies’s—to lift the only picture of Spring that seemed to have survived, partly so he could destroy it, and partly so he could be sure of recognizing the chap . . .’

  ‘Whom he’d only seen once. At night.’

  ‘Yes. He had obviously unlatched that window himself from the inside when we were all leaving earlier.’

  Molly took the piece of toast after all, broke it in two and put the smaller piece back in the silver rack. ‘But Spring still arrived without the money.’

  ‘Birth of Lewin’s second plan—to dispose of Spring while he had the opportunity and pick up the money some other way. And he nearly worked it. Unaided.’

  ‘You said Mrs Spring was certain a woman ’phoned.’

  ‘She found Lewin’s falsetto very convincing. I’d been told he sang counter-tenor and it stuck in my mind for some reason. Lewin and his wife didn’t get on. I couldn’t believe he’d have brought her in on a murder plan. He didn’t. Apparently she’d left him for the third time a week before—the reason, incidentally, everybody’s opted for his going berserk on a motor-bike. Emotional upset.’

  ‘In fact, with his wife away he had a clear field.’

  ‘And nearly put me off the scent at one point with that platinum watch he left on the body. It was what Iffley would have done, or Crutt, or almost anybody else who might have been involved.’

  ‘To make it look like a bathing accident.’

  ‘Exactly. I couldn’t credit Lewin would chuck away a couple of thousand pounds’ worth of watch until I remembered his saying he’d thought it was aluminium.’ Molly was nibbling at the toast without butter. ‘Iffley was your second choice in villains?’

  Treasure smiled. ‘Not really. He’s not even what’s called a bent copper. I’ve made discreet enquiries about him at a very high level—’

  ‘From Colin Bantree.’ Molly’s interruption was a mite deflating. Detective Chief Superintendent Bantree and his wife were old friends of both the Treasures.

  He left the point unacknowledged. ‘Anyway, he’s highly thought of and his superiors are sorry he’s leaving the Force. He’s a bit unconventional. Even by current police standards. But he gets results.’ He noted the emphasized lift of the eyebrows. ‘And this isn’t Private Lives and you don’t have to play Amanda for your doting public again till Thursday.’ The mock surprise turned into affected incomprehension. ‘The chap’s doing sterling work as a loner, but he’s—’

  ‘According to you he’s been behaving exactly as he pleases, having clergymen assaulted on trains . . Treasure had opened his mouth to protest. ‘All right, bogus clergymen. He’s been suborning his subordinates . . . er . . . even before they turn into murderers.’ She paused, conscious of a weak case. ‘Ah. He’s been frightening old ladies, seducing young ones, and doing a nice line in fine art on the company’s time—not to mention complicity in insurance fraud, lurking around cathedrals—you said— when he was supposed to be somewhere else, and. . . and. . .’

  ‘His car was parked where I saw it at what they call The Popples because it had broken down there earlier. He’d been in St David’s trying to find out where Spring was staying and left the car after whistling up a spare from the local police pool. He wasn’t trying to double-cross anybody.’ He paused. ‘Of course what you say is relatively true, but it’s about the most uncharitable interpretation one could apply.’

  ‘And you’re ready to forgive and forget?’

  Treasure nodded. ‘Partly for the way he tackled Lewin and the motor-bike. That took some courage. To be honest, when he turned up at New Hall I thought he and Lewin might be in league. I didn’t know he’d talked to Anna on the ’phone just before. She’d already practically accused him of murder. Anyway, he’s paying for his indiscretions by resigning his job. He’s lost Anna—really lost her. For her he was a passing infatuation.’ He caught Molly’s sceptical expression. ‘Emotionally she’s pretty unstable.’ The expression changed to one of pretended pity. ‘Incidentally,’ he was returning to firmer ground, ‘the resignation was my idea. Iffley expected I’d turn him in. I said that wouldn’t help anybody but I really thought he’d be happier in a different line of work.’

  ‘Like buying and selling pictures?’

  ‘Yes, as a matter of fact. He has the flair for it and the nose.’ He shrugged his shoulders. ‘You see, nobody would have gained if everything had had to come out. Even Mrs Ogmore-Davies would have suffered by losing an illusion or two. I didn’t tell you, her arch enemy Mrs Pugh says the Captain was trying to borrow carpet tacks from her husband, the landlord of the Boatman, the night he died. He’d decided to do away with the rods they had on the stairs at Mariner’s Rest, but he’d run out of tacks.’ He chuckled. ‘So it wasn’t a spirit that moved the stair-rods to the kitchen table. It was the poor old Captain when his wife was out.’

  He picked up the Judge’s letter, then looked seriously at Molly. ‘You’re going to say I’ve been playing God in all this.’

  ‘Again.’ She smiled and shrugged her shoulders. ‘I should hate to have to play Anna Spring in the film of the book. An enigmatic character.’ They both knew that so long as British
audiences continued flocking to watch their favourite interpreter of upper-crust comedy—from Congreve to Douglas Home—the need for Molly to test her art in high drama was happily remote. ‘Did she just charm you into arranging the cosy ending or did she offer more torrid inducements?’ Torrid was one of Molly’s favourite words. She lit a cigarette.

  ‘Smoking can damage your health . . .’

  ‘Not on Saturdays. So obviously she offered more torrid inducements.’

  ‘Nonsense. There were moments . . .’

  ‘Darling, I trust you. Remember? I’m sure it was good for your ego whatever happened. I’m not so confident about the poor little Judge. Let’s face it, there’s a lot he doesn’t know about his future wife.’

  Treasure ruffled through the pages of Nott-Herbert’s letter. ‘I’m not sure. Anna intends to tell him everything—in her own time. Well, almost everything.’

  ‘Or so she says.’

  ‘Or unless he stops her. Listen to this.’ He scanned one of the pages for the passage he was seeking. ‘He writes: “When a beautiful young woman consents to marry a comparatively rich and decidedly old man, and then refuses to name a date, there has to be a reason. Whatever Anna’s reason was it has now disappeared, I choose to believe, thanks to your visit.

  ‘ “This is exactly as Bishop Clarence Wringle anticipated. You will know, by the by, that the business of Mrs Ogmore-Davies was a harmless camouflage. The lady was of course mistaken over what she saw that morning in March. Even so, I sensed that what is best described as Anna’s disquiet was in some measure to do with the Ogmore-Davies oeuvre, and that it would be appropriate to have you crack that particular shell.”’

  Treasure looked up. ‘Now mark this next passage. “I have no illusions about the apparently inappropriate matching of Anna and myself. Although it will give me enormous pride to honour her as my wife for that part of life which remains to me, I have gone to some trouble to enquire into the use of discretionary trusts, and being satisfied that financially Anna could be nearly as well provided for in this way without marrying me—thus being free to marry someone else without great penalty—I have offered her the option. She will have none of it.