Mr. Campion's Abdication

by Mike Ripley

  Precious, the tallest, had ‘a fine, broad back’ and a big hat to contain her hair. Therefore she could be nearest the camera which would, in any case, only capture her shoulder movements as she dug.

  But the digging movements were important; they must throw themselves into it and dig furiously as soon as she gave the word. And they should, please, do it in silence, or at least the girls should. It would, however, be acceptable if the boys, Dave and Simon, were to grunt occasionally.

  ‘Positions, please. Action!’

  As they marched out of Heronhoe on the road to Sweethearting, Mr Lugg, his hands thrust deep into his pockets, became quite ruminative.

  ‘What you said back there, to that nasty little oik, about ’im bein’ identified by two witnesses of unimpeachable character, to whit: the daughter of a peer, which would be Mrs Bell, I suppose, and somebody who could pass in a dim light for a respectable gentleman, which …’

  ‘Yes,’ said Mr Campion, ‘that would be me.’

  ‘Well, did yer?’

  ‘Did what?’

  ‘Did you and Lavinia really see enough of Bill Crow the other night to be able to stand up in court, hand on heart, and identify him?’

  ‘Of course not,’ said Campion jovially, ‘but the scabrous Bill Crow wasn’t to know that.’

  They walked on in silence, and it was not until they were at the drive entrance to the hall that Lugg spoke again, as if the house coming into view had prompted him.

  ‘This Elspeth bird, who married the Bolzano, she worked at the hall for a while?’

  ‘So it would seem.’

  ‘And from what Billy Crow said, she was here when the dig was on?’

  ‘That was the implication.’

  ‘So she was here, in service, the night we was here when we did that recce?’

  ‘That is entirely possible, and I am ashamed to say I have absolutely no memory of her. We should have paid more attention to the staff but back then we took them for granted and treated them as if they were invisible.’

  ‘We ’ardly ’ad time to check up on all the locals, did we? I mean, we was called off, weren’t we?’

  ‘Yes, that always struck me as odd, sending us up here and then the phone call to say that our services were no longer required after less than a day. It’s clear now that the prince had no intention of staying at the hall that night. He had other plans in Sweethearting.’

  ‘But you’ve still got that girl on yer conscience, ’aven’t you?’

  Campion expressed surprise.

  ‘Elspeth Bolzano? No, it’s not her who haunts me. Come on, let us stretch our legs properly and amble down to the Barrow; see how the dig’s going or, more to the point, the filming. Who knows, you might get a part as an extra with that noble profile of yours.’

  Lugg shrank his bulbous neck into the collar of his coat and narrowed his eyes against the salty breeze coming off the estuary as he fell into step. Campion enjoyed the fleeting impression that he was walking in the company of a relatively well-dressed bipedal giant turtle. It was a turtle in contemplative mood.

  ‘I fort you was supposed to be retired,’ said Lugg after five minutes of silence, ‘taking it easy, putting your feet up, all that sort of malarkey, but you just can’t resist, can you?’

  ‘Resist what, me old mucker? If I’m doing something to increase your blood pressure then how can I resist?’

  ‘Don’t be a smart-mouth with me – I’ve heard it all before. You know what I’m talking about: this private narking. I always said it was a bit common, but for a man of your age and standing it’s positively undignified.’

  Campion allowed himself a smile. ‘Private detection, as I think you so colourfully put it, implies a client and a service for hire. I can assure you I am pursuing this particular investigation for purely personal reasons. I am merely satisfying my curiosity and surely that’s a reasonable and harmless occupation for a retired gentleman of a certain age.’

  ‘You make it sound on a par with reading an improving book, like you’re always on at me to do. And are you sure it’s your curiosity you’re satisfying and not your conscience?’

  ‘A fine distinction and a very good question,’ Campion conceded. ‘You really are a wise old owl. Though you conceal it very well.’

  ‘No call to be rude,’ snapped Lugg. ‘I was only thinking of your health and happiness.’

  ‘Well, that’s most considerate, old fruit, but I’ve never been healthier, and you will note that my hat is at a jaunty angle, signifying a modicum of happiness.’

  ‘But ’ow long would that ’ealth and ’appiness last if Lady Amanda were to find out you were consorting with low-life villainy such as Bill Crow? She’d say you were back to your bad old ways and you would never ’ear the end of it.’

  At the mention of his wife, Campion allowed his grin to broaden. ‘You may well have a point, and so I must appeal to your discretion. On the other hand, though, don’t be too hard on Bill Crow. He may be a chancer and a sneak but he’s not a die-hard villain – not like some we know.’

  He paused and raised a finger as if the thought had just occurred. ‘And think about it. There’s a great deal of overlap between the callings of the rag-and-bone man and the private detective. They both sift through vast amounts of rubbish and end up picking through the remains of the dead.’

  FOURTEEN

  Old Bones

  The two elderly gentlemen engaged in some preprandial exercise (much needed in one case), striding down the virtually traffic-free road, turned a curve on the outskirts of Sweethearting and saw a line of vehicles parked on the verge nearest the small copse of trees which marked the Barrow. There was Precious Aird’s familiar Volkswagen campervan, then the film crew’s Citroën nose-to-nose with Perdita’s bright red Mini Cooper.

  ‘It seems the gang’s all here,’ said Mr Campion jovially.

  ‘Which gang?’ Lugg teased.

  ‘Now, now,’ Campion chided, ‘let us be positive, especially in front of the children. Do you think you can raise your leg enough to get over this barbed wire or are your high-kicking chorus line days behind you?’

  ‘You’ll catch yer death of cold if you hang around waiting for me.’ Lugg threw a far-from-shapely leg over the sagging strand of barbed wire and balanced precariously on one foot for a disconcerting amount of time until a sufficient amount of weight had shifted its polarity, enabling him to complete the transverse.

  Mr Campion followed, if not with a skip and a jump then at least with a nimbleness which belied his age, and the two men began to walk around the end of the spoil heap rampart which, Campion realized, masked all activity on the dig site from anyone passing by on the road.

  ‘Cut!’ The shout stopped them in their tracks.

  ‘Oh, dear,’ said Campion, ‘I think we’ve walked into shot.’

  ‘Who’s been shot?’ Lugg glanced around him rapidly, his face a combination of bemusement and pure fury.

  ‘I am so sorry,’ Campion pronounced, raising his hat in apology. ‘Have we mucked things up?’

  They had rounded the rampart of spoil from the dig at the southerly end of the trench and were looking down the length of it on to the heads of the four diggers posed with the spades in mid-dig as if they were in freeze frame. Campion thought he could identify them all, but it took a few moments of concentration as all four were disporting headgear not normally seen on the youth of today, nor indeed the youth of thirty-five years ago. But if the camera concentrated on what Campion believed was called a ‘head shot’ and stayed above the waist (those ubiquitous blue denim jeans were so not Suffolk in the Thirties!) then a swift traverse across collarless shirts, waistcoats, flat caps and scarves might just fool an unwitting audience. He particularly liked the finishing touch supplied by – who else? – Precious, who had a lit briarwood pipe clenched between her teeth, and although she was blowing smoke rather than inhaling, seemed to be entering into the spirit of things. The other diggers appeared less enthusiastic, all three
of them shivering having exchanged their coats and gloves for shirtsleeves, the two boys, Dave and Si, quietly swearing under their breath, already disillusioned by the glamour of being on television. Only Cat, the smallest of the ensemble cast and the nearest to the end of the trench, seemed to be content with her lot, though it was difficult to discern her expression as she kept her gaze downward to the floor of the trench and her head was encased by a bowler hat at least three sizes too big.

  At ground level down at the other end of the trench stood Daniela Petraglia and next to her Gianfranco, leaning over a film camera mounted on a tripod, his face glued to the rubber flap of the eyepiece. Behind them, dressed as if for a cocktail party in a pre-war drama apart from the coats draped over their shoulders, were Rupert and Perdita. Their faces lit up when they caught sight of the intruders and Perdita stepped completely out of character to wave frantically and shout ‘Cooeee!’

  ‘Signor Campion, how nice to see you!’ Even at that distance, Campion could see the Italian woman’s face was set grim. ‘We were just doing a retake because of a hair in the gate. Now we will do it again.’

  ‘What’s she on about?’ Lugg breathed in Campion’s ear. ‘Who’s caught in a gate by the hair?’

  Out of the side of his mouth, Campion said, ‘It’s a technical term, my dear old Luddite. They check the lens of the camera after every shot and if a piece of fluff or dirt or leaf has got in there they call it having a hair in the gate and they have to retake the shot. Thanks to our surprise cameo appearance, they now have to retake the retake. Are you following? I had to mug up on all this, so I’m glad it’s come in useful.’

  ‘Mumbo-jumbo,’ scoffed Lugg dismissively, ‘it’s all just make-believe.’

  ‘Very possibly,’ said Campion, striding away from his companion just as Daniela Petraglia began to march towards him along the ‘clean’ edge of the trench which had been kept free of the backfill spoil being excavated.

  They met almost exactly at the halfway point, where Precious Aird was blowing smoke from her pipe and leaning, in character, on the handle of her spade. From her position below them, the two figures who shook hands as they met – the woman in her open long leather coat over a figure-hugging black cashmere sweater and the thin, bespectacled man in his buttoned-up woollen overcoat, scarf and fedora – presented a pose which reminded her of photograph she had seen in a school history book. The scene it had brought to mind was the meeting of the American and Russian armies on the Elbe in 1945: two allies celebrating victory over a common enemy on the eve of becoming enemies themselves. What on earth had made her think of that?

  ‘Is everything going to plan, Signora?’ Campion asked the Italian woman, but his smile was downward towards Precious.

  ‘We have completed several establishing shots of our principals – our actors – and I must say your son looks very convincing from a distance. He is too young, of course, and we have had to colour his hair. Your Prince of Wales was not un rosso.’

  ‘No, he was not,’ conceded Campion, ‘and it is perhaps a good thing his mother cannot see him betraying his Fitton redhead heritage. I have to say, though, that Perdita is a more accurate doppelgänger from a distance; very convincing in those clothes, very stylish, which of course Mrs Simpson was.’

  Signora Petraglia shrugged her shoulders with an audible creak of leather. ‘The girl is pretty, that’s for sure. Perhaps too pretty for this role, but we have used a lot of make-up to make her face white and she has strict orders not to smile.’

  Campion turned his attention to Precious Aird, whose head and eyes were at the level of his feet. ‘And how are the troops in the trenches?’

  ‘Grateful that it didn’t rain last night, otherwise we’d have been knee-deep in mud and it really would have looked like the First World War round here.’ Precious removed the briar pipe from between her teeth, grimaced in disgust and wiped her mouth with the back of a hand. ‘Yuck! What a disgusting habit. You don’t have any mouthwash on you, do you?’

  Campion’s smile broadened. ‘I’m afraid not, though I am sure Lugg over there has a hip flask of brown ale about his person. I wouldn’t put it past him.’

  Precious waved away the offer. ‘Forget it; I’ll survive until lunch break.’

  ‘Have you found any archaeology down there?’ Campion crouched down on the edge of the trench.

  Now it was Precious’ turn to shrug. ‘Not really expecting to. I think we’re still a couple of feet off the bottom of the original excavation. No sign of “natural” yet – the stuff we’re digging out is still all backfill. Plus we’re not even sure if we’re on the right orientation. If we could clean around and follow some edges we’d have a better idea, but that wouldn’t look neat for the camera.’

  ‘We are creating a picture for our viewers,’ said Daniela. ‘They are not interested in this boat burial, as you called it, but in who visited it.’ She pointed towards a shivering Mrs Simpson who was leaning closely into the chest of the Prince of Wales. ‘In any case, this will be on screen for only a few minutes and the commentary will tell the real story to the viewers, who will be Italians and therefore will be more interested in Mrs Simpson’s clothes rather than archaeology.’

  ‘They do have rather a lot of archaeology of their own,’ conceded Campion. ‘The Italians, that is; and it wasn’t just Mrs Simpson who was a trendsetter in fashion in the Thirties. The prince was too, you know. His casualwear was widely copied and he introduced turn-ups on trousers. Well, if he didn’t introduce them he certainly made them popular much, as I vaguely recall, to the dismay of his father who thought they were rather … dangerous.’

  Precious threw back her head and laughed with such violence that her oversize flat cap – lined with a folded newspaper, Campion noticed – fell backwards and released her long blonde hair.

  ‘You Brits,’ she said as she struggled to pack her hair back inside its asexual covering. ‘Only you Toff Brits could think of trouser turn-ups as dangerous …’

  ‘It’s part of our national charm,’ grinned Campion, ‘and now I must, as a loyal Toff Brit, go and swear my allegiance to the Crown over there in the personage of my dear son-and-heir-to-not-very-much and his beautiful wife, whose teeth I can hear chattering from here.’

  ‘Don’t forget to curtsy,’ Precious called after him before clamping the pipe between her teeth and shuddering at the taste of it.

  ‘Let us get out of your way,’ Campion said to Daniela Petraglia. ‘Where should we stand?’

  ‘Behind the camera, please.’ The Italian dismissed him and then addressed the inhabitants of the trench. ‘Now we will go again. Heads down; do not look at the camera and plenty of digging when I give the order.’

  Campion looked around the Barrow site and located Lugg shuffling through the bracken and the trees, making a wide arc to avoid the trench almost as if he was trying to outflank an enemy position. Campion was in two minds as to whether Lugg was simply extremely camera shy or merely trying to stay well out of the way in case he was dragooned into becoming a fifth digger in the trench. Given the fat man’s oft-voiced grumblings that his days of manual labour were both behind and beneath him, and that he was now a gentleman of leisure, Campion thought the balance of probability lay with the latter explanation.

  He, too, picked his way carefully to the far end of the trench, keeping out of the tripod-mounted camera’s line of fire, until he was able to stand with an arm around the shoulders of both Rupert and his wife.

  ‘So how are my film stars doing? Should I be asking for autographs?’

  ‘Well, it’s not exactly Hollywood,’ said Rupert, ‘or even Pinewood.’

  ‘Let’s be honest, it’s not even Cricklewood,’ chirped Perdita, ‘but thankfully we’re almost done and, to look on the bright side, we can now say we’ve done telly.’

  ‘Italian telly,’ Rupert pointed out.

  ‘Which is good, because nobody here will ever see it. That’s a win-win situation as far as our careers go.’

&n
bsp; Mr Campion gently squeezed his daughter in law’s shoulder. ‘That’s the way to look at it, my dear. Always find the bright side under the layers of dark, glowering clouds. Speaking of which, here comes Lugg, who I am sure will share his vast experience as a television critic. In some circles, you know, he is as highly regarded as that chap Philip Purser on the Telegraph and he never misses an episode of Blue Peter.’

  ‘This is all a bit of a palaver, inn’it?’ Lugg introduced himself to the assembled Campions. ‘It’s all play-acting.’

  ‘See what I mean?’ said Mr Campion. ‘Erudite, incisive and devastatingly honest in his opinions; everything one rightly hates about a critic.’

  ‘What’s he on about now? Wandering, is he? It happens when you gets to his age. Don’t suppose he’s asked how you are after your bit of night-time crime-fighting?’

  ‘I haven’t, which is remiss of me,’ said Campion, ‘but I shall do so now.’

  ‘It was all rather farcical,’ said Rupert. ‘Our room, the so-called Royal Suite, is at the front of the pub and Mr and Mrs Yallop sleep in a room at the back, so I heard him first. He jemmied one of the sash windows and got straight into the bar where the stairs to our room come out, so I was on him fairly quickly.’

  ‘Foolish boy,’ Campion scolded gently.

  ‘Exactly what I said,’ added Perdita, ‘only with more feeling and a few swear words.’

  Rupert held up his palms in mock surrender. ‘I know, I know, it was rash of me; he might have been belligerent.’

  ‘Or armed,’ said Perdita severely.

  ‘Well, he wasn’t. He was actually quite clumsy – we both were really. I sort of bumped into him. It was dark, you see, and neither of us had a torch. He had an armful of bottles which he’d taken from behind the bar, we collided and they went all over the place. One of them smashed when it hit the floor and I trod on it. While I was hopping on one foot trying not to bleed to death, the little sod ran across the bar and jumped out of the window quick as a flash. Perdita roused the Yallops and the hunt was on for TCP and plasters.’