by Amy Myers
‘No, but I had to tell her. She was incandescent, but she’s—’
But then another gorgeous blonde arrived – although perhaps the hair had had a little help in this case. Gran was here in person.
I’d had a vague stereotyped image of a decrepit white-haired old lady forced to give up her beloved Morris Minor because she wasn’t safe to drive any longer and had had to move into sheltered accommodation through declining health. What roared into the Frogs Hill forecourt was a stylish slim lady in a huge classic red Thunderbird convertible, which when it first came out was Ford’s answer to the Chevrolet Corvette. This Thunderbird, however, was a two-door 1958 model, bigger and fatter than the original and made for large empty roads, of which America had plenty and the UK most certainly did not.
It churned up the gravel and drew up with a flourish. Out stepped Gran, looking in her forties, rather than the sixty-or even seventy-year-old she must be. She was clad in tight jeans, an elegant jacket, and a sporty hat and was clutching designer sunglasses.
‘So there you are, darling,’ she said briskly to Daisy, after a friendly wave to the rest of us and a disdainful look at the battered Volvo. ‘What’s the news about Melody?’
‘Jack’s a firm line on her,’ Daisy lied unblushingly. ‘He’s a car detective. I’ve borrowed Justie’s dad’s wheels.’
Gran marched round the offending object. ‘Justin’s father, Daisy, has no style. One should always drive cars with which one feels an affinity, don’t you agree, Mr Colby?’
I did. I wouldn’t claim that owners grow to look like their cars, but they certainly acquire a relationship with them that goes beyond paying the maintenance bills. Gran then advanced towards me and, still stunned at this apparition, I shook her hand.
‘Tell me what this lead is on Melody,’ she demanded.
‘Not a strong one.’ I borrowed Brandon’s get-out. ‘Early days.’
She regarded me scornfully. ‘To find a Rose Taupe Morris Minor?’
‘Yes.’
She looked at me keenly and nodded. ‘Don’t leave it too long. Subject closed.’
Now, I thought, for the scarlet beauty. ‘Is this Thunderbird yours?’
‘It is. Rest assured I gave up car theft years ago.’
My admiration grew. She wasn’t in her forties, she might be in her seventies, but I liked her style. ‘Had it long?’
‘Two years. I thought, why not? I’ve always wanted one, and Melody was on the small side for me. I love this red beast.’ She patted the Thunderbird lovingly.
I could see that she did. I wondered whether Kent’s small lanes would cherish it as much as she did, however. Passing places are for normal-size cars not this monster, delightful though it was. The 1958 model was the first of the larger four-passenger models, and Len and Zoe had already shot out to inspect its innards.
‘Where do you live?’ I asked Gran curiously. ‘California?’
‘No. Out near Wormslea on the Downs,’ she said blithely. ‘I need a car to get around.’
She was right. Wormslea is a very small village and probably the nearest it ever got to public transport was the First World War landing ground on its outskirts. A Thunderbird nearby must be livening up its life considerably.
‘It was either this or a horse and cart,’ she explained. ‘The folks at my current residence would have found that difficult to cope with. Now, young man,’ she addressed me briskly, ‘I hear you have a Gordon-Keeble and a Lagonda. And this restoration garage. I need to see them all. Do you tweet?’
‘Sometimes, but—’
‘I’ll follow you. Blog?’
‘Yes, but—’
‘I’ll guest for you. Regularly, if you wish. Now, Daisy tells me you need me, so I came immediately. Besides, I thought you might like Juno.’
‘Who?’ I was thrown again.
She looked at me pityingly. ‘No education nowadays. Thunderbird. Juno, goddess. Wife of Jupiter the Thunderer.’
I laughed. ‘Stupid of me. Yes, I did want to meet you. Daisy tells me you knew the May Tree and the Charros band.’
She looked at me speculatively. ‘You could say that. The murder. I thought as much. It was your wife that Carlos Mendez ran off with.’
‘Yes. How well did you know the May Tree?’
She looked somewhat bewildered. ‘Very well, thanks. I co-owned it with my husband.’
‘James Fever?’ I reeled. ‘You bought the May Tree after Tony Wilson went inside?’
‘Correct. I’m Belinda Fever, known to the band as the Feverbird. I bought Melody after James died. He’d have loved her and Juno. The father of Daisy’s young man now owns the pub.’
‘Not my young man,’ Daisy said belligerently.
‘Nonsense,’ Gran informed her. ‘You’re ideally suited. I like Justin.’
Diplomacy was clearly not Gran’s strong point. ‘Carlos Mendez,’ I said firmly to get back on track.
‘I could do with a coffee.’
This took some time, and we were sitting in the garden together with refreshments by the time Gran Belinda was ready to impart whatever information she had. I was beginning to fear that was very little.
‘So you’re in the frame for Carlos’s murder, Jack?’ Belinda obviously believed in getting right to the point.
‘Half in, half out. My ex-wife came down here to join Carlos.’
‘And now you want to find out all you can about Carlos and the Charros. Didn’t you know the band at the time?’
‘No. I was too busy babysitting – the May Tree must have been Eva’s territory.’
‘Ah. I see now.’ She nodded thoughtfully. ‘Suppose you show me the Gordon-Keeble first?’
Was she deliberately employing delaying tactics? If so, she’d hit the right one. ‘You drive a hard bargain,’ I told her. Daisy, Belinda and I walked round to the barn where the Gordon-Keeble lives together with the Lagonda. ‘You do things in style, Jack,’ she commented. ‘That rear arch needs looking at though.’
I hadn’t noticed. Typical that I’d missed it. The cobbler’s daughter goes unshod, as they say. For cobbler’s daughter read garage owner’s own wheels. I’m devoted to my classics – so devoted that I don’t always see them when I look at them.
My respect for Belinda grew. She’d even heard the rumour that there was another Gordon-Keeble in existence, in addition to the accepted one hundred. ‘I love legends, Jack, especially car legends.’
‘Have you ever driven one?’ I asked. Mistake.
She brightened up. ‘No. Shall we—’
My turn to set the conditions. ‘Afterwards. Talk first.’
‘Talk about Melody,’ Daisy put in meaningfully.
I took the hint. Time to produce my nugget and blow it up as much as I morally could or she would be on my case night and day. Dave had told me that a Rose Taupe Morris Minor had recently been seen on Bluebell Hill. Bluebell Hill is a picturesque name for a road, and if one can forget the traffic on this fast dual carriageway and think of the lane it had once been years ago, winding itself up the Downs with woods on either side, it still is. Prehistoric man certainly thought so.
‘When are we going there?’ Daisy demanded.
‘I’ll go as soon as possible. No point your coming with me since there’s no guarantee it will be seen there again.’
Daisy scowled, but gave way gracefully when I pointed out that meant Melody might still be around in the neighbourhood and hadn’t been whisked off to foreign parts. ‘OK then. Get back to this dinosaur band of yours, but go over to Bluebell Hill, Jack.’
I agreed I would, and then kicked off, as Belinda had consented to delay her drive. ‘Did you know Carlos well?’
‘Of course. He used to come to the May Tree with his friend Matt Wright, and after I’d known them some months Carlos told me about his idea for the band. That would have been about 1987. He was rather a nice young man then, about thirty or so, and a first-class musician and leader, so I encouraged them, with the result that the Carlos an
d the Charros band was formed and often played at the May Tree. Carlos told me he knew all about mariachi bands because his father ran one and had often played in Kent. That’s how he had first met Matt and would stay with him occasionally. Then I think the family went back to Mexico for a few years. Both Carlos’s parents were Mexican so he could talk and behave Mexico one hundred per cent.’ Belinda paused. ‘Is this the kind of thing you want to know?’
‘Go right ahead.’
She obliged. ‘Matt became one of the Charros with three other young men and the singer. They were all with other bands when he found them, but he persuaded them to take their luck with him and learn new tricks. He poached them one by one, telling them they could make a fortune, and they were well on their way to doing so. Carlos was always the leader, playing the vihuela. Josie – the singer – had a magnificent voice. I can still hear it in my head. Love songs, blues, rock – she excelled at them all. Carlos persuaded them all to give up their day jobs and play full time at weddings and other events. Then he grew bored, said he wanted wider horizons, and off he went with your wife. The band, being British-reared not Mexican, fell apart, and there they were, jobless. Not unnaturally they blamed Carlos.’
‘Do you know where they are now?’
‘Of course,’ she replied, but did not offer any details. ‘I was fond of them all. Dear Josie. She’s the daughter of one of our former barmaids, Betty Gibson – we took her over with the pub. With her dark hair and eyes, Josie could have passed for Mexican or Spanish. Carlos taught her flamenco dancing – and other things.’
‘Other dances?’
‘The dance of life, my friend. Carlos was Josie’s lover for three, maybe four years. He cast quite a spell, that one. Until he met his match.’ She glanced at me, clearly amused. ‘Eva Colby.’ She was trying to goad me.
‘A long time ago,’ I said lightly, wondering if Eva had known of Josie’s other role in Carlos’s life – and vice versa.
‘And now she is back and Carlos is dead.’
There was no innuendo in Belinda’s voice but it brought the situation home to me in stark clarity. ‘Where is Josie now?’
‘After Carlos abandoned her, she drank,’ Gran Fever said matter-of-factly. ‘No more singing, no more bands. Now she is a trained live-in carer.’
‘Locally?’
‘Certainly. She’s employed by an archaeologist, Dr Keith Fairbourne, to look after his father full time. He, too, was an archaeologist.’
‘Not Ambrose Fairbourne?’ I’d heard of him years ago. ‘Specialized in Kentish history and archaeology and was always appearing on local radio and television?’
‘Yes. He was a great man. Josie is very happy there.’ She moved on, it seemed to me rather quickly. ‘The other Charros suffered too. Jonathan Lamb who played the violin went through a very sad time, poor man. But he has recovered and runs an interior decoration business called The House of Lamb near Canterbury. He works with another member of the band, Clive Miller, who played bass guitar. He served a prison sentence for drugs after the band split up and Jonathan gave him a job. An unlikely partnership but it works well.’
‘So they don’t bear bitterness?’
‘You must ask them.’
Her tone was matter of fact. Little speculation for Belinda Fever, I thought. Just the minimum. For the moment that suited me, although it suggested that if I needed to probe further it wouldn’t be welcomed.
‘That’s two Charros and Josie. And there was Matt Wright as well.’
‘Yes. Matt played the other guitar. He’s had a hard time. Went to pieces after the band split up and never fully recovered. He does odd jobs when he’s up to it, garden and house.’
‘And the last?’ I felt I was pushing even for the facts now, and I wondered why. What had her own relationship with Carlos been? She would have been older than he and apparently happily married, but had there been friction between them? Love even? What had been her attitude to Eva’s conquest of Carlos?
‘The last was Neil Watson. The other violin,’ she replied.
‘Where will I find him?’
A pause. Then she said: ‘A question of faith, my friend. Neil killed himself after the band dispersed.’
I was shaken. ‘And Carlos made the mistake of returning.’
‘His death is not forgotten.’
FOUR
‘Gran, that’s awful,’ Daisy said as I took in the implications of what Belinda had told us. And impli-cations there were in plenty now it was clear that Carlos’s actions were far from being buried in the mists of time.
‘Yes,’ Belinda agreed. Calm though she sounded, she must realize that this was highly relevant for Carlos’s death. Four people – all with good reason to want their revenge.
‘Have you told the police?’ I asked. This sounded a crass question, but I needed to know.
‘No. What should I tell them? I’ve no doubt they are by now fully aware of Carlos’s past history with the band.’
‘They are, but they might not know how strongly it still feels about Carlos.’
Belinda shrugged. ‘They’ll find out quickly enough if they want to. None of the Charros has anything to hide.’
I felt I was driving into muddy lanes here. Had Carlos deliberately chosen to stir up old emotions, or had he not realized what he might be running into? But how, I wondered, could his erstwhile colleagues have known he was back in their area? Had he told them or had they learned through the professional grapevine? Neither ticked enough boxes.
Belinda seemed to be more fully involved than her detachment suggested, so I probed further. ‘Do the Charros still see each other?’
‘At least once a year.’
Did I imagine a slight hesitation – and did it mean anything if so?
‘On the ninth of July,’ Belinda continued. ‘That’s the day on which Neil killed himself in 1992, and Jonathan Lamb hosts a lunch in his memory for those who knew him well.’
‘That’s a long time ago,’ Daisy said in awe. ‘I wasn’t even born then.’
‘A happy day for us all when you were.’ Belinda smiled at Daisy.
I wasn’t going to get deflected – if that had been Belinda’s intention. ‘Do you take part in the anniversary lunch?’ I’d been watching her and reckoned it was worth a guess. To draw together friends – presumably all the Charros – to commemorate Neil was admirable from one point of view but surely strange from another. Why remind themselves so formally of an unhappy period in all their lives? It suggested that a wish for revenge might not be so unlikely after all. Not forgetting Neil was good, but not if it meant the Charros had not moved on in life.
‘I go every year,’ Belinda answered, ‘and Betty Gibson comes too.’ Her eyes dared me to ask why the barmaid and the late pub owner’s widow should attend, with its implication that the May Tree was more a home to the Charros than simply a venue.
I accepted their challenge. ‘Why? What’s held you all together for so long?’
‘I’m not sure I can answer that. Ask Jonathan. He’s the prime mover.’
The Charros had failed as a band for reasons beyond most of their control, and Neil’s memory was so treasured that it glued them together. Was the lunch just the loving remembrance it seemed or had it become a ritual that suggested more than that? I had an image of the weird suppers that a rich Parisian gourmet held centuries back for the mighty and wealthy of Paris. They began by entering a room in complete darkness from which they were ushered into another candlelit one, the central table of which was thoughtfully surmounted by a coffin. I couldn’t believe the Charros’ lunch was anything as way out as that, but nevertheless I wondered very much what did happen there.
I prowled restlessly around Frogs Hill after Belinda and Daisy eventually departed in Thunderbird and Volvo respectively – Daisy with much reluctance, not because she liked my company but because I was her only possible link to Melody. Belinda left me with a stern order to me to: ‘Find Melody for Daisy.’
I had h
onoured my word and taken them both to the pub in Piper’s Green for lunch, driven in state in the Gordon-Keeble. Daisy clearly thought the Gordon-Keeble was second-best to the Lagonda, but Belinda was truly hooked, and I allowed her to drive back to Frogs Hill, at her insistence. I reckoned that anyone who could handle a Thunderbird on the North Downs could cope with my beloved car. As I explained, I’m very careful with the Gordon-Keeble owing to its earlier accident, which, despite Len’s magnificent restoration job, left it vulnerable. Every year he toils away murmuring darkly that it’s touch and go whether it will pass the MOT, and every year it does. Of course it does, it’s a Gordon-Keeble – and Belinda had loved it.
She had not offered to give me the Charros’ contact details, but I was confident that I had enough information to track them down easily enough. I decided to leave Josie for the moment and tackle Jonathan Lamb, who was simple to trace because of the House of Lamb design business. An affable recorded voice informed me that the office was closed until Monday morning but that I could ring or visit then.
There was no news from Cara, which was disappointing, and no word from Eva, which was a relief. I don’t know quite what I was dreading, but somehow silence seemed a good thing. Len and Zoe were still working flat out on the Alvis despite the fact that it was well into the afternoon, and they didn’t need any interruptions from me – even if they’d noticed I was around. So I decided to seek out Liz Potter, who runs a garden centre on the outskirts of Piper’s Green. She and I are in the comfortable position of being amiable former lovers. The only snag would arise if her nerd husband Colin was on the scene, but with any luck he’d be chasing microbes in a lab somewhere. He’s some kind of scientist. Where Liz and I are concerned, it is a case of all passion spent, as Milton put it. Passion had reigned for a year and a half when I first returned to England from the oil trade, although that included passion of all sorts, including the occasional flying potted plant during the latter stages. Her garden centre includes a good café for lunch and coffee, so it is equally convenient for practical reasons, as well as for seeing Liz from time to time. Not too often, though, or husband Colin takes the hump. Liz wouldn’t care about that, but I did on her behalf. I am not his favourite person, even though she was not married to him or anyone during our affair and I, too, had been single.