Jest and Die (Jordan Lacey Mysteries Book 5)

by Stella Whitelaw

  ‘Oh Jordan,’ said Francis, pushing the glass of brandy towards me. The colour of the liquid in the glass was burnished gold. ‘You should not be doing this work.’

  ‘Then I was following a stalker but the poor man who was being stalked has died also. He was found hung on a hook behind his dressing-room door. He was a comedian but there was nothing funny about his death.’ The brandy went down my throat as burning liquid fire, but not the Spanish fire water brand. It was not duty free from across the Channel. It was cask mellow and centuries old.

  ‘When am I going to persuade you to give up this awful job and come and work for me at Guilberts?’

  ‘As a store detective?’

  Francis hesitated. ‘Yes, if that’s what you want.’ It was not what he wanted, obviously, but I let it pass. ‘So your cases have dried up? You’re not being paid any more.’

  ‘Yes, I am being paid. Posthumously, in the case of George Hill as he sent me money before he died. And I have been paid a retainer for the vandalized garden which I have not yet worked off.’ I did not mention the long black leather coat, straight from Tolstoy and Anna Karenina.

  ‘You are too honest.’

  A plate of tiny triangular sandwiches arrived, decorated with watercress. No parsley. Francis must have heard I was off parsley. There was egg and cress, cucumber and cream cheese, chicken and bacon. And the tray of coffee with an elegant silver coffee pot, cream and sugar, and two gold-rimmed cups and saucers. I could live like this. I stirred myself to be mother and pour.

  ‘We are not leaving here until everything has been eaten,’ said Francis, offering me the plate. ‘Don’t just take the watercress. You must have lost half a stone.’

  ‘I like watercress. It’s full of iron.’

  I suppose Francis brought me back to the land of the living. He had been through a dreadful time when his son was murdered on a monster fairground spinning wheel last winter. Yet I had never heard a word of complaint from him or a word of self-pity. He had got on with his work running Guilbert’s store, hosting a staff Christmas party, and caring for other people, including me, when his heart must have been breaking.

  We talked about a lot of other things. I knew he wanted me around. But there was no way I could be what he wanted. Whatever that was daughter, mistress, second wife? I could not see myself in any role.

  ‘You must be strong. If you become ill, Jordan, I don’t know what I should do,’ said Francis, his eyes serious yet twinkling. The man wanted to touch me, take my hand. There was longing written all over him. I could feel my heart crawling the walls. ‘I shall have no one left.’

  *

  As I walked home, feeling one and a half degrees better, I counted all my good friends. It was humbling. I did not deserve so many. I had done nothing really, apart from being a nuisance and getting into scrapes. James was always hauling me out of one predicament or another. Mavis fed me. Doris kept an eye open for the best chance. Miguel cooked and poured out his best wine. Francis took me under his mature wing. And Jack … my shining knight in amusement arcade stainless-steel, ball-rolling, lights-flashing, hit the buzzer type armour. He was a star.

  So I put my mind to my shop and my cases. And I had a party to cancel. This time a red light was flashing on my answerphone. I pressed replay.

  ‘Hello, Miss Lacey. This is Tim Arnold. I’m sorry to disturb you but I have just thought of something. I wonder if you could drop by? I shall be in all day. It’s nothing really, but you did say if I thought of anything … ’

  I dialled back. There was no answer, only his gruff answerphone message. He was probably having a nap, enjoying the last of the summer sun in his new conservatory. ‘Thank you for the call, Mr Arnold,’ I said. ‘It’s Jordan Lacey. I’ll be right round.’

  I did not hold out much hope. The importance of what people remembered was variable. The ladybird was glad to have an outing, her engine humming, and we were there in no time.

  I slopped along a side road, parking near The Corner House. The garden was looking more colourful. Tim Arnold had bought some new shrubs and plants. He was asleep in his conservatory, head back, a half-drunk beer warming up on the table.

  Something made me do it. I switched on my mobile phone and keyed in DI James’s number. It was also on answerphone. Does no one answer these days?

  ‘It’s Jordan. I thought I’d let you know I’m visiting Tim Arnold at The Corner House, Goring, where the Steels used to live. He left a message for me saying he had thought of something. Since you are investigating Anne Steel’s murder, I reckoned you might like to know where I am.’

  I let myself into the garden by the front gate and walked round to the conservatory. A bee was buzzing frantically against the glass. It looked hot inside. Tim Arnold looked hot. His face was red and dry looking. Not a sign of sweat. I went to touch the handle of the door and leaped back. It was burning. I breathed on my fingers, trying to cool them with saliva.

  Wrapping my hand in the stretched-out hem of my T-shirt, I went for the door again and turned the handle. The door burst open and a blast of heat hit my face. Inside the conservatory was like a furnace.

  Tim Arnold was not moving. He was in a coma. He’d passed out with heat stroke. He was being baked to death.

  Seventeen

  The patient and the paramedics went straight into the kitchen and came back with armfuls of damp towels and tea towels which they wrapped round Tim Arnold. They fixed an oxygen mask over his face, talking as they worked.

  ‘What’s his name?’

  ‘Tim. Tim Arnold.’

  ‘Tim, Tim, can you hear me?’

  There was no response. He didn’t move, his face still red with the heat. They began sponging his face with tepid water.

  ‘Will he survive?’ I asked.

  ‘Are you a relative?’ they asked back.

  ‘No, a friend. I was calling by. He’d phoned me earlier.’ It sounded lame. It was lame.

  ‘You can call the hospital. Do you know if Mr Arnold has any relatives?’

  ‘No. I believe he’s a widower.’ I needed my notes to check. He must have told me.

  They looked at me suspiciously as if I’d turned up the thermostat myself. That’s what I guessed had happened. The heating was turned up to full blast. And it was already a sunny day outside. The big panes of glass had kept the heat in, doubling the temperature inside. The back of my T-shirt was wet with sweat even though both doors were open for a through draught.

  ‘I’d better turn the thermostat off,’ I said, wondering where it was.

  ‘I shouldn’t touch anything until the police have been here,’ said one of the paramedics sharply. ‘They’ll want everything left. They’ll need to dust for prints.’

  I longed to flash a badge and say, ‘But I am the police’ like in the movies. They were lifting Tim Arnold on to a stretcher and wheeling him out into the fresh air, talking on a mobile to alert the hospital of his arrival. Then he was moved into the ambulance. I didn’t ask to go with him. I wanted to be left in the house. Which I was. Very considerate of them.

  The house was quiet. It had no pulse. He obviously had a cleaner. Everywhere was spotless and tidy but without the usual touches of a woman. No flowers. Very little fruit. One wizened orange in a bowl. His freezer was full of single portion microwave meals. The refrigerator held only milk, cans of beer and an opened packet of bacon.

  All the downstairs rooms were furnished comfortably but without individuality. It felt like a set-piece show house, not a home. Upstairs was different. Tim Arnold’s bedroom looked like a real room. Maybe it was out-of-bounds to his cleaner. The double bed was not made. The furniture was strewn with discarded clothes. Beer cans and newspapers littered both bedside tables. A portable radio stood on the floor, next to a telephone.

  No obvious diaries or address books. Several gardening catalogues. No scraps of paper with the magic words: must tell Jordan Lacey about … Nothing personal at all, apart from crumpled socks and underpants.

 
I went through his wardrobe. It was not much fun. He had below average clothes sense. The chest of drawers was cluttered with socks and pants and ties and broken cufflinks. He apparently did not keep letters, photographs, receipts or bills in his bedroom.

  The other bedrooms were empty apart from a few suitcases. The Corner House was far too large for him. I wondered why he had bought it. He’d said he liked the garden.

  I was on the point of leaving when I decided to scan his collection of records in the cabinet downstairs. There was a stack of long-playing 33 r.p.m.’s. I wondered if he liked jazz.

  Maybe I would find a rare Stan Kenton with his Big Band. But no, it was fairly predictable, songs from the shows: My Fair Lady, Mary Poppins, The King and I.I could hum along to them on a wet day.

  One Barry Manilow sleeve did not contain a record. I took out a slim school-size exercise book into which someone had stuck a variety of photographs using adhesive corners. They were informal photographs of a skinny little girl with fair hair. She was pretty in a feckless way, playing up to the camera with a smile.

  Each photograph was dated underneath and named. Annie, aged 4. Annie, aged 7. Annie, aged 9. Annie at her 11th birthday party. Annie at Christmas. And so on, through the teenage years. Till the photographs reached Annie, aged 19, looking grown-up, smooth and glamorous. By then I knew who Annie was. The collection stopped. Lots of empty pages. There were no more photographs of Annie smiling to the camera.

  Annie was Mrs Anne Steel.

  Was this what Tim Arnold had been going to tell me about, or not? Maybe he was never going to tell me the connection between him and Anne Steel. But I was guessing that she might be his daughter. If she was his daughter, then her death would have been a terrible shock. Perhaps he was responsible for the thermostat mishap. It could be a suicide attempt. Maybe he had forgotten that he had phoned me or had not reckoned on my immediate response. Maybe he wanted me to find him so that his cleaner did not discover him on her next visit. A decomposing body is not a pretty sight.

  ‘What are you doing, Jordan? Not snooping again, I hope?’ DI James stood in the doorway, not exactly glowering at me, but finding my presence a surprise. He looked the same. His face had not changed. He was hiding whatever he was feeling.

  ‘I can’t resist other people’s music,’ I said, tapping the Barry Manilow cover. ‘Have you come about the accident?’

  ‘If it was an accident,’ he said. ‘The paramedics were not happy. They called me. And I had time for once.’

  ‘How’s Mr Arnold?’

  ‘They are still trying to cool him down. It’s touch and go.’

  ‘Poor soul,’ I said, turning away and slipping the slim book of photographs under my arm. ‘It seems I arrived just in time.’

  ‘What do you mean, just in time? I was going to ask you what you were doing here,’ he said, peering into the still baking conservatory. It was a wonder the glass hadn’t cracked. ‘Phew. I’m not surprised he passed out.’ He looked at the thermostat, loosening his collar, sweat running down his face. ‘140 degrees Fahrenheit. As hot as the desert.’

  ‘Mr Arnold left a message for me on my answerphone, asking me to call round. I think I arrived sooner than he expected. He really wanted me to arrive when it was all over. I was almost a friend, you see. He did not want to be found a week later, which might have happened.’

  ‘You think this is suicide?’

  ‘Could be.’

  DI James was on his phone. ‘Get the print people over here and a photographer. I’m not sure what it’s all about and I don’t know if it’s homicide or an accident. Well, not yet.’

  ‘It’s not homicide. He tried to kill himself,’ I said, glad that James was with me, glad that for once he was listening. His attitude seemed to have shifted gear although it was not that obvious. There was the tiniest thaw in Latching’s top detective inspector. It might not last long but I had to be grateful for this moment.

  ‘And you know why?’

  ‘I think Mrs Anne Steel was his daughter.’

  ‘His daughter? Interesting. How do you know that?’

  ‘I’m a detective, remember? Denbury Court is my case and I’m employed by Mr Steel.’

  ‘Mrs Steel is a homicide.’

  ‘I know. I’m not trying to solve her murder. That’s your case. I know better than to interfere. The garden at Updown is my case. Weedkiller, not garden shears.’

  ‘The shears didn’t kill her. They were like the final stab in the back of a bull’s neck at a bullfight. She was already dying.’

  ‘From what?’

  ‘They are still making tests.’

  ‘Still? How long does all this take?’

  ‘You know, Jordan, it’s never straightforward. Forensic are working on a cadaveric spasm.’

  ‘She had something in her hand. Tightly grasped? It’s usually hair or fabric, isn’t it?’

  ‘It was a genuine death grasp, not an attempt to fool us with fake evidence. I can’t tell you what it was.’

  ‘Maybe a button. If someone is trying to kill you, then you grab at anything. I’d grab hard,’ I said. ‘Really hard. I’m not a Crab sign for nothing.’

  ‘You’d fight tooth and nail, wouldn’t you? Tell me, Jordan, you would fight, wouldn’t you?’

  James was staring at me intently as if willing me into some action. There was something in his eyes that made my body go cold. I could not believe what was happening. James had kept a distance from me all the time that I had known him. I was used to it. I expected nothing else. But now he was looking at me differently.

  ‘Are you trying to warn me about something?’ I said suddenly.

  ‘I think so,’ said James. ‘You could be getting too near for comfort. I’d rather you dropped your present cases. Can you do that?’

  ‘No, of course I can’t. My work is important, you know that. People rely on me.’

  ‘George Hill is not relying on you anymore. You can drop that one. He won’t mind. Could you go away?’

  ‘George Hill has paid me, in full. I can’t give him the money back. I’ve got to find out all I can.’

  James moved closer. I could smell his aftershave. It was something very subtle. I could not name it. Whatever was happening was so unexpected. My face would not respond. It had frozen into a useless expression.

  ‘Listen, Jordan. You have got to get away. Take a holiday. Go to Cornwall, Jersey, Spain, anywhere. Change your name. If you need the money, I’ll lend you enough.’

  I could not believe what I was hearing. And that ‘holiday’ hurt.

  ‘James, you must be joking. I can’t go away and I never borrow money. And especially not from you. I’m not in any danger. What do you think is going to happen? Am I going to get sprayed with weedkiller or something?’

  I hoped he didn’t mean that. It was not a nice thought. So itchy.

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said wearily. ‘Everything smells bad. The whole case.’

  ‘Which case? Denbury Court garden or George the Jester?’

  He wasn’t going to answer. I could tell that. His stubborn look had reasserted itself. I was going to be left wondering what on earth was going on. The underwater stillness of his face gave my eyes a chance to search the fine lines and hollows. His cropped hair was so dark, the eyebrows matching in severity.

  ‘Jordan … why don’t you do what you are told, for once? I know I can’t make you go. I can only ask you.’

  ‘You weren’t asking me, you were telling me, ordering me about,’ I said. ‘Kindly remember I don’t work for Sussex police any more. They thought I was a liability, you know, liable to tell the truth at any instant.’

  He swallowed a groan, his fingers combing through what there was of his hair. ‘I don’t know what to do with you.’ He paused, as if making up his mind. ‘Would you go and stay with my mother? She lives in the country. She’d enjoy your company for a couple of weeks, longer maybe, until this thing blows over.’

  His mother. Now that was a serious
offer. It must have cost him.

  ‘That’s a very kind offer,’ I said, hoping I sounded properly grateful. ‘If the going gets tough, I may take you up on it.’

  ‘I don’t want you to take me up on it when it’s too bloody late. I want you to go now.’ He was nearly shouting. Perhaps it was the heat.

  ‘If you don’t mind, I think I’ll be off. I have quite a lot of work to do. Is it all right if I phone the hospital to find out how Mr Arnold is doing?’

  James nodded impatiently. ‘Please yourself. But I did warn you. This could turn nasty.’

  ‘I’m aware of that,’ I said with some dignity. ‘Two murders and one possible suicide are not exactly a quiet life. I actually prefer social security frauds. Cleaner type of living.’

  ‘Your shoulder bag is back at the station. You can collect it when you bring me the rest of those spreadsheets.’

  An unmarked police car drew up outside The Corner House and the requested photographer and fingerprint man were getting out with their cases of equipment. James turned away from me abruptly and went out to meet them. He wanted the scene of the accident recorded in detail.

  I drove back to the shop, wondering if I would find burning rags stuffed through the letterbox. I hoped not. My insurance did not cover everything. Only the contents up to a certain value. The premiums were beyond my budget. Maybe I ought to disappear for a while or take on another identity. James’s warning had unsettled me. I was starting to get nervous.

  Then I thought of George Hill’s empty flat and the key in my filing cabinet. No one would think of looking for me there. It was ideal. Only an idiot would hide away in the home of a murdered man. I could take on a new identity with ease. It was my trade mark. A different person every day.

  Sister, girlfriend, scriptwriter, publicist, secretary, producer … the choice was endless. I could be anybody I liked. I might even solve things.

  I went round to Doris to stock up on essentials. George Hill’s flat probably contained little in the food line. I bought rather more than usual. Doris surveyed the pile of tins and packets on her counter, tapping the tuna with her long nails.