by Amy Myers
I decided to sleep on it before I rang Brenda with my thanks – even then I would not take it for granted that this was a firm date. A lot of water might flow under the bridge before the rally. Julian could step in with an offer, or Tom Morris contest the will on Patricia’s behalf. Nick Morris might twist Brenda round to favour him as driver, or the Major decide he wanted to drive it himself. To crown it all, there was always the possibility of Connor Meyton waiting in the wings, although I hoped he was a ghostly spectre rather than a physical threat. His interest in the De Dion might have waned. Somehow I couldn’t believe that.
Just as I closed the farmhouse door the bell rang. Zoe stood belligerently on the doorstep, her body language telling me she didn’t want to be here, but she had no choice.
‘Come in,’ I suggested wearily, not sure I was up to this. She duly followed me to the living room.
‘I’ve got to tell you this, Jack.’ She plonked herself on the sofa. ‘But only because of that police job of yours. I don’t want to.’
‘That’s obvious. Is it Rob?’ I asked, almost hoping it was.
‘Dean.’
‘Have you seen or heard from him since the fire?’
‘No.’ She didn’t seem inclined to continue, so I pushed further. This sounded ominous. ‘Think anything has happened to him?’
‘Don’t know. Probably not. Not yet anyway. He might just be lying low. Has Dave Jennings talked about him?’
‘Not to me.’
‘Dean’s running scared, Jack.’
‘That figures. Of Meyton?’
‘Yes.’ She was retreating inside herself again, trembling. It was clear she was not yet over her ordeal.
‘Let me make it easy for you, Zoe,’ I tried. ‘Is Dean mixed up with Alf King’s death? Did he do Meyton’s dirty work and loosen that nut?’
‘He says not, and I believe him. He says he was fond of Alf.’
‘Would he have done it if he’d been forced to?’
The pause was long enough to make me realize that’s what she had been fearing. ‘I don’t think so,’ she said uncertainly. ‘He isn’t the sort to take direct action himself or for anyone to entrust him with a mission like that. He’d chicken out and run away. Thing is . . .’
‘Go on,’ I said gently when she ground to a halt.
‘I think he knows who did do it. He made a few remarks that were odd and he can’t keep his mouth shut, can Dean. That didn’t seem too bad when I met him at the funeral, but it got worse.’
‘Because of the fire?’
‘Yes, but it wasn’t just that. Dean was upset over those records vanishing. He says he took them to Meyton.’ She glared at me. ‘Now you’re going to say I should have told you.’
‘No, but you should have done so.’
‘Well, I didn’t,’ she yelled at me. ‘Do you want to hear the rest of this or not?’
‘Yes, please,’ I said placatingly. ‘I already guessed about the records, if that’s any comfort. It’s Meyton I’m interested in. Did he do the dirty work himself as regards Alf?’
‘I don’t know. Dean thinks it’s more likely he ordered one of his mates to do it.’
‘Don’t tell me – Mick Smith?’
‘That’s my guess.’
‘Is this all theory, Zoe? Or pillow talk?’
‘Jack!’ She flushed. ‘Too far.’
‘Zoe, I have to know.’
We exchanged glares (although I like to think of mine as an implacable gaze) and she capitulated. ‘Not pillow talk. Garage or pub and phone talk. I did have a call from Dean. That’s why the fire was a warning to him and why the body was there.’
‘Why would Meyton kill Mick just as a warning to Dean? Tough on Mick, isn’t it?’
‘Dean said Meyton was annoyed now the police were interested in Alf’s death.’
‘Even so, for Meyton to kill Mick makes it clearer that Alf didn’t die through an accident. Not a good move.’ Something odd here, I thought. ‘Unless of course Mick was blackmailing him.’
Zoe looked alarmed. ‘Dean’s a loose cannon, Jack. If he even hinted to Meyton that he had seen Mick Smith around the garage at the time of Alf’s death, Meyton might think he had got rid of one blackmailer only to find another.’ She paused. ‘Am I seeing bogeys where there are only bushes and not many of those either?’
‘No, I don’t think you are, but take care if you’re in touch with Dean again. And even if you’re not.’ I prayed that Zoe wouldn’t realize she herself might be in the firing line if Meyton decided I’d planted her at Dean’s garage as my informant or that Dean could very well have confided any information about Mick Smith to her.
‘Not.’ A pause. ‘Rob and I are giving it another whirl. His floozie’s history.’
‘Good.’ Rob Lane being back was good? This was the sharpest U-turn of my life.
What Zoe had told me about Meyton didn’t affect the De Dion – yet. It would be child’s play for him to have found out where Victoria Drake had secreted the car that night, although I reasoned that if he had discovered that, why not pinch the car? Had he killed her? Had Mick Smith killed her? Or had Meyton himself done so? If so, I hoped Julian’s security on his garage was as good as he claimed. To me it was now quite likely that Connor Meyton was still in the De Dion picture. What he was planning to do there, however, was another matter.
On Wednesday morning, I returned from a trip to Charing Police HQ to find a note pinned to the door. In typical style it read: ‘In the pub, Pen and Bob.’ As invitations go this wasn’t warm, but Pen’s like that.
I debated whether to give it a miss and decided I could not take the risk. Whatever Pen wanted, I knew it would be in her interests not mine, but sometimes, just sometimes, that worked. And Bob, I reminded myself, was still my only line of contacting Meyton. He claimed to be out of touch, and indeed the new number he had given me was now dead, but I had my hopes. With Pen breathing down his neck, he might well be carving himself out some leeway.
Our local pub in Piper’s Green was busy, even though it was a weekday lunchtime. That’s because its sandwiches are an art form in themselves and partly because there’s nowhere else to go to eat – except Liz Potter’s garden centre. Liz, the lady in my life a few years back and now a chum, does a good line in snack lunches but garden centres aren’t on Pen’s radar and Bob might faint without strong liquor.
I found them both at the bar, and we moved to a table where we could all three sit without looking like the three wise monkeys all in a row.
‘We’ve got a story, Jack,’ Pen began, when I’d joined them with my modest half pint.
‘Will I like it?’
She chuckled. ‘Doubt it. Bob wants to warn you, though, and that’s OK with me.’
‘How good of you both,’ I said warmly.
‘We’re serious,’ Bob said reprovingly. ‘Thought you might want to be in on it.’
‘Pull the other one.’
‘Seen today’s press, Jack?’ Bob fished in a bag and produced the Graphic.
Something went clang inside me, like the snap of a clutch cable. Wednesday was publication day. There was someone I recognized on the front page and it wasn’t a grinning blonde. It was Nick Morris looking mournful under a heading ‘My Vow’. There I read that in the tragic aftermath of the tragic death of his grandmother, Nick Morris vowed he would still be driving the De Dion Bouton in the August rally mock-up of the Peking to Paris race. It was apparently his grandmother’s dearest wish to see him do so. Now legal considerations and red tape were putting obstacles in his way, but owing to factors he was unable to reveal he was convinced that when the rally came he would be driving that car.
‘Great,’ I said. ‘I like the bit about being “unable to reveal” etc. Where do I come in, Pen? You seem to have it wrapped up.’
‘Not quite,’ Bob answered for her. ‘It’s the follow-up. Got some grapevine news for you. That’s where you come in, Jack.’
‘Wrong. This is where I go,’ I told them. A
minefield loomed ahead if I mentioned I was being asked to drive the De Dion myself. ‘There’s nothing the police can do,’ I continued on behalf of Dave Jennings.
‘But you can,’ Pen sweetly insisted. ‘You know all about this rally and I reckon you know where the car is. I think, and Bob agrees, that our Nick is in touch with Meyton. That’s the factor he says he can’t reveal.’
‘It’s a possible theory,’ I agreed. More than possible, I thought, but it doesn’t do to give Pen too much encouragement. ‘But you’re wrong. I haven’t seen the car since Victoria died.’ True enough.
‘Wherever it is it won’t stay there long with Meyton on the case,’ Bob said.
‘You betcha,’ Pen agreed.
‘Even so, the ownership of the car and who drives it is not up to me. The car’s in the hands of the solicitors now, both legally and physically.’
Bob brushed this aside. ‘Meyton knows where it is. It’s in Julian Carter’s garage. It was one of Meyton’s chaps did the moving job.’
TWELVE
All appeared well, or so I tried to tell myself as the clock ticked and days passed, bringing the rally ever closer. After all, the De Dion seemed to be off my responsibility list, and there was no sign of Meyton. Julian’s vested interest in the car still made me somewhat uneasy about his guardianship, bearing in mind there had been two murders, both (or neither) of which might relate to it. In vain I told myself that if either was connected, the point at which the assailants would most likely show their bloodstained hands would either be at the rally, due to take place on the third weekend in August, or during final preparations for it.
Helen was frantically busy collecting placards and posters from their printers in Canterbury, dashing around the Kent and Sussex countryside and cheering on the numerous troops involved in turning villages and towns into their Chinese, Mongolian, Russian and other European counterparts. I gathered they were all supposed to be in charge of their own temporary name and culture changes for the day on which the rally would pass through them, but some places were more on the ball than others; others needed jollying along and helping with the organizational spadework. I went with her once or twice and began to appreciate at first hand the work involved. Police had to be included in the discussions over roads and closures to other traffic. A whole army of volunteers had to be ready to display temporary signposts to Mongolia or Warsaw or wherever, all costumed more or less appropriately. Local caterers and craftsmen would be displaying appropriate wares – under Helen’s overseeing eye – rally route maps had to be provided for participants and arrangements coordinated with hotels.
It was hard to remember that I was a participant myself, and I was caught on the hop when Helen first handed me a route map. I stared bemusedly at it: Urga, Kiakhta, Omsk . . . Fortunately there was an English equivalent printed on the reverse side.
Sometimes she stayed overnight with me at Frogs Hill, but the rally and its timetable often demanded early-morning starts. On one of my lucky days, I woke up to find her still asleep. When her blue eyes eventually opened, she murmured, ‘I was having a nightmare about the Khyber Pass.’
‘Kalgan,’ I corrected her. ‘Khyber is Afghanistan. Off-route, thank heavens.’
‘So it is.’ She smiled at me. ‘So we might make Paris after all.’
‘We’ll head there ourselves when this is over,’ I promised her.
‘How about now?’ she said grimly. A rhetorical question alas and we both knew it.
My private nightmare, the De Dion’s safety, also resurrected itself from time to time as summer wore on. However much I reasoned that Meyton would gain little by stealing the car at this stage, the niggle remained. Julian himself was unperturbed when I discussed the possible threat to it. His security system was unbreakable, he told me. Having inspected it, I agreed it was remarkable. It had more lights, bells and whistles than a Broadway musical. Nevertheless the word ‘unbreakable’ had an unfortunate resonance with the Titanic’s ‘unsinkable’.
I’d telephoned Brenda and thanked her for suggesting I drove the car, but privately I wondered how practical this was – although not because of my skills or lack of them. Far from it. A car that has not been seriously driven for over a hundred years, however, was likely not only to be fragile, but showing every sign of resentment, especially if asked to carry two stalwart persons. Two, as Brenda had disclosed that she would be my passenger.
In addition I had not forgotten Pen and Bob’s theory that Meyton might have teamed up with Nick Morris. On the whole I now thought this unlikely. Meyton would have his own game and be playing for high stakes, which Nick would be unlikely to bankroll. Nevertheless, I reasoned, he could be playing a role as Meyton’s stooge. The road to the rally still looked murky, although Julian was behaving as though the car already belonged to him. He was talking in terms of ‘our’ car and what ‘we’ would do with it, and I sensed that the ‘we’ did not include Jack Colby or even the Mad Major. It was more likely to be Julian and the ghost of his grandfather. Who was I to knock that? Did I or Dad own the Glory Boot at Frogs Hill? No contest.
With the De Dion there was a contest. The Mad Major had a stake in it, so did Brenda, and so did Tom and Nick Morris. Stanley was taking a suspiciously back seat at the moment – but as a De Dion doesn’t have a back seat, he could reappear at any moment. Brenda too was all for a quiet life.
‘I’m leaving the unpleasant matter of ownership until after this rally, Jack,’ she told me on the telephone. ‘And then we’ll just see what happens.’
She took this attitude to surprising extremes. When I asked her in late July if she’d like to come over to Julian’s house while I had a test run round the yard, she declined. The solicitors might not like it, she told me, and secondly she would rather not spoil the excitement of her first ride in it. This would be when the rally left Dover Castle, the starting point of the route. She had no objections to my trying it out, however, and even – after a pause – Julian and the Major.
‘After all,’ she said, ‘I’m sure Mr Carter will see it remains in his garage. I don’t want the Morrises driving it.’
No contest there either, although every so often the Major put in a quiet plea on Nick Morris’s behalf. Julian ignored him. He was too busy consulting with Parr & Son on the De Dion about registrations, MOTs, insurance and the work that Alf had done in restoration.
When I arrived at Cobba House for the test drive, the car was already parked in the forecourt and Julian was fussing over it as if it were a babe in a pushchair. The Major was there too, admiring it, as was Helen, so I joined the sideshow.
Julian’s dominance began to worry me. There was a factor here that I wasn’t getting, especially as I still could not fathom why Benson & Hawkes had chosen his garage and not one on neutral ground. Then it occurred to me that they too might have their doubts about the Morrises and believed that Julian was neutral. His secure garage was hidden from view on the far side of the forecourt, tucked behind his usual garage and shielded by an eight-foot stone wall. Cobba House was sufficiently remote and far away to make an assault by the Morrises unlikely and Benson might be unaware of ‘professional’ threats from the likes of Meyton.
Although they had started the De Dion up during the last few weeks and driven it a short way, this was indeed the first major test of the De Dion. It was now registered and insured, so we could even take it on the road if we wished, but we agreed that was a step too far at present.
‘Who’s going to crank the lady up?’ I asked chattily. The Major had told me they had pushed it from the garage to this point so the first cranking was going to be a significant moment.
Julian looked at me in amazement. ‘You are. I’m taking the wheel.’
Of course, I thought, but even cranking this car was a privilege and I took the handle from Julian with due reverence.
At first there was no response to my cranking, except a cough or two. I felt my arms were being yanked out of their sockets, but then it happened. The m
ost beautiful noise in the world, the sound of an engine that had fired and caught. I leapt out of the way and the De Dion moved.
We all lost our heads, united at last, at this wonderful sight. Julian drove round the forecourt and chugged down the path to Treasure Island at a stately eight mph or so, while the Major, Helen and I ran beside it, cheering, laughing and singing like kids. Doubt and danger were put aside. This was the same car that had driven all the way from Peking to Paris in 1907, up mountains, through rivers, over broken bridges, and across deserts. That was well over a hundred years ago, when cars themselves were in their infancy, when driving was an adventure and the joy of motoring at its peak.
I swung Helen off her feet and high into the air in sheer jubilation. I stopped short of doing the same for the Major, even though he was cheering as enthusiastically as we still were. We watched in exhilaration, as Julian turned into the tarmacked area in front of Treasure Island, drove past it and stopped in front of Pompeii ready for the return trip. The De Dion had moved roughly three hundred yards, but it had given me an idea that I stored away inside my head for later consideration.
Julian somewhat ungraciously allowed me to take the wheel for the return trip. He cranked and I was lord of all I surveyed from the De Dion driving seat. Sir Edmund Hillary on Mount Everest had nothing on me as regards views, as I drove her in majesty surrounded by my enthusiastic courtiers. The De Dion was now a ‘she’ not an ‘it’. A bond had been forged between us. When at last I drove her back into her garage, however, I noticed the Major was looking doleful to say the least.
‘What’s the matter, Stanley?’ I asked quietly, as I jumped down and came outside to join them.
‘This car,’ he said awkwardly. ‘Victoria’s. Doesn’t seem fair somehow, our being here, her not.’