Just Desserts (The Simon Bognor Mysteries)

by Tim Heald

  ‘Unholy mess there, Simon. Just awful.’ Smith shook his head sorrowfully.

  ‘You think someone at Mammoncorp knocked him off?’

  It seemed the logical question but Smith looked pained.

  ‘You think that?’ he asked.

  ‘I don’t know. It just seemed a good place to start.’

  ‘Who would have done it?’ asked Smith. ‘No one benefits. Farquhar was a “divide-and-rule man”, as you people say. Lookit, it’s more than a month since he went and still they can’t decide who takes over. No sense any of those guys killing him.’

  ‘Who then?’ asked Bognor. He was deciding he didn’t care for this man. He seemed far too sure of himself. Bognor disliked certainty. As far as he was concerned life was a tentative affair made up almost exclusively of doubts.

  The Mountie leaned forward, his stomach bulging dangerously against the waistband of his trousers. ‘We know who did it, Simon,’ he said portentously.

  ‘You know?’ Bognor was incredulous.

  ‘For sure.’ Smith maintained his expression of high seriousness. ‘This wasn’t some boardroom piccadilly,’ he said, ‘this was your politically motivated crime.’ He leaned even further forward so that he was able to whisper. ‘Assassination,’ he said. ‘Those French bastards.’ And he returned himself slowly to a more normal posture, grinning.

  ‘You sure?’ Bognor frowned. ‘I mean, do you have proof?’

  ‘We have all the proof we need, Si,’ said Smith.

  Bognor wondered what this meant. It could mean that the assassin had been caught, as it were, in flagrante, or it could mean that the Mounties had no proof whatever, regarding such a thing as a dispensable luxury. He did not voice these questions, however, contenting himself simply with a thoughtful nod. Then he said, ‘But if you’re so certain about this why don’t you arrest these Frog bastards?’

  The policeman grinned as if humouring a backward two-year-old.

  ‘Like I said, Simon,’ he paused for a sip of coffee, ‘it’s a political crime so those guys in Ottawa call the shots. They say “no move”, because if we arrest the frogs who wiped Farquhar out, then Quebec will secede like there was no tomorrow.’

  ‘Ah.’

  ‘If it wasn’t for the politicians’—Smith offered the word contemptuously—‘they’d be inside by now and put away for a long time. They want to ruin this country. If they don’t like it they should get out and go back to la belle France where they came from in the first place.’

  Bognor did not reply. In view of the prejudice it seemed most likely that there was no evidence against the Quebecois. He would have to proceed carefully.

  ‘In the meantime,’ he said at length, ‘none of you will have any objection if I do some nosing around?’

  ‘You just do whatever you want, Simon,’ said Smith. ‘Be our guest.’ He finished his coffee, and put on an expression of friendly menace. ‘Just keep your nose clean,’ he added, ‘and steer clear of trouble. This time we have it solved, and this time we’re right. Happy to have your endorsement but as a matter of fact the work’s all done. Job’s finished.’

  ‘Right ho,’ said Bognor. ‘In that case I’ll just take a look round, for form’s sake, and concentrate on winter sports.’

  Smith smiled. Bognor smiled. It was obvious to each that their relationship was not rooted in trust, but for the time being they were both going to pretend. Bognor was good at pretence. Deceit was his stock-in-trade.

  2

  BOGNOR’S STATUS WAS, AT best, equivocal. He had not been invited by the Canadians. He had invited himself. The arrangement had been finessed by various malleable officials at the Board of Trade in London, the Foreign Office, the Canadian High Commission and External Affairs in Ottawa. Papers had been shuffled, cocktails consumed, likewise lunch, until at the end of the day his involvement had been agreed and the question of who had instigated it was lost in bureaucratic confusion. His ostensible role was to help in solving the murder, no matter how much the Mounties might protest that it was already solved. His real and more secret role was to safeguard British interests within the Mammon Corporation. Mammoncorp had, over the years, made substantial investments in Britain, but in common with most British investments these were yielding lower and lower returns. Men like Farquhar were fed up with the mother country. It was all very well for his fellow billionaire Ken Thomson. Ken owned The Times. There was prestige in that, but Mammoncorp was into beer, biscuits, textiles and, god help them, motorcars. Farquhar and his fellow directors would never have drunk, eaten, worn, let alone driven in, any of their British creations. They were second-rate and unprofitable and the plants were teeming with idle Marxists. Mammon had threatened to withdraw on many occasions but Farquhar had possessed a residue of sentiment for Britain. Now that he was gone, however, the pressure to cut and run would become irresistible and the only people who could be relied on to put old loyalty before new acquisitiveness were Harrison Bentley and his friends.

  Bentley therefore was the first of the Mammon board to be subjected to the rigours of a Bognor inquisition. This took place over tea, a meal which evidently lingered on in those reaches of Toronto society which still took pride in behaving in a manner more English than the English.

  ‘Good day to you,’ said Bentley, opening the door of his enormous 1930s colonial Georgian mansion overlooking a rocky ravine in the most expensive neighbourhood in town. Bognor was surprised to find that he was wearing a monocle. Also that he spoke with only the faintest hint of a North American accent intruding on an exaggerated, plummy, clubman’s English which Bognor had not heard in years. Bognor shook snow from his feet and crossed the threshold. He found himself irrationally irritated by the monocle.

  ‘Hello,’ he said, extricating a hand from a mitt and offering it to his host. ‘Bognor. Board of Trade.’

  ‘You had a good journey, I trust,’ enquired Bentley courteously. He was a man of about sixty, Bognor supposed. Silvery grey hair, somewhat arranged, a long deep-lined face, tall with a slight stoop, he had a look of James Stewart in one of the later films. He also gave the impression that he knew it, and worked at it. He might have been English but for the monocle and the tweed suit. The check was too loud and the squares too wide.

  ‘Yes, thank you,’ said Bognor.

  Bentley helped him off with his coat.

  ‘And how was dear old London town?’

  Bognor frowned, not sure what answer was expected. ‘Pretty much as usual I should say, actually,’ he tried, half-heartedly.

  ‘Ah,’ said Bentley. He hung up the parka with a fastidious disapproval, then rubbed his hands together for a moment and said, ‘Ah,’ again. Then he repeated, ‘Dear old London town’.

  Bognor did not reply.

  ‘Come on through, Mr Bognor,’ said Bentley, stepping across the highly polished oak floor dotted with elderly Persian rugs. A crumpled Airedale rose sleepily from a corner and joined them. ‘Muriel’s just made tea,’ said Bentley. ‘We have crumpets. Crumpets are quite extraordinarily difficult to obtain in this country, Mr Bognor. Indeed, had I had the opportunity I would have asked you to bring a consignment from Jacksons of Piccadilly.’

  ‘Jacksons closed,’ said Bognor. ‘Ça n’existe plus.’ He didn’t know why he said it in French. He guessed he did it to annoy.

  ‘Jumping Jehoshaphat!’ Harrison Bentley passed a hand across his forehead as they entered the drawing room, several hundred square feet of it complete with grand piano, real logs in the grate and a wife, faded, thin, long-suffering, seated demurely on a chintz chaise-longue. ‘Muriel,’ said Bentley, ‘this is Mr Bognor from London, England. He tells me Jacksons of Piccadilly is closed.’

  Mrs Bentley smiled wanly and shook hands. ‘Gracious,’ she ventured, ‘that’s too bad.’

  ‘I would have asked Mr Bognor here to bring crumpets from Jacksons,’ said her husband, ‘but now it seems there’s no point. Muriel found these in the Mix shop opposite the Summerhill Liquor Store. Are they Canadian, Murie
l, or imported?’

  Mrs Bentley said that she was afraid they were Canadian crumpets. Not at all, she implied, the same as English crumpets. She poured the tea from a handsome silver pot. The tea, she explained, was from Twinings. Bognor, politely, mentioned that Murchie’s of Vancouver enjoyed a fine reputation for tea. Mrs Bentley smiled, suggesting that while this might be so, it was not proper to mention the place in the same breath.

  ‘Mr Bognor is from the Board of Trade, come to tell us all who murdered Farquhar,’ said Bentley, spreading butter on his Canadian crumpet.

  Mrs Bentley favoured him with another of her insipid smiles.

  ‘That was a dreadful thing,’ she said.

  Her husband did not seem to agree. He did not say anything, but concentrated ferociously on the crumpet and did not look up.

  ‘Do you have any theories?’ asked Bognor, trying to push the Airedale away from his fly without its owners noticing. The dog refused to budge.

  ‘Theories?’ asked Bentley. ‘What sort of theories?’

  ‘About who killed Sir Roderick. Who the murderers were? Are?’

  ‘Cherchez la femme,’ said Bentley unexpectedly. He had finished his crumpet swiftly and now dabbed at the butter around his lips, using the red and white spotted handkerchief from his breast pocket.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’ Bognor was nonplussed.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Harrison Bentley smiled courteously and made a little play of removing his monocle and polishing it. ‘I understood from your earlier remark that you spoke French. Cherchez la femme. Find the woman. There’s a woman at the bottom of this, you mark my words.’

  ‘What makes you think that?’

  Mr Bentley coughed with exaggerated discretion. ‘Muriel,’ he said, ‘perhaps you’d be good enough to leave Mr Bognor and myself for a moment or two. I don’t think this is something you should hear.’

  Mrs Bentley rose and did as she was told. She was not the sort of woman who answered back.

  When she had gone Bentley said, ‘I don’t know how Farquhar managed at his age. He was insatiable.’

  ‘I’m sorry?’ Bognor helped himself, unbidden, to a second crumpet. They were not half bad.

  ‘Women.’ His host said the word with distaste. ‘All the time. Sometimes two at once. Maybe more for all I know. He was over seventy.’ He shook his head in a mixture of shock and admiration.

  ‘What sort of women?’ asked Bognor.

  ‘All sorts. That nigger manservant used to pimp for him. He laid on the whores and Farquhar looked after the classier ones himself. I don’t know what women saw in him, but, boy, they certainly saw something.’

  ‘But what makes you think his womanizing had something to do with his death?’

  ‘Stands to reason. He just cuckolded one man too many.’

  ‘Who in particular?’

  ‘Oh, I’m not saying anyone in particular,’ Bentley grinned, conveying to Bognor the impression that if he wished he most certainly could say someone in particular. ‘To be frank,’ he continued, ‘whoever did it performed a public service. We’re well rid of him. I know one shouldn’t speak ill of the dead but in his case I’m prepared to make an exception. It was particularly distressing to me that he should have been the holder of an order of knighthood. His conduct was always a long way short of that becoming a gentleman.’

  ‘You didn’t care for him?’ Bognor found it easy to fall into understatement. He glanced out of the french windows and saw that it was snowing hard. The conifers at the end of Bentley’s substantial garden were barely visible through the scudding flakes and under their thick coating of white.

  ‘You could say that.’

  ‘But you were happy to work with him? You’ve been on the board of Mammon for aeons. How did you square that with your dislike?’

  ‘I’ve never seen any reason to mix business with pleasure,’ said Bentley. ‘Farquhar was a considerable businessman. His ethics may have been questionable but he made money. That’s what business is about, so I was content to go along with him on that score.’

  ‘Until more recently?’

  ‘I’m sorry?’ Bentley leaned forward as if he had not heard properly, ‘How do you mean “more recently”?’

  ‘I understood,’ Bognor paused to remove a crumpet crumb from between two front teeth, ‘I understood that Farquhar was threatening to take Mammon out of the UK.’

  Bentley thought for a moment. ‘Yes,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘Yes, that’s about the size of it.’

  ‘Not something you were keen on?’

  ‘Naturally not.’

  ‘And yet,’ Bognor looked thoughtful, ‘you don’t mix business and pleasure.’

  Again Bentley seemed not to follow the drift of what Bognor was saying. Bognor explained. ‘Taking Mammon out of Britain,’ he said, ‘made commercial sense. Your objections were entirely sentimental. Wouldn’t you say?’

  Bentley removed his monocle and blew on it. ‘There are times, Mr Bognor, when a man’s principles must override other considerations.’

  In the grate a log spat, sending an incandescent crumb on to the hearthrug. Bentley hurried to pick it up between forefinger and thumb, and threw it back in the fire, wincing slightly as he did. Bognor watched and considered the implications of this admission. He thought of Dr. Johnson and patriotism.

  ‘Another crumpet, Mr Bognor?’ asked Bentley when he had eliminated the risk of fire. Bognor said he wouldn’t mind if he did.

  It was an unsatisfactory encounter. Part of Bentley’s perceived code of gentlemanly behaviour was absolute discretion. It was not so much that he could not tell a lie but that he did not wish to be caught out in one. He preferred to imply everything while saying nothing. He was a master of the gracefully delivered slur, the smiling innuendo. ‘All cut and no thrust,’ Bognor remarked to himself as he trudged gloomily southward through the blizzard, his eiderdown overcoat insulating him from the weather as effectively as the walls of Bentley’s Rosedale mansion. He had had nothing but waffle, protestations of loyalty to fellow directors, to the firm, to the old country, to everything in fact but the memory of the dead man. Bognor would be returning to Harrison Bentley at a later date. Of that he was certain. Not just because he had conceived a profound distrust for the man but also because of one intriguing discovery made just before his departure.

  At about the point that their interview had ground jerkily to its conclusion Bognor conceived an urgent desire to pee. He wondered if it was possible to get back to his hotel room without relieving himself first and judged that it would be more prudent to use Harrison Bentley’s loo instead. Besides it was Bognor’s experience that you could learn a lot about people’s character from their loos and bathrooms. Those intimate little rooms with their old school photographs, their framed cartoons, their soaps and unguents and mirrors and potted plants and select reading matter had often yielded clues to Bognor that he had not found in more public rooms where display was contrived, whose very function was to impress. Bentley told him that the downstairs cloakroom had fallen prey to some mechanical dysfunction caused by cold, so Bognor had been sent upstairs to the master bathroom, a luxurious affair with sporting prints and copies of Country Life. There was also a bottle of Balenciaga bath oil marked ‘Mis en bouteille pour Sir R. Farquhar—bottled exclusively for Sir R. Farquhar.’

  It was half full. Bognor frowned hard when he saw it. The report said quite clearly that the bath oil was—as the labelling suggested—bottled exclusively for Farquhar and certainly not for any Tom, Dick or Harrison Bentley. The report also indicated beyond all possible doubt that the bottle of bath oil found in the ‘Spirit of Saskatoon’s’ bathroom was the instrument of death.

  It was this discovery and this alone which raised Bognor’s spirits as he shuffled through the snow. In itself, of course, it proved nothing. He had not questioned Bentley about it because he already felt defeated by his evasions and simpering. He felt sure that Bentley would have produced an answer and that he would not have
believed it. Consequently he preferred to leave the question unanswered and therefore alive.

  ‘Balenciaga bath oil,’ he murmured, ‘exclusive to Farquhar, and yet sitting for all to see in Harrison Bentley’s bathroom.’ It made very little sense. The one thing a pseudo-English gent with a monocle would not do was bathe in Balenciaga. Maybe Muriel Bentley used it. He sighed and slipped on a patch of ice. That was not the point. The point was that the murder weapon or one just like it was brazenly on display in Harrison Bentley’s bathroom. Circumstantial perhaps but just as incriminating as coming across a revolver or a piece of bloodstained lead piping. He sighed and brushed ice from his eyebrows. He felt like a Baked Alaska in reverse—a warm, crumpety interior and a frozen façade. The thought of Baked Alaska cheered him up so that by the time he finally found a subway station he was actually humming a Verdi chorus and feeling on the borders of optimism.