Tickled to Death and Other Stories of Crime and Suspense

by Simon Brett

  Don’t use dynamite much either. Not in sticks. Plastic explosive’s much easier to handle. Less likely to have accidents. Still, whoever had stocked out that car boot reckoned I might need dynamite for the odd safe-job.

  They also reckoned I was going to need something else. The rectangular outline of the suitcase was familiar, and that of the cloth-wrapped object inside even more so. I felt the knobbly ridges of the frame as I undid it.

  It was a painting, of course. Same size as the Madonna. Old, like the Madonna. But it wasn’t the Madonna. Difficult to see what it was, actually. Or what it had been. The paint was all flaked and stained. Could have been anything. Can’t imagine anyone would have given two quid for that one, let alone two million.

  But the odd thing about it was that screwed to the frame at the bottom there was this brass plate, which said,

  MADONNA AND CHILD

  Giacomo Palladino

  Florentine

  (1473–1539)

  Someone was certainly setting me up, but I couldn’t right then work out what for.

  The Sunday was as boring as the Saturday. Some gamekeeper git give us a long lecture on grouse-shooting; there was a berk who went on about coats of arms; the “Traditional Sunday Lunch” was full of gristle. And whoever done the gravy ought to be copped under the Trades Descriptions Act. I mean, if the upper classes have been fed gravy like that since the Norman Conquest, no wonder they’re a load of wimps.

  The afternoon was, in the words of the old brochure, “less structured”. That meant, thank God, they couldn’t think of anything else to bore us silly with. Guests were encouraged to wander round the grounds until the great moment of tea with Lord Harbinger.

  I didn’t bother to go out. I just lay on my bed and thought. I was piecing things together. Though nasty things have been said about it, there is nothing wrong with my intellect. It just works slowly. Give it time and it’ll get there.

  Trouble is, thinking takes it out of me, and I must’ve dozed off. When I come to, it was quarter to five and the old Royal Command tea had started at four-thirty. I got up in a hurry. Half of me was working out what was up, but the other half was still following instructions. I had to behave naturally, go through the weekend without drawing attention to myself.

  As I hurried across the landing, I looked out through the big front window. I could see the red Peugeot parked right outside.

  And I could see Mr Loxton closing the boot and moving away from it. Thought I’d be safely inside having my tea, didn’t you, Mr Loxton?

  The tea give me the last important fact. As soon as I was introduced to Lord Harbinger, it all come together.

  “Good afternoon,” he said with a reasonable stab at enthusiasm. “Delighted to welcome you to Harbinger Hall.”

  It was the voice, wasn’t it? The bloke Loxton had been speaking to the night before. I realized just how inside an inside job it was.

  And I realized other things that give me a nasty trickly feeling in my belly.

  Half-past five the tea broke up. Lord Harbinger switched off like a lightbulb and, in spite of the Americans who would have liked to go on mingling with the aristocracy forever, everyone was hustled out of the drawing-room to go and get packed. I went up to my bedroom like the rest.

  Wasn’t a lot to pack, was there? But for the first time I took a butcher’s at the package in my suitcase. After what I seen in the car boot the night before, could have been anything.

  But no. It was a copy of the Madonna. Bloody good, too. I couldn’t have told it apart from the real thing. But then I don’t know much about art, do I?

  Ten to six, following my instructions to the letter, down I go to the hall, leaving my suitcase in the bedroom. There’s already a few of the punters milling around and piles of cases. Casual like, I take a glance at these and see, as I expected, that there’s one there just like the one I left in the bedroom. Expensive for them on suitcases, this job. Mind you, if it all worked, they’d be able to afford it.

  I hear Loxton’s voice suddenly, whispering to Lord Harbinger. “I’ll get away as quickly as I can afterwards.”

  “Fine,” says the noble peer.

  Just before six, most of the punters have arrived and the Harbinger Hall staff are all starting to make a farewell line like something out of a television serial. The Americans think this is wonderful and start cooing.

  “Oh, blimey,” I say loudly. “Forget my own head next!” Then, for the benefit of the people who’ve turned round to look at me, I add, “Only forgotten my blooming case, haven’t I?”

  They turn away with expressions of distaste, and I beetle upstairs. Do it by the book. To my bedroom, pick up the suitcase, to the Long Gallery, down the “Private” staircase. Out with the old metal-cutters, reach for the cables at the top of the alarm boxes, snip, snip. I’m tense then, but there’s no noise.

  Into the Great Hall, put the suitcase on the table. Unzip it all the way round, take the copy of the Madonna out of its cloth wrappings, and do what I have to do.

  Slam the case shut, back up the stairs, Long Gallery, bedroom, back down the main staircase towards the hall, stop on the stairs, panting a bit. Whole operation—three and a half minutes.

  Now you’ve probably gathered that I have got this unfortunate reputation for bogging things up. Just when the job’s nearly done, something always seems to go wrong. Bad luck I call it, but it’s happened so often that some people have less charitable descriptions.

  So, anyway, there I am standing on the stairs in front of all these people and I reach up to wipe my brow and—you’ll never believe it—I haven’t had time to zip up my suitcase again and I’m still holding the handle and it falls open. My aftershave and what-have-you clatters down the stairs with my pyjamas, and there, still strapped in the suitcase for all to see, is the Harbinger Madonna.

  “My God!” says Lord Harbinger.

  I say a rude word.

  Various servants come forward and grab me. Others are sent off to the Great Hall to see the damage. Loxton’s the first one back. He looks dead peeved.

  “My Lord. The alarm wires have been cut. He’s replaced the Madonna with a copy!”

  “What!” Lord Harbinger blusters.

  “Shall I call the police, my Lord?” asks another servant.

  “Um . . .”

  “All right.” I shrug. “It’s a fair cop. Story of my life. Every job I seem to screw up. And this one I really thought I’d worked out to the last detail.”

  “Shall I call the police, my Lord?” the servant asks again.

  “Um . . .”

  “You better,” I say. “I really have got caught with the goods this time. I’m afraid the police are going to want a really thorough investigation into this.”

  “Ye-es.” His Lordship sounds uncertain. “Under normal circumstances of course I’d call the police straight away. But this is rather . . . um . . . awkward.”

  “Why?” I ask. “I’m not pretending I haven’t done it.”

  “No, but, er . . . er . . .” Then finally he gets on the right track. “But you are a guest in my house. It is not part of the code of the Harbingers to call the police to their guests, however they may have offended against the laws of hospitality.”

  “Oh,” I say.

  “Gee,” says one of the Americans. “Isn’t this just wonderful?”

  Harbinger’s getting into his stride by now. He does a big point to the door like out of some picture and he says, “Leave my house!”

  I go down the rest of the stairs. “Better not take this, had I, I suppose?” I hold up the Madonna.

  “No.”

  I hand it over, sort of reluctant. “You better keep the copy. I got no use for it now. And I suppose the police will want to look at that. Might be able to trace back who ordered it.”

  “Yes,” says his Lordship abruptly. “Or rather no. You take that back with you.”

  “But—”

  “No. If the police could trace you through the copy, I
would be offending the rules of hospitality just as much as if I had you arrested. You take the copy with you.”

  “But I don’t want it.”

  “You will take it, sir!” he bellows.

  “Oh, all right,” I say grudgingly.

  “Oh, heck. This is just so British,” says one of the Americans. Made her weekend, it had.

  They give me the picture from the Great Hall, I put it in my suitcase, and I’m escorted out by Loxton. The punters and staff draw apart like I’m trying to sell them insurance.

  Outside, Loxton says, “God, I knew you were thick and incompetent, but it never occurred to me that you’d be that thick and incompetent.”

  I hang my head in shame.

  “Now get in your car and go!”

  “Oh, it’s not my car,” I say. “It’s stolen. Way my luck’s going, I’ll probably get stopped by the cops on the way home. I’ll go on the coach to the station.”

  Loxton doesn’t look happy.

  Takes a bit of time to get all the punters on to the bus. Loxton stands there fidgeting while further farewells are said. I sit right at the back with my suitcase. Everyone else sits right up the front. I’m in disgrace.

  The bus starts off down the steep zigzag drive towards Limmerton. I look back to see Loxton rush towards the Peugeot, parked right in front of Harbinger Hall. I look at my watch. Quarter to seven. All that delayed us quite a bit.

  I see Loxton leap into the car. Without bothering to close the door, he starts it and slams her into reverse. He screeches backwards over the gravel.

  But it’s too late. The Hall’s saved, but he isn’t.

  The back of the Peugeot erupts into a balloon of orange flame. From inside the bus the sound is muffled. A few of the punters turn curiously, but just at that moment we swing round one of the hair-pins and there’s nothing to see.

  I piece it together again in the train. They’ve left me in a compartment on my own. I’m still like some kind of leper. They all feel better having had their guesses at the sort of person I was confirmed.

  Lord Harbinger had money problems. Cost a lot to keep the Hall going, and the trippers weren’t coming enough. Stately Home Weekends might bring in a few bob, but they took such a lot of staff, there wasn’t much percentage in it.

  But he had got the Madonna. Couldn’t just sell it, wouldn’t look good, public admission of failure. Besides, either he or Loxton had worked out a scheme that’d make more than just selling it. They’d have it stolen, get the insurance and sell it. But they need a real mug to do the actual thieving.

  Enter Yours Truly.

  I had to raise suspicions when I came for my day-trip, then stick out like a sore thumb on the Stately Home Weekend. When I’d actually done the theft, switched the real Madonna for the copy, Loxton would have offered to take my bag to my car. He would have switched my suitcase for the empty one and put the Madonna in another car, in which he would later drive it up to London to do his deal with Mr Depaldo’s rival.

  I would have driven off in the Peugeot, maybe full of plans to doublecross my paymasters and do a little deal of my own. They weren’t worried what I had in mind, because they knew that half an hour away from Harbinger Hall, the dynamite in the back of the car would explode. When the police came to check the wreckage, I would be identified as the geyser who’d been behaving oddly all weekend, the one who’d obviously cut the alarm cables and switched the paintings. My profession was obvious. There was my record if they ever put a name to me. And if not, there were all the tools of my trade in the boot of the car.

  Together with the dynamite, whose careless stowing caused my unfortunate demise.

  And some burnt-out splinters of wood and shreds of canvas, which had once been a painting. A very old painting, tests would reveal. And the engraved brass plate which was likely to survive the blast would identify it as Giacomo Palladino’s masterpiece, “Madonna and Child”. Another great art work would be tragically lost to the nation.

  Had to admire it. Was a good plan.

  They only got one thing wrong. Like a few others before them, they made the mistake of thinking Billy Gorse was as thick as he looked.

  I felt good and relaxed. Pity the train hadn’t got a buffet. I could have really done with a few beers.

  Go to Red Rita’s later, I thought. Yeah, be nice. Be nice to go away with her, and all. Been looking a bit peaky lately. She could do with a change. South America, maybe?

  I got my suitcase down from the rack and opened it.

  Found it grew on me, that Madonna.

  And I was very glad I hadn’t changed the two pictures round in the Great Hall.

  I may not know much about art, but I’m beginning to realize what it’s worth.

  UNWILLING SLEEP

  “OH, MISS BLACK,” Jeremy Garson’s voice crackled authoritatively over the intercom, “could you come through for a moment, please?”

  Isabel, who knew Jeremy well, recognized when he was trying to impress. As soon as she had seen the elegant red-haired woman, whose appointment had been registered in the diary as “11 o’clock—Mrs Karlstetter”, she had known it would only be a matter of time before he started showing off. And then his secretary would be paraded in the office, another accessory, another labour-saving device to go with the desk-top calculator, the miniature memo-recorder, the telephone amplifier and the imposing, but unused, telex-machine.

  Jeremy was leaning back in his swivel-chair when she went in, his poise undermined by a little glint of insecurity in his eyes. At times he looked absurdly like his father, for whom Isabel had worked until John Garson’s premature death, but the old man’s eyes had never betrayed that fear.

  “Yes, Mr Garson?” She knew the rules. No Christian names when he was trying to impress. No lapse into assertions of her own personality. Just the image of efficiency, shorthand pad and freshly sharpened HB pencil at the ready.

  Jeremy smiled proprietorially. “Mrs Karlstetter, you met Miss Black briefly. She’s an absolute treasure. Runs the whole office for me.”

  He chuckled, to point up the humorous exaggeration of this last remark. “Miss Black, Mrs Karlstetter has not come to us to arrange the fitting of a burglar alarm.”

  “Ah.”

  “She has not come to take advantage of the advertised services of Garson Security. She is aware of the . . . other side of our business.”

  He vouchsafed Mrs Karlstetter a brilliant smile. “It’s quite all right. Miss Black knows all about the detective agency operation. She’s done all the paperwork for it since my father first . . . branched out in that direction. So we can speak freely.”

  Mrs Karlstetter nodded, acknowledging Isabel as she might a new wall-unit pointed out for her commendation.

  “Miss Black, if you could note down what Mrs Karlstetter says . . .”

  Isabel sat on the least eminent chair and translated the red-haired girl’s words into neat squiggles of shorthand.

  “Basically, I think my husband is trying to kill me.”

  Mrs Karlstetter left an appropriate pause for awestruck reaction.

  “The fact is, I have always been a very light sleeper—no, worse than that, I have always slept very badly, almost always had a couple of hours awake in the middle of the night . . .”

  “I’m not a doctor,” said Jeremy with his disarming smile.

  “I know. And if I wanted a doctor’s help, I would have gone to one years ago. But I don’t believe in drugs. I think many of them haven’t been properly tested out, you know, for all their side-effects.”

  “So you’ve just lived with your insomnia?”

  “Yes. One gets used to it. I’ve just assumed that it’s going to be with me for the rest of my life.”

  “Uhuh.”

  “But for the last four months I’ve suddenly started sleeping very deeply.”

  “Well, surely that’s good news.”

  “It would be, if I thought the sleep was natural.”

  “You think you’re being drugged
?”

  “Yes.”

  “By your husband?”

  “There’s no one else it could be. There’s only the two of us in the house.”

  “How do you think he does it?”

  “He gets a bedtime drink for me every night. Hot milk. I think he puts something in that.”

  “Have you tried not drinking it?”

  “No. I don’t want him to realize I’m suspicious, in case that makes him try something more drastic. But he’s been away on business a bit recently, and those nights I’ve prepared the drink myself . . .”

  “And?”

  “And I’ve slept as badly as ever.”

  “Hmm. You haven’t confronted him with it?”

  “I’m afraid to.”

  “And you haven’t thought of going to the police?”

  “What would I say? I can’t risk them blundering in. If I’m going to do anything about it, I’ve got to be discreet.”

  “Which is why you’ve come to me?”

  “Yes. I heard from a friend of mine, Mrs Littlejohn, that you sorted out a problem about her solicitor defrauding her . . .”

  Jeremy Garson nodded complacently. “So what do you want me to do?”

  “I want you to prove that I’m not imagining all this. My husband’s working late tonight—won’t be back before eleven—and I’m out playing bridge. I want you to search the house for some evidence, find the drug or whatever it is . . . before it’s too late. I’m sure he’s increasing the dose. I have great difficulty waking up in the mornings, and I get these terrible headaches. I’m sure he’s killing me . . . slowly but surely killing me.”

  “Can you think of any motive?”

  “None at all. I want you to find that out too.”

  “Hmm. How do I get into the house?”

  “I’ll leave the kitchen fanlight open. You can reach the catch of the large window through that.”

  “Breaking and entering . . .” Jeremy mused.

  “Yes. Will you do it for me? Please.”

  Isabel looked up from her shorthand pad to see her boss’s reaction. A break-in was unnecessarily dramatic. And risky. There were simpler ways of searching the house.