Dandy Gilver and a Bothersome Number of Corpses

by Catriona McPherson

  The little shack on the harbour was a very different place this Saturday luncheon time, thronged with people: a long queue of men and women snaking out of the door and coiling around the side, and on the bollards and lobster pots and the harbour wall itself there were gangs of little boys and girls, rabblesome families and courting couples all intent on the fragrant contents of the newspaper nests they held open in their laps. As we stepped down from the motorcar a gaggle of well-dressed but rather grubby little boys came tumbling out of the open doorway, holding folded newspaper cones of fried potato and stone bottles of ginger beer, and in spite of the recent sights in the cable station my stomach gave a slow, luxurious rumble.

  ‘That’s Mr Tweedie’s son!’ said the sergeant in tones of high astonishment. ‘The bank manager,’ he explained to me. ‘I don’t know what this place is coming to.’

  ‘Sodom and Gomorrah, Italian-style,’ I murmured. He did not hear me but Constable Reid gave an explosive snort which he turned into a cough with the skill of long practice.

  ‘You’re not a patron of Aldo’s then, Sergeant Turner?’ I said.

  ‘I most certainly am not,’ he said. ‘Mrs Turner won’t hear of it.’

  The families and couples who had boggled to see the arrival of a police motorcar were now openly listening, all conversation stilled, only the rustle of newspaper and the crunch of batter disturbing the quiet around us (that and the hopeful screeching of a perfect battalion of seagulls with designs on the crumbs).

  ‘Take him through the back, Reid,’ said the sergeant, returning to his seat in the motorcar, ‘and I’ll come round and speak to him there, away from the frying pans.’ But I do not believe it was the cooking smells which troubled him. The sergeant simply did not care to jostle into the shack with the hoi-polloi, which gave no quarter to the comings and goings of anyone not in the queue for luncheon. Even as we watched, an emerging figure had to turn sideways to squeeze through in the small space left by a stout man in brown overalls with his eyes fixed on the counter.

  This figure, once outside, revealed itself to be Alec. He was wiping his lips with his handkerchief and breathing hard, but when he saw me he broke into a jog.

  ‘Marvellous news, Dandy!’ he said. ‘Guess what?’

  ‘Alec, have you really just eaten fried haddock and chips?’ I said.

  ‘Certainly not,’ said Alec. ‘It was cod. The man is an artist.’

  ‘I’ve got news too, I’m afraid,’ I said. ‘This is Constable Reid, Alec. Reid, this is my associate, Mr Osborne.’

  ‘Associate?’ said Reid.

  ‘Glad to make your acquaintance,’ Alec said, holding out a greasy hand. He says he can always tell by my introductions of policemen and the like whether I have filed the man under ‘idiot’ or have turned down the corner of his card as a possible ally. I am not sure I believe him; more like lucky guesses on his part, I should imagine (for one would rather not be so transparent when one is bent on detecting). ‘But my news first,’ Alec went on. ‘She was seen.’

  ‘Fleur?’ I said.

  He gave me an odd look. ‘Mrs Aldo.’

  ‘Thank God,’ I said. ‘When and where?

  ‘Tuesday night,’ said Alec. ‘On the cliff path, heading for Dunskey Castle.’

  ‘Ah,’ I said. Reid and I exchanged a glance.

  ‘And . . .’ Alec began.

  ‘Could still be her, missus,’ said Reid. ‘Looks more like it now, if aught.’

  ‘What’s this?’ Alec said.

  ‘I’ve just come from viewing a body,’ I told him. ‘A woman’s body. Three days in the sea, washed up this morning.’

  ‘Just where it would wash up if it went in at the castle too,’ said Reid.

  ‘We came to ask Joe to take a look at it,’ I said, and we all three turned and looked in at the door. Over the heads of the waiting crowd we could just see Joe Aldo in his white hat and capacious white apron, tipping a sizzling basket of fried potatoes into a trough behind his glass counter.

  ‘Did your witness say anything about Mrs Aldo’s demeanour?’ I asked. ‘If she was walking alone at night on a cliff top it begins to look like suicide.’

  ‘She wasn’t,’ Alec said. ‘Walking alone, that is. She was with a man. And Dunskey Castle is a well-known local trysting place, I believe.’ He raised his eyebrows at Reid, who nodded and blushed a little, as though his knowledge of the spot might have been gained in his off-duty hours.

  ‘What man?’ I asked Alec.

  ‘My witness didn’t know him but she did go as far as to say she’d recognise the chap if she saw him a second time. She did go that far.’ He heaved a heavy sigh. ‘This is going to kill Joe,’ he said. ‘Absolutely kill him. He’s already beside himself even just hearing that she was seen with her lover.’

  ‘But he knew she had one,’ I said.

  Alec nodded. ‘It’s one thing to suspect one’s wife of a dalliance, but it’s quite another actually to hear proof.’ He shook his head. ‘It hit him like a brick.’

  ‘He’ll need a good hard nut on him now, then,’ said Reid, not quite unkindly. ‘Cos here’s what I’m thinking. Maybe she fell and her fancy man didnae tell a soul so’s nobody would know his wee secret. And maybe she flang herself down and he kept that quiet. But most likely of all, if ye’re askin’ me, if he was up there with her . . .’

  ‘Quite,’ I said.

  ‘I agree,’ said Alec.

  ‘Aye,’ said Reid, ‘he pushed her.’

  ‘But the witness was sure she’d know the chap again?’ I said.

  ‘Seemed to be,’ Alec said. ‘Although to be perfectly honest she scooted off again before I could grill her.’

  ‘Who was she?’ said Reid.

  ‘A little servant girl from one of those villas up there,’ said Alec, pointing. ‘I rather suspect she was out walking with her true love too and didn’t want it known that she had been.’

  ‘A wee servant girl?’ said Reid.

  ‘You’ll have to have another crack at her,’ I said.

  ‘Out walkin’ with her felly?’ He was frowning.

  At that moment the motorcar door opened and the sergeant leaned out and barked (the only word for it) at the constable.

  ‘Reid!’

  ‘Aye, Sarge,’ said Reid. ‘We’re just away in the noo.’ He dropped his voice before he spoke again. ‘I tell you what, though. I’m no’ taking the poor man through and letting the sarge tell him. I’ll tell him myself and get Sergeant Turner after. He’s no’ got a good touch with folk tae my mind.’

  But his concern was wasted, for when we entered the cafe it was to find Joe Aldo already in a state of shock so all-consuming that one wondered whether any fresh horrors could touch him. Even so, we shooed the hungry crowd out of the door (to gales of protest) and I scribbled a sign – 10 mins – and propped it up in the window. Then all four of us crushed into the back kitchen, Alec urged Joe into a chair and Constable Reid told him very gently that ‘a lady had passed away’ and would he ‘just glance at her to say it wasn’t his wife, please’ before leaving to fetch his sergeant for the rest of the interview.

  ‘Where?’ was the first word Joe uttered, when the two policemen had returned.

  ‘Up in the wee cove at Dunskey,’ said Reid. Joe’s face paled to an ugly cream colour and he rubbed his hand over it roughly.

  ‘From – from the water?’ he said.

  Reid nodded.

  ‘Is Rosa?’ asked Joe.

  ‘I couldnae say,’ said Reid. ‘I’ve never met your wife, sir. Sarge?’

  ‘I didn’t know her,’ said the sergeant, his past tense making me wince.

  Joe threaded a hand in under his apron and drew a wallet out of his waistcoat pocket. He flapped it open and held it out to us all, showing us a small photograph, rather dark, of a young woman in old-fashioned dress staring solemnly ahead. She might have been a great beauty; it was hard to say.

  ‘My Rosa,’ he said. ‘Is Rosa? In the cove?’

  ‘Can’t s
ay,’ said the sergeant. Luckily, Joe Aldo was mystified by this response, blinking slowly and looking around us all. If he had realised why we could not say he might well have fainted.

  ‘So . . .’ said Reid.

  Joe nodded, rummaged under his apron front again and pulled out a watch.

  ‘After the dinner time,’ he said. ‘One hour is the very most. Once my customers all are gone.’

  ‘Now hang on, pal,’ said the sergeant, causing a stir of protest from both Alec and me – he really was one of the most abrasive characters I have ever encountered and police sergeants are not known for being soothing. Constables and inspectors, in my experience, reflect the sweep of humanity but a sergeant always has something of the fox terrier about him. ‘We’re needing to crack on. We can’t hang about for you.’

  ‘Quite right, Sergeant,’ I said. ‘We’ll bring Mr Aldo to the cable station and you can, as you say, crack on. You’ve a case to solve and an obvious place to start from.’ I raised my eyebrows at Alec. He stared blankly back at me. I glanced at Reid. Both he and Alec continued to gaze back as though unable to guess at my allusion.

  ‘Taking statements from witnesses, for instance,’ I supplied, with another eyebrow wiggle at Alec and Constable Reid. They were two statues. It seemed ‘the sarge’ was not to be told of the servant girl and her observations.

  ‘I’m the best judge of my business, madam,’ said the sergeant, rather primly. He stood, straightened his suit coat and walked away. Joe shook himself, gave one last miserable look at Rosa’s photograph and went to reopen the shop. The three of us remaining – Reid, Alec and me – kept our seats in the back kitchen and as soon as the crowd had re-entered and their clamour would cover our voices I charged them with it directly.

  ‘Why on earth not tell Turner about the witness on Tuesday night?’ I said.

  ‘I found her,’ Alec said. ‘I’m not going to hand her over to him.’

  ‘Quite right, sir,’ said Reid. ‘I agree.’

  I turned on him.

  ‘Why?’ I said.

  ‘She’s as timid as a little rabbit,’ Alec said. ‘Sergeant Turner would terrify her.’

  ‘Sergeant Turner does terrify her,’ said Reid. ‘The both o’ them do.’ To our puzzled looks he offered an explanation. ‘It’s the Turners she works tae, see?’

  ‘She’s Sergeant Turner’s very own servant?’ I said. ‘How do you know?’

  ‘Well, Mrs Turner’s really,’ Alec said.

  ‘Well, then of course you should have—’ I began, but Reid cut me off.

  ‘Can I just ask, sir? How did you track her down?’

  ‘Well, I didn’t so much track her down as run into her,’ Alec said. ‘She came down here to the shack at the same time as me this morning.’

  ‘To buy an early luncheon?’ I asked.

  ‘Never,’ said Reid. ‘Cissie Gilhooley hates thon greasy muck.’

  ‘How on earth do you know that?’ I asked.

  ‘It’s not the least bit greas—’ Alec began, but then shook himself. ‘Cissie came down because Mrs Aldo was supposed to go and collect the washing yesterday and she didn’t show up. So the lady of the house sent the girl to see what was wrong.’

  ‘And you pounced on her?’ I asked.

  Reid shifted in his seat.

  ‘I asked when she’d last seen the woman,’ Alec said, ‘and she blurted out “Tuesday night” and blushed to the roots of her hair. It was then that I pounced on her. And she’s obviously going to get into considerable trouble if her mistress gets wind of her wanderings, so I’ll have to get even firmer with her if I’m to learn any more.’

  ‘Naw, no’ really,’ said Reid. ‘It’s right enough the wee lassie would get her papers if she got found out and we’ll can get it out of her without any o’ that anyway.’

  ‘You’re sure?’ I said.

  ‘Fine an’ sure,’ said Reid, shifting in his seat again. ‘It was me she was comin’ to meet.’ He turned as red as the big glass bottle of tomato ketchup on the table between us.

  ‘Ah,’ I said. ‘I see. You’d get into more trouble with your sergeant than she would with her mistress? Not that a little chivalry isn’t a welcome sight in these discourteous days. At least . . .’ I lowered my head and looked at him from under my brows. I have rather suitable eyebrows for the gesture, black and straight and formed for knitting. ‘. . . I hope it’s chivalry. I’m assuming your intentions are—’

  ‘She’s got a diamond ring on a chain round her neck, till we’ve a bit more saved and she can put it on her finger.’

  ‘Jolly good,’ I said. ‘And I suppose you didn’t see the mysterious stranger?’ He was shaking his head before the words were out of my mouth.

  ‘I did not. Cissie said she wanted to go a walk instead of sittin’’ – the blush deepened until he was almost purple from collar to hairline – ‘’cos of there bein’ other folk about and, to be straight wi’ youse, I didn’t really believe her.’ I pulled my eyebrows down again, not liking the sound of this at all. ‘Sitting’, as Reid called it, had to be at the lady’s discretion, surely. I could not think how to put this into words, however, without killing him off from embarrassment and quite possibly sending Alec with him. Besides, my eyebrows seemed to be doing the job on their own. He hung his head and scraped his boots against the floor and we left it there.

  Outside in the cafe the luncheon trade had picked up again to full strength after the break in service. Orders were being shouted, the bell on the till was dinging, the rush and sizzle of hot fat as cold chips poured into it broke out over and over again. All that was missing was Joe’s voice, describing his wonders and urging the crowd to ‘eat, eat, eat, eat’ as he had with Alec and me at breakfast time.

  ‘Quiet the day, Gee-seppy,’ one wag called over the counter.

  ‘Don’t tell me you’ve dropped yer tongue in the batter there,’ said another and a chorus of laughter rang out all around. Not quite friendly laughter. Perhaps these villagers, more than happy to eat his food and give him their money, had not yet welcomed him in as one of their own. Joe nodded, unsmiling, and carried on plunging, shaking, wrapping, telling the price and counting out the change until at last the crowd thinned to a stream, broke into dribs and drabs and finally stuttered out, just one or two stragglers looking for bargains. Then, at last, silence and emptiness and Joe turned the sign on the door.

  ‘Right then,’ said Alec. ‘To Dunskey Cove with us all.’ Joe was out in the privy in the yard washing the luncheon-time lard from his hands and face.

  ‘Not me,’ I said. ‘Not twice in one day.’ Alec nodded as though only just remembering.

  ‘In all the commotion I never asked you, Dan,’ he said. ‘Why were you there? How did that come to be?’

  ‘The police thought it might be a mistress from the school,’ I said, turning to Reid. ‘You heard that Mademoiselle Beauclerc was missing?’

  ‘Who?’ said Reid. ‘No.’

  ‘Well, not to say missing, but gone anyway,’ I said. ‘Like so many before her.’

  ‘But how could you help?’ Alec said. ‘You never met the woman.’

  ‘Fleur volunteered and I tagged along,’ I said. I turned to Reid again. ‘You must have heard about all the departures.’ Reid pushed out his lips and shook his head.

  ‘Don’t have much to do wi’ them up there,’ he said. ‘Gey queer set-up havin’ a bunch of women all doing science and geography and out on the cliff in their semmets at dawn.’

  ‘Really?’ said Alec.

  ‘Gymnastics,’ said Reid.

  ‘Ah,’ Alec said. Then to me: ‘Fleur volunteered?’ I nodded.

  ‘And if you don’t mind me askin’, missus,’ said Reid, ‘what did she mean by what she said when she was in there?’ I stared at him.

  ‘I thought you hadn’t heard,’ I said. ‘You asked her to repeat it.’

  ‘I thought maybe I hadn’t heard right,’ said Reid. ‘I asked to make sure.’ He turned to Alec. ‘Five, she said, sir. She
looked at the corpse and said the word “five”.’

  ‘No!’ said Alec.

  ‘So what I was wondering,’ said Reid, ‘was five what?’

  ‘Bodies,’ said Alec.

  ‘Alec!’ I said, putting up my hand in front of his face and startling him.

  ‘Murders,’ said Alec.

  ‘Stop it,’ I said, almost loud enough to call it shouting. ‘That’s not fair.’

  ‘What’s goin’ on?’ said Reid.

  ‘You refused to tell the sergeant about your witness just because you wanted to keep her to yourself!’ I said. I was glaring at him and I knew my cheeks were reddening with anger. ‘And then you blurt that out before I’ve even had a chance to talk to Fleur!’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Alec said. ‘Why didn’t you talk to her right away?’

  ‘What five murders?’ said Reid.

  ‘She was upset,’ I said. ‘I was upset. Wait till you’ve been and looked at it and then carp at me.’

  ‘What five murders?’ said Reid even louder. I rounded on him.

  ‘Constable,’ I said, ‘unless you want me to march right up the hill and tell Mrs Turner that you and her maid are in the habit of “sitting” on the cliff at Dunskey Castle on your free evenings, you’ll forget all about Mr Osborne’s indelicate outburst until I’m ready to discuss it with you. After I’ve discussed it with Miss Lipscott.’ I ignored the whispering little voice inside me.

  ‘Five mistresses have gone missing from St Columba’s,’ said Alec.

  ‘Aye?’ said Reid, his interest in the ‘bunch of women’ piqued at last.

  ‘And Miss Lipscott . . .’ said Alec.

  ‘Miss Lipscott said an unguarded word in a moment of great strain,’ I finished for him. ‘She is clearly . . . troubled. Perhaps ill. But her story is too preposterous to be true.’

  ‘Why not tell me what her story is and if ye’re right I’ll no’ believe it,’ said Reid. ‘Five mistresses missing and Miss Lipscott . . .?’

  I glared a little more at Alec and then let my breath go and sat back in my chair.

  ‘All right, I give up,’ I said. ‘Miss Lipscott said last evening that she had killed four times.’