by Amy Myers
A great story and Santoro was undoubtedly a good guy, but it was still a long step from being a popular racing driver to a car ending up in England over seven decades later. I followed up with an online search and after many false starts (when aren’t there?) discovered that Enrico, whose life he had saved, had bought the car for Santoro after the race and that, as Giovanni had found out, Santoro had republican sympathies (not a brilliant life plan under Mussolini’s fascist dictatorship and the complacent monarchy). Nothing more seemed to be known about him. Interesting, but not helpful.
And then at eleven o’clock fate stepped in with a lucky break in the form of Dave Jennings on the phone.
‘You’re on the move, Jack.’
‘Anywhere in particular?’
‘Plumshaw. Peter Compton’s Land Rover’s back.’
‘Good grief!’ At the very least this proved that it hadn’t been a straightforward theft for cash – unless of course the thief had a kind heart and returned it because of the owner’s bereavement. I had to tread on eggshells here, however. ‘What about Brandon?’ I asked.
‘It was he who told me about it. The Comptons rang him and for some crazy reason he wants you out there soonest. He’s got his team checking it out and probably taking it away with them, so get your skates on.’
Suited me. ‘Any no-go areas?’ I didn’t want to barge in on the Comptons without his approval.
‘None. When there’s something fishy in the pie, he wants the stink removed forthwith, and this stinks. And incidentally, he says to tell you it’s fairly certain Compton wasn’t killed there – no weapon was found in the pond or the barn, and the pathologist says he was dead when he went into the water. It could have been an ordinary sharp kitchen knife or,’ he added cheerily, ‘perhaps it wasn’t.’
‘Good news in a way, considering Giovanni would hardly have been carrying a kitchen knife away from the dinner table.’
‘Make the most of it. It may be the only good news you get.’ Dave rang off with this consoling thought.
Never had I been so glad to get away from Frogs Hill. Even the Glory Boot, normally a retreat, had become oppressive and the image of Louise met me round every corner of the house. It was straight to Plumshaw, therefore, with a brief diversion to Pluckley and the Vickers’ home to tell Maria how eager I was for her to come to Frogs Hill. She howled on my shoulder and I felt a heel for my insincerity, but at least I was in Mrs Len’s good books for ever. I hoped Maria’s sobs were in gratitude to me, but I couldn’t stop to enquire.
When I arrived at Plumshaw Manor two members of the forensic management team were indeed going over the Land Rover with a fine-tooth comb, so it was obvious that Brandon believed that it could be tied up with the murder. Dave was wrong. This was surely more good news as I couldn’t see how it could be part of his case against Giovanni. That’s one of the things I respect about Brandon though. He investigates everything, not just potential evidence against one suspect, no matter how convinced he is of their guilt.
I rang the bell and this time it was a girl who opened the door, her eyes red with lack of sleep or weeping or both. It must surely be Hugh’s daughter Bronte, the young Juliet to Jamie Makepeace’s Romeo. She was, as Giovanni had said, pretty and I hoped she at any rate fell outside the general impression that the Comptons were all weirdos. She brushed aside my apologies and self-introduction as ‘half a policeman sent by the Car Crime Unit’.
‘Don’t worry about intruding,’ she said wearily. ‘We want to get this awful business sorted out and if the Land Rover theft is anything to do with it, we need to know. And even more important,’ she added wryly, ‘you need to know.’
Inside the manor it felt depressingly like Frogs Hill, as though it too were weeping with loss. Even the graciousness of the albeit dilapidated Georgian house could not mask that.
‘Let’s go in here,’ Bronte said, turning into a room immediately by the front entrance. ‘Once the morning room, but now a dump.’
Not quite, but I could see what she meant. Gracious spindly chairs, elegant tables with daily newspapers laid neatly upon them for the visitors awaiting their turn were not what this room now boasted. Instead I saw a utilitarian table, chairs, a cupboard or two and an array of walking boots adorning the floor. It had a charm all its own, though, which suggested that visitors took it as they found it.
It only remained for me to be sure of what I was finding in the manor. ‘Did you hear the Land Rover being returned?’
‘No. It happened during the night, and the family bedrooms are at the back. We just don’t understand it. It’s not fair so close to Dad’s death.’
‘No notes left? Hot engines? Petrol consumption?’
‘Your job, Mr Semi-Policeman. The key was in the lock if that’s any help. It’s weird, isn’t it? Did that man who murdered my father do it? No,’ she instantly corrected herself, ‘he’s been arrested again, so he can’t have been around last night. He must have had an accomplice who returned the car.’
‘Whoa,’ I said gently. This girl was suffering badly. ‘Even if Giovanni Donati is charged, that doesn’t mean he’s guilty.’
‘But he is. We all know that.’ She looked at me pleadingly as if longing for me to agree. ‘He seemed such a nice man that night at dinner.’
‘Did anything happen then that could explain the attack on your father?’
‘No,’ she answered immediately, but then added, ‘Everyone was rather quiet, but that’s all.’
‘We have to look at everything.’ I tried to be tactful. ‘And as regards the Land Rover, it couldn’t have been Giovanni who stole it in the first place or returned it. He was with the police on both occasions. Why would he have stolen it anyway?’
Stupid of me, because Bronte’s voice became unsteady. ‘To put my father’s body in that pond. How could anyone do that?’
I waited while she regained some composure. ‘It can’t have been Giovanni who took the Land Rover,’ I repeated.
She sighed. ‘No, and Grandad is so pleased to have it back. He wants to start his daily trips round the village again to show the stiff upper lip, he says. The Land Rover’s so good for that. With the top down, he looks splendid riding around in it, so having it back is at least a little comfort for him. Not for me, though.’
I waited again while she recovered and then she said brightly, ‘Jamie knows Zoe Grant. He says she works for you.’
‘She does. Jamie’s your boyfriend, isn’t he?’
‘Fiancé,’ she said firmly.
‘The Romeo and Juliet of Plumshaw.’
‘You’d think so.’ She grimaced. ‘But it would take more than our marriage to unite our two families. Make it worse probably. Good luck to them. Why should we care? We’re getting married as soon as we can. I can’t stick this place without Dad.’
‘Will you live in the village or move away?’
‘No choice. My grandparents won’t have me anywhere round here, even though Dad told me they had a vacant cottage. I’ll move to Makepeace territory which will please them even more. Jamie might look for a job somewhere else though so that we can move away. Plumshaw’s going to be a building site for the next umpteen years or so, and I shan’t be sorry to leave.’
‘Is development certain? Your grandfather won’t sell, I’m told.’
‘Perhaps he will now, with Dad gone.’
‘Are you already a Makepeace in your loyalties?’
‘Not really. I can see why my father and grandparents want to stay here though. I think Paul and Stephanie would go like a flash if you greased their palm with a million quid or so.’
‘Is that likely?’
‘They’ll get the farm and estate once I’m going to be out of the picture by marrying Jamie, and probably Grandpa will leave them the Alfa Romeo too. It must be worth a bob or two and they may be counting on getting the loot from it. Once they get all that I wouldn’t mind betting they’ll sell up and move, and to hell with all their pretence of keeping the old estate goin
g.’
I decided to keep her talking, if only to keep her mind off her father. ‘It sounds as if only your grandparents are keeping old Plumshaw’s interests alive.’
She looked surprised. ‘You’re wrong there. There are heaps of old codgers round here who don’t want anything to change and, to be fair, not just old codgers either. Anyone with a brain can see what will happen if the Makepeaces’ plan goes through the way they want. We’d be living in a town not a village and one that’s all made of concrete. No room for green grass or cricket pitches in the Makepeace plans for the future. They’re all idiots.’
She had the grace to blush when she realized what she’d said. ‘Except for Jamie, of course. Anyway the Comptons will put up a good fight with their supporters behind them. The manor gives them a figurehead.’
‘A strong one though.’
‘Grandpa and Grandma make a formidable team,’ she agreed. ‘Grandma was an incomer to Plumshaw which makes her even more determined that nothing should change. Except,’ she added, ‘as regards her granddaughter’s choice of marrying into the opposition.’ She managed a grin. ‘I know you’ve met her. Do you want to meet my grandfather? He’s keen to meet you.’
I leapt at the chance. ‘I would. Is he up to it?’
‘No, but it will take his mind off my father for a while. He likes classic cars, you see.’
Even odder then, I thought, that he had left his Alfa Romeo alone and unloved all these years. Now I could ask him why.
I was over-hopeful. Bronte left me to check on her grandfather but it was Hazel who swept back in. No twinkle in the eye today. She looked drained and older, but she wanted it to be known by her body language that she was still the tigress in charge of the gateway, not Bronte.
‘I hear you want to meet my husband.’
‘At his wish. And only for as long as he wants to see me.’
‘Quite. Bear in mind that he is over ninety and our son …’ Her voice cracked, and I hurried to assure her that I would.
She looked mollified. ‘No doubt you’ll do your best to prove your friend innocent but I suppose the police know what they are doing in sending you along over this extraordinary Land Rover business. Or whatever else you may wish to know.’ A keen look here. ‘I expressed my views, but my husband is insistent that he wants to meet you.’
She led me to a room at the back of the house, where Peter Compton was sitting by the window in a splendidly old-fashioned wing armchair. Immediately I could see why he was still such a dominant figure in Plumshaw. A shock of grey hair, no thinning there. Keen eyes, and strong hands gripping the arms of his chair as though he were contemplating leaping out to attack me. I remembered he had been in the SAS during the war, and hoped he had forgotten his old methods of dispensing with opposition – which after all might be what he asked to see me for.
I was entirely wrong, to my surprise. As I approached him, he welcomed me, looking more Pickwickian than aggressive and certainly not like a lion scenting his prey. ‘There,’ he said loudly, as if addressing the troops. ‘Sit there, so I can see the whites of your eyes.’
‘To shoot me?’ I sat down opposite him as he indicated.
‘Probably not today.’ A belly laugh as he patted Hazel’s hand. She had protectively taken the upright chair at his side.
‘It’s good of you to see me in the circumstances,’ I told him.
‘You know what we did in the war with friends falling all round us? We went out twice as strong the next time to take our revenge. It keeps you going, Mr Colby.’ He switched subjects. ‘Martin tells me all about the cars you restore at Frogs Hill. It keeps me going, car talk.’
‘You own that fantastic Alfa Romeo. Do you have other classic cars?’
‘My dear chap, I’m ninety-five. There have been quite a few in my life.’ He embarked on a rambling account of the classic cars he had once owned, from a Brough Superior to a Gordon-Keeble. This elegant sports rarity gave us something in common because of the one I had inherited from Dad. Then we came to the Alfa Romeo again.
‘I heard you bought the Alfa Romeo in Italy. When was that?’
There might have been a hesitation before he spoke or perhaps I was mistaken for he answered readily enough. ‘I did. In 1946.’
‘And it used to belong to the racing driver who had to fall out of the Mille Miglia in 1938.’ Peter Compton had not been so forthcoming with Giovanni about its early history, I noted.
‘You’ve been doing your homework, Mr Colby. You’re right. I believe the owner died during the war and I picked it up afterwards about the time I married my first wife. Sofia was Italian.’
All this was flowing surprisingly well in the circumstances although Hazel was looking at him anxiously. ‘Is this relevant?’ she snapped at me.
‘Forgive me,’ I replied. ‘Car talk is second nature to me. No, it’s not relevant, but a lovely car to talk about. The Corto wheelbase, I noticed.’
‘Good man,’ Peter said approvingly. ‘And you know your stuff.’
‘Did you race it when you brought it back here?’
‘Not my style. Drove it a bit.’
‘On these English lanes or on a track?’
He roared with laughter. ‘Tried the lanes once. Then I brought it straight back here and drove it round the estate. No, never raced it, except round here. Like the Land Rover. Good now that it’s back. I hear the village has missed my little jaunts out in it. I’ll be starting again now. Stephanie or Paul will drive me.’
‘I’ll drive you,’ Hazel informed him.
Poor Plumshaw, I thought. The stately appearances would continue, with the stiff upper lip on display. Never admit defeat. Even so, even with this indomitable man, signs of his age were becoming apparent the longer I stayed. The shoulders had dropped a little and the lines of tiredness on his face had become more obvious. A tired soldier, a tired Pickwick too.
‘How could you resist the temptation not to drive the Alfa Romeo more often?’ I asked him, still curious about it.
‘No temptation, my dear fellow. One hangs an Old Master painting on the wall. One doesn’t move it around, one venerates it.’
‘But cars decay,’ I said gently.
‘I knew it was there. That was what was important. After what I had suffered—’
At this point Hazel rose to her feet. ‘Thank you, Mr Colby. We won’t detain you any longer.’
I took the hint and thanked them. There was clearly more to this story, but to my annoyance I knew I wasn’t going to hear it now. I couldn’t resist taking one risk before I left. ‘The car must be worth a lot of money now.’
He looked at me steadily. ‘Don’t be a fool, man. I’ll never sell it.’
No longer the eccentric squire. This was the former soldier speaking. I turned round to close the door behind me, however, and saw them off guard. No roaring tigress, no patriarch. Only two old but very determined people whose agenda remained a puzzle. It would be easy to underestimate them. And that might be just what they wanted. They were the victims in this murder case, and yet perhaps it was not as clear cut as that. Something, as Shakespeare wrote, was rotten in this state of Denmark. And for Denmark read Plumshaw.
‘Tough, was it?’ Bronte caught me up as I walked to my car.
‘You could say that,’ I agreed. ‘Your grandparents are unusual people.’
‘Don’t I know it. Come down to the pub?’ she suggested.
‘For more battering?’
‘No. I need to get away from this house, just to forget for a while, and Jamie can’t come here so I have to go there. Tonight I need company.’
We went together. I was aware of eyes watching me from inside the pub as I got out of the Polo, eyes that then swivelled to the other side of the car where I held the door open for Bronte to disembark.
‘Won’t Jamie be here?’ I asked as we walked up to the door.
‘I doubt it. He’s at work.’
There was silence as we went in, although not an inimical one.
I could see Andrew behind the bar, and the Makepeaces including George well in control here. It occurred to me that they must be wondering how to play this one. George finally broke the silence.
‘Have a drink on me, both of you,’ he said loudly.
‘Thank you, George,’ Bronte said calmly, and I thanked him too.
That relaxed the tension and temporarily the Hop and Harry seemed a normal pub.
SIX
The visits hall at Chelmsford, or indeed at any other prison, is not my idea of a great afternoon out, no matter the prisoner concerned. In fact it hadn’t been my idea. Maria, now installed at Frogs Hill, had stomped up to me on Friday with a grim look on her face.
‘Giovanni not want to see me Sunday. He want to see you.’
She had been here some days now, and this was the first major glitch. She loved my pasta, I admired her way with tuna – in short, she and I had come to a working arrangement at Frogs Hill, which now seemed in jeopardy. She had just visited Giovanni and the result had clearly not been an overwhelming success. He wanted her to return to Italy, she wanted to find board and lodging right next door to the prison.
No bail had been granted to Giovanni. This could perhaps have been because his solicitor’s approach had put backs up. Apparently this had been on the grounds that Giovanni was far too important a person to be imprisoned even on remand. As he could hardly be seen as a threat to the community at large, the reason was more likely the risk that such an important person would disappear back to Italy with consequent delay in retrieving him.
It was clear why Giovanni wanted to see me. His solicitor must be in despair faced with the evidence Brandon was holding. Giovanni was obviously pinning his hopes on me, leaving me with no option but to get involved. I ran it by Brandon, who was dubious but somewhat to my surprise finally okayed the visit. As Giovanni had been remanded for trial, there was in theory no case to be explored as far as Brandon was concerned. Hugh Compton had been thrown into the water two or three days before he was found; Giovanni had been freed on Saturday, three days before the discovery of the body, and could not satisfactorily account for all his movements. As Hugh had not died during the night of the barn episode, their theory had to be that he had been dying of wounds while Giovanni was in custody. I just could not go with this line. The murder had not taken place at the pond itself and the body therefore had to have been transported along the track through the woods, or from a car at the roadside by Puddledock Cottage (or, I had to consider, from the cottage itself). Perhaps there was a lingering doubt in Brandon’s mind also, because he had sanctioned my presence at the scene and my visit to Giovanni.