Murder a la Mode

by Patricia Moyes

  MURDER À LA MODE

  Patricia Moyes

  FELONY & MAYHEM PRESS • NEW YORK

  Born in Dublin in 1923, Patricia (“Penny”) Packenham-Walsh was just 16 when WWII came calling, but she lied about her age and joined the WAAF (the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force), eventually becoming a flight officer and an expert in radar. Based on that expertise, she was named technical advisor to a film that Sir Peter Ustinov was making about the discovery of radar, and went on to act as his personal assistant for eight years, followed by five years in the editorial department of British Vogue.

  When she was in her late 30s, while recuperating from a skiing accident, she scribbled out her first novel, Dead Men Don’t Ski, and a new career was born. Dead Men featured Inspector Henry Tibbett of Scotland Yard, equipped with both a bloodhound’s nose for crime and an easy-going wife; the two of them are both a formidable sleuthing team and an image of happy, productive marriage, and it’s that double picture that makes the Tibbett series so deeply satisfying. While the Tibbett books were written in the second half of the 20th century, there is something both timeless and classic about them; they feel of a piece with the Golden Age of British Detective Fiction.

  Patricia Moyes died in 2000. The New York Times once famously noted that, as a writer, she “made drug dealing look like bad manners rather than bad morals.” That comment may once have been rather snarky, but as we are increasingly forced to acknowledge the foulness that can arise from unchecked bad manners, Inspector Henry Tibbett—a man of unflinching good manners, among other estimable traits—becomes a hero we can all get behind.

  MURDER À LA MODE

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER ONE

  “I WON’T DO IT, I tell you,” shouted Patrick Walsh. “I won’t! It’s obscene. It’s hideous. If you give that monster a double spread, I resign. If you as much as run it over the gutter, you can give me my cards, and that’s flat.” He strode about the room, deliberately clumsy, attempting to tear a handful of shaggy grey hair from the abundant mop that reared like a battered Cossack hat round his large, red face.

  “It’s the new line and the new length, Patrick,” said Margery French firmly. She pushed up the veil of her black straw hat, held the shiny photograph at arm’s length, and squinted at it through half-closed eyes. “I see it as a tremendous shock effect, making the point of Helen’s copy. I agree it’s not conventionally pretty—”

  “Pretty!” Patrick stopped pacing and raised his enormous hands to heaven. “Pretty!” he bellowed again. “Who ever said I wanted pretty pictures? I just want something with a little shape to it, that’s all. Is it too much to ask?” Suddenly, he lowered his voice to a beguiling Irish whisper. “Look now, Margery darling, you’re a lovely girl and you’re the boss—but have a little pity on your poor old art editor. I can’t make a double spread out of that…that plum pudding on stilts.”

  There was an oppressive silence.

  In the office next door, Teresa Manners smiled, wearily. “Uncle’s going off the deep end again,” she remarked. “He really is impossible. I suppose we’ll be here all night.” She lit a cigarette and sat down on the desk, dangling her beautiful legs.

  “I shall certainly be here all night,” Helen Pankhurst replied tartly. “I always am, on these occasions. My work doesn’t start until yours ends, if you remember.” She blew her nose loudly and put on an enormous pair of spectacles outlined in rhinestone. “Would you mind getting off my desk, Teresa? You’re sitting on my justified captions.”

  The communicating door between the two offices opened, and a precise voice said, “Miss Manners, can you spare the editor a moment?”

  “With pleasure, Miss Field,” said Teresa. “Here we go. Into battle.” She took a long pull at her cigarette and went into the other office.

  “Ah, Teresa dear.” Margery French’s voice came pleasantly and steadily, with no sign of strain. “Patrick is a little unhappy about the Monnier spread. I’d like your opinion…”

  The door closed behind Teresa. Helen Pankhurst looked at her watch. Half past eleven already, and not a single layout through. Outside, in the lamplit Mayfair street, the commissionaire of The Orangery restaurant, dwarfed under his huge black umbrella, was hailing a taxi; a tired man in a shabby brown overcoat shivered beside a basketful of unseasonable red rosebuds. The road gleamed like black satin in the January rain.

  Half past eleven, and the whole long night ahead. Opposite, the houses were uniformly dark above the ground floor, with the exception of the one immediately facing Helen’s window. Here, a light still burned in an upper story. For the rest, they had long since been converted from private homes into offices, and the last secretary had hurried home, huddled against the wind and rain, soon after six. In the length of the street, only the tall Georgian mansion which housed the offices of Style was still ablaze with light and activity. For this was the night when the Paris Collections number was put to bed; the bi-annual occasion upon which certain members of the staff toiled and bickered until dawn, so that readers all over England could savour, on the appointed release date, pictures and fashion guidance from Paris presented in the authoritative manner of the glossiest of glossy magazines.

  The readers in question, who are an ingenuous lot, would have been surprised by this feverish activity, for the delivery date of this particular issue was still three weeks away. They did not appreciate, as Helen did, the immense effort entailed in holding a sixteen-page section for a fortnight beyond its normal press date. They could hardly be expected to know that the superb photographic reproduction, the impeccable colour blocks and fine typesetting of Style were the result of weeks of patient work, which, in this exceptional case, had to be telescoped drastically. It was one of the ironies of the business, Helen reflected, that the most important fashion reportages of the year should always have to be produced in this overnight shambles, with little or no time for corrections or second thoughts.

  Only that afternoon, the Style team in Paris had been perched uncomfortably on minuscule gilt chairs, watching the last show of the Collections. Only at six o’clock had the shutter of Michael Healy’s camera clicked for the last time on the skeletal person of Veronica Spence, as she pirouetted on the highest platform of the Eiffel Tower in a top-secret chiffon evening dress by Monnier. Only at nine had Teresa and Michael climbed wearily out of the plane at London Airport, followed by the efficient and imperturbable Rachel Field, private secretary to the editor of Style. Only at half past ten had the still-wet prints of Michael’s photographs emerged from the darkroom of the Style studios into the adjoining office of Patrick Walsh, the art editor.

  And now it was half past eleven, and in the editor’s office controversy raged as usual, and as usual tempers grew brittle and voices were raised. Which pictures should be used, and how should they be presented? What was the big story? Which trends in the new Collections were valid signposts of fashion influences to come, and which were mere flashes in the pan? Which of the new young designers rated the cachet of a page in Style? Teresa Manners, lovely and blonde and a semi-illiterate product of the best English private schooling, knew the answers to these questions, for she could feel the flow of fashion in the tips of her slim fingers, as an artist feels colour or a sculptor, form and texture. Teresa knew, but she found it hard to explain articul
ately. Patrick Walsh knew what would make a striking impact on the printed page. Margery French, as editor, was ultimately responsible. They would be arguing for hours.

  Meanwhile, Helen could only sit and wait. Her function was more practical. First, when the completed layouts arrived, she would write the captions—tailoring them carefully to fit the space that Patrick had allotted, and getting from Teresa’s scribbled notes Style’s views on the significance of Monnier’s new Z silhouette and the future of the jagged hemline. Then, from Rachel Field’s meticulously typed data, Helen would extract the information that the original fabric was by Garigue or Rodier or the Cumberland Silk Mills, and that this model would be available in March at Harrods or Debenhams. Finally, she had to make sure that, by seven o’clock in the morning, the hysterical confusion of the night had been resolved into neatly typed captions, each with its accompanying layout and photograph, checked and counterchecked and ready for the despatch rider to rush to the printers. It was a hard night’s work, and Helen was thankful that it only happened twice a year.

  She blew her nose again, and poured herself some tea from the battered red Thermos flask which she always brought with her to the office on Collections night. To her irritation, there was only half a cup left in it. She picked up her house telephone and dialed the number of the darkroom.

  “ ’Ullo,” said a lugubrious voice.

  “Ernie, this is Miss Pankhurst. Please come and get my Thermos and make me some fresh tea. At once.”

  “I’m supposed to be reducin’ a print…”

  “Don’t argue,” said Helen crossly, and slammed down the receiver. She knew that she had the reputation of being a dragon, but she did not care. It had its uses. Sure enough, in two minutes Ernie arrived, tousle-headed and surly, and removed the precious flask to his cubbyhole off the darkroom, where an electric kettle was installed for “brewing up.”

  Helen’s head ached, and she reflected bitterly that it was just her luck to have caught a stifling cold to add to all the other worries of the night. She felt infinitely older than her thirty-four years, and longed to lie down. Instead, she drank her half cup of tea, and began to study Teresa’s ungrammatical but colourful reports.

  “Hats like soup plates, v. important…sort of bull-fightish colours…gorgeous in a maid’s-night-out sort of way…O.K. for dumpling debs but basically old hat…the good old Balenciaga sack hacked round the hem with pruning shears…”

  It was all vivid and true, and Helen wished she could print it as it stood. Impossible, of course. She began to translate it into Stylese. “Discus hats, flat as flying saucers…a colour scheme of mantilla black and picador red, spiced with new-minted gold…dazzling for the woman who dares…classic in the modern manner…the slim sheath with the new ragamuffin look…” She blew her nose again, and wished she had brought some aspirin. It was nearly midnight.

  In the office next door, Teresa and Patrick were on their knees on the deep lilac carpet, groveling among a welter of photographs and experimental layouts.

  “Blow it up!” said Patrick, boomingly. “Blow it up enormous, and kill the hat picture.”

  “No,” said Teresa. “No. Honestly, I won’t have the hat killed.”

  “My dear girl, what does it mean?”

  “It’s important.” Teresa gestured, a little helplessly. “Without the hat, there’s no story. This year, it’s the hats that matter.”

  “All right.” Patrick was angry. “Let’s have all hat. One great hideous hat right across both pages. Give the spread some guts. Crop the picture here…”

  The door leading to Patrick’s art department opened quietly, and Michael Healy came in. He was an immensely tall, thin man, renowned as a dandy. At the moment, he was in shirt-sleeves, his fair hair rumpled, and his long face haggard with fatigue. In a light, biting voice, he said, “I know I’m only a poor bloody photographer, but would you mind telling me what in hell you two are proposing to do to that picture?”

  Teresa looked up quickly. “Only cropping it a bit, darling, to show up the hat.”

  “The point of that photograph,” said Michael acidly, “is in the line of the dress carried up to and through the hat. If you’re going to cut it up into small pieces, I’d be grateful if you took my name off it.”

  “Now, Michael.” Margery French sat back in her swivel chair behind the big desk. The black straw hat was beginning to grow uncomfortably tight around her temples, but she would no more have dreamed of taking it off than of undressing in public. “Let’s get this straight. Teresa considers that hats are extremely important this season.”

  “Well, they are.”

  “Patrick wants a double spread for the Dior suit.”

  “It’s the only damned picture that…”

  “Michael feels that this photograph will be ruined if it’s cropped, and I quite agree with him.”

  “Thank you, Margery.”

  “Well, then. Why don’t we give the Dior a double spread, go on to this picture, uncropped, facing a whole-page hat picture, and kill the Monnier chiffon?”

  There was a moment of concentrated silence.

  “How strongly do you feel about the Monnier chiffon, Teresa?”

  Teresa hesitated. “Not desperately,” she said, finally. “The Balmain makes the point. I’m for killing it.”

  “Margery, me darling, you’re a genius!” Patrick stood up and bellowed, “Donald!”

  Like a rabbit from a hat, the head of a dark young man popped round the art department door.

  “Take all these bloody layouts and burn them, you miserable Scotsman,” cried Patrick, in high good temper, sweeping up a sheaf of papers from the floor. “Then blow up the Dior on the photostat and we’ll make a paste-up of…”

  He disappeared into the art department. Margery French smiled—a warm, youthful smile which made it difficult to remember that she was nearly sixty, a formidable brain, and in her own sphere, a very important and influential woman.

  “That should give us ten minutes’ peace,” she said. “I think I’ll go and freshen up in the rest room. Call me there, Miss Field, if anyone needs me before Mr. Walsh gets back.” She stood up, very erect, not a blue-rinsed hair out of place. “I hope you’ve sent Ernest home, Michael. Surely all the darkroom work is done by now.”

  “He left ten minutes ago, Margery.”

  “Good. He’s been looking rather tired lately.” Margery smiled again, but this time it was a little forced. She swayed slightly, and put out a hand to her desk to steady herself. “Well, see you in ten minutes.”

  As the door closed behind Margery, Michael Healy said, “I hope to God she’s O.K. I’ve never known her…”

  Teresa yawned and stretched. “She’s not superhuman, darling, even though lots of people seem to think she is. She gets tired like everybody else, although she won’t admit it. She depends an awful lot on Helen these days. Unfortunately.”

  The silence that followed was broken by the sharp tapping of a typewriter, a necessary reminder to Teresa and Michael that they were not alone. Indeed, they could have been forgiven for forgetting that there was a third person in the room. Rachel Field was the acme of all that a private secretary should be. Neat, unremarkable, precise, soft-spoken, dauntingly efficient. Teresa knew that Miss Field (as she always called her) was considered by the junior staff to be a terrifying martinet, but she personally had never been able to see it. Miss Field simply wasn’t there unless one needed her. It never occurred to Teresa that it was only her own privileged position as fashion editor that protected her from the more ruthless aspects of Rachel’s nature.

  As for Rachel, she regarded Miss Manners (as she always called her) with carefully concealed dislike and exasperation. Miss French—now there was someone a person could be proud to work for; kind—sometimes too kind, in Rachel’s opinion—but efficient, decisive, and with a proper respect for files and an orderly office system. But Miss Manners…well…scatterbrained and irresponsible and spoilt were the epithets that Rachel, pri
vately, applied to her. Miss French said that Miss Manners had a flair for fashion, and if Miss French said so, Rachel supposed it must be true. Personally, she failed to understand the fuss that people like Miss Manners and Mr. Walsh made about which picture was to be used, and how. To hear them go on, you’d think they were talking about something important. Rachel considered it remarkably indulgent of Miss French to put up with their silly temperaments the way she did. And to think that Miss Manners and that man Michael Healy could go gossiping about Miss French behind her back, in her own office… Rachel hit the keys of her typewriter viciously, in loud, unspoken criticism.

  Michael said, “Oh, well. If you’re going to use the Paulette hat picture big, I’ll make another print of it. This one’s too dark.” He picked up a photograph from the floor and studied it. “God, that girl, Veronica Thing, has wonderful bones. A young Goalen. I could do something with her.”

  “I’m sure you could.” Teresa sounded slightly mocking.

  “Not what you mean, darling,” said Michael. He kissed the top of her ash-blonde head and went out, whistling. In the art department, he passed Patrick Walsh and Donald MacKay, enmeshed in festoons of sliced-up photostats and Gripfix.

  “I hope you two boys aren’t playing any nasty, messy games,” he said severely.

  “Go to hell,” said Patrick.

  “My dear Uncle, I’ve been there for years,” said Michael lightly, and went on into the quiet dusk of the darkroom, his own domain. It was half past twelve.

  Margery French lay on a day bed in the rest room and fought against feeling old and tired and ill. For years—more years than she cared to be reminded of—she had reveled in these all-night sessions. Even up until last year, she had been able, effortlessly, to run the younger members of the staff off their feet and still emerge, smiling and serene, to face the next day’s business. This tiredness frightened her more than she would admit.