by Simon Brett
‘That’s it. All the info on the Doreen Grange case is in there.’
‘Well, perhaps we’d better be moving,’ said Mrs Pargeter with some urgency.
‘Oh, before you do, though,’ said Bobby the Bill, ‘you hand that blue file across to me.’
‘OK.’
‘But do it very obviously, Truffler. In fact, if you could drop it as you’re doing so and pick it up, then everyone’ll see what you’re doing.’
Truffler Mason did exactly as instructed. He acted so clumsily that not a copper in the pub could have missed what was going on.
‘What was all that about?’ asked Mrs Pargeter as they sat in Gary’s limousine on the way back to Chigwell. ‘What the Chief Constable said, and all that business with the file?’
‘Ah well, you see, Mrs P, that was why Bobby the Bill chose to meet in that pub.’
‘Why? It was full of coppers.’
‘Yes, but they all thought we was narks.’
‘What?’
‘Police informers.’
‘I know what a nark is, Truffler,’ she responded with uncharacteristic asperity.
‘They thought we was giving information to Bobby the Bill, not the other way round.’
‘So that’s why the Chief Constable thanked us for making their job easier?’
‘Exactly.’
‘Huh,’ said Mrs Pargeter.
And she was silent all the way back to her mansion in Chigwell, deeply offended that anyone might have mistaken her for a police informer. To her mind, police informers were criminals, and she had never been one of those.
NINE
Bobby the Bill had done a good job. As Truffler spread the papers from the red folder over Mrs Pargeter’s sitting-room table, he observed that they now had as much information on Doreen Grange’s murder as the official investigating team did.
‘About time,’ said Mrs Pargeter. ‘It’s shocking how uncommunicative the police can be about ongoing enquiries. They don’t think. Their attitude puts the average amateur sleuth at a considerable disadvantage. At least with this lot—’ she gestured to the documents – ‘we start on a level playing field.’
They read through everything with great attention. Truffler made notes in a spiral-topped reporter’s notebook. (He liked traditional methods; though he did own a laptop, he only used it when he had absolutely no alternative.)
It turned out that Doreen Grange’s permanent home was on the Greek island of Atmos, where she spent all of her time and energy working unpaid for PhiliPussies. She was seventy-seven years old and lived comfortably on a generous Civil Service pension. Every couple of months she came back to England, being driven in a minivan full of cats that were about to be rehabilitated. When she made these trips she stayed with her sister Flora Grange in Rayleigh, Essex. Neither sister had ever married.
Her postmortem revealed that the cause of death had been strangulation by a tartan dog lead, which was still in place around her neck when her body was found. Time of death was estimated to have been in the small hours of the same day. The assumption was that Doreen Grange had not been killed at the location where she was buried. Further investigation was required, but it was thought likely that she had been driven in a vehicle from the scene of the crime to Epping Forest. Some threads found on her clothing would need further analysis, but looked very much as if they came from the carpeting in a car boot.
The attempt to bury her had been half-hearted. The grave was very shallow, and whoever dug it could not have expected the body to remain undiscovered for long, particularly as it was quite near one of Epping Forest’s main car parks. A favourite area for dog-walkers. And as regular readers of the newspapers know, dog-walkers constitute one of the sections of the population most likely to discover dead bodies.
The police had interviewed Flora Grange at her home in Rayleigh. She told them that the evening before her death Doreen had retired to bed at about ten o’clock. Neither sister kept late hours. There had been nothing untoward in Doreen’s behaviour. She did not appear to be upset, frightened or nervous. Her only complaint was about the coldness of Essex in May, when compared to sunny Greece.
Flora Grange had not been aware of any disturbance during the night, but then that was no surprise. Her hearing was very poor and she always removed her hearing aids when she went to bed. She said that a herd of elephants could have stomped through the house during the night and she wouldn’t have been aware of a thing. The first indication she’d had that anything was wrong was when she found Doreen’s bedroom empty the following morning.
Inspecting the premises, the police found that the bed in Doreen’s room had been slept in. There were no signs of forced entry, no evidence of any violence having taken place and no suicide note. The assumption had to be that Doreen Grange had left the house voluntarily in the middle of the night.
Checking recent calls on her mobile phone (which was found with her body) revealed nothing unexpected. All had been related to the activities of PhiliPussies. On the last day of her life she had spoken to Mendy Farstairs, Rochelle Brighouse and the vet Bailey Dalrymple. The one international call she’d made was to Greece. Ringing the number revealed that it belonged to the neighbour on Atmos who was looking after Doreen’s own personal pet cats while she was away.
And that was as far as the official police investigation had got.
‘Very helpful,’ said Mrs Pargeter. ‘You hear lots of criticism of the police these days, but there are some basic things they do very well. And they’ve even provided us with the address for our next step.’
‘Next step?’ repeated a puzzled Truffler Mason.
‘Well, obviously we go and visit Flora Grange. She’s the only lead we’ve got.’
‘True,’ he agreed dolefully.
‘And do you think Bobby the Bill will provide us with more information as he gets it?’
‘Course he will. He’s as honest as the day is long, Bobby. The minute the police get any kind of breakthrough, he’ll pass it on to us.’
‘Good.’ Mrs Pargeter was silent for a moment. ‘I’d prefer it if we found some other way of getting the stuff.’ The unease generated by being in a coppers’ pub had not left her.
‘Yeah, we can sort something out, no problem.’
‘Excellent. Though it is quite comforting to know that we’ll be up to speed with everything the police are investigating.’
‘It is indeed. And when they find out whodunit, we’ll be the first to know.’
‘Oh, I don’t think so.’
‘Wodja mean?’
‘I mean that we’ll find out whodunit long before the police do, won’t we, Truffler?’
‘Of course we will, Mrs P.’
TEN
Flora Grange’s house was an inoffensive suburban semi, only differentiated from the others in the road by its lime green front door. When Mrs Pargeter had phoned, using the number so helpfully (if unwittingly) supplied by the police, the woman who’d answered had been more than happy to talk about her sister.
‘The fact is,’ she said, once they were all settled in her very suburban front room, ‘that I could never stand Doreen. I know they always say one shouldn’t speak ill of the dead, but in her case it’s very difficult not to.’
Mrs Pargeter wondered whether this was just natural antipathy between two sisters, or a reaction against some criminal behaviour perpetrated by Doreen Grange. On brief acquaintance the latter scenario seemed unlikely, but Mrs Pargeter knew well how often evil lurked behind the most innocent of exteriors.
‘Difficult for anyone not to?’ she asked Flora. ‘Or just for you?’
‘Well, it was particularly difficult for me because I spent more time with the cow. She was there when I was born and I’ve spent most of my life trying to get shot of her.’
Mrs Pargeter was struck immediately by the contrast between the two sisters, which expressed itself both in their manner and their clothes. There was nothing nurse-like in Flora Grange’s spangly silver
top and red leather trousers. The black stilettos too could not have been more different from Doreen Grange’s sandals.
Flora had implied that she was younger than her sister, and from her looks the age difference could have been as much as fifteen years. Whereas Doreen’s face looked as if it had never been touched by make-up, Flora’s was caked over with the stuff. But it had been very skilfully applied, even down to the luxuriant false eyelashes. Though Mrs Pargeter reckoned she must be older, Flora Grange could easily have passed for late fifties.
Flora’s behaviour, too, was nothing like her older sister’s. Whereas Doreen’s voice had a coy, wheedling tone to it, Flora’s was direct and abrasive. She sounded as if she were afraid of nothing and used to getting her own way.
Her words about her sister – ‘I’ve spent most of my life trying to get shot of her’ – might have been interpreted by some amateur sleuths as a confession of murderous intent, but Mrs Pargeter was too canny to take them that way. In her experience, genuine murderers were much more careful with their words. Flora Grange’s very lack of caution pointed towards her innocence.
‘I gather,’ Mrs Pargeter said, ‘that you have been interviewed by the police …?’
‘Yes, and a right load of useless tossers they turned out to be.’
‘They presumably asked you questions about your sister?’
‘Of course they did. What else are they going to ask me about?’
‘And did you express your, erm, lack of affection for Doreen as forcibly as you have to us?’
‘No, of course I didn’t. For them I did the full grieving sister routine. I even managed to produce some tears. That’s why it’s such a relief to be able to talk to you. Because you have no official role in the enquiry.’
‘That’s true. What I can’t understand, Flora … I may call you “Flora”, may I?
‘Sure.’
‘Well, what I can’t understand is why, given how much you disliked your sister, you let her stay with you every time she came to England.’
‘I couldn’t avoid it.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Doreen had certain information about me which she threatened to disclose to the police if I didn’t do as she told me to.’
‘Blackmail?’
‘That’s what it amounted to, yes.’
‘Now, I’m not about to ask you what that information was …’
‘Just as well, because I wouldn’t tell you.’
‘I didn’t think you would. What I would like to know, though, is why you hated Doreen so much? Was it just sibling rivalry, two girls close in age and—’
‘Oy!’ Flora interrupted. ‘We weren’t that close in age! Now every newspaper in the country is broadcasting the fact that Doreen was seventy-seven, how old are people going to think I am? There was a very big age gap between us. Different fathers, you see. Our mother married twice. I think I must have been an accident. I don’t think she had planned to start another family so late in life.’
‘So …’ Mrs Pargeter dared to put the question, ‘how old are you, Flora?’
‘Fifty-five,’ the woman lied, without a hint of a blush.
‘Fine. And can I ask again why you disliked your sister so much?’
‘Oh, she was just so self-righteous. A prig. Always doing good works. It got up my nose. Why couldn’t she show a bit of natural selfishness like the rest of us? I think it was because Doreen was so bloody good all the time that I deliberately went off the rails. I was trying to get some reaction out of her, something other than patronizing pity. But it never worked. She remained the toffee-nosed do-gooder she had been since I first became aware of her. God, she drove me to distraction.’
‘I’m sure she did,’ said Mrs Pargeter with a degree of sympathy. Her very brief acquaintance with Doreen had prompted the same reaction in her. The thought of having to endure that pious self-righteousness for years … yes, she could see Flora’s point. But no time for that, she needed to get on with the investigation. ‘And had she always liked cats?’
‘Oh yes. Our family home was full of the horrid little beasts. It wasn’t just Doreen who liked them, it was my parents too. They certainly showed much more affection to the cats than they ever did to me. I loathe the creatures – scratching everything in sight, yowling all the time, dragging dead wildlife into the house. Horrid things! And Doreen was always bringing more of the little monsters into the UK.’
‘Did she ever have any with her when she came here to stay with you?’
‘No, she did not! That was one thing I would not put up with. I drew the line there. No, when she comes back to England the cats get delivered straight to the vet.’
‘Would that be Bailey Dalrymple?’
‘Yes, I think that was the name she mentioned. I’ve never met him. But I made it clear to Doreen that I wouldn’t have any cats in my house. I am actually allergic to them. I start wheezing if I go within a hundred yards of one. So Doreen wouldn’t dare bring one into the house. I made that clear to her. They went straight to some clinic in Leigh-on-Sea. Mind you, Doreen still always reeks of the animals; everything she wears is covered with cats’ hairs. The minute she comes into the house, my eyes puff up and my nose streams. My sister is just so thoughtless. She always has been. Like lots of do-gooders, she is totally insensitive to the needs of others. I can remember when she was about seven years old, she—’
Clearly Flora Grange could have gone on in this vein for some time, so Mrs Pargeter interrupted her flow. ‘Could we just go back to the last time you saw her?’
‘If you want to.’
‘According to the information we have …’
‘And where, may I ask, did you get that information from?’
Mrs Pargeter looked at Truffler Mason for guidance. ‘A variety of sources,’ he said judiciously. ‘We private investigators are a bit like journalists – never say where we got stuff from.’
Flora Grange did not seem to be put out by this, so Mrs Pargeter went on, ‘We were told that you both retired to bed early … about ten, is that right?’
‘Doreen went to bed at ten. She always was a wet blanket, terrible party-pooper. She had no relish for life,’ Flora concluded flamboyantly.
‘Unlike you?’
‘Very definitely unlike me. I’ve always believed in living life to the full, draining its dregs.’
‘So you didn’t go to bed at ten?’
Flora Grange looked at Mrs Pargeter slyly. ‘I didn’t say that. The question you should really be asking is who I went to bed with.’
‘Oh?’
‘Sex never featured much in Doreen’s life. I’m pretty sure she was a virgin when she died.’
‘Whereas you, on the other hand …’ suggested Mrs Pargeter.
Her appeal to the woman’s vanity had just the right effect. ‘I, on the other hand, have always been extremely highly sexed. And extremely attractive to men.’
‘Congratulations,’ murmured Mrs Pargeter. ‘So who was the lucky man that night?’
‘I’m not going to tell you his name.’
‘Fine.’
‘He’s a local lad. Does a bit of gardening and other services for me.’ Flora Grange was relishing the ambiguity of her words. She fancied herself in the role of cougar.
‘So are you saying,’ asked Truffler, ‘that this young man might be a useful witness, that he might have seen what had happened to your sister?’
‘Good Lord, no. He was only with me half an hour. I call him when the need arises and he goes when I’ve had what I want out of him. When he left we could both hear Doreen snoring. He commented on it. She always did snore. God, when we shared a bedroom, the number of nights she used to keep me wide awake you wouldn’t believe.’
‘I’m surprised,’ said Mrs Pargeter, ‘that you could hear her snoring the other night.’
‘Why’s that?’
‘Because I thought you wore hearing aids and took them out when you went to bed.’
‘No, of
course I don’t,’ Flora snapped. ‘Do I look the age of someone who needs hearing aids?’
‘Our information,’ says Truffler, ‘suggests that you did wear hearing aids. Or that you said you wore hearing aids.’
‘No, that’s just something I told the police.’ She looked at her two visitors with renewed respect. ‘How did you know that? The only people I told that to was the police.’
‘I have my ways of finding things out,’ said Truffler loftily, ‘but of course I never reveal my sources.’
‘You’re good,’ said Flora Grange with grudging admiration. ‘But when I tell you some of the things Doreen used to do to me when I was a small child you’ll—’
Another interruption was called for. Mrs Pargeter felt that they’d probably got all the information they were likely to get from Flora Grange. Though she could clearly go on at inordinate length about the iniquities of her sister.
‘Sorry to stop you, but, Flora, can you think of any person who might have wanted to murder Doreen?’
‘Anyone who had met her, I would imagine,’ came the predictable reply.
ELEVEN
The next morning Mrs Pargeter and Truffler Mason were sitting in Erin Jarvis’s front room. No one who had been there when it was the office of her late father ‘Jukebox’ Jarvis (so called because he ‘kept the records’) would have recognized the place. In his day a spaghetti chaos of snaking wires had spread across the floor, joining up a junkyard of desktop computers, monitors, printers and surveillance equipment. But in spite of what ‘Jukebox’ Jarvis himself regarded as a nod to modernity, most of his record-keeping was still contained in dusty cardboard boxes from which file cards, yellowed and flimsy with age, spilled out to join the general chaos of the floor.
But during his final illness the archivist had worked closely with his daughter to explain his complex filing methods, and soon after his death Erin had completed the task of digitizing every last card. For her the time spent working with ‘Jukebox’ had been extraordinarily precious. In the last months of his life the two of them, never particularly close before, had formed a bond which would sustain Erin for as long as she might live.