‘Señorita, what L the matter?’
She spoke croakily.’ My mouth . . . It’s burning.’
‘Let me get you something to drink.’
She jumped to her feet and ran back into the kitchen and by the time he had reached the door she had poured out a third glassful of water. She drank with such desperate eagerness that water spilled over the edge of the glass and down the side of her mouth. Then, with only a split second’s warning, she vomited.
Sweet Mother of Jesus, he thought, as the record ended with a sweep of violins, she’s been poisoned.
CHAPTER XIII
The doctor, a small man with wide-apart, gentle eyes which were contradicted by a sharp nose and pugnacious mouth, said: ‘She died at eight-fifteen this morning.’ He looked tired and he spoke with the bitterness of a man who had fought to the extent of his skill and yet still lost.
Alvarez looked across the consulting room. ‘She was poisoned?’
‘I’m sure the answer’s yes, but obviously no one will know for certain until after the post mortem.’
‘Do you think it was a llargsomi?’
The doctor began to tap the desk with his fingers. ‘I doubt it. I am remembering your original description of the way she had difficulty in swallowing and how she kept saying her mouth was burning. These are not the normal symptoms of phalloidine poisoning.’
‘Then can you suggest what it might have been?’
‘No. You’ll have to wait for the reports.’
‘It must have been strong to have acted so quickly?’ ‘Quick is always a relative term, isn’t it? For her, death must have seemed unmercifully tardy,’ His rate of tapping increased. ‘I’ve seldom seen such suffering and been so powerless to ameliorate it.’ Alvarez shivered.
Bertha Jarmine was known as Bertha the Bitch (although it happened only twice a year to a bitch) and because she was so contemptuous of all standards, even those few which pertained around Llueso, she was disliked and feared by other women. She was said to be as hard as nails and in support of this was told the story of how the day after her second husband died she had given a cocktail-party to six of her strongest admirers to decide who among them would keep her bed warm that night. In fact, she had been seeking solace, not sex. What people failed to understand was that she was both wanton and faithful, self-centred and sympathetic, mean and generous. She might have thought of Caroline with the ridicule that the so-called fallen reserve for the so-called chaste and upright, but she honoured genuine goodness in others as much as she dishonoured the goodness in herself.
She drove, in her battered Ford which was on English plates and which she kept without paying the new tax, to Caroline’s flat which was in a block set in an area of the Port which had managed to combine all that was worst in Spanish tourist development.
Caroline opened the front door. ‘Hullo, Bertha. Come on in. What fun to see you . . .’ She stopped because of the expression on Bertha’s face.
Bertha went in. ‘I’m sorry, Carrie,’ she said, her words crisp but her tone sympathetic, ‘but Mabel died this morning.’
Caroline, always affected by death and still more affected by Mabel’s because Mabel had died as awkwardly and ingloriously as she had lived, began to cry. Bertha put her arm around her and led her into the sitting-room where, being a practical woman, she poured out a large brandy for each of them.
‘But . . . but what was it?’ asked Caroline. ‘It was so terribly sudden.’
‘The word’s going round that she was poisoned,’ replied Bertha. Caroline must inevitably hear the rumour before very long, therefore there was no point in trying to shield her from it.
‘No one would poison her. Not Mabel. Why should anyone?’
‘God knows.’ She opened her handbag - typically, it was very large and of superb quality crocodile skin, yet she treated it as if it were plastic - and brought out a slim gold cigarette case. ‘D’you want one?’ When Caroline shook her head, she lit one. ‘Did you see her at all yesterday?’
‘I went to her home with Teddy on Wednesday, but the detective had just been talking to her and he said she was very upset. We didn’t go in because I thought that if she was so upset it was best to keep away for a bit. . . If only I’d gone yesterday as I thought of going.’
‘It wouldn’t have changed anything,’ said Bertha decisively. ‘Did Teddy find her calmed down when he saw her?’
‘But I’ve just told you, Teddy was with me and we didn’t go in.’
‘I’m talking about yesterday.’ Bertha looked at Caroline with a sharp enquiry which was edged with sadness.
‘Teddy didn’t see her yesterday. He and I were going back there today.’
‘Maybe it wasn’t him who went to her place, then. You know how people out here always get everything mixed up and twisted round.’
‘He can’t have gone there. Why are people so beastly. . .’
‘Look, Carrie, I know you carry his banner high. But you’ve got to realize he’s not everyone’s cup of tea. And if he did see her yesterday, you can’t expect people . . .’
‘I expect them to say the worst they can because they don’t like him. And you know why? They know he was born the wrong side of the railway tracks. Why the hell don’t they start realizing that the time’s now, not fifty years ago? They’d have to change their attitudes fast enough if they went back to England.’
‘You’re not becoming over-fond of him, are you?’
‘What’s that to do with anyone else?’
‘It’s everything to do with you. He could hurt you pretty hard: he’s that kind of a person.’
‘If you can say that, you don’t know anything about him.’
‘I know his type well enough. What he wants, he grabs, and to hell with the consequences. I’d hate to see you get hurt.’
‘I can look after myself.’
Bertha shook her head.
Alvarez looked at the telephone on his desk for several minutes before he finally lifted the receiver, dialled HQ, Palma, and asked to speak to Superior Chief Salas. The secretary with the very refined voice said he’d have to wait because Senor Salas was very busy. While he waited, Alvarez pulled open the bottom right-hand drawer of his desk.
‘Well?’ said Salas rudely, not bothering with any preliminary greeting. ‘Have you at last uncovered the true identity of the dead man?’
‘No, señor. What’s more, there has been a further small complication.’
‘What’s that?’
‘You may remember I previously mentioned the name of Señorita Cannon, an English lady?’
‘Of course. You told me you had every reason to believe she was responsible for poisoning the dead man. Have you arrested her?’
‘No, señor.’
‘Why not?’
‘She has just died. I fear she had almost certainly been poisoned.’
There was a short pause before Superior Chief Salas spoke. ‘Inspector, I must congratulate you! Although I had imagined that experience had left me incapable of being truly surprised by the course of any investigation undertaken by you, you have just managed to astonish me. Would it be too much to ask . . .’
Alvarez reached down for the bottle of brandy.
Alvarez put the key into the front door of Casa Elba and turned it. He pushed open the door and stepped inside. In the gloom, the ghost of the dead señorita chilled him and his ears were assailed by phantom shrieks . . . Sweet Jesus, he prayed, when death comes for me, let it come in kinder guise.
He crossed to the windows, opened them, and pushed back the shutters. The daylight, although not very strong because it was a cloudy day, banished the ghost. He went over to the desk and pulled down the flap. Because she had been so careless about appearances, he had expected to find the interior of the desk in total disorder, but instead there were folders neatly stacked, several bills clipped together, and an account book right up to date. The files were carefully labelled, in copper-plate writing: ‘Current Mail’, ‘Copies�
��, ‘Bank Statements’, ‘Will’
‘House’, ‘Car’, ‘Spanish Documents’, ‘English Documents’.
The will, in Spanish, had been drawn up by a local solicitor. Originally, everything she owned was left to Geoffrey Freeman. Then a codicil divided her estate between Caroline Durrel and Geoffrey Freeman, with the survivor taking everything. And separate from the will was a copy document, in French, which covered most of a large sheet of paper and at the bottom of which was provision for three signatures although there was no indication of whose these were to be. He tried, but failed, to make out what this was about.
He wondered what her estate was? There presumably was the house and its contents, but how much capital? He opened the folder marked ‘Bank Statement’. Where the statements were not up-to-date, she had noted down all deposits and withdrawals and had kept running totals. There were 46,370 pesetas in the Banco de Credito Balear and 18,116 in the local bank. And on a plain sheet of paper, in her handwriting, she had noted the fact that there were 919,220 Swiss francs now standing to her credit in the Banque de Foch, in Zurich.
Nine hundred and nineteen thousand! How many pesetas to the Swiss franc? There were several papers strewn over the settee and he checked through them and found the local paper in English which gave the rate of exchange as just over twenty-seven . . . Over twenty-four million! He looked round at the untidy room with its tatty furniture and visualized the dead woman in her badly fitting clothes. Who in his wildest dreams would ever have imagined that she was worth over twenty-four million . . .?
Caroline Durrel was going to be very wealthy . . .
He checked through the rest of her papers and discovered that there was among them not a single reference to her life before she had come to the island.
Alvarez sent a Telex message to England. He gave details of Mabel’s passport, a detailed physical description of her, the date of her arrival on the island and English address as supplied in her application for a residencia, explained that evidence suggested she was in some way connected with ‘Geoffrey Freeman’ who had died six days previously, and added that the señorita had the sum of over 919,000 Swiss francs on deposit in Switzerland. Could the police give him any information about her?
CHAPTER XIV
In contrast to Friday, Saturday was a day of warmth and sunshine and the land once more became beautiful and the mountains attractive, not lowering presences.
The Telex message arrived at eleven-fifteen in the morning. England reported that the address given did not exist, nor could they trace a Mabel Cannon. Further enquiries were being made.
Alvarez looked at the telephone on his desk. But there surely were times when things shouldn’t be rushed and therefore to report to Superior Chief Salas now must be unwise?
All urbanizacions on the island were, before a single plot of land was sold, legally obliged to lay down piped water, metalled roads, street lighting, electricity, and telephones. One or two promoters were said actually to have honoured their obligations, but most were long on promises and short on performance. Since it was usually foreigners who bought such land no one - apart from the foreigners, of course - was in any way inconvenienced. However, the urbanizacion in which Casa Elba stood had been developed by a promoter with a social conscience and there were not only metalled roads which hadn’t yet started to break up too badly, street lights, electricity points, no real reason why telephones should not be connected, and piped water which flowed except in bad droughts, there was also a man who was employed to tend the unsold plots, the verges, the rock garden, and the tennis courts.
Hevia was a tall, thin, balding man with a long, sad-looking face. He pushed to the back of his head the beret he wore in winter or summer and scratched his head with earth-stained fingers. ‘It’s like this, Inspector, most of the time I’m so busy I don’t notice no one.’
Alvarez stared at the rock garden, set to the side of the steps, which was crowded with weeds. ‘I can imagine. But maybe when you weren’t quite so busy you noticed someone going into Casa Elba?’
‘Casa Elba?’ Hevia hawked and spat. ‘That’s the place where that miserable old beanstick of a woman lives.’
‘That’s right. She died suddenly.’
‘So I heard tell.’
Two black vultures were riding the thermals high above the mountains. They really ought to settle over Casa Elba, thought Alvarez. ‘It’s beginning to look as if she was poisoned.’
Hevia showed no astonishment.
‘So I want to know who was visiting her on Wednesday and Thursday. I thought you might have seen someone?’
Hevia dug his mattock into the lowest pocket of soil and then leaned on the handle. ‘Wednesday or Thursday?’ He stared at the ground.
Alvarez waited with endless patience. Because he was from the same background as Hevia, he could appreciate the other’s need to consider the subject exhaustively before giving an answer: when one worked with the soil, one learned to rush nothing.
‘I’ve seen someone,’ said Hevia finally. He looked up.
‘On which day?’
‘It were the Wednesday.’
‘D’you know who it was?’
‘I reckon.’
‘Who?’
‘You.’
A superior chief from Madrid would have sworn loudly at such sly, stupid insolence, but Alvarez merely laughed. Hevia looked disappointed.
‘Anyone else?’ asked Alvarez.
‘There were someone there on the Thursday.’
‘Yeah. Me.’
‘Didn’t see you,’ said Hevia, and he laughed.
‘So who did you see?’
‘There were a man on a bicycle who went down the slip road.’
‘Did he go to her house?’
‘There ain’t no other house down that slip road, is there?’
‘What I’m asking is if you saw him go into her house?’
‘I just saw him bike down. I ain’t got all day to do nothing but just stand around and watch.’
‘About what time was this?’
‘Just as it were getting dark.’
‘Have you ever seen him around before?’
‘No.’
‘Can you describe him?’
There was another long pause. ‘He was young, I reckon. Can’t say more’n that.’
‘What kind of hair?’
‘Couldn’ve been any kind. It were getting dark and I was a ways away.’
‘What was he wearing?’
‘Clothes.’
Even Alvarez’s patience was tried by that. ‘What kind of clothes?’ he demanded sharply.
When Hevia spoke, his voice showed his satisfaction at having annoyed the other. ‘I wouldn’t know. Like I told you . . .’
‘It was getting dark,’ interrupted Alvarez.
As Alvarez approached Ca’n Ritat he thought how little he liked the place. Set against the mountain backdrop, the house looked attractive, the garden was lovely and even at a poor time of the year was filled with colour, but the old farmhouse had been so drastically altered and rebuilt that little of the original was left and the flower garden was wasting good, rich soil which could have grown vegetables.
Orozco was in the kitchen garden directing water through irrigation channels drawn out of the soil with a mattock. Alvarez stood and watched the water lap round the onion plants as the channel was closed, then quickly drain away. ‘I met an Englishman who reckoned that if we’d use good, modern seed on this island, we’d double our crops.’
‘There’s silly buggers everywhere.’
‘I don’t know so much. There’ve been tremendous strides in other countries in breeding hybrids which give better yields or are more resistant to disease. And we do tend to use the same strain of seed year after year. The experts’ll tell you it’s wrong to use seed from the same strain in the same ground twice or more.’
Orozco closed the last side channel. He trudged back to the main channel and altered the flow, with two mattockf
uls of earth, so that now the water ran to beans. He straightened up and flexed his powerful shoulders.
‘D’you ever meet an expert who got his hands dirty, doing the work? The señor gave me seed to plant. It won’t do no good, I told him. Plant it, he orders, this is proper, expert seed from England. So I let him see me plant it and then when he’d gone I slung it. I wasn’t going to waste my time. Our seed’s used to sun and his seed’s used to rain. Stands to reason his wouldn’t have been no good out here.’
Alvarez had never before heard him speak so freely, but talk to any true peasant about land or animals and he becomes loquacious. ‘But some of the newly developed seeds will stand up to a lot of sun even if they come from a climate like England’s . . .’
‘And when it grows up it comes with curl or rots or gets eaten by bugs,’ said Orozco with contemptuous certainty.
There was both weakness and strength in a peasant’s stubbornness, thought Alvarez, happy to associate himself with such stubbornness. It clung to tradition and refused to accept novelty: in a world which seemed to believe all tradition was nonsense and all novelty desirable, that was a valuable trait. ‘How’s the señora?’ He jerked his thumb in the direction of the house.
‘All right.’ Orozco once more became taciturn. He went over to the beans and changed the flow of water to another long channel.
Alvarez, who’d followed, said: ‘Is she over the shock of the señor’s death?’
‘Could be.’
‘Has she heard how her brother-in-law is?’
‘Couldn’t say.’
‘Is her husband back yet?’
‘No.’
He sounded uninterested, yet this would not be so, Alvarez knew. It was just that in such matters he would be a complete fatalist because life had taught him that to worry changed nothing. Alvarez’s mind changed tracks and he began to fidget with the button of his coat. ‘Luis is a lot older than she is, isn’t he? D’you reckon it matters very much?’
‘I reckon it ain’t none of my business.’
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