Corpse At The Carnival (A Cozy Mystery Thriller) (Inspector Little John Series)

by George Bellairs

  Queenie and her husband were the most elegant couple who'd entered Douglas police-station for many a long day. They looked to have stepped out of an advertisement for clothes-hire or West-end tailoring and couture. The types you see strolling in the Bois de Boulogne or along the Corisette at Cannes. . . . Film stars on location taking an hour off.

  They were both sunburned, and if it was artificially done it was a good job. She was medium built, dark, slim, and handsome, and she wore a cream linen costume, with a red handbag and lipstick and nail-varnish to match it. She was carrying a daily paper, folded in her hand, and before she spoke she partly opened it and pointed to the photograph of Uncle Fred as though it were some kind of passport.

  'May I speak to the officer in charge of the matter of Mr Frederick Boycott?'

  She was perfectly self-assured, but made an initial feint of nervousness to secure Knell's sympathy.

  'Come inside, please.'

  Littlejohn looked at the newcomers and thought of Uncle Fred. It was laughable! First his wife; now this pair. All dressed up to the nines and trying to impress. Whilst Uncle Fred had spent his time pottering about in an old boat with John Costain, wearing old trousers and a pair of soiled white shoes. And now and then he'd have a little binge and come home to his seedy digs disreputable and smelling of drink. Another world. . . .

  The pair of them made straight for Littlejohn.

  'You are the officer in charge?'

  'No. Inspector Knell has the case in hand.'

  They both seemed surprised and obviously wondered who Littlejohn might be. Queenie looked at her husband and blinked. She had long eyelashes, probably stuck on for effect. He took it as a sign to assume control and pulled out his card and passed it to Knell.

  W. VALENTINE-RUDD

  Objets d'art

  17 CANK STREET, NEW BOND STREET, WI

  Knell passed the card to Littlejohn. Objets d'art! It might cover anything.

  'You're an antique dealer, Mr Rudd?'

  'Valentine-Rudd. . . . Yes. Mainly French. I have an office in Paris. . . . Rue de la Paix.'

  A tall, heavy, dark, and hairy man, swarthy-skinned and a bit insolent in manner. Uncle Fred hadn't taken to him. No wonder! He wore a fine merino suit of light grey, almost white, with a navy blue shirt and a red silk scarf knotted inside it. There was a slight trace of scent on the air around him. He gave you a faint impression of having some middle-East in his make-up. Living apparently on his wife and his wits.

  'My wife was Mr Boycott's only daughter.'

  He seemed to turn instinctively to Littlejohn, which pleased Knell, who was completely at sea with such people.

  'So I gather.'

  'How did you know?'

  'Mrs Valentine-Rudd's mother has already told us.'

  The young woman – she looked about thirty, but might have been less – blinked again.

  'She is staying in Douglas? We . . . we are not on friendly terms with her.'

  'She said so.'

  A pause. It was obvious the Valentine-Rudds had rehearsed this scene, but it wasn't quite going according to plan. Rudd tried to bring it back on the lines again.

  'You will allow us to see the body of my wife's father? She used to be very fond of him.'

  He had a purring, insinuating voice, too sleek and far-back to be sincere, and Littlejohn waited for some kind of proposition to be made.

  'We wanted to make quite sure it is Mr Boycott. From what we've read we're both very surprised.'

  'Perhaps Inspector Knell will let you see it. It's in the mortuary.'

  Mrs Rudd recoiled slightly and dabbed her mouth with a small handkerchief.

  'Come this way.'

  Knell had begun to enjoy himself. He would show them poor Uncle Fred's remains and the clothes he'd worn. Then they'd know he'd forgotten them and the world they lived in.

  Littlejohn filled his pipe and waited for them to return. They were soon back. Rudd was wiping his hands on his handkerchief as though cleaning off some kind of contamination.

  'It's my father.'

  No tears; not even a trace of sorrow on the made-up face which might have been a mask. The eyes, however, were troubled, as though the calm of Uncle Fred had impressed her.

  'He looks peaceful. . . . He's even smiling.'

  Nobody replied.

  'He and I were very good friends when we were at home. I never got on with mother very well. My father didn't want me to marry, however. He was possessive about me. He was bored with mother . . . I must say it, then you'll understand. He found some sort of compensation in my company. . . . We went about together . . . . Then I met Willy . . . . My husband. Dad didn't want me to marry . . . . Not anyone, he didn't . . . . And when I married, he didn't come to the wedding. I never saw him afterwards.'

  No wonder! Uncle Fred was the type who would see through Willy in no time at all!

  'Did your father settle anything on you before he went away for good?'

  'I don't know what you mean, Mr . . . Mr . . .'

  'Superintendent Littlejohn, madam.'

  Willy almost jumped out of his skin.

  'Not from Scotland Yard?'

  'Yes, sir.'

  'Oh!'

  There was a wealth of meaning in the single word!

  'I mean, Mrs Valentine-Rudd, did your father, being fond of you, assign some of his money to you?'

  'Why do you want to know?'

  'I want to know everything about the late Mr Boycott. This is a case of murder, Mrs Valentine-Rudd.'

  'Well. . . I was at school when he went away . . . I was at Cheltenham. He wrote to me and asked me to meet him. He came to Cheltenham. . . . He said he had left my mother. She'd grown apart from him.'

  'What did he mean by that?'

  Another flutter of the eyelashes and a sidelong look at her husband, who was peering through the window, his attention divided between the conversation indoors, and the pretty girls going past on their ways to the beach.

  'She got to bossing him around. He was a quiet man with quiet easy ways, and all he wanted was his garden and his books and to go to Brighton and sail his boat.'

  'He had a boat, then?'

  'Yes. A fine motor-boat.'

  She opened her bag and plunged her painted nails in it, fishing out at length a dog-eared snapshot which she handed to Littlejohn. Her husband turned and almost sneered.

  'That's the only photo I ever had of him. I thought I'd bring it along in case. . . . Identification, you know.'

  Yes, it was Uncle Fred. Just recognizable. Only this time, elegantly dressed in flannels, blazer, and yachting-cap. Facing the camera with the same sad, rather quizzical smile. Comparing the photograph with the one in the daily papers, you would hardly say he'd come down in the world. He was neat and serene even now in the morgue. Only at the time of his death, he'd given up . . . turned idler. . . let the rest of the world go by.

  'In other words they lived in two different worlds.'

  'Yes. She was keen on the county people, managing the affairs of the village, filling the house with types she thought were somebody. Dad preferred to be quiet.'

  That was it. The first symptoms of the chronic complaint which, in the end, had fastened on him like a mortal disease. . . . He'd wanted to be quiet, loaf about in old things, sail his boat. . . just give up and do as he liked.

  'She nagged him nearly silly. So much so, that he'd grow queer and contrary, just to spite her. Once, when she was holding a garden party, he said he wasn't coming, and she had such a row with him that he gave in at last. And then, just as things were at their height, he appeared in old clothes and wheeled a barrow of manure across the main lawn. . . . I thought mother would have died. All the people thought he was the gardener until . . .'

  Rudd had had enough. He turned and bared his gleaming teeth as though getting ready to bite his wife.

  'My dear Queenie! They don't want to hear all that . . . .'

  She gave him a queer look, and Littlejohn could see she was a
fraid of him. Rudd, the half-caste-looking Rudd, somehow had her under his influence to the extent of squeezing all the fun out of her. Uncle Fred had once been fond of Queenie. Probably they'd had good times together, laughed, perhaps joked about her mother and her domineering ways.

  'I was saying. . . . He came to Cheltenham and told me he was leaving home because they couldn't agree. I didn't blame him. He said, if ever I wanted anything, I must write to him.'

  'Where?'

  'Care of the G.P.O. at Leicester. He was living somewhere in the country nearby. I learned he was living with another woman, later. From then on, he sent me money about every month. Then, when I left school, he came and met me in London. I introduced him to Willy. . . . He said I was too young to marry and got very awkward. We quarrelled. . . . I never saw him again, but I wrote just once to tell him we were married. He sent me a wedding present without even a letter of good wishes.'

  'What was it?'

  She looked again at her husband, but he was still busy at the window.

  'Five thousand pounds in bearer bonds.'

  'I see.'

  Rudd suddenly turned round. It was his turn now.

  'Could we see his home . . . or wherever he lived?'

  'He lived at a cheap boarding-house just off the promenade.'

  Queenie's false lashes opened wide.

  'Why. . . I thought

  'He hadn't very much money, you know. He left most of his fortune with your mother, and he seems to have had to provide for the other woman you just mentioned. That, on top of your bearer bonds. It didn't leave much.'

  'How much?'

  Rudd almost hissed it.

  'A few thousands. . . . Next to nothing to live on.'

  'But there was the money he left behind. I believe it was quite a fortune.'

  'I suppose so. Mrs Boycott supervised that, of course.'

  'But now that he's dead, the estate can be squared-up. My wife was his only child. . . . There must be a will somewhere.'

  And then it dawned on Littlejohn. The will Uncle Fred had lodged with the Costains. It left all he had in the world to the pair of them! Suppose the fortune in his wife's hands were thrown into the general estate. The Costains might get that, too. The Superintendent smiled grimly. There'd be a rare fight. Lawyers, doctors trying to prove Uncle Fred was off his head when he made his last will. . . . Interminable litigation. . . .

  'I said there must be a will somewhere.'

  'I dare say. That will come later. He's not buried yet.'

  'Perhaps it's among his papers in his rooms.'

  'There's nothing there.'

  A cunning look crossed the swarthy face of Rudd.

  'All the same, I'd like my wife to look around. Just to see where her father spent his last years. You want to see them, don't you, Queenie, dear?'

  'I'd like that, Willy.'

  'I suppose mother's been already.'

  'Oh, yes. She was there almost as soon as she arrived.'

  'When was that?'

  'Yesterday afternoon.'

  Willy made petulant gestures.

  'I'll bet she was. Well, we're wasting time. We're leaving on the last plane today. My business doesn't run itself, you know. We'd a job to get a room for last night. Just got in at a place on the promenade. No bath in the room, no proper service . . . awful dump.'

  Littlejohn could imagine the pair of them arriving elegantly and inquiring for a room with a bath in the high season. The hotel people would wonder whatever was coming, to begin with, and then when Rudd started trying to push them around, they'd be ready to show him the door.

  'We have to call there. Inspector Knell and I will take you. It's a place called Sea Vista.'

  Rudd screwed up his nose and wiped it with his scented handkerchief. He screwed it up a lot more when they pulled up at the seedy boarding-house where Uncle Fred had pottered his last days away.

  Trimble let them in. He was in his shirt-sleeves again and wore an old pair of white shoes which were nearly black. He smelled of spirits.

  'This is Mr Snook's daughter.'

  He had to explain about Snook and Snowball to the agonized Queenie.

  'I thought so. You don't look like 'im at all, but I could tell you because you take after your mother.'

  Rudd took over.

  'Show us his room, my man. We're in a hurry.'

  Trimble barred the way at once, which wasn't a difficult thing to do. He simply stopped the gap between the stairs and the bamboo hall-stand with his flabby bulk.

  ' 'ere. None o' that. My man, indeed! This is my 'otel and I'll trouble you to keep a civil tongue in yer 'ead. I please myself who I show my rooms to.'

  Littlejohn tapped him on the shoulder.

  'Let's get it over, Trimble, and then we won't hold you up.'

  'Seein' that it's you, Superintendent. . . . But I won't be insulted in my own 'ouse. . . . This way.'

  Mrs Trimble must have been out on her usual morning stroll, but Maria appeared from the kitchen, carrying plates to the dining-room. Rudd's eyes fell on her and almost gobbled her up. Their looks met and she smiled faintly at him. Mrs Rudd didn't seem to notice. She was used to it. One day, like her father, she'd probably get fed up, too, and clear out for good. If she'd any money. . . . If. . . now, she was trying to make up to Trimble for Rudd's rudeness.

  'You'll understand I haven't seen him for years and naturally when we read about it in the paper, we were both completely knocked out. You must excuse us if we're both upset.'

  'Of course. I understand. I get a bit touchy at times.'

  'Did he ever speak of me?'

  'I can't say he did. He must 'ave mentioned it casual, perhaps, one time. I'd always the impression he'd got a daughter.'

  'Did he talk much to you?'

  'Now and then. He was quite a sociable chap.'

  'What did he talk about?'

  'Oh . . . weather, pictures he'd seen at the cinema, Douglas in general, the Isle of Man and 'ow fond 'e was of it. Knew quite a bit about the Island . . . 'istory and customs. Liked to talk to the old Manx people he met.'

  'He was happy?'

  'In 'is way, yes. Content with just potterin' about, and now and then, he'd vanish for a day or two and come back. . . well . . . I used to say he'd been off for 'is little spree.'

  'I'm glad he was happy. Did he seem poor . . . or . . .'

  Her husband was now on her heels and she turned the conversation into channels which would suit him.

  'I never found 'im flush with money. But never hard up. Just enough. When he came back from his little spree, like, he'd have a pocketful of the ready again, and pay his bills for his digs . . . 'ere we are.'

  Rudd was almost holding his nose with disgust. But Queenie was still interested in her father. She continued to question Trimble.

  'Did he ever have any visitors?'

  'Never. Not here, at least.'

  'Where else could he have visitors?'

  'Well . . . as I said before, he'd sometimes take off. That always seemed to me as when 'e was short of money. Where 'e got his money from, I can't say.'

  Littlejohn didn't say anything about the Costains. No use letting a crowd loose on the modest pair at Cregneish. Knell looked across at him and he almost imperceptibly shook his head.

  Rudd wasn't interested in the social life of Uncle Fred.

  'Did you ever see any papers about?'

  'Eh? Wot papers?'

  'Everybody has private papers. . . . Bank books, investments, letters, official documents.'

  'I never saw any. I wasn't in the 'abit of riflin' his drawers or snoopin' among his private effecks. In any case, the police won't allow any lookin' in his drawers or trunks. That is so, isn't it, Mr Knell?'

  'That's right.'

  'I suppose Mrs Boycott's been here already. . . . I guess she's given his private affairs a good once-over.'

  'Didn't I say nobody 'ad? If you don't believe me, ask the police. . . .'

  Queenie and her husband wandered
round the room; she presumably trying to get a picture in her mind about her father's last days, he sizing up the place, valuing the contents.

  Trimble took Littlejohn aside and started to whine.

  'I wish you'd get all this settled an' over. We want to let this room. It's not good enough bein' strung up like this in the middle of the 'igh season. My wife and me 'ave 'ad to go up in the attic again. A boarder's turned up who'd booked Finnegan's room, and with you keepin' Finnegan here, we've 'ad to let 'im 'ave ours.'

  'It won't be for long.'

  'This new lodger's a bit of a trial, too. Religious sort of chap. Insists on sayin' grace before meals and he asked Vincent – that's the young chap 'oo plays the accordion – if he'd been saved. Asked 'im to play a few hymn tunes on his instrument. Very embarrassin' on top of wot we've gone through.'

  The Rudds had had enough and were anxious to be getting away.

  'We're catching the evening plane back to the mainland.'

  Good job the Archdeacon wasn't there. He'd quickly have corrected Rudd. England isn't the mainland to a Manxman! Across the water, or the adjacent island, yes. But mainland. . . .

  'I'm going to call on Mrs Boycott, too. Whether she likes it or not, there are one or two business matters to settle.'

  'You're not going to start an argument with mother, Willy? I wouldn't like that. After all these years as strangers.'

  'I won't leave this place till I've seen her. I insist. Can any of you tell me where Mrs Boycott is living?'

  'Fort Anne Hotel. On the way up to Douglas Head.'

  Knell gave the address with relish. You could see him enjoying in anticipation the shemozzle when the rival parties met.

  'It's really through her mother that my wife became estranged from her family. Now that her father's dead, we've got to settle about her birthright. It's only fair . . . .'

  Nobody seemed interested, and the little procession made its way downstairs again. This tramping up and down to Uncle Fred's room was becoming a kind of rite. On the trail down they met a large, big-headed, solemn man on his way up. He wore a black suit and a white dicky and a black tie. He looked ready to ask Rudd if he'd been saved, too, and then changed his mind. Perhaps he mistook him for a Mohammedan.