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

by George Bellairs

  Uncle Fred had been murdered. And, as likely as not, it had happened at the boarding-house and he'd walked out and died on the promenade. Died without telling who'd stabbed him.

  Mr Creer was telling a tale of how his grandfather had found himself accompanied one dark night in Glen Maye, by a phosphorescent stranger and had said to himself, 'Good God, who's this?' At the name of the deity, the phosphorescent one had fizzled out and gone.

  Yes, but if he'd been stabbed at Sea Vista, anybody there might have done it. Easy to lose one's companions in the carnival, sneak back, and. . . . All the alibis were useless.

  Mr Creer was fully in his stride. A friend of his had sworn he'd seen five fairies sitting on a gate as he went at dusk once to be seeing to the cattle. This friend was a Mormon and they called him Dipper. Well, the fairies wouldn't let him close the gate and get indoors again. 'Give us another swing on the gate, Dipper,' they kept saying, and Dipper afraid not to, lest he annoy them and they set the place on fire or else dry up the cows. . . .

  All the alibis were upset, except, of course, the lad with the accordion and his three pals who were always together; and perhaps the honeymooners, who were a pair of scared rabbits ; and the Greenhalghs, minding the kids all the time. . . .

  'My grandmother, who came from Scroundal, near Ballaugh, said herself she'd seen the fairies riding on the grindstone of the mill there. A great place for Themselves, was Scroundal. . .' Mrs Creer was saying, not to be outdone.

  Unless Mrs Boycott or the Rudds had nipped across by plane, stabbed Uncle Fred and then hurried back, that left Trimble and his three women, Mrs Nessle, Finnegan and his girl, Miss Arrowbrook, who was an invalid, and. . . nobody else. . . .

  The Creer boys were telling their own story. Mermaids used to be seen by the fishermen down at Dalby, a few fields away. They might have been seals, of course, but the old man with the long white hair who used to be seen fishing there in a little coracle wasn't a seal. He used to sing a song as he fished. The fishermen had noted the tune and somebody had written it down. The Arrane Ghelby, it was called, the Dalby Song. . . . One of the boys played it on the piano, a plaintive air, like a lament.

  Had Trimble been connected with Uncle Fred in the past ? Or Mrs Trimble? Or, now that the scene of the crime might easily have been Sea Vista, could it have been an impulsive act of jealousy involving Mrs Trimble, Maria, or even little Susie? Uncle Fred had been fond of the women; he liked a pretty face and a nice figure. . . .

  Time to go, and another run over the hills back to Grenaby. At that time of the year, it never went quite dark at night and they drove over deserted roads with the peaks and the gentle lines of the curving hills etched against the skyline. Quite a night for meeting some of Mr Creer's collection of little people, black dogs known as Moddhey Dhoos, phantom pigs, goblins, and Manx counterparts of Old Mother Shipton.

  Back at the parsonage, the Archdeacon let them in with his key. Voices in the kitchen. Knell and Maggie Keggin hobnobbing like old friends before the fire. Knell was eating a large hunk of game pie. An unsolved mystery was how the pair of them had buried the hatchet and become close friends.

  Knell rose a bit sheepishly, trying hard to gobble down his savoury mouthful.

  'Sorry to turn up again at this hour.'

  The clock had just struck midnight!

  'But I felt it would do me good to get away for a run in the country.'

  'And a liberal portion of Maggie's excellent pie?'

  'Aw . . . that was quite a surprise . . . but when I got back after seeing you home, sir, I found things had been happening at Sea Vista. In the first place, Trimble's disappeared.'

  'Well, well. . . . So things are warming up.'

  'He's not gone by boat, because the last one had sailed when he was last seen. He's not flown over, either, because we've enquired. We've doubled the watch on the 'planes and boats.'

  'How did it happen, Knell?'

  'Just after we left, Trimble went out. Said it was on an errand. He'd a parcel like a boot-box under his arm and he said he wanted to post it. Susie offered to go, but he said he'd go himself. We looked all over the place but, so far, there's no clue where he's gone. His wife got home about six and when she found he wasn't back by eight, she 'phoned us.'

  'We can't do anything until morning, now. . . . You'll be sure he doesn't slip past at the pier or airport.'

  'Trust us. There's another thing, too. Finnegan's woman is missing. She went off with her suitcase this morning in a taxi. . . . Hasn't been seen since. She must have got fed up with all the fuss and especially with Finnegan.'

  'All the same, she mustn't get away, yet.'

  'No. There's the usual look-out for her, too.'

  'What about the taxi? Did you trace him?'

  'Yes. Kelly, the owner of the boarding-house next door to Sea Vista, phoned for him at Mrs Finnegan's request. A chap called Shimmin. We got in touch with him. He just took her to the electric railway station at Derby Castle, the end of the promenade, and she got on the tram there.'

  'Who reported it?'

  'Mrs Trimble. Kelly had told her. She mentioned it casually when she phoned about Trimble. I wonder if the pair of them's bolted together.'

  'That would be funny. Any idea where she might be?'

  'None, as yet, sir. We're following things up.'

  Things were bucking up at last. Trimble, indeed! At least, it gave them something concrete to bite on and Littlejohn was glad of it.

  As for Finnegan's woman, if she'd run away with Trimble, she hadn't much taste. At any rate, it had freed the air at Sea Vista and Finnegan himself of the aroma of scandal which had been hanging round there. Not that it wasn't more or less there all the time.

  Knell's back tyre was flat when he returned to his car at around one o'clock. He changed the wheel with Littlejohn's help.

  'The little people must have been playin' a trick on me,' he said as he rubbed his soiled hands on an old rag and got ready for off.

  Littlejohn laughed, and then he looked at Knell's face in the glow of the dashboard light. It was dead serious. Knell must have meant it, after all!

  9

  FINNEGAN BOLTS

  TRIMBLE had vanished without a trace!

  The guests at Sea Vista didn't seem to mind that very much. It meant that Mrs Trimble had more to do, but she was a much more appetizing ornament about the place than her husband, half-washed, unshaved, in his shirt-sleeves all the time.

  The thing that upset the lodgers, however, was that Trimble had embezzled the four pounds he'd collected from them for Uncle Fred's wreath. 'It's worse than rifling the kid's money-box,' said Greenhalgh, who might have done the same thing himself at some time in his life.

  When Littlejohn and the Archdeacon arrived in Douglas the morning after Trimble's disappearance, they found poor Knell up to the neck in work. It was only nine o'clock and he recited what he'd done already.

  The whole of the police force on the Island had been warned to be on the look-out for Trimble, who, Knell now firmly suspected, had killed Uncle Fred himself out of jealousy. Door-to-door inquiries had been instituted again. This time a new theme song: Do you know Ferdinand Trimble . . . ? Watches on the boats, planes, and ports large and small had been redoubled. 'We've even called in the Loyal Manx special constabulary. . . .'

  Scotland Yard had already been on the telephone and Cromwell had left a message of affection for Littlejohn. They'd checked up on Finnegan at Seymour Mews, London, SW1. There were three workshops there and three houses occupied by the owners of the workshops. A man who manufactured tailors' dummies; another who made shrouds; and a third who engraved armorial bearings and monograms on cutlery. . . . None of them had ever heard of Finnegan!

  As for Warren & Hanby, Mr Wilfred Gravell was doing a stretch in gaol for blackmail, and it would take Cromwell a bit longer to get hold of the required information. He would see that it was soon forthcoming, however.

  All the addresses of the other lodgers at Sea Vista had be
en checked by telephone with the police across the water and were authentic. The mainland police went even further in one or two cases. Mrs Mullineaux owned a flourishing second-hand furniture store in Birmingham and her name had been Cleve until she'd married her shop assistant a week or two ago. Greenhalgh had been a bookie and now was an undischarged bankrupt trading in his wife's name. The late Mr Nessle, described as a merchant, had been a rather shady moneylender.

  'You've done a good day's work already, Knell. I'm proud of you,' chuckled the Archdeacon, and Knell was obviously pleased with the compliment, although, in his usual modest way, he tried to make light of it.

  'But it leads us nowhere, sir, does it?'

  And he looked at Littlejohn to make sure he was right.

  'Of course it leads us somewhere, Knell. It proves Finnegan is a fake, for one thing. It's all right his trying to hide his identity when he plays Don Juan, but he's lied to the police, now, and that's quite a different matter. You won't have called on' him yet ?'

  'Well, no, sir. . . . Hardly had time.'

  'Shall we go on the usual route march to Sea Vista again?'

  'I'd be glad if you would. Mind if I stay behind and deal with all this routine stuff?'

  'Of course. You'll be here, too, when Cromwell rings up with the news he gets from Gravell.'

  This time, the parson and Littlejohn walked along the promenade to the boarding-house. It was early in the day and the sun hadn't yet reached its full strength. A fresh little breeze blew in from the sea and people were walking briskly to keep away the chill. The promenade was full of visitors and many of them were setting up deck-chairs on the beach for the morning bask. The tide was going out and a mob of children, parents, and dogs were following the waves as they receded, like a little army occupying the deserted positions of a retreating conqueror. A few swimmers were already rollicking in the water, boatmen were rowing parties out to explore Conister Rock in the middle of the bay. The Salvation Army were holding morning service near a small breakwater and their cornets sounded along the promenade and far out to sea.

  'Why did Uncle Fred, who seemed to like peace and quiet, settle down in Douglas with the Trimbles, in a boardinghouse which got crowded out every summer, and where they turned him out of his own room and shoved him on another floor higher up for three months of every year? He made the excuse to Costain that he liked it; said that although Cregneish was his heart's delight, he wanted company . . . crowds. . . . And all the time, I don't believe he did want crowds.'

  The Archdeacon nodded his head.

  'I've been thinking about that, too. Could it have been that he had some financial interest in the boarding-house and wanted to keep an eye on it? Mrs Trimble likes playing the lady, you must remember, and would rather stroll about the promenade than work in the house. Trimble is a shiftless tippler. . . .If Boycott had put money in it, he would naturally want to protect his investment.'

  'That's true, sir, and I must follow it up. There's one other hypothesis. . . . Uncle Fred was reputed to be fond of the women. It might be a silly piece of scandal. On the other hand, might he have been interested in, say, Mrs Trimble? Or more than a little fond of young Susie? Hence, he'd want to be about the place most of the time.'

  The Archdeacon's clear blue eyes searched Littlejohn's.

  'Do you believe that? Knowing Boycott as well as we do . . . and I must confess I feel I've known him for years, now . . . knowing him as we do, can you honestly say you believe it? Is it in character with the man you call Uncle Fred?'

  'Not exactly. I'm not suggesting some sordid affair between him and one of Trimble's three women. But he had adopted Susie, if what she says is true.'

  'My suggestion that Boycott was somehow prevailed upon to invest in Sea Vista is more feasible. Don't you agree?'

  'Yes.'

  Horse-trams clopping along full of delighted passengers; whole families carrying buckets and spades, little fishing-nets, beach balls, toy yachts, trudging purposefully to the foreshore for a morning's earnest work; charabancs filling up for all-day trips round the Island; women knitting and their husbands reading the morning papers in the sunshine on seats facing the sea.

  A tall, flabby, shabbily-dressed young man took a snapshot of the Superintendent and the Archdeacon, and passed a card to Littlejohn. Flic Studios. . . .

  'Just a minute. . . .'

  The hungry-looking photographer turned in his stride and smiled. He looked tubercular and wore a heavy overcoat in spite of the weather.

  'They'll be ready at five this evening. The address is on the card, sir.'

  'Are you the young fellow who photographed the man who was murdered here the other day?'

  The smile broadened.

  'Sure. Did me quite a bit of good. For a couple of days people seemed to take a morbid delight in having themselves snapped by the camera which took the murdered man. It's dying down a bit now, but I did have my little hour of notoriety. You'll find your picture's a good one. The bishop especially. . . . He'll come out fine. He's a good type for camera work.'

  'You seem interested in your job.'

  'I used to be a film cameraman. . . . Been in Hollywood. But my health broke down.'

  As he talked, he kept snapping likely passers-by and handing them his card.

  'Did you notice anything peculiar about the old man when you took his picture?'

  'Such as . . . ?'

  'His appearance. . . . His looks. Did he seem ill?'

  'He certainly did. He was as white as a sheet. . . even grey. .'. and he just managed to totter to the rails and hold himself up. I've felt that way myself many a time. I made a mistake when I snapped him. One gets that way. Doing it automatically, if you get what I mean. He wasn't fit to photograph and not the sort who'd come to the shop to claim his picture even if it did turn out good. I ought to have asked what ailed him, but the procession was moving to wards us and I was eager to be getting on with the job.'

  'Was he wearing a raincoat when you met him?'

  'Yes; loosely over his shoulders. I remember wondering why, in such weather. Then I thought he might be one of those pessimists who always think it's going to rain sooner or later. . . .'

  Littlejohn rubbed his chin. The raincoat had disappeared. In the mob of revellers which had suddenly surrounded Uncle Fred, it could easily have slipped off or even have been dragged from his shoulders. And perhaps it had been trodden under foot, kicked in the sea and carried away by the tide, or picked up by someone. . . .

  'Is this your own business?'

  'No. I can't afford the set-up. I just rent a bedroom in town and spend my days in the open air. I get a percentage of pictures sold.'

  'Had any breakfast?'

  The young man bridled.

  'Of course.'

  'A bun and a glass of milk?'

  'You police?'

  'Yes.'

  'I thought so. Superintendent Littlejohn?'

  'Yes.'

  'Glad I've met you. Well, if that old chap hadn't been stabbed when I took his picture, he was precious near dying of something else . . . .'

  'You didn't see any traces of blood on him. He'd been stabbed in the back.'

  'No. As I told you, he'd a raincoat draped across his shoulders which hid his back. But his eyes were a bit glazed and he looked as if he didn't quite know where he was. He saw me when I put up my camera and looked as if he resented it. He seemed to want to be left alone. But I'd snapped him before I reacted to him, you see.'

  'Did the police pay you for the snapshot?'

  'I got nothing for it. Probably the boss drew something.'

  'Here's a couple of pounds. Now, now . . . no silly pride. You've helped us no end by what you did. If you hadn't taken that picture, we might never have known Snook's identity.'

  'All right, then. If it's pay for honest work, sir. Damned decent of you.'

  'You did us a service. One more question. Was there anyone else in the vicinity when the dead man appeared on the promenade?'


  'I didn't see a soul. The carnival was starting farther along the prom, and everybody rushed there like a flock of sheep. This part was absolutely empty except for the old man and me. He didn't seem interested. I doubt if he even knew what was going on around him. I couldn't rush. My breathing's bad and I stayed waiting for the crowd to come this way and then I could get busy.'

  'Snook arrived on the promenade from Broadway, I believe. The road leading from here to the upper town?'

  'Yes. He was all on his own. Nobody bothered with him and he didn't bother with anyone. In fact, when I saw him come out of Broadway, I thought he looked tight. He staggered a bit and sort of held himself loosely, like a drunk . . . .'

  'There was nobody following him?'

  'No. And nobody came near him while I was here.'

  'Thank you.'

  'Thank you, sir. I'll be seeing you. My name's Bannister. You'll always find me somewhere about here if I can be of any more use.'

  But he never was. Two days later, Bannister died like Uncle Fred, quietly, almost apologetically, in the middle of a carnival. Crowds, an ambulance, women fainting. . . . Only Bannister had no claim to fame. He died of a sudden haemorrhage. Natural causes; no fuss – or even a little paragraph in the newspapers. . . . Nobody claimed him, and only the Rev. Caesar Kinrade, Littlejohn, and two grave-diggers attended his funeral. He did, however, finish up with the benediction of an Archdeacon over what was left of him.

  Sea Vista seemed short of something without Trimble there to act as guide, to whine and complain, and to limp about in the now familiar processions up to Uncle Fred's room and then down again, after the manner of the famous Duke of York.

  Susie answered the door and led them to the little office under the stairs where Mrs Trimble was doing some bookkeeping, as though nothing unusual had happened.