Death with Blue Ribbon

by Bruce, Leo

  Grace Marvell, predictably, was calmer about it but it seemed that she too was deeply affected. The staff, for the most part, behaved with discretion and the routine of the hotel continued. At first, at any rate, Imogen caused less sensation dead than alive.

  Carolus had no wish to view the body having little faith in information gained from cigarette ash, fluff on the hair, footmarks on the carpet, the old-fashioned clues of fictional detectives, but confident that medical evidence, when it was forthcoming, would establish the cause of death. He had reason to regret this later.

  He found Grace Marvell when he met her in the Georgian Lounge as down-to-earth as he expected, though there were signs of strain in her manner.

  ‘I don’t blame Jyves,’ she said. ‘She needed something pretty potent to put her to sleep in her condition of last night. But I gather there have been other accidents of this kind in heavy drug-induced sleep. People have been known to swallow their tongues.’

  ‘You feel sure it was an accident?’

  ‘Oh, yes. Poor Imogen was a woman who made plenty of people say “I could murder Imogen Marvell!” but the mere fact that they said it meant that they never contemplated anything of the sort. There could be no motive, really. Besides, it would be obvious, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘I should have thought not necessarily,’ said Carolus.

  ‘Anyhow, there’s to be an inquest at which we shall hear all the evidence. I’m not quite sure whether Imogen would have liked that or not. It will certainly make headlines.’

  It did. During the days that followed Imogen Marvell’s name appeared in type as large as had been accorded her in her life-time. But the coroner’s verdict was disappointing for those who had expected more startling developments. She had died, it was found, as the result of an accident. There was the merest suggestion of censure for Dr Jyves who made an unfortunate impression when he gave evidence, but none for Miss Trudge who tried to accuse herself of negligence in not staying with Imogen that night.

  Only one point emerged from the expert medical evidence. The doctors agreed in thinking that death had occurred at some time in the evening, probably before eleven o’clock. This seemed to surprise most of those who attended the inquest since for some reason it had been thought that a death of that sort would have been likelier in the small hours when resistance was at its lowest. But there were no other surprises and members of the staff who gave evidence added little or nothing to the coroner’s information.

  Even so, and in spite of the clear-cut medical evidence, an impression was left in the public mind that something was unrevealed. This was interpreted by Mrs Boot in conversation with Carolus.

  ‘An accident!’ she said witheringly. ‘What kind of an accident is it when a woman in the prime of her life pops off in the middle of the night just because she’s sleeping heavy? There’s something they’re hushing up, you can be sure of that.’

  Mrs Boot used the indefinite ‘they’ with great effect.

  ‘You think so, Mrs Boot?’

  ‘Course there is. Stands to reason, doesn’t it? She had no wish to go, making all that money and her picture in the papers all the time. A big strong woman like that. You can’t tell me she just put her head in the pillows and snuffed it. Nor don’t a lot of other people think so, either. It looks fishy to me and I’ve said so all along. With that money, too.’

  ‘What money?’

  ‘Well, she had money, didn’t she? You couldn’t carry on like that for nothing. Where there’s a lot of money there’s them that wish anyone out of the way. That’s what I say. You wait and see who’s going to get it, then you’ll know something. You’d think the police would see that, instead of believing every word those doctors said. I don’t like doctors, myself.’

  ‘Homoeopathic?’

  ‘Certainly not. I don’t believe in anything unnatural. But when a doctor tells me something I do the opposite and ten to one it cures me. Look at my varicose veins.’ The invitation, fortunately, was metaphorical. ‘Suppose I’d done what the doctor told me, I’d of been as good as crippled for life. You take my word for it, doctors are dangerous. Saying it was an accident! How do they know? Anyone could have walked in and done for her before she could holler out. I’d like to know who did go to her room that night.’

  ‘So would I,’ admitted Carolus.

  ‘We haven’t heard the last of it, that’s one certainty. What about the man who went off without paying his bill? They didn’t get him to the inquest, did they?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I could have told them something about him,’ said Mrs Boot triumphantly. ‘They think he only arrived here in time for dinner that night. I could tell them different. What was he doing in the Spinning Wheel Cafe that afternoon I’d like to know.’

  ‘Having tea, probably.’

  ‘Certainly he was having tea. But who with? That’s where it comes in. And don’t say he wasn’t because I saw him with my own eyes when I went in to get a currant loaf which my husband will have for his tea though the baker doesn’t sell them.’

  ‘You saw him? How do you know it was the man who went off without paying his bill?’

  ‘It was the same who made all the fuss a week ago, before this all happened. Wasn’t I helping in the kitchen that evening, as I always do Thursdays when it’s the boy’s night off. “Oh,” I thought when I saw him. “So you’re back again. That’ll mean trouble,” I thought.’

  ‘You said he was with someone in the café.’

  ‘So he was. What’s more, you’d be surprised to know who it was.’

  ‘I don’t think I should. Tom Bridger?’

  Mrs Boot looked disappointed. She had expected to surprise Carolus.

  ‘I don’t know what makes you come out with that,’ she said. ‘Unless you’re mixed up in it, too. But that’s who it was, as large as life. I never liked that Bridger. You can’t trust people who are always smiling. There he was talking away to this man. He tried to pass it off, of course. “Afternoon, Mrs Boot,” he said when he saw I’d seen him. But that wouldn’t do for me. I gave him a look he won’t forget in a hurry. “Afternoon,” I said and walked out. It isn’t as though he couldn’t have had his tea here, either. I suppose they had to meet somewhere where no one would recognise them and thought they would be safe there. They was right inside the cafe where no one could see them from the shop only I just happened to look in while I was waiting for my change.’

  ‘They might have met by chance,’ said Carolus.

  ‘You can say that,’ conceded Mrs Boot. ‘But who’s going to believe you? I know better, anyway. I said to Tom Bridger, “Wasn’t that the man who made all the fuss about his dinner I saw you with in the Spinning Wheel?” I said. He laughed like he always does and said he’d never seen the man before in his life. But there you are. It had Something To Do With It, I’m sure of that. Well, I must be getting on.’

  Getting on, where? Carolus wondered. Getting on to what? In that world of dark suspicions and hard thoughts of everyone which Mrs Boot created around herself, she must surely stand alone like a spire surrounded with wheeling black bats. Who escaped her evil-minded conjectures? Perhaps her husband?

  ‘Does your husband work near here, Mrs Boot?’

  ‘No. He doesn’t. He works for the Council. Otherwise he’d know everything about it, same as he always does. Oh, yes. He’d know. I often wonder if there’s anything he doesn’t know. I asked him the other night. “What don’t you know?” I said.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘He didn’t know what to say. It’s the same with his sister. Only she never knows anything good about anyone. You’d think we were all criminals the way she talks. I don’t believe in that. You’ve got to think the best of people, I always tell her. Unless they go saying nasty things behind anyone’s back. Well, this won’t do. I can’t stop listening to you all day when I’ve got my work.’

  Mrs Boot made no move towards departure, however.

  ‘I’ll tell you another thi
ng which makes me think,’ she offered. ‘No one thought to ask where those two Arabians were that night, did they? Well, I could have told them. As soon as I got here on the morning the woman in number four was found dead, Mr Rolland sent me over to fetch them because they ought to have been down for an hour or more and he wanted to send them somewhere. So I went over to where the staff lives and what do you think I found in their room?’

  ‘I have no idea,’ said Carolus encouragingly.

  ‘Nothing!’ It was a cry of triumph. ‘No one. The beds had never been slept in. I thought to myself, they’ve gone. Hopped it, I thought. Not that I was surprised. You can never tell with anyone like that. They’re not the same as you’n me. It would have been nothing for them to go off in the night. Just as I was going back to tell Mr Rolland one of them came in and was quite nasty. “Why you here?” he asks and looks at me like a savage. I wouldn’t demean myself arguing. I said, “Mr Rolland wants you quick,” I said, and came away. I didn’t fancy being up there with him. Then the other came in and they started talking heathen.’

  ‘No. Arabic.’

  ‘I don’t know what it was but they sounded as though they were clearing their throats. What do you think of that? They didn’t know that at the inquest, did they? Well, I must make a move. My work’s not going to do itself, is it?’

  Carolus learned that the body of Imogen Marvell was to be taken from the Fleur-de-Lys, ‘her favourite hotel’ it came to be designated in the press, to be buried in the local churchyard. It seemed that Rolland had decided that the great disaster that had come to him might yet be turned to his advantage and he had persuaded Grace Marvell and Imogen’s husband that the publicity which this would bring him would be only fair recompense for what he had suffered. The food poisoning angle was forgotten and Imogen had died from another cause while paying her annual visit to the hostelry where she was most at home, to whose restaurant she had awarded the coveted five stars.

  Preparations went forward on a lavish scale. The coffin was to be followed by a retinue of discreet Rolls-Royce and Daimler cars in the first of which her husband, her sister and Miss Trudge were to travel. They were to be followed by three cars in which the chefs de cuisine of famous restaurants would ride and the funeral would be attended by a concourse of restaurateurs, writers on food and wine, PROs, members of editorial staffs, pressmen, wine-merchants and professional gourmets. It had been suggested that a funeral oration should be delivered by the famous author of several expensive coffee-table cookery books but Grace Marvell had put her foot down there.

  Carolus waited with cynical curiosity for the occasion and when it came was not surprised to see that on the coffin was laid a rosette larger than any wreath elaborately made up of twelve-inch-wide blue ribbon, the proud symbol of cordon bleu. Rolland had given orders for it.

  Nine

  Carolus realised with a disturbing jerk that only ten days of the school holiday remained and that if he were to learn the truth about events at the Fleur-de-Lys and the death of Imogen Marvell and the firm of solicitors in Gaitskell Mansions he would have to move quickly. Yet his habits could not be broken and he methodically set about the questioning of people concerned.

  He was aware that every movement of everyone in the hotel, including the staff, was known to everyone else and to conduct the interviews he wanted was no easy matter. He had some questions for Dave Paton, the apprentice, for example.

  Gloria solved that one.

  ‘I’ll tell him to go up to your room when he finishes work,’ she said. ‘That’ll be soon after closing time.’

  When the youth sloped in it was obvious that he had misunderstood the motive of the summons.

  ‘I can’t stay long,’ he said.

  ‘That’s all right. I just want to ask you a few questions.’

  ‘Aren’t you going to offer me a drink first?’

  ‘And call one of the waiters?’

  ‘Oh, they’re O.K. They won’t say anything. It wouldn’t do for them to.’

  ‘I think I prefer not. But I can give you a whisky-and-soda.’

  ‘Thanks, Carolus,’ said the youth who believed he was in a situation he understood well.

  Carolus rounded on him suddenly.

  ‘A man stayed here on the night of Imogen Marvell’s death. He had been here on a previous occasion and complained of food poisoning.’ Carolus saw that Dave Paton was watching him with sullen but close attention. ‘On that occasion you followed him out to his car and spoke to him. Why?’

  ‘Here, what is this?’ asked Paton defensively. ‘You the law, or something?’

  ‘Never mind what I am. Answer my question.’

  ‘Why should I?’

  ‘Because it’s in your own interest. I’m investigating a number of things here.’

  It was not much of a bluff but it seemed to work.

  ‘Is that what you sent for me for?’ Dave’s tone was less resentful.

  ‘For nothing else. Why did you follow that man to his car that night?’

  ‘I heard he owned a restaurant, if you want to know.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘I’ve had enough of this place.’

  ‘I see. And did he?’

  ‘No. They must have been pulling my leg.’

  ‘Who must?’

  ‘It was Tom who told me. Tom Bridger, that is. He said the man owned a restaurant and why didn’t I try for a job? So I went out and asked him.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘Turned nasty. Shouted. “No I don’t own a restaurant and if I did own a restaurant I certainly shouldn’t employ someone working in a place where I’d been poisoned.” I told him he hadn’t been poisoned here. If there’s one thing Tony’s strict on it’s cleanliness.’

  ‘Tony?’

  ‘Antoine, you call him. The chef. But this character wouldn’t have it. He went on about poisoning till he drove off.’

  ‘You had never seen him before?’

  ‘Not so far as I know. Why? Did he do for Imogen Marvell?’

  Ignoring this Carolus asked Dave if he was sure it was Bridger who had sent him across.

  ‘Yeh. He was pulling my leg. There’s a lot of that in the kitchen. Even old Tony who looks like a funeral doesn’t mind a joke now’n again. Tom’s always at it. But I want to get away.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘There’s things I don’t like.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Personal things.’

  ‘Like Gloria Gee?’

  ‘She was all right with me for a time till Tom stuck his nose in.’

  ‘I see. Unrequited love.’

  Dave used an explosive monosyllable in the plural. ‘Anyway,’ he added, ‘she’s gone on Rolland. God knows why. But his old woman found out about it.’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘Whatever there was between them. She came in here one day unexpected and found them in the cellar—checking bottles, they said. Since then Rolland doesn’t dare look at Gloria. His wife’s a proper old tartan.’

  ‘Tartar,’ corrected Carolus.

  ‘Well, she is. It’s her got the money, you see. Now Rolland’s scared to speak to Gloria she takes it out on me.’

  ‘And on Bridger?’

  ‘Not so much on Tom. Anyhow, I want to go somewhere where I can get on. Learn a bit more.’

  ‘You told Imogen Marvell you did enjoy the work.’

  ‘That was for her, the silly cow,’ said Dave impatiently. “Do you enjoy your work, my little man?” What’s she know about food, anyway? I’d like to see her deal with thirty or forty lunches at a time, all ordered à la carte. That’s what we do.’

  ‘You think you could do it on your own?’

  ‘In a small place, yes. Sure I could.’

  ‘How do you think Imogen Marvell came to suffer from food poisoning? Because she undoubtedly did.’

  ‘You know what I think? I think she took something specially to upset her.’

  ‘With what motive?’

&
nbsp; ‘Just to make trouble. She’s that sort of woman. It couldn’t have been the scampi. They’re kept in the deep freeze and only got out when they’re ordered.’

  ‘Who got them out that day?’

  ‘I did. And Tom made up the dish. If there had been one of them off I’d have seen it.’

  ‘Antoine had nothing to do with it?’

  ‘No. He was doing something else.’

  ‘Who else handled that particular dish?’

  ‘No one. Only Stefan in the dining-room, I suppose. Or whoever served it. It has to be flambé at the table.’

  ‘Mrs Boot wasn’t there that night?’

  ‘No. She only comes on Thursdays when I’m off.’

  ‘Tell me, Dave, did you go straight to bed when you’d finished work? On the night Imogen Marvell died, I mean.’

  ‘Me?’

  Dave wanted a few seconds for reflection.

  ‘Yes. You.’

  ‘Not straight to bed, no. As a matter of fact I went to a dance. Over at Netterly.’

  ‘How did you get there?’

  ‘Friend of mine in the village. Has a car. Took us over for the last bit of the dance.’

  ‘Us?’

  ‘I went with Ali and Abdul. Anything wrong with that?’

  ‘Nothing. What time did you leave the dance?’

  ‘ ’Bout one, it must have been.’

  ‘And came straight back?’

  ‘I don’t see what that’s to do with you, whatever you’re investigating. As a matter of fact this friend of mine from the village and I had a couple of birds to take home.’

  ‘Quite. What time did you get back?’

  ‘Couldn’t have been much before four o’clock.’

  ‘And the two Moroccans?’

  ‘Didn’t see them again after the dance. We thought they’d got a lift back.’

  ‘Had they?’

  ‘I don’t know. They don’t say much. They turned up here in the morning, I know that.’

  ‘And when you got back at whatever time it was did you see anyone about?’

  ‘You’re giving me a grilling, aren’t you?’