The Claresby Collection: Twelve Mysteries

by Daphne Coleridge

  “I don’t know what you are talking about.”

  “I’m sorry, I should have introduced myself: I’m Rupert Latimer. You saw me when you brought the coffee in to Miss Norman.”

  “I don’t care who you are and I don’t know what you are talking about. I’d rather you left us alone; you are upsetting my wife.”

  “You brought the coffee in,” persisted Rupert, “and it looked like there was sugar in the saucer, but Miss Norman didn’t take sugar. I’m rather a nosy person, and I took a sniff of the coffee. After that I swept the white grains into my handkerchief, where they still are. And then I threw the coffee away – so, like I say, the cyanide didn’t kill her. What I want to know is: did you put poison in anything else?”

  “But she must have drunk the coffee,” said the man. “If she didn’t, why...?”

  “Why indeed!” said Rupert. “So I gather that you didn’t poison her – at least, not successfully. The question is: who did?”

  When Rupert eventually returned to his wife with three glasses of brandy, Suzy had disappeared.

  “She went to make some phone calls,” explained Laura, her pale, pretty oval face looking a little weary. “What’s going on, Rupert? I know you have probably solved the case by now, but did you have to ask tactless questions of Suzy?”

  “Yes and yes,” replied Rupert, putting one of his long, angular arms protectively around his slender wife. “At least, I can deduce what happened, but whether it is susceptible of proof is another matter.”

  “Was she poisoned?” asked Laura, who had been following at least some of Rupert’s thought processes.

  “Well, that is an interesting question,” said Rupert happily, sipping his brandy. “You know that I was suspicious of the coffee, but even when she collapsed I knew that poison in the coffee wasn’t the cause. I don’t know much about poison, of course, but the classics are strychnine or cyanide. Well strychnine takes the biscuit for drama – violent death throes and all that. Can be concealed in coffee, which masks the bitter taste, but death is not instantaneous. Anyway, Kirsten’s death was sudden and without the spasms, so we can rule that out. So the stuff that looked like sugar wasn’t strychnine, but it could have been cyanide. A teaspoon of cyanide in the coffee would have caused death within minutes – and Kirsten did seem to die struggling to breathe as if she had swollen airways. The only problem is that she was looking just fine when she came on stage, so cyanide wasn’t the cause.”

  “And, in any case, she didn’t drink the coffee; you saw to that,” Laura pointed out reasonably.

  “No, but it did have a good old dollop of cyanide in it!” said Rupert, almost triumphantly.

  “Rupert! – how do you know that?” exclaimed Laura.

  “Because I just wheedled a confession out of George Gilbert, father of the very Hamilton Gilbert whom Suzy told us about – the brilliant but insecure musician that Kirsten gave the push because his emotional demands were getting in the way of her career. The two, it turns out, were engaged and Kirsten had been welcomed into the bosom of his family. After she broke off with him he went to pieces, never played the cello again and drowned his sorrows in drink. He alienated himself from his loving family – father is a chemistry lecturer, mother a music teacher – and became little more than a tramp.”

  Understanding dawned in Laura’s eyes. “So the father was after revenge and, as a chemist, a little bit of cyanide posed no problem. Are you going to tell the police?”

  Rupert shook his head slowly. “Tell them what? That I thought that the coffee smelled funny? That a disturbed old man told me that when he heard that Kirsten Norman was coming to his home town it was more than he could stand? And, after all, she didn’t drink the coffee.”

  “Rupert, it is not up to you to make judgements as to what the police should and shouldn’t know and whether or not a man deserves to get off with what was certainly attempted murder. And, anyway, I’d bet my last penny that you took a sample of that white powder.”

  “As a matter of fact I did,” admitted Rupert, “But it might well get left in my pocket and come out in the wash! If I am asked I will tell the police; is that good enough?”

  “I’m not sure that it is. After all, Kirsten did die and her death is consistent with poisoning, so you can’t rule out the possibility that Mr Gilbert had a backup plan.”

  Again Rupert’s expression seemed doubtful. “He was disbelieving when I told him that she hadn’t drunk the coffee – and, I suspect, a trifle relieved. And, as I said, I’m not sure that her death was consistent with a great dollop of cyanide. Furthermore, the only thing we know she did actually drink was the water you gave her. If the police do start asking questions they will be focusing on that!”

  “That did cross my mind,” admitted Laura. “But I bought it in the garage shop earlier today and never opened it. Unless someone tampered with it, intending to poison me!”

  “I really don’t think so,” said Rupert. “Kirsten seems a much more plausible target and no one could have known that she would be the one to drink the water. No, I don’t think it was that at all.”

  “What do you think happened?” asked Laura.

  “Well, there was the other half of the aggrieved family here on his home territory tonight: Hamilton Gilbert himself – the man whose promising career and entire grip on life were derailed by Kirsten’s rejection. This was the first time she had played here; he too might have felt the moment had come for revenge.”

  “How do you know that he is here?” asked Laura, flummoxed for the first time.

  “Because his father told me. Hamilton is our very own vagrant in the aviator hat who loves music so much. After his relationship broke down he turned to drink and dropped out completely. In fact, I could see a resemblance between Mr Posh and his son – the same intense, dark eyes.”

  “And he took the clarinet! Didn’t Kirsten or Suzy recognise him?”

  Rupert shook his head. “No. I think Kirsten had a fleeting recognition of his parents. But I’m not sure that either she or Suzy actually came into contact with him.”

  “So he somehow poisoned the clarinet?”

  “Not even that – and now I am only making deductions; I know nothing. At least, I do know that the mouthpiece of the clarinet smelled of almonds. I was thinking of cyanide at the time, but the clarinet didn’t smell of bitter almonds, it had a sweet smell.”

  “And Kirsten was allergic to nuts! You think he soaked the reed in almond oil – or simply replaced the reed with one he had treated? But how could he be sure that would kill her?”

  “I don’t suppose he could. In fact, I rather doubt that he meant to kill her. As her long-term boyfriend he would have known that she had an allergy to nuts. Perhaps he was just trying to embarrass her: she would have a reaction, gasp a little, mess up the playing. I don’t think such a violent reaction was predictable.”

  “But it is still murder.”

  This time Rupert’s shrug was eloquent with indifference. “Like I say, all that is guesswork. The police will soon know that she died of anaphylactic shock if that really is the case. That will lead to her allergy and they will look at the clarinet and find out that Hamilton Gilbert fiddled with it. If they are worth their salt they will get that far, no problem. As to whether a murder change will stick: who knows? Definitely a case of diminished responsibility. Best case scenario, Hamilton ends up getting the sort of treatment he needs.”

  “So you will say nothing?”

  “They would treat me like an interfering fool if I butt in with my harebrained scheme; and rightly so.”

  “What shall we do then?” Laura looked dispirited.

  “Find Suzy and take her home if the police have asked her all the questions they want to and then return to Claresby Manor. You can check in and see if Florence has settled for the night.”

  At this final suggestion Laura’s face brightened up and she took her husband’s hand and went with him to find her cousin.

  The Floods Murd
er

  “Getting through the ford could actually be quite dangerous,” said Rupert to Laura with a note of satisfaction in his voice.

  “Yes, well you knew that the river was in flood and chose to come this route, so I can only assume you fancied the challenge,” returned Laura.

  Rupert gave her a wicked little smile and ploughed the four wheel drive vehicle through the water, creating a small tsunami in their wake. Ignoring her husband’s smile of exhilaration Laura continued to address more practical matters.

  “I imagine that Sunley Grange may be flooded too. It is a beautiful house, but being so near the river has always been a problem and this autumn has been as bad as I can remember for persistent rain.”

  “I’m sure that Damian and Flora were at our wedding, but I can’t honestly recall them.”

  “They weren’t at our wedding, as it happens,” said Laura. “We spent some time together as children, but were never particularly close – I preferred Suzy.”

  “She’s coped well since Kirsten’s death,” mused Rupert.

  “Yes, I’m glad to see her in a more balanced relationship; she was too much in Kirsten’s shadow, but Peter obviously adores her.”

  “She was your cousin on your father’s side?”

  “Yes. It was my father’s sister, May who was her mother. George Reckless was mother’s brother and his wife was Sylvia: Damian and Flora are their children. They are very slightly older than me. I do remember staying at Sunley Grange as a child, but I’ve not been there as an adult. To be honest, I was pretty surprised when Damian contacted me and asked that we come to stay; especially at such short notice. It’s just lucky that Veronica was happy to babysit for us.”

  “I suppose that his father’s illness has been a bit of a shock. Still, Reckless is a wonderful name: he should have been a solicitor!” Another smile brightened Rupert’s large featured face.

  “Actually he was an estate agent: Reckless and Knocker. They went out of business years ago; I don’t think my Uncle George had much of a business brain. His real interest was antiques and books. He spent any money he did have on beautiful old furniture – or so my father said. He always used to think that Sunley Grange was the worst place for such things because of the pervading damp.”

  At this point in the conversation, Rupert and Laura Latimer arrived at their destination. Sunley Grange was a gracious Georgian house of balanced symmetry and old-fashioned elegance. Its best feature was that it had light, well-proportioned rooms; its worst that it was in a poor state of repair and tended to be chilly because of the expense of heating a large, five-bedroom residence. Neither Damian nor Flora actually lived with their father anymore, but since his illness Damian had moved in, ostensibly to look after the place. It was a well known fact that Damian had been left the house in his father’s will. There had been some speculation amongst the wider family that this was rather unfair, as George Reckless had no money to speak of other than the capital that was represented by the house and therefore Flora would receive almost nothing on her father’s death.

  It was still raining with steely persistence as Laura made her way to the front door, improvising with a pashmina to keep her glossy hair dry whilst Rupert wrestled their two bags out of the back of the Range Rover. Fortunately Flora stood with the front door already open and the couple were able to enter quickly. Despite the fact that the cousins were not particularly close, Flora’s rather mousy face was lit with a smile and an almost relieved expression as she welcomed Laura. Her brother, joining her in the hallway, seemed equally pleased to see them and shook Rupert – whose tall, angular frame towered over him – firmly by the hand. Flora herself, with her almost childlike height and figure, made Rupert feel as ungainly and oversized as he ever did, and he had to stoop almost double to give her a polite greeting peck on the cheek. They were led into a comfortable reception room where a log fire blazed in the fireplace. Despite the warmth this exuded Rupert was immediately aware of at least the smell and feel of damp in the room. Flora went out to fetch coffee and the other three sat down in some plum coloured eighteenth century mahogany armchairs.

  As Laura exchanged preliminary courtesies with her cousin, Rupert allowed his curious eye to rove around the room. He was used to the recently reinstated opulence of Claresby Manor, but was nonetheless impressed by the quality and style of the furniture he saw about him. The showpiece was a Queen Anne walnut cabinet, splendid but rather ugly with its mottled veneer and urn-finials above the doors. An olivewood long case clock with floral marquetry also caught his attention and impressed him more with its quality than its intrinsic beauty. Damian noticed his interest.

  “Beautiful furniture was my father’s hobby,” Damian explained to Rupert. “He bought and sold items over the years, usually at a loss. He did have good taste, but he was not a business man. The best stuff we keep in this room as we usually have a fire burning in here. We are quite lucky not to have been flooded this week. You will find we have sandbags at the side door, which is where we are most vulnerable.” He spoke about the house in a proprietorial way although Rupert knew from Laura that he actually lived in a modest bachelor flat in the neighbouring town. He also spoke about his father in the past tense. Before they could discuss the furniture more, Flora returned with a tray laden with coffee cups and a plate of biscuits which she settled on a small table, passing the coffee around with milk and sugar as requested. When she too was settled in an armchair, it was Laura who recommenced the conversation.

  “How is Uncle George? When I spoke to you yesterday, Damian, you sounded concerned.”

  “I’m afraid it really is only a matter of time,” replied Damian, his pale eyes fixed on his coffee cup. “He had a massive stroke about a week ago and since then the doctors have told us of serious cardiac problems. I’m not sure he would be alive now without their intervention, but without hope of recovery I gather that they will let nature take its course.”

  “Was he treated promptly after his stroke? I know he lived here alone and wondered how quickly he was found?”

  “Ah, well,” said Damian in measured tones, as his sister looked uncomfortable, “you haven’t heard the whole tale. He wasn’t alone: his wife, Elsa, was with him.”

  “Wife!” exclaimed Laura. “I didn’t know that he had remarried.”

  For the first time some colour came into Damian’s rather insipid complexion. His was a dull rather than an ugly face, but when his expression kindled, as it did now, the effect was not a pleasant one. There was a hint of bitterness in the tight line of his mouth. However, he spoke in an easy enough tone,

  “No, neither did I, Of course I knew that he was friendly with Elsa. She lives in one of the terraced cottages down by the church and I think my father had taken to going for walks with her. I bumped into her once when I came around to help my father with some gardening in the summer. She was just leaving. We saw her at the hospital too, didn’t we, Flora?”

  “Yes.” Flora had the same pallor as her brother, but on her the result was merely to make her look washed-out. “It was Elsa who was with him when he was taken ill.”

  Damian, not waiting to see if his sister had more to say, took up the story. “We were called by Mrs Talbot, father’s housekeeper – it happened to be her day. She left text messages for both Flora and me, just to say that father had been taken ill and was in hospital. I phoned the hospital and, as soon as I knew it was serious, I picked Flora up from Brightfields and we went in together.”

  “The school was very understanding,” said Flora with a weak smile. Laura knew that she was the secretary at a local preparatory school.

  “Of course when we got there, we were confronted by Elsa – all tearful and wifely. She had been having lunch here and said that father had complained about feeling funny and, before she could do anything, had collapsed. It was only when the doctor came in and addressed her as Mrs Reckless, that I had any idea that they were married. It was a shock, I can tell you!”

  Somehow Rupert w
as left with the impression that Damian had been more shocked by the discovery that his father had remarried than by the possibility of his imminent demise.

  “Was she not living here, then?” asked Laura, picking up on Damian’s mention of her coming for lunch almost as if she were a guest.

  “No; that’s the funny thing. Apparently they were married in a civil ceremony just over a month ago. Other than two friends of Elsa’s, who live in the village and attended as witnesses, no one else knew about the marriage – not even Mrs Talbot. I can only assume that it was a romantic gesture.” This final statement was said in such a tight-lipped way as to suggest absolute contempt for any such motive. “Beyond that, she was still living in her house and my father here at Sunley Grange. And, of course, he has still left the house to me in his will. You know how important it was to him to keep the house in the family – it was almost an obsession with him. It wasn’t a case of him having any particular fondness for me.” Another bitter twist moved the edges of his mouth. “Anyway, the will is over on the desk.” Damian nodded his head towards the fine oak and ebony Victorian desk where a formal looking document was indeed placed on top in sole occupation.