The Skeleton in the Closet

by M C Beaton

  “The editor will see you now. Jessie will show you the way.” A shy thin girl had emerged from a side door and stood waiting.

  They followed Jessie up a narrow flight of stairs, across the reporters’ room, to a frosted glass door which bore the legend. “T. J. Whittaker, Editor.”

  Jessie opened the door and ushered them in. The editor rose to meet them. He was a red-faced, fleshy man with a beer gut hanging over baggy trousers. His striped shirt was open at the neck. He had beetling eyebrows under which his heavy face sagged down.

  “Sit down,” he said. “So you’re writing a book on our train robbery. I was a reporter on that case. Dolphin, hey? That was the name of the signalman.”

  “My father,” said Fell. “I only just discovered he was a suspect.”

  “Why? I thought you would have grown up on stories of it.”

  “No, he never mentioned it.”

  “So what do you want to write a book about it for?”

  Fell decided to take the plunge. “I am really trying to prove my father’s innocence. He was pulled in for questioning.”

  “But he wasn’t charged,” said Mr. Whittaker.

  “Still…I’ve been to see Inspector Rudfern.”

  “Oh, really? I never found him much help at any time. Anyway, I’d better tell you what I know, seeing as it’s a quiet day. I was a reporter then and – ”

  The door to his office burst unceremoniously open and a young reporter said, “We’ve got a murder, Mr. Whittaker.”

  The editor stood up and lifted his jacket from the back of his chair.

  “Where? Who?” he demanded.

  “Down at the Railway Tavern. A knifing. Landlord says the chap was called Andy Briggs.”

  ∨ The Skeleton in the Closet ∧

  Four

  FELL and Maggie made their way slowly out of the newspaper offices. When they were outside, Maggie said, “I’m glad he’s dead. But what’s worrying me is that whoever killed him might have something to do with the robbery and come looking for us.”

  “Let’s just hope it was a drunken brawl,” said Fell. “I’m tired. Let’s go home and go to bed.”

  And I wish that were an invitation, thought Maggie gloomily once again. They seemed to be moving deeper into a nightmare. If only they could get through it together, really together.

  She drove them home. As she climbed the stairs to the bedroom, she heard the phone ring. “Could you answer that, Maggie?” called Fell. “I can’t take any more today.”

  Maggie ran downstairs and picked up the phone. “Melissa here,” breathed the voice at the other end.

  “I’ll get Fell,” said Maggie wearily.

  “No, it’s about next Wednesday. I’ve invited Fell to dinner and I forgot to tell him to bring you. Are you free?”

  “Yes, thank you,” said Maggie. “What time?”

  “Eight o’clock, and I forgot to give Fell the address. It’s number 5, Malvern Lane.”

  “Thank you,” said Maggie again. “Very kind of you.”

  “See you both then. ‘Byee!”

  “Who was it?” called Fell from his bedroom as he heard Maggie mounting the stairs again.

  “Melissa.”

  He shot out of his bedroom and confronted Maggie on the landing. “Is she still on the phone?”

  “No, she called to invite me to dinner as well.”

  She averted her eyes quickly, but not before she had seen the look of dismay on Fell’s face.

  “How kind of her,” he said bleakly.

  “You’re disappointed,” said Maggie. “I’ll tell her I’ve got a headache and can’t go.”

  Fell looked at her hopefully and then his mouth drooped at the corners. “She would think it odd if you don’t come.”

  “Like I said, I could make an excuse.”

  “No, she’s probably not interested in me anyway. How could she be?”

  Maggie wanted to shout out that any woman with half a brain would be interested in Fell, but kept quiet. Perhaps it would be better to go after all and study the enemy at close quarters. “Let’s get some sleep,” she said instead.

  ♦

  Fell rushed out the next morning to buy the local paper. The murder was on the front page. A man, said the report, was helping police with their inquiries.

  “I want to know who this man is,” said Fell, after reading the paper.

  “We could go back and ask that editor,” suggested Maggie. “Gosh, it’s so hot already. Your dandelion summer’s come back.”

  Maggie was wearing a cool sky-blue cotton dress. The days when she felt she could breakfast in a dressing gown were over. She never confronted Fell in the mornings without being fully dressed and made up. “I’ll make us some breakfast and then we’ll go,” she said, moving towards the kitchen.

  “Only toast for me,” Fell called after her. “I couldn’t eat a full breakfast.”

  They set out half an hour later, walking in the blinding sunshine. The air was close and humid. Outside the newspaper offices, Fell, who had been carrying his jacket over his arm, put it on.

  The bored receptionist, to their request, said that Mr. Whit-taker was at the court. “Not far,” said Fell. “Let’s walk round there and see if we can find him.”

  As they approached the Georgian courthouse in the centre of the town, they saw the portly figure of the editor. He was talking to a young woman. They stood a little way off, summoning up the courage to interrupt his conversation, when he turned and saw them. He said goodbye to the woman and hailed them with, “Sorry I had to dash off the other day. Got time for a drink?”

  Fell looked at his watch. It was quarter to ten in the morning. “Bit early. They won’t be open yet.”

  “Follow me. They’re always open for Tommy Whittaker.”

  He marched up to the doors of a pub called the Red Lion. The pub was an old Tudor building, black and white and leaning so crazily towards the street, it seemed a miracle it hadn’t fallen over like some of its drunken customers. Tommy Whittaker rapped loudly on the door, which opened a crack. “Oh, it’s you,” said the landlord grumpily. “You may as well come in.”

  “What’ll you have?” asked Tommy.

  “Orange juice,” said Maggie, and Fell said he would have the same.

  “Nonsense; have a real drink.”

  Intimidated by his overbearing manner, Fell changed his order to a gin and tonic, and Maggie weakly said she would have the same. The landlord said ungraciously that he hadn’t any ice.

  “I’m surprised he let you in,” said Fell as Tommy downed a large whisky and then attacked a pint of beer.

  “He knows what’s good for him,” said Tommy. “The newspaper runs a Best Pub of the Year Award.”

  “I shouldn’t think this place would qualify,” said Fell, looking around. Like a lot of English pubs which looked charming and quaint on the outside, the inside was a disappointment. A fruit machine flickered in one corner. The floor was covered in green linoleum, scarred with cigarette burns. The ceiling between the low beams, which had once been white, was now yellow with nicotine. Some of the tables still had dirty glasses on them from the night before.

  “No, but he lives in hope.”

  “What we wanted to ask you,” said Fell, squeezing his hands together, “is about the murder of Andy Briggs.”

  “Oh, that. No great mystery there. Drunken fight.”

  “Was the man who killed Andy connected with the railway?”

  Tommy laughed and took another pull at his pint. “You’re a conspiracy theorist. Bet you’re one of those ones who surf the Internet trying to find out if the American government is hiding aliens from us.”

  “I haven’t even got a computer,” said Fell defensively.

  “If you’re writing a book, you’d better get one and take one giant leap into the twenty-first century. Where was I?”

  He drained his glass of beer. “Ready for another?”

  “I’ll get them.” Fell ordered a pint and a double
whisky for Tommy and another gin and tonic for himself and Maggie.

  “Thanks,” said Tommy, loosening his tie when Fell returned to the table with the drinks. “God, it’s hot. Drink up.”

  Fell and Maggie obediently gulped down their first gin and tonic and started on the second.

  “So who have the police got for the murder of Andy Briggs?” asked Fell.

  “Pete Murphy, out-of-work villain. He picked a fight with Briggs. Murphy’s a small ratlike creature. Briggs is a big chap, or was, rather. So Briggs tells him to come outside and is ready to beat the shit the life out of him. Pete pulls a knife and sinks it into Briggs. Surrounded by witnesses at the time, because everyone had followed them out of the pub to watch the fight. They all jump on Pete and sit on him until the police arrive. End of story.”

  Maggie and Fell exchanged brief, happy looks of relief. Nothing to do with the robbery. No villain to come looking for them.

  “So how are you getting on with the robbery?” asked Tommy.

  “Not very far,” said Fell. “I would like to clear my father’s name. Do you know where Terry Weal lives?”

  “I wouldn’t bother with him.”

  “Why?”

  “He’s a bit crazy. He lives just out of town, near the railway. Before you get to the station, halfway over the bridge, there’s a lane off to the right. He lives down there, second cottage from the end.”

  “We’ll try anyway,” said Fell. “Can you remember much about the robbery?”

  “Course I can. I was a reporter covering it. Well, let me see…What is it?” An office boy had come into the pub and right up to Tommy.

  “Lady Fleaming’s in the office.”

  “Oh, blimey!” Tommy got to his feet. “She’s the proprietor. See you!”

  “We’ll get this story one of these years,” said Fell. “I’m not used to drinking this early in the day. But what a relief Andy’s gone and his death is nothing to do with us.”

  “Have you thought of getting a dishwasher?” Maggie asked.

  “You mean a dishwashing machine?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why on earth?”

  “I struck Andy on the head with that rolling pin. Even though he died of a knife wound, there’ll be an autopsy and they’ll start wondering about that blow to the head. What if I caused brain damage? What if the autopsy proves that the stabbing didn’t actually kill him but some sort of brain haemorrhage?”

  “Okay, but what’s that got to do with a dishwasher?”

  “They’re so clever with forensics these days. I washed and scrubbed that rolling pin. But a dishwasher would really clean it.”

  “You’re worrying too much, Maggie. How could they possibly know he was hit with a rolling pin, of all things? And how could it be connected to us?”

  “He may have told someone.”

  “Let’s hope he didn’t. I don’t even want to consider that,” said Fell. “We can throw out the rolling pin if you’re really worried. Meanwhile, let’s go and see Terry Weal.”

  ♦

  They walked out into a wall of heat. “Shall I get the car?” asked Maggie.

  “No, let’s walk. I’m not used to drinking this early and a walk would clear my head.”

  They set out in the direction of the station, keeping in the shade of the buildings. But once they crossed the Mayor Bridge which spanned the river, the buildings became low bungalows with long gardens in front, the shade disappeared and the sun struck down fiercely.

  “This was a bad idea,” mourned Fell. “I should have let you get the car. Do you think it’s global warming?”

  “I sometimes wonder if it’s us, humans, who cause it,” said Maggie, taking out a handkerchief and patting her damp face. “Every year, more and more people, and imagine them all sweating like us.”

  “Not far to go now,” said Fell. He remembered walking this way with his mother. That was the time he had been off school with mumps. His mother often took lunch to his father. Sometimes he just ate sandwiches, but mostly he liked hot soup in a thermos flask taken to him. He claimed the thermos never kept the soup hot enough for lunchtime if he took it with him in the morning. Fell wrinkled his brow trying to remember if he and his mother had ever talked about anything on these walks, but all he could remember was her saying, “Don’t scuff your feet. Straighten your jacket. Don’t slouch.” Things like that.

  Ahead lay the railway bridge. The day of steam trains was long gone and yet the air around the station always seemed to smell of soot and cinders.

  Halfway across the railway bridge, they turned off to the right and down a lane leading to a row of cottages which had been built in the last century for the railway workers. Most of the cottages had been smartened up and the land between the cottages and the railway line turned into extended gardens. But the second cottage, where they had been told Terry Weal lived, had a forlorn air. The window frames had not been painted in years and the garden gate was hanging off its hinges.

  Fell hesitated outside the gate. “I wish we had taken the day off from all this, Maggie.”

  “May as well go through with it now we’re here. We’ll take tomorrow off.” Maggie held open the gate. “Come on. He can’t eat us.”

  Maggie felt a little pang as she said those words. It was so easy for the two of them to be brave, one encouraging the other. If only they could be a real couple.

  They walked up a short path made of the same red bricks as the house. There wasn’t a bell. The paint on the door was blistered.

  Fell knocked at the door. He heard the signal at the station clanking down. A train was coming. It would be the down train to London, he thought, looking at his watch. The signal went down ten minutes before the train arrived.

  The door opened and a small bent man who smelt peculiarly of ham soup stared at them. “What d’ye want? I’m not buying anything.”

  “We’re not selling anything. I’m Fell Dolphin.”

  “Dolphin’s boy? I’ve nothing to say to you.”

  “Why?” asked Maggie.

  “Because I know Dolphin was in on that robbery, that’s why.”

  “But it was a coincidence that you were ill that day,” cried Fell.

  “I wasn’t ill. Dolphin says, says he, that he wanted to take the Saturday off instead. They didn’t like us switching shifts unless we were ill. He said he’d give me ten pounds to say I was ill. I told the police that. But he got away with it. Now he’s dead. They didn’t get him.” The old man spat somewhere at the region of Fell’s feet. “Why are you bothering me?”

  “I want to clear my father’s name.”

  “That’s a joke.”

  “I’m writing a book.”

  “Well, put this in your book. Your father was a criminal!” He slammed the door in their faces.

  They heard the approaching roar of the train. Fell seized Maggie’s hand. “Come on.”

  “Where are we going?” gasped Maggie as he pulled her down the path.

  “London!” cried Fell. “I’m sick of all this and I’ve never been to London. Have you?”

  But Maggie’s reply was drowned by the roar of the approaching train. They sprinted to the station and collapsed panting in a first-class compartment.

  “Have you been to London before?” demanded Fell again.

  “No,” said Maggie. “Never.”

  “Isn’t it odd?” said Fell. “Here we are living an hour and a half’s train ride from London and yet none of us has ever seen the place.”

  The ticket collector came round and Fell explained they hadn’t had time to buy tickets at the station.

  “Have you enough money on you?” asked Maggie.

  “Yes, I’ve got plenty. I’ve got this habit of carrying a wad of notes around with me. Damn that horrible old man, Maggie. There was a ring of truth about what he said. And why should he lie?”

  “Spite?”

  “No, I don’t think so. We must find someone else who might tell us why my father found it so impo
rtant to get that Saturday off.”

  “Surely Inspector Rudfern would remember.”

  “We’ll try him again. In the meantime, let’s have a holiday.”

  Lunch was announced in the dining car, so they went along and enjoyed the novelty of eating while the sunny countryside slipped smoothly past.

  “I’ve just thought of something,” said Maggie.

  “What?” asked Fell, turning dreamy eyes from the countryside.

  “Those twenty-pound notes in the cash box.”

  Fell’s eyes sharpened and focused on her. “What about them?”

  “I just remembered. They’re current issue. If they were part of the robbery, then the notes would be old. I mean, I think the twenty-pound note has changed at least a couple of times since the robbery.”

  “That would mean,” said Fell slowly, “that the money didn’t come from the robbery.”

  “Unless, of course, one of your parents changed the notes. They’re pretty crisp and new.”

  Fell shook his head in bewilderment. “This is my parents you’re talking about, Maggie. You have no idea how strict and moralizing they were. I cannot imagine either of them doing anything criminal.”

  “If they came by the money honestly but wanted to avoid paying tax on it, your mother, say, might just have gone from bank to bank changing just a certain amount. Did she ever go away?”

  Fell was about to shake his head, but then he remembered she had gone away for two weeks just a few years ago. “She went on a bus tour,” he said, “for a fortnight. I remember looking forward to two weeks of freedom.” But she had phoned every day, to the hotel where he was working or to the house, with instructions to do that or clean this, and so he had never enjoyed any of his brief freedom. He had an odd but vivid picture of his mother going from town to town and bank to bank doggedly changing the twenty-pound notes for new ones.

  “Let’s stop worrying just for today,” urged Fell. He sank back in his seat and soon there was a dreamy smile on his face. Maggie felt some of her pleasure in the day fading. She was sure Fell was dreaming about their forthcoming visit to Melissa.

  They alighted at Paddington Station. “Now where?” asked Maggie.

  “We’ll take a taxi and look at the sights.”