Strictly Murder

by Lynda Wilcox

  “Here we are. 27 Willow Drive.” He brandished a pile of papers in his left hand as he manoeuvred himself back round the desk to his seat.

  “Well now, the property is an attractive period building with some interesting original features,” he began chirpily and my heart sank. Knowing how estate agents love to manipulate and mangle the language, that meant it was a late Victorian villa that had had no renovation since it was built in 1900.

  I couldn’t resist the temptation of asking, “is it deceptively spacious?” which is estate agent speak for the size of a rabbit hutch, but the irony was lost on young Tom.

  “It’s ideal for city living,” he enthused.

  So, a rabbit hutch with no parking, then. I gave a mental sigh. Oh well.

  “What is the monthly rental?”

  He flicked through the papers.

  “Hmm… the landlord is seeking a figure of 650 pounds per calendar month.”

  Six hundred and fifty quid! That’s not a landlord, that’s a robber baron. There was little to be gained by pointing that out to young Tom, even assuming he’d ever heard the term. He was dealing with silly figures like this all the time. I’d just have to ask KD for a rise.

  “Would you like to view the property?”

  He pulled a large desk diary towards him and looked at me enquiringly.

  “Could I just look at the particulars for a moment, please?”

  He been so busy reading them himself he’d forgotten to give me a copy.

  “Oh, yes. Of course.”

  He took a sheet from the bundle he’d been holding and passed it to me. It was the usual thing, full of estate agent speak and therefore not a lot of use. It told me nothing but I folded it and put it in my bag anyway. A visit was definitely called for.

  “Is there any chance we could go now?”

  He gave a quick glance down.

  “Yes, I don’t see why not. I’m free until four o’clock and my next appointment is out that way so that should fit in nicely. I’ll just pick up the key on the way out.”

  We drove there in separate cars. Fortunately Willow Drive was almost empty and there was plenty of space to park.

  “Here we are,” said young Tom cheerily, clipboard in hand, as he put the key to the lock He jiggled it around for a moment.

  “That’s odd,” he muttered. “must be the wrong key.”

  He looked at the bunch in his hand selected a different one.

  “That’s better.”

  This time the key slid straight in. He pushed open the door and I followed him in. We stood in a hallway, stairs going up in front of us and with doors off to right and left. A passage ran down the left hand side of the staircase leading, no doubt, to the kitchen and the back door. Young Tom showed me round. It didn’t take long to view the downstairs part of the house. Although unfurnished the general state of repair was actually quite good. There were modern fittings in the kitchen, the two front rooms were of a reasonable enough size and, for the moment, I could live with the carpets and wallpaper. We returned to the hallway. So far, so good.

  “Upstairs, now?” asked Tom turning over a page on his clipboard.

  “Well, yes. Please.” He’d made it sound like a question and I wondered if he expected me to leave without having seen all of the house. His phone rang just as he put his foot on the bottom stair.

  “You go up and have a look round. I shouldn’t be long. Hello, Tom Powell.”

  I left him with his mobile to his ear and continued up the stairs. The carpet was worn in places and one of the newel posts was missing on the left hand side. At the top, a door in the facing wall led to a bathroom and toilet which, if the irregular join in the tiles was anything to go by, had once been separate rooms. The suite looked relatively new and recently cleaned. Tiles, missing from behind the bath, were of the plain white variety readily found in any D-I-Y store so I shouldn’t have trouble replacing them. A shower attachment hung over the bath with a rather disgusting curtain around it but once again that was something I could easily deal with myself. Close to the toilet and wash basin I detected a faint but heavy aroma. As smells often do it stirred a vague memory. I looked in vain for an air freshener. Coming out of the ‘usual offices’ a further door along the same wall opened into a small box room with a larger bedroom opposite, above the downstairs dining room. Here, I decided, I would set up my home office. This only left what the particulars had described as ‘the master bedroom’ so, with Tom still busy talking downstairs, I retraced my steps and opened the door at the far end of the landing.

  My first reaction when I got in there was to say “Oh, I’m sorry”, for a bed stood under the window facing the street and on it lay a woman wearing a long evening dress and a pair of high-heeled shoes. My initial surprise gave way to anger and I stepped closer, ready to make a fuss and ask what the hell she thought she was doing. The woman’s face, surrounded by blonde hair that spread out across the pillow, was composed and peaceful. I took a step or two closer to the bottom of the bed all set to let fly and give her the rough edge of my tongue but the words of reproach died on my lips. This woman would never again hear any reprimand from me or from anyone else for that matter. I had no doubt that she was dead, she was too pale and too still. No whisper of breath escaped the full lips.

  Of course, what really clinched it was the dagger sticking out of her chest. I took a closer look at the white, drained face. Well, I thought, one thing is certain. Jaynee Johnson isn’t missing any more.

  Chapter 2

  The police had arrived quickly after I called them on the mobile. Once I had done so I took a closer look at the woman (I tried not to think of her as a body) on the bed. I worked quickly, the police would not be long and Tom Powell could appear at any moment. JayJay lay on her back, arms straight down by her sides and dressed for an evening out. The white gown was shot through with silvery threads matching the solid silver snake around her neck, the crossed head and tail resting on her collar bone, the eyes picked out in precious stones. Judging from the peaceful look on her face death had come quickly, without struggle. Her platinum dyed hair spread out across the pillow. I glanced at her hands; palms down, no cuts or grazes on the soft, unblemished skin, the red painted finger nails undamaged, untorn. I forced my gaze upwards to her chest. The dagger had been thrust in until only the white, enamelled handle, that from a distance had camouflaged it against the dress, protruded from between her breasts. It pointed upwards like an accusing finger and I wondered how long it was. Not much blood, I thought with some surprise, though whether that implied she was dead before the vicious strike that had embedded the dagger in her her chest I would leave to the police and the forensics lab.

  Poor Jaynee Johnson. I scoffed at the modern cult of celebrity, but, Jaynee had, in her own talentless way, brought pleasure to the millions of people who watched her show. I couldn’t help but feel sorry for her now. I made a last appraisal of the otherwise empty room, went out and closed the door on JayJay’s death bed.

  Now I waited alone in the kitchen, while the police swarmed over the house like an army of soldier ants. Tom Powell had gone, dismissed after leaving his name and contact details, once the police discovered that he hadn’t set foot upstairs. Poor lad, he’d looked very pale as he’d scurried off down the steps, warned by the police to say nothing until they had issued a press statement. I hadn’t given him the name of the victim when I’d rejoined him and told him what I’d found and that the police were on their way nor had I been surprised that he didn’t want to go up and see for himself.

  “Miss Long? I’m Detective Inspector Farish and this is Sergeant Stott. Sorry to have kept you waiting.”

  I shook the offered hand. Behind the Inspector his younger sergeant smiled softly at me. If it was an attempt to reassure me it failed.

  “Please sit down.” The Inspector was curt.

  I was glad to. My legs were shaking.

  “Round up the usual suspects,” I muttered to myself.

  “Bu
t Major Strasser hasn’t been shot, has he?”

  I gaped at him.

  “It’s one of my favourite films, ‘Casablanca’.” He smiled and the knot of tension worming around in my stomach eased. Slightly.

  “No, this was as neat a stabbing as I’ve ever seen,” he looked serious again. “Did you know the victim?”

  “Jaynee Johnson?”

  He nodded.

  “No. I’d never even heard of her before she went missing and her name and picture were splashed all over the papers.”

  He raised an eyebrow.

  “You don’t watch television?”

  “I don’t watch LCD television, no.”

  “LCD?” queried Stott who, until now, had been doing a good job of blending with the background while he took notes.

  “Lowest common denominator,” supplied Farish. “So you were simply here to view the house?”

  “Yes. I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time,” I grimaced at the cliché.

  “But you didn’t call for an ambulance before you called the police?”

  “It was too late for that,” I replied, sadly. “She was obviously dead.”

  “Did you touch anything in the room?”

  I was sure I hadn’t but gave the question a moment’s thought.

  “No. Only the door handle, I think.”

  “You didn’t, for example, touch the body?”

  I shuddered at the thought. “No.”

  “Or remove anything from the room?”

  “No.” My denial this time was more vehement. “I know better than that. Why do you ask?”

  He ignored the question.

  “Not as a souvenir, perhaps?” he asked in a silky voice.

  “No!” I snapped. “I’m not a ghoul!”

  “So, you would have no objection to Sergeant Stott searching your bag?”

  I’d hardly begun to say, “No, that’s all right,” before his minion had whipped my bag off the table and rummaged through its contents. I didn’t miss the shake of the head he gave his boss before he replaced it.

  “What time did you get here, Miss Long?” The Inspector went on with his relentless interrogation.

  “Some time around half past two, at a guess.”

  “And you had no difficulty getting in?”

  “Oh!”

  Of course, Tom would have told him about the business with the key. I had been too occupied with wondering why there was a dead celebrity in a room upstairs to consider how she had got there.

  “Miss Long?” The Inspector’s stern face and voice demanded my answer.

  “Mr Powell did have a problem with the key,” I recalled. “He said it was the wrong one.”

  “And did you notice anything particular while you were alone upstairs?”

  “What. Other than a dead body, you mean?”

  His mouth twitched briefly at my sarcasm before he got it under control.

  “In any of the other rooms?”

  “No, I don’t think so. Oh wait.”

  There had been something. What was it?

  “There was a smell.” I struggled with the memory. “A faint smell in the bathroom.”

  I prevented him from making the obvious interruption by holding up my hand. I was almost there, I’d almost got it.

  “Perfume.”

  “Perfume?”

  “Mmm. Estée Lauder’s ‘Youth Dew’.”

  Inspector Farish raised an eyebrow while behind me Sergeant Stott’s pen scratched rapidly across the pad.

  “You’re sure?”

  “Umm?” I dragged my attention back from considerations of perfume to the man across the table. “Not a hundred percent, no, but fairly sure.”

  “Anything else you noticed?”

  I shook my head.

  “What do you do, Miss Long?” He changed tack.

  “I work for Kathleen Davenport.”

  Sergeant Stott looked up quickly from his notebook.

  “The writer?” he asked

  “Yes. Have you read her books?” I swivelled in my chair to look at him but it was his boss who replied.

  “I’m too busy dealing with crime fact, Miss Long, to have time for crime fiction.”

  Maybe, I thought. He still knew KD was a crime writer, though.

  “What is it you do for Kathleen Davenport? Secretary?”

  “Yes, I’m her PA and researcher.”

  He nodded as Stott made an entry on his pad

  “All right, Miss Long. I think that’s it for now though we may need to question you again. If you think of anything in the meantime please get in touch. Leave your name and contact details with Sergeant Stott, will you?”

  He rose and strode to the door.

  “Oh and by the way …” he paused in the doorway.

  “Yes.”

  “Given your job, please don’t be tempted to try a bit of amateur sleuthing. Leave it to the professionals.”

  “I’m a PA not a private detective,” I snapped back.

  “Yes, please remember that. The last thing I need is some star-struck typist getting under my feet because she thinks that working for a crime writer qualifies her to do so. It doesn’t. Stay out of this.”

  I was so stunned that by the time I thought of an answer, he had already gone.

  I drove home in cold fury. Slamming the door shut behind me I headed straight for the wine rack. Bloody Inspector Farish. I unscrewed the top off a bottle of red as if I were unscrewing his head from his neck and grabbed a glass. Bloody, rotten, stinking Inspector Farish. My hand shook so much I overfilled the glass, wine spilling onto the table. I cursed. What about me? I’d found her, for goodness sake. I’d found the body but did Farish care? Did he hell. I lowered my head to the glass, slurping at the wine until the level dropped. I was almost tempted to lick the spillage off the table. Damn Farish. I reached for a cloth. Damn all policemen. I’d have kicked the cat if I’d had one.

  Instead, I marched through to the living room. I swept the books and paper work off the settee and plonked myself down in the cleared space, took another good swig of wine, and promptly went to pieces. I sobbed for twenty minutes, probably as much in shock as in anger. I might work for a crime writer but finding real corpses was hardly part of my job description. I sobbed for myself and for the luck of the Longs that dictated I’d been the one to find her. I’d been the one on the end of the Inspector’s grilling, his callous, thoughtless treatment. Then I cried for JayJay. For a young life, a life that already held fame and wealth, cut short so brutally.

  When my tears finally stopped, I traipsed through to the bathroom and splashed water over my face. My fit of the vapours had ravaged my make-up. I repaired the damage as best as I could then went back to the kitchen, picking up my wine en-route.

  It was nearly seven o’clock, my baguette was a distant memory and my stomach was starting to complain. I took a pizza from the freezer and threw it into the oven while I prepared a small green salad and sat at the kitchen table to eat. Normally I would cook for myself and read whilst I was eating but I needed a calm mind to do both those things and calm was the last thing I felt at the moment. I spent the entire meal thinking about Jaynee Johnson.

  What had she been doing in a three up three down Victorian villa? Why had she gone there? And in evening clothes. How had she, and her killer, got in? Was there any significance to the smell of Estée Lauder in the bathroom? I’ll bet Inspector bleeding Farish is asking himself exactly the same questions, I thought as I carried my empty plate to the draining board. Despite the Inspector’s parting shot, I couldn’t help but be interested, given my involvement so far, in what the press would soon be calling ‘the JayJay murder’.

  I poured more wine and fetched my notebook then, for an hour or so, I wrote down everything that had happened since young Tom and I had left the estate agent’s office. I made lists. Lists of people, lists of known ‘facts’ and most importantly, lists of questions. This alone covered two pages. I leaned back in my chair,
arching my back, arms stretched above my head.

  Only then did I think of Inspector Farish’s questions to me and what lay behind them. Why had he asked if I’d removed anything? Why search my bag? Did he think … Of course! Realization hit me like a house brick. Where was Jaynee’s handbag? It would be a flimsy affair, made of fabric to match her dress or, maybe, white leather and holding no more than a lipstick, comb and mobile phone and, yes, it would be small enough to fit inside my voluminous carry-all. As I worked through the implications of this the Inspector’s questions began to make more sense - not that I liked him any better for it.

  Suddenly, feeling bone weary and ready for bed, I thought of KD. I ought to call her, let her know what had happened. For all I knew, the police might have called her to check my story by now and she would know already. I gave this idea a moment’s thought before dismissing it. No, KD would have phoned me if that were the case.

  With a sigh I walked through to the living room and picked up the phone.

  “You should stay out of it, Verity. Leave investigating JayJay’s death to the police. Don’t get involved,” said KD the next morning when I got into the office and informed her of my decision to do a little sleuthing.

  “But I am involved,” I cried. “I found her body.”

  “That’s no reason for you to get any deeper in than you already are. The police won’t thank you.”

  No, they wouldn’t. Which was one of the main reasons for doing it, of course.

  “Why don’t you take up a hobby. Line dancing, for instance.”

  “Line dancing! Bloody line dancing! Believe me, KD, I haven’t needed anyone to tell me where to put my feet since I was two years old and I don’t need instruction now from some prat in high heeled boots, a check shirt and a stupid hat. Line dancing is just another witless American import along with trick or treating, canned laughter and Scientology. And you can add to that burger bars, life coaches, drum majorettes, skinny lattes, diet cola, lifestyle gurus and euphemisms like ‘friendly fire’.”

  KD regarded me impassively for a moment after this outburst.