‘Impossible.’
‘Why?’
‘Believe me.’ She sounded upset and determined.
‘Do you have any particular reason to think so?’
‘She was only seventeen, strictly brought up.’
‘Delicately nurtured,’ I said. The expression had struck me when I found it in a Victorian novel: it seemed both apt and anachronistic now.
‘Quite so. She was a delicately nurtured young girl, and he was—’
‘He was a famous actor with lots of fans. She could have been one of them. She could have thrown her knickers onstage with all the ordinary lower-class girls, couldn’t she? And he could have picked them up? Metaphorically speaking? He said she was pretty. He was, indirectly, boasting about her.’
Miss Potter blushed and gulped her sherry. ‘Was he married, my dear?’
‘Yes. But his wife was in London.’
‘Her whereabouts are immaterial. He was a married man. We won’t pursue this avenue of inquiry.’
She was very agitated, and scratching round for reasons not to believe me. We were getting close to something useful. ‘You’ve made the right decision about all this,’ I said, to distract her while I tried to formulate a killer question.
‘My dear, do you think so? I’m not sure. I didn’t sleep at all, last night.’
‘Were you worrying about Toad?’
‘Regrettably, I was not. I was thinking about the past. I remembered so much. Everything. I lay awake, hearing voices I haven’t heard for thirty years. I’m not accustomed to break faith. I’ve always been loyal, always. I don’t want you to think that I’m just acting in a fit of pique, because those boys attacked me. It was much more than that.’
‘Tell me.’
She twisted her hands together and winced. ‘I don’t know that I can. It’s to do with duty and the responsibility of privilege. I have always believed that the only justification for the inequity in birth, wealth and education which pervades our country is the corresponding responsibility which the privileged undertake.’
‘Noblesse oblige,’ I said. I meant it ironically but she took it straight and nodded eagerly.
‘Exactly so. The duty of the strong to protect the weak, to look after their interests and run society for the benefit of all. I always strove to form my pupils’ characters so that they should return, in full measure, all they were fortunate enough to gain from the social structure into which they were born.’
We were sitting in Penelope’s large L-shaped drawing-room, on one of the two sofas, facing the – concert grand piano. I don’t know much about furniture but I know when it’s antique and much too expensive for me. All Penelope’s furniture fell into this category and there was plenty of it. There were original paintings on the walls, the kind you hang out of the sunlight with their own little lamps neatly adjusted to bring out the patina or avoid the patina or whatever. We were sitting, in fact, in congealed money. I could most likely have lived for a year on one of the ornaments displayed so openly. No wonder Penelope wanted a house-sitter, and needed the complicated burglar alarm system, the grilles covering the windows, the triple deadbolt locks. ‘What exactly would you say Penelope and her husband did to repay society for this lot?’ If said, with an inclusive wave of my arm. ‘What do they do?’
‘Penelope is a wife and mother. She has three soundly principled children. Hugh is fortunate enough to be able to live on his investments. He is also an underwriter at Lloyd’s.’
‘Terrific,’ I said. ‘That’s really helpful.’
‘He serves as a magistrate in the country.’
‘Where he hands down exemplary sentences to trespassers and poachers, I expect.’
‘We are losing sight of the point, Alex.’ Very cool voice. Pupil Alex was being obstreperous. ‘Where do you look for leadership, if the leaders . . .’ she trailed off into silence.
‘If the leaders are corrupt, venal or incompetent? Exactly. When did that strike you?’
‘I suppose I have long felt that Charlotte was not discharging her parental responsibilities towards Toad. More generally, it struck me in the form of a robber’s fist to the side of the head. He was a child, Alex, no more than fifteen. He should have been at school, at a decent school learning a trade, learning moral principles, self-discipline and good manners. Instead he and his friend had chosen to rob an old woman whom they had every reason to believe was defenceless.’
She helped herself to more sherry, without offering me any: I could tell she was nerving herself for a confidence, and turned, hopefully, to a new page in my notebook, but she swerved off again. ‘I believe the formative years are all-important, Alex, and impressions gained in youth are never eradicated.’
‘Psychology.’
‘My own experience. When you were a child, did you ever go abroad?’
‘The furthest I went was Boulogne, on a day trip from school.’
‘Which school was that?’
‘A comprehensive in Fulham.’
‘Ah. Kenya is a very beautiful country,’ she said sipping her sherry. ‘It was there I fell in love, in 1938, when I was seventeen. Perhaps I would have been prepared to – throw my knickers on stage.’ I was struck by the image. If I had to imagine Miss Potter in love, I would see her fully clothed down to gloves and hat. I smiled encouragingly. She didn’t notice. ‘He was an exceptional man. An exceptional man—’
‘They are, when you’re seventeen—’
‘A gentleman, an aristocrat. He wore a kilt. It was love at first sight. We met at the Caledonian Ball in the Muthaiga Club. You will keep this absolutely confidential? He was dancing with someone else. I’d left my wrap in the cloakroom and stood by the dance-floor, looking for my party. My eyes were searching the room for a familiar face; I was shy. He saw me. I forced myself to look away. I could feel his eyes on me as he danced. Then he left his partner and came towards me. He had most impressive knees. I didn’t look up, that is why I remember the knees. Before he reached me, I was joined by my friends. They introduced me, and it was then I realized who he was. It was Lord Erroll.’
She paused for me to exclaim. I exclaimed, trying to place the owner of the aristocratic knees, who did sound vaguely familiar.
‘You may have seen the recent film about his tragic death,’ she went on, and placed him for me. Joss Erroll was the white settler in Kenya who spent the twenties and thirties bounding about seducing people’s wives until someone shot him in the head. ‘White Mischief was, as these things are, a complete distortion of the facts. But be that as it may, I danced several times with Lord Erroll. A Gay Gordons, an eightsome reel and a foxtrot.’ She paused, and I exclaimed again. ‘Do you believe in love at first sight?’ she went on.
‘Sometimes,’ I said remembering the lustful glances I’d exchanged with the sound recordist on the Black Death doco and the sweaty night that followed. He hadn’t rung afterwards.
‘He whispered in my ear. He said . . .’ she paused. ‘I’ve never talked about this to anyone. Ever.’ People often say that to me. It maybe true. Listening is part of my job. It isn’t difficult, but it takes concentration, and when it’s well done most people find it irresistible: even, occasionally, people of Miss Potter’s generation and temperament, who have spent their lives silent, believing that self-doubt is vulgar and introspection distasteful, like picking your nose in public.
‘He said . . .’ I murmured.
‘He said, “You feel it, don’t you?” ’
Pause. Miss Potter topped up her sherry with the air of one who had delivered a bombshell.
‘And he was referring to . . .?’
She looked at me expectantly.‘My dear, you surprise me. I always imagine you young people to be so much more – aware – than I was. He was referring to—’
‘Of course,’ I said. ‘I understand.’ I know I was slow off the mark but I don’t think of men in 1938 having erections, and still less did I expect Miss Potter to refer to them, however obliquely. ‘This was duri
ng the foxtrot?’
‘I hardly think the question would have arisen during the eight-some reel, as you would know if you had ever learnt Scottish dancing.’
‘And you were shocked?’
‘I was surprised by his aristocratic frankness, yes, but it was also – thrilling. Quite, quite thrilling. I was pretty in those days, several people said so, but I never dreamt Lord Erroll would find me attractive.’
‘What did you say?’
‘Nothing. What could I say? I drew away a little but he was very strong, he held me close. It was a delightful sensation to be handled so surely. The dance was coming to an end, and he whispered in my ear again. “Meet me in the billiard-room,” he said. “The billiard-room. In half an hour.” ’
‘And did you meet him?’ ‘No. No, we didn’t meet. In the interim, I discovered that he was married.’
At ten, she was still trying to keep me there. Things had looked up about eight when she offered me what she described as a light supper. It consisted of one piece of toast sprinkled with my half share of three eggs, scrambled. I’d then watched, ravenous, as she toyed (I’d never before seen anyone toy, but she did) with her share and then scraped it into the rubbish bin.
I’d learnt plenty about the topography of Kenya, the mariners and customs of the post-war upper classes, Miss Potter’s views on the decay of standards and principle in modern England and her awe-inspiring capacity for sherry, but I was no further on with the murder.
Then she really dropped a bombshell. She told me that the lodge in Warwickshire she’d lived in for twenty years had been provided, at a peppercorn rent, by Laura, and that Charlotte had thrown her out after Laura’s death.
Listening to her blagging on, trying to disguise my stomach rumbles by shifting in the chair and clearing my throat, I’d been doing some toying of my own, with the fantasy that she was the murderer. Only someone devoid of basic human feeling would give a person one and a half scrambled eggs and then bore them to death. I hadn’t believed it, though, and the news about the lodge was the end of that theory. If Laura had given her the lodge, it was to keep quiet. Therefore Miss P. wasn’t the murderer, but she knew who was, or she knew enough to worry Laura.
I wanted to go home and think it through. When I got up to leave she fetched the clippings book. With it was a large brown envelope. ‘You mentioned photographs,’ she said. ‘You might be interested in these. It goes without saying that I expect them to be returned in good condition.’
‘Of course.’
‘With one exception. I am not, in any case, at all sure that it can be used. I certainly do not wish its return.’ She extracted a smaller envelope and handed it to me. Inside, a scene of crime photograph. A close-up of Rollo, what was left of him after, according to Lemaire’s report of the pathologist’s report, a shotgun had been discharged ‘within eighteen inches of his head. I’m not squeamish, but I couldn’t look at it for long. ‘Rollo, Lord Sherwin,’ she said, as if I hadn’t seen for myself. ‘I confiscated it from Charlotte. She purloined it from the murder room.’
‘Why didn’t you tell the police?’
‘They had not noticed its absence.’
‘Poor man,’ I said. ‘Poor Rollo.’
‘Indeed.’
Chapter Eight
When I got back from Miss Potter’s, there was a package from Barty on the table in the entrance hall. I carried it upstairs, tearing it open as I went. Two books, both by Miss Potter, and a message from Barty. Had I read Miss Potter’s books? No, of course I hadn’t, but if I spent much longer with her I could write them.
There was no message from Lally Lambert on my answering machine. I was surprised and annoyed. Maybe I’d miscalculated. I’d ring her at work in the morning. I wrote myself a reminder and pinned it up on the ‘Action’ section of the Sherwin project board on one wall of my kitchen, then Blu-Tacked up some of Miss Potter’s photographs, including the death photograph still in its envelope. I now had an Ashtons Hall rogues’ gallery.
They were a good-looking lot, all of them, even Oliver Farrell. The little girls were posed with Miss Potter and bicycles in the drive in front of the house. You could tell they would swan through adolescence without puppy-fat or pimples or lifting fantasies from market-stalls, and that they would emerge at twenty-one with a suitable husband and a trust fund. They would probably marry a big, handsome stupid man like Daddy. If Rollo had been stupid. His face didn’t look exactly that; more unreflective. Probably the most serious self-searching he ever did was when he had to decide whether to fag for the Captain of the First Eleven or the Keeper of Boats.
I made myself a late-night coffee, put the Eagles on the CD, flicked through my notes on Lemaire and thought.
According to the pathologist, Rollo had been shot between twelve and one in the morning, though his body wasn’t found until after breakfast the following day. All the witnesses had heard several shotgun blasts, which wasn’t surprising since some idiot with a shotgun in the boot of his car had taken it out during the course of the evening and blasted away at some rabbits on the lawn. There were no fingerprints on the murder weapon, one of Rollo’s own: it had been wiped clean. None of the guests could remember seeing anyone going into or out of the gun-room all evening. Everyone was vague about when they’d last seen Rollo, but the last public sighting was before midnight. Most suggested he had surprised a tramp in the act of robbing the gun-room. None could recall with any accuracy who he might or might not have been involved with or had any reason to suppose why he might have been shot.
What could Miss Potter be hiding? She might have seen the murderer, Laura or not, leave the gun-room. She might have information about Laura’s motive. I was nearly sure the killer was Laura, mostly because she’d allowed Miss Potter to live in her lodge, effectively free. Laura didn’t seem the type to take unselfish care of dependants. If it was Laura who had an interest in keeping Miss Potter quiet, then either she’d done it herself or she’d been protecting someone.
Who does a woman protect? Her man, her children, just possibly her parents. Dr Bloom, a most unlikely lover for Laura judging from the photographs (and why on earth had she married him less than a year after the murder? An impoverished Jewish doctor was a come-down), also made an unlikely murderer. The character that H. Plowright described was tender, peace-loving and affectionate, a New Man born before his time. Besides, he hadn’t been at the ball. Equally, I didn’t for a moment believe that the four little girls were involved; only in the pages of Agatha Christie does a baby Sloane adjust her headscarf, say ‘OK-yah’ and blast Daddy to glory. Laura’s father was an extreme outsider because I couldn’t imagine a motive. Besides, he had died of a heart attack a few months after the murder and Laura didn’t sound to me like a woman who would protect her father’s memory.
Laura’s motive? Could have been property and money, because she got the whole lot. Could have been sexual jealousy – I agreed with Revill that nothing causes more passionate ill-feeling. Or sexual desire. She might have killed her husband to marry the doctor, unlikely as he seemed as a violent object of desire. On the other hand, she might have shot her husband for almost any reason and then married the doctor to shut him up.
I was sure it wasn’t an unidentified woman whom Rollo had seduced and abandoned, or a jealous husband. Miss Potter wouldn’t have buttoned her lip for that, she’d have thought adultery was letting the aristocratic side down and they deserved all they got. Miss P. had been loyal: that was what she was reconsidering now: and only her employers or her charges would have evoked that in her. Rosalind would have particularly, of course, but I couldn’t see a motive, nor did it seem likely that Laura would lift a finger to help her niece. According to Patrick Revill, Laura had treated Rosalind in a spectacularly bitchy manner. Even allowing for adolescent paranoia, Rosalind’s evidence on her aunt’s feelings for her was probably the best we’d get.
My original excitement at Miss Potter’s revelation about the lodge had subsided. OK, so Laura had th
ought Miss P. knew enough to want to keep her quiet. So Laura probably did it. And anyone who knew anything about the case thought that already. Not much of an angle for my piece.
I had another bath to take advantage of the central heating while it still worked, then sat at the kitchen table to skip-read Miss Potter’s books, hoping for some facts. She got a good degree in History at London University, intending to work in Education – I think she meant being a schoolmistress – but after two years teaching History at Cheltenham Ladies’ College the war was over and she was given the Opportunity to return to Kenya as a governess and her career was diverted into Other Channels. The magic of Africa exerted a powerful pull and she rambled on about the beauty of the landscape and the captivating innocence of the natives. She didn’t mention memories of Joss Erroll (what had the billiard-room incident to do with the Sherwins? was it true?) but he was dead, of course, by now so she couldn’t have hoped for a reprise of the foxtrot.
A Governess Looks Back took us as far as 1965 when she gave up governessing for ever. Astoundingly, enough people must have bought it for the publishers (a small house, since, not surprisingly, bankrupted) to give her another go. A Housemistress Looks Back was decidedly less perky, however. Her first book had a strange, lavender charm, if you liked that kind of thing; it had some good descriptions of people and places, the anecdotes were mildly entertaining, and the persona of the author was compellingly gung-ho, anachronistic and full of moral fervour. I was interested by the accounts of Rosalind in Africa; Miss Potter had been enormously fond of her, clearly, and the girl sounded, for someone of her background, quite a promising human being. I often looked up at her photograph, as I read. She was in a beach group, wearing a swimsuit, grinning at the camera. She looked around seventeen. The two boys in the group were looking at her; she was emphatically not returning their interest, but hugging her bare legs to her swimsuited chest as if to say, ‘This is my body, buster, keep off.’
An Uncommon Murder Page 6