Murder Strikes Pink

by Josephine Pullein-Thompson

  MURDER STRIKES PINK

  JOSEPHINE PULLEIN-THOMPSON

  © Josephine Pullein-Thompson 1963

  Josephine Pullein-Thompson has asserted her rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents act, 1998, to be identified as the author of this work.

  First published in 2016 by Greyladies.

  This edition published in 2017 by Endeavour Press.

  Table of contents

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

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  CHAPTER ONE

  IT WAS FOUR O’CLOCK and the heat of the day was still unabated. In the ring, a desert of friable dun-coloured grass, save for the rich dark patches of peat spread before and after each gaily painted fence, there was no escape from the sun; since early morning it had burned down with unremitting fierceness, reducing the judges, the competitors and the horses to a limp and irritable exhaustion. In the enclosure what shade there was, cast by the white bulk of the refreshment tent, had been sought avidly by the wilting spectators. All through the long hot day they had jostled their deck chairs contentiously, for keeping a place in this dark oasis of shade, as the sun moved round, had become far more important to most of them than anything which went on in the ring.

  Theodora Thistleton had remained comparatively unaffected by the heat, but she was infuriated by the poor performances of her horses and the secretaries, recognising the signs of rising anger, sat one on either side of her in uneasy silence. As the prize winners, rosetted and applauded, cantered from the ring, Molly Steer, her nervousness increased by the knowledge that her deodorant had ceased to be effective, blundered into speech.

  ‘Oh, the sound of those poor animals’ hooves on that ground; the jar must be dreadful —’

  ‘Hoofs,’ snapped Theodora Thistleton, ‘and if either of you mention the state of the ground again I shall go mad.’

  ‘Oh, I am sorry, Miss Thistleton.’ Molly Steer’s large, anxious face flushed red and her pale weak eyes blinked behind the green diamante-decorated spectacles. So unkind, she thought. Joy does nothing to help; we just sit and sit in this dreadful uncomfortable silence. But Theodora Thistleton was already getting to her feet and straightening her tall gaunt figure, clothed in a depressing dress of brown silk, vaguely patterned with green leaves. A beige chiffon scarf tried, vainly, to conceal the long scraggy neck and a brown pudding basin of a straw hat topped the severe and elongated face with its huge tombstone teeth and angry grey-green eyes. Behind her back the secretaries mouthed at each other. ‘It’s not my turn,’ hissed Molly Steer, ‘I went with her last time,’ and she tried to look as though she intended to stay firmly in her seat, but Joy Hemming, fair, faded and starveling, merely mouthed back, ‘Not me,’ and sat tight.

  Theodora Thistleton was already threading her way through the deck chairs; at any moment she would realise that she was unaccompanied. As usual, Molly Steer gave way first; blinking, swallowing and stumbling over the rows of feet, she followed her employer.

  It was typical of Theodora Thistleton’s attitude towards her staff that she let the plump, sweating and obviously suffering Molly follow her across the show-ground and then, when she reached the first row of horseboxes, she turned and said, ‘I shan’t want you; I’m going to have a few words with Christina; you’d better go back.’

  ‘Yes, Miss Thistleton,’ Molly answered meekly, but her heart raged. So unkind, thought her mind, limited by its meagre vocabulary, but her heart raged without the need to transform emotion to words. And then, an unaccustomed feeling of mutiny sweeping over her, she sat down on the grass and took off her shoes.

  Christina Scott knew what to expect. For seven shows in a row she had failed to win T.T. a rosette and everyone, she reflected, knew what the old money-bag was like over winning; she had to have her bit of ribbon — or else. After each of the six previous shows the old girl had been progressively more unpleasant and the behaviour of the secretaries — always a yardstick by which you could judge your standing in T.T.’s establishment — had become less and less subservient.

  Seven shows, thought Christina Scott as she fortified herself for the coming interview with a nip from a bottle tucked away in the boot of her car. Seven shows. Well, my luck’s out, that’s all. And with T.T. breathing down my neck and making sarcastic remarks I’m losing my self-confidence. I’m too careful; I’m over shortening as I come into my fences; I can feel it, but I can’t stop myself and the more I worry the worse it gets. I’ve lost the knack or something, but if only she’d leave me alone and those cats of secretaries would stop their moronic criticisms. She knew what everyone must be saying behind her back, certainly in the collecting rings and horse-box parks and probably in the enclosures and before the television screens as well: ‘Christina’s lost her nerve.’ ‘Christina’s on the bottle.’ One had heard that sort of thing said so often about people who’d started on the slide down from the top, one had even said it oneself. But that’s not what’s happened to me; this is only a temporary thing, Christina reassured herself. I’ve just struck a rough patch; it’s impossible to win all the time with the competition as it is today. And then as T.T.’s gaunt and somehow forbidding figure came in sight she slammed the car boot shut and went forward to meet her.

  ‘Sorry, Miss Thistleton, no luck again. We have struck a bad patch this time.’ She smiled, the wry, sporting smile with which she had been taught to face defeat. The sight of this smile on Christina’s square, rather self-satisfied face was too much for Theodora Thistleton; with a sensation of relief she loosed the anger which had been building up in her all day.

  ‘So you think it’s bad luck, do you?’ she stormed. ‘I don’t, I know it’s your bad riding. I’ve told you to let them go on more, but of course you know best. Seven shows and not a single prize. And everyone knows what I’ve paid for those horses. All right, Miss Scott, if you can’t win on my horses I’ll find someone who can.’

  Christina showed no sign of emotion at this attack. Her eyes continued to gaze at T.T. with their usual cool directness, her brown, almost swarthy skin neither flushed nor blenched. ‘Of course, I don’t think that that little girl groom of yours, Brenda, is giving them nearly enough work,’ she said calmly.

  ‘So that’s it now, is it? First it was the fences, then it was the hard ground, then the horses were wrongly fed and now you have the impertinence to suggest that they’re not exercised. Well, I’m not giving you a chance to try that theory out, I’ve had enough of being a laughing stock, you’ve had your last ride on my horses; I’m not going to be humiliated in this way. I shall make other arrangements from today. And, if you take my advice you’ll find something else to do for a living, because you’re only spoiling good horses and making an exhibition of yourself.’ With this T.T. strode away across the showground, her long back still rigid with righteous indignation. Christina looked after her for a moment or two and then opened the boot of the car and helped herself with shaking hands to another nip from the bottle. She doesn’t really mean it, she told herself, trying to stem the tide of rising panic. Oh God! I’m finished if she does. No one’s offered me a ride for weeks. They used to beg me to jump their animals, she thought bitterly. Now I haven’t even the hope of a decent Grade C horse to fall back on. There’s the disgrace of it too. T.T.’ll tell everyone that she kicked me o
ut. Pity and sympathy, thought Christina with the revulsion of one who has always commanded admiration and respect.

  *

  Marion Keswick, huddled on a tip-up seat in the groom’s compartment of the horse-box, surrounded by saddlery, grooming tools and buckets and showered with hay seeds each time the horse nearest her pulled at his net, listened with half an ear to T.T.’s dismissal of Christina Scott, but found that, so far from distracting her, Christina’s troubles had merely intensified the misery of her own. She could no longer delude herself with the pretence that she was getting over Laurence, that she was making a new life for herself or that things had changed for the better. The sight of him had removed this, the prop of the last two weeks, and left her temporarily defenceless. For as long as T.T.’s horses had needed her ministrations Marion had managed to preserve a facade of normality; she’d saddled, bridled, bandaged and studded-up with grim concentration and, as each horse failed to qualify for its jump-off, she had unsaddled, unbridled, removed studs and prepared them for the journey home, with equal concentration. But now, with only old Grey Miller due in at five, there was nothing left to do and she had hidden herself in the horse-box and given way to her agonized thoughts.

  When Theodora Thistleton had telephoned her to ask for her help, explaining that after some ‘unpleasantness’ her male staff had left in a body and the one girl groom who remained was incapable of driving the horse-box, Marion had cheerfully agreed to help out until new grooms were found, partly because she was in that state of mind when change seems synonymous with progress and partly, though this was unadmitted at the time, because she hoped for a glimpse of Laurence. The glimpse of Laurence had been far from reassuring. Now as she sat in the horse-box, huddled as though cold in spite of the intense heat, the more agonizing moments of the day reproduced themselves. Laurence jumping a clear round, watched admiringly by Helen Farrell. The two heads, dark and fair, close together as Laurence helped Helen with her horse’s studs. Laurence standing at the collecting ring entrance and explaining to Helen how she could save several seconds in the Foxhunter jump-off. It would be bad enough with anyone, thought Marion, mopping ineffectively at the slow ooze of tears, but with the notorious Helen, on the loose again since her last divorce … Laurence, poor, silly Laurence would be no match for her. Few drifting husbands had withstood the deceptive look of innocence in those wide blue eyes, the rose-bud lips that were always a little parted, revealing two perfect teeth, the long golden hair, which, when it was not bundled under a hunting cap, hung about her face in a carefully arranged confusion.

  Pull yourself together, Marion told herself, you can’t behave like this. It’s all over. You’ve parted. But she was becoming aware that her body, ignoring common-sense decisions, had a life and determination of its own and, crying out for Laurence’s body it managed to suggest that the much vaunted triumph of mind over matter could well be a Pyrrhic victory. Marion sat on, oblivious of everything but the raw ache of her misery until T.T.’s angry face was suddenly framed in the doorway. ‘Where’s Brenda?’ she demanded and then, without waiting for an answer, she added, ‘I want the horses taken home at once; Grey Miller won’t be jumping in the Fault and Out.’

  *

  Laurence Keswick’s chief sensation on seeing his wife had been of anger. The irritation of finding her acting as extra dogsbody to his cousin had turned to anger as he realised that the letter he’d received from the interfering old woman that morning had probably been prompted by some confidence of Marion’s. No doubt she’d been pouring all her woes and all his iniquities into T.T.’s ear.

  His annoyance that their affairs were now known to a third person was increased by the sight of Marion creeping about looking broken and hideous. She always looked hideous when she was unhappy. The small, expressive, slightly monkey-face owed all its attractiveness to her vivacious personality and when her spirit failed there was no bone structure or feature of note to redeem her face from downright ugliness. And God knows when she’d last had her hair done; she was economising again, he thought angrily.

  He’d watched her earlier, looking from him to Helen with hurt, reproachful eyes. It was such a dog-in-the-manger attitude. She’d kicked him out — well, more or less — what right had she to complain? At least Helen tried to amuse. She didn’t nag or talk perpetually of money. She had a way of making you feel that you were the only man on earth as far as she was concerned, and though you knew you’d be lucky if it lasted six weeks that didn’t seem to matter; it was a wonderful antidote to the drear down-to-earthness of married life.

  Then realizing that it was almost his turn to jump he tightened his horse’s girths, mounted and walked him round. Concentrating all his attention on the ring he made sure he knew the course. They’d altered it for the Fault and Out, made it more complicated with sharper turns, and that treble they’d erected was a real stinker — a gate and a triple followed by parallel bars.

  *

  Greedily Mrs. Pratt added up her winnings. The girls had done well today. Between them Sybs and ‘Gin had carried off all the junior jumping prizes but the third, and Liz and Top Ten had again won the Foxhunter. It had been a good class — eighty-two entries — but more important than that was the first prize of twenty-five pounds. Now she could pay Old Smiley for the horse-box repairs and stop the constant drain which hiring made on her resources. For the garage, knowing of Mrs. Pratt’s pecuniary difficulties, had refused to return her ramshackle, but now roadworthy, horse-box until they were paid for the repairs and Mrs. Pratt was too well known locally to be allowed to hire a cattle truck for anything but ready cash. Now, while the girls tried to pick up a few extra pounds in Ring Two where a children’s gymkhana was being held, Mrs. Pratt was staying near the cattle truck to keep an eye on Top Ten. Nothing must happen to him before tomorrow; another win and they’d be clear of the grey pinching poverty of the last few weeks. Not, mused Mrs. Pratt, that the cheques would arrive at once, but if the girls did well in the gymkhana — those were cash prizes — she began to calculate how much she’d be in pocket if the girls won all the gymkhana events, which they had done before now, for the well-fed, nicely brought-up Pony Club children were no match for the wiry little Pratts, who knew that their next meal depended upon their efforts.

  They’d stop on the way home and buy a joint, thought Mrs. Pratt, and at the thought she felt her salivary glands go into action. Syb’s jodhpur boots would have to be mended — the soles were flapping — and perhaps, she thought wistfully, there would be something left for a drink. She climbed up the ramp of the cattle truck and stood looking at her ugly little bay horse with anxious, avaricious eyes. If only they could keep him right; he’d be up-graded before long, of course, but until then he was a real money spinner.

  *

  Helen Farrell, free of Farrell the ship’s engineer she had fallen for on a cruise round the Greek Islands and married, despite the objections of her father, Lord Creech, had taken up show jumping again as an outlet for her restless energy, while she considered her position and decided on her next move. As a young girl she’d been quite well known and had had two really good horses, but now the price of a Grade A jumper was so exorbitant, she had decided that a promising young horse, which she could ride in Foxhunters and Grade C classes, was all she could possibly afford. Devon Lad had gone well, he’d been seventh today — just in the money. He hadn’t touched a fence, it was just that she hadn’t liked to hurry him in the jump-off against the clock. If you hurried a youngster too soon he lost his head; you had to wait until they had a bit of experience before you rode all out to win. Now, with her horse boxed and ready for home, she was waiting to see Laurence Keswick jump in the Fault and Out. She looked across the collecting ring at him. Dark and lean and hard; madly attractive, she thought, and possessing all the culture that Jim Farrell had lacked. Poor Jim, she’d allowed sensuality to sweep her away there, but it was quite natural after that long dreary year with Bruce Cordil — her second husband, an immensely rich, but as
it turned out, miserly, industrial magnate. The frugal living had soon palled and his baldness, with which she’d been prepared to put up in the expectation of unlimited spending money, had become daily more repulsive. Then there were the endless dinners when she was supposed to make herself pleasant to the most incredible people: poisonous politicians, bulging dithering Lady Mayoresses and the dreary, over-dressed wives of Bruce’s business associates; and all she’d got out of it were some very ordinary diamonds. After that it wasn’t surprising that she’d begun again convinced that love was all that mattered. But life with Jim hadn’t been exactly a bed of roses. Oh, the crashing boredom of having him around all day, those long, long days between the nights of love. Naturally she’d persuaded him to give up his job, of what use was a husband perpetually at sea? She’d assured him that she could pay for everything and how furious he’d been when he found the drawer in the writing-table stuffed with unpaid bills and learned the state of her bank account. Now, though Daddy had forked out a little, the situation was still difficult, especially since she’d bought the horse, Land Rover and trailer and taken up jumping again. She wondered if old T.T. was really going to leave Laurence Keswick her quarter of a million. Laurence had said no, she was just as likely to leave it to a cat’s home when it came to the point. And then there was the immediate future. One thing’s certain, thought Helen, I’m not marrying just for love again. Whoever wants my body can jolly well pay through the nose for it. Why should women keep on giving, giving, giving, the whole time? Men are such selfish brutes.

  *

  To Hugh Chesterfield’s relief his mother had not been in her usual high spirits. Instead of excited and voluble she had been quiet and preoccupied and Hugh, who at seventeen believed that one’s sole duty in life was to conform to the point of being totally indistinguishable as an individual when among one’s own sort, had been spared hours of gnawing embarrassment. Normally, his younger sister’s epic jump-off against the Pratts would have sent his mother scurrying round amongst her friends and acquaintances to recount each moment in a loud, excitable voice. She expected equal enthusiasm from her listeners and was quite unaware that however pleased they felt about Sarah’s successes, few of them could raise any interest in her accounts of how each contestant jumped every fence, whether they took off too soon or too late or whether it was just bad luck that they’d had a brick off the wall. But today she’d hardly spoken to her friends and even her denunciations of the Pratts’ pot-hunting habits had lacked their usual force and gusto.