by TP Fielden
But, as the dawn rose and she fought her way out of her tangled bed to trip over Mulligatawny, she realised what a mad idea it had been. Oh, ouch! Too much booze!
She rubbed her forehead and tried to think. On the grounds of cui bono – who benefits? – a wily political specimen like Hungerford would realise he’d be the first suspect. Plus how would he, at his age, haul a grown woman against her will up the winding staircase of the Templeton Light, then stick a knife in her?
The whole thing was preposterous, and while she waited for the kettle to boil, Judy wondered what other clues or leads from the loose-tongued Hamish Madden she’d managed to get down in her impeccable shorthand.
She opened her notebook. And couldn’t read a word.
How many whiskies did I drink? she wondered, bumping into the kitchen table and spilling her tea. ‘Oh, Mull! Get out of my way! Go and catch a mouse!’
She unlatched the front door to let him out, and brought in the milk and her copy of The Times. Then she sat down ignoring both. It can only be Sirraway, she thought – Sirraway! We know of no other person who’d got anything against Mirabel.
But even as she tried to put the pieces of the jigsaw together, she realised they didn’t fit. Sirraway had a motive – perhaps – to kill Sir Freddy, who’d rebuffed every approach the professor had ever made. If he’d stolen that land, Sirraway could prove it in court – certainly an easier route to satisfaction than death.
But that was Hungerford – Mirabel Clifford had done Sirraway no harm. She’d treated him gently when he sent her threatening letters even though, if she’d wanted, she could have directed the full force of the law against him. And Betty – who, after all, had got to know him – said Sirraway was peculiar, but harmless.
No, someone else killed Mirabel. It was all very upsetting – the more so because the hangover refused to allow Judy to hold a thought in her head for more than a moment.
The doorbell rang.
‘Morning, Hugue, I brought you the first ranunculus from the garden – aren’t they glorious?’
‘Lovely of you to come all this way, Auriol, but I don’t think I can face the fish market this morning.’ It was their Friday morning arrangement, once a month.
‘You look wretched. Is it flu?’
‘Whisky. Make more tea, talk to me.’
Auriol scrambled some eggs and they went out to eat them in the garden under the blossoming apple tree.
‘So you see – Mirabel. Sirraway. Freddy Hungerford. You’ll have to help.’
‘I knew about his peerage being blocked,’ confessed Auriol. ‘I suppose I should have told you, but Hugue, we always have so much to talk about when we see each other, I forgot.’
‘How did you know? Not that it really makes much difference.’
‘Arthur told me – heard it from some chap at his club. Apparently, a word came down from the Palace, and Hungerford’s name was quietly taken off the list. Something to do with Prince George – you know, the Queen’s uncle. He was a terribly naughty fellow and got tangled up in all sorts of things. It was one of his women.’
Judy turned her head slowly. ‘Something’s coming back to me. Sorry, it’s this hangover. Can you remember any more?’
‘Apparently, Hungerford milked this woman for all she’d got – he had a hold over her because he knew about her affair with the prince, and used it to suck her money away. She was made bankrupt, and then committed suicide.’
‘Pansy Westerham!’
‘Sorry?’
‘Her name wasn’t Pansy Westerham, by any chance?’
‘Couldn’t say. I don’t think Arthur mentioned it.’
As the tea and Auriol’s company restored her jangled grey matter, Miss Dimont put to one side her concerns about the death of Mirabel Clifford and focused instead on what she’d learned from Mrs Phipps – that Pansy Westerham was a married woman with a child who’d left her husband behind and come to London, where she’d used her considerable fortune to get close to the royal circle.
She’d fallen from a house, but her friend Bobbety Thurloe said was it was murder. If it was murder, as Mrs Phipps implied, it could have been the men who talked softly and carried the big stick. But lodged in the corner of Miss Dimont’s mind was the mention of the other man in Pansy’s life.
Could that man have been Freddy Hungerford? Could Pansy have been one of his rich dupes? Could he have taken all her money and, in despair, had she thrown herself from the roof of her house?
‘Unravel this, Auriol,’ she said, watching as Mulligatawny stalked slowly down the garden to join them. The sun was hot now, the bees were buzzing. ‘If Freddy Hungerford was the other man in Pansy Westerham’s life, it links him to her death – just as there’s a link between him and the death of Mirabel Clifford.’
‘You’re not suggesting Hungerford killed Mrs Clifford?’
‘Well, I thought about that – but it’s not possible. The connection has to be Sirraway.’
‘I can’t see how. He would never have mixed in those social circles before the war – not the type. He could never have known someone like Pansy Westerham.’
‘But he is implicated in Mirabel’s murder – I’m sure of that.’
‘Why are you trying to link these two deaths anyway?’ said Auriol, collecting up the cups. ‘Twenty-five years apart, two entirely different victims, two very different means of death. The common factor, I’ll grant you, is Hungerford. But that’s all.’
‘Just a moment,’ said Judy, and disappeared inside the house. Auriol remained behind to have a short discussion with Mulligatawny about whether it was a sign of contentment when he lay with his paws crossed. The question was still unresolved when Miss Dimont returned.
‘Come on,’ she said. ‘Get your tiara out!’
Tanfield Castle near Tavistock lay in a small valley fringed with oak trees and carpeted with early summer flowers. An avenue of poplars led to an ornate doorway with an elaborate coat of arms, while underneath stood the proud bearer of those arms, a bent but jolly old fellow clutching a bunch of delphiniums.
‘Have you ever seen such joy!’ he said, as the two women emerged from Auriol’s car. ‘Come in!’
In the space of five minutes the friends had learned that the Thurloes could trace their line back to the Norman Conquest, for nine centuries they’d made it a family policy to keep their noses clean and avoid political argument, they were well-off but not rich, and the roof tended to leak but only in extreme weather. There was a new vicar in the local church who wouldn’t stick, he rattled on too much for Bobbety’s liking, and flowers were his lifetime’s passion.
They were on to the Madeira pretty quickly – Judy knew she’d regret it but couldn’t resist the cut-glass goblet it came in – and quite soon came to the point.
‘Pansy Westerham.’
‘Yes,’ said Bobbety, leaning back and stretching his legs, ‘I remember her well – an absolute corker. There was something extraordinarily mysterious about her eyes – I can see them even now – she laughed a lot, but there was pain there. Not enough for you to want to ask questions, but enough for you to take notice when you were waltzing her round the dancefloor.’
‘I get the impression nobody knew where she came from,’ said Judy.
‘Oh, she was perfectly well-brought-up. And, you know, they didn’t need a copy of Debrett’s in the Embassy lobby to check your credentials, they could always tell. She was a lady all right.’
‘I think, Lord Thurloe,’ said Auriol, ‘that Miss Dimont was saying…’
‘For heaven’s sake, call me Bobbety – let us, with our second glass, dispense with formality. They call this stuff Rainwater, y’know, doesn’t taste like it, does it?’
‘Auriol,’ said Auriol, smilingly accepting his offer.
‘Huguette,’ said Judy. The opulent salon in which they sat somehow called for it.
‘How delicious that sounds,’ said Bobbety. ‘French, of course – no doubt we’re related, via the Norman Conq
uest.’
‘I would like to think so,’ replied Judy with a nod to the old gentleman’s courtesy, ‘but I doubt it. We are Belgian.’
‘A wonderful country, though perhaps I did not see it at its best when I was there in 1915. Now, what more about the extraordinary Pansy?’
‘Freddy Hungerford.’
‘Ah, yes,’ said the old man, wrinkling his nose. ‘Not a popular figure in our circle. Too harum scarum. An inveterate gambler both on the racetrack and in, ah, the boudoir. Enormous push, of course, and perfectly charming to talk to, but a bad ’un.
‘Back in the old Embassy days there were social circles, like rings on a duck pond. The tightest, the innermost circle, was the royal family – or the ones you saw, anyway – the Prince of Wales, Prince Bertie, Prince Harry, Prince George. Even Princess Mary occasionally.
‘The next ring out were the close friends of the royals, the ring after that the friends of the friends, and so on. Hungerford was about three rows back but acted as though he was right at the epicentre of our group. He wasn’t.’
‘Go on,’ said Judy, enjoying the moment so much she forgot her pledge not to touch the second glass.
‘Prince George was having an affair with Pansy, but then he was having affairs with others, too, even though he was married. A very naughty boy but, oh, so adorable! Anyway, while Georgy was otherwise occupied, Pansy was with Freddy. Who did what he always did – encouraged her to buy a racehorse, took her to Ascot and made her lose a fortune on bad bets, urged her to buy risky investments through broker friends of his which never paid off. And in the space of a couple of years, she was broke.
‘When she came to London she bought a small house in Knightsbridge, and the day she died she had been told it would be taken away from her to pay her debts. And, as Geraldine Phipps has told you, it is my belief she was murdered.’
‘Do you think Freddy Hungerford killed her? I can’t see why he would, but do you?’
‘It’s hard to say. He lived life so near the margins in those days and he’d always been pretty ruthless. But by that time he was an MP – would he risk a political career by murdering someone?’
‘If only there was a way to find out more.’
‘Well,’ said Bobbety, ‘the one person who knows where all the bodies are buried – I’m speaking figuratively, of course – is Lady Hungerford. You know, the German woman – she knows everything. It’s why he’s stayed with her all this time and never sought a divorce – a wife not being able to testify and all that, while a divorced wife is free to sing like a canary. He wouldn’t dare leave her.’
‘If she’s kept quiet all these years, she’s not likely to speak up now,’ said Auriol.
‘I imagine you’re right.’
‘You heard about the death of Mirabel Clifford?’ asked Miss Dimont.
‘Most regrettable. I heard it on the radio. She sounded a fine person – a welcome relief to voters after years and years of that charlatan.’
‘Do you see any similarities – any link – between the two deaths,’ asked Judy, ‘Mirabel and Pansy? Even though they were twenty-five years apart?’
The old gent climbed to his feet. ‘I don’t believe I do,’ he said, putting down his Madeira glass. ‘In fact not at all. But come and have some lunch.’
Oh, drat, thought Judy. Just for a moment I’d hoped…
Fortunately, Tubby Clayton had brought a spare set of notes for his Austerity Lunch speech, and Betty was able to charm them off him. ‘Wish I could stay,’ she trilled as she waved goodbye, ‘but it’s a busy week. Let me know if the lunch goes up in flames!’
This is just the sort of behaviour which can get local journalism a bad name, and Rudyard Rhys frowned on it – Betty was there to sit through the lunch, like it or lump it. But she’d used her wits – first rule of journalism – to get what was needed, and nobody could object to that.
She was in no hurry to get back to the office, however, and decided on a sandwich in the Signal Box Café. The bliss of not having to swallow that gruel and listen to ghastly talk about self-sacrifice!
As the café door opened with a ting, she saw Lovely Mary and David Renishaw huddled at a table over by the old signal levers.
‘Oh! Hello, everybody!’
‘Betty,’ said Renishaw, neither a greeting nor friendly.
‘Er – I just came in for a sandwich, Mary, but if you’re busy…’
‘It’s OK, I’m off,’ said Renishaw and almost rudely pushed past her. And when she thought of their night together in The Chinese Singing Teacher – what cheek!
‘Come you over here, maid,’ said Mary, ‘nice egg and cress, do you? Pot o’ tea?’
‘Oh yes please, Mary – sorry – was I intruding?’
‘No, no, we was just settling up.’
‘Oh, OK, thank you.’
Betty sat down and inspected her nail varnish which, as usual, had taken a battering from the old Underwood, wondering if Revlon made a special line for factory workers that she could get her hands on.
‘Here y’are,’ said Mary, and plonked a plump sandwich in front of her. She sat down opposite.
‘What’s wrong, Mary? You look upset.’
‘Yore Mr Renishaw. Just handed in his notice, off at the end of next week. Told me not to tell anybody, but seeing as it’s you, Betty.’
‘Has he found somewhere…?’ Betty was going to say ‘nicer’, Lovely Mary’s accommodation being a bit on the spartan side.
‘Off up back to Lunnun. A shame – he was a difficult one, but he always paid on time and made his own bed. Left the bathroom spick and span, like.’
Betty put down her sandwich. ‘He’s going, Mary? He never told me!’
‘He allus pays a week in advance. He just says, This is the last one Mary, I’m off.’
‘Why? What?’
‘Had a row with your editor. Editor told him what to do, Mr Renishaw told the editor he couldn’t run a bicycle shop let alone a paper.’
‘I had supper with him only the other… he never mentioned it to me!’
Lovely Mary was looking at the sandwich on Betty’s plate with pride; she took pleasure in her handiwork. ‘Eat up now, I put a bit of extra in there just for you.’
‘It’s a wonderful sandwich, Mary, but I can’t – how could he leave without telling me?’
If Mary had an answer to that she kept it to herself. ‘He’s very disillusioned,’ she said. ‘He told me he had hopes of staying here for ever, but in the end he felt there were too many things in his way. He was never going to get forward.’
‘A bit too clever for us, Lovely.’
‘I wouldn’t altogether say that,’ said Mary, without elucidating.
‘He came with secrets, he’s going with secrets,’ replied Betty, testing.
‘You could certainly say that,’ said Mary and got up. There was something she wasn’t telling.
Betty followed her over to the kitchen. ‘Did he say where he was going? What his plans were?’
Mary gave her a searching look.
‘We went out a few times,’ explained Betty. ‘I’d like…’
‘Oh, like that, was it? You do surprise me! I didn’t think he liked women – not the other thing, you know, just not interested. Didn’t look at my Molly once, and everyone looks at my Molly, more’s the worry.’
‘No, Mary, not like that, but I had hopes he’d help me get to Fleet Street. He has connections.’
‘Does ’e?’ said Mary gruffly.
‘There’s something you’re not telling me, Mary.’
‘There’s lots I don’ share about, maid. A still tongue makes a wise head.’
‘You’re dying to tell me.’
‘Oh, go on then. There’s a daughter, see, who writes. Would be about twelve or thirteen. Lives with her aunt, or something, calls her Aunty anyway. Talks about her dead mother a lot.’
‘No, no, that can’t be right – he divorced Mrs Renishaw. He told me. Unless she died recently.’
/> ‘A couple of years ago by the sound of it.’
Betty stared at her. ‘You’ve been going through his…!’ she started, but then bit her tongue. Wasn’t she guilty of the self-same crime?
‘Though personally I’ll miss the money,’ said Lovely Mary. ‘I think you’ll find quite a lot of people will be happy when our Mr Renishaw leaves town.’
Will I? thought Betty mournfully.
Oh hell, I’ll have to give Dud another whirl…
Twenty-Two
Like a church congregation, the massed ranks of the Fleet Street press corps sat silently, as if in prayer. Their reverence was directed not towards some celestial being, however, but the lavish dinner which had just been laid before them.
Their leader rose to say grace: ‘Thank God for a murder!’ and was greeted with a gale of raucous laughter.
Behind the hilarity, however, lay a serious concern. The general election was eating up virtually every square inch of their newspapers’ pages, which meant that the parliamentary writers had their hands full and were pleading with their bosses for a few extra hands on deck. These men of crime, under-utilised, were in danger of being seconded to election duties which as far as they were concerned was a step down – severely reduced expenses, no Page One bylines, and having to mix with politicians, a type of person they neither knew nor trusted. Life was much safer among criminals.
‘The Gevrey Chambertin ’54!’ commanded Guy Brace of the Daily Herald.
The wine waiter Peter Potts leaned anxiously forward. ‘If I’m not mistaken, sir, it did not find favour with yourself last time you was here.’
‘What? Nonsense!’ barked Brace. ‘It’s a very fine wine, though I don’t expect you to know that. The largest village-named appelation in the Côte de Nuits, pure sunshine in a bottle!’
‘At the price we’re charging, I wouldn’t want you to be disappointed again, Mr Brace.’
‘What? Bring me the bottle, there’s a good fellow – in fact bring two while you’re at it!’
With the summer season not quite on its feet, a good murder in Temple Regis was a wonderful boost for the Grand. Other hoteliers in the resort looked on in envy whenever anything newsworthy occurred because as far as Fleet Street was concerned, there was no other place to stay, to eat, to drink, and to tell each other age-old stories they’d heard a million times before.