The Ellie Hardwick Mysteries Page 5

  ‘But you can’t see it. It’s hidden—it’s right up against a half height run of panelling.’

  ‘As I said—we’re thorough! Someone must have taken down a bit of the panelling to check for damp and observe the north face and he recorded what he saw on a photo—this one.’

  ‘There’s a bit more Latin,’ said Rupert, surprised. ‘But you’ve got me this time. I can’t translate that.’

  ‘I can,’ I said slowly. ‘It’s a continuation of the inscription about Aliénore. The whole thing reads: Hic iacet Alienora Iohannis Hartestis uxor et meretrix. A slap in the face from beyond the grave.’

  ‘Ellie—please stop showing off and tell me—what the hell does et meretrix mean?’

  ‘It means ‘‘and harlot’’. It says, ‘‘Aliénore—wife and harlot.’’ It means, Rupert, that Sir John considered his wife a—what did you say earlier?—a silly little trollop.’

  * * *

  We looked at each other steadily for a moment. The fire crackled. Somewhere a clock struck eleven.

  ‘What are you saying?’ Rupert’s voice was smooth and quiet.

  ‘I’m saying that for some men—for some families—the idea of the purity of the line was very important. We’ll never know whether your ancestor went as far as killing his lovely young wife—not unknown in those days—but the legitimacy of his offspring would have been vital to him. If Aliénore had been pregnant—inexplicably pregnant—and don’t forget that these old knights were quite frequently away from home, for years on end sometimes, then horrors might ensue on his return. If he suspected that a child born to his wife was not his, he might well have murdered her. And the child.’

  He listened without comment. We both knew I was really talking of Taro.

  ‘Of course, we wouldn’t have a problem nowadays,’ he said confidently. ‘DNA testing will sort out any paternity question.’

  ‘After the baby’s born,’ I said, ‘and by then it’s too late if it’s been accepted into a family which declares it never recognises illegitimate children.’

  ‘You’re saying that Taro was killed for a family reason. By me, in fact?’

  Before I could answer Edward strode into the room. He had changed into a black jersey and light linen trousers. I stared. I had been too quick to write him off as a waxed jacket and wellies type. He was slim and tall with stronger features but the same thick floppy hair as his son. An impressive man.

  ‘Dad!’ Rupert greeted him. ‘How did he take it? Is he all right?’

  ‘Of course. What would you expect? He took it well. His heart may be a bit dicky but there’s nothing wrong with his mental equipment. Steady as ever. He grasped the situation at once.’

  ‘Thank God for that! But Grandpa’s going to need all his bottle if what your architect here has worked out turns out to be correct.’ He threw a challenging smile at me. ‘She’s solved our crime! Move over Dick Jennings—you’ve been superseded by an art historian! And I grieve to tell you, Dad, it’s down to you or me! Eeny, meeny, miney, mo, catch a killer by his toe! She’s trying to decide which one of us did it! Come and look at this!’

  Edward smiled bleakly and came to join us at the table. I wasn’t amused. If my guesses were correct, with Rupert on one side and his father on the other, I was sitting shoulder to shoulder with a murderer. But on which side? A further chilling thought occurred to me—could they both be involved? At Edward’s invitation I went haltingly through my theory again.

  ‘A family thing. Yes, I believe you could be right, Ellie,’ Edward said. ‘But have you considered that if Rupert is not the father of the child . . .’ He turned to Rupert and said almost apologetically, ‘Oh, come on, let’s face it, Rupe, old son, you were out of your skull for most of the time till a few weeks ago and I don’t think you had a clue about what was going on in Taro’s life . . . then someone else is the father. That prat Theo what’s his name? Imagine—Taro tells him she’s marrying Rupert and giving up the modelling business. He’s about to lose his cash cow and his prospective child. ‘‘Okay,’’ he tells her, ‘‘I’ll bow out of your life but how about one last shoot to send me on my way? A golden handshake from the glossies . . . I’ve had a terrific idea for a location . . . And we’ll be able to stuff it up these Hartest prigs! Imagine their faces when they see the pics!’’ How does that sound? Revenge killing? Spite? Crime of passion?’

  He was interrupted by Mrs. Rose who just had time to announce Detective Inspector Jennings when he came striding into the room. Settling down with a cup of coffee and placing his mobile phone importantly on the table in front of him along with his notepad, he smiled round at the small group, gathering our attention. My opinion of the police is not high but I thought that this inspector might just raise it a notch or two. He looked keen and energetic and clever. I just wished he’d been a little less impressed by the Hon Edward.

  ‘I’ll be needing your individual statements, of course, and when I’ve finished what I have to say, I’ll send in an officer to take them. There have been developments,’ he announced with satisfaction. His phone rang as though on cue and he snatched it up and listened eagerly.

  ‘You’ve got him? Good lad! Where?’ He looked at us and, involving us in his triumph, ‘In his flat? You don’t say! He must have burned some rubber down the A12! Flinging his passport into a bag? This guy’s no Ronnie Biggs is he? Get the prints did you? What’s his story then?’ He listened avidly, occasionally chortling, occasionally cursing gently and finally switched off.

  Stretching out his legs and leaning back in his chair, he announced, ‘I’m pleased to say we’ve made an arrest! My London colleagues have picked up Theo Tindall in his Islington flat and charged him with the murder of Taro Tyler.’ He looked at his watch. ‘Has to be a record!’ Then he added thoughtfully, ‘Almost seems too easy . . .’

  We didn’t interrupt him and he went on, ‘We got a statement from Mrs. Wentworth at Parsonage Cottage. Very good witness. She keeps an eye out for visitors to the church, in fact she unlocks at six a.m. and locks up again at dusk. She thought it was odd that tourists would come roaring up at seven so she took down their details, car make and number, the lot. Two people went into the church carrying a couple of bags. She noticed the girl was dressed like a bride and then she recognised them. Those guests at the Hall who’d giggled all the way through Matins last Sunday. They’d been sitting in a pew up by the table tomb. Gossip was that the girl was a model. Well that made sense didn’t it? Catching the morning light for one of those fancy photos. Mrs. Wentworth went off watch. She noticed that the car drove away half an hour later, going rather fast but then young men always drive like that don’t they?’

  ‘We noticed a bloody finger print on the tomb,’ Edward said.

  ‘Yes, we’ve got it. That’ll be checked by the morning but he admits it’s his. Swears he didn’t murder her but his story’s a bit thin! Says they were all lined up for the shot, she spread out on the tomb in her draperies, when the light shifted and he decided he needed a different camera and a bit of extra equipment from the car. He nipped out to get it and came back minutes later to find her dead. Denies taking the dagger to the church as part of the props and says the first he’d seen of it was the handle sticking out of the body. Says he tried to pull it out. People will do that! Can’t seem to keep their hands off. Yanking the knife out kills the poor bugger they’re trying to save as often as not . . . Well, if he did there’ll be prints there as well.’

  He paused again, thinking aloud. ‘Neat, all sewn up, you might say. Yes, very neat and tidy . . . Anyway, he got some blood on his hand, panicked and ran off. Says he felt sure someone was in the church watching him and he thought he might be next for the chop. It all sounds so feeble, it could just be the truth . . . We’ll need a motive, of course. If he did take the dagger from the Hall, then it was premeditated. Her manager, I understand? I’d feel easier if we knew why he’d done it. Wondered if you . . .?’

  ‘Oh, yes, Richard. I think we can supply you
with a motive,’ said Edward smoothly.

  * * *

  The sound of a shot from the floor above wiped the triumph from his face.

  My three companions all jumped to their feet looking at each other with total dismay.

  Rupert was the first to move. ‘Grandpa!’ he yelled. ‘That’s from Grandpa’s room!’

  He started to the door. Edward and the inspector ran after him. I lingered behind just long enough to cast an eye over the inspector’s belongings abandoned on the table. There was something I had to find out without anyone noticing. Shifty but determined, I picked up his mobile and, one eye on the door, began to scroll through his phone book. I told myself what I was doing was in the interests of justice—and self-preservation.

  I scrambled after the others, hurrying up the staircase and along a corridor. Rupert burst into the room at the end and we all gathered behind him, keeping to the doorway. Peering over Jennings’ shoulder I could just make out the body of an old man wearing a camouflage-patterned sweater and dark cord trousers slumped across his desk under the window. A service revolver lay on the floor by his right hand. The wall to his left was spattered with blood. Edward put an arm around his son and hugged him, both men’s faces white with shock.

  Jennings went into action. ‘Stay back,’ he said unnecessarily. No one was trying to get close. He went to the desk and went through the automatic and superfluous gestures of checking the body for vital signs then abandoned this ritual and noticed the arrangement on the desk top. A large iron key was acting as paperweight for a single sheet of hand-written paper. He looked at it and waved to Edward. ‘Come and have a look at this,’ he said quietly. ‘Looks like a suicide note and it’s addressed to you. Edward.’

  Edward went forward and began to read aloud. He needn’t have done this and I wondered why he was involving us all in this way. More showmanship? I thought so.

  ‘My dearest Eddie, forgive me. I killed that friend of Rupert’s. Woman was a strumpet and did not deserve the honour he was about to bestow on her. I came down for a night-cap late last night and heard her planning—with that appalling photographer chap who’s been infesting the place—to defile the family tomb. Couldn’t have that. Made my preparations. I got to the church before them and let myself in through the vestry door on the north side using this old key. No one saw me. I hid and when the chap left the church to fetch something from his car I stabbed the girl with the dagger I’d taken from the display in the drawing room. I waited with the intention of terminating his miserable existence as well—I meant to snap his rabbit neck—but he was off like a flash. I couldn’t have caught him. I’m a bit decrepit these days but not as bad as I’ve been making out. In fact, I was faking my condition. I took to my room to avoid meeting this dreadful pair of limpets. In any case—it occurred to me that he was more useful to us alive—he’d make a jolly useful suspect, damn his hide! I trust Rupert will learn from this fiasco and one day he’ll be able to find a decent girl. God bless you both. Who dies? Eh?’

  As he read I looked around the room, anywhere but at the poor, shattered body. I took in the military neatness of his arrangements, the bed already made, the books lined up on his bedside table. The only untidy item in the room was a pair of pyjamas lying in a crumpled heap on the bed. A discordant note in this precisely organised room. Fearful of what I might find, unnoticed by the others, I edged nearer, put out a hand and touched them. I looked at the carafe of water and the bottle of pills on the bedside table and I moved around until I could see the label and the contents.

  What I saw confirmed all my fears.

  * * *

  Hours later after a sketchy lunch in which no one was interested and a tea tray in the library which seemed to have become the operations room, the police had finally left. Statements had been taken, frantic phone calls made, ambulances, police vehicles, pathologist and undertaker had gone about their business and, somewhere in the Islington nick I hoped that someone had thought to release Theo Tindall.

  * * *

  It had been a long, weary and sickening day but finally a weight seemed to have lifted from Edward Hartest. He poured me a glass of sherry, having, on one pretext or another, prevented my leaving for the last two hours. ‘Nonsense! Not in the way at all! I can never apologise enough for dragging you into such a grisly family scene but we’ve both been glad you were here. Kept us in touch with sanity in an increasingly mad scenario, you might say. And you were right, you see, Ellie, about the motive. Purity of the line. It meant a lot to my father.’ He fell silent, plunging into painful thought. Recovering himself he said, more brightly, ‘Ellie? Now that’s short for Eleanor isn’t it? And funnily enough, that’s the modern spelling of Aliénore. Did you know that? Your surname’s Hardwick? One of the Norfolk Hardwicks are you? Then your family are apple growers? You must know a good deal about apples?’

  Suspicious and disturbed by his change of tone, I admitted that I did.

  ‘Look, before you go, you must take a stroll in the orchard with me. The blossom’s wonderful at the moment. We’ve got some very special old strains that might interest an expert.’

  The thought of wandering under the trees in the scented twilight with the handsome dark lord was making my knees quiver. I tried to fix an interested smile and appear relaxed but all my senses were screaming a warning.

  For two men who’d just suffered a double bereavement, Rupert and Edward were charming hosts. But it was more than noblesse obliging them to put on a good show—they were hanging on to me because my presence was a necessary buffer between them. When I had gone they would be left alone with each other, with recriminations perhaps and with much sorrow. For the moment I presented them with the need to behave normally. I got to my feet, picking up my bag. I had to take my leave carefully, raising no suspicion that I knew a huge injustice had been done and that one of these charming men was a killer, a killer with the deaths of a young girl, her unborn child and an innocent old man on his conscience.

  Neither man had an alibi for the time of the murder. Rupert was thought to have been in bed and had made a rather stagey appearance in his bathrobe at ten thirty. Edward had told the police in his straightforward way that, as usual, he’d been working by himself in the fields since six o’clock. If the Inspector cared to ask, any one of what he called his chaps might be able to state that they’d spotted him out in the pightle, mending the tractor. Somehow I thought his chaps might be queuing up, tugging their forelocks, to do just that.

  The killer was probably trying to calculate how much I had worked out for myself, assessing from my behaviour how urgently I was trying to get away to raise the alarm, perhaps even working on a scheme to ensure my discretion—or my silence.

  Rupert scrambled to his feet and firmly took my bag. ‘No, it’s all right, Dad! The last thing Ellie wants is to go wandering round a damp orchard at this time of night. We’re not all apple freaks you know! I’ll walk you to your car, Ellie . . . No, I insist! It’s a bit dark down the lane now,’ he said. ‘You left it in front of the church, didn’t you?’

  And we set off together to walk down the tree-lined driveway to the church. He took my hand and held it tightly with what might have been interpreted as friendly concern.

  Distantly, the reassuring sound of the blue and white plastic ribbons outlining the crime scene flapping in the evening breeze was reaching my ears. We crunched on in silence down the gravel. Not much further to go. My hand curled round my car keys in the right hand pocket of my jeans. Fifty yards.

  At the bottom of the drive, Rupert abruptly put down my bag, pulled me into the deep shadow of a lime tree, turned to face me and put two hands on my shoulders. ‘You know don’t you?’ he said.

  I shivered under his hands. ‘Yes, I do,’ I said defiantly.

  ‘And I want to know what you’re proposing to do about it.’

  Keeping my voice level and unconcerned I said, ‘Nothing. That’s what I’m proposing to do. Who would listen to me in the face of so much ev
idence pointing so convincingly in a different direction? You’ve said it, Rupert—or was it your father?—It’s a family thing. You can sort it out between you.’

  ‘How did you guess?’

  ‘It was no guess! Sharp observation and intelligent deduction!’ I couldn’t let him intimidate me. I looked anxiously down the lane, trying to make out the outline of my old Golf. Could I outrun him if he got angry? Probably not.

  ‘It was the pills that gave it away.’ I spoke with confidence. I think I even managed a flourish. No one ever attacked Miss Marple in the middle of one of her explanations. And somehow this felt like a dénouement.

  ‘Pills, Ellie? What do you mean?’

  ‘In your grandfather’s room. All that stuff about his bad heart and being room bound—no one considered he could have done the killing but then, in his confession, he tells the world that it was all a bluff and, stiffening his old sinews, he does a commando-style exercise in the church for the sake of the family honour. Well, the police are happy they’ve worked out the bluff but they didn’t think as far as a double bluff! The pill bottle by his bed, Rupert—it was half empty. He’d been taking whatever it was in there all right. And what was in there—I looked at the label—was a heavy duty heart disease prescription. My aunt had the same thing. So, your grandfather hadn’t pretended—he was genuinely a heart attack victim and there’s no way he could have done what he confessed to! He was owning up to a crime he didn’t commit because he knew who had done it and was taking the blame for someone very dear to him. Paying the bill. For the family. Making sure that Hartest lives if you like.’ I added softly, ‘Ensuring your future, Rupert.’

  ‘I don’t know what to say. What can I do?’ He seemed suddenly helpless and disarmingly childlike. ‘I thought you’d worked it all out. Could be a bit of a problem . . .’

  He thought for a moment and went on: ‘You know he’s mad, don’t you?’ he said. ‘You’d have to be a bit mad, wouldn’t you to kill like that and be prepared to let an innocent man—two innocent men—take the blame?’