Murder in the Rough Read online

  “Ted and I swore silence until only one of us was left, you see.”

  No, I still didn’t see. There must be honor among thieves and servants. Different reasons, of course.

  “And?”

  He seemed so sad. “Now I’ve spoken to you, son. I sent Joe Winter with those old golf balls, hoping you’d buy them. Judge Wymond would outbid you. It would set you off hunting like you usually do, and bring things to light.”

  Nothing for it, so I asked, “What for, Benny?”

  “Could you help make reparation?”

  The way he said it meant reprisals, sanctions or something worse. One thing troubled me.

  “Who’s the rich bird? Mrs. Margrave? You heard her hire me. She’s a Norwich dealer, coming through the Eastern Hundreds.”

  “What makes you think I know her?”

  “Dunno.”

  But I did know. An exquisite woman draws everybody’s eyes, other women’s because they hate her on sight, men’s because we’re busy lusting after her legs. And if she’s got money, or says she’s an antique expert, then the one who takes no notice—in this case Benny—is definitely odd.

  He sighed. “I’d better tell you. The lady in the grave is the De Haviland daughter, Thalia. Unwed, she had a child.” He paused, stared frowning at some distant memory, then continued, “By a member of staff at the great house.”

  Decades ago, we’d have all been horrified at such dynamite scandal. Now we just wonder who the bab is, how it got on.

  “I’m sorry if I give offense, son,” he said quietly, like he was revealing some horrendous outrage. “But I’d best let you know.”

  “Why me, Benny?”

  “Other dealers forget that it’s people that matter, not furniture and pottery and money.”

  He was speaking heresy. Antiques and women first, and everything else nowhere. That was my law.

  “Look, Benny,” I said, uneasy at this turn in the conversation.

  “Please, son. My illness doesn’t give me long. I want it finished.”

  Suddenly I took a good look at him. He was a lot thinner. But how often did I actually stare at him on a Friday in his inglenook? His clothes hung on him. His hands looked transparent. I’d seen one of my uncles fade like this, from… I hated the idea.

  “And Thalia?”

  “She was… very beautiful.” He halted. The word took him by surprise. Perhaps he didn’t use words like that very often. “She had the baby in the east wing. Old Dr. Lambourne from Horkesley moved in during her last month. The baby was sent away and brought up elsewhere. Avoiding tittle-tattle is vital for society people.”

  I vaguely remembered hearing something about a daughter. A riding accident came to mind. Was it folklore, invented by a determined rich family, to cover up dreaded rumor?

  “Judge Donald Wymond—only the family lawyer back then—was being put up for the council by the De Haviland family. He often stayed. The scandal would have ended his ambitions.”

  “What happened to Thalia?”

  “She… died. There were tales, of course, below stairs. No way to stop those. Me and Teddy Winter were paid extra, to pass on funds silently for the child’s education and upbringing.”

  “You’re after revenge,” I said, like pass the marmalade.

  “Yes,” he said simply.

  “Then tell me who killed Thalia.”

  “I’m sure of the assassination, but not of the assassin.” His eyes looked opaque. “You’ll find out if it really was Wymond or not.”

  “Assassin” was an odd word. I would have asked more, but he started to nod off. His words were already blurred. I borrowed the fare home, brewed some tea for him and left him facing the river.

  There was a motor by my cottage when I reached home, and a note from Mrs. Margrave that it was hired in her name for me to start the sweep.

  The rest of that day I proudly drove my hired crate to visit anyone who might know of local historical scandals, and to dealers who were addicts of sporting memorabilia.

  My most significant visit was to a golf club steward. Jocko was a beefy retired bobby who joked that his girth increased three inches a year.

  “Free booze and grub, see?”

  “Lucky you,” I said enviously. “And free dossing, eh?”

  The golf course was on a peninsula by the estuary. You couldn’t imagine a more peaceful—read boring—scene. Golf links stretched here and there, flags marking holes, people dragging those carts about, rain sleeting down. The clubhouse was vast, its walls adorned with trophies. Everything was clubs, emblems, coats of arms of societies. God but golf crazies have a lot to answer for. Imagine what the world could achieve if it stopped wasting time like this.

  “Idyllic, isn’t it?” he said mistily.

  “Great, Jocko,” I lied. “Marvelous sport, golf, eh?”

  “The greatest. Did you know that Mary Queen of Scots shot a truly terrible round at St. Andrews when she played there?”

  “Well, it was a bad winter.”

  He sighed. “What I’d give for one of her golf clubs. Did you hear that an old iron club went for an eighth of a million the other day?”

  “Yes.” I hate hearing about other dealers’ successes, so I quickly changed to another lie. “Look, Jocko. I’ve got two funny-shaped clubs. Wood, stamped ‘Morris’ in capital letters. Any notion who’d give me the best price?” He gaped, speechless. I love the sight of greed. “They’re not up to much. Some string’s loose. I’ll stain them when I get a minute.”

  “Don’t touch them!” he shouted, then gathered himself. “Er, I wouldn’t, mate. You say you’ve got two?”

  Greed is the king of emotions. I watched Jocko with fascination. His hands started to tremble.

  “I’ve a few letters to go with them,” I invented recklessly. “I’m having difficulty milking the widow of her Spode trophy, though. Spode’s always got a market.”

  “Please let me see them all,” he said in a strangled voice. “I’ll sell them for you. Promise.”

  “Who on earth to?” Casually I wandered across the lounge to look at some drab painting hung beside the bar. It showed hundreds of people watching some nerks putting in a torrential downpour. It looked like a copy of J. Michael Brown’s 1913 painting of the thirteenth hole at St. Andrews. The original painting is pretty awful, even though it sold for a fortune, but this copy was sheer tat. This is what I mean about addicts. Some certifiable goon had actually paid to have Brown’s picture copied. “Just look at this. Who’d give it house room?”

  “I know, mate,” Jocko said, overacting like mad and thinking this was his lucky day. “These golfers.” I stared at his list of past club presidents and officers. “Once this bar gets crowded, they talk of nothing else. Drives me mad.”

  “Even got judges and doctors playing it, eh?” I indicated the list. “Old Doc Lambourne from Horkesley.”

  “Passed away years ago. Surly old sod.”

  “And Judge Wymond. He once sent me down for a month.”

  “Aye. Not all active, though. Judge Wymond’s in Norwich now, but keeps up his membership. Big in the proposed new club, they say. Lots of our members are in the syndicate.”

  “Not my scene, Jocko.” I made to leave as if disinterested.

  “Can I take those old golf items off your hands, Lovejoy?” He was sweating at the prospect of losing a fortune.

  “Honest?” I went all shrewd. “Don’t think I’ll give them away, Jocko. I know you’re a mate, but I want a fair price. I’ve heard those golf collectibles are popular in some circles.”

  “I’ll see you right, honest. There’s a member I know who’d buy golf historicals, comes in on Fridays.”

  We struck a deal. I felt really good, giving him the chance of a lifetime like that. He’d sell the golfiana that I’d discovered in my friendly widow’s attic, giving me a flat rate of 20 percent. He’d show me invoices. I would certify the items as genuine. I would not attempt any restoration. He wanted to draw up a legal docume
nt there and then, trying to bribe me with malt whiskeys. I declined. I wouldn’t use malt whiskey to do my teeth. Anyhow, all real antique deals are done on the nod. I felt I’d done him proud—if anything I’d said was true, that is. I’m always willing to help a friend.

  I stayed up all night, to be ready for Fern Margrave in the morning.

  It’s one of life’s most sinister truths that lawyers grab headlines while doctors, if they’ve any sense, don’t. That interesting link stayed in my dull brain: Wymond was an old golfing partner of Dr. Lambourne. The judge was retired now and Lambourne deceased. With these facts in mind, I phoned Lisa—she of the foul language, M.A. (Sociology), and stringer for the local newspaper—asking her to suss out details of past tragedies at the De Haviland manor. I promised her money and a scoop.

  “On a scale of ten, Lovejoy,” she demanded, cold, “how would you score this particular promise?”

  “Ten, love,” I said. There was a brief silence.

  “Are you really as sad as you sound?”

  “Worse,” I said. “Ring me, Lisa.”

  “Okay,” she sighed, “but just this once get my name right. It’s Lizzza.”

  Who can remember details, for heaven’s sake? I tried to doze on my grotty divan bed. The phone went at two in the morning. She’d got photocopies from the old extinct News Standard, with reports of a young woman’s accidental death. The coroner’s court had waxed lyrical over Miss Thalia De Haviland’s tragic demise, caused by taking herbal remedies for a mild stomach complaint. The doctor—guess who—was highly praised for his attempts to resuscitate the poor lass. The coroner ruled that there was no suggestion of suicide. She had presumably awoken, drowsily taken the wrong medicine and passed away peacefully in her sleep. A mercy, said the coroner, and God rest her soul. The family mourned.

  “Rumors kept surfacing, Lovejoy,” Lisa told me, reading stuff out. “A lawyer reviewed the case and said it was all tickety-boo. The family expressed gratitude.”

  The coroner was promoted very soon after. And Wymond sailed on, so to speak, to pastures new. Local dignitaries were content, and all was well.

  Until now, when poor Bendix started to die, and old Teddy Winter, his mate, passed away. Bendix wanted action before he went. I couldn’t afford an Ordnance Survey map of the area, so made Lisa promise to drop one off for me in the morning.

  “Is this the scoop?” she demanded.

  “Tell you soon, Lisa. Don’t forget the map.”

  The old De Haviland place still looked quite grand in the morning air, yet somehow it seemed to have shrunk, as if its brickwork was being whittled as the surrounding grounds dwindled. The trout farm was hived off, signs indicating where anglers could stand, and the oak wood had become some kind of nature reserve. Three distant pastures were now filled with bungalows, a milk float clinking around the cul-de-sacs. It took me a while to work out where Bendix must have been standing to paint his one contribution to world art so many years before.

  The field was a mere paddock, a lone donkey contemplating the infinite. Twelve trees stood in a circle, with a thirteenth standing alone in the center. I wondered how long ago those had been planted so precisely. How fast does a tree grow? Could they shoot up to that height in thirty years? East Anglians say that trees planted in a ring, with one in the center, mark some ancient tribal king’s barrow, from before the Romans came. Local farmers do it from superstition. I walked about the overgrown corner looking for Thalia’s small tumulus. Finally I persuaded myself that I’d found it, where the grass seemed more tussocky than elsewhere, but wasn’t sure because of the vicious brambles and hawthorns. Now, it’s quite legal to bury a relative on your own ground. You don’t need a religious service, free country and all that. There are even societies that will arrange burials in woodlands and on remote moors. Lisa had found no mention of the interment in her old newspapers.

  It would have been quite okay—if Thalia died naturally, that is. And everybody at the time had said so.

  Folding the map against the wind, I checked that nothing was marked for this corner. To the right, however, beyond the manor house was a series of huge new mounds, great bare swellings. I could hear engines revving and see puffs of diesel smoke. Margrave’s rubbish dump was active. I drove my whining little motor to see.

  Marjorie wasn’t there, but a couple of workmen in orange jackets directed the arriving trucks. Vaguely worded signs announced that this was an “authorized disposal facility” run by J. T. Margrave & Co. It seemed a hell of an area. A bloke came over, stocky, gruff.

  “Commercial or domestic?” he asked.

  “Eh?”

  “Commercial, you pay per truckload. Domestic rubbish you dump free.”

  “Why’ve you got four dumping spots instead of one?” I waited. His eyes narrowed. “This field’s seventeen acres. I thought you blokes did it inchwise, not random.” As I watched, a truck roared in, was waved to the far corner to shed its load of rubble. The driver handed an envelope to one of the workmen.

  “You a clever dick? It’s my orders.”

  So he was Margrave. I said I’d go to the council dump instead and cleared off. It was too early for a scrap, and anyway, I had to collect Mrs. Margrave. I was sure now that I was being had. I didn’t blame Bendix, him being poorly and all.

  The Margrave address was in what people call a leafy suburb. We all try to make our dingy streets sound like Los Angeles, dunno why. I knocked, and got admitted by some old dear who offered me breakfast. I brightened, but Fern Margrave swept in and said we had to be off. I obeyed.

  There’s something really odd about antiques. If you’re broke, you see Rembrandts and Turners on every street barrow, a Wedgwood on every stall, and gorgeous women smile at you everywhere. If gelt’s bulging your wallet, there’s not a genuine antique anywhere, and the world’s full of anonymous miseries.

  Like now, chasing round the Eastern Hundreds. Antiques thronged the universe. Unbelievably, in seven hours we picked twenty worthwhile antiques. Two were genuine Meissen, though it was hard work having to keep explaining to Fern Margarve (“Yes, missus. The base is always covered with leaves and florals; the figure looks separately made,” etc.)—God, did she argue. I got sick of her. I kept telling her the obvious: “No, missus, you can’t trust the mark, because every faker on earth copied the Meissen crossed swords, including Derby, Worcester, Bow…” I must have saved her a king’s ransom and earned her a fortune. Like, a set of Britain’s lead toy soldiers, including the marching band, wasn’t really antique, being only 1938, but I got it for the price of a meal. I had a hard time insisting that the boxed set would buy her a new motor. All I got was, “Toys?”

  She got on my nerves, trying to stop me buying her a Wellington chest complete with Bramah locks.

  “But it’s so ugly!” she grumbled. “And the back isn’t even polished. Nor are the insides of the drawers.”

  “Never are. Feel its weight, missus.” And when she couldn’t move it an inch, I told her sourly, “See? It’s heavy Cuban mahogany. The wood’s been impossible to get for the past hundred years. I’ve just earned you a year’s profit. We’ll do better if you shut up.”

  Even that didn’t stop her. I’d never met a woman like her for guessing wrong and grumbling at the expense. “Remember, this is my money, Lovejoy,” she kept saying, like I wasn’t aware I was only getting groats. She was so unlearned in antiques that she even tried to twist a pewter flagon, to test if it was genuine. I grabbed it from her in the nick of time, cursing. She gave me the one bit of knowledge she’d picked up: “It should give a kind of cry, if it’s genuine!” I set it back on the auctioneer’s tray, muttering that she wouldn’t like being twisted until she screamed. She stared at me after that and went quiet, but soon she was trying to scratch an ancient piece of jadeite jade with her diamond ring.

  “Right, missus,” I said in disgust. “That does it. I’m off. You’re a frigging barbarian. You’ve no bloody right to touch any antiques. Toodle-oo.”

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nbsp; “You can’t leave!” she cried, making people all over the viewing rooms turn and stare. “Not now that—”

  I froze. “Now that what?”

  “Now that I’ve got a decent collection for my antiques shop.”

  She had to think a few moments before the words came out. I let myself be persuaded, and on we went. That convinced me: She was no antique dealer.

  “North,” I told her as we stowed our—her—purchases in the motor. “Norwich.”

  I left Fern Margrave to bid for the items I’d marked in the catalog of an antique auctioneer a few miles outside Norwich. I’d carefully selected five items above Lot 200. The fastest auctioneer only manages fifty-six an hour, so I’d got at least three hours to drive to Judge Wymond’s home and get back in time.

  The house was a rambling affair, gables and gargoyles, slates off the roof and the drive overgrown. I drove up, gave the car door a convincing slam and knocked like the clap of doom. A pale elderly lady let me in. Yes, the judge was in the drawing room. I gave him my name and found him reading. Lots of maps of East Anglia on his walls, including an old sepia aquatint I recognized. I explained I was doing an antique sweep for a lady dealer and had found things he might want.

  “I take it you will be defrauding your client?” he said drily. “Using her resources to buy certain antiques, then slip them to another buyer? I had hoped you were going straight, Lovejoy.”

  That, from him?

  “Look, sir,” I said lamely. “If you’re not interested…”

  “You were at the Estuary Golf Club.”

  “Yes. Jocko told me about your new golf links.”

  “I overheard part of your conversation.” He adjusted a hearing aid. It whistled, making him grimace. “Old age is a problem, Lovejoy. Faculties diminish.”

  “Here’s my list.”

  He took the paper with an old man’s tremble. All the golfiana I’d lied to Jocko about were there, with two or three last-minute extra lies. He quizzed me with a glance.