Classic in the Barn (16 page)

I gave Charlie a pat to assure him he was doing a good job, and then we all gazed at the Lagonda. We'd already noticed as we brought her over that the fabric roof was not what it was. On the whole she'd come through her ordeal well, and then I got to the big question.

‘There has to be something special about her,' I said. ‘We're missing something.'

‘Not necessarily,' Zoe objected. ‘It could be something our chummy arsonist thought might have been left inside it.'

That ‘scrap of paper' again. ‘There was a café bill in it and a garage receipt. Nothing else,' I told them. ‘I gave them to Polly.'

‘No priceless jewels? No bundles of bank notes?'

‘I'd have noticed.'

Len had been thinking. ‘It's the car then.'

We are good, the three of us, at just standing and thinking about cars. Some people stand in front of an old-master oil painting for hours, just letting the atmosphere and meaning soak in. Len, Zoe and I do that with cars.

Someone had to make a start. I thought it might as well be me. ‘There's the headlights, of course. We know they're wrong.'

‘That's a given.' Zoe slapped me down.

‘Anything behind them?' Len grunted. He grabbed a can of penetrating oil and set to work. Then we peered in.

‘Nothing,' I declared.

‘Inside them?' Zoe asked.

Len unscrewed them. ‘Nope.'

So we went around the outside of the car, taking it little by little. Wheels, hubcaps, running boards, wing-mounted spare tyres. We all knew there was nothing underneath the lady, because the car had been on the lift, but nevertheless we lay flat on the floor; all I saw was the bit of straw that got up my nose.

‘Inside then. Upholstery?'

‘Doesn't look overstuffed to me,' Len declared. We poked at it, but nothing emerged, and short of ripping it all off we were stuck.

‘Glove compartments?'

We delved into the lady's secret places, but she didn't oblige. They were empty.

‘There has to be something,' Zoe said crossly. I agreed, but the engine compartment revealed nothing, and short of ripping up the carpets in the car even more than we had already, we were finished.

‘Boot?' I said without hope since we'd already given it a quick look. We opened it, but only the carpet and tool kit greeted us, plus lights and triangle for continental travel. We even took out the carpet, but there was nothing but the board covering the petrol tank. We lifted that out, but only a petrol tank could be seen. The tool kit? Was the awl actually a Medici dagger? Or the spanner made from gold bullion? Nope, they weren't. The lights and triangle? Nothing there, and we already knew that Mike and Polly did the continental shows.

‘Foiled,' Zoe muttered crossly. ‘There must have been something more left inside it, and it's gone. Or else the perp just thought it was there.' She and I gave up and began to leave, but Len didn't move. He had his thoughtful look on and was taking another overview of the car.

‘Not right,' he said.

‘What isn't?' I almost shouted at him.

‘Don't know.'

My sudden hope vanished. If Len didn't know, how on earth could I? ‘Do you think if you stood here for another twenty-four hours you could pin it down?' I asked ironically.

Len took me seriously. ‘Doubt it, Jack. It either comes or it doesn't.'

Doesn't seemed to be the order of the day, but I have faith in Len. He'd smelled something, and if he could then there was no reason I couldn't have a go. I thought of all the Lagondas I'd ever known or seen. I prowled round her once again and stopped at the open boot. I looked inside and sniffed like I'd never sniffed before. Len was right. Something
was
out of kilter.

‘Isn't it on the small side?' I ventured, staring into the boot.

My eyes met Len's, and with one accord we each had a door open and were scrabbling over the rear seat. With two pretty hefty guys in there we were stuck at the wrong angle though, so Len graciously got out again and hurried (yes, hurried) round to join Zoe by the open boot.

Then I realized what was odd. There might be a space, maybe two or three inches, between the rear seat upholstery and the closing panel. I could only be sure of this by pressing down on the upholstery that spread over to the panel from the rear seat. There
was
a gap there, because my fingers went down as I gently pushed.

‘Got it!' I shouted to Len who was flashing his pocket tape measure.

Simultaneously, he cried, with what passed for excitement for him, ‘Panel's been re-bracketed.'

And together we shouted: ‘Why?'

Re-bracketing is not unknown, but usually there's a good reason for it, and there didn't seem to be one at hand over this Lagonda, unless Tim Beaumont, Spitfire pilot, had smuggled tobacco into the country. Or diamonds. Or maybe Polly was a champion smuggler in disguise. Or Mike. Having wiggled my hand as far as I could down the available space and finding nothing, however, I was no further forward.

‘Someone,' I said rather obviously, ‘didn't want us to find this.'

‘A step too far, Sherlock,' Zoe whipped back promptly.

‘Don't agree. Why make your boot smaller in order to have an empty space?'

‘Maybe someone wanted to move the seats back, but gave the job up halfway.'

‘And maybe Lagondas can fly,' I retorted rudely. ‘Or they wanted to fix water wings to it.'

‘Quite possible.' Zoe went into haughty mode.

‘Perhaps they just thought they'd like a space of one foot high by three foot long and two and bit inches wide.' I was getting belligerent.

Len wasn't listening. ‘What about the petrol tank?' he asked.

‘What about it?' I was thrown.

Len wasn't into answering questions. He was levering off the boot carpet again. ‘There's another space under here.'

‘There always is, Len.' Zoe was getting cross too, so I called time.

‘OK, that's it, folks. We've found something odd. Where now?'

That silenced them. Could an oddity like the rear seat space be the reason that someone had decided to burn down our Pits? And could it have anything to do with Polly's death? Or was it a red herring? All I had was a series of apparent co incidences: the fact that Polly was killed outside the barn housing the car; that Polly's barn had then been broken into; that my workshop was half burnt down – and that the Lagonda had something special about it. Even if it was only a gap.

THIRTEEN

‘The Merc isn't that high priority,' Dave said mildly, when he arrived at the Chapter Arms a mile or so off the Canterbury road on Thursday morning. I had called more or less demanding a meeting.

I had the grace to blush – at least, I hope I did. ‘It's not the Merc, it's the Lagonda.'

‘Ah. Unofficial or official?'

‘Whichever you think appropriate.' In view of what had happened, I needed to touch base with the police murder case, and I didn't feel Brandon would be the best choice. I proceeded to bring Dave up to date with events on the Lagonda front. He listened attentively, although his initial remark took me aback.

‘Brandon hasn't lost interest in you. Thinks you and Tomas might have teamed up.'

‘Thanks for the compliment.'

‘Seriously, Jack, this cosh on the head, Polly Davis's barn break-in and now this arson attack. You may think they're connected, but Brandon is going to say you're inventing this so-called link to hide your own sins.'

I remained calm. ‘What are you going to say? That I'm not so crazy as to set fire to my own barn?' The minute I said it, I saw that's exactly what Brandon
would
say. I groaned. ‘I see; he'll think it an insurance fraud. If so, what would be the point of my having called the fire brigade so soon? I might as well have let the whole lot burn down if I was after insurance money. And I wouldn't have been so crass as to make the seat of the fire so obvious.'

‘I see that, but Brandon could well not get excited about the idea of there being something fishy over the Lagonda. After all, why? A crazed collector risking all? I know there would be a lot who would give their eye teeth for a Lagonda belonging to a famous Spitfire pilot, although that doesn't fit with someone trying to burn your workshop down. And the technicalities of a panel of wood being shifted an inch or two would not weigh too heavily in favour of the theory either.'

‘Do they weigh with you, Dave?'

A reluctant grin. ‘I wouldn't put my whole unit on the job.'

‘Any part of it? A junior cop?'

‘Get it a stage further, and I could be interested.'

I took a deep breath. ‘I can do that right now. This Lagonda must be really special. Your chum Barry Pole wants to buy it.'

Dave's sharp on the uptake. ‘Wants?' he queried. ‘Still going, is it?'

‘Only to you, me and the team, Dave.'

He grunted. ‘Hope you know what you're doing.'

So did I. ‘Someone else is interested too. Dan Burgess.'

‘Yeah?' Dave's attention was all on me. ‘You know what, Jack? You really know how to stick your head into a can of worms, don't you? Pole, Burgess and, coming right along behind, maybe Mason Trent.'

In the early evening I gave in to the temptation to check on the Lagonda in her second home. Len had told me he'd disguised her as best he could with tarpaulins, and he'd rigged up a temporary alarm. I was torn between contemplating the Lagonda problem and wondering how we were going to keep the restoration business going. A little word called mortgage kept popping into my mind too. Len and Zoe would find a way to run the workshop, I told myself. I needed to concentrate on the other problems. We had only lost a few essential pieces of equipment, and Andy had offered to loan us replacements. He'd also offered space as well, which could be useful from several viewpoints in getting to grips with who'd burnt down the Pits in the first place. Slugger Sam? A bit too obvious, since he'd been there earlier in the day. But sometimes obvious is the answer, especially with chaps as thick as Slugger and Andy.

Maybe I should keep on the right side of Harry too, I thought. He was positively dripping with enthusiasm to help us out. He'd repeated his offer on the phone just before I'd come out to look at the Lagonda. ‘As many of your old bangers as you like, Jack. I'll see you're all right.'

Old bangers? In Frogs Hill? No such thing. ‘Thanks, Harry,' I'd said again, as cordially as I could manage. ‘I'll be in touch.' When hell freezes, I thought as I put the phone down.

Next morning I found Len and Zoe taking care of the business by setting up a makeshift HQ in the garage where I keep the Gordon Keeble, Dad's old MG and my daily driver Sportwagon. First, I talked to Len, who, after consultation with me, decided to take up Andy's offer, rather than Harry's. Next, I rang Bea saying I'd like to meet the cleaner (and her), as she had suggested, and she was very keen.

I took the Gordon Keeble, thinking it might just be the kind of car Bea would like. I was beginning to feel Greensand Farm was familiar territory, which made me uncomfortable. Polly was as yet unburied, waiting for those who loved her (and that included me) to sort out the mess surrounding her death, and here was I popping in and out of her former home as if I had some kind of right to do so. That could only be if I made progress on finding her killer. I've a great respect for the police – even for Brandon, though it might be possible to draw the wrong conclusion from the way I've been writing about him – and they seemed sure that Tomas was their man. Who was I, a mere car detective, to contradict that?

Perhaps, I thought, I should concentrate on Tomas first. It hadn't escaped my notice that, as Tomas was out on bail, he was still around Guy's orchards and could have had ample opportunity to break into Polly's barn and then dash over and burn mine down. There was also the fact that he had deliberately cultivated Bea's acquaintance, possibly in the hope of getting access to Polly's barn. It was unlikely, though, and I knew I should stick to the more obvious reason he had for killing Polly: that he wanted Bea and her supposed fortune waiting to be inherited. Had he, too, heard the rumour about the missing millions? Theoretically, he might also have some line on the Lagonda. What, though? Always the little stumbling block.

The police believed he had killed her, and therefore that he had been at the barn that morning. They must have evidence to that effect. Had he met her by chance, and they had then had a row resulting in her death? No, back I came to the fact that he wouldn't have been carrying a gun if it had been a chance meeting. I needed to talk to cleaner Gloria and find out more about this phone call.

Bea answered the door herself, to my pleasure. She was looking more cheerful, and her face brightened when she saw me.

‘Come in, Jack. Gloria's here.'

I had pictured Gloria as one of the old school of cleaners, not quite with overalls, hair tied up in a scarf and a fag hanging out of her mouth, but at least someone of a certain age. No way. Cleaners had changed in the time between my father's housekeeper and this one. She was a lively twenty-something with a bright professional manner and a determined way that suggested no speck of dust would be safe from her eagle eye.

‘Jack Colby.' I shook the extended hand.

The inevitable ‘Hi Jack' came in response, but there was no giggle. Humour was out.

I decided on charm instead, but she seemed impervious to that too. ‘I gather you gave the police very valuable evidence over Polly's death. Hope you won't mind if I ask you again?'