Murder of Gonzago (10 page)

Stephan Farrar sat frowning down at his mobile phone. ‘Mummy isn’t answering. She’s the busiest woman in the world. She hasn’t got a moment to spare. That’s why I’m here, I suppose?’

‘That indeed is the reason, dear,’ Nurse Highgrove said comfortably. She plumped the pillows and smoothed the bedspread.

‘I must speak to her. I’ve remembered something. It’s rather urgent, actually. Perhaps I could speak to someone else. Someone who was at La Sorcière when Daddy R. died? Let me see.’ He looked down at his mobile once more. ‘I’ve got Auntie Lou’s number. And Gloves’s. Now, shall I ring Gloves or shall I ring Auntie Lou?’

He was a slender youth who looked about fourteen, with hair the colour of pale butter, cut
en brosse
, a small nose, a wide mouth and startlingly bright blue eyes that burnt with a feverish flame. He was wearing dark blue silk pyjamas styled as some sort of uniform. He brought to mind Saint-Exupéry’s
petit prince
.

‘Why don’t you phone both of them?’ Nurse Highgrove suggested. ‘I am sure they will be pleased to hear from you. What are friends for? But wait till you’ve had your tea first, why don’t you?’

‘I don’t want any tea. What I want is a fix.’

‘You know you can’t do that sort of thing here, Stephan.’

‘I can see you’re brimming over with moral indignation, aren’t you, Highgrove?’

‘Not at all. I wouldn’t know what moral indignation was if it hit me on the nose. I don’t want you to make yourself sick, dear, that’s all.’

‘I won’t make myself sick. I’m used to it.’

‘You’re sucking your thumb again, Stephan.’

‘Am I? Sorry. Shall I tell you why I like having a fix, Highgrove? Shall I give you a highly rationalized explanation of my addiction? It’s because I like being the subject
and
the object, the scientist
and
the experiment, all at the same time. When I have a fix, I’m setting the spirit free by enslaving the body.’

‘That’s clever talk, but I am not sure I approve of it,’ Nurse Highgrove said briskly. ‘Enslaving the body indeed. Doesn’t sound at all nice. As a matter of fact, I’d rather you didn’t say things like that ever again, Stephan.’

‘I remember there was a dinner at Remnant once – a rather grand dinner party. As it happened I’d taken something earlier on, Diamond Skies, I think, while they were serving cocktails. As soon as we sat down, I removed my black tie and announced that I was in fact a rat, then I got under the table and proceeded to gnaw at the ankles of each guest in turn. I eventually passed out at Princess Michael of Kent’s feet.’ Stephan laughed. ‘Everybody pretended nothing had happened, but I don’t think Daddy R. was amused.’

‘What’s Diamond Skies? No, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know.’

‘As in “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” – everybody knows what
that
means.’ There was a pause. ‘I’ve got something on my mind, Highgrove,’ he said.

‘What is it, dear?’

‘You know that I said I killed Daddy R.?’

‘Yes? What about it?’ Nurse Highgrove had already heard the story of the killing of Daddy R. She was a stoutish, grey-haired woman in a neat uniform, with a robust no-nonsense air about her. She not only looked but sounded like an old-fashioned nanny of the tender ogress type. That, indeed, was one of the reasons she had got the job at the clinic.

‘Well, I don’t think I could actually have done it,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘It suddenly came to me.’

‘Shall I tell you something? I never for a moment imagined you killed anyone, dear.’ She patted his arm. ‘A nice boy like you.’

‘Could I have a smoke, do you think? It would help me to concentrate.’

‘You know you can’t, Stephan. It’s not allowed.’

‘I don’t mean Mariá-Juana. I mean a cigarette.’

‘Who is Mariá-Juana? Oh! I see. You are so naughty, Stephan!’

‘I want a cigarette. I know you smoke. Give me one of your cigarettes, Highgrove.
Please
.’

‘I am sorry, Stephan, but smoking is not allowed on the premises. Dr Mandrake would be furious. You don’t want to make Dr Mandrake cross, do you?’

‘No.’ Stephan sighed.

‘I might lose my job, you know … What was it you were saying about the murder? I thought it sounded very interesting.’

‘Daddy R. was jolly rich and I always thought how good it would be if he were to die because then Mummy and Uncle Gerry would get everything. I hated Daddy R. because he was a bully and a madman. But I couldn’t have killed him. I thought I did, but I was wrong.’ Stephan frowned. ‘I was at the right place, at the right time, as they say, but I couldn’t have killed him.’

‘A good thing you remembered, dear.’

‘I
was
on the terrace and I remember wearing Bottom’s head, but it was too hot, so I took the head off. It was very quiet. There was a full moon. It was the colour of blood oranges and it had taken its place, like something in a stage set, above and to the right of La Sorcière … I stood by the french window and peeped in. They were starting the play. Daddy R. was alive then. He and Mummy were wearing crowns and looked really silly. Daddy R. had a beard
and
a false nose.’

‘A false nose! Fancy!’

‘It was
too
hot, not a breath of wind, so I went to the pool. It is always cooler by the pool. I felt like having some
Mariá-Juana,
I really wanted some, so I rang Karen and told her to bring me some. I’d already had some cocoa, but that was earlier on, much earlier on.’

‘Cocoa? Did you really? A nice hot cup of cocoa?’

‘No, not that kind of cocoa, Highgrove. I mean
cocoa
.’ He held up his pockmarked arm.

‘Dear me! Please, don’t do that, Stephan.’ She covered her eyes with her hand. ‘It gives me the heebie-jeebies.’

He laughed. ‘I sat by the pool and waited. Then Karen came and we lit up.’

‘Who was Karen? Do remind me.’

‘My girlfriend. Sort of. Her skin is as black as the coal Tradewell puts in the fireplaces at Remnant. I like that. When it’s dark, she is practically invisible. I don’t like English girls. English girls are pink and they look like shrimps, or they are fat, and they can’t kiss properly. Anyway, we kissed a bit, then we lit up. I don’t remember what happened after that, but Karen stayed with me all the time and she only ran away when Aunt Tense and Gloves appeared, you see.’

‘You remember them coming?’

‘No – but Aunt Tense told me about it the next day. I phoned Karen earlier on, actually, because it bothered me. I mean the time factor. I asked her if I ever went somewhere
and she said no. I then asked her if she ever left my side and she said, no, she didn’t. Not till she’d heard footsteps.’

‘You phoned Jamaica on your mobile? Isn’t that expensive?’

‘I phoned the Grenadin Island. That’s
not
Jamaica. Mummy told me I could talk on my mobile as much as I pleased. We are awfully rich, you know. Daddy R. used to feed his dog with caviar. He loved his dog, but then one day he got angry with him and shot him. Anyway, Karen says she was with me all the time. She said I never went anywhere. She’d have known if I had. She wouldn’t lie, why would she? There’s also the gun.’

‘What’s so special about the gun?’

‘It was the gun from Daddy R.’s desk, Highgrove. I mean Gloves said that. That’s Renée. Now, I remember I
meant
to take the gun, I can’t remember why exactly, but I sneaked up to Daddy R.’s study and opened the drawer and the gun wasn’t there! That was
earlier on
. While everybody was getting into costume. Do you see what that means?’

‘What, dear?’

‘It means it couldn’t have been me. I couldn’t have shot Daddy R. It was somebody else. They thought it was me because I hated Daddy R., because I’d already tried to shoot him, but it wasn’t.’ Stephan frowned again. ‘As a matter of fact, I think I know who killed him.’

‘Who is it? Who killed Daddy R.?’ Nurse Highgrove stood beside the door, looking at him. There was an odd expression in the boy’s eyes. She knew it was all nonsense; the doctor had warned her to expect a lot of nonsense, yet she had to admit there was something in the way Stephan spoke, something about his wide staring eyes, that she found compelling.

‘It’s too scary. You’ll probably think I’m making it all up. It’s too scary,’ he repeated. ‘You’ll get the heebie-jeebies,’ he warned her.

‘I won’t.’

‘You’d never believe it. You’ll say I’m making it up. Would you let me have a smoke if I told you?’

‘No. Smoking is not allowed.’

‘
Please
.’

‘Out of the question.’

He sighed. ‘All right. It was the Grimaud. It was the Grimaud who killed Daddy R.’

‘Don’t know what to make of Aunt Hortense,’ Major Payne said. ‘Would you say she was as cunning as the coiled cobra she used to wear round her wrist?’

‘I am not sure. That would be overrating her, I think.’

He started the engine. ‘
Toute vérité n’est pas bonne à dire
indeed … Does she really believe that telling half-truths or distorted truths is better than telling no truth at all? It’s pretty much the same thing, isn’t it? No – it’s worse!’

‘She was quivering like a twig in a gale,’ Antonia said thoughtfully. ‘
Could
she be the killer?’

‘Technically speaking she could be. She wasn’t in the room at the crucial time.’

‘She said she’d gone to the loo … She’d watched their rehearsals. That means she must have been familiar with the exact position of the body on the chaise longue and so on,’ Antonia mused. ‘She knew Lord Remnant would be in a direct line to the french windows. She was actually caught on camera drawing the silk curtains across the windows just before the sketch started. Did you notice?’

‘I most certainly did,’ said Payne. ‘You mean – she could have been making sure she wouldn’t be seen?’

‘Exactly. She could easily have popped out through a side
door, run across the terrace and shot Lord R. through the curtains, dropped the gun and run back into the room. It would have taken a minute, if that.’

‘Yes. She might easily have got hold of the gun earlier on … She might have been hiding it in the folds of her dress, or inside her handbag.’

‘Stephan was on the terrace, wearing the Bottom head, but he was probably too cranked up to make sense of what was going on …’

‘Or he wasn’t there at all,’ said Payne. ‘By the time Hortense appeared on the terrace, he might have taken off the head and removed himself. Perhaps it was Aunt Hortense who put on the Bottom head? A somewhat bizarre touch, but that’s what she
would
do if she wanted to throw suspicion on Stephan.’

‘Would she have wanted to throw suspicion on her grandson? Involve him in a murder case?’

‘She might have instinctively assumed that the police would never be called, that Lord Remnant’s murder would never become a
case
.’

‘But what was her motive?’

‘Well, she hated Lord Remnant. She made that abundantly clear. She thought the world would be a better place without him. Lord Remnant said and did infuriating things. He called her Miss Baedeker. He hid her glasses.’

‘You wouldn’t kill someone because they hid your glasses, would you?’

‘He laughed when she said sorry to an armchair after bumping into it. Perhaps she couldn’t bear to watch him humiliating Clarissa?’

‘The mother love motive.’ Antonia nodded. ‘And what a powerful motive that can be … It’s possible, I suppose. She kept saying how much she loved her daughter …’

‘If this were a whodunnit, Miss Tilling would be the least likely suspect. The Addled Aunt. Bespectacled, garrulous,
inconsequential and disarmingly scatty. Strictly for comic relief purposes.’

‘Actually, Hugh, she is not such a typical aunt figure. She is the Aunt with a Past.’

‘Yes. I keep wondering about her past … She looked damned attractive in that photo, with her come-hither smile and Keppel Clasp. Didn’t look like an aunt at all. She was a bad girl. Giving birth out of wedlock and so on. Comes from a line of bad girls, if the Keppel link is anything to go by. Mrs Keppel, Violet Trefusis, the former Mrs Parker Bowles. All of them bad girls.’

Antonia said, ‘I really doubt whether drug-riddled Stephan would have been able to focus well enough to plug his stepfather’s nape.’

‘The same objection could be raised about Hortense. If Hortense’s eyesight is so bad that she apologizes to armchairs, could she have got Lord Remnant so accurately in the head? It would have been like the man in the fairy tale who manages to shoot a fly in one eye.’

‘Unless she exaggerated her bad eyesight …’

There was a pause. ‘Lord Remnant had been receiving death threats,’ said Payne. ‘It may have been one or more of the locals who killed him, though would they have been able to get hold of his gun?’

‘The black major-domo might have given it to them.’

‘Indeed he might … Still, the murder was committed with Lord Remnant’s gun, which suggests it was an inside job.’

‘Louise Hunter may be afraid of taking any direct action. Do you think she would talk to us?’

‘She might. Let’s try to beard her as she has tea at the Matroni tearooms in Kensington, shall we?’ Payne suggested. ‘Or you could do it by yourself – less threatening, perhaps?’

‘I don’t know what she looks like. I never saw that videotape,’ Antonia reminded him.

‘She wore a helmet. She looked preposterous. Far from prepossessing.’

‘She is not very likely to be wearing a helmet when she has tea at Matroni, is she? I doubt a helmet is a permanent feature of her
toilette
.’

‘You will recognize her, I am sure. A large lady with vague hair and big feet.’

‘London is full of large ladies with big feet.’

‘True. Gosh, how depressing.’ Payne rubbed his chin. ‘Well, I could come with you, point her out discreetly, then withdraw. How about that? She has tea at Matroni every Thursday afternoon … What day is it tomorrow?’

‘Thursday.’

‘Is it really? Now, isn’t that lucky? We’ll do it tomorrow,’ said Payne. ‘I don’t think we should waste any time. We shall hunt down the Hunter! She is probably expecting someone to approach her anyhow.’

‘There is something else that struck me as curious,’ Antonia said thoughtfully. ‘Why was Clarissa so frightened when she imagined it was a man who was phoning her? Is Clarissa expecting a call from someone? Is that in any way important?’

After Stephan rang off, Louise Hunter remained sitting very still. She told herself it was all nonsense. It was one of Stephan’s drug-fuelled fantasies. He had been imagining things. Seeing things. He had been under the influence of heaven knew what lethal cocktail. The Grimaud was nothing but a preposterous superstition, a myth. The Grimaud didn’t exist …

Despite herself, Louise felt disturbed. She felt – chilled. She had heard about the Grimaud. She believed she had seen a crude drawing of the Grimaud somewhere. A terrifying-looking
creature … Of course it didn’t exist. But Stephan had sounded so
positive
.

Should she have some ice-cream? She always had
ice-cream
when she was perplexed about something …

Three minutes later she resumed her seat, a tub of
Häagen-Dazs
in front of her. American ice-cream was the best. Yummy. Better than Italian ice-cream. Better than Belgian ice-cream. Louise was something of an expert on ice-cream. Midnight cookies was her favourite flavour.

Stephan claimed to have seen the Grimaud with his own eyes. And there was something else. Two things, in fact. Lord Remnant’s hands. The laugh Basil had heard in Lord Remnant’s dressing room. She couldn’t say why, but she believed all three were connected somehow … Though how exactly were they connected?

No, Basil wouldn’t listen to her. Basil found her annoying. Basil detested her. Through the binoculars she had seen him walk in the direction of Remnant Castle. She had caught a glimpse of his face. There had been a closed, cagey look about him – an air of – of suppressed yearning.

Basil was mad about Clarissa. That much was clear to her. Perhaps he was trying to engineer a meeting with Clarissa? How she hated Clarissa! Clarissa – with her sidling seductive walk – with that indescribably rampant look in her eyes—

Whore, Louise mouthed. Slut.

The tape. Had Gerard Fenwick received it? Had he watched it and, if he had, had he seen the gun showing through the window curtains? Most importantly,
what was he going to do about it?
Well, he would get in touch with Clarissa and ask her what it all meant. That would be the logical course of action, wouldn’t it?

Louise rather liked the idea of Clarissa being pushed into a tight corner and asked awkward questions.

My brother was killed, wasn’t he? You know who shot him, Clarissa, don’t you? You must know. I am sure you are
behind it. However did you manage to get a death certificate signed by two doctors?

The tape was not the only thing Louise had sent. There was also the anonymous letter to Clarissa. She had cut the letters out of
Country Life
and the
Field
. Well, the more harassed and harried Clarissa felt, the better. People, women in particular, aged prematurely when they were kept in a state of anxiety. Women lost their allure fast. What was it Lady Wishfort said?
Why, I am arrantly flayed; I look like an old peeled wall!

Arrantly flayed. She would love to see Clarissa arrantly flayed!

Things between her and Basil hadn’t always been as bad as they had become. Only a couple of months back they had
talked
. They had agreed there was nothing like the last days of summer – those beautiful hot days that had within them the seeds of their own fragility. She told him how much she enjoyed waking up to a mild pinkish dawn and watching the mist lifting from the garden. He said there was nothing like an autumn sun shining out of a cloudless blue sky, without glare and without brilliance—

Louise Hunter fumbled for her handkerchief. Odd thing, memories – rising at such unexpected moments, quite unsolicited – exploding on the surface like bubbles.

And then, without rhyme or reason, she remembered something else that had happened at La Sorcière.

It had been about an hour and a half after lunch. She and Hortense had happened to walk past the open door of Lord Remnant’s study. Louise had been talking about the farm. Friends of Hortense’s had apparently just bought a farm in South Africa.

They had caught sight of Lord Remnant sitting at his desk, a startlingly gleeful expression on his face. In his hands Lord Remnant had been holding—