Corpse in a Gilded Cage (15 page)

‘And then there's Len Cartwright,' he said, ‘who I think you know.'

‘I'll say. Good old Chokey. Taught me all I know.'

‘Really? What sort of knowledge would that be?'

‘Oh, this and that,' said Phil, slanting a genial glance in Medway's direction. ‘You won't get me to shop old Chokey.'

‘I gather he has a record.'

‘Short as your little finger.
And
years ago. That's when he got the nickname. He's as fly as they come, is Chokey.
And
a heart of gold. Visited me in Maidstone, and in Daintree. There's not many have done that, I can tell you. He's the best pal I've got.'

‘I get a bit fed up with hearing about crooks with hearts of gold,' said Sergeant Medway.

‘Someone been singing my praises, have they?' asked Phil chirpily. ‘That fool of a governor, I suppose. That boy should never have been let loose from the East Cheam Polytechnic. His type gives prison a bad name.'

Phil let out a great laugh at his own wit, and would probably have continued with his views on the Governor, but at that moment they were passing through Meresham, and Phil's eye caught a large hoarding outside a newsagent:

M
URDERED
E
ARL
: Local Tragedy.

‘Mind if I get a paper?'

He popped out of the car, and came back with three papers—one class and two populars. He had also bought a chocolate bar and a packet of cigarettes, and for the rest of the journey he chewed, smoked and read the papers avidly. He expressed indignation at the scant and tight-lipped coverage the story received in
The Times
(‘Twenty p, and all it gets is five lines!') but the tabloids absorbed him, and beyond a sudden query as to how his mother was taking it all, he kept silent for the rest of the journey.

It was nearly half past ten when they drove towards the gates of Chetton. The road around was now thick with reporters' cars, and as the police car slowed to get through them, cameras were pushed up against the open windows, and ravenous faces with brown-stained teeth and stale breath shouted questions. Phil gazed ahead, in dignified fashion. Then the gates closed behind them, and they began the last lap to Chetton.

‘Bloody leeches!' said Phil. ‘I'm not sure how I'm going to deal with them . . . Blimey!' The park stretched out before his astonished eyes. ‘I knew the place was big, but . . . What's that? That's not Chetton Hall.'

‘I think they call it the Dower House.'

‘Just suit us.'

And as, finally, the East Front of Chetton came into view and the car neared the courtyard, Phil let out one of the favourite expressions of his late father:

‘By Jove!'

The car pulled to a halt.

‘Your new home,' said Peter Medway.

‘Be it never so humble,' said Phil. ‘Cripes! You'd need Stanley to come looking for you if you went missing in there.'

They opened the car doors and got out. Medway turned to look at Phil,
curious to see what the real reaction was, underneath all the jokiness. But from the entrance there came tumbling four shapes of various sizes, shouting and laughing and making a great crowing of triumph.

‘Daddy! Daddy!'

Phil waved his hand and ran towards them. He pulled Karen up in his arms and kissed her. He ruffled Gareth's hair and began sparring with Cliff. Then he swung the smallest on to his shoulders and began running towards the house. Shouting and laughing, the five of them romped up the steps towards the door, and then passed through it into the shadows. Where, waiting in the gloom, Peter Medway could perceive the cadaverous shape of Mr Lillywaite.

Thus Philip, thirteenth Earl of Ellesmere, entered the home of his ancestors.

The family had gathered in the Green Drawing-Room to greet the new Earl. There was nothing particularly feudal about this, no intention of curtseying, kissing hands or swearing fealty. It was just that, though they were now allowed back into their bedrooms, there was nothing so comforting or inviting about them as to make them desirable for an extended squat. If you went for a walk in the park you encountered cows, or policemen, or both; the conservatory was so little tended that to walk around it was like a trek through the South American jungle; there was apparently a billiard room somewhere, but nobody had been able to find it. All in all, it was better to stick together, however lugubrious the tone of the resulting gathering.

In any case, they all knew that Phil would soon be arriving, and around Phil, in one way or another, their futures revolved. Some of them were almost apprehensive. Even those who had seen him since his trial had done so too briefly to get more than a fleeting impression of how he had taken to incarceration. So, though none of them had forgotten what he was like, none of them were quite sure he was like that
now.

When they heard Phil and the children, first from a distance, and then marching through the hall, shouting and laughing together, they all of
them, unthinking, held their breaths. They heard Phil say ‘Shhh' to the children, heard him put the baby down, and then there he was, walking as cool as a cucumber into their green satin arcadia, followed by the lean, dark shape of Mr Lillywaite.

‘Hello, all,' said Phil. ‘Bit of a bugger this, eh?'

It wasn't at all what he said. It was just the sound of his voice, the warm, friendly tone of it. They all breathed out, in what was a sort of collective sigh of relief.

‘Oh, Phil!' said the Countess, and she heaved her dolorous bulk up from the sofa to give him a hug. When he generously responded she burst into tears on his shoulder, and stood there, clasped to him, sobbing luxurious tears of relief at the comfort of his return.

This particular moment in the drama of the heir's return played to a mixed reception from its audience. Dixie clearly felt rather piqued at the Countess's commandeering of Phil, and had to repress the urge to say something cutting. Mr Lillywaite, on the other hand, looked on with something like approval: this was what the situation called for; this was how the scene should be played. His measured approval was not lessened when Phil, having settled his mother, sniffing quietly, back on her sofa, had a reunion with his wife that similarly accorded with precedent.

‘Hello, Dixie, old girl,' he said, giving her a peck on the cheek.

Mr Lillywaite nodded. He could hear—granted the difference in name and accent—the echo of innumerable upper-class and stiff-upper-lipped marital reunions.

Then Phil went around the family. He embraced Joan briefly, and shook hands with Digby. He clapped Trevor on the shoulder and embraced Michele (perhaps for the pleasure of it, perhaps because he did not quite know what else to do with her).

There were only two left, standing a little uncertainly outside the family group.

‘Hello, Chokey, old mate,' said Phil, with a wide grin at his partner in crime. Chokey forgot his uneasy shiftings from foot to foot and returned Phil's salutation with a watery grin and a poke in the ribs.

‘I know you!' Phil said, when he got to Sam. ‘They said Sam Somebody was here, but I didn't connect. You used to live down the end of the road at Clapham.'

‘Still do,' said Sam, smiling widely. ‘Sam Barton.'

‘Well!' said Phil, finishing his royal round of greetings and landing up in
the centre of the room. ‘I should think we could all do with a cuppa. Who'll put the kettle on?'

Sam volunteered, but he was back in a couple of minutes. The police, unexpectedly considerate, had apparently foreseen the need for elevenses: along with Sam there came what the Countess was already calling to herself ‘that nice fair-haired Sergeant'. Both of them bore trays, and soon they began handing round cups of tea and a tin of biscuits. Phil said it was just like the first time he was pulled in for questioning, but before long it began to seem like any other jolly family gathering, and somehow it was not at all unnatural that Sergeant Medway should join the group.

‘It's lovely having you home again, Phil,' said Joan, putting it with much delicacy, she thought, and making it sound as if he had just returned from a tour of duty in the colonies.

‘Great to be here. In spite of—well, you know,' said Phil, very much your average Englishman in his unwillingness to talk about death. ‘Hey, Chokey, this'll kill you. Know what the Guv'nor said to me when he said goodbye?'

Joan, her efforts at genteel evasion wasted, gave a little
moue
of dissatisfaction, while Mr Lillywaite grimaced as if his tea were laced with senna.

‘He said, “Well, m'boy, it's been a pleasure having you here. You've been a real credit to the place.” Like it was my last day at the old school.' Phil, his mother, and Chokey burst into derisive laughter. ‘Then he said, “This is the opening of a new chapter for you, and I know it's going to be a happy one.” As if I'd won the pools, not had me poor old dad done in. Stupid git. I don't know how they pick 'em, I really don't.'

Mr Lillywaite was distressed by the turn the conversation was taking. The conventional modes of reunion past, he found himself listening to the tales of gaolbirds. It was not something to which he was accustomed, and in his distaste he overlooked the fact that Phil's opinion of the Governor of Daintree was identical with his own.

He said: ‘Perhaps you'd like to see round the Hall and its grounds?'

‘All in good time, matey,' said Phil. Mr Lillywaite flinched. ‘Haven't got used to all the old faces yet. Hardly recognize me own kids, they've grown so much—haven't you, Karen, my little wonder? Hey—this'll kill you.' He turned back to his family. ‘I went through passing out drill last night—you know, Chokey: where to go, what to do, how to keep my hands clean, and what have you. And true as I'm standing here they handed me the address of the Salvation Army hostel in Whitechapel, “in case of need”, they said. Cheek of working-classes, eh? I said, “Come off it, mate: I could invite the
whole Sally Army down to my place and still have room for half the bleeding Church of England as well.” '

They all laughed, even Digby and Joan. Things were really loosening up now Phil was back. He did bring the family together. How had they done without him for so long?

•   •   •

‘What a collection!' said Superintendent Hickory, as he shoved across the table to Sergeant Medway the assortment of this and that he had picked up in the various bedrooms. ‘And I'm not referring to the noble personages in this house, though I might well be.'

Hickory lay slumped in his chair like some depressive ruminant while Medway went through the various items. When he had finished Medway began to return them to his superior, then had second thoughts about one of the items. He took back and read again the letter Phil had written to his friend Chokey from Daintree, a communication as genially slapdash as his own personality.

Well me old cock Im keeping my pekker up and not letting things get me down not that I ever do you know me. They give you a lot of freedom and I have a bit of a hand of cards now and then with the guvornor whose as nice a chap as youd meet outside of Parkhurst and very libberal with it. You said last time you come you hoped I didnt blame you, what a load of tripe Chokey. More like you should blame me whose plan was it? Of course things are going to be just the same when I get out what do you think. Meanwhile take care, see the kids is alright and remember what I told you. Wo'nt be long now so dont get into any trouble, you need me beside you old mate.

Cheerio,

Phil.

‘Well?' said Hickory, when Medway had re-read it.

‘It
seems
to tie in . . .' said Medway dubiously.

‘It seems to be the letter of a born muggins—a dupe, a scapegoat. Is that how he struck you?'

‘Not precisely. No . . . Still, he certainly stuck up for his “pal” Chokey. No grassing, and all that kind of thing, pretty much as in the letter. But somehow it doesn't quite . . .'

‘What about his wife and her boyfriend?'

‘Didn't seem to turn a hair.'

‘Born dupe, like I said.'

‘Not exactly. He'd have been a dupe if he'd been fooled, but he wasn't. He was—what's the word?—'

‘Complaisant. Oh well, I don't suppose it makes a great deal of difference. The letter to Mum and Dad was even less revealing, I thought: starts telling them about the daily routine at Daintree, then gets fed up and signs off mid-afternoon.'

Superintendent Hickory sighed noisily and stood up. He looked dusty and a bit sweaty, and he walked heavily round the Pink Damask Room like a bum bailiff camped in the splendours of Becky Sharp's Mayfair mansion.

‘What's going on in there?' he asked, jerking a thumb vaguely in the direction of the Drawing-Room.

‘Nothing much. They're beginning to accept my being around, which is something. But all they're interested in at the moment is Phil's tales of what it's like in jug. Bit of a comic, our Phil.'

‘What's your impression of him, taken as a whole?'

‘On the surface, perfectly nice bloke: funny, sharp, life and soul of the party. Underneath—I just don't know. I wonder whether he isn't much tougher than he seems. On the other hand, he may be chief muggins, like you say: one of these blokes who stick to their mates through thick and thin—the Sir Galahad of the East End. He's a mystery. I'd like to watch him a bit more before I make up my mind.'

‘You'll get time to watch him. I don't see this case being sewn up before the end of the week. By the way, there were a couple of things I found on my tour of this stately pile.'

And he told Sergeant Medway about the oddly-placed picture in the bedroom corridor, and the oddities he and Hillier had discovered in the little corridor off the landing.

‘Interesting, sir,' said Peter Medway. ‘But only if they came about during the night. There'd been people going round the house for a couple of days before the actual murder.'