Hand in Glove (4 page)

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due under the estate of Miss Abberley’s late brother, Mr Tristram Abberley. Copyright in his works expires, I believe, at the end of next year.”

“Except for the posthumously published poems, that’s correct,”

said Maurice. “Perhaps it’s as well she never had to get used to doing without the income.”

Perhaps Maurice was right, thought Charlotte. He had Ladram Avionics, after all, in which the investment of Abberley royalties had paid a handsome dividend. And she had her own substantial shareholding in the company, inherited from her mother. But Beatrix was likely to have given away as much as she had saved over the years.

Though poverty would never have threatened her, the necessity to economize might have. That she had been spared the experience represented a meagre form of solace.

Ramsden’s office was only a few doors from the premises of Rye’s principal undertaker. There Charlotte and Maurice were received with doleful solicitude and gently guided through the maze of funer-ary alternatives. Beatrix had not specified in her will whether she wished to be buried or cremated and neither Charlotte nor Maurice could remember her ever expressing a view on the subject. Her neat and unsentimental nature suggested, however, that cremation was the choice she would have been likely to make and on this they settled.

Outside, the streets were crowded with shoppers and tourists.

Their loud voices and gaping faces seemed to magnify the warmth of the afternoon to a single burning pitch. All Charlotte wanted was to be done with the business that had brought them to Rye, free of the commitments Beatrix had wished upon her. But to want, as she well knew, was not necessarily to achieve.

“Do you think we should go up to the cottage?” asked Maurice.

“The police will have finished by now and we could easily collect the key from Mrs Mentiply.”

“I’d rather not. It’s too soon to start sorting through Beatrix’s possessions. I should feel she was there all the time, looking over my shoulder. Perhaps after the funeral.”

“As her executor, I’m not sure I can wait that long. I’ll need to find her cheque books and bank statements for probate purposes. See if there are any unpaid bills about the place.”

“Of course. I hadn’t thought of that.” It was typical of Maurice to

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take his responsibilities seriously. Fortunately, she did not have to.

“Can’t you go alone?” she asked, in a tone that urged him to say he could.

“I can, Charlie, yes. With your permission. You are the new owner, remember.”

“Don’t be silly. Of course you have my permission. Go ahead. I’m only grateful I don’t have to take the task on myself.”

“Very well. I’ll come back tomorrow and try to sort everything out. If that’s what you want.”

“It is. Definitely.”

Maurice suggested they eat out that evening and Charlotte agreed enthusiastically, hoping good food and drink consumed in pleasant surroundings might lift her spirits. Before they set off, however, there was one duty to be performed which she knew she could neither postpone nor avoid. Lulu Harrington had to be told.

Charlotte had never met Lulu, even though she and Beatrix had been friends from schooldays. She had taught at Cheltenham Ladies’

College for forty-odd years and now lived in a flat in the town, enjoying what Charlotte imagined to be a fittingly demure retirement.

When she answered the telephone, she did so in text-book style, stating the exchange as well as the number and pronouncing all three syllables in “Cheltenham.”

“Miss Harrington?”

“Yes. Who is that, please?” She sounded frail and a touch queru-lous. Charlotte’s heart sank.

“My name’s Charlotte Ladram, Miss Harrington. We’ve never met, but—”

“Charlotte Ladram? Oh, of course! I know who you are.” Her tone was warmer now. “Beatrix’s niece.”

“Not her niece exactly but—”

“Good as, I rather thought. Well, forgive me, Miss Ladram. May I call you Charlotte? Beatrix always refers to you as such.”

“Of course. I—”

“It’s a great pleasure to speak to you at last, I must say. To what do I—” She broke off abruptly, then said: “Is Beatrix all right?”

Suddenly fearful that Lulu would guess before she could tell her, Charlotte blurted out: “I’m afraid she passed away yesterday.” Then she regretted her abruptness. “I’m sorry if it’s a shock. It was for all of 24

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us.” But only silence followed. “Miss Harrington? Miss Harrington, are you still there?”

“Yes.” She sounded calm and sombre now. “May I . . . That is, what happened . . . exactly?”

She would have to know of course. There was no way of pretending Beatrix had slipped away peacefully. As she explained the circumstances, Charlotte sensed how brutal and unfair they must sound to one of Beatrix’s own age who also lived alone. But the circumstances could not be altered.

When she had finished, there was another momentary silence.

Then Lulu said simply: “I see.”

“I’m really very sorry to have to break such news to you.”

“Pray don’t apologize, my dear. It’s good of you to have called.”

“Not at all. You were Beatrix’s oldest friend, after all.”

“Was I?”

“Of course you were. She always said so.”

“That was good of her.”

“Miss Harrington—”

“Call me Lulu, please.”

“Are you sure you’re all right? This must have come as a terrible shock.”

“Not really.”

“What?”

“Forgive me. I mean simply that at our age—Beatrix’s and mine—death can never be regarded as a surprise.”

“But this is different . . . This was not . . .”

“Not natural. Quite so, my dear. The difference does not escape me, I assure you.”

“Then how . . .” Charlotte stopped herself. The old lady was clearly wandering. It would be charitable to disregard whatever she said. “Will you wish to attend the funeral, Lulu? It’s to be held next Monday, the twenty-ninth. It’s a long way for you to come, of course, but I could offer you overnight accommodation if that would help.”

“Thank you. That’s very kind of you. But . . . I will think about it, Charlotte. I will think about it and let you know.”

“Of course. Of course. Do that. Now, if you’re certain you’re all right—”

“Absolutely. Goodbye, Charlotte.”

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“Good—” The line went dead before she could finish. And left her staring at her own puzzled frown in the mirror above the telephone.

C

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FIVE

Fairfax.”

“Good morning. Is that Mr Derek Fairfax?”

“Speaking.”

“My name’s Dredge, Mr Fairfax. Albion Dredge. I’m a solicitor, representing your brother, Mr Colin Fairfax.”

Derek felt the blood rush to his face. It had happened. What he had dreaded ever since Colin’s arrival in Tunbridge Wells. A reversion to type, some might say. A stroke of bad luck, Colin would undoubtedly protest. A problem, unquestionably, that Derek did not need.

“Representing him in what, Mr Dredge?”

“I regret to have to tell you, Mr Fairfax, that your brother was arrested yesterday by the Sussex Police and subsequently charged with serious criminal offences.”

“What were the offences?”

“Handling stolen goods. Conspiracy to burgle. Aiding and abetting murder.”

It was worse than he had imagined. Far worse. “Murder, you say?”

“An elderly spinster was found battered to death at her cottage in Rye on Sunday afternoon. You may have seen a report of it on the local television news.”

“No. I don’t think so.”

“Then let me explain.” As Dredge did so, Derek felt a clammy foreboding rise about him. Colin would have no truck with violence.

That was certain. But he had never been scrupulous about the prove-nance of what he bought and sold. He habitually sailed close to the wind. Sometimes too close, as the affair in St Albans proved. Could he have gone so far as to commission a burglary in order to obtain a collection of Tunbridge Ware? If he knew he could make enough out of 26

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it, the answer had to be yes, especially if his finances were in a more than usually parlous state. Murder, of course, he would never have countenanced. Nor strong-arm tactics of any kind. But if he had misjudged his associates, if he had trusted to luck and the good sense of those who had none, then the consequences could be precisely what the police had alleged. “He is currently being held at Hastings Police Station,” Dredge concluded. “And will appear before the magistrates tomorrow morning.”

“Does he . . . deny the charges?”

“Unequivocally.”

“Then . . . how does he account for the Tunbridge Ware being in his shop?”

Dredge sighed. “He assumes it was planted there.”

“You sound doubtful.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. It’s simply . . . well, in the perception of the police, it’s exactly what he would say, isn’t it?”

“He hasn’t suggested
they
planted it, has he?”

“Mercifully, no.”

“Then who . . . why should . . .”

“Mr Fairfax, I don’t wish to be abrupt, but such questions are perhaps best considered at another time. My purpose in telephoning you today is to ask whether you would be prepared to act as surety in the event that the magistrates grant bail. If granted, the figure involved is likely to exceed your brother’s means.”

Derek could have told Dredge that himself. Colin’s means had never to his knowledge kept pace with his expenditure. Too often in the past, indeed, Derek had been obliged to bail him out, literally as well as metaphorically. And each time he had sworn it would be the last. So had Colin, come to that. “What sort of figure are we talking about?” he asked defensively.

“It’s hard to say. The police will oppose bail. The question may not arise.”

“But if the question does arise?”

“Then it will be a substantial sum.”

“How substantial?”

“I would imagine . . . somewhere between five and ten thousand pounds.”

A woundingly large portion of Derek’s savings, then, to be forfeited in the event that Colin decided a moonlight flit to an extradition-

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haven was in order. Even as Derek considered the possibility, he caught himself reflecting at the same time that it might almost be worth losing such a sum if it meant Colin could never again ask him for help.

“Your brother indicated you were the only person likely to be willing to assist.”

“No doubt.”

“And are you . . . willing to assist?”

“Yes. I suppose I am.”

“Can you attend the court tomorrow morning?”

Derek glanced at the diary that stood open on his desk. Wednesday the twenty-fourth of June contained nothing that could not be re-arranged. “Yes. I can be there.”

“The magistrates’ court is in Bohemia Road, Hastings. Proceedings commence at ten thirty.”

“Very well. I’ll meet you there.”

Derek put the telephone down, lifted off his glasses and began rubbing the bridge of his nose. When he closed his eyes, the present—his sombre suit, his desk, his office, his glazed vista of Calverley Park, his every proof and appanage of age and status—floated away like gossamer in the breeze. In their place, he and Colin were children again in Bromley, Colin six years the older, as fly and daring as Derek was shy and timid. Derek had often in those days taken the blame for his brother’s antics and covered his tracks and falsified his alibis. And now he knew—if he had ever doubted it—that nothing had really changed.

He rose and crossed to the window. Tunbridge Wells was looking its best in the quiet midsummer weather, the pale façades of Regency villas dotted amidst the greenery, the hazy air seeming to weigh down still further the heavy-leafed horse chestnuts in the park. He had lived here for seven years now, seven good if scarcely glorious years of steady progress at Fithyan & Co. Barring catastrophes, a partnership lay within his grasp. But might not Fithyan consider his connection with a corrupt antique dealer—or worse still a murderer—just such a catastrophe? What would the clients say? What would the other partners think?

How he wished Colin had never settled in Tunbridge Wells. It had only been intended as a temporary move in the first place, a way of easing him back into the outside world. Instead he had found the Treasure 28

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Trove and a swift road back to the profession that had already undone him. And now, it seemed, it had undone him again, with a vengeance that might be visited upon his brother as well as himself.

Maurice had set off early for Rye and was to return to Bourne End direct. For the first time since Beatrix’s death, Charlotte was left to her own thoughts and devices. A morning of energetic gardening having failed to cure her restless mood, she went out in the afternoon, scouring the shops for half a dozen things she did not need.

As the working day drew towards a close, she found herself halfway down the High Street and realized with faint surprise that she was heading in the direction of Chapel Place. She could easily have turned aside and taken a more direct route back to her home in Mount Ephraim. But she did not. Curiosity—or something more complex—overcame squeamishness and she pressed on towards what she now knew was her destination: the Treasure Trove.

It was a narrow-fronted emporium with peeling paint around the windows, squeezed between a photographic studio and a second-hand bookshop. The Gothic script in which the name had been rendered over the door matched the style on the card Hyslop had shown her. To one side there was a separate doorway with a bell labelled simply FLAT. The interior of the shop was unlit and seemed cavernously dark by contrast with the brightness outside. There was no sign proclaiming opening hours and Charlotte, who had assumed that somebody would be standing in for the proprietor, felt slightly cheated.

Stepping closer, she shaded her eyes and peered through the window. Several bookcases and sideboards revealed themselves amidst the gloom. She glimpsed some shadowy oil paintings and dangling brasswork, a pine chest and a cheval-glass towards the rear. Then, stacked in a tall corner cabinet, she noticed the Tunbridge Ware.

Small pieces for the most part, Fairfax’s legitimate collection—if it was legitimate—looked thoroughly unremarkable. Perhaps, thought Charlotte, that explained—

Suddenly, there was a movement close behind her, reflected in the cheval-glass. Glancing across to it, she saw a man standing almost at her shoulder, staring into the shop. He was of medium height, lean with thinning hair, dressed in a brown somewhat rumpled suit and wearing gold-framed spectacles on which the sunlight flashed.

She would have taken him for a disappointed customer but for the in-