The Belting Inheritance (18 page)

“You were perfectly right.”

The man on the stage made a mocking bow to us all, and vanished again behind the curtain. Uncle Miles called out something unintelligible. Betty and I stepped up on to the stage, and as we did so heard the sound of the shot.

Behind the curtain there was a tiny dressing-room, with a few improvised shelves, some boxes of tricks, clothes on hangers, a cracked looking-glass in front of a battered dressing-table. He lay on the floor with the revolver beside his hand still smoking, and a hole in his head as neat as that in Blakeney’s.

“The end of Ulfheim,” I said. “The dead who won’t awaken.”

Betty stood with her hands in her trouser pockets, looking down at him. Uncle Miles had turned away, a handkerchief to his eyes. His shoulders were shaking.

“It was clever of you to guess,” Elaine said. “I don’t see now how you did it.”

“He left clues. Not so much clues as jokes, really. Like Stiver and Strawman and Ulfheim. In the play Ulfheim is a landowner.”

“Oh. But how did you know it was David?”

“Not David,” I said. “Hugh.”

Treasure Island

“A special sense of humour,” I said. “The Wainwright sense of humour you might call it. Hugh was devoted to Ibsen. When he was looking for a new name to give Blakeney, Stiver seemed to him a good joke, and it must have seemed a better one still, when he was talking to us at Folkestone to use the name of a character in a play called
When We Dead Awaken.
He couldn’t resist making the whole thing a kind of puzzle to which we could guess the answer if we understood the rules. In that way he must have been rather like you,” I said to Miles.

It was the afternoon. The four of us were sitting – at last – in the Deux Magots drinking coffee, after a long session with the police and a visit to Hugh’s room in the rue Peter Paul where we saw his few possessions. It had been decided by Uncle Miles, for once assuming the burden of responsibility, that Hugh should be buried in Paris, and Miles had decided also that he would wait until we returned to Belting to tell the rest of the family the truth. Betty now said in response to my last words, “He was nothing like as nice.”

“So Ibsen struck one chord in my memory, if you like to call it that. And then last night when Fallon talked about the magician, going back to the magician, it struck another chord. I remembered how Monsieur Magique had had a booth on the beach at Folkestone and that he’d left it unexpectedly, and I understood too what it was that I had seen when Ulfheim opened his case in the restaurant that day. The wires and figures were those of puppets. So I knew this morning that we were looking for Monsieur Magique, and that he would be Hugh.”

“You’ve been very clever,” Elaine looked distastefully at a bearded man who was drinking Russian tea from a saucer.

“What I still don’t understand in my addled way is this,” Betty said, bobbing her bronze head. “What was the reason for this whole elaborate fandango? Why wasn’t Hugh’s family told he was still alive, and why didn’t he come back when the war was over?”

“That’s easy.” I looked at Elaine. “It wasn’t David who killed your uncle. It was Hugh. Arbuthnot hinted that to me, but I didn’t understand him. You must have known he was suspected, Uncle Miles.”

“You must remember I was away at the time, and when I came back Hugh and David had both been killed. That is, we thought they had. Mamma didn’t encourage anything being said about that other regrettable affair.”

I sipped my coffee, which was black and sweet. “The way it worked out must have been something like this. Hugh and Sullivan were partners in this firm of estate agents. You remember, Elaine, how surprised your father was that no money was left when the firm was wound up, that the winding-up was in the hands of Lady W – Lady Wainwright – and that she was quite generous about it and that your father got his money back. I think there was a good reason for that. Hugh had been cheating Sullivan. Sullivan found out, they had a row outside the pub that night and Hugh killed him. Isn’t it right – about Hugh cheating Sullivan, I mean?” I asked Miles. “Stephen must have known.”

He coughed unhappily. “Mamma did mention something about it, although not in those words. She said money was missing and that she had made it up. After that she didn’t refer to it.”

“I’m sure she didn’t. Now, before Sullivan’s body was found, Hugh had gone overseas and had been reported missing, believed dead. In the meantime the police must have discovered that Hugh had been robbing Sullivan, perhaps they even had a witness who saw them together that night. But though they may have been satisfied that Hugh was the murderer, what could they do about it? Hugh was dead, killed in action. The natural thing was to let the case drop. They must have satisfied themselves that David had nothing to do with it. In the report of the trial I read it was the coroner who asked David awkward questions, not the police. Now do you see why Hugh couldn’t come back? He would have been arrested for Sullivan’s murder.”

I paused and asked for more coffee. When it came I continued. I really felt like a detective.

“I don’t suppose we shall ever know what happened to Hugh in 1944. He must have known that his position was desperate, that at any time he might be ordered back to England to be questioned about Sullivan. The official story was that he had got separated from his platoon and was never seen afterwards. My guess would be that he managed to surrender to the Germans, and then worked for them. In fact it’s more than a guess, if you remember that snap.” The snap was among Hugh’s meagre effects. It showed him wearing the uniform of the Free British unit that the Germans had tried to organise, a cap stuck on the back of his head, his arms round the shoulders of two SS officers. “When the war was over he must have managed to slip back to France like a lot of others, and there assumed the name of Roger Lorraine.” It was under this name that Hugh had been living in the rue Peter Paul. “I dare say he had half a dozen other names before that.”

Uncle Miles sighed. “It’s a most distasteful story. I must telephone Mamma to let her know that we are coming back. I suppose one can telephone from this place.”

“Wait a minute.” I raised a finger, combining the role of detective with that of the Ancient Mariner. “There isn’t much more. We don’t know what Hugh did for a living, except that the police told us he became Monsieur Magique three years ago, and that he’d got no criminal record. The idea of substitution must have occurred to him when he met Blakeney, and learned that Blakeney was a survivor from the plane in which David had been killed. He knew his mother had adored David, he knew she was likely to accept anybody who came back and produced reasonable credentials. Of course the deception couldn’t be maintained indefinitely, and he must have told Blakeney that it wouldn’t have to last long. Once the will had been changed, Blakeney could say that he just wasn’t able to settle down again at Belting. He would go off, assisted if he was lucky by an allowance from his mother. When she died he would return to claim the money and then go off again, splitting the money with Hugh. All he had to do was to pass muster for a week or two and with the intensive training Hugh gave him, plus his own knowledge of David, that shouldn’t be impossible. It was a wild scheme perhaps but the stakes were high, and after all what had they got to lose? Markle was hired to give Blakeney a bit of moral support, and in case he ran into real trouble he could refer to Hugh, who had managed to get an engagement in Folkestone as Monsieur Magique.

“The scheme came unstuck, we know, but not because of Blakeney. He couldn’t have lasted out much longer probably, but he played his part well. The trouble came because Hugh was reckless enough to stay in Filehurst, where Thorne recognised him. He killed Thorne, but of course that brought the police down on Belting, and once they’d started to investigate, Blakeney was certain to be exposed. Hugh came back to Paris and Blakeney followed him. He must have threatened Hugh with exposure, so Hugh killed him too. But he knew the game was up, really.” I said the thing that had been in my mind ever since I saw the body in the little room at the back of the marquee, the mouth still set in its mocking smile. “I wish I’d known him. He must have been an interesting man.”

Miles looked at me, sighed again, and went away to telephone.

Elaine said, “I think he was horrible.”

“Christopher’s a romantic,” Betty remarked, rather as she might have said that I was an Albanian. We looked out at Paris flowing past us. On my left inside the café two Americans were arguing about existentialism. My stomach was quiescent. I was proud of my detective skill. Life seemed very good. I hardly looked up when a voice said hallo. It was Norman Beaver. He spoke to Betty. “I’ve been looking for you all over, Bets. There’s a Yugoslav painter I want you to meet – ”

Betty shook her bead. “Nix on Yugoslavs. I’m going back to England.”

“You are? What for?”

“I’m getting married.”

“Who to?”

“My ex. We settled it last night.”

“You did?” Norman did not seem surprised, but his interest in Betty noticeably diminished.

“It’s time I settled down.”

“I expect so. And the best of luck to you both.”

He was gone. I said congratulations. Betty looked at me with a considering eye. “Why don’t you two get married?”

Elaine and I began to laugh together, as we had laughed last night. Elaine said, “I was waiting for him to reach the age of consent.”

“I was meaning to ask you,” I said, “But I’ve been too busy.”

Somehow a bottle of champagne appeared. I goggled at Betty. “Don’t tell me you own this place too.”

“As a matter of fact I don’t, this seemed to be a toast-drinking occasion, that’s all. But perhaps you’d prefer that snake juice – ”

“No, thanks.”

We had almost finished the bottle when Uncle Miles reappeared, his face preternaturally solemn. “Yours is flat, but you’ll have to drink it just the same,” Betty said.

Uncle Miles took his glass, absent-mindedly gulped it down, then addressed me. “Christopher, Mamma is dead.”

It began to rain when we returned to England, and it was still raining when we buried her in Filehurst churchyard.

A dozen people stood by the graveside as the coffin was lowered into the earth. She had died on the morning that we had found Hugh, and I was glad that she had never learned the truth about Hugh and David, but had died in the belief that her son had come home. With this feeling there was another too, one which I did not like to acknowledge, relief that her benevolent tyranny was over and that my own independent life was about to begin.

Humphries, bowler hatted and wearing a black tie, was waiting for us when we got back to the house. He read the will in the drawing-room. Stephen was itching to ask questions, but Humphries shook his head. “I think it will be best if I read the will first, Mr Wainwright.” Stephen began to tell him about David, but the solicitor interrupted. “With your permission, Mr Wainwright, I should prefer to read the will.”

He sat in an arm-chair, took stiff sheets of paper out of a long envelope, and began. “This is the last will and testament of me, Jessica Mary Wainwright…” How easily I could summon up the image of her on that first afternoon in Woking, with her hair piled up under the tall hat with the feather in it, and how long ago that seemed. But what was Humphries saying?

“…I give to my three children, David who has recently returned to me, Stephen and Miles, an equal share in all my goods and property. I wish to express my appreciation to Stephen and Miles, and to Stephen’s wife Clarissa, for the devotion with which they have looked after me in my declining years, and I should like to say how sure I am that their care for me has not been motivated by any thought of future gain. If it were otherwise I would be grievously disappointed, and so would they.

“To Christopher Barrington I leave the sum of two hundred and fifty pounds, with my thanks for his help with the book about the Egyptian Wars. I trust that he will one day complete this, and that it will bring him a considerable financial reward.

“To Ellen Peterson I leave the sum of one hundred pounds, with thanks to her for the years of faithful service she has given…”

Two hundred and fifty pounds. I could hardly take it in. I looked at Stephen and Miles and saw that they were as bewildered as I. Humphries finished reading, coughed, and began to fold up the will. Stephen broke silence, speaking in a kind of high-pitched gasp. “I don’t understand. What does it mean?”

“It means, Mr Wainwright, that your mother had very little money to leave. She made the few bequests you have heard, and divided the rest equally among her children. There is the house, of course, but it is mortgaged.”

“Mortgaged! But Mamma was
rich.
”

“I am afraid not. She was left sufficiently well off when her husband died, but perhaps she was never quite as rich as you may have thought.”

“I thought there was – would be – two hundred thousand pounds.” Stephen stopped, as though conscious of the impropriety of naming a sum.

“Oh dear me no, there was never anything like that, nor even half of it. And then during the five years after the end of the war she plunged quite disastrously in the stock market. Strongly against my advice, I need hardly say. Recently she has speculated less, but even so her income had been further reduced. In a few years’ time things might have become very difficult indeed.”

“Do you mean there is
nothing.
” Stephen could not control the shrillness of his voice.

“There is a certain amount in the bank, and there are a few shares that are worth something. And there is the estate. It is mortgaged, as I mentioned, but for considerably less than its value. Lady Wainwright realised, however, that it would be impossible for any of you to maintain it. It will have to be sold.”

Uncle Miles began to laugh, not hysterically but with genuine amusement. I had never liked him so much as at that moment. “It’s like
Treasure Island,
isn’t it? You remember when they found Flint’s treasure chest, and it was empty. It was all for nothing, our staying with Mamma all these years, and Hugh’s trick was all for nothing too. Dear Mamma, she’s certainly had more brains than her sons.”

Clarissa bayed deeply. “It’s an outrage. After all the years we spent looking after her. An outrage.”

“I shall want to see the figures.” That was Stephen again. His voice had come down a note or two.

“By all means,” Humphries said coolly. “Whenever you wish.”

“I dare say there’ll be a few thousand for each of us,” Miles said cheerfully. He turned to me. “But what about you.”

“Two hundred and fifty won’t see me through the university.”

“It certainly won’t. What will you do?”

“I shall get married.”