Classic In the Pits--A Jack Colby classic car mystery (11 page)

‘
Very
nice tea this,' he added approvingly.

I informed him it came from Pluckley, not far from Frogs Hill and the village considered to host more ghosts than any other in Kent.

He listened carefully before commenting. ‘So, Jack, it's like this. I'm like one of them ghosts. You haven't seen me and I've never been to this place. Not a whisper, not a word or you'll be one of them. Got it?'

‘Wrong. The police are following the Porsche story up and I'm involved. So might you be. I might stop, but the police won't.' All my fingers were mentally crossed – or would be when they had stopped trembling.

‘Just leave them to me, Jack.'

I couldn't let it go at that. ‘
If
I can.'

A vision of Brandon and Dave's faces if they thought I was trading with Doubler floated before me, and momentarily I forgot the more immediate threat. ‘There's Mike Nelson's murder to consider,' I continued. ‘The car might be connected to that. Somebody wanted that car so badly they hired you to pinch it.'

He actually grinned. ‘You disappoint me, Jack, you really do. I don't go pinching anything. I arrange things for people – weddings, funerals. I'm what you'd call a consultant.'

‘Including Mike Nelson's death?'

The cold eye treatment again. ‘That's what I came here for. To remind you I don't touch murder.' A long pause. ‘Unless I've no choice.'

He stood up. Any minute now … I could feel my heart pounding as he put his mug down, carefully placing it on the coaster, and put his hand into his pocket. ‘I'll just use your toilet, Jack, and then I'll be going. It's a long walk back.'

‘Can't afford a car?' I quipped, weak with relief when all he produced from the pocket was a torch.

‘You will have your little joke, Jack. Just remember I don't do jokes. I do like walking. I can think better that way. The car's at Piper's Green.'

What, I wondered, was I going to find when Doubler had gone? A Medici-like contraption on the lavatory to plunge a dagger into me? Electrified wash taps? Poison in the soap?

He left Frogs Hill quietly enough, and I heard him whistling all the way down Frogs Hill Lane until the sound faded. Only it wasn't ‘Mack the Knife' any more. It was ‘John Brown's Body'. Oh great! I found no poisoned soap left behind however, nor daggers, only an artificial poppy probably left over from last Remembrance Sunday. Odd, because Doubler did nothing by chance.

‘You what, Jack? This a joke?'

I've never seen Len look scared before, but at my mentioning – for my own safety as much as anything – that Doubler had been at Frogs Hill the evening before he went white with shock.

‘Didn't let him into the Pits, did you?' he threw at me.

‘No way.' Thank heavens I hadn't. Len would have spent several months checking every nut and bolt in the place for sabotage.

Even Zoe looked perturbed. ‘I hope you know what you're doing, Jack.'

‘I'm not
doing
anything with Doubler. He came here uninvited.'

‘What for?' they demanded in unison.

‘I wish I knew. He was undoubtedly involved in the Porsche theft, but that doesn't automatically make him an active participant in Mike's murder.'

‘I don't follow,' Zoe said aggressively.

I tried to reason it out. ‘Involvement in the murder as well as the theft would imply some kind of insurance scam but then the car wouldn't have been found again. It would have been out of the country quicker than a Sunbeam Tiger on the loose. Instead it turns up in Sussex, probably bought in the marketplace.'

‘That's not like Doubler,' Len commented.

‘That seems to be his line too.'

Silence. ‘Well, at least the Porsche is safe,' Zoe said practically.

It was, so why
had
Doubler come to see me, as he must have heard that the car had been found? Was it to dissociate himself from the Porsche – or to warn me off? I couldn't see why he would have materialized in person for a mere stolen car, even that Porsche, but nor would he have done so if it
was
involved in Mike's murder. His talk of not destroying a beautiful object didn't make sense if it was Mike's car he was talking about, because there was no way Doubler would have returned it to its rightful owner, even if he had gone dewy-eyed over its beauty. Nor would anyone in their right senses, let alone Mike, destroy that Porsche for an insurance scam when it could have been sold for its full insurance value.

‘Doubler's trouble, Jack,' Len warned.

‘I know that. I'm not planning on doing business with him.'

I got my comeuppance for sarcasm. Two backs were turned to me as they bent over the Wolseley Hornet twin carburettors that had to be synchronized during their tuning of this beguiling car. I left them to it, having heard the toot of Dave's horn, and I went outside to join him. He duly drove in with a flourish in his police BMW and wound down the window to yell greetings at me. Time to meet Mrs Ansty – and the Porsche.

‘Good to have a day out now and then,' he added as I joined him in the car.

‘Great. Especially as you're paying me for the honour.'

‘Delighted,' he replied wryly. ‘We're meeting the Sussex lads HQ at Burwash Forstal, where the unlucky owner lives.'

‘How did she take the news?'

‘Badly, I'm told.'

‘How old's this Mrs Ansty? Youngish blonde, trendy? It has to be someone with a real eye for Porsches.'

‘Oldish blonde. Mid sixties.'

‘Buying that Porsche?' I was flabbergasted. ‘Who is she? A relative of Bill Gates?'

‘School dinner lady, just retired.'

‘You
are
joking, Dave?'

‘I take my work seriously.' He grinned at me. ‘It's true.'

‘Then how, when, why and where?'

‘That,' Dave said, as we negotiated a difficult turn at Biddenden, ‘we shall discover.'

Burwash and its satellite hamlets Burwash Common, Burwash Weald and Burwash Forstal are not far inside the Sussex border if one is travelling from Kent and so I knew the area well. Even so, when Dave turned off into Appleoak Lane I was in new territory. Ahead of us were the rolling hills that had so attracted Kipling at the turn of last century. I mention him because he lived at Bateman's on the far side of Burwash in a similar lane to this one. It now belongs to the National Trust and I know it well. I've a great affection for Bateman's – especially for the honour awarded to Kipling's splendid Rolls-Royce Phantom I displayed in its own garage in the gardens, glass-fronted like the one at Old Herne's. I drool over that car quite frequently.

The hamlet of Burwash Forstal was not far from Burwash village, and Broome Cottage was one of a small nest of houses. It was an attractive white-painted stone detached house with a garden at the front and no doubt at the rear as well, giving the picturesque impression, as so many cottages do, that it was sheltered from the storms of life. Its garage was independent of the house but our quarry was not in it. The Porsche was parked outside the front door, looking out of place but magnificent ‘eye candy', as they say.

It was Mike's. No doubt about that, and with its stylish headlights pointing towards us as we approached it looked almost indignant at its current residence. There it was, its silver paint gleaming, looking as spic and span as the day it left the Stuttgart factory in 1963.

Further along the lane I could see not only the Sussex police car but also a parked low-loader, so any hopes that I would be driving the Porsche back to its Kentish home myself receded. By the side of the Porsche stood a truculent-looking lady, arms folded aggressively across her chest and ready, it seemed, to defend her rights against all comers. She had her eye on the driver of the low-loader, who was walking along to join us together with the Sussex reinforcements. These consisted of a rather nice looking chap in his thirties, who introduced himself as DI Maine, and a constable, PC Middlemas. They told us they had arrived fifteen minutes earlier, had been routed by the dinner lady and were regrouping for another assault. The low-loader driver took a closer look at the opposition and wisely returned to his cab to rejoin his companion and admire the distant hills.

‘Leave this to me,' Dave said grandly. Being a family man, he reckons he has a way with elderly ladies.

Not that this one looked elderly. Medium height, medium build, but there was nothing else medium about her. She had blonde hair, was neatly clad in the kind of clothes magazines deem suitable for ‘country living', and had eyes flashing fury at us like warning lights at a level crossing. Hers were going to take longer to clear, I reckoned.

She stood her ground as Dave and I approached.

‘Detective Superintendent Jennings,' I introduced the party. ‘Kent Car Crime Unit. Detective Inspector Maine, Police Constable Middlemas, Sussex Police. I'm Jack Colby, working with them on this case.'

‘
This case
,' Mrs Ansty repeated with scorn. ‘I've been informed you all believe that this car has been stolen and that you insist it still belongs to the previous owner. Well, have I got news for you. It's mine.'

Constable Middlemas was already checking the plates and inside of the car, so I tackled the chassis number and engine, which of course didn't tally with Mike's. A number punch had been at work, falsifying enough numbers to ensure it went through the registration process safely. Why, it occurred to me, had the ‘dealer' – presumably from Doubler's set-up – not shipped it abroad where the registration process could be simpler? However, this was certainly Mike's car. Naturally enough there was no service book in the door pouch to prove provenance, but the engine and the roll bar welded to the body channels put it beyond doubt. All we needed now was the fake documents that Mrs Ansty must be holding. I nodded to Dave to say I was satisfied and she interpreted this correctly.

‘Come inside,' she said wearily. ‘I've got all the paperwork laid out for you including the bill of sale to prove I bought it from a dealer and therefore that means the car belongs to me. Nevertheless –' the hint of a smile – ‘I suppose I could run to some coffee for you.' She might be calmer now but she showed every sign of being a hurricane when roused.

Three of us went in, leaving the constable to watch for any last minute rescue attempts by persons unknown hiding in the undergrowth. A sense of fair play made me think we were somewhat crowding her inside this small house, but I need not have worried. Three hulking policemen were nothing to her. She dominated the small room to which she led us. Coffee preparations accounted for one table, a desk was laid out with the papers, and chairs were dotted around for convenience. She had been fully prepared.

‘There it all is,' she indicated. ‘Take your pick.'

She busied herself with coffee while we did just that. Dave and DI Maine began to go through them but I was more interested in the lady herself. Why had she chosen this car to buy? For a retired school dinner lady it seemed a mismatch, to say the least.

‘I'm told the person you think owns the car has died, and so I'm doubly sorry for his family,' Mrs Ansty told me, and she was clearly sincere. ‘But I do have rights, I'm sure of that. I bought it in good faith from a dealer and it's an expensive car, so you can't expect me to hand it over just like that. I tried to ring the dealer to tell him I was having trouble but there was no reply.'

Dave looked up at this and cleared his throat. ‘The problem is, Mrs Ansty, that this dealer of yours, Samuel Palmer, he doesn't exist.'

‘Nonsense,' she said happily. ‘Of course he does. I bought it from him – well, from his partner, which is the same thing. The partner is Samuel Palmer, but it was Simon Marsh who made all the arrangements. He assured me the car was a bargain.' For the first time a note of doubt flashed across her face as she looked from one to the other of us.

‘Did you go to the office to see the car?' Simon Marsh's ‘office', Dave had told me, was said to be in south London, and, guess what, that didn't exist either.

‘No. It was such a way to go that Simon said he'd drive it over here for me to see.' More doubt on her face. ‘I'd not long moved here, so I was all too glad to accept. I'm retired now and it was a new life, so I wanted a new car.'

‘The firm of Palmer and Marsh truly does not exist,' DI Maine assured her. ‘We've checked it out.'

‘But Simon Marsh does because I've met him,' she said obstinately. ‘He had all the paperwork from the last owner – a gentleman in Spain, I believe. Anyway, as you see, it's now been registered with Swansea and they didn't find anything wrong with the documentation.'

‘They wouldn't.' I tried to break this to her gently. ‘For them it was a first registration, so if the foreign paperwork all added up and the engine and chassis numbers had been altered so that they didn't show up on their records, no alarm bells would go off. But the Porsche Club 356 Register whom you contacted is a different matter,' I explained. ‘They know the engine and chassis numbers of every 356 ever built and every series. Yours didn't fit in the engine sequence numbers so it was an instant giveaway. Did you register it yourself with Swansea?'

‘Well no, Simon said he'd do it for me, because he had all the previous owner's paperwork, but the registration document came straight to me from the DVLA. All in order,' she said crossly. ‘I spent a lot of money on this car.'

My heart bled for her. Simon Marsh had done the registration? How generous of him. ‘How much did he charge you for the car?'

‘Twenty thousand pounds.' She looked at our astounded faces, slightly puzzled. ‘That's a lot, isn't it?'

She must have been thinking that our astonishment was because she had paid too much, poor woman. Considering the insurance on this car must be for at least a quarter of a million pounds and probably much more, she had a bargain – or would have done if it had been a legitimate sale. Even without Mike's car's provenance, any Porsche 356, with that Carrera engine, would be insured for way over the twenty thousand she'd paid.