Murder on a Summer's Day (10 page)

There is a first time for everything. This was my day for driving a Rolls-Royce. I had to sit forward in the seat to reach the controls.

‘It’s my car,’ Lydia said peevishly. ‘Let me drive.’

‘Get in. I’m driving.’ My patience ebbed. ‘It doesn’t run on gin.’

‘Oh yes it does.’

‘Oh no it doesn’t.’

She started to laugh, in a drunken slightly hysterical way, but climbed into the passenger seat.

We set off. I prefer drinkers who drop off to sleep. But I needed Lydia to stay awake, being unsure where along this twisting lane her parents’ farm was. The consolation was that I could not go far wrong, following the winding road between Bolton Abbey and Halton East. I noticed farm buildings to our left. ‘Is that it?’

‘No. That’s New Laithe. Stop the car. Let me drive.’

I guessed she wanted to turn up at her family’s farm appearing to be in charge. ‘You might not stop. I don’t want to be taken to London.’

‘Don’t put ideas in my head.’

‘It’s better that I drive. Your family will think you have a chauffeuse.’

This remark seemed to please her. ‘You’re right. Stop the car. I need to sit in the back.’

I stopped the car. She climbed out, stepped in a puddle, cursed, opened the rear door and poured herself in.

I set off.

‘There’s a cattle grid. You’ll see the turn after that.’

In under a mile, the motor grumbled across the cattle grid. Lydia waved in the direction of a muddy, cow-trampled lane. ‘Up there.’

Being a farm, the entrance had a gate. We sat, seeing who would give in first and open it. Neither of us wanted muddy feet.

In the end, I capitulated, probably because I wanted to decant her more than she wanted to be decanted. Stepping gingerly, I lifted the rope from the gatepost and pushed the gate. When I turned, I saw that Lydia had changed her mind and clambered into the driving seat.

I gave in gracefully, stepping aside as she drove through the gate, but not far enough aside to avoid being splashed with mud.

‘Hop in,’ she smiled. ‘My brother might drive you back on his motorbike.’

I climbed in beside her, ready to grab the wheel if we looked like hitting a barn.

Unfortunately for her, no one from the house was watching our grand arrival.

She pipped the horn. A woman’s face appeared at the window.

Satisfied, she climbed out, clutching her valise of jewellery.

I passed Lydia her overnight bag before sliding across into the driving seat.

Now was not the moment to intrude on Mrs Metcalfe.

As Lydia was ushered into the house, I turned the motor around. She called after me, something about her car.

Beyond the gate, I had to pull in by the side of the road when a herd of cows meandered towards me. They were followed by a man of about fifty years old, corduroy trousers tucked into boots, an old army shirt and a tweed jacket that had seen better days. I took a chance.

‘Mr Metcalfe?’

‘Who’s asking?’ When he touched his cap, pushing it back slightly revealing a balding head, the gesture was one of country courtesy, not deference. Here was a man singularly unimpressed by a Rolls-Royce.

‘Mrs Shackleton. I’ve just given your daughter, Lydia, a lift home.’

He gulped slightly at the mention of Lydia’s name. His open face betrayed such mixed emotions that I half expected him to say I could take her back where she came from.

Family loyalty prevailed.

‘Oh aye?’

‘She had some bad news. Her companion was found dead a few hours ago.’ I watched him carefully for any sign that he may have had something to do with the prince’s death.

‘I heard church bells.’ He glanced at the herd of cows. They were smart enough to have given me a wide berth and were carrying on without him, udders swinging. ‘Where did they find him?’

‘In the woods.’ That information would already be spreading so I was giving nothing away. ‘Mr Metcalfe, I was brought in to investigate the prince’s disappearance. This may seem like an impertinence, and irrelevant under the circumstances, but did he ask for Lydia’s hand in marriage?’

He hesitated. ‘How can he, when he’s already wed?’

‘Did he?’

‘He left a letter for me with the wife.’

‘When was that?’

‘Tuesday.’

‘Do you mind telling me what was in the letter? It could be important.’

‘It was of no importance to me. I chucked it on fireback.’

A cow made a lowing sound. Mr Metcalfe adjusted his cap.

‘Did he send anyone to intercede for him?’

‘I reckon he knew better than that.’ Mr Metcalfe nodded a goodbye.

As he moved away, I looked back and saw the cows waiting patiently by the gate.

If Mr Metcalfe were telling the truth, then the maharajah’s old school chum, who was meant to ‘disburse’ money to Mr Metcalfe, was better off by ten thousand pounds. No mean sum.

Mr Sergeant had given me the address of Thurston Presthope’s house at Halton East, but it was Lydia’s description of its neglect that drew me to it. It was the type of house that might once have housed a local squire. Constructed of stone, it stood no-nonsense square, with more than its fair share of sash windows, although two of them had been bricked up, possibly to avoid a long-ago window tax. In the evening sunlight, the windows looked dirty, one with a drooping curtain.

A drainpipe had come away from the wall. There were slates missing from the roof.

I stepped out of the Rolls.

It was a long time since the gate or the house had enjoyed a lick of paint. The gate took a bit of pushing as it was missing a hinge. Weeds grew through cracks in the path that led through an overgrown front garden to the porch. I raised and dropped the brass knocker.

After a long wait, during which I considered knocking again, someone called through the letter box to me about mislaying the key and saying I would have to wait. Eventually, after much shuffling about, the door opened. An elderly housekeeper looked from mud-spattered me to the mud-spattered white Rolls-Royce.

‘I don’t know if the master’s in.’

I produced my card.

She squinted at it. ‘I’ll ask.’

She left me waiting in the porch, with the door open, while she climbed the stairs slowly, leaning heavily on the banister.

The grandfather clock ticked fitfully and failed to chime on the hour of six. It was slow.

‘Who the devil is she and what does she want?’

‘She’s one of them rich eccentrics,’ I heard the housekeeper say, ‘covered top to toe in mud but driving a big car.’

An interested sound issued from the man’s throat.

A moment later, Presthope appeared on the staircase. From the corner of his mouth, he hissed, ‘Why didn’t you show her into the parlour?’

He then composed himself for what I took to be his version of a grand entrance, pulling in his belly, throwing back his shoulders, and probably – although I could not see – tucking in his buttocks and spreading his toes. He wore a silk smoking jacket, shabby dark trousers, and – from the stench – last week’s hair lotion. Cast in a melodrama as a younger man, he would have been the romantic lead. Now he was seedy and down at heel.

‘Come in, dear lady. Excuse my housekeeper’s rudeness.’

I smiled. ‘She was not at all rude, Mr Presthope. I am the intruder. Mrs Shackleton.’

‘I have heard all about you from Upton. You found my good friend’s body.’ His voice oozed charm, confidence and deep regret. No doubt the money the maharajah had entrusted to him would see him right in the spruce up and style department.

He hesitated in the hall before leading me into a dining room. ‘I’m sorry we haven’t lit fires. It’s so warm.’

We stood by the dining room table. I noticed that a side table held a photograph of a school cricket team. A young Prince Narayan and Presthope stood side by side.

He pulled out a chair for me. ‘I’ve asked for tea to be brought, unless you would like something stronger, after such a shock.’

‘Tea will be grand.’

‘I apologise for the scratchiness of my situation here, but my wife is in town, staying with her mother.’

From the look of the room, his wife had been staying with her mother for a very long time.

He sat in the carver at the head of the table. ‘I can’t believe that Narayan is dead. We were such good chums at school. Of course, as a sportsman, he excelled – cricket, polo, rugby. Such a loss, such a great loss. I am so glad to have seen him just once more.’

‘That is what I want to ask you about, Mr Presthope. You see, the Indian royal family will be arriving shortly, along with the duke and duchess. I want to be able to give his lordship a clear account of events so that he will be able to answer Maharajah Shivram Halkwaer’s questions.’

‘Of course. And if Maharajah Shivram wishes to speak to me, I should be glad to attend his highness.’

I bet you would. Here was a man with an eye for any opportunity.

‘When did you last see your friend?’

‘He stayed here four days ago, for one night. We had arranged the visit by letter. He was motoring from Derbyshire and unsure of his precise day of arrival, but he wired me the day before.’

‘You must have had a lot to talk about.’

‘Oh we did. He was in excellent spirits. We reminisced about schooldays, horses, motor cars. My wife being away it was not so awkward with Miss Metcalfe. She has turned into a fine looking woman.’

I played the simpleton. ‘I would have thought if your wife were here, it would be less not more awkward to entertain Miss Metcalfe.’

‘You jest, Mrs Shackleton. If my wife were here there would have been an extreme difficulty in receiving Lydia Metcalfe. Her family farm nearby and she is… well, being a gentleman, I shall be kind. She never did fit in, from being small. Country life did not suit her. She was sent to live with an aunt in London.’

‘Is that why your guests spent only one night here, because of the possible scandal?’

‘No! I would have accepted her, for his sake. But she objected to the lack of comfort. We plan some changes here, you see. The bathroom was not to her liking. And I dare say his highness is used to a great deal better.’

That surely must qualify for the understatement of all time, yet he did not blink an eye. I waited.

‘The Metcalfe farm was their first port of call, and then they came here. Respectable folk, the Metcalfes. It tells one something that Lydia did not get on with her own parents.’

‘So you did not approve of their engagement?’

He hesitated just a little too long before shaking his head in what he must hope would appear a wise and telling manner. ‘He would not have married her.’

‘Oh? I thought perhaps a wedding was planned and you were to be best man.’

He gave me an oily smile. I could see a compliment forming as he looked at me.

‘My dear lady, if you were to be maid of honour, I would be best man at any wedding. But I can assure you there was no such plan.’

I ignored his clumsy attempt to flirt. ‘She wore an engagement ring.’

‘A bull wears a ring through its nose but expects no nuptials, pardon my bluntness. He met her at the Folies Bergère. His other lady friends were immediately banished to the outer darkness, suitably recompensed, of course.’

If they had been suitably recompensed, I guessed that no previous mistress of the prince would trouble herself to risk a noose by shooting him. But a liar and a rogue who stood to gain a great deal of hard cash, and probably thought it his due, would have no such scruples.

‘Where were you on Friday afternoon and evening?’

He stared at me. ‘What? You don’t imagine…’

There was a kick at the door.

Presthope pushed back his chair. ‘You can’t get the staff these days.’

He walked to the door and flung it open. Keeping his voice low, he said, ‘I’ve told you. Put the tray down, and then open the door. Don’t just boot it.’

‘What? Pardon?’ The housekeeper did not lower her voice. ‘You want me to bend down and spin meself dizzy? Well I can’t do it, and I can’t hold a tray and turn a knob, not with my rheumatics.’

So spoke a woman who had not been paid her wages, and remained loyal to her absent mistress.

The door closed.

Presthope came to the table with the tray that had been thrust at him.

‘Excuse my housekeeper. I keep her on out of pity.’ He pushed the tray in my direction. ‘I was here on Friday afternoon, with my accountant.’

I hate those moments when it is left to me to pour tea, especially tea so weak it is not worth the trouble. But I did it, not wishing to interrupt my line of questioning by a debate about who should play mother.

‘You say you saw the prince just that one night?’

‘Yes. The constable asked me did Narayan ride across here to see me on Friday. Unfortunately he did not.’

‘What about Thursday?’ This was the date of the note when the prince had handed money to Presthope.

He shook his head as he took a careful sip of tea and only just refrained from pulling a face. It was stewed, and cold.

‘You were at the hotel on Thursday I believe, connected with an exchange of money?’