A Very Private Murder (31 page)

I pretend it was the stars that drew me there. I remembered that night a couple of weeks ago when I followed Toby to Low Ogglethorp, with the heavens ablaze with starlight. It was magical. Why do the stars all look the same size, I wondered? Not
exactly
the same size, but near enough when you consider how different they are: red giants and yellow dwarfs; galaxies and gassy planets; lumps of rock and blazing fireballs. They all look similar from down here on Earth, reduced by distance and time to insignificant pinpricks in the sky. I could’ve been an astronomer if I hadn’t made it as a cop.

I didn’t really want to sleep in a cell at Driffield. There’d be the same old leg-pulls; the same smells and noises; the same repeated explanations. It would have been worth twenty pounds to have a bed at Phyllis’s, but she still wasn’t answering the phone. If I got to Driffield after midnight the place might have quietened down a bit by then. I switched off and decided to go for a walk.

I’d miss Toby, no doubt about it. There’d be a fresh case in a day or two, with a different cast, but Toby would be a difficult act to follow. I took the same path again but this time there was no moonlight and I stumbled here and there, wondering if I was mad. There was something uplifting about her. Something life-enhancing. Her indomitable cheerfulness knocked you sideways, made you feel good to be alive.

I was there, wherever
there
was. Left for the hidden village of Low Ogglethorp, right for Coneywarren Field with its fake stone circle. I decided that the chances of breaking a leg were lower at Coneywarren and turned right.

My night vision had come good and I was seeing clearly now. And hearing. It was a small laugh, followed by the sound of footfalls on dry grass and someone humming, very softly. I stopped and listened, thinking about withdrawing, not wanting to interrupt someone’s lovemaking. But I thought I knew who it was, and felt myself being drawn slowly towards the sounds.

There were two of them, performing some sort of courtly pavan. He was leading her, pulling her along, his steps slow and stately, his gait high as they swayed in harmony around the newly restored silver birch. They were both as naked as the day they were born. I held my breath and watched the two figures, their whiteness luminescent, as they performed a ritual known only to them. Six times they went round in a clockwise direction, then they switched hands and made six more turns to the widdershins. They weren’t young people and they weren’t fine specimens of our race. Time had ravaged their bodies, but there was something innocent and ageless about their dance and I felt privileged to be witnessing it. They turned to each other and embraced, slowly sinking to the ground, and I sneaked away. Their laughter followed me down the trail: his like a cawing jackdaw, hers like breaking glass.

I had a long talk with Maggie in the morning. Banjo the pit bull had donated a saliva sample, and his owner, Chick Shillito, had put the finger on Sean and Carl and they were going down, no doubt about it. Young Oscar Sidebottom had decided that playing the white knight was not for him and had put all the blame on Janet Threadneedle. Janet, meanwhile, prompted by Oscar’s savage testimony, had blamed him for the whole thing. He wanted Threadneedle dead and had persuaded her that it was the right thing to do. She’d loved her young paramour and had been swept along by him. I said I’d see her later.

As soon as the streets were aired I drove to Curzon House again. I decided I was in danger of becoming neurotic and parked near the tradesmen’s entrance, just to demonstrate that I was a free spirit. Grizzly answered the bell.

‘Good morning,’ I said, hoping I didn’t look as if I’d spent a sleepless night in the cells. ‘This is a surprise.’

‘Good morning, Charlie,’ she replied. ‘Yes it is. We thought you had solved all your cases and gone home. What can we do for you?’

‘Loose ends,’ I explained. ‘There are always loose ends. I was hoping to speak to your father. Is he available?’

‘I’m afraid not. He’s taken Toby birdwatching. They had an early start. Can I take a message?’

‘No, not really. Any idea when they’ll be back?’

‘Lunchtime, at a guess.’

‘Where will they have gone?’

‘Sorry. No idea.’

‘OK.’ I wished her all the best and climbed back in the car. Something was troubling me, and it wasn’t the supercool, unhelpful Ghislaine Curzon. Toby had gone birdwatching with her father. Early in the morning. I wondered whose idea it was. I picked up my phone, then put it away. I switched on the Airwave, then switched that off, too. Motty had told me, in his own way, that it was Curzon who had shot Peccadillo. That it had been Curzon’s idea. When I told him, the day before, that I was about to take a statement off Motty, he must have realised that he’d be exposed as the killer. Perhaps he hadn’t broken the law, but there was an attempted insurance fraud to consider, plus the dodgy syndicate, and he’d killed a perfectly healthy horse. With a daughter engaged to a royal prince it was a tabloid’s dream story.

Puffins. I remembered the painting above Toby’s bed. She’d painted it herself because they were her favourites. ‘Daddy was going to take me to see them at …’ That’s where my memory ran out. I pulled the road atlas out of the seat pocket behind me and thumbed through it until I reached the Yorkshire coast. The background to the painting was a series of sheer cliffs. I’d seen photographs of them many times, on calendars and in magazines, but never visited them. They were our answer to Beachy Head, except Beachy Head has an unenviable reputation. Beachy Head hosts a fair number of suicides every year. There it was: Bempton, just up the coast from Flamborough Head.

God, it was miles away. I switched on the Airwave and once more switched it off again. Bridlington was nearer to Bempton, but how could I explain? And if they arrived there first, lights flashing, they might aggravate the situation; precipitate some rash action by Curzon. I lay the open map on the passenger seat, slammed into first gear and put my foot down, hard.

There was a network of narrow lanes between me and my destination. The B1253 threaded through them but took me into Bridlington. I risked it and was lucky, traffic was light and soon I picked up the B1255 towards Flamborough and then the RSPB signs for their reserve at Bempton.

It was a pay and display car park, divided into neat bays by low wooden rails. Three people were at the ticket machine, trying to help each other find the right change, but I didn’t bother with a nicety like paying. I drove straight past them and went on a tour of the park, looking for Curzon’s elderly Volvo. I was beginning to think I’d guessed wrongly when, suddenly, there it was. I parked tight behind it, blocking him in.

They weren’t in the shop so I set off down the limestone path towards the cliff and its viewing points. The place was buzzing with lesser-spotted birdwatchers. Some were obvious amateurs, with the wife and kids, hoping to see a puffin; others dripped with hundreds of pounds worth of cameras, binoculars and telescopes, and you just knew they could tell an Arctic warbler from a Greenland chiffchaff at five hundred metres and would sniff with disdain at anyone who couldn’t.

The RSPB information board said that there could be up to a quarter of a million seabirds there, including the largest colonies of gannets and kittiwakes in the British Isles. By the smell of the place I’d say they were all at home. I walked down the grassy field towards the sturdy fence that protected the edge of the cliff, and the thought of it, there in front of me, gave me a nervous feeling in my legs.

It took your breath away. Four hundred feet, dead vertical, and every square foot inhabited by a screaming, cawing, gaping mouth, demanding attention. The air in front of the cliff was filled with wheeling and swooping seabirds looking for their own offspring. I stood mesmerised, my mind completely boggled, and almost forgot why I was there.

There were five observation points where the fence was designed to give the birdwatcher a view of the cliff face. It was elbow to elbow at the first one but I guessed that number five, half a mile away, would be relatively quiet, so I struck out towards it.

When I was nearly there I saw Toby coming towards me, cleaning her spectacles, binoculars hanging round her neck. They were those green rubberised ones that have lens covers dangling on them. When she was right up to me I said: ‘Good morning, Toby. Fancy meeting you here.’

She peered up at me, thrusting her face close to mine, like short-sighted people do. ‘Charlie?’ she said. ‘Is that Charlie?’ She hooked her specs around her ears. ‘It is!’ she declared. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘I came to count the gannets,’ I told her. ‘It’s part of my job.’

‘How many did you get?’

‘Five thousand seven hundred and ninety-seven.’

‘I got five thousand seven hundred and
ninety-six
. You must have counted one of them twice.’

‘Never. You must have missed one.’

‘Rubbish! Have you seen them dive in?’ She made a diving motion with her hand, terminating in a
splosh
.

‘Spectacular, aren’t they. Where’s your daddy?’

‘He’s following me. Must have stopped to look at something.’

‘You walk on, Toby. I’d like a word with him.’

‘Without me there. I get the message. Is it true you’ve solved the murder?’

‘You ask too many questions, but yes, we think we’ve solved it.’

‘Will you get promoted?’

‘No! Now go!’ I pointed down the trail and she skipped away.

He was meandering, stopping to use his binoculars, then consulting a bird book to try to identify something he’d seen. I leant on the fence and watched the aerial ballet being performed before my eyes. The gannets were special, folding their wings for the last fifty feet of their dive and entering the water with hardly a splash. They rose out of it a few seconds later, not a feather out of place, their painted heads as immaculately drawn as the Clinique girls at the mall.

‘Hello, James,’ I said, ‘I didn’t know you were a twitcher.’

Curzon shook his head to break out of the reverie. ‘Hello, Charlie,’ he replied. ‘A twitcher? No, not me. This is a surprise. What brings you to Bempton?’

‘Grizzly said I’d find you here, and I just wanted to fill you in before I went back to Heckley. Are you heading home?’

‘Yes, I think Toby’s seen all she wants. But haven’t you work to do? I think we know enough about the whole sad case, don’t you?’

‘Possibly, but I’d like to clarify a couple of points. Can we have a chat back at the house, if you don’t mind?’

‘Fine,’ he replied, but his expression indicated that he’d prefer to have his fingernails pulled out.

At the cars I suggested that he lead the way because he was more familiar with the lanes. ‘Do you mind if Toby rides with me?’ I asked. ‘We’ve some catching up to do.’ Toby looked delighted with the idea.

He led us along back roads, skirting the Wolds with their wide, lush valleys, through villages with names as unlikely as Grindale, Thwing and Octon. Sledmere, with its ornate Victorian architecture, demanded closer inspection, but we drove straight through. It would have to wait for another day. I asked Toby how the tennis serve was going and she told me that her father had promised to buy a serving machine, so she’d have something to play against.

‘I’m going to call it Rafael, after Rafael Nadal,’ she told me.

‘Sounds fun,’ I said. ‘Some of those machines are so realistic they grunt and spit.’

‘Rafael doesn’t grunt and spit,’ she protested.

‘No, but some of the women players do.’

‘Ha ha! Perhaps I should start. When we get one will you come over and have a go on it?’

‘Ooh, we’ll see.’

‘It’s not just me. Grizzly would like you to, as well.’

‘Ha! I doubt it.’ Curzon had stopped at a narrow junction, waiting for a tractor and trailer to go by. The farmer gave us a wave and we were off again.

‘She’s not going to marry Kevin, you know.’

I said: ‘Toby, you should keep things like that to yourself. It’s personal.’

‘She told me last night, in bed.’

‘Did you hear what I said?’

‘Yes, it’s personal.’ She twisted in her seat until she was facing me, her knees drawn up. ‘She’s on the shelf, now,’ she declared, ‘so you could marry her, and that would make me your sister-in-law. Would you like me for a sister-in-law?’

I nearly drove into the ditch. ‘Over my dead body,’ I told her.

Curzon took me into the room with the
deep-buttoned
easy chairs and then vanished for several minutes. He reappeared carrying a tray laden with coffee and biscuits.

‘No milk, I believe.’

‘Thank you.’

He fussed about, placing my coffee on the Queen Anne table at the side of my chair, leaving me a napkin, neatly folded and geometrically positioned. I didn’t mind the time-wasting: I wasn’t looking forward to our conversation any more than he was. Eventually he took his place in the easy chair facing me.

‘So what’s it all about?’ he asked.

‘I think you can guess,’ I replied. ‘I went to see Motty Dermot last night, as you know, and we had a long conversation. I say conversation, but I did most of the talking, asking direct questions that required simple answers. Unfortunately, that caused me to make some mistakes with his replies in the past, to jump to false conclusions. Motty told me that he was assisted by the
meister
to kill Peccadillo, and I was led to believe that this meant Threadneedle, but I was wrong, wasn’t I?’

He sat in silence for a long while, then chose his words carefully. ‘Motty goes back a long way,’ he said, ‘and he’s lived a sheltered life, surrounded by horses and racing folk, like his father and grandfather before him. He, and others like him, are like conduits going back two hundred years, with language and values that stretch back that far. Because I live in the
Big House
he credits me with some sort of respect. Respect that I don’t deserve. When he talks about the
meister
, he means me.’