The Killing of Olga Klimt (12 page)

It rang almost at once. His mother clearly wanted to know details. I am not answering, he thought.

‘My fault, my fault,
my fault,
' he whispered. He hadn't been himself. It was a misunderstanding. A terrible misunderstanding. People uttered the most appalling idiocies when they were drunk and upset. The fat nanny had deprived him of the one person he loved more than anything else in the world!

He tried to get a grip on himself. He blew his nose and dabbed at his eyes with his handkerchief.

No – she couldn't have killed Olga – impossible – Olga was not dead – Olga couldn't be dead – things like that did not happen – strangers didn't exchange murders – she could not be dead …

But she was.

The body lay across the threshold, half in, half out of the open front door. He had asked the taxi to stop at the end of the cul-de-sac and had got out and run the short distance to the house … Philomel Cottage … It was he who had bought it for her … He remembered how Olga had clapped her hands in delight when he explained that it meant nightingale …

Tears streamed down his face. He knelt beside the body – reached out and touched her hair – there was a dark patch on her back – it felt sticky –

Blood
.

She must have been stabbed, though there was no sign of a knife. At least he couldn't see a knife. Had Miss Frayle taken the knife with her?

He thought of going into the house and turning on the hall light, but decided against it. There was a full moon, bathing the ghastly scene in its silvery light and with every second he saw more – the dark stain on Olga's back became darker – she was wearing a light-coloured coat –

He heard a scratching noise followed by faint mewing – something soft brushed against him – the kitten – the poor little kitten – it was he who had given it to her. He picked it up. The kitten licked his fingers. He put it inside his breast pocket. They had meant to give it a name but had never got around to it …

His nostrils caught the whiff of a perfume – Olga's perfume?

No, it wasn't. He was familiar with Olga's perfume.

He had the uncanny feeling of being watched and turned abruptly.

He saw a silhouette – a man standing very still, very straight, only a couple of paces away, looking not at him, but at Olga's body.

Charlie rose. The man's figure was familiar –
too
familiar.

‘Bedaux?'

I keep my hands inside my pockets as Mr Eresby tells me that Olga is dead. I remain silent. I believe Mr Eresby is wearing one of his five dressing gowns: the dark blue one with the dove-grey lapels.

In my right hand I clutch at the length of rope I brought with me. I clutch at it as though my life depends on it. It occurs to me that I won't need it now.

I am motionless, speechless, breathless. I am aware of my lips moving, articulating her name.
Olga. Olga
. I can't tear my eyes from her body. I can't see it very well from where I stand but I feel no desire to go anywhere near it.

This, I tell myself, is the end.

Suddenly the choking sensation in my throat lifts. Now I feel nothing.

Nothing at all.

‘She has been killed – I found her – she – she's been stabbed!' Mr Eresby stammers.

Without a single word I turn round and walk back towards the main road.

Charlie made no attempt to stop him. The last thing he felt like doing at this very moment was talk to Bedaux. Somehow he didn't believe Bedaux would call the police. From what Olga had told him, Bedaux had too many skeletons in his cupboard to want to have to anything to do with the police.

The kitten in his pocket mewed again …

Some instinct of self-preservation then began to assert itself and Charlie emerged from his stupor. He rose.

The police. He must call the police. That was what any law-abiding citizen would do in the circumstances. He knew he would immediately become their prime suspect. Olga had been his girlfriend. He was the rich boyfriend. It was his house. They wouldn't bother to look for anyone else –

But he had an alibi! He had been in bed at the clinic when he got the phone call. The murder had been committed by then – that could be proven quite easily – he would have to do a lot of explaining, though – he would have to tell them about the woman from the Sylvie & Bruno Nursery School and their conversation – how they'd exchanged murders – then the ball would be back in his court – oh God – what was he to do?

The nursery nut – that bloody Miss Frayle! He couldn't very well tell the police it was her without implicating himself – would they believe him that he'd never meant her to kill Olga?

He sniffed the air – that perfume again! Where had he smelled it before?

There was something wrong, though he couldn't say what it was. Well –
everything
was wrong! Things couldn't be more wrong.

He couldn't possibly go on standing there any longer, with the front door to Philomel Cottage gaping open and Olga's bloodied corpse lying across the threshold …

The next moment his mobile rang again.

He stood staring down at the name displayed on the illuminated monitor in shocked disbelief.

Olga? Olga was ringing him …

No, it couldn't be her.
Olga
?

Shivers ran down his spine and his hair stood on end, but then realisation dawned on him and his irrational horror turned to outrage.

It was Olga's killer calling him. Miss Frayle had taken Olga's mobile. It was Miss Frayle who was ringing him from Olga's mobile phone.

And of course that was Miss Frayle's perfume that hung round the body.

Major Payne lowered the book. ‘Nobody’s ever drunk, they are “inebriated”. Nobody hurries, they “hasten”. And flowers are invariably “bedecked”. It is all unbearably sycophantically courteous. It might have been written by a courtier.’

‘Wasn’t Shawcross a courtier?’

‘I don’t think so. He’s a journalist.’

‘I bet her gowns and hats and boas are described in vivid detail?’ Antonia smiled.

‘Yes, they are. In vivid vacuous detail …’ Payne opened the hefty tome at random. ‘Listen to this. “Cream chiffon moiré with appliqué bars of silver lame … Ivory georgette, heavily beaded … Japonica-pink velvet …” It’s strictly for readers that are secretly drawn to sartorial orgies … This seems less a biography of a person than a swatch of high-end dress fabric!’

‘No satirical edges?’

‘None whatsoever. All deadly serious, solemn, bland and adulatory.’

‘She lived to be a hundred and one. How could anyone write about her without a satirical edge?’

‘That’s what I keep asking myself.’

‘Doesn’t one get to know what she was like? I mean – really like?’

‘Well, no. I don’t think so. I was particularly curious to find out what it was that made Hitler call her the “most dangerous woman in Europe”, also more details of her treatment of Diana, but there is nothing about any of that. What one gets instead is the highly dramatic account of how, on one memorable occasion, she almost walks into a diplomatic reception wearing the
légion d’honneur
on the wrong shoulder.’

‘Wow,’ Antonia said.

‘The key word, please note, is “almost”. There are lots of opportunities for high comedy, but they have been missed.’

‘It’s such a big book.’

‘Yes! More than a thousand pages.’

‘I suppose we could employ it as a rather unusual doorstop?’ Antonia suggested.

‘Not a bad idea!’

The phone rang and Payne picked it up.

It was a woman’s voice that he didn’t recognise.

‘Hallo – is that Hugh Payne?’

‘Speaking.’

‘Oh hallo, Hugh. It’s Deirdre Collingwood speaking. Hope you remember me? We met at a party at the Peruvian embassy some time ago, last February, I think.’

‘Of course I remember you. Those grisly canapés!’

‘They were rather awful, weren’t they?’

‘What a remarkable coincidence.’ Payne grimaced at Antonia. ‘My wife and I were just talking about diplomatic receptions.’

‘It was Rupert who gave me your number,’ Lady Collingwood explained. ‘I do hope you don’t mind terribly. I am at my wits’ end. Rupert was against my calling you. He said I couldn’t possibly bother you about it, that it wasn’t the done thing, that I should call the police –’

‘What’s happened?’ Payne asked.

‘Charlie isn’t answering his phone. I don’t know where he is. He answered his phone just once. The first time. That’s when he told me about Olga. I have no idea where he is or who he is with. He was in a car – I could tell by the noise. I don’t want to call the police, not yet. I am afraid Charlie would be furious if I did. Rupert is not much help. He is in one of his moods. He’s gone to his study now. Rupert’s study is – well, inviolable. I simply don’t know what to do. Could Charlie have been kidnapped, do you think?’

‘What makes you think so?’

‘I am perfectly aware that this is a terrible imposition, Hugh, but I was wondering whether I could ask you for help. Rupert said you knew all about this girl Olga Klimt. I understand he told you the whole story.’

‘He told me about Olga, yes.’ Payne cast another glance at Antonia. ‘What happened exactly?’

‘To be perfectly honest,’ Lady Collingwood said, ‘I couldn’t care less whether Olga is dead or alive. It’s an awful thing to say, but I am mainly concerned about Charlie’s safety and state of mind. He should never have got involved with that girl, never, but you know what young men are. I called Charlie about half an hour ago. He was in a dreadful state. He was sobbing. I have no idea where he is at this very moment. All he said was that Olga was dead.’

‘Is that all he said?’

‘Yes. Olga is dead.’

Payne asked her a couple more questions. He reached out for the pad and pen they kept on the telephone table and made some notes. Eventually he rang off. He looked at his watch. ‘That was Deirdre, Lady Collingwood.’

‘So I gathered.’ Antonia rose slowly from the sofa. ‘Something’s happened to Olga Klimt, hasn’t it?’

‘Olga Klimt is dead. Deirdre doesn’t know any details. She has no idea how accurate the information is. She phoned her son earlier tonight. All he said was, “Olga’s dead”. Then he rang off. She hasn’t been able to contact him since.’

‘What does she expect you to do?’

‘She wants me to track him down.’

‘She should have called the police.’

‘She doesn’t want to call the police because she is afraid it may infuriate Charlie.’

‘What has Lord Collingwood got to say about it?’

‘He appears to be incommunicado. He has shut himself in his study.’ Payne looked down at the pad. ‘Deirdre rang the clinic where Charlie’s been staying – place in Bayswater – but was told that, following a phone call, Charlie left – he was seen running out of the building – then the porter saw him get into a cab. He was wearing his dressing gown and slippers. He appeared to be crying.’

‘We could assume that the phone call he received was something to do with Olga. Someone told him that Olga was dead,’ Antonia went on thoughtfully. ‘It was either the person who stumbled across her body or else the killer announcing their deed to Charlie.’

‘Why should the killer want to declare their deed?’

‘I don’t know … Oh.’

‘What’s the matter?’

‘No, nothing.’

But there was something. Something impossibly silly and irrelevant. She had remembered Eddy chanting, Aunt Clo-Clo must die. Aunt Clo-Clo must die. It had happened that day at the Sylvie & Bruno Nursery School. When she had asked Eddy who Aunt Clo-Clo was, he said he didn’t know, but he had seen it written on a sheet of paper on Miss Frayle’s desk. The sentence had been written
at least ten times, he had counted them! He had sworn he wasn’t lying.

Well, Antonia did remember him going up to the desk after Miss Frayle had left to attend to the man who had fainted and been brought into her nursery school. That man was Charles Eresby.

As it happened, it wasn’t Aunt Clo-Clo who was dead but Olga Klimt. Could there be a connection? Did Fenella Frayle have an aunt called Clo-Clo? Did she wish her dead? Antonia then remembered that Fenella Frayle had struck her as preoccupied when she and Eddy were first ushered into her office that morning … No, nonsense … Miss Frayle couldn’t have anything to do with Olga Klimt’s death!

Payne was talking, ‘Charlie may be anywhere at the moment, but we might as well start by visiting Olga’s little house in Fulham. It is called Philomel Cottage. Collingwood told me the address. It’s in Ruby Road … We’ve got the satnav, so we’ll get there in no time … Perhaps that’s where the body was found … Though it may be somewhere else … What do you say?’

‘Do we need to get involved in this?’

‘We most certainly do. I have been thinking of little else since Collingwood told me the Olga Klimt story. Things have now come to a head …’ He started patting his pockets. ‘Car keys?’

Antonia sighed. ‘I’ve got them.’

‘
Allons-y
! Cometh the hour, cometh the man.
And
the woman.’

‘She should call the police … There are better things we could do with our lives, Hugh.’

‘I am sure there are, my love, though not perhaps at this particular moment in time. We expected Olga Klimt to be killed and she was killed. How could we not get involved?’

In the car Antonia said, ‘She may have died a natural death. Sorry to be a wet blanket, but we shouldn’t immediately assume that she’s been killed. Or she may have died in an accident. Or she may have committed suicide.’

Payne looked at her.

Fenella Frayle was on her knees, in a prayer-like position, heaving over the lavatory bowl.

She gasped for breath …

Eventually she rose shakily to her feet. She went up to the sink and splashed cold water over her face. She then brushed her teeth frantically and gargled with two different mouthwashes. She avoided glancing at her face in the mirror. She knew she looked dreadful – all blotched and mottled, her eyes puffy, wild and staring.