Business Unusual (The Simon Bognor Mysteries) Page 8

  By the time the fire brigade had broken down the front door Freddie was dead. Very. Wartnaby had been notified of the death and seen enough at first glance to view it as suspicious and, given his earlier conversation with Bognor, probably relevant to his enquiries regarding Brackett. He had rung the Talbot and found Monica, just returned from an unsatisfactory afternoon watching a bad print of a movie which, as a result of some uncharacteristic failure of internal wiring, she had expected to be a Louis Malle but which was actually a Michael Winner.

  She had told Bert Wartnaby that Bognor had left a note saying he was Castle-bound so Wartnaby had phoned twice. On getting no reply, or rather one ‘no reply’ and one ‘wrong number’, he had called Monica again. She, concerned, had asked to go with him. On arrival they had bumped into the Earl on the drawbridge. He, incidentally, smelt strongly of Miss Dior (identified by Monica) and did not look in the least like a man who had just come in from the shoot. Indeed he looked pretty shifty. The three, entering together, were confronted by the butler, Perkins, who was evidently all too eager to connive at the come-uppance of the Countess and a guest to whom he had clearly taken an instant aversion.

  ‘I do believe m’lady said something about a medicinal sauna,’ he had said, or some such pseudo-sycophantic hypocrisy. So they had all crammed into the intimacy of an elevator made for two and burst in on Bognor and the Countess practically naked, and intimately entwined in the hot tub. End of story. Or of chapter.

  Secretly, of course, Monica was not altogether surprised nor even as cross as she had seemed. In a way she was relieved because it gave her an excuse for escaping from a provincial city which she was finding every bit as bloody as the Countess. And she knew that there was no malice in her wretch of a husband. It was just that a certain sort of woman, herself included should the truth be told, found him peculiarly cuddly. Of course he was exasperating. Of course he was pathetic. Of course he was easily led. But these were negative vices and against them Bognor had some positive virtues even if, for the moment, she could not recall what they were. Cuddliness was one. Vulnerability another. Oh well, what the hell, she was fond of him, and he, she knew, of her. Despite occasional appearances to the contrary. Besides, there was a certain bizarre satisfaction in having your husband snatched by someone quite as exotic as the Countess of Scarpington. Still Monica had observed, with unspoken pride, that while she was undeniably in good shape for a woman of her age, her breasts were distinctly scrawny. Monica considered hers definitely superior.

  And she had to concede that her spouse, now sitting green upon the hotel bed, did look impossibly sad and ill. Not, however, attractive enough, or contrite enough, to be forgiven just yet. And she was damned if she was going to stay in this provincial hell-hole a moment longer. So she would be on the ten o’clock to King’s Cross and let him stew. She would allow herself to be taken out for an expensive dinner by one of her handful of attentive, and rich, exes. And when she did finally deign to talk to Simon again she would let him know. She would even suggest that she too had dallied and strayed, perhaps to rather more effect than he had managed in the castle dungeon sauna.

  ‘Very well,’ she said, zipping her bag shut with a finality as withering as weed-killer. ‘I’m off. I suggest you have an extremely good night’s sleep and start off tomorrow with as clean a sheet as you can contrive. But don’t expect me to forgive. Or to forget. It is my opinion that you are beneath contempt.’ She looked at him properly for a second and to herself, silently, said, ‘Oh, Simon, Simon, who is your own worst enemy? You are such a silly little boy.’ And out loud: ‘I wouldn’t look in the mirror tomorrow morning. You might frighten yourself to death.’

  She strode to the door, opened it, and turned with one final theatrical toss of the head.

  ‘Don’t ring me,’ she threw back at him. ‘I’ll ring you.’

  Bognor tried to respond, but the words, whatever they were, would not come.

  She flounced out, crashing the door behind her.

  ‘Silly sod,’ she said.

  So Bognor slept alone that night. He did not enjoy it, but he slept the sleep of the dead, or the damned — dreamless and undisturbed. When he woke, it was to a knocking at the door.

  ‘Room Service,’ came the call, reminding him all too vividly of the events of the day before.

  He bundled himself out of bed, realising to his surprise and chagrin that he was still in his shirtsleeves and underpants, lurched to the door, opened it and found Osbert Wartnaby standing there with a tray and a clutch of newspapers.

  ‘What happened to Frantisek?’ asked Bognor, confused.

  ‘Who?’ Wartnaby seemed as confused. ‘I thought you’d need a proper breakfast so I’ve brought you the works. Charming girl called Miriam in the kitchen. I’ve charged it to your bill.’

  ‘Oh.’ Bognor stroked stubble and wondered why he was not feeling more hung-over. Probably still drunk. The hangover would strike around eleven, just when he was least expecting it. That was the way with hangovers. They were like clever muggers, always attacking you when your guard was down.

  ‘I must say I have to hand it to you.’ Bognor contemplated the tray. A cafetière of what looked like proper coffee, eggs, bacon, black pudding, fried bread, orange juice, thick toast, butter, Baxter’s. ‘This looks like the real McCoy. How do you do it?’

  Wartnaby smiled. ‘It’s amazing,’ he said, ‘the effect an official police identity card has on the average citizen. Very gratifying. Good to know that despite what one reads in the press there is an inherent respect for the law among Joe Public.’

  ‘Absolutely.’ Bognor took his dressing gown — silk, paisley, a gift from Monica — off the peg on the door and tied the belt round his waist. It gave him at least a semblance of dignity.

  ‘I’m sorry about yesterday,’ he said.

  ‘No problem,’ said Wartnaby. ‘My fault, in a way. I should have warned you what a man-eater the Countess is.’

  ‘I hope … er … I mean, your car. I seem to remember being unwell on the way home.’ It had been an unmarked car, Wartnaby’s own. If he had fouled it Wartnaby would presumably have had to clean it up himself.

  ‘Perfectly all right,’ he said, pouring out two cups from the cafetière. ‘I took the liberty of bringing in my own coffee. Higgins’s very own Kibo Chagga. Miriam didn’t seem to object.’

  Bognor took a sip. It was very good.

  ‘How are you feeling?’ Wartnaby seemed genuinely solicitous.

  ‘Fine,’ said Bognor. ‘I seem to remember Monica dosing me very heavily with Alka-Seltzer before she left.’

  ‘Left?’

  ‘She caught the ten o’clock train back to town.’

  ‘She would, wouldn’t she,’ said Wartnaby as Bognor tucked in ravenously. The black pudding was especially succulent. He adored black pudding. For a second it took his mind off marital problems.

  ‘She’ll be back, though,’ said Wartnaby.

  ‘You reckon?’ Bognor’s mouth was full. He swallowed. ‘I wouldn’t bank on it. Monica’s got iron resolution.’

  ‘I could see that, even on our short acquaintance. But speaking as something of an authority on the matter of the sexual tiff I can assure you she’ll be back. Maybe not to Scarpington but certainly to you.’

  ‘Good,’ said Bognor, not really convinced even though he was impressed by Wartnaby’s certainty and his man-of-the-worldliness. ‘Do you think I should apologise to the Earl?’

  ‘Absolutely not,’ said Wartnaby. ‘First of all, we got there in the nick of time so no actual intimacy took place. And secondly it happens all the time so there’ll be someone else in a day or two. In any case, he didn’t seem in the least put out. In fact, if it hadn’t been for me and the butler and Mrs Bognor I dare say he’d have sat down and watched while you got on with it.’

  ‘Good grief!’ Bognor stopped in mid-mouthful. ‘Do you really think so?’

  ‘You learn to spot that sort of thing when you’ve been in the force as long a
s I have,’ said Wartnaby. He smiled.

  Bognor ate on in silence.

  Presently he said, ‘What about Freddie? You say he’s dead. What exactly happened?’

  ‘Ah.’ The Detective Chief Inspector became grave. ‘We have a problem there,’ he said. ‘A very serious problem.’

  ‘Oh, dear.’ Bognor also put on an expression designed to indicate extreme gravitas. It actually just had the effect of making him look stuffed, but it was the only serious expression he had.

  ‘It’s what I feared,’ said Wartnaby. ‘First thing this morning I was summoned by my Chief Constable and told I was off the case.’

  ‘You’re joking.’

  ‘Afraid not.’

  ‘But they can’t do that.’ Bognor was almost more outraged than the DCI.

  ‘In Scarpington they can.’

  ‘But for what reason?’

  ‘A chief constable isn’t required to give reasons,’ said Wartnaby. ‘Not even to senior detective officers on his pay roll. Officially he says that the pathologist’s report shows that Brackett had a heart attack. Well, of course, you and I know better than that, don’t we?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ said Bognor. ‘Freddie fixed him with that little water pistol job.’

  ‘Spot on,’ said Wartnaby. ‘With which I suspect he also spiked your cocktails, thus inducing such uncharacteristic behaviour.’

  ‘It had crossed my mind.’ Bognor pushed the empty plate to one side and buttered some toast. ‘Do you think he was trying to kill me too?’

  ‘I doubt it.’ Wartnaby stroked his jaw. ‘I suspect he was just trying to warn you off.’

  ‘But what about Freddie? Who killed him?’

  ‘I suspect we shall never know,’ said Wartnaby.

  ‘But why not? I mean it doesn’t make sense. You’re the investigating officer.’

  ‘My Chief Constable doesn’t think there’s anything to investigate. He’s had the scene of crime report and he takes the view, or rather he says he takes the view, that our friend Freddie set fire to himself while drunk.’

  ‘And that’s it?’

  ‘That’s it.’ Wartnaby stood. His suit was sharper than yesterday’s. Almost presentable. ‘Not only am I off the case, I’m suspended.’

  Bognor was shocked. ‘But that’s deplorable. What are you going to do?’

  Wartnaby sighed. ‘There’s very little I can do. Or could do if it wasn’t for you, thank heaven.’

  ‘I’ll protest at once,’ said Bognor. ‘I’ll have you reinstated in a jiffy. My boss Parkinson is not without influence. I’ll get him to phone your Chief Constable and tell him what’s what p.d.q.’

  ‘No, no.’ Wartnaby held both hands up in a restraining gesture. ‘We have to keep very calm. The point is that, as I suspected, my Chief Constable is being hushed up by Puce and the Artisans.’

  Bognor nodded. It made sense. In a corrupt community the Chief of Police was always bent. Well-known fact.

  ‘Is he a member, your Chief Constable?’

  ‘No. Not an actual member. But heavily under the influence. As I told you, Puce has this town completely sewn up.’

  ‘I didn’t realise it was as bad as that,’ said Bognor.

  ‘Every bit.’ Wartnaby smiled grimly. ‘But luckily we have you to fall back on.’

  Bognor frowned. ‘I’m not entirely with you,’ he said.

  ‘Oh, yes, you are, thank God. That’s exactly what you are. Together we’ll see this thing through, if it’s the last thing we do. Do you want truth and justice to prevail or not?’

  ‘Oh very much,’ agreed Bognor, who despite a certain lassitude was, broadly speaking, on the side of truth and justice provided they did not get in the way of a quiet life. ‘So what do we do?’

  ‘What you do,’ said Wartnaby, ‘is to carry on as before. Nobody’s taken you off the case. Or had you suspended. I’ll brief you every morning at breakfast. Otherwise I’m going to lie extremely low. If my Chief Constable even begins to suspect that I’m maintaining any interest in the case he’ll have my guts for garters, as they used to say in the Army.’

  Bognor thought for a moment. It was all a bit irregular, but not seriously so. Wartnaby would help him complete his Board of Trade study by supplying inside gen, just as he had originally promised. If, in return, he could help an honest cop eradicate the cancer in the heart of local society, then that was a useful by-product.

  ‘You’re on,’ he said, wiping his lips with a Jolly Trencherman paper napkin.

  ‘Good man,’ said Wartnaby.

  ‘Now if I’m right,’ said the DCI, ‘and I’m seldom wrong, we’re dealing here with a serial killer who has struck twice in twenty-four hours. What does that say to you?’

  ‘One, that we’re dealing with some sort of maniac,’ said Bognor, ‘and two, that he’s likely to kill again.’

  ‘I’d say you’re right on both counts. Now …’ Wartnaby took from his inside jacket pocket a single sheet of lined paper. The writing was shaky and semi-literate. It was headed ‘“Bridge”. League B. November 17th.’ Underneath were four names and alongside them were numbers. They read as follows:

  Brown D. 3

  Moulton A. 2

  Festing A. 7

  Fothergill H. 9

  Bognor thought. ‘Jolly peculiar,’ he said, after a while. ‘I mean, on the face of it, it looks as if this is the result of November 17th’s bridge rubbers, but I thought you played bridge in pairs.’

  ‘Quite so,’ said Wartnaby.

  ‘So why has everyone got a different score?’

  ‘It’s conceivable,’ said Wartnaby, ‘that they swapped partners half-way through.’

  Bognor’s cardsharping went about as far as Snap and Beggar My Neighbour. Nor was he at his forensic best this morning.

  ‘I’d better write this down myself,’ he said, and got out his notebook. ‘OK,’ he said. ‘First of all, who are these people? Moulton is presumably the brewer and Brown the dairy owner, Festing the solicitor and Fothergill is my friend Harold, the Rupert Murdoch of Scarpington.’

  ‘Not quite,’ said Wartnaby. ‘You’re right about Moulton and Fothergill, but not the other two. Festing’s first name is Nigel and Brown’s is Ron.’

  ‘Funny,’ said Bognor. ‘It says Festings A. and Brown D.’

  ‘Unfair of me.’ Wartnaby looked smug. ‘This is where local knowledge comes in handy. Nigel Festing’s wife is Angela and Brown’s is Dorothy.’

  ‘Ah!’ said Bognor. ‘So we’re talking about a bridge four comprising Mr Fothergill, Mr Moulton, Dorothy Brown and Angela Festing.’

  ‘It looks very much like it.’ Wartnaby went to the double-glazed window and looked across the city. ‘With the working classes it’s drink; with the upper classes it’s sex; and with the middle it’s bridge. Or so my grandmother always maintained.’

  ‘The Jewish one?’

  Wartnaby turned and smiled. ‘You remembered. Yes. I wonder if she was right.’

  ‘So,’ said Bognor, looking at the paper. The problem was beginning to resemble one of those tricky questions that had scuppered his first attempt on elementary mathematics at ‘O’ level. ‘If Augustus Moulton has two points, Dorothy Brown three and Angela Festing seven, how many points does Harold Fothergill have?’ He frowned furiously. ‘Let’s assume,’ said Bognor, ‘that the blokes played the girls for the first rubber and won. That means they get one apiece and the girls nothing.’ He carefully pencilled the figure one against Fothergill and Moulton and left the other two blank. ‘Next round Moulton and Festing play Fothergill and Brown and the Moulton team win. So at the end of round two Moulton has two points, Fothergill and Festing one each and Brown nought.’ He jotted down the numbers. ‘I think I’ve cracked it,’ he said with ah air of triumph.

  ‘That’s what I thought at first,’ said Wartnaby, ‘but it doesn’t work.’

  ‘Why not?’ Bognor was sweating. He had not shaved yet, he remembered, nor bathed or washed. He was definitely a bit smelly. Wartnaby s
melled too, but his niff was something deliberate. Lavender, he thought, though he wasn’t too hot on smells. Monica would be able to identify it immediately. His own niff, on the other hand, was animal and inadvertent. As soon as his visitor went he would have a luxurious soak in the bath with a liberal dose of the Jolly Trencherman bath oil so thoughtfully supplied in a one-shot sachet.

  ‘Because,’ said Wartnaby, ‘the numbers don’t add up to an even total. They come to twenty-one.’

  ‘Hang on,’ said Bognor. ‘Two plus three is five. Plus seven is twelve. Plus nine is twenty-one. So what does that prove?’

  ‘It proves the scoring wasn’t done like that.’

  Bognor scratched an armpit absent-mindedly. ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Of course.’ The Inspector sounded quite tetchy. ‘Work it out for yourself. If two of them got a point for every win then it would have to be an even number total.’

  ‘Oh, all right,’ said Bognor, tetchy himself, ‘so maybe it was three for a win and two for a draw.’

  ‘You can’t draw at bridge.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Positive.’ Wartnaby seemed enviably certain. Once more Bognor wished Monica was with him for confirmation. She had played bridge when she was young. She knew about such things.

  ‘So they were playing some other game.’ Bognor thought. ‘Poker, perhaps.’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Wartnaby. ‘Now why do you imagine the score sheet — if it is a score sheet — was in Freddie’s flat?’

  ‘That bothers me too.’ Bognor looked bothered. A characteristic expression which, unlike others, was entirely revealing about the state of mind behind it.

  ‘There are various possibilities. Either he came about it honestly or he nicked it. If he nicked it, then why? And for that matter how? If he came about it honestly the implication is that he was there during the bridge.’

  Bognor followed this, although with difficulty.

  ‘Let us’ — Wartnaby, seeing Bognor’s problem, spoke very slowly and distinctly — ‘Let us assume that Freddie was there while they were playing. What would he be doing?’