R Raichev - Assassins at Ospreys

‘What need?’

‘Sorry – didn’t I say? Do forgive me. I keep falling prey to fugues and fancies. The monstrous monsignor attempted to murder me.’

‘Father Lillie-Lysander tried to kill you?’

‘Is that a better way of saying it?’ Ralph Renshawe frowned in a puzzled manner. ‘Well, I prayed for help and my prayer was answered. I was helped in my hour of need, inspector, exactly as the Bible promises. You want me to describe my guardian angel? Smooth-faced, seemingly delicate but in fact exceptionally strong, with golden hair and golden crown and golden wings, bran-dishing a sword, exuding goodness and mercy, but also breathing fire -’

Strong Poison

The discovery of Father Lillie-Lysander’s body in the grounds of Ospreys was announced later that evening on the ten o’clock news. He had been murdered – stabbed to death. The camera lingered on the theatrically Gothic pile with its absurd gables and turrets, then swept across the wildly overgrown garden, parts of which looked distinctly un-English due to the late Moira Montano’s now dilapidated pink conservatory, ragged palms, fantastical grotto benches and clumps of bamboo; it all brought to mind a decayed Mediterranean film set.

The camera came to rest on a rook perched on the edge of the seventeenth-century wishing well. The rook – rather a large specimen – gazed straight at the camera, flapped its wings and crowed. There was no perceptible change in the newscaster’s voice when he said that the priest’s body had been at the bottom of the well. It had been a particularly brutal attack. At the time of discovery, the body had been in the early stages of decomposition. The perpetrator was unknown and the motive for the crime remained unclear. The police were conducting an investigation and they were anxious to speak to Miss Ingrid Delmar.

‘Good lord, that’s not Ospreys, is it?’ Sir Marcus Laud said, peering at the TV screen.

‘It is Ospreys,’ Lady Laud said.

She was thirty years younger than her husband and his fourth wife. She had reappeared soon after he had got rid of Ospreys and since then they had been leading a life of unadulterated bliss in South Kensington. Sitting on the floor beside his chair, resting her auburn head against his knee, the fourth Lady Laud – who had read English at Oxford and was something of an expert on Kipling – sighed and once more she told the story of what had made her run away that day.

She had been aware of a little grey shadow, as it might have been a snowflake against the light, floating at an immense distance in the background of her brain. She had then been plunged into overwhelming gloom. Her amazed soul, she said, dropped gulf by gulf into that horror of great darkness which is spoken of in the Bible, and which, as auctioneers say, must be experienced to be appreciated. Despair upon despair, misery upon misery, fear after fear, until she found herself in a state of absolute panic. She hadn’t seen any ghosts or heard any voices – nothing like that, but, nevertheless, she had felt the overpowering urge to be as far away from Ospreys as possible. And again Sir Marcus – who had never read Kipling’s story ‘The House Surgeon’ – said comfortably that he wasn’t the least bit surprised. It was that sort of place.

(The truth was of course quite different and much more prosaic, and it had something to do with an unexpected phone call from a past lover who had suggested that they have one last month of passion in the Caribbean.)

The conversation then turned to Moira Montano.

‘In one of her films she comes out of a lake on a freezing cold night and hovers above the surface,’ Sir Marcus said. ‘There’s a chap in a boat and for some reason he’s got stuck in the middle of the lake. She is beautiful as a dream. Golden hair, enormous green eyes, a wide red mouth, but when she smiles at the chap, her teeth show white and pointed, sharp as needles – as many teeth as a strange fish.’

In Knightsbridge, reclining so far back in his chair that he was horizontal in front of his TV set, his arms crossed behind his head, Robin Renshawe too watched the broad-cast. A glass and a whisky bottle stood on the table before him. He had started by mixing himself whisky sours with grenadine, fresh lime and crushed ice, but had ended up drinking it neat. The ice cubes in the bucket had all melted. He was rather drunk; he was on the point of reaching that highly desirable state in which relaxation and irresponsibility mingle.

‘Who the fuck is Ingrid Delmar?’ Robin asked aloud. There hadn’t been much regret in his reaction to Lily’s demise. He had always regarded Lily as expendable. As disposable as a cocktail stick. Requiescat in pace, he had murmured and he had raised his glass. He had then wondered if it would be worth the trouble of sneaking into Lily’s flat and collecting the marble bust of Cicero or whoever that was. It seemed to have caught his fancy, oddly enough. No. That wishing well might have been swarming with flies, but Lily’s flat would be much worse – it would be swarming with les flics. Robin laughed at his joke, but his heart was far from light.

Another of his lieutenants gone. A couple of minutes earlier he had received a call from Eric at long last. Eric had told him he hadn’t been able to do what Robin had asked him. I am very sorry, Robin. The silly ass had given the most pathetic reason imaginable for failing to go to Ospreys on the morning of the 26th. Eric had been most apologetic in that absurd lisping voice of his. That famous saying, Looks like Tarzan, speaks like Jane, might have been invented with Eric in mind. Robin should have known better.

‘Why do I always associate with people like that?’ Robin murmured. ‘Why? Why?’ He shut his eyes.

Golden… golden… hair and eyes… and paradise. The words of a song floated through the open window in the warm night. Some people, it seemed, were managing to have a good time.

Everything had gone wrong. Lily was dead while his uncle was alive. Robin had been on the phone to Saunders, trying to pump him for information about the will. He had wanted confirmation – was there a new will? Saunders, however, had been terribly tight-lipped about it. Saunders had given him the cold shoulder. Saunders had been much nicer to him in the past, but then of course Robin had been his uncle’s main legatee. Now Saunders treated him like a leper. All solicitors were bastards. Profiteering hypocritical bastards. Robin had then called Wilkes. It was she who had told him about the new will, which she had witnessed – together with one of the cleaners. Well, she had confirmed what he had known all along. Everything to Beatrice fucking Ardleigh! Christ. The whole Judith Hartz fortune. Wilkes had commiserated with him. She had been on her way to the airport, apparently, off to get married or something.

‘Why Ingrid Delmar? Who is this Ingrid Delmar? ‘ Robin cried. ‘It is to Beatrice Ardleigh you should be speaking! You fucking ineffectual flics. It was Beatrice who killed Lily – must have done! Who else?’

His front doorbell rang. He remained seated. He yawned. He stretched his arms. He was not at home. The doorbell rang again. A manservant would have been able to deal with the matter in a smoothish kind of way. Mr Renshawe is not at home. May I take a message? Well, he couldn’t afford a manservant, unless he asked Eric to do it for free? Eric would look jolly presentable in a black alpaca coat and striped trousers. No, not Eric -he was finished with Eric – not even if Eric, like his famous namesake in the book, learnt to do things properly, little by little.

What the fuck was that? Robin couldn’t believe his ears. Someone was forgetting this was Knightsbridge and not fucking Redbridge. Manners, please. Fists had started banging on his front door. A voice shouted: ‘Mr Renshawe? We know you are there! Open up. Police!’