R Raichev - The Death of Corinne

She was feeling light-headed… She shut her eyes and rubbed at them. Delayed shock… Curb your imagination, she told herself.

She heard him clear his throat.

‘I am sorry!’

‘Aimless reverie or profitable reflection?’ Inspector Lyttleton smiled. He then asked her a question. When was the last time she had seen Corinne Coreille? The night before, at dinner. How had Corinne struck her? Antonia described Corinne’s manner as ‘quiet, subdued, neutral’. ‘The most remarkable thing about her was her passivity,’ she said. No, Corinne hadn’t looked particularly anxious. It was Maitre Maginot who had shown signs of considerable agitation – especially after the phone call from the womanwho had introduced herself as Tricia Swindon.

Inspector Lyttleton nodded. That call had been made by Eleanor Merchant, he ventured – they had examined her mobile phone; as a matter of fact Eleanor Merchant had made several calls to Chalfont Park. And there was a little mystery – Eleanor Merchant had received a phone call at ten minutes past eleven. ‘Who from?’ Antonia asked, greatly interested.

‘The caller’s number was unknown,’ Lyttleton answered. ‘We don’t think it has any bearing on what happened, but of course we are keeping an open mind.’

Had Antonia heard any suspicious noises during the night? She said no, pointing out that the gun had a silencer, at once regretting it for the inspector looked displeased. He said he wished they hadn’t gone inside the greenhouse at all! The shot that killed Maitre Maginot had been fired at a very close range, Inspector Lyttleton said thoughtfully – Eleanor Merchant must have been standing beside the door as Corinne Coreille’s legal adviser entered the greenhouse. Eleanor might have been aware of Maitre Maginot’s approach – it looked as though she had been waiting for her… Was it possible that Eleanor Merchant had taken Maitre Maginot for Corinne? Physically the two women couldn’t have been more different – unless Eleanor was completely unfamiliar with Corinne’s appearance? No, that was not very likely, was it?

‘Well, Mrs Merchant seems to have had very serious health issues – judging by the pills we found in her bag. I mean her mental state -’ He cleared his throat. He implied Mrs Merchant’s mental state provided the only explanation necessary for what she had done.

Had Miss Darcy heard any other noises? Footsteps – raised voices – commotion of any kind – the roar of a car engine perhaps? No?

‘I didn’t hear a thing,’ Antonia said. How interesting that Maginot should have been shot at a close range, she thought. A picture rose before her eyes, of the two women locked in a mortal combat, lurching about against the backdrop of all those decaying plants, the gun between them… No, no – of course not – that wasn’t how it had happened… The gun – where did the gun come from?

‘I don’t suppose you can help having ideas?’ Inspector Lyttleton said with a smile.

Antonia admitted she couldn’t. There was a pause, then he changed tack. Why hadn’t they called the police earlier? Why a private detective and not the police? Antonia explained that that had been Maitre Maginot’s idea. Maitre Maginot had done it out of consideration for Corinne Coreille and her career – she had been afraid of adverse publicity. Adverse publicity, he muttered. So, in a way, Maitre Maginot had brought it upon herself. He shook his head.

No one, Antonia emphasized, had imagined that Eleanor Merchant would be able to find Corinne’s whereabouts. He agreed – that was one of the most amazing aspects of the whole affair. He scrunched up his face.

However had Eleanor Merchant managed to get hold of Lady Grylls’s address?

The Killing Doll

How indeed?

That was a question – one of the questions – that had been bothering Antonia. How could Eleanor Merchant have known where to find Corinne Coreille, given Maitre Maginot’s obsession with secrecy and security – considering how carefully she had orchestrated operation ‘Safe Haven’? Maitre Maginot had explained that the reason for not taking any ‘entourage’ with them was to avoid attracting any attention at any stage of their journey.

No, Antonia had no idea where Corinne Coreille had disappeared or when she could have left the house. The oddity and reclusiveness of the French singer were touched upon, together with her memorable haunting voice. Surprisingly, it turned out Inspector Lyttleton was familiar with Corinne Coreille. He remembered the occasion well. He had seen her on TV in the early ‘70s – the Ed Sullivan show – Corinne Coreille had sung in duet with Eartha Kitt – the two of them had been kitted out as comic vamps – feather boas and fishnet stockings – they had sat on top of a grand piano. ’All white. The piano, the roses, the snow… It was a Christmas special. The pianist smoked a cigarette. They let people smoke on the box in those days. C‘est si bon,’ Lyttleton hummed and wriggled his shoulders lightly. ‘Variety. I’ve always been fond of variety,’ he said.

Had Corinne Coreille perhaps panicked and run off in the early hours of the morning? That at once suggested that somehow she knew what had taken place in the greenhouse. What was Miss Darcy’s view? Antonia shrugged. It was possible. She felt reluctant to swap theories with him. Could Corinne have heard a noise from outside, gone to investigate and found the bodies? Possible again, Antonia said, though she thought it highly unlikely. Corinne would never have left the house in the dark, all by herself. If she had heard a suspicious noise, a cry, say, she would have sought Jonson out, the man they had hired to protect her. But Jonson had been asleep in his room, or so he claimed. He had heard nothing… Had Jonson told the truth? Such a likeable young man, but – Antonia reminded herself – one thing one should never do in a case of murder was to warm to likeable young men.

There was also the question of transport. It had been a cold and wet night. Corinne couldn’t simply have walked out of the house, carrying her bags. The house was on the outskirts of the village. There was a cab service in the village, but the police had already ascertained that no cab had been called from Chalfont Park at any point in the night or in the early hours of the morning. A search, Antonia understood, was under way.

Where was Corinne? She seemed to have vanished into thin air. Without a trace. The way the inspector said it, the way he paused and frowned and shook his head, suggested that he thought Corinne Coreille too might be dead. Suddenly, he asked Antonia if she knew anything about the doll that had been found on the stairs. Where had it come from? She stared at him. She knew nothing about a doll – what doll?

He produced a see-through plastic bag from his briefcase and handed it to her across the desk. The doll was inside the bag. ‘Don’t take it out,’ he warned her.

‘I wouldn’t dream of it,’ Antonia said.

There were two large hatpins sticking out of the top of the doll’s head, two more had been run through its eyes, another two through its ears. A pin that was larger than the others stuck out of the doll’s mouth. Antonia shuddered. A voodoo doll? The next moment she realized with a start that it was a Corinne doll. Peverel had told them about it – and of course Eleanor Merchant had written about it in her first letter. The doll was about five inches long and it was instantly recognizable as Corinne. There was the fringe, the demure expression, the blue dress, the red bow. The eyes looked somewhat ‘Japanese’. Well, the doll had been made in Japan, to coincide with Corinne’s Osaka comeback concert.

The inspector had read Eleanor Merchant’s description of how she had set about sticking pins into a Corinne doll, turning it into a ‘pincushion’ and feeling ‘better’ as a result. Eleanor had asked Corinne whether ‘it hurt’.