R Raichev: Murder at the Villa Byzantine

Major Payne said, ‘We have had our share of murders and disappearances at grand houses, we unmasked the killer of the high-class hooker on the subcontinent and of the baronet at the exclusive retreat in Dulwich, but one thing we don’t seem ever to have tackled is the kind of mystery that is unremittingly suburban. I was thinking about it only the other day. Silly thing to think, but there you are.’

Antonia put away her lipstick and examined her face in the mirror. ‘Do people like reading murder mysteries set in the suburbs? Won’t that be too boring? Peril at Kinderhook…’

‘You suspect some devilry will happen at Kinderhook tonight?’ Payne’s left eyebrow had gone up.

‘I suspect nothing of the sort.’

‘You said Peril at Kinderhook.’

‘I thought it would make a good title, that’s all. You need so little encouragement.’

‘Is there perhaps something you know and I don’t?’

‘There isn’t. OK, it’s an odd name and it’s an odd-looking house and Melisande Chevret has definite possibilities, but that’s all. To tell you the truth, I am not at all wild about going.’

‘Would you rather we stayed at home and watched the box? Or we could play canasta. You are getting awfully good at it, you know.’

‘I am not at all keen on the box either, but at least I won’t have to talk to people I don’t know.’

‘Hell is other people, eh?’

‘I wouldn’t go as far as that… I believe I am shy.’

‘Your social manner is impeccable. You possess enviable poise as well as ease.’

‘It’s all an act… I don’t feel like playing canasta tonight. I suppose we could do the Times crossword. Or we could have an early night and read in bed… Oh, I hate it when I am indecisive! Don’t you hate me when I am indecisive?’

‘I love you in any and every state you happen to be in.’ Payne kissed her.

‘No – we must go. We’ve got the flowers and everything. Of course we’ll go. It’s only down the road anyway.’

‘Where did you say you and Melisande Chevret met? At the local Women’s Institute?’

‘At Wild Oats. We keep bumping into each other. Whenever I go in, she is there, or if I am already there, she suddenly makes an entrance. She is the kind that makes an entrance, yes. She is very dramatic. I must say she is always extremely charming to me.’

‘Perhaps she’s managed to engineer these meetings somehow? Perhaps it’s all leading up to something? Perhaps tonight is the night?’

‘The night for what?’

‘Some hair-raising outrage. Kinder sacrifice? Soul-bartering? Incidentally, what is wild oats in this particular context – not what young men sow?’

‘The local organic shop. You know that perfectly well.’ Antonia gave him a sideways glance. ‘I hope you won’t be saying silly things when we get there. Please. Don’t show off. Especially not in front of Melisande Chevret. Please.’

‘I am not entirely familiar with the local topography,’ Payne protested. ‘I don’t go shopping as often as you do.’

‘Perhaps you should.’ Antonia draped a scarf round her neck and patted her hair. ‘Melisande Chevret enjoys attention. The man who owns Wild Oats treats her like royalty. He is always dancing and bowing and scraping and tugging at his forelock when she is around. I think she likes that.’

‘It seems to be our lot, meeting people who are in the middle of some impossible drama, or else on the brink of perpetrating some terrible thing, have you noticed?’ Payne stroked his chin with his forefinger. ‘Or who are in some way desperate.’

Antonia said she didn’t think Melisande Chevret was desperate. ‘It’s her birthday.’

‘For some people that’s cause for desperation. How old is she? Seventy-eight? Eighty-three?’

‘I don’t think she is eighty-three. Don’t be silly.’

‘Sixty-six? The number of the beast.’

‘I don’t think anyone is meant to know her age. I suspect she is a little older than me, though of course she looks younger than me. I am not sure we should mention the word “birthday” at all. It is a cocktail party we’ve been invited to, don’t forget.’

‘I’ve never been to a birthday party masquerading as a cocktail party before. Did you say she had an older sister? So these are the people who bought Kinderhook. Two sisters. Chekhovian, almost.’

‘Melisande pointed out that she and I were the only celebrities in the area. I am not really a celebrity, am I?’

Payne said that Antonia was what was known as a ‘minor celebrity’. ‘You have written five detective novels. There are a number of blogs devoted to you. You were on the box last Friday. That was quite a performance,’ he went on reminiscently. ‘You tore strips off that play.’

Antonia had appeared on Friday Review.

‘I don’t think I was particularly horrid, was I?’

‘You used phrases like a “masterclass in pure theatrical torpor”. You said there was an almost epic scale to the play’s dullness. You said the sets were so horribly huge that even Fritz Lang would have considered them somewhat de trop. You were devastatingly witty. You made everybody laugh. If I were the playwright,’ said Payne, ‘I’d shoot myself with my old army revolver.’

‘Oh nonsense, Hugh. It’s a well-known fact that playwrights thrive on controversy, infamy, censorship and disgrace. As it happens, that particular playwright is already dead – has been dead for more than three hundred years. We are talking about Thomas Middleton.’

‘Middleton? Really? I must have dozed off.’

‘It was the direction and the production I criticized.’

‘In that case, it’s the director and the producer who should shoot themselves with their old army revolvers,’ Payne said smoothly.

‘Have you got the flowers?’ ‘Here they are. Should I kiss Melisande Chevret’s hand?’ ‘Certainly not. It will give her ideas. Purple roses – why purple?’

‘I thought purple appropriate for the mistress of Kinderhook somehow. Is my tie straight? I could have toddled along in my dressing gown and slippers… It’s acceptable in suburbia, isn’t it? Neighbours don’t stand on ceremony and so on.’

‘That would definitely give Melisande Chevret ideas.’

‘I must say you paint a somewhat disturbing picture of Melisande Chevret. Is she really a man-eater? I am scared now. I am not sure I want to go.’

They went out. Payne locked the front door. It was a warm evening in early August. The sun was sailing low in a pink and gold sky.

‘One can easily imagine an actress being called Melisande Chevret. It’s a jolly striking name,’ Payne went on. ‘Would you describe her as the kind of woman whose manner is normally faintly histrionic and often more emphatically so?’

‘I would. She likes to strike attitudes.’

‘The kind that either gets terribly excited or terribly upset about things and finds all that is in between sort of beige?’

‘That wouldn’t be a bad way of putting it.’

‘Perhaps you will make her the anti-heroine at the very heart of your next novel. She sounds just right for the kind of murder mystery you write,’ Payne said portentously. ‘Is she divorced or widowed?’

‘Divorced, I imagine.’

Payne gave his man-of-the-world nod and said that actresses were always divorced and, in that respect, minor actresses were the worst offenders. Hadn’t Antonia noticed?

Five minutes later they stood inside the drawing room at Kinderhook. Their hostess had gone to the kitchen to have a word with the two hired waiters.