TP Fielden - Resort to Murder - A must-read vintage crime mystery

Miss Dimont did as she was told but vowed it was an experiment she would not repeat. As they drove through the town and down Tuppenny Row into adjacent Bedlington-on-Sea, she gave the reporter what he wanted – his intro for the Bickington case.

‘We have a place at the end of the newsroom called Curse Corner,’ she then added. ‘Why d’you think it’s called that?’

‘No idea. I suppose …’

‘People sit there cursing and swearing because they can’t get started. They know how the story should go, but they can never find the first sentence. You had the same problem last night, but you thought it was stage fright.

‘Let me tell you, Valentine, it’s a curse which will stay with you the rest of your journalistic career. You can always tell someone else what the intro to their story should be, but you’ll almost never be able to think of one for yourself.’

The young man swung the wheel. ‘D’you know, I was really looking forward to starting on the Express ,’ he replied slowly. ‘I never realised how difficult it would be.’

‘Fun though,’ said Judy, ‘sometimes! You can drop me here.’

While Waterford’s fashionable but feeble conveyance struggled its way back up the hill Miss Dimont turned and made for the Seagull Café where her dearest friend Auriol Hedley held sway, dispensing delicious home-made lemonade and oven-warm rock cakes.

‘Haven’t seen you for a while,’ was Auriol’s cheery welcome. ‘How was your mother’s visit?’

‘Managed to put it off,’ said Judy, who only liked her mother in small doses.

‘She sent that letter saying she was coming down on the Pullman.’

‘I sent back a telegram.’

‘Very naughty. She treasures you.’

Miss Dimont took off her glasses and polished them. ‘She’s not your mother,’ she replied, wearily. ‘I get a letter a week and I always feel guilty after I’ve read them.’

‘You might feel less guilty if you bothered to reply,’ said Auriol, who knew her friend very well indeed. They’d worked together during the War and knew most things about each other.

‘Anyway, she’s going back to Belgium for a bit,’ said Judy with relief. ‘Catching up with the family.’

‘Ah yes, the Dimonts of Ellezelles,’ said Auriol in mock deference. ‘A distinguished lot.’

‘Instead, I’ve got Uncle Arthur coming to stay.’

‘Oh, now,’ said Auriol, ‘that will be a treat.’ The old boy was the sweetest man in the world, one of life’s true gentlemen, but he spent most of his time in South America.

‘Now look,’ said Judy, ‘I want to talk to you about this dead girl.’

‘I thought you might,’ said Auriol with satisfaction. ‘Let me just shut up shop and we can have a nice cup of tea and chat about it. I have a theory.’

Sure to be wrong, thought Judy disloyally, as they went inside.

SIX

It was a surprise, and not altogether a pleasant one, to find Valentine waiting when she emerged an hour later. He was leaning negligently against the red bubble car, head thrown back to catch the sun. The borrowed suit he wore neither fitted nor did it do his rake-thin frame any favours. He looked a bit like an unmade bed.

‘Hello,’ said Miss Dimont in a not wholly friendly way. She’d done enough nannying for one day.

‘Thought you might like a lift back into town,’ said the young man with a beguiling smile. ‘Hop in.’

‘Not sure I want to,’ said Judy, disobligingly. ‘“Hop” being the operative word. What on earth persuaded you to buy this thing?’

‘A dear friend misled me.’

Miss Dimont sniffed. ‘How long can it possibly have taken you to drive down from London in it?’

‘Did my National Service in the cavalry,’ he replied. ‘No horses any more – well, only sometimes – most of the time it was tanks so I’m used to slow progress.’

He was charming, of that there could be no doubt. Handsome too, though of course a mere child.

‘Have you written up the Bickington assault case?’

‘When I left you I went straight back to the office. It was wonderful – I used the intro you suggested and guess what – no curses! The story started to flow and I would have finished it in no time but …’

‘…your typewriter ran out of ribbon.’

‘Aha. You have identified a certain disorganisation in the Waterford way of doing things.’

‘Far be it from me to point out, Valentine, that one of your shoelaces is undone as well. So what happened, why didn’t you finish?’

‘The editor told me to stop.’

‘Why?’

‘Said he didn’t want interbreeding stories in the paper – bad for the town’s image. Ridiculous, he was only her uncle for heaven’s sake! Not as if …’

‘It happens from time to time,’ said Miss Dimont, recalling among others the Vicar’s Longboat Party, the Temple Regis Tennis Scandal and the Football Pools Farrago – Rudyard Rhys hated printing the really good stories. ‘More often than you might think.’

Later, filched by an underhanded sub-editor, such tales would often turn up in one of the murkier Sunday papers and the residents of Temple Regis would agree, yet again, that the Riviera Express was nice enough, but it never really had its finger on the pulse.

‘I mean,’ said Valentine, firing up the car’s tinny engine, ‘surely the Bickingtons were a good story?’

‘You have the right instincts,’ agreed Judy. ‘But I must warn you the editor will not always share them. Anything for a quiet life is his motto. Though it wasn’t always the case.’

‘Oh?’ said Valentine, expertly rounding the harbour wall and gauging whether the old bubble had enough puff to get them both up the hill, or whether Judy might have to get out and walk.

‘Yes. We worked together during the War.’

‘Doing?’

‘Well,’ said Miss Dimont cagily, ‘based in Whitehall. Royal Navy. A bit complicated.’

The young reporter looked sideways at her with interest. He looked a bit too long.

‘Look where you’re going!’ cried Judy. ‘The dust cart!’

‘Cloak and dagger?’ Valentine asked, slowing behind a refuse lorry which was inching at snail’s pace up the hill.

‘I don’t recall anyone ever wearing a cloak.’

‘Then you may have known Admiral Godfrey, sort of relation of mine.’

‘Ah yes, the Waterfords. Old family, rather a lot of them,’ said Judy with only the mildest sprinkle of sarcasm. ‘Yes, I knew him quite well. We were in the same quarters.’

‘Got you now,’ said Valentine, swerving out to overtake the lorry. As a traffic manoeuvre it was brave, but with such a feeble engine, not a great success. Conceding defeat, he slid back into his original position. ‘Pretty hairy stuff, I imagine.’

‘Actually,’ said Judy, ‘the lady I’ve just been to see – Auriol Hedley, at the café – worked in the same unit.’

‘Small world.’

‘Too small. I came down here because she told me there was an opening on the Riviera Express . I’d only been here five minutes when they appointed a new editor. Blow me down if it didn’t turn out to be Richard Rhys.’

‘I thought his name was Rudyard.’

‘Hah!’ snapped Miss Dimont. ‘That only came later when he tried to become a novelist.’

‘So you worked for him in the War Office?’

‘Other way round, Valentine.’

‘But he’s older than you!’

Judy Dimont sighed. The boy was young. He may have served his time in the armed services but he clearly had no idea of what it was like in the days of war, where talent led seniority, and bright young people were put in charge of the nation’s defences while their so-called olders and betters pottered obediently along behind.