Murder at Maddingley Grange (2 page)

“Laurie?”

“…I don't know.”

“Absolute maximum?”

Laurie, knowing she was making a terrible mistake, said: “Six.”

“Six
. You do mean rooms?”

“No. People.”

“That's ridiculous. It's not worth doing with less than twelve.”

“Let's not do it then.” Relieved, Laurie backtracked.

“Oh, don't be such a pain. House parties are terrific fun. And you know how you like people.”

“I do not ‘like people.' I like being up to my elbows in potting compost and watering cans and flowers and seed trays.”

“Twenty then?”

“Fifteen.”

“No.”

“Ten. A nice round figure”—he carried on quickly as Laurie opened her mouth—“and they're bound to be lovely upper crusters. Well behaved and stinking rich.”

“How d'you make that out?”

“Why d'you think I advertised in
The Times?
I have no intention of giving house room to the sort of people whose table manners are more suited to a low-class dive. Ten?
Please
…”

Fatally, Laurie hesitated. She seemed to hear a note of real desperation in Simon's voice. But then she often did. And he was a born actor. He had been acting his way in and out of trouble, it seemed to Laurie, for as long as she could remember. Now he leaned over and kissed her.

“You're an angel. Thanks for saying yes.”

“But I haven't,” said Laurie, knowing that by keeping silent she had. She looked across at her brother. Success had given his pallid skin a rosy glow and his eyes shone greenly. He smiled. Laurie recognized that smile. It had been present fairly regularly throughout her childhood and bathed the recipient in a rosy glow while at the same time giving him or her a slight frisson of alarm. A feeling that something extremely hazardous had glided closely by.

She had seen it first when she was five and her widowed mother had brought up to the nursery Victor Hannaford, whom she planned to marry, and his thirteen-year-old son. Simon had stepped forward with tremendous self-assurance, shaken Nanny's hand, kissed Laurie on the cheek and smartly removed a box of chocolate marshmallows from the top of her toy box. She had watched anxiously as they disappeared downstairs for they were her favorite sweets, and she had been tremendously relieved when he returned to say good-bye and put the box back. Later it proved to be empty. Now she said: “And there's no need to waste that smile on me.”

“What smile?”

“Your basking shark's smile.”

“Anyone would think you couldn't trust me.” Simon poured himself a third vodka and tonic, added lemon and ice. He swirled it round, admiring the silvery gloss on the surface before draining it in one swallow. “Right,” he said, becoming very brisk. “We've got ten at two fifty…less food, of course. We can raid the cellar for the wine—”

“Oh, no, we can't!”

“Why on earth not? All those dusty crates of plonk slowly turning to vinegar—”

“If it's plonk it'll have turned long ago. I shouldn't think anyone's been down there since Uncle George was carted up for the last time.”

“Exactly. We'd be doing Aunt Maude a favor clearing it out.”

“I doubt if she'd see it like that.”

“Anyway, it'll probably all be ours sooner or later.”

“Sooner or later isn't now. And don't count your chickens. We're not the only possible heirs.”

“We're the most likely.”

“There's Hazel's son.”

“Mervyn? Aunt Maude hates him. Says he looks like a constipated squirrel.”

Laurie giggled. “He does a bit. What about Jocelyn then? Or that weird cousin who had nervous palpitations and used to sleep in a fish tank.”

“Hetty? She went to Australia.”

“The Handsom-Nortys?”

“After that hushed-up flotation scandal? No,” repeated Simon firmly, ‘you and I are by far the best bet. Now—if we could please get back to business. How much do you think we shall have to pay the staff?'

“There you go again, harping on about staff. What staff?”

“We've got to have a butler and maid.”

“What's wrong with Mrs. Posture and Ivy?”

“God—you're so dim.” Simon explained slowly and clearly. “Apart from the fact that neither of them, however cunningly disguised, could ever be mistaken for a butler, there's the strong possibility that they'll tell Aunt Maude on her return what we've been up to.”

“You said she wouldn't mind.”

“Picky, picky. I shall put a help-wanted notice in the
Oxford Mail.”

“Safer to go to an agency.”

“I've no intention of paying a huge registration fee and inflated salaries, thanks very much. Especially as our profits have now been cut to the bone thanks to all this whining about numbers. The point of the weekend after all is to make a killing. I shall ask for references, of course.”

“I should hope so.”

Simon replaced his glass on the table and lifted his face to the warm early evening sun, calmly content. He had never in a million years thought that he would be able to persuade Laurie to go along with his plan. Or, should this persuasion miraculously occur, that she would agree to more than two or, at the very most, four visitors at a time. Huckster-like he had started by suggesting over thirty, knowing this would frighten the wits out of her, and now she had actually agreed to ten. Unbelievable. Tomorrow he really would put an advertisement in
The Times
. He said: “And the murder is still on?” When Laurie frowned he added quickly: “I'll organize it all.”

“What do you know about murder weekends?”

“Done lots of research.” Simon indicated a pile of brochures sitting next to some paperbacks by the lemonade jug. He picked up a copy of
Death on the Nile
and waved it about. “And got lots of ideas. I shall draw up a flexible plot outline, give everyone a stock character and let them get on with it.”

“It all sounds a bit vague.”

“Vagueness is vital. You've got to allow room for improvisation. Usually, according to these”—he patted the brochures—“actors are involved, but I'm certainly not hiring any. They want what's called the Equity minimum. I was horrified when I discovered what it was. I thought they all did it for love. Like nuns and missionaries.”

“I shall want to vet all the replies to the advert.”

“Naturally.”

“And this butler and maid.”

“Of course. Though they'll really just be set-dressing. You can do lots of cooking before the guests arrive and tart up the house. You know—put flowers in all the rooms—”

“Thanks a lot!”

“I thought you liked flowers. Right, so that's the weekend after this. June fifteenth to seventeenth.”

“And what will you be doing whilst all this activity's going on?”

“I,” said Simon grandly, tilting his chair back again and resting his loafers once more on the rungs of the table, “will be pressing my plus fours.”

O
ddly enough, in one respect Simon proved to be correct. Once Laurie had really thrown herself into the business of organizing the weekend, her misgivings, temporarily at least, slipped away. She vacuumed and dusted and ran up and down stairs with piles of lavender-scented sheets and pillowcases, making sure that each guest had fresh flowers, fluffy towels, scented soap and plenty of reading materials. Plus, on their bedside tables, a handwritten menu card.

She had prepared for their delectation pigeon terrine, boeuf en croute, lemon and toffee puddings and, in case anyone was a vegetarian, some ratatouille and a Stilton and broccoli quiche. All this was in the freezer together with a hundred rolls and fifty assorted croissants and brioche. There were still pheasants to prepare and a whole salmon was in the fridge awaiting Saturday lunch. For the first time Laurie felt grateful to her aunt who, quaintly believing gardening to be no job for a lady, had refused to pay her niece's fees for the coming year at Pershore College until she had completed two full terms at the Tante Marie School of Cookery. Now, feeling crisp and capable, Laurie checked her housekeeping list over and over again, sure she had forgotten nothing. She was, of course, wrong.

Simon, as always once he had got his own way, was all sweetness, light and helpful assistance. He had driven the Mountfield Simplicity to great effect over the vast lawns, throwing up sparkling clouds of frail grass cuttings and leaving stripes of exquisite perfection. He had also obtained a minibus (all the guests having taken advantage of the free train offer) by trading in, temporarily, his old Karmann Ghia. The bus now stood washed and polished outside the front entrance. An amber sunstrip, boldly lettered MADINGLEY GRANGE, arched over the windshield. And yesterday they had braved the cellar.

Neither of them had been down there before and they were amazed at the size of the place. It was like a small aircraft hangar dimly lit by three sixty-watt bulbs suspended from frayed old electric cord. A cryptish smell prevailed, the floor was gritty under their feet and the dust made Laurie sneeze. There was no echo. Rather the sneeze was immediately trapped and enfolded in an atmosphere of overpowering fustiness. As they stood, rather close together, one of the bulbs sizzled briefly and went out.

“Great,” said Simon. “We could hardly see a thing before. I should have brought a torch.”

“I'll go and get one.”

“Don't you dare.” He caught his sister's eye. “And there's no need to sneer.” His voice wavered theatrically. “Who knows what horrors lurk at the bottom of the Black Lagoon?”

Laurie reached up and pushed the light. It swung backward and forward. Huge shapes loomed out of the dimness, receded, loomed again. Old furniture piled high, some trunks, an upturned ancient rowing boat. Tennis nets, bats and balls, a set of mallets for croquet. And crates and crates and crates of wine.

“My God…” breathed Simon. “An oenophile's paradise.”

“I bet it's all off.”

“One way to find out.” Simon moved toward the nearest stack. Each set of fifty crates was enclosed in a three-sided cage made of open wire mesh over a wooden frame. He pulled out a bottle.

“Don't swing it about like that. There's bound to be sediment.”

“So I spoil one. There's hundreds more. What sort do we want? You're the
chef de cuisine.”

“Some red and some white.”

“I'd have thought all that pricy training would have left you with a slightly wider grasp of château and vintage than ‘some red and some white'.”

“There's no point in being precise when I don't know what we've got.”

“Well, this…” Simon peered at a bottle. “The label's flaked off.”

“Should tell you on the cork what it is.”

“There's obviously some serious testing to be done here. We can't give the punters stuff we haven't had a go at ourselves. You take the next three down and I'll bring these.”

“Simon…” Laurie had moved a few steps away. “Here a minute.”

Simon joined her. “Champers. Yum-yum.”

“It's Krug, 1955.”

“High time we polished it off then.”

“We can't do that. It must be worth a fortune.”

“You're not going to be tiresome, are you, Laurie?”

“What do the others say?”

“Drink me.”
Simon turned Laurie firmly toward the cellar steps and gave her a little push. “Go and find a corkscrew.” He collected three more bottles and followed his sister, nudging when she hesitated.

Back in the dining room he produced some long-stemmed tulip glasses, wiped the dirt and cobwebs from bottle number one—it still looked quite black—and eased out the cork. The wine glowed like rubies and a heavenly fragrance, massively opulent, arose from the glass. Black currants, cedarwood (or was it sandalwood?), plummy and rich. Laurie emptied her glass and gazed at Simon. She looked quite stunned.

“Delicious.”

Simon pulled a further cork. “This is a white one. I think you asked for one of each.”

The white one in its own way was equally superb. In color a lovely buttery yellow with a greenish edge. Disbelieving the first glass, they had a second. It smelled of…

“Vanilla.”

“Nuts.”

“Toast.”

“Toast?”

“And butter.”

“I wouldn't say that,” contradicted Laurie, wagging her head. “Seems to me”—investigating further—“to have a rare and subtle oakiness—”

“Spare me the wine babble.”

“Oany…oh…only…ocky…”

“One more word about rare and subtle oakiness and it all goes down the sink.”

“No!”

“Behave yourself then.”

“Yes, Simon.”

“Let's have no prating on about saucy little numbers with a quick good-bye.”

“No, Simon.” Laurie imbibed a little more. “Gorse bushes.”

“God, you're affected.” Simon broached bottle number three.

“That's the fish and meat then.”

“What is?”

“What we've just”—in a huge effort of concentration, Laurie frowned and gripped the edge of the table—“drunk.”

“I can see you're drunk. You're a disgrace to the family name.”

“Not true. Now…” Laurie laid a solemn and restraining hand on her brother's arm. “We want something to go with the pudding.”

“Pudding, madam?” Simon wrapped a clean tea towel around bottle number three. “Say no more.”

“I shall say what I like. Who you think you are?”

Simon poured. Hayfields newly mown under a baking sun. Mignonette crushed in the hand. Clover and wild flowers. A deep golden wine with a rim the color of burnt sugar, rich and sweet. Fat honeybee sweetness that stayed in your mouth. And stayed. And stayed.

“Now that”—Simon drained his glass—“is bliss. As close, I fear, to heaven as I shall ever be in this world or the next. What are you doing down there?”