The Price of Butcher's Meat (54 page)

He glanced toward the woman. Beard didn’t.

“Secretary. Sorry I didn’t get here earlier. Roadworks.”

His voice was so deep and vibrant that it almost massaged you, thought Charley. Talk to this guy on the phone and you’d date him anytime, even though he did use the same dismissive tone for both
secretary
and
roadworks
.

“Let’s step inside,” said Pascoe.

As they set off he glanced round at Charley, made a rueful face, and murmured, “Sorry. The will. Hang about and we’ll talk later. If you can, that is. Thanks.”

What had Dalziel called him? Old silver tongue. Well, she’d never been a pushover for a smooth talker. On the other hand, if his smooth talking was going to include some gobbets of info about the will, she certainly wasn’t going to miss the chance to hear that.

She turned round to find Godley standing so close to her she took an involuntary step backward. At the same time he did a backward hop of twice the distance.

She said, “Mr. Godley, if you’re going to make a habit of sneaking up on me, you’re really going to have to do something with that beard.”

“Yes. Sorry.”

He looked so hangdog, she felt as guilty as if she’d given him a kick.

Thinking only to make amends she said, “I was wondering—you must have heard all about Tom Parker’s plans for Sandytown from your sister . . . half sister . . . Doris. Right?”

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“Yes. Doris was very enthusiastic about the festival and everything.”

“But you weren’t?”

“Not really. Not my kind of thing. Don’t like a lot of people around. Don’t like a fuss. And with Doris being . . . well . . . being Miss Lee . . .”

She saw what he was saying. He loved his half sister very much, but he didn’t do deception. Being around her professionally must have been a real trial.

“So what made you change your mind?”

Silly question. She knew the answer even as she asked it, but it was too late.

He wouldn’t look at her but stared at the ground and gabbled something inaudibly.

Inaudible was fine by her, so she didn’t say, “Pardon?” or “What?”

but he took her silence as, “Sorry, I didn’t get that,” and straightened up and looked her in the eyes.

“Because when you and Mr. and Mrs. Parker called at the mill and Mr. Parker said you were going to stay with them for a few days, I thought if I accepted his invitation I might get to see you again.

That’s why I came.”

“But that’s just . . . daft!” said Charley.

“Yes, I agree,” he said instantly. “And I thought, the simplest way for me to see how daft it was would be to see you again and wonder why I’d bothered.”

It was silly for a sensible adult woman who really didn’t fancy being fancied by a weirdo to feel disappointed, but Charley defi nitely felt a pang of something a lot like disappointment.

“Good thinking,” she said heartily.

“Not really. It doesn’t seem at all daft to me now,” he said. “In fact, it seems perfectly logical. And I’m sorry I thought even for a second you might have been in on that trick the police played to get me to talk. When I thought about it later, I knew I had to be wrong, and T H E P R I C E O F B U T C H E R ’ S M E AT 4 0 7

when I heard you stand up to the pair of them just now, I was certain.

So there you go. What I feel about you might be hopeless, but it certainly isn’t daft. Now I’ve got to go.”

“Where? Why?” she demanded.

“To the Avalon. You were right, that girl Clara should be our main concern now.”

He turned and walked swiftly away.

She felt an impulse to shout after his retreating figure, to say they needed to talk more, but she was fearful that anything she said might be taken as encouragement. If he knew it was hopeless already, why risk changing that?

As he climbed onto the bike, a familiar dusty old Defender drew up alongside the lawyer’s Daimler and the driver jumped out. He was a tall young man with broad shoulders and a smile to match as he strode across the lawn toward her.

“Hi, Charley,” he said as soon as he got within distance. “Don’t be mad, but when we got your news, the only way to stop Dad coming straight over here to make sure you’re all right was for me to come, and I reckoned that was the lesser of two evils!”

He was right. She should have felt mad, or at least hugely exasperated to know that the Headbanger still thought of her as a helpless child in need of protection.

Instead, as her brother reached her and put his arms around her, she surprised herself even more than him by saying, “Oh, George!”

and bursting into tears.

7

In the large drawing room, the late Sir Henry Denham looked down upon the newly entered quartet of men with a patrician indifference.

Was the slight squint evidence of Bradley d’Aube’s determination to paint a true portrait, warts and all? wondered Pascoe. Or had he just got fed up with being patronized?

The drawing room had been Mr. Beard’s choice. He had led them there without consultation. Presumably this was where he usually encountered Daphne Denham. Also he was clearly a man used to being in charge, even or perhaps especially in the company of policemen.

He sat down on a huge sofa. His secretary placed the briefcase beside him as an unambiguous signal that he intended single occupancy, then she sat down at a small ormolu table by the wall near the big bureau, pad and pencil at the ready.

Pascoe and Dalziel and Wield rearranged three armchairs so they centered on the lawyer and took their seats with a synchronicity wor-thy of Busby Berkeley.

Beard said, “I take it, Mr. Pascoe, that you do not yet have the perpetrator of this monstrous crime in custody?”

“Afraid not,” said Pascoe.

Beard nodded as if this came as no surprise.

“And you have not seen a copy of Lady Denham’s will?”

“No.” Else we wouldn’t be wasting time sitting here with you, thought Pascoe, giving Dalziel a quick glower to stop him saying it out loud.

“I see,” said Beard, not sounding surprised, but sounding as if he might be if he let himself. “In that case, assuming that you regard all T H E P R I C E O F B U T C H E R ’ S M E AT 4 0 9

of those who might reasonably expect to profit from my client’s will as possible suspects, I think I am justified in revealing its contents to you in advance of the benefi ciaries.”

Dalziel scratched the folds of double chin with the baffled air of one who couldn’t see how the fuck the lawyer should imagine he’d got any choice in the matter even if he did look like a self-portrait of Toulouse-Lautrec.

“That would be most helpful,” murmured Pascoe.

Mr. Beard unlocked his briefcase and extracted a folder that looked as if it were made of vellum. Out of this he took a document.

He proclaimed, “I have in my hand what is, presumably, the last will and testament of Lady Daphne Denham.”

“Presumably?” said Pascoe. “Any reason to think there might be a later one?”

Beard sighed like a French horn and said, “No specifi c reason, else I would have mentioned it. But in her latter years Lady Denham had got into the habit of writing wills. It is not uncommon.

Some aging people solve crosswords, some do cross- stitch, a few take to the composition of haikus. But a large number devote themselves to the writing and revising of wills. Basically, size does not matter. As long as there is portable property of any nature and any quantity, the habitual will writer gains hours of pleasure from distributing and redistributing it. But where the estate is, as in this case, substantial, there is the additional element of exercising real power.”

“So how often did Lady Denham revise her will?” asked Pascoe.

“Four times this year that I know of,” said Beard. “By which I mean, four times when her purposed modifi cations were major enough to require my professional assistance. I suspect, nay I am sure, that there have been frequent minor changes, or even major ones that did not stand the test of time and bring her to the stage where she consulted me. Such documents of course would have no status unless properly signed and witnessed. So, as I say, this, to the 4 1 0

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best of my knowledge, is the last will and testament of Lady Denham. It is a document of considerable detail, and commensurate length. Do you wish to hear it all?”

Dalziel let out a sighing groan, or a groaning sigh, the kind of sound that might well up from the soul of a tone-deaf man who has just realized the second act of
Götterdämmerung
is not the last.

Pascoe said, “I think you might spare us the fine detail, Mr. Beard.

The principal bequests are naturally what I am most interested in.”

“As you wish. At what level would your defi nition of
principal
begin?”

Another sound from Dalziel, this one more ursine than human.

Hastily Pascoe said, “Start at the top and work your way down.”

“That would in fact mean starting at the end,” said Mr. Beard with distaste. “But if you insist. ‘To my nephew by marriage, Sir Edward Denham of Denham Park in the county of Yorkshire, all the residue of my estate real and personal . . .’ You see the problem, Chief Inspector? Without the details of the other bequests, the term is mean-ingless . . .”

“I’m sure you’ve made an estimate,” said Pascoe. “We won’t hold you to it.”

“It isn’t easy, property and the market being constantly in fl ux. I would say at least ten million. In fact, it could be as much as—”

“Ten million will suffi ce,” said Pascoe. “Go on.”

He went on. Esther Denham got a million and all her aunt’s jewelry except for the single item Clara Beresford was invited to choose to accompany her fi ve thousand.

“Five thousand,” interrupted Pascoe. “Not five hundred thousand?”

“No, five thousand,” said Beard.

“Not a lot, considering. By comparison, I mean.”

“It is not a lawyer’s duty to consider, Chief Inspector. Nor to compare. I will say that this was typical of the changes Lady Denham made in her will from time to time. The principal benefi ciaries T H E P R I C E O F B U T C H E R ’ S M E AT 4 1 1

tended to remain the same, but the pecking order varied considerably. There have been times in the last twelve months when Miss Brereton was in line to inherit the hall and a couple of million beside. Presumably when my client prepared this will, she felt she had reason to feel ill disposed to her cousin. Had she survived another week or so, no doubt it would have changed.”

Pascoe said, “Would these beneficiaries know of the changes Lady Denham made from time to time?”

“I don’t think she made a public announcement, but I do not doubt she made her dispositions known to those most nearly concerned.”

This would explain Ted Denham’s confidence that the hall and the bulk of the estate were coming his way, thought Pascoe. But why was he rifl ing through the bureau in the drawing room? Looking for the copy of the will, perhaps? But what need, if he knew its contents?

And in any case Beard would be in possession of the original.

Mysteries—but they were what kept him in gainful employment!

“May I proceed?” said Beard, bringing him back to the present.

“Please do.”

“The other substantial beneficiary is Mr. Alan Hollis, who gets the freehold of the Hope and Anchor.”

“The pub, eh? Worth killing for,” said Dalziel. “Looks a tidy little business to me.”

“Indeed it is, as I can testify. I always stay there on my visits to Sandytown.”

“Oh aye? Had you down as more the Brereton Manor type,” said Dalziel.

“I have been coming here for many years now, and the hotel, of course, has only just opened,” said Beard. “In any case, I prefer the simple life.”

“So what do you do when the pub’s booked up?” said the Fat Man.

This sounded like irrelevant chitchat, but years of watching the Fat 4 1 2

R E G I N A L D H I L L

Man’s apparently aimless wanderings bring him to some longed-for shore kept Pascoe quiet.

“The two letting rooms at the Hope and Anchor are used solely by myself and Miss Gay or any other visitors stipulated by my late client.

I am sure Lady Denham made sure Mr. Alan Hollis did not lose by the arrangement, and in any case his great expectations must have made him more than willing to oblige his patroness.”

There was a noise from the ormolu table. The secretary had let her note pad slip to the floor. She stooped to pick it up, her cheeks flushing as she mouthed an apology.

“Great expectations equal bloody big motive to me,” said Dalziel heavily.

“As a general principle, I would have to agree with you. In this case however Mr. Hollis is very comfortably situated and his expectations have never been in doubt. He seems to have possessed the happy knack of never falling out with his employer, and this bequest has been the one constant in all Lady Denham’s wills, which strikes me as a clever move on my client’s behalf, giving Mr. Hollis a powerful incentive to run as efficiently and as honestly as possible a business that would one day be his.”

“Trusting him didn’t stop her checking the accounts at least once a week,” observed Pascoe dryly, recalling the dead woman’s diary.

“Aye well, she were a Yorkshire lass. Belts and braces, tha knows”

said Dalziel, a phrase which drew an appreciative smile from the secretary.

Pascoe said, “Anything else you’d like to draw our attention to, Mr. Beard?”

“As I indicated earlier, the length of the will derives from the small detail,” said the lawyer. “None of the lesser bequests are such as to provoke a crime of greed, but one or two of them you may fi nd peculiarly indicative of Lady Denham’s state of mind as she made her dispositions.”

“For example?”

T H E P R I C E O F B U T C H E R ’ S M E AT 4 1 3

“ ‘To Harold Hollis, the shaving mug, badger-hair shaving brush, and cutthroat razor belonging to his late lamented half brother, my first husband, that he might have the wherewithal to make himself presentable should he care to attend my funeral. Also the sum of five pounds, which should suffice to buy enough soap to last the rest of his life.’ ”