Mad About the Boy? (38 page)

Haldean nodded. ‘It can. And to someone who loved Russia as Malcolm did, it must have been compelling. He felt things very strongly. And to be fair to him, he didn't want to hurt you or me. Anything but.'

‘He didn't seem to mind what happened to me,' said Stanton.

Lady Rivers nodded in vigorous agreement. ‘I can understand him wanting to revenge his friend. I don't agree with private revenge but it's understandable. What was truly wrong was him throwing the blame on Arthur.'

‘The whole wretched business was wrong from beginning to end,' said Sir Philip. ‘What beats me, Jack, is how on earth you got to the bottom of it all. I mean, why were you so sure that young Preston hadn't killed himself?'

‘That's easy,' said Haldean. Walking to the sideboard he poured himself a whisky and soda. ‘Tim hadn't been depressed or suicidal when I met him and I couldn't see why he should suddenly become so. Then Arthur found the famous disappearing cigarette packet and I overheard Lyvenden and Mrs Strachan going at it hammer and tongs about secret papers and so on, on Sunday afternoon.'

‘I was convinced Tim had killed himself,' Stanton said thoughtfully. ‘The idea of him being murdered seemed so bizarre.' He sat up straight. ‘I've just remembered it! Really remembered it, I mean. How Tim looked when he was telling me about the money he owed and what I said and everything.'

Isabelle put her hand over his. ‘It'll all come back to you, Arthur. I'm sure it will. Tim told you he'd seen some secret papers, didn't he, Jack?'

Haldean nodded. ‘That's right. Lyvenden obviously had some sort of Russian connection, because of that bloke, Yuri Gerasimov, who turned up on Sunday morning. So whatever these secret papers were, I was willing to bet they had something to do with Russia. I must say that Mr Charnock's Slav, or Ukrainian, to give him his proper nationality, rather obscured the issue, as did Mr Charnock himself. And, by picking a fight with Gerasimov and taking the man's knife, Mr Charnock gave Malcolm a weapon for murder.'

He sat down and looked at the light reflected through his glass. ‘Have you remembered what happened on Tuesday yet, Arthur?'

Stanton shook his head. ‘I keep getting odd flashes of things. I remember you finding the knife in my drawer, but not much else. I was so bewildered by it. I couldn't think how on earth it had got there.'

‘It had got there because Malcolm had put it there,' said Haldean. ‘And my word, his plan nearly worked. The sight of you in Lyvenden's room was overwhelming as, of course, it was meant to be.' He sipped his whisky thoughtfully. ‘I'm sorry to have to admit it, Arthur, but I really did wonder if you'd flipped and killed him. I thought the effect of seeing Lyvenden – remember you were meant to have a knife in your hand as well – could have pushed you over the edge. Fennimore was there when you found out that Lyvenden was Victor Todd and, like me, thought you had a compelling motive for murder. I really did have to think about it. Isabelle never doubted you for a moment, though.'

‘I just knew you could never do anything like that,' said Isabelle.

‘And you were right, Belle,' agreed Haldean, ‘but things looked very black.' He looked at Stanton apologetically. ‘After all, if you hadn't killed Lyvenden, who had? Had someone tried to frame you, or had you simply blundered on the scene? And why on earth didn't you come and get help? As I said to Belie, it was an unlocked room mystery.'

‘That's something I don't understand,' said Isabelle. ‘I know why Arthur didn't come and get us, of course, because the door was wedged solid, but how could Malcolm be so sure it would work? He didn't know poor Arthur was going to lose his memory. If we'd opened the door and Arthur had told us Malcolm had trapped him in there, we'd have been very suspicious of Malcolm's part in things.'

Haldean sat down again. ‘We would, certainly, Belle, but how would the police look at it? Arthur had a very strong motive to kill Lyvenden, he'd been seen with what I was prepared to swear was the murder weapon, and he'd had the opportunity. And I don't suppose for a moment Malcolm opened the door and shoved Arthur into the room by main force. He probably said something to the tune of “After you, old man,” and quietly shut the door once Arthur was inside. But, and this is the clever bit, because it wasn't locked when we all came to see what the fuss was about, it seemed for all the world as if Arthur had slipped his moorings altogether, stabbed Lyvenden, had forty fits and remained keening over the body. And what could Arthur say? That Lyvenden was dead when he found him and the door had stuck? It wasn't stuck when we tried it and the implication is that Arthur is a liar. No. It was a very strong circumstantial case and if it had come to trial, you wouldn't have had a chance, old son. I didn't think it would change a thing if you could remember everything perfectly. I believed Malcolm would have taken care to see it wouldn't. Ashley thought it was worth a shot, though.'

He lit a cigarette. ‘Oddly enough, it was something Malcolm said to me that made me think. He'd said that Mr Charnock's knife was very rare, but I knew that wasn't so. They're very commonplace. What if there were two knives? And if there were two knives, then there were two murderers, if you see what I mean. Arthur, the false one, and, in the background, the real one. And the real murderer had held the knife whilst wearing gloves. Arthur didn't have any gloves and there weren't any bloodstained gloves in the room. It was a very messy murder and the murderer must have got a good deal of blood on him. He would hardly have walked down the hall covered in blood, so that meant he'd gone out by the windows. Ashley and I searched high and low but couldn't find the key. That made me fairly sure that you'd been put on the spot. The key was always left in the lock and there was no reason for the murderer to lock the windows and take the key unless he wanted to stop you escaping through them.' Haldean grinned. ‘You solved that problem very effectively, I must say.'

Stanton returned the smile. ‘D'you know, I'm beginning to remember bits of that, too.'

‘What made you suspect Malcolm?' asked Isabelle.

‘I didn't, at first,' said Haldean with a shrug. ‘Then he staged his own kidnapping. He'd made a phone call to the Paradise Club in the afternoon and could have contacted them again when we were in the Grand in Brighton. However, what he didn't bargain for was that they'd not only try to kill me – I suppose Vargen Yashin must have heard how I worked things out in the Breedenbrook fête business and wasn't leaving anything to chance – but were horribly careless about the possibility of killing you, Isabelle.'

Haldean took a long drink. ‘I wish to God I hadn't
liked
Malcolm so much. He wasn't responsible for some of the things that happened. He went barmy when he saw you were in danger, didn't he, Belle? And judging from the way the Russians cracked him over the head, they couldn't give a damn about him, only what he could do for them. He might have used them, but by God, they used him. Anyway, I wasn't killed, but the knock on the head must have done me some good, because the next morning I tumbled to it. I read a bit in the newspaper about a long leather coat being washed up on the beach and suddenly everything fell into place. Of course, the murderer needed some protection, and a motoring coat was just the thing. Motoring suggested Malcolm, and I realized how he'd managed to fool around with time.'

‘I remember you looking as if you'd seen a ghost,' said Isabelle.

Haldean ran his finger round the top of his glass. ‘In a way I had. If you assume two knives, the murder could have taken place at any time after Adamson had left his master. Malcolm could have easily done it. But I knew that Malcolm hadn't killed Tim and as soon as I asked the question I knew the answer. Lyvenden had murdered Tim and Malcolm had killed Lyvenden in revenge. Once I guessed how Malcolm could have done it, I sort of saw him do it and it turned me over to think of Arthur being cold-bloodedly framed.' He drank his whisky thoughtfully. ‘However, having the grues was no good to anyone. I needed some evidence. Now Adamson had stated that Malcolm had brought the Argentine papers into Lyvenden's room in a big briefcase and left the case behind.'

He leaned forward. ‘The file was there but the briefcase wasn't. I'd thought earlier it was odd that such a slim file needed a large briefcase, but it had to be large to contain the coat. And if it had contained the coat, it wouldn't be in the room because the murderer would have to take it away with him. The notion it contained gloves as well seemed reasonable. That's when I knew I was on to something. And now I began to get a line on what the secret might be. If both Lyvenden and Malcolm were involved, then the betting was it concerned money. Bring Russia into the picture and you immediately get the idea that these two business partners – bankers – were involved in an illicit scheme to transfer money to Russia. Then I twigged the significance of what Lyvenden's Russian, Gerasimov, said on Sunday about learning something of value. He must have recognized Malcolm, Vargen Yashin's star prize, and for the first time linked him up with Lyvenden. Not that the knowledge did Gerasimov any good. He was shot. Malcolm looked really shaken when I told him Gerasimov's body had been found. It was obvious that Yashin only told Malcolm part of what they did. Anyway, we knew this Russian deal had been referred to in either papers or a paper. Ashley and I came across Malcolm searching Lyvenden's room, ostensibly to find the Argentine document. But if Lyvenden had been working on the Argentine document just before he died, then it would have been on top of the heap. So what had Malcolm been looking for? The Russian paper, obviously, and he didn't find it after Ashley and I came into the room. I think Lyvenden had had other papers with him and I wouldn't be surprised if Malcolm had taken them out of Lyvenden's room on the Sunday morning, Arthur, when the three of us were in there. I don't suppose you remember it, but Malcolm was really disturbed by the files he'd found. I bet one of them at least contained documents about the Russian deal. He said he was going to talk to Lyvenden about it and I imagine one of the things he said was to point out how dangerous it was to leave them lying around. He probably saw Lyvenden put the key document into his cigarette case.'

‘Didn't you find any of these files and so on afterwards?' asked Isabelle.

Haldean shook his head. ‘No. Either Lyvenden took them back to London on Monday or Malcolm hid them in his car. I can't tell you how I felt, Arthur, when I remembered telling Malcolm that you'd run off with the cigarette case. The document more or less had to be in it because the only things taken out of the room had been the briefcase and the cigarette case. I also told him that you were near your old home. I'd unwittingly set the hounds on your track and told them where to look.'

He interlocked his fingers and stared at the palms of his hands for a few seconds. ‘I knew that as long as you were free, Arthur, you were in horrible danger. Once I'd got you into the safe hands of the police, I could breathe freely again. However, I thought it was as well to advertise the fact because I was pretty sure that once you were found, Malcolm would show up again.'

‘Is that why we went to the Wheatsheaf that night?' asked Isabelle.

‘That's right. I also took the opportunity to tell any interested parties, through the newspaper, that as far as I was concerned, the attack had been successful and I was
hors de combat.
I had no desire for any Russian thugs to pay me a return visit. That came off. Malcolm was found but in such a dreadful state, I couldn't make it add up. From what he said to me on the beach, I don't think he really cared if he lived or died any more. He'd cold-bloodedly taken an overdose of morphine and gambled he'd be found in time. It was very convincing, but I knew I had to be right, despite appearances. Having the document translated clinched it.'

‘There's something I don't understand, Jack,' said Lady Rivers. ‘Why, with all that evidence, couldn't Mr Ashley simply arrest him?'

Haldean looked at her. ‘What evidence, Aunt Alice? We could prove he was planning to steal the bank's funds and illegally transfer them to the Soviets all right, but that didn't prove he'd murdered Lyvenden. As soon as the story about the money got out he'd be ruined, sure enough, because with the details on that document it'd be easy to find supporting evidence of the transfer, but that wasn't what I was after. So he'd bought a knife. So what? That's not a crime. For Arthur's sake I had to try to get Malcolm to admit it. We had nothing like enough evidence for a jury. The sort of lawyer Malcolm could afford would have made mincemeat of our case. It all sounded so hypothetical and airy-fairy compared to the sight of poor old Arthur standing over Lyvenden, covered in blood. I was hoping for a confession, but it all went horribly wrong. I realized, of course, that if he confessed he would be arrested, tried and hanged. If all Malcolm had done was take revenge for Tim, then I might have left it. Lyvenden was no beauty and deserved everything he got. But you, Arthur . . . I couldn't stomach that. We had to get him to admit it. Anything less wouldn't do. Malcolm had been completely safe because no one had seen him wedge Lyvenden's door to and trap Arthur in there. But what if someone had seen him? That would change things dramatically. So, I typed a blackmail letter.'

Sir Philip gaped at him. ‘You did what?'

Haldean grinned. ‘It was very respectful, as these things go. I signed it “A friend”. All it said was that the writer had seen what Malcolm had done in the corridor that day. If Malcolm had been innocent, it wouldn't have mattered a bean. I promised no further demands would be made if Malcolm could see his way to leaving two hundred quid – I wasn't doing this on the cheap – under the floor of the summerhouse by five o'clock that afternoon.'