The Man with a Load of Mischief (24 page)

“I'm trying to find out just who it was in this village Ruby Judd knew enough about to get herself killed over.”

Trueblood looked puzzled. “I'm afraid I don't follow.”

“I think she was blackmailing someone.”

“Me? That's just like the coppers. Run about in their panda cars looking for the queers to blame the rising crime rate on —”

“As a matter of fact, I
don't
think it was you, but I may take you in anyway just to get some proper answers.”

Trueblood lowered the pitch of his voice to a more normal tone. “Oh, very well. I'll try to remember if the girl said anything that might help. She had so little to say one would want to listen to. Stuff about her life, that sort of thing.”

“Tell me about that, then.”

“I was only laying her, Inspector, not doing her biography. I hardly listened.”

Jury wished
someone
had listened to Ruby Judd.

“She did say her mother was an old stick, and her father on the hob but mostly falling off. Gin. Sister spent her nights in front of the goggle-box mooning over American detectives.” Trueblood took a swig of sherry and lit another small cigar. “Then there was this aunt and uncle in Devon where she spent most of her ill-trained childhood. Then on and on through odd jobs here and there —”

“Like ‘modeling'? Read for that, porno stuff.”

“Who, her? I doubt it. Oh, I think she might have tried to rustle up a bit of street-corner business now and again, but she'd have made a poor dirty postcard.”

“Where were you on the night of December fifteenth, Tuesday?”

“All by my lonesome, dear. Where were
you
?”

 • • • 

“More goose, sir?”

Ruthven was standing at Jury's elbow, offering an enormous silver platter on which rested the remains of two birds, still in their adornments of cherries and truffles. But it hardly registered on Jury, whose eyes were on Vivian Rivington, seated across the table from him. Her amber hair curled above her gray cashmere sweater, and she looked as if she had materialized out of the mists of Dartmoor or the mysterious moors of Yorkshire's West Riding. If the goose had got up and started quacking across the table, Jury wouldn't have noticed. Her sister, Isabel, had opted for the Bicester-Strachans.

Lady Ardry spoke now. “Not very hungry, hey, Inspector? Perhaps if you'd be up and doing a bit more, you'd have some appetite. As I've been doing.”

“Indeed, Aunt? And just what have you been doing?”

“Investigating, my dear Plant. Can't have more of these murders, now can we?” She piled some chestnut stuffing on a split scone and tucked this starchy ensemble into her mouth.

“Oh, I don't know,” said Plant. “Perhaps one more. No, thank you, Ruthven.”

“I'll have some more,” said Agatha. “And speaking of the investigation, have you your alibi ready, Vivian?”

Jury cast Agatha a malevolent look. She had obviously not forgiven him for establishing an alibi for Melrose Plant.

“As a matter of fact,” said Vivian, “I've probably less of an alibi than anyone else. Except Simon, perhaps. We were at the Swan when that man was killed.” She looked at Jury so unhappily, he had to avert his gaze to the wineglass.

“We're all in the same boat, dear,” said Agatha with mock sweetness. “Excepting, of course, for Melrose. Only one in Long Pidd with an alibi.” She said it with such snappish truculence, one would have thought Melrose had been printing up alibis in the back room and refusing to hand out copies. She was wrestling a forkful of food from the drumstick she had speared from
the silver platter, as if she and the bird were locked in mortal combat. “You needn't snicker, Inspector. Plant isn't out of the woods, not yet. Remember you were only with him from eleven-thirty until noon or so, when I returned.”

“But you were with him for three hours prior to that, Lady Ardry.” What the hell was she up to, now?

“You sound as if you were
sorry
Melrose has an alibi,” said Vivian.

“Let's flip for it, Aunt Agatha,” said Melrose, taking a coin from his pocket.

“You needn't be frivolous,” she said to her nephew. Then to Vivian: “Certainly, I
would
be glad if Plant were clear. Only the truth is bound to come out in the end—”

“Truth? What truth?” asked Jury.

Carefully she put by her knife and fork, giving them their first rest in the last half hour. Snuggling her chin on her clasped fingers, elbows on table, she said, “I mean that I wasn't with you for every minute. Don't you remember, my dear Plant? I went out to the kitchen to see to the Christmas pudding. Martha does like to skimp on the mace . . .”

If Melrose had forgotten, Ruthven hadn't. Although he didn't spill a drop of the wine he was pouring, he closed his eyes in pain.

“I thought you'd merely gone to use the facilities.” Melrose sighed and asked Ruthven to clear away the dinner plates. “Anyway, you couldn't have been gone very long.” Reprieves from Agatha were never long, his tone implied.

Jury watched enviously as Vivian put her hand on Melrose's, which was twirling the stem of his wineglass. “Agatha! You should be ashamed!”

“We've all of us got to do our duty, my girl, no matter how painful an office that may be. We can't go about protecting our loved ones, merely because we wish to see them as innocent. The moral fiber of Britain was not built upon —”

“Never mind about Britain's moral fiber, Agatha,” said Melrose. “Tell me, how did I manage to get to the Swan, kill Creed, then nip back in the short time you were in the kitchen driving Martha crazy?”

Calmly, she buttered a biscuit. “My dear Plant, I hope you don't think
I
have been sitting around working out your crimes for you?”

Jury blinked. He had read several books on formal logic, but Lady Ardry defied them all.

“However,” she continued, “since we're speculating, you could have jumped in your Bentley, dashed off —”

Jury couldn't resist. “But, surely, you remember, Lady Ardry, the motor of the car was dead cold. It took us a good five minutes to get it going.” Vivian Rivington bestowed upon Jury a beatific smile.

As Agatha's face fell, Melrose said: “Don't give up, Agatha. How about my bike? No, too slow.” He seemed to be debating the little problem. Then he snapped his fingers. “My horse! That's it! I could have saddled up old Bouncer, dashed across the meadow to the Swan, dispatched Creed, and back again — zip! like a bunny.”

Vivian said, “It would have to be zip! like a bunny, consider-your horse.”

Melrose shook his head. “Well, there it is, Agatha. It simply won't wash. My alibi stands.”

As Agatha gritted her teeth, Ruthven brought in the dessert — a magnificent pudding. He touched a match to its brandy-soaked surface. After he served it, he poured some Madeira into the third wineglass.

When Melrose observed Agatha sitting there glumly, probably working out another way to destroy his alibi, he said to Ruthven: “That small package up there on the mantel. Hand that over to her ladyship, will you?”

Agatha's face brightened as she took the present and opened it.

Vivian gasped when Agatha drew from the small box a bracelet of emeralds and rubies. They gleamed, nearly spurting into small flames themselves when they caught the candlelight. Agatha thanked Melrose lavishly, but without a trace of bad conscience for all she had just been trying to do. She handed the bracelet to Vivian, who admired it and passed it across to Jury.

He had not seen the real thing since he was very young, working the robbery division. He knew now why rubies were described as “blood red.” Suddenly that missing detail floated into his mind. Rubies. Ruby. A bracelet. That was it, that image of the wrist sticking out of the ground. Ruby's wrist, but no bracelet.
She always wore it, sir, never took it off
. Daphne's voice came back to him.

Then where was it? His eyes were riveted on the gems as he passed the bracelet back to Agatha, his mind still so much on Ruby's naked wrist that he barely heard Agatha's comment:

“Quite handsome, Melrose. For paste.”

 • • • 

The ladies retired to the drawing room, leaving Jury and Melrose to their port.
Retired
was perhaps not the most apt description of Lady Ardry's leave-taking. Vivian finally got her out of the dining room, but Agatha managed a few assaults on it, coming back to collect various items that seemed to have dropped from her person — handkerchiefs, buttons, and her bracelet, which she had left in an untidy heap on the table as if its red and green magnificence were a handful of olives.

When she had gone off with that, Jury said, “That was a very generous gift, Mr. Plant.”

“I think she missed the red and green symbolism. Christmas colors. I thought it would be nice.” He studied the tip of his cigar, and blew on it to make it burn.

“Excuse me for asking, but what did she give you?”

“Nothing.” Plant smiled. “She never does. Says she's saving up for a specially nice gift — something she's been considering for years. Wonder what it is. A new car fitted out by the I.R.A.?”

Jury grinned, and then said, “There are a few ideas I'd like to toss around with you regarding these murders.”

“I'm listening.”

“Well, what intrigues me is their flamboyance. What sort of mind would think them up?”

“A very cool one. He might be a psychopath under it all, but I'll bet it's well hidden. I agree, though. The killer is being horribly
public
about it all. If you want to kill someone, why not arrange a
private
meeting?”

Jury drew a folded copy of the front page of the
Weatherington Chronicle
from his jacket pocket. “I can give you a good reason, I think.” He flicked his finger against the banner: “
Inn Murders Continue.
” There was a long account of the murder of Ruby Judd, followed by a review of the Creed murder. “It's the pattern. Either this inn business means something, or it doesn't —”

Melrose Plant blew a smoke ring. “That statement, Inspector, has probably unraveled a million years of philosophical speculation. ‘Either it means something, or it doesn't.' ”

“Mr. Plant, there are times when I'm happy I'm not your aunt.”

“Keep talking as you just did, and I'll soon be unable to tell the difference.”

“Mr. Plant, be careful. I could break your alibi.”

“You wouldn't.”

“If there were more than one murder—? How about that? You're only covered for the Creed murder.”

“Let's get back to our theories: now, is the murderer trying to get at something in these inns? What about gold in a press table? Or perhaps Matchett has the original Hogarth sign and doesn't know it — well, that sounds rather improbable.
Or
this inn business is a smoke screen.”

“I see you thought of that, too. Also: sometimes the most public way of committing a crime is the most private. The ‘purloined letter' idea. You hide something in plain sight. And since the murderer isn't hiding the bodies, well, maybe he's trying to obscure the motive.”

“Except for the body of Ruby Judd. There are two variations from the pattern. She was buried and she
wasn't
a stranger.”

“It's the variations that are interesting. Although it must have made no difference when the others were discovered, it
did
make a difference in the case of Ruby Judd.”

“But why murder Ruby Judd anyway?” Melrose twirled his port glass.

“Perhaps because she knew something about someone in the village.”

“Blackmail? Good heavens, what have we all been up to?”

Jury answered this obliquely. “There is some indication that Ruby had something going with Oliver Darrington.” Plant looked astonished. “Yes, I think the Judd girl really got around.”

“That chubby little farm girl?” Plant shook his head. “Some men have strange tastes.”

“Including Marshall Trueblood.”

Melrose nearly dropped the port bottle. “You're kidding.”

Jury smiled. “Trueblood does seem to be the standing butt of Long Piddleton's jokes, I admit.”

“Yes. But I've always felt jokes about another man's race, religion, or sexual persuasion to be in deplorable taste. Those are generally things one can't do much about. Not that I like him. If he walked down the High Street standing on his hands he couldn't be sillier.” Melrose shook his head in disbelief. “And Trueblood was actually sleeping with the Judd girl?”

“Only once, he claims. But there are things in Trueblood's past, as there are in Darrington's, that neither one might want known and that Ruby Judd might have found out. Then we have the Bicester-Strachans —”

“I'd plump for Lorraine, myself. She'd murder to protect her holy reputation —”

Agatha popped back into the dining room just then to hear what was going on, her excuse being she needed a drop of brandy for her splitting headache. “Just get me some, won't you Ruthven?”

Ruthven, who had just come in at that moment to clear the sideboard, turned haughtily and said, “My name is pronounced
Rivv'n
, madam.
Rivv'n
, as his lordship has so often told you.”

“Then why don't you spell it
Rivv'n?”

“I do, madam.” Ruthven started for the kitchen, tray in hand.

“Well!” Agatha turned to Melrose. “Is that the way you allow your servants to talk? And what aspersions have you been casting on Lorraine Bicester-Strachan?”

Turning round at the kitchen door, Ruthven came close to shouting, “Madam, it is
Bister-Strawn! Bister-Strawn!”
He wheeled round and went through to the kitchen.