Dead by Morning Page 3

  It was a small sitting-room, elegant in blue and gold.

  ‘When you’ve had coffee I’ll fetch my wife.’

  ‘Is she very upset?’

  ‘Depends what you mean by “upset”. Shocked, yes, grief-stricken – well I don’t think she would pretend to that. After all, until this week she’s thought her brother dead for many years now, so you could say she’s had time to get used to the idea.’

  There was a knock at the door and a girl in housemaid’s uniform of long black dress, frilly white apron and cap entered with a tray of coffee. Gratefully they all accepted the proffered porcelain cups of steaming liquid. Thanet waited until she had gone, then said, ‘When, exactly, did she learn he wasn’t dead after all?’ His fingers and toes were aching now as they thawed and it took considerable self-control not to betray the fact. He didn’t want to do anything to distract Hamilton’s attention from the conversation.

  ‘Day before yesterday.’ The muscles of Hamilton’s face tightened, betraying the tension their unexpected visitor had caused. He and his wife had obviously not been exactly overjoyed at her brother’s resurrection.

  An interesting thought crossed Thanet’s mind. What if Leo had been the rightful heir to the Longford Hall estate …? Here was a motive for murder if ever there were one. Questions crowded into his mind. He flicked a glance at Lineham. Take over. He wanted to think.

  ‘He just turned up out of the blue, without warning?’ said Lineham.

  Hamilton seemed surprised by the change of questioner. ‘Yes.’

  ‘After – how long?’

  ‘Twenty, twenty-five years. I lost count long ago.’

  Why come back now, after all these years? Thanet wondered.

  ‘Why come back now, after all this time?’ said Lineham.

  Hamilton shrugged. ‘He’d been living abroad for some time, apparently, only returned to England a week ago. Went to the barber’s and saw an article on Country House Hotels in one of the Sunday supplement magazines. Longford Hall was featured in it.’

  Hamilton’s tone had subtly changed. Suddenly he had become guarded.

  ‘I saw that article,’ said Lineham. ‘Chilston Park was in it too.’

  This was another well-known Country House Hotel in Kent, notable in that it was owned by the Millers, publishers of the famous Antiques Price Guide.

  ‘That’s right.’ Hamilton was obviously relieved to be distracted from the direction the conversation was taking.

  But Thanet wasn’t going to let him get away with it so lightly. By now he was sure he was right. Leo had been the heir. Another glance at Lineham. I’ll take over again. They had been working together for so long that this unspoken communication had become second nature to them.

  ‘How long has the Hall been a hotel, Mr Hamilton?’

  ‘Two years.’

  ‘What made Mrs Hamilton decide to make the change?’

  He was rewarded by the answer he expected.

  ‘Her father died four years ago and there was no way she could have kept it on without making it pay its way.’

  ‘Was Mr Martindale aware that his father was dead?’

  This was delicate ground. Hamilton’s tone was carefully casual as he shook his head. ‘Apparently not. As I say, he’d been living abroad for a number of years, in the South of France, although we didn’t know that at the time. Everything possible was done to try and trace him, without success. Apparently the villa in which he was … staying, was very secluded, up in the hills. His hostess was French and they had very little contact with the local community.’

  For ‘hostess’ read ‘mistress’, Thanet guessed.

  ‘So it must have been a considerable shock to Mr Martindale, to learn that his old home was no longer a private house.’

  ‘I suppose so. Though he didn’t seem at all put out by the fact.’

  ‘Really?’ Now if true, that was interesting. Had Leo hoped to cash in on all the hard work his sister must have put in to make this place into the going concern it presumably was?

  ‘And of course to learn of his father’s death,’ said Thanet.

  ‘Yes.’

  An uncomfortable monosyllable. Hamilton must know what was coming next.

  ‘The estate was left to your wife, not her brother?’

  ‘No.’

  Even more terse.

  ‘So,’ said Thanet delicately, ‘there must have been a certain problem of inheritance.’ He awaited Hamilton’s reaction with interest.

  But he was disappointed. Hamilton must have prepared himself for this moment for he simply smiled, a bland, meaningless stretching of the lips, and said, ‘Not at all, Inspector. Sorry to disappoint you, but I’m sure we could all have come to some amicable arrangement. To put it baldly, it’s a good-sized cake, there was plenty for everybody.’

  It depended, Thanet thought, on how large a slice Leo Martindale would have wanted to cut for himself. ‘How large, exactly?’

  ‘Two thousand acres.’ Hamilton smiled, the lazy, replete smile of the predator who has caught and eaten his prey. ‘And the house, of course.’

  Not to mention its contents, thought Thanet. They alone, from what he had seen of them, would be worth a pretty penny. He wondered how Hamilton’s wife had reacted to all this.

  As if on cue the door opened and a sleek dark head appeared. ‘Ah,’ said Delia Hamilton, ‘there you are, darling. Sorry to interrupt, but there’s a minor crisis. The butcher’s just rung to say his van is stuck in the snow. D’you mind if Byfleet borrows the Range Rover for half an hour to go and collect the meat?’

  THREE

  At Thanet’s request Delia Hamilton returned after giving permission for Byfleet to borrow the Range Rover. She sat down beside her husband with an embarrassed laugh. ‘I suppose you think I’m very unfeeling, Inspector, to be worrying about such trivial matters after what’s happened. But the fact remains that I’m still responsible for the running of this place and we do have guests. Not many at the moment, fortunately, but still …’

  She had changed from her outdoor clothes into an elegant tweed skirt, pearls and a smoky-green cashmere jumper the colour of her eyes. Her dark hair was now folded back into a smooth pleat. Immaculately groomed, she looked every inch the country lady, an image no doubt carefully calculated to impress her guests. Of grief there was no sign.

  ‘How many, exactly?’ said Thanet, ignoring the spurious apology.

  ‘Only eight. It’s usually pretty quiet at this time of the year.’

  ‘And they are …?’

  ‘Four Americans – a married couple and a mother and daughter – then there’s a family of three and a single man, all British.’

  Should make the task of interviewing easier, thought Thanet. If it had been a bank holiday weekend, now … ‘We understand from your husband that your brother arrived unexpectedly the day before yesterday, that until then you had thought he was dead.’

  ‘Which is why I can’t pretend to be devastated now. Leo was dead to me for so many years that it was his being alive I found difficult to take in.’ The embarrassed laugh again. ‘I suppose you think I’m pretty hardhearted, but there’s no point in being hypocritical about it, is there?’

  Thanet made no comment. There had been, he noted, no further word of a complaint to the Chief Constable. Perhaps it had been made and dismissed?

  ‘Could you give us some idea of his movements since he arrived?’

  She put up a hand to brush back an invisible strand of hair. ‘I’ll do my best, though we didn’t spend that much time together. I still had the hotel to run and Leo seemed quite content to wander around by himself, renewing old acquaintances, no doubt, and revisiting his old haunts.’

  ‘If you could just give us some idea …’

  She glanced at her husband. ‘Well, let me see … He arrived unexpectedly, early on Monday evening, shortly before dinner.’ She grimaced. ‘Shortly before we had dinner, I mean. We always dine at a ridiculously early hour so that I am free to be a
round while our guests have drinks and their dinner later on.’

  ‘By “we” you mean …?’

  A glance at Hamilton. ‘My husband and I.’

  ‘There are no other members of the family living here at present?’

  ‘There’s Tessa, our daughter, and our son Adam is here at the moment, too. But he didn’t arrive until last night. He’s away at boarding school but it’s his half-term and he spent the first few days of it with a friend. And Tessa was out as usual, she’d been up to town for the day and didn’t get back till late.’

  ‘By “town” you mean London?’

  ‘Of course. Look, is all this relevant? I can’t see why it matters what we did the night before last, it’s last night that matters, surely.’

  ‘I’m just trying to get the picture, so bear with me, please. Mr Martindale gave you no warning of his arrival, you say?’

  She shook her head. ‘No. Just turned up out of the blue.’

  ‘It must have been a shock for you, if you had been so certain he was dead.’

  ‘It certainly was … A nice one, of course.’

  ‘Of course,’ echoed Thanet, hoping the sarcasm was not noticeable in his tone. ‘Anyway, I imagine Mr Martindale would have been shown up to his room, when he arrived.’

  ‘Briefly, yes. All the rooms are always kept in a state of readiness, so there was no problem there.’

  ‘And then you had dinner. That would have been at …?’

  ‘Six-thirty, as usual. It was something of a celebration, of course, we opened a bottle of champagne. Return of the prodigal and all that.’

  Thanet couldn’t imagine that Leo had really been welcomed with open arms, but they had presumably gone through the motions. ‘And afterwards?’

  ‘We always have drinks with any of the guests who choose to join us in the drawing-room at seven-thirty. They like that, it fosters the private house image we try to cultivate.’

  ‘Did your brother join you that evening?’

  ‘Yes, he did. The idea seemed to amuse him.’

  ‘And afterwards?’

  She shrugged. ‘It was business as usual.’ She glanced at Hamilton. ‘I believe you did some paperwork in your office, didn’t you, darling, and I stayed around, generally keeping an eye on things. Leo went off to the pub in the village. He got back about nine, then disappeared to his room.’

  ‘And yesterday?’

  Delia Hamilton put a hand up to her head and said irritably, ‘I saw him around from time to time, but I didn’t exactly keep a diary of his movements, why should I? And I did have work to do, you know, this place doesn’t exactly run itself.’ Mention of her domestic duties made her glance at her watch. ‘Look, can’t we hurry things up a bit, we’ll be here all day at this rate.’

  Hamilton stirred. ‘And I have things to attend to, as well. Do you really need me here any longer? I can’t see that there’s much I can contribute. I’m out on the estate most of the day.’

  ‘I appreciate that, sir, but I’d be grateful if you could stay just a little longer. You might be able to clarify or corroborate what happened last night.’

  Hamilton settled back in his chair, frowning. ‘Very well, but let’s get a move on, shall we?’

  Thanet had no intention of being hurried. ‘If we could go back to yesterday morning, then …’

  Delia Hamilton frowned and sighed. ‘If we must. I’m sure our housekeeper could help you more than I.’

  ‘That would be …?’

  ‘Mona Byfleet. She’s married to our handyman-cum-chauffeur.’

  ‘You saw him outside, if you remember, Inspector,’ said Hamilton.

  ‘Ah, yes. Perhaps I could talk to Mrs Byfleet later. But meanwhile …’

  Delia Hamilton sat up straighter, as if to flex the muscles of her memory, then said rapidly, ‘Leo had a lie-in, I believe, and breakfast in bed. I saw him mid-morning and he said he was going to wander about, revisit his old haunts, as I said. At lunch he told me he’d been for a long walk on the estate. He said he was going down to the village in the afternoon and I assume he did. Then in the evening we had dinner together …’

  Some memory was making her uncomfortable, Thanet could tell, by the whitening of her knuckles as her clasped hands tightened, the way she adjusted her position in her chair.

  ‘You, your husband and your brother?’

  ‘That’s right,’ she said impatiently. ‘Really, Inspector, you do like to dot your i’s, don’t you?’

  ‘You said your daughter was here?’

  ‘She’d gone off to visit friends again.’

  ‘In London?’

  ‘No, locally.’

  ‘What did you talk about at dinner, Mrs Hamilton?’

  She met his gaze squarely but Thanet saw the toe of her shoe tilt as her toes bunched up in tension. Feet, he found, were always an excellent indicator of state of mind. ‘This and that.’ Her chin lifted and her tone was cool. The message was plain. I don’t see that it’s any of your business.

  Thanet ignored it. ‘Such as?’

  She shrugged. ‘Just general chat about what we’d been doing while he was away, what he’d been doing. We had a lot of catching up to do.’

  Thanet decided not to probe any further for the moment. Later, if necessary, he promised himself. At the moment he just wanted to get the general picture. ‘I see. And later, after dinner?’

  ‘I didn’t see him again after dinner.’

  ‘And you, Mr Hamilton. Did you?’

  ‘See him again?’ Hamilton shook his head. ‘No, I didn’t.’

  ‘Didn’t you think that strange?’

  This time they both shook their heads, spoke together.

  ‘Not at all, no …’

  ‘Not in the least. Why should we?’ This was Delia Hamilton. ‘This isn’t a council house, Inspector, we’re not exactly tripping over each other all the time. And there are a number of ways in and out, you could go all day without seeing someone else who is living in the house if your activities didn’t happen to coincide.’

  ‘Did he say what he intended to do, after dinner?’

  More headshakes.

  ‘And you, what did you do?’

  The Hamiltons looked at each other. ‘You drove to the station, to fetch Adam, didn’t you, darling?’ said Hamilton.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What time would that have been, Mrs Hamilton?’ Thanet sensed the heightening of Lineham’s attention, quite rightly. Any mention of either of the Hamiltons driving anywhere the previous evening could be highly relevant.

  ‘I must have left about twenty-five past seven. Adam’s train was getting in at seven-thirty and it takes about five minutes to get to the station.’

  Thanet remembered what Doc Mallard had said. Say between six o’clock and four a.m., then, to be on the safe side.

  ‘So you would have arrived back about twenty to eight?’

  ‘Something like that, yes.’

  ‘And you didn’t pass your brother on the way, either going or coming back?’

  Delia Hamilton’s eyes snapped. ‘Don’t you think I would have said so, if I had? I told you, I didn’t see him at all after dinner.’

  ‘What about you, Mr Hamilton?’

  ‘I was working in the office. I usually do, in the evenings.’ Hamilton’s eyes narrowed. ‘Look, why all the questions about what we were doing?’ His voice grew a little more strident. ‘For that matter, now I think about it, why all the questions about what Leo was doing during the day yesterday? What possible relevance can it have? I appreciate that you need to find out about his movements last night in order to discover how the accident happened, but surely it should be enough for us to say that the last time we saw him was at dinner?’

  ‘I’m afraid it’s not quite as simple as that.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Yes, why not?’ said Delia Hamilton.

  They both stared at him, waiting for a reply.

  Thanet hesitated. How much should he say, at this
stage?

  ‘Well?’ said Delia Hamilton impatiently.

  Thanet shrugged. ‘A man has died, Mrs Hamilton, and it’s our job to find out how and why. I can’t tell at this stage what information might be relevant.’

  ‘But it was a simple hit and run, surely,’ said Hamilton. ‘Unless you’re suggesting …?’

  ‘It’s a little difficult,’ said Thanet carefully, ‘to see how Mr Martindale could have landed in that ditch in the position in which he was lying without, shall we say, a little help.’

  ‘“A little help” …’ said Hamilton. ‘My God, Inspector, you’re surely not suggesting that someone put him there?’

  Thanet shrugged. ‘I’m afraid I can’t say any more at present.’

  ‘But –’

  ‘Look here –’

  Again, they spoke together. Delia Hamilton deferred to her husband with a glance.

  ‘Are you saying,’ he said incredulously, ‘that Leo was murdered?’

  Thanet was saved from a reply. The door, which must have been unlatched, was pushed open and a head appeared.

  ‘Sorry, couldn’t help hearing. Why the surprise, Dad? You always did say Uncle Leo would have come to a bad end.’

  It was a boy of fourteen or fifteen, though you would never have guessed it from the way he was dressed. Hair slicked down with brilliantine, he was wearing a navy-blue pinstriped suit, white shirt and narrow knitted tie. A white silk scarf hung loosely around his neck and he was carrying a trilby hat tucked under one arm and a silver-topped walking stick. Coming further into the room he posed with one hand on the stick, the other shoved into his trouser pocket.

  There were further shocks to come. ‘Sounds interesting,’ said a female voice, and a girl of seventeen followed him into the room. She, too, was apparently making a statement of some kind by her appearance, though Thanet couldn’t quite make out what it was. Rebellion against her upper-crust background, perhaps? She sported hair in stiff porcupine spikes, skull-like make-up with hollowed cheekbones and shadowed eye-sockets and an all-black outfit of high heels, tights, sweater and mini-skirt so short that it was more of a frill than a garment.