Saturday afternoon
The long room on the upper floor of Furbelow Hall never received direct sunlight, but any hint of gloom had been chased away by a warm, light-toned décor, bright upholstery on the sofas and armchairs, and several well-positioned lamps. A massive flat-screen television hung over the seventeenth-century stone mantelpiece, trailing wires that led to a satellite box, a Blu-ray player, and several types of video game consoles. An iPad had been left on an ottoman. Glass-fronted bookcases were well stocked with recent best-selling thrillers and DVDs. In one corner of the room was a small dressing table with a lighted mirror, strewn with boxes and tubes of theatrical makeup.
“Not quite how I pictured Dracula’s lair,” Effie remarked, after “the vampire” had ushered them merrily into the room and disappeared again with promises of a “nice cuppa tea.” She dropped onto a window seat. “Who is he?” she asked.
“His name’s Reg Thigpen.”
“That’s the name of the bus driver who was shot during the Undercroft Colliery strike,” she said with a frown. “A couple of years ago in Derbyshire. Well, you knew him. You’d had him for burglary, years earlier. You’re not telling me you know two people called Reg Thigpen?”
Mallard shook his head. “Just the one.”
“But Thigpen’s dead! He’s probably the most famous dead person we’ve had in this country. Angus Snopp, alias the Vampire of Synne, can’t be Reg Thigpen. Unless…”
She stopped, horrified by the words she was about to utter.
“It was a con,” she breathed. “His death outside that mine was faked. And now he’s hiding out here in Synne.”
“That’s the way it’s looking.”
Thigpen came into the room, carrying a tray crammed with tea-making equipment and plates of snacks. Over tea, he was perfectly happy to tell his story, as if he relished an audience. How after a lifetime of petty crime in the London area, he had left prison for the fourth or fifth time and was looking for a job (“bent or straight”) when one day, a well-dressed man approached him in the street and invited him to lunch at a nearby, expensive restaurant.
“My first thought was ‘Hello, what’s your game?’ Still, I was hungry. And then over lunch, he asked me if I wanted a whole new life—basically, I could live anywhere in the world, at his expense. Well, I was more convinced than ever that he was a sausage jockey with a taste for a bit of rough, pardon my French, Sergeant Strongitharm. So I was going to give him the bum’s rush, prawn cocktail or no prawn cocktail. But it turns out he just talked that way because he was a toff.”
“And what would you have to do for this life of ease?” Mallard prompted.
“What I did, Mr. Mallard. Stop being Reg Thigpen for the rest of my life. Well, I was all on my own, no close family. Hadn’t seen most of my friends for years, because I’d been inside. And one more thing. Something I have in common with Inspector Mallard here.”
“I’m a superintendent now,” Mallard told him, leaning back in the comfortable sofa. “And I know you won’t take this the wrong way, Reg, but I can’t think what we might have in common.”
Thigpen grinned. “Acting!” he declaimed. “We both like a touch of the old theatricals, don’t we? I remember we had quite a chat about it, that time I was handcuffed to you in the back of the police car. So last time I was in the Scrubs, I joined the theater group. Me and ten harry hoofters, doing Follies. Happy days!”
“And this ‘toff’ wanted you to perform the role of a man being shot in the head?”
“Not just that one gig,” Thigpen protested. “I had to be a scab bus driver for several weeks. That took some preparation, I can tell you. It goes against my true nature to stand counter to my brothers in the union, Mr. Mallard.”
Mallard sipped his tea, suppressing the observation that Thigpen was unlikely to have ever been a member of a trade union, since he’d never worked a day in his life.
“And your performance continues, as the Vampire of Synne,” Effie said.
“Yeah, I do like doing that posh voice,” Thigpen said excitedly. He let his Cockney-ish accent slip away and resumed the deep tones of Angus Snopp. “I bid you welcome to my dank and unworthy abode, Sergeant Strongitharm. Of course,” he added, back in his true voice, “they had to write me some brainy lines for the character. I didn’t know they’d ’alf-inched a few from Bram Stoker, as you pointed out. Can’t trust anybody these days.”
“Yes, who are ‘they’…?” Effie began.
“But why are you here, Reg?” Mallard interrupted. “Still in England, I mean, where you may be recognized? Aren’t you supposed to be in Punta del Este, flashing your pesos and surrounded by tanga-clad chiquitas?”
Thigpen looked uncomfortable and took a bite from a slice of Battenberg cake before answering. “Yeah, that was the idea. But when Captain C—he’s my minder—started listing all the places I could go, I realized I couldn’t speak the lingo, and I didn’t like the food. Eventually, I said I wanted to stay in England.”
“Didn’t that throw a spanner in the works?” asked Effie.
“Oh, it was too late by then. I was already dead and in hiding, in a safe house in Chiswick.”
While Thigpen’s attention was drawn to Effie, Mallard emptied his teacup into a potted plant. “Could I get some more tea, please, Reg?” he asked. Thigpen reached for the teapot.
“Maybe a fresh pot?” Mallard prompted.
“I’ll put the kettle on again.” Thigpen headed out of the door.
“We could be in trouble here,” Mallard said, prowling around the room and peering into vases and under lampshades. “That’s why I stopped you asking who’s behind this.”
“The company that owned the colliery, I suppose,” said Effie, watching him with curiosity. “A clever plot to turn public opinion their way and get what they wanted: the closure of a money-losing pit, without union resistance. That surely leaves them with deep enough pockets to promise Reg a life of luxury.”
“Maybe. But remember, that was what the government wanted too. That U-turn of public opinion after Reg’s murder helped them win an election. And here’s old Reg talking about ‘safe houses’ and ‘minders.’” He ran a finger around the edge of a picture frame. “Let’s not forget, Eff, faking a very public death requires a lot of inside assistance. No, this smacks of Whitehall. I just don’t know which Ministry.” Mallard paused in front of the window, noticing a black car parked beside his Jaguar. How long had that been there?
Thigpen returned with a steaming teapot.
“Are we bugged?” Mallard demanded.
“Not at all.”
“Then how come we have company?”
Thigpen glanced out of the window. “Oh, that’ll be my minder, Captain C. I called him when you first showed up.” He grinned. “You’ll like him, Mr. Mallard. He’s very tall.”
There was a brief rap on the door, and without waiting for an answer, Simon Culpepper stepped into the room.