Judith Cutler has produced no fewer than five series of crime novels, and thirty-four books in all. Her first regular detective was Sophie Rivers, and since then she has featured Fran Harman, Josie Welford, Tobias Campion and Lina Townend. She has also published two stand-alone novels.
‘Mrs Welford! How lovely to see you!’ Sir Charles Orpen greeted me as if I were an honoured guest, not the caterer. Tucking my arm under his, he set off to find his wife. The Orpens of Duncombe Hall were hosting a charity chamber concert. I was providing refreshments for the interval and the post-concert buffet.
‘I hear you’ve brought your own team of waiters,’ he observed, sounding doubtful.
‘They’re all properly trained professionals. I don’t want any accidents to spoil the evening. And please call me Josie.’
‘I like a spot of professionalism, Josie,’ he said, patting my hand. ‘Not like this lot playing tonight. They’ve made a fuss about everything. Couldn’t even agree whether to have the piano lid up or down. Madame Thingie wanted it up so that her sound would prrrrrrrroject. Monsieur Something pointed out that her projection would make his an impossibilité. There was a lot of mon dieuing all round. At last, I told her straight: that lid will be fixed halfway up, and no more argument. She didn’t like that, but the others did – had a good snigger.’
‘He’s not moaning about the musicians again, is he?’ Lady Orpen demanded. ‘Hello, Josie, you do look nice. And everything’s in place in the kitchen?’
‘Absolutely.’
Everyone who was anyone in the district was there in the gold drawing room; being tone deaf, or even stone deaf, was clearly no excuse. DJs and LBJs were de rigueur, mothballs vying with Chanel.
‘Richard!’ He summoned a middle-aged man. ‘My good friend Josie Welford.’
‘The Mrs Welford of White Hart gastro pub?’ Richard smiled.
‘There, I can see you’re going to get on like a house on fire.’ Chuffie patted my hand and left us to it.
‘The Mrs Welford who has a nasty habit of telling the police how to do their job? I’m the chief constable,’ he said, no longer smiling.
‘Chief constable! Does that mean I should curtsy?’
Not a glimmer of a smile. We were both relieved when Dr Kinnersley, the village GP, hove into view, steering me to the long gallery where the concert was being held.
They’d popped the musicians on to a temporary stage in a window embrasure halfway along the room. They couldn’t heave the grand piano up onto this, of course, so the string players would have to sit behind it.
The musicians, giving perfunctory bows, might have been about to play at a funeral. Madame looked meaningfully at the half-closed lid – or, of course, if you were a string player, at the half-open lid.
One of the men didn’t even nod; he was the double-bass player, needed for the first piece, something short by Bach, but then redundant for the next, a piano quartet by Brahms. The poor man would be kicking his heels for some forty minutes.
The Bach sounded thin to me, like an expensive chocolate with the centre sucked out of it. Only the pianist seemed to enjoy herself; perhaps her choccie had some nougat in it. Wishing I knew more about music, I occupied myself reading their biographies. It seemed that the double-bass player was married to a plastic surgeon, the cellist to a woman who bred poodles. Martine de la Court, the pianist, was a keen photographer. The second violinist played squash. The violist had won some prize at the Paris Conservatoire. All the string instruments were at least three hundred years old. How about that?
At last the Bach was over.
Leaving his instrument where it was, the double bassist took himself off to the side of the room, where he propped himself up against a door wearing an expression I can only describe as saturnine
During the Brahms, I had time to think about the way the musicians were placed. Surely each should have been able to see what the others were doing? At the orchestral concerts I’d been to, they’d all been in a semi-circle, the conductor at the focal point: just the arrangement I’d have wanted in his place. Now the pianist couldn’t see the others at all, and all they could see of her was her head. You could see that the musicians were giving their all. See but not hear: all the string players were completely drowned by Madame.
At long last, after a lot of noise from the piano – quite exciting stuff, I have to admit, some of it – Marion Orpen stood to lead the applause. This was where I stood too, to signal to my team to pop those corks and don their best smiles. For some reason the musicians didn’t acknowledge the applause with even a PR smile; if I’d been their manager I’d have given them the bollocking of a lifetime.
Refreshments were served to guests in the gold drawing room, but Madame had demanded a green room. Chuffie was clearly nonplussed. When he saw a tray of champagne and canapés, what did he do but seize it himself and take it off to the room where the players were ensconced.
At length we all trooped back for the second instalment. ‘The Trout Quintet’; I knew that – lovely tunes. Someone had closed the piano lid, so we might at least hear some of the string players. Madame, all teeth and poor complexion, opened it fully. Chuffie coughed meaningfully; it returned to halfway.
They all seemed to start together, and probably stayed that way. We couldn’t hear them, of course – only Madame and her fortissimo pounding.
At least they all finished together and stood as one to take their bow. The cellist looked profoundly bored, and the violist’s mouth still drooped. But if I’m any judge of people I would say that the double-bass player was looking puzzled.
Puzzled?
And then Chuffie got to his feet. As he opened his mouth, his complexion darkened and he tried to stumble from the gallery. Vomiting, he choked. Hands flailing for his throat, he fell face down, clearly in the most agonising throes, just by the door to the green room.
Shouting through the screams, Richard Pierce cleared the room on the instant.
Dr Kinnersley was already on his knees, trying to see what he could do. Poor Marion mutely did as she was told. I stood where I was and dialled 999: ambulance, and police too.
Since the musicians baulked at stepping over their host to get into the green room, I herded them off to join the guests, disposing of all that valuable wood in a sort of corral of chairs. Madame’s valedictory hiss indicated that she would sue if there were the slightest damage.
At last Kinnersley had to admit that despite all his efforts with CPR and injections, he had lost his patient. He moved aside to let the widow say farewell.
We stood together at the door in a spontaneous moment of silence. Then Richard wandered back in, puzzled by the wails of emergency vehicles – clearly more than just one ambulance. He stared at me furiously. ‘Why all this for what’s obviously a death by obviously natural causes?’
‘I was in such a panic,’ I said, reluctant, with our courteous host still warm on his own floor, to cross swords, ‘that I’m surprised we didn’t get a fire engine too. Anyway, they can always guard those instruments …’
Kinnersley spoke up. ‘I saw poor Chuffie only two days ago and he was in perfect health then.’
‘The man was eighty-six, for God’s sake! All this must have put his heart under tremendous strain!’
‘I’ve been to even worse concerts than this, and I’ve never had a corpse on my hands before! Now, if you’ll excuse me, I must see to Lady Orpen.’ He escorted her gently from the room.
Within seconds, Madame de la Court appeared, arms akimbo, demanding to be allowed to leave. ‘We have a ferry reservation from Dover; we must not miss it,’ she declared.
I spread my hands in a gesture as Gallic as hers. ‘As you can see, Madame, it will be very difficult to gain access to your belongings for just a few more minutes.’
The cellist joined her. And now came Monsieur Viola, too. ‘You cannot leave valuable instruments lying around unprotected!’
I pointed silently at the officers. But M. Viola set off for the green room. ‘I fear to lose my – my boutons de manchette?’ he announced.
‘And where might your buttons be, sir?’ A stolid country constable came to my aid.
‘Cufflinks,’ I explained in an undervoice.
‘On a table.’
‘Any particular table?’
‘It has the glasses on it. No, not les lunettes: les verres.’
You could see that the man was in half a mind to grant permission, but police training asserted itself, almost visibly. He pointed in silence to the corpse.
The musicians withdrew.
Kinnersley reappeared. ‘What a woman! They’d been married for fifty-odd years, but Marion still manages to be dignified. And to keep her wits about her. She can’t understand why he should die so suddenly. Bless her, she’s absolutely demanding a post mortem!’
‘Does that make this a crime scene, then, or can I collect up the dirty glasses from the green room?’ I asked.
Richard Pierce spread his hands indecisively. Taking that as permission I knew I shouldn’t have, I went on through. The empty instrument cases jostled each other on what I strongly suspected was priceless furniture, which shouldn’t have had so much as a morning paper laid on it. An assortment of clothes lay on a silk upholstered armchair. And there was my quarry, a tray with seven or eight champagne flutes. There were no cufflinks on it, nor could I see any lying around elsewhere. All the canapés might have gone, but one of the flutes was still half-full. And no wonder. It smelt decidedly unpleasant. Could one of the bottles of fizz have been off? But if it had, why had the others swigged down such vile-smelling stuff? Had they tried it and poured it politely into one of those priceless bowls or vases?
My God: what if my champagne had killed my poor old friend? Without touching the glass itself, I dipped a finger into the remaining liquid and tasted it. No, even the worst wine never had that aftertaste. So it wasn’t corked. And if it wasn’t corked …? More finger-dips established that all the other dregs were fine.
Leaving everything exactly where it was, I returned to the gallery, to locate Richard Pierce, under attack from the pianist. She was waving her hands around as if still at the keyboard, furious that she and her colleagues had to stay. The fact that the room in which she complained of being incarcerated was one of the most elegant in the beautiful building, with exquisite furniture to match, seemed to have escaped her notice. And her more taciturn but equally irate-looking colleagues seemed equally immune to its charms. I searched each face for evidence of guilt, but all remained phlegmatically blank.
I caught Pierce’s eye. ‘I think you should follow me,’ I said quietly, ‘to the green room.’
In his place I’d have died with embarrassment, but perhaps the wretched man had had a few too many sips of my champagne to care. Instead, he said, with a sudden inappropriate grin, ‘I’ve always wanted to forbid anyone to leave a country house. Ever since I read those Golden Age detective novels when I was a kid. That was why I joined the police, actually.’
‘Are you going to make a great revelation, à la Poirot?’ I asked dryly.
‘I’m tempted. Let me just pen them in, first. And get a scene of crime team along. Though I’ve messed it up a good deal,’ he added penitently. ‘I’d like Kinnersley’s opinion of that liquid, too.’
While he did his policeman act, Kinnersley smelt, touched, and tasted. And then frowned. ‘No doubt about it! Croton oil!’
‘Croton oil!’ I scratched my head.
Returning, Richard did likewise.
‘Poison,’ Kinnersley said flatly. ‘One of those things it used to be fashionable to take – oh, a hundred years ago. Fashionable ladies used to take it to keep themselves slim.’
‘So why on earth should it surface now?’ Richard demanded. ‘And why use it to kill poor old Chuffie? I shall leave no stone unturned to get to the bottom of this!’
He sounded as resolute as if he were going to work night and day himself, not get a load of others to do it. Kinnersley and I merely winced at his clichés.
‘Far be it for a humble cook to poke her nose in,’ I lied, ‘but I would swear that the double-bass player looked surprised when they completed “The Trout” without interruption. And we found that glass,’ I said, as if it had been all his own work, ‘in the musicians’ changing room.’
‘So we did,’ Richard agreed.
‘So might not that narrow down the range of suspects a bit?’
‘The musicians! And where would they have got this croton oil from?’
‘Where would all these elderly ladies and gentlemen have got it from? Or Mrs Welford herself – I take it it’s not one of your culinary essentials!’ Kinnersley countered. He too could do sarcasm. ‘The Internet?’
‘What in fact is croton oil used for?’ I asked.
‘Maybe the pianist is still taking it for her figure’s sake. You know these French people – always taking this and that for their liver,’ Richard said grandiloquently.
Although I didn’t think WeightWatchers would approve I stashed away the notion in case the pounds I’d managed to shed made an unwelcome reappearance. ‘Could it be used for oiling fiddles or something?’
Kinnersley shook his head. ‘It’s commonly used in laboratory conditions to test the efficacy of anti-inflammatory drugs: it provides the inflammation on mice’s ears, for instance, and the drugs do their best to cure it. The only time I’ve come across it in medical practice was when I treated a woman with a terrible skin eruption on her face. She’d been to some quack offering surgery-free wrinkle treatments. Apparently it’s a legitimate tool used by a proper dermatologist. It peels the top layer of skin away, and reveals a nice new unwrinkled layer underneath.’
‘A sort of extra-strong exfoliation?’ I asked.
‘Exactly the sort of thing Madame de la Court might use,’ Pierce decided.
‘It didn’t seem to me as if she paid much attention to her complexion,’ I said.
‘And no amateur would try it, surely!’ Kinnersley agreed.
‘Just because no one likes her doesn’t mean she was trying to kill anyone. Least of all Chuffie,’ I pointed out.
‘But poison’s a woman’s weapon,’ Pierce insisted. ‘And they’d crossed swords. Some business with the piano lid.’
‘I doubt if even the French would kill over a piano,’ Kinnersley sighed. ‘Next you’ll be saying Lady Orpen did it because he’d not done his share of the washing up.’
‘And we all know that most murders take place within the family,’ I added ironically.
Pierce considered this for a moment. ‘Not if she’s the one wanting a PM. She’d have used something less traceable. No, I’ll detain Madame for questioning. Then we can take everyone else’s names and addresses so CID can get witness statements tomorrow.’
‘Richard,’ I ventured, ‘I’d love it to be Madame, because she’s a loathsome woman and treats her colleagues appallingly. But I don’t see a shred of motive. Could she have been aiming at one of the string players and Chuffie drank the brew by mistake?’
‘Wouldn’t that rather break up the ensemble? And thus cut off their income?’ He was engaging with the idea despite himself.
‘I think Mrs Welford may be right. The group didn’t exactly cohere, did it?’ Kinnersley caught my eye and winked.
‘It’ll all come out when my team interviews everyone and takes witness statements,’ Pierce said with a note of finality. ‘We’ll get contact details from everyone and – yes?’ He broke off irritably as a shirt-sleeved PC appeared.
‘Sir, the musicians are absolutely demanding to leave, sir.’
‘Bring in CID, fast. Tell everyone in the drawing room that this is a possible crime and they will all have to wait a few more minutes so that we can record their names and addresses to get witness statements from them all later. As for the musicians, tell them that the green room is definitely a crime scene and no one must touch anything.’ Richard turned to me, in sudden despair. ‘Except you went in there …’
‘And found the glass contaminated with croton oil,’ I observed in my sweetest tones. ‘I don’t mind giving a DNA sample so I can be eliminated. So long as you promise to destroy it afterwards.’
The constable left, but reappeared a moment later. ‘They say you can search the room from top to bottom, but they want their property and they want it fast. Or they’ll sue.’
‘And was Madame their spokesperson?’ I asked.
‘Her and some bloke desperate for his buttons. Really worked up, they are.’
Kinnersley raised an eyebrow. ‘Why not take them at their word? Find a phial and then you’ve got some evidence!’
‘I suppose … OK, constable, contact CID and bring in a team.’
‘Tell the waiters there’s more fizz in cool boxes in my van,’ I said, throwing him the keys. ‘That should keep the guests happy,’ I added.
‘I don’t suppose there’s enough for us, is there?’ Kinnersley asked.
Other people feared Greeks bringing gifts; I feared co-operation from someone who might be a killer. If the phial or bottle or whatever wasn’t in a case, where might it be? They turned out their pockets with positively sunny smiles, or what passed for sunny in the violist’s case.
The police searched thoroughly, I give them that. Inside the vases, under the cushions, behind the curtains. They found the violist’s cufflinks, but no, the cufflinks didn’t have an obliging secret compartment containing dregs of oil. His viola case did contain a small cache of cannabis he assured us was for private use only. As was the coke in the cellist’s case.
The police didn’t even bother confiscating the drugs. Witness statements – the musicians were happy to give those. But really, they had to be on their way or they would miss the next ferry, and thus their next engagement.
‘And may we now have your gracious permission to pack our instruments?’ the violinist demanded.
Richard shrugged: why not?
I sat down and stared at the bubbles in my champagne glass. More correctly, a flute, of course. Another bloody musical instrument on a night we’d had rather too many. Druggie fiddlers, sardonic and silent double basses, prima donna pianists. And then I thought why not. ‘Tell them just ten more minutes,’ I said.
The double-bass player. He’d looked on from the back of the room while his colleagues hammered out Brahms. Saturnine, I’d thought him. And then at the end of the Schubert he looked surprised that they’d got through it. And what had I done most of the concert, when I wasn’t mentally planning next week’s menu, that is? I’d scanned their tedious programme notes.
There were still plenty lying on chairs, as if my fellow listeners never wanted to see them again. So I picked one up, opened it at the relevant page, and passed it quietly to Kinnersley, pointing.
‘So we have a source for our croton oil,’ he crowed. ‘But why the double bass? And where on earth is the receptacle the oil came in?’
Pierce shook his head. ‘Why on earth should he want to kill Chuffie, even if he had the means to do so?’
‘Perhaps he didn’t want to kill Chuffie. Perhaps he put the oil in a glass meant for someone else and the poor man drank it by mistake. He’d be too much of a gentleman to spit it out. How did it keep women’s figures slim?’ I belatedly asked Kinnersley.
‘Some sort of emetic or purge, I should think.’
‘That’s in small quantities? What about in bigger ones?’
‘I should imagine you’d get dreadful stomach cramps. You might vomit. You might get diarrhoea. And at Chuffie’s age … Well, in sufficient quantities, I suppose it might kill anyone.’
‘Suppose,’ I thought aloud, ‘you didn’t like someone. You didn’t hate them enough to kill, but you wanted to teach them a lesson. What did you do to teachers you hated?’
Pierce pulled a face. ‘Whoopie cushions? Matches in hollowed-out chalk? So you’re saying all this might have been a black joke that went wrong?’
‘I don’t know. But it’s a theory.’
‘And as good as any. So cherchez not la femme, but the bottle, whatever that is in French.’ Kinnersley stopped abruptly. He looked at me. ‘Are you thinking what I’m thinking?’
‘Let’s just find the bottle,’ I said.
Do you remember those children’s games, in the days before all those infant hands clutched electronic gizmos? Where you had a small plastic box containing a set of ball-bearings which you had to get into tiny targets, just by jiggling the box? Getting the phial out of the double bass was rather like that. We could hear it rolling around, and sometimes you could see it at right angles to what some musical constable called the F-holes, and others in exasperation called the ‘f-ing’ holes. At last, however, shaken gently over a pile of towels by two of the strongest officers available, the instrument yielded up our quarry.
The small glass tube had certainly held croton oil: in its concentrated form, the smell was quite distinct.
‘So you think the target might have been Madame Thingie!’ Pierce said.
‘She was a hard-working, capable but ultimately unprofessional woman. And her male colleagues resented her. Didn’t you see?’
Kinnersley shook his head. ‘We couldn’t see anything of them. Didn’t hear a lot, either.’
‘Exactly so. She was the focus of all our attention: the others never even got a look-in – literally. And if you play in those conditions, day after day, week after week, you must get resentful.’
‘Enough to want to kill her?’ Richard reflected.
‘That,’ I smiled sweetly, ‘must be for your teams of professional officers to discover.’
The double-bass player tried to brazen it out. Yes, he’d tried to dose Madame de la Tour; all the ensemble had agreed that she must be taken down a peg. During the tour her behaviour had become more and more egotistical. At last, he had resolved to humiliate her. Croton oil was a purgative. He just wanted Madame to have to spend a concert on the lavatory, giving him and his colleagues a chance to shine with a piece they’d privately rehearsed.
‘But where did you get it?’ Richard asked.
‘I told them I needed a replacement bow. It’s very easy to get back to France for a day, when you are playing near Canterbury. There was plenty in my wife’s clinic. I helped myself to a very little. Alas, when I put it in Martine’s glass, the old gentleman – he was very absent-minded, that one – drank it.’ He looked relieved to have the matter off his chest. ‘But you will not charge me with murder? When all I intended was a simple jest?’
‘That, monsieur, will be a matter for the Crown Prosecution Service,’ Richard said impassively.
The funny thing was, it was Madame de la Court who protested as he was led away. ‘How will we perform without him? Release him this instant. We have important engagements …’
‘Madame, he killed Sir Charles. And it might have been that he meant to kill you.’
‘But he did not succeed. Come, how can we perform without our double bass? Set him free tout de suite.’
I listened in amazement; I knew I couldn’t understand music. Now I knew I couldn’t understand musicians either.