The following morning after breakfast, Langham made three telephone calls. The first was to a psychiatric asylum in Hunstanton, where he spoke to the chief registrar. He gave his name, mentioned that he was working on a murder investigation and asked if he might make an appointment to meet Mr Nicholas Haggerston.
The second phone call was to Ralph Ryland’s home number; he spoke to his wife, Annie, and learned that Ryland had set off for Norfolk at first light.
The third call was to Detective Inspector MacTaggart at Norwich police station. He informed a desk sergeant that he had information concerning the Suzie Reynard murder case, and was told that Inspector MacTaggart was not available but would be calling at Marling Hall later that afternoon. Langham thanked the sergeant and hung up.
Maria had planned to return to London that morning – ‘But there is no way I am leaving you all alone with a killer on the prowl,’ she said.
When Langham tried to protest that he was hardly ‘all alone’, she waved this aside and said she’d ring Charles and ask for leave until Wednesday at least.
‘What are you doing now?’ he asked.
‘I think I’ll read a little more of the manuscript, Donald. You?’
‘I might go and have a word with Dennison.’
Yesterday the forensic team had completed their investigations and secured the door of the caravan with a padlock, and Dennison had moved to the bedroom originally allocated to him in the hall. Langham found Evans polishing silver in the dining hall, and asked him which bedroom Dennison was occupying.
Two minutes later he stood before Dennison’s door, waiting for the director to answer his knock.
He was about to leave and look for Dennison elsewhere, when the door was snatched open. ‘Oh,’ Dennison said, ‘it’s you.’
The director was unshaven and his shirt was open to reveal a mat of grey chest hair. The way he peered at Langham through slitted eyes suggested he was suffering a hangover.
Behind him the room was in disarray, littered with suitcases and piles of clothing.
‘I’d like a word, if you’re free.’
‘Take a seat, if you can find one. Shift the stuff from the chair.’
Langham moved a pile of books and folders, placed them on the carpet beside the chair, and sat down.
Dennison paced up and down before the window overlooking the driveway. ‘If you came here demanding an apology, Langham, think again. I might have gone off the deep end last night, but I was provoked.’
‘It’s always wise to make sure who you’re accusing, before you wade in.’
‘I still wish I’d landed another one on Ambler. You should’ve read what he wrote.’
‘Terry mentioned it last night. He apologized. He’s going to tell MacTaggart, today, just to make things clear. No doubt he’ll apologize to you, too – but promise me not to hit him.’
Dennison grunted. ‘I’ll try to restrain myself.’
The telephone bell rang, sounding muffled. The director rummaged under a pile of clothing until he dislodged the receiver and snatched it up. ‘Yes? No, not now. Look, I’m tied up at the moment. I’ll call you back later, OK?’
He hung up, and said to Langham, ‘I’ve been on the damned thing all morning, talking to the backers in London and a casting agency.’
‘And?’
‘The show goes on, Langham. I found someone to take Suzie’s part. New England girl just finished a run in the West End. Negotiated a fee over the phone. She’s coming up for a read through on Thursday.’
‘That’s good news.’
‘Yeah. The not so good news is that the press is on the case.’
‘I thought it wouldn’t take them long.’
‘They’ve got wind of Suzie’s death and plastered it all over the front pages. Edward was just saying that he’s already turned away a dozen reporters. Thing is, I don’t want to pay for security. I’m on a tight budget as it is. Things like shelling out for security skims off the cream.’
Langham nodded. He wondered if Dennison’s the-show-must-go-on bluster, his talk of finances so soon after the death of his lover, was his way of coping.
‘When we spoke on Saturday,’ Langham said, ‘and I mentioned I was a friend of Suzie’s …’
The director stopped his pacing and looked at Langham, his head cocked. ‘Yeah?’
‘I was being sparing with the truth.’
‘That’s what I like about you Brits, you don’t use one word when ten will do. You mean you lied?’
Langham sat back and smiled. ‘I wouldn’t go so far as to phrase it in quite that way.’
‘There you go again! A dozen words to say what you really meant, which was no … So, out with it, Langham, using short sentences. If you weren’t Suzie’s buddy, then what the hell are you?’
‘I’m a private investigator whom Suzie hired on Friday.’
‘There, that wasn’t so painful, was it? So … what did Suzie tell you?’
‘Just that she was worried about you. She said you were under some kind of threat.’
Dennison turned and stared through the window, muttering under his breath, ‘Jesus Christ.’
‘She was right, wasn’t she?’
Dennison sat down on the bed. ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘Yeah, the kid was right.’ He looked up. ‘So the killer came into the trailer for me, and it was Suzie’s bad luck that I couldn’t sleep and went for a hike.’
Langham nodded. ‘That’s the way it looks to me.’
‘But what I don’t get, Langham, is that the cops arrested Desmond last night, and he went and confessed. But Desmond wasn’t the kind of guy who would’ve tried to kill me – and he wouldn’t have done that to Suzie. So, what gives? They lay into him and beat a confession out of the old bastard?’
‘I don’t think so. But I haven’t worked out, yet, why he did confess.’
Dennison looked at Langham with bleary eyes. ‘So, if he didn’t do it, who did?’
‘I was hoping you’d be able to shed some light on that.’
The director dropped his gaze to the carpet.
‘Who’s threatening you?’ Langham asked.
‘I honestly don’t have a clue.’
‘But someone is threatening you?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Can you be more specific? What kind of threats have you had? Letters, telephone calls? Was the hare the first—?’
‘No,’ Dennison snapped, sarcastically, ‘it happens all the time. I get all kinds of wildlife nailed to my property.’ He shook his head and sighed. ‘Look, I’m sorry. This is eating me up.’
‘I understand,’ Langham said. ‘But if you can tell me anything about the threats, just what they were and when they came …’
Dennison stood up and walked around the bed. He opened a leather suitcase and pulled out a thick manila envelope.
He crossed to Langham and dropped it in his lap, a tic agitating his right eye.
Langham opened the envelope, withdrew its contents, and spread them across his lap.
He grimaced. ‘Not nice.’
‘You’re a master of the understatement, Langham.’
The half dozen six by six black-and-white photographs showed a variety of dead animals. They were not, in Langham’s opinion, stock footage, but taken impromptu by the photographer: several were roadkill, rabbits and pheasants plastered on tarmac, while one showed a fallow deer by the roadside, its entrails spilled across the grass verge.
Langham shuffled through the pictures, examining the animals and the backgrounds. He checked the postmark on the envelope, but it was smudged and all he could discern was that it was British. The address was typewritten, to Douglas Dennison, c/o Marling Hall, Norfolk.
‘Did they all come at once?’ Langham asked.
‘No. One by one. The first two while I was in LA.’
‘Do you still have the original envelopes of those two?’
‘No, they’re with a PI I hired in Hollywood.’
‘Did you notice the postmarks of those two?’
Dennison nodded. ‘British, from London.’
‘How long ago did the first picture arrive?’
‘Just over a couple of months ago.’
‘And after the first one, how regularly did they arrive?’
‘Roughly every week.’
Langham stared down at the photographs. ‘So, you had two delivered to you in Hollywood, and two here? What about the others?’
‘Two were sent to the hotel I was staying at in London.’
‘So whoever sent them knew your itinerary pretty well.’
Tight-lipped, Dennison nodded.
Langham thought back to his original meeting with Suzie Reynard. ‘Suzie mentioned that soon after you arrived at the hall, you had a phone call after which you seemed … troubled.’
Dennison was pacing the room again. ‘That had nothing to do with it, Langham. I was talking to one of the backers in London. I wanted an extension to the shoot, but he said the budget wouldn’t allow for that. I wasn’t happy.’
‘So the only direct threats you’ve received are the photographs, and the hare on the caravan door. Anything else?’
‘No. That’s all.’
‘And you’ve no idea, no inkling at all, what all this is about?’
Dennison turned and faced Langham. With his shoulders hunched and his fists clenched, he looked like a compact, muscle-bound middleweight up against the ropes. ‘I’ve no idea at all, Langham.’
‘I take it you’ve shown the photographs to the police?’
Dennison’s silence, as he turned and stared through the window, was answer enough.
Langham sighed. ‘How on earth, if you don’t mind my asking, do you expect the police to get to the bottom of what happened if you insist on withholding vital evidence?’
The director sighed. ‘When they interviewed me, just after Suzie was killed … I wasn’t in my right mind. I didn’t think to show them the pictures.’
‘But you will?’
‘Sure, just as soon as I next see MacTaggart.’
‘It’s important, Douglas.’ He hesitated. ‘Are you armed?’
The director crossed the room and plucked his flying jacket from a peg on the back of the door. From an inside pocket he pulled a small black revolver. ‘Another memento from the war. Colt 1903, US standard issue.’
‘Ammunition?’
Dennison indicated a chest of drawers across the room. ‘In there. I empty the shooter every night.’
‘Perhaps,’ Langham ventured, ‘it might be wise to keep it loaded, and on your person, at all times.’
‘Sure, I’ll do that.’
Langham heard a car engine, rose from his chair and moved to the window. Ralph Ryland’s clapped-out Morris Minor chugged up the driveway and pulled in beneath the elms.
Langham turned. ‘One more thing before I go. And please don’t think I’m prying. This is part of the investigation.’ He hesitated. ‘I understand that when you were in England back in the mid-thirties, you and Cynthia Marling – though this was before she was married – conducted an affair.’
‘I like the way you phrase it. “Conducted an affair”.’ Dennison nodded. ‘Yeah, that’s right, we did. That’s pretty impressive detective work, Langham. What of it?’
‘And when you were back here, during the war?’
‘What about it?’
‘Did you resume your liaison with her?’
Dennison smiled again. ‘No. No I didn’t. I hardly saw Cynthia. She was working in London most of the time, and anyway she was married by then. And not only that, but Edward and I were friends.’
Langham stared across the room at the director. ‘Isn’t that something of a coincidence? That the war should throw you together with the husband of the woman you knew back in the thirties?’
‘If you must know,’ Dennison said, ‘I saw Cynthia briefly when I came over here in ’forty-two. Just as friends, mind you. She told me she was married, and she introduced me to Edward. I liked the guy, really liked him. It was Edward, or his influence, who later got me out of the squadron and into Special Operations.’ He shrugged. ‘During the entire course of the war, I can’t have seen Cynthia on more than three or four occasions.’
‘And now?’
‘What do you mean, “now”?’
‘How is your relationship with Cynthia Marling now?’
Dennison snorted. ‘If you haven’t noticed, Langham, Cynthia is more interested in young Banning than with a third-rate, washed-up movie director like me.’
Langham glanced through the window. Ryland was standing in the driveway before the hall, staring up at the façade. The detective moved towards the entrance and disappeared from view.
‘Do you think Edward is aware of what’s going on between his wife and Banning?’ Langham asked.
‘Edward’s no fool. He has eyes in his head. But if you ask me, he’s past caring. He and Cynthia, if you haven’t noticed, are not on the best of terms.’
Langham hesitated before taking his leave. ‘“He’s no fool”,’ he repeated. ‘Do you think he knows about your affair with Cynthia, then? I take it you haven’t told him?’
Dennison shook his head. ‘I … I didn’t see the point, back in the war – or now. All that happened a long time ago. Water under the bridge. So, no, I don’t think Edward knows about Cynthia and me.’
Langham moved to the door. ‘Thanks for your time.’
Dennison waved him away, then said. ‘Oh – there is one thing.’
‘Yes?’
‘Suzie hired you, but now that she’s …’ He shrugged. ‘How much was she paying you, Langham?’
‘Five guineas an hour.’
‘That all? Look, buddy, I’ll make it ten – but make sure you catch the bastard, OK?’
‘I’ll do that,’ Langham said. He opened the door. ‘Inspector MacTaggart is coming over this afternoon. I’d show him those photographs, if I were you.’
Dennison saluted. ‘Will do.’
Langham heard raised voices before he came to the turn in the staircase and saw Evans remonstrating with Ryland.
‘I’m sorry, sir, but I must ask you to leave the premises immediately.’
‘Not on your nelly, mate!’ Ryland expostulated.
Langham hurried down the stairs. ‘What seems to be the problem?’
Ryland looked relieved to see him. ‘This here little Hitler wants to kick me out.’
‘I’m sorry, sir,’ the butler said, ‘but my express instructions, from Mr Marling, are that the press aren’t allowed—’
‘But like I said earlier,’ Ryland cried, ‘I ain’t no bleedin’ reporter!’
‘I can vouch for Mr Ryland,’ Langham said. ‘He’s a friend of mine, not a reporter.’
Evans eyed Ryland dubiously. ‘A friend, sir?’
‘That’s right. I assure you that Mr Ryland isn’t a reporter.’
‘In that case, my apologies,’ Evans said stiffly, and retreated.
Ryland nodded, running a finger around the inside of his collar and shooting his cuffs in the manner of the justifiably aggrieved.
Langham led the way along the corridor.
‘I’ve come across those types before,’ Ryland said. ‘They’ve been in service so long they’ve adopted the airs and graces of the gentry.’
‘Forget about him,’ Langham said, ushering Ryland into the library where they sat down. ‘How was the drive up?’
‘Once I got out of London, plain sailing. I stopped at Ely, bought a paper, had a gasper and read about the case.’ He pulled the Daily Mirror from the pocket of his frayed suit jacket and showed Langham the front page.
Movie Star Slain in Country House, ran the headline above a publicity shot of Suzie Reynard smiling out at the world.
‘Poor kid,’ Ryland said. ‘What a bleedin’ waste. What I’d like to know, though, is how much of this—’ he waved the paper – ‘is sensation mongering. I mean, it says here she was shot ten times and her terrified screams woke the household. Ten times? So the killer reloaded when the ammo ran out?’
‘Of course not. She was shot with a British army service revolver bearing a silencer, two or three times. And she probably didn’t have time to scream. My guess is that she died pretty much instantly. The killer shot her in the head.’
‘Says here she was found by her lover, the movie director Douglas Dennison.’
‘They got that right. And Dennison came straight in to the house and got me.’
‘So you saw …?’
Langham nodded. ‘The odd thing is, the killer dropped the gun before he fled, and according to MacTaggart, the inspector from Norwich, it’s covered in the fingerprints of Desmond Haggerston.’ He told Ryland about the old man.
Ryland nodded. ‘I heard a report on the radio before I set off that said the police had taken a suspect in for questioning.’
Langham explained about Haggerston’s confession, and the fact that he’d kept Maria up half the night with his snoring.
‘So, why’d the old geezer confess to the killing?’
‘That’s what I can’t work out.’
‘So this director,’ Ryland said, ‘claims he left the caravan at three thirty and came back at six, sat outside for a while, then went in and found the body?’
‘That’s right.’
‘And you buy that?’ Ryland asked. ‘Because,’ he went on, ‘from an outsider’s point of view it looks bloody suspicious. I mean, he ups and takes a walk at three thirty in the morning, leaving his bird in bed and the caravan unlocked?’
Langham shrugged. ‘On the face of it, it does look odd, I suppose. But apparently he’s an insomniac and often goes on night-time hikes. And then there’s the state he was in when he hammered on my bedroom door. He convinced me.’
He told Ryland about his meeting with Dennison just now, and that the director had hired him to find the killer.
‘Also, he’d been threatened,’ Langham said, and explained about the photographs.
‘Could always have sent them to himself,’ Ryland said. ‘Or had them sent.’
‘Very well, but why would Dennison have wanted Suzie Reynard dead? It can’t have been a heat of the moment thing, provoked by an argument – if he sent himself the photos, it was set up beforehand. Also, surely he would have had a weapon ready to use, not stolen one from Edward Marling’s gun room.’ Langham shook his head. ‘I don’t think Dennison did it. In fact, I suspect the intended target was Dennison himself.’ He went over his reasoning to his partner.
‘Very well. So, who are the suspects?’ Ryland rustled through the paper until he found the continuation of the front-page story. ‘Here we are. The press got hold of a few names, but you and Maria aren’t among them.’
He showed Langham the page. The paper had dug snapshots of the actors from the files. Sir Humphrey Lyle, Varla Cartier and Chuck Banning smiled out, their faces reduced to little more than grainy black-and-white smudges. The headline ran: Movie Stars in Country House Murder Mystery: Whodunit?
Ryland said, ‘The report also mentions Edward and Cynthia Marling.’
Langham went through the names one by one, giving Ryland brief descriptions of the people and adding one that the paper had missed: Terry Ambler, the scriptwriter.
Ryland sat back in his chair, listening attentively. ‘Right-o, Don. What I think I’ll do is have a poke around this afternoon and natter to a few people.’
‘I’ll have Maria introduce you,’ Langham said.
‘Then I’ll get back to London and do some digging. Seems to me we need to know a bit more about these folk. Anyone I should concentrate on specifically?’
‘It’d be nice to know a little more about all of them. One thing, Ralph – back in the thirties, Dennison and Cynthia Marling had a fling. If you could follow that up. I’d like to know how close they were during the war, when Dennison was over here. According to Dennison, they only met a few times then. Cynthia worked in St Bart’s as a nurse before and during the war.’
‘I’ll look into it and get back to you,’ Ryland said. ‘What are you doing this afternoon?’
He told Ryland what he’d learned at Haggerston House yesterday about the death of Victoria Haggerston. ‘Her son, Nicholas, was charged with the killing, but the death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. I’d like to talk to Nicholas about his father. I’m driving up to an asylum near Hunstanton to talk to him at three.’
He climbed to his feet. ‘Right, we’ll find Maria, shall we, and I’ll leave you in her capable hands?’