The Book of the Dead Read online

  ‘And you didn’t notice the repayments hadn’t restarted when you did your books?’ Carrington left a silence after the observation, examining the glowing end of the cigar. ‘However, I’m afraid I must ask for the full arrears to be cleared immediately and normal repayments reinstated. I’m sorry, Duggie.’

  ‘What do you mean by immediately?’

  ‘By the end of this month at the latest.’

  Lydden shifted uncomfortably in his chair. Being faced by an outraged husband would have been considerably easier to deal with.

  ‘Well, I’ll do my best,’ he said evasively. ‘It could be a bit of a stretch though.’

  ‘Really?’ Carrington said mildly. ‘You just told me things were going well. Anyway, I’m sure you don’t want to put me in a position where I have to send the receivers in. I’m quite entitled to do that under the terms of our agreement. The bank has already suggested it, but we’ve been friends a long time Duggie and…well, fellow Masons always do the right thing by each other don’t they?’

  Lydden’s discomfort grew as Carrington looked at him very directly.

  ‘I’ll sort it out,’ he said. ‘Don’t worry.’ Without thinking what he was doing, he finished his drink too quickly.

  ‘I’ve got nothing to worry about,’ Carrington stood up. ‘At least not about business matters. Sorry to end the evening like this, but I wanted to raise it as soon as possible. I’ll see you out…Jennifer will be wondering what’s keeping me.’

  As he drove away, Lydden’s mind raced. This was not just a matter of hastily retreating from another affair. Jennifer Carrington meant more than casual sex, she could provide the answer to certain problems. It was a dangerous answer, but Carrington’s demands for repayment moved them from the urgent to the critical. He would have to talk to her.

  Jennifer Carrington breathed deeply as she heard Lydden’s wheels spin violently on the gravel drive and her husband come upstairs. She had undressed, sprayed herself with cologne and put on a pair of Chinese-style pyjamas. When Carrington walked in, she smiled brilliantly.

  ‘What on earth have you two been talking about, darling?’ she asked. ‘I thought you were never coming to bed.’

  Several buttons running down from the Mandarin collar of the silk jacket were unfastened and a curve of soft flesh was provocatively visible beneath the material’s sheen of jet with its fiery pattern of jacaranda flowers.

  ‘Just something I wanted to straighten out.’ He walked towards the adjacent dressing-room. ‘Nothing important.’

  As she listened to him through the half-open door, undressing and cleaning his teeth, Jennifer Carrington took off the jacket and left it sprawled across the bed then pulled the duvet up to her chin. Carrington showed no reaction when he reappeared and climbed in beside her, switching off his bedside light. After a few moments, she slithered towards him, an affectionate, suggestive purr at the back of her throat.

  ‘Sorry, darling, do you mind? I’m rather tired.’

  He turned away and Jennifer Carrington stared at his back in dismay. It was the first time he had ever refused to make love to her. She was suddenly afraid that she was losing control.

  3

  Five minutes after Charles Carrington left for work the next morning, the telephone rang in Carwelton Hall and Jennifer leapt at it.

  ‘Thank God! I was just going to call you,’ she said. ‘Charles knows what’s going on.’

  ‘Are you certain? Has he said anything to you?’

  ‘He doesn’t need to. I know. Believe me.’

  ‘Might he do anything before Thursday?’

  ‘Perhaps, but we can’t move until then can we?’ There was a note of panic in her voice.

  ‘Of course we can’t, but it’s only a couple of days. Call me if anything happens, but otherwise I’ll see you then. And keep calm.’

  ‘Will you come and see me before?’ She sounded pleading.

  ‘No. Charles could be having you watched. Just hang on.’

  ‘All right.’ She sobbed suddenly. ‘Christ, I never thought it would be this bad. I’m terrified.’

  ‘Stop panicking, I’ll look after you. You always did need an older man. It’s going to work.’

  *

  In Brook Cottage, Maltravers wrote up his piece for the Independent, saving the Features Editor several tricky decisions by omitting certain stories which would have caused a number of actors to start screaming dramatically for their lawyers. Malcolm was at work and Lucinda out teaching, so when he finished he drove into Kendal to post his copy and have lunch. He parked in the market square opposite the old Working Men’s Institute, now rather inappropriately painted pink and white, then walked down Stricklandgate to the main post office. As he made his way back up the hill, looking for somewhere to eat, he found he was passing Quintessence and examined the window. Charlotte Quinn’s comments about her stock had been right. What he could see included elegant wooden and silver ornaments, first-class porcelain—thankfully not crafted into impossibly perfect animals, winsome children or nauseatingly lovable tramps—fine woollens and striking fabrics. The shop would have graced Covent Garden, but the prices were considerably less than those demanded and paid in WC2. An old-style shop bell suspended from a curve of sprung metal tinkled as he opened the door and moments later Charlotte Quinn appeared from the back of the premises.

  ‘I’m sorry, but we’re just…’ She stopped as she recognised him. ‘Oh, hello again. I’m afraid I was about to close for lunch. But if you’ve already decided on something I can let you have it.’

  ‘No, I was just going to browse,’ he said. ‘It’s the sort of place I ought to bring Tess to. She’s the one with the real taste. I just supply the money.’

  ‘Your wife?’ she queried.

  ‘Not yet, but she’s working on it,’ he replied with a grin. ‘I only escaped last Leap Year by being out of the country on the twenty-ninth of February. She’s the actress Tess Davy. She’s due here at the weekend after the play she’s in ends its provincial tour in Chester. Then she’s got a free week before they start rehearsals for London. I’ll come back with her. Anyway, let me buy you lunch. I assume you know a decent place.’

  ‘I usually go to the Wheatsheaf just across the road,’ she said. ‘Their menu plays havoc with the diet but what the hell? All right, thank you. I’ll be with you in a moment. Turn the sign on the door to Closed, will you?’

  He examined a rack of silk ties while he waited, then they left the shop and crossed over Stricklandgate and into the pub. They were just ahead of the lunchtime rush and managed to find themselves a table by the window overlooking the busy main street.

  ‘According to the book of conversational gambits, I should ask if you enjoyed yourself last night,’ Maltravers commented as he returned from the bar with their food and drinks. ‘However, I think that would be as tactless as asking Mrs Kennedy if she liked her day in Dallas.’

  ‘Something like that,’ Charlotte Quinn agreed. ‘It was loathsome, but I’ll curb my tongue. Coming from the south, you’re not used to people speaking their minds.’

  ‘I lived in Manchester for more than a year, so I know something about northern bluntness,’ he replied. ‘And I think you were offended by…the presence of one guest in particular and his connection—how’s that for polite Home Counties euphemism?—with our hostess?’

  She laughed. ‘Oh, very circumspect—I said last night you were too clever. You pick things up very quickly. How much do you know about what’s going on there?’

  ‘Lucinda and Malcolm have told me a good deal,’ he admitted. ‘I know that Jennifer Carrington and Duggie Lydden are having an affair…and something about yourself and Charles.’

  ‘Yes, but you don’t know all of it.’ Maltravers followed her gaze out of the window to where a shop with Lakeland Interiors above the window stood on the opposite side of the road next door but one to her own. Charlotte Quinn kept looking at it as she continued.

  ‘Three years ago that place nearly
went to the wall. The bank was about to foreclose when Duggie Lydden went crawling to Charles for help. They knew each other through the Masons but they go back further than that. Charles put up twenty thousand pounds and saved him. Duggie has paid very little of it back. And how does the little sod show his gratitude? By screwing his wife and then going to his house to laugh in his face in front of his friends.’ She turned back to Maltravers. ‘Any more questions?’

  ‘Why did you accept the invitation?’

  ‘I’ve known Charles an awfully long time and, dear God, I’ve done my best to accept Jennifer, despite what I think of her,’ she said. ‘I’ve kept going to Carwelton Hall since the marriage because of my feelings for him. But I didn’t know Duggie was going to be there last night. I don’t know how I controlled myself.’

  ‘You did it very well,’ Maltravers assured her. ‘And from what I’ve been told, Jennifer is just one of a small crowd. It seems that any woman who isn’t green with two heads has a chance with Duggie.’

  ‘That’s about it,’ Charlotte confirmed. ‘He made a play for me once, but I made it quite clear that I wasn’t going to join his collection of easy lays. By the time I’d finished, I’d verbally castrated the randy little bugger.’

  Maltravers felt certain that Charlotte Quinn’s acid tongue would have made a comprehensive job of the operation.

  ‘How long have you known Charles?’ he added.

  ‘Nearly twenty years. When I was married, we all used to go on holiday together. I remember how he nursed Margaret while she died of cancer by inches. Christ, that was terrible. Then David was killed and Gillian was destroyed by drugs—do you know anything about all this?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Charles seems to have been a very unfortunate man.’

  ‘And it’s still happening to him,’ she said bitterly. ‘Jennifer set out to get him and nothing could stop her. He was dreadfully vulnerable and didn’t stand a chance. Some of us tried to warn him, but he was besotted. It’s the most stupid thing he’s ever done.’

  She finished her wine at one swallow. ‘Can I have another please? No, I’ll pay if you’ll collect them. Here you are.’

  She took a purse from her handbag and gave Maltravers the money. While he was waiting at the bar to be served, he decided he may as well probe her feelings further; she was obviously in the mood to talk.

  ‘As far as I can work it out, there must have been about ten years between Charles’s wife dying and when he met Jennifer,’ he said as he sat down again. ‘Were you divorced at that time?’

  ‘I was divorced in 1975.’ She sighed wearily. ‘And yes, that’s what really hurts. You don’t have to be a genius to work that out. I loved him very much—I still love him—but somehow I just couldn’t…I don’t know. I just messed it all up.’

  They had finished their meal and she accepted a cigarette when he offered his packet, looking at her thoughtfully.

  ‘Why are you telling me all this?’ he asked. ‘This is only the second time we’ve met and you’re pouring out your life story.’

  She exhaled smoke slowly, as though trying to explain it to herself.

  ‘Last night I wanted to scream,’ she said finally. ‘What was happening in that house was sick and I had to go through the pretence of behaving as though nothing was wrong. It’s been building up inside me all morning and my assistant’s off today so there was nobody I could talk to. If I hadn’t met you, I’d probably have blurted it all out to some customer in the shop. Sorry to use you like a member of the Samaritans. I only hope I’ve got it right that I can trust you.’

  ‘Completely,’ Maltravers assured her. ‘None of this will go any further. I’m glad we bumped into each other.’ He paused for a moment. ‘Charles may have been stupid over Jennifer, but he’s still an intelligent man. Do you think he knows about the affair—or at least suspects something?’

  She shrugged as she stubbed out the hardly smoked cigarette. ‘I often wonder about that. He’s never said anything to me to indicate that he does, but I can’t believe he could be so unaware—although there’s no fool like an old fool is there?’

  ‘Stop putting him down,’ Maltravers told her. ‘He deserves better than that from you. I think he may at least have guessed about Lydden, but if he hasn’t then somebody who says they care for him ought to tell him instead of carrying a torch and wallowing in their own misery.’

  Charlotte Quinn’s face flashed angrily, then she looked remorseful.

  ‘Ouch,’ she said. ‘That hurt. You did learn to call a spade a spade in the north didn’t you? You’re quite right of course, but I’ve been through that hoop lots of times. I persuade myself that I don’t want to hurt him, then my conscience tells me that I’m deceiving him as well by staying quiet. But perhaps it’s really because I don’t trust my own motives. If I break up the marriage, am I doing it for him or me? Shakespeare said that conscience makes cowards of us all.’

  ‘In the occasional gaps in an active sex life, Shakespeare managed to say something about virtually everything,’ commented Maltravers. ‘But I don’t think deathless verse is of much help at the moment. None of this is my business, but you should talk to him. Whether he suspects or not, you can’t lose anything and it’s the least he deserves from you.’

  ‘Perhaps.’ Charlotte Quinn shrugged in indecision then smiled apologetically. ‘And you just came into town for a quiet lunch, not to have some inadequate woman unburden her soul to you. Sorry.’

  ‘Now you’re knocking yourself,’ he said. ‘Don’t. You’re not inadequate.’

  ‘Aren’t I?’ she replied cynically. ‘Tell me about it. If I’m not inadequate, how did I lose a husband and then fail to get the one man I wanted and could have made happy? Let’s face it, Gus, I was seen off by another woman and a much younger one at that. I must be very stupid.’

  ‘No,’ Maltravers corrected. ‘Charles may have been stupid in fact it looks very much as if he was—but that wasn’t your fault.’

  ‘I’d like to think that.’ Charlotte Quinn appeared unconvinced as she stood up. ‘Thanks for lunch and for listening, but I must get back.’

  They parted outside the pub with Maltravers promising to return to Quintessence with Tess. He watched Charlotte Quinn cross Stricklandgate and unlock the shop door then went back to his car and drove out into the Langdale Valley. He parked by the pub at the foot of Stickle Ghyll and walked up the rough path of boulders laid alongside the beck as it tumbled down in a series of bubbling, foaming waterfalls from the tarn in the hills. Drained now of all rain, the sky was a translucent autumn blue with drifting meringue clouds casting slow-moving shadows over the wide plain of the valley and the air was clean and cold. As he sat on a rock by crashing white water, Maltravers thought about the dinner party. It might not need Charlotte, or anyone else, to talk to Charles Carrington; if the odd incidents he had noticed really meant anything, the situation at Carwelton Hall would resolve itself one way or another.

  *

  ‘Is anything the matter, darling?’ Jennifer Carrington put the question cautiously as her husband sat opposite her reading the paper that evening.

  ‘Should there be?’ The paper was not lowered as he replied, but she instinctively knew he was listening to her carefully.

  ‘No, you just seemed a bit…distracted,’ she said. ‘I thought something might be on your mind and we could talk about it.’

  The newspaper rustled as Carrington turned the page but remained behind it.

  ‘Nothing for you to worry about.’

  In the silence that followed the dismissive reply she returned her attention to the television, watching its images without seeing or listening. Duggie had told her about the conversation the previous evening and she felt nervous. Carrington’s rejection of her in bed, now coupled with his obvious determination not to talk to her, had destroyed her confidence that she could always mould him the way she wanted. And that was something she had to keep doing. She had to stay calm while she completed the last stages o
f her part in his murder. She realised that she had finally used the word in her mind; before it had always been ‘dealing with Charles’ or just ‘doing it’. Now that she had grasped the proper word herself, it somehow seemed less terrifying, an acceptance of the inevitability of what had been planned.

  ‘I’m going shopping in Manchester on Thursday,’ she said casually. ‘I could try in Sherratt & Hughes for that Kingsley Amis novel you want.’

  She felt relieved as he folded the paper and finally looked at her.

  ‘Thank you. I never seem to have time to get it in Lancaster. Are you spending the whole day in town?’

  ‘Probably,’ she replied. ‘What time will you be back from Carlisle?’

  ‘Midnight at the latest. The meeting should be over about ten.’

  ‘Then I’ll probably call and see Angela before coming back, but I’ll be home before you. I’ll wait up.’

  ‘There’s no need. Excuse me, there are some papers I must look at.’

  As he walked out of the room, Jennifer Carrington became apprehensive again. The tone of his voice belonged to the office, not to their home and their life together. She stood up and turned off the television then stood in front of the fire, arms folded defensively across her chest as she thought. However strong Charles’s suspicions about Duggie were—and everything pointed to them being very strong indeed—it was still all right as long as he didn’t come straight out with it. And in two days, he would not be able to do anything.

  In the library, Carrington unlocked his briefcase and took out several pages of notes in his precise handwriting. A lifetime as a lawyer had ingrained the practice of putting everything into words on paper. He still had the diary he had kept when his first wife was dying; now, for very different reasons, he was doing the same thing with Jennifer. But the language of the law was detached and unemotional, helpless to capture love, unable to embrace grief, too controlled to express fear. And the rule of the law demanded proof before anyone was guilty. Until that proof came—and he knew that he kept putting off pursuing it—then Jennifer had to be innocent. The law said so.