He Died with His Eyes Open Page 5

  'Well, it wasn't an accident,' I said. 'He didn't fall or get run over by a passing car. He wasn't killed where he was found, either. He was found one side of London and he lived on the other'

  'He could have had business where he was found.'

  'Most unlikely. Besides, there was hardly any blood under the body' I produced the photograph I had shown the governor of the Agincourt. 'A bit of a mess, isn't he?'

  Grampian took a quick look at it, belched, put a hand to his mouth and said, turning white: 'Please put it away.'

  'What exactly were your relations with your brother?'

  'Well, hum,' said Grampian, rubbing his hands together, 'few and far between.'

  'The further between the better, in fact,' said Mrs Staniland.

  'I see. Why was that?'

  'Money,' they replied simultaneously.

  'He was often asking you for it?'

  'Well, he'd have done it even more often if we'd given him the chance,' said Mrs Staniland acidly.

  'I assume, though,' I said, gesturing around me, 'that when you inherited all this, er, stuff here, your brother must have been left something too?'

  'That's a private matter, I'm afraid.'

  'Nothing's private to me,' I said flatly.

  A silence fell.

  'I wonder if we oughtn't perhaps to ring our solicitor, Grampian,' said Mrs Staniland suddenly, 'if this interview is going to turn awkward?'

  'I wouldn't bother him at this stage if I were you,' I said. 'I haven't bitten you yet.'

  'No, quite,' said Grampian. He said to his wife: 'I honestly don't see the need, Betty.'

  'I just don't like answering questions like these without expert advice,' she snapped. 'That's all.'

  'Well, no solicitor on earth can prevent me putting the questions to you,' I said.

  'Of course not,' said Grampian. 'It would be fifty pounds simply thrown down the drain, Betty. You must see that. In any case,' he said to me, 'there's absolutely no way we can be implicated in my poor brother's death, don't you see?'

  'All right,' I said, 'well, let's pick up the thread again, then. When you inherited, your brother inherited.'

  'More than I did, too. He was the elder.'

  'So he was quite rich at one stage.'

  'Oh, not badly off at all, not at all. Even after duty had been paid. Property, mostly. He had some nice things, too.'

  'You're in the antique trade?'

  'Oh, I don't know about trade, exactly. I dabble in objects, buy and sell occasionally, invest in certain painters and manuscripts a little, yes.'

  'What happened to your brother's property?' I said. 'Where did it go? He hadn't a light when he died, as far as we can make out.'

  'Well, it's, er, all quite complicated,' said Grampian. He cleared his throat, twice. 'But actually I've got it, you see.'

  'Perhaps you wouldn't mind enlarging on that.' I suddenly understood why Grampian's house was so full of things.

  'Well, the trouble with Charles,' said Grampian, 'was that he was always roaming about. Never bought a house. Hated settling down. Never had much idea about money, never had any money. So, well, I put it to him-—'

  'You offered him cash for the lot.'

  'That's right,' he grumbled, 'and the hell of a business I had raising it like that in a hurry, too. What with sky-high interest rates—'

  'How long ago was this?'

  'Oh, I don't know, must be five years or so, I suppose.'

  'What was the sum involved?'

  He huffed and puffed. 'Oh, pretty hard to remember now, at this distance in time,' he boomed, blowing through his purplish lips.

  'Have a go,' I said drily.

  He sucked in air judiciously. 'Well—shall we say in the region of thirty thousand pounds?'

  I realized instantly that Staniland had been badly cheated. I knew that from what I had seen in this place. But to cheat someone in that way unfortunately isn't an indictable crime, and even less so between brothers.

  'What happened to the money?'

  'How should I know?'

  'What we do know,' Mrs Staniland interrupted, 'is that it went.'

  'But you don't know how'

  'That's right.'

  'And then he started trying to borrow money from you?'

  'Yes, after he came back from France.'

  'And how long ago was that?'

  'Oh, about two years. After his wife and daughter had left him.'

  'Anyway, you neither of you lent him any money.'

  'Grampian had told him all along that it simply wasn't on!' shouted Mrs Staniland.

  'We've got our own row to hoe,' said Grampian, 'and making ends meet isn't easy these days, Sergeant.'

  I knew that.

  'And then to have him coming down on us!' Mrs Staniland's voice trailed indignantly away.

  'But he didn't become unpleasant in any way? Threaten you, anything like that?'

  'Oh, no,' said Grampian. 'He just rang up sometimes, came round once or twice—'

  'Always drunk,' Mrs Staniland put in.

  'And asked for a loan?'

  'Well, talked round it.'

  'Seems normal enough,' I said, 'if you're a brother who's fallen on hard times.'

  'He never fell on any other times,' said Mrs Staniland, and snorted like a horse.

  'Did you ever help him at all?'

  'Well, I tried to advise him, naturally;' said Grampian.

  'What sort of advice?'

  'Does that really come within your purview, Sergeant?' said Mrs Staniland.

  'It certainly does,' I said. 'We're talking about a murder, believe it or not.'

  'I hate your manners,' said Mrs Staniland. 'I find them really detestable.'

  'The truth's no respecter of drawing-rooms, madam,' I said.

  'If I could just resolve the little impasse,' said Grampian, clearing his throat. 'We were talking about advice. I said to Charles, ease up on the sauce, cut back on these harpies you go in for, that sort of thing. If he'd had a few bob to spare, I could have given him some tips on the Stock Exchange, of course, but as it was—'

  'If only he hadn't always been so drunk!' said Mrs Staniland.

  'There, there, Betty,' sighed Grampian, 'de mortuis, etcetera. Poor old Charles.'

  I saw how greatly they had both hated, even feared, Staniland; but, like all egoists, they couldn't afford to admit it in case it damaged their own view of themselves, in the eyes of a third person.

  'Talking of the dead, by the way,' I said, 'there'll be the funeral, of course, after the inquest.'

  'Oh, quite.'

  'And the expenses.'

  'Yes, but well, that's just the snag,' said Grampian awkwardly, snapping his huge pink fingers.

  'I don't see how we could think of coping,' said Mrs Staniland firmly. 'Not financially.'

  'Yes, we'll have to see,' said Grampian in a tone which suggested that he already had. 'Incidentally, was there evidence that he was drunk much of the time, not just when he came to see us?'

  'Some.'

  'Yes, well, that was what I was always warning him about, of course.'

  'Quite. But, in talking to him, you must have realized that he had other problems, surely?'

  'Other problems?' said Grampian. 'What do you mean? Mental problems? You don't actually mean to say he was mad, do you? Do you? Really, how very interesting!'

  'No,' I said, 'I don't mean to say he was mad. Quite the opposite. I just mean there was evidence to show that life had got rather on top of him.'

  'We could all of us complain about that,' said Mrs Staniland tardy.

  'What evidence, anyway?' said Grampian.

  I hadn't read all through Staniland yet, so I just said: 'A good deal, and there's more to come.'

  'There's always more to come with someone like my brother-in-law,' said Mrs Staniland bitterly.

  'You can't tell me, either of you, what he was doing while he was in France at all?'

  'I've no idea,' said Grampian. 'Just existin
g, I should think. Drifting along.'

  Just existing. This long, boring London evening, interviewing Staniland's next of kin, suddenly got up my nose. I had an image of Staniland himself, somewhere in the South of France, appearing at his local bistro, hanging over the bar at six o'clock like a thirsty angel.

  'Which would be pretty typical of him,' said Mrs Staniland.

  'He was living on this money you gave him in consideration of, er, what he sold you?'

  'I assume so?

  'All right,' I said, 'what about his wife, now?'

  'Margo, you mean?' snapped Mrs Staniland. 'Margo was nothing but a tart.'

  'Still, I gather she had a daughter by your brother-in-law.'

  'Charlotte? Destructive little devil,' said Mrs Staniland. 'The only time she came round here with her mother she broke one of my Delft vases.'

  'Oh, well, children do that,' I said. In a flash, I saw my own child, lying asleep and flushed on a spotless white pillow. She would be twelve now.

  'They do if you don't watch them,' said Mrs Staniland, 'and give them what-for now and then. Thank God I haven't got any.'

  'How did you know your brother-in-law's wife was a tart, by the way?' I said. 'Just by looking at her?'

  There was an uneasy silence, during which the pair looked covertly at each other; the sun came and went in slow yellow bursts of hysteria beyond the heavy window curtains. The pendulum of the little clock I had noticed before jumped desperately up and down, like a decoy trying to distract my attention.

  'Well, it rather goes back,' said Grampian, clearing his throat, 'to before.'

  'Before what?'

  'Well.'

  Now the silence was really loud. It was like the lull before a first flash of lightning.

  'Come on,' I said.

  'Well, I met Margo in a club,' said Grampian.

  Mrs Staniland exploded: 'She was a whore, just a whore! She worked in night clubs!'

  Grampian turned a nasty colour, red and purple. The colours looked all right in a tweed suit but were alarming on a face.

  'He's just a poor old goat,' said Mrs Staniland hoarsely, turning away.

  'Now, now, Betty old girl!'

  She didn't say anything, but put her wrist over her mouth and started screaming at him from behind it. Grampian darted me hopeless glances, as much as to say: We're both men, old boy!

  I took no notice. I leaned against a table covered with bric-a-brac and left him to settle her down if he could. He managed to get her up onto a sofa, dashed out to the kitchen and came back with a damp cloth which he smacked onto her face. She screamed even louder, snatched the towel away and threw it on the floor. Grampian picked it up again and put it back on her face, leaning on her this time to stop her getting up. The table I had settled my bottom against creaked loudly. He heard that all right. 'Not that table, if you please!' he shouted politely above the din. 'It's quite valuable!'

  I stood upright, just looking through them, thinking about Staniland. Mrs Staniland eyed me from time to time from under her wet towel. As soon as she realized there was no mileage to be got out of me, she came to her senses surprisingly fast and sat up little the worse for wear.

  'I must apologize for that,' said Grampian.

  'Apologize?' she shouted. 'You dirty old man!'

  'Now, now, Betty! My wife's a very highly strung woman,' he confided to me, aside.

  'Now, now, my foot!' snapped Mrs Staniland. 'Our marriage nearly broke up when I found he'd been going with her. Very nearly.' Grampian might as well have been in Edinburgh for all the notice she took of him. He went and stood by the door looking sheepish, wringing the towel nervously in his rosy hands.

  'Did your brother-in-law know anything about all this?' I asked.

  'Pah,' said Mrs Staniland, 'who cares? I shouldn't think so. But I'll tell you this much, Sergeant, do you know how I found out about it?' She stabbed a sharpened finger at him: 'He talked in his sleep.'

  'Look here, Betty!' said Grampian. 'Now really—'

  'Oh, yes you did!' she shrieked. 'Don't you remember how you used to mumble that she wore nothing but a fur coat and gilt slippers when she came to you? And opened up the coat over your face? And didn't you love it? And didn't you spend a thousand pounds of my money on her, you filthy old goat?' She turned to me and said calmly: 'We sleep in separate rooms now, of course.'

  'Was your brother running her?' I asked Grampian.

  'No, she did it off her own bat,' he mumbled. 'I'm sure she gave him the money I gave her.' He twisted his fingers till the knuckles snapped: 'She loved him.'

  'Love?' shrieked Mrs Staniland. 'Her?'

  'Well, she joined him in France with the child, anyway,' I said. 'But what matters to me is, does either of you happen to know where she is now?'

  'She's the sort that moves around,' said Mrs Staniland grimly.

  'Okay,' I said, 'well, I think that's all. For the moment.'

  'What do you mean,' said Mrs Staniland, sitting up straight, 'for the moment?'

  'Well, I've got other people to interview, and you never know— a lot more'll come out once we really get digging.'

  'Nothing that might redound to our discredit, I hope?' said Grampian anxiously 'I don't think my wife and I could stand it if... I mean, we've told you things between these four walls that...'

  'Is it going to get into the papers?' said Mrs Staniland. 'That's what I want to know.'

  'I couldn't possibly tell you,' I said coldly. 'I don't know.'

  'God, I shall really scream if it does,' said Mrs Staniland.

  'Now, now, Betty!'

  I squashed the cigarette I had been smoking into one of the eleven silver ashtrays. 'Well, I'll be going,' I said. 'If either of you leaves home, would you notify your local police station, please?'

  'Er, quite,' said Grampian. They followed me dumbly with their eyes as I squeezed my way out of the room. As I reached the front door I heard Mrs Staniland saying behind me: 'God damn Charles. God damn him!'

  That was one way of talking about the dead.

  'As for Margo,' she continued, 'I hope she goes to jail, the little slut!'

  Grampian said: 'Now, now, Betty, don't you think you ought to take two of your pills?'

  'If you weren't completely impotent, Grampian, I wouldn't need any pills!'

  I slammed the front door behind me to indicate that I had gone; when I got out into the street I breathed in a very deep breath, then expelled it right out from the bottom of my lungs.

  9

  Looking through Staniland's things, I found a postcard in a woman's handwriting. The card bore a faded view of some Italian beach but a British stamp, and was postmarked SW3. It started: 'Let me know, Charles, when you are truly sorry. Then perhaps we can talk.'

  Sorry? I thought. The man was a walking wound, a mobile case of sorrow. The woman's remark, whoever she was, was not merely inapposite but absurd: to require Staniland to feel regret or remorse for what he was amounted to telling a man with terminal cancer that he looked rather ill.

  The card continued: 'It will of course, Charles, only be a talk. There can, as you yourself must quite realize, be no question whatever of a return to the past.' The card was signed with a self-conscious squiggle that reminded me of an ageing virgin trying to shake an impertinent finger out of her knickers.

  Staniland had sensibly annotated the card: 'What balls. Any return to the past would be as improbable as it's uninteresting."L" had no past—she tried to use mine instead: a self-satisfied old cow of about my own age who introduced herself to me on the beach at Rimini. She had few ideas unconnected with her money, and I tweaked her nose for it one night after dinner.'

  The next thing I got out of the pile was a pasteboard card for a minicab firm called Planet Cars with an address in the shabby part of the West End towards Euston Road. Underneath I read the words: 'High Class Cars, Distance No Object, Theatres, Weddings, All Functions Attended. Also Vans, Trucks to Five Ton & Arties, Helpful Drivers.'

  There we
re three phone numbers at the bottom of the card, and I saw no reason why I shouldn't try one of them.

  10

  'E ad a wife, you know.'

  'Yes, I'd heard.'

  'And a kiddie.'

  'That's right.'

  I was taking my ease today, being invited to relax with the boss of Planet Cars. The office was on the second floor of a dingy building behind Charlotte Street, sandwiched between a Pakistani restaurant called the Allahabad, European and Indian Dishes, and a delicatessen that specialized in tinned mangoes, chillies and ladies' fingers. The bow window we were sitting in peered out at a rather alarming angle onto a public lavatory, kept permanently locked against queers and youths who wanted to give head or shoot up in there. Behind this urinary redoubt was a pub called the Quadrant, in which the Factory took a permanent interest.

  Around us, at desks in the room, were three startlingly white girls, two of whom looked adoringly at their boss while the third read the Standard and did her nails. Also there was an Irish accountant, the first I had ever seen, doing the drivers' figures with the aid of a computer terminal, and the whole area was sprinkled with bilious green telephones which didn't often ring—if one did try, the call was instantly cut off by the adorers and transferred to the overworked dispatchers' office on the floor below. From that floor I could hear voices drifting up through the thin planks. The day dispatcher groaned on to his underlings about the shortcomings of fucking amateurs, while out of the window I could see the only roller-skater the firm had. It said Planet 209 in black and yellow on his back, and he swept to an easy stop in front of the office with a practised double eight, relinquishing the boot of an SS 100. I watched him take off his skates and make for the stairs, his satchel for documents booming off his muscled buttocks, his swatched blond hair swirling against his hips. 'New set of needles today, Dave,' I heard him call out to someone. 'Twenty bleedin quid!'

  'We like to entertain the law,' the boss of Planet was saying to me. 'Oh, yes, we ain't got nothin to fear from the law.' He was a small man whose tailor, having measured him for a little suit, would have charged him the price for a big one. He evidently didn't care about things like that, being more interested in the bottle he was pulling out of his desk drawer. 'Come on, Sarge, just a little one,' he said in a confiding tone. 'Chivas Regal, ha, ha, Chivas Illegal, the lads call it.'