Death in Disguise

Chapter 7

Detective Chief Inspector Barnaby was cooking Moules à l’Indienne, pounding away at some cardamom seeds in a stone pestle. He wore a long cotton tablier of the sort favoured by waiters in speakeasy type dives and had a glass of Frog’s Leap Chardonnay to hand.

It had dawned on Tom the hard way, and over many years, that Joyce, his beloved prop and mainstay, was not going to (indeed saw no reason to) improve her cooking. Take it or leave it was her attitude and the fact that on the whole he left it was not apparently reason enough to instigate reform. And as she had once said, poking him none too playfully below the belt, you didn’t get up to thirteen stone by going without. She was neither defiant nor aggressive; just simply did not understand his point of view. Joyce ate her own cooking quite happily and now ate her husband’s, when he had time to do any, just as happily - but without any indication that its quality was at all superior to her own. Barnaby had long ago decided that she suffered from the gastronomic equivalent to being tone deaf.

‘What’s for starters?’

‘Tarragon eggs.’

‘Are they the ones in brown puddles?’ Joyce took a deep swallow of wine and beamed encouragement. ‘I like those.’

‘I’ll put more gelatine in this time.’

The making of aspic had come into part seven, ‘Raised Pies and Galantines’, of Barnaby’s ‘Twelve Cookery Lessons for Absolute Beginners’ at Causton Tech and was one he had missed, due to being on call. He had taken to the art straight away, really looking forward to Tuesday evenings when he could once more get to grips with scales, knives, pots and pans. The only male in a class of seventeen, he was left relatively in peace once his fellow students had got used to his lumbering masculine presence and tired of pulling his leg. Only one lady, a Mrs Queenie Bunshaft, still persisted in asking archly where he was hiding his truncheon and which of them was going to be his dish of the day. Barnaby threatened to run off with Mrs Bunshaft when Joyce got particularly obstreperous.

The meal was to celebrate his daughter’s engagement. Both parents had been pleased but surprised at Cully’s emotional declaration some weeks ago. Barnaby had been quite caustic when shown the ring, a pretty white-gold love knot studded with Victorian garnets.

‘I thought he just moved in these days with a toothbrush and a packet of peppermint-flavoured Mates.’

Cully had smiled dreamily and looked demure. Demure! The first time, as Joyce said later, since she’d abandoned nappies. Nicholas looked simply stunned as if he could not believe his luck, which was quite true.

‘Students,’ moaned Joyce once they had danced away. A Hollywood pavane complete with dry ice and string accompaniment.

‘Not for much longer.’

‘They’ve no money.’

‘They’ve as much as we had.’

‘At least you were in a proper job. The theatre, Tom ... of all things ...’

‘They’re only engaged, not married with five kids. Anyway - she’s enough confidence for fifty that one.’

‘You don’t know what it’s like.’ Joyce emptied her glass and reached for a bowl of coconut.

‘Leave that alone. I’ve weighed it out.’

‘Don’t start throwing your weight about with me. You’re not at the station now, you know.’ Joyce put some of the white shreds in her mouth. ‘It’s going to be all right for Sunday, isn’t it Tom?’

‘Fingers crossed.’

At the moment matters were quite sluggish. No shortage of crime (when was there ever?) but for the past few days it had been seedy, run-of-the-mill stuff. There were occasions - not many, never long - like this. Other periods seemed to hold such an escalation of smashing and grabbing; of screaming, squealing tyres and breaking bones that Barnaby sometimes felt he had been sucked into an ever-spinning maelstrom of brutality. He marginally preferred these times. This acknowledgement gave him neither pleasure nor comfort but neither did he attempt to duck the fact.

In the hall the phone rang. Joyce got up saying, ‘Oh no.’

‘Probably Cully ...’

‘Bet it isn’t.’

Barnaby started to chop some chillies, half an ear to the door. Joyce reappeared, expressionless. Barnaby pulled at the strings of his apron and turned off the gas. Five minutes later Joyce was helping him into his jacket.

‘Sorry, love.’

‘I don’t know why you keep up this fiction of saying sorry, Tom. You’ve been doing it for nearly thirty years and it wouldn’t deceive a child. You already look twice as sparky as you did in the kitchen.’ Barnaby buttoned up and kissed her. ‘Where is it, anyway?’

‘Out Iver way.’

‘Will you be late?’

‘Looks a bit like it.’ He added, pointlessly, for she invariably did, ‘Don’t wait up.’

She called after him down the path, ‘Shall I ring Cully and cancel?’

‘Not yet. See how it goes.’

Troy had taken to wearing glasses for driving. Glinting, squared-off steel rims which made him look like Himmler. Weaving and snaking, foot down, they were already half way to the Manor House.

‘Break up anything special did it, Chief - this caper?’

‘Not really.’

Just rustling up a few Moules à l’Indienne for my daughter’s engagement dinner. Barnaby smiled to himself, imagining his sergeant’s response. The concealed disdain behind a courteous. ‘Oh yes, sir?’ And the limp-wristed mock-up of a chef portrayed later in the staff canteen when he was safely elsewhere.

To Troy, cooking, like hairdressing and making clothes, was a pursuit fit only for women. Or poofters. It was his proud boast that he had never as much as toasted a slice of bread or washed a sock in his entire life. Start doing that sort of thing, he’d say, and you’d got women left with time on their hands. And women with time on their hands got into trouble. Known fact.

’Course a baby went quite a way to solving that problem. His own was now nearly one. Incredibly bright. Troy wondered if this was the moment to pass on what she had said at breakfast. It was so clever, so advanced. He had told everybody at the station; one or two people twice. But with the Boss you never knew. Sometimes you’d think he was paying attention then discover he hadn’t heard a word. Sometimes he jumped down your throat. Ah well - worth a try.

‘You’ll never guess what she said this morning. Chief.’

‘Who?’

Who ...? Who? For a minute Troy was so flabbergasted he could not reply. Then he said, ‘Talisa Leanne.’

‘Hmn.’

Could have been a grunt. Or a cough. Could even have been a sigh. Only the most besotted parent would have taken it as encouragement to continue.

‘She was eating her Weetabix ... well, I say eating ... flinging it about’s more like it ...’ Troy laughed, shaking his head at the wonder of it all. ‘Some in her bib ... some on the wall ... there was even -’

‘Let’s get it over with, Sergeant.’

‘Pardon?’

‘What did she say.’

‘Oh. Yes. Well - it was “ball”.’

‘What?’

‘Ball.’

‘Ball?’

‘True as I’m sitting here.’

‘Good grief.’

The sky was almost dark. A rim of crimson seeped into the horizon’s edge as the car swung with great panache into the village. Barnaby half expected to see an ambulance on the Manor drive but there were just two police cars and George Bullard’s Volvo.

As soon as Barnaby climbed out he heard the howling. Terrible agonised cries like an animal in a trap. He felt his skin ice over.

‘Jesus!’ Troy joined him in the porch. ‘What the hell is that?’

A constable positioned inside the hall became alert in recognition. ‘Everyone’s upstairs, sir. Along the gallery to your left. Far end.’

Troy stared around as they climbed, too disturbed by the dreadful sounds to experience his usual knee-jerk resentment when entering what he presumed to be the environment of the upper crust. He sniffed and said, ‘What a stink.’

‘Joss sticks.’

‘Smells like cat mess.’

They found Scene of Crime in a long room almost bereft of furniture. Controlled businesslike people moving with quiet efficiency. A photographer sat on some steps, a Pentax with an attached flash dangling from his neck. A second constable was at the door. Barnaby asked who was making all the row.

‘One of the people who lives here, sir. Apparently he’s a bit mental.’

‘That should cheer things up.’ Barnaby crossed over to the dais and crouched by the white robed corpse. Some blood had oozed from the wound in his chest and lay in a long narrow crinkle, glistening like newly set plum jam. ‘What’ve we got then, George?’

‘As you see,’ said Doctor Bullard. ‘A blade artist.’

‘Neat.’ Barnaby took a close look then nodded in the direction of the howling which was dying into a series of tormented moans. ‘Can’t you give him something? It’s enough to drive a man to drink.’

The doctor shook his head. ‘As far as I can gather he’s already on quite complicated medication. Not wise to mix it. I’ve suggested calling their own doctor but they say they haven’t got one. Do it all themselves with herbs and moonshine.’

‘They must have. How does he get his stuff?’

‘Hillingdon at Uxbridge by all accounts.’ He got up, dusting his knees unnecessarily.

‘On the way to bed was he Doctor Bullard?’ asked Troy, winking at the body. ‘In his nightie.’

‘How long, George?’

‘An hour at the most. But this time you don’t need me to tell you. Apparently they were all here when it happened.’

‘What ... You mean they were playing about? This is some sort of accident?’

Troy recognised a trace of disappointment in his chief’s voice. Briefly Barnaby looked betrayed. Smiling to himself, the sergeant looked down at the dead man, noting the refined passionless features and tissuey skin. And get a load of that hair. He looked like something out of the ten commandments. You could just see him as Moses in the wilderness shouting: ‘Let my people go.’ Or was it ‘come’? Troy and the Bible were not close. Barnaby was now talking to Graham Arkwright, Scene of Crime. The sergeant tuned in.

‘... a lot to go on, I’m afraid. We found this behind that curtain over there.’ He indicated a small embrasure and held up a plastic bag containing a bright yellow glove. ‘Might get something on the knife for you, there’s a bit of thread attached. Know anything about this set-up, Tom?’ Barnaby shook his head.

‘My wife came here on a weaving course. Took me for ever to get rid of the scarf. I gave it to a jumble sale in the end. Turned up later in the window of Oxfam. She wouldn’t speak to me for a week.’

‘I’d call that a result myself,’ said Troy.

Barnaby took the glove and a second bag containing the knife and said, ‘I’ll drop these off later at Forensic - OK?’

A flash bulb flared and the two officers made their way towards the man standing in the doorway.

‘You first here, Sergeant?’

‘Yes, sir. Arrived same time as the ambulance. On patrol with Policewoman Lynley. Notified the CID and stayed here with the body. She’s got the others downstairs. The big room far side of the hall.’

‘How did it strike you - the set-up?’

‘Well ... much as you’d expect really. They were all standing round looking gobsmacked. Apart from the idiot boy who was yowling his head off. I did ask if the dead man had been touched and they said no. I couldn’t get anything out of them after that.’

‘Right.’ Barnaby lumbered back downstairs. Troy, slim as a whip in his worn leather blouson and tight grey pants, running ahead opening two doors before finding the right one.

It was quite large with a ‘feathered’ ceiling made of wood, as were the panelled walls, so that one had the impression of being in a large carved box. There were a lot of shell-like polystyrene chairs on thin metal legs and an imperfectly cleaned blackboard. A place for lectures and seminars.

The communalists were all bunched together with the exception of one man who stood some distance away by the French windows. Bunched fists rammed into his pockets, he looked baffled and full of rage. There was a long scratch beaded with fresh blood down his left cheek. Barnaby thought he looked vaguely familiar.

Troy clocked the WPC (never see thirty again and dumpy with it), and then the rest. A weeping girl in a sari being comforted by a man in jeans. The wailing boy, his head in the lap of a bold-featured woman wearing blue. A dolly, dolly blonde and a harsh-faced pepper-and-salter in corduroy pants. Two fat pathetic-looking hippies with lumps of rock in the middle of their foreheads and a woman in a mad frock who looked only marginally more life-like than Stiffy upstairs. Plus a round little geezer with a beard the colour of tomato sauce.

Barnaby introduced himself and asked if any of them could tell him precisely what had happened. There was a long, long pause. Troy got the impression that the girl in the sari was struggling to control her sobs preparatory to speech, but then everyone (bar the man by the window) turned to the woman in blue. Still stroking the head of the crying youth, she gave a reluctant inclination of her head and made to stand but the boy clung so tightly to her knees that movement was impossible. When she spoke her voice was very tight. Low and calm but unnaturally so as if large reservoirs of emotion were being strenuously damned.

‘The Master has left us. He has entered his body of lights and is now at one with the over soul.’

Oh dear, oh dear, thought the chief inspector. It’s going to be one of those. Troy wondered what the chances were of slipping out for a quick drag before things got going seriously. He’d cut down to five a day, had smoked the first four before breakfast, and the need for a long cool inhalation was driving him up the wall. A greatly extended two minutes went by without anyone saying a dicky bird. Then the tart with saggy boobs started yammering whilst opening her arms wide, before flinging them across her chest as if to keep warm.

The sergeant regarded these flamboyant obsequies with irritation and dislike. You’d have thought they were a load of foreigners the way they were cracking on. Italians. Or jabbering Caribbeans. His hand reached into his pocket and closed wistfully over a lighter and packet of Chesterfields.

Barnaby quickly realised that questioning en masse would get him nowhere. All he had ascertained so far was the dead man’s name. It was like talking to captured prisoners of war. So he asked for a separate room and they were offered what appeared to be The Lodge’s office.

A workmanlike place - boxes of stationery and manila envelopes, filing cabinets, an old fashioned duplicator. On the wall a reincarnation advisory poster: Ever signed a cheque ‘William Shakespeare’ then wondered why? It was an internal room with no windows which made it especially satisfactory from a policeman’s point of view. The combination of an unknown interrogator and the complete disappearance of the outside world could mean you were already half way there.

Barnaby sat at a little round table with a stack of rough paper and some pencils, his plastic bags by his feet. Troy strolled about. A further patrol car had arrived, releasing the constable on the front door who was now seated with a Biro and notebook, his chair positioned so as to be invisible to the person being interviewed. As the gathering had remained schtum, the chief inspector was not able to follow his usual procedure of taking the most useful witness first so he had started with their spokesperson and was already ruing the day.

Barnaby had been of the belief that, after thirty years in the force, he had come across just about every type, colour, sexual proclivity and variety of political and religious zealot that his country had to offer. Within minutes he realised he was mistaken. The woman facing him gave her full name, her astral name (‘Pacifica’) and her opinion that Barnaby should be writing on yellow paper rather than white - to allay confusion and harmonise his spleen. Barnaby, who had been doodling, put down his pen.

Asked about the death in the Solar she explained that the term was inappropriate. The Master had been magnetically transmuted and was now an ariel tapping into the interplanetary pool; a lord of all the Elohim and a droplet in the great field of cosmic consciousness.

‘Be that as it may, Miss Cuttle ...’ (Oh, very witty thought Troy.) ‘What I’m trying to get at is who was responsible for sending him there.’

‘Oh no, no, no - it wasn’t like that at all.’ She bestowed on him a sweet but slightly patronising smile. Barnaby felt he might be advised any minute not to worry his pretty little head.

‘How was it then?’ asked Sergeant Troy.

‘Well ...’ May settled herself more comfortably, resting her bag like a kangaroo’s pouch in her lap. ‘It all started with my regression.’ She broke off noticing the increased strain on Barnaby’s rugged features. ‘Oh dear ... it’s so difficult explaining to outsiders. Suffice it to say that we have all been on this earth many times before and, under the guidance of the Masters, I relive incidents from one or the other of these lives the third Friday of every month except for Feb. when there was a Psychic Self Defence Workshop.

‘There is always a great deal of energy humming about at regression times but today was really outstanding. I had an accident, for instance, this afternoon which I see now was not an accident at all but a metaphor. A chunk of iron fell off the roof -’

‘Could we stick to this evening, Miss Cuttle?’

‘Oh. Very well. Continuation of same, really. A symbolisation of Astarte, goddess of the moon. Then later during the actual regression, nebulæ crashing about, stars colliding, darts of silver light showers and showers of golden rain, spinning moons ... The passing of an arahat is of gigantic astral significance and cannot be accomplished by mere common or garden dynamism. It is no casual or accidental matter.’

‘Certainly not accidental.’

‘I see you’re hankering after some sort of human intervention.’

‘That’s the line this investigation will be taking - yes.’

‘When you came out of this trance or whatever it was you were in,’ said Troy, ‘what exactly did you see?’

‘I’ve just explained all that. Moons whizzing -’

‘I mean in actual fact.’

‘Those are the facts.’

Barnaby continued, determined to tighten his questions in such a way as to leave no loophole for further astrological whimsy. ‘Now Miss Cuttle -’

‘Taster to the General.’

‘Pardon?’

‘That’s what I was tonight. In Roman Britain.’

‘Really?’ Never strong on ancestor-worship, Barnaby pressed on. ‘Could you tell me - or better still show me - where he and the others were sitting before you began.’ He pushed over a pencil and sheet of paper, adding hurriedly as she opened her mouth, ‘White is all there is.’

May said, ‘Music’s my forte you know. Not art.’

‘A rough sketch will do. Use crosses if you wish. But don’t guess. If you’re not sure leave a blank.’

She drew like a child, concentrating fiercely, her tongue peeping out. Barnaby looked at the results.

‘And had these positions changed when you ... um ... were yourself again?’

‘Oh yes. Everyone was crowding round me. Arno was crying - silly man.’

‘Why?’

‘I’d been poisoned. When I was tasting some mushrooms. They will worry so. He should have known I’d be all right. Once I was bound to a chariot wheel -’

‘You say everyone,’ said Troy. ‘Did that include Craigie?’

‘No. But I didn’t realise that till Christopher put the lights on.’

‘Where is he on this?’ Barnaby took the drawing.

‘Nowhere. He stayed with me.’

‘You mean it was dark?’ inquired Barnaby.

‘Duskish.’

‘That’s handy,’ said Troy.

May frowned. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘Who suggested putting them off?’

‘No one. It’s always done for meditative practices.’

‘So what did you see once they were on again?’

‘The Master was standing in front of his chair -’

‘Still on the dais?’ Barnaby glanced down at the sketch.

‘Yes. Then he just sort of toppled down the steps.’ The voice faltered and her lips trembled with remembrance. ‘His bosom had already received the celestial lance.’

The chief inspector’s patience was wearing thin. Brutally he picked up the first polythene bag and pushed it across the table. ‘Your lance, Miss Cuttle. Do you recognise it?’

‘My ...’ She picked up the bag. The stains had already oxidised to a rusty orange. ‘But that’s one of our knives from the kitchen.’ She put it down again. ‘How could ...?’ For a long moment she stared at him, her forehead tuckered deep with puzzlement, her eyes bewildered. Then they cleared.

‘Of course.’ The cast-iron confidence was back. ‘We are unawakened ones here, Inspector. We strive, we pray, we struggle for perfection, but it is a long and troubling discipleship. None of us, apparently, are ready for the revelation of divine wisdom. Knowing this, the Gods in their ineffable kindness have transmuted their sublimely mysterious weapon of dispatch into a humble household implement. Something all we acolytes can easily assimilate and comprehend. I’ve no doubt at all you’ll find a karmic fingerprint.’

Troy snorted. Barnaby, feeling perhaps that this analysis lacked a certain rigour, produced his second bag. ‘And is this from the kitchen too?’

‘Yes. Janet wears them. She has a mild skin disorder, gradually giving ground to my Mallow and Horehound salve. What are you doing with it?’

‘It was found behind one of the curtains in the Solar.’

‘How odd. You can’t wash up in there.’

Given her conviction of a mystical assassin, there seemed little sense in pointing out the evident connection. ‘Did you see anyone cross to the window at any time?’ May shook her head. ‘And these regressions - do they usually take such a dramatic form?’

‘Varies. I succumbed to the Black Death once and screamed the place down. Next week - a whizzo time with Henry the Eighth. You just can’t tell.’

Good question, thought Troy. Very shrewd. Because if people knew there might be a possible distraction on the way ... He put a question of his own. ‘Was anyone present who was unfamiliar with this routine?’

‘Yes indeed. Mr and Mrs Gamelin were strangers to us.’ (Gamelin, thought Barnaby. That’s who it was.) ‘They’d come down for their daughter’s birthday. Poor child.’

Her accent really stuck in Troy’s craw. Toney. British racing green. Born to order others to jump to it. Or thought they were which came down to the same thing. You could get away with being bonkers if you sounded right. But you couldn’t get away with murder. The chief was asking about the structure of the commune and who would take charge now.

‘We’re equal here, Inspector Barnaby, although, as in all groups, I suppose you will find a natural hierarchy.’ Barnaby nodded, thinking how rarely people who used the phrase saw themselves at the bottom of the heap. ‘I have been here longest and I suppose you could call me the bursar. I do all the ordering from the soya beans to Calypso’s hay. And the banking. I’m allowed to sign cheques.’ She went on to list the other members of the organisation, the order of their arrival and length of stay.

‘And the boy?’ Barnaby nodded in the direction of the door. The moaning had now quite died away.

‘Tim? Oh - he was ... found.’ She appeared uneasy. ‘I don’t know the details. Arno would never tell me. He got quite upset when I asked a second time. One day he and the Master simply brought Tim home. How he will bear this ... poor boy. The Master was his life, his whole existence. I fear for him, I really do.’ She got up. ‘If that’s all, could I go? I’d like to see -’

‘One more question,’ said Barnaby. ‘Has anyone changed their clothes since the regression?’

After she had replied in the negative and been allowed to go, the three men exchanged bemused glances. Barnaby said, ‘Calypso’s hay?’

‘They’ll all be vegetarians, sir,’ said the young constable.

‘Get every word of that did you, sunshine?’ said Troy.

‘Course not, Sergeant,’ said the PC, going very pink. He had an absurdly fluffy moustache like a strip of duckling feathers. ‘Just the relevant details.’

‘They had plenty of time to get together on this before the patrol car turned up, Chief. Maybe this supernatural garbage is going to be the official party line.’

‘I doubt it. They can’t all be as batty as that one.’

There was a knock and the woman with the long grey hair came in, followed by the man with the Hey Viva! moustache. They had taken off their headbands and wore expressions of exalted mourning. Their eyes were sharp and interested. She carried a tray with three cups and he a plate which could easily have fitted on the tray.

‘We thought you might appreciate some refreshment -’

‘A cup of Acorna -’

‘A really excellent coffee substitute -’

‘And some cake.’

Barnaby, taking a cup, asked their names. Then he said, ‘Well perhaps as you’re here you wouldn’t mind answering some questions regarding Mr Craigie’s murder.’ He named the deed deliberately just so everyone knew where they stood.

Plainly this was the whole point of the exercise and they were both sitting down in a flash. Ken opened by saying, ‘You can’t call it murder.’ Adding kindly, ‘Not as a layman would understand the term.’

‘There’s only one way to understand the term, Mr Beavers. The wanton destruction of human life. You can trick it out in whatever airy-fairy jargon you choose. Murder’s what it is.’ He responded to a brace of pitying headshakes by pushing over the paper and pencils and explaining about the sketch. He added, ‘No conferring’ and watched them start to draw.

Their diagrams, like their clothes and hairstyles, were almost identical. He could just see them in the winter in matching sweaters and matching bobble hats on their matching pointy heads. Troy was struggling with his refreshment, which as a piece of cake would have made a great foundation stone.

Ken returned the paper saying, ‘Perhaps I could meta-comment on your last verbalisation.’

‘By all means. But speak plain if you would. I haven’t got all night,’ replied Barnaby, fearing very much that he had.

‘The knife was inserted by a mortal hand.’ Very grudging. ‘But that hand was divinely guided. To tell the truth both of us were more than a little upset at not being chosen -’

‘We would have been honoured -’

‘No followers could have been more devoted.’

‘However,’ Ken sighed sniffily, ‘it was not to be.’

‘You should be grateful it was not to be, Mr Beavers. Unless you fancy spending the next ten years in a prison cell.’

‘Where are you coming from on this?’ cried Heather, tossing her head back and revealing briefly an embryonic suggestion of what might have been, in the fullness of time, given intensive exercise and a great deal of hugely expensive plastic surgery, the whimsical beginnings of a chin.

Ken said, ‘There is no such thing as a cell in the life of the spirit.’

This was when Barnaby passed over the two bags. The one with the knife was handled with intense reverence by Ken, murmuring ... ‘Vibrations still present ... subtle but potentwise ... wow ...’

‘He can be of real assistance, Inspector,’ said Heather. ‘Try and think of him as your cosmic tuning-fork.’

What a pair of piss-artists, thought Troy. Right off the wall. He asked what form this assistance might take.

‘My husband is a sensitive.’

‘A sensitive what?’

‘It is a term used to denote a soul in tune not only with the fathomless depths of their own being but with all the vibrant currents of the hidden universe.’

‘That a fact?’

‘A side effect of this,’ said Ken with a grave and modest lifting of the shoulders, ‘is that I was chosen to be a channel for Hilarion. One of the greatest minds the world has ever known. Transmuted many times, you might know him better as Samuel the Prophet of the Lord. Or Merlin. Better still as Francis Bacon, Son of Elizabeth the First and Robert Dudley -’

‘What I’d really like ...’ Barnaby determinedly tried to stem the wave of rôle-playing.

‘- the true author of the so-called Shakespearean plays -’

‘What I’d really like ...’ He could glare to great effect when the occasion demanded and did so now. They sat up smartly. ‘Is to ask if either of you have any idea why this murder was committed.’

‘It wasn’t like that.’

‘Assuming,’ Troy leaned over speaking loudly into their faces, ‘it was like that.’

‘Impossible. Everyone loved him.’

‘At least one person obviously didn’t, Mrs Beavers,’ said Barnaby. ‘Now, I know there wasn’t much light but did either of you notice any sudden movement during the regression?’ He glanced down at the drawings. ‘Anyone sitting on the steps for instance?’

‘Well of course we all got up because of May. And rushed down to her.’

‘Simultaneously?’

‘Pretty much wouldn’t you say, Heth?’

Heather nodded. Barnaby suspected this might be the first of many similar opinions. A darkened room. People concentrating on the horizontal figure. Everyone looks one way, the sleight of hand takes place in quite another. A common conjuring ploy. Even so it was a daring thrust. So why choose such a dangerous time? At this stage the question was plainly unanswerable so he changed course, attempting to fill in more of the background.

‘How many people live here?’

‘There are ten of us in permanent residence but of course we can accommodate many more. Sometimes at retreats or workshops there can be forty ... fifty people.’

‘Can’t be easy,’ said Troy, ‘living that close. Must be arguments and upsets.’ Two cloying smiles and headshakes. ‘A clash of personalities? Rows about money?’

‘Materialism is not our bag.’

‘What is money but the concretisation of etheric force?’

There was a bit more of this then Barnaby let them go. He and Troy were being discussed adversely before the door had even closed.

‘Those guys ... from another planet ... you know?’

‘Not listening at all. Just hearing the words.’

‘I must remember to tell Maureen that next time she tries to up the housekeeping,’ said Troy. ‘How’d it go - money’s the concrete what ...? And speaking of concrete - have you tried this cake?’

‘I’ve taken enough risks for one night,’ said Barnaby. ‘I drank the drink.’

‘Not what you’d call leaping ahead are we, Chief?’ Troy perched on the table, fielding Barnaby’s sour glance with a winning smile. ‘What about the conspiracy theory? The old dingbat deliberately lays on the drama to draw attention from the dais ... they all rush down thus allowing the other half of the combo—’

‘Exactly. They all rushed down.’

‘Yeh ... well ... look ...’ Troy turned May’s sketch round. ‘There’s what ... nine of them? It’s dark ... ish. Nine people do not move as one. Obviously somebody lags behind, does old Obi Half a One Kenobi, then brings up the rear. How long would it take? A second? Two? And with her yelling and carrying on, no one’d hear even if he did cry out.’

‘Mm. It’s a sensible theory.’ Troy smirked with pleasure. ‘Not sure I buy the conspiracy bit, though. Well - let’s talk to -’ he turned the sketch back, ‘Christopher Wainwright. He stayed with the Cuttle woman throughout the regression so, like her, had a head-on view. He may have seen -’ A brief tap and the thirty-something policewoman put her head round. ‘What is it?’

‘There’s a Miss McEndrick outside, sir. She says she has some urgent information about the incident upstairs.’

The officer had hardly finished speaking before Janet pushed her way into the room. She stood screwing up her eyes with nervousness and blinking, bony shoulders hunched before bursting into a flurry of speech. The words tripped each other up, fell over themselves.

‘I’m sorry - I couldn’t wait till you sent for me - sorry - it’s just that I saw something - I’m sure it’s important - that you’d want to know before wasting your time on other people - sorry ...’

Everything about her was remorseful. She seemed to be asking forgiveness for her height, her unappealing clothes, her angle-poised body, her very existence. Yet she had forced her way in. Imposed herself upon a stranger in a position of authority. That must have taken some doing.

Barnaby asked her to sit down. She did so saying, ‘I know who did it. He wore a glove didn’t he? A washing-up glove?’

‘What makes you think so?’

‘Behind the curtain, wasn’t it?’ She paused and Barnaby said, ‘Go on ...’ noting the lack of grief in the intelligent, wide-apart eyes and the jumping-jack nerve in her cheek.

‘He pulled it out of his pocket. I was watching. He’d been glancing round the room as if waiting till he was unobserved, so I looked the other way - pretending to be talking to someone - but I caught him!’

‘Caught who, Miss McEndrick?’

‘Why - Guy Gamelin, of course.’ She was struggling to speak evenly but there was a current of triumph in her voice that could not be disguised.

Of course? This is personal thought Barnaby and wondered why. Perhaps, like his sergeant, she was simply one of those people consumed by envy in the presence of the very rich. Somehow the chief inspector didn’t think so. He asked what her opinion was of Mr Gamelin.

‘Me?’ She flushed an ugly crimson. ‘I have no opinion. I only met him today.’

‘You had dinner together.’

‘Hardly together. There were nine of us.’ Barnaby nodded, looking expectant and encouraging. The silence lengthened but the expression of concerned interest upon his features did not change. One would have to be a churl not to respond.

‘If you really want to know, I thought Gamelin quite obnoxious. Full of himself - like most men. Putting us right when he wasn’t putting us down. Laughing at our ideals and the way we try to live. Of course some people are easily impressed by power. And money.’

‘The majority perhaps?’

‘More fool them.’

Barnaby explained about the sketch, and offered her some paper, but Janet said, ‘Why? I had nothing to do with this.’

‘You are all being asked.’

‘But isn’t it over now? I mean - why don’t you just go and arrest him?’

‘You any special reason for wanting that, Miss McEndrick?’ Troy stalked behind her chair.

‘No ...’ The word whipped out. Janet screwed her neck round, seeking the questioner. She took in the bristling red hair and thin mouth, and sensed a cold unkindness that alarmed her. She turned back, almost with gratitude, to the older of the two men. ‘It’s just that I thought whoever used the knife must have worn a glove because of fingerprints. When I saw him hiding it -’

‘You put two and two together?’ suggested Troy.

Janet started on her map. Barnaby observed her downcast head as she drew. Noted the pin-thin scrupulous parting - not a single hair straying to the wrong side of the tracks. Battleship-grey metal grips cruelly scraped the scalp. He could just see her brushing the wiry mass night and morning without fail. Fifty hard, punishing strokes. Nothing to do with beauty, more with self-flagellation. A wish to drive the demon out. Or was he being fanciful? Which demon, he wondered, might it be? Jealousy, despair, sloth ... lust? The sketch was returned, looking (a brief glance down) pretty much like all the others. He jumped into the dark.

‘Do you like living here, Miss McEndrick? Get on all right with people?’ She looked wary. He sensed a retrenchment. ‘Yes. I suppose so.’

‘Do you have a particular friend perhaps?’

‘No!’ In one swooping motion she had left her chair and veered towards the door. Opening it, she turned a tormented face to Barnaby. ‘I’ll tell you something else about Guy Gamelin. The Master pointed him out when he was dying. Pointed him out to us all. That’s how guilty he is. Ask him ... Ask anyone ...’

Chapter 8

‘I had a sports teacher like that,’ said Troy when Janet had departed. ‘Knobbly knees, plimsolls, no tits, whistle round her neck. They really turn me up, dykes. All members of the buggerocracy, come to that. Don’t they you?’ He directed his question at the note-taking constable.

The young man glanced across at Barnaby who, head down, was still writing busily and decided to play safe. ‘Never really thought about it, Sergeant.’

‘Going to have Gamelin in now, sir?’ asked Troy.

‘I prefer to hear what everyone else has to say. See what we can build up.’ He sent the constable after Christopher Wainwright.

‘I don’t suppose he’s used to being kept waiting.’

‘Bring a little novelty into his life then, won’t it?’

Troy admired that. He knew plenty of officers (some far senior to Barnaby), who wouldn’t have kept Gamelin waiting longer than it took to polish the seat of the visitor’s chair. I shall be like the chief, vowed Troy, when I’m DCI. No one’ll push me around. I shan’t care who they are. That he would be operating from a position of psychological weakness, rather than strength, did not occur to him.

Christopher Wainwright looked to be in his late twenties. The pallor of his face was somewhat exaggerated by the solid blackness of his hair. He wore tight jeans and a short-sleeved sports shirt with a little green alligator patch. If he was devastated, he concealed it well. Although he looked at both policemen frankly enough, there was about him a controlled caution that puzzled Barnaby. What could the boy have to be worried about? He was one of the two people in the room who could not have delivered the fatal blow. Was he concerned on someone else’s behalf? The weeping girl he had been holding in his arms? Barnaby asked if he had seen anything at all from his uniquely helpful viewpoint. Christopher shook his head.

‘Most of the time I was watching May. The last few minutes holding her hand. In any case we were a good ten feet from the others. And there wasn’t a lot of light.’ Asked to do a sketch he said, ‘It’ll be rather vague. I hardly remember where anyone was. A murder puts that sort of detail right out of your mind.’

‘Do you have any idea why Craigie was killed?’

‘Haven’t a clue. He was a most inoffensive man. Genuinely kind unlike one or two people here who talk about love a lot but fall down somewhat on the practice.’

‘Aren’t you in sympathy with the general attitudes of the commune?’

‘With some, not others. I suppose you’d call me an inquirer with an open mind. I was on holiday in Thailand last year and was tremendously impressed by the spirit of the people. By the temples and the monks. When I came back I started reading Buddhist literature then I found a three-day course here - a meditation on the Diamond Sutra - listed in the Vision. I signed up for it and six weeks later I’m still here.’

‘And why is that, Mr Wainwright?’

‘I ... met someone.’

Barnaby saw the shoulders loosen and the watchful tightness around the eyes smooth out and thought, so he’s not concerned on behalf of the girl. It was something else. He seemed to want to talk about her and the chief inspector let him.

‘I couldn’t credit it at first.’ He appeared rather shamefaced as if admitting to a hidden vice or weakness. ‘Falling in love.’ He attempted to sound ironical and failed. ‘One has had affairs of course ...’ he shrugged. ‘But the real thing ... never. To be honest my first inclination was to scarper. I liked my life the way it was. Nice little flat, no shortage of female company. But I hung on just a fraction of a second too long and there I was ... trapped.’ His pale skin flushed. He didn’t look trapped. He looked happy and hopeful. ‘I didn’t know who she was then.

‘I took a month’s leave - I’m a BBC cameraman - which was due. When that ran out, I asked for a three-month sabbatical which will also soon run out. By the time it does I hope I’ll have persuaded Suze to marry me. She’s frightened of the step, I think. The Gamelins have been at each other’s throats for years. Her childhood must have been diabolical.’

‘So, Craigie’s death,’ said Barnaby, ‘could be said to work to your advantage. Her environment being now far less secure.’

‘Yes. It’s sad and naturally I regret what’s happened but I do feel it might tip the scales in my direction.’

Jammy devil, thought Troy. Talk about falling on your feet. Didn’t know who she was. He must think they were born yesterday. Obvious to anyone with an ounce of brain what happened. He picks up on the telly grapevine where poor little rich girl’s hiding. Comes down, makes a play and pulls it off. Once they’re hitched with a joint bank account she won’t see his Ferrari for gold dust.

This imaginative projection, linked with Barnaby’s thoughts on the motive, gave Troy an idea. ‘Where actually is the light switch Mr Wainwright?’ he indicated the just-completed sketch and Christopher obligingly put a cross. Troy looked over his shoulder. ‘I see. So to reach it, you’d have to pass quite close to the platform.’

‘Not really. To get from here to here,’ he drew a diagonal line, ‘that’s the quickest way.’

‘And is that the way you went?’

‘Of course it is.’ Christopher stared at the sergeant. ‘What are you getting at?’ Then, realising, he laughed. ‘Oh come on ...’

The sergeant snatched up the sketch and studied it closely, eyes hooded to conceal his anger. Troy could stand anything he told himself, (untruthfully), except being laughed at.

‘I believe,’ said Barnaby, ‘that the dying man pointed at someone before he fell.’

‘He was standing with his arm stretched out, yes. Whether he meant to indicate anyone special, I don’t know.’

‘Doesn’t seem much sense in it otherwise.’

‘It’s been suggested,’ Troy replaced the paper, ‘that he was fingering Gamelin.’

‘Who by?’ Receiving no reply, Christopher continued, ‘Well you can understand that. He’s the outsider. No one can bear to think it’s one of us.’ He was shown the knife and glove and agreed that they both came from the kitchen, then said, ‘Suze has some ideas about what really happened. Quite honestly I think they’re a bit on the wild side. What I wanted to ask was, can I stay when you talk to her? She’s still pretty upset.’

‘Provided you don’t interrupt.’ Barnaby gestured towards the door.

‘Is that a good idea, Chief?’ said Troy, once Christopher had left.

‘I think so. The more relaxed and coherent she is, the sooner we’ll be through and on to the next one.’

‘Tell you something about that bloke - he dyes his hair.’ Troy presented this perception rather touchingly, as a dog might bring along an absurdly shaped bone. Barnaby, who had already noted the fact, said nothing. ‘Now he’s not the sort to try for street cred. He’s too young to be going grey. So why do it?’

The Gamelin girl must have been waiting outside for they were back already. Fresh tears lay on her cheeks and she was still in great distress. Barnaby never enjoyed questioning the grief-stricken but there was no doubt that it could be very fruitful, circumspection usually being the last thing on their minds. And so it proved now. No sooner had the girl sat down than she launched into a flood of anguished guilt-infested speech.

‘... it’s all my fault ... he was only here because of me ... and now he’s dead ... the most wonderful man. He was a saint ... he loved us all ... he had so much to offer the world ... so much to give ... you’ve no idea what has been destroyed here today ... wicked ... so wicked ... Ohhh I should never have come here ...’

She continued for a while longer. Wainwright held her hand and Barnaby tried to sort out the various ‘he’s’. Eventually she calmed down a little and wiped her eyes with her sari which already had many damp patches.

‘So you think this is all down to you, Miss Gamelin?’

‘My father would not have been here otherwise.’

‘You believe he was responsible for Mr Craigie’s death?’

‘I know he is ... I know he is ...’ She had leapt to her feet. ‘No one else would have done it. They had no reason. We all worshipped the Master. He was the centre of our world.’

‘So this “knowledge” is based on nothing more than emotional supposition?’

‘It’s based on proof. The Master when he was dying pointed directly at my father. It was unmistakeable.’

‘Were there not a whole group of people crowding round Miss Cuttle at the time? He might have been indicating any one of them.’

‘No.’

‘And the weapon?’ Barnaby pushed over the knife.

She looked at it and shuddered. ‘It was on a rack in the kitchen. He was in there this afternoon. That was my fault too. I actually left him alone while I carried some tea upstairs. He took it then. He must have been planning it all along.’

‘And the motive?’

‘Ha! The motive behind everything he does. Money. I came into a trust fund today ... my twenty-first. Half a million.’

Christopher gasped. ‘You didn’t tell -’

‘Mr Wainwright ...’ Barnaby held up his hand and nodded for her to continue.

‘I didn’t want it. It was just a burden.’

My God, the rich, Troy thought, the bloody rich. The idle fucking rich. A burden.

‘So I decided to give it away.’

Well look no further, lady. Here I am.

‘I wanted the commune to have it. The Master thought that was unwise. That I’d be sorry. He suggested I talk to my parents. Apart from the question of the money he thought we could heal our differences.’ She laughed again, another grating humourless syllable. ‘He was so naïve. He didn’t understand how terrible people can be.’

‘Tell me, Miss Gamelin -’

‘Don’t call me that! It’s not my name.’

‘Did your parents actually meet with Mr Craigie?’

‘My father did. They talked together for half an hour at seven o’clock. My mother was late arriving.’

‘Do you know anything of the outcome?’

‘Only that they were going to carry on the discussion later. I don’t think much of the Master’s influence rubbed off. My father was absolutely bloody at dinner.’

‘How did he react when you told him your decision about the trust fund?’

‘I didn’t. I left that to the Master.’

Barnaby glanced down at the sketch. ‘You recall him then, your father, as standing directly behind Mr Craigie’s chair?’

‘Yes. You can see why now. All he had to do was lean over and ... and ...’

‘It’s not quite as straightforward as that, is it? For instance you’ve just said that your father knew nothing of your decision to hand over the money until he talked to Craigie.’

‘That’s right.’

‘At seven o’clock.’

‘Yes.’

‘So why would he take the knife at five o’clock?’

‘Oh ...’

Troy wondered how she’d cope with that one. Always pleased to see anyone disconcerted, he strolled over and placed himself behind Barnaby to watch.

‘Well ... the money need not have been the only reason. I’d been talking about this place. Telling him how content I was.’

‘Surely no one could take offence at that?’

‘You don’t know him. He’s terribly jealous. He can’t bear me to be happy with anyone. After I left home he used to hang round in doorways and spy on me.’ She reached out and picked up the bag with the glove. ‘Did he wear this as well?’

‘We’re presuming whoever handled the knife wore it, yes.’

‘It’s a left-handed glove. He’s left-handed. They were in the kitchen as well. What more do you want? And May getting upset was the perfect distraction.’

‘Trouble about that, Miss Gamelin,’ perching on the table-edge, Troy repeated her name with some satisfaction, ‘is that it rather works against the premeditation theory. As he hadn’t been here before, how was he to know things would take such a dramatic turn?’

‘You’re going to let him wriggle out of it aren’t you?’ She glared at Troy with contemptuous disgust as if he were infinitely bribeable. ‘I should have known. Money gets you off any hook.’

Troy was furious. He was a lot of awful things but he was not corrupt, nor would he ever be. ‘You keep your bloody insults to -’

‘All right. Enough.’ The words were quietly spoken but Troy connected with the chief inspector’s gaze, slid off the table, turned away.

Barnaby realised that the determinedly exclusive cast of his present witness’ thought made further questioning pointless. Running out of factual evidence, there was a real danger she’d start dreaming something up. He let them both go and turned on his bag carrier.

‘What do you think you’re about, Troy? Letting yourself be provoked by a bit of a girl?’

‘Yeh ... well ...’

‘Well what?’

‘Nothing. Sir.’

Barnaby checked his list and sent the young constable for Mr Gibbs. Troy stood, stiff-backed, staring down at the old Gestetner. It had a yellow sticker refusing Nuclear Power with a polite ‘No Thanks’. The mildness of Barnaby’s reprimand in no way mitigated, to Troy’s mind, its hurtful timing. To be pulled up like that in front of a policeman still damp behind the ears, plus two members of the public, was unforgivable. Crashingly insensitive to the feelings of others, Troy’s own sensibilities were fragile to a fault. He was on his high horse at the merest hint of criticism.

‘See if you can get some water. I’m parched.’

‘Right.’ Troy moved with Jeevesian formality towards the door.

‘And refuse all alternatives. Especially that unspeakable substitute for Ronseal. I wouldn’t clean my drains with it.’

When Troy opened the door, Guy Gamelin was there. He moved forwards and the sergeant immediately took several steps back.

‘I’m returning to my hotel now. I should be there until tomorrow morning. Chartwell Grange, outside Denham.’

Barnaby rose to his feet. ‘Mr Gamelin,’ and indicated the empty chair. ‘A few things I’d like to ask before you leave.’

The two men sized each other up. Guy remained standing. He also remained uncooperative, saying, ‘Can’t say’ or ‘No idea’ to Barnaby’s first few questions. And he declined the invitation to draw a sketch.

‘I don’t remember where I was, let alone anyone else. With the exception of that stupid cow mooing and rolling about on the floor.’

‘You don’t have a lot of time for this organisation then?’

‘A load of self-deceiving weak-minded histrionic wankers.’

‘In that case you can’t have been pleased to find your daughter living here.’ At this remark, Guy’s formidable jaw thrust forward slightly and his breathing quickened. But he did not reply. ‘I understand,’ continued Barnaby, ‘that you and she have been estranged for some years.’

‘If you choose to believe the gutter press.’

‘Isn’t it true then?’

‘Moderately. Not that it’s any of your bloody business.’

The adverb seemed inappropriate. Gamelin struck the chief inspector as a most immoderate man, the sort to fly from one extreme of heightened emotion to another.

‘Tell me - had you met Craigie before this evening?’

‘No.’

‘What was your opinion of him?’

‘He was a con man.’

Takes one to know one. Troy was staring enviously at the watch on Gamelin’s wrist. A glittering oval of pale gold and crystal with an immaculate display of Roman numerals all on a platinum trellised band. Cost me a few years’ salary that, thought the sergeant.

‘He was trying to take Sylvie for half a million. But I’ve no doubt you’ve discovered that by now.’ Barnaby went in for a bit of ambiguous throat-clearing. And waited. ‘I’ve come across some shysters in my time - the City’s full of them - but he was something else. He not only tried to dissuade Sylvie from giving the money. He asked me to talk her out of it as well.’

‘Wasn’t that a bit risky?’

‘Not at all. You don’t understand how these fakers work. That’s the final move. Like the end of a haggle in the market place. The customer walks away knowing he’ll be called back because he’s got the whip hand. All this pretence made Craigie look good, y’see. Reinforced the saintly image.’

There was something in the voice and in the bloodshot piggy eyes that did not quite ring true. Or marry with the words. What was it? Envy? Disappointment? A failure of belief? It could even have been, thought Barnaby, desolation. Gamelin was speaking again, vindictively shoring up the character assassination.

‘What Craigie was into, was what all these guru types are into - money and power. That’s how they get their spiritual rocks off.’ Black misery coloured every word.

‘You’ve not seen the light then, Mr Gamelin?’ asked Troy.

‘I’ve seen the dark,’ replied Guy. ‘It’s preferable believe me. You know where you are in the dark.’

‘That why you killed him, Mr Gamelin? Because of the money?’

‘You what ...’ So quiet. Words with no sibilants yet making a sort of hiss. Gamelin leaned forward, clenching the table’s edge. He pushed his face - a meatball of congested flesh - to within an inch of the chief inspector’s. ‘Listen to me. You watch your fucking step. I’ve eaten people twice your size. I sharpen my teeth on men like you.’

Spittle coated his bristling chin as his expression of frustrated rage intensified. Fury flowed untrammelled across the narrow space between the two men. Barnaby sat quite still, a clot of saliva on his tie, unimpressed by the third-rate dialogue but very impressed indeed by the measure and quality of Gamelin’s ferocity. He had never had a boiler explode in his face but felt the time might well be nigh. Beneath his hand the table shivered.

Troy, who had been on the point of moving forward, stayed where he was and watched. They could have been a pair of great bull moose at the start of the season. Shoulders solid, foreheads low. Troy observed his chief’s impassive unflinching profile with a stirring of collaborative pride. He thought as he turned his attention to Gamelin, you’ve picked the wrong one there boyo.

Barnaby produced the glove. ‘We believe whoever used the knife wore this. You were seen hiding it.’

‘Who told you that?’

‘Do you deny it, Mr Gamelin?’

‘No.’ He was drawing his rage back. Hoarding it now. Barnaby noticed a blue rim on the inside of the slack lower lip. Gamelin sat down breathing carefully, evenly. His hand rested briefly on his breast pocket. Came away.

‘Do you want something to drink, Mr Gamelin? A glass of water?’

‘No. Nothing.’ He sat quietly for a while then said, ‘The glove. After the bearded dwarf with the stupid name had gone to the phone for an ambulance and the others were staring at each other not knowing what to do, I reached for a handkerchief and the glove came out with it.’

‘Someone must have noticed that surely, sir?’ asked Troy.

‘I didn’t think so at the time. I was on my own you see - at the far end of the room. Persona non grata. Been like that all night. They wouldn’t even let me sit by her at dinner. Said they always kept to the same seat.’ He made to touch his cheek. ‘I put it straight back. It was plain what had happened. Whoever killed the man was planning to incriminate me. I went over to the window, waited until I thought I was unobserved, then stuck the glove behind the curtain.’

‘Are you left-handed?’

‘As it happens.’

‘I can see that may well have been as you describe, Mr Gamelin. But there’s also the matter of the dying man pointing you out ...’

To Barnaby’s surprise Gamelin made no attempt to deny or explain the fact. Nor did he attempt to bluster it away.

‘Yes. I can’t understand that. Plays perfectly into the murderer’s hands of course. Backs up the glove to perfection.’

‘Perhaps ...’ Barnaby tested the water, offered a way out. ‘If you were part of the group ...?’

‘No. It was me all right. I was standing a little away from the others. It’s funny but I thought at the time he was trying to tell me something.’ He shrugged, appearing slightly confused. ‘A bit thin but that’s it.’

Bloody thin, thought the chief inspector. Trouble was, Gamelin didn’t seem like a man to dissimulate. He just didn’t give a cuss what anyone thought or felt or said about him. A position of extreme strength or extreme arrogance according to your point of view. The chief inspector, a modest way along that path himself, naturally favoured the former. He asked if Guy had any ideas of his own on who might be guilty.

‘None at all. I don’t know enough about the set-up here. Quite honestly I wouldn’t have thought any of them had the guts to swat a fly.’ He was silent for a moment then said, ‘I’m ideal, aren’t I? The outsider bringing in all the nasty ways of the wicked world. All the hands here, whiter than white. Mine, redder than red. You’ve got to hand it to the cunning buggers.’ His throat released a short explosive clatter. ‘Praahh.’ Belatedly Barnaby recognised a laugh.

‘Do you believe then that you were invited specifically for that purpose?’

‘Of course not. I was asked down by Craigie himself. He’s hardly likely to collude in his own death. Unless ...’ he looked across at Barnaby, alert and interested, the boiling fury of a minute ago apparently quite forgotten, ‘unless my visit was suggested to him by someone else, which means this was all planned some time ago. Perhaps ... at the last minute ... he understood. That could be why he was pointing me out ... as a warning ...’

Troy had come across some smart examples of thinking on your feet but for sheer nattiness that took some beating. Guilty as hell and giving them a twinkle-toes runaround. He couldn’t understand why the chief was even pretending to go along with it. Both men were getting up.

Barnaby said, ‘I shall want to talk to you again, Mr Gamelin. Tomorrow.’

Gamelin did not reply. He walked to the door, his exit vastly more restrained than his arrival. His massive shoulders slumped and there was tiredness in his step. When the door had closed, Troy said, ‘Why didn’t you arrest him?’

Barnaby waited for the tag line. Open-and-shut case. Handed on a plate. Bang to rights. Short and curlies. In the matter of the well-worn apothegm, Troy stood alone.

‘We can pick him up in the morning. We’ll know more clearly where we are when we’ve finished the interviews. So far it’s pretty circumstantial.’

Behind the Boss’s back, Troy shook his head in disbelief. How much plainer could anything be? Obviously Gamelin was going to say the glove was planted. Who wouldn’t? Talk about snoringly obvious! But he’d got the motive, opportunity, both to take the knife and use it and, most damning of all, the murder victim had fingered him. The man was over a barrel. For a traitorous moment Troy wondered if he had been wrong about his chief’s imperviousness to the seductive power of wealth.

Barnaby was muttering now, apparently to himself. Troy listened, thinking he might not have heard aright. Something about always being sorry for Caliban. He remembered the earlier request for water and moved off.

By the time the sergeant returned, Arno was being questioned. He was sitting nervously hunched up, looking intently at the chief inspector. Encouraged to do a sketch, he had produced a host of stick figures - one flat on its back, toes turned up, hands crossed on breast and a ‘Smiley’ face. Barnaby having ascertained Arno’s position in the commune and noticed his extreme agitation, left the dark heart of the matter temporarily aside.

‘Tell me Mr Gibbs, what do you think will happen here now? To the Manor House for instance.’

‘I don’t know. I just don’t know.’ Arno sounded deeply melancholic. He was ashamed to admit, even to himself, that once having absorbed the distressing fact that the Master was no more he had thought of little else but his own possible future. How would things fall out if the commune broke up? Who would look after Tim? And, most important of all, how on earth could he survive without the robust and serene presence of his dear love? Denied that radiant gaze that lit and sustained each awakening, and benevolently solaced the going down of the sun, his own life would hardly be worth the living.

‘You have no idea how the property is entailed?’

‘No. Actually I don’t think anyone has. Somehow it was never discussed.’

‘Did members have to buy into the organisation? Shares - that sort of thing?’

‘Not at all. We just pay our way. The Lodge made money from courses and workshops. We were planning to apply for charitable status actually. Become a trust but ...’ He gave a defeated shrug.

‘Did you know about Miss Gamelin’s bequest to the commune?’

‘No. I do now - they were just talking about it.’

‘And this evening ...’ Arno braced himself. ‘What do you think actually happened?’

‘God - I don’t know. It was so terrible ... so confusing ... One minute he - the Master - was guiding May through her regression -’

‘You mean verbally?’ Barnaby interrupted.

‘Yes.’

‘First we’ve heard about that,’ said Troy severely and Arno looked abashed as if he were personally at fault. ‘How does it work?’

‘He asks questions - what do you see now? Where are you? That sort of thing. And May replies. This time she touched down in Roman Britain. He asked if she could describe anything and she began to tell us about the tent. I think that was the last time he spoke. Shortly after that she began to make the most dreadful noises. Of course we all ran to see if she was all right.’

‘Why “of course”, Mr Gibbs?’ said Troy. ‘We’ve been led to understand such reactions were not uncommon.’

‘Oh, it’s never been as bad as that before. But she will persist. She has the bravest heart and an unquenchable thirst for knowledge.’

Troy noted a tremolo in the vocals and the sudden emotional ducking of the little red beard, and thought, hullo - we’ve got a gruesome twosome in the making here or I’m a monkey’s uncle. If middle-aged people in love knew how grotesque they looked they might take up something more seemly. Like exposing themselves in the park.

‘We were warned that today would be special. Ken - speaking as Zadekiel that is - said the cosmic energy released was tremendous. And of course there was the omen. They have to send one you know - the Karmic Board - if a grand master is to be withdrawn from the physical octave. Unfortunately we didn’t see the link until it was too late. The others thought they’d sent Astarte, goddess of the moon, in the shape of Mrs Gamelin. My own feeling is that the omen was May’s accident -’

‘Yes, Mr Gibbs. She told us about the accident,’ said Barnaby.

‘Oh. I beg your pardon.’ Arno looked at them both then added: ‘I must say you seem to be taking it very lightly.’

‘We’ve got a murder to concentrate on,’ said Troy. ‘Now, are you of the opinion that Craigie pointed out Guy Gamelin before he died?’

Arno was gravely hesitant. ‘Well ... you know ... one is reluctant to say anything that might ... but yes. That was my impression. But that’s not to say the gesture was an accusation.’

‘What else do you think a murdered man is going to use the last seconds of his life for?’ asked Troy.

Arno looked deeply upset at this and became even more so when Barnaby said, ‘We shall have to talk to this retarded boy I’m afraid. I understand you know something of his background.’

‘Oh you can’t do that! He’s withdrawn, hardly coherent. It’d just be a waste of time.’

‘He’s a witness, Mr Gibbs.’ Barnaby glanced down at his sketches. ‘Actually sitting at Craigie’s feet. Closer to him than anyone. He may have seen something.’

‘He’s asleep. Please let him rest.’ Arno’s freckled skin was beaded with luminous sweat. ‘His world has come to an end.’

‘In the morning, then.’ Arno’s alarm was palpable. Barnaby added gently, ‘We’re not monsters you know.’

‘Of course not. I wasn’t meaning to imply ... oh dear. Could I be present?’

‘In the case of the mentally ill someone has to be, Mr Gibbs. And if you think you’re the best person - by all means.’

They talked to Mrs Gamelin next and the conversation, though not short on entertainment value, was in all other respects an absolute frost. May, leading the police towards the communal sitting-room, described Felicity as ‘rather poorly and resting’.

Troy had already volunteered the information that the lady was a smackhead. As they walked along he added, ‘Crashed the car. They found some stuff. Lost her licence. It was in the Sun.’

‘Surely not,’ replied Barnaby.

‘Bet she’s tranqued out of her skull.’

Face to face with Felicity, Barnaby felt his sergeant might well be right. Her huge eyes beneath smudged purple lids swivelled and slipped all ways. The hands made delicate broken movements. Up as if to touch her face, changing direction, plucking at her dress, scrabbling in her tangled hair. Her face was shrunken and seemed to fold in on itself, pinched and tiny, like a worried marmoset’s.

Felicity became aware that people were present. One was talking rather persistently and his voice rattled inside her head, making no recognisable sounds. He pushed a piece of paper of a pleasant pale shade her way. Felicity admired it politely and handed it back. He offered it again with a pencil and seemed to be urging her to try it out. She smiled, quite agreeable to this suggestion for she had loved drawing as a child. She spent a long time bending over the paper and the result, Barnaby had to admit, was not unattractive. Several quite charming horses, one with only three legs and a garland of flowers big as cabbages round its neck.

Felicity then asked for a drink and Troy got her some water. She hadn’t meant water and poured it over his trousers. Shortly afterwards the interview came to an end.

While it was going on, and directly overhead, Trixie was walking up and down. She had been chain-smoking and the air was acrid and stale. ‘Why are they taking so long?’

‘I expect they want to talk with everyone. It’s only been ...’ Janet turned the Snoopy alarm round, ‘an hour and a half since they first arrived. That’s not bad.’

‘You’re not waiting are you?’

‘I don’t know why you’re getting into such a state. You didn’t have anything to do with it.’ She crossed to the window and pulled aside a curtain to reveal a low hanging sliver of moon. Cold and sharp, like a scythe.

‘Don’t do that. You know I hate the night.’ Janet let the curtain fall. ‘What are they like?’

Janet recalled narrow lips, a fiery brush cut. ‘All right.’

‘Are you sure you told them about the glove?’

‘I’ve already said a dozen -’

‘And that you were the one who saw him hide it?’

‘Yes. How many more times?’

‘Then they should have arrested him, shouldn’t they? I don’t understand it.’

You and me both, thought Janet sadly. But I know it all goes back to this afternoon. After the first fierce rebuff she hadn’t questioned Trixie again, but it had not been difficult to guess at the reasons for the girl’s smeared make-up, milk-white face and held-together clothes. So Janet, guessing at revenge, understood when Trixie had explained what she wanted her to do.

‘The thing is Jan - I saw him hide the thing. I really did. I wouldn’t ask you to tell otherwise. The trouble is, once Gamelin knew who shopped him he’d tell them I was making it up out of spite and they’d believe him.’

‘Why?’

‘Because he’s rich and powerful, stupid.’

‘Then why can’t we both say we saw it? I’d back you up.’

‘I don’t want to be in it at all.’

So Janet had told her lie, still not sure if Trixie spoke the truth but sympathising with, indeed almost sharing, her friend’s need to exchange a hurt for a hurt.

There was a knock at the door and a policewoman asked if Miss Channing could spare a few moments.

‘They’re very civil, aren’t they?’ said Trixie. ‘I wonder what they’d be like if I told them to take a running jump.’

‘Don’t antagonise people unnecessarily. And don’t take those cigarettes. You’ve already had -’

‘Oh for heaven’s sake, stop clucking. You’re like a bloody old hen.’

Troy had no complaints about the cigarettes. As wreaths of smoke surrounded Trixie’s blonde curls, his nostrils flared - sucking in such wisps as came his way. It helped to take his mind off his soggy trousers. She sat, knees very close together, gripping a golden box of Benson’s and a lighter.

Barnaby could see she was frightened. Smell it too. A scent both sour and intemperate. He’d met it before, had attempted to describe it once and the nearest comparison he could find was to the smell released when digging out old nettles. He asked if she’d been at the Manor House long.

‘A few weeks. Why? What’s that got to do with all this?’

‘Could you be more precise?’

‘No. I’ve forgotten the exact date.’

‘Do you like it here?’ His tone was courteous yet she took immediate offence.

‘I suppose you think I don’t belong. Just because I’m not wearing a wafty frock and chanting hallelujah.’

Troy chuckled. Trixie looked at him in surprise, then mistakenly believing his response to be sympathetic, with sly interest. She then assured Barnaby that she could not help at all regarding the death of ‘our poor Master’, though her sketch showed her to be sitting very close.

‘But it was kind of dark, you see. We rushed to help May then the light came on and it was all over. He pointed Guy Gamelin out. But I expect everyone has told you that.’ She looked at him expectantly.

‘There seems to be some difference of opinion there,’ lied Barnaby.

‘Oh no - it was absolutely clear. Directly at him.’ She flushed, recognising her insistence on the matter. ‘Also I heard upstairs he was seen hiding a glove. It must have been the one he wore to hold the knife.’

‘Had you met Gamelin before today, Miss Channing?’

‘Blimey - I don’t move in those circles.’ Then, as if remembering her persona, ‘They’re so materialistic, aren’t they?’

‘You seem to be quite sure that he’s the guilty party.’

‘I don’t see who else it could have been.’

‘May Cuttle is of the opinion,’ said Barnaby, ‘that the despatch was brought about by supernatural means.’

Trixie laughed. A spontaneous robust shout of amusement, fear momentarily flown. Troy said, ‘You’re not a believer then?’

‘Oh -’ A devout expression appeared with such speed as to make her look positively silly. ‘Yes - I’m a disciple of course. Just not that far along the road.’

If you’re a disciple, my girl, thought Barnaby, taking in the perky breasts, glossy lips and flashy triple wedges, I’m Joan Collins. She was back on Gamelin again.

‘Is ... um ... is he still here?’ When Barnaby became engaged with some papers and did not reply, she added, ‘We need to know you see ... if someone’s staying overnight.’ Another pause. ‘To make up the bed ... and food ...’

Finally the chief inspector took pity on her. ‘I believe Mr Gamelin has returned to his hotel.’

‘You let him go!’

‘I shouldn’t worry about it,’ said Troy. ‘We keep a close eye. On everyone.’

Grumbling that it wouldn’t be of any use, Trixie did a sketch and then Barnaby released her. As the door closed, Troy said, ‘A worried girl, Chief.’

‘She’s hiding something that’s for sure. So’re Wainwright and Gibbs. Yet when I pressed the murder button none of them jumped. Now why is that?’

‘Wheels within wheels, I’d say.’

‘It was Gamelin set her off. Claims she’s never met him before today, yet can’t wait to stuff an apple in both ends, truss him up and bung him in the oven. If there’s one thing I can’t stand,’ he got up, moving stiffly, ‘it’s being railroaded.’

‘Talk to him again in the morning?’

‘Oh yes. We’ll bring him in I think. Meanwhile - drop these off at Forensic on your way home.’

Troy took the plastic bags. The lab was not on his way home. In fact it was not on anyone’s, but if it was on anyone’s way home then it was more on the chief inspector’s way home than it was on his sergeant’s way home ...

Saying ‘Right you are sir’ he foisted them on to Constable Fluffy and reached thankfully for the fifth cigarette.

Guy was slumped in a wide deep armchair in front of the flickering television set. He had undressed but he had not bathed. He had called his lawyer but he had not cleaned his teeth. He was wearing socks, boxer shorts and a sweat-stained unbuttoned shirt. Links removed, the cuffs flopped down - covering the backs of his hands.

His body was motionless apart from occasional movements towards a freshly filled ice bucket, but his mind stormed and raged. He felt nauseous, although whether this was because of what he had drunk (the bottle of whisky ordered that afternoon was almost empty), or because of the foul, seething blackness inside his head, he neither knew nor cared.

He was devoured by thoughts of Sylvie. Obsessed by the recollection that it was she who had been closest to him when they had all been bending over May. And on his left; side sinister. The side on which the glove was found. Her flowing robes could have concealed it perfectly as they could the knife. This fact, coupled with the knowledge that it was only because of her he had been there in the first place, pointed to the agonising assumption that he might have been set up. And struggle as he might against the idea, within his fog of alcohol and morbid introspection, Guy was unable to put it quite aside. His skull ached with the effort of trying to do so and the muscles in his neck were like knots of steel. The more he twisted and turned, the more remorselessly logical did the hot depths of his imaginings seem to be.

It explained why she had lured him into the kitchen and left him alone - so that he should have easy access to the knife and glove. And most terrible of all, her instant accusation. For, after the first hellish seconds when the lights went on and they had all stared immobile and disbelieving at the falling white-robed figure, Sylvie had turned on her father, shouting, ‘You ... you ...’ and struck him across the cheek, her nails searing the flesh.

Someone had restrained her and Guy had backed away, assuming the position and rôle of pariah in which the police discovered him. Had it formed then - the first suspicion? The evil little canker. Guy groaned and reached for more ice, rummaging in the bucket with his glass, using it like a shovel. He poured whisky over the cubes. It slopped about, some going into the bucket, some on to the tray. The room reeked of it: a peaty, raw-paper smell. He drained the stuff in two gulps.

Muddied in with the dreadful apprehension of his daughter’s treachery was a mixture of irritation and resentment against the dead man. They had been going to talk again. Guy had wanted that. Although there had not been even the faintest trace of the judgemental in either Craigie’s attitude or conversation, Guy knew he himself had not come out of their earlier encounter well and the knowledge rankled. He felt that he had come across simply as a man with an out-of-control super-ego. But there was more to him than that. And life, in any case, had made him what he was. No one who hadn’t been there knew what it took to climb out of the gutter. The energy and determination, the terrible transforming cost. A moment of weakness and you were face down again in the sewage with a dozen spiked boots ramming the back of your neck. If he could have told Craigie that ...

Guy remembered the stillness in that empty, quiet room. The feeling that he had briefly laid down the burden that was Guy Gamelin. A burden he had not even realised he carried. If he went back, if he were allowed to go back, would the silence still be there? And could it really heal?

Even as he posed the question he became angry at the gullibility that provoked it. Craigie was a trickster, right? Right. An impresario putting on a show with a bit of silk and sunlight. Remember that.

‘Remember that.’ Nodding vigorously in selfconvincement, Guy returned his glass to the bucket and unscrewed the whisky bottle.

Seeking distraction he applied himself to the television set, screwing up his eyes in an effort to distinguish and separate the blobby shapes on the screen. A woman washing up, a little girl with shining hair standing next to her on a box. They were having a serious conversation about cutting grease. The woman gave a false ‘maternal’ laugh and placed a sparkly bit of foam on the tip of the child’s nose. Guy zapped channels but the damage had been done.

Renascent deprivation gripped his heart and with it the final cruel apprehension that it really was too late. That what he wanted, what he yearned for, was not his daughter - that tall duplicitous stranger - but the child that she once was. Flesh of his flesh. The utter hopelessness of this desire quite overcame him and his face became disfigured by grief.

He caught sight of himself in the cheval glass across the room. Swags of flab hanging over the elasticated band of his shorts, wet matted chest hair, face the colour of uncooked pastry and running with perspiration, whisky stains down his shirt. As he stared at this gross and repulsive figure, a powerful visceral queasiness made itself felt. Then an overwhelming sensation of physical heat. Guy put his head between his knees.

The room tilted and slid first one way then the other. He sat up again, hanging on to the braided edge of the armchair. He was going to be sick. Struggling, heaving and pushing, he somehow got to his feet and started towards the bathroom. Half way there he felt an astonishing fierce tearing sensation in his chest as if someone was ripping it open with a bill hook. He cried out and stood swaying, looking round.

The pills were in his jacket. Guy moved slowly, dragging legs weighty as marble columns. A step away, a second tear knocked him off his feet. He lay on his back till the worst was past then forced himself up on one elbow and, raising his other arm, grabbed the table. He got the edge of the fruit bowl, dislodged a small card. Apples and oranges, pears and bananas rained down, hit him in the face and bounced off.

Impossible to try again. The pain was back, this time in iron hoops. Guy fell back against the carpet and let it devour him.