Murder at the Villa Byzantine

9

Hearing Secret Harmonies

An hour later they were sitting on the ottoman in Tancred Vane’s green-and-gold study, drinking coffee out of large snow-white cups and eating the delicious cake Miss Hope had made herself and brought with her. It was one of her very special walnut cakes that had a don’t-you-dare-cut-me-with-anything-but-a-silver-knife sort of air about it. Tancred had been only too happy to bring a silver knife from the kitchen. He had no great appetite but she urged him to eat. He needed to eat! She was treating him like a growing boy.

‘The police took the sword away-’

‘Ah – the sword! That noble sword! It was a samurai sword, wasn’t it? What can ail thee, knight at arms, alone and palely loitering?’

‘They need it for fingerprinting and – and blood analysis, I believe they said.’

‘Keats’ knight of course would have been carrying a different kind of sword altogether,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘Not a samurai one. I told you, didn’t I, that there was a samurai sword at the royal palace in Sofia?’

‘No, you didn’t.’ The way she sprang the most fascinating information on him! ‘Wait a minute.’ Tancred Vane produced his little notebook and pen. ‘Was the sword Prince Cyril’s?’

‘His brother’s. It belonged to the King, but Cyril couldn’t keep his hands off it. The sword was a present to Boris III from Hirohito, the Japanese Emperor, you know. The Japanese were to become allies. Fellow fascists, you know. Rome, Berlin and Tokyo. The notorious Axis. Those appalling POW camps! The way they treated our boys! Such beasts, the Japs. That’s what my dear father used to say-’ She broke off. ‘Sorry, I was telling you about something else. What was it?’

‘Cyril and the samurai sword.’

‘Oh dear. Yes. He would pick it up and brandish it from left to right and then from right to left, looking gleeful – swoosh-swoosh – around the Salle de l’Ambre – the Amber Chamber – swoosh-swoosh – making those ferocious “Japanese” noises… Aaargh! It drove the Queen mad! Giovanna couldn’t stand her brother-in-law.’

Tancred Vane reflected that many readers would be more interested in Prince Cyril and the sword than in, say, Prince Cyril’s Nazi sympathies and treachery, or the account of his kangaroo trial and summary execution.

‘I believe I tried to pick up the sword once or twice, didn’t I? I mean your sword. The murder weapon. So my fingerprints would be on it? I don’t think I was wearing gloves, was I?’ Miss Hope frowned. ‘Would that get me in trouble? Would the plod come pounding after me?’

‘Actually the inspector asked for your phone number. I’m sure it’s only routine. I gave it to him. You don’t mind, do you?’

‘Not in the least,’ she reassured him. ‘I’d be happy to talk to the plod, though of course I wouldn’t have much to say. How did my name crop up?’

‘I said I was expecting you. I kept looking at the clock. I told them you might come any moment – only you didn’t.’

‘I suppose that made them suspicious?’ The familiar dry laugh. ‘Did they take your fingerprints?’

‘They did. I also had to write a statement – um – explain how long I’d known Stella Markoff, the reason she’d been coming to my house and so on.’

‘How fatiguing for you!’

‘I can’t believe any of it happened.’

‘Neither can I! This murder yet is but fantastical.’ Miss Hope spoke in grave tones but there was an air of impish gaiety about her.

‘Isn’t it considered unlucky to quote Macbeth?’

‘Nonsense. The Scottish Play can only affect actors. Which, my dear boy, you and I are not.’ For some reason this made Miss Hope laugh till tears sprang from her eyes. ‘Can’t abide actors!’ She blew her nose with her handkerchief. ‘Detest the theatre!’

This was odd, Tancred Vane reflected, since Miss Hope seemed to know an awful lot about the theatre. Only a couple of days before she had quoted from Terence Rattigan’s The Sleeping Prince. Prince Cyril, she explained, had talked to British embassy officials in a manner similar to that employed by the Regent in the Rattigan play. She had also told Tancred how at the age of thirteen she had been taken to see an amateur production of Murder in Pupil Room, William Douglas Home’s very first play. Douglas Home had written the play while he was a pupil at Eton.

By a strange coincidence Tancred Vane had always called his study Pupil Room. Strange coincidences seemed to be happening all the time with Miss Hope, from the very moment his collaboration with her had started. Objects she saw at the Villa Byzantine, or something she heard him say, seemed to trigger off the most extraordinary memories. It was almost as if they had been meant to meet and collaborate on this project.

She had entered his life a month before, completely unexpectedly. She had answered his ad. Was it only a month? It felt as though he had known her all his life! He felt at peace when they were together. They moved in perfect harmony. He adored her. She had become indispensable. She was now part of his life.

Miss Hope wore a sensible tweed skirt and a heather-coloured blouse. She sported a hairnet over her carefully arranged white hair and an anachronistic rimless pince-nez on a black ribbon. She sat very straight. She was the English nanny par excellence, the last of a vanishing breed, yet, he reflected, there was something archetypal about her. The wise woman – the fairy godmother – the white witch – the eternal aunt figure – one of Barbara Pym’s excellent women. Eccentric, faintly preposterous, yet kindly and reassuring and spouting sound no-nonsense advice.

‘You are a funny colour, Tancred.’ She reached out and held him by the chin. ‘Show me your tongue – say aah – wider – wider! This looks all right, but when I leave, I want you to go to bed. Promise you will. Pull the blinds down, let your head hit the pillow and start counting – no, not sheep – coronets. That would be more your thing. Envisage peers. A sea of peers in ermine cloaks – each with a coronet on his head. Say you promise?’

‘I promise…’ A curious happiness, a contentment, a warm glow crept over him.

‘Good! No, don’t move. Your tie is a bit askew. Your terrible tartan bow-tie! Let me-’ Once more she leant towards him. ‘There! The perfect butterfly effect.’

‘Is my bow-tie terrible?’

‘An absolute fright, but then there is no accounting for tastes, is there? Why the long face now? Vane by name, vain by nature! All right, you silly boy, your bow-tie makes you look like an auctioneer at Christie’s! That better?’ She patted his cheek.

He reached out for his notebook. ‘One thing I wanted to ask you. What was the colour of Prince Cyril’s eyes exactly?’

‘Cyril’s eyes? I am sure I have told you. You’ve started asking me the same questions twice, Tancred!’ She laughed. She wagged her forefinger at him. ‘I hope you aren’t testing me, are you?’

‘No, of course not. It’s just-’

‘Windsor blue. Cyril’s eyes were Windsor blue. There!’

‘I’ve been reading Chips Channon’s diaries and Chips refers to Prince Cyril’s “dark satanic gaze”. Apparently Prince Cyril’s were the only dark eyes among the royalty that attended George V’s funeral in 1936. Chips Channon is usually quite accurate over little details like that.’

‘I do believe Cyril’s eyes changed colour,’ she said slowly. ‘They were like the sea. On a “good” day, that is when he hadn’t drunk the night before and didn’t have a hangover, his eyes appeared much lighter. This does suggest, doesn’t it, that he must have been drinking heavily the night before George V’s funeral? I must say Cyril drank an awful lot, like the proverbial fish. Now you must tell me something.’ She leant forward. ‘How did this Stella manage to get in?’

‘I have absolutely no idea. Perhaps I forgot to lock the front door. I never gave her a key.’

‘She might have stolen one of your duplicate keys from the hall the last time she was here… How about that?’

‘Why should she want to do any such thing?’

‘I don’t know, Tancred, but, to tell you the truth, she struck me as a bit odd. I wouldn’t say “unhinged”, but she reminded me very strongly of-’ Miss Hope broke off. ‘No, that’s awfully unfair! All right, but you must promise you won’t laugh at me!’

‘I promise.’

‘Well, she reminded me very strongly of a woman who stole my poor father’s umbrella at an open-air event in Sofia in August 1941. The same soulful eyes, the same prim mouth, the same vague hair. There was thunder and lightning and it looked as though the heavens were about to open. The woman stopped us and asked the time, then she suddenly grabbed my father’s umbrella, just as he was about to open it, and skedaddled. She vanished into the night. We never saw her again.’

‘She stole your father’s umbrella?’

‘It all happened in a flash. My father was not amused! Now then, your three duplicate keys are prominently displayed on that wall board in the hall, correct? And as though that were not enough, you have actually attached tags with Front Door written out on each one of them! Most invitingly, if you know what I mean.’

‘As a matter of fact one of the keys is missing,’ he said sheepishly.

‘Are you serious? Goodness.’ She put down her coffee cup. ‘Did you tell the police?’

‘I did.’

‘You are too good, Tancred, too trusting. Too full with the milk of human kindness!’

‘But why should Stella want to come into the house while I was away?’

‘Why indeed! Well, one’s name is often an indicator. Stealing Stella. It would be different in Bulgarian, of course. No, no, we shouldn’t assault the integrity of someone who was destined to remain a stranger. Still, your house is full of treasures. Something may have caught her fancy. Not inconceivable, is it? One of your bibelots – or even the sword?’

‘Now that you mention it, she did ask to look at the sword the last time she was here.’ Tancred frowned. ‘She said her little girl would find it interesting – she’s got a daughter, apparently – but she wouldn’t try to steal the sword, would she? It’s too big!’

‘Where there’s a will, there’s a way,’ Miss Hope said firmly. ‘Shame you haven’t got a security alarm. Culpable carelessness, my Tancredi!’

Sometimes, when in one of her ‘Italian moods’, she addressed him as ‘Tancredi’.

‘I ordered a security system this morning.’

‘Being wise after the event, my Tancredi!’

There was a pause.

‘That day – when she met you – Stella Markoff behaved rather oddly,’ Tancred said. ‘She stared at you, did you notice?’

‘I did notice. Hard not to! Such big eyes! I thought it bad-mannered of her, but then Bulgarians do tend to stare, poor souls, even the so-called “better-class” ones.’

‘She seemed somewhat agitated – asked a lot of questions about you after you left.’

‘I know one mustn’t speak ill of the dead, Tancred, but she gave the impression of being a little peculiar – as well as of being a singularly unfulfilled woman. But what an awful way to die! To be deprived of one’s head! I believe the sword was in what they call “good working order”, wasn’t it?’

‘It was. It was extremely sharp.’

She shook her head. ‘The whole thing brings to mind a not very good detective story, if you know what I mean. Incidentally, Prince Cyril was terribly fond of Englische Kriminalgeschichten. Cyril adored Edgar Wallace. He had quite a collection of Edgar Wallace’s books, all in German translation. German was the language he spoke best. Not a congenial language, my father used to say. Designed for barking out orders and cracking crude jokes.’

Tancred picked up his pen. ‘I had no idea Prince Cyril liked Edgar Wallace.’

‘He adored Edgar Wallace. On one memorable occasion Cyril missed a dinner party at the Romanian embassy because he needed to finish Edgar Wallace’s Das Gasthaus an der Themse. He actually wrote a fan letter to Edgar Wallace in English and had it despatched to London through diplomatic channels.’

‘Did he receive a reply?’

A strange faraway light came into Miss Hope’s eyes. ‘I believe he did, yes. Edgar Wallace sent Cyril his autograph. The Guesthouse on the Thames, that’s correct. Well, few writers can resist the allure of royal patronage and second-rate writers are particularly susceptible. All of Edgar Wallace’s books are quite ghastly. I don’t suppose you have read any?’

‘No.’

‘He apparently boasted that he could write a book in a week! Well, let me tell you one thing – it shows! He had three secretaries, I read somewhere, sitting in the same room – he would walk about and dictate a different book to each one.’ She watched Tancred Vane as he scribbled in his notebook. ‘I hope you are feeling better?’

‘I am much better. Thanks to you.’

‘Jolly good.’ She beamed at him. ‘Jolly good.’ Suddenly she rose from her seat and smoothed down her skirt.

‘What’s the matter?’ He blinked. ‘You aren’t – you aren’t going, are you?’

‘I’m afraid I am. Don’t look so disappointed! I’m sure you will find sleep more salutary than my silly old yarns.’

‘I won’t! Must you go?’

‘Ah, Lady Antonia Fraser’s memoir. I’ve been reading it. What a terrifying creature the late Pinter seems to have been. Unfortunately, my answer, unlike hers, will have to be, yes, I must go. I am sorry, Tancred, but I’ve got to go. So much to do! All kinds of unresolved problems. My niece – my great niece, actually – an absolute calamity-’ Miss Hope broke off and shook her head. ‘Young people nowadays!’

‘When – when will you come again?’

‘Soon.’

‘When exactly?’

‘Soon.’

‘When is soon?’

‘Soon enough.’ She adjusted her hat and pushed the pince-nez up her nose. ‘Tomorrow afternoon, perhaps. At half-past three? We’ll have tea together. We’ll have a proper powwow then. And now – now you must go to bed.’

Tancred protested that he did not feel in the least sleepy.

‘You need to make an effort, my boy. All great artists need to die for a few hours in order to live for centuries. You wouldn’t want to develop into one of those insomniacs who get sent to a kurhaus in the mountains, would you? Have you ever been to a kurhaus? Such strange places! Staffed by werewolves and vampires, or so everybody said. Sinister sanatoria, my mother called them. They have them in the Balkans. Or used to.’

‘I’ll go to bed later,’ he prevaricated.

‘No. Now.’

‘How happy is he born and taught,’ Tancred quoted sullenly, ‘that serveth not another’s will.’

‘Whose armour is his honest thought – and simple truth his utmost skill. See? I know my Sir Henry Wotton!’ She patted his cheek. ‘Come on, let’s go. Chop-chop.’

‘Five more minutes?’

‘Chop-chop.’

‘Three minutes – please!’

She remained adamant. ‘Chop-chop.’

He sighed. She held the door open. She accompanied him to his room.

Tancred wondered whether a casual onlooker might not find their relationship a trifle on the odd side. Miss Hope had already suggested – as a joke, no doubt – that perhaps she could move into the Villa Byzantine and keep house for him. It was not inconceivable that a casual onlooker might get the idea that Miss Hope had a crush on him. He smiled. Ridiculous – impossible – at her age!

As he reached for his pyjamas, she turned round primly and faced the wardrobe. A minute later he lay in bed and she kissed his forehead lightly, then stepped back. Before she shut his bedroom door, she whispered through the crack, ‘Goodnight, sweet prince, and flights of angels sing you to sleep.’