Murder at the Villa Byzantine

22

Phantom Lady

‘I scribbled my phone number on a piece of paper and slipped it to him,’ he told his aunt some forty-five minutes later as she was buttering a second crumpet for him.

‘Most enterprising of you. You think he’ll ring you?’

‘I believe so, yes.’ Payne glanced at his watch. ‘As soon as he gets rid of her. The moment I said “Melisande Chevret”, his eyes rounded – became as big as saucers. The name seemed to strike a chord at once. He gave several nods when I put an imaginary phone to my ear and mimed dialling a number.’

‘How perfectly extraordinary. What d’you think has been going on, Hughie?’

Payne looked up at the ceiling. ‘Weird things. Crazy things. Things no normal person would do. That is how Stella’s daughter put it.’

‘Surely, Hughie, you can’t take anything that gel says seriously? From what you’ve told me, she’s not to be trusted one little bit.’

‘In this particular instance,’ Payne said thoughtfully, ‘I am prepared to give Moon a chance.’

‘You don’t think the gel chopped her mother’s head off?’

‘She might have done, but, as it happens, I don’t think she did.’

‘You suspect Miss Hope?’

‘I suspect Miss Hope, though of course no such person as “Miss Hope” exists. I believe that Miss Hope is in fact the actress Melisande Chevret.’

‘Heaven knows I am no expert, but I bet you’ll find in the end that the gel did do it after all.’

‘Well, you may be right, darling. It may be her, as you say. I am doing my best to keep an open mind. As a matter of fact, I haven’t counted anybody out yet. Not even Tancred Vane. Or James Morland.’

‘The garden of live flowers. I find I have started saying the first thing that pops into my head. Is that a sign of dotage?’ Lady Grylls poured herself more tea. ‘Are you comfortable in that chair? You don’t think this room is too narrow?’

‘No, not at all. It’s comfortable. It’s cosy.’

‘I must admit I feel a little cramped up here, Hughie. I know I wanted a house in St John’s Wood more than anything in the world, but now that I’ve got it, I find myself regretting my decision. Last night I dreamt I went to Chalfont again.’

‘You aren’t serious. After everything you said!’

‘I find this place too small and stuffy, Hughie.’

‘You used to find Chalfont too big and draughty.’

‘Do you think it’s perverse of me?’

‘As a matter of fact I do, darling. Terribly perverse.’

‘You don’t think I could change my mind and buy Chalfont back?’

‘No. Too late. The Russians won’t have it. They’ll laugh at you – or shoot you. Given how hard you bargained and how you bullied them and how you drove them mad and everything. You got exactly the price you wanted.’

‘They can have their filthy money back, down to the last rouble.’

‘That would be a ridiculously large amount of roubles. Actually, they paid you in pounds. What garden of live flowers? Is that Genet? No, I’m thinking of Our Lady of the Flowers.’

‘It’s in Alice, actually. To find the Red Queen, Alice had to go in the most unlikely direction. It all happens in the garden of live flowers,’ Lady Grylls explained, ‘and that’s how detectives in detective stories try to find the killer, I believe? I expect Antonia’s making pots of money out of her books?’

‘No, not pots.’

‘What’s Our Lady of the Flowers about?’

‘Male prison romances. Not for your tender eyes.’

‘Must make a note to ask Provost to get it out of the library for me. Now then, back to l’affaire Stella. Let me see whether I’ve got this right.’ Lady Grylls pushed her glasses up her nose. ‘The dead woman’s daughter told you that her mother was convinced that the old nanny she met at the Villa Byzantine was no other than Melisande Chevret in disguise?’

‘That is correct.’ Payne bit into a crumpet.

‘Stella believed that Melisande took James Morland’s desertion jolly badly, that she tipped over the edge. Stella feared she might be in danger. Stella imagined that Melisande might steal one of Tancred Vane’s treasured possessions – or even kill Tancred Vane – and make it look as though Stella had done it?’

‘Yes. Or that she herself might be killed.’

Lady Grylls observed that the late Stella appeared to have been rather a paranoid sort of person.

‘Maybe not so paranoid, darling. Stella did die a spectacular and rather gruesome death after all, don’t forget.’

Idly Payne picked up a pen and started drawing something on one of the napkins. That handkerchief, he thought. How did the handkerchief fit into the new set-up? Did it fit in at all?

‘How did Melisande manage to lure Stella to the Villa Byzantine?’ Lady Grylls asked. ‘Have you any ideas?’

‘Um. She asks someone to phone Stella and pretend to be Vane. Some trusted friend from the acting fraternity – an old flame – or her ghastly agent Arthur… Stella is asked to go to the Villa Byzantine. Melisande – as Miss Hope – has already ascertained that Vane would be out that morning. Melisande has already stolen one of his front door keys. She gets into the house, unhooks the sword and then waits for Stella?’

‘Are you going to involve the police? Or are you and Antonia playing a lone hand?’

‘The good old days of the solitary sleuth are over, alas. The police are already involved in any case.’ Payne took a sip of tea. ‘I’ve been trying to imagine the kind of guff Melisande – as Miss Hope – has been feeding Vane.’

‘Tales of Balkan imbroglios, princely picnics and duels at dawn? D’you think she made everything up?’

‘Well, she must have done. Perhaps not everything. She probably did research and got some of her facts from various royal biographies – but I expect her imagination has been central to the enterprise.’

‘She must be frightfully convincing. Or else this Tancred Vane is a complete sap. Is he a complete sap?’

‘Something of the well-bred naif about him. A pleasant enough chap, but not a terribly forceful personality. All right, a bit of a sap, perhaps… When I first met Melisande Chevret, I decided she couldn’t be a very good actress, mainly on account of her manner being so affectedly actressy, but clearly I was wrong. She must be terribly good after all.’

‘Something’s not right, Hughie. I don’t know exactly what I mean, but- Very well, let’s assume it was Melisande Chevret who killed Stella. Her aim was to eliminate Stella, and that she managed to achieve, correct?’

‘Correct.’

‘Why then, in the name of sanity, did she continue visiting the Vane fellow? What was the point? You said she was in his house today. We are now – what? Five days after the murder? She’s achieved her aim. She’s got rid of her love rival and so on. So why doesn’t “Miss Hope” simply disappear?’

Major Payne scrunched up his face. ‘One possible explanation is that she has gone completely mad and she has actually persuaded herself she is “Miss Hope” now. Is that too feeble? Or she might have started playing some other, more sinister, game. She might be intent on ruining Tancred Vane’s reputation as a royal biographer. She might have taken against him, for some reason.’

‘She’s got a sister, did you say? What’s the sister like? Equally cuckoo?’

‘Not at all. Winifred is the soul of well-bred reserve. A paragon of discretion and good sense. Nothing like Melisande. Well, something must be done about Melisande Chevret – before it is too late.’

‘You think she might run amok or something?’

‘She might. Morland told me she’d been trying desperately to win his affections back. He got me on the phone this morning. He said he was unable – as well as reluctant – to go back to Melisande. He said that whatever he’d felt for her once was no more. But apparently she keeps ringing him. He has now stopped answering her calls. He believes she is unhinged.’

‘You look worried.’

‘I am worried about Vane. Why hasn’t he phoned? I hope he’s all right.’ Major Payne looked at his watch. ‘If she gets it into her head that he suspects her of not being who she says-’

The next moment Major Payne’s mobile phone rang – but it wasn’t Tancred Vane.