Weekend
Gary had to admit feeling humbled by the undoubted
usefulness of the information about Bryn Thomas that Dorothy had learnt in
Cardiff. He had thought he was doing himself a favour by giving Dorothy
something to do, but now he realized that he would have a hard job matching her
expedition since Harry Marble had to be found first. Gary had been shocked to
hear that he had abused Jessie, although it gave him a good reason for arresting
the guy on the spot. But it was far from definite that he would find Marble
where Cleo thought he might be.
It took a long time to get to Brighton. The traffic going
south was horrendous. Several units had set up roadworks although it was
freezing cold; hardly seasonal weather for the kind of road-widening that
seemed to be taking place. The road-workers looked miserable and moved slowly,
though running around might have kept them warmer.
Eventually, Gary and Mia finally arrived and found the house
where Miss Riddle had lived with her niece Silvie. Silvie had been sentenced to
life imprisonment. Vengeance and resentment had got her and her mother there.
With Dr Marble dead at their hands, they could not enjoy the fruits of his life’s
work as a reputable solicitor who had always been at pains to hide his children,
Harry, Silvie and Jessie from the truth of their origin and judgment of his
clients, who were in the main upright and not given to hypocrisy. But Dr Marble
did not take chances and was not aware that his private life was an amusing
subject of tittle-tattle.
Mrs Riddle, the housekeeper who had called herself Mrs
because that was more respectable if Dickensian than admitting to spinsterhood,
had served Dr Marble in bed and out of it, but he had not married her. It was
thought to be the old story of class differences since Mrs Riddle was a humble,
but this time the old story had a twist. Not only had Dr Marble been ashamed of
his illegitimate children, but he was also embarrassed at being married to a
woman who was mentally unbalanced and had been shut away in a mental
institution after killing their legitimate child. Not getting a divorce was
part of Dr Marble’s admirable (?) interpretation of ethics, though his wife no
longer knew who was paying to have her looked after in considerable comfort,
and had long since forgotten that she was married and had killed her baby.
But Dr Marble’s past was catching up with him at last and in
public, since the bank was obliged to pay for the nursing-home out of the
estate. An eloquent bank teller had enjoyed passing that story around. That
obligation would cease with the sale of the villa since Dr Marble had in fact
been cash-strapped in retirement. The future of Dr Marble’s wife thus looked
even more dismal than it had been, unless his illegitimate children could be
called upon to foot the bill. Looking after his wife had almost bankrupted Dr
Marble and the villa had been heavily mortgaged.
And now that villa, a fitting home for Gary’s big family,
had been all but destroyed. Gary was devastated. Cleo pointed out that if the
woman could not be kept at the expensive nursing home she would be transferred
to the top security wing of a mental hospital. Dr Marble had not wanted that to
happen, but he was no longer alive to make that choice.
***
Harry Marble’s suspected alliance with Bryn Thomas melted
the cases Gary had to solve into one, although at first glance they were
unconnected and the product of think-tank construction. Would talking to Harry
Marble shed light on the issue?
“The house looks nice,” said Mia as they drew up to a brick
house, one of a row in a quiet suburban road and built before it became
fashionable to pebble-dash everything in sight. .
“As far as I know, Miss Riddle, the only family member left
in freedom, lives alone, except that we need to find out if Harry Marble has
come to stay,” Gary explained.
“Do you think it’s likely?”
“Cleo thinks so. I would have sent Greg if he hadn’t been
away on holiday. Now he’s back thanks to his girlfriend carelessly breaking a
leg, it was too late to put him in the picture and he is not really interested
anyway. I think Nigel will explain to him what is happening, though his
thoughts are probably on tomorrow’s travesty show.”
Gary led the way to the front door and pressed the bell. It
took quite a long time for Mrs Riddle to answer the door.
Gary was surprised to find her there, though had read a note
informing him that the housekeeper was to be conditionally released on
compassionate grounds.
Dr Marble’s housekeeper looked a lot older than the last
time Gary had seen her and her left arm was in a sling. She also had bruises on
her cheeks and a black eye.
“It’s Mrs Riddle, isn’t it?” said Gary. “What has happened
to you?”
“I fell…down the stairs.”
Gary instinctively disbelieved her, and Mia was not one to
mince her words.
“You look as if you have been beaten up, Mrs Riddle,” she
said, holding up her police badge.
Mrs Riddle looked panic-stricken.
“You’d better come in,” she said in a small voice. “But you
can’t stay long.”
“Where is he?” Gary asked as it dawned on him that Cleo’s
instinct had not fooled her.
“Who?”
“You know who. Harry Marble.”
“He isn’t here.”
“Don’t be silly, Mrs Riddle,” said Mia. “Admit that he
knocked you about. We can deal with him.”
“I can’t do that,” said Riddle. “It’s too dangerous.”
“It will be even more dangerous if you are not straight with
us, Mrs Riddle,” said Gary.
“He must not find you here,” said the housekeeper.
“On the contrary, we are here to find him,” said Mia. “We
have to find him.”
“What has he done now?”
“He has left a two week trail of destruction behind him,”
said Gary.
“He just wanted a bed for a night or two, and I thought it
would be right and fair to help a relative of Dr Marble, but he’s staying here
for longer, he said. I’m so frightened of him.”
“Why didn’t you call the police, Mrs Riddle?” said Mia.
“He said he would kill my sister’s little dog if I tried
anything.”
“So where is the little dog now?”
“He killed him anyway, before my very eyes,” said Mrs
Riddle, bursting into tears.
“I’ll get him for that, too,” said Gary. “Does he use the
front door?”
“Yes.”
“Where is your sister?”
“She went to visit Silvie in prison,” said Mrs Riddle.
“We’ll wait for him in the kitchen, or better still in the
pantry, if you have one.”
“Yes, we do,” she said, leading the way.
Gary and Mia settled down surrounded by preserves and other
foodstuffs for a wait of undefined length, joking that they would not go
hungry, but a few minutes later they heard the front door slamming and the
voice of Harry Marble.
“Been a good girl, have you?” he shouted. “You know what
happens to naughty girls, don’t you?”
“Yes,” said Riddle.
“Couldn’t use the phone, either, could you?” he said,
holding up the disconnected phone lead. “Not that you would have phoned anyone.
You are too scared and you don’t even have a mobile phone now I’ve destroyed
it.”
Marble laughed as if at a dubious joke. Riddle said nothing,
which incensed Marble even more.
“I can smell perfume,” he said. “Has someone been here? I
hope not, for your sake.”
“It’s only toilet spray,” Mrs Riddle explained. “What do you
want from me?”
“I want to see you squirm, you old ratbag,” said Marble,
pushing Mrs Riddle into the sitting-room.
“I haven’t done anything wrong,” she said.
“You had a baby with my father and that baby grew up and
killed him before he could put me in his will.”
“I don’t believe that. He was your uncle and her father.”
“Yes. I’m the result of my father seducing his own sister.”
Mrs Riddle was understandably appalled.
“I didn’t know that. None of us knew that.”
“He ruined my mother’s life. I wish I had killed him.”
“Didn’t you?”
“I didn’t have to. Your lovely daughter Silvie did it for me.
She is your child, isn’t she? Not your
sister’s.”
“Yes.”
“You farmed her out when my uncle did not want her at the
villa.”
“He thought the scandal would ruin him.”
“And you understood, I suppose.”
“Yes. And I don’t believe that my daughter committed murder.”
”You’d better. She’s in prison for it, isn’t she? And you are
only out because you are on old bitch and were costing the state money.”
“Silvie was wrongly imprisoned and so was I,” said Mrs
Riddle, spurred on by the knowledge that Gary and Mia were listening and waiting
to pounce.
“Shut up, or would you like me to break your other arm?”
Gary and Mia moved quickly out of the kitchen into the hall.
It was time to bring the awful scene to a close. They drew guns and barged into
the sitting-room, grabbed Marble from behind and handcuffed him. It had only
taken a few seconds. Gary ordered a patrol car. He had Marble in an iron grip
on one side and Mia on the other as they moved towards the front door to wait
for the cat. Marble would be taken to a cell and arrangements made to transport
him to Middlethumpton for further questioning. Gary charged him with inflicting
grievous bodily harm on Mrs Riddle and would give the patrol team his business
card so that he could be contacted quickly.
Harry Marble’s struggles were futile. Mrs Riddle had been on
the receiving end because she was defenceless and weak. Such aggressors use
intimidation and mental cruelty. She was an easy target.
“One moment,” said Mrs Riddle. “There’s something I have to
do before you go.”
She went up to Marble, grabbed his glasses and crushed them
under her feet. Then she slapped him in the face with a fierceness that
surprised them all. Not content with that, she stabbed him in the stomach with
a paper knife she had fetched from the hall table.
“That was premeditated,” sneered Marble. “They’ll get you
for that little scratch. Attempted murder.”
“Self-defence, Mr Marble,” said Gary. “I don’t think you’ll
find anyone who thinks otherwise.”
Mia instructed the patrol team to get Marble to see a doctor
to make sure the injury was only a scratch. She informed them that he was
wanted for rape, intimidation and probably murder. They pushed Marble onto the
back seat of the patrol car. Mia went back to the house and gathered up the
broken specs. She pushed them into a pocket in Marble’s jacket.
Marble was not badly injured. The blunt knife had not got into
flesh through the tough denim of the jeans he was wearing.
Gary’s undisputable success in Brighton would get round very
quickly. He was relieved, though the action had been instigated by Cleo. A wild
goose chase would have been extremely mortifying, he reflected. Marble was a rotter.
His arrest was a doing society a good turn.
“I think we can get back to HQ today,” he told Mia.
“Have some lunch first,” said Mrs Riddle.
“That would be nice,” said Mia.
“And thank you for rescuing me.”
“All in the course of duty, Mrs Riddle. What on earth made
you attack that awful man?” Gary asked.
“Satisfaction,” said Riddle.
“Not revenge?” Mia said.
“That too,” said Riddle, “and slightly belated self-defence,
of course.”
“So be it,” said Gary.
“Will cheese on toast be all right?”
“Exactly right,” said Mia.
***
Gary reported his success to Cleo on the long drive home. He
was relieved that Marble would no longer be a danger to anyone, given that he
would face a long sentence for rape and anything else they could pin on him.
“So now we can concentrate on the travesty show,” said Cleo.
“Is that tomorrow? How time flies!”
“I thought you might like to stay at home and baby-sit,”
said Cleo.
“Can’t Toni do that?”
“I’ll ask her. There’s a final rehearsal tomorrow afternoon.
Maybe that will be enough to satisfy her curiosity.”
“I was going to take the girls to the rehearsal,” said Gary.
“OK. So do that and stay at home during the evening.”
“If you think …”
“I do, Gary. You’ll hate it, anyway.”
***
With Thomas and Marble behind bars, Gary hoped that the show
would not suffer any disturbance, though there was feeling against the idea of
men dressing up as women and doing high kicks. The opposition to the show had
been supported by Hilda Bone and Jane Barker, as Cleo pointed out, and they
were not there to lead or even follow a demo.
Dorothy was organizing the evening, though she was having
second thoughts about its suitability for Christmas family entertainment.
Gloria Hartley was in top form. The rehearsal was a lively affair, not least
thanks to Gloria’s antics. It embarrassed Gary to watch her prancing around
giving the cast final instructions, but Charlie and Lottie were enchanted.
“You are a stick-in-the-mud, Daddy,” Charlie declared.
“They look like ladies,” said Lottie, “only most of them are
prettier.”
“It’s just a game, kids,” said Gary, trying not to be
appalled at the capers of the Lucky 13 troupe and looking away whenever he
could from his mother-in-law, the admirable, high-kicking Gloria, who had
dressed herself in a glitzy trouser-suit and plastered her hair down with loads
of brilliantine. I’ll do my makeup this evening, she was heard to say.
After the rehearsal, the two girls went onstage to talk to
Nigel and Gloria while Gary waited in his seat. The troupe made a big fuss of
the girls, and they enjoyed themselves immensely trying on the colourful
feather boas and skyscraper high-heels on which the girls could not even stand,
let alone dance. Eventually Gary prised them away from the showmen and they
went home.
Cleo noted that Gary had found the whole show embarrassing,
whereas the girls had taken it all as a big load of fun. Cleo was glad that
Gary was going to baby-sit with Roger, who had also declared indifference to
men dressed as vamps.
***
The seats in the church hall were not numbered, so Toni,
Grit and Cleo got there early so as not to be at the back, and were joined by
Linda, since Dorothy was otherwise occupied.
The house was packed and the show a brilliant success; so
brilliant that it was to be repeated in a week’s time, the only difference
being the introduction of a dancing Christmas tree.
***
Grit and Cleo walked home suitably fortified by the
indomitable jollity of the travesty show. It had been amusing, even or
especially when Gloria did her act, depending on whether it was your mother
sending herself up or not, though Cleo thought the addition of a stuck-on moustache
was definitely going too far. As Grit put it, not everyone has a mother who
does high kicks in a glittering trouser suit at her age. At the end of the show
Gloria had been presented with two enormous bouquets: one, a red rose affair
with a velvet heart sticking out from Lucky 13, and the other a poinsettia
affair that tinkled with silver bells. That was from her latter-day lover,
Romano, who had fallen in love with her all over again and told the whole world
as much, which caused Cleo discomfiture.
Mr Cobblethwaite had brought his wife, or rather she had
persuaded him that the Mayor of Middlethumpton should be present at such an
event, and to his immense surprise he enjoyed himself, albeit fortified by a
hipflask containing something fortifying.
Someone had gone up to Cleo to ask her if it was her mother
and if she also did high kicks. Cleo was glad that Gary had stayed at home.
When Grit and Cleo finally tore themselves away from the
afterglow, during which various members of the Lucky 13 cast treated everyone
to extra entertainment, their extremely late reception back at the cottage
could only be described as fraught.
“The kids were fine,” said Roger. “Those two girls were a
tremendous help, and Toni is a brick.”
“So why the long faces,” Grit asked.
“Marble has escaped,” said Gary.
“I don’t believe it,” said Cleo. “You had it all wrapped
up.”
“Mia and I did, but the urgency of the situation was not
apparent enough to the force in Brighton.”
“What did they do?” Cleo asked.
“As instructed, the prisoner was brought to Middlethumpton
HQ.”
“OK.”
“In a patrol car that left so that they would be guaranteed
to arrive in Middlethumpton after dark.”
“Isn’t that normal?”
“Not really. He needed secure transport in daylight, not a
ride in a taxi,” said Gary. “To cut a long story short, they paused on the
motorway and Marble was taken to the public conveniences and café handcuffed.
So far, so good. Then the patrol team put him back in the
car, of course, and they continued their journey. That happened three times
since nature calls even prisoners and cops, but after the third time the safety
lock on the back door of the patrol car must have been off. Mr Marble simply
got out of the car and disappeared in the crowd of shoppers lining the street
in front of HQ.”
“I don’t want to believe it,” said Cleo. “I suppose Marble
managed to move the kiddies’ catch on the car door while he was being put back
in – it might not even have been on at all. Marble just went with the flow. He
wouldn’t have wanted to escape in the back of beyond, so he waited until he got
back to civilization.”
Gary thought Cleo was being rather frivolous about what was
really quite critical.
“We’ll have to investigate all that,” he said.
“You won’t get that patrol team to admit to anything. They
were probably laughing and talking and merely going through the motions with
Marble. They will have pushed him back onto the back seat and carried on
chatting. It only takes a second or two to release the lock,” said Cleo.
“That’s probably what happened,” said Roger.
“We can safely assume that Marble was not handcuffed during
the journey, can we?” said Cleo.
“He was,” said Gary, “some of the time. The car had a grill
between the front and the back, so he could not have got at them during the
drive.”
“I suppose we should be thankful for that,” said Roger.
“Then there could have been some sort of collusion,” said
Cleo. “For instance, they could have left the handcuffs unlocked. I doubt
whether Marble is still wearing them and they had probably been removed when he
went to the bathroom and not put back on because Marble was behaving like a
model prisoner.” “Where are those patrol guys now?”
“They’ve gone back to Brighton,” said Gary.
“It beggars belief,” said Cleo. “Weren’t they questioned?”
“Not intensively enough, I imagine,” said Gary. “My Man
Friday was entertaining Upper Grumpsfield and Greg was probably visiting Rosie,
so there was only a skeleton staff on duty. Anyone else would not have the
authority to order the patrol team to stay and nobody had the gumption to phone
me..”
“That’s no excuse, Gary,” said Cleo. “What about Gisela? You
keep talking about her.”
“I don’t suppose she was spending her Saturday evening at
HQ,” said Roger.
“Are you going to look for Marble immediately, Gary? He’s
dangerous.”
“Of course, we are,” said Roger. “I’ll help all I can.”
“Tomorrow,” said Gary.
“How about tonight?” said Cleo. “You really should get to
him before he gets to Jessie or even goes back to Brighton.”
“Those broken glasses are actually helpful. Judging from the
lenses he is short-sighted. Not having them might help to catch him.”
Famous last words, Grit was heard to say. She and Roger went
home and Cleo took a look at her babies before joining Gary under their
communal king-sized duvet.
“They’re all right, aren’t they?”
“Of course they are, Sweetheart. Did you enjoy the evening?”
“I did actually, though it was quite exhausting.”
“Too exhausting? You have to get some quick thinking done if
you want to catch up with our friend Marble before he does any more damage.”
“Can you think where he could be?”
“He might be aiming for Jessie, but on the other hand, he
might go to Hilda’s house and shack up there. There’s no one to stop him and
Bryn Thomas would know better than to refuse him ‘sanctuary’.”
“I’ll start there, then.”
“Wouldn’t now be a good idea?” said Cleo.
“I’ve got a better one… “
***
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