Duty and Delusion Page 6

  *

  It had been arranged that the two women would share a table at dinner, so when Bel entered the dining room at seven she was surprised to see Marnie seated at a table for four. Alongside her sat Bud Baxter. Each looked relaxed and happy as they chatted to a third person at the table.

  She was disconcerted, but sat in the spare seat, smiling weakly. She would have to be polite to the pilgarlic in front of the new chap. He too was tall and thickset, though he had more hair on his head than Bud: a bushy rim of faded auburn curled round his ears, growing forward onto his cheeks as impressive ginger sideburns.

  Very seventies.

  It was explained that the other man was Bud’s brother, who’d come over from the coast for the funeral and was staying around a day or two longer to help with the legal stuff. He was at Hepworth House for dinner and a chat with his brother. Bel tried to look nonchalant. How much does he know?

  She was desperate to avoid a conversation with Bud but needed food. He returned her smile faintly. She felt embarrassed. She tugged at her skirt and fiddled with her earrings; rummaged in her handbag for a tissue and checked her phone for no reason.

  Marnie was looking less tarty than usual, in a blue smock dress of floaty blue printed muslin. Very seventies, Bel thought again. She was slim enough not to look pregnant in such a dress. In fact, everything about Marnie looked different: softer, gentler, happier than when they’d first met. As she exchanged banter with the men, Bel began to understand how the woman attracted men without effort, never mind her status or situation. How natural, then, that she should seek to please them in ways that kept a roof over her head.

  Belinda didn’t feel much like talking. It was all too awkward. Not until they were on the dessert did Bud speak directly to her.

  “Marnie was telling us about your village hall, before you came down. It sounded quite interesting.”

  He was clearly trying to make up for his rudeness the other night. How could anyone possibly find Sallby Village Hall interesting? He needn’t think he could win her round so easily.

  “Anything but!”

  “Why get involved if you don’t like it?”

  “Well, someone has to.” She sounded prim, snooty. Invaded. The village hall was her domain. It was not up for discussion with these… these… ne’er-do-wells.

  Bud’s brother, Miles, piped up, “There have been some very interesting studies on the importance of village halls in maintaining services in rural areas.”

  We seem to have an expert in the room!

  He went on, “With the new emphasis on the Big Society, government is looking at ways of supporting these volunteer-led facilities without taking them out of the hands of the community. There’s been too much Big Government over the past two decades. Now it’s all about handing power back to the community.”

  Who was this guy? She didn’t want any more power, thanks. What outsiders saw as power was actually responsibility. Less of that would be welcome, not more.

  This bloke was a prat who didn’t know what he was talking about, but now was not the time to tell him. She repeated her weak smile.

  “You seem to know a lot about it,” she said without enthusiasm, as she lifted the last spoonful of raspberry pavlova to her lips.

  “I’m on a parliamentary subcommittee looking at the rural economy,” he replied, as if she ought to have known that. Bel looked up, only slightly more interested. Was this another fantasist?

  Bud interjected quietly, “Miles is a Member of Parliament.”

  Bel was stunned.

  “Miles Baxter-Hatton, MP for Uttering South.” He rose slightly and reached his hand across the table in a formal handshake.

  Belinda found herself rising from her own chair as she took the hand and almost bobbed a curtsey.

  “He’s my half-brother,” muttered Bud.

  “Daryl’s mother was Dad’s first wife,” Miles smiled. “He soon realised that she was ‘not a keeper’ and took up with Amelia, my mother.”

  Bud was not smiling. “They were divorced by the time Miles was seven, but Amelia made another good marriage.” His voice was tinged with resentment.

  “Yes, Mother is still alive and living in Harrogate, quite comfortably, with her second husband, Edward Hatton, who played the father’s role in my life.”

  Belinda was trying to take this all in. She felt instinctively that she wouldn’t like Amelia.

  She felt sorry for Bud, protective almost. No wonder he’d wanted a mother like her, someone normal.

  Daryl/Bud spoke up. “Our dad was a charmer. He could charm the birds from the trees, but he had a hard upbringing and not much schooling. Managed to get by without, mind, because people believed in him. He had kind eyes, but there was only so much kindness in his heart.”

  This was the most thoughtful thing Belinda had heard him say. Both sons had in some way taken after him; each had a warm expression. Even Bud must have displayed some charm to convince her that a second drink had been permissible the other evening. Only when he was drunk and crying had he become a slob. And give him his due, he had been crying for his dead father, no matter how tough his childhood had been.

  Miles was speaking again. “The way forward is about rolling back the state. Letting people take charge of their own destinies and communities. That’s why we’re encouraging volunteerism. There’s been too much nannying from the state. People have the right to stand on their own two feet and regain self-esteem. Communities are longing to come together, decide what they want in their area and make it happen.”

  Bel noticed that the other diners had gone silent. Political speeches were not often heard in Hepworth House.

  “Take the Yorkshire Sculpture Park.” He warmed to his theme as on the hustings. “If the community wants to change it, there should be nothing standing in the way. Community needs should not be restricted by Arts Council diktat about what constitutes art. They could display artwork produced by schoolchildren and pensioners, the local painting classes and photography clubs if art was what they still wanted. The whole place could be run by volunteers, if only they were organised enough. They could even sell off some of the land to developers, to build local homes for local people. The place would become a truly local facility, run by locals for locals, what we in government call the Localism Agenda. This would free up valuable funds, enabling Arts resources to be directed towards the cultural centres, where visitors want to be.”

  Ron broke in. “Local people round here have got homes already. It’s selling them that they have trouble with nowadays.”

  Bel was reminded of Candy Dunne, whose home had been on the market since soon after young Job’s party.

  “What cultural centres? What visitors?”

  Miles sailed on without answering.

  “To be of economic value to the nation, the greatest works of art must be easily accessible to overseas visitors. Those visitors almost all arrive via Heathrow. Hence, the art and culture of the nation needs to be co-located in the south of England, within an hour’s travel of Heathrow. Think of the jobs created. Think of the income generated. Overseas visitors bring money and they’re prepared to pay high prices for British culture. Think of the lure of London’s bright lights, the royal parks and historic buildings. Add to that the entirety of Britain’s most precious and challenging works of art, and we would create a world treasure. The wasteful policy of free museums and art galleries for the masses would be a thing of the past.”

  “But what about the people here? What about all the money spent on the new galleries and restoring the parkland? That would all have been wasted.” This was Marnie.

  “Not at all. We’d be giving this wonderful resource back to the community, as I said. It would be theirs to maintain and use as they saw fit. If they wanted to use the buildings, say, as a hostel for the homeless, government would not stop them.”

 
Miles had indeed made an impression. The room was quiet. The single spat whisper,

  “Prick!” hissed out. Everyone stared at their plates, silently concurring.

  The noise of cutlery chinking against china bowls resumed, and forced, inconsequential chat shielded the diners from their embarrassment. More than embarrassment: it was fury.

  Bel was sorry she’d returned the chisel to the pavilion. Half of her wanted to tell Miles that she and Marnie were ‘visitors’ to the cultural hub of the YSP, who were spending their money there and thus supporting the local economy. She herself had bought half a dozen postcards and stamps, plus several drinks and sandwiches in the café. She wanted to ask where these volunteers would come from and why they wouldn’t be at work, now that no-one was expected to retire at sixty-five but to work until they dropped?

  The other half of her wanted to sink a chisel in his skull.

  This man had given up living in the real world. How long had he ever lived in it? she wondered. Was Edward Hatton a more desirable role model than Al because he was a good father, or had young Miles been brought up and educated amongst the privileged classes to ensure that he lost track of his roots?

  After coffee, she had no polite reason not to cross the hall to the sitting room. Ron came through from the kitchen and took up position behind the kitsch little bar, eyes narrowed above gritted teeth.

  Miles found the set-up rather quaint and did his best not to patronise; his best was poor. The MP’s most outstanding feature was his voice. He knew this, and loved its sound, imagining that his audience was equally smitten.

  Touching on a range of political topics, he lectured Bud, Belinda and Marnie through two rounds of drinks. No other guests joined them. From time to time Ron moved back into the kitchen, where Maureen’s nephew and his pal were enjoying the leftovers of that evening’s boeuf bourguignon. After an hour, Miles returned to the theme of volunteering, and village halls in particular.

  Bud seemed to have shrunk, somehow. Recalling coyly how she had first thought him a hunk, Bel saw now that he was just a bald, middle-aged chap with not much to say for himself. For all the brothers’ parity in height and build, Miles appeared the larger man.

  When at last he paused for breath, Bel got up to visit the Ladies’. Ron intercepted her in the hallway.

  “The police did call round this afternoon,” he said quietly.

  Her heart jumped in her chest.

  “And…?”

  “They were quite impressed.” He grinned. “Took lots of photos and had a bit of a laugh about it.Went off to look up that word up on the internet.” He looked her in the eye, raising one eyebrow.

  “What about the old couple?”

  “Sheila calmed down eventually after she’d spoken to their son. He told them to hire a car for the rest of the week so I got on the blower and sorted out a Corsa for them. Rentamotor delivered it around lunchtime, so they were able to get off on their trip. Gordon was relieved to be driving a car like his own, so they went off quite happily.”

  Bel breathed more slowly now, regretting the upset she’d caused.

  “And did the police find any clues?”

  “A couple of tab ends in the car park but they weren’t near the 4x4. They asked which guests were smokers, but of course, I don’t know that. This is a non-smoking building. Those fag ends could have been left by anyone – the window-cleaner, even.”

  Their eyes met, both faces deadpan.

  Ron held in his hand a business card. Hearing the handle of the lounge door turning, he quickly dropped it into Belinda’s palm, signalling that this was private. She closed her fingers and turned away as Miles came through the door.

  “Aha, caught you at it! In flagrante!” he jested loudly. “And what are you two talking about?”

  “Only the unfortunate vandalism that occurred here this morning.”

  Leaving Ron to explain the rest, Belinda moved along the corridor to read the card. On a background of vibrant stripes were the words: Bronte FM, your local news and music station, followed by email and website addresses. There was also a phone number.

  Puzzled, she tucked it in her purse.

  Back in the lounge, Miles was giving the low-down on the morning’s events to Marnie and his brother as if he had witnessed them himself. Bud had already set off for the bus stop when the crime was discovered. Marnie kept quiet. The defaced car was still on the drive, so the three of them went outside, briefly, to inspect the damage by the light of Miles’s keyring torch.

  Back in the bar, Marnie and Bud were even quieter than before. For him, one or two things had fallen into place. The window of his room overlooked the bed of laurels beside the silver car’s parking spot; he had lain awake, unable to sleep, listening to the exchange of hoots and wheezes between two owls. He recalled a vague sense of the sound of movement on the gravel and a soft, intermittent scraping that he couldn’t identify. He hadn’t bothered to get out of bed to look and was soon asleep again.

  “Ah yes, The Pilgarlic!” Miles declaimed. “Came third in the1980 Grand National! I was just a lad at the time but I was there at Aintree, with Mother and Edward. Stood me in good stead, too. I had it as a nine-letter word when I appeared on Countdown some years ago. It clinched victory for me.”

  “Never heard it before,” said Marnie.

  “Ah yes. It’s archaic of course – meaning bald-headed, or alternatively a worthless fellow/ a poor creature. But it proves two things: one, the perpetrator is a betting man, and two, he is not young. Maybe also he is a Countdown aficionado who recalls my contribution. But it was his victim he labelled a pilgarlic. Ergo, the victim must be thin on top.”

  ‘Ergo’?

  Miles looked around him. His brother was shaven-headed; Ron had a silver comb-over Brylcreemed down over a freckled scalp. His own wiry locks surrounded a pate as slick as a domed skating rink. “What about the old chap?”

  The others tried to remember, but Gordon had not struck a memorable figure. Between them, eventually they put together an identikit description of a small, bespectacled septuagenarian with thick hair of steely grey covering most of his head. There was a round hole in the centre like a comic-book monk’s, but he wasn’t really bald.

  “No, but bald enough, and a miserable creature, by your description.” Miles clearly wanted to take the reins of this investigation. Marnie had been very quiet, with a sense of doom that was familiar. Trouble had always followed her, but when she’d decided to spend the remainder of her savings on a couple of nights at Hepworth House, she was aiming to build a moat around her precious time away from real life. Yet as usual, Trouble had crept unnoticed into her suitcase and come along for the ride. And this Miles chap really got on her nerves.

  She looked at Bel. “Whoever is responsible for the graffiti knew what they were doing. As a piece of art which carries a message, it’s quite effective.” Her eyes glinted. “And it must have been someone educated, to use a word like that. I’ve never heard it before. Have you?”

  “It rings a bell,” Belinda smiled. “I probably saw Miles on Countdown. I used to watch it every afternoon when I worked mornings.” She struggled not to smile.

  The chat was interrupted by the clang of the old-fashioned brass doorbell hanging from a bracket outside. Seconds later, two police officers walked in, wearing full kit. One was talking into his radio.

  “Don’t bother getting up. We’d just like a word with you, if you don’t mind,” said the other.

  Miles stood to introduce himself, volunteering his own opinion on the crime.

  “Thank you, sir, but we’ll do the investigating if you don’t mind. Now, can I take your names and addresses?”

  One by one the group gave their details, some with more misgivings than others. The officers asked the whereabouts of each guest the previous night. There was no way of corroborating Bel’s or Bud’s statements that eac
h was in their own bed and heard nothing. Marnie had stayed in her bedsit on the outskirts of the city. Miles had been ‘at a friend’s’.

  “Can you give us the name and address of this…‘friend’, sir?”

  “No I can’t. I don’t intend to drag anyone else into this. A man in my position has to be beyond reproach and you have my word that I was there all night.”

  “Indeed, sir. Beyond reproach,” repeated the officer slowly, scratching his ear. Against Miles’s name, he wrote in his notebook: Declined to give whereabouts.

  Without a pause, the second police officer took over. “Any of you know the word pilgarlic?” He looked benignly round the group. All eyes turned to Miles.

  “Well of course,” he blustered. “Any racing man will have heard of it. Third place in the 1980 Grand National.”

  Rocking back on his heels and flexing his knees slightly in stereotypical plod style, PC Pete Manton gave a small cough.

  “Archaic: meaning – a bald-headed man; a miserable creature.” He looked handsomely around the assembled company while ruffling his own thick blond hair.

  After a few more questions, the two officers left the room to speak to the lady of the house, returning ten minutes later. The taller one asked to speak to Miles in the hallway. Miles agreed with alacrity, certain that the plods wanted to pick his pretty special brain to aid their investigation. They even asked him to come down to the station with them to assist with their enquiries.

  “As you seem familiar with the word pilgarlic, sir, and with your well-known interest in policing, it could be beneficial all round. You might be able to shed some light on the situation… able to spot something we’ve missed.”

  One of Miles’s pet themes was the fight against crime, it was true. He supposed it was his duty, as an elected member, to assist the law enforcement agencies in any way possible. It would be interesting, at any rate, and no doubt get some positive coverage in the press, so he acquiesced with a show of reluctance.

  Pete Manton’s colleague Dale started the car, then remembered something.