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Authors: Dicey Deere

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BOOK: The Irish Village Murder
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I
t was Megan O'Faolain. Head up, eyes wide, she repeated, “It
wouldn't
have! Because, of course … No way I could have known! Not
then.”
She worried one of the pearl buttons on her plum-colored silk shirt and it came off in her hand. She sat turning it over and over.
“An Algerian gatekeeper! It meant nothing to me. John was … was dead, and at once there were the television crews and all sorts of phone calls coming in. Bills were piling up, and still the usual mail, questions of book rights, letters from fans. Roger—Mr. Flannery—had quite disappeared into Dublin, a girl, I think. So I tried to handle the mail myself.
“That unfamiliar stamp. The letter was so … so sweet, so gentle; and such a poor attempt at English, all mixed up with French. About a gatekeeper, elderly, who had suffered an embolism and died. It was signed simply ‘Maziba.'”
Megan's hand on the pearl button went still. “The stamp was Algerian.”
From the listeners, something like a giant indrawn breath.
 
Inspector O'Hare refrained from looking at Owen Thorpe. It was too ironical that in desperation to save Castle Creedon, Owen Thorpe had needlessly murdered John Gwathney.
The lights flickered, there came a flash of lightning, then a crack of thunder and a heavier spattering of rain against the windows. Simultaneously, the station door opened and two figures appeared.
“Damn!
It'll shrink my cap!” And Willow, coming in, snatched off her white knitted cap.
“You
again!” she said, stumbling over Nelson. On Willow's heels was Ms. Torrey Tunet. Her brilliant peacock bandanna bound her dark hair and the geranium color was high in her cheeks. She looked, in Winifred Moore's estimation, extraordinarily unlike the Dickens orphan she'd resembled at lunchtime in Finney's. Hugging her outsized canvas shoulder bag to her chest, she gave Jasper Shaw a startled glance and came down the side of the room to where he stood with Inspector O'Hare. “Jasper! I tried—never mind!”
She dropped her shoulder bag beside Inspector O'Hare's desk and looked around. Constance Thorpe, pale and with bitten-off lipstick, sat matching her thumbs. Roger Flannery, arms folded, was staring down at his shoes. Megan O'Faolain was flinching away from Blake Rossiter's overly solicitous attempt to adjust her cashmere scarf, which had slipped from her shoulders. Sergeant Jimmy Bryson was conspicuously ignoring Winifred Moore, who was lighting another cigarette. Ms. Rosaleen O'Shea was on her cell phone, her eyes wide.
“Inspector!” Torrey took a deep breath. “I have—” She broke off. She was staring at the bundle of manuscript on his desk. She reached out a hand and touched the manuscript, then gave a soft, incredulous laugh. She looked at Jasper Shaw and said, “You're wearing that awful striped sweater again.”
Owen Thorpe said, “Inspector.” He was seated so close that Torrey could see his hand tremble as he ran it through his fair hair. “We'll be off, never mind the storm.” And with infinite sarcasm, he added, “You'll know where to find me, Inspector. At
Castle Creedon.” He gave a helpless half-laugh. “But … God knows, I didn't kill John Gwathney! Courts or no courts.”
To Inspector O'Hare's amazement, Torrey Tunet said gravely, “I wouldn't doubt It”—and even as she looked at her watch, the door of the station opened.
 
 
A
sprite of a man. Hatless, balding, with round brown eyes in a cheery face. His old-fashioned yellow oilskin was buckled high to his neck. He looked about, head tipped up like a bird jerkily questing.
“Here!” Torrey raised a hand and fluttered her fingers.
“Ah!” He came quickly down the side of the room, smiling. “So you're Ms. Tunet! Traffic slow, this rain, and I'm not an excellent driver. But I managed, obviously, because here I am!” His laugh showed small white teeth. He unbuckled the oilskin and shook it off. He wore a brown wool suit and tan shirt with a flowered tie.
Inspector O'Hare frowned impatiently at Ms. Tunet. His informal was over, it had revealed all. Tomorrow, the phone would ring, it would be Chief Superintendent O'Reilly calling from Dublin Castle congratulating him. “Egan,” Chief Superintendent Emmet O'Reilly would say. “Egan—”
“Inspector,” Ms. Tunet said, “this is Mr. Bendersford. He was kind enough to make the trip from Dublin. He'd dropped in at Gwathney Hall one day early in October.” Torrey glanced over at Megan O'Faolain beside Liam Caffrey. “Ms. O'Faolain may remember that visit as a pleasurable … But something happened that afternoon that is pertinent to John Gwathney's death. So …”
Exasperating. Inspector O'Hare frowned. But in a way, he owed her. And God only knew how long this thunderstorm would last, caging him with this gaggle of people on folding chairs. He looked around, met Sergeant Jimmy Bryson's gaze, shrugged, then nodded to Ms. Tunet.
“Thank you, Inspector.” Ms. Tunet turned to Mr. Bendersford. “Tell us about that afternoon at Gwathney Hall, if you don't mind, Mr. Bendersford.”
 
Mr. Bendersford had a kind, quiet voice, something a bit romantic in it, as he told of the afternoon he'd stopped at Gwathney Hall for John Gwathney to autograph one of his books for his nephew.
“So after a truly delectable lobster lunch,” Mr. Bendersford recounted, “Gwathney showed me about the Hall. He had a few paintings he wanted me to see. I'm a dealer, in Dublin. In fact, about ten years ago, John Gwathney bought the Landseer through me. Two dogs. A fine Landseer, indeed.
“He took me into his study. Very private, no one allowed into his study except his assistant, Roger Flannery. I felt honored. He proudly showed me his favorite painting. It was on the wall between two windows. It was a Pissarro in a narrow gold frame. Lovely. On a tropical island, a dilapidated old mansion entangled in vines, a broken iron gate. As you may know, Camille Pissarro was born in the Virgin Islands, in 1830. He was a grown man before he came to Paris.”
Mr. Bendersford paused. He sighed. “That painting in Gwathney's study. A gem of a painting—if it had been genuine, that is. But it was not.”
Only the rain against the windowpanes. Then
“A forgery!”
someone breathed. Sheila Flaxton. “Oh, my!”
Mr. Bendersford shook his head. “No, ma'am. A forgery is a piece of work passed off as a previously undiscovered original. So, no. A
fake
, however, is a painting purporting to be an origin
al.” He smiled a sprightly smile at Sheila. “The Pissarro on John Gwathney's study wall was a fake.”
Inspector O'Hare clasped his hands behind his back. What's this, what's
this?
Exasperating! Off on a tangent. A whole other bag of beans, nothing to do with his informal. A far cry from the business in hand, which was murder.
Mr. Bendersford, hands in his pockets, and rocking on his heels, sighed and shook his head. “You can imagine Gwathney's anger when I told him. Whoosh! Rage! Later, out on the steps of Gwathney Hall, as I was leaving, he said—”
“I'd like to strangle Clewes and Company!'” Winifred Moore said loudly, half out of her seat. Her hazel eyes in her square-jawed face, with its high russet color, were startled. “
That's
what John said!”
“Indeed! Indeed!” Mr. Bendersford nodded. “How do you do, again … Ms. Moore, if I recall?”
“You recall correctly, Mr. Bendersford.” Winifred Moore looked past Mr. Bendersford at Torrey Tunet, who had taken something from the shoulder bag she had dropped on Inspector O'Hare's desk and was unrolling it. “What's
that?
”
Torrey further unrolled what appeared to be a worn canvas. She held it up. “The Pissarro.”
 
Necks craned, Rosaleen O'Shea said, “What's it all
about?
” Roger Flannery said, “My God!” Blake Rossiter half-rose to see over Owen Thorpe's head. Willow Thorpe, back beside the soda machine, waved her white knitted cap at Ms. Tunet. Jasper Shaw ran a finger along his upper lip, suppressed a smile and regarded Ms. Tunet with a look of wonder.
Mr. Bendersford gave an exclamation of surprise. “Well, now! Yes, yes, indeed! The Pissarro! That's it! That's the painting I saw in John Gwathney's studio. Quite,
quite
remarkable for a fake. I'm particularly a scholar of Pissarro. You know, he was not only a masterful painter, he was a teacher of Gauguin,
Cassatt and Cézanne, among others.” He stepped closer to the canvas, studying it, nodding. Then, peering closer, he frowned. “Wait a bit, if you don't mind, Ms. Tunet.”
“Not at all.” Torrey held the canvas taut. Mr. Bendersford fumbled in his breast pocket, took out a pair of spectacles, and put them on. Again he peered, again he frowned. “Hmm … It now has a brown stain, rusty-looking, on that left upper corner. Hmm … a smear, rather, that wasn't there when I saw it at Gwathney Hall.” He peered even closer, moving his head from side to side. “Not paint. But more …” He looked up, rather like a startled rabbit. “Oh, my!”
Inspector O'Hare felt goose bumps.
 
 
I
nspector O'Hare folded his arms. He looked grimly from the Pissarro to Mr. Bendersford to Ms. Torrey Tunet. She was rolling up the painting. O'Hare gave a sigh from the heart, never mind that the stain on the Pissarro could be anything and likely was … a bit of dirt caught in the process of the painting being rolled up, or … anything, an innocent bit of who knew what. But then, catching Sergeant Bryson's eye, he thought of his past association with Ms. Torrey Tunet and felt a chill. “What's all this about, Ms. Tunet? If you'll be so
good
as to … And exactly
how,
Ms. Tunet, did you come into possession of this painting?”
A hoot of a laugh, quickly suppressed, from back beside the soda machine. Willow Thorpe put a hand guiltily over her mouth.
Ms. Tunet pulled at a lock of hair that had escaped from her peacock bandanna. “I've always admired Pissarro.” She looked at Mr. Bendersford. “From the Virgin Islands, was he? I never knew
that.”
She looked back at Inspector O'Hare. “I was in John Gwathney's studio the day after he was killed. If there'd been a Pissarro on the wall, I'd have noticed it. It would have blown me away. But there was no Pissarro.”
Ms. Tunet smiled at Mr. Bendersford. “Thanks to what you confirmed for me in our phone conversation this noon, I
guessed that someone other than John Gwathney had removed the painting”—again she smiled at Mr. Bendersford—“and where the painting might be … if it hadn't been destroyed.
“So I commandeered Ms. Willow Thorpe and her motorbike.” Here, one of Ms. Tunet's hands strayed to the seat of her jeans and she winced. “I found the painting rolled up in an umbrella stand. And I … uh, reclaimed it.” Ms. Tunet looked over at Jasper Shaw. He was grinning.
Reclaimed,
as in “stole.”
Inspector O'Hare's was becoming full-blown. “Found it
where,
Ms. Tunet? ‘In an umbrella stand' is hardly sufficient—”
“Inspector O'Hare!” Mr. Bendersford broke in, his cheery face distressed. “Inspector, in fairness I ought to say that I am responsible for Ms. Tunet's ah … unusual activities. This noon, I was in my office in Dublin, lunching at my desk, my usual peanut-butter-and-olive on whole wheat, when I received that phone call from Ms. Tunet. She reminded me of my visit last September to Gwathney Hall and of John Gwathney's angry comment on discovering his Pissarro was a fake: ‘I'd like to strangle Clewes and Company!' Ms. Tunet told me she thought she knew who Clewes and Company was, and she asked me if I could confirm it. I said yes, indeed. She asked me then, would I, an established, ah, authority in the art world, come to this investigation. She wanted me to appear and confirm who owned Clewes and Company.”
The station was a frozen scene, the listeners immovable, not even the creak of a folding chair.
Mr. Bendersford continued. “So I told Ms. Tunet what John Gwathney had told me when I told him the Pissarro was a fake: that Clewes and Company is Blake Rossiter.”
 
 
A
stunned silence. Then Blake Rossiter laughed. “A thief and a schoolgirl! A fine pair! Invading my home! Stealing one of my paintings!” He raised his eyebrows at Inspector O'Hare. “Inspector! That's cause for legal action. And the garbled tale of Ms. Tunet! And the nonsense from that would-be Pissarro expert!
And
, need I point out that I was in Brussels when someone murdered John Gwathney?”
“Oh!” The exclamation came from Rosaleen O'Shea, and she got up so quickly from beside Blake Rossiter that her folding chair teetered. “But I
saw
you that afternoon! I was, uhh … wondering if you were, ah,
interested
in Colleen Healey and that's why you drove into Ballynagh through the back road that goes by the Healeys' and not through the village, what with her father being so crazy if anybody … So I … sort of bicycled up the back road, it being a lovely day, warmer than usual for the season.” And Rosaleen backed up almost into Sergeant Bryson, who was standing along the wall.
Sergeant Bryson was feeling excited and a little sick at Rosaleen's words. He had only his small police off-duty revolver, and if it had come to the revelation of Mr. Owen Thorpe of Castle Creedon as John Gwathney's killer, as he and Inspector O'Hare had expected, there would've been no problem; Owen
Thorpe would've bowed his head, no violence, what with his wife and those twins right there.
But Blake Rossiter! Something in the glitter of Rossiter's narrowed eyes, and his fists that were slowly clenching, and his tensed body that might uncoil and spring … Sergeant Bryson reminded himself that he had never used the small handgun except in target practice.
Nevertheless, as Blake Rossiter sprang at Ms. Rosaleen O'Shea with the speed of a wildcat, Sergeant Bryson fired his off-duty revolver.
BOOK: The Irish Village Murder
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