‘It still might have been a stranger.’
‘You would invite a stranger into the house, late in the evening? I do not think so.’ Pünd looked around him. ‘There is a painting missing,’ he remarked.
Fraser followed his eyes and saw that it was true. There was a bare hook on the wall next to the door and a section of the woodwork had faded slightly, a telltale rectangle that clearly delineated the missing work of art.
‘Do you think it could be relevant?’ Fraser asked.
‘Everything is relevant,’ Pünd replied. He took one last look around him. ‘There is nothing more for me to see here. It would be interesting to learn exactly how the housekeeper was discovered when she died two weeks ago but we will come to that in due course. Can we proceed into the living room?’
‘Of course,’ Chubb said. ‘The door leads into the living room and Sir Magnus had his study on the other side. There’s a letter we found there that may interest you.’
The living room had a much more feminine feel than the entrance hall with an oyster pink carpet, plush curtains with a floral pattern, comfortable sofas and occasional tables. There were photographs everywhere. Fraser picked one up and examined the three people standing together in front of the house. A round-faced man with a beard, wearing an old-fashioned suit. Next to him, a few inches taller than him, a woman staring into the camera lens with a look of impatience. And a boy, in school uniform, scowling. It was obviously a family photograph if not a particularly happy one: Sir Magnus, Lady Pye, and their son.
A uniformed policeman stood, guarding the door on the far side. They went straight through into a room dominated by an antique desk set square between two bookshelves with windows opposite giving views across the front lawn and down to the lake. The floor was polished, wooden boards partly covered by another rug. Two armchairs faced into the room with an antique globe between them. The far wall was dominated by a fireplace, and it was evident from the ashes and charred wood that someone had recently lit a fire. Everything smelled faintly of cigar smoke. Fraser noticed a humidor and a heavy glass ashtray on a side table. The wooden panelling from the entrance hall was picked up again with several more oil paintings which might have hung here as long as the house itself. Pünd went over to one of them – a picture of a horse in front of a stable, very much in the style of Stubbs. He had noticed it because it was slightly perpendicular to the wall, like a half-open door.
‘It was like that when we came in,’ Chubb remarked.
Pünd took a pen out of his pocket and used it to hook the painting, pulling it towards him. It was hinged along one side and concealed a very solid-looking safe set in the wall.
‘We don’t know the combination,’ Chubb continued. ‘I’m sure Lady Pye will tell us when she’s up to it.’
Pünd nodded and transferred his attention to the desk. It was quite likely that Sir Magnus had been sitting here in the hours before he died and that, therefore, the papers strewn across the surface might have something to say about what had actually happened.
‘There’s a gun in the top drawer,’ Chubb said. ‘An old service revolver. It hasn’t been fired – but it’s loaded. According to Lady Pye, he usually kept it in the safe. He might have brought it out because of the burglary.’
‘Or it could be that Sir Magnus had reason to be nervous.’ Pünd opened the drawer and glanced at the gun. It was indeed a .38 Webley Revolver. And Chubb was right. It had not been used.
He closed the drawer and turned his attention to the surface of the desk, beginning with a series of drawings, architectural blueprints from a company called Larkin Gadwall based in Bath. They showed a cluster of houses, twelve in total, stretching out in two lines of six. A number of letters were piled up next to it, correspondence with the local council, a paper trail that must ultimately lead to the granting of planning permission. And here was the proof of it, a smart brochure with the heading: Dingle Drive, Saxby-on-Avon. All of these occupied one corner of the desk. A telephone stood at the other, with a notepad next to it. Someone, presumably Sir Magnus, had written in pencil – the pencil itself lay nearby.
ASHTON H
Mw
A GIRL
The words were written neatly at the top of the page but after that, Sir Magnus must have become agitated. There were several lines crossing each other, an angry scrawl. Pünd handed the page to Fraser.
‘A girl?’ Fraser asked.
‘These would seem to be notes taken down from a telephone conversation,’ Pünd suggested. ‘Mw may stand for something. Note that the w is in lower case. And the girl? Perhaps it is the subject of which they spoke.’
‘Well, he doesn’t seem to have been too pleased about it.’
‘Indeed not.’ Finally, Pünd turned to an empty envelope and next to it the letter that Chubb must have been referring to and which lay at the very centre of the desk. There was no address, just a name – Sir Magnus Pye – handwritten in black ink. It had been roughly torn open. Pünd took out a handkerchief and used it to pick up the envelope. He examined the paper carefully, then replaced it and, with equal care, picked up the letter beside it. This was typewritten and addressed to Sir Magnus Pye with a date – 28 July 1955 – the actual day that the murder had taken place. He read:
You think you can get away with it? This village was here before you and it will be here after you and if you think you can ruin it with your bilding and your money-making you are so, so wrong. You think again, you bastard, if you want to live here. If you want to live.
The letter was not signed. He laid it back on the desk so that Fraser could read it.
‘Whoever wrote this can’t spell “building”,’ Fraser remarked.
‘He may also be a homicidal maniac,’ Pünd added, gently. ‘This letter would seem to have been delivered yesterday. Sir Magnus was killed a matter of hours after it arrived – which is what was promised.’ He turned to the Detective Inspector. ‘I would imagine this relates in some way to the diagrams,’ he said.
‘That’s right,’ Chubb agreed. ‘I’ve put a call in to these people, Larkin Gadwall. They’re developers in Bath and it seems they had some sort of deal with Sir Magnus. I’ll be heading their way this afternoon and you can join me if you like.’
‘You’re most generous.’ Pünd nodded. His attention was still focused on the letter. ‘There is something about this that I find a little peculiar,’ he said.
‘I think I’m ahead of you there, Pünd.’ The detective beamed, pleased with himself. ‘The envelope is handwritten even though the letter is typed. You’d have thought that would be a dead giveaway if the sender wanted to hide his or her identity. My guess is they sealed the letter first, then realised they needed to put the name on the front but it wouldn’t fit into the typewriter. I’ve done the same myself often enough.’