A Nice Class of Corpse Read online

  Miss Naismith poured herself a tumbler of neat gin and slumped on to her bed. She picked up the remote control of her television and switched on to the video channel. She had been rather looking forward to seeing what Newth had selected from the Video Library this time. He knew her tastes well by now, and the title on the cassette, Confessions of a Swedish Schoolmistress, did sound promising.

  But it was some time before she could lose herself in the locker-room lubricities of the film. Mrs Pargeter was still on her mind.

  If she were to remain at the Devereux, the new resident might have to make some adjustments.

  On the floor below, in her room at the back, Mrs Pargeter reflected that, if she were to remain at the Devereux, the hotel might have to make some adjustments.

  But nothing was insuperable and she did not envisage major problems.

  She dropped off to sleep, as always, cheerful and confident, though without the expectation of sleeping very well. The first night in a strange bed, she always found, tended to be a little restless and broken. But she accepted this fact philosophically. It took a lot to upset Mrs Pargeter. . . .

  As anticipated, she did wake a few times during the night. Once she was woken by the sound of a door opening. She was not yet sufficiently familiar with the layout of the hotel to know exactly where the door was, but it seemed to be on the floor below.

  She lay in the darkness, aware of the unfamiliar, half-heard rhythm of the sea, then she heard the opening of another door, the flush of a lavatory and, subsequently, a slight commotion, perhaps a small cry, from somewhere below. She wondered, without much urgency, whether she ought to get out of bed to investigate the noise.

  But it was followed by silence. Only the sea swished distantly.

  Then, as she drifted back to sleep, she heard a door close somewhere in the Devereux Hotel.

  Had Mrs Pargeter been on the first-floor landing and witnessed the causes of these half-heard sounds, she would have seen Mrs Selsby emerge, blinking, from her bedroom at the front of the hotel and totter, as unsteady as if she were on stilts, towards the bathroom (a visit that these days she had to make more than once a night).

  Then Mrs Pargeter would have seen someone else appear on the landing. That person was the only one living in the Devereux Hotel who kept a diary.

  Mrs Pargeter would have heard the lavatory flush and seen Mrs Selsby move unsteadily out of the bathroom and start back towards her bedroom.

  Mrs Pargeter would have seen the diarist suddenly move out of the shadows when Mrs Selsby reached the top of the stairs.

  She would have seen the diarist push hard, and seen Mrs Selsby lift and launch forward over the staircase. She would have seen the thin old arms flailing, fragile as sugar-sticks, till the brittle body clattered to a halt in the Entrance Hall, its chicken neck snapped sideways, its thin-lipped mouth locked open and still.

  But Mrs Pargeter saw none of this.

  Nor did the other residents of the Devereux Hotel.

  Except for the murderer, who looked down with satisfaction at the crumpled body, and returned to finish writing up that day’s diary entry.

  6

  TUESDAY

  5 MARCH – 3.15 a.m. – It is done. It was even easier than I anticipated – no resistance, no commotion. I had been prepared for the possibility of an imperfect job, perhaps just of an injury and a tedious wait until she died of pneumonia, but I feel as confident as anyone who has not examined the body closely can be, that it worked first time.

  The temptation to check that she was dead was strong, but I resisted it. There is no point in taking unnecessary risks. I am confident that I have achieved what I set out to do.

  And how do I feel now that I am a murderer? Have I been struck down by guilt and remorse?

  No. I feel the same as ever. A little angry with myself, perhaps, that I did not think to resort earlier to this way out of my difficulties. And very exhilarated at the ease with which I did it.

  To sum up – murder is easy and murder is effective. And, if ever the need arose again, I would not hesitate to commit a second murder.

  7

  Newth was the first to rise at the Devereux. Though some of the residents woke early, as is common for people of their age, it was another of the hotel’s unwritten rules that no one should leave his or her bedroom (except to go to the bathroom) until half-past seven. By that time Newth and Loxton would have done all that was necessary for the start of another smoothly running day. Miss Naismith did not like the stage-management of the Devereux to be observed, and new residents who wandered round the public rooms before seven-thirty were quickly discouraged from the practice.

  Newth rose at six; Loxton arrived half an hour later. Newth checked the central heating boiler, switched off the burglar alarm, and then unlocked the back door of the hotel to admit Loxton. After that he opened the front doors of the hotel.

  By the time he had returned to the kitchen, Loxton would already have got the kettle on for the first of the day’s many pots of tea. Newth would sit and enjoy a cup, passing the occasional comment on the weather, while Loxton prepared the Devereux residents’ breakfasts. Breakfast and tea were the only meals for which she was responsible; the alternating team of Mrs Ayling and Mrs Denyer, who were in charge of lunch and dinner, lived out and arrived at the hotel around eleven.

  On the morning of the 5th of March, this pattern was disrupted.

  Newth rose as usual at six and by quarter-past was shaved and dressed in his white porter’s jacket. He had been in the army for some years and did not believe in wasting long on his appearance.

  When he was ready, he went to check the central heating boiler.

  It was in the basement utility room adjacent to his bedsitter, and was an old solid fuel system. Though gas would have been less messy and cheaper to run, Miss Naismith was disinclined to make the large investment of replacing the boiler. So long as it worked, and so long as Newth was happy to cope with the mess, she felt that she was saving money by keeping it. In her running of the hotel, Miss Naismith made a great many dubious economies. Though obsessed by money, she was always resistant to anything that involved a large capital outlay, whatever long-term savings it might produce.

  Newth loved the old boiler and tended it with great sympathy. Every morning he raked it out, removed the night’s accumulation of clinker, and put in more fuel. He found the warmth and the pulse of life from within the old iron body reassuring.

  He checked it as usual on the morning of the 5th of March, then went upstairs to switch off the burglar alarm and admit Loxton.

  His next task was to open the hotel’s main doors, so that the paper boy could bring in the day’s regular order and place them on the Reception counter. (The residents got very upset if their papers were left outside to catch the dampness of the sea mist or, worse, were folded too many times to fit through the hotel’s letter-box.)

  But on the morning of the 5th of March Newth did not get as far as the front door. The sprawled debris of Mrs Selsby stopped him in his tracks.

  Showing no visible emotion, he went forward to check that she was dead. Even without his army training, he would have been left in no doubt. The old lady was cold and still.

  He paused for a moment, but his decision was quickly made. Loxton was unlikely to emerge from the kitchen, so he need not worry about her. Stepping over the inert form of Mrs Selsby, he went quickly but silently up the stairs to the top of the hotel and tapped on Miss Naismith’s door.

  She was still asleep, but woke quickly, threw a housecoat over her surprisingly flimsy nightdress and came to the door. Newth explained the situation in few words and Miss Naismith instantly followed him downstairs.

  She looked at the body in the Entrance Hall, then checked her watch.

  ‘Put her in the Television Room, Newth. We don’t want the other residents upset. I’ll ring Dr Ashington.’

  She went into the Office while Newth unquestioningly obeyed her orders. If he felt any distaste or pertu
rbation at handling the corpse, he did not show it. Mrs Selsby’s body was still limp, though a slight stiffening around the jaw accentuated the strange angle at which her neck hung. With one arm cradling her back and another under her knees, Newth was surprised at how light she was. The skin had faded down to the bone, and now that too felt as if it might slowly dwindle and disappear.

  Perhaps that was why Newth was so little moved. For a long time Mrs Selsby had been like an old poster pasted to the sea wall, slowly washed colourless and transparent by the elements. Her death, the moment when the last outline could no longer be traced, had been part of a long, almost imperceptible process.

  Dr Ashington was not best pleased at being woken before seven, but when he heard that his caller was Miss Naismith, he became all charm. The proprietress of the Devereux unfailingly recommended him to her residents, and, since snobbery (if not wealth) dictated that most of them should be private patients, he benefited from the connection. Some, when they arrived, swore by distant doctors (like Mrs Pargeter’s ‘chap in Harley Street’), but most soon came to realise the advantages of a local service. And, since Miss Naismith’s ground-rules for the Devereux excluded the chronically sick, Dr Ashington’s part of the bargain was not too onerous.

  When he heard of Mrs Selsby’s death, he said he would be round straight away. ‘Is she still lying where she was?’ he asked.

  ‘Good heavens, no. I have the other residents to think of.’

  ‘Hmm. She shouldn’t really have been moved. In the case of a violent death . . .’

  ‘Oh, really, Doctor. What harm could it possibly do? She was definitely dead.’

  ‘It’s not that. It’s the kind of question that might be asked at the inquest.’

  ‘Inquest? Will there have to be an inquest?’

  ‘Oh, I would imagine so.’

  Miss Naismith was very put out. She had not considered the possibility of an inquest.

  But through the gloom cast by that thought glowed a little spark of excitement. Mrs Selsby’s sea-front room was one of the most coveted in the hotel. Miss Wardstone was top of the list to take it over, and Miss Naismith thought that the necessary changeover would be a good opportunity to raise the room’s price.

  And of course a new resident would have to be chosen to go into Miss Wardstone’s room. Miss Naismith determined to make her selection with rather more care than she had shown in admitting Mrs Pargeter.

  And she also determined to charge rather more than hitherto for Miss Wardstone’s vacant room.

  Which was one of the reasons for the smile of satisfaction with which she replaced the receiver on the telephone.

  8

  By the time the residents of the Devereux descended for breakfast at about eight o’clock, Dr Ashington had arrived, examined the corpse, and left.

  Death, he had quickly concluded, had been caused by asphyxia following a broken neck. Given Mrs Selsby’s extreme frailty and short sight, he was unsurprised by her falling down the stairs. However, to Miss Naismith’s continuing pique, he still thought there would have to be an inquest.

  The Television Room was then locked, not to be opened again until the body was collected later in the morning by the local undertakers (jolly, thriving men who knew they were on to a good thing operating on the South Coast). None of the residents would notice the locking of the door, as the room was not used at that time in the morning. The watching of breakfast television (or indeed television at any time before seven-thirty in the evening – except of course when Wimbledon or snooker was on) was regarded as slightly infra dig at the Devereux (though Mr Dawlish secretly watched TV-AM on a portable set in his bedroom, because he found himself strangely moved by the leotard of the Keep-Fit Lady).

  Miss Naismith decided to delay the announcement of Mrs Selsby’s death until after breakfast. There seemed little point in putting the residents off their various orders of cornflakes, All-Bran, scrambled eggs, kippers and prunes. She swore Newth to silence and Loxton cooked away in the kitchen, unaware of the night’s accident.

  The other residents, all of whom appeared in the Admiral’s Dining Room, did not comment on Mrs Selsby’s absence. It was assumed that she was having a tray in her room. This practice was allowed, though most of the residents, eager to stress to Miss Naismith how ‘active’ they were, resorted to it infrequently. None of them wished even to hint at the social solecism of ill-health.

  Colonel Wicksteed was always the first to finish breakfast. Although he ate more than any of the others, he shared Newth’s military conviction that one should not spend too long on the indulgence of the body, and so wolfed down his scrambled eggs and four slices of toast and marmalade at great speed.

  Then, wiping his mouth with a table napkin, he rose to his strictly vertical position, picked up The Times, which had lain correctly unread beside his plate while he ate, and announced to the company, ‘Well, time and tide wait for no man, so I think it’s time I went to have a look at the tide.’

  Since he made this witticism almost every morning before a long visit to the lavatory and a brisk ‘constitutional’ along the front, Miss Naismith knew that her cue to speak had come. She could not risk any of the residents being absent for the news and receiving their first information of the death from the arrival of the undertakers.

  ‘Excuse me, I have an announcement to make.’ She gestured to still Loxton, who had moved forward to remove the Colonel’s dirty plates, and Newth, who had just come in with a fresh pot of coffee.

  ‘I very much regret to tell you that Mrs Selsby suffered an unfortunate accident during the night. She fell down the main stairs and has, I am afraid, passed on.’ How bitterly Miss Naismith regretted that the English language did not possess an even more genteel euphemism for death.

  The announcement prompted a ripple of reactions. Loxton let out a little scream; Mr Dawlish, perversely, emitted a high-pitched giggle. Mrs Mendlingham’s vague eyes came suddenly into sharp, troubled focus, and she dropped the tea cup that was half-way to her lips. Eulalie Vance, who somewhere in her much-vaunted past had been a Catholic, crossed herself instinctively; and on Miss Wardstone’s taut face appeared, briefly, an expression of sheer triumph. Lady Ridgleigh’s bony features set into the expression affected by the Queen at funerals of Commonwealth leaders, while Colonel Wicksteed said, ‘Oh, damned bad show.’

  Into Mrs Pargeter’s clear blue eyes came a new thoughtfulness.

  And the diarist, who of course was one of those present in the Admiral’s Dining Room, felt that really it had all gone off very well.

  ‘I will be out for lunch, Miss Naismith.’

  ‘Oh?’ The proprietress looked up from the desk in her Office, quickly forming the opinion that the red of Mrs Pargeter’s two-piece suit was, if not quite ‘strident’, at least ‘bold’. But once again the jewellery, yet another matching set, was real.

  ‘Most of the residents do tend to take luncheon in the hotel, unless of course they are away visiting.’

  ‘Yes. Well, I dare say I’ll take it plenty of times, but today I’m going out.’

  Miss Naismith couldn’t be sure whether or not she detected a note of mockery in Mrs Pargeter’s echo of the word ‘take’.

  ‘That is all right, isn’t it?’

  ‘Of course, Mrs Pargeter. So long as you inform the staff that you will not be taking luncheon before eleven o’clock in the morning.’

  ‘Which is exactly what I’m doing.’

  ‘Yes, Mrs Pargeter. Though it is quite sufficient for you to inform the staff, as I say. Tell Newth or Loxton. There is no need to tell me. I often find myself very busy in the mornings. Particularly, of course, today, in view of the most unfortunate circumstances.’

  ‘Yes.’ Mrs Pargeter paused. ‘Is the body still here?’

  Miss Naismith winced at the indelicacy of such directness. ‘The undertakers have not as yet arrived, no.’

  ‘So where is it?’

  This was really too much. ‘I really don’t think it nec
essary for such details to be known, Mrs Pargeter.’

  The new resident shrugged. ‘Very well. Please yourself.’

  Miss Naismith breathed deeply, then, with the strained smile of a lady at a tea party ignoring something a dog has done on the floor, asked, ‘And may I ask how you plan to spend your day, Mrs Pargeter?’

  ‘Thought I’d have a wander round. See the delights of Littlehampton. I don’t know the town at all.’

  ‘It’s not a large place. It won’t take you long to see it all. I mean, there’d be plenty of time to see a bit, come back here for luncheon, and then continue your tour in the afternoon.’

  ‘Yes, I’m sure there would. But I just feel like going out for lunch today.’

  ‘Very well.’ Miss Naismith took in another deep breath. Mrs Pargeter’s decision upset her disproportionately. New guests should devote some time to studying the routines of the Devereux; once they had done that, then it was quite permissible for them to diverge from those routines, but not until after a few days’ acclimatisation. Miss Naismith tried to find a way of expressing her disapproval, but all she could come up with was: ‘I’m afraid you may find the weather a little inclement.’

  ‘I’ll survive.’ Mrs Pargeter grinned. ‘See you.’

  Miss Naismith thought perhaps something really should be said. ‘I think you will find in time that the Devereux suits you very well, Mrs Pargeter. I’m sure we’ll soon get used to each other’s little ways.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Mrs Pargeter, pausing at the Office door. ‘I’m sure you will.’

  Mrs Pargeter looked less perky as she ate her lunch. She had, as promised, examined the delights of Littlehampton, and found them much to her taste. It was a pleasingly tacky town. Mrs Pargeter liked the evidence of new vulgarity slowly swamping a former gentility. Yes, she could happily live there.

  But she did not smile as she sat over excellent fish and chips in an empty riverside café looking out at the rushing brown water of the Arun estuary. There was something on her mind other than the suitability of her new home.