Wycliffe and the Winsor Blue

by W.J. Burley

Genres: Mystery; Cozy Mystery; Hard-Boiled; Police Procedurals; Traditional Mysteries; Crime Fiction

Synopsis

A mysterious death in the Cornish art world - and a murder investigation for Chief Superintendent Wycliffe... When Edwin Garland dies of a heart attack, no one outside the expectant circle of his relatives is concerned, but the situation changes dramatically when, on the evening of the funeral, his son is shot dead. Chief Superintendent Wycliffe is faced with a seemingly motiveless killing, and Edwin's will, though mischievously contrived, offers no explanation. Garland had been friends with Gifford Tate, a well-known painter who died several years before. Now, the only clue Wycliffe has to the murder is an artists' pigment called Winsor Blue. He finally identifies the motive behind the crimes - but is it too late to prevent another death? Why readers love W.J. Burley: 'First-class, old-time, hyper-ingenious whodunit.' Observer 'You can always count on Wycliffe ... he inevitably guarantees a good story, convincing characters and appealing landscape ' Financial Times 'Wycliffe teases out the truth with delicate skill that leaves the reader intrigued and convinced.' Mail on Sunday 'Gripping.' The Times Fans of Ruth Rendell, Val McDermid and Peter Robinson will love W.J. Burley: 1. Wycliffe and the Three-Toed Pussy 2. Wycliffe and How to Kill a Cat 3. Wycliffe and the Guilt Edged Alibi 4. Wycliffe and Death in a Salubrious Place 5. Wycliffe and Death in Stanley Street 6. Wycliffe and the Pea-Green Boat 7. Wycliffe and the School Bullies 8. Wycliffe and the Scapegoat 9. Wycliffe in Paul's Court 10. Wycliffe's Wild Goose Chase 11. Wycliffe and the Beales 12. Wycliffe and the Four Jacks 13. Wycliffe and the Quiet Virgin 14. Wycliffe and the Winsor Blue 15. Wycliffe and the Tangled Web 16. Wycliffe and the Cycle of Death 17. Wycliffe and the Dead Flautist 18. Wycliffe and the Last Rites 19. Wycliffe and the Dunes Mystery 20. Wycliffe and the House of Fear 21. Wycliffe and the Redhead 22. Wycliffe and the Guild of Nine * Each Inspector Wycliffe novel can be read as part of a series or as a standalone*

Release date: December 16, 2010

Publisher: Orion

Print pages: 192

Sample

Edwin Garland felt uneasy, a vague shapeless unease for which he could find no immediate cause.

‘You haven’t taken any ham, father.’

‘What?’

Beryl lifted a slice of ham on to his plate. ‘Are you feeling all right, father?’

‘Of course I’m feeling all right! Why shouldn’t I?’ In fact, he was feeling quite queer.

His son, Francis, was munching away, his protuberant eyes fixed on his father in an unwavering stare.

Beryl was beginning to look like an old woman; her hair was lank and grey, and there were fine wrinkles about her mouth … And that nose which seemed to sharpen with the years made her look predatory … How old was she? Fifty-five? About that … Nine years older than Francis … That gap … Why was she always so damned miserable? Of course she was drinking on the sly, her and her precious friend …

He was really feeling strange, curiously detached, but he struggled to hold on. His thoughts seemed to wander out of control … They were watching him. Concentrate on something! He looked at his wife’s portrait which hung on the wall opposite where he sat. Gifford Tate had painted it a few weeks before she died. A fair painting; free in style but at the same time a good likeness. Gifford had gone overboard a bit in the blues though … For some reason this thought made Edwin chuckle to himself.

Francis’s owl-like countenance obtruded again. Francis was too fat, his face was podgy and he had a paunch. Soft! Too much food, too little exercise. Greedy from childhood … Hard to credit that he had once fathered a daughter – and a beautiful girl she had turned out to be – like her granny … Funny thing, heredity; hit and miss. Anna was twenty now, living with her mother and some randy young rooster who knew when he was well off.

His thoughts returned to his wife’s portrait. The Dresden China look. ‘Refinement and fragility’ Gifford had said. He was right: Judith had been … Judith had been exquisite – that was the word. And a bitch, but that was another story.

What was the matter with him? He was confused; and that was another word, an unpleasant one in the ears of a man of seventy-five. Mealy mouthed jargon for senile. Better eat some of this bloody ham or they would think … He pushed it around with his fork. Soggy! How did they make the stuff hold all that water? An offence to water milk so why not ham?

Back to Beryl and Francis. What a pair! They were Judith’s children, so why were they so damned unprepossessing? And they had mean, scheming little minds. He had supported them all their lives and what had they ever done for him except wait for him to die? Watching, like vultures … Well, they wouldn’t have long to wait, now, but they had a surprise or two to come.

He caught sight of Beryl’s head in profile. Her mother’s daughter, but Beryl exquisite! He wanted to laugh. What the hell was wrong with him? Time to pull himself together.

Safer to look out of the window, concentrate on the view; that had never let him down. The living-room was at the back of the house, overlooking the harbour, and from where he sat at table he could see right across Carrick Roads to St Just-in-Roseland. Sunlight glittered on the water and the colours … the colours were not bright, but the light shattered in reflection, was brilliant. How often had he struggled to make that distinction on canvas? Painting light: that was what it was all about. The Impressionists had tried, God knows! but even they …

‘I think I shall go down to the studio.’

Beryl said: ‘But you’ve eaten hardly anything, father! Really —’

‘I’ve had enough.’ And he added under his breath: ‘More than enough!’ without being quite sure what he meant.

‘Shall I bring your coffee down to you?’

‘No.’

‘You haven’t had your tablets …’

‘For Christ’s sake!’

He went down the stairs, holding tight to the bannisters and swaying slightly. He felt giddy.

He had been born and lived all his life over the shop: E. Garland and Son, Artists’ Suppliers and Printers. In the little hall at the bottom of the stairs one door opened into a side passage leading to the street; the other, to the back of the shop through which he had to pass to reach the studio. The shop was closed for the lunch hour. He shuffled past well ordered, dusted shelves and racks, and past the little office where his father had sat and schemed for most of his life. The place was peopled with ghosts and soon he would be one of them. He fumbled with a key from his pocket then opened a door into another world.

Like the living-room upstairs his studio looked out on the harbour. It was more like a workshop than a studio – a painter’s workshop. There was a sturdy bench, with an orderly arrangement of tools, where he made stretchers and frames. There was an earthenware sink, a table, a couple of easels, a painter’s trolley, a chest of shallow drawers. Empty frames and canvases were stacked against the walls … And almost every object in the room seemed to be spattered with multi-coloured splashes of paint; while the windows were covered with grime and festooned with cob-webs. A scruffy orderliness. That was how he liked it.

When Gifford Tate was alive and used to visit him, Tate had croaked through his beard: ‘Why the hell don’t you get yourself a decent studio, Eddie? God knows you can afford it! At least get somebody to clean the bloody windows!’ And Garland had answered: ‘I like it as it is, and as for the windows, that muck is a natural filter for the light and if any interfering bastard ever cleaned ’em I’d twist his credentials off.’

Entering his studio always gave his spirit a lift; it did so now.

He fetched a tobacco pouch out of his pocket and a packet of cigarette papers. With a lifetime of practice behind him he rolled a passable cigarette in his fingers and lit it.

There was a painting on one of the easels and the trolley with his brushes, tubes of paint, and palette was beside it. He pulled up a high stool and stood, his bottom propped on the stool, which he used like a shooting stick, his painting posture for these latter days. The painting seemed complete: another harbour scene. He studied it with growing distaste. ‘That water … as exciting as a sludge pit in a sewage works.’

He closed his eyes and tried with all the concentration of which he was capable to see with his mind exactly what it was that he had wanted to paint. Slowly the scene seemed to materialise once more out of his imagination: the mist, the swathe of sunlit water; the water like shot silk in the shelter of the boats; ripples elsewhere, tiny vibrant glittering crests … Points of pure light … so brilliant that they hurt the eyes …

God! How they hurt the eyes! But for once he believed that he was seeing as he had striven all his life to see … Diamond points … blinding! They seemed to sear into his brain. He groped vaguely with his right hand as though reaching for a brush and as he did so he experienced an intolerable contraction in his chest, a paralysing pain, and with a cry of anguish he fell, taking the stool with him.

His niece, Cathy Carne, found him when she came back to open the shop after lunch. She was surprised to see the studio door open, he always closed the door when he was working and kept it locked when he wasn’t there. Then she saw him, his heavy body lying mounded over the stool which had fallen with him. His jaw sagged and his eyes stared.

Her first reaction was incredulity. The old man had been with her in the shop that morning, the same as ever, gossiping about the business, about the vagaries of their customers, the oddities of town councillors and the perverseness of families – all with a humour that was wickedly spiced. Of course he had been warned; the family had been warned, but …

She felt empty inside.

She went upstairs. On the landing she could hear voices coming from the living-room and she pushed open the door. Beryl was clearing the table; Francis, with his hands in his pockets, was staring out of the window. There was an atmosphere, as always when the two of them were left alone together.

Beryl looked at her: ‘What’s wrong?’

‘It’s uncle; he’s collapsed in the studio.’ She added after a pause: ‘He’s dead.’

Without a word Francis turned away fom the window and pushed past her. They heard his heavy footsteps descending the stairs.

Cathy picked up the telephone which stood on a side table. ‘I’d better telephone Alan.’

She dialled a number and spoke to the receptionist. ‘I’m speaking for Mr Garland at the art shop. Is Dr Tate there?’ A pause and when she spoke again her manner was familiar: ‘Oh, Alan – Cathy here. I’m afraid it’s bad news … Yes, Uncle … he collapsed on the floor in the studio … I’m afraid so … If you will … Yes, come to the side door.’

She replaced the receiver and turned to Beryl. ‘He’ll be here in a few minutes.’

Beryl was standing motionless in the middle of the room, her hand on her heart. ‘I knew something was going to happen; I could feel it! And he brought it on himself.’

Cathy said: ‘We’d better go down.’

They went downstairs; Francis was standing in the doorway of the studio. ‘Well, he’s dead all right.’

‘I telephoned the surgery.’

‘Good!’

Cathy was looking past him into the studio. ‘Can’t we move him?’

‘Better not.’

Beryl said: ‘I’ve told him and told him but he took no notice … He wouldn’t even take the tablets Alan gave him. He brought it on himself.’

And then it occurred to Cathy that although the old man was lying exactly as she had seen him, something had changed. Surely, there was a different picture on the easel? Odd! She was on the point of saying something but changed her mind. After all, what difference could it make? If Francis was up to something it was nothing to do with her.

Francis, hands thrust deep into his trouser pockets, said: ‘I thought he seemed a bit queer at lunch but I didn’t expect it to come to this …’

They stood, silent and waiting, until the side door opened and Alan Tate came in. He was slight of build, very dark, with a sallow complexion, and meticulously dressed in a dark grey suit with a silk tie. Son of Gifford Tate, the painter, he had been the Garlands’ doctor since, at his father’s death, he had returned to Falmouth and set up practice in the family house.

Subdued greetings, then he went about his business. A brief examination, his movements rapid and sure. He spoke in staccato phrases: ‘His heart gave out, that’s what it amounts to. Bound to happen sooner or later … Give me a hand, Francis – get the stool out from under him; straighten him up a little.’ Although first names were being used his attitude and manner were strictly professional.

Beryl said: ‘We can’t leave him here, he’ll have to be taken upstairs.’

Tate looked up at her, his brown eyes enlarged by the lenses of his spectacles. ‘He’s a big man, Beryl; too much for Francis and me. The undertakers will do it and it will be more decent that way.’

Francis said: ‘You’ll come upstairs, Alan?’

Tate glanced at his watch. ‘I can spare a few minutes.’

Cathy Carne said: ‘Shouldn’t we tell Uncle Thomas and Mark?’

Blank looks from Beryl and Francis.

‘After all, Thomas is his brother.’

Beryl said: ‘They’ll hear soon enough.’

Cathy gave up. ‘Do you want me to shut the shop?’

‘The shop?’ Francis turned his bulging eyes on her: ‘What would be the point of that?’

Cathy stayed in the shop while the others went upstairs. Ten minutes later Tate came down alone. Cathy was in the little office and he came to stand in the doorway. ‘They are both quite composed. I doubt if there will be any problem with delayed shock.’ Cynical. ‘You found him, I gather?’

‘Yes.’

‘A shock for you. They’ve been in touch with the undertaker and when I left they were arguing about the funeral.’

‘When shall I see you again?’

Tate hesitated. ‘I’ll telephone.’ And added, seemingly in explanation: ‘Marcella is very depressed. I’m concerned about her.’

Cathy was feeling the heat; little beads of perspiration formed between her shoulder blades and breasts. She had worn a full-length coat because it was all she had that was decently subfusc; now she wished that she had been less conformist.

She was staring at the coffin, the wooden box with fancy trimmings which held the mortal remains of Edwin Garland, her uncle and employer. She wondered what his comment would have been had he been in a position to make one.

‘Man that is born of woman hath but a short time to live and is full of misery …’

They weren’t talking about Edwin Garland; Edwin had enjoyed life in his own way.

There were more wreaths than she would have expected and the flowers were already wilting in the merciless sun. She wondered who had sent them all.

Francis, as chief mourner, stood next to the vicar; his paunchiness exaggerated by an old, dark suit that was too small for him. She wondered about the bruise on his cheek: she had noticed it the evening before when he came back from his Tuesday round. ‘I walked into a door.’ Somebody had hit him. Interesting!

With glazed eyes he was staring into the middle distance. Day-dreaming of life after the shop? More than likely. It wouldn’t be long before he closed a deal with one or other of the chain stores who had shown an interest in the site. Then there was the printing works … Francis had never shown any real interest in either side of the business and, as far as the shop was concerned, this had meant that Cathy had been free to go her own way under the old man’s eye.

Beryl would have to move out, but she would go to live with her friend; two old-maids together. It was what they both wanted and with her share of her father’s money Beryl would be well able to provide for both of them in style.

‘And that leaves me … At thirty-six.’

She had had a letter from Edwin’s solicitor asking her to come to his office the following day. It must mean that she had been mentioned in the will. A picture, probably; she had always admired his work, perhaps a little money to go with it; that would be welcome.

‘… deliver us not into the bitter pains of eternal death.’

Yes, well, it might not be as bad as that.

It was Wednesday afternoon. In the tradition of the street Edwin was being buried on early closing day so that the other traders could attend. But the custom had lost its meaning because there were so few private traders left, and company managers are faceless men, here today and gone tomorrow. All the same, there was a good crowd, the more surprising because Francis had not bothered to organise anything properly.

It was one of the hottest days of the year and the new part of the cemetery was without trees. Most people were out enjoying themselves and she could hear children on the beach which was not far away.

Francis’s illegitimate daughter, Anna, was there with her boyfriend. They stood a little way back from the others as though unsure of their right to be there at all, and they were in bizarre contrast to the rest of the mourners. The girl’s fair hair was scraped back and held with a slide; she wore a grey shirt, open half-way down the front, and bleached jeans. Her boyfriend had his hair down to his shoulders and wore a bandeau. His sweat-shirt carried the slogan: ‘No! to Trident!’, and his jeans seemed about to fall apart. Both of them were so beautifully and evenly brown that clothes seemed superfluous.

Cathy looked at them with a mixture of envy and doubt. At their age she had already spent four years working in her uncle’s shop. But what would they be doing at thirty-six?

Also standing well back from the grave, Mike Treloar, the printing works foreman, supported himself on a stick. As a boy he had been crippled by polio.

Cathy was almost opposite Alan Tate and he was watching her, or seemed to be. It was hard to tell because of the sun glinting on his glasses. Looked at objectively there was nothing special about him: a smallish man, slight of build, dark-brown hair en brosse, spectacles with thick lenses and a broad, carefully trimmed moustache. Everything about him was meticulous, as though the parts had been made and assembled with scrupulous care. Cathy sometimes wondered why women found him so attractive, why she herself did.

He was with Marcella, his father’s second wife and widow. In her late thirties, she was two or three years younger than her step-son. Once she had been attractive, with a good figure: now she was painfully thin and her sharp features gave her a pinched look. She did nothing to improve her appearance; her flaxen hair was cut short so that it fitted her head like a helmet and accentuated the angularity of her features.

Cathy was surprised how ill she looked, there was an area of paleness about her eyes, and her nose was pinched and reddened about the nostrils; perhaps a summer cold, though Alan had said she was depressed.

‘Forasmuch as. . .