Murder in a Surrey Tribe

Murder in a Surrey Tribe

Lucy Abelson

Lone Hare Press

First published in Great Britain by the Lone Hare Press

Copyright Lucy Abelson 2007

Fourth edition published by the Lone Hare Press at Smashwords

The right of Lucy Abelson to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

This book is fiction. All the characters in this book are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Incidents that take place in real places are also imaginary. Any likeness to a living person is entirely co-incidental.

ISBN 978-09557631-8-2

It is customary at this point for the publisher to include lavish praises of the author’s work from fellow writers and celebrities. Only you dear reader are about to enter the realm of Bisley Heath where they frown on such exhibitionism. (See the views of Genevieve Mountbank in Chapter 24, ‘Althea on the course’). Hence The Lone Hare Press has decided the practice is not within the spirit of this book.

This book is dedicated to all the girls at Hankley Common who have made my time on the course such fun.

You are all far too nice to be included in this story.

OF MATCH AND MEDAL PLAY

The choice of, and conduct towards, a partner are matters of considerable importance. If we get beaten, no matter who he is, or how he has played, or how we have played, it will, as a matter of course, be entirely his fault. During the match, however, it is politic to mask our disgust and contempt; for it is not the scolder, but the scolded, who is apt to go to pieces. No man who takes a partner ever questions for a moment that he himself is the amiable factor in the combination.

The Art of Golf by Sir Walter Simpson

published in 1887 by David Douglas

Copyright, Classics of Golf.

CONTENTS

Chapter 1. An awkward encounter.

Chapter 2. The search engine

Chapter 3. A match with Patsy

Chapter 4. In the Sloane Club

Chapter 5. The Hamish article

Chapter 6. A game with Mike

Chapter 7. Death on the course

Chapter 8. The Wake

Chapter 9. Invitation to detect

Chapter 10. The car park incident

Chapter 11. Valerie’s party

Chapter 12. Becoming a sleuth

Chapter 13. A strange will

Chapter 14. The Gate

Chapter 15. Tea with Bella

Chapter 16. Phil’s scene

Chapter 17. Dinner at the Four Seasons

Chapter 18. At home with Brad

Chapter 19. George on the course

Chapter 20. Phil comes supper

Chapter 21. Inside the sheds

Chapter 22. A meeting with Byron

Chapter 23. Sympathy to Siobhan

Chapter 24. Althea on the course

Chapter 25. Rosie’s dinner party

Chapter 26. Tessa’s revelations

Chapter 27. An unwelcome guest

Chapter 28. George in trouble

Chapter 29. Plant secrets

Chapter 30. A conflict of interest

Chapter 31. Lunch with Ratty

Chapter 32. At the solicitors

Chapter 33. Mixed Foursome

Acknowledgements

Bibliography

About the Author

Further Bisley Heath Stories

Chapter 1. An Awkward Encounter

Impey’s hand gripped the door handle. It refused to turn. She felt in the pocket of her shorts and pulled out a scrap of paper. CXC729. Yes. The number was right.

She tried to twist the knob again, but it stuck firm.

Around the locked hut was a copse, but with some of the trees felled and the lower branches taken off others, it was difficult to spot anywhere to hide. There were only patches of bracken. At this stage of the summer though hard and prickly, the stalks were still waist high. She could crouch amongst their large fronds, but she must hurry. Jo was waiting for her.

She pulled down her shorts and pants and bent her knees into a low squat to pee. With her head forward, she should be fairly well hidden. Her hair would blend in with the rusty gold bracken like a harvest mouse amongst corn. With relief she let her water go.

Its soft hiss was interrupted by one loud crunch in the undergrowth followed by another. Someone was taking steps towards her. Judging from the heavy tread, they were made by large feet, masculine feet. For a few seconds, she squatted down further to stay out of sight until the man moved away, but he didn’t go. The noise of his footsteps became louder and nearer before it stopped.

Drat it. She couldn’t keep Jo waiting any longer.With her knees bent, Impey tried to pull her shorts and knickers up her legs. As she rocked back on to her heels, her right foot slipped. The ground beneath it gave way. Her ankle twisted. She tried to straighten it to stand but it sank down into a hole. Stuck lopsided, she squealed.

Can I help? Asked a deep gruff voice.

Impey lifted her head up to see a pair of long cream woollen socks that ended at the knees of a vast man. Her eyes travelled up the shorts, over the burgundy striped polo shirt to recognise the large oblong face of Mike Gibbon, known to some as the Human ape.

Erm yes thank you. She grasped the hairy-backed hand held out to her. Right now help was welcome from any hominid.

He pulled her into a standing position. Then, without waiting for her to adjust her clothing, he bent down and yanked her trapped foot out of the hole.

She squealed again. It hurt when she tried to stand on the released foot.

Damn rabbits. Here let me. With a deft movement he pulled up her lower clothing which was still hanging some way below her buttocks.

Erm. Thank you. Impey’s voice came out staccato. This was not the way she would choose to meet Mike Gibbon, the newly appointed Vice-captain of Bisley Heath Golf Club.

Ouch. She put her hurt leg ahead gingerly.

Will you be all right? Mike glanced at the watch on his brawny arm covered in long bronze hairs.

Oh yes fine. Impey lied through gritted teeth. She hobbled back to Jo.

Hands on hips, Jo stood with Impey’s clubs alongside her ball on the fairway. Is something wrong? You’ve been ages.

I’m sorry but I sort of hurt myself.

Poor you. Will you be all right to play?

I hope so. The trouble was…

Impey cut out the explanation. Jo wouldn’t want to be delayed further by hearing about her problems with plumbing.

She plucked a five iron out of her bag. It should hit the right length. Not that her game mattered when somehow she had to walk the rest of the way round the course. She must keep Jo’s score. At this half way stage it was good enough to win today’s competition.

Impey swung her club back. As she turned on her heel, something inside her foot tweaked. A fibre slipped back into place. When she finished her swing, she felt just a faint twinge of pain whilst her ball flew through the air to land on the green.

Whew. Thank goodness for that. She dropped her club back into her bag. It’s lucky… Tentatively she put her heel down, then pressed the ball of her foot down before she lifted the other leg off the ground. She felt in the pocket of her bag, found a pain-killer and stuffed it into her mouth.

Provided you’re okay, we really do need to make tracks. Jo pranced forward pushing her trolley in front of her. Head over her shoulder she said, We’ve lost a lot of ground. I’ve had to let people through. Okay," Like a foal following a large mare, Impey managed to trot after her. As she moved, the pain dulled. To blot it out when she played she focused on her shot. She pictured her ball fly straight down the fairway.

Good shot, Jo kept saying. There was a wry expression on her face when they sat down on the wooden bench outside the professional’s shop to add up their scores.

Beware the injured golfer. Jo thrust Impey’s clean neatly marked score card into her outstretched hand.

You got forty points.

Impey tentatively held out Jo’s tattered card. I’m sorry. I had it in my pocket, but you did well, you got forty points too.

Only her forty points was better. She would win the competition rather than Jo, because a tie would be decided by the higher number of points made on the last nine holes.

She jumped off the bench. Today’s score might change her life. It meant her handicap should come down. She’d be good enough to play at weekends. Permission should go through the committee of men who ruled the club as a mere formality. Now she could take part in mixed competitions she would meet new men, healthy, wholesome sports men, unlike her soon to be divorced husband.

No longer would she have to juggle her interviews with business men around golf matches. She would be on the end of the telephone at home from Monday to Friday, not worrying her mobile might ring in her golf bag.

Thankfully when they reached the club house, Jo asked, Do you mind if we don’t have a drink? We did get rather delayed and I’ve got lots to do at home.

Not at all. Impey nodded. Once she’d dropped her card in the competition box, she could shower and hurry home herself. Back there she could get a few hours real work done, before she dashed back to the club to discover the crucial results of today’s game. She must know them before tomorrow’s match.

Although it was six o’clock in the evening, when Impey returned to the club, the car park was crowded with cars.The only space she could find was fifty yards from the club house. She parked her little old Fiat and hurried across the car park.

A tall lean man whose thin aquiline face was topped with silvery hair stepped across her path. Well hell..lo… He drew out the words.

Er hallo. Impey leant backwards awkwardly on her good leg unsure how to address Sir Patrick Rattray. His cronies called him Ratty, but the Bisley Heath girls said he should be called Mole because he found out every salient fact about everybody.

You’re a fast worker. His thin lips stretched out into a wide grin.

What do you mean?

I’m sure you know. He chuckled.

No. She shrugged.

He winked a hooded eye and turned away singing softly. Amongst some Da das and Ba Bas in his song, she picked up the words chimp and honeymoon as he swerved past her. On his back, his clubs clanked in his bag, the irons toning with his hair as they glinted in the late summer’s afternoon sunshine whilst he walked to his car.

Impey grinned at his rear view. Part of the fun of belonging to a club was the eccentrics you met. She ran to the entrance on the side of the club house which led up to the Ladies’ suite of rooms, irritated she had to stop to fumble in her handbag for her card to swipe the lock. There was a popping noise when she slipped the card through the slot and the door jerked open. Impey hurled herself through it and skipped up the stairs two at a time.

At the top, she made her way across the sitting room of the Ladies’ suite to the official lobby where the notice boards were hung. On the other side of a shut oak panelled door, there was a buzz of voices. They stopped abruptly when the brass door handle creaked as she turned it. An eerie silence greeted her entrance into the room. The bunch of women there eyed her.

Impey hesitated where she stood in the shelter of the half-open door.

Huddled together in front of the wall, the ladies blocked the notice board she wanted to see. Every woman in the half ring had their heads turned towards her, but none of them moved or spoke They looked like a pack of animals tensed on their haunches ready to pounce The invisible hair that covered their bodies must be standing on end, the way the women bristled.

Impey looked down. The thick pile wool carpet beneath her feet felt as soft as earth, but apart from the green and white apple blossom on the chintz upholstery and curtains, the large pink roses in cut glass vases on the polished oak table and shelves were the only visible vegetation. Their pithy sweet fragrance suggested they were freshly picked from someone’s garden.

She stepped forward. Silly to be nervous. Golf was an elegant civilised game. If you so much as rustled a tree to let a ball drop you got a penalty. That funny song she heard in the car park had brought back memories of one day’s field work. That was all. She could put out of her mind the picture of those two high ranking female chimpanzees who shook a tree branch so ferociously a young newcomer ape, wishful to join their group, fell bruised and battered to the ground.

As members of the Ladies’ committee, these women were dominant too, but they must be good-hearted people to be chosen. Nonetheless it was oddly reminiscent the way they stared at her. Chimpanzees could be the sweetest of creatures, until provoked.

If she were in the jungle, she’d know what to do. Make a gesture of submission. She dropped her head in a slight bow. Ridiculous to bend further even if lying flat on the ground was supposed to work with gorillas.

Impey lifted her head. She would not be cowed by their silence.

Maybe they were upset because of Jo? It was a shock to see her friend amongst them even if she was on the committee. Yet there was her small brown curly topped head on her long neck stretched out high above the others. She looked as cross as the rest of them.

Impey strode towards the group. She smiled above their heads at Jo.

Jo shifted from one of her long legs on to the other, before she acknowledged Impey’s arrival with a slight nod. She must still be fretting over their game this morning.

‘Pigs wretched tits’ thought Impey. ‘I should be more upset than her. I was the one who suffered.’ She could still feel the odd twinge of pain in her ankle.

Hi. She swivelled her head around to include everyone in her greeting.

Hello. Jo alone spoke in return.

I just came to see how we did this morning.

Fine, said Jo flatly. You’ve won again. Her tone dropped. Well done. You did it.

Thank you. That’s great. Impey glanced round at the other women. Rather than congratulatory, their facial expressions were so accusing she mumbled, I hope the break in the middle didn’t put you off.

Not as much as it might have done, I suspect. Snapped Dr. Wilhemena Stalker. She looked down her beak like nose at Impey’s face as though she had green sludge running out of her eyes or ears.

Impey stared back. The loose cut off trousers she wore today were much longer than the shorts the doctor once criticised as adhering to her like cling film. That time Jo told her not to worry. The Old Bill as Wilhemena was nick-named, was really very kind. Just wanted to keep up sartorial standards. Then Jo seemed to be on Impey’s side, but now she and Old Bill stood shoulder to shoulder.

What do you mean? Anger mounted in Impey.

Seeing what you were doing. Sneered another woman who had such deep brown hair and droopy jowls, she really did look like a chimpanzee.

Come on, said Impey. Everyone has to do it sometimes.

I suppose you might think that. The Old Bill emphasised the you.

Jo reddened. Her clenched fist thumped her hip.

Impey chewed her lip. Something was wrong here. These women were over-reacting to a ridiculous extent. They must think she’d done something far more reprehensible than squatting outside the wretched toilet. Just what is it you think I’ve done?

If you don’t know, I’m sure we can’t imagine. Said Old Bill.

She could watch the film. Said the droopy jawed woman.

What the hell were they talking about Maybe the answer was to humour them. Yes, and I suppose I could wear the tee-shirt.

Do that and you’ll never set foot in this club again, said Old Bill.

Chapter 2. The Search Engine

Naked from waist to knee Impey thrust her pelvis forwards whilst Mike leant towards her, his hairy-backed hand draped at the end of his arm outstretched towards her thigh. Her short beige polo shirt was scrunched upwards whilst the tall gold fronds of bracken hid the rest of her clothes. Only her dark bush stood out.The golden brown hair on her head was tousled as she swayed.

Sickened, Impey shoved her breakfast plate with its half-eaten piece of toast away from the computer on her desk. Who says the camera never lies?

She re-read the email with the film. Don’t shoot the messenger. But I wondered if anyone had the courtesy to show you this. How??? Love Rosie.

How indeed? Impey drew a breath through gritted teeth. She moved the arrow on to reply to Rosie Metcalfe.

Thanks. Silly accident seems to have got out of hand. There was no time to explain. Her next email was from Sir Hamish Mashie’s secretary

Sir Hamish has an important early evening meeting. He would be available to see you later. Can you meet him for dinner at the Sloane Club at 7.30pm?

No that would be most inconvenient, she would have liked to have written back. She’d arranged her golf match for late morning so that when it was finished she could go straight up to London. Now she would have time to kill before she went for the interview. Irritating man.

She hated working over meals.

There was no way she could use the time usefully doing extra research. That was what she should be doing now. She blinked. The ghastly picture of her naked bottom half flashed in front of her eyes.

She thumped her elbow on her desk and rested her head on it. With the other hand she fingered the mouse of her computer. So that was what that committee lady meant about seeing the film. She shook her head. Not surprising they were shocked, but they’d get over it. After all it didn’t mean anything.

Time to do something sensible.

She tapped into her computer’s search engine. Then her eyes glazed at the hundreds of references to Sir Hamish Mashie. ‘Pigs tits’. Didn’t this man do anything except make dull speeches on finance? She might be a financial journalist but the Daily Mail magazine expected her to dig out the human story. The editor told her it was a real scoop that the tycoon had agreed to see her. Sir Hamish Mashie didn’t normally speak to the press.

She flipped through the pages. There must be something she could get a handle on, but it wasn’t going to be different methods of accountancy or the chemical content of organic food. Her hand waggled the mouse in frustration on its mat. Hundreds of pages zipped by. At random she picked one.

Ah! Now she knew why the prominent industrialist hated tabloid journalists. This story must have been a kick in the groin. Sir Hamish had taken out an injunction to stop any paper repeating it.

No cookies at Christmas, was the banner headline. My son’s a real Scrooge’ says Sir Hamish Mashie’s mum. Underneath there was a picture of a frail looking woman in a wheelchair. The plucky little old lady, crippled with arthritis, says she never hears from her son. Knighted for his services to the food industry, Sir Hamish is too busy ever to visit his mother in Scotland. Although Great Grains plc has given thousands of pounds away in charitable donations, the chairman and chief executive has never managed to send a food parcel to his impoverished mother. When our reporter visited the toilet he found neatly cut up squares of newspaper to use instead of a roll of tissue.

The inside and outside of the old lady’s cheaply furnished flat was pictured alongside the article. Her home in a high-rise tenement block of flats in Glasgow was contrasted with Sir Hamish’s luxury mansion in a lush part of England’s Home Counties, near Ascot.

That story appeared eight years ago. No wonder since then Sir Hamish had avoided any personal contact with journalists. It was her luck he’d decided to emerge from his shell for her. He must realise she wouldn’t want to give him a platform to air his prejudices on finance or food content but would ask him the gritty details of how he clawed his way from a poverty stricken birth in the Gorbals to reach pavements of gold and respectability in the City of London.

Except Sir Hamish was not entirely respectable.

As Impey trawled through further references to the knight, she spotted the word prison. A few more clicks and one article after another appeared on her screen giving her a crime story. Twenty years ago, Hamish Mashie spent a year in gaol for insider trading. It was a curious case, a white collar crime that seemed more technical than criminal, but nonetheless, Hamish had gone down.

Impey flicked through all the references to his time in prison, but she could find no description of his experiences. Hamish had almost managed to airbrush it out of his life, but it was obviously another reason the newly ennobled knight was unenthusiastic to meet journalists. He would rather not talk about his dealings in Bonus Biscuits.

Sorry Sir Hamish. If you think I’m going to be too soft to ask you about your life at Her Majesty’s Pleasure in Ford, open prison or not, I’ll still like to hear how you coped with slopping out.

With enough background information, she was about to switch off her machine when another name flashed before her eyes. In his current semi-retired role as non-executive director of a rival food company, Sir Patrick Rattray had attended a conference with her prospective interviewee.

A smattering of the song he had sung in the car park flittered into her mind. Her fingers felt for the keys to type the words chimp and honeymoon plus Abba Dabba into the search engine.

Results flooded on to her screen, most of which pointed to one song. The Abba Dabba Honeymoon was a favourite popular song of the First World War. Impey dragged her top teeth over her bottom lip as she read the simple lyrics. Ow. Yuk. ’I love you’ said the monkey to the chimp. Worse still, said the chimp, ‘I love you too’.

So that’s what it was about. It wasn’t just the ladies who’d seen the film. Everyone in the club had. People really did think she’d had a tryst in the woods.

Bile rose in her throat. She shivered. This was no time to say, ‘So what? As a matter of fact I didn’t, but so what if I did.’ Bisley Heath was one of the most esteemed clubs in the country, on a par with Surrey’s other grand places like Swinley Forest or Sunningdale. Etiquette was as crucial as the rules. If people thought she held up the field because she had had an amorous tryst in the middle of a competition, she could be disqualified, suspended, or even sacked from the club.

Maybe she should ring Mike Gibbon? He’d been very charming and he was involved too. No, that was far too embarrassing. Suppose his wife answered the phone? She could hardly say ‘People think I had a tryst with your husband in the woods, but I didn’t.’

Her handbag lay on the floor beside her desk in the cottage’s sitting room. Inside it was the Bisley Heath diary. She pulled it out to look at the list of members. There must be someone she could ask what to do.

The trouble was her friends weren’t high ranking females, but minor players. Only Jo had any influence.

She was the obvious person to help. This morning’s episode was just a hiccup. Before that she’d always been absolutely lovely. She must realise the loo door sometimes jammed or else she gave her the wrong number?

She