Marcus’s voice sounded distant. He’d gone back in time now, remembering. He explained how the old man had instructed him on exactly what to say to the police: Irene had left home for work and never returned, simple as that. Keep it simple and stick to it.
‘Oh, and a word of advice,’ Bill had said, ‘if you ever want to blackmail anyone again, you’m going to have to be a bit more convincing... you young puppy. Go on — get off ’ome now.’
But as Marcus had reached the cottage door, Bill had called him back. It was the old man’s last words which held the sting in their tail.
‘You’ll hear from me — I may want something from you in return.’
What he had wanted from Marcus was custody of his life.
From that moment on, Marcus was never again to be entirely his own man.
‘Why did Bill Turpin want you under his control?’ she asked.
Marcus shrugged. ‘He told me he thought I was clever, didn’t have any morals, and had a weakness that would always be with me. The combination made me valuable to him, I suppose. I would have all the help in the world to raise me to positions of great power. All I had to do in return was to be absolutely loyal and always do exactly what I was told. Then I would remain infallible... whatever I did...’
Jennifer appeared totally shocked.
‘Bill Turpin was certainly not what he seemed, was he?’ she remarked mildly.
‘In a way he was,’ Marcus replied.
And he told her what he knew of Bill’s history, his time in the services, the death of his wife and children. Bill had told Marcus that during the war he had met a group of men who were as disillusioned with their country as he was. They shared his bitterness and despair, his anger at the hell they had been thrust into, and felt the world owed them something special after all they had been through. At the time Bill saw himself almost as a kind of Robin Hood, making up for society’s various injustices, inequalities, and cruelties. There were real villains among them, Marcus was sure, but they came from all walks of life and it was only their shared purpose which united them — to be free and powerful, and that had to mean rich as well. Bill’s involvement had initially been political in a way, although he would never have understood that, but had he been a more educated man, he would have channelled his rage against society differently; he might well have joined the communist party, as so many did in the reaction days of the fifties...
Jennifer interrupted Marcus at that point. He was warming to his theme, arguing around it in the way he was so good at, sounding quite smooth. She was not going to let him prevaricate.
‘So what actually was Bill Turpin?’ she asked.
Marcus shrugged again. ‘Not a man to cross,’ he said. ‘In the early days he was top muscle. The old Pelham gossip wasn’t the half of it.
‘He was involved in the Lord Lynmouth burglary, at least two other major art robberies, and God knows what else. Arms dealing — one of the great markets of our time. It seemed crazy, a joke when people talked about it back in Pelham, but Bill and his lot knew all about the international arms market from the beginning, from the war. Arms to Korea. To Suez — by fancy routes, of course. And to every African banana state invented. If it still seems far-fetched, think about what is public knowledge now — British firms, legitimate British firms, supplying weapons to the enemy during the Gulf War. Bill and his mates knew what they were about. They knew how to use the stuff they were flogging, for God’s sake — they’d lived through all that.’
Marcus was sweating. He wiped a silken arm across his forehead. She had been aware that he had been sniffing profusely. He took a handkerchief from his pocket and blew his nose. He still didn’t stop sniffing. Strange that it had not ever occurred to her until this day that Marcus’s extraordinary energy could sometimes be chemically encouraged. Maybe he read her mind, she’d often felt he’d done that before — within seconds he had the sniffing under control.
She tried not to look at him. ‘Go on,’ she commanded.
He did so, quite intently. ‘Bill Turpin once told me how he’d learned during the war that he had one great talent — it was for killing people. Then he laughed as if that was a joke.’
Jennifer remembered what Todd had told her about the unsolved murder of the Earl of Lynmouth, about the string of fine-art robberies just after the war, and even about illegal arms deals out of Bristol. She had a vision of a small gang of highly trained soldiers, breaking and entering into big houses and galleries, using their army skills, and one of them with a special job for which he had a special talent — to listen, to watch, to wipe out anybody who got in the way. Swiftly. Cleanly. Silently. Bill Turpin. She had not believed what she was saying when she had asked Todd if he thought old Bill was some kind of hit man. It seemed that was more or less what he had been. The puzzle was starting to fit together finally. Marcus was still talking, and all she had to do now was listen.
Once Marcus began to tell the story, he could not stop, it was as if the floodgates had been opened. He tried to explain his mixed feelings of revulsion and gratitude towards Bill. When Marcus ran to the cottage he wasn’t even sure what he was asking for, he said. It was Bill who had immediately begun an elaborate cover-up operation with a calm efficiency which suggested it was not the first time.
Bill had always said they were kindred spirits, the two of them, which in the early days had sent shivers down Marcus’s spine. Bill unnerved him because Marcus never understood what he got out of it all. He had always known Bill was a very wealthy man, but he never lived as if he was. He lived exactly the way you would have expected without the other secret side to him. For Bill Turpin the game had all been in the playing. He had talked to Marcus about the perfect murder, enjoying the conversation.
‘And Marjorie Benson — it was Turpin who killed her, wasn’t it?’
Marcus nodded. ‘For sure. Not that he ever put it into words. He wouldn’t, the bugger.’
‘And Johnny Cooke?’
‘Yes, poor Johnny,’ said Marcus, in a voice which held no sympathy at all. ‘Wrong place, wrong time. Probably his destiny. Suited Turpin though. I had my instructions, all I had to do was give a more or less verbatim account of Johnny Cooke’s midnight visit the day after the murder. It certainly sounded like a confession — and what could make a murderer feel safer than to have another man convicted of his crime?’
Jennifer kept looking away. With difficulty she kept her voice neutral, pleasant even.
‘So why did Bill Turpin kill Marjorie Benson? Who was she, for goodness’ sake?’
Marcus shook his head. ‘Didn’t the diary tell you?’ he asked.
Jennifer answered him quickly.
‘Only that Marjorie had to die because she knew too much, because she could destroy everything.’
Marcus nodded. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘She was always the real mystery — not Bill. I never had a clue who she was — but she really did have something on the old man, him and his buddies.
‘That’s all I ever knew really. I had nothing and he helped me — she had everything and he killed her.’
‘So did she try to blackmail him too?’
Marcus shook his head. ‘I don’t know, doesn’t seem likely the way Johnny described her. Bill was in no doubt that she had come to Pelham Bay to get him though, in some way or other.’
‘I wonder why he put her body in the sea,’ Jennifer said suddenly.
‘How the hell do I know?’ Marcus replied with a question. ‘I don’t suppose he did. I would imagine he rolled her into the river, there where it cuts through the dunes, and she was swept into the estuary.’
Of course, that would make sense. Out of sight, out of mind, until the tide carried her back the next day. Bill Turpin might have expected it to be longer before she was found. If Jennifer had not swum out so far, the tide would probably have taken the body out to sea again without anyone noticing; it could have been several days before she was discovered. But in the end that turned to Bill Turpin’s advantage. He had something tangible with which to frame poor Johnny Cooke...