My eye settled on another man who was standing on his own with the church tower rising monstrously behind him, too big for a church that was too big for its town. It was his Hunter Wellington boots I noticed first. They were brand new and bright orange – an odd choice for a funeral. I couldn’t see much of his face. He was wearing a cloth cap and a Barbour jacket turned up at the collar. As I watched him, his mobile phone rang and instead of putting it on silent, he took the call, turning away for privacy. ‘John White …’ I heard him give his name but nothing else. Still, I knew who he was. This was Alan’s neighbour, the hedge fund manager he’d fallen out with just before he died.
Still waiting for the service to begin, I searched through the crowd and found Melissa Conway and her son, standing next to the cemetery’s war memorial. She was wearing a raincoat tucked so tightly around her that it appeared to be breaking her in half. Her hands were deep in her pockets, her hair concealed beneath a scarf. I might not have recognised her but for her son who must have been in his late teens now. He was the spitting image of his father – at least in Alan’s later incarnation – uncomfortable in a dark suit that was a little too large for him. He was not happy to be here; by which I mean he was angry. He was staring at the grave with something like murder in his eyes.
I hadn’t seen Melissa for at least six years. She had come to the launch party of Atticus Pünd Takes the Case, which had been held at the German embassy in London, an evening of champagne and miniature Bratwurst. I was seeing Andreas occasionally by then and because we had him in common we were able to strike up a conversation of sorts. I remember her as being polite but disengaged. It can’t be much fun being married to a writer and she made it clear that she was only there because it was expected of her. She knew nobody in the room and nobody had anything to say to her. It was a shame that the two of us had never met properly at Woodbridge School: I had no knowledge of her outside her relation to Alan. She had the same blank look on her face now, even though it was a coffin rather than canapés that was being brought in. I wondered why she had come.
The hearse had arrived. The coffin was carried forward. A vicar appeared, walking out of the church. This was the Reverend Tom Robeson whose name had been mentioned in the newspaper. He was about fifty years old and although I had never seen him before I knew him immediately. ‘ … his tombstone face and his long, slightly unkempt hair.’ That was how Alan had described Robin Osborne in Magpie Murders and, even as I thought that, something else occurred to me. I had seen it as I entered the cemetery, his name written on a sign. It helped having that visual prompt.
Robeson is an anagram of Osborne.
It was another one of Alan’s private jokes. James Taylor had become James Fraser, Claire was Clarissa and, now that I thought about it, John White the hedge fund manager had been turned into Johnny Whitehead the second-hand furniture dealer and petty crook, this the result of an argument about money. As far as I knew, Alan had never been a religious person despite this very conventional funeral and I had to ask myself what his relationship with the vicar has been and why he had chosen to celebrate it in his novel. Osborne had been number three on my list of suspects. Mary Blakiston had discovered some sort of secret, left out on his desk. Could Robeson have had a reason to murder Alan? He certainly looked the part of the vengeful killer with his rather grim, colourless features and his robes hanging forlornly off him in the rain.
He described Alan as a popular writer whose books had given pleasure to many millions of people around the world. It was as if Alan was being introduced on a Radio 4 panel show rather than at his own funeral. ‘Alan Conway may have left us all too soon and in tragic circumstances but he will, I am sure, remain in the hearts and the minds of the literary community.’ Even ignoring the question of whether the literary community actually had a heart, I thought this was unlikely to be the case. It’s my experience that dead authors are forgotten with remarkable speed. Even living authors find it hard to stay on the shelves; there are too many new books and too few shelves. ‘Alan was one of our country’s most celebrated mystery writers,’ he went on. ‘He lived much of his life in Suffolk and it was always his wish that he should be buried here.’ In Magpie Murders, there is something hidden in the funeral address that relates in some way to the murder. On the very last page of the typescript, when Pünd is talking about the clues that will solve the crime, he specifically refers to ‘the words spoken by the vicar’. Unfortunately, Robeson’s speech was almost deliberately bland and unrevealing. He didn’t mention James or Melissa. There was nothing about friendship, generosity, humour, personal mannerisms, small kindnesses, special moments … all those things we actually miss when somebody dies. If Alan had been a marble statue stolen from a park, the Reverend Tom Robeson might have cared as much.
There was just one passage that stayed with me. It certainly struck me that it might be worth asking the vicar about it later.
‘Very few people are now buried in this cemetery,’ he said. ‘But Alan insisted. He had given a great deal of money to the church which has allowed us to undertake much needed restoration work to the clerestory windows and the main chancel arch. In return he demanded this resting place and who was I to stand in his way?’ He smiled as if trying to make light of what he had just said. ‘All his life, Alan had a dominant personality, as I discovered at quite an early age. Certainly I was not going to refuse him this last wish. His contribution assures the future of St Michael’s and it is only fitting that he should remain here, within the church grounds.’
This whole section of the speech had an edge to it. On the one hand Alan had been generous. He deserved to be allowed to lie here. But that wasn’t quite the case, was it? Alan had ‘demanded’ it. He had ‘a dominant personality’. And ‘as I discovered at quite an early age’. Alan and the vicar obviously had some sort of history. Was I really the only person who noticed the discordance in what was being said?
I was going to ask Charles what he thought as soon as the service was over but in fact I never made it to the end. The rain was beginning to ease off and Robeson had reached his closing remarks. Bizarrely, he had forgotten Alan altogether. He was talking about the history of Framlingham and, in particular, Thomas Howard, the third Duke of Norfolk, whose tomb was inside the church. For a moment my attention wondered and that was when I noticed a mourner who must have arrived late. He was lingering over by the gate, watching the service from a distance, anxious to be on his way. Even as I examined him, and with the vicar still speaking, he turned on his heels and walked out onto Church Street.
I had not seen his face. He was wearing a black, Fedora hat.
‘Don’t leave,’ I whispered to Charles. ‘I’ll meet you at the hotel.’
It had taken Atticus Pünd one hundred and thirty pages to discover the identity of the man who had attended Mary Blakiston’s funeral. I couldn’t wait that long. Nodding at the vicar and detaching myself from the crowd, I set off in pursuit.