The Sirens Sang of Murder ht-3 Read online

  The French bird is rather good news. I don’t mean fanciable exactly — must be fairly ancient, and she’s got one of those squashed-in-looking faces, with sort of mud-coloured eyes not leaving much room for anything else — but the sort of bird that livens things up somehow. Edward Malvoisin says he fancies her like mad, but it doesn’t do him any good because she’s batty about her husband. She’s married to an Italian — he’s a count, like Italians mostly are, so that makes her a contessa.

  The Irish chap is all right as well — bit of a smoothie, but sound views on getting through the heavy stuff in plenty of time for drinks before lunch.

  Then the accountant turned up, long stringy chap by the name of Gideon Darkside with a face like a skull and crossbones, and lowered the geniality level by about 90 percent. He spent twenty minutes explaining how his plane had been held up and it wasn’t his fault he was late and another twenty telling us how important it was to get down to business and not waste time on gossip, so it wasn’t till nearly halfway through the morning that anyone thought of showing me a copy of the settlement.

  There were pages and pages of stuff about the trustee’s investment powers and that sort of thing, but the gist of it was that it was a settlement made by a chap called Philippe Alexandre, who lived in Sark, for the benefit of the descendants of some chap called Sir Walter Palgrave. At least that’s who it said it was for the benefit of — when I looked at the bit about discretionary powers it turned out that the trustee could give the loot away to anyone it liked, and these Palgrave characters would only get what was left over.

  The first thing that got me worried was that it said the trust fund was one hundred pounds sterling, and I pointed out that wouldn’t go far towards paying our expenses, let alone any fees that anyone might be thinking of charging. They all thought that was tremendously witty, even old Darkside. They said there was actually a bit more than that, and when I asked how much they said nine and a quarter million quid, give or take a hundred thousand. So we should be all right for our fees.

  So I said all right then, if that wasn’t the problem, what was? They all looked a bit embarrassed and not awfully keen to explain, but in the end Clemmie said the problem was that they sort of couldn’t find their beneficiaries. What I thought she meant was that all these Palgrave characters had gone off to America or somewhere leaving no forwarding address, the way beneficiaries do sometimes, and I said the best thing would be to hire a private detective to track them down.

  They all thought that was frightfully witty as well. They don’t know a thing about the descendants of this Walter Palgrave chap and they don’t give two hoots what’s happened to them, because the last thing they’re going to do with this trust fund is give a penny of it to these Palgrave characters. The idea of having a settlement where the people named as beneficiaries are the ones that are actually going to get the money didn’t seem to be one they’d ever heard of before, and they weren’t too keen on it. “Prejudicial to confidentiality and fiscal effectiveness” was what they thought it would be — I suppose they meant it would make it more difficult to keep things dark from the Revenue.

  So I said all right, if they weren’t going to give the money to the Palgrave characters, who were they going to give it to? So they said what they wanted to do was give effect to the wishes of the settlor. I asked if there was any chance that that meant the Philip Alexandre chap, who was supposed to have made the settlement, and like I was rather expecting by this time, they thought that was so witty they nearly fell off their chairs. What they meant by the settlor, they said, was the chap who’d actually put the money in in the first place, and it certainly wasn’t Philip Alexandre.

  So I said fine, who was the chap who’d put the money in and how were they going to find out what his wishes were if there wasn’t anything in the settlement to tell them? That’s when they started looking as if they’d definitely rather be talking about something else. According to them, the usual thing with this sort of settlement is to get a separate letter from the settlor telling the trustees what he wants them to do with the cash. No deed or witnesses or anything, just a few notes scribbled out on the first bit of paper they’ve got handy — back of an envelope or something like that. I said all right then, where was the envelope that the settlor’s wishes were written on the back of?

  So, bearing in mind that this is a nine-million-quid settlement run by a top-class international bank with high-powered professional advisers, what do you think they’ve gone and done with the envelope? Absolutely right, Larwood, lost it is what they’ve gone and done.

  Well, the line they take is that they haven’t lost it exactly, because so far as they know it’s still sitting on some file or other in somebody’s office somewhere. It’s just that they’ve all got thousands of files and they don’t know which one it’s on. It’s not on any of the ones to do with the Daffodil Settlement so what they reckon is that it must have been filed under the name of the settlor. But there’s nothing in the Daffodil files to say what the name of the settlor is, because that would be prejudicial to confidentiality and fiscal what’s-it. And they’ve just tumbled to the fact that none of them actually knows who he was — the only one who did was a chap called Oliver Grynne, who was the senior partner in Clemmie’s firm and kicked the bucket some time last year. The only thing the rest of them know is that the settlor snuffed it a few weeks before that and that means it’s time they started doling out some loot.

  I pointed out that strictly speaking there wasn’t anything for them to get in a tizz about, because according to the settlement the trustee could give the trust fund to anyone it liked, so there was nothing to prevent the Edelweiss outfit from trousering the loot and saying no more about it.

  Gabrielle thought that was the wittiest bit of all and laughed like a drain. Well, not like a drain really, because she actually sounds rather nice when she laughs, sort of bubbly but not squeaky, like champagne coming out of a bottle. Anyway, she laughed a lot.

  The rest of them didn’t think it was witty at all, they all looked a bit shocked, and Darkside made a face like a corpse sucking a lemon, as if I’d made a joke in the middle of a funeral service. The way they saw it, trousering the loot wasn’t on. Inconsistent with the bank’s international standing and reputation for unblemished integrity was what they said it would be — I suppose they meant it would look bad if anyone found out. So they wanted to know what else they could do.

  Sweet suffering swordfish, Larwood, what do they expect me to do about it? Pull the beneficiaries out of a hat for them? Send me a swift telex if you’ve got any bright ideas.

  Over and out — Cantrip

  “To such innocent minds as Cantrip’s and my own,” I said, “the arrangements which he describes appear bizarre. I assume, however, that to one versed in Revenue matters they are entirely normal and commonplace?”

  To my surprise, Julia seemed hesitant.

  “Up to a point,” she said at last. “That is to say, the settlement sounds for the most part like the sort of thing everyone was doing in the late sixties and early seventies — Basil must have drafted dozens of them. The basic idea was that the trustees wouldn’t be liable for U.K. income tax or capital gains tax because they were nonresident and the intended beneficiaries wouldn’t be liable because they weren’t legally entitled to income or capital — they wouldn’t get anything except in the exercise of the trustees’ discretion. And it was standard practice, in that kind of settlement, to avoid any mention of the real settlor or the persons he or she really intended to benefit. What I don’t understand is this reference to the Palgrave family — I’d have expected a disposition in favour of the Jersey Lifeboat Fund.”

  “Perhaps,” I said with incautious naiveté, “the settlor had no desire to benefit that institution.”

  “Oh,” said Julia, “it wouldn’t actually get anything, you know. But it’s indisputably charitable by the law of both England and Jersey, so it’s convenient from the tax point of view to make it th
e default beneficiary. I don’t say that was the invariable practice — sometimes there was a provision that in default of appointment the fund should be held on trust for the Chairman of the Board of Inland Revenue. Or the Chancellor of the Exchequer, or someone like that.”

  “In the hope of engaging their sympathies?”

  “Not exactly. The Revenue used to contend, you see, that the default beneficiaries under this sort of settlement would be liable for tax on capital gains realised by the trustees even if they never actually received a penny of the fund. So some people liked to draw settlements which on that view would impose the liability to tax on the Chairman of the Board — you know how people in Lincoln’s Inn enjoy teasing the Revenue.”

  “Perhaps Sir Walter Palgrave,” I said, “held some similar public office — the name seems faintly familiar.”

  “I thought so too,” said Julia, “but I don’t know in what connection — he certainly wasn’t Chairman of the Board of Inland Revenue. Well, whoever he was, it looks as if his family may receive a rather pleasant little windfall if Cantrip’s clients don’t manage to identify their settlor.”

  “But, Julia,” I said, “the position is ridiculous. They must have some way of finding out who he was.”

  “Oh no, I shouldn’t think so,” said Julia. “If they had, you see, it would mean there was some loophole in the arrangements they’d made to protect the confidentiality of their client’s affairs, and that’s not at all what one expects of a Swiss bank — the Swiss are very serious about that sort of thing. I rather wish I’d warned Can-trip about that — if his clients knew he’d been mentioning the name of the settlement in an uncoded telex, they might be rather upset about it.”

  “Were you able to offer him any advice?”

  “I sent him a telex suggesting that his clients should apply to the Royal Court of Jersey for directions. But, as you will see, he feels that the idea will not appeal to them.”

  TELEX CANTRIP TO LARWOOD TRANSMITTED 10:30 P.M. SUNDAY 29TH APRIL

  Yoo-hoo there, Larwood — thanks for the telex, but not ruddy likely. My clients go waltzing along to the Royal Court to get directions and who’s that sitting at the back of the courtroom with his notebook out and his ears flapping? The chap from the Financial Times, that’s who, Larwood, the one who’s always chatting up Selena and wanting to do exposés of things. If you were a Swiss bank that had lost its files and didn’t know what to do with nine million quid, would you want a half-page spread in the F. T. about it? You bet you wouldn’t.

  Not to worry, though, it doesn’t look as if giving legal advice is mostly what I’m here for. I’ve found out what Clemmie wanted me for, and it’s not because she thinks I’m the world’s greatest tax lawyer and it’s not for what Ragwort thinks either. I got her to come clean about it after dinner on Friday evening.

  We’d been having dinner at Patrick Ardmore’s place at Gorey, which is a rather jolly little fishing village at the eastern end of the island — all of us except for Darkside, who said he’d got work to do even if no one else had. We had a lobster each and lots of wine and everything was pretty bonhomous until someone said something about the Cayman Islands. I didn’t hear what it was exactly, because I was having a cosy chat with Ardmore’s wife — rather fanciable blonde doctor, who thinks all tax planners are more or less round the twist. I just heard someone say “last year in the Cayman Islands,” and then everyone not saying anything for a bit, and then someone else talking about something completely different. But it definitely seemed to cast a blight, and we never got properly bonhomous again.

  So the party broke up quite early after all, and Edward Malvoisin drove us all home — viz me and Clemmie to the Grand and Gabrielle to a tremendously smart-looking place about halfway between Gorey and St. Helier. On the way there Gabrielle said she’d hired a car for the weekend and would Clemmie and me like her to drive us round a bit? To which Clemmie said that she, i.e. Clemmie, couldn’t make it, because she’d got to work on some papers, but Cantrip, i.e. me, would love to, wouldn’t I? She kicked me on the ankle and I said yes, rather, because no one can say I don’t know a subtle hint from my instructing solicitor when I get one.

  Pretty peculiar was what I thought it was, so when we got back to the Grand I hauled Clemmie into the bar and got her to spill the beans about why she was so keen on me going driving with Gabrielle. And the gist of it is that what she wants me for is to be a sort of bodyguard.

  The Daffodil crowd get together twice a year, once here and once in the Cayman Islands, and at all the last three meetings before this one Gabrielle’s had the feeling that someone’s following her. Clemmie says she pretends to treat it as a sort of joke, but she’s really pretty rattled about it. Clemmie was getting worried about her, being rather a fan of hers, and she reckoned it would be a good idea to have someone around this time who could make themselves useful if there was any trouble. But she didn’t want Gabrielle to know she’d fixed it up on purpose, in case Gabrielle thought she was fussing and got miffed.

  When I asked if she’d any ideas about who it was, she said they both reckoned it must be the Revenue, but what they weren’t sure about was whether it was the English Revenue or the French. To start with they thought it must be the French, on account of Gabrielle having a lot of French clients that the Frog tax inspectors would probably like to get the goods on, but that doesn’t square with it always happening at Daffodil meetings. The Daffodil setup’s all geared to saving tax in the U.K., so on balance they think it’s probably our lot.

  I was a bit spectical at first, or whatever the word is for thinking your instructing solicitor’s having you on about something, but Clemmie was dead serious about it. She says the U.K. Revenue play pretty rough nowadays — not as rough as the French, but much rougher than they used to. She reckons that these days they wouldn’t turn a hair about bugging your telephone and searching your wastepaper basket and things like that, and she doesn’t see why they should draw the line at putting a tail on someone if there was enough tax involved to make it worthwhile.

  I asked her if all this had anything to do with whatever it was that happened in the Cayman Islands that everyone wanted not to talk about, but she pretended there wasn’t anything and I’d just imagined it. You can’t call your instructing solicitor a barefaced liar, even if she is an old mate, so I couldn’t find out any more about that.

  Anyway, I promised I’d stick to Gabrielle like a postage stamp for the rest of the weekend, which actually sounded like rather a jolly scheme, and if any sinister chaps in false beards started leaping out of the undergrowth, I’d be on hand to biff them.

  I say, Larwood, is this tax-planning business really as exciting as these Daffodil characters seem to think or do they just make believe it is to make life more interesting? I mean, if I’d known it was all about codes and secret documents and biffing chaps in false beards, I wouldn’t have minded going in for it myself — let’s have some of it in our book.

  Saturday turned out pretty quiet from the men-in-false-beards angle. Gabrielle picked me up at the Grand after breakfast, and we drove round Jersey looking at the historical bits — castles and Norman manor houses and things like that — with stops for the odd swim and the occasional cream tea. We talked about what a lot of fun the Normans must have had, riding round in armour and fighting tournaments and having seigneurial rights over peasant wenches. Gabrielle thinks I’m very sensitive to historical atmosphere — I think I am too, actually, but a lot of people don’t notice it.

  I’d been a bit worried at first that she might want to talk tax planning the whole time, so I’d explained straightaway I wasn’t really a tax chap, just a sort of general knockabout Chancery chap. She seemed quite pleased, though — she said the kind of lawyer they needed in the Daffodil business wasn’t the kind who looked things up in books but the kind who had an instinct for realpolitik, and that’s what she thinks I’ve got. I suppose that’s Kraut-speak for having a bit of sense.

  We met up wit
h Clemmie and Malvoisin for dinner and found a place to go dancing, so all in all it was a pretty good sort of day, except for not spotting any sinister characters lurking in the undergrowth. I did spot old Wellieboots again, sitting in the bar of the place where we had lunch — I think he’s jolly sinister, but I suppose he doesn’t count.

  Today was a bit different.

  We’d fixed up to meet at St. Clement’s Bay, which Gabrielle said was her favourite place in Jersey. The idea was to get there at low tide and walk out across the sand to something she calls the Sirens’ Rock — that’s her private name for it, it’s called something different on the map. She says it’s the one that the witches used to dance round and lure fishermen onto, like you were talking about last week.

  There’s another big rock in the garden of someone’s house that’s called the Witches’ Rock, but Gabrielle doesn’t think it’s the right one because it’s on dry land. She says the proper one must be one of the ones that are covered up by the sea when the tide’s in.

  It’s in the bottom right-hand corner of the island, quite near where her hotel is, so it seemed a bit silly for her to drive into St. Helier to pick me up. I told her I’d get there under my own steam and got up early and walked there.

  When the tide’s in it looks like you expect the seaside to look, with a sandy beach and lots of blue water next to it, all nice and neat like on a postcard. When the tide’s out it looks quite different, like a desert with damp problems — acres and acres of squelchy brown sand covered with seaweed and spiky splodges of rock all over the place, with shiny bits where the water’s got stuck between them.

  I thought as soon as I saw her that Gabrielle was looking a bit under the weather, as if maybe she hadn’t slept too well. I didn’t say anything, though, in case it was just a hangover and it would be un-suave to show I’d noticed.