Classic in the Dock Read online

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Recent Titles by Amy Myers From Severn House

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Author’s Note

  Jack Colby’s List of Those Involved in His Latest Case

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  The Car’s the Star

  Recent Titles by Amy Myers from Severn House

  The Jack Colby, Car Detective, Series

  CLASSIC IN THE BARN

  CLASSIC CALLS THE SHOTS

  CLASSIC IN THE CLOUDS

  CLASSIC MISTAKE

  CLASSIC IN THE PITS

  CLASSIC CASHES IN

  CLASSIC IN THE DOCK

  The Marsh and Daughter Mysteries

  MURDER IN THE QUEEN’S BOUDOIR

  MURDER WITH MAJESTY

  THE WICKENHAM MURDERS

  MURDER IN FRIDAY STREET

  MURDER IN HELL’S CORNER

  MURDER AND THE GOLDEN GOBLET

  MURDER IN THE MIST

  MURDER TAKES THE STAGE

  MURDER ON THE OLD ROAD

  MURDER IN ABBOT’S FOLLY

  CLASSIC IN THE DOCK

  A case for Jack Colby, car detective

  Amy Myers

  This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  This first world edition published 2015

  in Great Britain and the USA by

  SEVERN HOUSE PUBLISHERS LTD of

  19 Cedar Road, Sutton, Surrey, England, SM2 5DA.

  Trade paperback edition first published

  in Great Britain and the USA 2015 by

  SEVERN HOUSE PUBLISHERS LTD.

  eBook edition first published in 2015 by Severn House Digital

  an imprint of Severn House Publishers Limited

  Copyright © 2015 by Amy Myers.

  The right of Amy Myers to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988.

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

  Myers, Amy, 1938- author.

  Classic in the dock. – (A Jack Colby mystery)

  1. Colby, Jack (Fictitious character)–Fiction. 2. Antique

  and classic cars–Fiction. 3. Alfa Romeo automobile–

  Fiction. 4. Murder–Investigation–Fiction. 5. Detective

  and mystery stories.

  I. Title II. Series

  823.9’14-dc23

  ISBN-13: 978-0-7278-8513-5 (cased)

  ISBN-13: 978-1-84751-615-2 (trade paper)

  ISBN-13: 978-1-78010-666-3 (e-book)

  Except where actual historical events and characters are being described for the storyline of this novel, all situations in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to living persons is purely coincidental.

  This ebook produced by

  Palimpsest Book Production Limited,

  Falkirk, Stirlingshire, Scotland.

  To Sally

  with much love

  Author’s Note

  Classic in the Dock is Jack Colby’s seventh recorded case. He still lives at Frogs Hill Farm in Kent, where his classic car restoration business is based and from which he carries out his car detection work for the Kent Car Crime Unit. This is a fictitious name, as are several of the place names in this novel, including Plumshaw; the North Downs, however, a designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, is familiar territory to Jack, as are the Greensand Ridge where Frogs Hill is situated and the landscape around it, and they are far from fictitious. As regards the Alfa Romeo featured in this story, it is a fictitious contender in the 1938 Mille Miglia. Those that took first, second and third place in it are factual, as are the hardships endured by the Italian civil population and Partisans in the north of the country during the Second World War and the Allied involvement there.

  My thanks for his enthusiasm and help in writing this book go to my husband James, without whose car-buff knowledge it would not have been possible to tell the story of Jack Colby’s seventh case. He also runs Jack Colby’s website for him at www.jackcolby.co.uk. During my career as an editor of military books, I had the privilege of meeting Michael Lees, whose memoir Special Operations Executed was helpful about his time in the Apennine Mountains in the last desperate months of the Second World War, as were Philip Warner’s Special Air Service, SOE agent Charles Macintosh’s From Cloak to Dagger and Eric Newby’s inimitable Love and War in the Apennines.

  My thanks are also due to my agent, Sara Keane of Keane Kataria Literary Agency, and to the unrivalled team at Severn House, in particular to my editor Rachel Simpson Hutchens and to Piers Tilbury who must have been hiding out at Frogs Hill to produce such splendid cover designs for Jack’s classics.

  Amy Myers

  Jack Colby’s list of those involved in his latest case:

  Jack Colby: myself, the proud owner of Frogs Hill farmhouse and classic car business

  Louise: my partner in love

  Len Vickers: irreplaceable crusty car mechanic in charge of the Pits, the barn we use for car restoration

  Zoe Grant: Len’s equally irreplaceable number two

  Pen Roxton: investigative journalist who treads a fine line between friend and bête noire

  Harry Prince: local garage magnate, ever hopeful of buying me out

  Dave Jennings: head of the Kent Car Crime Unit for whom I work (on and off)

  DCI Brandon: of the Kent Police

  Giovanni Donati: famous classic car artist and friend of the Colby family

  Maria Donati: his long-suffering wife

  Umberto Monti: owner of La Casa restaurant and Giovanni’s ally

  Martin Fisher: garage owner in the village of Plumshaw

  Andrew and Lucy Lee: managers of the Hop and Harry pub in Plumshaw

  Peter Compton: head of the long-established Compton family at Plumshaw Manor

  Hazel Compton: his second wife

  Bronte Compton: their granddaughter

  Stephanie Ranger: Peter Compton’s daughter by his first wife

  Paul Ranger: Stephanie’s husband

  Jamie Makepeace: grandson of George Makepeace and engaged to Bronte

  George Makepeace: the bogeyman behind Plumshaw’s push for development

  Nantucket Brown: Plumshaw’s peacemaker

  Giulio Santoro: former racing driver

  ONE

  Not in the Pits? Not working at their favourite occupation?

  Even if the unmistakable roar of a very special car heading for Frogs Hill Farm was the attraction, it takes a lot for Len and Zoe to down tools and rush out to see what was going on. Or, rather, what was coming in. A hand waved in greeting from my unexpected guest.

  ‘Ciao, Jack!’

  Giovanni had hit town, as the phrase goes, although as Frogs Hill is set in the midst of the Kent countryside overlooking the green and fertile Weald of Kent, the word ‘to
wn’ hardly applies. ‘Hit’ does. Giovanni, lithe and graceful as always, slid out of his priceless bright red Ferrari 1972 Daytona Spyder. I’d heard its unmistakable sound coming along the lane and had rushed out to see what glorious fate was bringing our way.

  Giovanni came over to hug me. For good measure he hugged Zoe and Len too, a tribute to which Zoe responded with alacrity. Len wasn’t so keen, being roughly forty years older than her and of the generation that views casual hugs with suspicion. They work in the Pits, our name for the Frogs Hill classic car restoration barn, which thankfully for their employer – me, Jack Colby – is a harmonious arrangement.

  ‘What are you here for? A tune-up?’ I joked to Giovanni.

  Delighted though I was to see him, he must have driven his precious Daytona all the way here from Bologna, and Kentish lanes are hardly ideal for such an immaculate car, especially one famed for road speeds of 170 mph. Nor would Giovanni seek out Frogs Hill on a mere whim and without prior notice. Frogs Hill is not a place for casual calling.

  ‘The Glory Boot, my friend,’ was his answer.

  All was explained. A world-famous artist, Giovanni is older than I am – in his late fifties – and was a chum of my father’s before I joined his fan club too. Some of his early works hang in the Glory Boot, which was Dad’s name for his prized collection of automobilia, kept in a specially built annex of the farmhouse. Giovanni does have a surname too – Donati – but he’s so famous he’s known everywhere simply as Giovanni.

  ‘Need a bed for the night?’ I enquired. My partner, Louise, was away for a few days and it would be good to have company, especially Giovanni’s.

  ‘Grazie, Jack. Tonight we drink. Tomorrow I go to Plumshaw.’

  Instant alert! ‘Plumshaw? What on earth for?’

  Every time I go there Plumshaw strikes me as an unhappy village. No such thing? Just as human beings can exude signals that all is not well, so can houses, cars and villages. I’d heard hints of a village feud which might account for it in Plumshaw’s case.

  Giovanni hooted with laughter, but it was Zoe who broke in impatiently: ‘Get up to speed, Jack. The Alfa Romeo.’

  I had indeed been asleep at the wheel. There had been a rumour in the car world so unbelievable that I had not given it much attention. Plumshaw Manor, it claimed, was the home of a classic Alfa Romeo that had been resting there on its laurels since the 1940s.

  ‘One of the Alfa Romeos?’ I asked Giovanni, not sure I had the story right. ‘The 1937 Alfa Romeo Spyder 8C 2900B, only thirty-two or thirty-three ever built?’ The doubt about the number is because it depends on whether one assembled in 1941 from spare parts is counted, and now on whether the car found in Plumshaw was the real McCoy.

  ‘Si, Jack. I paint la bellissima Alfa Romeo Spyder.’

  Even Len’s face registered extreme emotion.

  Some hours and a bottle of Chianti later, I was in the picture – perhaps literally, knowing Giovanni’s artistic pranks. He paints classic motor cars lovingly true to every tiny detail but in an idiosyncratic surreal setting that always manages in some brilliant way to heighten each car’s ‘persona’. My father’s beloved Gordon-Keeble (now mine) appears at a sixties’ coffee bar in the sky with Sophia Loren, Popeye and John Lennon.

  ‘Do you know the Comptons, Giovanni?’ I asked carefully. The family that owned Plumshaw Manor had the reputation of being stuck in a time warp where feudal attitudes lingered, albeit without oppression. Peter Compton, who was over ninety, was considered patriarchal and eccentric; his word was law, although for all practical purposes his son Hugh ruled the manor estate. He was generally liked, I gathered, but even so the idea of the carefree Giovanni painting in the midst of this family enclave gave me instant misgivings. I couldn’t see the mix.

  ‘No. No matter, Jack. I paint the car and Mr Hugh will like it.’

  If the story I had read was true, this Alfa Romeo had been kept in a barn at Plumshaw Manor and was badly in need of rescue. Its true place was in motor racing history. Although a roadster, the 2900B had been aimed at the racing scene and had triumphed in the Mille Miglia road race. It had dazzled the 1938 race, the last before the Second World War broke out; one of them had won the race, another had come second and a slightly different model third. And one of these rare beauties was apparently living in retirement only half an hour’s drive from Frogs Hill.

  Giovanni and I spent so much time that evening chewing over the delightful details of the Alfa Romeo and curing our consequent thirst with Chianti that the Glory Boot visit had been delayed. Its moment finally arrived, however.

  ‘And now, Jack, we go to the Glory Boot,’ Giovanni demanded. ‘Your health, my friend.’ He raised his glass.

  ‘To the Glory Boot,’ I echoed, by now somewhat unfocused.

  Giovanni was no stranger to the collection, and once inside the Glory Boot annex he forged his way straight to his objective. To my surprise, this was not to study his own early paintings – well, not immediately – but the trunkfuls of old photographs and newspaper clippings that my father had hoarded in the belief that, unsorted and uncatalogued as they were, someone somewhere sometime would find them invaluable. As apparently Giovanni did now.

  Usually these trunks merely provide a place on which to perch, as apart from the old car seat or two there are no chairs in the Glory Boot. One stands in respectful contemplation, but there is only a narrow path between the piles for such solitary musing. Half an hour later, the path had disappeared under discarded pictures and newspapers as Giovanni fought his way through to whatever he sought.

  ‘What exactly are we here for?’ I asked plaintively.

  No answer. I continued to wait, wondering whether the trunk on which I was perched would be next in Giovanni’s mad pursuit of some cherished item.

  ‘This,’ he cried in triumph twenty minutes later, waving it under my nose. ‘This’ proved to be a faded photograph and, since he was alternately jerking it around and planting kisses on it, I had to work hard to see the subject of the picture. When I finally focused on the image, it was unmistakable. It was a 1930s race and an Alfa Romeo was centre-stage.

  ‘The Mille Miglia,’ I said. ‘Nineteen thirty-eight.’ I was beginning to focus again.

  ‘Yes, my friend. In all its glory.’ Another kiss. ‘And this is the car.’ He pointed at the centre-stage Alfa Romeo.

  ‘The one at Plumshaw Manor?’

  ‘Yes. I am sure of it. This car was the one that had to drop out just before the end. The mechanic was taken ill and its driver, Giulio Santoro, abandoned the race to drive him to a hospital.’

  ‘How can you be so certain?’

  ‘Because all the other 2900Bs can be accounted for. This one could not be found. It had disappeared.’

  ‘Disappeared? How could it?’

  Giovanni was staring hard at the photo as though it could reveal the answer to my question. ‘I do not know,’ he said finally. ‘Santoro himself owned the car after that race, but Mussolini then ruled Italy with the king a mere puppet and Santoro was no fascist. When Mussolini joined Hitler in 1940 and war came, Santoro would have had to serve in the army. Who knows what happened to the car then.’

  ‘For it to have made its way to England and to a Kentish barn is quite a step,’ I pointed out. ‘Hugh Compton is only in his mid-forties so he can’t have been involved, although his father might have been.’

  Giovanni grew querulous. ‘I am here to paint it. That is all. It will be the best painting I have ever done. It will be my masterpiece and I shall be even greater than I am now. My Maria will be proud of me. She will walk on diamonds.’

  ‘Uncomfortable,’ I joked.

  He ignored me, but in any case Maria, his long-suffering wife, is used to putting up with Giovanni’s whims. She appeared in one of his paintings as Boadicea standing in a 1936 Mercedes-Benz as her chariot and facing a terrified Roman warrior army rigid with fear in Model T Fords.

  ‘So now I have found my photo, let us drink more good Italian wine,
’ he declared.

  My photo, I noted, wondering whether I would ever see my bed again. It was already midnight. Then our twosome unexpectedly became three.

  ‘Make mine cocoa please.’

  To my befuddled amazement, Louise was standing at the doorway, as calm and beautiful as ever, with her dark hair fastened back with a blue scarf. She was clearly tired, however, and naturally surprised to see a visitor. I hadn’t even heard the door open. She must have had a long day on the set and this week she was filming near Tunbridge Wells, a fair drive from Frogs Hill.

  She came reluctantly to join us and I hastened to introduce her to Giovanni.

  ‘I’ve heard a lot about you, but we haven’t met before,’ she said to him, her voice somewhat stilted.

  Louise is a celebrity, being a famous actor on stage and screen, but she studiously keeps her private life to herself. She’s therefore on guard against any potential intruder into this situation, although Giovanni wouldn’t come into that category.

  ‘That is a pity,’ he replied gallantly, and Louise received a kiss on the hand that she had extended in welcome.

  ‘Giovanni’s staying overnight, Louise,’ I said brightly to fill the conversational gap that followed.

  Another hesitation. ‘Sir Galahad awaits you,’ she replied. She still hadn’t relaxed.

  Giovanni not unnaturally looked puzzled until I explained. ‘Our guest room always has a bed made up so we call it the Galahad Room, as King Arthur’s Round Table always kept an empty chair waiting for the noble knight’s arrival.’

  His face cleared. ‘He has arrived. I am he.’ Typical Giovanni.

  Considering that Louise and I have only been living together for six months – and that for much of that time she had been filming away from Frogs Hill – I was childishly proud of the fact that we had already established a joint tradition, even if she didn’t seem to view Giovanni in the role of a holy knight. She was tired of course, and an unknown guest was probably the last thing she wanted.