Someone from the Past: A London Mystery, page 1
This edition published 2023 by
The British Library
96 Euston Road
London NW1 2DB
Someone from the Past was first published in 1958 by Eyre & Spottiswoode, London.
Introduction © 2023 Martin Edwards
Someone from the Past © 1958 Polly Thelwall, reprinted with the permission of David Higham Associates
Volume Copyright © 2023 The British Library Board
Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 0 7123 5473 8
e-ISBN 978 0 7123 6866 7
Front cover image © NRM/Pictorial Collection/Science & Society Picture Library
Text design, typesetting and eBook by Tetragon, London
Contents
Introduction
A Note from the Publisher
Someone from the Past
Introduction
Someone from the Past, first published in 1958, is a stylish whodunit which occupies a small but unique niche in crime writing history. It is the one book to win the Crime Writers’ Association’s award for the best crime novel of the year, only for its author never again to write another novel in the genre. While still in her forties, Margot Bennett went out at the top.
The story is narrated by a young woman, Nancy Graham, who meets a close friend and former colleague Sarah Lampson, whom she hasn’t seen for nine months. Sarah, recently divorced, is about to marry a wealthy company director. She mentions, in passing, that Nancy ‘knew all about poetry’, a point worth keeping in mind as an intriguing mystery begins to unfold. Unfortunately, Sarah has a problem: ‘someone from the past is threatening to murder me.’
Sarah hasn’t told the police about the threat to her safety (one of the things that she and Nancy have in common is a woeful lack of judgment) but she wants Nancy to figure out who is making that threat: ‘It’s the kind of thing you like doing… You’re so curious about people.’ She forwards the threatening letter to Nancy with a brief note saying, ‘Do what you can.’
The letter reads:
‘I haven’t forgotten what you did to me in the past. You don’t deserve to live, what’s a life worth to you? I’ve watched the road you’ve taken… there’s no turning back, we’ve both passed the fork, there’s only one way now. I’m coming for you, one night soon, and until I come you’ll never know which of your lovers is going to murder you.’
Nancy reflects: ‘It was the letter of a madman, but I’m not at all sure if it’s better to be threatened by the mad or the sane.’ No sooner, however, has she poured herself a cup of coffee than someone knocks on her door. Her visitor is her boyfriend Donald, who happens to be one of Sarah’s exes.
Donald breaks the news that Sarah is dead. He called on her and found her body, and now he is frightened that he will be accused of the crime, because he is one of the men she had treated with her customary casual brutality. ‘She left me to die,’ he says, and Nancy retorts, ‘And now you’ve left her dead.’
As the letter indicates, Donald is not the only suspect. Nancy is familiar with four men in Sarah’s past: ‘Laurence, ruined; Mike, angry and implacable; Peter, criminal; and Donald’, with whom she is now herself romantically involved herself.
Nancy, fearing that Donald will be suspected of the crime, embarks on a cover-up. It has to be said that Nancy’s behaviour is often absurd; all the same, it’s hard not to warm to someone who says things like: ‘There is a time for melancholy self-accusation, but it shouldn’t be extended; when the damage has been inspected, the assessor should withdraw.’
This observation is typical of Bennett’s sardonic wit. She excels at dialogue:
‘One has a reputation, Nancy.’
‘A reputation for what?’
‘A divorce or two, or even three, won’t hurt a reputation, but naturally they have to be divorces of the right kind. If one’s wife goes off with the Duke of Kew Gardens, it’s a step up in the world.’
Here’s another example:
‘I’m in trouble, Nancy,’ she’d told me. ‘I don’t know what to do.’
‘I’m sure you’ll manage to do the wrong thing. Both of us are rather good at that.’
‘I think I’ve done it already.’
‘Something worse than before?’
‘Much worse.’
‘You’ve written the story of your life for a Sunday paper?’
This is the third novel by Bennett to be republished as a British Library Crime Classic, following The Widow of Bath and The Man Who Didn’t Fly. The latter was a runner-up for the Crossed Red Herrings award, given by a panel of critics appointed by the Crime Writers’ Association for the best crime novel of the year. Someone from the Past did even better, winning the penultimate Crossed Red Herrings Award in 1958; the award was presented to her by J. B. Priestley. The award was renamed the Gold Dagger in 1960. In 1959, Bennett was elected to membership of the Detection Club, but having reached the top of her profession, she promptly stopped writing crime novels so as to concentrate on writing for television.
The only detailed commentary I can find from Margot Bennett on her own work appeared in Twentieth Century Crime and Mystery Writers, edited by John M. Reilly. After discussing her earlier work, she concluded: ‘My best books were the last two. The Man Who Didn’t Fly had an unusual plot and a set of people I believed in. In the same way, Someone from the Past had five characters I might have met anywhere. The best of all my people was the girl Nancy. She was kind and cruel, and loyal and bitchy. She was a ready liar, with a sharp tongue, but she was brave and real. All through my books, the best I have done is to make the people real.’
My guess is that Bennett identified closely with Nancy. There are some similarities between their experiences, as well as inevitable differences. It’s possible that the memory of her injuries sustained as a result of the crash of an ambulance while she was nursing during the Spanish Civil War informed her description of Nancy’s car accident in Chapter 5. And there’s probably more than a dash of Bennett in Nancy’s account of leaving journalism in order to write a novel: ‘I type three pages every night and tear two of them up in the morning. If I’m home early enough in the evening, I tear the third page up too.’
Bennett’s life and work is discussed in more detail in my introductions to her other two Crime Classics. Since then I’ve learned that, having published two science fiction novels, she was involved in discussions in late February 1964 about writing an early episode of Doctor Who. The idea was to write a historical adventure for William Hartnell, the First Doctor, but in the end, nothing came of it.
I became aware of her work from Julian Symons’ history of the genre, Bloody Murder. Symons was a friend and admirer of hers and I share his regret about her failure to build on the success she had already achieved. As a result, her books soon went out of print and her reputation faded. But she was one of the finest women crime writers of her era and her work deserves to be remembered—and read.
Martin Edwards
www.martinedwardsbooks.com
A Note from the Publisher
The original novels and short stories reprinted in the British Library Crime Classics series were written and published in a period ranging, for the most part, from the 1890s to the 1960s. There are many elements of these stories which continue to entertain modern readers; however, in some cases there are also uses of language, instances of stereotyping and some attitudes expressed by narrators or characters which may not be endorsed by the publishing standards of today. We acknowledge therefore that some elements in the works selected for reprinting may continue to make uncomfortable reading for some of our audience. With this series British Library Publishing aims to offer a new readership a chance to read some of the rare books of the British Library’s collections in an affordable paperback format, to enjoy their merits and to look back into the world of the twentieth century as portrayed by its writers. It is not possible to separate these stories from the history of their writing and as such the following novel is presented as it was originally published with minor edits only, made for consistency of style and sense. We welcome feedback from our readers, which can be sent to the following address:
British Library Publishing
The British Library
96 Euston Road
London, NW1 2DB
United Kingdom
1
‘If we drink any more champagne,’ Donald said, ‘something terrible will happen to us.’
‘The way I feel tonight, I can’t think of anything terrible,’ I said.
‘Try.’
‘We might have to hold the tops of our heads on with wire, like champagne corks.’
‘I’m willing to let the top of my head go. Nan, I’ve something to tell you,’ Donald said. He leant forward and took my hand.
While I waited, letting his fingers tell me, I looked past his dark, elated face at the rookery of waiters that flapped by the service door, and on to the china birds that perched in the trellis. They would have a sentimental value, later. Then I felt his warm hand grow cold, it was as if he had been reminded of death. He wasn’t looking at me any more, but obliquely, across the restaurant.
I turned round.
She waved to me, from the other side of the room.
I had to wrench my hand away from Donald’s, to wave back again. When I let my hand fall, I still had a minute left for retreat. We could all live different lives, if we did the right thing, at the right time. A little dignity is a small part of what we have to lose. She spoke to the man she was with, then stood up and began to walk across the room towards us. She was with us, and the minute of possibility was over.
‘Hello, darlings,’ she said.
Donald didn’t stand up. His hand still lay on the table, and he looked at his fingers. It was a good imitation of a man accosted by a strange woman, until he spoke to her.
‘Darlings?’
‘It’s just a manner of speaking.’
‘It’s a new manner for you.’ He was trying to be offensive, but his voice was unsteady, and Sarah smiled at me, inviting me to share the old secret amusement.
She wasn’t smiling at Donald.
‘Is this one of your special little places?’ she asked, in a voice that knew special little places were always cheap.
‘It’s a special big place,’ Donald said.
‘So you’re celebrating something?’ she asked.
‘Sit down, Sarah,’ I said quickly, because someone had to say it.
‘Thank you, Nancy,’ she said in a voice that was wholly friendly.
A waiter rushed with another chair, another glass, another bottle.
‘I wanted to tell you I’m getting married,’ she said. There was one of those four-second pauses, three seconds too long for comfort.
‘Who is it?’ I asked.
‘He’s called Charles Lester.’
‘And what is it?’ Donald asked.
‘He’s a company director,’ she said.
‘We must drink to your happiness,’ I said.
‘And to your companies,’ Donald added. He wasn’t looking at me. I had no power over him, at all. I was relieved when he suddenly raised his glass and drank. He smiled at her. It wasn’t a good smile, but it restored a little civilization to the proceedings.
‘Thank you, darlings. I must go back to Chas. now. But Donald, may I ask you a favour? Just for one minute, I wanted to speak to Nancy.’
‘I’ll go out and buy a cheap little cigarette I know,’ he said. ‘They wouldn’t sell it here.’
She watched him go, and I watched her. She was twenty-eight, and now she had the clothes to match her looks. I remembered her as I had seen her first, standing in front of the long mirror, jabbing an angry red mouth on to her bitter, beautiful face. She was twenty-two then, but she looked at least two years older. She looked as if she had seen life. It wasn’t the way I looked. No one had ever been in love with me, then. A lawyer’s clerk had once followed me through the back streets of Cologne, bellowing, ‘Nandzee, Nandzee’ like a wounded bull, until there were angry awakened citizens swearing at every window; and a Dutch barman with a squint had given me a rose every night until my father had decided to get drunk in a different bar, but I didn’t wish to call these incidents love. It was dreadful to me that at twenty I should be plain, poorly dressed, and absolutely without experience.
It was six years since I had first met her. She was more beautiful now; there was more surface to her; she had acquired a background; but between the surface and the background there was still visible the faint, ineradicable scar; the unwanted proof that she had suffered for love.
When Donald had gone through the door she turned back to me.
‘Nancy, I haven’t seen you for years.’
‘Nine months.’
‘And once we knew each other so well. You taught me so much, Nancy.’
‘Me?’
‘You were so full of ideas and attitudes. And you knew all about poetry.’
‘Not all. Next to nothing. You make me sound like a blue stocking.’
‘Weren’t you?’
‘Never more than a blue sock.’
‘And what are you now, Nancy?’
‘A single strand of blue wool. Do you want it?’
‘Have you forgotten how we used to talk?’ she asked.
‘We used to laugh together, too. That’s not so easy, now that I’m… concerned with Donald.’
‘So there’s no one I can tell.’ She began to look back at the table she had come from.
‘What are you doing now, Nancy?’ she asked, lingering.
‘Writing.’
‘Is that all?’
‘Most of it.’
‘You used to tell me everything. And we used to help each other.’
She smiled at me in the old, hopeful, half-humiliated way, and suddenly I was back in an evening in the past, when I had left her crying by an open window in the dark, while I took a taxi to the ten pubs in London, W.i, where Mike was most likely to be drinking, and then walked him up and down the Embankment for two hours, trying to let him talk his rage out at me before I took him back to her.
‘Sarah, you’d better tell me what you want me to do,’ I said.
She gathered confidence at once.
‘Guess what?’ she said.
‘I need a clue.’
‘A voice from the past.’
‘Someone I know?’ I asked.
‘Oh, yes.’
‘A friendly voice?’
‘No.’ She was very emphatic.
‘Laurence? Peter? Mike?’ I watched her as I said each name, but she didn’t give anything away.
‘Did I say it was a man?’
‘Did you need to?’
‘I don’t need to say anything. I just thought you’d be interested.’
‘Why?’ I asked. It was the kind of conversation that once had led into a maze of secret history, speculation, and laughter.
‘Because you’re always so curious about people,’ she said.
‘But some people repeat themselves, and then I stop being curious.’
‘This isn’t a repeat.’
‘Sarah, are you really worried?’
‘I suppose so. But it may be nothing.’
‘Explain the nothing.’
She picked up the champagne glass and drank a little, quickly.
‘I’ll explain it,’ she said. ‘Someone from the past is threatening to murder me.’ She spoke in careful flatness, but twisting her mouth a little as she had always done when she was telling me something dreadful. That didn’t prove she was frightened. She wasn’t in any way a simple character. She liked all the drama she could get, and was quite capable of copying her own mouth-twisting trick.
‘Don’t waste time guessing what I’m trying to say,’ she said. ‘I’ve said what I’m trying to say. Someone from the past is threatening to murder me.’
‘You must go to the police.’
‘No.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because I’m going to marry Charles, and nothing is going to stop me. I’ve waited all this time for my divorce to go through, and now I’m going to marry him at last. Nancy, we’re going to Jamaica for our honeymoon. It’s been one of my dreams, to go to Jamaica.’
‘Don’t eat too much sugar in dreamland.’
‘It isn’t dreamland. It’s a fact, or nearly a fact. But if the police come to the flat, he’ll know.’
‘Know what?’
‘Much more than he does now.’
‘Doesn’t he know anything?’
‘Nothing serious.’
‘They keep their ears shut, in the City.’
‘He doesn’t meet the kind of people we meet. He knows I was married to Mike.’ She said the name in a hurt, but unalarmed voice. I saw she didn’t think it was Mike.
‘Tell your Charles about the others,’ I suggested. ‘It might be awkward, if he learnt for himself.’
‘He won’t learn. We shall be moving in different circles.’
‘Maidenhead and Deauville,’ I said. I laughed. ‘Peter in Maidenhead,’ I explained. ‘I wonder what Peter would do in Maidenhead?’ Her face didn’t show anything.
‘Is it Peter?’ I asked her.
She frowned, and gave her head a small shake.
‘I don’t know. I had this letter. It was typed. I’ve had some others, too, but I tore them up. I’ll post you this last one, if you like.’
‘Yes. Is it the same as the others?’
‘They’ve all been the same, the same kind of letter, with different words. I’ve had about five in the last seven or eight weeks. But I had one two days ago, and this one this morning. The pace is getting hotter.’
‘What do you want me to do?’
