Death at Dearley Manor, page 12
part #2 of Sukey Reynolds Mystery Series
‘They don’t know Dad like we do. We know he couldn’t possibly kill anyone—’
‘Gus, they deal with evidence, that’s all. They hand it over to forensics, and then it’s passed back with reports to the investigating officers—’
‘Yes, I know all that, but surely there’s nothing to stop you asking around, talking to the people you met?’
‘What do you suppose the police are doing?’
‘They might not ask the right questions – or talk to the right people. That old lady you told me about, the one they say’s a bit gaga, suppose she did see the real killer and could describe him?’
‘I’m sure the police will be talking to her – if they haven’t already – but she really is very strange and I doubt if they’ll take her stories of spooks and death in the cards very seriously.’
‘But she could be a vital witness. You were kind to her, you gave her a lift… maybe she’d talk to you, tell you things she wouldn’t tell the police—’ He was distraught, grasping at straws, on the verge of breaking down altogether. ‘Mum, you could at least go and see her, it’s worth a try… please!’
She was already half persuaded; at odd times during the morning, despite her efforts to concentrate on other things, similar thoughts had been passing through her head. Mrs Willow might be confused and subject to occasional delusions, but she was by no means senile. If she had caught a glimpse of a strange figure moving stealthily around in the moonlight, she would have been more likely to identify it as one of the ‘uneasy spirits’ she claimed to have seen; but it was still possible that, if handled with tact and patience, she could give a recognisable description. Ezra Hampton had hinted that to be questioned by a uniformed police officer was liable to upset her, but…
Fergus tugged impatiently at her hand. His eyes were feverish. ‘Please, Mum!’ he implored. ‘You’ve got plenty of time, you’re not on duty till four.’
It was a plea she could no longer resist. ‘All right, I’ll try and have a word with her,’ she promised, and for the first time since he learned of Myrna’s death something like a smile passed briefly over his face. It brought home to Sukey, almost more than his frantic pleading, the strain he was under. ‘But not a word to Jim or anyone else, d’you hear?’ she insisted and he nodded, gratitude shining through the tears that he brushed away with the back of his hand. ‘Right, you get back to work now or you’ll be in the doghouse. I’ve made a chilli for supper.’
‘Fine. See you later. Thank you, Mum!’ He gave her a bear-hug, kissed her on the cheek and hurried from the house, leaving an untouched mug of tea and a half-eaten sandwich on the table.
August had given way to September and the weather had changed with the month. A cool wind from the southwest swept over the Cotswolds bringing ragged clouds and a fine drizzle that drifted like mist over the land. Ignoring the first road into Dearley, which would have taken her past the Manor and possibly in sight of police officers who would recognise her, Sukey drove on a further couple of miles before turning into the narrow lane which brought her to Dearley’s Acres Lane without the need to go near the village.
In the field opposite Pussy Willow’s cottage, the stubble faded now to a dull greyish yellow where yesterday it had shone golden in the sunshine, a tractor drawing a plough was clanking to and fro, pursued by a flock of gulls and a scattering of rooks that hovered and swooped as they hunted for food in the widening band of freshly turned earth. Sukey pulled onto the verge, got out of the car and pushed open the wooden gate that bore the legend, ‘Holly Cottage’, a name obviously inspired by the hedge separating the little front garden from the road. A tabby cat appeared from behind the cottage and ran to her, gazing up at her with huge green eyes and miaowing, then turning to run ahead of her along a brick path leading up to the front door. This had an unused appearance, having no bellpush, knocker or letter box. It occurred to Sukey that, like many country folk, Mrs Willow probably used the back door for her comings and goings. As if in confirmation, the cat, which had momentarily vanished, re-emerged from behind the cottage and began winding itself round her legs, still miaowing piteously, before running back again. Sukey followed and found it standing in front of a green painted door with a fox’s head knocker, an old-fashioned round doorknob and a letter box, all of well-polished brass. She gave a brisk rat-tat-tat and waited.
There was no sound from inside the cottage. She knocked again, a little more loudly, and rattled the flap of the letter box. The cat continued its protestations, switching its attention between the door, which it obviously expected to be opened at any minute, and two empty earthenware bowls which stood on the ground alongside an ancient iron boot-scraper. ‘What’s up, Puss?’ said Sukey. ‘Did your missus forget your breakfast?’ In response, the cat rubbed itself against her legs and gave an optimistic purr as she stooped to stroke it. She began to be concerned; it was one thing for Mrs Willow to be out, but she had a feeling that to leave her cat without food or water was something she would not normally do.
She was about to bend down and call through the letter box when she heard a heavy step on the path behind her. A man’s voice said, ‘Are you looking for Mrs Willow?’ Sukey jumped and swung round to see Ezra Hampton. ‘Oh, it’s you,’ he said before she had a chance to speak. ‘I saw the car and thought I’d better see who it was. She gets flustered if strangers come to the house; she’s got this fear of being turned out, you see—’
‘I’ve knocked a couple of times, but she doesn’t answer,’ said Sukey. Her momentary alarm at Ezra’s unexpected arrival turned to relief at having someone with whom to share the problem. ‘The cat doesn’t seem to have been fed, either. Do you suppose she’s ill or something?’
Ezra frowned. ‘I haven’t seen her about today, come to think of it,’ he said. He pounded on the door with his fist and shouted, ‘Mrs Willow, are you there? It’s Ezra.’ When there was still no response, he grabbed the doorknob and twisted it. The door swung open. ‘Funny,’ he muttered uneasily, ‘she’s usually so fussy about locking up if she goes out.’ He raised his voice and called again, ‘Pussy, are you all right?’
There was no reply. ‘Do you think we should go in?’ Sukey suggested. ‘Maybe she’s been taken ill, or had a fall.’
Ezra nodded. They stepped into the neat kitchen, where everything appeared to be in place. The cat had rushed in ahead of them and disappeared through a door in the far corner. ‘We’ll try the back room, that’s where she usually sits,’ said Ezra. On the other side of the tiny hallway were two more doors, one of which stood ajar. He pushed it wide open and gave an exclamation of alarm. ‘She’s here… it looks as if… I don’t like the look of her—’ He stood still, pointing, seemingly reluctant to enter the room.
Sukey caught a glimpse over his shoulder of the figure on the floor and pushed past him. ‘Let me see,’ she said urgently.
Mrs Willow lay on her back on the empty hearth with her head resting on the edge of a cast-iron fire basket. She was fully dressed and there was no visible sign of injury, but at the sight of the wide-open eyes gazing up at the ceiling in a fixed, glassy stare Sukey knew instinctively, even before her fingers touched the marble-cold flesh in a fruitless search for a pulse, that the old woman was beyond help.
Her first thought was, No one will ever know now whether what you saw on the night of Myrna’s death was her killer or a figment of your imagination, and the second, If this was an accident, it could be very convenient for someone.
‘Is she dead?’
It was Ezra, bringing her mind back to the immediate problem. She got to her feet and said, ‘I’m pretty sure she is, but we must get hold of a doctor right away to be sure. Do you happen to know—?’
‘She goes to the surgery at Barcomb.’ His voice was a dull monotone. He seemed dazed, unable to take it in.
‘Do you know the number?’
He fumbled in his pocket and pulled out a grubby notebook, found a place and held it out to her. ‘There’s no telephone in the cottage,’ he said.
‘My mobile’s in the car. Leave it to me.’
‘Two stiffs in the same village in two days – that’s quite a score,’ said Mandy Parfitt. She put a mug of tea in front of Sukey, dragged a chair from an adjoining desk and sat down opposite her. For the moment, the two civilian SOCOs were alone in the office. ‘And you found both of them. Are you going to make it three in a row for the bonus point?’
‘Oh, shut up!’ Sukey gave a watery grin and sipped gratefully at the tea. ‘It is turning out to be quite a week,’ she said wearily. And you don’t know the half of it, she added mentally. I’m going to have to explain what I was doing at Pussy Willow’s cottage, and there’ll be no bonus points for that.
‘At least, it doesn’t sound as if this death is suspicious,’ Mandy went on. ‘What did the doctor say?’
‘Not a lot, really, except to confirm that she was dead, had been for some hours. She didn’t have a history of heart trouble, but then heart attacks and strokes often happen without warning and it could have been one or the other that made her fall. He said that whatever the cause, hitting her head on that iron grate was probably enough to finish her off, but of course he’ll have to inform the coroner and there may be an autopsy.’
‘Presumably he’ll have informed our people as well?’ Mandy pointed out.
‘Yes, of course.’ Sukey stared down into her mug to avoid meeting her colleague’s eye. At least one difficult interview lay ahead.
Mandy put down her empty mug and thought for a moment before saying, ‘I hear Inspector Castle’s taken you off the Maxford case. I thought it was very considerate of him.’
‘Yes, wasn’t it?’ The remark could mean one of two things: either it had not occurred to Mandy that Castle’s decision had been prompted by anything other than a recognition of the trauma Sukey was presumed to have suffered, or she knew the real reason but was tactful enough not to say so. What was more to the point, the subtext of her comment was almost certainly, So what were you doing in Dearley this afternoon when you weren’t even on duty?
‘Of course, he’s off it himself now, or didn’t you know?’ Mandy went on.
It was what he had warned her might happen, but Sukey pretended to appear surprised. ‘No, I hadn’t heard. Any idea why?’
Mandy shrugged. ‘Something to do with protocol, according to George Barnes. He says the victim’s business associates wanted a more senior officer to take charge, so the Super’s given the case to DCI Lord. Bit of a cheek, if you ask me.’ To Sukey’s relief, she appeared to regard the explanation as perfectly reasonable.
There was a silence, interrupted by the appearance in the doorway of Castle himself. ‘Ah, Sukey, could I have a word?’ He stood holding the door open, indicating that the conversation was to be in private.
‘Of course, sir.’
She followed him along the corridor to his office. ‘Close the door, please,’ he said, still in his slightly brusque official manner. He sat down behind his desk and waved her to a chair facing him. She sat in some trepidation, waiting for him to speak. Uncharacteristically, he concentrated for several seconds on the brass paperweight he was fingering instead of looking directly at her. At last he raised his head. ‘This is going to be upsetting for you, I know,’ he began, and her stomach gave a lurch.
‘Paul’s been arrested, hasn’t he?’ She could hear the catch in her own voice as her throat contracted with a surge of emotion.
‘Not arrested. He came to the station voluntarily this morning to help with the inquiries.’ Sukey gave a wry smile at the non-committal formula she had heard so often. ‘He wasn’t detained, but he’s still very much in the frame. I thought it would be easier for you if I told you privately,’ Castle added gently.
‘Thank you.’ She felt sympathy for Paul, but for the moment her aching concern for Fergus almost drove everything else from her mind.
‘The SOCOs found a knife in the kitchen with traces of blood and Reynolds’ fingerprints on it,’ the detective went on. ‘We have to wait for the result of tests on the blood, but there’s no doubt about the prints.’ He spoke as if the case was all but wound up, as if no further inquiries would be necessary.
‘But that needn’t mean a thing!’ Sukey burst out. ‘He lives in the house, he’s entitled to go into the kitchen and use a knife. He could have had an accident and cut himself – maybe it’s his own blood?’
‘Funnily enough, that’s what he’s claiming. He showed us a cut on his hand, but doesn’t seem all that certain when he did it or when was the last time he used a kitchen knife. He says he often prepares a grapefruit for his breakfast – he has to get his own as the housekeeper doesn’t always arrive in time to do it before he leaves in the morning.’
And his wife wasn’t likely to do it, was she? Sukey thought waspishly. Aloud, she said, ‘Well, there you are then. You’ve admitted it wasn’t enough to justify arresting him.’
‘Yes.’ There was a pause and Sukey felt her pulse rate increase. Something about Castle’s demeanour told her that there was worse to come. His next words confirmed it. ‘There’s something else you have to know,’ he said. Beneath his cool, detached manner she detected a genuine understanding of her predicament. ‘I had a call from DCI Lord a few minutes ago to say another body has turned up in Dearley and he’s pretty certain there’s a link.’
‘You mean old Mrs Willow?’ There was no point in pretending she didn’t know, even though the news of her involvement had obviously not reached him.
His brows shot up and his eyes bored into hers. ‘Who told you?’ he demanded.
‘No one. Ezra Hampton and I found her.’
‘I hope you had a good reason to be there,’ he said angrily. ‘I’d like to remind you that you’re a SOCO, not a detective, and that I expressly took you off the Maxford case.’ There was no hint of gentleness in his manner now.
Sukey felt her confidence ebbing away as she tried to justify herself. ‘Ezra told me yesterday that she’s… was… very nervous about strangers coming to the house,’ she explained. ‘It sounded as if she might have seen something or someone prowling around that night after everyone had gone home. I thought she might have important evidence, but not be willing to talk to the police – that perhaps she’d be more comfortable with me, seeing we’d already met and had a chat.’
‘Oh? How did that come about?’ His tone was glacial.
Feeling like a suspect under questioning, Sukey explained how, after driving Mrs Little to her cottage at Sergeant Radcliffe’s request, she had encountered Ezra, Pussy Willow and several other people in the village shop. ‘She was going on about there being death in the cards, more evil to come and an uneasy spirit in a shroud prowling around on the night of the murder. The other people in the shop obviously thought she was completely out of her tree, but I wondered… anyway, I happened to overtake her walking home a few minutes later so I offered her a lift.’
‘You were supposed to be coming straight back here to make your report, not go driving around the countryside with deranged old women.’
‘I was on my way to do that, but she was going in my direction and she was struggling with a heavy load of shopping. I couldn’t just drive past her—’
For a moment, she detected a flicker of sympathy in Castle’s expression. ‘We’ll let that go for now,’ he said. ‘Go on.’
‘She does – did – have irrational moments, but she wasn’t deranged, not by a long chalk,’ Sukey insisted, more confidently now. At least, he hadn’t scoffed at her; his intent expression told her he was interested. ‘She was talking quite sensibly most of the time, telling me about the history of the village, but she was so sad, and missing her husband so terribly—’ She broke off and swallowed hard to check another wave of emotion. This, she reminded herself, was not professional behaviour. She pulled herself together and said, ‘Please, do you mind telling me what evidence there is that Paul had anything to do with her death? The doctor seemed to think she might have had some sort of seizure and fallen.’
‘DCI Lord called in the forensic pathologist, who isn’t convinced that the wound on the head was caused by her falling on the iron grate. In other words, he’s regarding the death as suspicious. If he’s right, then I think we must assume that Mrs Willow did see something or someone, and that whoever killed Mrs Maxford wasn’t going to take a chance on her story being taken seriously.’
‘If that’s true, then her murder was premeditated and the killer went to a lot of trouble to make it look like an accident.’ Impulsively, Sukey leaned across the desk. Forgetting for a moment that this was an interview between a senior police officer and a civilian employee who had stepped out of line, not a heart-to-heart discussion between lovers, she put a hand on his arm. ‘Paul’s no angel, Jim, but he could never do that, not in a million years,’ she said earnestly. ‘You must believe me—’
‘Let’s stick to facts, shall we?’ His voice was cold as he withdrew his arm; the rebuff was deliberate. ‘This morning’s house-to-house inquiries revealed that he was seen by the tenant of one of the cottages soon after nine o’clock last night, leaving the flat where he’s been staying since Sunday. Another man who was out walking his dog remembers seeing him come back an hour or so later. No particular importance was attached to it at the time, but in the circumstances he’s got some explaining to do.’
Sukey stared at him in bewilderment. ‘I don’t understand. He had no reason to go out again.’ This unexpected development found her completely unprepared. ‘It must have been immediately after I—’
‘After you left him, yes. That’s where you were when I phoned, wasn’t it?’ Dumbly, she nodded. ‘Radcliffe said an officer reported seeing you driving away,’ he went on, ‘but he thought he must have been mistaken. What’s got into you? You know the form – you have no right to speak to anyone connected with the case, let alone a suspect. Well?’ he snapped as she still remained silent. ‘Haven’t you anything to say?’
