Chapter Fourteen
I didn’t feel, somehow, that I could tell Inspector Dean about my find – for all I knew, what I had done was illegal. So when I got back I telephoned Taunton police
station and asked to speak to Roger.
‘Sheila? Is anything the matter?’
‘No, but I’ve got something to tell you, and some-thing to show you. But unofficially, as it were.’
‘Ah. Well now. I have a day off tomorrow and I know that Jilly wants to have a session with her mother about curtains and things for the new house, so I could drive her
over to Taviscombe and, if you like, come and see you some time in the afternoon, and you could tell me then.’
‘Oh marvellous, bless you, Roger. But what will you tell Rosemary and Jilly?’
‘I could be borrowing a book, do you think? I could say I rang to see if you’d got a copy of – what? Dynevor Terrace. Have you got a lending copy of that, by the way?
I’ve always wanted to read it and never been able to get hold of it.’
‘Indeed I have. I always buy up copies of Charlotte M. Yonge whenever I see them in secondhand book-shops, so that I can lend them to fellow enthusiasts. I’ve got
two spares of Dynevor Terrace so you shall have one to keep – unless that counts as bribing the police?’
Roger laughed. ‘That depends on what you’ve got to tell me,’ he said. ‘But thank you very much indeed. I’d love to have it. I’ll come about three o’clock then, if that’s all
right?’
Roger arrived promptly the following afternoon. I was glad to see that Foss and Tris took to him at once. Tris barked excitedly as if he was a long-lost friend and rolled
with his paws in the air – something he doesn’t do for everyone. Foss simply appropriated him. He took one look at Roger, leapt on to his lap, turned round twice and went to
sleep.
‘Oh goodness, Roger, I am sorry – put him down, you’ll be all over cat hairs.’
‘Certainly not, I wouldn’t dream of disturbing him. I’m very honoured.’ And he stroked him gently with one finger so that the very tip of Foss’s tail twitched slightly with
pleasure. I
reflected that Jilly really had got a pearl among men.
‘Now then, what’s it all about?’
So I told him about the property deal – I implied that I’d got it all from Charles so as not to get Carol into trouble – and I sort of hinted that it was common knowledge,
or at least gossip, that Philip Bradford was involved with Lee, and let him put two and two together. I explained how I’d had the luck to meet Bradford at Anthea’s and
managed to get the keys of the cottage.
‘Oh, well done!’ Roger exclaimed as if applauding some clever stroke.
I described the cottage and how near it was to Plover’s Barrow and then I told him about the eye-liner.
‘I’m positive it’s Lee’s. It’s the make she uses, and her colour.’
I got up and took the plastic bag with the liner in it from a drawer.
‘Here it is. I have a horrid feeling that it was probably illegal to take it. And perhaps I should have left it in situ as evidence, but I was terrified that Bradford might
‘Here it is. I have a horrid feeling that it was probably illegal to take it. And perhaps I should have left it in situ as evidence, but I was terrified that Bradford might
somehow see it and take it away. If only I’d had a camera...’
Roger took the plastic bag carefully and laid it on a small table beside him.
‘I don’t imagine that Mr Bradford will claim ownership of this little item,’ he said. ‘But of course we don’t know how long it’s been there.’
So I explained my theory about Lee having stayed there the night before she was murdered, and all about the spillage in the oven and the water in the ice-tray.
‘Good God!’ he exclaimed. ‘Detection and deduction! Remarkable, my dear Holmes!’
I laughed happily. ‘And there’s Mrs Ellis!’
With some pride I reported my conversation with Mrs Ellis – about Lee’s involvement with Bradford and the fact that her car was seen at the cottage on the morning of
the murder.
‘Women.’ Roger said. ‘They’ll beat Special Branch any day! How on earth did you get all that out of her?’
‘Well, it helped a bit that her father used to be my milkman...’
Roger grinned. ‘You’re wasted – the whole WI mafia. You should be running the CID!’
‘Anyway. Does it help? I mean, it’s another suspect, isn’t it, instead of Jamie and Andrew?’
‘Motive?’
‘Oh, money, of course. You see, if she was still stringing Bradford along – and she obviously was, because she spent the night with him – he had no idea that she was
buying up the property in Charles’s name and was going to ditch him. But he might have found out that night – she might even have told him. The more I find out about her, the
more I feel that she was an amazingly destructive sort of person, someone who’d hurt other people just to see them wince! Anyway, she might well have told him what she’d
done, and that she was going to marry Charles, and that he couldn’t do a thing about it.’
‘For two reasons.’
‘Yes, because she could let people know that he’d abused his position on the Council by telling her about the development, and she could let his wife know about their
affair.’
‘Neat.’
‘Well. He would have been furious, wouldn’t he, and worried, because she would be a danger to him. He couldn’t, obviously, kill her at the cottage, but he knew that she
had an appointment at Plover’s Barrow that day. So after she’d left, he walked over there and – well – killed her.’
Roger looked thoughtful.
‘It’s possible. I still wonder about the client who never showed up, though. And the horseman who was seen riding away?’
‘The hunt was out that day, remember? It could just have been a stray rider. Anyway, life is full of loose ends, if you come to think of it.’
‘And he simply walked back to – what’s the cottage called?
– Barleymead. And then drove back to Taviscombe. Well, Mr Bradford certainly has some explaining to do. We’d better have a word with him.’
‘Roger – I don’t quite know how to put this. Could you manage to question him without letting him know that Mrs Ellis told me about him? Only if he’s not guilty, then
he’d be pretty annoyed with her, and she’d lose her job. And I think they need the money...’
‘It’s all right. Information received. He need never know that it was your Mrs Ellis. Or that it was you, for that matter.’
‘Oh, I don’t mind, he was an odious man and I certainly don’t want to meet him again.’ I suddenly thought of something. ‘I must get those keys back to him somehow,
without seeing him. That is – unless you want to go and have a look for yourself...’
‘My dear Sheila, what are you suggesting? Entering private property without a search warrant!’
‘No, of course not, I didn’t think. I forgot for a moment that you were official! Well, I’ll just drop them through his letter-box with a polite note. When will you be going to
see him?’
‘I think I’ll leave that to Inspector Dean. As he’s local he may have his own thoughts about Bradford, especially if Bradford has a bit of a reputation.’
‘But won’t the Inspector think it’s odd that I told you and not him?’
‘Leave it to me. Inspector Dean is an old friend and I think I can put it tactfully.’
‘Oh good, I was a bit worried about that. Can you stay for some tea or will Rosemary be expecting you back?’
‘No, I must get back to them, thank you very much.’
‘In that case I’ll get you that book. Come and have a look at my collection.’
I gave him the copy of Dynevor Terrace and we had a most agreeable conversation about the linked novels, so much so that I quite forgot that he was a detective
inspector until he said, as he was getting ready to go, ‘I mustn’t forget to take the evidence with me,’ and picked up the plastic bag.
‘Let me know what happens, if you can,’ I said.
‘I’ll do my best. And thank you – for everything.’
After he had gone, while it was still in my mind, I wrote a hasty note to Bradford, saying that I thought the cottage was delightful and that I would be writing to my friends.
I put the keys in the envelope with the note and got out the car. I hoped that I could drop them through his letter-box before he returned home in the evening.
He lived in a large house on the other side of Taviscombe and, as I parked outside, I was glad to see no car or any other sign of life. I thrust the envelope through the
letter-box and almost ran down the path, since I really didn’t feel I could bear to come face to face with Philip Bradford after all I had told Roger about him that afternoon.
That evening Michael telephoned from Oxford to ask me to send some books on to him. When I went up to his room I was appalled to see how awful it looked. Because
of my obsession with the Lee affair I had neglected my household tasks. No, that’s not quite true. I loathe housework and am delighted to find any excuse to turn my back on
it. I needed to feel very strong, anyway, before tackling Michael’s room because he never, ever puts anything away, and since he never throws anything away either the room
was silted up with archaeological layers going right back to his early childhood. Indeed, as I looked along the overflowing shelves for Prescott’s Conquest of Mexico and
Constitutional Conflicts of the XVIIth Century, I found scribbled-on copies of My First Dinosaur Book next to Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
I hadn’t touched anything since Michael had gone back after Christmas, apart from throwing all the inferior garments that he had rejected as unworthy of Oxford into the
laundry basket. The room looked not only chaotic but shabby as well, and I decided that I would have it redecorated before he came back for the Easter vacation. Since I am
absolutely useless with a paint-brush I knew I’d have to get it done professionally, and I seemed to remember that Marjorie Fraser had told me that she had found a very
reliable man to do some decorating for her. On an impulse I rang her. She provided the name of the decorator most efficiently and then she said, rather gruffly, ‘You seem to
be in with the police – have they found out any more about this Lee Montgomery business?’
I guessed that she was worrying about Jamie, and felt sorry for her.
‘As a matter of fact,’ I said, ‘I think there is something new. It’s just possible that there might be someone else – other than Jamie or Andrew, you know—’
‘Who is it?’ she demanded.
But I didn’t feel I could tell her anything about Bradford so I simply said vaguely, ‘Well, I don’t know for sure, but I sort of got the impression that the police have their
eye on someone else. I don’t know the details but I hope it might divert their attention from Jamie ... Have you seen him recently?’
‘No. He hasn’t been out the last couple of times. Too worried, I suppose. I spoke to him on the telephone and he said that inspector had been there pestering them. He’s
extremely worried about the effect of it all on Andrew.’
‘Poor boy—’
‘The police have absolutely no proof,’ she said fiercely. ‘They can’t do anything if they’ve no proof...’
She sounded strained and uncertain, quite unlike the brisk, confident person I was used to. I was very sorry for her. Love is never easy, and when it comes late in life and
to such an unlikely person – well, as they say, it’s the devil and all.
I said, rather helplessly, ‘Don’t worry, I’m sure it’ll all come right in the end.’ But as I put the telephone down I thought that even if Bradford had killed Lee, and Jamie
and Andrew were safe from suspicion, I could see no happy ending for Marjorie where the Hertfords were concerned.
Chapter Fifteen
A few days went by and I was still waiting for a word from Roger. I employed the time by catching up on my marmalade making. I had bought the Seville oranges quite a
while ago and they had been sitting in the larder reproaching me ever since. Normally I had the whole thing done and the pots neatly labelled and in the store-cupboard before
the end of January. As I cut up the oranges I went over and over in my mind all the events of the past weeks and I decided that, in a way, the most peculiar feature was
Charles’s reaction to the whole affair. He had seemed to be deeply infatuated with Lee when we all had that pub lunch together, and had sounded quite distraught when she
had been missing. But oddly enough, when he actually heard about her murder, he hadn’t sounded, somehow, like a lover and a fiancé. Well, of course, there were the
exclamations of horror and he had certainly seemed shocked, but then there were all those questions about the police going through her papers. That, surely, had been more
the reaction of someone concerned about a business deal – and a shady business deal at that – than of a man in love.
How much had he known about Philip Bradford? He obviously knew that Lee had got the tip-off about the development from someone, but had he known who? He
couldn’t have known about Lee’s affair with Bradford – or could he? Would someone engaged in that kind of business deal think that an acceptable way of getting
information? I pulled myself up short. What a horrible thing to think about one of my oldest friends. Next I would be wondering if Charles had murdered Lee!
There was, a voice inside my head whispered, the little matter of that plane ticket to London in January. I had pushed that particular piece of information to the back of
my mind, preferring not to think the unthinkable, but now I took it out and examined it. If – if Charles was really interested in Lee only for the money she could make for him,
then all he had to do was finance the property deal. Everything would be in his name and Lee would expect to get her share when they were married and Bradford had been
jettisoned. But suppose Charles had been using Lee and had never intended to marry her? It would have been easy, once he knew that everything was signed and sealed, to fly
over and arrange by telephone to meet her in a remote spot (easy to think of some excuse for that). Then he could have hired a car and driven to a lay-by on the coast road
and walked down to the house. Charles was a local and knew his way around the moors so that would be no problem. She would have been expecting him and would have let
him into the house. Perhaps Charles was the mysterious ‘client’ she was meeting there. Then, after he had killed her, he could have been in London in time to catch the late
afternoon flight and be back in New York that evening, such are the marvels of modern travel! And there he would be, far away from the scene of the crime, waiting to be told
that Lee was dead so that he could be a grieving fiancé.
But the body hadn’t been discovered for quite a while, and he had got restless and, furthermore, he knew that he must appear to make enquiries about her – why she
hadn’t written or telephoned. So what would be more natural than to get in touch with his old friend Sheila, who was always so splendid, and get her to set the wheels in
motion. By now the marmalade had reached the required slow, rolling boil and I stirred it agitatedly. It would all fit. I checked my thoughts. I had been speculating, moving
theories around like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, seeing if they could be put together in some way to form a picture. It was, I told myself, like playing a game. Of course Charles
wasn’t like that. I had known him all my life – he simply wasn’t capable of doing such a thing.
But how well do you know him? that tiresome inner voice persisted. People we’ve known all our lives suddenly do the most amazing and unexpected things, especially if
the motives are strong enough. And Charles’s life had always been dominated by financial gain, we had all known that – Jack and Ronnie had rather admired him for it. Charles
had been prepared to spend years of his life going round the world, leading a fairly nomadic existence and breaking up his marriage in the process, for the considerable financial
rewards it had brought him. Would he have been prepared to go this far, to make ‘a pretty good killing’?
The marmalade was setting and I took the pre-serving pan off the stove and put the jars to warm. I would wait and see what Roger had to say about Bradford, I told
myself. That was a perfectly reason-able theory and much more comfortable. If Lee had threatened him ... He would have lost a great deal of business as well as prestige if he
was turned off the Council, and he was the sort of self-important man, a large fish in a small pond, who would hate to lose face, even to his wretched, long-suffering wife. Yes,
a more plausible suspect altogether.
I opened the back door to let out the powerful smell of marmalade, and Foss came rushing in and leapt up on to the work surface, leaving a pattern of muddy pawmarks.
As I automatically wiped the surface clean I resolved to concentrate on my own life for a bit and clear my mind of upsetting suspicions.
Roger telephoned the next afternoon.
‘I’m sorry, Sheila. After all your hard work ... Dean has been to see Bradford and I’m afraid he has a perfectly good alibi for the time of the murder.’
‘Can you tell me?’
‘Well ... It seems that he was in a council meeting at nine thirty that morning.’
‘But—’
‘Yes, I know what you’re going to say. But even if he had actually gone to Plover’s Barrow with Lee in her car – and they hadn’t left by eight, remember – he still had to
kill her and then walk back to the cottage, pick up his own car and drive back to Taviscombe by nine twenty, which is when he arrived. It’s simply not on. As it is, he would
have had to be pretty nippy to get back to Taviscombe by then.’
‘Oh dear, yes. I see. What about Lee being at the cottage?’
‘He doesn’t deny that. He was pretty embarrassed, of course, and hopes it won’t have to come out at the inquest...’
‘Will it?’
‘Actually, we’re asking for an adjournment. There’ll be the absolute minimum of formalities, I expect. You’ll have to be there, but I shouldn’t think you’ll be called.’
‘So it wasn’t Bradford.’
‘Apparently not. Sorry about your clever detection. Not quite all in vain, though. It does help us to build up a fuller picture of Lee Montgomery.’
The name Montgomery struck a chord.
‘Roger, what about his wife? Montgomery’s, I mean. She had a motive, in a way.’
‘Actually, we did check her. She died last year. I’m afraid you’re clutching at straws a bit, aren’t you.’
‘I suppose I am.’
‘So now we’ll have to go on looking at the only suspects left to us.’
‘Jamie and Andrew?’
Roger hesitated.
‘Yes. Though there is someone else we might consider.’
‘Who?’
‘Charles Richardson.’
Now it was my turn to be silent for a moment.
‘Charles.’ I said at last, and tried to make it sound as if the possibility had never occurred to me. ‘But he was in America!’
‘There are such things as planes. Concorde, even. You could be there and back in one day at a pinch. Certainly two.’
‘But Charles was going to marry Lee.’
‘Possibly – possibly not. We’ve found some very interesting documents among her papers at the flat. She’d bought up property in his name which, if this development
thing goes through, will be worth well over a million pounds. Perhaps he didn’t want to share it with her. It’s a lot of money, if money is what you care about.’
‘But if everything was in his name he wouldn’t have to kill her.’
‘In a way, but she could have made things awkward for him. As it is, as far as he knew she had no next of kin, no one to make a fuss about the money anyway. I think
you told me that he thought she was divorced.’
‘Yes,’ I said, trying to sort things out, ‘he didn’t know that she was still married to Jamie. I suppose he’s her next of kin.’
‘Precisely. He’ll get anything she might have to leave. That will certainly come in handy. They seem to live very much from hand to mouth.’
‘But Jamie thought she hadn’t any money.’ I said quickly. ‘He told me...’
‘That’s what he told you, yes.’
I felt thoroughly miserable. Everything I thought of seemed to implicate Jamie or Charles. A million pound!! Charles could have his pick of attractive females with a million
pounds. Lee was quite bright, but, in trusting Charles, had she been bright enough?
Roger said sympathetically, ‘I’m sorry, Sheila, I know how distressing this must be for you. It’s very hard to think of anybody one has known for ages as a possible
murderer. But these things do happen, you know – have happened – and we just have to get at the truth the best way we can.’
‘Yes, of course, Roger, I do see that. It’s just that ... well, you know. Thank you for telling me.’
‘I’ll see you at the inquest, the day after tomorrow, isn’t it? And then, after that, try and put it out of your mind. Why don’t you go and spend a few days in Oxford – see
your son, do a bit of reading in the Bodleian...’
‘What a good idea, perhaps I will.’
But I knew that while this wretched thing was unsolved it wouldn’t matter where I was, it would still worry and niggle at me and I’d find it difficult to concentrate on
anything else. I felt very depressed about it all. I had rather meanly hoped that Bradford would be the villain of the piece because I had disliked him, but life, as we all know, is
not like that. On the principle that if you’re really fed up then the best thing is to do a job you actively hate, I decided to clear out Michael’s room to get it ready for Marjorie’s
Mr Owen to start decorating as soon as possible.
As I heaved furniture about and ruthlessly thrust ancient, yellowing copies of Motorcycle Weekly into black plastic dustbin bags, I felt that there was some-thing at the
back of my mind that might explain everything if only I could think what it was. But, as when you try to remember the name of a small-part actor in an old film, thinking about it
simply drives it away, and the only thing to do is to wait and see if it’ll come to the surface of its own accord. So I turned Foss out of a cardboard box, which he had
appropriated, and began neatly packing away Michael’s old school exercise books.
Chapter Sixteen
Mr Owen was a large, middle-aged Welshman, a redundant miner who had turned to building and decorating. I wondered why he had come to Taviscombe.
‘Always liked this part of the country.’ he said. ‘Me and the wife used to come on the steamer for day-trips. Besides,’ he winked, ‘does no harm to have the Bristol
Channel between me and the wife’s mother.’ He was a good worker and marvellous at clearing up – as I suppose I might have expected of someone recommended by
Marjorie Fraser – and it was a relief not to have Radio One constantly blaring away. He did ask me if I minded if he played his tapes on his cassette recorder. Of course, I said
that would be fine, and waited with interest for full-throated Welsh male-voice choirs, but it turned out to be Glen Miller and Perry Como, and, after the first morning, I found
myself going about my household tasks humming ‘String of Pearls’ and ‘Catch a Falling Star’, which was cheering, somehow.
I had had a note from Mr Hawkins, the vet, to say that Tris’s annual booster injection was due, and, groaning inwardly, I nerved myself to take him there. Tris, normally a
happy, obedient little dog, became a whining, trembling, obstinate fiend whenever we came within fifty yards of the vet’s door. I hauled him into the waiting room, where he
immediately went to ground under my chair and sat cowering and uttering pathetic little yelps. I tried to ignore him as I looked at the other, perfectly well-behaved animals
around us – a placid labrador, lying peacefully on its owner’s feet, a white poodle with a neatly bandaged paw sitting smugly on a chair next to his mistress, and a black and
white cat, wrapped in a woollen shawl, on its owner’s lap, who gazed at us scornfully and opened and shut its mouth in a silent miaouw of contempt. As so often happens in
such places, the animals ignored each other while their owners exchanged symptoms.
‘...cut his paw on this broken bottle. People really shouldn’t be allowed...’
‘...I think it’s his teeth, he’s quite an elderly gentleman now...’
‘...no, only a routine injection, thank goodness...’
The door opened and my heart sank when Marjorie Fraser came in with her spaniel and sat down next to me. I greeted her and stroked the dog.
‘Marjorie, how nice to see you – hallo Tessa; good girl! – I’ve been meaning to ring and tell you how delighted I am with Mr Owen. He really is a treasure.’
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘his work is quite satisfactory.’
We chatted for a while about decorating and she told me about the extension she was planning to build and how she needed extra stabling for her horses. ‘Of course,
they weren’t actually built as stables,’ she said. ‘So they will need to be extensively rebuilt. I had been thinking about finding somewhere bigger.’
‘Somewhere like Plover’s Barrow would have suited you,’ I said, ‘although it’s a bit isolated. And now, of course—’
‘As a matter of fact I had considered it. I saw the particulars in the window of that Montgomery woman’s agency and wondered if it might do.’
‘It wanted a lot doing to it, though.’ I said. ‘The kitchen would have needed completely modernising, for a start. That awful old sink!’
‘Yes, and those stone flags would have had to come up...’
‘And that costs the earth, I know,’ I replied rue-fully, ‘because we had them in our present house when we first moved in and the damp underneath you wouldn’t believe
– we had to have a whole new damp course...’
‘Anyway, the house would have been far too big – it’s just that it’s difficult to find that amount of stabling with a smaller house. I rather want to go in for a little horsebreeding.
Jamie Hertford’ – she looked slightly self-conscious as she mentioned his name – ‘is advising me. He has been very helpful.’
Oh well done, Marjorie, I thought. That’s one sure way of engaging his interest! I was about to see if I could find out if she had seen him recently when the receptionist
called me in. Needless to say, I had a dreadful time hauling Tris out from under my chair, and when I did, he refused to move a step, his nails making clattering noises on the
linoleum as I tried to drag him along, while the others looked at me as if I was some kind of inhuman monster. Finally, avoiding Marjorie’s eye, I had to pick him up bodily and
make my escape into the surgery.
‘Well then, how’s my old friend?’ Mr Hawkins boomed cheerfully as I put Tris on the examination table and he, the little hypocrite, barked excitedly and licked Mr
Hawkins lovingly on the nose. Animals!
I thought quite a bit about Marjorie and the Hertfords. She must have rather a lot of money, and if she were to go into some sort of partnership with Jamie for breeding
horses ... Jamie would benefit – and Andrew, who was so good with horses – and Marjorie would have a constant excuse to be with him, without the need for any overtly
emotional sort of relationship, which would suit them both very well. It would be a splendid arrangement all round. I positively beamed with approval. Then I remembered that
Jamie was the number one suspect in a murder investigation and my heart sank.
The inquest came and went. Jamie wasn’t there. As Roger had said, it was a mere formality. I saw him briefly, looking official, and he gave me a slight wave and a friendly
but absent smile. I longed to ask him if he had made any progress with the case, but it seemed neither the time nor the place. Jack and Rosemary had very sweetly come with
me, and after it was over we went to have a drink and a sandwich at the George. We were nice and early so it was empty and we were able to get a table in the window
looking out over the sea.
‘There you are, girls,’ Jack said, putting down our gin and tonics. ‘I’ll just go and see about the sandwiches.’
‘Guess what!’ I said. ‘Marjorie Fraser’s going in for horse-breeding and Jamie Hertford’s advising her!’
‘No!’ Rosemary exclaimed. ‘How marvellous for her! And for him, if she’s putting money into it. Though I suppose he’ll get any money that Lee Montgomery left – there
must be a bit. That agency must fetch something and I bet she was the sort of person who had all sorts of little deals on the side.’
I preserved a tactful silence about the extent of Lee’s deals because I wasn’t sure how much Roger wanted known about all that. Instead I asked, ‘Where does
Marjorie’s money come from? She seems pretty well off. That house at Bracken must have cost a fair amount – I mean, it’s got quite a bit of land. And she’s talking about
having it extended and more stables built.’
‘Marjorie Fraser’s money?’ asked Jack, putting down plates of sandwiches. ‘Those are ham and those are roast beef. Oh, I think she got a very good price for her
husband’s practice. You know he was a vet, somewhere this side of Bristol, a lot of dairy farming round there, very prosperous. He died a couple of years ago, I believe, and
she sold up and came out here. And I think she’s pretty shrewd where investments are concerned – old Boothroyd, he’s her broker too, was saying the other day that she’s
got a good head for business.’
‘Oh wouldn’t she just!’ said Rosemary disgustedly. ‘That woman is too perfect for anything! No wonder everybody loathes her!’
‘I’m beginning to feel sorry for her, in a way. It’s quite pathetic when she talks about Jamie, rather like a school-girl with her first crush!’
Rosemary snorted.
‘Anyway.’ I said, ‘I’m grateful to her for finding Mr Owen for me...’ and the conversation turned exclusively to decorating, imperfectly lagged pipes and the iniquities of
plumbers.
That evening I had just switched off the television after watching a particularly horrible thriller, in which every character was either revoltingly vicious or repellently weak. I
feebly stayed with it to the end because I hadn’t got the remote control near at hand and I didn’t want to disturb Foss, who was heavily asleep on my lap. I was, therefore,
feeling a little irritable at having mindlessly wasted an hour on something that had neither entertained nor informed me, and, when the telephone rang, I snatched up the receiver
and snapped ‘Yes?’ in a very brusque way.
‘Sheila?’ It was Charles, obviously taken aback by my uncharacteristic greeting. I was taken aback too. Suddenly to be confronted by Charles, after the theories I had
invented about him, and before I had had time to collect my thoughts, was very disconcerting.
‘Charles’ I exclaimed. ‘How lovely to hear from you.’
‘How are things going? Have the police any news yet?’
‘Well – not a lot,’ I said hesitantly. ‘Haven’t they been in touch with you?’
‘I don’t know, really. I’m just in from Johannesburg and I haven’t been back to the apartment yet. But have they made an arrest or anything? I’m sorry it’s been so long
since I called but we’ve been having a fairly hectic time over here – the Aroldson merger, I expect you’ve heard about it?’
Since the financial pages of the Daily Telegraph are so much wasteland to me, I naturally hadn’t, but I made interested murmurs.
‘Honestly, I seem to have been going round the world nonstop since Christmas.’
I seized the opportunity to probe a little.
‘Yes, your splendid secretary told me you’d been in London early this year – I wish we could have seen you.’
‘Oh that – now that was a complete balls-up,’ Charles said, warming to his theme. ‘Fredrikson – our head of European operations – asked me to go with him to help
with the negotiations – well, I know a lot of the people involved – and we got to Heathrow on the second – think of travelling the day after New Year’s Day, you can imagine
what my head was like! Anyway, there was a message for us at the airport that the whole bloody shooting match had been transferred to Frankfurt! Muller, their vicepresident,
couldn’t get to London. Would you believe! Absolute nonsense, of course, just a ploy
– still, we had to get the next flight out to Germany. All I saw
of London was that God-awful departure lounge.’
‘Poor Charles.’
‘Actually, I tried to phone Lee from Heathrow, but there was no reply. I suppose she was out somewhere.’
‘Yes, I suppose she was.’
‘Poor kid – it all seems unreal, somehow.’
‘The money from that property deal isn’t unreal,’ I said sharply.
I could almost feel Charles’s interest quicken. ‘ Oh, has that been sorted out then? I gathered from Lee that everything was more or less wrapped up.’
‘From what the police have told me, it seems that you’re likely to be a very rich man.’
‘It was a neat little operation,’ he replied. ‘Poor Lee, if only she were still around we could really have had fun...’
I was suddenly furious with Charles for his casual, uncaring attitude.
‘I suppose her next of kin might have a claim,’ I said, dropping a stone into the pool.
‘Her what?’
‘Her next of kin – her husband.’
There was a stunned silence at the other end of the line and I was glad that I was not paying for what would probably be a long and expensive telephone call.
‘But she was divorced.’
‘No. She’d never got around to it. Oh, she was going to, when she thought you’d marry her. But she died before anything was done.’
‘But this Montgomery chap...’
I explained about Mr Montgomery and then about Jamie.
‘I’m afraid she wasn’t a very nice person, Charles. The way she tried to get that last pound of flesh out of Jamie, when she simply didn’t need it – well...’
‘Good God. Jamie Hertford! We – Jack and Ronnie and I
– used to think he was the last word! I can’t believe it. And she – she never mentioned anything. And’ – his voice sharpened suspiciously – ‘that man Bradford? What
about him?’
There seemed no point in holding anything back now, so I told him about Lee’s last night at Bradford’s cottage.
‘I’m sorry, Charles, this must be painful for you.’
But I couldn’t really feel sorry for him. I knew that it was only his pride that was hurt. He would soon bounce back and there would be another marvellous girl – someone
more suitable next time perhaps. But, what with all the money, I wasn’t very hopeful.
‘That poor chap!’ Charles seemed more concerned now with thoughts of Jamie. ‘Poor Jamie, indeed. You realise that he is the chief suspect, him or Andrew, his son.’ I
told Charles about Andrew.
‘Well,’ he said, and suddenly he sounded like the Charles I used to know, ‘if anything does happen to Jamie Hertford, I’ll certainly see that the boy is all right financially.
They ought to have some of the money anyway.’
‘I doubt if Jamie would take anything connected with Lee
– even for Andrew’s sake. They just want to be left alone.’
‘Fat chance of that if he did murder her – not that anyone could blame him after the way she behaved. Perhaps he might get off with manslaughter. A good lawyer ... I
know just the man. I’ll pay, of course. I feel sort of responsible.’
‘Steady on, Charles. He hasn’t been arrested yet. I don’t think they’ve anything like enough proof – it’s all circumstantial evidence.’
‘Well, let me know. I’m off to Chicago tomorrow, and then to Rio, but Paula will always have a number for me.’
Dazed by all this whizzing around the world, I assured Charles that I’d keep him informed and thankfully said goodbye.
‘So that’s that,’ I said. ‘It wasn’t Charles.’
Foss, who had been stalking round and round the room in the purposeful way he does when he wants to indicate that it’s bed-time, stopped and looked at me in surprise.
‘Oh, Foss, I’m so glad, really, that it wasn’t Charles,’ I said foolishly.
The next morning, just before I had to collect Mrs Aston from the Out Patients department after her physiotherapy, I crossed the road and went to have a look at
Country Houses. It was all shut up and there were letters pushed through the letter-box and lying on the floor. Carol must have gone – I hoped she’d got that receptionist’s
job. I’d find out next week, when I went for my check-up.
I looked at the photographs of properties, still in the window. They looked dusty and forlorn. In the centre, in pride of place, I saw the particulars of Plover’s Barrow and
idly read through the description. ‘Fine property ... two acres of land ... extensive stable block ... some modernisation necessary...’ I stared at the photograph, as if it could tell
me what had happened that morning in January. Then, quite suddenly, the picture of Lee lying on the cold, stone floor came into my mind and I found myself shaking, as I had
the day I’d found her. My head swam and I had a dreadful feeling of nausea. For a moment I was afraid I was going to faint and I clung to the sill of the window. I tried to pull
myself together and breathed deeply, thinking, as one does, that I mustn’t make an exhibition of myself by behaving oddly. After a while I felt better and able to walk on. I
crossed the road slowly and went into the hospital to collect Mrs Aston. I found her sitting in the waiting area with a martyred expression.
‘I got through early,’ she said, ‘so I’ve been waiting. Freezing, it is in here, people coming and going leaving that door open. I wouldn’t be surprised if I’ve caught a cold,
sitting In a draught all that time...’
I held the door wide open, so that she could get her walking frame through, deeply grateful to return to normality again.
Chapter Seventeen
A train of thought is a funny thing, the way your mind hops about. Mine is worse than most—‘genuine one hundred per cent grasshopper’, Peter used to say. I was
making a cup of tea for Mr Owen. (He’d done Michael’s room so beautifully that I’d got him to decorate the bathroom, which badly needed doing.) I was putting out some
chocolate digestives on a plate and humming ‘Little Brown Jug’, which was what Glen Miller was playing up-stairs. That made me suddenly remember that I had, somewhere,
a large brown earthenware jug that would be just right for the enormous bunch of pussy-willow, catkins and forsythia that Rosemary had given me the day before, and which
were at present reposing unworthily in a plastic bucket. I had a sort of feeling that the jug was at the back of the cupboard under the sink, in among all the unused baking trays
and cake tins. I got down on my knees to have a look, and as I did so I noticed that the vinyl floor-covering round the sink unit was coming away in places and really ought to
be seen to. It had been down for ages, ever since we had the kitchen remodelled when we moved in. I remembered Peter and I going into Taunton to choose it. I even
remembered where we had had lunch afterwards...
A scrap of conversation came back to me, and the elusive thought that had been floating about in the recesses of my mind for the last few weeks came to the surface, and
the two fitted together with other pieces of the puzzle, and I was suddenly sure that I knew what had happened at Plover’s Barrow when Lee Montgomery was murdered.
The electric kettle was boiling, so I got up off my knees and made the tea. Only one person could answer the question I had to put, but I was not at all sure what I would
do with the answer when I had got it. I gave Mr Owen his tea and admired the new tiles he was putting up behind the bath. I told him that I had to go out for a while and could
he make sure that the animals were in if he left before I was back. Then I got into the car and drove out to Bracken.
It was a glorious day. The sun was shining and it seemed as if spring had really arrived at last. The banks of the narrow lane I drove along, up to Marjorie Fraser’s house,
were dotted with primroses and celandines, and there was a haze of green on the hawthorn hedges. Spring is my favourite time of the year and it was the sort of day when I
usually feel a great lift of the spirits, but as I approached the house I was so overwhelmed by sadness and apprehension that I could hardly bring myself to get out of the car.
There was no answer when I rang the front-door bell, so I went round to the stables where I knew Marjorie was far more likely to be. She was inside, grooming one of
the horses as I stood in the door-way and greeted her. When she saw that it was me she gave a strange little half-smile and invited me to sit down on a wooden kitchen chair
just inside the stable.
‘Forgive me if I go on doing this,’ she said. ‘What can I do for you?’
It was difficult to frame the question that I had to ask, so I decided to be as blunt as Marjorie herself would have been.
‘How did you know that Plover’s Barrow had a stone-flagged floor?’ I asked. ‘That wasn’t in the particulars in Lee Montgomery’s window.’
She continued smoothing the mare’s coat with the brush and I watched the rhythmic, circular movements for some time and began to think that she wasn’t going to
answer me.
‘What a little thing,’ she said eventually. ‘And I suppose there could be some perfectly rational explanation for it, but I’ve had enough. I’m not very good at lying and I
don’t think I can go on any longer. Have you worked it all out? The academic mind is supposed to be very thorough. Though I don’t see how you could have done – nobody
knows...’
She turned at last and gave me a sharp look of enquiry, and I stared back at her, trying to match her calm manner.
‘I have what I suppose you could call a theory.’ I said.
‘And what is that?’ She sounded so much like her old peremptory self at committee meetings that I found myself speaking in the flat, level tones that I use to read out the
minutes of the previous meeting.
minutes of the previous meeting.
‘It was obvious, from that remark about the stone floor, and from your tone of voice when you spoke about it, that you’d actually been to Plover’s Barrow, and if it had
been for some perfectly innocent reason you would certainly have said so. And there was another thing at the back of my mind: a shepherd there said that he saw someone
riding away from the house about midday on the day that Lee was murdered. He thought it was a man, but he was a long way away and you’re tall...’
Marjorie had finished grooming the horse and had taken a bridle down from a hook on the wall and was polishing the bit.
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘I was at the house that day.’
‘I suppose it was for Jamie and Andrew, wasn’t it?’
‘In a way.’
The spaniel, Tessa, hearing voices, came into the stable. She laid her head on my knee for a moment so that I could stroke her, and then settled down in a patch of
sunlight at my feet.
‘I can’t really believe that Jamie killed her,’ I went on, ‘so it had to be Andrew. I don’t know how he came to be at Plover’s Barrow – perhaps Lee told him about it
when she spoke to him on the phone. But I can imagine only too clearly how she teased and tormented him until, poor boy, he snatched up that knife and tried to put her out of
their lives for ever. I imagine that Andrew must have left some sort of note for Jamie, who came to find him. He would have come in the Land Rover and left it up on the road,
coming down cautiously on foot, not knowing what he would find. When he saw what had happened he’d have wanted to get Andrew away as quickly as possible – the boy
must have been in a dreadful state. But there was the problem of Andrew’s horse. He was obviously in no condition to ride all that way back, but Jamie didn’t dare leave the
horse there, while he went back for the horse-box, in case someone saw it. The only person he could trust to get it back for him was you.’
Marjorie gave a little laugh, and the dog lifted its head and looked at her, but she didn’t say anything. I continued.
‘So he put Andrew in the Land Rover and stopped at that telephone box on the coast road and phoned you. You drove over and left your car, as Jamie had done,
walked down, collected the horse and rode it in easy stages back to Jamie’s. Then he drove you back to your car and you went back home. Is that the way it was?’
Marjorie let the polishing rag lie idle in her hand and looked at me with a strange mixture of admiration and contempt.
‘Oh Sheila,’ she said, ‘you really are extraordinary, you simply cannot bring yourself to believe anything bad of anybody, can you. Jamie couldn’t possibly have killed Lee
Montgomery, so it must have been Andrew – a poor boy, who didn’t really know what he was doing, wasn’t responsible for his own actions!’
‘It wasn’t Jamie?’
‘No, of course it wasn’t Jamie, though God knows he had reason enough.’ She rubbed at the bridle again, holding it up to the light to see if she’d got all the polish off. ‘It
was me. I killed her.’
Her voice was flat and unemotional, but there must have been some quality in it that made the mare suddenly move nervously in its stall and toss its head, and I
remembered how the horse had reared and plunged when I had told Marjorie how I had found Lee’s body.
‘I suppose I must explain. I knew I would have to one day soon. The burden of such a thing is very heavy. And, of course, I couldn’t allow anyone else to have taken the
blame for what I did.’
‘But why? I burst out. ‘Was it for Jamie?’
‘Partly. That was why I went to see her. Jamie had told me what she had said about the money. I don’t think he meant anyone to know, but he was desperate with worry
about Andrew, who had gone off, as you know. I just happened to phone that evening – to see if he’d got the date of the Invitation Meet,’ she continued, looking rather selfconscious,
and I remembered how I, too, in the first flush of love, had always found some excuse for phoning the object of my affection.
‘I’d seen the advertisement for Plover’s Barrow in her window, and, as soon as I’d spoken to Jamie, I phoned her office.
I just caught her as she was leaving and arranged to see her at the house the next morning, pretending that I was thinking of buying it. I didn’t want anyone to know I was
seeing her – well, I was sure Jamie wouldn’t want it known, and nor did I, for a lot of reasons. I made the appointment for the next morning, partly because I needed to see her
as soon as possible, and partly because I knew I would be out with the hunt on that part of the moor that day. I got there just after eleven, a bit late – she was getting impatient
and not in a good mood anyway. I knew it was no use appealing to her better nature, so I offered her money. Not as much as she would have got from her share of the sale of
the smallholding, but she could have had it at once, with no strings or bother.’
I tried to visualise the scene.
‘What did she say?’ I asked curiously.
‘She was very offensive. She implied’ – here Marjorie found difficulty in forming the words and a deep flush darkened her face – ‘that I was in love with Jamie. She
laughed and made some very distasteful remarks...’
I could imagine that very well. Lee would have known just how to hurt and humiliate Marjorie, and she would have enjoyed doing it.
‘Did she say she’d take the money?’
‘Oh yes. She was very greedy.’
‘Then, why...’
‘Why did I kill her? I still wasn’t sure that she would leave Jamie and Andrew alone. She said’ – Marjorie hesitated again
– ‘she only had to lift her little finger to get Jamie back again. I was almost sure that Jamie wouldn’t, but you never know with men – she seemed to have this peculiar
attraction, I can’t pretend to understand it – and then he’d have been unhappier than ever.’ She fell silent for a moment and then continued more in her old manner. ‘I told you
it was only partly Jamie. That was only the last straw. I have hated Lee Montgomery – overwhelmingly hated her – for two years now.’
‘But you’ve only been in Taviscombe for about a year...’
‘The story goes back six years, really. You probably know I used to live just outside Bristol; my husband was a vet and I helped him in the practice. We had a daughter,
Lucy...’ For the first time, Marjorie’s voice broke. ‘I’m sorry, it’s been so long since I spoke her name. She was a marvellous girl, everyone loved her ... Well, one day she
was out on her bike when this car knocked her down. There were witnesses and the police were called and Lucy was taken to hospital. She had concussion and some
abrasions. They kept her in for a couple of nights and then let her come home, and she made a good recovery. The driver of the car was a woman. She’d obviously been
drinking, so the police prosecuted. When the case came up she was fined for dangerous driving and had her licence taken away for a year. A year,’ she repeated. She looked
at me. ‘Yes, it was Lee Montgomery – Elizabeth Hertford was the name she gave in court. Well, we went on as before for four years and then suddenly Lucy collapsed and
within a day she was dead. It was an aneurysm, apparently, a sort of blood clot. These things happen very suddenly and very quickly...’ Marjorie’s voice trailed away, vaguely
almost, and then she said, fiercely, ‘They said that the concussion probably hadn’t anything to do with it, that it would have happened anyway, but how could I believe that!’
‘Oh Marjorie, how terrible for you...’
She seemed not to hear me, and went on painfully.
‘We both adored Lucy, David and I, we’d built our entire lives around her. Without her he didn’t see any point in going on – I wasn’t enough, you see.’ She was clasping
and unclasping her hands around the bridle until the metal bit into her fingers. ‘He killed himself. An overdose. I don’t know, really, why I didn’t do the same. I suppose it’s the
way I was brought up. Suicide is a sin. Murder is too. But an eye for an eye ... and for a child.’
I thought of Michael and wondered what I would have done. And then I thought of Peter who had died too, but surrounded by love and knowing that he had left a son
behind him.
‘After a while, I sold up the practice and moved down here. It was a place where we’d all been happy. We used to come for riding holidays – Lucy had a marvellous pair
of hands, she would have been really good ... David and I always said we’d retire down here and keep horses. It seemed, almost, something I could do for him.’ She looked
at me. ‘Was that very foolish?’
‘No.’ I said quickly. ‘No, I would have felt the same.’
‘I’d been down here for about a month when I saw her in the town and found out that she lived and worked here. It was a dreadful shock, a horrible coincidence. I used
to see her driving around in that big, powerful car ... I never told anyone about Lucy and David. It was too private and too painful. I tried to lead a normal life. I joined things, I
kept busy.’ She gave me a quizzical look. ‘I know you all thought that I was bossy and interfering, but all that organising and managing was what kept me sane. That, and the
horses.’
‘Oh Marjorie, I’m so sorry.’
‘I used to feed my anger. Several times I went into that place and made enquiries about houses, just to see her and speak to her. She didn’t recognise me. We never met
over the case and Fraser is quite a common name, I suppose. So, you see, when all this blew up over Jamie and Andrew and I saw how she was going to ruin two more
lives...’
The mare was restless again, and shifted in its stall. Marjorie got up, put her arm around its neck and spoke quietly and soothingly to it.
‘After she had gone on about Jamie, she began to sneer at Andrew, called him half-witted and other things. So then I told her about Lucy and how she had killed her...’
Marjorie had turned to face me, and now she was dreadfully pale.
‘Do you know, she simply didn’t remember the accident, she had totally forgotten about it ... People sometimes say, “I don’t know what came over me” – and that’s
really how it feels. Something came over me, a feeling so strong that it was almost tangible. She’d turned away, she was picking up her handbag to go, not bothering, not
caring. I took up that knife and killed her. I was quite calm, I did know what I was doing. I knew just where to put in the knife so that she would die instantly. I know about
these things and, as you say, I’m tall, so I could manage exactly the right angle from above.
‘I wonder, did I really go there that morning intending to kill her? I had my alibi. It’s easy to leave the hunt for a while and then rejoin it, no one misses you, they’re too
absorbed, themselves. Everyone thinks you’ve simply fallen behind or taken another line across country. I left no finger-prints – I was wearing riding gloves – and there were
no tracks because I left Satin tied up at the back. I didn’t know, of course, that someone saw me ride away. I honestly don’t know if it was in my mind all the time...’
She turned away and leaned her face against the mare’s neck for a moment. Then she turned and said, almost briskly, ‘I knew that this would be only a temporary respite
– time to settle things properly. I’ve written a letter – it’s with my solicitor. I’ll take the horses to the livery stables this morning. I want Jamie to have them – I’ve left him
everything – well, there’s no one else now. Actually, Sheila, would you do something for me? Would you go and see Jamie and try and explain to him? I can’t, somehow, put it
all in a letter, and I would like him to know how it was. I would like him to think of me, well – you know...’
‘Yes, of course I will.’
Jamie and Andrew would be amazed and sad and grateful, but, secure at last in their little world, they would have no real idea of what they had meant to her, and perhaps
that was just as well.
‘I know I shouldn’t ask you, but can you give me a day? I mean, I know you will have to tell the police about this conversation, but if you could give me time to leave
things as they should be.’
‘I have to go to that meeting in Dulverton this afternoon,’ I said carefully, ‘and I have an appointment with my accountant tomorrow morning...’
‘Thank you, Sheila. There is one other thing. It’s Tessa. She was Lucy’s dog – just a puppy when she died – and I don’t want to have her put down. Would you mind
taking her? She’s quite obedient and she gets on all right with that Westy of yours.’
Tears that I hadn’t shed for the human actors in this drama came into my eyes, stupid, sentimental tears, but none the less real for that. I bent down and patted Tessa to
give myself a moment to recover.
‘Of course I will...’
Marjorie picked up the dog’s lead, which had been lying over the stable partition, and clipped it on to its collar.
‘Right, then.’ Her voice was brisk and businesslike, the Marjorie I knew – or thought I knew. ‘Come along, then, I’ll put her in your car and then she’ll know she has to
go with you.’
We walked together to the car.
‘What a beautiful day!’ she said as we came into the sunshine.
I opened the car door and she put Tessa in the back, stroked the dog’s head and shut the door.
‘Marjorie...’ I said uncertainly.
She opened the driver’s door of the car.
‘Thank you for everything,’ she said. ‘Good-bye.’
I drove out of the gate and down the lane, between the clusters of primroses and celandines. In the back of the car the spaniel was making little whining noises.
‘It’s all right, Tessa,’ I said. ‘Everything’s going to be all right.’
END