Ghosts from the Past
Page 116
“Correct.”
“It’s me. Melanie Cox, remember? I…”
I feel warmer already, and smile.
“Of course. And I hope your helping me it didn’t land you in trouble.”
“Not at all. In fact, everyone’s been really supportive. I heard all about what happened to poor Greg and the terrible business at Wombwell Farm last week. At least Professor Vickers is safe with you. Please tell him that the whole Department wants him back, won’t you?”
Stephen shakes his head and continues into the dining room.
“I will,” I say. “Incidentally, where are you calling from?”
“I didn’t go to Buenos Aires after all.”
“Why ever not? It sounded exciting.”
“I’ll tell you when I see you. I’m parked just by the recreation ground in case you didn’t want to see me again.”
A hundred yards away.
Just then, it’s as if the dead weight of sorrow slips from my shoulders.
Stephen also smiles. “Better get another plate and a bottle ready,” he suggests. “We could all do with cheering up.”
Yet as I make my way into the kitchen, with a noticeable spring in my step, a particular smell stops me in my tracks. A whiff, no more, but certainly nothing to do with the Aberdeen Angus topside sizzling and ready in the oven
My phone again.
Melanie. This time sounding different.
“Sorry,” she begins, “but there’s some old guy who seems to be following me. I’ve a good mind to stop and tell him I’m on my way to see a cop.”
“Can you describe him?”
“Weird blue eyes. Seriously old. Thick-set. A lot of white hair… Hang on…”
Weird blue eyes? Bad news.
I’m soon by the front door, opening it. My too-bulky phone still clamped to my ear while Melanie runs up the path ahead of a quickening figure dressed in a long, black coat and battered boots who then stands at the gate staring at my house. I push her inside and slam the front door behind her before facing the man whose eyes beneath his shaggy white brows are unmistakeable. Someone who must be in his early nineties. Hate still devouring his heart.
I punch in Connor Morris’s personal number and listen.
Come on. Come on…
“Matthew Crane, by any chance?” I venture to ask the intruder who’s pushing open my gate just enough to step on to the path. “Or is it Constable Drummond?”
This doesn’t go down too well. His mouth twists into a grimace.
“Stop trying to canonise a tart who gave me a death sentence.”
“Tart? Death sentence? What are you talking about?”
And where on earth is Connor Morris?
“Sarah Parminter no less. That foxy leper. Remember? Begged me for sex the same day they came to Wombwell Farm. Like in Dorset while her thieving husband worked away. Randy slut. But I never knew she was diseased, did I? Only when it was too late. Suffered for years with my lungs. Almost died, till they found a cure ten years ago.” He points a big, black-nailed finger my way. “No cure for you though, Mr. Lyon. What a shame, as I smell a tasty dinner cooking…”
Still no Morris…
“Leave now,” I order him, “or I won’t be responsible for what happens next.”
“You listen. My Mollie told me all about your ways,” he barks, spittle flecking his lips. “How you lied. Pestered her. The love of my life, she was. My little angel. But what would you know about that, eh? I’ve enough proof you pushed her in the Howse to see you rot in jail for life.” He pulls something from inside his coat. I duck instinctively then feel like an idiot. Her doll with that same chipped and cracked porcelain head, with wide, blue eyes, and rags hanging off its cloth body.
The sun has finally disappeared. My blood cools too quickly. Forget Connor Morris. This is getting weird…
“Proof from whom?” I challenge him. “She jumped in the river of her own accord, and if you don’t like the word ‘suicide, then tough. She was a liar, a coward, and like you, a killer.”
He stands his ground, entirely focussed on me, while at last, someone answers my call. Morris isn’t available. Can he call me back?
Dream on…
“Proof from whom?” I repeat instead, working out when best to make a surprise tackle.
“That one you’re waiting for. The cop you knew in Nottingham. We see eye to eye on a lot of things,” his black smile leaves those eyes untouched. “And I’m not short of a bob either. He gave me this doll…”
I feel weak.
Traitor.
A wave of sickness rises up. I push the intruder back towards the pavement, lash out with a right hook but he dives sideways. Nimble for his advanced age. Then at last, Connor Morris finally answers my call. He sounds odd. Reluctant, even, and I know why.
“John? That you?”
“Why the Hell did…”
But my question dies in my throat as a sudden movement makes me leap behind my Citroën before a bullet shatters its rear window into a shower spray of diamonds, then another one fells me backwards.
Someone yells from inside the house while those same diamonds and the sky beyond turn red, brown then black bringing faces I recognize and can name. Faces I’ve loved, segueing one into the other, particularly a young woman, looking down with infinite kindness while suddenly bringing the creeping stench of death, foul earth and water full of bones and human waste until an oncoming siren screams then fades to nothing.
*
DISS EXPRESS. Monday 9th January 1989.
Yesterday, Diss Community Council agreed to place a consecrated memorial stone in Priest’s Field adjoining Wombwell Farm in Hecklers Green, to commemorate those so cruelly disposed of on 14th December 1920. The Reverend Philip Hawes, present incumbent of St. John the Martyr, Longstanton, will be involved in the creation of a suitable inscription. Meanwhile, Longstanton Heritage Society, who are purchasing the farm from the Crown Estate, have agreed to re-build it in its original form for use as an historical and educational resource for the future.
END.
GLOSSARY - Norfolk dialect.
Bor - Boy
Dickey - donkey
Feck - Fuck
Guzunder - Lavatory
Hersen - Herself
Hisen - Himself
Loken - Lane
Lummox - Clumsy
Mawther - Young girl/woman
Mesen - Myself
Squit - Nonsense
Titty-totty - Small
Yoursen - Yourself