The Valentine Murder

by Evelyn James

  “What on earth are you two doing?”

  Chapter Ten

  The man was, of course, Mr Steadman, alive and well. Clara rose to her knees smartly and spoke fast.

  “We found the door open and saw the stain,” she waved at the rug. “We thought something awful had happened, considering recent events.”

  Steadman had a look of disbelief on his face, even though this was the honest truth. After a while, he cast his eyes at the stain.

  “I spilt my coffee,” he said.

  “It looked like a blood stain from the doorway,” Tommy hastened to add. “The light isn’t great in this room.”

  Steadman stared at them both and then shook his head.

  “Everyone is jittery since old Beech was killed,” he went to the door which had been left open when Tommy and Clara hurried in and shut it. “I left the door open for my cat. If I close the door, he scratches on it.”

  He pointed to a shelf by the fireplace, within the deep recesses of its shadows perched a large black cat. It had been so discreetly curled up and snug in the darkness, that neither Clara nor Tommy had noticed it.

  “Still,” Mr Steadman said as he took a good look around his room and saw no harm had been done, “I appreciate your concern. Who are you, anyway?”

  “Clara and Tommy Fitzgerald,” Clara said swiftly. “We are private detectives who have been asked by Mr Spinner to investigate the death of William Beech.”

  She skirted around the real reason they were there; that they had been tasked with proving Spinner’s innocence. You had to be careful about saying such things, you could influence the way a person spoke to you if you revealed too much.

  “Spinner is no doubt beside himself,” Steadman said with a gruff snort and it was quite obvious he disliked the man. “Something like that can tarnish a man’s reputation, even when he was not involved. No one wants to work on a farm where an old fellow was brutally murdered.”

  “The sooner his killer is brought to justice, the better then,” Clara said firmly. “I wanted to ask you about the fourteenth February. I believe Mr Spinner came to see you.”

  “That he did,” Steadman had the hint of a growl to his voice. “He wanted to give me a piece of his mind about the price I got for his last crop of wheat. He had the audacity to accuse me of cheating him.”

  “We rather had the impression that Mr Spinner is a man of forthright opinions,” Tommy said.

  “That is the least of it,” Steadman grumbled. “He also doesn’t have a clue about farming. His father built up the farms, hired the workers, arranged the contracts for outside agents like me and then gave it to his son. In the five years Alastair has been running the operation, he has decreased the profits by nearly half. Only, he doesn’t realise that is because of his own poor decisions and mismanagement, he thinks it is because people like me are cheating him.”

  Steadman stabbed a finger into his chest to emphasise how despicable it was to accuse him of cheating a person.

  “Do you recall what time Mr Spinner arrived to see you?” Clara asked.

  “It was probably after ten. I was working in my office. I do the accounts for most of the farms hereabouts, as well as acting as an agent for buying and selling crops and seeds. I know he banged on my door in the morning.”

  “Do you know how long he remained with you?”

  Steadman started to frown, a look of confusion on his face.

  “I thought you were investigating the murder of William Beech?” He said. “Why all these questions about the time Spinner was here?”

  Clara had thought it unlikely she could avoid telling the truth to a man like Steadman for long. He was sharp, sharper than Spinner.

  “Mr Spinner recalls walking back across his fields and seeing no sign of Mr Beech. I am trying to pin down the times when Beech was working, to establish when he died and who might have been around.”

  Steadman gave her a hard look.

  “That doesn’t make sense,” he said sternly.

  Clara saw the game was up. Steadman could not be misled.

  “I am sorry, Mr Steadman, the situation is delicate, and I was attempting not to reveal too much about Mr Spinner’s circumstances,” Clara answered him. “Mr Spinner is concerned he may be accused of killing Mr Beech and I am hoping to prove that was not possible by charting the times he was at different places and who he was with.”

  Steadman sucked in air through his pursed lips, whistling quietly.

  “Well,” he said, “that is interesting. Spinner always has been paranoid, of course, I’m not surprised he has convinced himself he shall be accused of the crime.”

  Clara was relieved that Steadman had not asked her if the police thought Spinner a suspect, that would have made things more awkward.

  “Can you confirm the times he was with you?”

  Steadman folded his arms.

  “He turned up at my doorstep around ten, as I said. He was blustering before I even opened the door. We rowed. He accused me of cheating him, I told him to get his head out of his…” Steadman remembered himself in time and cleared his throat instead of finishing his sentence. “Not sure how long we argued, but finally he calmed down. I showed him the figures, the bills of sale, allowed him to go through all the sums himself. At last he was satisfied. He even apologised and said he would take me for a pint to make amends. We went to The King’s Arms, though, honestly, I don’t care for beer that early in the day.”

  Steadman gave a slight glance at the coffee stain.

  “I prefer hot beverages,” he said. “I drink quite a lot of coffee, helps to keep my brain functioning. Anyway, Spinner downed maybe three or four pints before I could finally get rid of him. That was about noon.”

  “Does Spinner normally drink so much during the day?” Tommy asked.

  “I am fairly certain he does,” Steadman replied. “To be frank, it would not have surprised me if he had had a drink before he came to see me.”

  “Mr Spinner is a drinker?” Clara asked, to clarify what he was saying.

  Steadman gave a shrug that was made meaningful by the look in his eyes, it was the sort of shrug that says ‘I don’t know’ while also implying the suggestion is absolutely true.

  “Should I expect a visit from the police?” Steadman asked next.

  Clara would have liked to have returned his shrug but decided that lacked professionalism.

  “I would imagine so,” she said. “You didn’t happen to see Mr Beech that day?”

  “No,” Steadman sighed. “Old boy didn’t deserve what happened to him.”

  “Did you know him well?” Tommy added.

  “Not really. He wasn’t the sort of man you knew well. Kept himself to himself, but he was one of the oldest residents in the area.”

  “Who would know about him?” Clara was thinking a better understanding of Beech might offer a better idea of who could have killed him.

  Steadman thought for a while.

  “Honestly, I would say most of the folks he grew up with are long gone. Dead or moved away. That would leave his daughter, Hanna. You can find her house on the edge of the village. It is an old tithe cottage.”

  He gave them detailed directions of how to reach the home of Hanna Beech.

  “Does Spinner really consider himself under suspicion from the police?” Steadman asked as they were preparing to leave.

  “You sound incredulous,” Clara replied. “Is that because you don’t think him capable of something like this?”

  “No,” Steadman snorted. “It’s because I didn’t think him bright enough to think up such a thing.”

  They left Steadman to make himself more coffee and headed towards the north of the village, towards the outskirts. They passed houses that looked straight out of an old painting, and numerous winding lanes. Around every corner you caught sight of a stretch of fields, or a wood.

  “This place is beautiful,” Tommy said. “Maybe we should move here?”

  Clara pointed to a wooden sig
n at the side of the road. It had been recently installed and announced that several acres of land behind it had been purchased for development. The rolling grass and leafless trees would soon disappear beneath bricks and concrete.

  “I’m not sure how long this place will remain an idyll,” she said. “Hove is fast expanding and looks to me as if before long Hangleton will be making space for extra homes.”

  Tommy pulled a face.

  “The march of progress,” he said glumly.

  “It is how the world turns,” Clara patted his shoulder. “Try not to dwell on it.”

  The home of William Beech proved to be not far from the redevelopment site. It was a tiny cottage, a little ramshackle and in desperate need of modernisation. The windows were spotlessly clean, but their frames were nearly rotted to pieces and a glimpse through one showed an antiquated pump by the kitchen sink, the only source of running water. The residents of these quaint, but hopelessly outdated homes would be just the sort to benefit from a new, modern house – if they could afford one, that is.

  Clara knocked on the front door with her knuckles, wary of using the iron knocker in case it came off in her hand. No one answered, so she went next door and tried there. A young woman came to the door, wiping wet hands on her apron.

  “Sorry to disturb you,” Clara began. “We were looking for Hanna Beech.”

  “She’s at work,” the woman told them. “It will be about her father?”

  “Yes,” Clara replied.

  The woman drew in her lips and looked miserable, then she made a decision.

  “Best you come in, then.”

  Her own cottage was presumably a mirror of the Beech resident. There was a single room downstairs that served as kitchen and parlour, with a staircase leading up the back wall. There might be a couple of bedrooms upstairs, but it would be extremely cramped living.

  “Are you Mrs Yates?” Clara asked the woman as she went back over to her sink where she was washing dishes. A toddler of indeterminate sex played on the cold floor with a rag doll and a wooden spoon.

  “Yes. Who are you?” The woman asked.

  “Clara and Tommy Fitzgerald,” Clara went through the familiar introduction. “We are private detectives working for Mr Spinner. Recent events have upset him greatly and he wishes for us to discover what happened.”

  “I thought that was what the police were doing?” Mrs Yates gave them a hard look.

  “We work alongside the police,” Clara assured her.

  Mrs Yates gave a sniff.

  “Must be all right for some, being able to afford to hire people to investigate a crime. Folk like myself, we just have to make do with the police.”

  “The police are very good at their work,” Clara assured her. “I have no doubt they shall have the culprit in custody soon.”

  Mrs Yates still had that hardness in her eyes. Clara decided to try a new approach.

  “I can’t think of a more terrible thing for your husband to witness, but the mutilated corpse of his neighbour. He must have been shocked.”

  “It was horrific,” Mrs Yates nodded. “He has told me about it, and he has been having nightmares.”

  Mrs Yates gave a shudder.

  “It makes my blood run cold to think of someone doing that to an old man. What has the world come to?” The question was rhetorical. “I blame the war. All that bloodshed, it gave people ideas. And women getting jobs. Look at her next door, working all the hours in the day. It isn’t right. If she had been home, taking care of old Bill then maybe this would never have happened.”

  Clara thought that farfetched. What did Hanna’s work arrangements have to do with William’s murder? It was not as if she would have been out in the fields with him, had she been at home.

  “This crime is deeply upsetting for everyone,” Clara said, avoiding getting into a debate about women working. “Was Mr Beech afraid of anyone? Maybe he thought someone wished him harm?”

  “Bill didn’t talk much,” Mrs Yates answered, pulling a clean plate from the soapy water and wiping it thoughtfully with a drying rag. “He was the sort of person who held a conversation with yes and no as his only words.”

  “Do you mean he was unfriendly?” Tommy asked.

  “No, that would be a cruel thing to say. He had a kindness to him. He could be generous to a fault. When my Matty was sick, I would find baskets of fresh food on my doorstep. Potatoes and carrots from Bill’s own vegetable plot, and eggs and milk he must have sent Hanna to buy. I mentioned it to Hanna once, said I could never repay such generosity. She told me it was her father’s doing and he did not want a penny in return. He just wanted to know that me and my family were all right,” Mrs Yates had paused, her mind turning back to this act of neighbourly charity and her eyes had taken a distant look. “You don’t see kindness like that often. Bill might not have felt the need to talk to people, he liked his space, but that did not mean he was uncaring. You compare him to that Mr Spinner, after all, who talks and talks, usually to people who don’t want to listen to him but doesn’t have a kind bone in his body.”

  Mrs Yates had spun from grief to anger in an instant.

  “You don’t like Mr Spinner?” Clara asked.

  “No, I do not,” Mrs Yates said firmly. “I have told my Matty he is not to work for him again. Last time he helped on that farm, Mr Spinner was late paying him, which made us late with the rent. He kept asking him and asking him for the money and there was always an excuse why it was not there at that moment. We were getting quite desperate.”

  “That seems strange, considering the money Spinner’s Farm must make,” Tommy observed.

  “Don’t ask me about that,” Mrs Yates dried her hands. “What I could never fathom is why Bill kept working for him. He can’t have been paid regularly either. I would mention it to Hanna, but she would just shrug it off.”

  Mrs Yates shook her head sadly.

  “An old man like that should not have been working still. What is the world coming to?”

  At that moment, the toddler managed to hit itself in the face with the wooden spoon and started to cry. Mrs Yates went to hush it and Clara felt it was time they made their departure. They had learned as much as they could for the time being at Hangleton. Perhaps now was the moment to find out exactly why Park-Coombs thought Spinner was the murderer.

  Chapter Eleven

  It was dusky as they returned to Brighton, weary from the long day of travelling. Clara’s legs were splattered with mud from walking along the lanes and Tommy’s trousers looked little better. They headed for home first, to recover from their excursion.

  “Spinner doesn’t seem a killer,” Tommy said as he warmed his hands by the fire. “He blusters a lot, but the sort of violence meted out to William Beech seems beyond him.”

  “Well, let us hope that is the case as we have been charged with proving his innocence,” Clara said.

  “You mean the alternative is we find him guilty?” Tommy gave this idea due thought. “That would be awkward. We wouldn’t get paid for a start.”

  Clara was about to say that would be the least of their worries when the telephone gave out its plaintive ring.

  “Could it be Annie?” Tommy said in alarm.

  Clara waved a hand at him.

  “Annie is fine,” she told him firmly and then answered the telephone herself. She was not sure who she was expecting on the other end of the line, but it had not been the inspector.

  “Clara,” Park-Coombs sounded brusque. “What is this I hear you have been hired by my chief suspect to prove him innocent?”

  He sounded angry. Clara was not entirely surprised. She would rather have had the chance to break the news to him herself. She wondered how he had heard.

  “Yes, that is true,” she told him. “Mr Spinner summoned me to his farm today and hired me. At that point, however, I was only aware of his own fears that he was a suspect, not that you considered him your chief one.”

  Park-Coombs grunted.

  “Th
at doesn’t make things better. You shouldn’t have taken the case.”

  “Why ever not?” Clara asked him. “I only intend, as I always do, to unravel the truth, whatever that may be. You know me better than to suppose I would manipulate things to achieve what Spinner wanted. If he is guilty, I shall prove him guilty, and will forfeit my fee as a result. But that is how it will be. I shall not be compromised on the truth.”

  She could hear the inspector still grumbling under his breath.

  “You make my life complicated, Clara.”

  “Not if we work together,” she said smoothly. “Tell me why you suspect Spinner and I shall continue to do my usual poking about. If your suspicions are correct, I shall find the evidence to prove them, if not, then I shall earn my fee from Mr Spinner and hopefully point you in the direction of the actual killer. Either way, justice will be done.”

  “You always have an answer, don’t you?” Park-Coombs huffed, but she knew he was mellowing.

  “It is not hard to have an answer when you always attempt to do the right thing,” Clara replied. “I am sorry you did not hear about this from me personally, Inspector, I have only just returned from Hove, you see.”

  “I ought to talk to you in person,” Park-Coombs muttered. “I could call at your house around five?”

  “You will be most welcome, Inspector, I shall endeavour to have some tea things ready for you as Annie would do.”

  “No need.”

  “Annie would never forgive me if I failed to offer a guest food,” Clara assured him. “I am sure I can manage a sandwich or two without burning down the house.”

  “You sure?” Park-Coombs said drily.

  ~~~*~~~

  A short while after five Park-Coombs arrived on their doorstep and was welcomed into their warm parlour. There he sat by the fire, taking the chill off his bones, while Clara served tea, cheese sandwiches and generous chunks of fruit cake. Not made by herself, of course, but one of those Annie had baked before she had departed to Hove. Park-Coombs adored Annie’s fruit cake and it was a worthy peace offering.