Polly nodded. ‘He might get hurt.’
‘Richard would not know where to find a frying pan,’ answered Anna. ‘Meredith? Meredith, are you weeping?’
Jean ran to her daughter’s side. ‘Sweetheart, don’t cry. Whatever he intends, he will be stopped.’
Polly, too, had begun to sob, but for a different reason. Seeing him again and remembering how she had treated him made her ashamed. Derek was a nice man. She should have been content with a nice man.
Elsie did what Elsie always did in such situations – she went off to make copious amounts of strong tea. Then they sat and waited for the men to come home. ‘Just like the war,’ Elsie said mournfully after her second cup. ‘We waited then and all.’
Henry snorted and opened his eyes. ‘Did I miss anything?’ he asked.
‘He could sleep through an invasion,’ whispered Anna. ‘Now, come on, everyone – do buck up. We have to hope for the best.’
‘What?’ asked Henry.
‘Nothing,’ she replied. Her brother had suffered enough.
Colin moved across the room and sat on the arm of Meredith’s chair. ‘You’ll be all right,’ he said. ‘My dad will straighten things out.’
She dried her tears. Like his father, this young man had strength. She smiled at him, and the older women looked at each other. Even now, in the darkest of hours, the matchmaking went on.
‘Any more tea in that pot?’ Henry asked.
The women got on with the business of clearing and washing dishes, Henry drank tea, was told that the men had gone to walk off their dinner and that Aggie had accompanied them. Minutes dragged, became an hour, and still they lingered quietly in the firelight while Christmas tree lights flickered.
When dishes were cleared and cleaned, the real business of waiting began. Meredith leaned against the arm of Marie’s brother and took solace from his nearness. Christmas was over; Father had ended it.
Every single downstairs window was closed and locked.
He placed the two cans of paraffin on the pathway and, using the hammer he had taken from a stable, smashed a pane. It was easy to release the catch and raise the sash. Then he placed his booty on a small table to the left of the window and climbed inside. A dog barked, the sound coming from the kitchen, but the grange was beyond earshot of the village, so the noise was no cause for concern. ‘Breaking into my own bloody house,’ he mumbled softly. The frantic barking was getting on his nerves. Steeling himself, he picked up the containers of paraffin and walked towards the hall.
The lights were out, but he could see the tree twinkling in a corner. His eyes, already adjusted to the blackness outside, marked items of familiar furniture as he made his way across the space towards the stairs. He knew every creak of every board, breathed in the scents of a home that had been his since birth; it remained his and no-one could deny the fact. This was his to own, his to enjoy, his to destroy. With a paraffin container in each hand, he made his way to the fragrant one’s room. In her little jewel case sat several thousand pounds’ worth of items, some handed down and carefully reset after centuries of wear. They were his heritage and he would reclaim them.
Larger items he would leave outside on the steps to be carried to the van when he had finished here. He must be careful not to take too much, as he was not capable of carting a great deal of weight to the place where he had been forced to park his van. There were few regrets when he thought about the extent of his proposed actions. Chandlers Green was no longer in the hands of the family; all that would be lost was this meaningless pile of sandstone and even that was well insured.
Jean’s room was at the back of the house; the view from her windows was countryside only, so he switched on the light before drawing tight the curtains. She had left her knitting on an ottoman and he dragged the work from its needle, tearing away until the whole item was destroyed. As he ripped at it, he envisaged her face bloody and battered, eyes gouged from their sockets. ‘Easy, easy,’ he ordered softly. The dog continued to bark.
He opened the jewellery case, saw diamonds, pearls, emeralds, opals. Swiftly, he crammed the lot into his pockets; he was not stealing, because everything here was the property of the Chandler family, of which line he remained the moral heir. Henry might have deleted him from his will, but Richard had every right to line his own pockets. The engagement ring was missing – she was probably sporting that at Martindale’s table. Let her keep it; let her enjoy that one piece, because it would remind her of the man she had betrayed.
The girl had some pieces. He made his way to Meredith’s room and emptied her jewellery case, too. Paintings and ornaments he would forget. ‘Let them all burn,’ he said as he sprinkled paraffin all over the landing. Jewellery he could sell in Manchester; larger items might be more difficult to liquidate, so he simply dismissed them from his agenda.
Dripping the rest of the paraffin onto the stairs, he returned to the hallway, tossing the empty cans onto the floor. From a trouser pocket, he took a box of matches and was preparing to scrape one of its members along the sandpaper edge when the front door was thrown open.
‘Chandler!’ yelled Alfred Martindale.
Others followed him in; the little red-haired girl flew across to the kitchen. ‘Hero!’ she screamed.
Derek Fishwick and Bert Ramsden stood one at each side of the rag-and-bone man. The word ‘hero’ seemed to echo around the walls, bouncing back to plague Richard Chandler’s senses. Yes, here came the hero, Victoria Cross and Bar.
Alf inhaled the fumes and placed his arms across his companions’ chests, urging them nearer to the door. ‘Stay where you are.’ These words were squeezed from a corner of tightened lips. He opened his mouth fully. ‘Strike that match, Chandler, and I shall make bloody sure you burn with the house. You will not get out alive.’
Richard laughed mirthlessly. ‘Neither will you. There’s no court martial here, Martindale. I’ll take you with me if it’s the last thing I do.’
Jeremy stepped in. ‘Take me, too,’ he said. Then he wandered casually across the hall and switched on the central chandelier. He folded his arms. ‘Get on with it, then – we have a party waiting for us. Standing where you are, you’ll be the first to catch fire. A fitting end for a man whose fortune came from naked flame, don’t you think?’
The man at the bottom of the stairs blinked. This was becoming complicated. Alf Martindale was a great one for complications.
Alf walked towards his enemy. He was truly terrified, but he knew what had to be done.
The match rasped against the box, but did not catch light. Alf took one massive swing and knocked Chandler to the floor. ‘If it hadn’t been for Fenner, you would have ruined me, you miserable, heartless bastard.’ He kicked away the match-box and Derek Fishwick retrieved it. ‘Go away,’ snapped Alf at Polly’s estrangedhusband. ‘This bugger ismine.’ The woodsman-turned-detective returned to his place by the open door.
Richard struggled to his feet and reached blindly for a weapon. His hands made contact with a vase on the ornate hall stand and he threw this item into Alf’s face. Strength returned to him – he was young again – proud again – and he launched himself at Alf.
Alf floored him once more. ‘I’m hard-faced, you see, Chandler. I’m not officer material, so your pretty vase just bounced off. There’s a lot to be said for time spent out in all weathers.’ He could taste blood in his mouth, but he would not let this fellow see the pain.
‘Leave them,’ urged Bert when Derek tried to step forward again. ‘This is personal. Let Alf get his tenpenn’orth out of him. He’s waited long enough for the chance.’
Alf, who was plainly getting the better of Chandler, stood back while the man ran upstairs. ‘Run, run,’ he yelled. ‘Go on, you lily-livered freak – go while you can.’ He turned to Jeremy. ‘Get the police – now. We’ve got him for attempted arson and possible insurance fraud, at least.’
Jeremy picked up the phone. Before dialling the number, he called to his father, ‘One last chance. Get out of
here now and we shall forget that this ever happened.’
Alf was ready to forget nothing. His anger burned bright as he launched himself up the stairs. ‘No more chances,’ he shouted. He wasn’t having his Leena hiding and spending all her time with other people just to be safe; he could not bear the thought of Jean Chandler and her family waiting for this man to come back. He had come back. He was here now and he had soaked the stairs in paraffin. ‘Get the fire brigade, too,’ he shouted to Jeremy. ‘This place will have to be made safe before you and your mother can come back.’
Jeremy dialled. He knew that Alf was right, that allowing Father to leave now would just postpone the inevitable. It had to be done, had to be finished here and now.
When the two men were struggling at the top of the stairs, the kitchen door opened and Hero dashed out, Aggie hot on his heels. ‘Stop him,’ she screamed. ‘I don’t want him hurt.’
But it was too late. One of Hero’s ancestors came to the fore and the mongrel was suddenly 100 per cent greyhound. In less than two seconds, he was at the top of the stairs. Alf took a swing at Chandler, missed, saved himself from falling down the stairs, and, in that split second, Hero leapt forward.
The rest happened in slow motion. As Richard moved a step to push Alf downstairs, the dog passed between the two opponents, his thin body making harsh contact with Richard Chandler’s legs. The man swayed and hovered for what seemed like minutes, his body apparently suspended over the drop. He lurched, turned and tumbled, his body bouncing all the way down to the bottom. Once there, his head made sharp contact with a solid knob on the huge Victorian hall stand, then he rolled, twitched, and foamed slightly at the mouth before becoming completely still.
Alf, suddenly breathless, sank onto the top step. He could hear Jeremy speaking to the operator, heard Bert’s voice saying, ‘Looks like yon man’s a goner.’
Once the call was completed, Jeremy slid down the wall and sat on the hall floor, his face devoid of all colour. Aggie ran to him, knelt beside him and drew him into her arms. She had never seen a dead body before, and she turned her back on the scene. Chandler’s eyes were wide open and bulging. The clock struck, but she could not count the time.
‘Is he really dead?’ Jeremy asked.
‘Yes, I think so, love.’
‘He banged his head on the knob of the hall stand.’ Jeremy closed his eyes. ‘Mother pretended that Nanny Foster had died in that way. Fate is strange.’ He swallowed a sob. It was hard to know how to feel. The dead man was his father; the dead man had been hated by all who knew him. Guilt and shock combined to make Jeremy too weak to stand.
Derek Fishwick bent over the body, felt for a pulse, proclaimed life extinct, then dragged the dog back into the kitchen.
‘It was my fault,’ Aggie said softly. ‘I opened the kitchen door and Hero just shot out like a bullet from a gun. I should have kept him in there. He thought they were play-fighting and he joined in – he does that with me and Jeremy.’
‘It was an accident,’ said Bert, ‘an accident that was waiting to happen.’ He gazed upstairs at his best pal. ‘Alf?’
‘What?’
‘Are you all right?’
‘No. No, I’m not. Just leave me where I am till they come.’ How often lately had he prayed for Chandler to be dead? And how many men had he, Alfred Martindale, killed in the course of a dozen battles? This was different, because this had been personal.
Police and firemen arrived. The latter party set about the business of distributing foam to make the carpets safe.
The group was split, each member taken away and questioned separately; a female constable went off with the sergeant to visit Jean at Claughton Cottage. It was midnight before the torture ended.
The body of Richard Chandler was removed from the grange to be taken for post-mortem. Police seemed satisfied with the explanations of witnesses. They retrieved from Richard’s pockets a large amount of jewellery, which they recorded, bagged and took to one of their cars.
The same cars carried Alf, Bert, Jeremy and Aggie back to the cottage, while Derek made his own way to the little house in the woods. He went inside, made a fire, drank a bottle of beer. It was over. The man who had destroyed so many lives no longer existed. And his Polly was all right.
It was almost the middle of January before the funeral could be arranged. Richard Chandler was laid to rest in the family vault, a chamber created beneath the church built by his ancestors. According to the post-mortem report, he had been dead seconds before reaching the hall stand, had suffered a coronary occlusion during his fall down the stairs. All the twitching and foaming had been produced by the relaxing muscles of a corpse.
A large party left the church after the service, each of its members there to support Jean and her children. Outside, in the rays of a weak sun, stood a little woman with dyed blond hair peeping out beneath the brim of a borrowed black hat. Jean went to her. ‘Did you look after my husband during his last few weeks?’
Freda Pilkington nodded. ‘He were good to me.’
‘I am pleased,’ answered Jean. ‘Take your flowers in – he is in the crypt below. Thank you for coming.’
Freda entered the church and descended to the underground chamber. The vicar was there, as were the undertakers. She placed her flowers with the rest and stood back, wondered how to pray. A lapsed Catholic, she muddled her way through a half-forgotten Hail Mary, then left Richard to his Maker. How long had she sat in that pink nylon nightie? ‘Stay as long as you like,’ he had said. And he had never come home.
This one true mourner left the churchyard and watched as his family and friends walked away. It had been in all the newspapers, including the nationals. Richard had gone on Christmas Day to burn down his own house, had stolen his estranged wife’s jewels, had fallen to his death down the stairs. With him had disappeared Freda’s chance of happiness and she missed him sorely. Whatever he had been to his family, he had treated her well.
Polly Fishwick clung to the arm of her newly discovered husband. He had never forgotten her, had never stopped loving her, had returned to try to win her all over again. They had buried the bent frying pan together; now, they had buried her former lover. Aware now of how fragile life was, Polly was determined to hang on to it and on to Derek for as long as she could.
Back at the grange over tea and sandwiches, the young ones sat together in a quiet group. It had been hard for all the Chandlers; Richard had been a bad man, but he had also been their father. Yet there was strength in the group. Colin had added his weight to the equation and these six had stuck together through every spare moment of every day during recent weeks.
Peter bit into a salmon and cucumber sandwich. ‘Hero was the hero,’ he remarked thoughtfully. ‘Father had only weeks to live. According to the coroner, he must have been in great discomfort. Hero probably put him out of his misery.’
Everyone made the right noises, each showing agreement with the speaker.
The dog in question arrived on cue, tail wagging hopefully when he saw the food. Peter stroked the bony head. ‘Remember Mr Baines?’
The dog whined.
‘He saved your life and I assisted,’ Peter informed the animal. He stood up. ‘I am going for a short walk,’ he told Marie. ‘I won’t be long.’
Outside, Peter Chandler wandered across the lawn, hands deep in pockets, mind deep in contemplation. Turning, he looked on the façade of a house that had remained standing in spite of his father’s plans. It was a thing of beauty, a testament to builders long dead, to craftsmen of many trades who had laboured hard in days long before the invention of cement mixers and electrically powered tools. ‘My home,’ he said aloud. ‘Our home.’
Soon, he would move to Bolton with Marie, would start his journey towards a new life and a career as a vet. But Chandlers Grange would remain his and Jeremy’s and Meredith’s. It was the very core of a family that would rise again phoenix-like from ashes that had remained metaphorical – no thanks to Father.
A
ll three young Chandlers were struggling with the ambivalence of thought and feeling. Guilty, they remembered wishing their father dead; angry, they recalled how he had treated their poor mother. Achieving some sort of equilibrium was going to take time and affection and loyalty. Jean, bruised and battered, would be comforted by her friends, people who had replaced Sally, that dear companion whose life had been terminated by Richard. Jeremy had Aggie, Meredith leaned on Colin, Peter depended on his Marie.
In the end, it all came down to love and to chance, because the former arrived by means of the latter, a meeting in an hotel room, an idea spawned by Meredith, chance, love and faith. And the cement was Anna, the one whose tenacity had encouraged the family to go forward into New Chandlers.
Peter sat on a stone seat, his eyes widening to take in the landscape that was his own. They would survive, all of them, because they had to.
A scuttering of feet on gravel announced the approach of Hero. Peter turned to greet the animal who had adopted Aggie, who had captured the heart of Don Baines and his make-shift assistant weeks ago. This was the dog whose actions had terminated the life of Richard Chandler.
In his mind’s eye, Peter saw the vet’s kindly face, heard his voice as he spoke about the innate intelligence of dogs. They owned an extra sense, or so it seemed; they knew when to persevere and when to give up. Hero had persevered, had lived, had acted in accordance with his own wisdom.
Peter stood up and turned to walk back to the house, Hero at his heels. As he climbed the steps, he heard Don Baines speaking after the operation was over, listened all over again to the words of his mentor. And in that moment, he accepted his father’s fate.
Richard Chandler had been killed by an act of dog. And that fact was strangely easy to accept.
About the Author
Ruth Hamilton is the bestselling author of A Whisper to the Living, With Love From Ma Maguire, Nest of Sorrows, Billy London’s Girls, Spinning Jenny, The September Starlings, A Crooked Mile, Paradise Lane, The Bells of Scotland Road, The Dream Sellers, The Corner House, Miss Honoria West, Mulligan’s Yard, Saturday’s Child, Matthew and Son and Chandlers Green. She has become one of the north-west of England’s most popular writers. Ruth Hamilton was born in Bolton, which is the setting for many of her novels, and has spent most of her life in Lancashire. She now lives in Liverpool.
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