by Kris Pearson
“Stop that, Greedy-guts,” I said, bending to retrieve the utensils. I put them in the sink, careful to do it quietly. Then I chose clean ones from the drawer, placing them on the table beside Paul so he could continue eating if he regained his appetite. I went to wipe up the mess on the floor and found a small pink tongue had already done the job for me.
Paul took his time to sit up straight. He took a lot longer to look me in the eye. “So now you know why I’m in the ‘peaceful’ colonies,” he finally said, bitterness twisting his lips.
“PTSD,” I said – a statement rather than a question.
He nodded. “The Church found me a quiet location where I’m supposed to be recovering from the nightmares and flashbacks and general anxiety the war trauma caused.”
“There’ll be more thunder yet,” I warned. “But at least you’ll know it’ll be thunder next time.” Right on cue there was another huge boom, and although he flinched it was a less extreme reaction.
“Yes, it helps to know,” he agreed, flexing his hands into fists and relaxing them again several times in a row as though it was something he did to calm himself.
“So it would have been terrible for you, finding Isobel like that.”
State the obvious – why don’t you, Merry.
He blew out a big gusty breath. “Especially in my church, which is my sanctuary. My place of peace.” He swallowed a couple of times, his throat working visibly. “The hell of it was,” he added quietly, “I was supposed to be there to give comfort to the troops. To those who were hurt and anxious themselves. I saw too many of them badly wounded, close to death, dying in front of my eyes…”
I lowered myself onto the chair opposite him again. “It would take a very strong person to cope with that,” I confirmed. Another flash of lightning brightened the room for an instant. We both waited, still and tense, for the accompanying boom of thunder, and I quietly counted out loud. It took five seconds to start. The storm was moving away. “It’s going,” I said. “Come into the sitting room for a few minutes. I’ll draw all the curtains in there and put some music on. Hide the weather, and drown it out with something soothing.” I reached for his hand.
He was slow to rise from the chair but allowed me to guide him through to the other room. I pulled the old linen curtains across the two windows to block out the possibility of seeing any more, and switched on the ancient radiogram. The Concert program sprang to life – as good as anything else I was likely to find. It sounded like one of Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos, although I couldn’t tell you which one. I lowered the volume and coaxed Paul to sit on the sofa. He rested his elbows on his knees and buried his forehead in his hands. I sat beside him and began to rub slow, soothing circles on his back, although it was hard not to speed up with that lively music. “There’s sweet sherry if that would help relax you?” I suggested.
He pressed his lips together, plainly amused at such a useless suggestion. “Sweet sherry isn’t the answer to the problem, Merry,” he muttered. “Or to many problems at all. Alcohol of any kind is a bad idea for this.”
“If we go forward in a logical manner, it might help?” I hazarded, still circling my palm on his back. “Not that I know much about it. Just being sensible. Can you eat any more? If you finish the rest of your omelet there’s ice-cream.”
He looked sideways at me as though I was treating him like a small boy. Perhaps I was. I’d never been in a situation like this. Never seen anyone so devastated.
“Rather lost my appetite for now – sorry. Just give me a few minutes, eh?”
We sat together without speaking further. The concerto’s last notes ebbed away and the announcer said, “That was The New Zealand Chamber Orchestra.” Another flash of lightning through the fawn linen curtains. Another roll of thunder. We both listened but even though it still sounded like booming gunfire, Paul had himself under iron control again.
He heaved a deep sigh, then straightened and glanced across at me. Pale. Embarrassed. But looking more together now. “That was an excellent omelet, Merry, but I think I’m done. See if the dogs want the last of it. There won’t be much left.”
I rose and walked quietly to the kitchen as something new started up on the old radio. Yes, we’d both almost finished but there was enough to give Itsy and Fluffy a morsel each. The moment I touched their bowls they scampered out from the dog bed again, encouraging me with grunts and wags before they fell to eating what I scraped off our plates.
Paul seemed to be recovering okay in the sitting room so I rejoined him. Rubbing his back any more felt out of the question so we listened to the music, and sometimes the receding thunder, until it had rolled right away.
“Ice-cream time,” I said, rising from the sofa and indicating he should come back to the table. I’d seen a tub in the freezer. It may have been in there a little too long, but I peeled and chopped up a banana and a couple of fuzzy green kiwis from the fruit bowl to go with it and it was fine. No one was going to die from it anyway.
Something was bugging me though. I set the plates on the table and sat down opposite him again. “Paul, tell me to shut up if I’m crossing lines here. You have three churches to hold services in but they’re not busy ones. Maybe you’re getting too much time to think and worry?”
He picked up his fork and stabbed a piece of banana “Which is why I paint the fences and keep the gardens up to scratch. You New Zealanders are very self-sufficient. I’m not… needed… as much as I hoped to be.”
I had a sudden memory of him tweaking a weed or two from one of the pots at the church as he walked out with PC Moody. “You’re the gardener, too? The primulas and calendulas at St Agatha’s are amazing this year. I thought as we were standing outside that it looked like flames and smoke.” I decided to keep my ‘rocket blasting off to heaven’ description to myself. “You’re not feeling useful enough, are you? That’s no good for your spirits. Who do you think killed Isobel? Come on – good mental distraction,” I added when he looked astounded.
“I’m not exactly DS Weasel.”
I grinned at the name. “But you know people. You have different connections from mine. John at the Burkeville Bar?”
He shook his head. “I’ve no connection with him at all, apart from an occasional meal there. He’d have no reason to kill Isobel.”
“And yet?” I said as suggestively as I could, “He wanted to buy her house out from under her.”
Paul shook his head more firmly and then stopped. “Really?”
“He told me so himself, and said she wasn’t willing to sell. He seemed annoyed.”
“Not annoyed enough to kill her, surely?”
“No, I shouldn’t think so,” I conceded. “Do you know if Isobel owned the house outright? Might her parents have left it to both daughters, with a life interest for as long as Isobel needed to live there?”
“They might have. I don’t know.”
He scooped up some ice-cream and kiwi fruit, looking thoughtful, so I let him keep thinking.
“Given how much Margaret appeared to own compared to Isobel, that hardly seems fair though,” he eventually said.
I grimaced. “Life’s not always fair, but these things happen in families. You said the parents were almost ninety. People of that age don’t think about changing their wills – if they even have one in the first place. Ask my brother… Margaret could have killed Isobel to hurry the process along.”
His eyes really bugged out at that. “No Merry, I’m sure she didn’t!” He shoveled some more ice-cream in as though he was using it as an excuse not to talk about something so distasteful.
“She wasn’t far away from the church when it happened,” I murmured. “Somewhere around the shops.”
He began to cough, and I waited until he’d safely swallowed.
“Graham might know?” I suggested chasing a slice of banana around my plate to give him time to consider. “I’ll ask him anyway. No harm done if he doesn’t know.”
“Or won’t tell you.”
A hint of a grin followed that.
I relaxed a little more. This was going better between us now. “The rain’s easing. I hope this old roof doesn’t leak.”
He cocked his head. “I don’t hear anything overflowing. I’ll check the gutters and downpipes for you before I go.”
I nodded my thanks. “And then,” I said, “We need to consider Margaret’s husband. I gather he wasn’t the most scrupulous businessman.”
“Tom Alsop?” Paul’s eyebrows lifted. “What do you mean?”
“I’ve heard he’s a very slow payer, among other things. Maybe because he needs money? Could he have bumped poor Isobel off? With a car jack, maybe? Something lethal and heavy like that from one of his car yards?”
Paul shook his head, as though indulging a child. “Have you ever touched a car jack, Merry?”
“No,” I admitted. “Graham does all the car stuff. Or he gets Ten Ton Smedley to. There has to be some benefit in having a brother on hand.”
Another faint grin. “I can think of much more suitable weapons. In fact a car yard would be full of better alternatives. So would the average garden shed. Anyway, following her into church where anyone else could turn up seems a very odd choice.” He pointed at me across the table. “Why wouldn’t he just come out here where it’s isolated? Get her alone? Hit her with a big stone and leave her on the beach? Make it look as though she’d tripped over?”
“You’re a bit too good at this,” I said, and we returned to eating our dessert.
I held up a finger after a couple of minutes. “Okay, there’s John’s mate, Erik. We didn’t consider him. He might have done something so John could get the house he wanted?”
“You’re kidding me,” Paul said, shaking his head. “I think John’s plenty capable of doing his own dirty work.”
“Why?”
“He was a navy SEAL, or something along those lines.”
Huh! The body and the surf fell neatly into place.
“Erik’s got an awful lot of teeth,” I mused.
“Isobel wasn’t gnawed to death…”
“No, but he’s very smiley. As though he’s hiding something.”
Paul finished his last mouthful and set his spoon and fork down neatly in the center of his plate. “Give it a rest, Merry. Leave it to DS Weasel. Thank you for dinner – it was great.”
“Or there’s Lord Drizzle,” I tried. “Wanting this piece of land back to add to his farm.”
“So he can mine the uranium under it,” Paul suggested with a totally straight face. After a few seconds he cracked up and slapped a hand on the table top.
I must have been looking so foolish – mouth gaping, eyes wide, actually believing…
“Anyway, I have someone for you,” I said once I’d recovered from his uranium joke. “Rona Jarvis – old lady who could do with a few visits, and maybe some help. Lurline from the animal shelter rescued her cat and says she’s arranged Meals on Wheels – for Rona, not the cat.”
“Rona Jarvis… ” Paul murmured. “Doesn’t ring any bells.”
“Could be before your time here. She might have been virtually house-bound for ages. A real recluse and invisible to the rest of the village.” I stacked the empty dessert plates together. “What you don’t see, you forget about easily enough. Check with Lurline.”
Paul nodded, looking surprisingly keen to track Rona down. “Loneliness is very hard on some of the senior citizens. Sometimes just a friendly face and a few minutes of chat work wonders.”
“Or a pretty cupcake from The Café,” I agreed. “I could drop in with the odd goodie when I’m out for a walk.”
“You could drop the odd goodie in to me, too,” Paul surprised me by saying.
“Buy your own!”
He rolled his eyes. “That’s the trouble – Iona won’t let me pay. She seems to think I lead an impoverished life as a minister and can’t afford treats.”
“Do you need more treats, Paul?” I couldn’t help asking.
I swear he blushed. He certainly couldn’t look me in the eye any longer.
Chapter 6 – Spying in the garage
I made Paul a cup of hot sweet tea before we went outside again. They give that to people who donate blood, don’t they? I was working on the theory that it might make him feel better.
He took his leave soon afterward, insisting on walking around the cottage first to make sure the guttering wasn’t clogged up and water wasn’t spilling over anywhere.
There were plenty of low bushes around but I guess the salty wind was enough to discourage many taller trees so there was no leaf build-up to worry about.
“How do you reckon she keeps all this so tidy?” I asked. “I mean it’s not exactly house-and-garden, but it’s a lot for one person. She has to have help of some kind, surely? With the lawns at least? I wonder who.”
“Hardly lawns,” Paul said, surveying the expanse of rather lumpy rough grass. He was probably picturing English parks and cricket pitches. “But yes, it’s been cut in the last couple of weeks or so. Be a devil of a job though.”
I kicked at a hopeful dandelion flower which had shot up since the last mowing. “I could ask the man with the lawn service who does ours if he does these too.”
Paul moved closer to the plot where he’d cut the lettuce. “She probably copes with the flowers and vegetables on her own. The over-all effect is good but it’s weedy if you look closely.”
“Needs your tender touch,” I joked.
He bent to pat the teddies who were gamboling around with us, no doubt getting wet and muddy from the grass. I wondered whether I’d need to bath them, or at least give them a good brushing.
“Ironic, isn’t it,” he said as he straightened. “The first meal out I have in ages is on the same night I have an appointment with the school principal in Burkeville.”
Lucy Stephenson. Heading for retirement, and so thin her wrinkles have wrinkles. Not competition.
I gave the dandelion another kick. “I’ve heard she’s very well thought of. What are you planning?”
Paul took a deep breath of the salty air. It smelled different now, as though the lightning had changed it. “Activities for the older boys who don’t have enough to do.”
I privately hoped he didn’t have Religious Studies in mind. “Such as?” I crossed my fingers behind my back.
“Basketball. Steven Adams has made it popular here, playing in Oklahoma so successfully, and some of those kids are already six-footers. I played at the base. It was a good way to get rid of… aggression.”
I looked at him with real surprise. My mental picture of him bowing his head over a bible switched to a big hot man charging around as part of a team, hurling himself sideways to bump others out of the way. Dust and sweat and army sports gear. Grunts and curses and yells of triumph. No problem to imagine at all.
“So you’re going to coach them?” I asked, trying to banish that image and confine him to a cassock and dog-collar again.
“Once the school has the hoops and backboards set up. Which will cost a bit, of course, but they have a fundraiser under way.”
“Good for them,” I said. “And good for you. I hope it goes well.”
He glanced at his watch. “And keeps the kids off the streets. Speaking of going, I do need to be off. Lock the place up properly and… thanks for getting me through that.”
“You got yourself through it, Paul,” I said, attempting a smile. “I didn’t have a clue what to do.”
“You were there. It helped,” he said, touching me on the arm before heading to the gate. “Sorry I’ve left you with the dishes.”
“Pffft! Four plates, one salad bowl. I’m glad you were here. The dogs and I wouldn’t have enjoyed the thunder much on our own.”
And wasn’t that the truth. I’d have been gibbering on the floor if I’d been here alone when that first clap of thunder hit.
It took only five minutes to clean up. As I swished the dishes around in the sink I remembered what I’d been doin
g when Paul had unexpectedly arrived.
Snooping, basically.
It was still semi-light now the clouds had scudded away so I decided the garage was worth a quick check.
PC Henderson from Yorkshire said they’d found nothing amiss when the house was visited, but I presumed they’d been searching for blood and forced entry, not anything more personal yet. I’d hung the car keys and the garage door fob on a curly brass hook beside the fridge so I grabbed them, gave them a little toss from hand to hand, and muttered ‘last chance’ as I walked across the cracked and glistening wet concrete.
I was surprised there was something as modern as an electric garage door, but maybe the original timber one had rotted? Perhaps it would have cost more to replace it with a proper carpentry job than this ribbed metal? Or perhaps it was the original door after all because the garage was nowhere near as old as the house. I pressed the button, and the light flickered on as the door rolled up.
The little Mini crouched inside and there were full-height shelves against the wall at the far end. That was all. Shaking my head, I checked them out. Some old cans of paint, a packet of new windshield washer blades, a plastic container of engine oil with dribbles down it, short pieces of timber, dusty boxes. Just assorted rubbishy stuff any garage might have. The side window was draped with cobwebs. Defeated, I leaned on the nearest shelf and just about fell over.
It turned, smooth as silk, on some sort of mechanism. Behind the shelving was a small separate room. Lit by an overhead skylight. With a desk, a filing cabinet, and an iMac.
Bingo.
I held my breath. This was better than the exercise book of old household accounts! I’d bet a million bucks (if I had it) that the Police hadn’t found it. It was invisible from the outside, with only the skylight in the flattish roof. It was invisible from the inside because the Mini looked as though it took up all the available space. Why would anyone presume otherwise? Who’d give more than a cursory glance?