‘I thought you were suggesting that she ate it.’
‘She wouldn’t have eaten the bones and the pelt, or the contents of the paunch. Would the police tell you what was in her dustbin?’
‘As a matter of fact, yes. I asked the question as a matter of routine and was surprised to get an answer. The bins had been emptied on the Thursday and her bin was still empty on the Saturday except for a newspaper, eggshells, one vodka bottle and some cabbage leaves. The refuse bag under her sink held only an empty cat food tin and some potato peelings. A very frugal lady, my late client.’
‘Then, assuming that the vicious deed wasn’t completed prior to the Thursday, whatever remains of Horace is probably buried in the garden. She wouldn’t want to leave it in her dustbin for several days while she could expect the Pelmanns to go on the warpath on behalf of the absent McIntoshes. She may have courted unpopularity, even suspicion, but not universal condemnation, which is what she would have undergone if there had been proof of her eating Katie McIntosh’s ewe lamb.’
‘You have a point,’ Bruce said. ‘Let’s go and take a look. If it happened that way, I only hope that last night’s storm didn’t obliterate the last traces.’
‘That’s what this chap’s along for,’ I said, indicating Jason. He caught the movement and thumped his tail.
Chapter Four
Bruce looked from me to the elderly Labrador and then shrugged. ‘I suppose we have to accept what help we can get. Give me a minute to tidy up what I’ve done so far and I’ll be with you. Meanwhile –’ he looked at me guilelessly, as lawyers do when they’re pulling a fast one ‘– you could make a start on the inventory.’
‘Not now,’ I said. ‘Some other year.’
I was becoming mildly curious about the late Mrs Horner and decided to take a look around. The rooms were smaller than I had expected. The furniture was mostly antique but only just qualified for that description and, to my inexpert eye, probably genuine but not of a good period. The pictures were Victorian, oils heavily varnished and darkened with age, sentimental subjects predominating, in gilt frames. In the dining room a pair of glass cupboards displayed some china, not quite down to the category of A Present From Clacton but nothing that struck me as being valuable or even desirable. The carpets and curtains had been good but were now badly worn. Mrs Horner’s catering must indeed have been superb if her guests kept returning to the gloomy surroundings.
I heard footsteps outside on the gravel but nobody came to the door. I could see Bruce at a shoddy, folding desk in the sitting room, clipping bundles of paper together. He had the conviction, common in doctors and lawyers, that other people’s time came free. I decided to go out and investigate.
There was no one outside at the front of the house but when I walked round through the gate I saw the heavy figure of Sergeant Morrison. He was standing near the greenhouse and looking around him. Beyond the gravel drive, a neatly mown grass path led between strips of delphiniums edging tidy vegetable beds. Mrs Horner had had green fingers and a capacity for hard work in the garden had substituted for expenditure on the house. Her cabbages and lettuces were large and perfectly formed, her onions stood to attention in ranks like soldiers. To judge from the feathered greenery, her carrots would have been perfection. Obviously, no caterpillar or carrot-fly had dared to invade the jealously defended garden.
Keeping Jason strictly to heel I joined the Sergeant on a square of turf under the big pear tree and greeted him by name. ‘Are you looking for something in particular?’ I asked him.
He shook his head as though scaring away a persistent fly. ‘What might you be doing here, Captain Cunningham?’ he asked.
‘Mister Cunningham, if you don’t mind. I came to see Mr Hastie,’ I said. In point of fact, it was none of his business what I was doing there now that the police had vacated the place, unless he suspected that I was planning to steal Mrs Horner’s tawdry possessions, but my mind had, for once, slipped into gear. ‘Tell me, isn’t it rather unusual for the local Bobby to be dogsbodying for the officer in charge of a case?’
The Sergeant looked at me in mild surprise but decided to return a civil answer. Bearing in mind the possibility of other ears behind the garden walls I had lowered my voice and he replied in kind. ‘Mr Blosson had a CID sergeant with him. It’s just he finds he gets more done if he can send his own sergeant out making enquiries and taking statements while he makes use of the local man as a witness and a note taker. That’s what he said.’
‘And, now that it’s a murder case, is Detective Inspector Blosson still in charge of it?’
Sergeant Morrison hesitated. ‘Well, now. It only became a case of murder when Mr Blosson arrested Mr Branch. Until then, it was only a suspicious death, possibly an accident. Detective Superintendent Fraser is in overall charge. But an arrest’s been made now, so he’s leaving Mr Blosson to tie up the evidence.’
‘And is that why you’re here?’
‘More or less,’ he said. The vagueness of the answer was itself very informative.
‘You’re not quite happy with it,’ I suggested.
He drew in his breath sharply, looked around to be sure that DI Blosson was not eavesdropping from behind the cypress tree and lowered his voice further. ‘Between ourselves, in confidence?’
‘Definitely.’
‘If you quote me, I’ll deny it.’
‘I understand.’
He hesitated again and then it came with a rush. ‘No. I’m far frae happy,’ he said. ‘I ken Mr Branch fine and I canna see him being violent to a woman. My good lady fell and broke her wrist and Mr Branch put her into his car and took her to the hospital, as gently as if she’d been one of his own family. But for some daft reason, Mr Blosson seems to have his knife into him. The evidence against him might convince a jury but it doesna convince me.’
‘And having made the arrest and covered himself with glory, Detective Inspector Blosson will not look favourably on any contrary evidence,’ I suggested.
‘I would not say that at all.’ I had gone too far. The Sergeant was constrained by loyalty and I respected him for it. All the same, he was not going to get away with it too easily.
‘Has he ever met Mr Branch before now?’ I asked.
The Sergeant twitched. ‘How would I be knowing a thing like that, now?’
The army had taught me to recognize when a man is being evasive. Pressure now would only push him into a more entrenched position. I filed that subject away for later. ‘This Detective Superintendent Fraser,’ I said. ‘Is he a stocky man, an inch or two shorter than I am? Ginger hair and freckles?’
‘Aye. That’s the man.’
‘I met him when he was a chief inspector. A sound man.’
‘He is that.’
My mind was still rushing ahead but, before I could cast out any more lures, Bruce came out of the back door of the house. ‘I was just about to tell the Sergeant,’ I explained to Bruce, ‘that we’re going to look for more evidence. I think that he should be with us. An unbiased and official witness to whatever we can find might make the difference between acceptance and the suggestion that we fabricated it. And we can trust him to be honest. We needn’t tell him what we’re looking for unless we find it.’
Bruce looked searchingly from one to the other of us, but in the end he only said, ‘Very well.’
‘Let me take this in my own sequence,’ I said. ‘Come with me. I’ll explain later when my mind clears.’
First, I looked at the water butt and the spreading tree – now laden with unripe pears, some of which had fallen in the storm. I checked Jason, who has a habit of eating unripe fruit and then worrying Beth by suffering major stomach upsets. The tree must have been a magnificent sight, I thought, at blossom time but there was little else to be learned. The ground had been trodden over too often, the grass scarred by too many feet, and the water butt had been emptied. I led them instead to the gate in the back wall beside the greenhouse and examined the bolt.
‘
Did the police open this gate?’ I asked the Sergeant.
‘Not to my knowledge, and I was here most of the time. Why would we? We were more concerned with keeping Nosey Parkers out. Nobody could have let himself in from outside with the gate bolted as it is.’
‘Mr Branch said that he’d never seen it open but it’s been opened recently.’ I showed them a thin line of bright metal where the rust of ages had been scraped away. My miniature camera could focus down to a very close-up shot and I recorded the signs as best I could. The subject might be too small to register well without a special lens but at least there were witnesses. Unless some policeman owned up to having opened the gate, somebody had gone out that way and, presumably, returned.
‘You could have pulled that bolt,’ the Sergeant remarked. It was not an accusation but a simple statement of fact. A competent defence counsel would no doubt make the same point in court and I should be warned.
‘I could,’ I said. ‘But I didn’t.’
The gate had dropped slightly over the years and to draw the bolt back was a wrestling match. The gate opened with a loud squeak from dry hinges. I caught Bruce’s eye. Somebody would have to ask another question of the Pelmanns.
When we emerged into the back lane, the remainder of the layout was immediately clear. There was no fence, the lane being part of the field. A thin strip of grass and clover, with a single surprised-looking holly tree almost opposite the gate, separated the lane from the dark green crop of oilseed rape. The rape had suffered in the storm and already wood pigeon were flighting into the laid patches. To our right, we were looking at the back walls of Roland Bovis’s house and garden. The lane continued to the village street through a gate between Roland Bovis’s high garden wall and the fence and hedge of the neighbouring cottage. To our left, the lane curved right-handed past the back gardens until it made a sudden turn around the end of the last house and emerged into Old Ford Road. The houses and their gardens were partially screened by the ever-present trees.
I took a careful look at the rough strip between the lane and the field, confining my search to an area corresponding to Mrs Horner’s garden. If somebody had come out of the gate to lift a cigar butt and a dog-turd, they would have tried to avoid going far enough along the lane to be seen and remembered. But if there had ever been any signs left, time and the storm had obliterated them, or else I was too incompetent to find them. Jason joined me by sniffing along the rough fringe, investigating the visits of other dogs, but I could see from his body language that there was no trace of rabbit or game. There were one or two old dog droppings in the grass but that was to be expected. Nobody picks up faeces on farmland. I took a few photographs to illustrate the layout and left it at that.
We returned to the garden and I bolted the gate behind us. My mind had gone into overdrive. ‘Could you get us a sample of the famous dog-plonk?’ I asked the Sergeant.
‘I doubt that,’ he said. ‘It’ll be stored at the police lab.’
‘How about a close-up photograph of it?’
He nodded. ‘I could maybe manage that. Mr Blosson had extra copies made.’ The Sergeant did not ask why I wanted them. Either he was singularly incurious or he was thinking along much the same lines as I was. I thought it better not to probe.
‘Was any search made in the garden for disturbed ground?’ I asked.
‘The lady had been gardening,’ the Sergeant replied.
‘In fancy earrings?’ Bruce said doubtfully.
Sergeant Morrison shrugged. ‘There was only the hoe taken out and a watering can. She was wearing heavy shoes, only fit for the garden. My guess is that she’d changed her shoes and that was all she needed to change. She likely planned to do a few minutes of light gardening, just tidying up and watering the greenhouse plants, before she put on fancier shoes and went out to the shops or suchlike.’
If Mrs Horner had been using a hoe, it was unlikely that any signs remained of a burial several days earlier. I let Jason try his nose. His walk changed and he made small noises in his throat. I knew his language well. It was evident that there had been at least one rabbit in the garden. He followed a scent-trail which zigzagged into the corner between the greenhouse and the garden wall, then turned and retraced his steps. He was hesitant and not showing his usual interest and I could tell that the trail was an old one.
I cast him out again but it was evident that the rain had washed any scent away except where the ground was sheltered by the pear tree. Nevertheless, I kept him working and, obliging as ever, he quartered the ground, taking his own time.
Jason began to show interest again in the middle of the row of delphiniums that had been planted to make a partial screen to the larger vegetable patch. One clump, still showing flowers of that remarkable blue, seemed to be wilting despite the night’s rain. When Jason came to that place he slowed, pointed and then began to scratch around the plant.
I called him away and photographed the place. ‘Is there a spade?’ I asked.
‘You think there’s something buried there?’ the Sergeant asked.
‘The dog certainly does,’ I said. ‘And he’s not often wrong.’
‘Her spade’s in the greenhouse, but you’d best not touch it. There’s a wee shovel in the coalhouse. Bide a moment while I fetch it.’
He was back with the small shovel in seconds. We examined it together but there was no sign that it had been used for anything but coal. It was not an ideal tool but it would serve. It seemed to be agreed that the Sergeant should do any digging. I photographed him at work.
The clump of delphiniums came up easily. It had recently been lifted and replanted. A few inches deeper, the shovel hit something soft. After a few moments of trial and error the Sergeant uncovered and lifted out onto the grass path a skin covered in muddy black fur, an assortment of rabbit bones and a set of guts.
I called away Jason, who was becoming very interested in the bones and guts. ‘One more moment before we explain,’ I said. I led them, firmly including Jason, back to the corner by the greenhouse. A short rake was standing in the corner between the door and the wall. Its wooden handle was too rough to take fingerprints but I used my clean handkerchief to lift it carefully. Several fine black hairs still clung to the metal tines and there was a trace of blood.
Poor Horace. Poor Katie.
‘Mr and Mrs Pelmann can give you the details,’ I said, ‘but here’s an outline.’ I explained to the Sergeant about Mrs Horner’s earlier threat to kill and eat Horace if he invaded her garden again. ‘You can see clearly what happened,’ I said. ‘Horace did come under the wall again, attracted by all these vegetables. Mrs Horner will have filled the hole in later. She chased him around the garden and cornered him beside the greenhouse. It wouldn’t be much of a chase – I’m told that he was a very friendly and trusting rabbit. She used the rake to kill him. And then she ate him.’
‘A little girl’s rabbit?’ We had lowered our voices further so that the Sergeant spoke barely above a whisper but his professional impassivity had gone and I could hear and understand the revulsion in his voice. A child’s pet and the eating of meat were too far apart to be thought of together.
‘A little girl’s rabbit. Mrs Horner was just that sort of person, cruel and sly. She buried the remainder rather than leave it in her bin, in case anyone insisted on looking in it.’
The Sergeant had produced his pocketbook and was writing busily. ‘I’d met the woman, of course,’ he said. ‘She was aye one to complain and she’d no hesitation about having a neighbour –’
He broke off.
‘Prosecuted?’
‘Maybe.’
‘Who?’ I asked.
‘I can’t tell you that.’ Clearly he was under direct orders.
‘Let it go,’ Bruce said. ‘I may be able to find out through the fiscal’s office.’
The Sergeant took refuge in his notes. ‘Just so’s I understand, the rabbit belonged to the McIntosh lassie next door, but they’re abroad just now and the rabbit wa
s being looked after by Mrs Pelmann. Is that the way of it?’
‘So we believe,’ Bruce said. ‘Can you think of anything more certain to generate friction?’
‘Yes,’ the Sergeant and I said in unison. His face shifted for an instant towards the other houses strung out along Old Ford Road. I believe that we were both thinking of a death threat, via a prosecution in court, against a beloved dog.
‘The more important question,’ said Bruce, ‘is where do we go from here? You’re a witness to what we’ve found?’
‘That I am,’ the Sergeant said stoutly. ‘There can be no denying it.’
‘But would you like to go further and take the credit for these discoveries?’
The Sergeant reared back like a startled horse. ‘Here! There’s no way I’m making out that I went investigating behind the back of a superior officer, contradicting his findings. I’d be way out of line.’
‘Properly speaking,’ said Bruce to me, ‘we should let the Sergeant make whatever report he thinks fit. Nearer the time for the trial, we would produce our evidence and, if we’re quite sure who the other culprit would be, make our plea of impeachment. The trouble with that is that Mr Branch would have to spend months on remand and in custody. And he’s not a young man any more. The days and weeks and months will be precious to him.’
‘That’s not the only disadvantage,’ I said. ‘It would mean that the police spend the intervening period bolstering the case against Alistair and picking holes in this alternative or at the very least investigating it with lukewarm enthusiasm. Tell me, is DI Blosson the golden boy as far as Detective Superintendent Fraser’s concerned?’
During the slur which I had cast on police impartiality, the Sergeant had made a show of his mind being elsewhere. He returned his overt attention to me. ‘I wouldn’t say quite that.’ His voice became almost inaudible. Divided loyalties were pulling him apart. ‘Mr Fraser has been heard to say that the DI’s getting too big for his boots, so I’ve been told.’
Dead Weight (Three Oaks Book 11) Page 9