From Devon With Death

by Stephanie Austin

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  I dared not switch on the torch until I had turned the corner of the barn and was out of sight of the farmhouse windows. I fumbled in the dark and rain, feeling my way, inching my way forward, desperate not to slip in mud or trip over stones, keeping one hand on the rough wall of the barn until I came to the corner and changed direction. Then I felt I could flip the torch on without being seen, although I kept it in my left hand, between me and the wall, pointing directly at the ground, lighting the scattered stones and puddles in my path.

  I eased around the back of the barn and got some respite from the wind. I could see dear old White Van waiting where I had parked it. As I drew out my keys and pressed unlock it gave a little chirrup of welcome, a sound I sincerely hoped wouldn’t carry through the storm to the occupant of the farmhouse.

  I slid inside, locking the doors after me, thankful at last to be out of the storm. I was breathing heavily. I wiped away the rain that ran down into my eyes. There was no time to brood about what I’d just discovered. I mustn’t think about anything except getting away. But I couldn’t drive like this. My boots were caked, the soles slippery, thick with mud. I eased them off into the footwell of the passenger seat and slipped into my shoes. My jeans were sodden with the run-off from my waterproof jacket and my hair was dripping. All that would have to wait. I had a terror that Daniel Thorncroft would suddenly appear, banging on the windscreen, rattling the doors, trying to get at me. I turned the ignition, praying the van would start, put it in reverse, let off the handbrake and began to back, very slowly over the bumpy turf. I didn’t put my lights on. I could see almost nothing as I turned to look out of the rear windscreen except for a narrow strip of pale sky on the distant horizon where the storm was clearing. I was relying on the fact I’d parked straight, and going back for a hundred yards should bring me safely onto the road. I felt my wheels crunch on gravel as it crossed the verge and then the smoothness of tarmac. I hit the lights, slammed into first gear and turned onto the road, just as the farmhouse door opened and I saw the tall figure of Daniel Thorncroft, a dark silhouette against the light behind him, standing in the doorway and watching as the van sped away.

  To this day I don’t know why I didn’t drive straight to the police station or ring Dean Collins and tell him what I’d found. Sometimes instinct holds us back and we never know why. The message from Jessie and the sledge were evidence enough to bring Daniel Thorncroft in for questioning, maybe to arrest him, to get a warrant to search his house and barn. But I didn’t. I felt as if I was clutching the handbrake of a juggernaut, and once I released it, sent it rolling down the hill, it would crush someone, just as it had crushed Luke. I had to be sure it wasn’t the wrong someone. And despite what I had found in the barn there was still a tiny voice inside me crying that Daniel Thorncroft couldn’t be a murderer. Perhaps, I realised, acknowledging the ache I felt inside, I just didn’t want him to be. In spite of myself I couldn’t help liking him. But Dean had said it: I had liked murderers before.

  I brooded on this as I soaked in a hot bath, my sodden clothing stripped off in a heap on the bathroom floor. Daniel Thorncroft must have known that the note accusing him of murdering his wife came from Jessie. Had she taunted him about it? He told me Jessie used to work for his aunt, Selena Harrington. Jessie must have found out about Claire’s death from her. And perhaps from his aunt, Daniel had learnt of Jessie’s history of writing poison-pen letters. Grief or guilt might have tipped him over the edge, rage at her terrible accusation. Verbena had found out somehow, and was that why he’d murdered her too? Then there was Meredith, who swam every day in the river, alone, vulnerable. I must talk to her. If Daniel suspected she knew anything she could be his next intended victim. I must warn her to be careful.

  I hauled myself out of the bath, wrapped my towelling robe around me and headed into the living room to grab the phone. I tried Meredith’s number, letting it ring for a long time, whispering repeatedly for her to pick up. Eventually, an answering machine kicked in; Meredith’s voice, low and charming, invited me to leave a message. ‘Meredith, it’s Juno. If you’re there, pick up, it’s really important …’ I waited, just in case, but there was no response. I hesitated, wondered if I should say more. What if she was listening to the message and she wasn’t alone? What if Daniel Thorncroft had left the farmhouse and was with her in the flat now, listening too? If I said too much, revealed that I knew who’d killed Verbena I could be putting her in more danger. ‘Just ring me, please, as soon as you can,’ I said and put the receiver down.

  It was only then that I saw the red light flashing on my own answering machine. I pressed play and heard Digby’s voice, jovially enquiring if I had forgotten our date for that evening. I was supposed to have gone around with Chloe’s tablet so that he and Amanda could hunt for their photograph. It could wait for another occasion, he went on politely. They just hoped I was all right.

  I must be thick, I suppose. It was only then that I put it together. Someone had tried to kill Amanda, someone who broke in and stole the photograph, possibly the same person who had broken into Chloe’s place to steal her tablet. Perhaps I’d been right after all about the killer seeing Jessie in those photos. I had thought the killer might be Digby or Amanda, but what if someone else had been on that cruise, someone who was a victim of her blackmail?

  I grabbed the tablet and began hunting through Chloe’s photos, my fingers skimming each one, flicking one after another aside until I came to pictures of Amanda and Digby. Chloe had taken several photos of the two of them, smiling happily into the camera. Then there were some group shots: the happy couple in the foreground, other people grouped behind, all smiling, all with glasses raised in their hands. I scrutinised each face in the crowd, but saw no one I knew. I kept on skimming through. Then I felt a jolt of recognition. Someone had taken a picture of Chloe. She was standing on deck, smiling, her face shaded by a large sun hat. In the background, leaning against the ship’s railing, was someone I had seen before. I stroked my fingers over the screen to enlarge the picture, to be sure, to focus on the face. I took in a sharp breath. It wasn’t the face I had been expecting to find.

  Next morning I came to the place early, the mist hanging over the river, the leaves underfoot turning to mulch, every branch and stone slick from last night’s rain. I hadn’t collected the dogs. They would have to wait. This was the time I knew I’d find the person I was looking for. Here, in this place by the river, where the water ran deep. I had walked along a muddy bridle path to get here. I was a long way from the road.

  Swollen by the rain, the river swept down under the tiny bridge, its ancient stones green with moss. Water foamed white between boulders in its path before it fell over a ledge in a curtain, forming a deep pool beneath, and filtered through the branches of a tree the storm had torn down. It lay like a fallen giant across the stream, its stout trunk wedged between rocks, the crooked fingers of its roots still holding the soil torn away in its fall. The purling of the water was the only noise. The dripping trees were silent. A footstep, quiet as a falling leaf, made me turn. A tall, dark figure stood behind me: someone I was willing to bet had never had a migraine in her life.

  ‘Clever, Juno.’ Meredith smiled. ‘I knew you’d work it out eventually. When I heard your message on the phone last night, I could tell you’d done it at last. I’ve been waiting for you. I knew you would come.’

  ‘Your favourite spot,’ I said. She was wearing her wetsuit, the hood tight around her pale face, as she must have worn it when she’d killed Verbena – no fibres from any clothing, Dean had said, not a hair.

  ‘Why Jessie?’ I asked.

  ‘Because of my mother,’ she answered simply. ‘She was involved in a road accident, years ago, a crash with a motorbike. It wasn’t her fault. There were witnesses − they all said that she couldn’t have avoided him, she was completely exonerated.’ Her usually low voice had risen high, like a child’s, and she took in a deep breath to control it, clenchin
g her hands into fists. ‘But after the inquest, the letters started. We knew it was Jessie. The police warned her, but she didn’t stop. My mother was blameless, but she was tormented by guilt because the stupid bike rider died. After months of Jessie taunting her, she killed herself. And then Jessie disappeared, just slipped quietly away. I was fourteen. I vowed if I ever found her I would kill her.’ She took a deep breath, struggling to master her emotions. ‘And then, two years ago …’

  ‘You went on a cruise,’ I said.

  She laughed. ‘It wasn’t my idea. I went to keep a friend company. One evening I found myself next to your Mrs Berkeley-Smythe, subjected to her boring photographs …’

  ‘And you recognised Jessie?’

  She nodded, a strange half-smile twisting her lips.

  ‘And came to live here,’ I went on, ‘so that you could kill her.’

  ‘I’d sworn I would.’ She laughed. Her eyes, burning like dark furnaces, never left my face. ‘I’d have killed that fat old bitch too! I came to her house to do it, that day when you were there packing for her cruise. I’d have killed her if you hadn’t been there. I went back the next night, but I couldn’t get in.’ She smiled again. ‘I’ll get her one day.’

  I thanked God Chloe was safely on the high seas. ‘But why? She hasn’t even recognised you. She thinks you remind her of a film star.’

  ‘But if she keeps looking at those photographs, one day, she may. The other woman did.’

  I frowned. ‘You mean Amanda?’

  ‘She came into the gallery. I don’t know where dear Digby was, but for once she was sober enough to walk upright on her own. Just as she was leaving, she realised she knew where she’d seen me before. I told her she was mistaken and some customers came in then, wanting my attention, so she had to cut the conversation short.’

  ‘So you broke into her cottage.’

  ‘I knew she’d be there alone, sleeping. Digby had told me she sleeps every day after lunch while he takes a walk.’ She bit her lip. ‘I nearly got caught, though. I thought I’d better steal something to make it look like a burglary.’ She gave a low laugh as if she’d enjoyed it all, got a kick out of flirting with danger. ‘The photograph was the first thing that came to hand, ironic it should have been taken on the cruise.’

  ‘So, you’d been on the cruise,’ I said, shrugging. ‘On its own that doesn’t make you a murder suspect.’

  ‘You worked it out.’ She smiled. ‘I’m just rubbing out the links in the chain, eliminating the risks. Besides, if you want to hide a tree, the best place is in a forest.’ She laughed, amused by her own wit.

  ‘A forest of dead bodies,’ I said. ‘It was you who tried to break into my shop. Were you planning to murder me too?’

  She didn’t answer. Just smiled. I wanted to keep her talking. I knew what would happen when she thought she’d said enough. ‘Didn’t Jessie recognise you?’

  ‘She hadn’t seen me since I was fourteen.’ She laughed. ‘It was all so easy! She thought I wanted to be her friend. She would come into the gallery and talk, even tell me about the poisonous little notes she was sending. I encouraged her, persuaded her I wanted to join in. Then she showed me a dummy some children must have made, she found it by the river … just a pair of overalls stuffed with plastic.’

  ‘And you made the mask.’

  She nodded. ‘I told Jessie we could have some fun. She was obsessed with that stupid legend …’

  ‘Cutty Dyer Dun This.’ I smiled back at her, although I felt sick inside. ‘I bet the postcards were your idea.’

  She nodded. ‘I made her practise writing them.’

  Poor Jessie, she never knew that one day one of them would be pinned to her own corpse. ‘So you got your revenge.’

  ‘Do you know what the sweetest moment was?’ she asked softly. ‘Telling her why I was killing her.’ She sucked in a breath at the memory of it, a frisson of pleasure shuddering through her body. I’ve faced men who wanted to kill me before, violent characters, far more powerful adversaries than Meredith, but no one had made me as afraid as she did in that moment.

  ‘Of course, I couldn’t know that you would be the one to find her, but it was so perfect that you did − Ashburton’s very own amateur sleuth!’ Her laughter was mocking, her smile one of genuine amusement.

  ‘You held Jessie’s head under the water,’ I accused her, trying to keep my own voice level. ‘Didn’t you feel any pity for her?’

  ‘She had none for my mother.’

  ‘She must have struggled.’

  ‘I am very strong,’ she flashed back at me. I realised that despite her arrogant calm, her assured laughter, inside she was coiled tight as a snake. I resisted the urge to step back.

  ‘What about Dave Bryant?’ I asked.

  ‘His death was nothing to do with me.’ Her dark eyes blazed with sudden fury. ‘How dare they? The lowlifes who murdered him, how dare they steal my idea and use it for their clumsy, ugly slaughter?’ Her voice rose high, shrill, once again like a child’s. ‘It ruined everything!’

  Madness, if the word meant anything, was what flamed in her eyes now.

  ‘And Verbena?’ I asked.

  She smiled again, once more composed. ‘Didn’t she make the perfect Ophelia? I couldn’t bear to cut her pretty white throat, that’s why I tied the red ribbon. I got the idea from the painting in your shop … Oh, not straight away, of course! I only marked it with that red pen for a joke − that day when we came in and bought the watercolour by your friend Sophie. Not even Daniel saw me do it. I didn’t think about killing Verbena until a few days before the ball, when she came around to show me that ridiculous dress she’d had made …’

  My anger rose like bile. Because of her, because she had murdered Jessie and Verbena, Luke had thrown his life away. I struggled to stay calm, to keep her talking. My voice came out in a savage whisper. ‘What had she ever done to you?’

  She bit her lip, her answer almost defensive. ‘She was trying to take what was mine.’

  ‘Daniel?’

  ‘Not that I want him,’ she added petulantly, ‘but that’s not the point. After the ball I sent the two of them away, pretending I had a migraine. I changed into my wetsuit and drove to her house. I had the sledge ready, in position—’

  ‘—which you stole from Daniel’s barn.’

  ‘He didn’t even notice it had gone.’ Her voice was laden with contempt. ‘I knew Verbena would answer when I knocked. I could hear her laughing. She thought I was Daniel. “I knew you’d come back” she was saying when she opened the door.’ She looked at me slyly. ‘I was right about her, you see.’

  ‘Does Daniel know any of this?’ I asked.

  ‘Daniel?’ She laughed as if the idea was ridiculous. ‘He doesn’t even know what day of the week it is!’

  Actually, I thought to myself, I think he does.

  ‘And you’ve put the sledge back in his barn.’

  ‘With a few clues for when the police find it,’ she added smiling. ‘I shall call them myself, you see, to tell them of my terrible suspicions about him. And I’ve planted Verbena’s scarf in his house,’ she added proudly. ‘It won’t be difficult for them to find.’

  ‘You don’t love him, then?’

  She hesitated. ‘I could have done,’ she admitted, and for once there was no hint of mocking pride in her voice, ‘if he wasn’t so pathetic about his beloved Claire …’

  ‘You sent him that terrible postcard.’

  She shrugged. ‘Of course.’

  ‘You’re a cruel bitch,’ I told her softly.

  She scowled. ‘She is all he thinks about, apart from that damn dog. Although I think …’ her words faded, she tipped her head on one side, as if considering something for the first time.

  ‘What?’ I asked.

  ‘I think he’s a little in love with you,’ she answered, eyes widening with wonder. ‘Poor Daniel!’

  She sprang at me like a cat. I thought I was ready for her, but she took me by surprise
, knocking me backwards. I staggered, trying to place my foot flat amongst a knotted network of gnarled roots. My ankle turned. I felt a sharp needle of pain and I fell, hitting the ground hard, the breath punched out of me. She was quick and fierce, on me at once, straddling my body, her hands around my throat.

  I bent my knees up behind her, dug in with my feet and thrust upward hard with my hips, dislodging her body. She was tipped forward by her own momentum and rolled away over my shoulder. I turned and scrabbled to my knees, tried to get to my feet but was knifed by the pain in my ankle. My leg wouldn’t support me. I tottered like a drunk, and before I could draw myself upright, Meredith charged. We went flying, rolling down the shallow bank together, kicking and scratching. Meredith’s hands were in my hair, but my clawing fingers could not reach her face and I could get no purchase on the slick arms of her wetsuit.

  We crashed into the river. Cold shock stole my breath. Suddenly I was underwater, seeing the world through a brown-tinted lens as it rushed before my eyes, Meredith’s hand hard on top of my head, pushing me down. I reached up and grabbed her wrist, lashing out with my good leg and kicking her in the knee. She staggered, releasing her hold and my head broke the surface. I rose out of the water, gasping, my wet clothes dragging me down. I grabbed a loop of root breaking through the earthen bank and hauled myself up. I managed to stand on the river bed, clinging on. The cold of the rushing water had numbed the pain in my ankle, but I could put no weight on it. I turned to face Meredith, but she had disappeared. I stared down at the water’s rippling mirror, trying to see her through constantly shifting fragments of light and shadow. She was down there somewhere, swimming around me. She might pull my legs from under me, or rise up from the depths like Cutty Dyer.