Murder is in the Air

by Frances Brody

  Murder is in the Air

  A Kate Shackleton Mystery

  FRANCES BRODY

  To my readers and to booksellers everywhere. Thank you and happy reading.

  Chapter One

  My name is Kate Shackleton. I am a private investigator. Although I could stretch to an office, Batswing Cottage remains our centre of operations. We are close to Leeds city centre, yet near open countryside for dog walks and thinking time. Jim Sykes, my assistant, lives a short walk away in Woodhouse.

  For my meeting with William Lofthouse, the informality of being ‘at home’ would suit us very well. William and I first met at the opening of an exhibition in a London art gallery, before he married Eleanor, his much younger artist wife. I am the proud owner of an early Eleanor Hart painting, from her time at the Royal Academy. The painting depicts a shepherd and his dog herding a flock of sheep through a snowstorm towards a distant glimmer of light. My housekeeper, Mrs Sugden, calls it bleak. I think it optimistic.

  William owns Barleycorn Brewery in the North Riding market town of Masham. He and Eleanor live a stone’s throw from the brewery, at Barleycorn House. In anticipation of today’s meeting, I did my homework. He inherited land in the North Riding of Yorkshire, as well as inns and alehouses in Masham and surrounding villages and hamlets. He and his late wife were childless, but there is a nephew, James Lofthouse. In a rare burst of poetry, Jim Sykes told me that Barleycorn Brewery is renowned for its luscious and richly flavoured Nut Brown Ale.

  The doorbell rang promptly at 2 p.m. Mrs Sugden showed William Lofthouse in, and then went to invite his chauffeur into the kitchen for tea and cake, and probably to find out everything she could about his life and times.

  William’s secretary made the appointment for him to see me. He had come from attending an old schoolfriend’s funeral at Lawnswood Cemetery. Having seen his friend’s obituary in the Yorkshire Post, it did not take a high degree of skill to pinpoint William Lofthouse’s age at sixty-two. Today, he looked older. His greying hair still showed signs of having once been coppery. More lines etched his face than I remembered.

  ‘William, hello. Come and sit by the fire.’ I felt a clamminess as we shook hands.

  ‘Hello, Kate. A change to see you somewhere other than a picture gallery.’ William moved towards the chair like a man carrying a burden. I rang the bell for tea, but William’s pinched look prompted me to offer whisky, which he gladly accepted. I was curious to know why a brewery chairman needed a private investigator.

  As William sipped his whisky, he talked about the funeral and his old schoolfriend. I sympathised, saying how sad to have a death in April when spring bursts into life.

  After Mrs Sugden had settled the driver in the kitchen, she brought tea, sandwiches and cakes.

  As pre-arranged, after setting down the tray, Mrs Sugden said, ‘Oh and here’s the diary, madam.’

  ‘Thank you, Mrs Sugden.’

  My visitor did not hurry to the point. After talking about his boyhood friend, he enlightened me about this morning’s weather, and the state of the roads.

  It was time to give William an opening, and a little prompt. I asked did he still play an active part in the running of the brewery, adding that my assistant sang the praises of Barleycorn’s Nut Brown ale.

  William came to life, telling me about working with his head brewer on a new beer that would top the lot. ‘We’ll be flooded with orders.’

  I congratulated him. At a time when so many companies were laying off workers, here was a man providing employment.

  After a moment or two of hearing more about the new brew, I realised that he was reluctant to tell me just why he was here. Perhaps I was on the wrong tack. Did Eleanor want to buy back her painting? Had I been crossed off the list for the garden party?

  There was nothing for it but to stop dancing around the maypole. Just as I was about to form the direct question, he crept up on his topic.

  ‘Eleanor and I were chatting the other day, and she gave me your card.’

  This was not a moment to let slip. ‘Eleanor believes you need an investigator. Do you think so too, William?’

  ‘I wouldn’t go as far as that.’

  ‘What then?’

  I waited until he filled the silence. ‘As often happens, you hear of a person once, meet that person, and hear more about them. People have very good words to say about you, Kate.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it.’

  ‘You’ve a right good reputation for discretion, for tackling all sorts of tricky business. My insurance agent mentioned you as having a chap on your books who looks into the business side of things.’

  ‘Mr Sykes, Jim Sykes.’

  William snapped his fingers. ‘That’s the fellow my agent mentioned.’ He set his whisky aside for a moment to take a gulp of black tea. Dry throat, clammy skin, unhealthy colour. Here was a man feeling his age, with a wife in her thirties, something going wrong in his business, and suffering from a bout of jaundice.

  If William Lofthouse worried himself to death, Eleanor may shortly become an independent and wealthy woman, never having to think twice about the price of oil paints.

  ‘How may our agency help you?’ I asked.

  ‘The business is going through an uneven patch, let’s say. It’s worrying but these things happen. We have some good people working for us, and I ought to know. I was brought up to it. There’s nothing I haven’t done. I shovelled barley into the kiln during school hols, groomed the horses, shadowed the head brewer. Father encouraged me, showed me how to do every job. Mother didn’t like it. A brewery can be a dangerous place.’

  I perked up at the word dangerous, but he did not expand. ‘What exactly has gone wrong?’

  ‘If you blink in this business, something goes wrong. I took time off to be with Eleanor after our marriage. She wanted to get to know the area and see some of the places I went as a boy, and then she was making changes in the house and I enjoyed being with her. There was a bit of a muddle in the accounts. The accountant was a young man when he started working for my father. Out of decency, I had to wait until he came to me and said he planned to retire.’

  A litany of minor business mishaps followed. William went on to explain that his secretary attended a lecture by a know-it-all businessman. ‘She came in the next day, after listening to this fellow, still wet behind his ears, and told me that we needed an outside eye on our doings.’

  ‘You have a nephew in the business I believe.’

  ‘That’s right. James is my right-hand man. He’s away in Germany, picking up new ideas from the brewers there.’

  ‘When will James return?’

  ‘There’s the question. In our trade, we send our youngsters to learn from another brewer. James had all that, years ago, in his twenties, at the Anchor Brewery in Southwark.’

  He leaned forward, his frown giving him a slightly anxious look. ‘He ought to have been back a month ago. He ought to be with me at the Barleycorn helm by now but he’s flitting about Germany; Dortmund, Münster, Munich. Tells me we have to keep up with the times and that we have a thing or two to learn. He has written about his big plans for when he returns. But it’s him I want back. Now letters have stopped. We get a weekly postcard.’

  There was yearning in William’s voice when he spoke of James. A prodigal son situation?

  ‘You miss James.’ I smiled. ‘I won’t promise to go to Germany and bring him back, but if you give me his itinerary, I’ll see what I can find out. Discreetly, of course. I have contacts there.’

  He smiled back. ‘Thank you but I don’t want to check up on him. I don’t mind if he’s taken up with a German lass, as long as he brings her back here.’

  Until that moment, I was finding it ha
rd to grasp just what William wanted from me, thinking that perhaps he was one of those men who likes to work with chaps. He had perked up at the mention of Jim Sykes.

  Now I realised that there was something else going on. The way he moved betrayed him. He shifted his position in the chair, pressing his hands on the chair arms. It was one of those sudden insights that could be wildly wrong.

  He has lost his grip, lost his confidence. Expecting James to take over, William had been winding down, got into a bit of a mess, and was embarrassed about it.

  ‘You want everything to be ship-shape for when James returns?’

  ‘Just so, Kate.’

  ‘Then Jim Sykes is the man for the job.’

  ‘Yes, I should like him to come out and see us. What will his daily rate set me back?’

  Being used to blunt Yorkshiremen coming straight to the point, I told him. He did not blanch.

  ‘It’ll be worth it to me. When could he start?’

  I reached for the diary. ‘The timing is perfect. Mr Sykes could start on Monday. We would send a letter of engagement with our terms. I’m sure you and Mr Sykes will pinpoint where he may be most helpful to you.’

  I hoped Sykes would be more successful in this regard than I had been so far.

  ‘So, what are the terms, Kate?’

  ‘The daily rate, based on an eight-hour day, travel and accommodation and necessary disbursements. Any additional outside expenses incurred in connection with the assignment, would be payable at the rate charged to our agency by a third party. We work with an excellent solicitor.’

  ‘Hadn’t thought of that sort of malarkey, just a general tidying up operation.’

  ‘That would be your choice to be made at the time. Your company has a good name and a reputation to protect. Now, will you arrange accommodation for Mr Sykes, or shall we?’

  ‘I’ll book him into the Falcon. It’s our own public house, much favoured by commercial travellers. It’s on the town square, brewery right behind it.’

  ‘And motoring expenses, unless you have a rail service?’

  ‘We do but it’s being run down. Blighters intend to close it, except for freight.’

  ‘Then there will be travelling time above thirty miles, and petrol.’

  ‘You drive a hard bargain, a woman after my own heart!’ He reached for an iced bun and popped it into his mouth.

  ‘The letter, in duplicate for signature, will be in the post today. I’m sure Mr Sykes will have everything in order very soon.’

  ‘That’s reassuring.’ He rose to go. ‘Oh, and Kate, perhaps you and Mr Sykes would like to come over if you can spare the time on Friday afternoon. You could take a look at the brewery. We’ve a lad coming out of his cooper’s apprenticeship, so there’ll be a trussing and a bit of a do.’

  ‘Cooper—that’s a barrel maker? But what’s a trussing?’

  ‘Ah, you’ll have to wait and see.’

  I walked him into the hall. ‘Will Eleanor be there?’

  ‘She hasn’t said. But if you do see Eleanor, she may bend your ear about our wages clerk, Ruth Parnaby. Miss Parnaby won the Brewery Queen of the North Riding contest. You’ll have heard of it.’

  ‘How exciting! I read about it in the local paper. She will be a sort of ambassadress for your industry?’

  ‘So I understand. The idea came from some of the bigger brewers in the North, starting on the other side of the Pennines. Good luck to them, I thought. That won’t reach Masham.’

  ‘But it has?’

  He sighed. ‘The local papers invited young women with a connection to the industry to send in their pictures. Readers voted as to which one went forward. Long story short, our wages clerk—good brass poured into her training and qualifications—suddenly finds herself Brewery Queen of the North Riding, more absent from work than present. You could have knocked me down with a stick of liquorice.’

  ‘Did you know she’d entered the contest?’

  ‘I wasn’t consulted. Nor was her father, our head cooper. Girls these days, they dress like film stars and do as they please. Eleanor is cock-a-hoop about it.’

  It is sometimes necessary to state the obvious. ‘You’re not cock-a-hoop?’

  ‘No disrespect to your sex, Kate.’ He sighed and shook his head. ‘Four years ago, I asked the headmaster who was his best lad among the school leavers. He said his best lad was a lass. Ruth Parnaby. She should have gone to the grammar school, but her father wouldn’t hear of it. Against my better judgement, I took her on. Should’ve known it would end in marriage or some sort of goings on. She’s too good-looking.’

  ‘How long will she reign as North Riding Brewery Queen?’

  He gave a bitter chuckle. ‘A year and a day would you believe? Some people have stopped believing in the real world. Think they live in a fairy tale.’

  ‘I’m sure it will be manageable.’

  ‘That’s what my wife claims. Says it will be good for business. What’s more, she wants Miss Parnaby to have a chaperone and move out of the family home.’

  ‘I can understand the chaperone part, but why move away from home?’

  ‘Oh, her father, Slater Parnaby. He is an odd man but the stories about him murdering his wife were discredited years ago. And I have no grounds for supposing that Slater knocks his youngsters about. Neither Ruth nor her brother George ever come into work with a black eye.’

  As the car drove off, I wondered whether Eleanor had given William my card for an entirely different reason than muddles at the brewery and an errant nephew.

  Of course, that nephew would be near Eleanor’s age. That thought set off a whole new line of possibilities about why James Lofthouse may be staying away. James and Eleanor had fallen in love.

  Before becoming an investigator, I never attached underhand or wicked motives to people. Now the thought fleetingly crossed my mind that William’s anxiety about his business combined with his clammy skin and touch of jaundice might be a result of Eleanor fiddling the books and slowly poisoning her husband before James returned from Germany. I immediately felt ashamed at such a melodramatic thought. Eleanor was genuinely fond of William, perhaps even in love with him. Put those thoughts aside, I told myself. Stick to business.

  But what was the business? There was something William was deliberately holding back or did not want to face.

  Sykes and I would certainly attend the apprentice’s trussing. I wanted to know what was really going on in Masham.

  Chapter Two

  George Parnaby waited in the wood stores among the stacks of new cask-staves that he’d brought down yesterday from the drying loft. He breathed in the familiar smell of the wood that had come all the way from Quebec. Wood never hurt anyone. Wood had no temper. Wood had no vicious streak.

  The trussing wouldn’t last long. The other coopers, Tim and old Barney, they’d see to that. They would make sure George came out in one piece. They had cleared a space in the cooperage, pushing trestles and saw-horses against the far wall. Each man’s saws, planes and hammers hung in their proper places. Chairs and bar stools were set out for the spectators who might need to sit down. They’d swept the floor. That was usually George’s job, the apprentice’s job. Who’d do it now, he wondered? Would they take turns sweeping? If he had courage, he would say to his old man, I’m a cooper now, like you. The old man would laugh.

  George heard the voices as people arrived. Why did they come? It was no one’s business but his that this initiation had to happen. They were laughing and talking, waiting for the show to begin. I’m not a show, George said to himself. I’m not a circus animal. He wanted to yell at them. Go away, the lot of you.

  He closed his eyes, breathing in the mellow smell of wood, planks and sawdust shavings. You are in a forest, he told himself. Shut your eyes. Go to the forest in Quebec. When your eyes open, you will have a bad dream of a trussing with people staring. Then you can be in the forest again.

  Old Barney had said, ‘It’s nothing. Everyone goes through it. Yo
u’ll look back and wonder what all the fuss was about.’

  George pressed his hand on his chest, to slow his heart. He ran his tongue around dry lips. Looking at himself in the cracked mirror, he smoothed his hair. He admired his shirt, ironed by his sister Ruth the night before. ‘This is your big day,’ she whispered. ‘I have my start as brewery queen, now you’ll have yours. Our new beginning.’

  This morning, when George put on his clean shirt, the old man sneered. ‘You’re not off to a wedding.’ And then he laughed his nasty laugh, which was the only laugh he had.

  As George waited, something was happening in his head, a thump, thumping at the front of his skull. He listened to people coming into the workshop, footsteps and low voices.

  He made himself look through the crack in the door. The audience made a horseshoe-shape at the far end of the room, so many of them, too many. ‘Don’t come, Ruth,’ George willed. ‘Don’t come, don’t watch.’ The feeling came to him, like a blow in his solar plexus. George had imagined something like a trophy, or a badge, now he knew that it would not be like that at all. He should have tried harder to find out what was going to happen at this trussing.

  Suddenly, the audience cheered. Why?

  George realised that Barney was speaking to the crowd that had come to ogle, that’s why they cheered. Barney always stole the show at the Christmas pantomime. He’d played the bailiff in Mother Goose, wearing a yellow and purple jacket, red trousers, and a collapsible hat. Here Barney was, in well-worn trousers, old jersey and leather apron. But because Barney was Barney, master of ceremonies, the watchers thought they were in the upstairs room at the Town Hall, expecting a jolly time.

  That’s it, George told himself. I am playing a part. My show won’t last as long as Mother Goose.

  Through the partition wall, George listened to the bouncing hailstones of Barney’s words.

  ‘Cooperage—fine and ancient trade—long line of craftsmen—apprentice George Parnaby—apprenticed to his father, Slater Parnaby, also known as Sniffer.’