Wake the Dead

by Dorothy Simpson

  Experience had taught him that sooner or later he would find it.

  FIVE

  ‘We looking for anything in particular?’ said Lineham, peering into one of the drawers of Mrs Fairleigh’s desk.

  Thanet shrugged. ‘Not especially. Anything and everything.’ He leaned forward to try to decipher the signature on an indifferent watercolour of the house. It was signed E. Fairleigh, 1878. Hugo Fairleigh’s great-grandmother? He tried to work out the dates, then gave up. What did it matter? He resumed his prowling around the room.

  It was much later. The SOCOs had been and gone, the old lady’s body had been taken away and Thanet and Lineham had been left in sole possession of this, her most private domain. If Isobel Fairleigh had had any secrets, this must be where she had kept them, thought Thanet, looking around the bedroom. The sitting room shared with her sister was too much a joint territory. He wondered how it had felt for old Mrs Fairleigh to give up being the mistress of the entire house and retire to one small section of it. Had she been angry, resentful, or resigned, accepting? No, never resigned, he thought, remembering that proud, decisive profile. Isobel Fairleigh had not been the type to lie down and let life dictate its terms to her. If she had chosen to withdraw, to abdicate in favour of her daughter-in-law, it could only have been a deliberate choice, the result of careful consideration. So, he wondered, why that particular option? Why not move out altogether, to a cottage in the village, perhaps? He couldn’t believe that it was because she hadn’t been able to afford to buy another house. No, much more likely that she wanted to stay near Hugo. Thanet doubted that there were any other children. It was always Hugo who gazed solemnly out of the framed school, team and undergraduate groups which hung upon these walls, smiled out of the elaborate silver frames disposed about the room. There were just two exceptions, a head and shoulders shot of an officer in First World War uniform – Isobel Fairleigh’s father, he guessed, by the resemblance – and a wedding photograph of Isobel and her husband. Thanet picked this up to study it more closely. They had been a handsome couple, Fairleigh tall and well built with the same sleek fair hair as his son, Isobel a classic English beauty, her abundant hair framing a face in which the glow of youth eclipsed the ominous firmness of jaw and mouth. There was no photograph of Hugo and Grace’s wedding, he noted.

  ‘Seems to have been pretty well organised,’ said Lineham. He was systematically sorting papers into piles: business correspondence, personal letters, bank statements, chequebook stubs, dividend slips.

  ‘That doesn’t surprise me.’ Thanet’s reply was abstracted. He had picked up an envelope which he had noticed earlier on the bedside table. It had already been opened and he took the letter out and glanced at it. Nothing interesting, just an estimate from a local builder for some proposed decorating. ‘This is post-marked yesterday. Someone must have brought it in and read it to her.’ He put it back on the table. ‘Any sign of a diary, Mike?’

  ‘Not so far.’

  ‘Probably in her handbag.’ Thanet looked around. He couldn’t see one. Someone had probably tidied it away during the old lady’s illness. The obvious place was the wardrobe, an elegant Edwardian serpentine-fronted affair of inlaid satinwood. It was full of expensive clothes crammed in so tightly that it must have been difficult to extricate them. Well-polished brogues and high-heeled shoes of sleek, soft calf were neatly lined up on the floor and the long shelf above the hanging rail was stacked high with hats and handbags. Thanet guessed that the one Mrs Fairleigh had been using when she had had her stroke would have been kept apart from the others. Yes, that would be it, on the floor at one end, a pigskin handbag with single handle. He fished it out and sat down on a chair to open it. And yes, here was a diary.

  Lineham glanced across. ‘Found it?’

  Mmm.’ Thanet was already engrossed. What sort of a life had she led?

  A busy one, he discovered. Until the last week or two there were entries for most days, sometimes two or three in a day. There were a number of regular weekly commitments. On Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays Isobel Fairleigh had helped serve meals on wheels at lunchtime. On Tuesday and Thursday afternoons and on Wednesday evenings she had played bridge. On Friday mornings she had had her hair done. In between she had served on various committees, attended coffee mornings and fund-raising events for charity, gone to WI and NADFAS meetings.

  And on the first day of every month, regardless of which day of the week it was, she had written a capital B.

  Thanet pointed it out to Lineham. ‘Wonder who B is?’ He turned to 1 July, the day after Isobel had had her stroke. Yes, there it was, an appointment which had never been kept.

  ‘One of the family might know.’ Lineham was running his finger down a piece of paper. He whistled, a long drawn out sound of wonder and awe. ‘Just look at this! Half-yearly statement from her brokers. She had close on a half a million tucked away here and there. Is Mr Fairleigh’s face going to light up when he sees this! Or perhaps he’s already seen it, and thought it might be worth his while to give his mother a helping hand, speed her on her way.’

  ‘Half-yearly statement, you say? Sent out when?’

  ‘Dated 3 July.’

  ‘After her stroke, then. In that case, as it’s obviously been opened, someone’s seen it, that’s certain. I wonder who’s been opening her letters for her.’

  ‘And who she’s left it all to.’

  ‘Quite. Find out who her solicitor is, Mike. Incidentally, I haven’t had a chance to tell you before, but I’m pretty certain Fairleigh was lying earlier, about his movements this afternoon.’

  ‘He wasn’t exactly shedding too many tears over his mother’s death, either, was he, sir?’

  ‘So far as I could see, nobody was.’

  ‘Except Miss Ransome.’

  ‘I didn’t think that was grief, did you?’

  ‘Either shock or panic, you mean? She was definitely lying, wasn’t she?’

  ‘About not coming upstairs, you mean? Yes. Through her teeth.’

  ‘Young Mrs Fairleigh knew it, too, didn’t she? She must have seen her.’

  ‘But had no intention of giving Miss Ransome away.’

  ‘You think Miss Ransome knew she’d been spotted?’

  ‘My impression was that she didn’t. And I think she was concentrating so hard on her own performance and its effect on us to notice Grace Fairleigh’s reaction.’

  ‘So d’you think Miss Ransome might have done it, sir?’ Lineham tapped the broker’s list with his fingernail. ‘She’s probably had a good look at this, and no doubt her sister will have left her a tidy chunk in her will.’

  ‘I agree. Still, we mustn’t jump to conclusions, Mike. You know as well as I do that every time we’re involved in a murder investigation we find that people start lying right, left and centre, trying to cover up grubby little secrets which have no bearing whatsoever on the case.’ Thanet stood up. ‘Come on. Bundle all that stuff up into an envelope and we’ll take it back with us, study it at our leisure. I want to have a word with Mrs Kerk before we go home.’

  This was old Mrs Fairleigh’s housekeeper. She had been working in the kitchen all afternoon, supplying hot water for the teas and supervising the washing-up, and Thanet wanted to ask her if she had noticed anything suspicious. He had assumed she lived in, like Hugo Fairleigh’s housekeeper, but she didn’t and by the time he got around to asking for her she had already gone home.

  The address they had been given was on a small new council estate on the edge of the village, an attractive mix of houses, old people’s bungalows and maisonettes which was a far cry from the rows of dreary, identical council houses thrown up all over the country in the post-war years. Some of the tenants had obviously taken advantage of right-to-buy schemes encouraged by the Conservative government, pride in their homes demonstrated by porches, extensions and refinements such as wrought-iron gates.

  Mrs Kerk’s house sported no such embellishments but the council would no doubt consider her a good tenan
t: the windows sparkled, paintwork shone and the front garden was neatly mown and ablaze with a dazzling display of summer bedding plants.

  An expensive motorbike was parked outside by the kerb and as Thanet and Lineham walked up the path the front door opened and a youth came out carrying an elaborate crash-helmet.

  ‘Mrs Kerk?’ said Thanet.

  The youth hesitated, then pushed open the front door, which he had been about to close behind him. ‘Mum!’ he yelled.

  There was a brief blare of sound from the television set as a door opened and closed and a woman came out. ‘Yes?’

  The lad ran off down the path, fastening on his helmet as he went. He jumped on to his bike and kick-started the engine. Thanet waited for him to move off before introducing himself and Lineham.

  ‘Oh,’ said Mrs Kerk nervously. She glanced back over her shoulder at the door from which she had emerged, then up and down the street. She stepped back. ‘You’d better come in.’

  She led them down a short passage into a neat modern kitchen well-equipped with gadgets such as microwave oven and food processor. ‘Um … Would you like to sit down?’ She gestured at the small pine table and chairs.

  ‘Thank you.’

  Thanet studied her with interest. Isobel Fairleigh couldn’t have been the easiest of employers and he suspected that anyone with too much spirit would quickly have come to grief. Mrs Kerk was middle-aged, buxom, with a round placid face and neatly permed brown hair. She wore no make-up and was wearing a flowered cotton skirt and a short-sleeved white blouse which displayed her solidly fleshed upper arms. She folded her hands together on the table in front of her and waited, only the whitening of her knuckles betraying her tension.

  He set out to put her at ease. He might need her co-operation later, when he began to probe more deeply into the relationships within the Fairleigh family, and at this initial meeting he didn’t want to frighten her off and make her clam up. ‘Just some routine questions, Mrs Kerk, no need to worry, this shouldn’t take long. How long have you been Mrs Fairleigh’s housekeeper?’

  His conversational tone reassured her and they chatted for a few minutes before edging nearer the purpose of his visit.

  ‘There were just one or two small points I wanted to clear up with you. The first is this. What were the arrangements for letters, in the household? How did Mrs Fairleigh get her post?’

  The factual nature of the question made her relax further and she became quite voluble.

  ‘All the post for the house was delivered to Mr Fairleigh’s side. That Bert – our postman – couldn’t be bothered to walk all the way around the back to deliver ours separately. It used to make Mrs Fairleigh so mad, time and again she complained about it and for a few weeks he’d do it, and then he’d go back to delivering it all in one bundle. Said it were the post office that didn’t separate it out.’ She gave a sniff which expressed scorn for all the people in the world who couldn’t be bothered to do their job properly.

  ‘And what happened to it after that?’

  ‘Miss Letty or Mrs Fairleigh would go down and fetch it.’

  ‘And since Mrs Fairleigh has been in bed?’

  ‘Sometimes Miss Letty went down for it, sometimes young Mrs Fairleigh would bring it up.’

  ‘And who would read it to her?’

  ‘I don’t know. One or the other of them, I suppose.’

  ‘What happened to it today, do you know?’

  ‘No, I’m sorry. We was all so busy, with the fête …’

  ‘Yes, of course … I wonder, did Mrs Fairleigh usually tell you where she was going, when she went out?’

  Mrs Kerk looked blank, shook her head. ‘She’d tell me she was going to be out for lunch or dinner, that’s all.’

  ‘Only we’ve been checking through her diary …’ He fished it out of his pocket and showed her the entry for 3 July. ‘And she seems to have met someone with the initial B on the first of each month. Do you have any idea who that might be?’

  Another shake of the head. ‘Sorry. I really haven’t a clue.’

  ‘Her friends never came to the house?’

  ‘She didn’t –’ She stopped, abruptly. ‘Only for the bridge.’

  Had she been going to say, ‘She didn’t have any friends’? ‘And who were they?’

  ‘Well, there was Mrs Fairlawn, Mrs Crayford and Mrs Pargeter, mostly. And sometimes Miss Highstead or Mrs Porter, if one of the regulars couldn’t come. But it was mostly them three.’

  ‘And do you know their Christian names?’

  ‘Mrs Fairlawn is Edith, I think, and Mrs Pargeter is Margaret. I don’t know the others. Miss Letty might be able to help you.’

  ‘Miss Ransome didn’t play bridge herself?’

  A smile, for the first time. ‘No, not she. Said it was beyond her and she wouldn’t dare, they all took it so serious, like. It could get quite nasty at times, she said.’

  ‘Right. There’s just one other point I wanted to raise with you. You were working in the kitchen off the downstairs passage all afternoon, I understand?’

  ‘That’s right, yes.’

  ‘Now I want you to think very carefully before you answer my next question.’

  She immediately looked apprehensive, the broad forehead creasing into vertical lines.

  ‘Did you at any time this afternoon see anyone other than those who were helping you come into the house?’

  ‘I was busy.’ She was defensive. ‘I didn’t have much time to stand around watching comings and goings.’

  ‘Yes, I realise that. I just thought you might have happened to notice? If you could think back?’

  Silence, while she considered. And yes, she had remembered something, Thanet could tell.

  ‘There was someone,’ she said, slowly.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘A woman.’ She stopped.

  ‘Someone you knew?’ Thanet was encouraging.

  ‘No, I’d never seen her before. Said she was looking for the toilet. I told her toilets for the public were outside.’

  ‘There is one, though, isn’t there, just inside the back door?’

  ‘Yes, but they wasn’t supposed to use that. We couldn’t have half the village tramping through the house, could we?’

  ‘Where was she?’

  ‘Coming back along the passage towards the back door.’

  ‘From the direction of the stairs, then?’

  ‘Yes. I’d just been out to collect some crockery to wash up. I came in through the back door and she was coming towards me.’

  ‘And what did she say, exactly?’

  ‘Something like, oh, sorry, I was looking for the loo.’ Mrs Kerk hesitated. ‘She seemed in a hurry.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, anxious to get out, like. A bit breathless. I thought she just wanted to go bad, you know, and I did wonder whether to tell her to use the indoor toilet, but I thought no, do it for one and before you know where we are we’ll have them queueing up outside the back door. So I didn’t.’

  ‘Did she seem upset, would you say?’

  The housekeeper shook her head. ‘I don’t rightly know … You’re not thinking she had anything to do with Mrs Fairleigh’s … well … with what happened, are you?’

  ‘I’m not thinking anything at the moment, Mrs Kerk. At this stage all I’m trying to do is gather information. This woman, could you describe her for me?’

  Mrs Kerk frowned with the effort of recollection, screwing up her eyes and pursing her mouth. ‘Not young, but not what you’d call middle-aged, either. Early forties, perhaps? Not slim, not fat, sort of plumpish, I suppose. Dark curly hair.’

  ‘Height?’

  ‘Middling. Bit taller than me. Nicely dressed, but not a lady.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Her accent. She was well-spoken, but she didn’t speak like Mrs Fairleigh or Miss Letty.’

  ‘What was she wearing?’

  ‘A navy dress with little white flowers on it. Long sleeve
s.’

  ‘I must congratulate you, Mrs Kerk. You are very observant. That is an excellent description.’

  Mrs Kerk looked pleased.

  Now for the crucial question. ‘What time was this, do you know?’

  Another frown. ‘Sorry, I don’t. I didn’t think it was important.’

  Pity. ‘Of course not. But was it early in the afternoon, or later?’

  ‘Must have been getting on, because we was so busy washing up, and people didn’t really get going on the teas till about three. I tell you what, though, it wasn’t that long before I saw Mr Hugo come hurrying into the house with another man.’

  ‘A smallish man, with half-moon spectacles and a bald head?’

  ‘That’s right!’

  Doc Mallard. So whoever the woman was, she had been in the house during the crucial period. ‘How much time do you think elapsed between your seeing this woman and then Mr Fairleigh?’

  ‘I’m not sure. We had a bit of a rush on about then.’

  ‘If you could think, I’d be grateful.’

  She frowned with concentration. ‘Ten minutes?’ she said, eventually. ‘I couldn’t swear to it, mind.’

  ‘But it was something like that.’

  She nodded.

  ‘Mrs Kerk,’ said Thanet, ‘there’s no doubt about it. You are a gem.’ He waited for her gratified smile before saying, ‘Now, are you sure you didn’t notice anyone else come in? Miss Letty, perhaps?’

  A shake of the head.

  ‘Or young Mrs Fairleigh?’

  ‘Oh, yes, I did see her once, now you mention it. Early on, before we got busy.’

  ‘Mr Fairleigh?’

  ‘Only that once, I told you about.’

  Thanet rose. ‘Well, perhaps you’d have another think. And if you remember anything else, I’d be grateful if you’d let us know.’

  ‘So,’ said Lineham as they got into the car. ‘Could this be a case of cherchez la femme?’

  ‘Drop me at my mother-in-law’s house, would you? I told Joan I’d meet her there … Who knows? In any case, with all the people there this afternoon it’ll be like looking for a needle in a haystack. All the same, we’ll take a good look at the names and addresses taken by the men on the gate, show it around to the family. Someone might recognise a name.’