by Rebecca Tope
‘Who’s the friend?’
The voice became more amicable. ‘Now you’re asking,’ the woman said cheerfully. ‘That’s not the sort of thing I’d have a note of. It’ll be in her will, I suppose.’
‘I doubt if I can get to you by teatime. My assistant’s away for the weekend, and it would take her quite a while to get back.’ Inwardly he cringed at the thought of disturbing Maggs’s romantic little holiday. Maggs in a sour mood was not something to be taken lightly.
‘She’s a tiny little lady. I would think you could manage her on your own, if you had to. I don’t mind lending a hand if it comes to it.’
Drew had to think about that. It was unprecedented to do a removal unaccompanied. That had been drummed into him during his first job with Daphne Plant. Even when staff absences had stretched them to the limit, they always managed to find a second pair of hands.
‘OK then,’ he agreed. ‘Thanks very much. I’ll be on my way in a few minutes.’
‘Don’t get here before three, will you?’ she said hurriedly. ‘They’ll still be in the recreation room till then, and we’d have to pass by that window.’
For the hundredth time, Drew allowed himself to wonder just what extravagant sensitivities ordained that inmates of a nursing home should not be permitted to observe the departure of one of their number. It smacked uncomfortably of 1984 and group manipulation. There one minute, disappeared the next. Where’s Hilda got to? Hilda? Oh, she isn’t here any more. Surely that couldn’t be how they did it? They probably told some story about her passing away peacefully during the night, and the funeral flowers had been sent in everybody’s name. No wonder so many of the poor old things spent their days in murky confusion. The normal rules of existence no longer applied once you got yourself institutionalised.
‘Right,’ he confirmed, glancing at his watch. It was only half past one. He wouldn’t have to leave for another forty-five minutes or so.
Karen was hovering, listening to his side of the conversation. ‘A removal?’ she said. ‘Who’s going with you?’
‘Nobody. She says I can manage on my own.’
‘My God. What would Daphne say?’
‘She’d throw a fit. Bugger Daphne.’
Karen made coffee. The children came back from the garden, dripping with mud and were cleaned off in the kitchen. Timmy, droopy from a hectic morning, went willingly to his bed for an afternoon nap. Stephanie embarked on a large colouring project on the kitchen table.
‘Something just struck me,’ Karen said, going back to Drew to finish her coffee. He pretended alarm, looking around her, craning to see the back of her head.
‘Did it? Are you hurt?’
‘Idiot. No, listen. You do realise that Julie might have done it, don’t you? The cheated wife. She might have heard things about Peter and Sally Dabb, and been murderously jealous. It does happen.’
‘True,’ he rubbed his chin while he thought about it. ‘She said something. It wasn’t so much the words, but the tone. Something about an excuse. It didn’t fit properly. I hardly noticed, but it was like a tiny snag in a smooth surface. It made me think she might know why he was killed, if not who did it.’
‘And then she told you all that about the supermarket contract and you thought that must be what she meant?’
‘Right. Except it didn’t feel as if that was really it. Hard to explain.’
‘Well, we should remember the emotional stuff. Woman stuff. We can’t just ignore the existence of Sally.’
‘I wasn’t suggesting we ignore her.’ He glanced at his watch, wondering whether he should give the van a quick clean-out. Karen kept on talking.
‘I know she told you and Maggs there was no truth in the stories about her and Peter. That doesn’t actually make any difference, does it? If Julie believed it was true, that’s enough. Or Sally’s husband, of course.’
‘Have they known each other forever?’ Drew wondered. ‘Did Julie and Sally go to school together and fight over him from the fifth form?’
‘No, I don’t think so. Della was reminiscing about schooldays a while ago. I was getting her to fill me in on the Food Chain people. I still feel like a newcomer sometimes, even after nearly four years. Anyway, if I remember rightly, Della and Sally knew each other, but Julie’s an incomer like me. She’s from Yorkshire, I think.’
Drew nodded. ‘She has got a bit of an accent, now you mention it.’
‘Oh, and she told me about the older generation, too. Della’s mother’s dead, but she was good friends with practically everyone around here. Hilary Henderson, Maggie, Mary Thomas – they all went to the Grammar School. Della’s got one of those long photos with every single pupil on it. There were only about two hundred in the entire school.’
‘Another world,’ said Drew. ‘I never see anyone I was at school with.’
‘Me neither,’ said Karen. ‘Not that I’d want to, really.’
The removal went very satisfactorily. The woman at the nursing home turned out to be broad-shouldered and good-humoured. She insisted on giving him a cup of tea in her office before they did the deed. ‘Give them time to settle down a bit,’ she smiled. ‘One or two pop back to the rec room for a magazine or their glasses or something.’
‘Did you find the name of the friend?’ he asked. His curiosity had become intense as he’d driven through the Saturday afternoon tourist traffic.
‘Oh yes. I remembered. She used to talk about this woman quite a lot, a few years ago. You know how old people go back in time, and somehow get stuck?’ Drew tilted his head, indicating uncertainty. ‘Well, they do,’ she assured him. ‘Elsie’s been with us for seven years, which is a lot more than usual. She’s ninety-five. Was ninety-five, I should say, poor old love. The friend was someone she knew in her fifties, I think. A much younger woman. They were neighbours, and Elsie minded the little girls. Actually,’ The woman leant forward confidingly across her desk ‘I think there was a lot of very strong feeling between them. On Elsie’s side, anyway. You should have seen her face when she talked about this Gwen …’
‘Gwen?’ Drew’s heart lurched. ‘You did say Gwen?’
‘That’s right. I see you know who we’re talking about. I understand it was rather a celebrated burial. We had to do a bit of research, you see, when Elsie decided she wanted to be buried close to her.’
Drew knew there was only one Gwen buried in his field. And he had ample cause to remember her: she had been the very first body to be interred there. In fact the interment had happened before he’d even opened for business. And Gwen Absolon had been murdered.
‘But surely she’s got family? Or more recent friends?’ He was stunned at the way the memories came flooding back. For several weeks, Gwen Absolon’s name had been acutely significant to him; but that had been three years ago, and he’d hoped he’d forgotten it by now.
The woman shrugged. ‘Evidently not. When we discovered your natural burial ground, and read all about it, she got very excited. I think she’d have wanted to go there regardless of Gwen. It fitted with her outlook, you see. Pity you never knew her. She was a splendid old lady.’
A new and awful idea struck Drew. ‘The daughters. Gwen’s daughters, I mean. Have they been in touch? Do they know Elsie’s here?’
How would he cope if Genevieve Slater turned up again, after everything that had happened between them? And what – oh God, what would Maggs say?
The woman mercifully shook her head. ‘We did write to one of them at an address in North Wales when Elsie was obviously failing, but never got a reply.’
‘So, how did you find out where Gwen was buried?’
‘The Internet, of course. You can find anybody these days. And Gwen was rather a celebrity, not very long ago. The papers were full of her. A search threw up loads of references, right away.’
They carried the defunct Elsie easily down the stairs and out through the back door to Drew’s waiting van. Driving her back to North Staverton, he pondered on life’s coincidences an
d the impossibility of remaining out of sight. Your lapses would always come back to haunt you. He had been mesmerised by Genevieve Slater, Gwen’s daughter, allowing her to manipulate him and draw him into the unsavoury tangle that was her family life. Maggs had watched and warned, to no avail. The only good thing was that Karen had never been fully aware of what was going on. Pregnant with Timmy, at a point of crisis in her own life, she had let Drew work his own problems out.
Or so he had assumed.
CHAPTER NINE
‘New customer?’ Maggs stared at the small body in the cool room in astonishment. ‘Who did the removal with you?’
‘Nobody. The woman at the nursing home. She’s so small, it wasn’t a problem.’
‘My God. What would Daphne say?’
‘Bugger Daphne.’
‘Right. Will you do it or shall we get Den onto it?’
‘Don’t be filthy.’
‘So where’s she going?’
Drew paused long enough for her to notice. She gave him a searching look. ‘Tell me,’ she demanded.
‘It’s a small world,’ he began. ‘It seems she has a friend buried here. A friend from nearly forty years ago. They lived next door, so now she wants to be buried alongside her, too.’
‘Are you going to make me guess?’
‘That’s a good idea.’
‘Drew!’
He sighed. ‘Gwen Absolon. Remember her?’
Maggs clapped her hands like a small child, and crowed. ‘I don’t believe it. Really? What a hoot.’
Drew frowned and said nothing. He’d expected something like this.
‘Is the hellion daughter coming? Does she still know this neighbour lady?’
‘Apparently not, thank God. And I haven’t had time to check that there’s space next to that grave. I suppose there will be.’
‘Course there is,’ Maggs assured him. ‘You’ve been steering clear of that bit of the field for three years now.’
‘No I haven’t. Or not for the reasons you think. I just didn’t want people being ghoulish about it. Luckily most of them seem to have either forgotten the story or never heard it.’
‘People have short memories.’
‘Except for this Elsie Watkins. She hadn’t seen Gwen since about 1960, but suddenly she has to be buried beside her.’
‘What family is there?’
‘There’s a great-nephew in Dubai or somewhere. He’ll probably show up, if only to collect whatever goodies she’s left him.’
‘And pay for the funeral.’
‘With any luck, that too,’ Drew agreed.
With little more to be said on the subject, Drew asked Maggs about her weekend. She suddenly turned coy, and became busy with the morning post. ‘It was fine,’ she said. ‘They let me have a go at milking the cows.’
‘Gracious! On a three-legged stool in a straw-strewn cowshed?’
‘Don’t be stupid. It was very modern. There were lambs, too. Funny ones with long black ears. Blue-faced Leicesters, they’re called.’
‘I’m amazed.’
‘What did you do, then, besides removing the Watkins woman?’
‘Nothing, really. I had a visit from Mrs Grafton. That was interesting. And Karen was there when the police arrested Mary Thomas. And Della phoned this morning saying she didn’t want Karen to have the boys until after lunch, so she’s feeling a bit let down, I think. She’d got all geared up for some heavy duty glueing. Stephanie doesn’t like doing that sort of thing without Finian.’
‘The police arrested Mary Thomas?’ Maggs repeated slowly. ‘Is that the woman from Ferngate?’
‘Right. She seems to be involved in something mysterious. Karen’s got some rather wild ideas about it all.’
‘I thought I was the one with the wild ideas.’ Maggs pouted exaggeratedly.
‘So did I.’ This had all the signs of the last word, and Maggs took it as such. She went to the filing cabinet and extracted the detailed chart that showed precisely which grave was where. As expected, there was empty space on each side of Gwen Absolon’s burial place.
Before she could point this out to Drew, the phone rang. He answered it, saying after a few seconds, ‘Hello, Stanley. Haven’t heard from you for a while … Oh, good. We’ll be over for him tomorrow, then, all being well. Depends on the wife, of course. We can’t keep him here more than a couple of days. I’ll phone her, then. Right. Thanks very much. Bye.’
‘They’ve released Peter Grafton,’ Maggs summarised.
‘Not quite. The inquest is this afternoon. Then, as likely as not, they’ll let us have him.’ Drew screwed up his nose, in a parody of disgust. ‘You know something?’ he said. ‘We haven’t had to deal with a body that’s had a post-mortem – not since …’
‘I know. Gwen Absolon,’ Maggs supplied.
* * *
The new funeral, in addition to the large event that would accompany Peter Grafton’s burial, seemed to send everything off balance. Drew couldn’t help thinking about Genevieve, despite his stern admonitions to himself to stop it. Maggs appeared to find the whole thing both amusing and intriguing, and a side effect of this was a dramatically increased interest in the murder of Peter Grafton. It was as if the reminder of an earlier murder mystery had awakened something dormant in her.
‘Den’s been chatting to his old Inspector – man called Hemsley,’ she told Drew. ‘He thought he might be able to help with the market murder, seeing as how he was more or less there at the time.’
‘And could he? Help, I mean?’
‘Not really, except he knows Karen and she seems to be pretty much involved in the whole thing.’
‘Den doesn’t know Karen very well, though,’ Drew pointed out. ‘He doesn’t know anything about the Food Chain stuff, or why anybody might have killed Grafton.’
‘He soon realised that when Hemsley started asking questions. I think he was a bit sheepish about it. You know what it is, of course.’
‘What?’
‘He’s missing the police. This is the first murder he’s come across since he left, and it’s making him restless. He wants to be in there, like the old days.’
‘Must be a bit strange,’ Drew sympathised.
‘Yeah, well, he should have known this would happen. Now I’ve got to try and distract him.’
‘Oh?’ Drew was careful to keep his face straight. Saucy innuendo between the two of them had always been kept to a minimum. It wasn’t very difficult – Drew usually missed even the most obvious risqué jokes. Karen had pointed this out, years ago, saying she assumed it must go along with being an undertaker.
‘No, no, I just prefer my gratification to come through actual contact, not through words and jokes,’ he’d responded pompously.
This had changed slightly when Maggs moved in with Den. It evened up the balance; they were both now officially with sexual partners and could afford to relax their carefully platonic relationship. Even so, Drew still shied away from overtly prurient remarks.
‘That’s why we went away this weekend, to give him something else to think about,’ she explained seriously. ‘But now we’re back, he’s as bad as ever. Wants to come and talk to Karen, actually. See if he can spot anything significant in what she saw.’
‘But …’ Drew frowned. ‘I’m not sure what she’ll tell him.’
‘I expect it’ll be OK. He says he’ll be very sensitive and low key about it. He’s going to try and get here early this afternoon, and see if he can catch her. Don’t say anything, will you,’ she warned. ‘It’s up to him, if he wants to risk getting told off.’
‘Actually, she might be quite cooperative,’ Drew predicted. ‘She’s been having a few off-the-wall ideas about Mary Thomas, since Saturday, and might want to share them with a professional. She didn’t really get very far with me. I tried to show an interest, but, somehow …’
‘You’re losing it, mate,’ she told him blithely. ‘Getting altogether too middle-aged you are, these days.’
‘
Middle-aged! I’m not even thirty-five yet.’
‘So act it,’ she said. ‘Have a bit of fun, why don’t you.’
Drew blinked, surprised at how much her words stung. ‘Are you saying I’m getting dull?’ he demanded. ‘Me?’
‘I expect it’s only temporary,’ she smiled.
‘Just because I didn’t go off for a romantic weekend rolling in the hay,’ he grumbled. ‘You wait. I’ll show you.’
‘I’ll look forward to that.’
He went back to opening the post, and she put the map of the graves away carefully. The silence became more and more uncomfortable.
Maggs sighed noisily. ‘Don’t forget to phone Mrs Grafton then,’ she said eventually.
‘I’ll wait until late this afternoon – after the inquest. Nothing’s really certain until then.’
‘OK.’
‘We haven’t been of much use to Sally Dabb, have we?’ she said, a few minutes later. ‘Nobody’s asked me about her affair with Peter Grafton, at any rate.’
‘Nor me,’ he agreed. ‘But it’s early days, I suppose.’
‘Will they catch who did it, do you think? Den can’t see it. There aren’t really enough bits of evidence. Unless they get some inside information. I suppose that’s the way they usually solve crimes, when you think about it. They can’t do much otherwise.’ She was prattling, talking as much to herself as to Drew, as she copied Elsie Watkins’ details into their record book.
‘They might find the crossbow,’ he said vaguely.
‘Well, I really do think it’s all very exciting,’ she burst out, slamming the updated volume closed. ‘There must be a connection between the farmers’ market and SuperFare. I mean, it could be some kind of food politics, couldn’t it? Somebody trying to stop something that could cost them money. Like – what if the supermarket was feeling threatened by the success of Karen’s lot. They’d try some dirty tricks, wouldn’t they?’