Tainted Ground

by Margaret Duffy

  I thanked her again, wished her a speedy recovery and went back into the living room.

  ‘He’s gone,’ Brandon said. ‘Asked me to tell you he’s having a look round outside.’

  I surveyed him slumped in his chair doing a fair impression of a couple of hundredweight of gone-off lard and said, ‘It’s lunchtime and your sick wife is hungry. There’s bread, ham, butter and salad in the fridge. Fix!’

  And walked out, slamming the door hard.

  Patrick was rooting around in the hedge. ‘I was wondering about the murder weapon,’ he said when he saw me. ‘You never know where things are going to end up but I expect Carrick’s lot did a full sweep along here this morning. Shall we talk to the people upstairs?’

  Both flats on the first floor had been sealed off by Carrick’s team. We carried on up the stairs to a wide landing with more plants and paused to look out of the large floor-to-ceiling window. There was a good view over the car park below and beyond, on rising ground, stretched the southern side of the village crowned by the church spire.

  There was no response to either doorbell being rung.

  ‘These people are not yet suspects,’ Patrick said, partly to himself, stepping back from the door of number six. ‘Therefore I won’t use my skeleton keys to gain entry and have a look around as I might have done in the good, bad old days. And for all we know everyone’s still in bed and has no intention of answering the door.’

  ‘It might not be any kind of lead but Mrs Brandon had an idea Janet Manley told her that her husband had been in the police.’

  ‘I’ll check up on that before we do anything else,’ Patrick said, but before he could reach for his mobile the door across the landing opened, revealing a man wearing a bathrobe.

  ‘Sorry, I was in the shower,’ he said. ‘Are you the police?’

  Patrick introduced us.

  ‘I thought you’d be back.’ He spoke with just a hint of a French accent. ‘I am Pascal Lapointe,’ he went on. ‘This is my partner, Lorna Church.’ Here he gestured in the direction of an attractive woman, also attired in a bathrobe, who was making coffee in the adjoining open-plan kitchen. ‘Do sit down. Is it too late in the morning for coffee for you?’

  We accepted even though by this time it was actually early afternoon.

  ‘We didn’t know these unfortunate people well, you understand,’ Lapointe began by saying when he had seated himself. Lorna had gone away to get dressed. ‘The truth is that we felt sorry for Chris and Janet. They did not say a lot but we got the impression they felt themselves exiled here, not really suited to country living, after a life in the city – London, I think it was.’

  ‘Their choice, surely,’ Patrick said.

  A Gallic shrug. ‘Ah, but there is a difference between retirement and exile, yes?’

  ‘Do you think they were running away from something?’ I enquired.

  ‘Perhaps. But you must understand, this is just my own thoughts. Lorna says I have an overactive imagination.’

  I was not alone there, then.

  ‘We asked them up here on a couple of occasions. We have gatherings of friends, mostly from Bristol where we both work. You can love the rural life but it can be too quiet. Sometimes there has to be good conversation and plenty of good food, music and wine.’

  ‘They didn’t really fit in to that either,’ said Lorna, reappearing all at once wearing a black velour tracksuit and big fluffy pink slippers. They made an attractive couple; he slim and tanned, she a Nigella Lawson lookalike.

  ‘You are just a little bit snobby,’ Lapointe told her.

  She pouted. ‘It’s true, though. Neither of them had any conversation and if you’re honest you’d admit they didn’t really enjoy themselves. They didn’t like the food, didn’t know what they were drinking and didn’t even come properly dressed. Even you said that the English live in jeans and T-shirts whatever the occasion.’

  ‘And the other man?’ Patrick said. ‘Keith Davies? Did you invite him up here too?’

  Lapointe shook his head emphatically. ‘No. At least – and I think you will find this strange – I sometimes got the impression that he was not far away. I once opened the front door when we had a crowd here as it was a very warm summer’s evening and the flat was stuffy even though we had all the windows open, and he was out on the landing, smoking.’

  ‘He wasn’t our sort at all,’ Lorna drawled.

  ‘But there must have been a connection between the three of them,’ Patrick said. ‘Perhaps he felt left out and that was his way of letting you know.’

  ‘He did not appear to be a sociable person,’ said Lapointe. ‘He—’

  ‘You said,’ Lorna interrupted, ‘that he was as rough as rats and you wouldn’t want him here.’

  ‘Perhaps I was a little annoyed at the time and hasty in my judgement,’ he told her, giving her a reproving look.

  ‘Did the Manleys mention him at all?’ I asked.

  ‘I can’t remember them doing so.’

  ‘Did they all go around together?’

  ‘I saw him driving them in their car on several occasions.’

  At which point my overactive imagination kicked in and produced a quite bizarre theory. But this was not the time to air it.

  ‘Did you go out on Thursday night?’ Patrick asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Lorna said. ‘We went to the pub for a meal.’

  ‘The Ring O’Bells in the village?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘What time did you get back?’

  ‘It was quite early – I think at about a quarter to ten.’

  ‘No, it was much later than that,’ Lapointe interposed. ‘Around ten thirty.’

  ‘Are you sure, darling? I thought—’

  ‘You’ve forgotten. I wanted to see a TV programme,’ he said with an air of finality.

  The rest of the questioning was routine. Neither of them had seen any strange people during the past few days, or even weeks, the only visitor to the mill, to their knowledge, having been the boyfriend of the occupant of the other top-floor flat, Tamsin Roper. He apparently was a naval officer by the name of Owen, whom they thought had been on leave and staying with her.

  ‘I think you will find they’ve gone to see Tamsin’s mother in Bath today,’ said Lapointe. ‘They’re taking her out to lunch as it’s her birthday.’

  ‘And Tamsin herself told you all this?’ Lorna asked with another pout.

  ‘Last week,’ Lapointe answered evenly but speaking quite loudly. ‘She’s our neighbour. I talk to her.’

  We left before war was declared.

  ‘Miss Roper will have to wait,’ Patrick said as we descended the stairs.

  ‘To whom did the cars belong?’

  He consulted the notebook. ‘The BMW belongs to the Dewittes, the Discovery to Lapointe, the Audi to the Brandons and the Ford to Tamsin Roper. They must have gone to Bath in the boyfriend’s car. So either the victims’ vehicles were stolen by whoever killed them or someone on this side of the law had them removed and forgot to mention it to Carrick.’

  ‘Lorna doesn’t appear to have a car of her own, then?’

  ‘Perhaps he drives her to work. It might be off the road. Who knows? We can ask her if it becomes important. Do we now go and batter Brian Stonelake for Elspeth?’

  ‘Can I share an idea with you first?’

  ‘Fire away.’

  ‘The murder victims are a couple where the bloke might have been in the police, plus Keith Davies, who’s done time. Do we have a bent copper, his wife and their minder burying themselves in Somerset as things got too hot on the home patch?’

  ‘That’s a passable theory. But why were they killed?’

  ‘Revenge? Was Davies part of a gang? Were they all lying low because someone was out for their blood or until they could access some hidden ill-gotten gains?’

  ‘You said something along those lines earlier but I thought you were trying to wind James up.’

  ‘That’s the last thing
I’m going to do! No, I was sort of joking in an effort to lighten the atmosphere a bit, but, on reflection, it ought to be borne in mind.’

  ‘The bodies didn’t show any signs of violence that would suggest they had been tortured for the whereabouts of anything like that before they were killed.’

  ‘There’s every chance they could have volunteered the information. In exchange for their lives, perhaps. Only—’ I stopped speaking, the mental images I was creating unbearable.

  ‘We could ask Brian Stonelake if anyone’s been digging holes on his farm recently.’

  ‘Digging holes?’ Stonelake said, giving every indication of puzzlement. ‘No, I don’t think so. Why should they? I used to get folk looking for mushrooms in the autumn and the odd metal-detector nutter, but that’s all. I sent them on their way, don’t you worry.’

  Within roughly five seconds of meeting the farmer I had decided, rightly or wrongly, that here was no true son of the soil. I was probably biased by the truly hideous barn he and his father had built and in so doing swept away hundreds of years of rural history, but he did himself no favours. A shambling, unshaven beanpole of a man, he looked so shifty that if someone had informed me he was involved with running rackets on East End greyhound tracks I would have believed them. I told myself sternly that this was my first lesson in not pre-judging people and prepared to give him the benefit of every smallest doubt.

  ‘But you haven’t lived there for a while,’ Patrick said.

  ‘No, but I still take a walk round the place most days, especially up by the house. Can’t think why you lot want to search there – it’s quite a way from the yard where the bodies were found.’

  ‘Did you know the murder victims?’ Patrick asked.

  The interior of the bungalow, as so often happens when the place is rented, had an unhomely feel to it, boxes stacked everywhere, some open and with the contents spilling out as though Stonelake had rummaged in them, looking for things. The beer opener? No, no, I berated myself.

  The living room was comparatively tidy and contained some good pieces of furniture, antiques, but these had been pushed to the walls in haphazard fashion and were covered in dust. With difficulty I refrained from removing a half-drunk mug of tea, cold-looking, that had been placed on the top of a rather fine mahogany chest of drawers.

  ‘No,’ Stonelake said in response to the question, ‘I only know that they lived in the village. How long are you lot going to be in the barn? There’s a bloke coming to look over the place in a couple of days’ time.’

  ‘I couldn’t tell you,’ Patrick replied. ‘And it’ll take quite a while to search the whole farm.’

  ‘You didn’t answer my question – what the hell d’you have to do that for?’

  ‘Mr Stonelake, three people have been butchered on your property. One item we will be searching for is the murder weapon.’

  Stonelake threw himself sulkily into a chair.

  ‘Have any dodgy people shown an interest in buying the farm?’ Patrick went on. We remained standing, mostly because the rest of the seating was occupied by clothing, newspapers and a large and smelly dog that was either asleep or moribund.

  ‘No, no one like that. I haven’t had much interest at all. Farming’s in a dreadful way. That’s why I’m selling up now my mother’s gone into a home. With a bit of luck I’ll be able to flog off most of the land for housing but knowing my luck that would go against green-belt rules or some other crap like that.’ He hurled a nearby phone book at the dog, which lunged to its feet and half fell off the sofa, sending things in all directions.

  Once upon a time Patrick would have probably hefted Stonelake out of his chair and shaken him until his worn dentures rattled. Sadly, as far as this instance was concerned, he could no longer do so.

  ‘Bloody thing,’ Stonelake muttered. ‘It’s Mother’s and if she didn’t keep asking how it is I’d take it out and shoot it. Turned up one night, starving, and they took it in. Still, when the old lady goes a bit more ga-ga—’ He broke off and eyed the animal meaningfully, and as if knowing what was being said it slunk nervously off into a corner.

  Patrick brushed some of the hairs and dried mud from the seat vacated by the dog and sat down on the edge of it, staring hard at the other man. ‘Your farm has a bit of a history, hasn’t it?’ he said. ‘Bodies have been found there before – in the old barn that was demolished to make way for the new one. Suicides, a tramp, a suspicious death. Rather more than coincidences, in the light of what’s happened, wouldn’t you say?’

  Stonelake shrugged dismissively, not meeting Patrick’s gaze. ‘I heard about those but they were bloody years ago. Mum used to talk about it after she’d done some research in Bath library for something she wrote in the parish rag. Dad told her she musn’t have enough to do at home if she was bothering with it, and I certainly wasn’t interested.’

  Patrick said, ‘The murder victims were hanging by their heels and had been butchered like animals. Their throats were cut and two of them had had their heads almost severed. Have you ever employed anyone who had worked in a slaughterhouse? Anyone like that who might have a grudge against you and would try to implicate you in a violent crime?’

  This was more like it, I thought, the questioner giving the impression that if no useful response was forthcoming then the man he was talking to might suddenly find himself dangling upside down from the ceiling.

  ‘There was Shaun Brown,’ Stonelake said, ‘but that was a while back now. He helped me a couple of winters ago, with the cattle. He’d worked at one time for a meat-packing plant at Warminster, killing pigs, but I had no problems with the bloke. He wasn’t strange in the head or anything like that. Not knife-happy or likely to go off and kill folk. Why should he be? It’s an honest living.’

  ‘You parted on good terms, then?’

  ‘Well, no, not really. I had an idea he’d helped himself to some diesel – you know the red diesel farmers use? – for his van and we had words. He went off in a paddy and I never saw him again. Heard he was back at the meat plant.’

  Patrick glanced at me and I wondered if he was thinking the same, that we had probably heard only an edited version of what had happened. Had Stonelake withheld wages to pay for the alleged theft?

  ‘Oh, come to think about it I do know about the body that was found back in the sixties,’ Stonelake went on, almost eagerly. ‘I’d left school by then and was helping the old man. He found it, a bloke who was missing from home in Bristol. He’d been a real no-gooder by all accounts and had got into dealing drugs. Done time for it. There wasn’t a mark on him and I seem to remember they ended up not knowing how he’d died. It was freezing that weekend and he was a scraggy little git so perhaps the cold got him.’

  ‘Did you see the body?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes, I ran in the barn when I heard Dad shout. He was lying there all stiff like one of those things in shop windows.’

  ‘And you?’ Patrick said. ‘You have a criminal record as well?’

  I had an idea he was ready in case the other vented any fury on the hapless dog but Stonelake remained where he was, staring at the window behind Patrick’s head.

  ‘A driving ban for a year when I was a lot younger,’ he finally admitted. ‘You know … young and hot-headed.’

  ‘Anything else?’ Patrick enquired.

  ‘No. You lot once tried to pin thieving fence posts on me but you couldn’t make it stick.’

  ‘I see. So you didn’t once blast someone you thought might be a poacher with a shotgun.’

  At this Stonelake did see red. ‘That was gossip! Hearsay! The police never became involved with that. How did you hear about it?’

  ‘Well, seeing as you’ve asked I’ll tell you. It was me you took the shot at.’

  ‘You!’ Stonelake’s face assumed a rather ghastly pallor.

  ‘Yes, I was taking a short cut one evening through the woods down by the river. Fortunately only half a dozen pellets actually landed and I didn’t get much sympathy at
home as I’d been warned that both you and your father were trigger-happy.’

  ‘We were always having people breaking down the fences after rabbits and pheasants in those days.’

  ‘Oh, I didn’t expect you to apologize,’ Patrick said and rose to his feet. ‘Chief Inspector Carrick should be searching the farmhouse and other outbuildings right now and if he finds anything that incriminates you I assure you I’ll be back.’

  On the way out the dog gazed up at him and, fleetingly, Patrick’s long fingers gently stroked its head.

  Four

  ‘Is that true?’ I asked when we were in the car.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Why didn’t your father call the police?’

  ‘Because he had an idea Barney Stonelake knocked his wife around, Vera often coming to church with bruises that she explained away by saying how clumsy she was getting. I seem to remember I was given the usual anaesthetic, a tot of whisky, and sent along to the doctor’s. The pellets had only just penetrated my skin and GPs did that kind of first aid in those days.’

  ‘It must have been when your parents first moved to the village and you were sort of between the police and the army.’

  ‘Yes, I was living at home for a few weeks. I suppose there was a wish on their part, being quite newly arrived, not to make too many unpleasant waves.’

  ‘I’m still surprised you didn’t go and sort him out yourself.’

  ‘I do as my mum and dad tell me even now, don’t I?’

  I had to smile. ‘Prejudice apart, what d’you make of him?’

  ‘I think I have to agree with Elspeth’s view – he’s a nasty piece of work.’

  ‘He could be involved in the killings.’

  ‘Easily – my only reservations being whether he’d be stupid enough to agree to have something like that happen right on his own doorstep.’

  Well, perhaps not so close to home after all. We were surprised to discover that the old farmhouse was situated at least a quarter of a mile from the scene of the killings, later explained when we found out that the old barn that had been demolished to make way for the new one had originally belonged to an ancient steading not part of Hagtop Farm, the amalgamation having occurred in the eighteenth century.