Groaning Spinney
Page 1
Contents
Cover
About the Book
About the Author
Also by Gladys Mitchell
Vintage Murder Mysteries
Title Page
1. Mrs. Bradley takes a Christmas Vacation
2. The Shape of Things to Come
3. The Expected Begins to Happen
4. The Ghost faces East
5. Parson’s Farewell
6. Saturday’s Child
7. No Names, No Packdrill
8. Reappearance of a Housekeeper
9. Bridge of Sighs
10. Peculiar Persons
11. What’s in a Name?
12. Enter Two Gravediggers
13. The Dragon’s Teeth are Sown
14. The Beginning of the End
15. The Gun
16. The History of Worry
17. Point-to-Point
18. The Hunt is Up
19. Goblin Market
20. A View to a Death
Copyright
About the Book
Christmas in the Cotswolds brings with it the apparition of a country parson, a series of poison pen letters, and a woman’s body frozen in the snow. The eminent psychologist and superior sleuth Mrs Bradley has a theory about who’s behind all three and sets about a plan to ensnare the unseasonal villain.
About the Author
Gladys Maude Winifred Mitchell – or ‘The Great Gladys’ as Philip Larkin called her – was born in 1901, in Cowley in Oxfordshire. She graduated in history from University College London and in 1921 began her long career as a teacher. She studied the works of Sigmund Freud and attributed her interest in witchcraft to the influence of her friend, the detective novelist Helen Simpson.
Her first novel, Speedy Death, was published in 1929 and introduced readers to Beatrice Adela Lestrange Bradley, the heroine of a further sixty six crime novels. She wrote at least one novel a year throughout her career and was an early member of the Detection Club, alongside Agatha Christie, G.K Chesterton and Dorothy Sayers. In 1961 she retired from teaching and, from her home in Dorset, continued to write, receiving the Crime Writers’ Association Silver Dagger in 1976. Gladys Mitchell died in 1983.
ALSO BY GLADYS MITCHELL
Speedy Death
The Mystery of a Butcher’s Shop
The Longer Bodies
The Saltmarsh Murders
Death and the Opera
The Devil at Saxon Wall
Dead Men’s Morris
Come Away, Death
St Peter’s Finger
Printer’s Error
Hangman’s Curfew
When Last I Died
Laurels Are Poison
The Worsted Viper
Sunset Over Soho
My Father Sleeps
The Rising of the Moon
Here Comes a Chopper
Death and the Maiden
Tom Brown’s Body
Groaning Spinney
The Devil’s Elbow
The Echoing Strangers
Merlin’s Furlong
Watson’s Choice
Faintley Speaking
Twelve Horses and the Hangman’s Noose
The Twenty-Third Man
Spotted Hemlock
The Man Who Grew Tomatoes
Say It With Flowers
The Nodding Canaries
My Bones Will Keep
Adders on the Heath
Death of the Delft Blue
Pageant of a Murder
The Croaking Raven
Skeleton Island
Three Quick and Five Dead
Dance to Your Daddy
Gory Dew
Lament for Leto
A Hearse on May-Day
The Murder of Busy Lizzie
Winking at the Brim
A Javelin for Jonah
Convent on Styx
Late, Late in the Evening
Noonday and Night
Fault in the Structure
Wraiths and Changelings
Mingled With Venom
The Mudflats of the Dead
Nest of Vipers
Uncoffin’d Clay
The Whispering Knights
Lovers, Make Moan
The Death-Cap Dancers
The Death of a Burrowing Mole
Here Lies Gloria Mundy
Cold, Lone and Still
The Greenstone Griffins
The Crozier Pharaohs
No Winding-Sheet
VINTAGE MURDER MYSTERIES
With the sign of a human skull upon its back and a melancholy shriek emitted when disturbed, the Death’s Head Hawkmoth has for centuries been a bringer of doom and an omen of death - which is why we chose it as the emblem for our Vintage Murder Mysteries.
Some say that its appearance in King George III’s bedchamber pushed him into madness. Others believe that should its wings extinguish a candle by night, those nearby will be cursed with blindness. Indeed its very name, Acherontia atropos, delves into the most sinister realms of Greek mythology: Acheron, the River of Pain in the underworld, and Atropos, the Fate charged with severing the thread of life.
The perfect companion, then, for our Vintage Murder Mysteries sleuths, for whom sinister occurrences are never far away and murder is always just around the corner …
MORE VINTAGE MURDER MYSTERIES
EDMUND CRISPIN
Buried for Pleasure
The Case of the Gilded Fly
Holy Disorders
Love Lies Bleeding
The Moving Toyshop
Swan Song
A. A. MILNE
The Red House Mystery
GLADYS MITCHELL
Speedy Death
The Mystery of a Butcher’s Shop
The Longer Bodies
The Saltmarsh Murders
Death and the Opera
The Devil at Saxon Wall
Dead Men’s Morris
Come Away, Death
St Peter’s Finger
Brazen Tongue
Hangman’s Curfew
When Last I Died
Laurels Are Poison
Here Comes a Chopper
Death and the Maiden
Tom Brown’s Body
Groaning Spinney
The Devil’s Elbow
The Echoing Strangers
Watson’s Choice
The Twenty-Third Man
Spotted Hemlock
My Bones Will Keep
Three Quick and Five Dead
Dance to Your Daddy
A Hearse on May-Day
Late, Late in the Evening
Fault in the Structure
Nest of Vipers
MARGERY ALLINGHAM
Mystery Mile
Police at the Funeral
Sweet Danger
Flowers for the Judge
The Case of the Late Pig
The Fashion in Shrouds
Traitor’s Purse
Coroner’s Pidgin
More Work for the Undertaker
The Tiger in the Smoke
The Beckoning Lady
Hide My Eyes
The China Governess
The Mind Readers
Cargo of Eagles
E. F. BENSON
The Blotting Book
The Luck of the Vails
NICHOLAS BLAKE
A Question of Proof
Thou Shell of Death
There’s Trouble Brewing
The Beast Must Die
The Smiler With the Knife
Malice in Wonderland
The Case of the Abominable Snowman
Minute for Murder
Head of a Traveller
The Dreadful Hollow
The Whisper in the Gloom
End of Chapter
The Widow’s Cruise
The Worm of Death
The Sad Variety
The Morning After Death
GLADYS MITCHELL
Groaning Spinney
1. Mrs. Bradley takes a Christmas Vacation
*
‘Go, stop the swift-winged moments in their flight
To their yet unknown coast, go hinder night
From its approach on day.’
William Habington
* * *
MRS. BEATRICE ADELA LESTRANGE Bradley tapped with the corner of a stiff envelope on the edge of her writing desk. It was very seldom that she found difficulty in coming to a decision, but on this occasion she was conscious of doubt and hesitation.
She put the envelope down, took up a foolscap envelope instead, re-opened it, and re-read the letter it contained—an invitation to a conference of educational psychiatrists in Stockholm. The letter was warmly expressed, Mrs. Bradley had spent an autumn and early winter in special and most fascinating research, and she badly wanted to attend the conference, whose views, generally speaking, would not accord with her own, but whose members would be interested in, if argumentative on, what she would have to say.
On the other hand, there was the invitation from the Cotswolds. Mrs. Bradley’s three marriages had provided her with a vast and varied tribe of spirited and gifted in-laws, some of whom she liked. The stiff envelope contained a letter from her favourite nephew who had obliged her by marrying the young woman of her choice. Mrs. Bradley had greatly desired to find place in the family circle for the lovely Deborah Cloud, and her nephew Jonathan had been the vehicle for this inclusion. That he had chosen Deborah for his own and not for his aunt’s reasons delighted that powerful but scrupulous mediator almost more than the actual fulfilment of her wishes.
‘Now we’ve somewhere to live, won’t you please come and spend Christmas? We are combining a Christmas party with a general house-warming, and are particularly anxious to have you,’ Jonathan had written. ‘Good company, Deb looking her best, and, what’s more, I’ve achieved a bottle of Scotch, and if you stay until New Year’s Day I swear you shall have a haggis.
‘P.S. We don’t care how many of your pet cases are going to collect delirium tremens at the festive season, or how many conferences you want to attend in January. Blood is thicker than water, and you always said you would visit us as soon as we were settled. You also promised to stay a good long time. So what about it? If coming, don’t bother to reply.’
Mrs. Bradley rarely acted on impulse and was averse to solving her difficulties by indulging in superstitious practices, but on this occasion her mind was so divided that she suddenly picked up two long spills from a jar near the fireplace and tossed them into the air. One landed on the rug and the other fluttered on to the writing desk. The tiny kitten on the hearth immediately pounced, and began to play with the spill on the rug.
‘If you’ve got the longer one I’ll go to Sweden, if the shorter, I’ll go to the Cotswolds,’ pronounced Mrs. Bradley, solemnly. She picked up the kitten and took away the spill. She measured it against the one which had landed on the writing desk. The spill which the kitten had captured was the shorter by almost an inch. Mrs. Bradley took up a telegraph form, scribbled rapidly on it, and rang the bell. She handed the form to her secretary with instructions to send the telegram at once. Then she seated herself, picked up the kitten and the two spills, looked thoughtful for a moment, and then, putting down the tiny animal, she looked closely at the two spills, which were home-made from strips of newspaper. Then she untwisted the ends.
‘Oh, dear!’ she said aloud. ‘Now what have I done?’
The end of the shorter spill had been doubled over. As she straightened it out she discovered that the actual length came to several inches more than the length of that which she had decided at first was the longer spill.
‘It ought to have been Sweden, after all!’ she thought, with some amusement, crumpling the spills and throwing them into the basket.
‘Well, the telegram’s gone,’ said her secretary, when Mrs. Bradley told her what had happened. ‘And I’m very glad. You need a holiday. You can go to Sweden next year!’
Jonathan Bradley and his wife Deborah had been lucky. A great estate in the Cotswolds had been offered for sale in two lots. Two-thirds of the property and the huge modern house had been sold to the Ministry of Education, but the remaining third of the land and the original manor house had been purchased by Mrs. Bradley’s nephew. It lay in typical Cotswold country, hilly yet gloriously open. It was partly wooded, had a dashing stream, and offered some shooting and the chance of going out with the local Hunt.
Jonathan and his wife had bought their share of the estate in January, had moved in in April, and had purposely refrained from inviting guests until they felt that they were settled and at home.
The month was now December, and Mrs. Bradley arrived two days before Christmas Eve. She travelled by train, for her chauffeur had been given Christmas leave, and she had deliberately made no mention to her nephew of the time of her train, for his house was miles from Cheltenham, (her terminus), and she disliked to cause inconvenience.
Jonathan Bradley, however, was at the station to meet her.
‘Deb wanted to come,’ he observed, ‘but I didn’t know whether I’d picked the right train. You didn’t say, and I thought it was a bit too cold for her to hang about draughty stations. I wish I’d brought her now.’
He took Mrs. Bradley out to his car, and saw her luggage put on. A few minutes later the car was slipping like a homing cat across the Oxford-Gloucester turning, past a fifteenth-century barn, past a country bus-shelter, and so along the Cirencester Road.
Great slopes brooded dreamily upon their lost summer treasure of wheat, clover and barley; little by-roads sloped quietly up or down to Coberley, Elkstone, Brimpsfield and Compton Abdale. After half an hour’s driving, some deep woods, a lodge with its drive, a full stream at the bottom of steep banks, a straggle of black pine trees, a desolate farm, a narrower road, a sandy turning, and the entrance to a long and uphill lane, brought the car on to Jonathan’s land.
The car crept onward up the steep, uneven lane. Mrs. Bradley, seated beside her tall and black-haired nephew, looked out of the window with interest. To her left ran another small wood. On the right the treeless ground curved almost voluptuously downward to another noisy little stream.
‘That turns the mill,’ said Jonathan, jerking his head towards the sound. ‘We’ve got a mill, a smithy, the pub and the post-office. Quite a model village, all told.’
As the rise mounted and the wood was left behind, the wet green slopes of the country filled the landscape. At the top of the rise was a grey and snow-filled sky, and, as the car climbed and the hills changed their contours, Mrs. Bradley saw two small houses, one on either side of the way.
‘What do you think of it?’ asked Jonathan, touching his horn as the car approached the houses, and then changing gear as the slope became more gentle and a drive took the place of the lane.
‘Desolate, enchanted, apt and supernormal,’ replied his relative, gazing raptly at the charged and lowering sky.
‘Apt for what?’
‘For treason, magic, stratagems and snow. Who lives at the lodges now?’
‘Will North, the gamekeeper, lives in the left-hand one. He’s a grand chap. I’ve been out with him several times already and always had good sport. The other one belongs to the Woottons, Abel and Harry. They garden for us and for the College. Deb likes gardening, fortunately, so for us they don’t do very much. They chop stuff down and burn it, and they tackle most of the digging. They work at the College mostly, but I was asked to let them stay on here at their cottage. They’re most steady, respectable chaps. Abel is a widower with one kid, a boy of twelve. Harry is a bachelor. They’ve a sister who keeps the lodge at the College gates, and they go up there for their dinner more times
than not. The sister’s a dragon, but she has a keen sense of duty, sees that her brothers toe the line and don’t spend their money at the pub, and she mends the kid’s clothes and makes him go to Church and get to school early and that sort of thing, you know. I really hardly see what they’d do without her.’
‘Who looks after Will North?’ Mrs. Bradley enquired.
‘Oh, Will? He’s self-sufficient. Cooks and cleans, and is all kinds of a handyman. He gets food from our cook when he wants it, but he’s remarkably independent, and a wonder with a gun or with snares. The last owner used to rear pheasants, but I don’t know what happens now. Will finds me one or two to pop at, but the woods are no longer preserved. You can’t get the food for the birds.’
‘I think I shall like Will North.’
‘I’m sure you will. He’s a bachelor, sensible bloke!—and cares for nothing much except his dog and his ferrets. He’s got what he calls his Dogs’ Cemetery behind those bushes you saw by the drive. Properly-dug, deep graves, headboards, last messages and all. If he takes a fancy to you you’ll be shown it, I shouldn’t be surprised.’
The drive curved in almost a semi-circle, and Mrs. Bradley had her first sight of the house which her nephew had purchased.
It was of stone, and had the high gables and beautiful greyness of all early Cotswold manors. It had been built in 1560, but was simply designed and had the bareness and austerity of even earlier days.
Its tiles were of stone, too, and had weathered to a mellowness which was absent from the stark walls and the Tudor drip-stones above the windows. A broad archway led to the stables, and there was a large dovecot, almost the size of a cottage, at the side of the house. There was a row of plain stone shields cut just above the square-headed Tudor doorway, and beneath them was the lovely Deborah Bradley, waiting to welcome home the travellers.
‘This is grand!’ said Deborah, greeting Mrs. Bradley. ‘I betted Jon you wouldn’t come! I said you’d be off on a toot to some conference or other. Do tell me what worked the charm!’
Mrs. Bradley told the tale of the kitten and the two spills.