Old Sins, Long Memories

by Angela Arney

  ‘Mum said to come because you might have some work,’ he said, in a surprisingly well educated and cultured voice. His mother and younger brother Wayne had the soft, slow drawl of the area; the long vowel sounds, typical of a Hampshire accent. Tarquin, on the other hand, sounded as if he’d had elocution lessons.

  ‘It’s only gardening, I’m afraid,’ said Lizzie. ‘You won’t earn a fortune.’

  The semblance of a smile fluttered momentarily across Tarquin’s features. ‘I gave up any hope of earning a fortune years ago,’ he said, in a resigned tone of voice. ‘But I like gardening, and anyway, it’s the only thing I can do. I’m not much use at anything else.’

  Lizzie led the way through the cottage to the back where the garden stretched down to a small stream, which formed the bottom boundary of her property. They stood in silence for a moment regarding the wilderness. Then Lizzie spoke. ‘I have to confess,’ she told him, ‘that the only gardening I’ve ever done is buy plants every spring from a garden centre, put them in pots around a paved area, and then try to remember to water them at regular intervals. My house in London didn’t have much of a garden.’

  Tarquin stood, hands in jean pockets. A cold northerly wind blew and Lizzie shivered, pulling her jacket more tightly around her. Tarquin, however, seemed oblivious. Then he said, ‘This house used to have a lovely garden years ago when the Walshes lived here.’

  The remark puzzled Lizzie. ‘I thought a Mrs Burnett lived here until she died recently, and that you used to tidy the garden for her.’

  ‘I did. But the Walshes lived here before her. It was then that the garden was lovely. Sometimes Niall and I used to help a bit, but mostly we played tennis.’ He waved a hand in the direction of the field at the side of the cottage behind the privet hedge. ‘That was a tennis court in those days.’ He took a few steps and peered over the hedge into the empty field. ‘All overgrown now. Nothing left to remind anyone of what it used to be like. Even the gate through the hedge has gone. Grown over by privet.’

  ‘That field doesn’t belong to me,’ said Lizzie.

  Tarquin sighed. ‘No. Mrs Burnett sold it to Towles Farm but they’ve done nothing with it and now it’ll never be a tennis court again.’

  He sounded wistful, and Lizzie watched him as he stood moodily surveying the scene. There was something about him. He didn’t fit in with the family she’d seen at Candover House. But it was more than that. There was a mantle of melancholy hanging over him. She shivered again.

  ‘Who was Niall?’ she asked, tucking her hands into the sleeves of her jacket.

  ‘The Walshes’ son. We were at school together. His dad paid my fees at Willhampton Private Grammar.’ So that’s how he acquired the educated accent, thought Lizzie. ‘I was company for Niall.’

  ‘And Niall was company for you,’ said Lizzie.

  Tarquin was silent. He seemed lost in thoughts of the past. Then he said softly, ‘Yes. We were inseparable until. . . .’ He stopped, took a deep breath, took both his hands out of his pockets, looked uncomfortable, and scuffed about in the grass with his feet. It was as if he had suddenly realized who he was talking to, and regretted his confidence.

  ‘Yes, until?’ prompted Lizzie, curiosity aroused.

  ‘Until he moved away,’ said Tarquin abruptly. The shuttered expression on his face told her that he would say no more.

  ‘Well, let’s get back to the subject of the garden,’ she said briskly. ‘Is there anything you can do at the moment, or is it the wrong time of year?’

  ‘I can do a bit of clearing, and I can cut the hedge back. Best get that done before the birds start nesting in the spring. But the main part will have to be left until later next year.’ He looked over at the greenhouse, which stood a little way back from the cottage with a shed beside it. ‘Last time I was here that was in pretty good shape. If you get some oil, I’ll light the heater and get some plants going in there. Then they’ll be ready for bedding out in the spring.’

  ‘You’re on,’ said Lizzie. ‘I’ll get the paraffin tomorrow morning from the garage.’ She held out her hand. ‘I’ll give you seven pounds an hour, cash in hand. Is that okay?’

  Tarquin held out his hand and grasped Lizzie’s. ‘Done, as long as you promise you won’t shop me to the benefit people.’

  ‘I promise. But whatever makes you think I’d do that?’

  ‘You’re a doctor. You’re part of the “establishment”, and establishment figures always stick to the letter of the law.’

  ‘Not when they desperately need a gardener, they don’t,’ said Lizzie. ‘Cash in hand it is, and mum’s the word.’

  ‘Thanks, I appreciate it.’

  They walked slowly back into the house, or rather Tarquin walked slowly. It seemed to Lizzie that he was almost reluctant to leave the garden and its memories. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ she heard herself offering against her better judgement. What was the matter with her? She had plenty of things to do, without inviting a dejected young man in for tea. Half of her belongings were still in boxes stacked on the floor. She should be unpacking.

  ‘Thanks,’ he said again, then lapsed back into silence as he followed her into the kitchen.

  Lizzie put the kettle on and got down two mugs from the dresser. The letter box on the front door clattered announcing the arrival of the evening paper. Lizzie retrieved it and put it on the table. She was finding Tarquin’s mournful silence rather unnerving. ‘Have a look at the paper if you want,’ she said, ‘while I make the tea.’

  She turned away and poured the boiling water into the pot. Behind her a strangled cry echoed through the kitchen. It was Tarquin. If she’d thought he was pale before it was nothing compared to the colour of his face now. He was a ghastly slate grey.

  ‘Darren!’ he croaked. ‘Darren’s been murdered.’ Lizzie saw the newspaper spread out on the table. It was the headline in the Stibbington Times: Local Man Murdered In His Own Home – No Motive – Who Will Be Next?

  Pulling out a kitchen chair she forced a trembling Tarquin to sit down. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘Was he a friend of yours?’

  ‘Yes . . . no. We were all. . . .’ His voice tailed off into silence. Then he said in a dull voice. ‘He wasn’t a close friend. We went to school together, me, Niall, and Darren.’

  For someone who wasn’t a close friend, Lizzie thought, Tarquin had reacted very violently. In fact, quite unnaturally. She chose her words carefully. ‘In a small place like this, where everyone knows everyone else, it’s bound to be a shock when something horrible happens on your own doorstep.’ How well had Tarquin really known Darren Evans? Well enough to be shaken to the core by his death, that much was plain to see.

  ‘Yes,’ he said slowly, ‘it’s a shock. Darren and I were not what you would call really good friends, but we still saw each other quite often, although we kept ourselves to ourselves. I never knew what he was thinking, and I don’t suppose he even guessed at my thoughts.’ He turned his pale face to Lizzie. ‘It’s true everyone does know everyone else, but at the same time no one truly knows anyone. You know, sometimes I think we are all living on our own separate little planets. We’re surrounded by people and yet we’re completely alone. Darren was alone. I’m alone. Sometimes it seems to me that there’s no point in living at all. Why do we do it? Why are we even born?’

  Lizzie regarded the young man before her. In her professional opinion he seemed to be perilously close to suffering full blown clinical depression. He was so young, and yet was obviously appallingly lonely and depressed. Everyone, including herself, suffered bouts of depression sometimes, but being swamped by a sense of hopelessness, and questioning life itself was different.

  ‘Have you ever talked to anyone about the way you feel?’ she asked carefully.

  The shuttered look closed over Tarquin’s face again. ‘No. And I don’t propose to. What I think is my business. Nothing to do with anyone else.’

  ‘Yes, I suppose . . .’ Lizzie searched for words. She was unprepa
red. He wasn’t a patient, or a friend. She’d only met him a few moments ago, and didn’t know enough about him to offer words of advice or comfort. So what could she say? In the end she did what millions of other English men and women have done before in times of crisis, she poured a cup of tea. ‘Here,’ she said, pushing it across the kitchen table towards him. ‘Drink this.’

  The front door tweeted, and began playing a tinny version of the Bluebells of Scotland. ‘Oh! I must get that damned doorbell changed before it drives me mad,’ she said. A musical-box door bell might have suited Mrs Burnett’s personality, but it was definitely not for Lizzie.

  The effect on Tarquin was immediate. He jumped up as if an electric shock had just shot through the chair. ‘You’ve got another visitor. You didn’t say.’

  Lizzie remembered the meeting with Adam Maguire. ‘It’s only the policeman in charge of the investigation into the murder. He’s come to take a statement because . . . ’ she had been about to say ‘because I discovered the body,’ but Tarquin had already gone.

  ‘I’ll let myself out through the gate at the bottom of the garden, down by the stream,’ he shouted over his shoulder. ‘I know the way.’ He disappeared through the utility room at the back of the house.

  Lizzie heard the outside door slam and then there was silence for a moment until the front door tweeted again and this time started on There’s No Place like Home. ‘Damn,’ said Lizzie and went to answer the door.

  ‘Love the door bell,’ said Maguire. He looked quite cheerful.

  Lizzie looked at him suspiciously. Was he serious? ‘I don’t,’ she said. ‘I inherited it with the house, and it’s being ripped out the moment I’ve got a minute to spare.’

  ‘You’ve had a visitor, and he or she has just left by the back gate,’ said Maguire. ‘Why?’

  ‘Presumably because he or she didn’t want to meet you,’ replied Lizzie sharply. ‘Do you always snoop on people?’

  ‘I’m afraid so. It comes with the job.’ Maguire looked at her. She was hostile again. Was the respectable new lady doctor entertaining a man friend that she didn’t want anyone to know about? And why shouldn’t she? He’d heard she was divorced and on her own. She could do as she pleased. Have an orgy – although she didn’t look the type – if she so minded. ‘I’m not an ogre,’ he said. ‘Your friends have no need to run from me unless they have something to hide.’

  Lizzie led the way into the kitchen feeling slightly ashamed for being so acerbic. Of course he was absolutely right. There was no point in being secretive when she had nothing to hide. ‘For your information my visitor was Tarquin Girling. He’s going to help me in the garden. And I think he may well think you are an ogre. From my brief acquaintance with Tarquin I have the feeling that he views anyone in authority with suspicion.’ She took Tarquin’s mug of tea and poured it down the sink, then got another clean mug and put it on the table. ‘Would you like a cup of tea? I’ve only just made it.’

  Maguire hesitated. The warmth of the kitchen was tempting, but he had Tess to think of. ‘I can’t be long. I’ve got Tess in the car.’

  ‘Tess?’

  ‘My dog. She’s very old. I don’t like to leave her too long on her own.’

  ‘Bring her in. I like dogs.’

  So Adam brought her in and Tess settled down happily on the rag mat in front of the gas boiler. The atmosphere almost visibly thawed. Adam looked around the kitchen. It was clean but untidy, not at all like his own clinically clean kitchen. There were stacks of books and medical magazines on the floor. The blank eye of an opened lap top computer stared at him from a small table in the corner.

  Lizzie saw him looking at it. ‘My work station. I can access patients’ records at the surgery. At least, I’m supposed to be able to, but the whole system isn’t up and running properly yet,’ she said. ‘Sorry about the muddle, but I prefer to work in the kitchen, that way I can always nibble on a biscuit when I feel like it. Now, tell me. What do you want to know?’

  Maguire hauled a large manila envelope from his raincoat pocket, and took out a notepad. ‘I need to know everything, and I do mean everything, that happened from the moment you first passed Darren’s bungalow.’

  ‘You mean even before Mrs Matthews flagged me down?’ Lizzie poured the tea and passed a mug to Maguire.

  ‘Anything you saw or heard might be useful.’

  The whole process took about half an hour. Maguire meticulously recorded everything Lizzie told him, which wasn’t a great deal. ‘I’m sorry there’s nothing new to tell you,’ she said at last, ‘but I was only involved on the periphery.’

  Maguire snapped the notebook shut. Nothing she’d told him had moved the investigation on, but he said, ‘every little helps. We’ve not got much to go on so far. At the moment, it’s a question of racking our brains, and waiting for a lead.’

  Lizzie raised her eyebrows. ‘I thought everything was fed into a computer nowadays and the name of a suspect popped up at the click of a mouse.’

  Maguire snorted. ‘Computers! I hate the things. Computers don’t have intuition; they only react to the data put in, and in this case there’s not much of that. Trouble is the public seem to think that all we have to do is press a few keys and we’ve got the murderer. And an even bigger trouble is that some of the younger coppers are beginning to think that way as well.’

  His vehement reaction amused Lizzie. She was already hooked on computers, and used them whenever possible. She’d suggested that the Honeywell Health Centre upgrade its computers, and that all the partners have compatible laptops, like her own, which could link into the main system. With a new system, and compatible laptops, the aim would be for a paperless practice. Lizzie’s argument that this would save time and money had been greeted with scepticism by the other three partners, and a noticeable lack of enthusiasm by Tara Murphy, acting practice manager, and the rest of the office staff. But as yet, they were not to know that she had a reputation for stubbornness, and was determined to win them over. Mistakenly, they thought she had accepted defeat graciously, when in fact she’d made arrangements for new computers to be demonstrated the following week.

  ‘What data have you got?’ she asked. ‘Or is that a state secret?’

  ‘No, most of what we’ve got is common knowledge. Darren Evans was a drug addict. Registered at your own health centre, as you know, where Dr Jamieson prescribed him methadone, although he wasn’t as rigorous with his check-ups as he should have been. If he’d checked more thoroughly he would have known that Darren was topping up his fix by mainlining heroin as well.’

  ‘I expect Dick knew. Most addicts do that and there’s not a lot you can do about it. But,’ Lizzie frowned, ‘do you think that had anything to do with his murder?’

  ‘Who knows? He was almost certainly selling the stuff, although we don’t know who to. He also had masses of cannabis drying in his upstairs bedroom, but there were no signs of fresh plants. So we’d like to know where the dried stuff came from.’

  ‘I see. More questions than answers at the moment,’ she said. ‘And I suppose you must be thinking the motive was something to do with drugs.’

  Maguire finished his tea with a gulp, stood, and picked his raincoat up from the back of the chair. ‘It seems the most likely scenario. I can’t think of any other reason why someone should want to pick off a no hoper like Darren Evans. His life was an uncomplicated, drug-fuelled mess. He had no purpose in life at all other than to obtain the next fix. And as far as we can make out, he had no friends either. Other than Major Brockett-Smythe, who he gardened for and who wants to pay for his funeral.’

  ‘That’s odd,’ said Lizzie. ‘I’m not sure I’d pay for my gardener’s funeral.’

  ‘My sentiments exactly. But as they say, there’s nowt as queer as folk.’ He bent down and prodded the sleeping dog. ‘Come on, Tess. It’s time we were on our way.’

  The phone rang and Lizzie picked it up. It was Dick Jamieson. ‘I know it’s short notice, but Stephen is ill.’
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  ‘Not again,’ said Lizzie. ‘He’s already had half a day off this week.’

  ‘I know.’ Dick sounded apologetic. ‘But apparently it’s some virulent stomach bug; both his kids have got it as well. Peter has gone away for the weekend to his in-laws, and I’m due at BMA dinner in London tonight. Tom has left his answerphone on and hasn’t got a mobile, sensible man, so—’

  ‘Can I do the late visits this evening?’ Lizzie finished the sentence for him.

  ‘Yes. There are two lined up already. Our old friend Mrs Matthews claims she’s having panic attacks and is short of breath. Apparently, she’s nervous about living so close to the scene of the murder, and is afraid the murderer will come back. I should think a few words over the phone will probably sort her out, and then there’s Mr Hargreaves. He had a stroke some time ago and his daughter has rung in to say he’s unwell. She’s not a time-waster so I think they ought to have a visit. Maybe the old chap has had another little stroke. Stibbington and the environs are usually pretty quiet on a Saturday evening so I think you’ll be okay, but there’s always Mike Hamilton at Stibbington Infirmary to call on if you get stuck.’

  ‘I think I can manage without calling in Mike Hamilton,’ said Lizzie wryly. The said Mike, fifteen years younger than herself, was still wet behind the ears in her opinion. She scribbled down the two messages. ‘Okay, I’ll do it. Just make sure that my mobile number is the one patients get put through to.’

  Dick chuckled. ‘I’ve already have done that. I didn’t think you’d let us down. And there’s no need to get touchy about calling in Mike. Everyone needs advice at some time.’

  ‘Not his advice,’ said Lizzie sharply. ‘If I want advice it will be from someone older and wiser.’ She put the phone down and immediately felt guilty for snapping Dick’s head off.