Murder Served Cold

by Paula Williams

  “OK, here’s the thing,” I said. “I – I signed up to an internet dating agency and had arranged to meet this guy in Dintscombe. On Sunday. I remembered all the safety advice I’ve been given and agreed to meet him at the entrance to Dintscombe Park. I waited for over an hour. But he didn’t turn up. Pathetic, isn’t it? I was stood up.”

  I might have been making up the story, but I wasn’t making up the embarrassment I felt. It was not helped by the fact that I could feel my mother’s eyes on me all the time I was speaking, although I didn’t dare look at her.

  “You signed up to an internet dating agency?” For a moment there, he wasn’t PC Watkins but plain Ben again. The same Ben who, a couple of days earlier had asked me out. Or, at least, I thought that perhaps he had. I gave a silent groan. Could things get any more embarrassing?

  “Yes. Do you need to know which one?” I asked, hoping desperately that he wouldn’t. To my relief, he shook his head.

  “That won’t be necessary, thank you, Miss Latcham,” he said stonily, all po-faced and formal again. There was a deep silence in the kitchen, broken only by the hum of the fridge as he seemed to take forever to write in his notebook. I could imagine what he was writing. “Sad loser who has to use the internet to get a date.” Well, better that than knowing what I was really doing there. For my sake – and Liam’s.

  “While you were there, waiting for your no-show date, did you happen to notice anyone visiting the cottage opposite?” he asked.

  “You mean, the one that burned down?” My eyes widened. “Wasn’t that a terrible thing to happen?”

  “Did you see anyone?” he repeated, his expression as stony as ever. He made no attempt to answer my question.

  “No. Apart, that is, from the lady who lived there. At least, I suppose it was her. A tall, thin woman with her hair in a bun. She came out while I was waiting there, got into her car – a small, blue hatchback of some sort, I think – and drove off. Oh Lord, was it her body they found in the fire?”

  He didn’t quite say, ‘I’m the policeman and I get to ask the questions. Not you,’ but he certainly looked as if he’d have liked to. Instead, he asked, “You say you saw her? What time was this?”

  “I’m not sure exactly. But I guess it would have been round about half past three. She drove off in the direction of the High Street.” I stopped myself from adding that I didn’t know where she went after that. I’d already told one outright lie and a couple of half truths. I didn’t fancy racking up any more.

  He took out a card and held it towards me. “Well, if you think of anything else, perhaps you’d contact me on that number?”

  “You’ve already given me one of those, remember?”

  “Oh yes, of course,” he said. “At the Manning farm. You do seem to make a habit of being in the wrong place at the wrong time this week, don’t you?”

  Somehow I didn’t think now would be a good time to tell him about my suspicions about Gerald Crabshaw. So I just gave him a weak smile.

  As Mum went to let him out, I sat down in the nearest chair with a thump as my legs finally gave way.

  “Well now, what on earth was that all about?” Mum demanded as she came back into the kitchen, a look of steely determination in her eyes. “Internet dating? I don’t believe that for a single second, even if he did. What’s going on, Katie? What were you really doing in Dintscombe on Sunday afternoon? That same day you crunched my car. You never did explain exactly how it happened. Was it something to do with that poor woman who got killed in that fire? Come on. Out with it. I think it’s time for some answers, young lady, don’t you?”

  “Later, Mum. I’ll tell you later, I promise. But first I must make a phone call. It’s really important.”

  At that moment, the door to the salon pinged. “You’re going nowhere, except to shampoo Mrs. Tinley,” Mum said firmly. “That’s her now. Go on. We’ll finish this little chat later. I don’t know what you’re up to, Katie, but whatever it is, it’s giving me a very bad feeling.”

  She was getting a bad feeling? I thought as I followed her into the salon. That was nothing to the feeling I was getting.

  ***

  It was over an hour before I got the chance to slip away from Mum’s ever-watchful eye on the pretext of getting a fresh batch of towels from the airing cupboard. As soon as I was out of earshot I called Liam.

  “I had a visit from the police,” I said quietly the second he answered. “Apparently, I was seen on Sunday.”

  “The devil you were!” His voice shocked me with its harshness. “Didn’t I tell you not to follow her?”

  “Yes, you did,” I said, stung by his tone into speaking louder than I’d meant to. I lowered my voice again, not wanting Mum to hear. “But I was seen when I was parked in the lay-by, not when I was following her. And you needn’t worry. I kept your name out of it. Just came up with some daft story “

  “I am so sorry, Kat, I surely am,” he said, his voice back to its normal lilting Irish cadences. “I didn’t mean to bark at you. I was worried about you, that was all.”

  I suppressed the retort that it had sounded more like he’d been worried about himself, not me, as he went on, “and if you will insist on driving a car that looks like a marshmallow on wheels, I’m not surprised you were seen. You can’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  But this time there was no censure in his voice, just a little gentle teasing. I shrugged and let the prickle of annoyance go.

  “You did indeed,” I said. “Well, apparently, a ‘security conscious neighbour’ was how the police described him, saw me parked in the lay-by and got suspicious because I was there so long. So he took down my registration number which he then passed on to the police.”

  “So what did you tell them?”

  I groaned at the memory. “I had to think quickly. I said I belonged to an internet dating agency and that the guy I’d arranged to meet had stood me up. Made me sound a right loser, but better that, I thought, than telling the truth. At least that way, we both get to keep our jobs.”

  “Ah yes, now,” Liam said slowly. “About that. The thing is, I’ve been meaning to call you all morning but there hasn’t been a chance. I’m sorry, Kat, but I’m afraid there’s been a bit of a problem.”

  “What sort of problem?” Even as I asked the question, I had this niggly feeling I wasn’t going to like the answer.

  “Mike called me into his office this morning. It appears he’s having second thoughts about the whole idea of using village correspondents. Or community correspondents, as he was going to call them, as he thought it sounded more inclusive. He was really taken with the idea. But that was yesterday. Now today, he’s had a change of heart, and thinks it could create problems.”

  My stab of disappointment was like a physical pain. “What sort of problems?” I asked, trying to remember to keep my voice down.

  “He didn’t say. And why are you whispering?”

  “Because I don’t want my mother to hear. I’m in enough trouble with her as it is. I’m supposed to be fetching some towels and she’ll yelling up the stairs for me any moment.”

  “Then you’d better go.”

  “No. I need to know about my job. Or lack of it. This is down to Gerald Crabshaw again, isn’t it? You said the other day that he and your editor exchange funny handshakes, which I take it means they both belong to the same mutual backscratching club. In fact, only last night Gerald boasted about getting me fired from not one but two jobs.”

  “Last night? How do you mean?”

  “At the Parish Council meeting. I turned up, as agreed, and he was the first person I saw. He told me to go home.”

  “So you didn’t cover the meeting? Well, at least that was one good thing. I would hate to think you’d done all that work for nothing.”

  “But of course I covered the meeting. As a matter of fact, the chairman came along and insisted that I did so. Gerald threw a hissy fit and did this ‘either she goes or I do’ thing. And when the chairman call
ed his bluff, he went off in high dudgeon. I tell you, Liam, I am so not his favourite person at the moment.”

  Liam sighed. “Did I, or did I not, tell you to keep away from him?” The prickly note was back in his voice again.

  “And I did,” I said indignantly. “It wasn’t my fault he turned up for the meeting last night, was it?”

  “No. I suppose not. But trouble does seem to follow you around, Kat. Maybe it’s best you forget about going after a job on The Chronicle, at least until things settle down.”

  “But that’s so unfair,” I protested. “None of this is my fault. Besides, I’ve already written up two pieces from last night’s meeting and am about to start on a third, about the footpath obstructions. Stuart Davies – he’s the Chairman – is going to think it pretty odd if, having made a point of insisting that I stay and cover the meeting, my stories don’t appear in next week’s paper, isn’t he?”

  “Katie?” Mum’s voice came up the stairs. “What are you doing up there, for goodness sake? Mrs Marshall is waiting for her coffee. Black, two sugars. Not too strong.”

  “Sorry, Mum. Just coming,” I called, then went back to Liam: “Sorry. I’ve got to go.”

  “Ok. And Kat, I think you’re absolutely right. None of this is your fault. And Stuart Davies might think it strange if the stories didn’t appear. You go ahead, write them up and email them in. I’ll square it with Mike. Would you like to email them to me first and I’ll give them the once over, then forward them for you?”

  “Would you? That would be brilliant. Thanks, Liam, you’re a star,” I breathed, suddenly seeing a glimmer of light in a day that had started badly and got progressively worse. “As I said, this is the second time Gerald Crabshaw has tried to get me sacked. I must have got him really rattled again, just like that time in the pub when I asked him where he was the day Marjorie was killed. If you could have seen his face when he saw me last night. Talk about if looks could kill. He – oh, my God.”

  The pile of warm towels in my hand felt like ice, as a chill ran through my body.

  “What’s wrong?” Liam asked anxiously.

  “I – I’ve just remembered something. Something that will prove he was lying about his alibi. Gerald Crabshaw killed Marjorie Hampton, Liam, and I think – no, I’m sure – I can prove it.”

  “What on earth—?”

  “No, I’ve got to go. Mum will be sending out a search party if I don’t. And besides, I need to think this through and check out a few things out before I say any more. Check my sources, like a good journalist should. Isn’t that what you told me?”

  “Indeed I did. But I also told you to be very careful. Gerald Crabshaw’s a nasty piece of work. Not that I’m saying he’s a murderer, mind you. But he’s definitely hiding something, the very least of which is his affair with Doreen Spetchley. Something that, after this latest news, he’ll be even more anxious to cover up.”

  “How do you mean? What latest news?”

  “I’ve just come from a police press conference. They don’t think Doreen’s death was an accident. The post mortem showed she was dead before the fire started and they’re treating her death as suspicious. Now, if you’re right about Crabshaw, there’s no saying what he’d do if you challenged him. Promise me you won’t.”

  “Don’t worry. It’s not Gerald I’m going to see. But someone who can prove he was lying about his alibi. And when I’ve done that, I’ll go to the police and straighten everything out.”

  “Damn it, girl,” he growled. “You will not.”

  I bristled at his tone. “I don’t think—” I began but he cut in.

  “Now, listen,” he said, his voice low, urgent. “We need to get together and talk this through before you do anything, or say anything to anyone. Understand? I’m tying up a few things here, then I’ll be on my way over to Much Winchmoor anyway. I’ve been trying all morning to get hold of Gerald Crabshaw to interview him, but have drawn a blank every time. I’m just hoping he hasn’t done a runner because, if he has, it will be down to you interfering in things you know nothing about. So promise me that if you do see him, you won’t approach him, follow him or antagonise him in any way but will contact me. Got that? I’d hate to think you’d blundered in and scared him off.”

  Blundered in? I drew in a sharp breath. What sort of an idiot did he think I was? “Of course I wouldn’t blunder in as you put it,” I said indignantly. “I’m not a fool, you know.”

  “That’s your opinion,” he snapped, then went on quickly before I could protest. “And I don’t need to remind you, do I, that Gerald Crabshaw is my story? And it’s very unprofessional of one journalist to pinch another’s story.”

  “But I wasn’t—” I tried to interrupt, but he wouldn’t let me.

  “In fact, to put it bluntly,” he said sharply, no trace of that lovely Irish warmth in his voice any more, “this is my big chance, Kat, my ticket out of this hell hole, and I’ll not have it wrecked by a little girl like you playing at being a journo. So keep out of it, ok? Back off. Go back to your little old ladies and their perms, and leave the real work to the professionals. Do you understand?”

  Before I had chance to come back with some withering put-down, he ended the call.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  I was seething as I put my phone back in my pocket. Go back to your little old ladies and their perms. Leave the real work to the professionals. Of all the patronising things to say. How dare he? He’d been all silver-tongued charm when he’d wanted something, but he’d just shown his true colours. It seemed that Will had been right about Liam all along – and that annoyed me as much as anything.

  Liam had used me from day one. He’d first made contact with me because he thought I’d give him all the gory details about finding Marjorie’s body. Then, when he’d realised that wasn’t going to happen, he encouraged me to think there was a job going on the paper when there obviously wasn’t, just because he needed someone to watch Doreen Spetchley’s house. What an idiot I’d been, willing to risk anything for a ‘maybe’ job on his precious paper. Believing him when he’d said it was a chance for us to work together on the story, maybe even sharing a by-line.

  He would no more think of sharing a by-line with me than a kidney. What a naive, gullible idiot I’d been. And to think I’d covered up for him by not telling Ben Newton what I was really doing outside Doreen’s house on Sunday.

  Well, I was going to put that particular bit of misinformation right, for a start, I decided. I fished in my pocket for Ben’s card, but stopped as I realised that I, of course, was the one who’d been lying to the police. Not Liam. All he had to do was deny any knowledge of me – and, to be fair, he’d never asked me to follow Doreen. In fact, he’d been furious with me when I told him I had. So I was the one who’d be in trouble. Not him.

  On the other hand, there was something that had occurred to me that the police might be very interested in. But I needed to check it out with Jules first.

  “Katie?” Mum’s voice, as she called up the stairs again, was several decibels higher this time. “Are you coming? Mrs Marshall would like her coffee this morning, not tomorrow, if it’s all the same to you.”

  It was almost half past one by the time I managed to get away. Jules would, of course, still be working, so I planned to catch up with her in the pub. Thankfully, Mum bought my story about how I’d promised to let Jules have a couple of books I’d been talking to her about. She didn’t need to know that the last time Jules and I had been talking about books was when she’d blackmailed me into doing her English Lit homework for her.

  After the cloying perm lotion and hair spray-laden atmosphere of the salon, it was great to be outside. It was one of those glorious sunny days you sometimes get in early spring where everything is sharp-focussed and bright, when the sky is so blue it makes your eyes ache. In the bank at the bottom of our back garden, clusters of primroses were opening up, encouraged into flower by the warmth of the sun. Just the sight of them put me in a better
mood. Yesterday’s storm, when Will and I had been on the coast, seemed a million miles away.

  Perhaps whatever had been bugging Will then had passed over too, like the storm. I decided to go up to the farm after I’d seen Jules, to see if I could find out what had been getting him down. Now we’d got back to our old, easy ways (yesterday afternoon excepted) I didn’t want to let things fester on, like they had before.

  I fetched my bike and was about to pedal off in the direction of the High Street when I heard the throaty roar of a powerful car coming down the road behind me, and I pulled over to let it pass.

  It was Gerald Crabshaw. After last night’s run-in at the parish council meeting, I was in no hurry for another showdown with him. I hoped he’d just keep on going, but no such luck. He stopped the car a few yards in front of me and clambered out. And something about the purposeful way he strode towards me told me that my day was about to get a whole heap worse.

  “Katie. Just the person I was hoping to see,” he called out.

  And you’re just the person I was hoping not to see, I could have said but didn’t. Instead I gave him my falsest, brightest smile and got ready to pedal off as fast as I could.

  “I’m so sorry,” I said. “I can’t stop. I’m late as it is.”

  With a turn of speed I’d never have believed him capable of, he lurched towards me. Before I’d realised his intentions, he’d grabbed my handlebars with both hands and hung on grimly, like a red-faced matador wrestling a bull by the horns.

  It was a ridiculous and – I don’t mind admitting – rather scary situation. I was stuck, straddled across the bike, one foot on the floor, the other on the pedal. I could do nothing. Go nowhere. Not without letting go of my bike.

  I looked around desperately. Who would see me? Or hear me, if I yelled? The days when people stood around gossiping on the streets of Much Winchmoor were long gone, along with the shop, the village bakery and the post office.