Deadly Desires at Honeychurch Hall

by Hannah Dennison

“I can’t pull him. Drop it, boy. Come on! Drop it.”

  There was a series of growls. “He wants to play,” I said, relieved. “He’s okay.”

  “Got it.” Alfred withdrew his arm and tossed an object aside, reaching back in. “Bingo!” he cried as he dragged Mr. Chips out by the scruff of his neck.

  “He stinks!” Mum exclaimed.

  And he did. Mr. Chips was coated in slick mud and what suspiciously looked like animal poop.

  “Wrap him in a towel, Kat,” Alfred ordered. “Don’t want him to catch his death.”

  But Mr. Chips slithered out of my grasp, barked a few times, and trotted back to the edge of Coffin Mire.

  “What’s he doing?” I exclaimed.

  “He wants to show us something,” said Alfred grimly.

  Mum found the object that Alfred had tossed aside. “What on earth is this?” She picked it up gingerly and held up her flashlight. “Good heavens! It’s a man’s shoe. Look, Kat.”

  She handed it to Alfred who dropped it with a cry of alarm. “Jesus have mercy,” he said again.

  “What’s wrong?” I turned to Mum. “What can he see?”

  Mr. Chips tore across the grass barking, then tore back again to the edge of the mire.

  “He wants us to follow him,” said Alfred. “I’m coming, boy.”

  Mum picked up the shoe again and shone her flashlight over it. “It’s looks expensive. Not your average farmer’s boot.”

  “Oh God.” I felt sick. A peculiar foreboding swept over me. I’d found Valentine’s walking cane in this field. Could that shoe possibly belong to him, too?

  But no, that couldn’t be right. We’d been sharing text messages.

  “The other shoe is over here!” Alfred called out and waved us over with his shovel.

  Alfred pointed his flashlight to a matching shoe partially submerged in a black inky pool of water, yards away from firm ground.

  “Do you think someone drowned in there?” said Mum.

  I’d initially thought the same but it wasn’t logical. “No, Mum. Of course they haven’t. Look, that shoe is on top of the mire and since Mr. Chips was able to get the other one, it couldn’t have been far in. If someone has drowned, those shoes would be on that person’s feet. Right?”

  “Yes. You’re right. Of course you’re right. We all know this place is haunted. I just got a bit spooked. Perhaps it’s Sir Maurice playing a trick,” she said more cheerfully.

  Suddenly the wind blew up again and the moaning seemed even louder this time. Alfred put down his shovel, removed his cap, and raised both arms to the sky again. The three-quarter moon settled directly overhead casting down a pyramid of light. I felt a rush of gooseflesh.

  “Oh aye, we hear you, my lads,” said Alfred. “We hear you.”

  “Oh. My. God. Alfred is going to raise the dead,” Mum exclaimed.

  “Youngsters, that’s all they were,” Alfred went on. “Fooled by a Honeychurch Cavalier. But wait—Oh, Jesus.”

  He stepped back abruptly and snapped on his flashlight. “He’s here.”

  “Who!”

  Mum grabbed my arm and gave a cry of shock. “It’s over there! Shine it over there, Alfred! Quickly, shine it over there!”

  Alfred slowly panned the area and Mum and I gasped in utter horror.

  “You’d best call out the police,” said Alfred grimly.

  There, sticking out of the bog, was a hand.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  I spent a terrible night dreaming of Roundheads wearing Italian shoes and David flailing around in the mire, drowning a horrible death. Alfred’s reaction to the walking cane now seemed heavy with meaning.

  Alfred couldn’t have slept much that night, either, because when I came downstairs, the hallway was completely clear of furniture. A quick peep into the sitting room confirmed my suspicion. He had just shoved everything back in there.

  Mum and Alfred were in the kitchen eating breakfast. To say you could cut the atmosphere with the proverbial knife was putting it mildly. Alfred looked nervous and kept knocking his spoon off his saucer and the way my mother was biting into her toast made it clear that the two must have had “words.”

  “Any news from the police?” I said.

  “I left a message,” said Mum. “You know the station doesn’t open until nine.”

  “It’s an emergency, Mother!”

  “I told Iris to call nine-nine-nine,” said Alfred. “But she wouldn’t hear of it.”

  “And I told you, this isn’t London. Let’s let our local plod handle it,” she went on. “The dowager countess hates any kind of scandal and we don’t want the paparazzi hearing about it and the place crawling with reporters. You seem to forget that Kat is a celebrity.”

  “Thanks, Mum,” I said. “But in this case I agree with Alfred.”

  Mum rolled her eyes. “What’s the rush? Whoever is in there can’t get any more dead, can they?”

  “Then let that be on your conscience, not mine.” Alfred got up from the table and strode out of the kitchen. We heard the front door slam.

  “What’s happened?” I demanded. “Have you two had a sibling tiff?”

  “Have you seen the sitting room?” said Mum. “Alfred just threw everything back. The paint isn’t even dry in places.”

  “He promised to put the furniture back. And he did.”

  “Since when did you change sides?”

  “When Alfred rescued Mr. Chips.” I regarded Mum with curiosity. “What’s really going on?”

  “Don’t say I told you so but—” She took a deep breath, “I think you’re right. I can’t live in that mess.”

  “I thought you didn’t mind,” I said, exasperated.

  “Frank’s mess was neater.”

  The wall phone chirruped and Mum snatched it up. “Good morning. Good. Yes.” She listened, nodding. “A shoe. Yes. A hand. That’s right, I told you all this on the answering machine. No. Isn’t that your job?”

  Mum put the phone down. “That was Shawn. As if I would make it up! He’s on his way over right now.”

  My stomach was churning. “Oh, Mum. Who do you think it can be? What if it’s Valentine? Maybe he fell in when he went to pick up the placards?”

  “What are you talking about?” said Mum.

  I summarized the conversation I’d had at Ogwell Car Hire and told Mum the placards had been found in the back of Valentine’s SUV.

  “Why would Valentine pick them up when he put them there in the first place?” she pointed out.

  “I have no idea,” I said. “But he really seemed upset on Monday evening. He was drinking heavily, too. The next morning, when I went out riding with Edith, the placards had gone. I knew something was wrong when I found his walking cane in that field.”

  “Let me see…”

  Mum grabbed a piece of paper and a pencil. She drew a line to divide the sheet in half. “This is the bridleway and the bank of oak trees where Harry has his tree house.” She drew a square. “This is the five-bar gate that opens into the bridleway.” Then she drew a circle below the line and to the far left. “That’s Coffin Mire.” She drew an oval to represent Cavalier Copse in the center of the page just under the bridleway. “And this,” Mum drew elaborate curlicues all around the edge of the paper, “is the boundary hedge and ditch.”

  A further ten crosses marked the locations of the signs that ran below and above the horizontal bridleway. On the far right, Mum drew a square—Bridge Cottage—and scribbled a cloud of undergrowth around it.

  “Where did you find Valentine’s walking cane?” she asked.

  I picked up the pencil and made an X. “Between the five-bar gate and Coffin Mire.”

  “So it wasn’t next to the mire at all.”

  “But … there is something else.” Nausea hit me again as I remembered Joyce lying facedown in the water.

  “What have you done, now?” said Mum.

  “Not me, Valentine.” I explained that Shawn and Roxy believed that Valentine coul
d have been involved in Joyce’s death.

  “You mean he mowed her down and ran off? It was a hit-and-run?”

  “No one knows where he is,” I said. “He’s disappeared.”

  “You heard from Valentine on Tuesday,” said Mum. “Remember?”

  “Yes.”

  “And Joyce died on Monday night—”

  “I think that’s why he called me,” I said, recalling his urgent message. “Perhaps he was going to tell me about Joyce.”

  “I wish you’d told me all this,” Mum grumbled. “Why am I always the last to know?”

  “Do you think that Valentine may have gone back to the field the following day and bumped into Patty? Perhaps there was a disagreement.”

  “That would assume that Patty knew that Valentine had been involved in her mother’s accident.”

  “You’re right,” I said. “And we don’t know that.” I thought again. “Angela told me that Patty is famous for lawsuits and even sued the vicar. What if—?”

  “No, I don’t like that theory.” Mum frowned then gave a yelp of excitement. “I know! What if Valentine saw Sir Maurice at Hopton’s Crest! Sir Maurice was so angry about this railway line that he led Valentine to his doom in Coffin Mire.”

  “Now you’re being silly,” I said.

  “Of course, it could be one of those old Roundheads lying there.”

  “From over three hundred and fifty years ago?” I said. “I doubt it.”

  “Look at Lindow Man.” Mum warmed to her theme. “He fell into a peat bog in two B.C. or something and, voilà, centuries later he’s discovered! Perfectly preserved.”

  “But in this case, the hand was sticking out,” I said. “And if it had been one of those Roundheads, the hand would have been skeletal.” I shuddered with disgust. “Can we talk about something else?”

  “No. Seriously. It could be a Roundhead. With all the rain we’ve been having, the water levels must have shifted. The hand could have just popped up yesterday.”

  “Well, I hope you’re right—but it doesn’t explain the fancy shoe. Where did you put it?”

  “In that piece of newspaper.” Mum gestured to a package wrapped in Wednesday’s edition of the Daily Post on the floor next to the oak dresser. I could see the photograph of my face on the outside. “Someone has big feet. It’s a size eleven.”

  Lavinia burst into the kitchen. “Frightfully sorry to interrupt—”

  “You’ve heard about the hand already?” said Mum.

  “Hand? What do you mean?”

  “Nothing,” said Mum. “Tea?”

  Lavinia shook her head. Dressed in her usual riding attire with her blond hair clamped under a hairnet, she looked even plainer than usual.

  “Something terrible has happened,” she said.

  My stomach flipped over. “Has Harry run away again?”

  “What?” Lavinia looked startled. “Oh. No. Why? Of course he hasn’t. No, it’s—” She seemed jittery. “If it’s not too much of an inconvenience—”

  “Do you want to talk privately, Lavinia?” Mum said, pointedly dropping the title. “Kat was just going out, weren’t you?”

  “Mum, the police will be here any minute.”

  “The police?” Lavinia’s eyes widened. “We don’t need the police!”

  “We do need the police,” I said, gesturing to Mum to say something but she just waved me away.

  “This is important, dear,” said Mum. “Just give us a moment.”

  “More important than someone laying dead in a bog?” I exclaimed.

  “What is she talking about?” Lavinia cried. “Who is dead? Where?”

  “In Coffin Mire,” said Mum.

  “Oh. That. The mire is riddled with bodies. Rupert found one last year.”

  “See!” Mum shot me a smug look. “It could just be a Roundhead.”

  Lavinia waited for me to leave the kitchen. As I pulled the door closed I overheard her say, “Benedict has gone.”

  “Gone?” Mum cried. “Gone where?”

  “I don’t know. He just disappeared yesterday.”

  “Oh dear.”

  My stomach lurched again. Benedict had disappeared. This was a conversation I was not going to miss.

  In the corridor next to the kitchen was a walk-in cupboard where I could eavesdrop through the flimsy wall. I’d discovered this quite by accident one day when the plumbers were called about a blocked pipe and I had been clearing it out.

  “Have you tried to phone him?” I heard Mum say.

  “Of course I have,” said Lavinia. “His phone must be switched off.”

  “Oh dear.”

  “It’s too maddening for words.” I heard the scraping of chairs and what sounded like a peculiar mewing noise. I wondered if Lavinia was crying.

  “Have a cigarette,” said Mum.

  “I don’t smoke.”

  “Nor do I.”

  There was a pause—presumably they were both lighting up.

  “I’ll open a window. Kat can be such a tyrant. She hates me smoking.”

  “So does Rupert. Oh, Iris! I’m afraid I’ve done a frightful thing.”

  “Let’s try to stay calm and not panic,” said Mum. “When did you speak to Benedict last?”

  “Yesterday.”

  “What time?”

  “Just before lunch. He seemed very agitated.”

  “Oh dear.”

  “Why? Why do you keep saying, ‘oh dear’?”

  I pressed my ear against the wood. I hoped Mum was right about her Roundhead theory but if not, perhaps it wasn’t Valentine laying there after all. Perhaps it was Benedict.

  “Maybe Benedict has done a runner,” said Mum.

  “A runner? Why would he do that?”

  “He’s run off with all our money.”

  “Has he? Good grief! How do you know?”

  “He hasn’t? I thought … never mind.”

  “No. This has got nothing to do with money,” Lavinia went on. “This is far more serious.”

  “How can it be more serious than money?”

  “Benedict gave me an ultimatum otherwise he threatened to tell Rupert everything.”

  “An ultimatum? What kind of everything?” I could detect the change of tone in my mother’s voice and suspected she was whipping out her Post-its. “What exactly did Benedict say to you?”

  “I knew you would understand. You write about love and relationships in your wonderful books and … well.”

  “I am a bit of a connoisseur when it comes to that sort of thing,” Mum said. “All I can tell you is to follow your heart.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous!” Lavinia exclaimed. “Our sort never follows our heart. We have our duty to perform and besides, I love Rupert. I love him desperately.”

  There was a silence. I could almost hear Mum’s brain trying to process this new piece of information. I knew I’d been right about Lavinia being devoted to Rupert.

  “So … since you are not having an affair with Benedict,” said Mum. “What hold can he possibly have over you?”

  “I suppose I was angry with Rupert for going off to London without a single explanation,” Lavinia said. “We had the most awful fight.”

  “Over Benedict?”

  “No! Not over Benedict! Why would we argue over Benedict? It happened years ago.”

  “So you’ve got nothing to worry about.”

  “Of course I’ve got something to worry about, Iris.” Lavinia was getting hysterical. “I made a terrible mistake and I apologized.”

  “So you did have a fling with Benedict?”

  My head was beginning to spin trying to keep up.

  “It was more than a fling.”

  There was a distinct pause. I suspected Mum was worried about saying the wrong thing. “Why don’t you tell me what happened so you can get it off your chest?” she said finally.

  “Are you sure it won’t bore you?”

  “Of course not. You can trust me to be discreet and not tell a sou
l.”

  “Promise?”

  “Cross my heart and hope to die.”

  I checked my watch. It was nine-fifteen. The police would be here at any moment. Mum and I had seen a hand in the mire and here she was discussing Lavinia’s love affair—or whatever they wanted to call it.

  “I met Benedict again after Rupert married that frightful servant girl, Kelly,” said Lavinia.

  “Ah yes. They eloped during your New Year’s Eve party—”

  “Oh. You knew about that?”

  “Not all the details,” said Mum quickly. “I’m just trying to get the backstory straight.”

  “Benedict was a school chum of my brother Piers so I’ve known him since I was five,” Lavinia went on. “Hopeless with money. When Thornton Park sold he invested what was left—which was quite substantial I must say—in all sorts of ridiculous schemes. He even bought a luxury hotel on Pemba Island.”

  I stifled a gasp. Pemba Island? There couldn’t be two islands of the same name. Valentine even had this key fob stamped Pemba Island. He’d also suggested that Laurel, from Ogwell Car Hire, should stop there on her birthday trip to Africa.

  This was no coincidence. Something was going on.

  “Where is Pemba Island?” said Mum.

  “It’s part of the Zanzibar Archipelago,” Lavinia said. “Piers took me there on hols. Thought it would do me good to get away from the scandal. I suppose Benedict was a rebound of sorts—”

  “He was a transitory object.”

  “Yes! Exactly!”

  “But he wanted more?” Mum ventured.

  “Yes! Exactly!” Lavinia said. “But I was frightfully fond of him. If Rupert hadn’t been around—”

  “But Rupert was around,” said Mum. “Did you and Benedict stay in touch after that?”

  “No, of course not. I hadn’t seen Benedict for yonks,” said Lavinia. “He suddenly called me out of the blue to tell me he was back in the country—”

  “And wanted to see you again?”

  “Things hadn’t gone well abroad and he wanted to make a fresh start. He’d formed an environmental consultancy firm and heard about Operation Bullet.” Lavinia blew her nose. “He wanted to help. He didn’t want Honeychurch to go the same way as Thornton Park.”

  “Only Thornton Park became a retirement community,” Mum pointed out.

  “Oh. That’s true.” Lavinia paused—probably to take another drag on her cigarette. “Benedict asked if I was happy—and of course I am happy but Rupert isn’t the easiest person to live with.”