Pretty Maids All In A Row

by Anthea Fraser

  'There's not much privacy, is there?'

  Carrie smiled. 'It doesn't stop Mrs Cowley sunbathing. "If they want to look, let them!" she says. There are chairs in the garage, and they have footrests. You should be quite comfortable.'

  While Carrie went in search of one, Jessica beat the bounds of her temporary home. It took her only a moment to see that in fact there was no privacy at all. The whole garden lay exposed to anyone either in the adjacent field or walking along the road beside it. Momentarily the fact disturbed her. Working as she did in the constant glare of spotlights, her desire for privacy offstage bordered on the neurotic. Still, they'd only be here a month. She must simply echo the garden's owner. 'They see—what see they? Let them see!' she misquoted wryly.

  A decorative wrought-iron gate separated the cottage from the garage and gave access to the front. Through this Carrie was now struggling with two folded deckchairs. Perhaps she thought Matthew would be coming out, too. And perhaps, later, he might.

  'I'll put it near the fence, out of the shade of the house,' Carrie said, and Jessica bit back an instinctive protest. Yet why skulk behind the house? She was only going to sit and read, after all. Carrie settled her comfortably with her books.

  'I'll be back at six to cook your supper,' she promised. Jessica watched her return through the gate, collect her bicycle which was propped against the side of the house, and disappear from sight.

  With a sigh, she leant back and closed her eyes. Moving about was such an effort that she was permanently tired at the moment, and the hot sun flowed comfortingly over her. She drifted into sleep, dimly aware of the unaccustomed sounds of the country about her, the bleating of a sheep, surprisingly close at hand, the distant barking of a dog. Once a tractor, rattling along the road, jerked her briefly awake, but the driver, coming from the village, had his back to her, and she slid back into sleep.

  When some time later she came awake again, there was a light flashing in her face and, screening her eyes with her hand, she struggled into a more upright position. The sun had moved round and was now behind her shoulder. It must have been shining on a window on the higher road. Jessica's eyes moved along the backs of the houses, the large one which she now knew to be The Willows Residential Home, and the smaller, private houses on either side. She frowned. None of their windows was reflecting the sun— but she suddenly saw what was. Between the houses, in a gap in the hedge on the top road, she caught the flash again. Then, even as she watched, it moved and was gone.

  Her heart began a rapid uneven beat. Binoculars? Was that the explanation? Was someone up there spying on her? But why?

  Jessica reached hastily for her crutches, but, forgetting Carrie had propped them against the chair for easy access, her groping hand dislodged them and they fell to the ground beyond her reach. She fought off an illogical but none the less enervating wave of panic. She couldn't move! She was a prisoner in her deckchair until Matthew took it into his head to come and see how she was. And who knew, in his present state of absorption, how long that might be? In the meantime she could only sit there, clearly visible to anyone who cared to study her, the red of her dress a bright splash on the green triangle of the garden. Oh Matthew, for God's sake—! And as the desperate plea formed in her head, miraculously the back door opened and he came down the steps towards her.

  'Matthew, thank God! There's someone up there, watching me!'

  He paused, the sentence he had ready to greet her swept aside. 'Up where? Nonsense, darling! You've been dreaming.'

  'The flashing light woke me. Binoculars, I suppose. In that gap in the hedge.'

  He followed her pointing finger, scanning the skyline, but the telltale gleam had gone.

  'It was there,' Jessica repeated stubbornly.

  'Perhaps your fame has gone before you. Whoever it was will no doubt show up, asking for your autograph.' He turned to more pressing matters. 'Darling, Dominic's just phoned. He's looked out some diaries for me, and I'll need to read through them before I go any further. We've arranged that I'll call and collect them after dinner, and we can work out a rough schedule while I'm there. You won't mind, will you? I shan't be very long.'

  Jessica shook her head, her attention still on the mysterious light. But Matthew's presence and his normal conversation had dissolved her anxiety. After all, there must be a logical explanation—a car, perhaps, emerging from a driveway on the far side of the road. She looked up with a smile.

  'Sorry about the panic. I couldn't reach my crutches and had no way of attracting your attention.'

  'Poor sweet! We'll fix you up with a bell to ring when you need me. Now, how about a cup of tea?'

  'Lovely, but I'll come in with you. I've had enough of the garden for one afternoon.'

  It had been a long, tiring day, and Lois Winter, matron and proprietor of The Willows, was glad she could now relax. Nine-thirty, she noted, glancing at the carriage clock on the mantel. She kicked off her shoes and went to the cabinet. A gin and tonic would revive her. The window of her pleasant sitting-room, on the first floor of the old house, was still wide open, though she must close it soon, or the moths would come in. Not a breath of air stirred in the darkness outside.

  She stood in her stocking feet, sipping her drink and looking appreciatively round the room. It always restored her at the end of the day. She loved the gracefully high ceiling, with its white-painted cornice, the heavy brocade curtains and comfortable chairs. Her eyes lingered affectionately on the silver-framed photograph of her dead husband, but there was no sadness in them. Ten years now she'd been alone, but she'd spent them usefully. She enjoyed her life, was fond of, though often exasperated by, her charges, and had some good friends in the village. All in all, she'd been very lucky.

  She carried the glass to her favourite chair and sank luxuriously into it. What was on tomorrow? She was too tired to check in her diary, but days at The Willows followed each other in an admirably orderly fashion and one week was much like the next. Tomorrow, as always on Wednesdays, Carrie Speight would be here for the day. She must ask her to give an extra good dust to Mrs Southern's room. Carrie was a favourite with the old lady, who insisted she was the only one who knew how to clean, a claim which didn't endear Mrs Southern to the other helpers.

  Lois smiled to herself and sipped her drink. And this was Delia's week, too. Once a fortnight, on half-day closing, she came to wash and set the old ladies' hair. It was amazing what a morale-booster her visits proved. Lois often thanked heaven for the Speight sisters. Life at The Willows would not run as smoothly without them.

  Out in the garden an owl hooted suddenly, and she shivered. Silly, how that always affected her. She put her glass on the table and went to close the window, pausing for a moment to look down across the garden at Hinckley's Cottage on the lower road. There were lights on. Someone said the Cowley woman had let it for a month. Shrugging, Lois drew the heavy curtains, and as she did so a knock sounded on the door. She turned swiftly, frowning. It was a strict rule that, once off-duty, she was only to be called in emergency, and a swift recap of the patients, all of whom she'd seen within the last half-hour, brought no imminent crisis to mind.

  'Who's there?'

  'It's Sister, Matron.'

  Lois's frown deepened. Frances had gone off duty over an hour ago; what was she doing back again? 'Is it urgent?' 'I'm afraid so, yes.' 'Very well. Come in.'

  Lois walked back to the fireplace and slipped into her shoes. Frances Daly was her second-in-command, a competent woman, divorced and in her late thirties. She wouldn't disturb her unnecessarily. The woman came into the room, turning to close the door behind her, and Lois felt a sudden flicker of unease. Something, she knew instinctively, was very wrong.

  'What is it, Frances?' In the privacy of this room, they were on first-name terms.

  The woman moistened her lips. She was pale, but her eyes met Lois's steadily. 'There's no easy way to say this. I've been raped.'

  Lois came slowly out of her chair, eyes widening in h
orror. 'What?'

  'I wasn't going to tell you.' Frances spoke jerkily. 'I felt I couldn't bear anyone to know. It's so—degrading.'

  'Sit down.' Lois moved swiftly back to the cabinet, poured brandy into a glass, and handed it to her subordinate. 'Drink this.'

  Frances sipped at it. She'd started to shake, and held the glass with both hands to prevent it spilling. 'It was horrible,' she said in a low voice. 'I can't tell you—'

  'But you will,' Lois insisted gently. 'To start with, where and when did it happen?'

  'In the garden, as I was going off-duty.'

  'Owr garden?' Lois felt in the midst of nightmare.

  Frances nodded. 'I didn't see him. He caught hold of me from behind and tied my hands behind my back. Then he slipped something over my head—a woolly, helmet kind of thing. And it was dark anyway.' She took another drink, her teeth rattling against the glass.

  'I just can't take this in. It must have been—What?—an hour and a half ago?'

  'Yes. As I said, I'd decided not to say anything. All I wanted to do was hide. When he left me, I staggered back to the annexe and had a bath—as hot as I could bear it. I felt—defiled.' She was silent for a moment, but Lois could think of nothing to say, and eventually she continued. 'But then I started thinking, suppose it had been Jane, or young Pammy? And it could be, the next time, if I kept quiet. Or anyone else in the village, come to that.'

  Lois leant forward. 'Fran love, I know it's painful, but tell me as much as you can. Surely you got some impression of him—height, or build?'

  She shook her head. 'Nothing. With my hands tied I couldn't even feel his clothes.' She shuddered, not looking at her friend. 'The worst part of all,' she added, only just above a whisper, 'was that he made me recite nursery rhymes, all the time he—all the time.'

  'Oh God!' Lois breathed.

  '"Another!" he kept saying. "Go on, you know plenty more!"'

  'But that's—obscene!'

  'Yes.' Frances dropped her glass on the table with a clatter and put her face in her hands. Lois slipped to the rug, her arms going round her. 'There, love, it's all right, it's over now.'

  'But it isn't,' Frances said in a muffled voice. 'I know what happens in cases like this. I'll have to go over it again and again, to the police. And they might not believe me, anyway.'

  'They'll believe you,' Lois promised grimly. Frances removed her hands and folded them in her lap, a precarious calm restored. Lois sat back on her heels. 'I can't imagine who it could be. We know most of the people round here, and I can't think—'

  'Oh, he probably came from The Packhorse. There was a darts match tonight, and cars parked all along the road. Probably he celebrated too well—or drowned his sorrows —and wandered down the road till he reached us.'

  'In which case he's probably gone home now, God knows where.'

  'And good riddance.'

  'Don't you want him caught?'

  'Not really. I never want to see or hear anything of him again.'

  There was a silence, during which Lois refilled both their glasses. 'I'll have to get on to Ted Frost,' she said at last. 'I was afraid you'd say that.'

  'There's probably no chance whatever of catching him, but it will have to be reported.'

  It was hard to know who was the more embarrassed, the red-faced police constable or the victim. In nearly thirty years on the Force, this was the first rape he'd come up against. Fervently he hoped it would be the last. And to a nice, respectable lady like Mrs Daly; it didn't bear thinking about. stolidly he wrote down what she had to say while Matron stood at the fireplace, gazing into the empty grate.

  'Right, ma'am,' he said at last, closing his notebook with relief. 'I'll have to get on to Shillingham, and I'm afraid they'll have more questions. In the meantime, we'll ask Dr Prentiss to come and have a look at you. May I use your phone?' Nursery rhymes, indeed. He'd never feel the same about them again.

  As he lifted the receiver, Lois looked at her friend with helpless apology. Shakily Frances smiled back, lifting her shoulders in a gesture of resignation. As she had known would happen, the matter had been taken out of their hands. From now on, she would be a case on the files of Shillingham CID.

  CHAPTER 3

  Detective Chief Inspector Webb stood in the grounds of The Willows and looked about him. If there was one crime he disliked above others, it was rape. Not only for the terror and humiliation it caused, but for the difficulties posed in following it through. Scenes of Crime had finished photographing the area and were now engaged in gathering samples of soil, leaves and grass from the spot where the alleged crime took place.

  Webb pulled himself up. 'Alleged'. Was that a male reaction? He hoped not. In his own mind, he was sure the victim had spoken the truth. She seemed a decent woman, divorced and with no current men friends. According to Mrs Winter, she was reserved, efficient and reliable. Webb accepted that she had reported the matter only from a sense of duty, to prevent a recurrence. Certainly her initial actions bore out her first intention of keeping quiet. Dick Hodges had not reacted well to being told that all the clothes she'd worn at the time had been bundled straight into the washing machine. She had also, by her own account, scrubbed herself all over and washed her hair. Any worthwhile evidence had probably long since been washed away into the Westridge drains.

  'Hell and damnation!' Dick had exploded. 'Why didn't she bulldoze the garden, while she was at it?'

  Webb sighed and studied the terrain. A close-board fence separated the front and back gardens, but at each side of the house a gate gave access, and he'd established that these were not locked until the off-duty nurses returned from their evenings out. They'd still been unlatched when he arrived the previous evening.

  A glass sun-lounge had been built against the back of the house—empty at the moment, since Matron had decreed that those showing a prurient interest in police activity should at least be denied a grandstand view. He was aware, however, that their every movement was being watched from the upper windows.

  On his far right, conveniently close to the kitchen, was a thriving vegetable garden and beyond it a small orchard of apple trees. In the centre, separating him from his colleagues, lay a large circular rose-bed. The garden sloped away for some hundred and fifty feet, and at the far end, screened from the lower road by a clump of trees, was the annexe, used as the nurses' home.

  According to Frances Daly's statement, she had left the house by way of the sun-lounge just after eight o'clock. The path she'd taken, along the left-hand side of the grounds, was bordered by a mass of overgrown shrubs among which, presumably, her attacker had lain hidden. Nearer the annexe, these merged with the fringe of trees on to which the bungalow backed. The spot where the attack had taken place was a small gap just inside the shrubbery, screened from casual observers by a curtain of buddleia. Whether by chance or design, it was sited just beyond the point where light from the house windows would floodlight the garden, yet outside the radius of that from the annexe.

  There were two male residents at The Willows, both infirm and in their eighties. Webb felt he could safely discount them from his suspicions. The only other man on the premises was the cook's husband, Frank Chitty, who acted as gardener, odd-job man and porter. They had a basement flat in the main building. According to his statement, he'd gone along to The Packhorse to watch the darts match. A large man, pasty-faced and balding, he'd looked scared, but that might simply have been due to police questioning.

  Webb thought back to his meeting with the victim. She'd looked up quickly when he introduced himself and he'd seen recognition in her eyes, though she'd made no comment. Her own name also seemed familiar, but he couldn't place it, and he was sure he hadn't seen her before. He'd a good memory for faces—he needed it.

  'I thought I'd at least be spared identification,' she had begun bitterly, and, cutting short his assurances, added: 'You've arranged for a search of the grounds at first light. Once people know where the attack took place, it won't take long to discove
r who was involved.'

  She was right, of course. He'd left her with Sally Pierce, to whom, her protest made, she had presented her story with almost unnatural calm. Webb had played back the recording in the car.

  'He came up behind me and something sharp pricked my neck. "Don't make a sound," he said, "or it will be your last."'

  'Would you know his voice again?' Sally'd interrupted. 'No, he was whispering. You can't recognize a whisper.' 'Go on.'

  'He told me to put my hands behind my back. He laid the knife on the ground while he tied them, but I was too frightened to try to break away. Then this thick, woolly helmet thing came over my head and he pushed me ahead of him into the bushes.' She paused. 'It was most effective, that helmet. Not only could I not see, it dulled all my other senses, too. I even had difficulty breathing. But I think that when he first came up to me, I caught a whiff of beer on his breath. I know I immediately thought of The Packhorse, because I'd seen all the cars along the road.'

  She drew a deep breath. 'I imagine you don't want the clinical details. They can't vary much from case to case.'

  'It would help to know if he was violent, apart from threatening you with the knife.'

  'Not physically, no. Mind you, when I knew it was inevitable I didn't struggle. But the odd thing was he insisted I kept reciting nursery rhymes.'

  'Nursery rhymes?'

  'It was—macabre. He had the knife in his hand, and it was an effective prompter, I can tell you. Every time I faltered, he gave me a little prick. Then, when he'd finished, he made me turn on my face while he untied my hands and removed the helmet. He threatened various obscenities if I turned to look at him, but he needn't have worried.' Her voice shook momentarily and she steadied it. 'And that, Miss Pierce, is all.'