‘I forgot to turn off the gas too,’ Tessa was saying. ‘Dick always turns his off.’
‘We’ll see to it, Tessa,’ said Drummer. ‘Don’t you worry. Where was the boat? How did you get there?’
‘I don’t remember,’ Tessa frowned. ‘I just remember you weren’t here, Mummy, and Mrs Cox came.’
‘Was the boat far away, Tessa?’ Drummer asked. He knew the boats by the river had been inspected when Tessa was first missed; how had she not been found then? She’d been concealed in the flat at first; that was certain, but for how long?
‘It was near the rec,’ Tessa said. ‘It wasn’t an island after all. There were nice pink curtains.’
The pattern, though modified, repeated, Drummer thought grimly. In the basement flat, Mrs Cox’s newspaper cuttings had been discovered and the police knew that they had in their charge a convicted child murderer who, after serving her time in prison, had made a new life in Berbridge under another name. The scenes-of-crime team examining the flat had found a Mars Bar, wrapped in a handkerchief, tucked down the side of the wing armchair; it bore the clear impression of a child’s teeth and had been sent to the lab for testing. Some providential chance had caused Tessa to bring up the drugs she had swallowed, and saved her from inhaling her vomit. Her life had been preserved by luck, he thought.
In the background, Ruth and the woman police constable were murmuring about taking Tessa to hospital, but the child seemed quite well and alert. Only Drummer, of the company, knew that she had probably ingested a large dose of drugs, and even WPC Frost did not yet know Mrs Cox’s true identity. Louise, clutching the child, shook her head when she caught the drift of the discussion.
‘It would be like what happened to me all over again,’ she kept saying.
Drummer did not understand what she meant but he did not press Louise. Instead, from the Henshaws’ flat, he telephoned her doctor, who was off duty. His partner, a woman, agreed to come round at once and it was decided that she should be the judge of whether Tessa need be taken to hospital.
The doctor was gentle and kind, and said that she thought home, her mother, rest and warmth were the best medicines now for Tessa. The bruises on Tessa’s legs and body were not, she thought, due to blows but were knocks of a lesser kind. Her reflexes were normal.
‘Were you very sick?’ she asked Tessa.
‘Very,’ Tessa confirmed. ‘And in Mrs Cox’s bathroom, too.’
The doctor conferred with Drummer, who told her what had been found in the basement flat. Tessa had probably been given nitrazepam, he said, and perhaps a baby sedative. Chloral hydrate had been found, too. These drugs, said the doctor, were, it could generally be said, fatal only in large doses. Chloral hydrate was an irritant and could be corrosive; it tasted very bitter. She couldn’t be certain without looking it up, but she had an idea it interacted with antihistamine, the main ingredient of the baby sedative, and so would provoke nausea. These circumstances had combined to save Tessa.
There had been no sodium amytal handy this time, Drummer thought grimly; Tessa would not have recovered from that, any more than the other child so long ago.
The doctor said she would return later in the day to make sure Tessa was not in need of more treatment, and advised a bland diet with plenty of fluid. When she and Drummer were gone, Tessa had a bath and a hairwash, and dressed in clean clothes. WPC Frost took away what she had worn during her captivity, each garment sealed in a plastic bag, for traces from Mrs Cox’s person or clothing might be found on them by the lab.
After that, everyone went down to lunch in the Henshaw’s flat, which Tessa thought was quite an excitement. Mrs Henshaw had come to the door and talked to Mummy and then they’d all gone round the house and through the front entrance to the big ground floor flat, with Tessa wearing a padded anorak of Mummy’s since the police had gone off with her own coat and Mummy said she mustn’t catch cold after her bath. The anorak hung down past her hands and reached to her ankles.
Tessa had scrambled egg for lunch, instead of roast pork – the pork smelled good, but somehow she didn’t want any. After that, she had lots of ice cream. She still didn’t understand why Mrs Cox had told such a fib about Mummy, who hadn’t been hurt at all, but had just missed her train. It all seemed a bit puzzling, but everything was all right now. Unlike someone older, Tessa required no explanation for Ruth’s unexpected presence.
Drummer returned in the afternoon to tell Louise what had been discovered. The Henshaws had known that Mrs Cox went baby-sitting regularly, and the police had found a diary in her kitchen, with ‘Bradley, 7 p.m.’, entered for Saturday. They had soon traced the Bradleys, just round the corner in Shippham Avenue. Mrs Bradley had been rather surprised, this morning, to find on the kitchen cork tiles, beside the boiler, a stain such as a very wet raincoat might leave if it was hung nearby and dripped. She’d cleaned off the mark, but the policeman who had called to inquire whether Mrs Cox had kept her appointment could take her word that it had been there. Her husband had fetched Mrs Cox by car, she said, and had taken her home later – about midnight, she added.
The constable went next door, as routine, to ask if the neighbours had noticed anything odd the previous evening. There, he was shown the pram, still muddy, though the worst of the dirt had been wiped off. The lab could analyse what was left to see if it matched that in the recreation ground or on the river bank. They’d seek other proof of how the pram had been used; there would be traces.
The boat with the pink curtains was soon found, with the broken lock on the cabin door. Detectives were now painstakingly examining it for evidence to prove that Mrs Cox had been there.
In Berbridge Central Police Station, Mrs Cox raved insanely when challenged by Drummer. At first she had refused to talk at all; then she had begun to cry and talk about wickedness stalking the earth, waiting for little girls who must be saved from evil.
After that, suddenly, she snapped, all reason lost. Drummer thought she might never be fit to come to trial, but she would certainly not be free to threaten the safety of anyone ever again.
After Tessa’s return, Ruth had telephoned Freda. She rang again in the afternoon, to say she would be leaving for Cornwall soon, and should be back between nine and ten that night. She came back from this second call looking thoughtful. The others were about to have tea, settled cosily round the gas fire in the sitting-room. Tessa was preparing to cut the cake, an orange sponge, which Louise had made that morning.
‘How would you feel about coming back to Portrinnock, Louise?’ Ruth asked, when this important task was complete.
Tessa, her slice of cake in her hand, paused with it in the air and caught her breath. She looked at her mother.
‘For a holiday?’ Louise was saying.
‘No,’ said Ruth. ‘For good. Marjorie Browne – the receptionist,’ she added to Alan, ‘is pregnant. She wants to leave in the summer and her job will be going. Your mother suggested you might like it.’
‘She did?’ Louise clasped her hands together. ‘You’re telling the truth, Ruth? It wasn’t your idea?’
‘No, I promise,’ said Ruth. ‘She asked me to tell you.’
Tessa’s eyes were shining. There was no doubt what she thought about such a plan.
Ruth’s gaze held Louise’s, across the room.
‘It’s your decision, Louise,’ she emphasised. ‘Yours alone – no one else’s,’ and she nodded meaningly in Tessa’s direction. ‘You couldn’t live at the hotel, there isn’t room, but you could find a flat or cottage to rent in Portrinnock, I’m sure. Don’t decide now – take time to think it over.’ She cut a sliver of cake and held it, ready to eat. ‘Why not come down when Tessa’s term ends and see how you feel then? You could ask about the school and so on.’ She popped the piece of cake into her mouth. ‘Delicious,’ she said, and added, to Alan, ‘the present receptionist lives in the town and comes in every day.’
Tessa had forgotten about the cake.
‘Oh, Mummy!’ she breathe
d.
They would go, Alan knew with bleak foreboding. It would be right for them both. Louise had ghosts from the past to lay and she needed to come to terms with her mother. Perhaps her gremlin attacks were cured, but she might, he feared, have more. If so, in the more tranquil, slower-living West Country she would find it easier to cope with them. What could he, after all, offer her that could compare with the security her mother, and the thriving hotel, would provide? He had no job; he was married; he was much older than she was.
He looked stricken, Ruth saw. Would he try to persuade Louise not to accept her mother’s offer?
Alan sipped his tea. Nothing would alter at once. Louise needed him now while she recovered from these last terrible days, and he must help her to find her own way to a decision without letting her see that he would be desolate without her. He would never forget this brief love, but he must let her go when she was ready.
There was this fellow, Dick, whoever he was, with his boat, in Portrinnock. Louise had known him for years. Was he married?
Alan plodded through a slice of cake while they talked about her mother’s suggestion.
‘You should think about it, Louise, as Ruth says,’ he advised.
Before Ruth left, he went round to the Henshaws’ flat to telephone Daphne. It couldn’t be postponed any longer. Their telephone was attached to the kitchen wall, and they tactfully closed the door so that he could talk privately.
‘Tessa’s been found,’ he said.
‘I know,’ Daphne said. ‘It was on the one o’clock news.’
‘She’s quite all right,’ Alan continued. ‘Not hurt, I mean.’
‘Yes. So it said on the radio,’ Daphne replied. No other details had been given; Daphne knew nothing about Mrs Cox and her part in Tessa’s disappearance. ‘You’ll be home soon, then,’ she said.
‘No.’ Alan could dodge it no longer. He plunged. ‘I can’t leave Louise now,’ he said. ‘She’s had the most dreadful shock. I’m staying.’
Daphne heard the words, but she would not accept their message.
‘You mean you’ll be going straight to the office from there in the morning?’ she said.
She still didn’t know! So much had happened in the last hours that this fact had been driven from Alan’s mind.
‘No,’ he said again.
‘What do you mean? Are you taking the day off?’
‘I haven’t been near the office for weeks,’ Alan said. ‘I was sacked – made redundant.’
‘Oh!’ Daphne’s voice came as a wail. ‘Oh, Alan,’ she cried. Her mind was reeling. ‘She’s not your secretary then? This girl—what’s her name?’
‘Louise,’ Alan said. ‘No, she’s not.’
‘You said she was,’ Daphne accused. ‘You lied to me, Alan.’
‘Yes,’ he admitted, but Daphne was rushing on.
‘Why didn’t you tell me you’d been sacked?’ she asked.
‘I tried, Daphne, but you wouldn’t listen,’ he said. She wasn’t listening now, not to what he was really trying to say. ‘We can’t discuss it on the phone,’ he went on. ‘There’s a lot I’ve got to explain, but I’m afraid it must wait.’
‘But your job, Alan,’ Daphne said. ‘What are you doing about finding another?’
‘I’m looking,’ he said. ‘I’ll tell you about it later. I can’t stop now. I’ll ring you tomorrow.’
It was her hospital day tomorrow, he remembered.
He might be able to postpone explaining until the dust had time to settle. He’d ring in the morning and make sure she had left as usual, then go round to pick up some clothes. He was moving in with Louise until he was sure she could manage without him – until she wanted him to go.
At last Daphne understood what he was saying. He meant to spend the night with that girl.
‘You must come home, Alan,’ she said. ‘Come home now.’
‘I’ve told you already, Daphne, I can’t leave Louise,’ he said.
‘But what about me?’ Daphne said. ‘I’m your wife!’
‘I know, and I’m sorry to hurt you,’ said Alan. ‘I’m afraid I’m letting you down very badly.’ He’d been weak and craven, he thought, and he shouldn’t be doing this to Daphne at all, much less over the telephone. But he did not intend to let Louise down too: everyone else, except possibly Ruth, had failed her before, and if she was to face the future with courage, she must know that she could rely on him now. ‘I’m needed here,’ he said.
For a while, he thought, just a while; and he wondered if Daphne had ever really needed him.
‘I’ll ring tomorrow,’ he said again. Perhaps they could talk in the evening, if she wasn’t off at bridge or badminton.
Daphne replaced the receiver without replying. She stood staring at it, eyes smarting, but her tears were of anger, not grief.
How dare he behave like this! It was some sort of middle-aged madness, of course. He’d return to his senses soon enough and come running back. Either that, or this girl would get tired of him. She must be feckless to let her child get lost, but if that hadn’t happened, how long would it have been, Daphne wondered, before she found out what was going on?
To lose his job and not tell her! The enormity of it was shocking. Unless he soon found another, how could they continue to live at Cherry Cottage?
Daphne’s world rocked. She would never give up her home. Nothing – no mad infatuation of Alan’s – would be allowed to destroy her life, she decided grimly, already beginning to stitch up the great, ugly, gaping wound she would never acknowledge, either to herself or to anyone else. He would find a job, and a good one, and their life would resume, just as before. She would think of an excuse to explain his absence from home – a business trip abroad, perhaps. Meanwhile, she would not let her mind dwell on where Alan was now, or all it implied.
He would return.
'Dr. Patrick Grant' Titles
(in order of first publication)
These titles can be read as a series, or randomly as standalone novels
Dead In The Morning (1970)
Silent Witness (1972)
Grave Matters (1973)
Mortal Remains (1974)
Cast For Death (1976)
Other Margaret Yorke Novels
Published by House of Stratus
Devil's Work (1982)
The Hand Of Death (1981)
Pieces Of Justice (Short Story Collection) (1994)
Safely To The Grave (1986)
Serious Intent (1995)
A Small Deceit (1991)
Synopses of Titles
Published by House of Stratus
A. Dr. Patrick Grant Titles
Cast For Death
Sam Irwin, actor, is found dead in the River Thames. It appears to be suicide. But why should he have taken his own life shortly before opening in a new play at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre at Stratford-upon-Avon? Dr. Patrick Grant, a friend of Irwin, manages to link the seemingly unconnected occurrences of the death of a dog, a further suicide, and a series of art robberies in coming to an conclusion. That, however, is not what is seems, being only the prelude to a massive deception. Grant himself is threatened, and unless he can escape unscathed from a concert at the Festival Hall, the secret of Irwin's death will die with him.
Dead In The Morning
Imagine an old lady who was hated because of her arrogance and cruelty towards her children, and whose lives she dominated, becoming a murder victim. But it is the housekeeper who is found dead. Had a mistake been made and the wrong woman killed? Dr. Patrick Grant uses his powers of logic and deduction to determine this is not the case, but he can only prove it at the expense of incriminating an innocent person. How does he solve this particular conundrum?
Grave Matters
Amelia Brinton, a retired headmistress of a top girl's school, appears to have accidently fallen to her death in Greece. Her friend, a Miss Forest, also meets her death having been pushed down stairs in the British Museum. Dr. Patrick Grant connects th
e two events and his investigations lead him to a quiet backwater village in Hampshire. Yet more mysteries unfold; a dog drowns in shallow water, there is a case of food poisoning, and finally a house appears to be haunted. There is then another murder. What connects these events and why was Amelia Brinton killed. It takes Grant's full powers of logic and deduction, with a little help from the police, to get to the bottom of what is a spine tingling mystery and ultimate crime story.
Mortal Remains
Dr. Patrick Grant does not believe that Felix Lomax died accidentally. The unfortunate Lomax was thought to be lecturing on a luxury cruise liner, but is found washed ashore on a lonely beach in Crete. Grant's investigations take him upon a trail which eventually leads to the tombs of Mycenae, where he ends up risking his own life in an effort to determine the truth.
Silent Witness
The Austrian Alpine ski resort of Greutz is the scene of rivalry between an English party and some new arrivals. The tension mounts with the weather closing in, when blizzards envelope the resort and avalanches threaten. Dr. Patrick Grant's particular powers of logic and reasoning are needed, however, when a member of the party is discovered murdered. Why should a seemingly insignificant individual become a victim?
B. Other Titles
Devil's Work Page 18