Simeon's Bride

by Alison G. Taylor

  ‘How would you know when it’s full?’ McKenna was curious.

  Wil laughed. ‘Your lavvy backs up! Mind you, I can see why the council insisted on the tank. If your drains just went straight out to sea, they’d back up every time the tide comes in.’

  ‘And what d’you do when it is full?’

  Wil regarded McKenna assessingly. ‘Don’t know much, do you?’ he commented. ‘You call the council or the water board, and they send a truck round to suck it all out so’s you can start filling it again.’

  Removing his Wellingtons at the back door, Wil padded in his socks to the Primus stove, to put on the kettle. ‘What d’you want to ask me?’

  ‘We’ve just found out some letters might have come here, addressed to a Margaret Bailey, or just an M. Bailey.’

  ‘Oh.’ Wil sat on his crate and lit his pipe. ‘That her real name, was it? Always thought the other one was a bit far-fetched, even for the English.’ He puffed smoke rings. McKenna watched them float slowly upwards towards the smoke-blackened beams of the ceiling, pierced by a shaft of sunlight through the dusty window.

  ‘No,’ Wil continued. ‘Not seen any letters at all. Not even that junk mail folks are so fond of. Why don’t you ask his highness at the estate office?’

  ‘I shall … all in good time. Have you nearly finished here?’

  ‘All but, provided folk leave us alone, and I don’t only mean yourself,’ Wil said. ‘Word’s got out about Rebekah … bloody tourists, wanting to be shown where we found her. Mostly Americans, I might add, rabbiting on about history.’ He tamped his pipe on the tiled floor. ‘Bloody obsessed with history, the Yanks.’

  ‘Can’t blame them, Wil. They haven’t any of their own to speak of…. I’d better be making tracks.’

  ‘Stay for a panad. The kettle’s nearly boiling.’ Wil put coffee in three mugs, and stood looking through the window, his back to McKenna, waiting for the kettle to whistle. ‘Tell you something you can’t quite put your finger on,’ he said. ‘I keep seeing this bloke hanging round on the edge of the woods, and I’m beginning to wonder if there isn’t something in all these tales after all. Dave’s seen him too. Dark-haired guy in a white shirt, with a dead pale face and cold eyes.’

  McKenna remembered the shadow that dogged his footsteps on Wednesday night. ‘Mary Ann in the village says he’s a gipsy.’

  ‘Oh, does she? Not what Wednesday’s paper reckoned, was it?’ Wil took the kettle off the stove and poured steaming water into the mugs. ‘He must be the first gippo in history able to vanish into thin air while you’re staring him in the face.’

  Dewi pulled up outside the estate office, humped the heavy ledgers into his arms, slammed the car door shut with his foot, and walked into the office. A small woman in rimless spectacles sat behind Prosser’s desk.

  ‘Can I help you?’ she asked.

  ‘I’m from the police,’ Dewi explained. ‘I’ve brought these back.’ He put the ledgers on a filing cabinet. ‘Er – where’s Mr Prosser, then?’

  ‘Oh, he’s always off sick at this time of the year. He gets the most dreadful hayfever. You didn’t need to see him, did you?’

  ‘Well, my boss might. How long is he usually away?’

  ‘A week. Ten days, perhaps. His doctor fills him up with drugs, and he can’t drive or do anything while he’s on them. I usually take over.’

  ‘D’you deal with everything when Mr P.’s away, then? Mail and whatnot?’

  ‘Oh, yes. I have authority to deal with everything.’

  ‘It must be very interesting. I’ll bet these bodies have caused a bit of a kerfuffle.’

  ‘I’ll say! Are you going to be arresting anybody soon?’

  Dewi tapped his nose with his forefinger. ‘Can’t say, can I? But make sure you keep watching the news. It’s been nice talking to you, Mrs—?’

  ‘Miss Hughes. And you, too. Do call again.’

  Dewi was at the door when he said, as if in afterthought, ‘By the way, do you ever get mail for Gallows Cottage? In this office, I mean.’

  ‘Mail for Gallows Cottage? Well, not very often. It’s empty, isn’t it?’

  ‘Just a thought. I wondered what happened to letters if they arrived after the people’d left. You know, who sent them on?’

  ‘Actually, there were one or two letters for somebody called – Bradley, was it? Quite some time ago, but I remember seeing them…. It wasn’t Bradley, though … some other English name beginning with B.’

  ‘Oh, yes?’ Dewi crossed his fingers behind his back. ‘Did somebody collect the mail from the cottage?’

  ‘Collect the mail? No, the post brought them here. Mr Prosser took them. He must’ve had the forwarding address, but you’d expect him to, wouldn’t you?’

  ‘Are you absolutely sure?’ McKenna asked. ‘We can’t go chasing Prosser on a rumour.’

  ‘It’s not a rumour, sir,’ Dewi insisted. ‘That’s what she said, clear as day. Mr Prosser took the mail for Gallows Cottage.’

  ‘Yes, but,’ Jack intervened, ‘it wasn’t post for Bailey, was it? There’s no reason why Prosser shouldn’t send on mail. It’s no crime.’

  ‘Whereas,’ McKenna took up the conversation, ‘if we say to Prosser: “Why didn’t you tell us you were sending on mail for a dead woman?” we’ll be accusing him of something he might not have done. D’you see my point, Dewi?’

  ‘No, I don’t. With all due respect, sir, if Prosser’s just been sending post on for somebody who stayed in the cottage some time, he’s not going to mind us asking, is he? And if it’s post for Romy he’s been handling, then we’ve got the right to drop on him like a ton of bricks.’

  ‘The boy’s right, really,’ Jack said.

  ‘We’ll give Mr Prosser a visit, then,’ McKenna decided. ‘A friendly visit. No heavy-handed stuff. Is that clear?’

  Chapter 20

  Trefor Prosser lived in an ancient and beautiful cottage near the top end of Rating Row in Beaumaris. His sleek Volvo stood at the kerb, gleaming in the sunshine. McKenna drew in behind the car, and peered at the cottage, its small windows shrouded in snow-white netting. ‘These places are worth a bundle,’ he observed. ‘Highly sought after residences in the most highly sought after place in North Wales.’

  ‘People want their heads seeing to in my opinion,’ Dewi said. ‘The houses were only built for fishermen and the like.’

  ‘Yes, Dewi,’ McKenna agreed. ‘That was then, and this is now. Let’s go and beard the lion, and no roaring.’

  The front doors of the houses led straight on to a narrow pavement, just as they did in McKenna’s street, but by comparison, McKenna dwelt in a slum. The door to Prosser’s house, painted a deep glossy blue, was furnished with a brass knocker in the shape of a lion’s head. McKenna ran his hand over the paint. ‘Nice colour. What would you call it, Jack?’

  ‘Poncy blue,’ Jack sneered.

  ‘Actually, sir,’ Dewi volunteered. ‘It’s called French navy. Our neighbour used it on his house last year. You can buy it at B&Q.;’

  ‘I don’t think the chief inspector wants to know, Prys,’ Jack growled.

  ‘I was only trying to help,’ Dewi protested. ‘For all we know, Mr McKenna might be planning a spot of home decorating now the weather’s picking up.’

  ‘Will you two shut up? Knock on the door, Jack. Let’s do what we came for.’

  The first snapping of the lion’s teeth against wood yielded silence. Jack rapped harder, bringing a faint whisper of slippers on carpet. The door swung slowly open, and Prosser squinted around its edge, looking first at Jack, then at McKenna and Dewi. His eyes were bloodshot and red-rimmed, his cheeks pale, the end of his nose cherry bright.

  ‘I’m ill. Can’t you see?’ he grumbled.

  ‘Just a few words, Mr Prosser. We wouldn’t bother you if it wasn’t necessary. You know that.’

  ‘What about?’ Prosser hung on to the edge of the door, his body shivering gently.

  ‘Let us in for a few minutes, will you, pl
ease?’ McKenna asked. ‘It’s not a good idea to stand out in the street, is it?’

  The door glided open far enough to admit them in single file. McKenna trod on a carpet so thick he could have slept on it in comfort, along a narrow hallway sweet with the scents of beeswax and pot-pourri, Prosser shuffling in front and into a back room which looked out on to a long, lawned garden. Cherry trees in full glorious bloom tossed in the wind, their petals showering to the ground.

  Easing himself into an armchair upholstered in olive-green hide, Prosser waved his hand at the three police officers. ‘Find yourselves a seat,’ he invited, his voice muffled, catarrh blocking the sinuses. McKenna sat opposite on a matching sofa, Jack beside him, Dewi leaning against the wall by the door. Padded silk brocade draped the windows, thick velvety carpet lay underfoot, antique china was displayed on window ledge and mantelpiece. The chimney alcove held an ancient chest in aged and mellow oak. On illuminated glass shelves above stood the figure of an oxen led by a young boy, life breathing from every line of the exquisitely carved ivory. The room was spotlessly clean, sweetly scented like the hallway. Prosser dragged a handkerchief from his trouser pocket, and wiped his watering eyes.

  ‘What’s so bloody urgent it can’t wait?’ he demanded. ‘Why do three of you need to come? Scared I might attack you?’ Clad in carpet slippers, grey flannel trousers, and a silk roll-neck sweater, he ran his fingers inside the collar, loosening it from his throat, wiped his eyes again, and held the handkerchief balled up in his left hand.

  ‘We haven’t progressed very far with the investigation into Ms Cheney’s death,’ McKenna began. ‘However, we are pursuing several leads.’

  ‘I should bloody hope so! That’s what you get paid for, isn’t it?’

  ‘One of the things we’re looking into,’ McKenna went on, ‘is the matter of some post which arrived at Gallows Cottage quite recently.’

  ‘Post?’ Prosser wiped his eyes again, hiding his expression behind the handkerchief. ‘What post?’

  ‘Post addressed to someone whose name begins with B. We understand it was sent on to the estate office.’

  ‘Well, it would be, wouldn’t it, if they weren’t there any longer?’ Prosser’s tone was acid.

  ‘Miss Hughes seems to think you might have taken it to send on. To a forwarding address.’

  ‘Miss Hughes is probably right then, isn’t she? Part of the job.’ Prosser sniffed loudly.

  ‘Would you perhaps remember the letters, Mr Prosser?’ McKenna asked. ‘Could you recall who they were addressed to? After all, you must know who’s been in Gallows Cottage.’

  ‘Of course I can’t remember!’ Prosser raged. ‘Why d’you ask such a bloody stupid question? Is that what you’ve come here pestering me about? Is it? Why the bloody hell couldn’t you use your common sense and look in those ledgers of mine you were so keen to take?’ He was standing, shaking with rage. ‘Go on! Get out! And don’t think you’ve heard the last of this, because you haven’t!’

  Jack and McKenna stood up. Prosser stamped to the door, and waited. McKenna sighed. ‘You’ve made your point, Mr Prosser. But I must warn you, if we find you’ve been withholding information, all the complaints in the world won’t make any difference.’

  Prosser’s small plump frame stood in the shadow of the doorway, as, McKenna recalled, Christopher Stott’s willowy body had been darkened by the massive embrasure of the Snidey Castle door. He stared at Prosser. ‘You see, Mr Prosser, we can’t exclude the possibility that you know more about Ms Cheney than you’ve told us…. Like her real name, for instance.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘Maybe you don’t,’ McKenna said thoughtfully. ‘We know that post addressed in her real name of Bailey was sent to Gallows Cottage in February … and redirected somewhere. We haven’t found out where as yet, but we will. You can be quite sure of that.’

  Prosser turned on his heel and walked down the hall. They heard the front door open. McKenna went after him, Jack and Dewi trailing behind, and expected to see Prosser waiting to show them out. Instead, he saw him, small as a child, behind the wheel of the Volvo, its motor running. He rushed out on to the street as the car roared away up the hill.

  Dewi erupted from the front door. ‘Prosser’s full of drugs!’ he shouted. ‘That’s why he’s not in work. He’s not supposed to drive!’

  Jack, the better driver, took the wheel of McKenna’s car, and went after Prosser, up the hill and under the old railway bridge to the first junction on the road criss-crossing the uplands. ‘Where now?’ he asked, skidding to a halt by a signpost. ‘Llanddona or Pentraeth or Menai Bridge?’

  ‘How the hell do I know where the bloody fool’s gone?’ McKenna snarled. ‘The man’s crazy!’

  ‘Guilty, more like,’ Jack muttered, turning into the pot-holed lane to Llanddona, racing through the village, past the twin television relay masts crowning a hill apiece, and on until the road petered out at a sweep of sandy heathland overlooking Red Wharf Bay. ‘Well, he’s not here, is he?’ he commented. ‘Unless he’s driven into the sea.’

  ‘That’s what I’m afraid of,’ McKenna fretted. ‘Why did he do it? What did I say?’

  ‘I dunno.’ Jack turned the car, driving on to an unfenced field dotted with pale brown cows and bright yellow gorse bushes. Salty sand crunched under the wheels. ‘We’d better try the other road.’

  ‘Which one?’

  ‘Pentraeth. He might’ve gone that way.’

  ‘What’s the use? Wherever he went, he’s miles ahead of us.’ McKenna picked up the telephone to call the police station in Llangefni. Jack drove back to the crossroads, and turned up the Pentraeth road.

  ‘I want to go back to the house,’ McKenna said, holding the telephone. ‘The local police can sort him out, and tell us when he turns up.’

  ‘Yeah, well suppose he doesn’t?’ Jack asked, as the car slewed on a blind bend. ‘Turn up, I mean.’

  ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake! Just leave it be, will you? I don’t know how, but we’ve made some almighty blunder!’

  ‘You have, you mean!’ Jack’s face flushed. ‘You were the one did all the talking.’ He accelerated along a road winding through folds of hilly pasture, crowned here and there with little thickets of trees in bright new leaf. McKenna fell silent, anxiety gnawing his innards, that dreadful Celtic prescience which knew when disaster stalked a person’s own small patch of earth.

  They found Prosser fifteen minutes later, on the narrow walled road outside Llansadwrn village, the Volvo rammed hard against the left-hand wall, heavy grey stones pushed out of the centre and tumbled on to the bonnet by the impact. A red, green and white Crosville minibus, a red dragon emblazoned on its sides, slewed across the hummocky verge opposite, its few passengers and the driver milling around in the road like so many sheep, moving this way and that, towards the Volvo then away from it. The bus driver sat down suddenly in the middle of the road, and wiped his hand over his head. When he saw the blood running down between his fingers, he fell backwards in a faint. McKenna, out of the car before it stopped, rushed to the Volvo. Jack summoned ambulances and fire engines before following him.

  Trefor Prosser might never again enjoy the comfort of his luxurious home, Jack thought, or any other earthly pleasure, for he had ignored all advice, and neglected to fasten his seat belt. He hung over the steering wheel, fat little buttocks in their grey flannel clothing reared in the air, arms outstretched, his head rammed hard against the shattered windscreen. McKenna put his hand to the artery in Prosser’s neck, holding his breath. ‘He’s still alive.’

  ‘I’ve called in. They should be here soon. We’d better look at the others. The bus driver’s head looks stove in.’

  ‘Shit! Shit! SHIT!’ McKenna seethed. ‘Why did this have to happen?’ He wrenched at the door of the Volvo. ‘We must get him out! The car might go on fire!’

  ‘Leave him!’ Jack ordered. ‘Don’t you know you can do more harm that way?’ He moved aroun
d, sniffing for petrol fumes. ‘Anyway, when did you last hear of a Volvo going on fire? There’s not a whiff of petrol. They build these things like tanks.’ He surveyed Prosser. ‘And if that daft bugger’d fastened his seat belt, he’d be legging it across the fields by now.’

  Prosser had lain in the ambulance on the gurney opposite the bus driver, his vital signs monitored by paramedics, one of whom kept searching ears and nostrils for signs of blood and fluid leaking from a fractured skull. Watching Prosser’s waxen face and still body, McKenna had felt a great guilt fall upon his shoulders, with all the weight of God behind it.

  In between retching agonizingly into an oval container made of what looked like old egg boxes, the bus driver told McKenna how Prosser came storming along the narrow road in the big red car, how he and Prosser each swerved to avoid the other, how Prosser’s car rammed the wall with a crunch the driver said he would remember on the day he died.

  Jack and Dewi drove McKenna’s car to Bangor, Prosser’s home secured, the crashed Volvo towed away to be examined for mechanical faults in the event of Prosser’s dying.

  Owen Griffiths awaited them. ‘This is a bad show,’ he commented. ‘What on earth happened?’

  ‘Something must’ve put the wind up Prosser, and he took off,’ Jack replied.

  ‘He wasn’t supposed to drive, sir,’ Dewi added. ‘Mr Prosser knew that. It was the reason he was off work.’

  ‘But what did you say?’ the superintendent asked. ‘Oh, my God!’ His face blanched. ‘You were chasing him when he crashed, weren’t you?’

  ‘No, sir,’ Jack said. ‘We didn’t see hide nor hair of him until we found him outside Llansadwrn, and he’d already crashed by then.’

  ‘I suppose we should be thankful for small mercies, then.’ Griffiths looked weary. ‘Go and do your reports, then bring them to me.’

  ‘There really is little point in your staying here, Chief Inspector,’ the registrar said. ‘Your friend has a depressed fracture of the skull, and a number of broken ribs. He’s still unconscious, and could remain that way for days.’