The Winter Mystery

by Faith Martin

  ‘Looks like the devil’s family is turning against him at last,’ she said, nodding her head in acute satisfaction. ‘You mark my words, they’ll all leave him eventually. Just needs one to get up the nerve, and the rest will go, like a line of dominoes toppling over. And serve him right, too,’ she gloated.

  Jenny sighed. Mrs Jarvis, with her tales of doom and gloom, she could do without.

  ‘Mrs Jarvis, weren’t you going to go into the village to do some shopping today?’ she reminded her, and none too diplomatically at that. But if the daily felt any shame, she hid it well. Instead her hands flew up to her cheeks in remembrance.

  ‘Lumme, yes, so I was. Oh, blast and damnation, I left my purse and shopping bag back home.’ She sighed angrily. ‘I’d best go back and get it. You won’t mind if I take the morning off, then?’ she reiterated, as if desperate for reassurance or permission. But she was already walking to the door, donning her coat and muttering evilly to herself about her bad memory and the fate of devils.

  Jenny watched her go, and hoped she didn’t run into Stan Kelton on the way back to The Dell. With the foul mood they were both in, one or the other of them was unlikely to survive the encounter!

  * * *

  The first batch of twenty mince pies was in the oven by the time Stan Kelton came back. It had stopped snowing, but his hands were red and raw with the cold, and when he passed by her to check on something in the cellar, she could feel the cold coming off his clothes in shiver-making waves.

  She reached automatically for the mop, which she now kept outside the cupboard. Why bother keeping it inside, when she was perpetually using it, she wondered peevishly, grumbling to herself as she worked.

  ‘I’m just off to the tack room.’ Stan’s comment stopped her in mid-mop, and she watched, totally exasperated, as he walked back across the floor in his muddy wellies. She looked at the floor, and its single track of new, muddy footprints, and leaned on her mop, slowly counting to twenty. She balefully watched him walk to a side door she’d never seen used before, and there he took off his wellingtons and slipped on a waiting pair of old, cracked-but-dry work boots. She supposed he liked to keep the stables as dry and mud-free as he could. He obviously cared more about his carthorses than he did his own home.

  As he disappeared into the corridor beyond, she breathed a sigh of relief. At least he was now out from under her feet, so once she’d mopped the floor again it should be all right for a few hours at least, until everyone piled back in for lunch.

  Wielding the mop, she set to once more, muttering colourful curses under her breath that she’d learned from an old admiral she’d once cooked for. The range of swear words would have turned a Pimlico prostitute pink.

  She had prepared baked potatoes with a cheese and onion topping for lunch, and after Stan’s cutting remark about her plain food yesterday, had decided to make good use of four of the rabbits hanging in the cold cellar to make savoury rabbit with tarragon sauce for dinner. To go with it, she’d prepare some duchess potatoes and braised baby vegetables.

  For dessert, she’d decided on apricot and ratafia tartlets, which was very posh fare indeed. Let him talk about plain food when he had that feast set before him! Although, Jenny fumed silently, he’d probably then complain that the food was too fancy.

  At last, she could finally put away the hated mop, and fetch the rabbits. When she came back, Sid had returned from the living room and his books, and was brewing a pot of tea.

  ‘Just what the doctor ordered,’ Jenny said, giving him a wide grin. Lifting a crock dish and finding only two eggs inside, however, wiped the grin right off her face. ‘No eggs?’

  ‘They’re kept in the chicken house, in the little lean-to leading off it,’ Sid told her. ‘You can’t miss it. They’re next door to where the geese are kept.’

  Jenny thought of trekking across the bare arctic of the exposed farmyard and groaned.

  ‘Don’t worry. I’ll have a steaming cuppa ready for you when you get back.’ He gave her a sympathetic grin.

  Jenny, once more muttering some of the admiral’s more choice epithets under her breath, donned her coat and boots and left via the front door. She was not, definitely not going to go out the back way and be forced to make her own wet and muddy footprints on the floor when she came back. She’d be having nightmares about that damned mop if she did!

  She crossed the courtyard, glad to see that one of the boys had shovelled most of the snow out of the way and piled it up against the surrounding walls. She made her way quickly past the goose shed, shivering in the icy wind and giving the gander the evil eye as he came out hissing at her, promptly sending him hissing back again.

  The chickens, she saw with pleased satisfaction, were tried and true black leghorns, with a few Light Sussex hens thrown in for good measure, with a handsome Light Sussex cockerel to rule the roost. But to get to them she had to battle her way through three feet of snow, and it was heavy going. Once in the spacious henhouse, however, she tossed them some grain from the sack, to save Delia the trouble when (or if) she returned from her visit to her friend.

  Inside the lean-to, she paused to get her breath back and give her arms a good thumping. She stamped her feet vigorously, but her circulation was loath to return. Good grief, it was cold. But that same cold weather, she was sure, had kept the eggs reasonably fresh. Nevertheless, as she found the store of stacked eggs, she carefully weighed each one. They felt cold and solid, and the shells were a good deep colour.

  She carefully re-latched the chicken-house door behind her and trudged her way back to the farm’s front door, taking off her boots in the dry shelter of the porch and standing them next to the door once she was inside the hall.

  She was glad to get out of her coat and hustle back into the warmth of her kitchen. Sid was sat with his back to her at the table, and the kettle was bubbling merrily away on the stove.

  ‘So much for having my cuppa waiting for me,’ she said cheerfully to him as she passed. Her mood was gradually lifting into something lighter, even happier. The tastebud-arousing smell of cheese and onion permeated the room, and she had the prospect of a lavish meal to cook ahead of her. That alone was always guaranteed to make her beam. Besides it was Christmas Eve, after all.

  She began to hum ‘Jingle Bells.’

  She walked to the stove and removed the kettle, checked that Sid had spooned a good amount of tea into the teapot — he had — and reached for the sugar. The tea made, she checked her mince pies, saw that they were nicely browned on the top and took them out. The next batch of pies was ushered in, and Jenny quickly shut the stove door, anxious to let none of the precious heat escape.

  Unable, ever, to resist steaming-hot mince pies fresh from the oven, she took down a plate and with much ‘oohing’ and ‘ouching,’ transferred four of the piping-hot mince pies onto it with her bare hands. After all, who would want to eat only one mince pie?

  She turned, the teapot in one hand, the plate of mince pies in the other, and carried them triumphantly to the table and set them down. ‘Now, Sid, what do you make of those?’ she asked with a grin and looked up.

  And her smile froze on her face. She felt her eyes widen and begin to ache, and an instant later, she felt her knees start to buckle under her. Luckily, the chair next to her was already pulled out, and she quickly clutched the table as she sank down onto the seat with a hard ‘whump.’ The table rocked a little as she did so, for she was still clinging onto it, her knuckles white with the intensity of her grip.

  It made Sid, whose arms were both lying limply across the tabletop, tremble just slightly.

  But Sid didn’t feel it.

  Sid wasn’t feeling anything at all.

  Jenny, her mouth as dry as the Sahara, took a deep steadying breath, and held it.

  She did not cry. She did not scream.

  For a long, long moment, she merely sat and stared at Sid, as if unable to believe what she was seeing.

  Like a nightmare, her mind played back
the last few minutes. When she’d walked in, Sid had been sat with his back to her, his sparse hair pale in the overhead light. It had been so dark that morning, she’d never bothered to turn the kitchen light off. It had seemed to her then that he’d been sitting there naturally enough.

  Jenny swallowed hard, fighting back nausea as she replayed in her mind the making of the tea, the transference of the mince pies and her walk back to the table.

  Only to confront this monstrosity.

  Jenny blinked, and took another, even deeper, steadying breath.

  Sid continued to sit silently opposite her. He even seemed to be watching her, and patiently waiting. Although waiting for what, she could not have said. His eyes were open, she noticed. His mouth shut. He looked, in fact, like he always did. The teapot and mince pies steamed on the table in front of him, ready to be served.

  And still Sid just sat there, a long, thick-bladed knife embedded in his chest.

  So still. So quiet.

  Vaguely, through a curtain of shock, Jenny recognized the knife as one belonging to the set in the drawer by the sink.

  Suddenly she shuddered, her mind finally engaging into a proper gear instead of just spinning around uselessly. What was she doing wondering about a vegetable knife when she had to . . . to . . .

  Jenny Starling took the last of her deep steadying breaths, closed her eyes for a moment, and then opened them once more.

  She now felt perfectly calm.

  She had to get help, of course. Oh, not an ambulance or the doctor. Sid was gone far beyond all of that. But the police. Yes. She needed the police.

  She stood up, and blinked. If there was a telephone here at Kelton Farm, she had never seen it. She suspected that Stan had probably refused to have one installed. But surely, in this day and age, somebody must have a mobile? Although, in this house, she wouldn’t have bet on it. For a start, she doubted that the wages Stan Kelton paid would allow anybody to be able to afford even such a minor luxury.

  Then she realized that even if one of the others did have a mobile, she had no idea whereabouts on the farm they were in order to find them and ask them to use it. Then with a mental head-slap, she ran to her bag and delved inside for her own phone. Shock was definitely making her woolly-minded!

  To her dismay, however, there was no signal, which meant she’d have to walk into the village.

  Feeling stiff and disjointed, she walked to the hall, re-donned her boots and coat, this time putting on her scarf and gloves, and left the farm. She still felt gloriously numb — calm and numb. Once out of the courtyard and onto the lane, she was again in the grip of winter’s chilly hand.

  It never once occurred to her to seek out Stan Kelton and ask for his help.

  The snow banks on either side of her were high and intimidating, covering hedge and fences alike. It was frosty, the air nipping at her nose and ears. Luckily, there was no wind, for she’d forgotten her hat. Funny, the things you think when the world has suddenly turned topsy-turvy on you.

  She had gone a little way up to the road before she realized that she’d automatically been plodding in the footsteps she’d made in the snow on the way up to the farm yesterday. Then, of course, she’d been coming up to the farm, instead of leaving it, so she was putting the toe of her boot where her heel had once been.

  She began to slow down as her mind insisted there was something important she had to do. Think, damn it, she thought grimly to herself. Think. What was it? What was wrong? And suddenly, without warning, the numbness left her, and her mind, bright, clear and sharp, suddenly came up with the answer.

  It had snowed lightly in the night, and so should have obliterated the tracks made by the bottom of her boots. But in that case . . .

  Jenny stopped dead in the middle of the snowy landscape. She bent and peered more closely into the tracks she’d made yesterday. And there, clearly defined, were the ridges of another boot, one that was longer and wider than her own had been.

  Someone else had come to the farm since yesterday, stepping into the footprints she herself had made. Someone who’d walked up the farm road and stabbed Sid. Then, just as quickly as the thought leapt into her mind, it leapt out again. Of course someone had come that way this very morning. Had, in fact, delivered the mail and duly been attacked by the gander: the postman! And Sid had been alive and well long after the postman had delivered his mail and left. Plus, of course, Mrs Jarvis had been going to and fro.

  She knew she was only trying desperately to keep her mind off what had happened back at the farm. But surely that was excusable? She didn’t want to think of Sid sitting there, with that obscene black-handled blade in his chest. His blood staining his shirt. His eyes open and patiently waiting . . . waiting . . .

  No, far better to think of other things.

  She knew she wasn’t operating at her best; shock was slowing down her thinking. The way she’d panicked over the phones before remembering to try her own mobile was proof of that. It was not like her to be so incompetent.

  Although she was unaware that she’d walked on a fair way as she’d been thinking things through, she found herself stopping again and staring once more at the other tracks before her. The snow all around was pristine, except for the tracks left by first herself and then the postman.

  But what if someone had used these tracks after the postman had been and gone? If someone had come from the village to murder Sid, then she herself was eradicating the marks of their footprints with her own! And the police would certainly want to be able to take photographs of the boot prints, just to make sure.

  Guiltily, she took a quick step sideways out of the tracks, and sank her feet into nearly three feet of virgin snow. From now on she would just have to wade her way through the snow and leave the tracks well alone. Anxiously, she looked up, gauging the sky. It didn’t look as if it was about to snow any time soon. But if it did, it would eradicate the tracks for sure.

  Carefully, and still feeling about a hundred years old, she took off her scarf, selected the clearest set of boot prints she could see, and covered them with her scarf, anchoring it down in the snow so that any wind coming up wouldn’t easily blow it away. It wasn’t ideal, but it was the best she could do to preserve a section of the tracks.

  That done, she straightened painfully and began once more to plough her way stoically through the snow, stumbling now and then, mindful that there were ditches near the hedge. But even as she trudged grimly on and at last emerged onto the main road to the village, she knew, deep in her heart, that the police would find those boot prints had been left by the postman after all; that no one from the village, or a stranger from outside the village, had made his way to Kelton Farm and killed poor Sid.

  A tractor had flattened the snow down on the road to the village, which meant she could walk faster. She quickly spotted the cheerful bright-red splash of an old-fashioned telephone box that BT hadn’t yet got around to upgrading, and made her way towards it, her breath harsh and loud in her ears.

  The telephone booth was flanked on one side of the road by a row of cottages, but apart from smoke pouring from their chimneys, there was no other sign of life. No doubt people were inside, doing their own Christmas baking, or were down in the centre of the village, buying their last-minute groceries from the tiny village shop.

  She was glad to be spared the curious glances and prying questions of the locals. She stepped inside the ice-cold glass booth, and lifted the receiver. But even as she did so, she was already grimly convinced that whoever had killed Sid must have come to the farm from the field, or from the direction of The Dell.

  There was simply no getting away from it.

  Someone who lived or worked at Kelton Farm had killed Sid. But why? Why?

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Jenny watched the car as it pulled to a careful halt in front of her, the front wheels sliding a little on the compacted snow still covering the road. She’d left the shelter of the telephone kiosk the moment she’d seen the car appear in t
he distance, and now she shivered forlornly.

  It had looked like a police car, even though it was a common model with no markings on it at all. The man who climbed out of the passenger seat was one of the greyest men she had ever seen. His hair, his eyes and his coat were all grey. He was tall, lean, and so totally unremarkable that Jenny couldn’t help but feel a deep pang of misgiving. Let it just be a policeman’s disguise, she thought desperately. Then told herself not to be such a muffin. The man was probably as brusque, lively and efficient as any other officer of the law. First impressions, after all, were not always right.

  The man who emerged from behind the driver’s wheel was a startling contrast. He was at least a foot shorter than his superior, and had a head of deeply ginger, riotously curly hair. Over the roof of the car his blue eyes shone like tiny blue lamps as they quickly ran over her, assessing and missing nothing. He reminded Jenny of a Jack Russell terrier spotting a rat.

  Yet another policeman emerged from the back, this one a mere lad in uniform. His eyes widened slightly as they took in Jenny’s height and rounded girth, and the beauty of her eyes.

  He looked both nervous and excited at the same time. Probably his first murder case, Jenny surmised.

  ‘Are you the woman who called a short while ago about Kelton Farm?’ the tall, grey inspector was the first to speak, his voice, if possible, as grey as the rest of him. It was a flat, rather unnerving monotone.

  Jenny nodded. ‘I am. Yes.’ She introduced herself.

  ‘I see. I’m Inspector Moulton, this is Sergeant Ford.’ He didn’t bother to introduce the constable, who was doing his best not to look too impressed by the proceedings. She found that his eagerness made her want to just sit down and cry. She determinedly quashed the feeling; she could have a good cry later, in the privacy of her own room, she promised herself. Right now, she had to keep it together — for Sid’s sake.