Murder in Abbot's Folly

by Amy Myers

  Jennifer hesitated. ‘Silly, I know, but it’s the collection. It’s still in the folly, and I’m stuck with doing my presenter’s bit here with Jill. I’m worried because I don’t trust Douglas any more. I’m afraid he might torch the lot. Most of it I’d be only too happy to lose, but the watercolours and the oil painting I feel strongly about. I had a threatening phone call last night, and though it didn’t mention the collection and wasn’t Douglas’s voice it wasn’t reassuring.’

  ‘Is that why the uniformed police are there? I heard Tom Miller making threats in the pub yesterday.’

  Jennifer paled. ‘He’s in the catering tent giving Barbara a hand. Craig’s there too.’

  ‘I’ll have a word with the police,’ Georgia said uneasily. What was Craig doing here when again it was probably a non-alcohol day? It didn’t sound like Craig to be eager to help out his mum unnecessarily. ‘Is the folly open?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes, Jake’s filming inside now. He’s got this great idea for the tunnel too.’

  Georgia shivered. ‘What’s the idea?’

  ‘It’s where Northanger Abbey comes in. Jake wants to film inside the tunnel, and his crew’s prowling along it now.’

  ‘What’s the connection with the novel though?’

  ‘Catherine Morland and the Gothic angle. When Henry Tilney is trying gently to coax her out of her fixation that every corner holds a dark and dangerous secret he teases her about a secret subterranean communication between her apartment and the chapel of St Anthony scarcely two miles off. Jake said there’s mention of a small vaulted room too, with a dagger, mysterious chest and a few instruments of torture in it, so he’s seized on it as his way out now the love affair is off limits. The stuff is safe enough in the folly at present, and I’ll collect it when he’s finished.’

  By lunchtime Jake must just have finished at the folly because he arrived complete with crew to grab a quick sandwich. There was still no sign of Peter or Luke, or even Mark, and Jill had gone to join Jennifer in the house because filming was behind schedule and that’s where Jake was heading next.

  ‘How’s it going?’ Georgia asked as Jake stopped to have a word with her on his way out.

  ‘Well, thanks.’

  ‘Have you finished with the folly yet?’

  ‘Yup, all done in the folly itself and we’ll film in the tunnel this afternoon. I want to get the house done first.’

  ‘Has Jennifer taken her watercolours out of the folly yet? She was worried about them.’ When he shook his head, she thought this at least was something she could do for Jennifer. ‘Tell her I’ll collect them for her.’

  ‘Will do.’

  She hesitated. ‘Is it all going OK with Douglas and Phil?’

  ‘Haven’t seen Douglas, but Phil’s doing fine on the revised script. What’s more he said his publishers have agreed to postpone publication so that he can rewrite or rejig the text as necessary.’

  ‘That’s a relief.’

  ‘He’s looking his old self again.’

  ‘But that won’t change—’

  ‘’Fraid not,’ Jake said. ‘But he’s happier about it now. And, thankfully, so’s Tim. I thought he might have thrown a wobbly with the revelations about his father, but no. And Roy’s happy too. So it’s on with the show!’

  Could it really be as simple as that? Somehow Georgia thought not.

  SEVENTEEN

  Georgia was all too uncomfortably aware of how close she was to Abbot’s Retreat, and her steps towards the folly quickened. The sooner she was back at the house the happier she would be. In her casual offer to Jennifer via Jake she had forgotten one thing. When she went into the folly, she would have to run the gauntlet of the ‘fingerprints’ again. Added to that, images of Laura’s death refused to go away.

  Peter had told her that now there was corroboration that the Austen collection had been faked, the police were working on the line that Amelia Luckhurst had killed Laura in order to prevent the truth emerging after she had unsuccessfully tried blackmail. Georgia had mixed feelings. It would be a relief to agree with the police, rather than to think of Laura’s murderer still being at large, but she was not convinced this was the answer. How many others had Amelia tried to blackmail, one of whom might have killed her?

  Georgia tried to fix her mind on the rest of the day ahead. By the time she returned to the house Peter would be there, and probably Luke too. Peter might even have Elena with him, and perhaps the detour to pick her up from her hotel had caused his delay in arriving.

  As she approached Abbot’s Folly she could still hear voices, snatches of music and distant sounds floating across the gardens, which made this shady path seem lonely. Being so near the Retreat did not help. Jennifer had talked of making it a memorial to her mother, renaming it Laura’s Garden, when ‘everything was over’, as she put it. What was ‘everything’, however? The filming? Laura’s murderer behind bars? Jennifer’s marriage to Tim? The Luckhurst case solved? Or just today? At the moment Georgia would settle for that.

  When she reached the folly she was relieved to see that the door was open, which implied that at least someone else was here. Probably Jennifer had not yet got the message that Georgia was fetching the watercolours and had sent Roy or Tim. Or – and sudden fear – was it someone else? Tom Miller? Then she relaxed as she remembered she had seen him in the catering tent, far too busy to have reached the folly before her. Douglas? Could she cope if so?

  As that unpleasant thought struck her, the fingerprints overwhelmed her as she stepped over the threshold.

  ‘Roy!’ she shouted. The door to the archives was open, but there was a scurry of movement in the study so she went straight there.

  And stopped, transfixed.

  There was no Roy. No Tom. No Douglas. It was Philip, looking as stunned to see her as she was him. She only fleetingly registered that, however, as he pushed past her and was effectively blocking the door. Most of her attention was on the terrifying sight before her.

  The study was in chaos. Paper and books were strewn everywhere, savaged, ripped and torn. Emptied drawers lay around, shelves had been swept clean, prints taken from the wall, torn and their frames and glass smashed. The watercolours, she immediately thought in panic, then remembered thankfully that they were in another room and so was the oil painting. Had that too been vandalized? Then her eye fell on the piled-up desk, where the two watercolours lay out of their frames, waiting for the next onslaught.

  She wanted to cry out, but that would only encourage him. Take your eyes away, she told herself, or the watercolours will be next. Her eyes took it all in, but her brain could not cope with what was happening and what it meant.

  ‘What,’ Philip said from behind her, ‘have you come for?’ His voice was dispassionate and cold, as though she had interrupted a tutorial.

  ‘Jennifer sent me to fetch something for her.’ She tried to sound matter-of-fact.

  ‘The watercolours, I suppose. I’m taking them,’ Philip said. ‘Jake wants them.’

  ‘Good . . .’ she began. She could feel herself trembling and could not stop herself. ‘What’s all this mess?’ she cried. ‘Did you find it like this? Who’s been here?’

  ‘I did it.’

  The words chilled her. It didn’t take much to realize what danger she was in. She disciplined herself to turn round slowly and saw the gun in Philip’s hand with little surprise. It was pointing at her. No need to ask him why he’d trashed the room, nor why he happened to have a gun with him.

  ‘You killed Laura.’ She listened to her own words disinterestedly. She could think about them later – if there was a ‘later’ for her.

  ‘I had no choice.’ Philip sounded as though it was of little interest. ‘The woman had no compunction at all about proposing to announce that the story of Jane and William Harker’s affair had no basis. That’s what she told me when I went to see her that afternoon. She didn’t care a damn about my book or reputation. Amelia thought I’d buy her off when she rang me to
say she was going to tell Laura it was all faked, but I don’t have that kind of money. That’s why I’d no choice. My father taught me to shoot, and so I took his old gun with me to the Gala in case I couldn’t make Laura see sense. I couldn’t, so I told her I’d found evidence in the folly archives that the collection was not fake and she should come with me to see it. It had just been Amelia making mischief. Now the whole lot’s worthless: this collection, my book, my future.’

  Keep him talking, she thought desperately, aware that the hand holding the gun was moving nervously around. ‘Jake told me your publishers had a plan to save it.’

  ‘Sure they have a plan, but not to save it. They’re scrapping the whole edition if the third opinion they’ve taken comes through that most of the collection is fake. And it will. I know that now. Douglas thinks it’s funny. I suppose you do too.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You and your self-satisfied publisher husband. They’re all the same, publishers. Where is he, by the way? I haven’t seen him. Nor will you. You could try to run away, but it wouldn’t be any use.’

  Her mouth went dry. He was serious. He was serious.

  She seemed to be watching herself from somewhere very far away, wondering why Georgia Marsh, happily married woman, was facing a maniac with a gun.

  ‘I don’t want to kill you,’ Philip said reasonably. ‘I’m going to shoot Jake, and then myself. But you’re here now, and you’ll do nicely as a hostage. If I let you go, you would warn Jake, but if you did I’d have to shoot that smug husband of yours instead. I don’t like him. Your choice, Georgia. Makes no difference to me.’

  Think, think, think. But her mind was jelly. Unrelated thoughts bound together only by the gelatine of terror. ‘Let’s talk about your book, Philip.’ She really sounded quite calm, she told herself. ‘There are always ways round problems, and I know about the publishing world. I write books of my own. I’d be an objective eye on the situation. I can help.’

  ‘No. Let’s go.’

  ‘But you can’t . . .’ She heard her voice getting shriller and tried to calm it. ‘You can’t just walk through the crowds with me as a hostage in order to shoot Jake. You’d be bounced on from behind. And there are police here. Luke is on his way too.’ It sounded weak even to her but she had to keep fighting.

  ‘We’re not going outside,’ he said. ‘We’re going through the tunnel. Jake’s meeting me there for the tunnel shots in fifteen minutes’ time. There will be real shots though.’ He laughed at his joke. ‘One, two, three of them. We’ll all go together. One for you, one for Jake, one for me. I’m taking the watercolours with me, and I’ll make you tear them up in front of him. Jake is fond of them. He was fond of me too once, but that’s gone. I still love him though, and that’s why I want to take him with me. That’s reasonable, isn’t it? And if that husband of yours turns up, you can take him with you. That’s only fair. Four shots.’

  She had to go. If she didn’t this crazed man would shoot her in the back, and if by any chance she escaped he’d stalk Luke to kill him as well as Jake. Her brain was ice-clear now, she had no choice. With luck, as a hostage she might escape. Jake was his real target. If Jake saw what was happening in time or if she yelled out a warning, he would retreat – and Philip might rush after him, without her, and they’d both escape. No, that wouldn’t work. So much that could go wrong. Talk, talk, talk, she told herself. The only hope, but such a slim one.

  ‘Did you kill Amelia too?’

  ‘Yes.’ Philip sounded quite pleased with himself. ‘I had to. I think she guessed it was me who killed Laura, but even if she hadn’t I couldn’t risk Amelia spreading the story of the fake collection. But then you did,’ he added.

  ‘And I told the police too.’ Georgia knew she sounded scared. Stop, stop. ‘It was Douglas who started it, however. He did the faking.’ Better.

  ‘Doesn’t matter. It was your fault. I quite liked you, but I do need a hostage.’

  His voice was trembling, and his grip on the gun increasingly uncertain, but if she risked grabbing it . . . Self-defence training or not, a gun was a more formidable opponent than she could manage.

  He must have seen what she was looking at, because his face hardened again. ‘We’re going. Now. Move.’ With one hand, he picked up the watercolours from the desk and pushed them at her. ‘You carry them.’

  ‘What about light?’ she asked as she clasped them. ‘Do you have a torch?’ Please say you do, she prayed. It might help distract him, and the dark might prove her friend this time.

  A giggle. ‘Jake’s gaffer has kindly lit the whole tunnel, so that I can see to fire straight.’

  She looked down the steps into the darkness of the tunnel and the claustrophobic atmosphere rose up to meet her. She had no choice though, and she picked her way gingerly down the uneven steps. The tunnel ahead was indeed lit, but it somehow looked even more sinister. Think survival, she told herself. I’m going to survive this. I must. There’s Luke, Peter and Elena and Rosa. I have to get through it. What would Peter and Elena do if I was taken from them, just like Rick?

  ‘Aren’t you worried about the effects of shooting in the tunnel?’ she asked inanely. She stumbled, and the gun poked impatiently at her back. Her fear gradually steadied as she progressed a little further.

  ‘Why should I?’ he answered. ‘I’ll be dead. It can bring the whole roof down for all I care.’

  What to say next? ‘Where are we meeting Jake?’ It came out as half choke, half mumble. ‘By the Abbot’s Retreat exit?’

  ‘No, that’s where I took Laura. We were going to the folly where she thought I’d show her my new evidence, but I changed my mind. I told Laura that if she sat in the gardens I’d bring it to her, because she was looking a bit peaky by then.’

  ‘But where are we going?’

  ‘There!’ Philip’s voice rang out almost in triumph as the grotto came into sight. ‘What a backdrop for an orgy of killing.’

  ‘Jake’s not here.’ Alarm bells began to ring in her mind. Was all this Philip’s fantasy?

  ‘He will be. You’ll see. He’ll realize he loves me.’

  Waiting, waiting . . . every second a minute, each minute an hour. There was no sound except the steady drip of water.

  ‘A leak in the roof,’ he said dispassionately. ‘The roof’s weak here. You’re right. The shots may bring it down. That would be dramatic, only I won’t be here to see it. Nor will you.’

  Still no Jake. ‘He said he’d come,’ Philip muttered.

  She could hear his ragged breathing; he was beginning to panic. ‘Perhaps he’s changed his mind. We could—’

  ‘He will come. I know he will.’

  The silence continued. Georgia tried to empty her mind of everything but the need to focus on that gun, but there was too much . . . too much . . .

  She felt the pressure leave her back and hope flickered as he walked round in front of her. But the gun was still trained on her as he peered for one brief instant into the arch of the grotto. ‘Put the watercolours on the table as an offering to the gods,’ he giggled. ‘That would be a nice touch.’

  ‘Would it?’ she said wearily as she obeyed him. There was no sound, no sight of anyone else in this godforsaken tunnel, only the two of them.

  ‘Perhaps you’re right. He’s not coming after all,’ Philip said. ‘That’s the trouble with Jake. He keeps changing his mind. No organization. Not like me. So Georgia, I’m sorry, I really am. But it’s got to be you. I can’t go alone.’

  He’s mad, Georgia thought dully. The atmosphere was beginning to choke her, a tomb for the living. I shall survive, I shall survive, she repeated silently like a mantra, but could not believe it.

  ‘First you, then me,’ Philip said, raising the gun. Any second now he would pull it and it would be over. One instant of pain and then . . . what? Survive, survive . . . The word was meaningless as his finger rested nervously on the trigger. She felt her eyes closing and struggled to open them.

  Then came t
he noise. The world exploded around her, and she opened her eyes to blood and Philip’s body sprawled in a sea of red. More noise, more, and then more dust and small bits of stone as the noise intensified all round her. She threw herself to one side as the roof of the grotto began to crack and crumble. Then came pain and nothing more.

  Pain, and more pain. She was conscious, then nothing, then conscious again. She could feel someone holding her – hands on her, perhaps checking for broken bones, carrying her with her pain, and then mercifully nothing. Then she was conscious again, lying on some kind of bed in a tent, Luke there, Peter, and at her side Elena, smiling as she used to, stretching out her arms to her. Georgia sat up with difficulty and went willingly into them, aware that she was crying. She might have been talking too because she heard someone say ‘Mummy’. Or perhaps she was wrong.

  ‘A sprained wrist and a bruise or two. Not bad, eh?’ Georgia managed to joke, when Luke collected her from the A and E department in the small hours. She seemed to have been checked out by every machine known to Wallace and Gromit, plus a few human beings into the bargain.

  ‘The word miracle comes to mind,’ Luke said quietly. ‘If only I’d got there earlier.’

  ‘You couldn’t have known I would run into a maniac.’

  ‘Knowing you, I could.’ He hesitated. ‘Sweetheart, do you feel like talking to Mike and Diane Newton tomorrow morning?’

  ‘Is there an alternative?’

  ‘Only my taking you to a nice cosy police station.’

  ‘Medlars it is then. You’ll be there too?’ She felt weak asking for his presence.

  ‘Chained to your side.’

  In fact, the ordeal was not as great as she had feared as she related her story to Mike and Diane and answered questions as best she could.

  ‘Something else, Georgia,’ Mike said when she had finished. ‘Douglas Watts.’

  Diane promptly looked very po-faced, and Georgia wondered what might be coming. ‘You know about the opinion Jennifer received on the collection?’

  ‘Yes, but that’s not what Diane wanted to tell you. Go ahead, Diane.’