Blood in the Cotswolds

by Rebecca Tope

  She pressed her lips together, and put a finger against them. ‘I’ve said too much,’ she whispered. ‘And here’s Thea back with refreshments. I’ll just stay a few more minutes.’

  It had to have been half an hour since Thea had disappeared into the house. Phil held her searching gaze for several steady seconds, unsure of what she was trying to discover. ‘Finished?’ she asked sweetly. ‘I’m getting rather good at this, aren’t I? Leaving you to discuss murder while I kick my heels in the kitchen.’

  Gladwin took her up swiftly. ‘Are you cross about it?’ Again the genuine sympathy, the instant understanding. ‘I wouldn’t blame you if you were.’

  ‘I am a bit. I know it’s his job, and he loves it. I don’t even want him glued to my side every moment of the day. But I guess I wouldn’t be human if – well, you know.’

  For Phil it was utter déjà vu. His wife had struggled and kicked against his divided interest, his inability to make or keep firm promises. All the usual clichés had been there, including the pleas from him that she accept it, as fishermen’s wives and farmers’ wives and soldiers’ wives all seemed to do with so much less of a fight. What was so special about the police that it made marriage almost unworkable?

  Thea had tried to explain it to him. ‘It’s because you think about it all the time,’ she had said. ‘And it’s such dirty work. Dealing with people who’ve become subhuman, so much of the time. That’s what I hate about Jessica joining the Force. She mixes with the dregs of society – addicts and prostitutes and street gangs, and I know it’s going to rub off on her eventually.’

  He hadn’t denied it. He hadn’t argued with her characterisation of criminals, either. There was no denying that they had mostly lost any vestiges of civilised values. There was scarcely any honour amongst thieves any more. The arguments were far better employed in establishing how and why it had happened and what might be done about it.

  But now Thea had crossed a line she had baulked at so far. She was acting like a neglected wife, and he was saddened by it. ‘You didn’t need to leave us,’ he said. ‘We would have been happy for you to stay and join in.’

  ‘I didn’t want to,’ she said simply. ‘Besides, I’ve found something about St Kenelm in Miss Deacon’s magazine collection. He was murdered too, you know. By his sister, according to one story.’

  ‘Sister?’ repeated DS Gladwin. ‘That’s unusual.’ Her eyes lost focus. ‘Where have I heard the name Kenelm already today?’ She scratched the side of her face. ‘I know – that woman, Janey Holmes. She’s doing some sort of festival for him next month. And of course, she’s a sister, too.’

  ‘Is she?’ Phil and Thea spoke almost together.

  ‘Oh yes – didn’t she tell you? She’s got the same blue blood that everybody around here seems to think is so important. Her brother is a bloke called Rupert Temple-Pritchett. Except,’ she added with a small frown, ‘we don’t seem able to find him.’

  ‘But we’ve seen him,’ said Thea. ‘He came here on Sunday, looking for Miss Deacon. Is he really Janey’s brother? That’s incredible.’ She looked at Phil in puzzlement. ‘Janey never said anything about that. She even changed the subject when I said his name. They certainly don’t look remotely similar.’

  Gladwin listened closely. ‘Did you notice anything else about him?’

  ‘He’s got a sporty sort of car and talks like Noel Coward.’

  ‘Did he say where he lives?’

  ‘No. I suppose it might be some distance away, because he didn’t know Miss Deacon was on holiday. I wouldn’t think he’d be too hard to trace.’

  ‘Well, he isn’t easy,’ said Gladwin.

  Phil looked at her. ‘How hard have you tried?’ he asked.

  She shrugged. ‘Phone book, Google, not much else. There’s no real reason to question him as yet. We just wanted to place him in the picture. If you see him again, could you try and get an address out of him?’

  Phil nodded and Thea shook her head in continuing amazement. ‘Brother and sister, eh?’ she said. ‘You couldn’t hope to find two such different people. Are you sure you’ve got it right? Who told you?’

  Gladwin didn’t answer directly. She simply smiled patiently and said, ‘Oh yes, it’s right enough. You can take my word on that.’

  Chapter Ten

  He had sent Gladwin off with the firm advice that she ferret out as many hard facts as she could. Thea’s introduction of a long-dead saint into the equation had been interesting but surely not relevant. The unearthed body was a matter for urgent present-day detection, not a romantic mythology of long ago.

  Thea was in a bustling mode, watering plants, feeding fish, swabbing every surface in the kitchen. ‘I still haven’t been outside to check the horses,’ she said. ‘Everything suddenly seemed to need attention in here.’

  ‘But you’ve only got a few more things to do – right?’ he said. ‘You’ll be done by ten-thirty at the latest and then we could go out somewhere.’

  ‘We could go to Guiting Power again,’ she suggested. ‘We didn’t really look at the village green properly, and we could try the other pub. Or do you want to go further afield?’

  ‘Guiting Power is remarkably beautiful,’ he agreed. ‘And it’s unusual in that it actually has people living there full time. Plus children and dogs.’

  ‘It’s more beautiful than Temple Guiting, that’s for sure,’ she said carelessly.

  ‘Hush!’ he admonished. ‘You can’t say that. It’s axiomatic that all Cotswold villages are beautiful. Surely you know that. Besides, that manor house is pretty much as good as it gets, if you ask me.’

  She looked blank. ‘Which manor house?’

  ‘Come on. In the middle of the village. Opposite the church, more or less. You must have seen it. I was wondering who lived there – I assume it’s not one of the Temples or Pritchetts. It looks as if it’s worth a couple of million at least.’

  She frowned. ‘I’ve hardly looked at the village,’ she realised. ‘Although I did notice those peculiar black-painted houses near the shop. I can’t even remember where the church is.’

  He was about to tell her when he caught a movement through the window. ‘There’s somebody else here now,’ he said. ‘I didn’t hear a car, did you?’

  It was a person they had not encountered before, standing outside the front door as if unable to find the courage to knock. Phil watched as Thea went out and spoke to the young wispy-looking woman. The spaniel jumped up at her, wagging violently, causing the visitor some obvious irritation. He found himself wishing Thea could have trained the dog better. His own Claude and Baxter would never have dreamt of approaching a stranger so uninhibitedly.

  He opened the casement window wider, making his presence obvious to the stranger. He heard her say something about Miss Deacon and the word ‘horses’. For very different reasons, Phil entertained doubts as to whether this person was any more of a rider than big Janey Holmes could have been. anybody scared of a cocker spaniel was surely not going to have much confidence with a horse.

  But Thea’s reaction made it clear that the girl had not come for a ride. She threw out her arms in a gesture of wild panic, and turned to call to Phil. ‘They’ve got out! The horses are up in the road. We’ll have to go and get them back.’ Then she remembered. ‘Or I will,’ she amended.

  He didn’t pause to think. ‘I’ll come as well,’ he said, already heading for the passageway and the front door. ‘I can block up a gap, at the very least.’

  The newcomer looked from one to the other in some confusion. ‘No, it’s all right,’ she said. ‘My Dad has got them tied up by now. They’re very quiet, he says. He’ll put them back in the paddock for you – but there’s a gap in the corner of the field. He won’t have time to fix it. It only needs a couple of stakes knocking in and a strand of wire – or something.’

  Thea’s panic subsided, but she still looked pale and worried. ‘I’ll have to come up and see where you mean.’ She glanced at Phil. ‘Can you walk?
’

  ‘Absolutely,’ he assured her. ‘It’s a lot better today. I hurt my back at the weekend,’ he explained to the girl, who looked younger the closer he got to her. ‘Can you show us the gap?’

  It all turned out to be a very minor difficulty. The girl, who belatedly introduced herself as Soraya, led the way to a point where the horses’ field met the road a short distance from the spot where the beech tree had fallen. It seemed likely to Phil that one of the police team – which had all packed up and gone by this time – had damaged the fence in the process of examining the site after the skeleton had been discovered. Hopping over for a quick pee behind the hedge, in all probability.

  Soraya’s father turned out to be as fair-skinned and slight as his daughter. His shoulders were bony and sloping, in the skimpy black singlet he wore. When Hepzibah jumped up at him he swiped her away with a careless blow that made the animal yelp.

  ‘Thank you so much,’ Thea gushed at him, as she inspected the errant horses, having failed to observe the unkindness to her dog. ‘Are they all right? How far did they get?’

  ‘They’re fine,’ he assured her. ‘They hadn’t gone any distance. They just fancied some of this fresh grass on the verge.’ He pointed at a few clumps of slightly dusty grass, which to Phil’s eye looked rather less tempting than that in the field.

  ‘This is where they found those bones, then,’ he said, his head cocked to one side, as if pointing towards the beech tree. His gaze never left Phil’s face, as he spoke.

  Phil merely nodded.

  ‘You’re a police detective, that right?’

  Phil nodded again, adding, ‘Off duty this week. Damaged my back.’ The walk up to the road had gone easily enough, he was relieved to note. He began to think it could be possible to get back to work by the following Monday. After all, it couldn’t be said that there were many physical demands on him these days. No lifting or bending or twisting for the average detective superintendent.

  ‘But you saw them – the bones? Wasn’t it you that found them?’

  Thea had been tinkering with the fence, pulling at the wire, and dragging a piece of dead wood she had found into position across the gap made by the escaping animals. ‘Will that do for the time being?’ she asked. ‘Or should I move them to the other paddock? Miss Deacon’s got two, hasn’t she? Have I got that right?’

  The man shrugged, but Soraya spoke up. ‘Best leave them where they are,’ she said. ‘They won’t try to get out again – not if you give them a treat down by the house.’ She glanced at her father as if to check that she had not spoken out of turn.

  The man was still fixed on Phil’s face, ignoring Soraya. ‘Those bones,’ he muttered, ‘did you see them? Was there anything—? I mean, could you tell—?’

  Phil sighed. Morbid curiosity was as annoying as it was understandable. ‘You live round here, do you?’ he countered.

  ‘Not far, aye. Thing is, there’s a fair bit of talk about it, and I was wondering… You never know what to believe, do you?’ His expression turned to one of supplication. ‘And you’re a detective, they say. Must have been here when they took it all away.’

  ‘I’m on sick leave,’ Phil repeated, with a sense of going round in circles. ‘What is it you’re trying to ask me?’

  ‘What it is, see,’ the man glanced swiftly around, ‘I might have an idea who it could have been. It came back to me, in the night – Christmas two, three years ago, there were a spot of trouble with an old chap living rough. Got the Council to come and shift him.’ He grinned humourlessly. ‘Not the sort of area for that kind of thing. Lets the place down, like.’

  Phil made every effort to listen patiently, disregarding the flaring pain in his back as he stood unsupported, sending the optimism of a few minutes before flying right off into the blue yonder. Thea was engrossed in her fence repairs, as far as he could tell. Certainly she was offering him no assistance. ‘A vagrant, you mean?’

  The man nodded. ‘Yeah. Homeless bloke. There were folks dead against him, might have got a bit sharp with him.’ He shifted from foot to foot.

  ‘You think some of the locals killed him and buried the body under that tree?’ Phil had no compunction about cutting through to the main point.

  The man shivered in the burning sun. ‘No, no, I ain’t saying that,’ he blustered. ‘But seems like it’s the same bloke. He maybe just froze after he’d tried to dig himself in under the tree to get warm.’ The pleading look returned. ‘That could happen, eh?’

  ‘Dad,’ came Soraya’s soft voice. ‘Leave it. We got the horses back. You don’t know anything for sure, after all. Just leave it.’

  Phil straightened his suffering back. ‘Thank you for the information,’ he said formally. ‘And for rounding up the horses. It’s much appreciated. Isn’t it, Thea?’ he added more loudly.

  ‘Oh! Yes, of course. I hate to think what might have happened. But look – I’ve patched it up again quite well, haven’t I? It only needed a few things straightening.’ She wrinkled her nose and narrowed her eyes. ‘I might almost think somebody had made the gap on purpose. That post in the middle had been pushed sideways, and some of the fence wire trodden right down low.’

  ‘The horses must have done it,’ said Soraya’s father, with reddened cheeks.

  Phil might have said something if he’d been on duty, if his back hadn’t been flaming in all directions, if Thea had given him some encouragement. He knew a lie when he saw one after decades of questioning amateur criminals and pathetic fantastists. ‘Well, everything’s fine now,’ he said. ‘Can we go?’

  Thea nodded and went to his side. ‘Are you still all right for walking?’ she asked.

  ‘Have to be, won’t I,’ he panted. ‘This is ridiculous. It’s four days now – it ought to be better than this. It swamps me,’ he complained. ‘So I can’t think straight.’

  ‘Thanks again,’ Thea said to the man and his daughter, who’d started to move away. ‘It’s nice to have met you. Apart from you, we’ve only met Janey Holmes and a chap called Rupert Temple-Pritchett. Do you know them?’

  Phil was impatient to leave, but he knew how much Thea enjoyed pronouncing the man’s name, and forced himself to allow her a few moments’ chat.

  ‘Yeah, we know them,’ said the man, with a glance at his daughter. ‘We see Rupert around quite a bit, even though he doesn’t live local. Bit of a waste of space, if you want the truth.’

  ‘Dad!’ Soraya reproached him. ‘We should go.’

  The man and his daughter walked off towards a battered pick-up truck parked on the verge with a single backward glance. His hand was on her shoulder in a gesture of automatic control. Phil watched frowningly, remembering the way the girl had checked everything she said, and acted as if under orders throughout the encounter. Then he turned to face the bumpy sloping track down to the house. It could have been the north face of the Eiger.

  * * *

  An hour later, assisted by two painkillers, he was slowly recovering. Thea was hovering restlessly, having remembered to go out and open the window of the snake’s shed, and thrown the horses a few carrots to persuade them they were better off staying where they were.

  ‘I think that bloke deliberately let them out,’ said Phil. ‘It was all a devious plot to get to talk to me about the dead body, and feed me that nonsense about a vagrant. And the girl was his accomplice. She was doing exactly what he’d told her to. You could tell at a glance he wasn’t genuine.’

  Thea blinked. ‘I thought he was all right. Isn’t that a bit convoluted? Why not just come down to the house if he wanted to say something to you?’

  ‘Not his style. You didn’t see him cuffing Hepzie, did you? You’d agree with me if you had.’

  ‘He didn’t, did he? I heard her yelp, now I think about it. What exactly did he do?’

  Phil recounted the scene, exaggerating slightly. ‘He’s not a nice man,’ he concluded. ‘And I don’t feel easy about that girl of his. He had her right under his thumb.’

&n
bsp; Thea gave a long sigh. ‘It must be awful to be you,’ she said. ‘Always suspecting the worst of people. You must see the world as such a dark and wicked place.’

  ‘Don’t start that again,’ he begged her. ‘Let’s just stick to the reality in front of us, shall we?’

  ‘OK.’ She gave in readily, with a smile. ‘And what are those facts, then?’

  ‘You know as well as I do. We’ve unearthed an old crime, which has stirred things up for the locals, and they’re panicking. Or some of them are. Something like this raises a lot of old fears and secrets – even perfectly innocent people remember something they feel guilty about from years ago, and wonder if somehow this could lead to them being found out. Guilt lurks in all of us, just waiting to be activated. This is the very thing to get it going.’

  ‘But—’ she thought hard before going on, ‘can that really be true? If I’d run over somebody’s cat, for example, and left it in a ditch to die – would I think this would betray my guilty secret?’ She didn’t wait for him to reply. ‘I suppose I might. But if I’d stolen some money from my neighbour, or written an anonymous letter to the Council about a farmer leaving dead sheep around – well, yes, maybe.’ She rubbed her chin and gazed across the garden. ‘Not the money, maybe, but anything to do with dead things. What if that vagrant had been living illegally in somebody’s barn, and a local group of upright residents drove him out? They would feel guilty, wouldn’t they?’

  Phil laughed at her stream of consciousness, and nodded happily. ‘See what I mean? There’s always something. But it doesn’t make my job any easier. That bloke just now – he was almost certainly trying to divert my attention, telling some story about a vagrant, when all the time he’s got something else on his mind altogether.’

  ‘At least he didn’t look as if he’d claim descent from one of the Templars. I still think that’s a major preoccupation around here. Listen – if you’re too knackered to go out, I wouldn’t mind spending the day browsing through some of Miss Deacon’s magazines. You’ve persuaded me they’re worth a look.’