Peter remained rigid and avoided her eyes but Jack believed her. From what he knew of Dorothy it would not have surprised him if she had given the younger woman a run for her money.
‘Have you ever taken Nardil, Mrs Pengelly?’
‘Nardil? What’s that?’ Her astonishment was genuine.
‘It doesn’t matter. That’s all for now. I’ll see myself out and leave you to get on with your meal.’
He was about to step outside when his bleeper went. ‘I’m sorry, may I use your telephone?’ Peter waved a hand to indicate where it stood.
‘Sir? Where are you? We couldn’t get you on the car radio.’
He heard the words ‘Fred Meecham’, the name of one of Dorothy’s friends, but when he heard Barry and Rose’s names too he felt sick. Slamming down the handset he was out of the door and into the car in almost one movement. With tyres screeching he drove to the shop.
Barry was studying the other drinkers and found he was enjoying doing so. No wonder Rose took so much pleasure in watching people. Because he was beginning to unwind he did not, at first, notice how long she had been gone. He looked at his watch. Something was wrong. He placed his drink on the bar and left the pub.
Outside he looked left and right and wondered which shop she could possibly have gone to. Surely they were all closed now. The street-lights were on, the pavements and road illuminated, but there was no sign of Rose. His stomach knotted in apprehension. How stupid he had been, he ought to have known that there would be more to their outing than a meal. If only she would confide in him more. And why had he not questioned her sudden need for something from a shop when she had had all day in which to buy things? He wiped his forehead and breathed deeply then began walking swiftly in the direction she had taken.
Ahead he saw a couple, hand in hand. It was no use asking them if they had seen a small, auburn-haired woman because they were oblivious to everything but each other. No lights spilled on to the pavement, each shop he came to was in darkness, the closed sign on the door. Until he came to Fred Meecham’s premises. There were lights on there and the door was partially open. Unable to see inside because of the display unit behind the window, Barry pushed open the door. It took several seconds for his eyes to adjust. ‘Rose,’ he cried. ‘Oh, Rosie.’ With an enormous effort he swallowed the bile which flooded his throat and went inside. ‘It’s all right, it’ll be all right,’ he repeated several times as he stepped around the pools of blood and reached for the phone.
Jack’s car skidded to a stop as he parked at an angle against the kerb. If Barry Rowe had made the call he knew with a sickening certainty that Rose was hurt or in danger. He could taste the tuna roll he had eaten hours earlier and the coffee he had drunk too quickly. Rose did not want him, Rose only wished to see him as a friend. That was okay, that was good, that was fine by Jack Pearce, but to live without ever seeing her again? For the first time since his father had died he felt as if he might cry.
He was walking through treacle, everything was in slow motion. Ahead of him was an ambulance, its blue light casting its eerie glow over the buildings on either side of the road as it revolved silently. The paramedics were loading a stretcher into the back of the vehicle, the patient invisible from where he was. His knees sagged.
Barry Rowe emerged from the shop doorway pushing up his glasses in that irritating manner. Then, behind him, deathly white and with bloodstains on the front of her dress but apparently unscathed, came Rose. Jack’s fear and anguish instantly turned to fury. He ran towards her.
‘You stupid bitch, what the hell do you think you’re playing at?’ He towered over her, his anger coming from relief in the way a mother’s does when a child runs into the road.
Rose took a deep breath and controlled the trembling which threatened to start at any second. ‘Inspector Pearce, I was merely doing your job for you. Excuse me, Barry’s going to take me home. You can send someone else over to ask your questions.’ With as much dignity as she could manage, Rose took Barry’s arm and they walked unsteadily back to where he had left the car, neither caring that she was bloodstained.
Her own anger at Jack’s treatment of her had prevented her from passing out. As it drained away she clung more tightly to Barry’s arm. He helped her into the car and got the key into the ignition on the third attempt. He was shaken himself and thankful that he had had no more than half a pint of beer. And however small a gesture, driving Rose home was at least something he could do for her. Putting the awful scene to the back of his mind he realised he was pleased at the way in which she had spoken to Jack. He did not allow himself to hope that the relationship was over, that would be too much to ask.
Neither of them spoke until they reached the cottage. Staggering, Rose made it inside. ‘Please, go, Barry,’ she said. ‘I’ll be all right.’ But before he could answer she had fled upstairs and was violently sick.
At her insistence Barry had left. Rose lay in bed, shivering despite the two hot water bottles she had taken up with her. The fear she had felt when Fred grabbed the knife resurrected itself when she thought how close to death she had been. He had screamed at her, cursing her and Dorothy and saying other things which she did not understand. His bereavement, she thought, had sent him mad.
Jack spoke briefly to the two officers who had arrived at the scene before him. Only after Barry and Rose had gone did he step into the shop. Barry, it seemed, had had the sense after he’d rung the emergency services to switch off the shop lights and turn the sign on the door to closed whilst Rose had remained with Fred, trying to stem the bleeding. The ambulance crew had said they believed he’d survive. Jack would have to wait to find out what had preceded their arrival. As Barry had done, he stepped around the pools of blood. From the floor he picked up the knife which Fred used to slice the joints of meat which he kept in the refrigerated counter if customers wanted them thicker than the slicing machine could provide. At some point someone would have to go and see Barry and Rose but he doubted they would be up to answering questions that day and he knew he could not face her himself so soon.
The first thing Rose did upon waking was to ring Laura. She was still shaking and needed to talk to someone before the police arrived, which she knew they would.
‘I’ll be right over,’ Laura said.
Rose replaced the receiver, knowing that what she had said must have come across as gibberish. She was still standing by the phone when she heard the tap on the kitchen door and Laura was there holding out her arms. ‘What on earth have you got yourself into this time, girl?’
As Laura made tea Rose explained all that had happened, from the time Jack had told her it was suicide up to his abysmal treatment of her when he had turned up at the shop. She looked up: a figure had passed the kitchen window and Jack Pearce stood in the doorway. Laura let him in. ‘I’m off now, Rose. Trevor’s sailing this afternoon.’
‘I’m sorry. I forgot.’
‘Hey. It doesn’t matter. What’re friends for.’ As she turned slowly, Laura’s eyes travelled the length of Jack’s body. ‘You’re a bastard,’ she said and closed the door quietly behind her.
‘She’s right,’ Rose added in a voice so low he hardly heard her. ‘What do you want?’
‘Several things, Rose, but firstly and foremost to apologise. You see, I saw the ambulance, I thought it was you, I thought something had happened to you.’ He stood just inside the door with his hands in his pockets. Rose was still pale and her eyes were dull. ‘I didn’t mean to shout. I was scared, scared I’d lost you completely.’
‘If you’re here to take a statement you’d better sit down.’ She refused to look at him, to be influenced by what she knew she would see in his face.
‘I am. I have another officer waiting in the car, I just wanted you to know how I felt first.’
Rose closed her eyes and nodded. The sooner it was over with the better. Jack went outside and signalled for someone to join him. It was a female.
When they were all seated Rose spok
e of her visit to Audrey Heath in Plymouth and about how Marigold’s disappearance had coincided with the stabbing of a man. She went on to say that Marigold had moved to Cornwall and that, for reasons of her own, Dorothy had wanted her to find the map of Plymouth which she had marked with a cross.
‘He did it, you see. Fred Meecham killed that man and Dorothy somehow found out about it. I went to the shop and showed him the map. He thought Dorothy had confided in me – she hadn’t, but he wouldn’t believe me. He went berserk, I didn’t really know what he was shouting but, but …’ She stopped, inhaling deeply. ‘He picked up the knife and I thought he was going to kill me.’ Rose squeezed her forehead between her thumb and forefinger. She felt exhausted. ‘I was trying to get out of the shop when it seemed he’d changed his mind, that it wasn’t me he meant to harm any more, it was himself. It was so quick I couldn’t stop him. He slashed both wrists. It was horrible. He dropped the knife and staggered around and fell to the floor. I grabbed some tea towels from one of the shelves and wrapped them round his wrists. I should’ve acted faster but the knife was there beside him and I thought he might pick it up again and go for me. Then Barry was there, he turned off the lights and shut the door to stop any customers coming in. The knife … the meat knife – Oh, God, it had ham fat on it and blood. I …’
‘It’s all right, Rose. It’s all right.’ Jack wondered how much of it was his fault. He had told Fred Meecham that it was Rose who had given him his name.
‘Rose, can I use the phone?’
‘Yes.’
Jack was away for several minutes and she was unable to hear what he said. ‘Is there someone who can stay with you? Barry or Laura?’
‘No. I’m all right. I’d prefer to be alone.’
‘If you’re sure. We’ve got to go now, Rose.’ He reached out as if he was about to touch her but either the presence of the female detective or Rose’s change of heart stopped him. His own heart was behaving peculiarly. Wrapped in an oversized robe Rose looked very young and very vulnerable and he was partly to blame for the latter because he had helped to get her into the situation.
Rose watched them leave but then remained at the kitchen table, unable to drag herself upstairs to dress.
13
The morning passed and the shock was beginning to wear off. Gratefully Rose remembered that Stella Jackson’s dinner party was that evening. She had accepted the invitation with alacrity, delighted to hear that other artists would be present. She wondered if Nick Pascoe would be one of them but although she had rung him back and arranged to meet him for a drink on Tuesday, he hadn’t mentioned the Jacksons. It didn’t matter, whether he was there or not it was bound to be an interesting evening: her social life was finally starting to expand.
Rose decided to find out how Fred Meecham was faring but she was not sure if the hospital would give her information as she was neither a relative nor a friend.
As she showered in preparation for the party she began to see how much she had to look forward to although she would also like to know the whole story behind Dorothy’s death. At least she had proved to Jack Pearce that she had not taken her own life.
Rose decided to travel to St Ives by the branch line train. It was too dark to appreciate the view from the rails which ran high up along the coastline and overlooked miles and miles of powdery sand running from Hayle and Carbis Bay to St Ives.
The Jacksons lived above their studio and gallery and immediately she entered their apartments she was back in the sixties. The floors were uncarpeted, the boards sanded and polished. Sofas lined the walls, deep and comfortable and half hidden by hand-made cushions and woven blankets. Rose saw immediately that the furnishings were not those of her own youth, items purchased or borrowed because of lack of finances. Stella and Daniel had deliberately created this atmosphere but it had not come cheaply. A table held an array of bottles and glasses and from the kitchen came the unmistakable smell of chilli. In an A-line calf-length denim skirt, a cream frilled shirt and a waistcoat Rose blended in with the other guests as if she had known them all her life.
Stella put an arm across her shoulders and led her around the room, stopping at the table to hand her a drink. ‘We’re so pleased you could come,’ she said, smiling. Her teeth were uneven and one pupil did not move as quickly as the other but beneath her straight black hair, cut just below her ears, her quirky face portrayed a lazy sexuality.
Rose had had time to study the other guests and felt only a slight disappointment that Nick Pascoe was not one of them.
When one of Stone’s taxis came to pick her up Rose felt exhilarated. The conversation had ranged from art to politics, from literature to the theatre, and she knew that soon she would host such an evening of her own.
In the morning she sang as the kettle boiled, not very tunefully nor very loudly, but she was out of practice lately. It did not matter that a gale force wind was rattling the windows and bringing down more leaves. To Rose they looked beautiful as they skittered across the grass, their reds and golds colours she would capture in oils.
In the sitting-room she stood in the window, steam from her coffee misting the glass, and watched the waves battering the reinforced wall of the Promenade as they had done since it was built and would continue to do as long as it stood.
So many new and exciting people had entered her life that it was difficult to feel sorry for Fred. But it still hurt to think of Dorothy. There was plenty of time until she was due to collect Martin and take him over to Truro.
‘Oh, no.’ She backed away from the window but it was too late. Jack had seen her and waved as he strode up the path. She pulled her dressing-gown more tightly around her and went out to the kitchen.
‘Don’t be angry,’ were his words of greeting. ‘Knowing your curiosity I thought you’d want to hear the outcome.’
‘Come in. Coffee?’
‘Please.’
Rose made instant and handed him a mug, omitting to ask him to sit down.
‘Meecham’s going to pull through – it wasn’t as bad as it looked.’
Rose nodded, biting her lip, guessing that Fred would have wished it otherwise. ‘I think all he wanted was someone to love him, someone of his own.’ She was sure he had begun life as a decent man but circumstances and insecurity had changed him. Looking up she saw what was going through Jack’s mind. She ought not to have mentioned love.
‘Yes. He lost his first wife, then his son. We now know he paid regular visits to Plymouth to visit prostitutes, one in particular. Marigold Heath. It was the old story. He fell for her in a big way and wanted to take her away from it all, to save her, if you like. The irony is that, in a way, he did, despite the fact that he, a church-going man, was frequenting such a woman.’ Jack took a few sips of his coffee. ‘You should’ve told us about the map, Rose, and you were extremely foolish not to mention those threatening calls.’
She remained silent although she had noticed the use of the plural pronoun which depersonalised the conversation. ‘What’ll happen to him?’
‘Psychiatric reports. All that.’
‘He won’t last, you know.’
‘He may not go to prison.’
‘I didn’t mean that. I don’t think he wants to live, not now. He spent all those years with Marigold, firstly protecting her from that pimp of hers, killing him for her sake, then protecting her from gossip. That’s why they didn’t marry, isn’t it? Because he, or they, thought that it would draw attention to themselves and that someone might make the connection. A sister’s always a safe bet.’
‘You’re probably right. He’s confessed, Rose, to the murder of Harvey, that’s the man in Plymouth and to murdering Dorothy. You understand that this mustn’t go any further, there’s his trial to come yet and –’
‘You don’t need to tell me, Jack.’
‘No. I’m sorry. It’s … well, it’s the new circumstances, I’m not sure how to deal with you.’
Rose turned away to hide a smile. Deal with her? Wa
s she that awkward?
‘Marigold was involved too. She’d told him how Harvey treated her, he was a sadist, and there was no way he was going to let her walk off into the sunset. They set it up together. Heath led Meecham to him. It was as easy as that. Then he provided her with an alibi. Heath made sure she was seen with Harvey earlier in the evening, as she would have expected to have been, and he was fine when she left him. Meecham wasn’t known in Plymouth and there was no reason why he should have come under suspicion. He’d booked a hotel room, a double, and made a show of taking her up mere but they slipped out later. When he got back to Cornwall the next day he put it around that his sister was coming to live with him.’
‘Dorothy knew all this, is that why he killed her?’
‘Yes, Dorothy knew, or guessed. She’d been unpacking some china with a view to selling it. It was wrapped in old newspaper. She happened to come across a report and put two and two together.’
Rose frowned. It was unlike Dorothy not to have done anything. Then she remembered that the unpacking would have been recent and she had done something, she had put the map in an envelope for Rose to find, trusting her not to do anything until Marigold had been buried. Maybe Dorothy suspected how Fred would react if he was confronted, maybe she was trusting him, too, to do the right thing.
‘But why was Dorothy selling her things?’
‘This is strictly between you and me. She was setting up a trust fund for Martin. She wanted Hinkston to provide prints or replicas of everything she sold him in case Peter and Gwen noticed the missing items and made life difficult. She was terrified they’d get a doctor in to say she was unfit to live on her own. We know that the daughter-in-law went up there and an argument took place, but I suspect Gwen Pengelly got her money’s worth from your friend.’
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