by Jill Downie
“Take a suit from the van if you’re coming in, Falla!”
As if she didn’t know by now, but with Jimmy it wasn’t sex discrimination. He’d have said the same thing to Moretti. Falla put a hand on the shoulder of the trembling letter carrier. He was wearing the lime-yellow shirt with reflecting bands that all postmen wore on delivery, and the shorts they all favoured, whatever the weather, so some of the shaking could have been from the chill air.
“Come on. We’ll sit in the police car.”
She escorted him over to the police Vauxhall, opened the passenger door, went around and got in herself. Outside the windows of the car, the mist was drifting in again from the sea, hiding the world from them as the glass started to fog up with their breath.
Liz pulled out her notebook, and said, “Go through it from the moment you parked the car.”
She watched his face as he spoke. He would be about the same age as her father, probably close to retirement; a small man with a slight build, sparse sandy hair above a freckled face dominated by a luxuriant ginger moustache. He had been delivering letters as far back as Liz could remember, and the first question was the obvious one.
“Was the hermit’s place part of your normal route? Doesn’t look like he’d be on any route.”
“Call him by his name. Gus Dorey.” Gord Martel sounded angry and his face turned red. “I liked him, and I used to add him to my route when I was done, or when I was taking my lunch break.”
“How did you meet him?”
“On the beach, not when I was working. I was out early, using my metal detector, and we got talking. He said he liked the beach before anyone else got there, but he was friendly enough. He wanted to know if I found anything interesting, and I said all kinds. He said he’d found stuff too, and would I like to see some. I could hardly refuse, could I? You never know, so I said ‘yes.’”
“And had he? Found anything interesting?”
“Shards mostly. He had them put up where they caught the light. But he also had some old bottles, that kind of thing. Said he’d never found a message from a castaway in any of them. He liked to have a laugh, did Gus. Poor old bugger.”
Gord Martel took out a large, pristine white handkerchief, unfolded it and blew his nose with vigour. Beneath the moustache his narrow lips trembled. Liz Falla gave him a moment, then took out her notebook and pen.
“Let’s go through what happened today. What time did you arrive?”
“Around my lunchtime, late morning. I parked the van …”
“Did you see anyone? Anything unusual?”
“Nothing, not a sausage. So I walked up to the house shouting like I always, did, ‘Wharro, mon viow!’”
“You spoke patois together?”
“Not me, but I think he had some of the old language. He used to say ‘Tcheerie’ to me when I left, so I started saying it back to him. Once or twice he said ‘Cheerio’ in a la-de-da kind of way, like a joke — you know, like the plum-in-the-mouth kind do. Gus was not fond of them arseholes, as he called them — sorry, miss, about the language.”
“So you called out. Did he normally come to the door? Or did you have to knock? Get his attention?”
“Mostly he heard the van and was at the door by the time I got there. When he didn’t this morning I didn’t think much of it. But when I called out again and he didn’t come, then I got worried. So I went in.”
Gord Martel gulped, and held the handkerchief to his mouth.
“Went in? The door was unlocked?”
“That was usual. He never locked it, said it was for the best. Less damage than if the yobbos broke in.”
“Had he had problems that way?”
“In the past. But not recently, from what he said.”
“Then you saw him?”
“Right. I couldn’t believe it. Swinging on that rope. I got out my mobile and got hold of you lot.”
The postman was clearly in shock, his body trembling violently beside her on the seat.
“Had he said anything before this that gave you the impression he was depressed? Suicidal?”
“Nothing. He was his usual self.”
“Which was …?”
“Cheerful. But he could get mad as a wet hen about some things. Like telephones, and tourists and the social services.”
“Things that interfered with his life?”
“Right. The maddest I ever saw him was talking about some — ‘girlie,’ he called her — from the social services who came to talk to him about his ‘lifestyle.’ It wasn’t so much at her as at that word. ‘Lifestyle.’ He did a whole speech about language and the death of it. I wish I’d written it down. He was a beautiful talker, Gus. I don’t mean ‘posh’ — he hated that too — but all the words.”
“Did he ever ask you inside?”
“If the weather was bad, yes. But mostly we talked outside.”
“What sort of mail did he get, besides magazines?”
“Nothing much. I learned not to bring him junk mail. That was another thing he hated, and the closest he got to yelling at me.”
“All those books he had — did you ever deliver books to him?”
“Some. He had a mailbox in the post office in town, on Smith Street, and once or twice he asked me to take the key and check it for him.”
“Did you always hand the key back?”
“Of course. He’d stick it back in his pocket.”
“We’ll probably find it.” Liz closed her notebook and put it away. “That’ll be all for now, Mr. Martel, but we’ll need a written statement from you. One other thing — did you notice anything different about Mr. Dorey’s place when you went in today? Was it all as it usually was, when he asked you in? Did you touch anything? SOCO have not found a note, for instance.”
“Touch anything?” Gord Martel sounded outraged at the suggestion. “I got the fright of my life seeing him hanging there, and I went straight back to the van. I didn’t even check to see if he was still alive.” At this, the postman burst into loud sobs. Liz put a hand on his shoulder, at which Gord Martel gave a loud gulp and turned to face her.
“There was nothing you could have done, Gord. The doctor said he died instantly. As it usually was, you said?”
“All I noticed was there was some stuff laying around on the floor and that, like he’d been looking for something, I thought. I’d forgotten about that.”
“So he wasn’t an untidy person?”
“Gus? No. Finicky, I used to call him, everything just so, ’specially his books. Meticulous was his word for it. Can’t have been himself, because there they were, on the floor.” Gord Martel put his handkerchief away and smiled tearfully as he looked out of the window towards the roundhouse of the hermit. “Poor old bugger,” he repeated, “Poor old bugger.”
Moretti had listened in silence to Falla’s account, watching as she consulted her notes from time to time. When she finished, she closed her notebook and said, “Poor old bugger. That’s what Gord Martel said, and that’s how I feel. And Martel’s right, Guv, about the tidiness. I was expecting to walk into a tip, but the place was all clean and tidy. He’d strung himself up from a girder that connected to the chimney, kicked the chair away, and there were books on the ground around that area. I’ve asked to have them left there, where they are, until you have a chance to take a look. But it seems pretty straightforward, doesn’t it?”
“Lonely old hermit does away with himself, yes. But listen to this.” Moretti handed the phone over to Liz. “Not the chief officer and the voodoo, Falla, but Dr. Edwards.”
Dr. Edwards’s voice came as a surprise to Liz. In person, she was an imposing woman, tall and big-boned, with striking features. Although she had long, dark hair she always wore it coiled up into a chignon, which probably made it easier to fit under the hoody-like protective headgear. On the phone, though, detached from her appearance, her voice was light, almost girlish.
“Hello, DS Falla. This is Dr. Edwards. Here is my first impression, as p
romised. Mr. Dorey probably died the morning he was found — I’ll be more precise, I hope, after the post mortem. He was an old, frail man, and the drop caused a cervical fracture from the look of it — in other words, he broke his neck. Doesn’t always happen, and the PM will tell me if he was asphyxiated, or died from occlusion of the blood vessels, or the fracture did him in. But there is something else that’s a bit of a bother.” A moment of silence and then the girlish voice added, “He still had quite strong leg muscles, perhaps from doing a lot of walking, but his upper body on the other hand — it was skinny and weak to the point of emaciation, which is why his neck snapped like a twig.” Another pause. “So, what I’m saying is — how did he manage that humungous knot on that massive rope? Thought I’d throw that at you.” A silvery laugh and then a click.
Moretti and Falla looked at each other. Liz spoke first.
“Is she saying what I think she’s saying?”
Moretti looked across the table at his partner. “If you think she’s saying the hermit had a helper. then, yes. I think that’s exactly what the observant Dr. Edwards is saying.”
Chapter Four
The drive out to Pleinmont, on the southwestern tip of the island, was one of the longer journeys on Guernsey, and gave Liz Falla time to regale Moretti with an account of her evening with the vampire. Once or twice he threw his head back and laughed with a lack of restraint that took Liz by surprise. In the short time they had been together as partners, she rarely remembered him behaving in such an extroverted way.
What had changed in his life, she wondered. She knew he had originally come back to the island after the breakup of a long-term relationship, and since his return had been involved with a couple of women, neither of them islanders. As far as she knew, those were love affairs, not life affairs — a big difference, in her book. He was an ascetic, according to Elodie, with hidden fires. Maybe the hidden fires part only showed when he was playing jazz piano.
She had looked up “ascetic.” It was one of those words she thought she knew, but really didn’t. Someone who had been briefly in her life, flaring up and self-destructing, brilliant as a shooting star, had encouraged her to do this. “Severely self-disciplined,” her dictionary said; the word “abstinent” was also used. Well, that bit wasn’t accurate.
“I was sailing around this part of the coastline yesterday, with Don Taylor — remember him? It was a great day. Reminded me of when I was a kid, risking my life climbing the cliffs at Le Gouffre with Andy Duquemin.” Moretti was laughing again. “There really is a god who looks after small boys, Falla.”
So it was a boat, not a babe. “Not small girls, Guv? It’s okay, you don’t have to answer that. That’s just some of my feminist claptrap. I know what you mean.”
“Don’t you have an aunt who lives around here? The one you’d rather not talk about?”
Liz Falla made an unnecessarily brisk twist of the wheel to the left as they turned on to the coast road.
“She’s actually my great-aunt and yes, she does. With her simples, and her goats and her ouija board — sorry, planchette. She considers the ouija board new-fangled. Here we are, Guv.”
Ahead of him Moretti saw the hermit’s roundhouse, surrounded by police tape. The strange building had been there for well over a decade, as far as he knew, but certainly had not been there when he and Andy Duquemin had roamed the cliffs and the Common. He remembered asking his father about it, when he came home on his first vacation from London University. It was his mother, the island girl, who had answered him.
“Gus Dorey. Came back with his mother after the war to find his family home in ruins. Reprisals, I imagine. He built that himself, when he came back again, years later. His parents were long gone by then.”
“Gus Dorey,” said Moretti. That visit was the last time he saw her, and he heard again the echo of his mother’s voice, saying the name. When he got out of the car the brisk wind of autumn made his eyes water. “Is there anyone watching the place, Falla?”
As he asked the question, a uniformed constable came out of the house.
“Yes, Guv. Looks like it’s PC Mauger. I think he came on duty this morning.”
PC Mauger walked briskly towards them across the rough scrub that surrounded the house, his arms folded across his body against the wind.
“’morning, DI Moretti, DS Falla. You didn’t bring any hot coffee with you, by any chance?”
“Sorry, no,” Falla replied. “Anything to report?”
“Nothing, but PC Bichard, who was here last night, thought there was someone hanging about outside. When he went out to check, he could see nothing, wondered if it was his imagination playing tricks.”
“He’s a policeman, he’s not supposed to have an imagination playing tricks.” Moretti’s voice sounded sharp, and both officers looked at him with surprise. “I’ll speak to him when we get back to the station. Let’s take a look at Gus Dorey’s hideaway. I’m assuming SOCO are done here?”
“Yes, sir. I was told not to move anything, but no need to wear gloves. There’s not much to see, sir. Is there, DC Falla?”
“Not much.”
Falla watched Moretti go ahead of them into the roundhouse, and turned to PC Mauger. “Did Pete Bichard say what he meant by ‘hanging about’?”
“Blimey, he’s in a mood, isn’t he? What’s got up his nose?” One look at Falla’s expression quelled any further comments about Moretti’s mood, and he went on, “He thought he heard a vehicle on the road, then he thought he heard it stop. Then he thought he heard someone moving around. That’s all.”
“Did he go outside and take a look?”
“Yes. It was pitch-black and he saw nothing. Then he heard a vehicle again on the road, but he saw no headlights, which was weird. Should have seen them from here.”
Falla looked back towards the road. There were few trees, and Pete Bichard was right. He should have seen headlights.
“Go and sit in the car for a bit, Bernie, get warmed up.”
Bernie Mauger trundled happily off towards the road, and Liz went into the roundhouse. Moretti was kneeling on the wooden floor surrounded by books. Behind him lay the chair, still on its side. He looked up as she came in.
“Interesting,” he said.
It was Moretti’s default word, and could mean mildly interesting, or extremely interesting, depending on the circumstance. She waited for him to elaborate, which was usually best and, given his sudden hissy fit with PC Mauger, probably advisable right now. If she wasn’t a copper, the laughing Guv of a few minutes before would seem like her imagination playing tricks.
“Some of these are quite valuable.” Moretti held up a nondescript-looking book bound in a faded green, brushing the silvery-white dust left by SOCO off the cloth cover. “First edition of Nicholas Nickleby, 1839, with the original etchings and frontispiece. Probably worth a bob or two.”
“A bob or two?” Liz crouched down beside him.
“A thousand pounds or two,” Moretti replied. “Until the place is cleared, we’ll have to keep a police guard on it. Word will get around.”
“Wow!” Liz looked at the books around them and picked up a leather-bound volume. “What’s this?” Moretti took it from her.
“Looks like a book about James Gillray, with some very nice steel engravings — he drew satirical cartoons, Falla. He had eclectic tastes, our hermit.” Moretti gestured at a scattering of ancient Penguin paperbacks with their distinctive orange, black and white covers, the little penguin standing in a white oval alongside the titles. “Do we know if he left a will?”
“Jimmy didn’t mention it, but I don’t think that was a priority. Everything was left in place, except the rope. Jimmy took it back to Hospital Lane. He’d been cut down — the hermit, I mean — by the time I got here.” They both looked up at the exposed beam, surrounded by the pink batts of insulation.
“We’ll need to find out if there’s a will. The death will soon be reported in the Guernsey Press, and possibly some law
yer in town will come forward. Though he doesn’t seem to have been a lawyer type of person.
“Let me tear myself away from these,” Moretti swept a hand over the books on the floor, “and take a look around. Not that there’s much else to look at.” He stood up, brushing the dust from his hands.
There was indeed little else in the hermit’s hideaway. The place was lined with sturdily constructed bookcases that looked homemade, and the only attempt at decoration were the shards, bottles and pieces of driftwood placed on top of them. Some of the shards were arranged on the narrow ledge beneath the one small window in the roundhouse. On the floorboards were a couple of woven wool rugs that also looked homemade, the colours faded to a blur. There were blankets and a threadbare quilt on the truckle bed that could have been easily moved closer to the fire when necessary. An ancient hipbath stood close to the fireplace, a towel draped over the higher end. A camp stove, a kettle, a few pots and pans and pieces of cutlery on a trestle table alongside a loaf of bread and some cheese, an overripe banana and an orange, some canned goods, a packet of tea. Another table was loaded with magazines, and there was a battered armchair covered in a threadbare fabric Moretti remembered from his childhood, called moquette. There was a space left on one of the bookshelves for a small pile of neatly folded clothes, and there was a well-worn pair of felt slippers near the armchair.
“Was he wearing boots, Falla, did you notice?”
“Yes, Guv, and an overcoat. One of the boots had fallen off.”
“As if he’d just come in. Hmmm.” Moretti looked up at the pink surface above him. “Interesting choice of ceiling material. Makes the place feel quite —” He paused.
“Cosy,” Falla supplied for him.
“Almost.” Moretti stood up. “I need to talk to the postman. Did you ask him to come in to the station to make a statement?”
“Yes, Guv. I told him it could wait until today, but he may have been in this morning. Want me to check if he’s been?”
“Go ahead.”