The Garden Plot

by Marty Wingate

  “You have a description of someone discussing what could be the murder, and you wait days to tell the police. This won’t do. You are too close to this situation and may not be able to see clearly. A police inquiry does not involve emotional ties to suspects.”

  Anger and confusion filled her. She chose to ignore the distinct possibility that she might be interfering on the Wilsons’ behalf only because they showed her kindness. “Surely you don’t look just at someone’s opportunity to commit a crime. Surely you take into consideration a person’s character and—”

  “If you attempt to obstruct this investigation,” he began, and Pru stood up abruptly. “What I mean to say …”

  “Oh, I know exactly what you mean, Inspector.” She began to dig in her bag. “And here’s another piece of evidence I withheld—a flash drive with photos I took of the Wilsons’ garden before and after the murder.” She slapped the flash drive onto the table. “Here, go ahead, arrest me.” She turned, almost bumping into the server with their plates of food, and walked off down the footpath. She didn’t hear Christopher call after her.

  Pru pouted the rest of the day, feeling as if a potentially lovely afternoon had been hijacked by official police business and—just perhaps—her own stubborn reaction to being told what to do. Jo found it impossible to get a word out of her about her lunch with Christopher. During the rest of that Sunday in the country—croquet on the lawn, tea in the garden, dinner in front of the fire—Pru kept mostly quiet; when she did talk, her cheerful demeanor bordered on manic. The next morning, Jo and Pru drove to London together; Cordelia returned with Lucy. As they started back in the rain, Jo ventured a few questions.

  “Do you want to talk about yesterday?”

  “No.”

  “Did he stand you up?”

  “No.”

  “Was he mean to you?”

  “No.”

  “Do you want to see him again?”

  “No.”

  Jo sighed. “Well, this will be a pleasant drive.”

  Chapter 7

  In London, Jo started to take the left turn just before Grovehill Square, but suddenly swerved and continued straight.

  “Jo, why didn’t you turn?”

  “What?” Jo’s face was flushed. “Oh, I wasn’t thinking, Pru, sorry. I thought that was a street too early. Here now, I’ll just go around. We’ll be there in two ticks.”

  It took longer than two ticks; Jo drove what seemed to Pru far out of the way before circling back to Grovehill Square, and fifteen more minutes passed before they arrived at her door. She saw Jo glance around the square, as if doing a quick reconnaissance.

  “There now,” she said, the relief evident in her voice, “home again.”

  “Right,” said Pru. “Thanks, Jo, I really did have a lovely weekend.”

  Jo recovered her good spirits. “You don’t have any appointments at the police station this week, do you?”

  Pru smiled. “I’ll talk to you soon.”

  Pru took herself and her weekend bag into the front hall. Two days’ worth of post lay on the floor. She shut the door, turned on the light against the gray outside, and bent to pick up her letters. As her hand reached down, she stopped. On top of the three or four pieces of mail, which lay scattered in a small heap, was part of a large shoeprint.

  Pru’s hand hovered over the mail. No postman in here. She stood up quickly and listened; quiet filled the house. She looked back at the mail; she could see something with Sarah Richards’s return address—maybe it was finally her check. For a moment, she stood looking at the floor, then she bent down and collected the letters.

  Now, be sensible, she said to herself, how could someone get in here, and why would he want to? She walked quietly to the back door, which was securely locked. All windows closed. The locked door to the basement—for which she had no key—still locked.

  She checked every room and saw no signs of disturbance, ending up in the front room where her laptop sat on the desk, shut down but with the lid up. She held her breath and stared at it. Hadn’t she closed the lid? Doesn’t she always close the lid? No, wait, she remembered now—she forgot to close the lid one day last week, too.

  She let her breath out. Okay, no one broke in; no one is here. I’m fine. Nothing is gone. She checked the lock on the front door, and, without allowing herself a reason, pulled the kitchen table up against the back door and hoped there wasn’t a fire in the middle of the night and she couldn’t get out. She fixed herself a sandwich for dinner and had a glass of wine, opting for the quiet entertainment of a book instead of trying to listen for unusual sounds over the voices of the television or Radio 4.

  Later, Pru rang the Wilsons to ask if she could stop by the following day, and—she had to admit—to hear a friendly voice. Mrs. Wilson said they would love to see her for tea in the afternoon.

  Boars Hall

  The Royal Corner

  Billy Row, Crook

  Durham

  DL15 9UA

  8 October

  72 Grovehill Square

  Chelsea

  London SW3

  Dear Ms. Parke,

  I write to regretfully inform you that you have not been selected for the post of head gardener for Boars Hall Castle and Gardens. Thank you for sharing with us your knowledge of the gardens, mining, and history of Durham.

  We appreciate your interest in this post and wish you well in your future endeavours.

  Yours sincerely,

  Anne Stanhope-Worthington

  Boars Hall Castle and Gardens

  ASW/bbr

  No email from Lydia followed the rejection letter from Boars Hall, which was a relief to Pru only until her phone rang and she saw whose number it was: Marcus. She left the ringing phone on the kitchen counter and walked into the front room, to get as far away from it as she could. When it stopped—with no message left to ignore—she stuck it in her pocket and left for the Wilsons’.

  “Harry’s joining us today, dear,” said Mrs. Wilson when Pru arrived.

  Mr. Wilson had decided to take some time off work. Pru remained in the dark about Mr. Wilson’s employment; she’d learned he was a director in a company, but didn’t know what the company did. Whatever it was, he was senior enough to do as he pleased.

  “Why don’t you pop downstairs, Pru, and let him know the tea is ready?”

  The basement door off the front hall was open, and Pru walked down the stairs to find Mr. Wilson staring at a letter in his hand. He hadn’t noticed her.

  “Mr. Wilson?”

  He started. “Pru, I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you.” He folded the letter up and stuffed it into the envelope he held in his other hand. He rolled up the envelope until he was unable to roll it anymore and it resembled a fat cigar. He stuck it in his pocket. But Pru caught a glimpse of the letterhead before it disappeared in the folds: Hodges & Hodges Appraisals. She’d seen that on a letter her first visit to the Wilsons’; she remembered the announcement on the company’s website about an upcoming important auction of ancient items. She told herself Mr. Wilson must be buying, not selling.

  “Tea is ready,” she said.

  While Mrs. Wilson fussed with the tea, Pru told them the funny story of running into Christopher in the country and about watching the badgers—she left off the part about stomping away from lunch. Mr. Wilson told her about some of the interesting finds he’d been involved with—the reason for all the awards covering the little tables in the hall.

  “Our society, well, we’re amateurs, so we only help the real archaeologists—we never work by ourselves. A few years ago, we were a part of a group that found a collection of Roman vessels down in Wiltshire. It never ceases to amaze me to think that we come across pieces of people’s lives, the cooking pots and jewelry and stoneware from so long ago.”

  “Who has the pots now?” asked Pru.

  “The whole collection is in the Salisbury museum, so that everyone can learn about them and enjoy them.” Mr. Wilson shrugged his shoul
ders. “It wouldn’t be any fun if what we found was just locked away in someone’s cupboard. It’s in the sharing that we discover more.”

  He was like a gardener talking about a prized collection of dahlias—you could see that light in his eye. No gardener would want to hide the fruits of her labor, that’s why there were garden open days. And for archaeologists, museums. Mr. Wilson could never be involved in the unsavory business of stealing and murder. She wished Christopher could hear Mr. Wilson talk about his activities. “Are there collectors of Roman antiquities? Like art collectors or collectors of rare books?” she asked.

  “There are indeed,” said Mr. Wilson. “Just a few years ago, a fellow down in Wiltshire dug up an intact Roman helmet in fine condition—very rare, an astounding discovery. There were many museums that wanted that piece, but he wanted money, and put it up for auction, where it fetched £1 million.”

  Mrs. Wilson seemed to pursue her own line of thought. “It would make a lovely weekend away for you and a friend, dear,” she said, “if you were to go down to Salisbury. Harry could show the two of you around.”

  “I’d love to, but I’m not sure what friend I’d persuade to go,” Pru said.

  “Oh, well,” Mrs. Wilson said, “you never know, Pru. What about the inspector?”

  Mrs. Wilson as matchmaker, Pru thought. She decided to change the subject. “You’ve both been so kind to me, when I haven’t even been able to get started on the garden. I feel quite at home here.”

  “We enjoy your company, Pru, and talking about history and gardening,” said Mr. Wilson as his wife set down a plate of buns. Toffee Woof-Woof raised his head. He had been napping near his tin of treats, but now moved over to sit beside Pru.

  “It feels as if we’ve known you for ages,” Mrs. Wilson said.

  Some people gather up strays, thought Pru, it’s part of their nature; and whether she was the latest in a long line of lost souls that the Wilsons acquired, or whether she was a rare occurrence, it didn’t really matter to her. As an only child, Pru made up her own family—or many families. The Wilsons felt like some favorite aunt and uncle.

  “Look,” said Mrs. Wilson, nodding toward the table, “I brought something out to show you.”

  A fat photo album sat on the coffee table. Mrs. Wilson opened it up to the middle and began showing her photos of their garden and house, Greenoak, in Hampshire—the one Alf owned and had booted them out of, unceremoniously, saying that he was selling it. Mrs. Wilson talked about the garden and Simon Parke, their gardener, with Mr. Wilson adding a remark or question occasionally (“Vernona, what was that tree with the pink flowers by the drive?”). As Pru readjusted the large book in her lap, an old, yellowed photo fell out of the front. Pru picked it up and saw a boy in his early teens with a smirk on his face, dressed in an old-fashioned school uniform. “Who is this?” she asked.

  “Oh, that’s Alf. What an old snapshot that is. He was a good boy growing up, but he did have a tendency to look for the easy way out of anything,” Mrs. Wilson said.

  “Vernona is being kind. He owned that house free and clear. We paid him a lease all the years we lived there, and he’d still ask us for money. The house should’ve gone to both of you.” He nodded at his wife.

  “Does Alf live in London?” asked Pru.

  “We’re never very sure where he is. He may be here or down in Hampshire. It’s part of his shifty nature,” said Mr. Wilson.

  Pru started to put the photo back in the album, and as she did, she flipped it over, and on the back she saw, in a child’s handwriting, the name “Alf Saxsby.”

  Alf, Mrs. Wilson’s brother. Saxsby, the man she’d heard talking with Malcolm. Mrs. Wilson began a story about Alf as a lad and some silly idea he had about making money from marketing special telephones that wouldn’t need to be plugged in at home—anyone could talk anytime and anywhere. It distracted Pru for a moment—too bad he didn’t follow through on that one, she thought—but soon she found herself dwelling on Saxsby, and Mrs. Wilson’s story became background chatter. Alf Saxsby. Poor Mrs. Wilson. Alf, in trouble for most of his life. Alf, who lurked around one of Mr. Wilson’s digs a couple of years ago. Alf, who met Malcolm last year.

  Pru pushed aside concern for how Mrs. Wilson would take the fact that her brother was involved in a murder—could Alf have murdered Jeremy?—when she remembered hearing Alf cavalierly flinging accusations. He had practically said to Malcolm that Mr. Wilson committed the murder—how could he do that to his own brother-in-law?

  Alf might have wanted the mosaic for himself. Pretending it was his own, he could’ve auctioned it. Although Pru didn’t understand how you could move an entire mosaic floor and sell it without someone noticing. As Mrs. Wilson finished the story—“He still believes that the company owes him money for the idea”—Pru realized that she now had acquired more information on the case. Unintentionally, she pointed out to herself. She needed to talk with Christopher.

  Her thoughts preoccupied her as she left the Wilsons’, and she didn’t notice Malcolm coming round the corner until she almost bumped into him.

  “All right there, Pru? You looked a bit faraway.”

  “I’m fine, Malcolm, I just stopped in for a visit at the Wilsons’.” She thought it was high time to take advantage of these “chance” encounters. “Do you have time for a pint? I wanted to tell you about some new rose breeding I was reading about.”

  She didn’t want to push her luck—perhaps he would call her out on eavesdropping, but his usual friendly manner made her think that she might get away with a few pertinent questions. Malcolm jumped at the chance to talk roses.

  They found a pub partway between the Wilsons’ house and hers—the Queen Charlotte. It wasn’t one of Pru’s favorites; the pub had taken up with some consortium and now offered the same tired, microwaved menu as dozens of others around the city. “Real English food!” the chalkboard proclaimed—but it wasn’t even a real chalkboard, just painted to look like one. At least they carried a few real ales. Pru ordered a half pint of Old Speckled Hen, but Malcolm went for a Dubonnet.

  He kept to the subject of roses, even though occasionally Pru tried to veer off into another area. Finally, as the topic of rose scent—tea versus fruity—came to an end, she took another go.

  “Malcolm, have you known the Wilsons long?”

  He answered cautiously. “Well, neighbors, you know, you’re so close, you find out a great deal about them in short order.”

  If the police had questioned him about Saxsby, Malcolm would know she had been the one to tell them. But for now she could pretend that she had no idea “Alf” and “Saxsby” were the same person.

  “Do they have family about?” Pru kept her voice light. “Mrs. Wilson said something about her brother … is it Alf? I believe he lives in Hampshire.”

  Malcolm’s face went blank. “Well, I’ve met him, but I don’t get invited to any family dinners,” he said with a tinny laugh. “You seem to be getting close to them, though. Maybe they’re even confiding in you, Pru. Or perhaps they’ve let something slip out about Jeremy or what happened in the shed. Is that what was upsetting you earlier?”

  “I don’t believe they have anything that could slip out, Malcolm,” Pru said. “Do you suspect Mr. Wilson of … murdering his friend Jeremy?”

  “Pru,” he began in an instructional tone, “you shouldn’t be taken in by people who pretend to be kind to you. They could be hiding a great deal. This could be a dangerous situation for you.”

  For a moment, she expected him to tell her she was not a police officer. “Malcolm, don’t you think that’s a bit harsh?” She thought that his warning could apply to him just as easily as anyone else.

  “They’re such a chummy bunch”—she could’ve sworn she saw him stick out his bottom lip a bit—“with their digs and their exciting finds and their ‘I have an award for this and that.’ Wouldn’t it just serve him right to be blamed for murder?”

  Malcolm sounded as if he hadn’t been picked t
o play on their side for kickball—or cricket—hardly a reason to accuse someone of murder.

  “That doesn’t really sound like evidence, does it?” she pointed out.

  “There may be evidence, Pru,” he said in a low voice, looking over his shoulder as if someone listened in. But the small crowd of males in the pub stood up at the bar watching television—the replay of a soccer game from Brazil. “I just don’t want you to be hurt when it all comes out.”

  He was beginning to sound like a broken record, she thought, and decided to give the record player a kick. “Malcolm, I was checking on the soil near the wall the other day. That’s when you saw me.” He squirmed in his seat, as if the memory of the encounter made him uncomfortable.

  “Pru, you shouldn’t get involved in all this.”

  The barmaid had come round gathering up glasses from the surrounding tables, and Pru waited until she moved on before taking a different tack. “Is the soil at the bottom of your garden very wet? When your roses died, how far down did you dig?”

  With relief clearly showing on his face, Malcolm plunged into talk about his roses again. “I went down a couple of feet and it got wetter and wetter. I knew I had to abandon any hopes of putting a Zéphirine Drouhin or Félicité Perpétue on the bottom wall.”

  “That would’ve been lovely,” Pru commiserated, noting to herself that the soggy soil was not isolated to the Wilsons’ shed. “I suppose Alf knows about the wet soil in the garden,” she said and waited for a reaction.

  “Alf?” asked Malcolm in surprise. “What would Alf care about soil or roses?” He thought for a moment. “In fact, I did try to show him when he visited that first time, but he just laughed. But then he got quiet for a moment,” Malcolm said with a frown, “and said that he had a boggy place in Hampshire. He knows nothing about roses.” He looked at his empty glass, with only a film of Dubonnet at the bottom. “Would you care for another half pint, Pru?”