Chapter Fifteen
With Kate’s cake shop still closed, Ruby once again took the bus into Cheltenham.
“What’s Kate up to? Has Iris eaten her up?”
“No. That sweet old lady is doing very nicely.” Andrew Rockwell-Smith was one of the few Rochester residents who bothered to keep up with local matters. “The Howard girl must have won the pools. She’s rebuilding the whole place. It’ll be a baker’s and a restaurant and tea place and everything else too. It’ll put Little Woppington on the tourist map.”
“Why should I sit on a map?” demanded Amy from a corner.
“You mean that whole building is going to be pulled down?” asked Stella. “All that horrid scaffolding stuff. I’ve just managed to sell my own ruined old house, and now there’ll be another on the doorstep.”
“It’s a ten minute walk.”
“We have a large doorstep.”
“Oh pooh,” said Ruby. “It’ll be out of service for weeks. I shall have to go back into town. Damnation.”
“Get us some cakes while you’re at it,” called Andrew. “My arthritis is playing up. I need peaceful solace.”
“Cream cakes,” smiled Ruby, “are the true bringers of peaceful solace. I shall bring home I shall bring home sackfuls.” And she plodded out to the bus stop. No one offered her a lift since Arthur was busy raking up dead leaves in the grounds around the back, and Sylvia and Harry were still in London with Tracy Sullivan. Muttering under her breath, Ruby caught the next bus, discovered it was so full she could not find a seat, and in spite of her age, and the occasional groan which she muttered as she stood in the aisle hanging onto a strap, no young man stood up for her.
Having lurched through several puddles and holes in the road, the bus finally stopped in the town centre. Ruby scrambled, half tumbling from the bus, and straight into the arms of Brad Peacock who was simply walking past, ready with his infectious smile.
“Good Lord,” said Brad.
“Heavens above,” stuttered Ruby. “Where on earth did you come from?”
“I was in the area.” He took her hand and shook it cheerfully. “I was so bored. It’s a real pleasure to see you.”
Charmed by the greeting, Ruby giggled. “Yes, it’s a little bit old fashioned here, I’m afraid. So why do you keep coming back? Isn’t Cornwall more interesting? Do you go to college there?”
“Oh yes,” he was still holding her hand, “but not every day. I come up just to see my friend, but he had to – hurry off. So I just thought I’d do some shopping before going home.” His smile somehow managed to sparkle. “How about a cup of tea and a cake somewhere? I’m not in a hurry.”
“Nor me.” Ruby felt a little flushed. It was a long, long time since anyone , apart from Brad the puppy, had taken a liking to her. “I’d love tea, cake, and a nice chat.”
He squeezed her hand. Without thinking, she squeezed back.
Ruby already knew two small cafes which produced what she enjoyed, and offered comfortable seating without ludicrous prices. She led the young man to the nearest of these, and they sat at a small table facing each other, grin echoing grin.
Brad said, “You know, I don’t have many friends. Even in college. It’s so nice to talk to someone who’s not my parents, but’s over the age of ten.”
Ruby laughed and decided on honesty. “Dear boy, I’m seventy-five. So just a little over the age of ten.”
“I’m seventeen.” Brad did some mental maths. “Fifty-eight years too young for you. Is that right?”
“Bang on,” Ruby ordered tea, a platter of six assorted cakes, and a refill if the waitress noticed anything running out. “We may eat everything you have,” Ruby explained, “and drink twenty cups of tea each. Just keep the supplies on tap.”
Laughing, perhaps impressed, Brad thanked her. “Great. Good fun.” He reached one long narrow hand with bitten fingernails. “When do you have to get back home?”
“Next year, sometime, never. Why?”
“Well,” said Brad. “I thought perhaps you’d like to come out to dinner with me. If we don’t eat more than a hundred cakes each, then we should have room for a decent steak and spuds. Even perhaps another cream cake for dessert.”
“That’s the sweetest offer.” Ruby was laughing too. “But I can’t let a young teenager spend all that. I shall buy dinner, and you will talk your head off all evening. The last bus leaves Cheltenham at around ten thirty, so I have to be at the bus stop before that.’
“And I have to be at the train station at ten fifteen.”
“So let’s start on cake.”
The platter had arrived, oozing cream. Ruby seemed to be oozing too. Brad reached over the table and grabbed her hand, squeezing her fingers again. Both flattered and disconcerted, Ruby wriggled her hand away and tucked it in her lap. She continued eating and sipped her tea. Brad began to discuss the weather, which led to favourite summer holidays in Mevagissey, moving onto Blackpool, and finally in Spain.
“My Mum and Dad took me to Spain last year. Lots of nice clean beaches. We stayed in a nice little flat with a great view over the seaside. I loved it.”
“I know Madrid and Barcelona,” sighed Ruby. “I travelled a lot with my late husband. Where are you planning for this year?”
“Dunno. My Mum and Dad decide.”
Ruby finished the second cake and the first cup of tea. “Have you any brothers and sisters? Do you all travel together?”
He nodded. “One brother – Steve. And a sister – Gemma. Yep, we all go together. I’m the eldest. You got a lot of family?”
Inane chatter turned to possible career choices in the future, chef, bank manager, dentist or perhaps open a shop selling computers, and eventually, almost without aim or intention, drifted to a discussion of the recent murders.
Morrison was discussing the same issues almost word for word. Sylvia and Harry were not present since the talk took place in the Briefing Room at the station. Instead, they sat in Morrison’s office and waited.
“I have an theory, perhaps more of a conclusion now, having thought it over for many, many days. There are two hubs, both centres of these particular crimes, and we’ve as yet discovered no motive for the killer to travel backwards and forwards between these cities, in order to commit his vile crimes. We’ve suspected Lionel Sullivan from the beginning. The particular methodology fits, more or less.
“But,” and he stared around the upturned faces, “we can’t possibly imagine, sadly, there’s only one brutal creep capable of creating these massacres. I’m more and more convinced there must be two killers.’
Some nodded. Others shook their heads. DC Leslie Napper simply grunted. “Poor bloody Tammy weren’t cut to bits, were he? Bludgeoned. That’s not Sullivan’s way, is it now!”
“We don’t know,” said Rita, who was sitting at Morrison’s side, although he was standing. “Killing a man may not excite him. He brutalises women. But he killed our friend Tammy for his own protection. Being noticed, he had to stop his position getting out. It wasn’t a kill for pleasure.”
“But everything fits together,” DC Walsh said loudly. “We know Sullivan haunts Gloucestershire. Our Tammy was killed – in a shed – right here in these forests. Nothing to do with Nottingham. So we got near proof who’s at it down here. Now Nottingham’s seen two nasty killings, both brutal and both involving rape and dismemberment. The choice is simple enough. Some other scum in Nottingham, maybe a copy-cat, is still free up there. Or for reasons of his own, Sullivan got over there and fancied practising his hobby in a different place where no one would expect him.”
“Going across there – why?”
“How should I know why? To buy a new pair of shoes. First get them measured, and kill Chelsea Murrow. Then back home. Two weeks later he has to go and collect the shoes. So back he goes and kills Shirley Ramington. Home again, and so on. He has to get special shoes, doesn’t he? Those feet of his are ten times too large for shoe shops.”
“I agree with I a
gree with Dougie,” DC Susan Grant said, looking up. “He steals cars, so he can pick up girls easy enough if he disguises himself, or pulls a hood over his face. And now he has a gun, I bet he’s gained courage too. Reckons he’ll get away with whatever he wants.”
“Well – he is, isn’t he?” mumbled Rita.
“One murder near Nottingham clashed with one down here,” remembered DC Napper. “Well, OK, not exactly at the same moment, but close enough.”
“Estimated time of death couldn’t be proved, only estimated,” Susan Grant said. “And a fast car can drive between here and Nottingham in very little time. We all knew it was possible. Not easy – but possible. I bet he did it just to confuse us. A warped sense of humour.”
“Warped everything.”
“Everything seems too close together,’ Morrison said slowly, hands in his pockets. “Even that damned train crash. Right on the Nottingham killer’s doorstep. Now how did that fit in?”
“It didn’t,” said Napper. “Kids on a bridge throwing stones. How the devil is that connected with Lionel Sullivan and the most nauseating murders we’ve known in a decade or more?”
“Those two Nottingham killings weren’t as typical of Sullivan as the media wanted us all to believe,” Morrison continued. “Why would a different setting give such a monster different ideas?”
“He was disturbed, or thought he was going to be. So he hurried.”
“Yes, that’s possible.” But Morrison was still shaking his head. “But there’s something wrong. I’ve a gut feeling about this.”
“Chief, you’d be calling me a proper fool if I went on gut feelings. You always tell us we need proof for every detail.” Napper laughed. “Come on, Boss. So what’s your gut say?”
“Cheeky bugger,” Morrison muttered. “My gut churns just like yours. My gut says two killers. But I also remember this. Sullivan doesn’t necessarily base himself here. Not always. His vile hideaway was in these woods before, but that’s been destroyed anyway. We know for a fact he was living further north and on the Welsh border for some time after the escape. His first wife and the daughter lived most of their lives in London. One of the earlier murders took place in Monaco. So stop thinking he’s bound to Gloucestershire. He isn’t. He can’t leave the country without a passport, but he could be in bloody Scotland for all we know.” He paused, looked around, assured of attention, and finished with a thump on the table. “My gut tells me there’s two killers. But my common sense says Sullivan isn’t back in these woods since we’ve searched every step. So find evidence. Find proof. At least start by finding a likely direction.” Heading towards the door, with Rita following, he turned once. “Off with all of you, and collect the proof I need. Napper, you go back on helicopter reconnaissance with Budgie. Walsh, go over the dates again. I want that paperwork all checked meticulously. Grant, you come with Rita and me. I have an idea.”
“Nottingham?” asked Susan Grant.
“Not at the moment,” Morrison told her. “But I need to phone the Nottingham chief.”
“I went to Nottingham once,: sighed Brad. There was a football match my brother wanted to see and I took him. I didn’t think it was different to anywhere else.”
“The sheriff was famous once. A great shot, he was, with a bow and arrows.”
Sniggering, Brad gulped the last of the tea. “Is the forest still there?”
“I haven’t the faintest idea,” said Ruby. “Never been there, and don’t like football either. But I shouldn’t make jokes about it. Those killings are just horrible. A couple of my friends used to know the disgusting murderer. And I once knew one of the poor girls who died. I shouldn’t be talking about it.”
“Then we won’t,” said Brad. “We’ll talk about you. Ruby Pope, widow to a famous Formula One Racing Driver, who I’m afraid I never heard of. But he was a lucky guy. He had a great career and a great wife.”
“Who me? Never, my friend.” Ruby wiped the last crumbs from her mouth. “I was never appreciated. Well – not after the first two or three years. Rod was so often unfaithful, and went gadding off for so long I just about forgot what he looked like.” Honesty again. Ruby smiled at herself. Admitting unnecessary truths had never before been her habit except with Sylvia. It seemed that Brad Peacock inspired her honesty as few others had. “But,” she added, “when he retired he changed. Too old. Too fat. And wanted me to look after him. He still tried a few affairs, but most of the time he was stuck home with me. He died some years back.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Oh, don’t be. I wasn’t heartbroken when he went, though I was sort of sorry. I still get lonely sometimes, thinking about him. He was a good looking man. Just like you, Brad.”
“What? Me? No way.” He seemed shocked. “No way good looking, lady. The kids at school call me Grumpy. I had a good hair cut once, and you can still see those bleached tips. But the headmaster didn’t approve. It was him who was grumpy. But no one ever thought I was good looking.”
“Well I do.” Ruby patted his hand, which was resting on the table beside his empty cup. “And not grumpy – no way. You always cheer me up.”
“Well,” he grinned, “you’ve made my day.”
They walked a little down by the Torr which widened beyond the town’s outskirts. The wind was chilly although the sun, once it sneaked out from behind the clouds, brought a meek and mild warmth.
As they walked into the shaded pathway, the breeze chilled further and Ruby shivered. Immediately a long-fingered hand slipped around her shoulders, and Brad pulled her close to him. The unexpected touch seemed somehow magical. No man , except perhaps Harry, had touched her for so, so long, unless they were simply pushing past her. Instinctively and automatically, Ruby rested her cheek against Brad’s shoulder. She couldn’t see his smile, but she heard him say, “Well, sweet lady, you’re the sunshine.”
It reminded her of what Sylvia had told her once. “Harry comes into the room and the light turns on,” she had said. “He brings the sun out from the grey clouds.”
Mumbling and muffled against his shoulder, Ruby said, “What a lovely thing to say. I almost forget that you’re just a little boy.”
Brad stopped abruptly and looked down at her. “Little? But I’m a good deal taller than you, my little lady.” He bent, looking into her eyes. Her own eyesight was not as clear as it had been in her youth, but she could see the soft unlined immaturity of his skin, the first vague discolouration of facial hair around his jaw, his upper lip almost like a baby’s.
And then he kissed her. His plump softness pressed hard down onto her, and his tongue forced into her mouth, pushing against her own tongue and tasting the taste of her. She responded, her own memories exploding, of kissing Rod, of him climbing on top, both of them in front of the fire, then a hot afternoon under the trees.
Banishing memories, Ruby pulled back, gasping for breath. She squeaked, “Brad. That’s – crazy.” She stared at him, thinking him mad and then thinking him gorgeously mad.
“I just wanted to,” Brad said. “I really, really wanted to. Didn’t you like it? I’m a bit inexperienced.”
“I can’t believe that,” Ruby said, which was true. She believed the girls must surely flock after him.
But he shook his head. His voice shrank to a whisper. “Lots of younger men have their first affairs with older women, you know.”
“Older?” Ruby was blushing, but it was with flustered annoyance as well as embarrassment. “Brad dear, I’m old enough to be your grandmother. Maybe even your great-grandmother. Don’t let's exaggerate the truth – after all – that Mrs Robinson story of the older woman put her at thirty-something. Perhaps forty. Not a hundred and two.”
He sniggered. “So what do I prove first? Intentions? Emotions? Come on, I look nice undressed. How about one mad night of passion?”
“Stop. Bloody hell.” Ruby was perplexed. The kiss still lingered against her face with that tingle of wild excitement and the first awakening of attraction in more than
thirty years. “This is - !” she did surely know what it was. And why would one night of absurd attraction hurt anyone? Maybe he could spread the news all over Facebook and make a fool of her, but she’s never know because she didn’t have a tablet let alone a computer, and she never looked at Facebook either. Just the one kiss had been so electric.
“Come on. Let’s find a hotel room.” He was tugging at her hand.
She tugged away. “Look,” said Ruby, “I admit, OK, it could be fun. But I can’t really believe you want to. The kiss was crazy, and now you want to go all the way. Is there some tricksy cheat in your head? I mean – get to the bed – get me to undress – look and cackle and then run?” But she knew he was sweet, and she knew she trusted him, and she knew she was madly dreaming now, of a cuddle, an intimate caress, and a long, long kiss. Something more? She’d almost forgotten how you do it.
“I’ll show you.” He grabbed both her shoulders and hauled her close, bent and kissed her again. lips were determined, forcing her mouth open. Having given up hope of wearing lipstick sometime past, Ruby knew perfectly well that her own lips had disappeared into dry, wrinkled crusts. Yet she made no attempt to pull away. Both of them were out of breath by the time he let her go.
Having avoided mirrors for a very long time even when fully dressed, hating the way she sagged and wrinkled in strange places as well as the expected places, Ruby now actually had less idea of how she seemed that she had a decade past. Perhaps, she wondered, with the light off and all curtains pulled, and if she climbed very quickly under the sheets, she might escape scrutiny. Brad was sweet, kind, a little lonely, very gentle, easily touched, and must surely care for her since he had spent more than half the day with her and hadn’t complained of either boredom or annoyance.
And if he laughed with his friends afterwards – well, she’d never know. She’d have lovely memories which she would even share with Sylvia, who might be shocked, even scald her, perhaps giggle.
Daisy Chains Page 14