Folly

by Stella Cameron

  No, she didn’t believe Tony had done something horrible to his wife. They must have a conversation but she wouldn’t have it in front of O’Reilly.

  ‘What does this have to do with what’s happening in Folly-on-Weir?’ she said, clearing her throat every other word. ‘What point are you making?’

  Tony rested his elbows on his knees and scrubbed at his face.

  She wished he would say something.

  ‘It probably has nothing to do with our case, but we’re bound to make sure you know everything that could affect you.’

  Why hadn’t anyone talked to her about this? Why hadn’t Tony told her? ‘I’m afraid I don’t understand why it’s your job to spread other people’s troubles around.’

  ‘You’re not looking at this with your eyes open,’ O’Reilly said. ‘We’ll move on. It did occur to you that we’ve started on a second box of darts, didn’t it?’

  ‘Yes,’ Alex said. ‘That makes it even more important for you to get to the bottom of all this, doesn’t it?’ She hadn’t thought too much about it but she would now.

  ‘It would have made it easier if you’d known how many actual darts you had down there.’

  ‘Well, I don’t,’ Alex said, surprised by Tony’s complete withdrawal from the conversation. ‘They were there when I bought the pub. Anyway, how do you know they came from the Black Dog? There must be thousands that look like they do.’

  ‘Batch numbers,’ O’Reilly said shortly. ‘They’re from the same one.’

  ‘You’ve made your point,’ Tony said. ‘Now tell us why anyone would use a weapon – or something as a weapon – when it leads right back to a place like the Black Dog.’

  ‘Because none of this has a thing to do with the pub,’ Alex said defensively. Did O’Reilly want her to feel trapped and guilty for some reason? He had to know she wouldn’t point a finger to herself.

  ‘True enough,’ O’Reilly said. ‘But could be at the start it was a snap decision, then the killer was stuck with it so he or she carried on. Those darts were easy to get at when someone decided to use them.’

  ‘That could be any one of dozens of people,’ Tony said. ‘They come and go all the time.’

  ‘You’d know that, Alex. I never had you picked out as a crack darts player.’

  She realized her mouth had dropped open and closed it. This had to be the most irritating man she’d ever met. ‘You learn something new every day,’ she said, smiling tightly at him. ‘I bet I started out younger than most. When my mum worked as a barmaid at the Black Dog, I got into passing the time with darts. Unfortunately other things filled up my time soon enough and there was no more of that for me.’

  ‘You never fill in if they’re a player short.’

  Her palms shouldn’t be sweating. This was ridiculous. ‘I’ve been known to do that, but not if I can help it.’

  ‘Hey,’ Tony tossed aside the crisps he’d been about to eat. ‘For crying out loud, is this another of your wild goose chases? Now you find out Alex has thrown some darts in her time so she’s a suspect. That would be smart on her part, wouldn’t it? To kill with a dart and risk someone making the connection.’

  ‘Just making conversation.’ O’Reilly stood again. ‘There’s no need for either of you to involve yourself in this case unless we find out we need you.’

  Apparently it didn’t bother the man to feel intense dislike aimed at him.

  ‘It’d be a simple thing for me to take you down to your mum’s, Alex,’ he said. ‘I’m sure she’d feel better to have you with her tonight.’

  ‘You obviously don’t know my mother,’ Alex said. ‘She brought me up to be self-sufficient and she doesn’t hover.’ Her mind seemed to almost touch something, but not quite and she couldn’t make sense of what she was thinking. She had missed something. They’d all missed something.

  O’Reilly wasn’t giving up. ‘You’d make everyone more comfortable if you were in the village,’ he said.

  ‘I’ll be staying.’ She was damned if some policeman would turn her against someone she believed in – or tell her what to do in any case.

  ‘Perhaps it would be best if you went,’ Tony said, leaving his own chair. ‘For everyone.’

  Cold slicked over Alex and goosebumps followed in its wake. ‘Everyone?’

  ‘It would be more comfortable for me,’ he said.

  Her cheeks actually stung.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  When they were in O’Reilly’s car and he started the engine, he turned to her and said, ‘You’ve made a wise decision.’

  ‘The decision wasn’t mine.’ She sounded curt but that was fine with her.

  He steered from Tony’s driveway and set out for the downhill drive. ‘Harrison knew you were just being a loyal friend. He helped you do what you knew you should.’

  She didn’t answer. What Tony had said hurt. But leaving him like that hurt more. As soon as she could, she would call him. And she’d make sure she saw him within hours.

  Bogie sat on her lap and stared straight at the detective. His little body was rigid. He’d made it clear he wasn’t interested in coming back out into the icy night.

  If she let the man goad her, she’d lose her temper. That could be exactly what he wanted. Out of control people often talked too much. She let it go, closed her eyes and pretended to rest – not that he’d be fooled.

  What felt like an interminable time later they drew to a stop and Alex saw they were in front of Corner Cottage.

  ‘I’d appreciate having that lace, now,’ he said. ‘It’s late, sure enough, but it would be a good thing if we could talk some more. Just the two of us.’

  She shrugged and got out of the car with Bogie in her arms. O’Reilly managed to reach the gate in time to hold it for her.

  Lily opened the door before Alex could knock and she raised her brows. She obviously hadn’t expected to see her daughter, and certainly not the detective.

  ‘Detective Inspector O’Reilly drove me down, Mum. He wants to ask me a few more questions.’ He wouldn’t see how she wrinkled her nose with distaste for her mum’s benefit.

  ‘I was just off to bed,’ Lily said. ‘I’ll leave you to it, then. Unless the detective has questions for me, too.’

  ‘Not at the moment, thank you, madam,’ O’Reilly said, excruciatingly polite.

  Lily took Bogie from Alex. ‘I’ll put him on your bed,’ she said and went quickly upstairs.

  ‘In here, please,’ Alex said, opening the door to the tiny front sitting room for O’Reilly. ‘I’ll get that material.’

  When she returned from the kitchen where she’d put the folded tissue in a drawer reserved for manuals they never used, O’Reilly was looking carefully at one of her mother’s much-loved pieces of Belleek porcelain – the shapes of two fish formed into a pale lemon vase.

  ‘This is an old one,’ he said. ‘Back in County Wicklow my own mother has a glass-fronted cabinet filled with little pieces. She says it’s patriotic for the Irish to collect Belleek. Do you know why they started making it?’

  She didn’t, but she did recognize a tiny alarm. O’Reilly wasn’t above using a tried and tested method to get her to relax with him. Chatter about simple, unthreatening interests could do wonders to break social ice.

  ‘Y’don’t, do you?’ And now he really sounded Irish. ‘It was a brainchild to get some people work after the potato famine. Too bad it took so long to get going, but it happened in the end. You can see through the stuff. I used to sneak a bit and look at it in the light.’ He held the vase to a nearby lamp to show how transparent it was.

  ‘Pretty,’ she said. ‘Mum’s been buying bits and bobs since I was little. I hope you never broke anything at home.’

  ‘Aw, no. I’m still here, aren’t I?’ He laughed, and looked young and appealing.

  O’Reilly, giving her an open and so charming smile, could have swept her into his cozy corner. But this wasn’t the night for cozy anything.

  ‘Here’s what you’re looking fo
r.’ The simple hospitality her mother would have expected shamed her into adding: ‘Can I offer you something? There’s Glenlivet unless you’ve an aversion to Scots whiskey. Or tell me your poison and I’ll see what I can do.’

  ‘Glenlivet will do nicely,’ he said and grinned again, pulling on a pair of blue latex gloves. ‘I’ll count myself not officially on duty.’ He sat at the end of the small damask-covered sofa to unwrap her tissue packet.

  She poured the amber Scotch into two glasses, her own just a half finger. O’Reilly got half a glass. She needed all the help she could get.

  When she was seated across from him he took a healthy swallow and set the drink aside. The tissue he spread open on his thigh before gently straightening the lace-edged lawn.

  Satisfaction. It gleamed in his dark eyes when he looked up at her. ‘Have you a magnifying glass? No bother if you don’t.’

  ‘I do,’ she said, knowing instinctively that somehow he had already learned about the initials.

  The glass was in Lily’s sewing basket. Holding it close to the specimen, O’Reilly didn’t make a sound, but this was one time when his face didn’t don his practiced blank expression quickly enough.

  Alex wanted to ask what it meant to him but passed her whiskey back and forth under her nose instead and watched intently.

  Finally he sat back and there was nothing of the smile left. She got the full force of how cold he could appear.

  ‘There’s been a lot of violence in this village,’ he said abruptly. ‘Far more than most think we’re looking into. Do you understand what I’m talking about?’

  So much for Belleek. ‘No, I don’t.’

  ‘Well then, Alex, what do you know about this little lace exhibit, other than where it came from? We’ve been looking for it, by the way – to complete the whole piece. We’ve got the rest of it.’

  The less squirrely she appeared, the better. ‘It was inside the cincture, wasn’t it? When I cut it I must have cut through that, too, and caught a little bit on the edge of the knife.’

  He looked at her for a long time but she wouldn’t let her eyes move from his. ‘Didn’t you have to pull this off the knife? You could have given them both to me at the same time.’

  ‘No, I couldn’t.’

  Again the extended stare. ‘We can go into the station and do this as officially as I should. I thought we could be friendly about it but I expect you’d prefer to have your solicitor with you.’

  Her stomach flipped, just as he’d intended. She crossed her arms and gave him back some of his own silence.

  ‘All right. Is there anything you think you want to tell me? About anything?’

  Thinking, turning over possibilities of what he did and didn’t know and what he wanted her to say, she looked at her hands in her lap. If she could make him feel she wanted to help him – not that she didn’t, but she would not drag dear friends into this. She could help without harming, couldn’t she?

  When he moved she thought he was getting up, but he picked up his Scotch again and savored another mouthful.

  ‘There’s an old story in the area,’ she told him hesitantly. She could mess this up so easily. ‘About a bride’s handkerchief being placed in her coffin after she died. That would be some years after her wedding. Have you heard anything about it?’

  She heard the breath he took in through his nose, slowly. ‘Something. Yes, I’m thinking I did.’

  ‘It’s probably just a silly tale that’s hung around for years. You know how those things go in places like this.’

  ‘A bride’s handkerchief? Like this one?’ He set a forefinger on the tissue.

  ‘So you think that’s what it is?’ Her chest bumped hard.

  ‘Do you?’ he asked.

  ‘Could be.’

  ‘How do you think it came to be inside Brother Percy’s cincture?’

  She frowned at him.

  O’Reilly didn’t blink. ‘Doesn’t make any sense, does it? But if that were, say, a handkerchief that belonged to Cornelius Derwinter’s wife and it was put in her coffin? Who took it out?’

  ‘Edward Derwinter?’

  O’Reilly leaned toward her. He didn’t look tired any more. ‘That’s the story you heard, is it? Did you hear it a long time ago, like some kiddies’ ghost story? Or is this being talked about now?’

  When she didn’t answer, he went on: ‘Are they saying something happened to Edward Derwinter because of this?’ That steady forefinger remained on the tissue paper – beside the handkerchief scrap. ‘Concentrate. Did they do something to the boy that could have a bearing on this case?’

  Alex stood abruptly and jerked her arm, forgetting the Scotch. Droplets of pale gold liquid arced through the lamplight and glittered as they fell.

  ‘What?’ O’Reilly said, scrambling to get up and protect his precious evidence at the same time.

  ‘Was Brother Percy … no, I was thinking for a second that Percy was actually Edward. That’s not right. But Percy was wearing Edward’s cincture. He said he had something he wanted to give back to him.’

  TWENTY-NINE

  ‘This is Tony Harrison. Please leave a detailed message. I’ll get back to you.’

  Alex was finished with leaving messages.

  ‘Don’t do this, Tony.’ She spun away from the phone on her mother’s hall table and stood, staring the wall. ‘Damn, damn, damn. This isn’t going to help you – us.’ He ought to know she trusted him and that they’d come too far not to keep on working together.

  But did his reaction mean he didn’t trust her?

  She had started trying to reach him as soon as she woke up early that morning. He had turned his mobile off. By this time he should be at the clinic but, if so, he was screening her out.

  O’Reilly would be pleased. He wanted to drive a wedge between her and Tony. Divide and conquer – or at least see what contradicting information he could worm out.

  She already regretted her outburst about the cincture. That idea should have been kept to herself until more pieces of the case fell into place.

  Now she was even thinking like a plod, as Will would say.

  Her mobile rang and she slapped it to her ear, ‘Tony?’

  The clearing of a throat at the other end let her know she should have waited. ‘Hello, Alex.’ The very English voice was held low. ‘Major Stroud here. Your good mother gave me your number. I’m calling on her behalf, and mine. She’s tied up. We’ve got a bit of a shindig in progress at the Black Dog, m’dear. Hate to disturb you but it shows signs of getting nasty. Of course, I’ll make sure nothing gets too out of hand, still …’

  ‘Oh, f-iddle.’ She collected herself, but couldn’t do anything about the thumping headache that began. ‘Thank you, Major. Not even lunchtime and someone’s fighting?’

  ‘Not exactly. Not yet. Usual suspects but I regret to report that Mrs Winslet set it off. Unexpected arrival. Not that I think she intended to cause this.’

  Alex sighed, having difficulty imagining the diminutive Fay Winslet causing a row. She rarely appeared at the pub and more rarely had anything to say. ‘Thank you, Major. I’m on my way.’

  With Bogie behaving as if he was on his way to a canine carnival, she clipped on his lead, put on the black woolen coat and a green scarf she’d retrieved from Lime Tree Lodge and left Corner Cottage. This time she locked the door and she would be insisting her mum did the same in future.

  The snow had finally stopped. A white-blue sky dazzled her but the wind was still cold enough to make sure she was wide awake. She paused for a pair of toddlers, the Graham twins, and their mum to fuss over Bogie, but didn’t tarry any longer than she could help.

  O’Reilly was staying at the Black Dog. She’d only partially taken it in when he’d told Tony to meet him there. Hurrying across the snow-packed street, she scanned the road for his car. No sign, and she hoped fervently he wasn’t hearing whatever was going on in the bar.

  The sound of raised voices met Alex as she walked into the entryway. Thi
s was getting to be a nasty habit. She went straight through the door into the public bar but apart from Major Stroud who raised a hand in acknowledgement and grimaced, the disagreement raged on as if she hadn’t arrived.

  ‘Enough’s been said.’ Will caught her eye. He gave a half-hearted wave and let his arm fall heavily to his side. ‘Let’s pack it in, boys and girls.’ Cathy attempted to continue serving but seemed to have withdrawn into herself.

  The place was too crowded for the time of day. Alex wondered how many had arrived in response to the village person-to-person system.

  ‘If Kev spent more time at work than ’e does proppin’ up that bar, none of this would have happened.’ Another Derwinter worker, this one Colin Best, was too close to Kev. A burly, dark-haired Welshman in his thirties, his naturally ruddy complexion was the color of beets and veins stood out at his temples and in his neck.

  ‘And if you weren’t propping it up right now, we wouldn’t have to listen to your foul mouth,’ Kev said.

  Colin narrowed his eyes and put more distance between them. But he didn’t stop muttering.

  ‘I haven’t said anything the rest of you aren’t thinking,’ Kev said.

  Alex had the thought that anyone passing by should be able to hear him. Gladys and Frank Lymer from Underhill stayed close to the door as if ready to escape. Wonderful.

  ‘Let’s go, Kev,’ Fay Winslet said. ‘Don’t say any more.’ She didn’t match her husband. Small and fair – and usually quiet – she had big brown eyes and pointed features. In the village, if she was mentioned at all, it was likely to be in reference to her church work.

  When Kev looked at her his regret showed, but he was too wound up to just walk away.

  ‘You started this,’ Colin said. ‘You shoot your mouth off. If you didn’t want to be the center of everything, we’d all be better. There, now I’ve told you.’

  ‘And I’m so hurt,’ Kev said, sneering. ‘A man telling a bit of truth doesn’t mean others who don’t know what they’re talking about can blab a lot of rubbish and make trouble. But now you want to blame me and back out of it, don’t you? Without the Derwinters, where would we all be? They keep this village alive – as much alive as it’s likely to be.’