The Work of a Narrow Mind

by Faith Martin

  ‘Sorry, guv.’ Wendy flushed, and sighed mournfully. ‘I don’t think I’m ever going to get the hang of this, guv. I don’t think I’m clever enough.’ She sounded so despondent that Hillary had to smile.

  ‘What? You going to just hand the floor over to Jake without a fight?’

  Wendy snorted. Then suddenly stiffened. ‘Guv.’

  ‘I can see her,’ Hillary said softly. For Freda de la Mare had just opened the door of her cottage. For a moment she stared down the path at the two women clearly visible in the front seats of the car, then retreated back into the house. She was only gone for a moment or two however, before she reappeared, wearing a coat and carrying something in a clear, plastic bag: something long and thin.

  As Freda walked, stiff-backed and tight-faced down her garden path, Hillary got out and opened the rear passenger door, holding it open for her. As she approached, Hillary nodded at the bag she was holding. Inside she could just make out a glimpse of something gold-coloured.

  ‘That the murder weapon?’ Hillary asked casually.

  ‘Yes,’ Freda agreed. She seemed to hesitate for a moment, as if unsure of the etiquette of such a moment. ‘I imagine you want to take it?’

  Hillary smiled and agreed, reaching out gently for it. Then she turned and placed it on the front passenger seat, aware of Wendy staring down at it, wide-eyed and open-mouthed. She then followed Freda into the rear of the car. From the back seat, she leaned forward a little. ‘Back to HQ Wendy,’ she prompted gently.

  Wendy swallowed hard and turned the key in the ignition. ‘Right, guv,’ she croaked.

  ‘Speed limit,’ Hillary reminded her gently. But for once, the Goth needed no prompting, and drove very circumspectly indeed back towards Kidlington.

  In the back seat, the other two women sat in a mutually reflective, calm silence.

  Wendy followed them towards the interview rooms, then veered off to one side, not at all surprised to find both Jake and the new superintendent already in place in the viewing room.

  Jake eyed the pale but keyed-up girl with a rueful smile. ‘Trust you to be in at the kill. What’s going on?’ he whispered.

  But Wendy, with a wary eye on the new boss, shrugged. ‘To be honest, I’m not quite sure,’ she admitted.

  ‘Where’s the boss?’

  ‘She’s dropping off what we think is the murder weapon with Forensics.’

  Jake whistled silently through his teeth, and nodded at the older woman now being shown in by the custody sergeant, and being introduced to Steven Crayle. ‘So she did it then?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Wendy whispered back. ‘The guv asked Sexy Steven to get warrants for practically everything else on her but murder. And there was something going on just now about a visit to the local churchyard.’

  Jake frowned. ‘I don’t get it.’

  ‘Me neither. But our Hillary’s got it all sussed, I can tell you. Jake, I think she’s amazing.’

  ‘Who’s got a crush on Miss then?’ Jake whispered, nudging the top of her arm with his shoulder.

  ‘Oh shut up!’

  ‘That sounds like a good idea to me,’ Superintendent Sale said, still facing the viewing mirror and hiding a smile. He’d heard from Steven that the two wannabes were good kids, with plenty of brains and enthusiasm between then, and that they got on well, which was good to know, but there was a time and a place for everything.

  Besides, he was keen to see his prime investigator in action, and he didn’t want to be distracted and, he had to admit, he was already impressed. When Steven Crayle had outlined the Perkins case just five days ago, he’d secretly decided that it would probably never be closed, let alone within a week. Just like the two kids behind him, he was keen to see how it all panned out.

  It wasn’t beyond the bounds of possibility, after all, that the much-vaunted Hillary Greene would fall flat on her face.

  At the super’s rebuke, Jake and Wendy fell silent, but not before Wendy gave Jake a retaliatory nudge back.

  In the interview room, Steven Crayle was just going through the necessary details for the benefit of the tape recording, citing his name and that of Freda, the time, the date, and reading Freda a list of her rights. Just then, Hillary came into the room, and he duly added, ‘Hillary Greene, civilian consultant has just entered the room at….’ He read off the time, then leaned back slightly as Hillary took a seat beside him.

  Freda de la Mare smiled at her wearily.

  ‘Freda, thank you for coming in today,’ Hillary began. ‘This shouldn’t take long. We know most of what happened the day Sylvia Perkins died. We just need you to corroborate it. I take it that you’re willing to do that?’

  ‘Of course I am,’ Freda said flatly. Her red hair looked dishevelled, as if she’d forgotten to comb it before coming out, and she was still huddled in her coat, as if she found it hard to keep warm. It made Hillary wonder if the artist might not be suffering a little from shock, in which case, she needed to speed things up.

  ‘I don’t suppose I can smoke in here,’ Freda asked, then quickly waved a hand, answering her own question. ‘No, no, I know. Let’s get on with it, shall we?’

  ‘The brass poker that you brought in with you. You understand that that’s being forensically examined?’ Hillary got that in first. She knew that barristers and solicitors liked good solid evidence to be dealt with promptly.

  ‘I imagined it would be,’ Freda agreed, with a tight smile. She looked tired, but not defeated, and in the viewing room, Jake couldn’t help but smile.

  ‘She’s a game old bird, isn’t she?’ he said admiringly.

  ‘Shush,’ Wendy said, fascinated.

  ‘All right,’ Hillary began. ‘Let’s start at the beginning. This all began, really, when Maureen Coles started to show signs of dementia, didn’t it?’ she said, surprising everyone else listening.

  Beside her, Steven, who had the most experience of Hillary’s habit of pulling rabbits from a hat, reacted the least by merely shifting slightly in his chair.

  ‘I suppose it did,’ Freda agreed slowly. ‘She always was a bit flighty, I suppose. A bit of a dreamer. So when she started becoming forgetful or confused, it didn’t register at first that it was more than just Maureen being silly old Maureen. Sylvia was the first to realize it was more serious than that.’

  ‘What did you do?’ Hillary asked gently.

  ‘Well, between us we managed to persuade her to see her GP. They did some tests – you know, memory stuff, what day of the week was it, who was prime minister, that sort of thing. And …well … there it was.’

  ‘Alzhiemer’s,’ Hillary said flatly. ‘Yes, I talked to the police doctor about it. He said, without having access to her notes, that she probably suffered from a thinning of the veins in her brain, restricting blood flow and slowly causing parts of her brain to … well—’

  ‘Dry up. Ossify. Wither and die,’ Freda supplied bitterly. ‘Yes. It was awful. Her mind seemed to quite literally get narrower and narrower. The woman we knew, the friend we loved and laughed with, slowly turned into this woman we didn’t recognize. Sometimes she thought I was her mother.’ Freda shrugged, fiddling with her hands, obviously longing for a cigarette. ‘But we took care of her. Sylvie, me, and one or two others. It wasn’t hard. We both lived right next door – one of us on either side. We did her shopping, set up direct debits so that all her bills were paid, did her housework, took care of her garden, made sure Sputnik was fed. We were coping.’

  Freda paused, then sighed.

  ‘Yes,’ Hillary said. ‘Sputnik. Poor old Sputnik.’ Then realizing that she had to get it all down for the tape, added, ‘Sputnik was the latest in a long line of ginger tom cats that Maureen adored, wasn’t he? We’ve been told how she doted on her cats.’

  ‘They were the children she never had. And to be fair, the cats all loved her back. Whenever either Sylvie or me called on her she’d be sitting in her favourite chair with Sputnik curled up on her lap. He used to sleep on the bed with he
r as well. Kept her company.’

  ‘And then, one day, Sputnik wasn’t there,’ Hillary said flatly.

  ‘No. She found him dead in the garden. She came round to me, carrying his poor little corpse. She was beside herself. We just couldn’t console her. Especially Sylvia….’ She paused. ‘You do know that she got it into her head that Sylvia was the one who poisoned Sputnik, right?’

  ‘Yes,’ Hillary agreed. ‘Several of your neighbours and friends remembered that. Apparently Sylvia had complained about the cat taking garden birds and scratching up her vegetable patch.’

  ‘But that was before Maureen got ill. She told Maureen that she should put a bell around his neck. It was something that Maureen latched on to later. It was odd, you know, some of the things she’d remember and the things that she didn’t.’

  ‘Yes,’ Hillary agreed quietly. ‘But Sylvia wouldn’t have put poisoned meat down. Not to kill her friend’s cat, or any other wildlife for that matter.’

  ‘No. It was that twit over the road,’ Freda snorted. ‘The one who fancies himself as a smallholder.’

  ‘Paul Quinlan. He admitted to putting out poisoned bait to keep the fox numbers down. But you couldn’t persuade Maureen of that, could you?’

  ‘No,’ Freda said sadly. ‘The trouble was, once she’d got an idea into her head, you just couldn’t shift it. You’d tell her, you’d explain, and she’d seem to take it in and accept it. Sylvie used to swear over and over again that it wasn’t her fault poor old Sputnik was dead, and Maureen would cry and believe her and they’d make it up. But the next time Sylvie came around, Maureen would have forgotten, and would accuse her all over again. It was so distressing for both of them.’

  Freda sighed, and leaned forward on the table, dropping her face into her hands for a moment. ‘In the end, we agreed that perhaps Sylvie would have to stop visiting, which was a bit of a blow, since it meant most of the work then fell to me. Looking after Maureen, that is. She didn’t have any family left, see.’

  Hillary nodded. ‘So tell me about that day. When Sylvia died. You were in your home, I take it? Painting upstairs?’

  ‘Yes, that’s right. I heard someone downstairs. I shot down, thinking some low-life was after the silver, and found Maureen instead,’ Freda said. ‘She was just standing in my living room, looking puzzled. At first I didn’t realize … I didn’t see what she was holding. I just thought she’d come round to borrow something, and then forgotten what it was. Then I saw the poker in her hand. Her dress and arms were splattered in something red. She just …’ Freda faltered, took a sharp intake of breath, and blurted, ‘she just said to me “I’ve killed her then. My poor Sputnik has got his revenge.” That’s what she said. Her exact words; I’ll never forget them. Then she looked at me, and smiled, and said, “Oh, hello Freddie. Have you popped round for a cup of tea?” I just … gaped at her. I made her sit down and I dashed down to Sylvia’s and went in and … well … you know what I found.’

  ‘Yes. But if you could describe it to us for the tape, Ms de la Mare.’

  Freda nodded. ‘Oh, right. Yes. Of course. Well, I saw Sylvie lying on the living room carpet. She was bleeding … her head … I could see that she was dead. She wasn’t breathing. Her eyes were open and staring. I just … backed out and went back to my place. Maureen was in the kitchen making a cup of tea. She was still holding on to the poker. I took a plastic bag and gently prised it out of her hands. She looked surprised and puzzled, and asked me if I wanted to make up a fire. She recognized the poker, you see, but not what had happened. She never did remember what she’d done and for that I was grateful. Really.’

  ‘Ms de la Mare, why didn’t you call the police?’ Hillary asked firmly.

  For a long moment, Freda de la Mare stared down at her hands. Then she looked up at Hillary and gave a wobbly kind of smile. ‘Oh, I thought about it. Long and hard. Believe me, more than once I went to the phone and was about to call them. But then I thought about what would happen if I did. To Maureen.’

  ‘But you must have known she almost certainly wouldn’t have stood trial,’ Hillary said. ‘You’re an intelligent woman: we’re not living in the dark ages any more.’

  ‘Yes, I know all that. But they would have had to take her away and question her, wouldn’t they?’ Freda said. ‘To make sure she wasn’t faking it. Maureen hadn’t left Caulcott in years. She hardly ever left her house, even. The confusion she’d have felt. The fear. The trauma. And you know what else? What really stopped me from doing it?’ Freda said, her voice more urgent now, and begging for understanding. ‘I knew that Sylvia would have been furious with me if I had let it happen.’ Freda looked from Hillary to Steven, who was looking down at his hands expressionless. ‘Don’t you get it? Sylvie was the one who was dead, she was the real victim, and I just knew, if she was standing there beside me, if her ghost was there, she’d have been urging me to look after Maureen. To do the best that I could for her. To keep her safe.’

  Freda shook her head helplessly. ‘Oh I can’t really explain it. I just knew I had to do it. But I wasn’t completely reckless. I took the murder weapon and kept it safe just in case anyone else was ever accused of the crime. I knew that I had a responsibility to see that no one else was blamed or suffered for it. I also wrote everything down and left it with my solicitors. It’s to be opened when I die…. But I suppose I can get them to relinquish it early now.’

  ‘Yes, but Freddie, what about Sylvie’s girls? All this time, they’ve been thinking that some heartless man, some faceless stranger, killed their mother and is still walking around scotfree. Didn’t they deserve to know the truth?’ Hillary asked helplessly.

  For a moment, the artist stared at her, her face working. But she managed to hold back the tears. ‘I know. Believe me, I do. It’s been heavy on my conscience all these years, don’t think it hasn’t been. But th … would it really be better for them to know the truth?’ she asked desperately. ‘I can’t say any more. I’ve thought about it so much. Is it easier for them to think that some nameless man did it, or for them to know that it was her best friend? That it wasn’t anything like an evil act that robbed them of their mother, but the desperately sad, confused actions of the friend she’d loved and tried to take care of? Which is worse, do you think?’

  Hillary stared at the artist for a moment, then, defeated, simply shook her head. She looked at Steven, who roused himself and began to tell Freda that she was under arrest for attempting to pervert the cause of justice, and for being an accessory after the fact in a case of murder.

  Freda merely slumped back in her chair and said nothing.

  In the viewing room, Wendy chewed nervously on one of her black-painted fingernails. She knew now whose grave Freddie had visited just before coming here. She’d been taking the flowers to Maureen, of course, as an offering – a way of saying sorry, because she was just about to betray their secret.

  ‘They won’t make her go to prison, will they?’ she asked, but neither Jake nor Roland Sale could answer that. In the end, it would be down to the CPS whether or not they pursued a case against Freda de la Mare.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  In Steven’s office, Hillary was making her report to both her bosses. Steven, who knew what to expect from previous such briefings, was calm. Roland Sale, however, looked fascinated.

  ‘Well, right from the start, the real puzzle for me was the question of motive,’ Hillary began. ‘Sylvia simply wasn’t the sort of woman to attract real enemies. And the crime didn’t look particularly opportunistic, either. It was unlikely that she had simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time. So until I could understand why someone wanted her dead, I realized that we were really up against it. Well, that, and the lack of any real evidence, of course. DI Jarvis did a great job, but there simply weren’t any witnesses to be found, and all the forensics evidence was pretty much inconclusive. It wasn’t until we got around to interviewing Freda, that I finally sensed a witness who was holding back. Even then, I did
n’t really twig to what it was all about for quite some time. But it gradually dawned on me how everyone knew about Maureen Coles blaming her friend for the death of her cat, and when I learned more about her dementia, the more I began to wonder. As I said, I quickly became convinced that Freda knew more than she was telling, but she was clearly not going to spill it voluntarily, so I had to think of something that would make her come forward of her own volition.’

  ‘So you told her that you were about to arrest someone,’ Rollo Sale said, nodding approvingly. ‘And it worked a treat. Her conscience couldn’t let some innocent person go through that, it seems.’

  ‘Sorry your first cold case wasn’t more of a triumph, sir,’ Hillary Greene said quietly. ‘The killer herself is deceased, so there’ll be no arrest or prosecution. And I really can’t see the CPS going after Freda.’

  ‘I can’t say that I’m particularly worried about it. She’s hardly a menace to society, is she?’ Rollo shrugged. ‘And don’t apologize. You’ve closed a case, and brought the truth to a grieving family. Sometimes that’s worth more than conviction rates or statistics.’

  Hillary nodded, glad to hear him say so. The more she learned about her new boss, the more convinced she became that she was going to be able to work well with him. ‘Can I leave the clearing up to you, sir?’ Hillary asked, turning back to Steven, who looked slightly surprised. ‘Jimmy has something he thinks I need to see to,’ she added neutrally, by way of explanation.

  Steven caught on at once. Jimmy had only one priority at the moment and that was finding out what Jake Barnes was up to. ‘Well, better get on with it then,’ he said with a brief, tight smile. ‘It’ll give me a chance to fill in Superintendent Sale on how things progress from here. Besides, the paperwork is usually our domain anyway.’

  Rollo Sale groaned. ‘Tell me about it.’

  ‘Sir,’ Hillary said briskly, and got up.

  When the door had closed behind her, Rollo Sale smiled across at the younger man. ‘You’re going to miss it around here, aren’t you?’