by Issy Brooke
Inside the community hall, there was a buzz of activity. It smelled like all village and community halls smelled – a slight whiff of damp, industrial cleaning fluids, dust and large vats of tea kept at a continual rolling simmer since the end of the war.
The usual folding tables had been set out in a horseshoe shape, and various people fussed around. Most of them were women, and they were all of a certain age. That age being the more mature side of fifty, at least. And in many cases, Penny was being charitable.
But this was no time to be ageist. After all, she was what she considered to be the “wrong” side of forty though was there a “wrong” side? It wasn’t like she could put it “right.” She was already the sort of woman that she remembered looking at when she was younger, and wondering if she would ever, ever get to that age. And here she was, at that age, and not a lot had changed.
Except her stress levels, her resilience, her sense of humour and her general reaction to life’s difficulties, of course.
No. The person she once was would return, she promised herself. In fact, she already was. She lifted her head high and walked into the hall, clutching the portfolio to her chest.
She was greeted enthusiastically by everyone, and she thought she recognised a few faces though she could not place them. They were people she’d seen in town, perhaps, or maybe with the ramblers. Just the act of recognition made her feel warm and part of something.
A stately woman in a formal blue dress suit with intimidating shoulder-pads introduced herself as Ginni, the secretary of the group. “I’m not quite a leader,” she said with a laugh, “but I am the closest thing, I think. I do the paperwork, which is power, of a sort.”
Penny was introduced to everyone in a whirlwind round and promptly forgot all the names. All except one, the very woman she was here to talk to: Mary.
There was a spare seat either side of her, and Penny sidled onto the left side. Mary smiled warmly. She was in her early fifties, perhaps, with slightly mad fuzzy hair and enormous purple-rimmed spectacles. She was a loose-skirt-and-bangles sort of woman, with a throaty laugh.
“Penny! Now then, duck, you sit here and tell me all about yourself!”
Perfect! Penny grinned back. “I’m sorry … so many new names. Mary…?”
“That’s right, Mary Radcliffe, that’s me. So you’re new to Upper Glenfield, are you? What brings you here?” Mary’s eyes glistened with something very like greed and Penny realised that here was a woman who collected gossip in the way that others collected stamps or coins.
She didn’t look like a woman in mourning for the love of her life, either, but then, Penny reminded herself, who was she to judge? Grief – like stress – took people in different ways. She was increasingly sure that there wasn’t a checklist of “things to feel when someone dies.”
Penny told her a little about London and her career in the heady world of television, but Mary had a particular talent that seasoned rumour-mongers all had. She was able to tease out more information that Penny had intended on giving. It was a skill Penny wanted to learn, although not by being on the receiving end of it.
“Stress, hey?” Mary was saying. “Enough that you gave up your job and moved away? That sounds more like a breakdown to me.”
Penny shook her head – nothing so dramatic – but Mary was unstoppable. She blundered on. “There was a woman that I knew, lived up on the Abbeystead estate, oh, she was terrible with it. Terrible. Made herself quite ill, you know? I saw her once, she hadn’t washed her hair in two weeks, no make-up, shocking, it was!”
“That sounds more like depression,” Penny hazarded, grabbing a gap in Mary’s stream of words.
“Well, they do go together, don’t they? As I am sure you know.”
“No, I–”
Mary patted her hand. “I’m sure you’re a very private person and you don’t know me at all, but I want you to know you can always come to me if you need to talk. I’m a very good listener. Everyone knows.”
Penny glanced around. ‘Everyone’ seemed very intent on their own business in their own little groups, and there was a noticeable space around the pair of them. No one looked their way.
Mary was clearly not as popular as she thought she was.
Penny desperately wanted to steer Mary away from the topic of stress and depression before she leaped to any more conclusions. Penny already recognised that denial on her part would simply strengthen Mary’s convictions.
Penny unzipped her portfolio and began to pull out her sketches. She felt nervous about unveiling her work but it was a good tactic to divert Mary. It was much like throwing ham around when Kali spotted another dog. It worked.
“Oh my! What a talented artist you are!” Mary said, her hand darting in amongst the pile and sifting through them as if Penny had given her permission. Which she had not. “What a beautiful dog! I used to draw, you know, but I’ve moved on.”
As if drawing was something you did until you could do something else. Penny decided that Mary was simply bad with her impulsive phrasing, not wilfully rude and tactless. She tried to rescue her sketches but Mary was intent upon them. “Is this your dog?”
“Yes, Kali. She’s a Rottie.”
“Oh, what vicious dogs they are! They’ll rip your face off as soon as look at you. You wouldn’t think it to look at her there, would you?” Mary said.
Now Penny was properly annoyed. You can say bad things about my drawings but not about my dog, she thought. She hadn’t realised how protective she felt until that moment. “There is nothing vicious about Kali,” she snapped.
Mary pursed her lips and ploughed on. “Barry Nuttall had one of them. Not quite like this one. His dog was smaller, and chunkier. More like … well, it was a pit bull terrier. Or something like it. It looked like one of them banned dogs, anyway. Horrible thing. Anyway, it died!”
And your point is…? thought Penny, disliking Mary more and more. The plan to become friends was a regrettable one. She gritted her teeth and said, “So, what crafts do you do now? Is that decoupage?”
Mary pushed all of Penny’s sketches aside with a dismissive sweep of her arm, the bangles jangling. “I’ve been making cards. High-class ones, obviously. Well, I’ll decoup onto anything, but cards is easiest.”
Decoup? Mary’s grammar made Penny itchy and she wasn’t usually a snob about how people spoke. It was all the aspects of Mary’s demeanour that were making her uncomfortable. “May I see?” she asked, pointedly trying to demonstrate what good manners looked like.
Mary picked out one of the worst creations and presented it with pride. A fat robin had been cut out and glued onto a blue card, with golden glitter applied around the edge. Penny was unconvinced that it counted as ‘decoupage.’
“I’m selling at craft fairs all over the county!” Mary told her. “This is one of my most popular designs.”
“At Christmas?”
“I sold one last week.”
“Wow,” Penny said with genuine feeling. “They are certainly unique.”
“They are very popular,” Mary repeated. “Have you thought of selling at craft fairs?”
“No, it hadn’t occurred to me. I’m not really good enough yet.”
“Nonsense! A bit of work, a nice frame, someone will buy them. You’ll improve. Although you probably want to draw a cuter dog. Do a terrier. Everyone loves terriers. A terrier in a bow. With flowers around it.”
Penny resisted the urge to say something nasty about terriers being loved by her Rottie as a nice snack. “Well, quite,” she said. “I’ll see.”
“No, you must!” Mary said. She was becoming quite insistent. “We could share a lift! Wouldn’t that be nice? You wouldn’t be on your own, and it’s cheaper with petrol.”
“Perhaps in the summer.”
“There’s a fair next weekend in Grantham. There’s still time to book a table there, only a fiver. It’s not too far and it will give you a real taste for it!”
Absolutely not, for many reas
ons, not least of which she didn’t want to spend too much time in Mary’s company. “No, I’m afraid…”
“There is nothing to be afraid of!” Mary said, missing the point, possibly deliberately. “I’ll book the table. You don’t need to do anything except pick me up on Saturday morning. We’ll have to leave early, of course. How big is your car?”
Hit the brakes! Hit the brakes right now, Penny screamed silently. “I can’t. I’m busy at the weekend.” It was a lie and she hated to tell it. “I’m sorry,” she said. As if it were her fault. Aargh!
Mary frowned and her face was not pretty when her brows lowered and her frosted-pink lips puckered. “I lost my car recently,” she said petulantly. “And I lost my job, and my dear, close gentleman-friend.” She pulled out a tissue and dabbed at her eyes unconvincingly, an act which sent her right to the top of Penny’s mental list of suspects. Who would list their boyfriend – well, ‘gentleman-friend’ – last?
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Penny said. This was her chance, wasn’t it? But how on earth did one ask for details about something so sensitive? She wanted to know, above all, if Mary was to be a beneficiary of David’s will.
But she wouldn’t be so upset about not having a car, then, would she?
Or maybe she would. Penny said, hesitantly, “Probate takes such a long time, doesn’t it?”
“Especially when the poor dearly departed was murdered,” Mary said in a low whisper, her hand darting out and gripping Penny’s wrist. “Tragic. You’ll have heard all about it, I’m sure. My poor David. It’s in all the papers! Tragic, tragic. When you reach my age, my duck, you’ll understand what a trial life is…”
Your age? I’m only five or ten years away. And yet it seemed like a lifetime. “I really am sorry to hear about your troubles.” She was supposed to add ‘if there is anything I can do’ to be polite, but social convention could go swing for it. “Perhaps when the will is read…”
“Ha!” Mary hissed and sat up straight, her chin jutting up and out. “Fat lot of good that is to me now, is it?”
Penny winced. It wasn’t going well, and people were starting to look their way. She could read Mary’s words in different ways. Had she experienced financial problems which led her to murder David in the hope of getting something from the will, unaware that probate would be delayed due to the circumstances of his death? Or did she know she was not a beneficiary anyway? Had David’s death caused her more financial problems? Had he been supporting her in some way?
There were so many questions and no easy way of asking them. “Perhaps you have friends who might give you a lift next weekend,” Penny said slowly. “Or relatives. David had a brother, didn’t he? Maybe his wife, Eleanor…”
“Eleanor?” Mary’s voice quivered. She repeated the name, louder this time. “Eleanor? What is Eleanor in all of this? Why would I speak to that woman?” She pushed her chair back, the legs scraping on the hall floor. “Who put you up to this? Who has been talking?”
It was a bit rich, Penny thought, for her to complain about gossip. “No one. I’m sorry. I thought…”
“Haven’t I been through enough?” Mary wailed, and now everyone’s eyes were upon them. She started to grab her cards and bits of paper, pulling them towards her in a mess of glitter and loose pictures, stuffing them into a carrier bag. “And now you throw that … that … woman into my face again. Her!”
Ahh. Well, this has answered one question, Penny thought miserably. Eleanor and Mary were no longer friends.
It probably was not the right time to ask when and how they had argued.
Mary slammed the final handful of awful cards into the plastic bag and punched a hole right through it, causing the paper to spill to the floor as she stood up. This prompted a fresh round of wailing, and Ginni stalked forward to take command of the situation, her kitten heels clacking ominously over the hard floor.
Penny shrunk down in her chair as the situation dissolved around her. Ginni glared at Penny, before turning to Mary and asking if she was all right, and did she need a glass of water.
“It’s all too much for me!” Mary wailed. “All I wanted …”
“There, there. It’s okay.” Ginni patted Mary and shot a slit-eyed death stare of warning at Penny. She began to put her sketches back into her portfolio case.
“I’m so sorry. I seem to have said the wrong thing. I really didn’t mean any harm.” She really did feel awful. Mary’s distress was quite genuine, but it was odd that it was only the mention of Eleanor that set her off; she had talked about David’s death with perfect equanimity.
“Yes. This is a calm and peaceful group,” Ginni said.
Penny tensed. “I think I’d better go. Again, I am so sorry. If there is anything I can do…”
“You’ve already said you won’t take me to the craft fair,” Mary said, pausing her sobbing for a moment to dig at her.
“It’s that I can’t rather than won’t…”
“I still won’t be able to go, will I? After all I’ve been through. Oh, everything is so difficult for me…”
“You’ve had a nasty shock,” Ginni said. “It’s been a trying time for you. We all understand.” She angled her broad shoulder to exclude Penny from the conversation.
Penny took the hint, and left.
* * * *
She had annoyed Drew by wanting to ask questions, and now his warning was proved justified. Cath wasn’t happy. Warren was, well, just Warren. Ed had been upset by her probing, and now Mary – and the whole craft group, and by extension the entire community of Upper Glenfield – were furious with her.
Only Francine was her unlikely ally.
She should stop asking questions. She knew that.
Give it up.
Quit.
I am not a quitter, she said to herself as she stamped home, unwisely given that her ankle was still sore. She felt hot and angry, and a little ashamed that she had upset so many people.
But the fact was that a man was dead. Dead, she reminded herself. So if some folks got upset, surely it was justified?
She was hazy about the ethics of it.
Penny stopped suddenly, as a new thought hit her.
She was feeling full of energy once again. Her lethargy and her unsettled ennui that had plagued her for so long was gone. She was on fire once more. She was alive.
She had made lists in her head, and organised her time, and not once had she felt overwhelmed by it all. She hadn’t shied away from essential tasks. She hadn’t fallen into negative thoughts or patterns of behaviour.
This, then, was progress. Her new hair style, her cottage, her motorbike, her dog, her renewal of her art skills – yes. And it was all tied up in the murder case. It gave her a purpose.
It is my investigation, she decided. I need to find out who killed David Hart for myself as much as anyone else. Yes. There it is, plain and simple. It’s a selfish motive. At least I’m being honest.
Which is more than can be said for everyone else I’ve spoken to, she though sourly. There was a lot in Mary’s reactions that simply didn’t add up.
Mary Radcliffe was now a prime suspect.
Chapter Twelve
Penny flopped onto the sofa and put her feet up on the low coffee table. Her ankle wasn’t hurting, exactly, but it was letting her know that she needed to take care. Kali jumped up and lay alongside her, her head resting on Penny’s thigh. Penny absently stroked her head and ears, and Kali started up with the low rumbling that she’d found quite disconcerting in the beginning. Now she simply considered it Rottweiler Purring.
She wanted someone to talk to. She could call Francine, as she had promised, but she was far away. She wanted someone there, right now, who knew about the case. Drew, or even Cath. But they both thought she was being silly to think of herself as an investigator. And Cath couldn’t condone it from a professional stand-point.
And Drew was worried about her getting more involved. After all, such things were far better left to the police.
“They don’t understand,” she told Kali. “Okay. So neither do you.”
Kali rolled her eyes up at Penny, hopeful that the speech that she just heard as noise predicated treats. It did not.
“Everyone’s grief is different but there was something not right about Mary’s reaction, surely?” she mused. “Or am I reading too much into it? She’s hiding something, I’m sure of it. So she was sacked from the surgery and she likes to gossip. And everyone was avoiding her at the craft group. Usually people like to have a gossip. So why isn’t she more popular?”
Kali closed her eyes.
“I bet any amount of money she was sacked for gossiping. What a wonderful, terrible job for a gossip… as that man said, the surgery should have known better than to employ someone like her! She had access to the intimate details of all the people in Upper Glenfield…” Penny shuddered. “What a disaster.”
“So,” she continued, in spite of Kali’s disinterest, “what other trouble has her gossiping got her into?”
She decided she wouldn’t be able to go back to the craft group again, which was a shame as she was enjoying her rediscovery of sketching and drawing.
“This was still a successful day,” she told Kali. “I know more than I did before, so it has to count. And I’m feeling less stressed, which is the most important thing.” She thought she probably ought to dig out the blood pressure monitor that she had been given. She was supposed to track her statistics but she’d found the figures too scary. Now, though, it would be interesting to see if she was really improving.
She closed her eyes and together, she and her dog began to drift into sleep.
Only to be interrupted by a tentative knock at the door. Kali leaped down and went into full-on bark-the-walls-apart mode. Penny’s heart thudded and she made her way slowly to the door. Was it Mary, come to continue the argument? Or even Ginni, who had seemed like one of those pleasant country women who were built entirely from steel girders and determination? Ginni was clearly of the stock that had flown unarmed spitfires through the night from airfield to airfield in the war. No. Ginni would have hammered more loudly.