Six Feet Under

by Dorothy Simpson

  “Who owns the farm?”

  “Man called Martin.”

  “Do these cottages belong to him?”

  “I don’t know. I could find out.”

  “Do that.” Thanet turned away from the window. “Well, we’d better get on with it. You go and see what the neighbours have got to tell you about last night, if you can find any of them at home. And find out all you can about Miss Birch—what she was like, where she went, who she talked to, the usual sort of thing. Not a word about the money at the moment, though. I’ll go across and have a word with Miss Pitman. She should have finished seeing to her father by now.”

  “What shall we do with all this?” Lineham nodded at the packages of pound notes.

  “Leave it where we found it for the moment. We don’t really want to cart it around with us all day and I should think it’s most unlikely that the place’ll be burgled, with the area crawling with coppers.”

  The two men replaced the mattress and left the house, Thanet locking the door behind him and pocketing the key.

  “What happened to the key Jenny Gamble let herself in with this morning?” he said.

  “That’s it, I think. Miss Pitman kept it.”

  The two men looked at each other. “My God,” Thanet said. “I’m slipping. Miss Birch’s bag! Where is it? She wasn’t wearing a coat, so I didn’t think … For that matter, where is her coat, if she’d been out?”

  “Perhaps she came back?” said Lineham.

  “Better check,” Thanet said. The two men went back into the house and made a quick but thorough search. Lineham found two empty handbags on the floor of Carrie’s makeshift wardrobe, but there was no sign of one in use. A worn brown coat hung on the back of the scullery door.

  “Looks as though this was the one she used most,” said Thanet. He would have to ask Miss Pitman. “I’d give a lot to know where that bag is now,” he said.

  Outside again, “I’ll start with Mrs Davies,” Lineham said. “I’m pretty certain she’s in.”

  As they set off down the lane Thanet experienced a prickle of unease between his shoulder blades. He turned around, expecting to see that there was someone coming along the road behind them, but the lane was deserted. He frowned, scanned the windows of number five. Had he seen one of the net curtains move? He couldn’t be sure. The movement, if there had been one, had been very slight, glimpsed only on the very periphery of his vision. It would not, of course, be surprising if old Miss Cox was watching them. She must be aware that they would want to see her, would probably be looking out for their visit. Well, Lineham would be along shortly.

  “What’s the matter?” said Lineham.

  “Nothing,” Thanet said, walking on.

  He and Lineham parted and Thanet crossed the road to the Pitmans’ house, which was uncompromisingly called The Bungalow. Miss Pitman had obviously been looking out for him; the front door opened as he walked up the path.

  “Do come in, Inspector. I’m sorry I was in a bit of a state, earlier.” She stood back to let him pass. She had tidied her hair, put on a little discreet make-up and looked altogether more composed.

  “Not at all. It must have been a very distressing morning for you.”

  The room into which she led the way overlooked the garden at the back and was light and airy, with large windows on both outside walls. The colours echoed the view outside. There was a grass-green carpet, a settee and armchair with loose covers in an attractive design of sprays of green leaves on an off-white background. The floor-length curtains were made of the same material and there were a couple of Victorian button-back chairs, one covered in cream, the other in a deep, muted blue. The large stone fireplace was flanked by ceiling-high bookshelves and the general effect was comfortable, attractive and unpretentious. Thanet felt immediately at home.

  “Your father’s all right?” he said politely.

  “Oh yes, fine. He’s eighty-two, you know, and needs quite a lot of care. He is badly crippled with arthritis and can do very little for himself now. I don’t know what I’m going to do without Carrie, I really don’t. Oh, I’m sorry, that sounds so selfish.…”

  “Understandable, though, if you relied on her.” Briefly, Thanet verified the information Lineham had given’ him: Marion Pitman had arranged for Carrie to come in at about nine the previous evening to check that all was well with her father. He also learned that Carrie had never bothered to put on a coat to cross the road unless it was bitterly cold or pouring with rain, and that she had invariably carried an old black handbag. Marion herself had attended the PCC meeting at the vicarage, leaving the house at seven twenty-five and returning at ten fifteen.

  “That was when the meeting ended?”

  “No. It ended at ten, but I stayed on for a few minutes to discuss something with the vicar. I’m treasurer, you see.”

  “So most people would have left at ten?”

  “That’s right.”

  “And on your way home, did you see or hear anything suspicious?”

  “I’m sorry, no. Since … since Carrie was found, I’ve thought and thought about it, just in case there could be anything relevant. But there was nothing.”

  “A pity. Miss Birch worked here every morning, I believe?”

  “That’s right. I teach part-time, you see, in a school for handicapped children in Sturrenden. Carrie’s coming made that possible. It’s not that my father needs constant attention, it’s just that she was here if he needed anything. I don’t like leaving him alone for long periods.”

  “Had she worked for you long?”

  “Oh yes, for years. She first came when I was teaching full-time, it must be, oh, fifteen years ago now. She cleaned the house for me, two mornings a week. Then, as my father’s health deteriorated, she came more often until eventually it was every morning. As I say, I don’t know what I shall do without her.”

  “You got on well with her?”

  “Oh yes. Of course.”

  Thanet detected some slight reservation in her voice. “But …?” he said.

  “Nothing.” She gave a little, nervous laugh. “Really. I didn’t see very much of her, of course, I was always out when she was here.”

  “Except in the school holidays.”

  “Well, yes.”

  Her reluctance intrigued him. “What was she like?”

  “Carrie?” Miss Pitman looked away, out of the window, as if trying to catch a distant glimpse of the dead woman. “Quiet. Unobtrusive. Got on with the job. Undemanding. She didn’t say very much, really.”

  “What did you talk about? On the odd occasion when you must have had a cup of coffee together, for example?”

  “Nothing much. The weather. Village affairs.”

  “Nothing personal?”

  “Not that I can remember.”

  “She never, for example, said anything about her relationships with other people?”

  Miss Pitman looked startled. “Who, for example?”

  “I don’t know. I’m hoping you’ll tell me.”

  “I don’t think she knew many people, other than very casually. She worked for the Selbys two afternoons a week. They live in the Old Vicarage.”

  “Had she been with them long?”

  “Ever since the Selbys came to live here, about five years ago. Irene Selby asked me if I could recommend a cleaning woman and although … I suggested she approach Carrie.”

  “Although?”

  Miss Pitman shook her head. “Nothing.”

  “The Selbys are a big family?”

  “No, just the three of them. Susan, their daughter, is seventeen and still at school. But it’s a big, rambling house to manage alone.”

  “And Mr Selby?”

  “Major. He’s managing director of Stavely’s.”

  Stavely’s was a thriving timber yard in Sturrenden.

  “He’s standing for the County Council elections next month,” she added.

  “And how did Mrs Selby get on with Miss Birch?”

 
“All right, I believe. I’m afraid I couldn’t really say. We’ve never discussed the matter.”

  “Can you tell me anything else about what Miss Birch used to do with her time?”

  “She used to clean the church. But apart from that, nothing much. Her mother was very demanding.”

  “Did she ever complain about her mother?”

  “No, never. But no one could help noticing how Mrs Birch treated her.”

  “Didn’t she belong to any village organisations? WI for example?”

  “No.”

  “You make her sound a pathetic little creature.”

  “Well I suppose she was, rather,”

  “And yet,” Thanet said softly, “I have the feeling that you had reservations about her.”

  “Reservations?”

  Thanet said nothing, simply waited. But Miss Pitman merely gave that nervous little laugh again and shook her head.

  “I can’t imagine what you mean, Inspector.”

  Thanet could see that it was pointless to pursue the subject at the moment.

  “Do you think I could have a word with your father now?”

  Her laugh was a little too loud, explosive with relief. But there was genuine amusement in it. “You don’t think I’d get away with keeping you from him, do you? He’d be furious. He may be frail but believe me he has all his wits about him and he’s been looking forward to your visit all morning!”

  Thanet grinned, stood up. “Then we’d better not keep him waiting any longer, had we?”

  Old Mr Pitman was sitting up in bed, looking expectantly towards the door. This, too, was an invalid’s room, but very different from Mrs Birch’s. There was colour, light and evidence of much activity. The bedspread was scattered with books and newspapers and beside the bed there was a large Victorian mahogany tea-trolley, its three tiers laden with many more books, a radio, tape-recorder and rack of cassettes, boxes of slides, viewer, stamp catalogues and albums, magnifying glass, tweezers, scissors and a jar of felt-tipped pens.

  The owner of all this ordered clutter looked alarmingly frail, the skin stretched taut over nose and cheekbones, hanging in loose folds about the neck. He had once, Thanet guessed, been a tall, strong man but now he was merely gaunt, shrunken and twisted sideways against the mound of pillows, as though it was impossible for him to sit upright. His hands, resting one on top of the other on the neatly folded counterpane, were blotched with the brown spots of old age, swollen and misshapen with his disease. The eyes which twinkled out at Thanet beneath the quiff of white hair, however, were piercingly alive and brilliant, a clear periwinkle blue. It was as though all the old man’s life and energy were now concentrated in his mind, visible only through those penetrating blue orbs.

  “Come in, come in,” he said. “Sit down.” And he nodded at an armchair set beside the bed. “Where I can see you properly.”

  “This is Inspector Thanet, father.” Marion Pitman approached the bed and, in a ritual that was clearly so familiar as to be second nature to them, she put her arm around his shoulders and helped him to lean forward, plumped up his pillows and eased him back against them.

  “Thank you, my dear,” he said. “Now, off you go. The Inspector and I will do very well without you.” But there was no sting to the words and he watched her fondly as she left the room. “She’s a good girl, Marion,” he said, when the door had closed behind her. “I don’t know where I’d be without her. Well, I do, of course. In hospital. Though I sometimes think it would be much better for her if I could persuade her to let me go. It’s not much of a life for her, you know, looking after an old wreck like me. However,” he said briskly, “you haven’t come here to talk about us. How can I help you?”

  “I believe Miss Birch came here last night?” Thanet said. “Do you by any chance remember exactly what time she arrived and left?”

  “Certainly. I’ve had plenty of time to lie here and think about it this morning,” said the old man. “She came in bang on nine o’clock—I’m sure of that because the news was starting.” He nodded at a portable television set on a table pushed against the wall. “And she left a few minutes after it ended, say at nine thirty. I know that’s so because I always like to listen to the news and it used to annoy me that she came just then—she always did, when Marion was out.”

  “Couldn’t you have asked her to come earlier, or later?”

  “I did hint, but to no avail. It was her mother, I believe. Like an alarm clock, that woman was. Though heaven knows, I shouldn’t complain about that. When one’s in this sort of situation it’s all too easy to be thrown when one’s little routine is disturbed. You wouldn’t believe how easy it is to sin lying here in bed! The temptations are endless—to bad temper, self-pity, lack of consideration … It’s so easy to justify one’s lapses, you see, to think you have every right to indulge in them …’ He grinned wickedly at Thanet. “Confidentially, I do allow myself the occasional self-indulgence, just for the pleasure of feeling guilty afterwards. It convinces me I’m still alive!”

  Thanet laughed out loud. “I must remember that, the next time I’m tempted.”

  “But I mustn’t waste your time, Inspector, must I? It’s just that it’s such a pleasure to see a new face, have a new audience.… You see how easy it is to slip? I’m doing it now! Please, do go on with your questions.”

  “I’d be very interested to know what you thought of Miss Birch.”

  “What did I think of her,” said the old man ruminatively. Like his daughter, he looked away, out of the window, as if to recapture an image already blurred by the passage of time. Or was he simply trying to gain time while he thought up a suitable answer? Thanet waited with interest.

  The reply, when it came, was a disappointment, echoing Marion Pitman’s.

  “Quiet. Unobtrusive. A good worker, and reliable. I don’t know what we’ll do without her.”

  And Mr Pitman had the same reservations as his daughter, Thanet noted. He tried again. “But …?”

  The old man did not evade the question nor did he answer it satisfactorily. “But I never really warmed to her. Mind, she had a very bad time with that mother of hers, so it’s not surprising that she was so … reserved.”

  “What did you talk about, when she was here?”

  “We didn’t talk, not really. She had work to do, but apart from that our conversation was strictly about practicalities—what I wanted, needed and so on.”

  “Did she have any close friends, do you know?”

  “Not to my knowledge. She led a very circumscribed life, you know. Whenever she wasn’t working she was dancing attendance on her mother. I shouldn’t think she’d ever been further away from Nettleton than Sturrenden in her whole life.”

  Thanet was being distracted and he knew it. But he didn’t want to alienate Mr Pitman. An old man like this, with a lively, enquiring mind and considerable local knowledge might be a valuable ally. There were already questions crowding into Thanet’s mind, but he wasn’t ready to ask them yet. He wasn’t certain that they were the right ones. Those, he knew, would emerge as the case progressed and then he would enlist Mr Pitman’s help openly. He was sure that the old man would be delighted to cooperate. There was just one point, though …

  “Was she honest?” he said, suddenly.

  Mr Pitman looked startled. “Did she steal, you mean? Not to my knowledge. If she did, I’ve never heard a whisper of it.”

  There was something about that reply that was interestingly off-key, but Thanet decided not to query it. He rose. “Well I think that’s all for the moment, Mr Pitman. May I come and see you again, if I think of anything else I want to ask you?”

  The old man grinned. “I didn’t think you’d need my permission. But in any case, I’d be delighted. I’ll be keeping my eye on you all, of course.”

  Now it was Thanet’s turn to look startled.

  Mr Pitman nodded at the wall behind Thanet. On it there was a large convex mirror which reflected the road outside. Thanet half squa
tted until his head was on a level with Mr Pitman’s and alongside it, then looked at the mirror. The area which it reflected was surprisingly extensive, stretching from the new vicarage gate on the left to well past the entrance to Church Lane on the right. As Thanet looked, a familiar figure, slightly distorted by the curvature of the mirror but readily recognisable, emerged from the front gate of number five and started to walk down the lane towards the road: Lineham, his interview with Miss Cox over.

  “So I see,” Thanet said, straightening up.

  A pity, he thought as he took his leave, that it had been dark last night when Carrie left the Pitmans’ house. Mr Pitman would not only have seen where she had gone, he might even have seen the murderer.

  4

  The exterior of the Plough and Harrow in Nettleton was unprepossessing, its car park almost empty.

  “Just our luck,” said Thanet to Lineham. “The food’ll be terrible, the beer unspeakable, by the look of it. Still, at least it should be quiet.” He pushed open the door and they went in.

  The two men had left their cars parked in front of the church and had walked down to the pub, which was at the other end of Nettleton on the main Sturrenden to Maidstone road. Thanet had enjoyed the short stroll. The temperature had risen several degrees and the sun was doing its best to break through the dense bank of cloud which earlier had so depressed him. His mood had lightened considerably now that he had something on which to focus his energies.

  On the way he had filled Lineham in on the interviews with the Pitmans. Now he was eager to hear how Lineham had got on.

  They bought pints of beer and the soggy tomato sandwiches which were all that the pub had to offer in the way of sustenance and settled themselves in a corner of the bar. The only other two customers were a middle-aged executive type in a dark blue suit, striped shirt and floral tie, and a pretty girl of about twenty. One thing about a place like this, Thanet thought—if you wanted to conduct a clandestine love affair, there wasn’t much danger of being spotted.