“You managed to find your way to Nepal, Beryl,” Edwina said.
“You assume a bit there, my friend. I found Nepal but I had been looking for Burma.” Beryl gave her friend what she hoped was a winning smile and donned a hat of her own.
“I thought you had a faultless sense of direction,” Edwina said. “The newspapers are always going on about it.”
“What I have is a faultless sense of adventure and an enormous talent for making the best of things.” Beryl draped a coat over Edwina’s shoulders and propelled her towards the door. “Both of which I am attempting to share with you. Now lead on.”
* * *
Sticking to the road would only make sense if they had taken the motorcar. As it was still out of commission Beryl had assured Edwina that she was delighted to see a bit of the countryside whilst they were at it. At the outset she insisted too much ease would make her stout if she didn’t have a care and take some exercise. Crumpet naturally supported the notion of a good romp, and before long the three of them were clambering over a stile at the back of the property rented by Norman Davies.
“Are you quite sure this is the best way to go?” Beryl asked. She may have been known as an intrepid adventurer but she was not showing signs of it as the smell of the field dressing reached her nose. “You don’t mean to walk across this muck, do you?” She looked down at the recently amended field with a scowl on her face.
“You said you wanted to experience life in a quiet backwater. Well, this is what it is like,” Edwina called over her shoulder. “A bit of manure never hurt anyone.”
“I don’t believe my shoes would agree with you.”
“What happened to your spirit of adventure?” Edwina asked.
“One of the keys to success when on expedition is to make sure to be kitted out in the appropriate gear. When you said we’d be cutting through a fallow field I had imagined stubble from a hay crop. Besides, I have rather a thing about shoes.”
“I think this may be a wonderful time for you to show me how you make the best of situations,” Edwina said, watching Beryl shake her shoe.
“If Polly doesn’t have a car of her own it might explain why she never showed up for work today,” Beryl said. “I’d be more than a little tempted to miss it if I knew I’d have to cross all this just to get started.”
“I do wonder if she knew the field was going to be dressed when she suggested starting today.”
“How much farther is it to Polly’s parents’ house?” Beryl asked. “It’s starting to get a bit dark.” Above their heads a flock of small birds wheeled and landed with ease in the uppermost branches of a tall tree.
“Three quarters of a mile, at least.”
“Should we head back?” Beryl asked. “It is cocktail hour after all and I’m sure you’ll be wanting one of your cups of tea. If we turn back now I might still be able to salvage these shoes.”
“We’d be better off continuing on towards the Wallingford Estate. There is a road that runs back into the village from there. We could walk back on that instead of through the field.” Beryl nodded and thus bolstered picked up the pace. Wallingford Hall stood on a bit of a rise visible a way off in the distance. Small cottages, empty save for one or two, dotted the edges of the rolling fields. As the gloaming enveloped them light winked on in the nearest cottage.
“Someone must live there,” Beryl said, pointing to the flashing lights.
“Norman Davies rents that one.”
“The sprouts and parsnips we had for luncheon must have been grown right round here,” Beryl said. “I wonder if we’ll see them.”
“This is a fallow field. There are no crops planted here. That’s why it’s had the manure put down. He’s preparing it for next year.”
“What’s that then?” Beryl asked, pointing at a fluttering bit of material waving in the breeze. “Does the farmer mark things off in some way?” She took a step towards whatever it was, her concern for her shoes forgotten for the moment.
“No. Not to my knowledge.” A vague snatch of memory tugged at Edwina’s mind as she thought the fabric seemed familiar, even in the low light. She felt her gait quicken even without the conscious decision to hurry. Surely the fabric was something unusual. They crossed the hundred yards or so at a swift pace and drew up sharply.
There was no doubt about what they were seeing. Polly Watkins lay on her side not a mile from her home, facedown in the field. Edwina recognized her clothing from the evening before. Wetness from the soil had seeped into her frock and Edwina ridiculously thought how well it would match Beryl’s shoes. She must be suffering from shock to think such silly things. She wondered if Polly had slipped and become disoriented in the dark. Could she have died of exposure in the night? Her hair had, by and large, fallen from the cheap comb holding it in place. Edwina felt it made the girl look even more vulnerable somehow. She bent to turn her over, to raise her face from the muck, when she felt Beryl’s hand restrain her.
“You mustn’t touch a thing. We need to call for the police.”
“Yes, of course. It doesn’t seem right to leave her here though.”
“You’re absolutely right. I’ll stay,” Beryl said. “After all, you know your way round and I don’t. Go telephone the authorities immediately. Take the dog with you. He’ll only get into mischief here.” Edwina nodded and then surprised herself by breaking into a run. She hadn’t run in years. The soft muck of the field pulled at her feet with each step, hampering her efforts but not her determination. She was drawn for a fleeting moment to the lights in Norman Davies’ cottage before chiding herself. He would not have a telephone. The caretaker at Wallingford Hall would be in and would let her use the one there. If it was still in service. She clutched her skirts in one hand and ran even faster.
Chapter 13
Beryl watched Ed disappear into the twilight. It was not the first time she had been alone to watch over a dead body. It was however the first time she wondered if the person whose vigil she kept had been murdered. Her heart hammered about in her chest. Not because she worried about coming under attack herself but because she suddenly wondered if Edwina would make it safely to call for help. Hadn’t someone made an attempt on her life only days before? She told herself Edwina was far more capable than she looked. Besides, Crumpet was with her, and although he wasn’t very large, Beryl had no doubt of his devotion to his mistress. She dug her hands down into her pockets to warm them and awaited her friend’s return.
After a moment, despite her admonishment to Edwina, she couldn’t resist confirming her worst fear. She pulled a small flashlight from her pocket. A torch Ed would be sure to call it, and flicked it on. She swept a bright, focused beam around Polly’s body and then, before she could talk herself out of it, she bent down took a closer look at Polly’s neck. No purple discoloration like the bruises on Ed’s throat ringed the dead girl’s neck.
Beryl found herself a bit light-headed. Not that she’d admit as much to anyone. To think something like this could have snuffed out her friend’s life while she was pottering about in the guest room at Ed’s house. But what did kill the poor girl? She held the beam of light steady and looked again. The hair on the side of Polly’s head looked darker than the rest of it. It was matted, too. Beryl was sure it was not mud or muck she was seeing. She had seen enough bloody wounds to know the difference.
She straightened and looked out across the increasingly dark pastureland. It seemed an eternity before she spotted a play of lights making their way back across the field towards her. She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. She waved her own flashlight about in wide, sweeping semi-circles to point the way. As they approached she made out two figures. The newcomer was taller than Ed and appeared to be a man. Crumpet had placed himself between Ed and her companion. Ed’s face looked pinched. The shock seemed to have worn off a bit but sadness and that look of resignation everyone wore like a uniform over the past several years had taken its place. Beryl desperately wished she had
not insisted they venture out to confront Polly. Or that she had not hired her back in the first place.
“This is Douglas Gibbs, the caretaker at Wallingford Hall. Thankfully he was in when I rang the bell.”
“We’ve telephoned to the pub and asked for someone to locate my wife.”
“Mr. Gibbs is married to Doris Gibbs, the village constable.” Beryl heard a subtle change in Ed’s tone that suggested she should keep what Ed had shared about her misgivings concerning the local bobby to herself. “A call to the pub is the fastest way to reach her. Not that she spends her time in there,” Ed hastily added.
“Folks will run out and scour the streets until they find her. We never have things like this happen in Walmsley Parva. Polly will be sorry she missed the excitement,” Mr. Gibbs said. He didn’t seem to realize the irony of his words.
“Do you expect it will be long?” Beryl asked. “For her to get here, I mean?”
“I shouldn’t expect so. Someone will have a motorcar and will drive the constable over to the big house.”
“Should someone tell her parents?” Beryl asked.
“I think we should wait until my wife takes a look at her. She’s a stickler for procedures is my Doris.”
“They must be worried sick. I am certain she has lain here since sometime last night or the early hours of the morning,” Beryl said.
“She was wearing that same outfit when we saw her go into the cinema last night,” Edwina said. “Did you notice if she was with anyone then?”
“I heard someone call her name from the opposite side of the road. You did too, I thought.”
“I heard it too but Polly didn’t seem very interested in their company, did she? After all, she didn’t call him or her over or even wave. She just hurried round the side of the building without a word.” Both Beryl and Edwina cast a glance towards the small cottage with the warm glowing lights shining from the inside.
“Are you certain that is Norman Davies’ cottage?” Beryl asked, dropping her voice to keep Mr. Gibbs from overhearing her.
“I’m afraid it is. You don’t think he had something to do with this, do you?” Edwina asked.
“I’ve never met him so I am sure I can’t say anything about his propensity for violence. I do know he was late getting those sprouts and parsnips dug, supposedly because, according to his uncle the butcher, he was having a lie-in.”
“Do you think he was out here with Polly instead of home in bed where a good farmer would be?”
“His uncle mentioned he was distraught about the fact that she threw him over and was doing whatever he could to convince her to take him back. Do you think he might have reacted poorly if it became clear to him she wasn’t about to change her mind?” Beryl stole another glance at the nearby cottage. She thought she saw a curtain twitch in the window.
“I would have said I couldn’t imagine such a thing until this week. But then I wouldn’t have believed anyone who suggested someone would attempt to strangle me in my own garden either. At this point, I’m sure of nothing.”
* * *
The moon had risen in the clear sky and revealed that the road was not as far from the field as Beryl had assumed. In fact, it was quite near to where the body was found. She and Ed had entered the pasture at a spot well away from the road but she realized they must have been traveling in a diagonal and had cut a long way off the journey. Still, it was easy to see the lights of an automobile arriving as it hurtled up the road and ground to a screeching halt when Mr. Gibbs waved his flashlight wildly.
Two figures got out of the car and Beryl heard the muffled sound of the doors shutting. The light had almost entirely faded from the sky and the chill of the night air seeped into her body. She wished she had dressed more warmly. Beryl cast a glance down at Polly’s body once more and wondered at the way the girl had been dressed. Surely she could not have been planning to be out on her own in the dark without at least some sort of a wrap?
“So what have you found, Douglas?” A slim woman dressed in a dark jacket and matching long skirt addressed Mr. Gibbs. Her hat declared her to be a police constable even if her no-nonsense tone had somehow been unnoticed.
“It tweren’t me, Doris. It were these two that found her.” Mr. Gibbs flashed his light first on Beryl then on Edwina. “They can tell you more.”
“You must be our famous visitor. The one causing all the chatter down at the pub and in the post office,” Constable Gibbs said to Beryl. She turned to Edwina. “An attention seeker like her, I can imagine being involved in a thing like this. I should have thought you’d not be inclined to attract such notice.”
“I hardly think it deliberate that we stumbled across a body out in a field while taking a walk,” Edwina said.
“Where were you walking to?” Constable Gibbs asked.
“We were heading to see Polly, as it happens,” Edwina said.
“Sounds to me like you were asking for involvement after all.” Constable Gibbs turned her flashlight on the body. “So what have we got then? Douglas, train your torch right here.” She bent over the corpse and with an effort rolled Polly’s body onto her back. Beryl heard Ed gasp at the sight of Polly’s mud-streaked face. The girl’s eyes were half opened and the clear blue color of them against her dirty face made a grotesque contrast.
Constable Gibbs passed her flashlight over Polly’s head then held it steady over the matted patch of hair Beryl had noticed. “Looks like she struck her head and knocked herself out. Dressed as she was she could have died of exposure even if there was no complicating injury inside her skull. Although Lord only knows what could have happened in there.”
“Struck her head? On what?” Edwina asked. All four of them swept the area immediately around Polly’s body for something that explained the injury. Mr. Gibbs stood and held his flashlight steady.
“What about that?” he asked. Constable Gibbs picked up a large stone the size of a baseball with her gloved hands. It lay just beside the body.
“I’d say that would explain it. She walked through here in the dark. Drunk as a lord, likely as not. She stumbled and fell. She struck her head and that was the end of that.” Beryl heard a small hiss escape from her friend’s lips. Edwina swept her light around them slowly then back again even more slowly.
“Have you noticed, Constable, that this is the only rock anywhere in this part of the field?” She turned the beam on the constable’s face. “Are you not the least bit surprised that she should have the enormously bad fortune to happen to fall in the one place where she would deal herself a death blow?”
“You aren’t trying to make this out to be something more than it is, are you?” Constable Gibbs asked. “You have a too much of a taste for the dramatic to suit me.”
“It wasn’t my intention to suit you. It was to once again point out that there might be more going on here than can be easily dismissed.”
“Why was it you were going to see Polly?” Constable Gibbs fixed a gimlet eye upon Edwina and crossed her arms over her chest.
“She was engaged to begin working as a daily at the Beeches. She didn’t arrive as agreed this morning and Miss Helliwell and I decided to walk over to her parents’ house to ask her why she had not shown. Now we know why,” Edwina said.
“Were you angry at her for not keeping her word?” Constable Gibbs asked.
“I was rather put out as it happened and did not want Polly taking it into her head to believe she could be so lax with her schedule if she wished to remain in my employ,” Edwina said. “But I wouldn’t go so far as to say I was angry.”
“I told Ed we should have it out with her and should be sure the girl really wanted the job,” Beryl said.
“So you planned to confront her? You wanted to engage in an argument with Polly?” Constable Gibbs asked.
“It wasn’t quite like that. We weren’t spoiling for a fight, if that is what you are implying,” Beryl said. “Besides, it was all my idea and all my fault that we came out to speak with her. Ed w
as simply showing me the way to Polly’s house.”
“While I am certain neither my friend nor I killed this poor girl, I am equally certain it seems very peculiar that she would hit her head on the only rock in the field.”
“You know as well as anyone that strange and unfortunate things happen all the time. I’ll take a closer look once we’ve gotten her body inside and under better light. But don’t go saying there is anything more going on here than an accident unless you hear me say so. I don’t want another incident on our hands like that one with the missing Land Girl.”
“Constable, there is something you should take into consideration when you are trying to decide what happened here,” Beryl said. “Two nights ago someone attempted to strangle Ed with her own scarf in the garden of the Beeches.”
Constable Gibbs stood and flashed her light into Edwina’s eyes. “Why didn’t you alert me when it happened?” she asked.
“I didn’t want you to tell me I was being melodramatic about the entire ugly scene. Besides, I ran whoever it was off myself and have had no sign of trouble since.”
“Until this,” Beryl said, shaking her head at Polly’s prone form.
“I wouldn’t go assuming the two incidents had anything to do with one another. As I already said, it’s more than likely the young woman tripped and the entire thing was an accident,” Constable Gibbs said. “You’ve done your duty by calling for me so promptly. I thank you and suggest you leave the rest of this to those who really are in charge. Douglas and I will take it from here. After all, you no longer work on the Wallingford Estate and I expect you are rather cold. Clarence Mumford drove me over. I’m sure he’d be willing to drive you both home.” Constable Gibbs turned away.
“I hope she plans to do a more thorough job this time than she did with the search for Agnes,” Edwina said quietly to Beryl.
“Look,” Beryl said, pointing to Norman’s cottage. A tall figure stood silhouetted in the open doorway. “Someone seems curious about what is going on over here.”
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