Next morning it was clear that Windsor had caught it badly, and Maid of Honour Row looked as if a bomb had dropped on it. My windows were out and my roof was damaged. When I looked up through my cracked bedroom ceiling, I could see the sky.
I was insured but it would take time. The builder called to assess the damage and was not optimistic. ‘ Going to take a while,’ he said. ‘Half Windsor is calling on me to put the roof back on.’
He was a small wiry man wearing dark spectacles and carrying a notebook in which he made little scribbles and diagrams as he went around the house.
‘Not the Queen, I suppose?’
‘No, not her,’ he replied seriously. ‘She’s all right up there on the hill, built strong the castle is. Besides, she’s got other places to go, hasn’t she? No, you’ll have to take your turn. I can rig a tarpaulin up to keep the water out.’ It had already started to rain. ‘But you’ll have to wait. I’ve got mothers and babies and little old ladies on my list and they must come first.’
I thought about offering a bribe but decided that was not my style, and it may not have been what he was hoping for.
As he left, he said: ‘ You’ve got a bit of subsidence too, by the look of it. Better get that done at the same time.’
I could see that once in, he was going to be with me for weeks. Possibly months. He had come highly recommended as an honest man, but I decided I would get both an estimate of the cost and a survey. We were clearly in for a long relationship and it had better be a good one.
He confirmed this thought with his next words: ‘Take my advice, go and stay with a friend and let me get on with it nice and easy, and I won’t worry you.’
I walked round the corner to see my friends, the neighbourhood witches, Winifred and Birdie, to find out how they had fared, and discovered without surprise they had escaped all damage.
Entirely due, said Birdie, to having foreseen the storm coming and having had the right protective spells to cast around their house.
‘I wish you had done the same for me, then.’
Birdie shook her head. ‘You must have faith, and that’s not in you, dear.’
It was true that my life and career had not encouraged in me faith in much except dogged hard work.
‘So what will you do, Charmian?’ asked her companion witch, Winifred Eagle. ‘Come to us if you like, we’d love to have you.’
‘No. Thanks, but I shall go out to the house in Brideswell.’ True, the unknown telephone caller had advised against it, but I had made up my mind without conscious thought.
‘Oh, you can’t live there by yourself, dear.’ This was Birdie. ‘Would you like to take the dog?’ We shared ownership of the dog, but he preferred them to me. She looked down at the dog, comfortably asleep by the fire, the storm had not stressed him either. ‘You’d like that, Ben, wouldn’t you?’ Ben wagged his tail without opening his eyes.
‘I won’t be on my own, or not all the time.’ I had the intention of sending Humphrey a message: if you want to see me, come out to Brideswell. If you want to stay in the country, stay there with me. In my house. You might call it an ultimatum. ‘I shall take the cat.’
I didn’t know what Humphrey would answer, but it would be unexpected, he usually managed to surprise me. Then I left a message for my assistant saying that I would be staying in the country, that I would be absent from my office today, but he could always get me on the telephone, he had my number.
I piled all the possessions I wanted with me, the books I was reading, the notes I was making for a book I was writing, country clothes, and some food, into my car; I put Muff in her basket and set out for Brideswell.
I was going to take possession of my property.
I was well on the road to Brideswell, with Muff keening by my side, before the thought came to me that the village too had been in the path of the storm with consequent damage to the houses there. I might be going to ruin worse than I had left behind.
Trees were down on either side of the lane which led to the village with branches thrown across the road, mute testimony to a wild night. But now the sky was blue and tranquil, the air calm.
I passed down the village street, seeing with relief that it looked unscathed. None of the houses had lost even a window whereas Windsor had looked bombed. There was the church, and the Red Dragon, all as normal, and there was my house.
A small bush had come from nowhere to rest on my garden wall, a laburnum tree that stood near the house was tilted at an angle, and a broken flowerpot lay on the patch of grass, but the house stood as it always had.
I unlocked the door, hurried to push the button that started the heating. I hauled in my cases and then gave Muff her freedom, offering her words of advice about watching the traffic and remembering the way back. But she showed no sign of wanting to rush outside. On the contrary, she leapt up to the top of the bookcase and looked at me with a sad and sombre face.
Snug within its thick stone walls, the house soon warmed up. I lit the fire in the hearth downstairs, the bottle of sherry still stood on the bookcase with a glass ready and waiting. I poured myself a drink, then stood by the fire enjoying the heat.
It was very quiet; I realized how little I had of silence in my life and how easy it was to enjoy it. Never before, in my working life, had I deliberately taken time off. But I was doing it now. I admitted to myself that I had wanted to come here to this house and that the storm had given me the chance.
Standing by the fire, I could see through the window to the street, catch a sight of the church and a good view of the Red Dragon. Only a few cars parked outside. Trade must be poor today.
The telephone did not ring, no one called, I did not exist. I felt weightless.
I ate my lunch sitting by the fire, reading. Muff stayed where she was. We ignored each other but I could tell by the occasional sharp twitch of her tail that she was not pleased with her move.
Then suddenly, she leapt down and disappeared through a half-open door. I ignored that too, I knew that all outer doors and windows were closed and she could not get lost.
Lured out by the sun, I walked through the village towards the church. A few people had now emerged with shopping baskets and dogs to walk; I could see customers in the shops. Life was picking up after the storm. I saw some faces I felt I would like to get to know, but no one spoke to me. I was studied though, an object of interest as the new owner of Mrs Armitage’s house.
On my right was the house where Crick Leicester and David Cremorne lived. I thought about ringing their door bell but decided against it. Today I wanted to be solitary.
I walked up to the church, undamaged by the winds. It was open now, and I entered to meet the usual smell of furniture polish and brass polish and flowers. Damp as well, and very cold.
The walls were lined with memorial plaques, most in honour of the Barons Cremorne. I walked slowly past, reading them where they were in English as my Latin was not up to translating the earlier inscriptions. They seemed to have got their start in the mid-eighteenth century, so there must have been an earlier owner of the manor and estate before them. Or they had married the heiress, and the estate had passed with the female line.
A prolific lot, I thought as I read, with sons and daughters in comfortable numbers.
Quite a few Drydens about too, I saw, and some buried in great style with splendid stone statuary. They were probably an older family than the Cremornes, and perhaps once had been considerable landowners, possibly even owning the manor itself. An estate as old as this one must have passed through the hands of many families.
I amused myself with the romantic Thomas Hardyish notion of a noble family now reduced to poverty.
Of course, the man I had seen on that other visit had not looked poor, nor spoken like a farm worker; he had been classless, hard to pin down.
I looked down the length of the church towards the altar. The figure that I had seen in the distance was moving down the aisle towards me, where it turned into Ellen Bean, whi
te witch.
She was carrying a duster and a tin of brass polish. She seemed as surprised to see me as I was to see her.
‘Hello, Mrs Bean. I didn’t expect to see you here.’
‘My week for cleaning the altar brass.’
That was something I hadn’t expected either. How did white witches feel about altars and crosses?
She picked up my thought. ‘It’s a very old church, Norman, Saxon, and before that there would have been a temple here. It’s very old and very sacred, this ground. You can feel it. Or if you’re sensitive, then you can. I feel it very strongly. Do you?’ I shook my head wordlessly. ‘Oh, well, not everyone can. Birdie said not to expect too much.’ Thank you, Birdie, I thought. Then she patted one of the pews as if it should have its share of her benediction. ‘Besides, whatever deity comes here, He’ – she paused, then added thoughtfully – ‘or She, will want it nice and shining. And that’s my job.’
A kind of housemaid to the gods, I thought.
‘And my Jack’s a churchwarden.’
‘So he is.’ I remembered seeing his name. Jack Bean and Ermine Sprott.
‘But I like doing it, I enjoy a nice bit of bright brass. It pays for the rubbing. Miss Garden does the flowers when she’s here, she’s more artistic than I am. But she’s away at the moment on tour so the vicar does them himself, and a poor hand at arranging them he is.’
‘Some old families here,’ I said, as we paced down the aisle towards the door, passing a Dryden memorial tablet. ‘Lots of Drydens and Beasleys.’
‘It’s a funny village,’ she said obliquely. ‘Bean and I aren’t local. Bean’s a Reading man but he’s quite a countryman at heart, goes rabbiting and has a dear little ferret; and I come from Oxford. I said a special prayer when we moved into the Midden.’
‘Did you think that necessary?’
‘Not necessary, just a precaution. But don’t you worry. You’ll be all right where you are, that house can look after itself.’
After this somewhat unnerving remark she gave me a kind of bob as if I was the Queen and sped off down a side aisle to the vestry.
I walked home, stopping only at the Post Office to get some stamps and then on to the baker’s to choose a loaf. I thought I’d seen the last of Ellen Bean for the day, but she was there outside the baker’s shop.
In my experience, witches tend to be tall and thin with an air of fly-away thinness, at least Winifred and Birdie were like that, but Ellen was short and muscular. But she possessed the same sharp observing eye that my two Windsor friends had, like a bird fixing on a likely worm, and I recognized the expression now. She bent her head to pick up the worm.
‘You’re looking for that girl?’
‘It’s not my case. Really nothing to do with me.’ Not exactly true, since Billy Damiani had tried to engage my interest. The village knew I was a high-ranking police officer but had no idea of how I worked and what my powers were. Damiani got closer to it, he knew I had power, but even he did not really know.
Because all information about major crimes came into my unit, my important-sounding title might have meant that I was no more than a super collater. Possibly this is what the powers that be had had in mind when they offered me the post. Perhaps they had it in mind to sideline an irritating and ambitious woman, but they had reckoned without me. I had now established my own small investigating unit: I could initiate an enquiry.
Billy Damiani knew this much, and was trying to use me. But I was using him: to establish the extension of my powers I needed a successful case. The missing Chloe might even provide it.
Ellen heard what I said but did not accept it. ‘Oh.’ A look of surprise crossed her face. ‘Being a woman, I thought it would be you.’
‘I don’t specialize in cases involving women.’
‘This will be …’ She spoke as if she was sure. ‘You won’t find her.’
‘I think she’ll turn up,’ I said cautiously. The loaf was still warm, they must bake on the premises, unusual these days. It smelt delicious, yeasty and wholesome. I was suddenly hungry. I felt like tearing off a corner and chewing it.
‘Not in one piece.’ Ellen Bean spoke with conviction. I didn’t answer, because I agreed with her.
All the same, she should not know about the finding of the clothes and the arm because the information had not been released. I had observed before from Birdie and Winifred that these white witches were always well informed – and it wasn’t telepathy in my opinion. Nor anything paranormal. I thought they ran a very good intelligence network. It might be worth tapping into Mrs Bean’s.
She took in my silence. ‘You’re not going to talk about it, I can see that. Birdie said you wouldn’t. Well, you know where to come if you want help. The village doesn’t like it, the girl disappeared from this very street you are standing on.’
Prompted by her words, I looked up and down. The street was empty.
‘Pity no one saw her go,’ I said.
‘Not many people out that night, big football match. The doctor or the vet might be on the road. You’ll see the vet as you’ve got a cat.’
So she knew that too? Birdie and Winifred had been busy. ‘She’s a very healthy cat,’ I said.
Ellen opened the shop door. ‘Accidents do happen. Must get my loaf.’
‘Wait a minute,’ I said. ‘As you know the village so well, tell me what the three Beasleys died of.’
She paused, one hand on the door, obviously considering what to say. ‘ Yes, very nasty, and they kept it very quiet,’ she said. ‘One of those infections, virus, went through them all and the doctors couldn’t help. Some people say it was poison,’ she said, her eyes bright. ‘But as I say it was kept quiet.’
‘But no one else caught it or died of it?’
She considered that too, and decided what to say. ‘No, and very glad we were too, it could have gone through the village, decimating us. But they’d been in a bad car accident before and the shock lowered them. An “ opportunistic infection”, the doctors called it. If it was an infection. They were specially nursed, barrier nursing, and all that, but it didn’t do any good. I could have told them it wouldn’t, got their name on it, that virus had.’ She pushed open the door of the shop.
But I didn’t let her get away. ‘And then Mrs Dryden died, she was twin sister to Mr Beasley. Did she die of the same thing?’
‘No, officially it was a road accident.’ She shrugged. ‘Supposing it was one of those purposeful accidents?’
‘Any reason for her to do that?’
‘Missed her brother, I suppose. Twins … it’s different for them, isn’t it?’
Her eyelids veiled her eyes as a bird’s do. Something she knew, and something she wouldn’t say. Well, it wasn’t my business. Nothing in the village except the house was my business. It was not my case.
I went back to my second home and put some more logs on the dying fire. No sign of Muff, usually a keen fire watcher.
‘Muff, Muff, where are you?’
She didn’t come at my voice as she usually did. I went round the house, calling her name. Upstairs in the bedroom I still had very little furniture, nothing she could hide in. There was my suitcase with a few clothes in it but I hadn’t even opened it. The camp bed was standing near the window. I could see a few cat hairs, so she had been there.
I stood by the window, taking in what I had. I would make this room beautiful, it was a room built for elegance. Nothing forced, elaborate or shiny, I decided, but simple country stuff. Antique, if I could afford it. My friend Annie Cooper would help me here. Annie had a very good eye for furniture and although rich herself never encouraged antique dealers to get above themselves. She could bargain with the best.
Shivering a little, I went back to the living-room fire. But I had to find Muff, there was no peace for me while she might be lost. I returned to the kitchen.
And there I saw a cupboard door was ajar. I opened it wide to reveal a broom cupboard, now empty except for the smell of polish
and damp. Yes, I had to admit there was a smell of damp.
Or was it mice?
It was a deep cupboard built into the wall, sloping slightly downwards. No sign of Muff though. But there was just a stirring of the air that suggested quiet movement.
I looked up, and there, on a high shelf, she was, bright eyed, tail lashing, with a mouse in her mouth. I couldn’t speak, ma’am, her eyes said, I’ve got my mouth full.
The mouse, fortunately, was dead.
Muff slid from the shelf, all limber liquid movement, and disappeared. I let her go. Cat owners know all about nature being red in tooth and claw. Muff, the placid, loving, gentle creature was only domestic as long as it suited her.
I closed the cupboard door, and decided to make some tea.
On the wall by the stove was a bracket where something long had hung leaving only its ghostly outline on the wall. Now the house was heating up, I could tell that this must have been a cosy corner in winter if you were an old lady who did not use the sitting room overmuch. A lovely if battered old rug still rested by the great old Aga which had mercifully been converted to burning gas when the central heating was put in.
Possibly Mrs Armitage had hung something she valued from the bracket. Or it might have held a pot plant. Although from all I had heard of Beatrice Armitage and seen of her garden, she had not been a pot plant admirer.
I made myself a pot of tea, and took it to drink by the fire which was now crackling with flames. Presently, Muff slid into the room to stretch out in the warmth. Neither of us mentioned the mouse.
I was a hunter myself, professionally, but I felt a lot of sympathy with that mouse just then, surrounded as I was by people I couldn’t trust.
I don’t like you, Billy Damiani, I thought, you use women, you are trying to use me. I wonder if you killed Chloe? I thought of those elegant, well-manicured hands with the heavy gold ring, squeezing the girl’s neck until she stopped breathing.
But no, he was too rich and too sophisticated to do it himself. He would hire a killer.
Whoever Has the Heart Page 4