The Crow Trap

by Ann Cleeves

  “If you wait a few minutes I’ll give you a lift.”

  “That’ll be all right.” The crem was giving her the creeps and already she could feel one of Rachael’s lectures coming on.

  She had started walking along the wide pavement towards the town centre when Godfrey’s car pulled up behind her. She presumed he’d got rid of his wife -perhaps she’d come in her own car and was about to climb into the front passenger seat when she saw that Barbara Waugh was already there. It gave her the fright of her life.

  “Mrs. Preece, hello,” Barbara said through the open window. “Can we give you a lift into town?” Then

  “Barbara Waugh, perhaps you don’t remember. We met at the opening of the Wildlife Trust Reserve.”

  “Oh yes,” Anne said. “Of course.”

  Godfrey stared straight ahead over the steering wheel. It had obviously been Barbara’s idea to stop. She hadn’t told her husband about the cosy lunch at Alderwhinney and wanted to make sure that Anne didn’t mention it either if they bumped into each other at the White Hart. That suited Anne very well. The impulsive gesture to phone Barbara already seemed childish and vindictive. She preferred Godfrey not to know about it.

  “Are you going to the hotel, Mrs. Preece?” Barbara asked as Anne climbed into the rear of the car. “I gather Mr. Furness has invited everyone.”

  “No, I didn’t know Bella very well. I only came to the funeral to give Rachael support. She’s been so upset.”

  “Can I take you to Langholme then? I’ve got my own car in town and it’s not far out of my way. I’m going straight back.” “I thought I’d spend some time in Kimmerston. Since the project started I’ve not had much chance … “

  Barbara seemed disappointed and Anne was worried for a moment that she might suggest a girls’ lunch out, a trip round the shops. Instead she said quickly, “Of course, I quite understand.”

  Godfrey dropped Barbara off first at the car park next to the Sports Centre.

  “I’ll get out here,” Anne said. “It’s not far.”

  But Barbara wouldn’t have it and insisted that Godfrey should take her to where she wanted to go. So she went with him to the car park in the courtyard behind the White Hart. When he went into the hotel to make, as he put it, ‘ least an appearance’, she sauntered across the road and down an alley to a coffee shop. She drank a cappuccino and read an old copy of Cosmo until he came to pick her up.

  He took her for lunch to a town in the south of the county, where once there were shipyards and coal mines. This was a place where they could be sure of avoiding people who might know them. It was also a place where Godfrey seemed at home. For Anne it was like straying into a foreign country. The boarded-up shops, the litter in the street, the bare-legged women pushing mucky babies in prams, all this seemed a million miles from Lily Fulwell and Holme Park and gave her a peculiar thrill.

  Yet even here, Godfrey had found somewhere special to eat. There was a gem of a restaurant, very small and discreet, in a terrace between an old-fashioned park and the jetty where a ferry docked. The ferry carried shoppers back to a small community on the other side of the estuary. Once the terrace had housed the harbour master’s offices and the small dining room, simply furnished, the walls decorated with photographs of submarines and master mariners, had the feel of the officers’ mess. Now, at two o’clock, it was empty.

  The owner recognized them at once and took them to their favourite table.

  “A drink?” he asked. “The usual? Are you in a hurry today?”

  Sometimes they were in a hurry. It was an hour from Kimmerston and Godfrey had meetings.

  “No,” Godfrey said. “We’ve got all afternoon.”

  So he brought them drinks, a menu and went back to his seat behind the bar and his book. He was reading The Brothers Karamazov. He only looked up to call over, “The chefs on good form today. You’re safe with any of the specials.”

  The chef could be moody. He was an alcoholic, usually reformed, given to sudden rages. They smiled.

  “I’m sorry about earlier,” Godfrey said. “Barbara insisted.”

  “That’s all right.”

  “She’d have been suspicious if I’d refused to stop.”

  “She doesn’t suspect anything, does she?” It was one explanation Anne thought for Barbara’s original invitation at the Wildlife Trust Reserve. Perhaps she’d wanted a closer look at the opposition.

  “No, of course not.”

  “What was it like there, the … ” She wasn’t quite sure what to call it. Reception sounded like a wedding and wake was far too jolly for a finger buffet at the White Hart. “The do.”

  “All right, I suppose. I didn’t stay long.”

  “How was Neville bearing up?” Some of Barbara’s hostility must have rubbed off because what she had intended as a simple question came out with an undercurrent of sarcasm. He seemed not to notice.

  “Bella Furness was his stepmother not his mother. I don’t think they were particularly close. You wouldn’t expect him to be upset.” “No,” she said. “I’m not surprised. He always seemed a cold fish.”

  “I didn’t mean he didn’t care. He put on a decent enough show for her.”

  “Will it make any difference to your plans for the quarry? Neville being in charge of the Black Law land?”

  “Why should it?”

  “It’d make access a heck of a lot easier if he gives you permission to use the track.”

  He studied the menu intently, frowning. For a moment she thought he wouldn’t respond at all. “I’m not sure it’s altogether ethical, our discussing the quarry.” He adopted a joking tone but he was warning her off. She could understand why Barbara had felt excluded.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I could be influencing your results.” “Oh yeah!” she said. “Right. We’ve been having an affair for nearly a year, but a chat about Neville Furness is much more likely to influence my judgement than that. Come off it.”

  “We have to be careful. Because of that.”

  “I know!” She was indignant that he felt he had to say it. Then something about his voice, something about the way he looked down at the menu just as she was about to meet his eyes made her ask: “Why? Has anyone said anything?”

  “No.”

  “But you think someone might have guessed?”

  He shrugged.

  “I’ve a right to know, don’t you think?”

  “That first time we went to the Riverside. When we came out together I thought I recognized the car on the other side of the road. We might have been seen. That’s all.”

  “Who by? Whose car was it?”

  “Neville Furness.”

  “Oh!” she cried. “Bloody great!” Then she thought that Barbara’s notion that Neville was putting pressure on Godfrey to go ahead with the quarry against his better judgement, might not be so wide of the mark. Godfrey would go along with a lot not to have his wife and child upset.

  “Has Neville said anything?” she demanded.

  “No.”

  “Not even indirectly? He could make a fortune out of the scheme.”

  “Not even indirectly.” He sounded irritated. She had never known him so cross with her.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “What’s the matter?”

  “I have enough of that sort of talk at home.”

  “What sort of talk?”

  “Barbara thinks that Neville has too much influence over me. She’s never been happy about the quarry proposal. Since we’ve started to flesh out the details she’s become obsessed.”

  “Perhaps she’s right!”

  “No, you don’t understand. Neville’s not like that.” He handed her a menu. “Look, we should order. Rod will wonder what’s going on.”

  Although Rod still seemed engrossed in Dostoevsky.

  “What about this? Mullet baked with shallots and new potatoes.”

  “Yes,” she said. “Anything.”

  They sat in silence until the fo
od had arrived and they’d begun to eat.

  “Tell me then,” she said at last. “If Neville Furness isn’t into blackmail, what is he like?”

  “An ordinary, decent bloke. A bit lonely. A bit shy.” He smiled. She could tell he was trying to please her. “He could do with a good woman. If he was the monster Barbara makes him out to be, do you think I’d have taken him on?”

  “You might if you thought he’d be useful.” “No,” he said quietly. “Of course I want the business to grow. It’s how I measure what I’ve been doing, my achievement. But not at any price.”

  “Why did he leave Holme Park?”

  “I don’t know. I mean, not exactly. I can tell you how it happened if you’re interested?”

  “Yes,” she said defiantly. “I am interested if that’s OK with you.”

  “I had some preliminary meetings with Robert and Olivia Fulwell about the quarry. The approach came from them. At least I think probably from her. Furness was in on some of the discussions. I was impressed.

  I also had the feeling that he wasn’t happy. The relationship between him and Mrs. Fulwell was … strained. I offered him a job. He accepted.”

  “What did Lily Fulwell make of that?” His calm explanation reassured her. She was starting to relax, to enjoy the idea of Godfrey poaching Neville from Lily.

  “I don’t know. It was none of my business.”

  An idea occurred to her. “Do you think they’d been having an affair?”

  “Like I said. None of my business.” Unusually he poured himself a second glass of wine. He looked tired. She pushed away her plate, still littered with fish bones, twigs of thyme, and reached across the table, a repeat of the gesture which had first brought them together.

  “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have questioned your judgement.”

  He seemed about to say something but lost his nerve at the last minute.

  They spent all afternoon in the restaurant, finishing the wine then several cups of coffee. In the end Rod took their money and asked them to see themselves out. He’d long ago put up the closed signs and locked the door. Anne had the feeling again that Godfrey was building up to some confidence, but it wasn’t until they were out on the street that he seemed prepared to speak.

  They’d wandered into the town centre, towards the secure car park which they always used. Anne, waiting for him to spit out whatever was bothering him, saw her reflection in the window of a shop selling cut price shoes. She looked so wretchedly old that she thought: he wants to get rid of me, that’s what he wanted to say. That’s why he picked that fight. At just that moment he started to speak.

  “It’s Barbara.”

  “What about her?” Anxiety made her aggressive, shrill.

  “I’m not sure I can stay with her. Not indefinitely.”

  “What are you saying?”

  He stopped in the middle of the pavement. All around them were jostling women, kids on their way home from school. The stream of people eddied round them, took no notice. They were used to couples making a scene in the street.

  “I’m asking what you feel about that.”

  “I didn’t mean to come between you. That wasn’t my intention.”

  “No. It’s nothing to do with you. It’s Barbara. You don’t know how much I owe her … “

  “If you hadn’t married her you’d still be a craftsman, chiselling stone?”

  “It’s not just that.” He became impatient because he’d lost his drift.

  He raised his voice but still the crowds moved on, unheeding. “What I mean is that being grateful isn’t enough. What I mean is, I’d rather be with you. Not yet. When Felicity is a bit older. More independent. When this business with the quarry is settled. I need to know how you feel about that.”

  It was only then that she realized he wasn’t giving her the push.

  “You mean openly, publicly?”

  “Marriage, if you want it.”

  The next morning when he left her at the end of the lane to walk down to Baikie’s, she felt about fifteen again. She’d not slept. Godfrey had fallen asleep quite suddenly in the early hours and she’d lain awake listening to his quiet breathing. It was the first time they’d spent the night together. But still she felt she had the energy to work all day. And that she’d do anything Godfrey Waugh asked her to.

  Chapter Eighteen.

  If it hadn’t been for occasional trips out to meet Godfrey, that week after the funeral would have driven her demented. Being trapped in Baikie’s with the two other women was worse than being back at school.

  She even considered moving back home despite the long drive to the survey area, but Jeremy had returned from London and seemed installed in the Priory for a long stay. He seemed chastened. Perhaps one of his love affairs had gone sour, or perhaps it was one of his business ventures, but he was in little boy mode, in need of comfort, and she didn’t have the patience for it. Not now.

  Rachael she could have handled. Even though Rachael was a frustrated bitch, uptight and heartless, at least she was sane. But ever since she’d come across Grace staring at the estate workers’ cottages at Holme Park, Anne had realized that she was as mad as a snake. Anne wasn’t given to whimsical fancies, but being woken at night by the rustling of Grace’s night clothes, the padding of her feet on the bare floor, made her seriously worried. She wouldn’t have put it past Grace to lose it altogether, and if someone was going to wake up with Grace’s penknife through her ribs, she didn’t intend it to be her.

  So she told Rachael in the pub that she was going to move into the box room It might not have a lock, but at least she could wedge a chair under the door and she wouldn’t have to put up with Grace’s midnight wanderings. The pub had been Rachael’s idea. She’d been on management courses. She probably saw it as a team-building exercise. But as Grace spent all evening in the public phone box in the street outside and Anne used the opportunity to tell Rachael what she thought of Grace, it was a bit of a failure.

  “Have you seen her records?” Anne demanded. She’d had a lot to drink in a short space of time, though she could tell Rachael disapproved.

  She needed it.

  “Not yet. Not in detail.”

  “We’re talking fantasy here. I mean real fairy-tale time. The other day I saw her miles outside the survey area. Miles from the nearest river if it comes to that. Where did you get her from anyway?”

  Rachael muttered something about it being Peter’s decision. Anne thought Rachael wasn’t really management material despite the courses and the degrees.

  The next day she felt she needed cheering up. The vegetation classification had been going well. The quad rats in the peat bog had proved interesting. There was nothing so special that the development of the quarry would be threatened, but she’d enjoyed the variety of species there. She had a hangover and could afford to take time off.

  The last time she’d seen Godfrey, he’d presented her with a mobile phone, so they could keep in touch. She hadn’t told the others and when they were around she kept it switched off. There was no real reason for the secrecy she could have said she’d bought it herself but she knew what would happen. Rachael would consider it communal property and suggest that whoever was going furthest into the hills should borrow it as a safety measure. If Anne objected she’d be made out to be a heartless monster. Well, bugger that, she thought. If Peter Kemp wasn’t such a tight bastard he’d have provided mobiles for them all. Another reason for wanting a room of her own was so that she could charge it up without anyone else seeing.

  That morning Rachael drove into Kimmerston for a meeting with Peter and the developers. Grace, more together than she’d been for days, actually had breakfast with them and volunteered the information that she’d be out all day. As soon as they’d left Anne called Godfrey on her mobile.

  “Can you come out to play?”

  “I don’t know … “

  “You weren’t planning to be at the meeting with Kemp Associates, were you?”

>   “I hadn’t realized there was a meeting. Neville must have fixed it.”

  “If Neville’s as good a bloke as you say, get him to drag it out. Keep Rachael out of the way and give us longer.”

  “I can’t involve him.” “Why not? If he knows already.” She paused. “Have you got a pen?”

  “Of course.”

  “Write down this shopping list. You can call at Tesco’s on your way over.”

  “You’re expecting me to come over to Black Law?”

  “Why not? They’re both out.”

  “Well … ” he said. “Someone might see.”

  “So what? You’re entitled from time to time to look at the development site.”

  “I want to see you.”

  “Then come.”

  When he arrived he was laden with carrier bags like a suburban husband.

  He seemed quite comfortable with the role. She thought he must have been shopping for Barbara. Like a suburban housewife she unpacked the groceries. He held out a polystyrene tray of chicken pieces wrapped in cling film

  “Shouldn’t these go in the oven now, if we’re going to eat them at lunchtime?”

  “Are you joking? I’ll do them later. I’m not wasting time cooking when I’ve got you to myself.”

  It was a grey and misty day and she’d lit a fire. They had a picnic in front of it. She’d ordered salad, bread, a lump of Stilton, olives, chocolate.

  “All the things,” she said, “I love most in the world.”

  And me?” “You?” she said. “Oh, I don’t think I could fall for anyone who fishes for compliments like that!” But she pushed the tub of olives out of the way and pulled him down beside her instead.

  They were at the undignified stage of events. His trousers undone but not fully off, her bra undipped but dangling from one shoulder, when Grace arrived. They heard the kitchen door open then shut and they froze. Godfrey started scrabbling for his clothes then, but it was too late. She came straight in and saw them. She stood in the doorway staring, her eyes blank, not quite focused, as if she were thinking of something else altogether.

  She didn’t say anything. Not even “Sorry for disturbing you1 which Anne thought was a bit of a cheek. She just turned round and went out.