The Nursery Rhyme Murders

by Anthony Litton

  ‘Indeed, very… edgy, I think the word is.’ she replied, casting an amused glance at her son, well aware that he was goading her. ‘Still, one must move with the times,’ she added, not having the slightest intention of doing so.

  ‘In with a chance?’ he asked, unable to resist asking.

  ‘Marcia seems to think so,’ his mother replied drily. ‘Personally, although I found the whole attempt repulsive, I’m more concerned with the fact that they had help, extensive help, from the contractors of the various items they bought.’

  ‘They said they’d done it all themselves!’ he said in surprise.

  ‘Indeed, that is what they said. My information is otherwise,’ she replied crisply. ‘Regardless of whatever marks they get from Marcia and the vicar, they will lose fifty marks automatically.’

  Desmond had earlier felt a fleeting sympathy for the beleaguered vicar as he imagined his convoluted attempts to maintain at least some dignity as he endeavoured to please both the two strong-willed ladies when they met up at the end of the visits and made their final decisions. It was, however, only fleeting, and he now wished heartily that he could eavesdrop on the up-coming conversation.

  Having been directed to their next destination, the penultimate one on their list, he noted with great relief, Desmond was intrigued. Abel Bulstead, a villager well into middle age, had suddenly gone to the far east and returned with an oriental bride, a lady he admitted later was twenty years his junior. Equally intriguingly, he’d insisted on entering two categories of the competition – the Innovative and the Traditional. A hurried read through the rules, made it clear that, although no one had ever done so before, there was nothing to stop him, so the judges were extremely curious as to what he’d come up with.

  ‘Oh! How lovely!’ murmured Eleanor as they entered the small garden through the open French windows. And indeed it was, thought her son. And it was blindingly obvious why Abel had entered it in the two categories. Obviously under the influence of his diminutive wife, who shyly acknowledged their welcomes, he had created an exquisite, and very traditional, Japanese garden. The couple radiated an air of quiet happiness in each other, despite the obvious disparity in their ages, which Desmond put nearer to thirty years rather than the twenty Abel would reluctantly admit to, and this had translated into the serenity of the lovely garden.

  The minimalist beauty of the true Japanese garden was brilliantly caught. Stands of bamboo, interspersed with other tall grasses, provided the backdrop to the rest of the space. Central was a beautiful ornamental pool, spanned by a tiny bridge constructed of wood and stone, while below, in the clear water, lazily swam a number of small carp, their indolent swimming causing scarcely a ripple on its tranquil surface. A small stream ran from the pond and meandered gracefully, via a series of small waterfalls, around an area of pure white gravel, raked into geometric shapes. This, unlike the harsh offerings in the Linklaters’ garden, fitted beautifully and enhanced the over-all theme of timeless harmony. Small, raised stepping stones giving access to the pond and the placing of moss-covered rocks throughout the garden completed the lovely picture.

  A beautiful creation and one Desmond knew, would deservedly score very highly in the final placings.

  ‘One more and your duty’s done, darling,’ Eleanor said, smiling tiredly as they left Beldon Magna to travel the short distance to its smaller neighbour

  ‘I’m fine, Mum,’ he assured her and he was. Although not as extremist in his views as Tessa, he’d viewed the idea of spending half a day looking at, what were to him, empty spaces, with little enthusiasm. As always, though, he’d enjoyed his mother’s company. He always had, and he’d never gone through either the teenage angst of being ashamed of his parents, or particularly felt the need to rebel; well, not frequently anyway, he mused occasionally. And when he had, he’d made damn sure they didn’t find out, well aware of their ability to mete out suitable chastisement. Both he and Gwilym still had vivid memories of one of the rare thrashings his father had, on his mother’s instructions, and with the happily given permission of Bryn, Gwilym’s father, given them both. They’d been caught red-handed, playing with fire dangerously close to a barn full of hay, as they set alight a rough effigy of one of the less pleasant village residents. Despite being caught dead to rights, they’d tried to bluff their way out of trouble and loudly denied any wrong-doing. After the punishment, his parents had sat the boys down and carefully explained that it wasn’t the act itself – which in truth, both parents privately found very funny – but the fact that they’d lied in denying it. It was a lesson both boys learned well, unlike some politicians they both occasionally thought.

  ‘It’s you I’m worried about,’ he said, genuine concern on his face as he looked down at her as she settled into the seat.

  ‘I’m fine, really I am,’ she responded. ‘Besides I always enjoy seeing the Blakes’ garden.’

  ‘Which category is it entered in?’

  ‘Oh “Traditional” very much so. Samuel would never move out of his comfort zone,’ she replied. ‘I wasn’t sure Dolly would enter this year, now that her father’s dead, particularly as it was only Christmas when he had his heart attack, but she was adamant, that she wanted to carry on and enter for his sake.’

  ‘Yes, they were a close-knit family, the three of them, weren’t they,’ he replied. ‘I suppose they had to be with her mother running of with that Yankee airman,’ he added.

  ‘Yes, so out of character, but I suppose the shock of young Timothy’s diagnosis must have made her do it. It would throw any mother,’ she added, feelingly.

  He nodded sombrely. The whole village had felt for the family. After years with just the one child, they’d found, both in their late thirties, and Dolly already in her teens, that Jean was pregnant with a second. ‘It might have been the shock of finding she was pregnant again, when she was just starting that teaching course. That must have been hard enough, but then to find the child was as badly brain-damaged as he was, and knowing he would never grow into an independently functioning adult would have been a double blow,’ Eleanor added, as they drew up in front of the trellised gateway of the old cottage.

  And traditional it is, though with touches of originality, thought Desmond later, as he stood filming and chatting to Dolly as the three judges walked round the beautifully laid out garden looking for any flaws which would mean a reduction in marks.

  All borders and pathways swept round in gentle curves, each leading to a different small enclosed space. One of these featured a lovely pool with a tiny waterfall, another led to a small outdoor fernery - ‘very popular with the Victorians, dear, indoor ones particularly,’ Eleanor informed him later; another lead to a small enclave ringed with white gravel, silvery sand and seashells of various kinds, giving it a vaguely seashore feel; it also had flowers, some with silvery bell-shaped blooms that Desmond, for one, had never seen before and some small, colourful ones, standing neatly in ordered rows, which he had, but couldn’t remember the name of. ‘One can almost hear the sea lapping at its edges,’ trilled the vicar – somewhat fatuously, thought at least one of his fellow judges. Yet another small pathway meandered into an area dominated by the harsh, beautiful colours of sunflowers, marigolds and geraniums, giving it a hard, bright, Mediterranean feel. The one Desmond particularly liked, though, was the small garden planted with lavender, tarragon, mint and any number of other scented and attractive herbs.

  Each little area featured a small bench, always half-hidden by the banks of flowers around it. Entirely surrounding the little oases and sweeping round the whole garden, were large, colourful beds of almost every traditional flower imaginable, including high, bright beds of Hollyhocks and Foxgloves backing deep borders of multi-coloured Dahlias, foxy red or vibrant orange Heleniums and massed banks of other popular flowers, all in descending order of height.

  ‘What a lovely effect! Your father would have been proud, my dear,’ said Eleanor as Dolly, followed slowly by a heavily overweight boy in
his mid-teens, came out to greet them. ‘It’s lovely how you’ve kept a similar layout but re-invigorated it, very much put your own stamp on it.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said the slim, dark woman. ‘We weren’t sure we could do anything this year. We didn’t realise just how much Dad did in the garden, until we tried to do it without him, did we, Timothy?’ she replied turning to boy who’d followed her out.

  ‘Hello Timothy,’ Eleanor smiled at the boy, who merely stared back at her, his eyes scarcely focused and his slack mouth drooling spittle.

  ‘Oh, Timothy!’ said Dolly, reaching into her pocket for a large handkerchief and wiping his lips. ‘It’s not one of his better days,’ she said apologetically to the older woman. ‘He sometimes gets a little uptight when visitors are around, don’t you sweetheart?’ she said turning to the boy. He turned his head slightly towards her, but beyond that she got no response from him.

  Watching the tableau, Desmond felt wrenching pity for the young woman. She had had to become her father’s main support after her mother left when she was still a teenager and, at the same time, had also had to take on the care of her badly disabled little brother. Still only in her late twenties, she seemed destined to spend the rest of her life as nurse to her young sibling. Although it sounded heartless, he thought she’d be far better off if the already powerfully built teenager was in residential care.

  ‘Timothy won’t go,’ his mother replied later, when he voiced the thought. ‘When Samuel was alive, he wouldn’t hear of the boy going into care, so that was that. When he died, Dolly did make enquiries and even got him into a home, a very good one, in fact. She didn’t say so, but I could see that it was such a relief for her, though I think she did feel guilty. But he only stayed three days,’ she ended, with a sad shrug.

  ‘So what happened?’

  ‘Apparently he kicked and screamed almost continuously and assaulted two of the staff. They refused to let him stay or even attend on a day-care basis. She did try another home, just on a daily basis, but the same thing happened, so she had to give up on the idea.’

  ‘What’ll happen when the boy is fully grown? Will she be able to cope?’ he asked.

  ‘To be honest, I’m not entirely sure that she can fully cope now. You’ve seen how big he is already; strong for his age too. But, she has been offered some daily in-house care at home, and she’s said she can manage with that, though how much longer she can go on saying it, I don’t know,’ she replied.

  They drove back in silence, both thinking how much sadness existed, both with Joe and Dotty and with Dolly and Timothy, despite their living in fairy-tale cottages in a village which was well-nigh perfect, with its thatched cottages, Tudor and Georgian houses, unspoilt green and a river meandering gently round its edges.

  Leaving his mother at the Vicarage where the final discussion – or confrontation – would occur, Desmond drove thankfully back to the Dower House. After the afternoon, he was even clearer in his own mind that if the Dower House’s large gardens were ever entered in the ‘Most Beautiful Garden’ competition, it would be entirely down to the efforts of two or three people. One would be the part-time gardener his mother currently used for heavy work, who had already agreed to become full-time; a second part-time gardener would join him soon, as would a young trainee straight from school. Between them the three would maintain the extensive gardens of both “The Plovers” and the Dower House. He himself had absolutely no intention of doing anything in either garden other than sit under an umbrella with a large gin and tonic in one hand and the latest edition of The Stage newspaper in the other.

  Chapter 13

  ‘Bloody hell! This business is making everyone jumpy as hell,’ said Desmond as he entered the Bar of the Crown and Sceptre in the afternoon of the following day. ‘I just walked up behind Miss Grinton, said good morning, and she almost had a heart attack!’

  ‘Scarcely to be wondered at, though,’ said Gwilym as he handed his partner a large gin and tonic.

  ‘True enough. When someone said that people had better go round in pairs until this was sorted, some local wit said even that wasn’t safe as the person accompanying you “might turn out to be the one that done the old doc in,”’ Desmond reported, his local accent faultless. ‘It’s awful, bloody awful,’ he added, his voice serious again. ‘You can see the fear in everyone’s eyes as they look furtively at each other,’ he added in a quieter voice. ‘And she bollocked me!’ he added, suddenly plaintive.

  ‘Who did? Miss Grinton?’ asked Gwilym, understandably confused by the sudden change in his partner’s tone.

  ‘Yes, Miss Grinton! “That was very thoughtless of you Desmond Appleby! You were brought up better than that!” Made me feel like I was back in bloody school!’ he added, laughing.

  ‘Yes, she’s always had that knack hasn’t she!’ Gwilym, smiled, as he recalled their school-days. ‘Remember how she could shut us all up with just one word!’

  Desmond nodded, appreciatively. Both men adored the little spinster, as did almost all of the villagers who’d been taught by her over the forty five or more years she’d been the village school mistress. Through choice she’d remained unmarried and had dedicated her life to the children of the village; and was entirely happy in that life.

  Besides the immense professional and personal satisfaction her job gave her, she had long holidays and a reasonable income. Both the last two were doubly fortunate as she also had two elderly parents who needed care well beyond that which the NHS would provide, so most of both her out of school time and her money had gone into providing the shortfall. One result of this, however, was when she came to retire, although she had an adequate pension, she’d nowhere near the capital she needed to fulfil her one, long cherished, though never discussed, dream of an around the world cruise.

  Stoically she’d accepted that it would never happen, but someone had found out about both the dream and its unhappy ending. A collection had been silently organised by some of her ex-pupils. With quietly generous donations from Desmond, Gwilym and others, enough money had been quickly collected. The final sum was not only enough for the cruise, but also more than sufficient to ensure that she had the funds both to be able to spend without worry and also to ensure that the whole trip would be done entirely in the best ship available and in one of its first-class cabins. The elderly lady’s face when she found out and understood the love and respect it signified, was one of the richest and most humbling experiences many in the villages had ever known.

  ‘Mind you, I did cause her to drop the cake she was carrying,’ Desmond murmured, ‘so I suppose she had some cause! It was her turn to provide the cakes apparently,’` he added; an obscure comment but one which his partner fully understood.

  ‘No wonder you got a rollicking then!’ Gwilym laughed. It was the custom for Ellie Grinton, Eleanor, Emily Wilkinson and three or four other village ladies of the same vintage, to have a working afternoon tea each week. Besides it being a social occasion, they always had some project going, whether it was sorting clothes for refugees, creating food banks for the destitute, or Christmas parcels for the soldiers serving in whatever war zone the government had currently deposited them. In addition, there was a keen – in Desmond’s view, almost deadly – though unacknowledged, rivalry as to who could produce the tastiest cakes week on week.

  ‘So, what did you come in for?’ asked Gwilym, after they’d spent a few minutes happily reminiscing.

  ‘Oh, bugger, I forgot!’ laughed Desmond. ‘Mum’s for once run out of that disgusting sherry they all drink and it’s her turn to host, so she sent me over to get some. It’s that stuff over there,’ he added pointing to one of the lower shelves.

  ‘Bloody hell, that is rubbish!’ agreed Gwilym passing over a bottle; expensive though, he thought happily as, responding to Desmond’s look, he got out a second, and then a third bottle.

  ‘They hotly deny it, but Mum’s never got much left in the second bottle,’ he added cheerily, as he paid. ‘And this one is
my peace-offering,’ he smiled, waving the third bottle in the air as he left the bar.

  He’d intended only to deliver the sherry, make his peace with Miss Grinton and leave them to it, but he suddenly realised that he was enjoying the company of women he’d known all his life. He found himself accepting their invitation to join them as they worked on the knick-knacks for their stall at the upcoming fête, though he drew the line at the offered sherry,

  ‘We were just talking about that time a few years back, when Dennis Hickwell didn’t realise we were standing behind him!’ laughed Emily Wilkinson, the down to earth lady who’d been the area’s district nurse for over thirty years prior to her retirement some years previously.

  Desmond burst out laughing, as he handed round the sherry, in the unusually large glasses his mother had set out, he’d noticed with silent amusement. Although in London at the time, he’d soon heard about the “luckless old fool’s latest foot-in- mouth episode”, as his informant prefaced the tale. Hearing that the ladies’ current project was parcels of warm socks, gloves, packets of sweets and so on, for the troops in Afghanistan, and talking to a group of his cronies outside the village shop, he’d referred to them all as a set of daft old bats, and went on to list succinctly – and, to be fair, entirely correctly – what the young gentlemen in the forces, at least, would prefer in their Xmas parcels. The sudden silence of his mates alerted him to the fact that something was amiss, and he turned round and found a stony-faced Emily flanked by an equally stony-faced Ellie, standing just behind him.

  ‘I never did hear exactly what it was he’d suggested as alternatives,’ Desmond murmured wickedly, totally unable to resist it. His mother’s choked laugh was smothered in Emily’s tart response.

  ‘And you won’t hear it from us, Desmond! After all, as ladies we didn’t understand most of his references, anyway,’ she added blandly, if dishonestly, as she knocked back her drink. Joining in the laughter, he found himself chatting and laughing with them through most of the afternoon; silently glad, watching their rate of consumption, that he’d bought the third bottle.