Palmer-Jones 03 - Murder in Paradise

by Ann Cleeves

  “I know,” George said. “What exactly did he say before he saw James?”

  “He said that she was a good screw.” He blushed, and became a child again. “It probably never happened. He tells terrible stories.”

  George ignored his embarrassment. “What happened next?” he asked.

  “I don’t think very much happened. He hung around her all summer. He was always trying to find excuses to get her on her own, but it’s not easy on a place as small as this, and he just made a fool of himself. I don’t think she was really interested. She liked the admiration but she didn’t take him seriously. You can’t blame her. She was used to a more exciting life than this.”

  “You mean that all this fuss has been over one incident three months ago?”

  “As far as I know. Since then Sylvia’s been flirting with Alec just to annoy Maggie.”

  “How has Maggie reacted to it?”

  “At first she just ignored him. She thought he was all talk and no action. It’s happened before. He’s disappeared up to Ellie’s Head after a dance with a pretty young woman several times, but they’ve always been visitors to the island, so it never mattered so much. More recently I think all the gossip has been getting her down.”

  “And Jonathan? Was he similarly tolerant?”

  “He seemed to be. He knows that Sylvia isn’t happy here.”

  George was disappointed. He had expected there to be something more. A real motive for murder. But he showed no disappointment.

  “Did you notice when Mary left the hall on the night of the party?” he asked.

  “No. I was playing guitar for the band. She wasn’t around in the interval.”

  “What did you do in the interval?”

  “I had a drink and something to eat.”

  George could remember seeing him, lounging against the wall, watching the rest of the crowd with a detached, rather superior air.

  “Did you notice if anyone was away for a long time before or during the interval?”

  “No. I didn’t notice.”

  No, George thought, you were busy wondering what people were thinking of you.

  They sat in silence again watching the short-toed lark in the field. Each spike of stubble was hard and clear in the sunshine. All the colours on the bird were very bright. The hall was full now. There was no one else outside and it was very quiet.

  “It must be something else,” George said, almost to himself. “There must be another secret. You don’t know what it can be?”

  “No.”

  Suddenly, from inside the hall, there was the sound of a scream. It was of anger and exasperation, not of pain, but it was loud enough to make the short-toed lark rise into the air before settling again farther away. Elspeth ran out of the hall towards them. Tears were streaming down her face and she took no notice of the men. She was completely absorbed in her own misery. She was wearing a calf-length skirt, and as she ran she stumbled and caught her knee on the hem. Will called after her but she took no notice. When she reached the road, he got up and hurried after her without saying a word to George.

  George walked slowly towards the hall. As he reached the door Kenneth and Annie came out. Annie, too, looked as if she had been crying. Kenneth had his arm around her shoulder. They followed their daughter home, like grieving relatives following a coffin at a funeral.

  Obviously everyone inside the hall had enjoyed the disturbance, yet they were shocked by it. The scene was another indication that everything was not as normal. The clothes for sale on the trestles were ignored and people stood in small groups, talking. Some of the wedding decorations were still strung over the ceiling, and with the colourful clothes, the place still had a fantastic carnival air. When George walked in, the islanders stared at him, hoping that he might have the power to satisfy their curiosity, but he took no notice and they turned back to their friends to gossip and speculate. The Woollie Man held up some violently striped towels in a last effort to attract custom, but there was no response, and he began to pile the unsold goods into suitcases.

  Sarah was there, talking to Agnes, and George approached her.

  “What was that about?” he asked.

  “It was really strange.…” Her voice was clear and piercing and people turned to look at her, waiting for her interpretation of the incident which had taken place.

  He took her arm and led her outside. The audience was hostile, resentful because they were being deprived of another free show. Sarah seemed not to notice them. She seemed as excited as all the others. Once outside she continued:

  “It was really strange. Elspeth went up to the counter to buy some things for her little boy. The salesman was talking to her, joking, you know, saying how pretty she was. Then when he was giving her the change, he said he thought he recognized her and hadn’t she been on the television? She said no, of course she hadn’t. You could tell that she was hating it. She was almost shouting. But he insisted. He said he had a wonderful memory and he was sure he’d seen her face on the television. That was when she screamed and ran out.

  “The funny thing was that I looked at Annie while it was going on and she was upset too.”

  “The salesman wasn’t specific? He didn’t say how long ago he’d seen her or what sort of programme it was?”

  She shook her head.

  “No. It happened just as I told you.”

  He waited until she had walked away before he went back into the hall to talk to the Woollie Man. All the customers had gone and the trestle tables were empty. A shaft of sunlight came in through the open door and showed the dust in the air and the cobwebs on the rafters. The Woollie Man answered his questions with a polite bewilderment, but he provided no more useful information. He was very sorry that he had upset the young lady. He had not meant to do that. He thought that she must be famous because he had seen her face on the television. Once a famous actress had bought from his stall in Glasgow.

  “Are you based in Glasgow?”

  “Yes, I travel. It’s six months since I was there, but Glasgow is my home.”

  “The young lady comes from Glasgow. Perhaps you met her there.”

  “Perhaps.”

  He was no longer interested. He had not sold as much as he had expected and he was disappointed. He wanted to finish clearing away.

  George was at the door when he turned back.

  “I wonder,” he said. “Could I come out with you on the plane? I’d pay half of the charter cost.”

  The man grinned.

  “Sure,” he said. “Sure.”

  At the school the children were out to play for lunchtime. The girls had a skipping rope and were singing a rhyme. The boys were playing spacemen. Ben Dance sat on a wall and watched the children, but made no attempt to join in.

  Jonathan sat at his desk in the school room drinking a mug of coffee. He was reading the manuscript of a paper about gull population control sent by an ornithological magazine for his comments. He was concentrating so hard that he did not hear George come in.

  “There’s a short-toed lark on the stubble field below the hall,” George said.

  “That’s good. I’ll get down to see it after school.”

  “Will Stennet found it.”

  “Is he back? I’ll have to arrange the swan-ringing expedition, then.”

  “I’m going out on the plane. I’ll stay on Baltasay tonight and come back on the Ruth Isabella tomorrow.”

  “Will you see Sylvia?”

  “Probably. But that’s not why I’m going.”

  “Tell her that I miss her,” Jonathan said abruptly, “and that I’ll leave the island as soon as I can get another job. Before that if she’s desperate to go.”

  “I’ll tell her.”

  “The police phoned from Baltasay,” Jonathan said, “just after you’d gone out. They’re coming in this afternoon, in their own plane.”

  “They’ll miss me, then.”

  He went into the house to pack an overnight bag, then began to wal
k to the airstrip. He hoped to leave before the police arrived on Kinness. It was not that he felt in competition with them. He would have been glad of a chance to discuss the information that Elspeth Dance had a secret and was frightened of being recognized. But he knew that they would not be interested. They were willing to consider that Robert’s death was murder, but he was certain that Robert had died only because he shared Mary Stennet’s knowledge. Mary Stennet’s death was the key to the thing, and they believed that she was a foolhardy girl who had slipped.

  He enjoyed the walk to the airstrip and got there before Alec’s car or the aeroplane. He heard the engine of the plane first, then Alec’s car raced up the track and stopped dramatically with squealing brakes and a cloud of sand, just as the plane touched down.

  As the Woollie Man unloaded his luggage from the boot, Alec stuck his head through the car window and shouted at George:

  “You’re leaving then, are you? You rake up all the muck and then you piss off. Well, don’t think you’ll be welcome on Kinness again.”

  Perhaps he thought that George would not hear him. The noise of the plane’s engine was very loud. George got in and chose a seat by the window. The plane took off and circled the island once before heading for Baltasay. George looked at Kinness, green and perfect below him, and he knew that what Alec had said was true. However things turned out, he would never be welcome on the island again, and once the matter was resolved, he knew he would never return.

  Chapter Eleven

  That afternoon Sarah met Elspeth quite by chance. Alec had told her that George had gone to Baltasay. She supposed that he was following some line of investigation and felt resentful because he had not told her why he was going. Jim had refused her offer of help on the croft and she did not want to stay inside. The sunshine tempted her to explore.

  On the west side of the island there was a small, sandy beach. Sarah saw it from the clifftop and thought that she could get down to it. It was an adventure. When she got to the beach, Elspeth was already there. Sarah had not seen her from the clifftop. She was sitting on a rock and she was crying. She was wearing a shawl round her shoulders and Sarah thought that the first Ellie Dance must have looked like that. Sarah did not know what to do. Elspeth had not seen her, she was staring out to sea with a mournful, melodramatic air. Then Sarah slipped on the shingle at the top of the beach. The pebbles rattled and bounced with a sound like gunshot and Elspeth turned and saw her.

  “I’m sorry,” Sarah said awkwardly, walking up to the rock. “I didn’t know you were here. I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

  “I suppose that they’re all talking about me,” Elspeth said, “because I made a fool of myself at the sale.” She had not dried her tears and her face was red and blotchy like a miserable child’s. “I suppose I should be used to it by now, but the thought of all the tongues wagging still bothers me.”

  She seemed not to expect any answer and continued:

  “The police are coming in this afternoon to ask more questions about Robert. I wish they’d stop. I hate it.”

  With another sudden change of conversation she said:

  “You seem very happy with Jim. I’ve been jealous. I suppose I’m a bitch.”

  “It must have been difficult,” Sarah said carefully. “All the fuss about the wedding. If you still cared for Jim.”

  “Yes. It was difficult. It wouldn’t have worked, if we’d married. He would have hated me very soon. But it was nice to dream about. I suppose we all need something to dream about during the difficult times. I dreamt about coming home and marrying Jim. When I got here, I found that he was already engaged to a pretty English girl.”

  “But you didn’t pin the note on my wedding dress?”

  “No.” She did not ask for an explanation for the question. “ I hoped that you wouldn’t like it here,” she said. “ I hoped that you would leave. But it must have been horrible. First Mary and now Robert.”

  “It hasn’t been too comfortable.”

  “I wonder if I would have been different, nicer, if I’d been born somewhere else,” Elspeth said. “ I seem to have been doomed from birth. I was named after a girl who went mad and committed suicide.”

  “I know.”

  “It haunts me sometimes. As if that’s my fate, too, and there’s nothing I can do to prevent it.”

  “That’s ridiculous. And it’s an excuse for making no effort to determine your own future.”

  “Perhaps. But that’s how I feel. I tried to explain to them in Glasgow but they couldn’t understand. They thought I was making excuses.”

  “There’s Ben,” Sarah said. “ You have to make a future for him.”

  “They said that in Glasgow too. And they were right. Of course they were right. But they didn’t know how guilty I felt, and that it helped sometimes to think that I wasn’t entirely responsible.”

  “Elspeth,” Sarah said, “ what happened in Glasgow?”

  She was quite sure that Elspeth was preparing to tell her everything. She felt very close to the other woman. She could smell the wet wool of the shawl mixed with the odour of salt and seaweed. Sheltered by the cliffs, they could see nothing of the island, and the middle-aged gossips in the tidy white houses seemed a thousand miles away.

  Then around the bottom of the cliff, looking out of place in his working clothes, walked Kenneth Dance. He was wearing Wellingtons over his grey trousers, but the tie, the neat waistcoat, and grey jacket made it seem that he had left the post office in a hurry. He was obviously finding the exertion of the walk uncomfortable, and stopped to catch his breath.

  “Damn that man,” Elspeth said. “He’s spying on me. He follows me everywhere.”

  “He can’t hear us.”

  “It’s no good. He doesn’t trust me. He’s come to take me home to face the police.”

  Sarah expected her to walk down the beach towards her father, but she ran away up the cliff, her shoes in her hand and the shawl in a tangled mat around her shoulders. Kenneth Dance looked helplessly as she disappeared, then walked back the way he had come.

  As he went the plane flew in again.

  George was surprised to find Sylvia waiting for him at the Baltasay airport in a hire car.

  “Jonathan telephoned me and said you were coming.” she said, “I thought this would save you the bother of coming to find me.”

  “It was kind of you.”

  “Oh, I’ve been starting to feel bored again. Baltasay isn’t very much more entertaining than Kinness.”

  She turned to him and smiled and he felt that she was pleased to see him.

  “Where do you want to go?” she asked.

  “Would you mind if we had tea? I missed lunch. Perhaps we could have a proper island tea with scones and cakes.”

  She laughed, and as she tipped back her head her long earrings moved and reflected the warm colour of her skin. He was glad to be alone with her.

  She took him to the hotel where James had courted Melissa. It had not changed very much. They sat in a large, gloomy lounge, surrounded by dark stained wood. They were alone.

  “Why have you come?” she asked. “There’s no mystery about my leaving, and I’m going back to Kinness on the next boat. Won’t your questions wait until then?”

  She was humouring him, taking an interest in the inquiry through politeness. She thought that he was bored, as she was, missing his work, and he had to create a little diversion for himself, to pass the time.

  “They would have waited,” he said. “ Something else brought me to Baltasay.”

  “Did it?” Again she was not really interested. She was pouring the tea and she seemed to be devoting her attention to giving him just the right amount of milk. But he felt that her thoughts were elsewhere. It was not that she was anxious, only preoccupied with a pleasant daydream. She looked up and saw that he was watching her.

  “I’m sorry that I left the island in such an impulsive way. Did you think that I was your murderer?”

  She real
ized that she had gone too far. He knew that she was mocking him. “ I’m sorry,” she said again. “What do you want to know?”

  “I want to know your secret.”

  She had not expected this and gave him her full attention. The languorous mood was over.

  “That’s very ungallant,” she said, recovering herself. “ No woman will reveal all her secrets.”

  “Start by telling me about Alec Stennet.”

  She was relieved and laughed again. She stretched a long, smooth arm across the polished table, then turned the palm of the hand up in a gesture of indifference.

  “One night at a party he got drunk and I let him walk home with me. Jonathan had left hours before. He’s an unsocial bore at times. I must have been drunk, too, because I let Alec kiss me. He is handsome, you know, in a strange, brutish way. He won’t let me forget it and neither will the island. It was only a kiss, despite what he’s told them. They think I’m a scarlet woman anyway because I won’t go to church, so they’re quite prepared to think the worst of me. There would hardly be less gossip if I were running a brothel in the school house. Alec’s attentions were entertaining for a while, but they became tedious.”

  Her diversion, he thought, her relief from boredom.

  “And there are no other secrets?” he asked.

  “Nothing that I’d be prepared to talk to you about.” She smiled. “And nothing that could have any relevance to Mary’s death.”