by Jean Hill
Peter had helped Janet when she made her will in 1980 but when Peter retired in his mid sixties his son Jeremy had taken over the reins of the business, following in his father’s footsteps. His grandson Matthew, who had also studied law, was now in charge of the business. Whether Jeremy or Matthew had updated Janet’s will since he had retired he could not remember. They had probably mentioned it to him and he thought Jeremy had possibly made another will for Janet in 1990 but he was getting almost as forgetful as Janet. He had a vague idea that Janet had left some money to the Mace family together with some of her better pieces of furniture. He would have no hesitation in accepting anything she wanted his family to have. They had looked after her well over the years. The financial adviser he had recommended had no doubt kept a sharp eye on her affairs and increased her fortune through good investment.
Peter’s wife Alice had died ten years previously which had left him lonely, and he valued Janet’s friendship. Janet did not have any children and depended on him and a few other close friends for company. He was lucky to have his son Jeremy and grandson Matthew.
Peter climbed the road to Primrose House one afternoon almost every week to visit and talk about old times with a dog treat tucked in his pocket for Jack, who would nuzzle and press against his legs until he produced it. He thought that he was a smelly old dog, a bath would not go amiss, but he did not care to express that feeling to Janet and upset her in any way. Janet was becoming very forgetful and Peter was concerned about her state of mind. He would struggle up the slight hill to see her, stopping every few yards to catch his breath and lean on his trusty walking stick.
Approximately one week after Felicity arrived he paid one of his usual visits. The October damp crept into his bones insidiously as he made his way to Primrose House that day. His nose had turned a deep pink, purple veins cloaked his cheeks and his feet felt numb with the cold. Joyce showed him into the lounge and disappeared with haste into the kitchen to produce the afternoon tea of egg sandwiches and the sugar-splattered Eccles cakes she knew he liked.
‘Poor old man,’ she muttered to herself. ‘He’s still a good friend though and Mrs Lacey could do with a few of those.’
He warmed himself for a few minutes by a radiator before sitting down gratefully in an armchair. He expected that Janet would join him as usual, making her way to the lounge with her walking sticks, independent as ever, and not allowing him to assist her.
He heard footsteps, quicker than he had expected, and adjusted his old metal-rimmed glasses which had a habit of slipping down his nose. He turned his head as Felicity entered the room. For a moment he was startled. A stiff and somewhat false smile was glued to Felicity’s countenance and she gave him a derogatory look.
‘Who are you?’ he stammered rudely, which was unusual for this mild-mannered man.
‘I am Felicity Brown. Mrs Lacey’s niece. I’ve come to stay with Auntie, and who are you?’ she retorted sharply, a scowl creeping over her face which emphasised a spiteful hard expression which was impossible to disguise. Peter cringed.
‘I’m your aunt’s very old friend. We were at school together. I used to be her solicitor many years ago. We have tea together most weeks. Haven’t we met before?’
Felicity looked at Peter with a brief flicker of interest in her cold eyes. Huh, she thought. He is the one named in the will but he does not look as though he is going to last long. She expelled an audible sigh of relief. She wondered what his son was like and how many of the wretched Mace family still lived and were waiting ready to grab a share of her aunt’s fortune. She made an effort to compose her face into a pleasant and innocuous countenance and sat down on a chair next to him.
‘We probably met when I stayed with Auntie as a child,’ she responded in as pleasant a tone as she could muster. Her expression lost some of its suspicious edge.
What is the ghastly woman planning? Peter wondered. She is a typical leech and without doubt only interested in her aunt’s money. He was for a second or two quite dismayed and dumfounded as this realization sunk in.
‘How long are you staying with your aunt?’ he managed to say after a slight pause.
‘Oh, a month or two if Auntie will have me,’ was the swift and confident reply.
‘Well, then, we will probably see quite a lot of each other.’ Felicity hoped not but she looked forward to finding out more about the will she had found in the drawer. The wretched man may be able to help her.
Joyce’s head appeared at the door. ‘Tea will be served in the dining room today sir,’ she said, ignoring Felicity. ‘I’ve made a few of your favourite egg and cress sandwiches.’
Felicity quivered. Ugh, egg. What a silly old man. We could have had smoked salmon if he had not come, but still her mouth watered. She was always hungry. She should watch her waistline which was threatening to expand and spoil the sleek lines of her new clothes but she was enjoying the luxury of the free food in Primrose House. There would be chocolate cake with cream filling, she thought and cheered up. The sight of the sugary looking Eccles cakes was not welcome. They would sit like lumps of lead in her stomach and that she did not want. She hoped her face was not turning green. They sat with mounting unease around a small table in the dining room. Janet had struggled to move from her usual comfortable armchair with her stiff and unyielding limbs in an effort to sit between Peter and Felicity like a good hostess should. Felicity looked at Peter with small sly eyes. She must pump him about that will sometime. To do it without raising suspicion in the old fart’s mind would probably take some guile but she would think of something.
‘I think we definitely did meet when I was a child,’ she proffered in her strange Canadian accent, breaking the charged silence and looking at Peter with the most innocent expression she could muster as she fluttered her short stubby eyelashes. ‘I remember now.’
‘Yes,’ Peter replied. ‘I remember too; it was a long time ago.’ He remembered all right. A vile child, malicious and cruel, he had considered at the time though disturbed was a more apt description. She did not look much more agreeable now.
‘How is your brother Ronald?’ he asked after a short pregnant pause. Poor little fellow. He was unlucky having to put up with a sister who behaved like she did.
‘Oh, OK, sure,’ Felicity replied in a flippant tone. ‘He is a dentist now and married with one kid. They live in Melbourne, Australia and are doing all right I think. We don’t correspond much.’ She turned her head to look at her aunt and gave her a warm smile, the subject of Ronald neatly closed.
Janet nodded and passed the rather gooey egg sandwiches to Peter. They were soft and oozing with mayonnaise with flecks of wilted green cress hanging out of the sides. There was a vacant look in her fading brown eyes as her mind wandered.
Felicity sniffed and wriggled in her chair. Peter took his fifth sandwich, mayonnaise dripping down his fingers, and an odd silence engulfed them for several minutes. In Felicity’s eyes he was just a greedy old twit. He held a torch for auntie years ago she reflected and almost laughed out loud. Good old Uncle James got there first and they did not have any brats to complicate matters. Thank goodness for that.
Felicity poured the tea from a large elegant fine china teapot into the matching cups that Joyce Skillet had set out earlier. Peter was surprised. He always did that for Janet when they had tea together. The wretched niece was playing at being hostess and usurping him. She was unnerving him and forcing him to make an effort to stop his hands from shaking.
Peter looked with avarice at the antique dining chairs, a look that was not lost on Felicity. The six chairs were elegant and no doubt worth a penny or two, Felicity turned over in her mind. Peter caressed the soft striped velvet chair covers with his arthritic fingers and smiled with satisfaction. Jeremy had taken the chairs to be repaired and re-covered in a traditional style only a few years ago, having made the excuse that they were getting wobbly and unsafe for visitors to use. They cost Janet a lot to repair but were, he
was sure, valuable antiques and Janet had promised to leave them to the Mace family in her will.
‘Another sandwich, Felicity?’ her aunt said interrupting her reverie and making an effort to take over the role of hostess.
‘No thank you Auntie dear,’ Felicity responded in a gushing tone. She observed the fine Minton plate. Nothing but the best it seemed for old Peter Mace. A feeling of nausea was threatening to overtake her. She swallowed several of what she considered to be the tasteless soggy old sandwiches. There was no added salt in them because Peter had said he did not like that. It was bad for his blood pressure.
‘Would you like another one Peter ... er Mr Mace?’ she drawled, smiling in as charming a manner as she could manage, and took the plate from her aunt in order to pass it to him. Scraps of egg already clung in an unsavoury way round the edge of his mouth and Felicity groped for a napkin and made a desperate effort not to retch. Her face blanched but both Peter and her aunt with their failing eyesight did not notice.
Peter Mace continued his visits as usual during the month of November. He liked to look round the garden at Primrose House before taking tea with Janet. He had a habit of wandering round to the kitchen garden at the back where there was a small greenhouse which contained many of Janet’s garden plants that needed shelter at that time of the year. Robbie was a wonderful asset to his friend, he had concluded. Peter never failed to be impressed. There was a large potting shed next to the greenhouse where Robbie kept the garden tools, which were all well oiled and cared for, and an old table and chair he used when he took his morning coffee or ate his lunchtime sandwiches if he stayed that long.
The next time Peter visited Primrose House he clambered up the short metal staircase which led to the kitchen from the garden. He sometimes entered the house that way when he thought that Joyce Skillet would be there to let him in, though quite often the door was left unlocked if he was expected. Struggling with the icy conditions he clutched and hung on, as well as he was able with bent old hands, to the slippery and worn iron handrail in an effort to stop himself from falling, but his arthritic feet and legs were not helpful. On reaching the top he paused for a moment to catch his breath. The door swung open and, to his surprise, an arm shot out and hit him violently in the chest. Losing his grip on the slippery rail he slid backwards. His legs buckled painfully beneath him as he plummeted downwards and landed with a sickening thud that resounded on the frozen earth. Peter struggled to open his eyes and saw someone holding a large stone above his head. He tried to cry out but could make no sound. Something akin to an electric crackle trickled across his brain accompanied by a bizarre and remote feeling of helplessness. Within seconds there was darkness.
Joyce Skillet had gone to visit her elderly mother in the cottage hospital in Brinton and Felicity had been left in charge of making the egg sandwiches for Peter. She had prepared them with a heavy heart, vile things, especially if they did not have salt in. She set the small table in the dining room as usual and Janet and Felicity waited for the guest. The clock in the hall struck half past four but there was no sign of the old man.
Janet became anxious. ‘I can’t understand it Felicity, he rarely forgets to come,’ she repeated many times until Felicity’s patience began to run out.
‘Don’t worry Auntie, something unexpected has probably come up and he has forgotten to let us know.’ She smiled smugly as she poured two cups of the foul-tasting Earl Grey tea which she made using an electric kettle in the dining room, and handed her aunt an egg sandwich. She helped herself to a slice of soft chocolate cake and one of Joyce’s delicious home-made iced sponge fingers. She spread one of the dainty Japanese napkins that her aunt liked across her lap to catch any unwanted crumbs and tucked into her tea with relish.
Felicity looked out of the windows at the white puffs of cloud that had begun to drift across the sky as the north-easterly wind strengthened. ‘It is probably too cold for him today,’ she said in a dismissive tone. ‘The sky is a nasty colour and it looks as though it may snow soon.’
Peter’s body was found the next day by the milkman when he delivered the milk, eggs and Janet’s favourite fruit yoghurts. Felicity, like many of the villagers, preferred the Everton supermarkets. She thought the milkman’s goods were too expensive but had to admit to herself that it was a relief that he had arrived early to find the body and for that she was thankful.
‘I am so sorry Auntie,’ she said to Janet. ‘Peter was such a good friend.’ She smiled inwardly and the thought that there was one less Mace to benefit from Auntie’s will was satisfying.
The police were called, enquiries made, and it was concluded that his death was an unfortunate accident. Detective Inspector Holmes from Brinton who had been assigned the case did not think it was an accident but no evidence could be found at that time to support his suspicions. He had placed the bloodstained stone that had been found lying a short distance from the body into a plastic bag and sent it to the local Police Forensic Science Laboratory but he was not optimistic about obtaining a positive and useful result. There was one smudged fingerprint which would not be easy to identify.
Peter Mace was buried in Enderly churchyard next to his wife Alice. A sprightly lady curate conducted the service. The church was filled to capacity with curious villagers, a few old clients and the small Mace family consisting of Jeremy and his son Matthew. Jeremy’s wife Betty had died three years earlier and Matthew, who was now in his late thirties, had so far shown no interest in getting married, though he did have a few girlfriends when he was in his teens. He was an attractive bachelor and Felicity was pleased to discover that he was not married; it would make things easier for her if she did not have too many of the Mace family to deal with.
Robbie drove Janet to the church and helped her with care into a pew at the back. She looked sad and bereft following the loss of her old friend and Robbie determined that he would try and discover what happened that fateful day. Like DI Holmes he found it difficult to accept the accident theory but without witnesses or some concrete evidence he knew that murder would be difficult to prove. Robbie had vowed to repay Janet and her mother’s kindness to him when he was a child and he was now very anxious and fearful with regard to Janet’s safety. He was a clever man, far more intelligent than Felicity realized at that time, though she appreciated that he was no fool. The fact that he intuitively suspected that she might have been involved in Peter’s demise was something of which she was blissfully unaware.
Janet had dressed for the funeral with conventional respect in her best black suit and thick woollen overcoat. She was not sure why but had been prompted by Joyce to wear black. She stumbled as she entered the church, though she was leaning heavily on Robbie’s arm, and looked with unease down the short aisle where she could see Peter’s coffin. There were white lilies draped over the lid and their sickly smell wafted towards her. A cheap coffin she thought, and wondered if the family were short of money. For a moment she forgot whose body was inside that horrid pine-coloured box, then she remembered and groaned. The sea of faces, a mixture of the firm’s clients and villagers, were almost all strangers to her. Many of the people she had known well in the past were dead or had moved away. She was convinced for a few moments that she had drifted into some alien world. Had she been in this church before? She was unsure. The cold grey stone walls and pretty stained-glass windows looked familiar.
The organist played Handel’s Largo as the mourners took their seats. When the service started the congregation reached for their Order of Service and their voices became subdued. There were only two short hymns which had been Peter’s wish though Janet thought that the service continued for an eternity. She longed to get away from the musty damp smell coming up from the floor below the pews that reminded her of rotting bones. She had made the effort to say goodbye to her old friend but there was no way she could stand for more than a few minutes on her weak and wobbly legs to join in the singing. The curate’s sermon and somewhat tedious readings
by Jeremy and Matthew drifted over her head without real meaning or understanding. Jeremy was slightly tipsy and his speech was slurred and muddled. Janet dreaded having to follow the family to the graveside and was glad of the support of Robbie’s strong arm to prevent her frail body from falling.
‘It’s all right Mrs Lacey,’ Robbie assured her. ‘I’ve borrowed a wheelchair to take you to the graveside.’
Janet was relieved but insisted on standing up, stiff and miserable, to watch when the coffin of her friend was lowered into the cold earth. The weather was raw and a bitter wind whipped round her thin legs. She uttered a pitiful sob and Felicity patted her arm with feigned sympathy. Felicity’s blue flecked eyes looked calm and expressionless. Robbie supported Janet as well as he could and Matthew also offered her an arm.
Felicity turned her attention to the other mourners with somewhat muted interest and then her thoughts wandered to what lunch in the Maces’ home would be like. She was hungry and her mouth, as usual, threatened to water. Felicity had scarcely noticed Janet’s obvious distress or her need to be supported by Robbie and Matthew. She was too busy wallowing in pleasure as she clutched her new thick black cashmere coat closer and tightened the pretty black fake-fur scarf around her neck in an attempt to avoid the effects of the cold whistling wind. Thank goodness she had purchased some new long fur-lined boots and a fur hat to match the scarf. She glanced down at her lovely leather boots and ran her hand down the front of the immaculate soft and voluminous handbag she had purchased to match. Quite perfect, hmm ... quite perfect.
Matthew and Jeremy threw a sprinkling of fine black Enderly earth onto the coffin lid and as it pattered down Janet thought for a moment that her heart would break. She removed a faded pressed rose from her handbag and watched as it fluttered down onto the coffin lid. It was a flower she had saved with care. She had kept it pressed between the pages of her Bible after Peter had given it to her when they were schoolchildren and there it had stayed until now. Peter dead! Janet tried to get her head around that concept. It was defeating her. Glimpses of the boy he had been at school and the friend who had supported her tirelessly over so many years passed through her mind then drifted away again like snowflakes melting on desolate ground. A fleeting memory of him as a small child in school, perhaps only about ten or eleven, came to mind. She had a hazy idea that they had been sweethearts for a while in their early teens, but she knew that she had never really loved him with any passion or thought of him as being more than a friend. She recalled with difficulty that his eyes had been greyblue with flecks of brown, more flecks in the left eye than the right, and had fine arched eyebrows which he told her many times with pride were inherited from some revered aristocratic ancestor, a lord somebody or other. Ridiculous, she had always maintained. Why should anyone care about something so trivial?