by Will North
Even though she worked with him nearly every day on rebuilding the gardener’s cottage she’d not been able to bond with Drew as she had Nicky. He was kind and affectionate to her, but she sensed a distance, as if he did not know how to deal with a girl. She’d meant to talk to Flora about this but didn’t know how to begin without possibly hurting Drew. That was the last thing she wanted to do.
Now, late this afternoon, after the danger at home had passed, she sat at her safe place. The ocean was gentle, its swells unlashed by storm or wind. The waves lifted and fell languorously on the rocky beach below and hissed over the pebbles as they retreated. Just offshore a seal traced speedy vectors just beneath the surface as it chased fish. Gulls followed the vector hoping for leftovers. The afternoon light over the Atlantic was bright but aging to gold, almost orange near the watery horizon and then fading to pale blue above. She wished Randi were with her. He was the world’s best companion, but he wasn’t healed enough yet.
And maybe I’m not healed enough, either, she thought. It didn’t seem something you could call up from within you, embracing a new family. She admired Drew greatly. She reckoned she loved him. She knew Jamie did, too, and that said a lot. But where Nicky was artistic and emotional, Drew was cool and analytical: way smart, she reckoned, but also a puzzle she hadn’t quite yet solved.
She was considering these differences when she sensed a presence above her on the coast path. Was it Drew, summoned even as she’d thought about him? She looked upward just as a rough block of granite flew down at her from above. She twisted away from a direct hit but the stone grazed her head and crashed into her right shoulder. She screamed and clung to the turf but the pain was so intense she passed out.
“GET UP, DAMMIT, you’re needed,” Flora ordered. “Jamie’s away and Nicola is God only knows where. Lee’s in trouble. Get a move on!”
“What? Where? How do you know?”
“You wouldn’t understand.”
Andrew pulled on clothes and, a bit woozy and his head throbbing, followed Flora out of the house and down the valley to the coast, trying mightily just to keep his feet under him.
At the cliff edge, Flora pointed to the inert body below.
It was his own Lee.
Surging with adrenalin, he slid down the steep path to her side. He checked that she was breathing and pulled her into his arms. He knew he couldn’t haul them both to the top of the ragged scree slope given his weakened condition, but he scrambled up as far as he could, shoes digging into the shattered granite rubble, and passed her up to Flora, who grabbed an arm from above as he lost his footing and slid back down. She still held it when he finally reached the top. Together, they pulled the child up to the coast path. Lee screamed. Andrew yanked away the collar of her tee shirt and saw that her shoulder was bleeding and misshapen, possibly dislocated. They’d pulled it to lift her. He felt sick.
“Be still, darling girl,” he whispered into her ear. “You are safe now. I’m going for help. Trust me, okay?”
Lee opened her eyes. “Hurts awful.”
“I know. Be the brave girl I know you are. Your most favorite person, Flora, is right here beside you while I get the rescue chaps. Okay?”
“You’re my most favorite person, Drew,” she said before her eyes rolled back in their sockets again.
MARY WAS JUST taking the dry clothes off the line when she saw him shuffle down the lane and enter his cottage. It was nearly six and he looked weary, his normally erect shoulders slumped. She’d already decided to invite him to her own home for dinner: prawns in pasta with a pesto cream sauce she’d bought at the Co-op in St. Just. But first she’d wait for him to shower.
Half an hour later he answered her knock. But he’d not showered. He was sweaty, like he’d been running, and held a glass of white wine in his hand.
“Goodness, are you all right?”
“Sto bene, mia Maria, bene. Solo stanko…tired.” He waved her in. “Much walking today. Vino bianco?”
“Si, senore.” She’d been studying Italian on her computer. She knocked back her glass of wine and mustered her courage: “I have a dinner for you in my house tonight. Pasta? Prawns? Pesto? You will come?”
He smiled and sank into the white wicker chair in the kitchen. She wondered how far he’d walked today, what had so tired him.
“Si, Si. Mille grazie, Maria. But first…” he gestured with his hands the need to shower.
“Of course.” She leaned down, kissed him, pulled him from the chair and led him to the cottage’s sparkling new bathroom. She undressed him, slowly, and then herself. In the shower together she soaped him and rubbed his skin, teasing him. Then she stepped out of the enclosure, leaving him there. “Dinner is soon,” she said, winking.
She dried and dressed. He was still soaking in the shower under the hot, steamy water. “When you are ready, come down the lane…and bring wine!” Her smile was lascivious…or at least she hoped it was. She’d never known a want like this.
“YOU AGAIN?”
It was the same female medic who had treated Andrew after the crash that morning.
“Busy day, you’ve had,” she said. “You should be resting.”
“No kidding.”
Andrew had the ambulance drive down the rutted valley lane to the ruined mill and they had walked from there to the cliff with the stretcher. The medic and her assistant kneeled and examined Lee’s shoulder. Flora hovered.
“Looks like a fractured clavicle. Dislocation is also possible. There’s also an abrasion on that side of her head; minor bleeding. Who is she?”
“Almost but not quite yet his adopted daughter,” Flora answered.
“And you are?”
“Friend.”
“Part of the family,” Andrew corrected.
“What happened?”
“We don’t know,” Flora said. That ledge is her special place where she goes to think.”
“So you’re saying it isn’t likely that she simply fell from the path? She knew her way down?”
“Oh, yes.”
The medic considered for a moment. “Then this is an impact injury. Something from above. If you don’t call the police, I will.”
Andrew was already on his mobile. He called Nicola first this time, and then 999.
“Excuse me, but do you have a name?” Andrew asked the medic when he rang off. “We seem to be becoming regular associates…”
“It’s Marion. Marion Robbins. And I hope not to see you again anytime soon.”
“Very flattering, that is.”
She smiled and patted his shoulder. “You know what I mean. Take care of that head of yours and this girl; looks like you’ll be needed for a while.”
DAVIES MET WEST at the cliff edge just as the sun began dipping into the western Atlantic. The SOCO team had brought battery-powered lights and now Calum, in his usual white coveralls, was on his knees studying the well-beaten coast path which, in this stretch, was a mix of ground granite and bare outcroppings. But the weather had been dry for days and he found no footprints. While Morgan and Andrew watched, he skidded down the steep slope to the grassy terrace where Lee, who was now with Nicola at the hospital in Penzance, had been injured. But apart from the flattened grass where the girl had sat, he saw nothing unusual.
It was as he struggled to climb back up to the level ground above that he realized that the fact that he could see nothing unusual on the cliff face was, in fact, what was unusual: rock falls were common on this storm-battered coast but the rock here was uniformly weathered and intact; there were no scars from fresh breaks. Wildflowers sprang from the crevices. The rock here was stable; it had not shelved off or fallen.
He was winded and his heart was doing its odd little dance when he regained the coast path. Morgan ordered him to sit.
“Something wrong here,” he said, panting.
“No kidding, you idiot: you can’t breathe!”
He shook his head. “I’m working on that, my dear, but that’s not my point.
Something’s missing.”
“Besides your common sense?”
West clambered to his feet and looked around. There was an old stone hedge that separated the coast path’s right of way from the farm field just above. He did not walk toward it directly but took a circuitous route so as not to disturb the grass and bracken in between. Then he picked his way along the foot of the hedge until he found what he’d already guessed must be there…or rather, not there. This particular hedge, like many in the area, was built of roughly horizontal granite blocks and then topped with thinner stones set on edge to divert rainwater and winter frost away from the core of the hedge. Directly opposite the injured girl’s “special place,” one of these big sharp stones was missing and the faces of its neighboring stones were freshly abraded.
He retraced his steps and ordered his team look for any evidence in the bracken.
“It’s assault or attempted murder, Morgan,” he said. “One more mystery on this apparently accursed estate. Something’s going on here. Someone meant serious harm this time. I don’t know why.”
His shoulders sagged. “I’m tired. Let’s go home and let the lads finish.”
Morgan took his elbow and the two of them walked back up the narrow valley to their waiting cars.
“You okay to drive?”
“Yes, Morgan luv. Better now.” He looked at his colleague for a moment, at her handsome, chiseled face, her spiky blonde hair, and her voluptuous figure and saw beyond her prickly manner. He realized she genuinely cared for him and…that he actually adored her.
IT WAS LATE Thursday night. They lay in each other’s arms on the big sofa before the glow of the coals in her sitting room fire. Mary reckoned dinner had been a success; he’d wolfed it down like a man starving. She wondered when he’d eaten last but did not ask. They’d finished a second bottle of Verdicchio. The sex had been long, strong, and thrilling.
She got up, walked into her bedroom and brought out his clean clothes. She felt conscious of her naked body, standing before him, and proud that he wanted her.
“I washed your clothes; I hope you don’t mind?” She bowed slightly and winked.
“Certo che no. Sei molto gentile, grazie!” He reached out his arms to pull her back upon him.
“It was a bit of a struggle getting out the bloodstains,” she said into his chest, “but they’re mostly gone. What happened? I heard a cow was killed just north of Zennor a few days ago; were you there to help?”
He paused just for a moment while he thought, and then he smiled and shook his head: “Una pecora…sheep? E una volpe…fox? I try to save. I fail.”
She straddled his lap and kissed him. “I’m so sorry. The foxes are so vicious. I suppose they must be, just to survive. But at least you tried to help, you darling man.”
He nodded but looked away. “Si. Ho provato…I try.”
She held him close, pressing her breasts against his chest, but he seemed to have pulled inside himself.
“Are you all right?”
“Si, Si. Sto bene. But is time I go.”
“But…?” She wanted more. She wanted him to stay the night with her.
“Tired, amore.”
He dressed silently, gathered the folded laundry, and embraced her: “Domani, cara mia. Domani.”
She stood at the door, naked, and watched him walk up the lane.
He closed his cottage door, went to the kitchen, poured another glass of wine, and sat.
He had not anticipated this danger.
FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER, wrapped now in a white terrycloth robe, she answered a knock at her door.
“Oh! It’s you!”
Fifteen
IT WAS A young couple, or rather the boyfriend, who spotted the body late Friday afternoon. Tommy O’Dea and Tara Fields, his young co-worker from the department store chain Marks & Spencer’s, had rented Mary Trevean’s hay barn cottage by the cliffs for a “naughty weekend.” Tommy, an Irishman from Galway and an ambitious business graduate from University College, Dublin, had been promoted to menswear manager at the big M&S store at Cribb’s Causeway Mall, just outside Bristol. Tara, just twenty-two and a lithe brunette with cropped hair slashed with a thin line of blue dye along the right side and a silver stud in her right nostril, worked in the store’s food hall. Used to seeing Tommy in suit and tie she found him even sexier in tight jeans and a pressed light blue chambray dress shirt rolled up to his elbows. As they sped south in his black Audi A3 Friday afternoon, she noticed a delicate geometric Celtic tattoo traced around his normally covered right forearm as he held the wheel. She thought that mysterious and sexy, too. They’d had lunch together for a few weeks when Tommy suggested they go away. To his surprise, she accepted. She’d followed his advancement in the company and had decided to grab on to his rising star. Tommy was going places. She’d go with him.
They’d had lunch at an ancient, if touristy, pub on Bodmin Moor: the Jamaica Inn. He told her it had figured in a famous book by Daphne du Maurier. She’d never heard of it.
Later that afternoon Tommy pressed the buzzer mounted on the enamel-white frame of the door to Mary’s farmhouse. No one answered. Not to be deterred, for he was rather eager for this weekend with Tara to begin, Tommy walked around the old farmhouse peering into the ground floor windows. He saw nothing until, from a sitting room window, he caught sight of a bare foot. It protruded from behind a sofa, the back of which faced him. Nothing else was visible from his angle. He raced around to the front of the house and, thinking the landlord was ill or had passed out, hammered on the door. There was no answer. The door was locked. He thought of breaking a window but instead punched 999 into his mobile, the police emergency number.
Tara stepped out of the Audi and met Tommy as he walked away from the house.
“What’s the problem? Is she not at home, Tommy? How will we get our key?”
“Someone is home, luv, but lying on the floor. Unconscious, I think. I’ve spoken to the police.”
“Wait, will this ruin our weekend?”
“I don’t know. Perhaps, okay?” And in that moment Tommy O’Dea knew Tara Fields was not for him.
“TERRY? PENWARREN HERE.”
Terry Bates was at her desk at the Bodmin hub. Penwarren was on his way home to Padstow. It had just gone 4:00.
“Comms just contacted me. We’ve got a body down in Boswednack, south of Zennor. Treen Farm. Can you get there straightaway? Morgan’s on a training course in Exeter: community relations, if you can credit it. Can’t reach her. This one’s yours. West is already on his way, along with the forensic pathologist. They’ll be there first. Fast as you can, right?”
“On it, Sir.” She was grinning and was glad “Mister” couldn’t see her.
Bates grabbed her murder kit and headed for the police car park at the rear of the building. This was her first independent murder investigation. She jumped into a white unmarked two-door Ford Escort, wishing she could use a regulation squad car with its lights and claxon siren, and tore out of the lot heading for the A30 south.
DR. JENNIFER DUNCAN, one of two forensic pathologists under contract to the Devon and Cornwall Police, knelt beside the body of Mary Trevean. Duncan had been wrapping up an autopsy at the mortuary in the Royal Cornwall Hospital at Treliske, just up-county outside Truro, when she got the call. She’d driven south and had just begun her examination when she heard the unmistakable growl of Calum West’s turbocharged Volvo Estate as it down-shifted and skidded into the farmyard.
Man’s a menace, she thought to herself, but a brilliant driver. But she was glad to have her favorite crime scene manager on this one.
West logged in with the young community service officer guarding the yellow police tape outside the door, climbed into his white Tyvek jumpsuit and blue paper booties, clamped a hair cap on his head, pulled on two pairs of nitrile gloves (the top pair were always entered into evidence), and entered the house.
“We must find other ways to meet, Jennifer; these rendezvous are always so un
seemly…”
“You look like hell, Calum.”
“These outfits are not flattering.”
“I’m talking about you face. You’re knackered.”
“Remind me never to marry a forensic pathologist; I was down here last night. Case nearby. A lot of driving, not much sleep.”
She smiled, patted his cheek gently, and went back to work. West began taking scene photos. The room was tastefully decorated, like one that might have been pictured in his late wife’s favorite magazine, Country Living. The walls were painted a muted light gray with a touch of brown to warm it. The carpet was a darker warm gray. At one end of the long room a white slipcovered sofa faced a hearth with a small jet black Victorian era cast iron coal grate and surround. Its ashes had not been cleared but were cold. Flanking the sofa were two easy chairs covered in natural linen in a herringbone weave. In the center, there was a weathered antique pine tea table stained with a pale lime wash. Bookshelves lined one wall—apparently, the victim was a reader. At the end of the room, opposite the hearth, stood a baby grand piano polished so high that the early evening summer sunlight slanting through the room was almost blinding. A peaceful, domestic scene, West thought.
The victim lay on her back on the carpeted floor. There was no blood. There were no evident signs of violence either upon her body or anywhere in the room itself. It was as if she’d simply fainted.
Except that she was dead.
West watched the deceptively young-looking pathologist examine every inch of the woman’s now naked corpse. She’d cut off the victim’s plush white robe and bagged it for West as evidence. He’d check the pieces later for hair and fibers. She clipped off and bagged the woman’s fingernails for analysis of whatever might be beneath them. Next, she checked the victim’s rectal temperature and swabbed every orifice. It was standard procedure and though it always seemed to West a violation of the deceased, he left her to it. The last thing she did was uncurl the victim’s fingers and take prints.