The Trebelzue Gate

by Anna Fitzwilliam

  Esther McCarthy lived in a cottage named Hillbrow, halfway down the steep hill into St Mawgan village. The walls of the cottage were painted white, the door and the window frames a bright lemon yellow. In the porch well-tended pot plants sat in shallow tins which had once contained Fray Bentos pies. Esther showed Sergeant Bee through a low beamed living room into the kitchen at the back of the house. The back door was open onto the garden; runner bean plants had begun to climb a framework of bamboo canes and two rows of young leeks grew strongly, the shape of their green tops stylised and heraldic. Beyond the vegetable rows a girl of six or seven in a pink anorak was pushing a small bicycle and singing to herself.

  ‘My granddaughter,’ said Esther. Her accent was southern Irish. Adroitly she lifted the kettle from the cooker just as it began to whistle. She asked the sergeant if he minded a mug and he said that he preferred it that way.

  ‘There’s cake if you like,’ she took the lid from a round tin.

  ‘So, you’ve been combing those woods then,’ she observed. She stood watching him, holding the mug with both hands, close to her chest.

  ‘Good cake this,’ said the sergeant.

  ‘It came out a bit dry but no doubt it will fill a hole.’ She drank some of her tea.

  ‘Have you worked for them long, the Haig-Mercers?’

  ‘Long enough, more than twenty years. Sometimes I wonder why I stay up there, you know. My daughter’s always telling me to call it a day.’

  ‘And are you tempted?’

  ‘Tempted right enough, but we need the money, at least until Neil gets himself properly set up – my son-in-law, he’s a musician, folk, you know. So my daughter says, well at least get something less demanding, something with more regular hours.’

  ‘Do you have to work late?’

  ‘To be fair, not like I used to do. There’s no entertaining to speak of nowadays, not like there was. Nothing’s been the same since the old man went.’ She held the knife over the cake with a questioning look.

  ‘Best not,’ he said, ‘Do the young couple not do much entertaining then?’

  ‘Not so as you’d notice. Sometimes there’ll be people over to do with this shooting business they’re setting up, like that agent fellow Payne, he’s going to invest in it. Madam might give a lunch once in a blue moon, but nothing like the old days.’

  ‘Not much life to the house then?’

  ‘God, no. This scheme for the shoot, Nicholas and his wife, Felicity, they’ve had to work together on it, but she’s the one puts the energy into it. To be honest with you, I think he’s lost interest in the estate. They go their own separate ways most of the time. He does his bit with the tenant farmers and the holiday cottages, though Lydia would look after most of that for him. And half the time nowadays he comes to me and says Esther, I’ll be eating out so not to bother for me and then the two women are up there on their own in the dining room. I said to Madam, it’s not worth using it, they should put the dust sheets on and just use the breakfast room. She said to me, Esther, to be perfectly honest with you I’d as soon have a tray on my lap.’

  ‘And what about the younger Mrs H-M, does she go out much?’

  ‘Not her, she’s no friends to speak of - except for that Heather one of course.’

  ‘Heather?’

  ‘Yes, the lady doctor, she’s at the GP surgery in the town. So, what story did the old lady give out to you about Nicholas then, all about how he wasn’t as good as his brother?’

  ‘She did mention the elder son, yes.’

  ‘I bet she did too, never misses an opportunity to tell people that Nicholas isn’t as good as Peter.’

  ‘Did you know both boys?’

  ‘I did. I knew them from years back, growing up, in their old place at home - in Ireland, you know, they would come over for the summer holidays. Peter was always the favourite, he was full of energy, good at sports, he used to get into mischief, but he always got forgiven, you know the sort. Nicholas now, he wasn’t sporty, he liked his books and his studies. The old man used to try and bring him out a bit. After Peter died, Nicholas turned in on himself more, he went off to university and then he got himself a job with a publisher, I think he was really happy doing that but when the old man took sick they made him come back to run the estate. I’m sure he never wanted to…’ she broke off to look out at the little girl was ‘she’s gone quiet … what’s she up to out there … oh, she’s all right, happy as can be…’

  ‘On Tuesday, what time did you leave?’

  ‘About six, it would have been,’

  ‘And you must come along part of the road through the woods to get here, do you remember seeing anything unusual?’

  ‘Not really. The dafty one, Robin, he was out, but then he’s always hanging about.’

  ‘What was he doing?’

  ‘Just the usual, standing at the edge of the road, like he does. I think he likes to watch the cars go by. I always give him a wave, unless I’ve got Kerry in the car, she’s frightened of him.’

  ‘What do you think of him?’

  ‘I’d say he was just tuppence short, you know, but on the other hand I wouldn’t let Kerry out to play if I thought he was nearby. Are you thinking he’s a suspect then?’

  ‘We’re keeping an open mind, talking to everybody who might have seen something. What about the family, where were they on Tuesday?’

  ‘Missus was home on her own. I cooked for her at lunchtime so that she could have a cold supper when she felt like it – she probably had it on a tray in front of the telly. Nicholas had gone up to London, he left in the morning, about ten, he was going to leave his car at Bodmin Parkway and get the train up. Felicity, she went off to some game fair, at the Bath and West showground. She was staying overnight.’

  ‘And what time did they come back?’

  ‘Felicity, she came back on the Wednesday afternoon. I remember because she dumped a great pile of brochures and stuff from the game fair on the table, right where I was trying to get the vegetables done in a hurry. I’d heard there was some kerfuffle over the other side of the airfield and I had to pick up Kerry from school, I was afraid the traffic might be bad. Nicholas, I don’t know when he got back from London. I saw his car in the stable yard when I left but I don’t think he’d come into the house, but that’s not unusual, I think he’d rather be over there with Lydia. I said to her once, you look after him like a mother.’

  While Sergeant Bee was eating cake in Esther’s kitchen, Monica was driving towards St Eval. Walter Thurn, officer commanding USNAWF, the United States Naval Aviation Weapons Facility, lived in the largest house on the St Eval married quarters site. During the war St Eval, some nine miles north of RAF St Mawgan, had also been an operational airfield, now only the service housing and stretches of tarmac runway remained. The old runway was much used by local people taking driving lessons. All the roads of married quarters housing at St Eval were named after aircraft. The airmen’s quarters were long grey terraces, hurriedly built in the 1940s from pre-cast sections of concrete and china clay waste. The road names were Wellington, Wildebeest and Sunderland, Lincoln, Orion and Anson, Hudson, Warwick and Botha, Halifax and Lancaster. The officers’ quarters, larger, detached or semi-detached houses, rendered and white painted and standing in rows and avenues, were named Neptune and Beaufighter, Lerwick, Spitfire and Catalina.

  Commander Thurn’s house was in Catalina Row. Its broad metal framed windows looked out towards the grassy space which served St Eval as a village green. On the green there was a children’s playground, and beyond it a NAAFI shop and social centre.

  Mrs Thurn answered the door, a slim woman in a patterned silk tunic shirt and white trousers. She was tanned and smiling and welcoming. Her teeth were very white teeth and her brown hair was streaked with blonde. Monica was reminded of someone.

  ‘Come on in, I’m Laura. Do dogs bother you?’ asked Mrs Thurn.

  A young corgi was at her heels, wagging its stump of a tail so that its whole body squirme
d and wriggled under a coat still puppyish in its plushness.

  ‘Not at all,’ said Monica.

  ‘However, I think I will pick him up, he just loves people and he can be a little too enthusiastic with visitors.’ She turned, confidingly, ‘You know, the other day a friend asked me why I make such a big deal of my dog, pets are just part of the furniture, she said. So, I said to her, you know, the day my couch jumps up and greets me when I get home, that’s the day I’ll go along with you on that.’

  Monica followed her through to a dining room, the pale tawny rump of the dog fidgeting under Mrs Thurn’s arm. There were silver candelabra on the highly polished table. French doors stood open onto the garden. On the crazy paving beyond a fair-haired middle-aged man was inspecting the shaft of a golf club. He wore a grey polo shirt and grey checked Bermuda shorts. Relaxed and friendly, he stepped forward to greet them. His eyes were clear and wide and blue.

  ‘Good to meet you, I’m sorry it’s taken a while to organise. Please, come and sit down.’

  Garden chairs and a swing seat were arranged on the lawn. Monica chose a chair. When she was seated the commander said

  ‘I believe you have some connection with the Navy too, don’t you Chief Inspector? The Royal Navy of course.’

  The commander was sitting on the deep cushions of the swing seat. The cushions were upholstered in a fabric patterned with green tropical leaves. The canopy had a fringe of tassels.

  Monica looked surprised, ‘Well, I was a cipher clerk at Admiralty during the war…’

  The commander’s wife appeared between them bearing a tray with a tall jug and glasses.

  ‘I guessed you might be thirsty. Arnold Palmers, non-alcoholic,’ she said.

  Monica took a sip from her glass.

  ‘That’s very good, thank you.’

  ‘You’re welcome,’

  ‘Uh huh,’ the commander continued, shifting his foot very slightly so that the seat swung gently, ‘and your husband, also?’

  ‘Well yes, but …’ Monica regarded the commander and then she smiled, ‘Did you honestly go into that much detail before agreeing to see me?’

  ‘M’am, only because my superiors insist that it’s vital to do so. Me personally, I’m just here to make sure everybody gets along,’ he smiled genially and from the cushion beside him he picked up a blue folder stamped with a gilt crest. Unobtrusively, Mrs Thurn was returning to the house with the tray. Gently she nudged the corgi with her sandaled foot and closed the French doors behind them. The commander opened the blue folder, inside there were several pages of typescript on flimsy, carbon copy paper. Lines and parts of lines in the text had been obscured, blocked out by bars of black ink.

  ‘I believe I have all the information you requested. But firstly, I’d like to say how sorry we all were to hear about this terrible incident.’

  ‘Did you ever meet Amanda Shute, Commander?’

  ‘Not that I am aware of. Laura and I have met Marilyn Shute at various functions. Also, we took out a membership at the Old Parsonage when we arrived, I believe the young lady worked there sometimes, but I don’t recall ever meeting her.’

  He held up the edge of a thin page between finger and thumb.

  ‘Here I have sworn statements from PFC Gene Azaria and PFC Leroy Gibbs of the United States Marine Corps. These corpsmen were on peritrack patrol detail on the night of June 19 from 20:00 hours.’

  ‘And this patrol, it is a regular routine, is it, Commander?’

  ‘It is indeed, M’am, around the clock.’

  With considered courtesy, the commander waited a moment before resuming.

  ‘Azaria was driver, Gibbs was observer. As they approached the northern dispersal area Gibbs noted a vehicle pulling on to the verge of the B376 Watergate Road, parallel to the perimeter fencing. Distance about 250 yards. Azaria halted and activated the spotlight on the jeep roof. His guess was that the driver was making a comfort stop and so, to use his words, ‘We thought we would light things up a bit’. You will understand and excuse, I hope, Chief Inspector, the night time patrol detail can be very dull for these boys. The driver had opened his door but as soon as the spotlight hit it was slammed shut again. The corpsmen followed on the inside of the wire but the vehicle drove off at speed. They then changed tack and reversed level with the spot where the driver had stopped. It was next to the gulley where the River … Menalhyl? – pardon me if my pronunciation is incorrect – flows away under the road and down towards the shore. Gibbs used a flashlight to inspect the site through the fence. He found nothing to report. They logged the incident at 02:23 hours and then resumed their patrol. No further activity was noted by the detail that night.’

  ‘Do they give a description of the driver?’

  ‘Minimal, wearing a driver cap, possibly a three-quarter coat.’

  ‘And the vehicle?’

  ‘It is recorded as a small delivery vehicle, a van, light in colour.’

  ‘And I don’t suppose they got the registration number?’

  ‘Unfortunately not, it was obscured by mud.’

  He closed the folder and smiled ‘And I’m afraid, Inspector, that’s just about all I have for you.’

  Monica said, ‘I’m grateful anyway, Commander, thank you.’

  ‘Sure, glad to help. We – that is my service colleagues and I - wish you every success with your investigation.’

  They stood up. They had begun to walk up the lawn when Monica paused

  ‘One other thing, Commander,’

  ‘M’am?’

  ‘That incident about eighteen months ago, when a young WAAF was attacked, I believe that there were some issues over RAF and civilian police being involved in the investigation. In consequence, it doesn’t seem quite clear how – if - it was all resolved.’

  The commander also paused. He nodded briefly and equably as though the question were to be expected and then he smiled.

  ‘As the man said, great power involves great responsibility. All the branches of the United States armed forces have a special – unique if you will – role overseas. We are very conscious of that role and of our duty as guests to abide by the laws of the host nation. However, we must also ensure our own security. Given the breadth of our engagements abroad, we have in place a status of forces agreement. This agreement allows us to handle any disciplinary issues internally. We keep our own house in order.’

  ‘And the marine concerned, did he go to prison?’

  ‘I am not able to comment on that matter specifically, Inspector. I can however assure you that the issue was dealt with proportionately. The corpsman is no longer serving in Europe, there can be no possible connection with this case.’

  ‘I see, thank you, Commander,’

  He shook her hand and said ‘Well, I hope I’ve been able to reassure you.’

  Silently Mrs Thurn had reappeared to show her out.

  ‘Good to meet you,’ she said. As she walked down the path Monica realised that Laura Thurn reminded her of Ethel Kennedy. An image from the cover of Time magazine.

  Out on the crazy paving Walter Thurn had resumed his absorbed inspection of the golf club. His lie had been well told. The registration plate had not been obscured by mud and the corpsmen had been able to read and record its details. In consequence, the vehicle had been traced to a small hire company in the St Paul’s district of Bristol. Among those tasked with ensuring the security of United States interests abroad, the location of this company had piqued a short-lived interest. For, also sited in the environs of St Paul’s, was a small but dedicated cell of anti-nuclear campaigners. Further enquiries were made. It was established that a Mrs Sandra Andrews, the hire company receptionist who had handled the booking of the van, was absent, on indefinite sick leave. Mrs Andrews was in the third trimester of her first pregnancy and there were some concerns about her blood pressure. However, before going on sick leave she had recorded the name of the hirer of the van in neat script in her ledger: a Mr Jenkins. At the behest of those making en
quiries, Stuart, the owner of the hire company, had telephoned Sandra to ask why she had not included more details. Sandra’s reply was defensive, it had been late in the afternoon, she said, and hot. Stuart knew how the sun struck full on the windows of her little cabin office in the afternoons. In any case, Mr Jenkins was a nice man, he had come from somewhere out Nailsea way and he needed the van because he was clearing his late mother’s house. A real hoarder, his mother had been, a proper magpie.

  Mrs Andrews, so close to her confinement, was not troubled with further questions. Therefore, neither Commander Thurn, who had told a lie, nor those who had directed his lie and who maintained a vigilant watch over such groups as the small cell of St Paul’s anti-nuclear protestors, ever knew or even suspected that there had been a second lie. For, in exchange for a useful sum of money, Sandra Andrews had been quite content to stay at home and to record and promulgate false anecdotal details of the hirer of the van. The sum of money involved was enough to defray her wages and to purchase a smart new navy blue Marmet perambulator. The pram would last her for two more babies, eventually being sold on through a card in a post office window.

  Out on the green two boys were flying a model aeroplane. Watching it dip and swoop, Monica wondered why, if the van had been too far away for the registration number to be read, the Marines corpsmen could have ascertained that it was obscured by mud.

  ‘So, the van driver was our killer, hoping to dump the body in the gulley under the road,’ said Sergeant Bee.

  ‘It seems likely,’ Monica replied. There was a light breeze from the Atlantic as they stood side by side on the verge of the coast road, watching the men who moved laboriously on all fours across the place where the River Menalhyl flowed down to the sea.

  ‘I shouldn’t think many people come along this road on foot, if a body was hidden in the gulley, it could have stayed there for ages before it was discovered.’

  They looked towards the large, grey, pre-cast concrete pipe. The water level was low, a depth of two or three inches, but its course was steady.