by Jean Rowden
‘That’s true, I’ll keep it in mind, though we’ve found no cartridge, and there weren’t any powder burns on the coats. Still, I think I’d better get this area searched again. If this was missed, maybe there’s something else we haven’t found.’
‘If we’re looking for a sharp instrument, there’s a lot of tools inside,’ Deepbriar suggested. ‘And Simon keeps a good edge on them.’
Stubbs grimaced. ‘Sergeant Jakes and the fingerprint chappy were supposed to have checked those, the first day we were here, but I suppose it won’t hurt to take another look.’
At first sight the task was daunting, but many of the tools obviously hadn’t been moved for several months. In half an hour they were down to three possible weapons; a pruning knife, a scythe, and a spade. All of them had been cleaned recently, and were extremely sharp. ‘Doesn’t bear thinking about,’ Deepbriar mused, inspecting the spade without touching it, and with an uncomfortable image in his head of old Bronc’s scrawny neck beneath its many layers of clothing. ‘This would be lethal, slashed across a man’s throat.’
‘Everything was checked for fingerprints, you can pick it up,’ Stubbs said, lifting the knife gingerly between finger and thumb, ‘I’ll send these to County headquarters. I’ve heard they can find traces of blood, left in dents or scratches in the metal or in the joint with the handle, even when a weapon’s been cleaned.’
‘Yes sir, I’ve heard that. Pretty clever these scientific types,’ Deepbriar agreed, stopping short of admitting that his knowledge came from one of Dick Bland’s recent adventures.
‘Go and fetch Giddens,’ Stubbs said. ‘We’ll give him a treat, seeing as he found that bloodstain; these young lads love to get behind the wheel of a car, he’ll enjoy a trip to the big city. And we’ll send them a sample of that earth, too, just to make sure we’re not getting excited over a spilt can of paint!’
Mrs Emerson was inclined to be a little sulky when they returned to the house, but when Stubbs sat her down and informed her that they needed to take a formal statement, with Deepbriar ordered to take down her every word, she recovered her good humour. ‘Oh, my,’ she said archly. ‘I do hope I’m not a suspect, inspector.’
‘Not at the moment, madam,’ Stubbs replied, straight faced. ‘But we do need to clarify a few things.’ He started by asking her about the events of the weekend before Bronc’s disappearance, and had some difficulty persuading her not to give a repeat performance of her leading role on the Saturday evening.
‘We know the man only arrived in Minecliff after most of the villagers were gathered in the hall to see Madame Butterfly,’ the inspector told her, holding up a hand to interrupt her in full flow, ‘so let’s start when you returned home, shall we?’
Deepbriar’s fingers were cramped by the time they reached the details of what happened on Monday evening; nothing of any interest had come to light, despite a minute by minute account of Mrs Emerson’s life. Of one thing she was certain; she would have heard a gunshot if a weapon had been fired in her garden.
‘I can hear the guns clearly when the Colonel has people shooting on his land,’ she said, ‘and since I mentioned the noise to him he makes sure they don’t come too close, but I still find it quite deafening. And I am a very light sleeper, the least sound awakens me. It’s a price one pays for having an artistic temperament. In spring I’m always awake at dawn, the birds make such a noise. At this time of year I’m quite grateful for the longer nights, although occasionally an owl disturbs me, screeching the way they do.’
‘Just one more thing then,’ Stubbs said. ‘Are there any firearms in the house, Mrs Emerson? Perhaps your husband had a shotgun to keep the rabbits down? Or some people brought weapons home from the War, as a keepsake.’
She shuddered. ‘On no, nothing like that. I wouldn’t allow anything so dangerous under my roof. And my poor dear Edgar was in the pay corps, as far as I know he was never given a gun.’
‘How about the tools in the garden shed? Do you ever use any of them?’
She looked shocked, as if he had said something indecent. ‘Oh no. I have a little fork and trowel, and some scissors for cut flowers, that sort of thing. I keep those in the conservatory. The bothy is entirely Witherby’s responsibility.’
It was as they were leaving that Mrs Emerson suddenly remembered that she had something to tell Constable Deepbriar. ‘I’m so sorry, Thorny, all this excitement, it quite drove the other matter from my mind,’ she said. ‘That kind Mr Harvey gave up his bridge evening to help me check through the property store at the village hall on Friday. Do you know, it’s the strangest thing, but only one item was missing, and I can’t imagine why anyone would want to steal it.’
‘Let me guess,’ Deepbriar said. ‘It was a plaster cast.’
‘Why yes!’ She clasped her hands together as if in amazement, though there was a touch of disappointed resentment in her eyes. ‘How clever of you!’
‘And,’ Deepbriar added, not without a touch of asperity in his voice, ‘I suspect you told a few other people about it. Maybe on Saturday?’
‘I believe I may have mentioned it, yes.’ She sighed and fluttered her eyelids at him. ‘Was that naughty of me? I went into church to see how the flower ladies were getting on, and then I had to call at the shop. Everyone in the village is so very friendly, don’t you think, all these rustic types, they are so rural and homely, and always ready to stop for a chat.’
Which cleared up the mystery of Bert Bunyard’s abrupt exit, Deepbriar thought glumly, as he extricated himself from the woman’s clutches and followed Stubbs to the conservatory.
Simon Witherby was muttering to himself as he scattered DDT over some begonias. He gave the two police officers a baleful look as they came in, closing the door behind them.
‘I’m almost out of baccy,’ he grumbled, when Stubbs invited him to sit down so they could talk, ‘I was going to the shop. She’ll be closed for lunch by the time I get there.’
‘Have one of mine,’ the inspector offered, holding out a pack of Players. ‘If you don’t mind smoking ready-made.’
‘They’ll do,’ Witherby said. ‘But I don’t know what you’re after now. I told that young copper everything. Took it all down in writing he did.’
‘Yes, I know. And we’re grateful for your help, but there are just a few more things I need to ask you. That spot behind the shed. You didn’t notice that there was something strange about it?’
‘I’ve not been round there in months, not since I slashed the nettles down, back in summer. Would have got round to raking off the leaves in a week or two, other than that I’ve no call to go rooting about in corners, there’s more than enough to be done in a garden this size, specially when I’m only here Mondays and Fridays.’
‘And you haven’t dropped anything out there, no paint or oil or anything?’
Witherby looked at him scornfully. ‘You trying to tell me what that young chap found isn’t blood? I was on the Somme. I’ve seen a pint or two spilt in my time, and the smell’s enough to tell you, even if it has been there a fair old time. And before you ask, no, I didn’t notice that neither, not till your bobby started digging around in it.’
‘Fair enough. We’ll be taking away some of your tools. They’ll be returned as soon as we’ve finished with them.’
‘And how am I supposed to do my job without my blooming tools?’ Witherby demanded.
‘We’re only taking three items, and you seem to have plenty more hanging up in the shed, quite an arsenal in fact. Lots of good sharp blades.’
‘You really think old Bronc was killed with something out of my shed?’ The gardener seemed to shrink visibly at the thought.
‘It’s a long shot, Simon,’ Deepbriar consoled him, ‘but we have to check.’
‘Well, I don’t think we need to keep you any longer,’ Stubbs said, getting to his feet, ‘unless you’ve got anything you’d like to ask, constable?’
‘There is one thing, sir,’ Deepbriar said, pleasantly s
urprised by the inspector’s invitation. ‘Do you remember what Bronc was wearing when you met him that Saturday morning?’
‘Aye.’ Witherby gathered himself together, his face resuming its usual rather jaundiced expression. ‘He had on that silly hat, the one I found by the compost heap. And the mac, that was in the bonfire. The same one he were wearing last year, and the year before that too I reckon. I already told you that, Thorny.’
‘I know. You didn’t happen to notice if the coat was torn, did you?’
‘It was a bit tattered,’ Witherby said. ‘But I don’t know as it were any worse than usual. What’s that to do with owt?’
‘I see what you’re getting at, Deepbriar,’ Inspector Stubbs’s eyes narrowed. ‘The older coat was badly torn when it was found. You think that happened when he was attacked.’
‘No, I think it happened when a car knocked him into the ditch on the way to Minecliff,’ Deepbriar said, ‘though what that’s got to do with him disappearing I honestly don’t know. Where do you think Bronc might have gone on the Monday, Simon? He wouldn’t be tramping the roads just for the fun of it, not at this time of year.’
The gardener shook his head. ‘I don’t know, and that’s a fact. I thought he’d moved on to Goldings, but George swears he never went there.’
‘George?’ Stubbs asked.
‘Hopgood,’ Deepbriar said. ‘He’s foreman at Goldings. I checked with him myself, and spoke to a couple of his men. Bronc hasn’t been seen there since the spring.’
Stubbs gave Witherby two more cigarettes before they left, and the old gardener stuck them behind his ear with a nod of thanks. The inspector led the way to the police car that was waiting to carry him back to Falbrough.
‘Unless there was some jiggery pokery with the hat and the parcel, Bronc was out and about on Monday, which means somebody must have seen him,’ Stubbs said. ‘I don’t see much point widening our search for the moment, we’ve covered the whole of the village.’
‘Hold on, I think I’ve been missing something here,’ Deepbriar said, stopping in his tracks. ‘Bronc was in the pub!’
‘What? When?’
‘Monday lunch-time. I’m sorry inspector, Harry Bartle told me, but it had slipped my mind. He came visiting when I was in hospital, and my head wasn’t too clear at the time. He said Bronc had been in the porch at the Speckled Goose, and there’d been a man in there talking to him. A stranger.’
‘Yes, I knew there was somebody in there, I heard them talking.’ Don Bartle was thinking hard, his brows furrowed with the effort. ‘But I didn’t see who it was with Bronc. And it’s no use asking Phyllis, she was in Belston visiting her cousin.’
‘Harry didn’t see him either,’ Deepbriar said. It was frustrating. He’d found three people who swore old Bronc was talking to somebody in the pub that Monday lunch-time, but the most he could discover about the stranger was that he wore a pale coat and dark hat, that he wasn’t very short, nor very tall, and that when he left the pub he had hurried out of the village on foot, in the direction of Gadwell, a village some four miles away.
‘Sorry, Thorny,’ Don said. ‘We were a bit busy. We had a barrel sprung a leak, and Harry was down in the cellar dealing with it for the best part of an hour.’
‘Not to worry,’ the constable sighed. ‘It’s back to knocking on doors for me, see if anyone else saw this man, but I can’t say I’m hopeful.’
He started with the three houses between the pub and the open road that led to Gadwell. As he expected, nobody had seen the stranger. It was a Monday, which meant Minecliff’s housewives were all occupied with their laundry, just as they had been three weeks before.
It was a quarter to three, and he’d only had a sandwich for his lunch. Deepbriar headed back towards the police house, thinking he had time to snatch a cup of tea and a slice of Mary’s cake, if those vultures from Falbrough hadn’t eaten it all. As he turned in at the gate he heard the hand bell being rung in the school yard, announcing the end of afternoon play time. The sound brought him to a stop. He swung round and hurried back down the road, and was just in time to see the last pupil, a boy in a tattered jumper, overlong shorts and with woolly socks gathered at the ankles, dashing across the yard from the outdoor privy to the Victorian brick building that had been Minecliff’s school for over a hundred years.
‘I hope none of our pupils have been misbehaving themselves,’ Mrs Harris said, once the normal pleasantries were out of the way, and the constable was settled in the visitor’s chair with a cup of tea and a plate of ginger biscuits before him. ‘Nobody trying to climb on to Mr Coe’s shed from our roof?’ She added innocently.
Deepbriar had been caught attempting that feat in answer to a dare, during Mrs Harris’s very first year as headmistress. He swallowed hastily and nearly choked on a ginger crumb.
‘Another old pupil of mine came to mind this morning,’ Mrs Harris said, giving the constable a chance to recover, ‘when I cycled past Oldgate Farm. Poor Mr Pattridge, he was devastated by John’s death, and I’m afraid Tony had spent so long in the shadow of his brother that he had no hope of redeeming himself. People tended to think of him as a rogue, even as a child, but I think most of it was merely an attempt to be noticed. He had a good brain.’
‘His father never rejected him,’ Deepbriar said, ‘but he took it hard when Tony didn’t even get in touch with him over Christmas.’
‘Did he not?’ Mrs Harris’s eyebrows lifted in surprise. ‘That’s strange. I met Tony in Belston last year, about the middle of December. He was out with little Barbara Baker. They were friends at school, before her mother died and she went to live with her grandparents in Belston. That was during the War of course, her father was in the army.’ She smiled. ‘They made a good-looking couple, I confess I hoped I might soon be hearing of an engagement. I gathered the pair of them had been shopping, and I’m sure Barbara said she’d helped Tony choose a present for old Mr Pattridge.’
‘If she did I’m afraid he never received it,’ Deepbriar said.
The headmistress shook her head sadly. ‘A shame, I always thought Tony might have turned out well, given time. Well, Thorny, it’s nice to sit and chat but I have got work to do. How can I help you?’
‘I’m looking for information. I was wondering if there were any lads out of school on Monday the third. I know one or two of them are inclined to play hooky, especially on a Monday.’
Mrs Harris sighed. ‘That’s unfortunately true. It’s a perennial problem. Why are you interested in that particular day?’
Deepbriar explained about Bronc’s disappearance, and the stranger who had been seen talking to him. ‘In my experience, young lads are pretty observant. If one of them happened to be hanging around outside the village there’s just a chance they might have seen something.’
‘I’Il check the registers,’ Mrs Harris said, rising from behind her desk. She smiled, taking a packet of biscuits from a drawer to replenish the nearly empty plate. ‘You seem hungry, Constable, do have another ginger nut.’
‘It was about something that happened three weeks ago, Mrs Pratt,’ Deepbriar said, standing outside a council house three doors up from Honeysuckle Cottage where Joe and Emily Spraggs lived. ‘It’s all right, he’s not in trouble.’
‘That makes a change,’ the woman said harshly, rubbing her damp and wrinkled hands together. ‘Young beggar. And now he’s got the measles if you please, as if I ’aven’t enough to do without running up and down stairs all day! You’d best come in.’ She nodded at the stairs. ‘First door on the right. I got me washin’ to finish.’
Kenny Pratt lay on a narrow bed under a couple of blankets, with an old rug and his school coat spread on top. He looked up in alarm as the large uniformed figure loomed in the doorway.
‘It’s all right, Kenny,’ the constable assured him. ‘Whatever it is you’ve been up to, we’ll wait till you’re better before we run you off to gaol. Can’t have all the prisoners catching the measles, can we?’
The boy grinned, only a little uneasy. ‘Ain’t done nothin’,’ he said.
‘How about playing hooky three weeks ago?’ Deepbriar lowered himself warily on to the room’s only available seat, a rather rickety three legged stool.
‘You ain’t lockin’ me up for that, Mr Deepbriar,’ Kenny replied, his confidence returning.
‘Not this time. Not if you do something for me.’
‘Like what?’
‘Help me if you can. See, we’re looking for somebody, and there’s just a chance you might have seen him.’ He described the stranger, and how he’d left the Speckled Goose at about one-thirty on the day Kenny had decided to skip school.
Kenny shook his head. ‘Didn’t see ’im,’ he said. ‘Saw somebody else though.’
‘Who was that?’
‘Old Bunyard.’
‘That’s Mr Bunyard to you,’ Deepbriar reproved him. ‘When was this?’
‘Bell ’ad just gone arter lunch, ’bout ’alf past one. ’E was on them crutch things, goin’ up the ’ill towards the old aerodrome. Cussin’ an’ swearin’ ’e was, but ’e was gettin’ along all right. I kept me ’ead down, didn’t want ’im seein’ me.’
‘You didn’t see anyone else? Somebody you might recognise even if he didn’t live in the village?’
‘Old Bronc you mean?’ The boy shook his head. ‘Everyone knows ’e’s gone missin’, I’d ’a’ said if I’d seen ’im.’
‘And you didn’t see anything else out of the ordinary that day?’ Deepbriar was disappointed, it had been a long shot but he had great faith in the inquisitive nature of small boys.
‘I saw a car parked up the lane. A sports car it was. Ol’ Bunyard, I mean Mr Bunyard, ’e ’ad to squeeze past it.’
‘The lane to the aerodrome?’
Kenny nodded.
‘So, it was parked where nobody could see it from the village,’ Deepbriar said thoughtfully. ‘I don’t suppose you took down the number?’