Death in Elysium

by Judith Cutler

  ‘But it’s my camera!’ I prodded the polythene bag, which he’d turned inside out.

  ‘So is that good news or bad?’ Theo asked, his arm tight round me.

  ‘One theory is that he lost Jodie’s camera and felt unable to face her. So he scarpered. That might be right.’

  ‘What if it isn’t?’ I asked, suddenly changing my mind. ‘What if … Surely, Dave, you must know someone who could – you know, check it over.’

  ‘Looking for what?’ Theo asked. ‘Blood? Fingerprints? I can see a bit of a dent. I still cling to your original idea, Jodie – he was so chagrined at having damaged it he simply couldn’t face you.’

  ‘But he knew it was insured. He’d have brought it back to me with some rigmarole about how it wasn’t his fault. He wouldn’t have chucked it away. You should have seen the way he looked at it, handled it. If it’s possible to love an inanimate object, at first sight, too, he loved it.’ I looked from face to unbelieving face. ‘He couldn’t wait to use it. And he wasn’t just snap-happy, content with rubbish, according to Mazza – he was meticulous. Mazza said he took one house again and again till he was satisfied with the results.’

  ‘Why don’t we look at the pictures he took?’ Theo said reasonably. ‘You’ve got those lightweight disposable gloves somewhere.’

  ‘In the kitchen.’

  He nipped off.

  ‘I used to wear them for cleaning the church brass. That was on the days I had manicures to worry about,’ I added ruefully.

  ‘And still should, if you ask me,’ Dave chipped back unexpectedly. ‘No need to let yourself go, you know, Jodie. Menopausal woman and all that.’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’ It was more an explosion than a question.

  Theo returned in time to stop a cousinly row. ‘Are these the ones? One size?’ We separated a pair each. He peered disbelievingly. ‘Are they really going to fit Dave and me?’

  They did. But though the men were kitted up, I was going to be the one to pick up and examine the camera, which I did as tenderly as Burble had done. Apart from the minor dent on the lens cap, all seemed fine. But it wouldn’t let me review what he’d taken. I was ready to exclaim that he must have thrown it down in a fit of pique. Then I read the on-screen message: NO MEMORY CARD.

  Stupidly I looked anyway.

  The battery was still in place. Well, it had to be, for me to get the message. But the slot beside the battery was empty. I pointed.

  ‘Could it just have fallen out?’ Theo asked.

  I passed him the camera. ‘See if you can make the battery fall out? Go on, a really good shake … No? That’s why I bought it. Idiot proof.’

  ‘Not that you’re an idiot,’ Dave said, so sharply Theo blinked at him.

  ‘Was the battery cover open or closed when you found it?’ I asked.

  ‘It was just as it was when I gave it to you. So no, I didn’t look round for anything – I’d have been hard put to with all that gorse.’ He displayed a badly scratched arm. ‘But I did mark the spot. Just in case,’ he added meaningfully.

  ‘In case this finally interests the police?’ Theo asked.

  ‘Quite. Unfortunately, in this economic climate it’ll take a lot of information to interest them. Which is why, Jodie, I think you’re right about getting it checked. I’ve got a contact who’s a freelance forensic scientist. Let’s just get a nice clean polythene bag – you need some more by the way, Jodie. I had the last of the cheese—’

  ‘What a good job she did a supermarket run this morning,’ Theo said, in a tone I couldn’t quite register.

  ‘Meanwhile, I’ll take the camera to my forensic scientist friend. It’ll cost you, I’m afraid; she needs to earn a crust.’ He paused, possibly embarrassed.

  A her: ho, ho. I jumped in. ‘Whatever it costs, Dave – whatever!’

  He nodded, adding casually, ‘I’ll probably eat with her this evening, so don’t wait for me. Or wait up. OK if I take your car, Jodie?’

  ‘Of course. You know where the keys are. Any idea when your motorbike will be back, by the way?’

  He looked embarrassed, even shifty. ‘Actually I wouldn’t fancy leaving it in the open round here,’ he confessed. ‘It’s got every alarm going, but if someone came and picked up the whole thing bodily on to a truck, they’d probably get away with it.’

  ‘Not if you put it in the garage,’ Theo said firmly. ‘In a village like this Jodie needs wheels, just as I do. Now, I don’t mind leaving the Focus out – it’d almost be a mercy if someone did nick it – but I think you need your own transport. When it’s been repaired, that is. One of us can give you a lift to the garage whenever you need to pick it up.’

  I had a feeling I should have said that. After all, I would have done if someone had been employing me to say it. Sometime, somehow, I’d lost my edge, along with my pampered and painted hands.

  Theo had retired to his study with a strong cup of coffee. I donned some of those gloves and attacked the oven. After all, I’d sunk too much alcohol to run, and I had to find some other way of working off excess energy which avoided the villagers, not all of whom would have been impressed by what some of them would certainly have inaccurately called a media circus. There’d be no point in telling them that I’d had nothing to do with organizing it, and it would be demeaning even to try. If the young man angling for the contract to install his aunt’s shop in the church had wanted to float the news, then so be it. I thought he might have been a little premature, but, as I told the putative vegetable patch, there was nothing I could do now. And refusing to give an interview would have been churlish and hurtful to Violet, who no doubt would even now be telling all her friends to watch the six thirty news.

  Which, of course, we did ourselves. The piece about the shop’s move to the church was on, but bumped right down the order because the lead story was of a raid on a village post office near Dover. The thieves had brought up an official-looking low loader, rolled a JCB off it, and then driven the JCB into the front wall of the post office, scooping out the safe. Then, safe still aboard, it had trundled back up on to the low loader and been driven away. The low loader’s number plate was illegally but credibly obscured by mud. And there were no witnesses except the shocked and outraged post mistress, because all the villagers commuted out of the village to work. Hmm. That sounded familiar. So the link between that and our shop’s proposed move to the church was equivocal, to say the least. On the other hand, they’d got a spokesman from the diocese to comment very positively; perhaps he had his fingers crossed behind his back.

  Tonight was a WI meeting, but since it wouldn’t start till seven thirty, I had time to speak to Pill, assuming he and his Corsa were where Mazza had suggested. They were. Uninvited, I got in. The young man, who looked like a young John Lennon, nearly died at the wheel.

  ‘You’re Pill – right? No, I’ll ask the questions. When did you last see Burble? Did you sell him anything bad?’

  ‘Weed. Only stuff I use myself. Well, some skunk.’ He might have been auditioning for the BBC, his delivery was so RP. But he looked even less healthy than Burble.

  ‘Anything stronger? You know his mum died: bad heroin.’

  ‘Shit, no. I never touch chemicals. What about Burble? I’ve not seen him for a bit.’

  ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘He owes me sixty quid, so of course I’m sure.’

  ‘You say you use yourself. Do you grow it yourself? Hydroponics?’

  He looked as if he might embark on the sort of paean you’d expect an expert gardener to give on the subject of runner beans.

  ‘Look, Pill, have you heard of this latest pot-detecting device – sniff cards that tell people if someone’s growing illicit cannabis in their neighbourhood? Because if I have, other people keen on a reward will have done too.’ I let the information sink in. ‘Tell me, why start growing something like that in the first place? If you don’t nick someone else’s electricity, it can hardly be profitable.’

  ‘Someone I kne
w had MS. Cannabis is great for that.’ There was a long pause. I suspected the patient had died. ‘And the job situation.’

  ‘What’s your background?’ I managed not to groan as he told me. ‘So you have a biochemistry degree, student debts and no job? Look, Pill, you dry out, right, and kill your plants, and then take this card to the guy whose name’s on the back.’ I printed clearly. ‘Read it back to me. Right. Now, if you haven’t contacted him within the week and also got back to me to tell me what job he’s offered you and what you’ve accepted, I shall grass you up – pardon the pun. OK? I said, OK? Seems like a good deal to me. No gaol and a decent job, a reasonable way from here so you get a proper fresh start. My friend will find you accommodation.’ I got out of the car but leant back in. ‘I didn’t hear you say OK. Of course, I could just call the police now.’

  ‘OK.’ He checked the card, and added with a smile with a decent hint of humour in it, ‘OK, Doctor Harcourt.’ Then his voice got cockier. ‘Of course, nature abhors a vacuum, doesn’t it? So even if – even when – I give up, there’ll be a dozen others ready to take my place.’

  ‘Not if I have anything to do with it, Pill. Or perhaps from now you should become Philip again. Now, my friend there will check that you do have the qualifications you say you have. Please don’t disappoint him. Or me.’

  He looked like a kid suspected of stealing sweets. I was asking a lot of him, wasn’t I? I’d ask a bit more.

  ‘Who is it dealing heroin round here?’

  ‘I daren’t tell you. He might … OK, I won’t be round here, will I? He just calls himself Wiley. I think that may be his surname. And I fancy his initial’s D. But I … you know how it is, Doctor Harcourt.’

  I did. ‘How are you for cash?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘You might be short, since you obviously won’t have time to collect any drug debts you may be owed.’

  He took a deep breath. ‘If this mate of yours gives me an advance, I should be OK.’ He looked at his hands, as if not quite sure they were his; after a while, he stuck the right one in my direction. ‘Thanks. I think.’

  ‘No problem.’ I made as if to leave. ‘You’ll need a new phone. You wouldn’t want your old clients to be able to contact you and turn you from the path of righteousness, would you?’ I held out my hand for the phone, which I put right under his front wheel. I flicked him some nice used notes: ‘Get yourself a new phone – different number, right?’

  ‘I’ll text you as soon as I’ve spoken to this guy.’

  As would my contact, so I’d know he was telling the truth. I watched him put the Corsa into gear and solemnly squash the phone.

  And so, seamlessly, to the village hall and the WI.

  As I’d suspected from the lunch nibbles, the WI link with the pub was being nicely firmed up. It turned out that one of the other members, Tina, who’d given the impression of being ditzily impractical in an old-fashioned feminine way, had actually been a lawyer in her pre-retirement life, and a sharp one at that, at least if her skills with the contract between the WI and Suze of the Pickled Walnut were anything to go by.

  ‘So it’ll be just morning coffee for a trial period of a month,’ Tina told us, wild hair and hands whirling. ‘Softly, softly, catchee monkee, and all that. Then we might want to give up altogether or add in afternoon tea. And if everything works, we might want to join up the sessions by offering light lunches. But everything is subject to month by month agreement, which can be terminated with a month’s notice on either side.’

  ‘Time to draw up a rota, then,’ Elaine said, looking encouragingly – or compellingly – around the room at each member in turn.

  Including me.

  ‘But I can’t cook to save my life!’ I wailed in the privacy of our bedroom an hour or so later. ‘And I can’t excuse myself by claiming to have a full-time job.’

  ‘You’re pretty busy anyway,’ Theo said absently, attacking a hangnail.

  ‘Not so busy I can’t set aside a few hours.’ There were times when I was desperate for occupation, after all, though he wasn’t to know that. ‘It’s what I do in those few hours that worries me: imagine trying to pass off my poor cupcakes on paying customers.’

  By now I had his full attention. ‘Does it have to be cupcakes? What about jam or chutney? You could sell half of what you make for the church appeal. Which is, I have to point out, still very much in need of funds. I think we’ve got so jubilant about winning a battle, we’ve forgotten there’s still a major financial war on. And no, I’m not suggesting that you instantly raise some Monopoly money.’

  ‘What if I did what that vicar did who gave each of his flock a tenner and told them to go away and make money from it? No one simply walked off with the cash and most doubled or tripled it … I could provide the cash for the initial investment.’

  He cupped my face in his hands and kissed me. ‘You have a generous soul, my dear one. I’ll float the ideas to Ted and George; technically it’s their problem, since I’m just the incumbent.’

  My heart leapt: did this imply he was ready to go somewhere else? But now wasn’t the time to leap up and down humming the theme from The Great Escape.

  ‘Wave a few fivers at them, it’ll concentrate their minds beautifully. Meanwhile, making jam and chutney is a brilliant idea.’ Even though it would raise pence, not thousands of pounds. ‘I’ll put it to the WI committee. Meanwhile, it has to be cakes.’

  ‘But not necessarily cupcakes? I have happy memories of your cherry cake. Very happy. Not all of them to do with baking, I admit,’ he said, obviously enjoying the memory so much that he decided to rekindle it – though without any culinary ingredients.

  The following day my wave to Mazza and Dave, who’d returned about half an hour earlier, was perfunctory. It was time to call the police with the possible ID of Sharon Hammond’s dealer, Wiley; they didn’t overwhelm me with their gratitude, but a few minutes’ conversation persuaded them that they shouldn’t just write it down on the back of a shopping list and forget it. Then I forced myself into the kitchen. Surrounded by flour, sugar and eggs, I sat at the table, Merry’s files in front of me, the neat writing a constant reproach to my appalling computer-eroded scrawl. As far as Theo’s parishioners were concerned, she’d only failed on one count, as far as I could see: there were no children in the rectory. I know Theo regretted not being a father, but apparently she’d been adamant. As for me, the biological clock had not just ticked but struck midnight, so no joy there for him either. Childlessness apart, she’d clearly been a paragon. She was even able to manage on the pittance that was a parson’s stipend. Not just food and heat, but even her clothes. Perhaps she didn’t take to charity shops, she bought from them.

  To be angry and resentful about a woman who’d died in a motorway pile-up six years ago was simply unreasonable, I told myself firmly. As well as being pretty unchristian. After all, as Alison Cox had pointed out, we all have our gifts. Mine was for making money, not saving it.

  All the same, clearing my head with a run didn’t seem a bad thing at all. Theo was going to be busy all day, and had asked me not to leave anything except a sandwich for lunch. The sun was shining. I would run.

  No, I wouldn’t. When I’d finished baking I’d make another attack on that vegetable garden and maybe later on treat myself to a trip to a garden centre to buy some plants to put in it.

  I’d be a proper rector’s wife if it killed me.

  TWELVE

  The rectory was used to unexpected visitors, but usually, of course, they were for Theo. So when one arrived for me, even though it was Elaine and I expected a drubbing about my cake quota, I was delighted, particularly as I hadn’t started cooking and was still relatively clean and tidy. Although I meant to install her in the living room, she drifted into the kitchen with me when I went to make coffee.

  She sat, looking expectantly at the machine, like a dog waiting for its bone. When I placed the mug of mocha in front of her, she savoured the aroma with closed eyes.
‘Oh, how wonderfully chocolatey. I bet it tastes … mmm … heavenly. Whoops! Sorry!’

  I waved aside her apology for a pun best avoided in a clerical household, perhaps. On the other hand, when I bought chocolate I couldn’t resist the Divine brand, which had the double bonus of being Fairtrade and delectable.

  ‘Golly, I was bracing myself for some of Theo’s vile brew,’ she continued, ‘and I get this nectar! Actually, his was better than Merry’s. She always bought the cheapest possible and never put enough in the mug. This is coffee bliss.’

  ‘Thank my new best friend.’ I patted it affectionately before I sat down. ‘It was yours that inspired me. I wish I could say it was your biscuits that inspired these, or even that I’d bought them at Violet’s, but I can’t. The posh range at Sainsbury’s. Let’s be frank, Elaine, I’m going to ruin this brilliant idea of yours. Unless I bake an endless supply of cherry cakes.’

  ‘There’s no reason why you shouldn’t. I’ve never seen so much wonderful fruit in one cake. But I can’t help wondering if that’s the best use of your talents.’

  I spread my hands in a gesture of surrender. ‘OK. I’ll make chutney and jam to sell to punters. Theo’s suggestion last night,’ I added. ‘I gather he’s been talking to you.’

  ‘No. Why should he? WI business, not the church’s. And we hadn’t bargained on selling goodies, not at this stage.’ Her look was quite penetrating. We sipped in silence till she pointed at the pile of cake ingredients and the files waiting balefully at the far end of the table. ‘Don’t get the idea that Merry was a domestic goddess, Jodie. She wasn’t. She was a nice, quiet, conscientious woman, whom Theo married straight out of uni – but I guess you know that. What you wouldn’t know, because he’s a decent, loyal man, is that a number of us thought that had he not been a parson, the marriage would have ended long before he moved here.’