Having unburdened herself, she tucked herself round him, and went to sleep.
No one sleeps late with an independent-minded vigorous young cat in the house and although Muff was not as young as she had been when she had joined up with Charmian, she showed no sign of ageing yet.
Her voice was usually raised in the house so Charmian was not surprised to hear a long wail close to her ear. But she was surprised that it came with a chink of china and a strong smell of coffee. She rolled over towards the smell and opened her eyes.
A tray of coffee and toast was on the table beside her. So was Muff, whose paw was reaching out towards the butter.
‘Hop it, Muff.’ Humphrey lifted the cat down, then sat on the edge of the bed. ‘Took me some time assembling that tray of breakfast, love, so eat it up before it gets cold.’
The coffee was strong and hot. ‘You look better this morning.’
‘I had a good night’s rest. Which was more than you had.’
‘I was late.’ Charmian buttered some toast and took a bite. Food did help to clear the mind. ‘The man that was brought in, lad really, confessed to killing Sarah Holt, but I think he told more lies than truth.’
‘You always get the false confessor, don’t you? Aren’t there plenty of them around?’
‘They’re not all like Totty, he’s an unusual kind of horror. Dante would have found a special little hell for him.’
Death and Dante were strong in her mind at that moment. Toast wasn’t helping to wipe out hell this morning.
‘I did hear some of the things you were muttering at me.’ Humphrey, who was fully dressed and had clearly been awake and around for some time, poured some coffee for himself. ‘Something about a chap called Feather.’
‘Dan Feather. I like him, used to like him, but I felt a kind of double talk last night. I wonder if anyone’s leaning on him and if so why?’ She sipped the coffee. ‘He has local loyalties, they may operate. Or am I just tired, suspicious, and paranoiac?’
‘Well, it has happened.’ And sometimes her anger had lashed out over him. ‘But it’s a nasty business. It always is with children.’
‘I think it’s going to get nastier’ She threw back the blankets. ‘I suppose I’d better get up and start the day. Things get better if you face them. As a rule … We’ve both got things to face.’
‘I think I’ve faced mine. With your help.’
‘Thank you for saying that: She grabbed her dressing-gown and went to the looking-glass. Her hair needed attention, she would have to go to see her hairdresser. ‘I must have been pulling this in the night.’
He picked up the tray. ‘You could have been. You had a nightmare last night. I was worried about you.’
‘I did?’ She turned away from the glass to stare at him. ‘ What did I do?’
‘Talked a bit. I couldn’t make all of it out.’
‘What was I saying?’ If there was a thing she hated, it was being out of control, and a nightmare was a prime example.
He hesitated. ‘Seemed to be about smothering a child. You said it several times. I thought you were crying and tried to comfort you but you pushed me away.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘I didn’t take it personally. It wasn’t me you were pushing away, someone else entirely.’
‘I don’t remember any of it: But this was not quite true. Odd bits of memory were pushing through like dry twigs through mud. Death certainly figured, someone’s death, perhaps an infant. ‘I have been thinking about child murder and infanticide lately, had it pushed at me, so I suppose I can’t be surprised if I dream.’
‘Bones and babies and dead boys and missing little girls, you’ve had the lot. No wonder you talked about hanging.’
‘Did I? I don’t like the idea of capital punishment any more.’
‘Not even for people like Totty?’
‘Oh, him … I don’t know. Castration, maybe.’ But she had an idea that in her dream it was she herself who had hanged. No, surely not. It was symbols, anyway. ‘Totty’s the sort of little weasel that will get away with it somehow, and he knows it. But I’m not happy with his confession and I’m not happy with the way Feather is taking it. He doesn’t believe him, but I have the feeling that he just might settle for Totty as the perpetrator.’
‘The child may turn up.’
‘Think so?’
There was a moment of silence while she finished dressing. Jeans and sweater, this was no day for dressing smartly. Sackcloth and ashes felt the thing.
‘I don’t like the family’s line. No truth there, either. But families do cover up in matters of this sort, there’s always something to hide.’
‘Want me to talk to Loomis? I could do. I used to know him pretty well. He might say more to me.’
‘Yes, thank you. Good idea.’
‘I’ll telephone.’
‘Now that you’re going, I don’t want to lose you. I want to hang on to you.’
‘You can do that. You’ve cured me, I think.’
‘I wish.’
‘I’m going to believe it.’ Yesterday he had needed help from her, today it was her turn. In the mysterious way that happens in close relationships, power, energy, strength, whatever it was, had seeped from one to the other. He had been weak and was now strong. ‘Go and see Mr Madge, talk about the locket, you’ll never identify the baby but you can talk about the locket. It’s heavy gold.’
She was obsessed by that little bag of dry bones to which they had given due burial, last night he had not known what advice to give, this morning all was clear: she was used to thinking about problems in a concrete way and it might help her to do so now. ‘Madge can’t tell you the name of the child but he can date the object and then you consult parish registers and birth registers.’
‘I doubt the birth of that child was ever registered.’
‘You never know. You might get some clue to a family name, then you can guess. Isn’t that what you do all the time?’
‘I ought to shoot you for saying that,’ but she was laughing, he had achieved that much at any rate.
Their dispositions were soon made. He was off to London and then possibly to Rome, he would telephone from wherever. He was purposely vague. She would finish dressing and go off to work.
She consulted her diary where, as only to be expected, there was the usual hodge-podge of engagements and duties, some of which she would enjoy doing and others which she would rather ignore. In the first category came the promise to attend, nay, to open, a charity bazaar in Merrywick, a promise extracted from her by her friend Winifred Eagle. Once she got there, if she got there (and she’d better, or Winifred or Birdie Peacock would issue a mandatory spell of bad luck), she would enjoy it. So much for that in the evening. In the second less happy group of engagements, she must chair a committee on juvenile crime in the district. This was the third meeting of the committee, whose members manifested lower spirits with each session, since they felt hopeless and helpless. There had been one hilarious moment however when they had interviewed a trio of lads who had volunteered to talk to them, they had arrived on foot, kempt, clean, and recently purified, given their spiel on the newly discovered happiness of virtue, and left in three cars stolen from the committee car park, Charmian’s being one. It was laugh or cry, and they had decided to laugh. The cars had turned up later that day not far away, neatly parked side by side, and of course, by that time, wheel-clamped. The joke was on them.
There were also various, inquiries she had initiated where she must read the reports. But her first responsibility was to Rewley.
‘I thought you’d want to know about last night.’
‘Certainly would. Especially as Dan Feather walked right past me this morning without a word. To be honest, I don’t think he saw me, but he has his moods, you know. He doesn’t like living in a city, not even Windsor, he’s a countryman pure and simple, but he’s had his ambitions.’
‘He wasn’t talking to himself as he walked past?’
Rewley laughed. ‘ No, and if he had been he wouldn’t have let me read him, he’s on to me there, he puts his hand up. I was on his team for a while just after I got out of the uniformed branch and into plain clothes; he regarded me as an aberration of nature, I think, and he got rid of me as soon as he could.’
‘He may be in a bad mood because his girlfriend is going off to Canada with her daughter. Whether for ever or just for a holiday no one seems to know. Opinion is he doesn’t know himself.’
Not like Rewley to gossip so he must have thought it worth her while to know. Which it was, of course; if Feather was in a difficult position she would have to walk with even greater care than usual.
‘He’s a friend of Clive Barney.’ Rewley’s voice was carefully vague. ‘Walked their beat together.’
Ah, now he was saying something. And something she didn’t want to hear. Clive Barney had been in charge of the investigation of the murders in Bridewell, a charming village where Charmian had, in a passing way, owned a house. And also in a passing way, there had been a relationship between her and Barney. It had been very private and neither of them had talked about it, but, as was to be expected, other people had noticed and done the talking for them. When Charmian had drawn away, Clive Barney had been hurt. He was too reserved and proud a man to say much, but if there was pain, then Dan Feather would have seen it.
Clive had taken it well when she had made it clear that was it, thus far and no further, he had nodded, said it was probably the right thing, but a pity because he liked her a lot, and would she like another drink? (They were in the bar in a smart country hotel in a village between Oxford and Windsor where they had met and gone on meeting.) But she had heard that he had taken a spell of leave just after (but anyone might do so, after all), and then later she had heard a rumour (that might not be true) that he was considering a transfer.
None of us like to think of our mistakes, the times we have not behaved well, and Charmian was no exception. She realized that every thought about Barney was set around with brackets and that was what he was in her life: a man in brackets, not part of the main stream. This was not something to be proud of for either party but she had been able to bury the thought while apparently he had not.
Barney wasn’t the sort to have said much to Dan Feather, but the signal Charmian was getting from Rewley was that he had said something, enough.
‘I think Feather may be keeping something back from you.’
‘I’m sure he is, I’d expect it.’
‘If you’d ask he’d tell, but he’s hoping you won’t ask.’
‘So, you know what it is?’
‘Well, they can’t resist joking around that team, not Feather himself so much but the others …’
The Feather Fan Club, she thought.
‘Simes is the worst. He was kidding around this morning saying that Feather had a new witness who had seen the girl around with a man.’
‘Is that so funny?’
‘It was to Simes because from the description it sounded like the child’s father, Peter Loomis.’
‘Who is this witness?’
‘Don’t know that, or whether it’s a trustworthy source, but he must think so, he’s no fool,’ said Rewley with regret, but the report came in last night so Feather knew even as he was questioning Totty Bow. It would be a treat for him to get Loomis, he’s always disliked him.’
‘He didn’t work on the case, did he? It was the Met.’
‘No, but Feather has a grudge against Loomis, it goes way back.’
‘Don’t tell me Feather and Loomis were at school together and have hated each other ever since?’
‘No, Loomis is probably Summerfields and Eton and Feather, who knows? But there is a connection. Something to do with a close relative who worked for the family and was treated badly. I believe it was a cousin who was a gardener for them and was dismissed for pulling up the wrong plants.’
Personal relationships shouldn’t influence an investigation, but they so often did. ‘ So Feather had decided even last night that Totty Bow had nothing to do with the girl and was lying?’
‘No, not entirely, he’s hoping to tie Totty in somewhere, because he doesn’t like him either.’
‘Neither do I. Thank you for telling me. I may hear from him myself
She thought she heard Rewley laugh.
She gave Muff breakfast and did a modest amount of tidying the house; there was enough disorder and dirt and blood in her working life to make her want tidiness at home.
All the time she was debating: Who was this witness? Was it Amy Mercer again? No, Feather wouldn’t take that tale twice from the same woman.
She rang Kate, had a brief conversation during which she learnt from Kate that her mother, Anny, was coming back to Windsor.
‘She’s ordered what she insists on calling a layette from the White House. I didn’t think babies wore layettes now. Especially hand-embroidered with initials … You need a coronet or two to justify that sort of thing. I don’t know what my darling will say.’
Charmian grinned to herself. Which is why Anny is doing it, Anny and Rewley had never seen eye to eye.
‘Never mind, I’m on your side.’
‘Thanks, Char. How did your mother treat you?’
‘Does,’ corrected Charmian, ‘she’s still alive, but I had a very alarming old grandmother.’
Kate sounded full of life and happy. Vibrant, energetic, thank goodness. ‘I’ll be in to see you,’ Charmian promised.
The clock in the kitchen tinkled out the hour. If she hurried she would not be too late for her first appointment of the day. As she was slipping her papers into her briefcase the telephone rang. She let the answer-phone deal with it, listening for a moment, and when she heard Dan Feather’s voice, she picked up the receiver.
‘I am here, just slow getting to the phone.’ Not true and he probably knew it. ‘What were you saying?’
‘Something new came in, and I thought you ought to know.’
‘Oh yes?’ She couldn’t resist a hint of satisfaction in her voice. ‘Another woman spectator sport? She saw the girl with her father? Is that it?’
‘Oh, you’ve heard that, have you?’
‘It did get to me.’
‘I thought it might do.’ He sounded amused. ‘You used the word sport, I think that story was just a bit of sport on the part of one or two chaps. A joke.’
‘You mean they made it up? A lie?’ Her tone was bleak. She didn’t relish being made a joke.
‘Just fooling around … they didn’t know they could be overheard.’
‘Oh, I understand.’ And she did: the story had been fed to Rewley for him to pass on to her. They both hated being laughed at. Damn you, Feather, she thought. I’ll get back at you. Anger being a wasted emotion unless you did something about it. But she controlled her fury. ‘So what is the real story?’
Feather reined in his amusement, he had scored his goal and could rest on that for a moment, but business was business, he became serious: ‘Not a story this time, more a viewing. A picture.’
‘Go on.’
‘As you know, we’ve been calling in all the security videos made by various outfits in the town: shops, banks, building societies. Most of them are inside views but several focus on the streets.’
Charmian understood: this was a royal town with a castle, a barracks, and a daily Army parade through the streets as the guard changed. Security was tight and watchfulness the word.
‘The story that the girl had been seen in Peascod Street made the search important, even if we didn’t believe it.’
‘You didn’t believe it?’
‘Jury is still out. What about you?’
Charmian didn’t answer. ‘Go on about the video. What have you got?’ Obviously there was something.
‘In one shot there is a kid that looks like Joe, he’s moving down the street.’
‘So?’ Nothing too surprising here, Joe had been in and around the town. What
would be helpful would be if he was clearly with someone. Say Totty. Totty Bow in the shot would be a marvel to receive.
‘In the next frame, when he had moved a bit, there is the back of a girl child who might just be Sarah Holt.’
‘I’d like to see it.’
‘You shall … whenever it suits.’ Having scored his joke, he was being obliging. ‘We’ll be showing the mother.’
‘Of course you will.’ She was thinking that she would like to see how Biddy reacted. ‘When? I’ll come along.’
‘Not fixed yet. I’ll leave a message for you.’
‘Thank you. I’ll be in and out.’
‘Did you see my TV appeal? Went out on the morning news. Be repeated this lunch time and later. On national and local networks. I’m hopeful of a reaction. We usually drag in the calls even if you have to weed them out. So I’ll see you.’
End of conversation, she agreed she would wait for the message, just for the moment, she was on the end of his hook.
But he didn’t let her go just then.
‘Well what did you make of my TV appeal? On the Breakfast Show. I thought it went well, the producer said it caught a big audience.’
‘I’m sorry, I didn’t see it. I’ll watch later.’ He sounded pleased with himself.
‘On again on the main news, all channels.’
Yes, definitely he liked being a media personality. She was learning more about Dan Feather every day. Also more about herself, because she felt a small pang, just a little tweak, of envy.
She was on the point of leaving the house when the doorbell rang. Once, twice, loudly.
On the doorstep was Amy Mercer carrying a bag with what looked like an apron in it and wearing a big smile.
‘I’ve come to work. Clean your house. As arranged.’ She was in, still smiling, before Charmian could speak. ‘ Don’t say you don’t want me. But I can see you do.’ She was taking a brisk look around the hall and into the kitchen. ‘In need of a good clean up, I’d say. I don’t think your last lady did you justice.’
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