Dying In The Wool: A Kate Shackleton Mystery

by Frances Brody

  The pictures came thick and fast. Mrs Kellett lying dead. A footprint, an abandoned cricket bat. Another picture wasn’t mine at all but sprang directly from Hector’s memory into my brain: Joshua Braithwaite talking to him through the bars of the gate.

  I talked to the cat, asking its name and telling it everything would be all right.

  Naturally, being a cat, it disbelieved me.

  When I arrived home, Mrs Sugden met me with a message from Sykes. ‘Mr Sykes says to tell you that the initials on the cricket bat were EB.’

  EB. Edmund Braithwaite.

  Mrs Sugden looked at the box in my arms that seemed to move of its own accord, and a screech came from it. She took a step back. ‘What the blue blazes is that? That box is alive.’

  ‘I thought we might like a cat.’

  17

  Scouring

  Scouring: Washing the fabric to remove grease, dirt and any other impurities picked up during processing.

  Sookie, my newly acquired loquacious marmalade-eyed cat, leaped from the box and ran under the kitchen dresser.

  ‘I want you to keep her in for a few weeks, Mrs Sugden.’ I poured milk onto a saucer and placed it by the edge of the dresser. ‘Find her some scraps, eh?’

  Mrs Sugden blew out her cheeks. ‘She won’t run off! A cat knows when it’s fallen on its feet.’

  ‘All the same, let’s keep her in for now. She’s had a bit of a shock.’

  ‘It’ll do its muckment under there. Be a right to-do having to shift that dresser to clean under it. I’ll butter its paws, that’ll make sure it won’t stray. I don’t suppose it’s ever had butter.’

  ‘Oh I should think it will have. It’s a country cat.’

  ‘Country folk are the worst. They’ve no sentiment over animals – it’ll have had to catch mice for a living there.’

  ‘She can do that here, once she’s settled.’

  I felt a powerful obligation to keep the cat safe but did not have the energy to debate about it. ‘Just keep her in for a day or so.’

  Being chum to Tabitha and playing house guest for Evelyn while poking in my beak, lying and tying loose ends, had proved a strain. My limbs ached, my head throbbed. Having kept up some semblance of energy for the drive home I now felt near to exhaustion. The words “Wreck of the Hesperus” sprang to mind, strapped to the ship’s bow in the fearful storm.

  Mrs Sugden turned her attention from the cat to me.

  ‘You look dreadful. What’s happened?’

  ‘An awful lot.’ How do you begin to recount two murders, the total failure of progress in searching for Braithwaite, and a series of events that made no sense? I shook my head. ‘Not now.’

  ‘You get yourself to bed. Rest. I’ll bring you something up.’

  For once, I did not argue. To be in my own bed sounded like heaven. In no time, Mrs Sugden brought bed warmers and beef tea. One of the best things about going away from home is coming back. Gerald and I had chosen this house together. Small and sunny, with big bay windows, it had come with its own ancient black cat that died and was buried by Gerald in the garden. Now by tragic twists the black cat had returned.

  I love my little house. For all the Braithwaites’ luxury, my tiredness was not only due to the emotional strain of the murders, and getting up in the middle of the night to break into the mill. I had stayed reasonably polite, on best behaviour with Evelyn, Tabitha and the evasive Hector for days.

  I fell asleep, to the peering and disappearing faces of black cats, Lizzie Kellett, Paul Kellett and Joshua Braithwaite wearing his wedding-day smile. After that, I knew nothing until eleven o’clock the next morning.

  I woke from a dream in which the gate clicked. In the dream I knew it was Gerald coming home.

  I heard his voice. I was only missing. I lost my memory. They didn’t know who I was. I didn’t know myself, but I’m back now.

  I opened my eyes but there was no one.

  A few minutes later, Mrs Sugden tapped on the door. ‘Are you awake?’

  My answer was meant to be yes but came out as a great groaning yawn. I sat up in bed, perfecting my yawn, smoothing out my cheeks and running my fingers over what felt like bags, more like portmanteaus, under my eyes. A wrinkle on the face is like a crinkle in a piece of tissue paper. You’ll easily smooth it out. I don’t think so.

  I reached out to grasp the cup of tea.

  Mrs Sugden set down a slice of toast on the bedside table. ‘That Mr Sykes called. I told him to come back later.’

  ‘When?’

  My drawing room looks out onto the garden. Through the bay window, I saw that in spite of the cool April, green buds had multiplied on my apple tree in the few days I had been away.

  Between the door and the window stands a baby grand piano on which, when I have time, I like to thump out ragtime tunes. My old school friend, who is married to a New York banker, sends me sheet music. This interest in ragtime gives both of us the opportunity to be considered fashionably scandalous.

  Though I am not a brilliant pianist, playing takes me into a different world. I placed the sheet music for St Louis Blues on the stand and began to pick out the tune. This delayed the moment when I had to try and make sense of the events of the past five days.

  At four o’clock Sykes and I sat in wing chairs on opposite sides of the hearth. A small fire burned brightly in the grate.

  He draped one leg over the other. Sitting opposite him like this, in the stillness of late afternoon, I noticed he was thinner than I thought. The bones of his knees made a sharp angle in the crease of his trousers. He took his notebook from an inside pocket.

  He waited for me to begin.

  I crossed the room to pick up my notebook from the oak bureau, more as a prop than a necessity. ‘The main question is, are the deaths of Kellett and Mrs Kellett connected to our investigation? Has someone turned windy? And if so who, or why?’

  Sykes does not make huge expressive movements when he speaks, but has a habit of moving his large hands just a little from the wrist when putting forward an idea, opening his palm as if to make an offer, or turning his hand the other way when something does not quite fit. He did that now. ‘We have no evidence of a connection. I hear from my contact in Keighley that Scotland Yard have been notified.’

  ‘Then while I’m away in London, perhaps you could find out what you can from your contact and keep me in touch?’

  He nodded.

  I gave Sykes an account of my visit to the mortuary and the conversation with Dr Fraser, about the morphia and gel sem found in Kellett’s stomach. ‘Dr Fraser thinks the morphia was to ease the pain of his amputation. Someone could have increased the drug dose unbeknownst to Kellett. That would have dulled his senses. Kellett himself told me, when I toured the mill, that just a moment’s misjudgement and the vat of dye could be lethal.’

  ‘Did Mrs Kellett say why anyone may have wanted to do Kellett harm?’

  ‘She thought it could be envy. Because they had money put by to start a new life. She didn’t name any particular person, only that everyone knew about their plans, all the dye workers.’

  Sykes stroked his chin. ‘Mitchell’s inspector is treating the motive as theft.’

  ‘The cash box from under the bed?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It puzzles me, Mr Sykes. Why didn’t the thief just break into the house when the Kelletts were at work, and take what he wanted?’

  Sykes shrugged and shook his head. ‘Mrs Kellett had a lot of people tramping through her house paying condolences. Maybe the thief thought someone else would get to the money first, or that she’d pack her bags and go live with one of her relatives. Keighley CID believe they’ve got the weapon, and the time. Her last visitor left at nine o’clock on Friday, and you found her at eight o’clock on Saturday morning, so that gives just eleven hours in which the murder could have taken place.’

  The thought of Lizzie so coldly arranged on the stone steps of the cottage made me shudder. I picked up the tongs an
d placed a cob of coal on the fire.

  ‘It was in the earlier part of those eleven hours. She hadn’t gone to bed on Friday night.’

  I pictured the neatly made bed, the folded nightdress.

  We had both almost imperceptibly turned towards the fire, as if for comfort. Sykes said, ‘I’m not sure that whoever did her in went to the house with that intention.’

  ‘Why do you say that?’

  ‘He, or she, hadn’t taken a weapon. It looks likely that the cricket bat was the weapon. The perpetrator fled the house with it in his hands, probably blood and hairs still on it, and dropped it in the beck, expecting it to float downstream. Only it was caught in the reeds. If we’re fortunate there’ll be prints on the handle. Whoever dropped it must have been in a hurry. It’s thought to have been in the house. Apparently Miss Braithwaite took it to Mrs Kellett as something that had belonged to her brother Edmund. It was meant to entice him back from the spirit world. Miss Braithwaite says she left the bat at the cottage.’ He smiled ruefully. ‘I got that titbit from Mitchell, as my reward for letting him take the credit for finding it.’

  I closed my eyes, feeling a cold fury with myself. The mental picture was clear from my first visit to Mrs Kellett. The cricket bat was lying by the dresser. The cat had used it as a scratching post. ‘I did see that cricket bat. Why didn’t I notice it was missing when Lizzie was killed?’

  ‘It might have come back to you. These things happen, when there’s a lot to take in.’

  I stared at the fire as a new lick of flame cut through the coals. This kind of detecting was a far cry from tracking down a missing soldier. But was there some comparison in the motives? The war had complicated life. A person could begin again, using someone else’s identity card. A live man could take the identity of the dead. A soldier may have a good reason for abandoning his once nearest and dearest. Perhaps that was true of Braithwaite too, in spite of wealth and position. Yet in looking for Braithwaite, there was no clear trail. No stolen identity cards, only a jumble of odds and ends.

  What else had I missed, and what else did I remember?

  ‘Mrs Kellett’s address book was gone from the table drawer, I spotted that. But the cricket bat was part of the general clutter of the house and didn’t seem significant, until you found it.’

  ‘Address book? Why would someone take that do you think?’ Sykes opened his palms as if he expected me to drop a solution into his hands.

  ‘I don’t know. To delay her relatives being informed? Constable Mitchell said the Keighley chaps would make enquiries of her workmates, so they can track down her sister and brother.’

  I passed Sykes my notebook. ‘I saw three postal order stubs at Mrs Kellett’s. One was blank but two had initials – one on the payee line and the other on both the payee and post office lines, written in black ink, probably at the post office. Constable Mitchell has kept the stubs, but I made a note.’

  Sykes copied my note. ‘I’ll see what I can make of it.’

  I stood up. ‘I’ve one or two things to show you, in the dining room. They may give us an extra insight into Braithwaite’s state of mind.’

  Sykes unfolded himself from the chair and followed me. ‘And when we know the missing man well enough, he will speak. We hope.’

  I had placed the painting of the children by the beck in the centre of the window seat. Now I turned it, placing it to the left so that it caught the light. ‘Evelyn gave it to Dr Grainger to hang in Milton House. He was clearing out. Rather than leave it there, I took it. Eventually I’ll give it to Tabitha.’

  Sykes took a pair of steel-rimmed spectacles from his top pocket. He glanced at the painting, and then at the initials J.B. in the bottom right corner.

  While he studied the painting, I put my other displays on the dining room table: the photographs, the map, the scrap of material that Hector had taken from Joshua Braithwaite’s watch chain when he found him in the beck.

  ‘This is a good painting,’ Sykes said. ‘Braithwaite was truly talented. That might give him a reason for wanting to break away from his life at home, and at the mill. Perhaps he thought of himself as an artist, a frustrated genius. He’s caught the light on the water so perfectly, and the clouds practically float. The children are painted with such tenderness.’

  ‘Yes. Tabitha, and Edmund.’

  I suddenly realised that Dad had made an excellent choice in recommending Sykes to me. Not many policeman, not many people, would look at a painting and see so much.

  In the light from the window, the water of the beck glinted as it would in real life when caught by the sun. Tabitha said he painted it quickly, but every stone on the humpback bridge seeped age and damp. Tabitha, her skirt tucked up, leaned forward, poking a stick into the water. Edmund crouched on his haunches, holding a child’s fishing rod with net. By the waterfall, there was a smudge, like a stain, and on the bridge a grey shape that marred the painting, almost as if it had been accidentally leaned against another painting. Sykes pointed out these imperfections.

  ‘I know. I didn’t notice them when Dr Grainger first gave it to me. You only see the smudges in a good light.’

  ‘Could something have been painted over?’ Sykes asked. ‘Would this smudge on the bridge have been his wife?’

  ‘And Joshua painted her out?’

  ‘If he did, that would be a reason for her to give it away. She wouldn’t destroy it, not when it’s of her children, but she would have been angry with him.’

  I swear Sykes almost added ‘that’s marriage’, but changed his mind. I wondered about his marriage, and how his wife felt about him putting work first and coming to see me on a Sunday afternoon.

  I took the painting out of the light and leaned it against the wall. ‘There’s a chap at the museum, something of a specialist in cleaning and restoring paintings. I’ll ask Mrs Sugden to get in touch with him to come round and see what he makes of this.’

  ‘Good idea,’ Sykes said.

  Like me I guessed he would feel relieved if we could solve one tiny mystery – even if only the secret of the painting.

  I spread my photographs on the table.

  ‘This is Tabitha’s fiancé, Hector Gawthorpe, the ex-boy scout.’

  ‘Ah yes, he escorted you from the bridge, carrying your camera bag.’ Sykes smiled.

  ‘And he finally decided to tell the truth and shame the devil. This is the scrap of material he’s held onto all these years. It was caught on Joshua Braithwaite’s watch chain when he was found in the beck.’

  I told Sykes how Hector and two other boys had found Braithwaite.

  Sykes examined the material, holding it between finger and thumb. ‘It’s a heavy weave.’

  ‘I know. Poor Hector imagined it might have been from his uncle’s shirt. Heaven help the mill when he gets in there.’

  Sykes replaced the scrap of material onto the table. ‘His uncle?’

  ‘Arthur Wilson, the assistant scout master. He’s weaving manager at the mill.’

  ‘Ah, the inventor. Hector could be onto something. What else did he have to say?’

  ‘A week or so before he went missing, Braithwaite packed some stuff into his motorcycle sidecar, including a bucket and spade.’

  ‘Bit old for that wasn’t he?’

  ‘Well, yes. Hector thought he was losing his marbles through grief, that it was Edmund’s bucket and spade.’

  A sudden thought struck me like a thunderbolt. It was too mad to contemplate. I put a hand to my forehead to make the thought go away.

  ‘What is it?’ Sykes asked, his voice suddenly full of concern.

  ‘Oh nothing, just one of those mad ideas. What if Edmund didn’t die? What if he held a grudge, he deserted, and came back and murdered his father?’

  Sykes gave a lot of concentration to the items on the table, and then looked through the window, as if for inspiration. Finally, in a low voice, he said, ‘Edmund was killed, on the Somme. I took the liberty of checking with one of his surviving comrades –
a lad in Bingley who drinks in the Ramshead.’

  I felt suddenly foolish, and I also knew that Dad had told Sykes about how I could never let go, and how I always half-expected Gerald to come back.

  With careful fingers, Sykes straightened the photographs on the table. ‘So do we think Braithwaite may have been headed for the seaside?’

  I made my voice sound very even, as if no mad idea ever struck my brain with the force of lightning. ‘Possibly. But who was getting on beaches in 1916? They were full of barbed wire and look-out posts weren’t they?’

  ‘And which seaside?’ Sykes said thoughtfully. ‘Where would you go in his place?’

  ‘Me? I’d try somewhere new. The family used to go to Grange-over-Sands. Locals there would recognise him. He’d choose the opposite coast, Scarborough, Whitby, Filey.’

  Sykes gave an amused laugh. ‘Some folks would choose the opposite end of the country. But if he made a preliminary trip in advance with bucket and spade then it couldn’t have been so very far away.’

  ‘And it sounds well planned, as if he knew exactly what he was doing.’

  ‘Yet that doesn’t tie up with his being in such a confused state when he was found at the beck.’ I lifted the painting from the window seat and sat down, nodding to Sykes to join me. ‘Hector said that Mr Braithwaite didn’t recognise him by the beck, but that by Monday, when he saw him again through the hospital gates, he was more himself.’

  Sykes stretched out his legs and contemplated his toe caps. ‘How did Hector account for that confusion?’

  ‘He said Braithwaite had been seriously duffed up, including a cut lip and a bruise. He was too dazed to remember Hector as the boy who’d cleaned his motorbike. But by Monday, when Hector went to Milton House, Braithwaite was sufficiently recovered to ask Hector to do him a good turn.’

  ‘Which was?’

  ‘Braithwaite wanted Hector to locate his motorbike and to tell him, or Kellett, where it was. Kellett was working at Milton House Hospital.’

  ‘Was he now? That’s interesting. And Braithwaite had forgotten where he left his motorbike?’