Scaring Crows

by Priscilla Masters

  She was frowning as she thanked Beeston for his help.

  He grinned back at her. ‘Any time, Inspector,’ he said cheerfully. ‘It’s a shame our paths don’t cross a little more frequently.’

  She met his eyes with a touch of amusement. ‘Well considering there’s invariably an ugly crime somewhere in my wake, Mr Beeston, I think you should be grateful our paths don’t cross too often. I’m afraid I’m bad news.’

  ‘An ugly job for a woman like you,’ he said and waved goodbye abandoning her to an unwelcome vision of Matthew’s pained expression and Eloise’s triumphant one. The images crowded her mind as she watched Roderick Beeston stride back towards Martin Pinkers’ farm.

  She sighed and turned back to Mike. ‘Let’s talk,’ she said steadily. ‘Let’s just talk.’

  The rain was just starting, heavy, drenching, cooling and welcome. The verges would soon be green again, the fields damp, the streams and rivers full. All would be well. England would be England again soon, not some mock-up of Southern Spain.

  Mike was waiting expectantly.

  ‘I don’t see where Pinkers fits in,’ Joanna began. ‘Did he get up early on Tuesday morning? And if he did, did he visit the bull in the shed? And if he did. Mike,’ she said urgently. ‘You saw the view from up there. He could have seen something, someone. He didn’t start milking until round about ten. He wasn’t quite ready for Dave Shackleton, was he? Even if he got up late – for a farmer – what was he doing that morning? Where was he and what does it have to do with our case?’ She didn’t let him speak but hurried on, softly speaking her thoughts out loud. ‘I had assumed that the father of Ruthie’s baby would be our killer.’

  Mike didn’t speak.

  ‘Well, I am certain that Titus Mothershaw is the father of Ruthie’s unborn baby. But I can’t see him shooting Aaron and Jack. So was my assumption wrong? Or my judgement?’

  Mike’s eyes flickered.

  ‘Go on then,’ she exploded. ‘Speak.’

  ‘You’re doing the usual thing,’ Mike said angrily. ‘Just because you like someone you’re assuming he couldn’t have killed.’

  ‘Then do you think he did shoot them?’

  Mike ran his fingers through the cropped, black hair. ‘I don’t know what to think,’ he said.

  As abruptly as it had started the rain stopped. The sky was blue and the lane steaming with evaporating puddles. The colours looked fresher and greener than Joanna could ever have imagined.

  4 p.m.

  It was nearly two hours later when Joanna spoke again. ‘Let’s go for a walk.’

  For a few minutes they stood in the yard, watching the rain evaporating on the walls of the old, stone farmhouse. Normally they would have sheltered from the rain or dressed in stormproof clothing. But it was still hot. Then Joanna turned away suddenly. Something was wrong.

  A low grumble of thunder blasted through the quiet.

  She looked around for clues to her feeling of sudden panic.

  There was nothing. The cows were peacefully grazing, a few made uneasy by the threatening weather were clustered beneath the spread of the wide chestnut tree towards the middle of the field. One or two stopped grazing and lifted their heads. Almost in a dream, Joanna moved towards the gate.

  More cows were lifting their heads; one or two stood up, lowing gently. They began walking towards the gate.

  One ran.

  Joanna clutched Mike’s arm. ‘For goodness sake,’ she said, ‘what was that?’

  Through the gloom came the unmistakable sound of a farmer’s whistle. Piercing, loud. A distinctive summons.

  The cows knew that sound. They stood up and jostled against the gate.

  Joanna hardly dared glance back along the lane towards the farmhouse. She knew what she would see and hear. The slap of Wellington boots, the farmer, come to collect his cows. Aaron? Jack? Ruthie?

  She turned her head.

  There was nothing. Nothing. The lane was empty. There was no one there. No Aaron. No Jack and no Ruthie.

  Then came the whistle again. Pure, clear, piercing. Summoning.

  And the cows knew it too.

  Even Mike was nervous. ‘What’s the game?’ he said.

  ‘Where’s the farmer? Joanna who is it?’ And then the whistle came closer and Joanna found its source. Sitting in the hawthorn hedge was a starling. She recognized its small, speckled body and watched while it opened its beak and whistled again and Joanna realized how Lewis Stone had heard the farmer whistle an hour after he was dead.

  Not the farmer but this mischievous bird.

  She leant across the gate and began to think.

  That was when she recalled Matthew’s grumbling statement to her when he had wanted to buy just such a farmhouse. Isolated, traditional, old fashioned.

  ‘Let’s go and share a cup of tea with Hannah Lockley,’ she said.

  Chapter Eighteen

  5 p.m.

  They stood outside underneath the dripping slates of the porch. Hymns of Praise was playing on the radio. And Joanna was instantly transported back to her childhood, Sunday teas with a tablecloth, cakes, sandwiches and jelly. A brief moment of peace between services.

  She didn’t bother to knock.

  Hannah Lockley was in the sitting room, crumpled in a chair, staring ahead and seeing nothing.

  Nothing.

  Joanna sat opposite her and spoke slowly, not quite sure the old lady would take it all in. She began with a blindingly obvious statement.

  ‘It must have meant a lot to you, knowing Ruthie would take care of the farm?’

  Hannah nodded.

  ‘After your sister had entrusted it to you?’

  Again that sightless nod.

  ‘You knew Aaron was dying.’ Another statement.

  Again a nod without any real connection.

  ‘And Jack ...?’

  It provoked a response.

  Hannah looked up, suddenly fierce but still a shadow of the woman Joanna had first met less than one week ago. ‘He wasn’t capable of running a farm.’

  There was a bleakness in the old lady’s entire demeanour.

  Then Joanna asked the significant question. ‘And Ruthie?’

  Then Hannah Lockley stared at Joanna as though she was seeing right through her.

  Joanna tried to help by supplying the words. ‘You knew she was pregnant?’

  A tiny nod.

  ‘And you thought they were excluding her from the farm because of that?’

  For the first time the old lady was coherent and offered some new information. ‘I heard Aaron talking to Jack. I thought... Ruthie would have kept the farm going.’ She turned an agonized face towards Joanna. ‘There was no point,’ she said. ‘I thought it was the only way but there was no point. I shot them but Ruthie was already dead.’ She buried her face in her hands. ‘My poor, beautiful Ruthie.’

  Her sobs were genuine. For Ruthie, for Aaron, for Jack. The horror of what she had done had at last come home to the old woman. ‘I loved them all,’ she said.

  And now Joanna understood everything. A misunderstanding, a terrible mistake which had led to a misguided dual murder. But she kept the triumph out of her voice, keeping her tone deceptively calm and gentle. ‘I’m sincerely sorry,’ she said. ‘You’ll have to come with us to the station.’

  The old lady closed her eyes. ‘What does it matter?’ she asked.

  And there was no answer.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Monday, July 13th, 7.30 a.m.

  She had used her car this morning. There would be lots of paperwork. Paperwork she could use to buy time. But first of all she must see Matthew – and inevitably Eloise.

  Eloise was sulky, opening the door, tall and thin, now thirteen years old. She had Jane’s pinched face, the pale hair, the sliding eyes.

  ‘May I come in, Eloise?’

  The girl didn’t dare refuse. Especially when Matthew appeared at the door, his face lathered for shaving. He looked surprised to see her but
grinned, ignoring Eloise to plant a soapy kiss on Joanna’s cheek.

  Joanna laughed, suddenly and inexcusably happy. ‘I just wanted to thank you,’ she said when her mouth was free.

  Matthew’s eyes looked bright and green and very friendly. ‘Whatever for?’ He gave Eloise a look of mock dismay. ‘Now what have I done?’

  The girl disappeared back along the hallway and again Matthew ignored her.

  ‘The kettle’s on,’ he said cheerfully before planting another soapy kiss on her other cheek. He took hold of her hand. ‘It’s so good to see you, Jo. You don’t know just how good.’ He gave a deep sigh. ‘I’d forgotten just how nice you can look this early in the morning. Now what is this thing I am supposed to have done?’

  She waited until they were both perched on bar stools in the tiny kitchen and mugs of coffee in their hands. ‘Before I knew about the murders,’ she began, ‘right at the beginning, on that first day you gave me the motive.’

  ‘I did?’

  ‘Yes.’ She drank some of the strong coffee. ‘You handed it to me on a plate.’

  Matthew wiped the soap from his face with a towel and aimed it at the towel rail.

  ‘I did?’

  She nodded. ‘You explained the rural attitude to property.’

  He looked even more confused. ‘But I don’t remember saying anything.’

  ‘Yes.’ She touched his hand briefly. ‘You told me the families hang on to their land for generations. Handed down from father to son, you said. Now do you remember?’

  ‘Vaguely. But what on earth ...?’

  ‘Never let go of property or land.’

  Matthew shrugged. ‘Don’t tell me that’s why those two poor sods were blasted. It’s a terrible reason.’

  ‘I know.’ Joanna nodded. ‘And all because,’ she said. ‘All because Paulette Summers died. All because her daughter was given charge of looking after her brother, Jack. All because she accidentally tipped him out of the pushchair. And he was brain damaged from that day on. Then Titus Mothershaw moved to Owl Hole and he and Ruthie had a love affair. But her father had contracted stomach cancer and was dying. And tragically Ruthie Summers died too and poor old Aaron believed Jack would have to be the one to manage the farm. But Hannah Lockley heard him talking. Her understanding was that her beloved niece was being cut out of the inheritance because she was pregnant so she shot both her brother-in-law and her nephew in the belief that Ruthie would have to inherit. But Ruthie was already dead.’

  Matthew said nothing for a while then he bent forward and kissed her again. ‘Strong family ties,’ he said. ‘And inheritance. And all that ...’ He fell silent. ‘All those consequences of events. Falling in love.’ He was looking directly at her. ‘So when all this is over we can make an offer on that house in Waterfall. And then we can make a dynasty of our own.’

  Joanna’s eyes slid away towards the floor. Was there no end to the deceit practised between herself and Matthew Levin?

  From the corner of the room Eloise was watching silently and knowingly.

  9 a.m.

  Mike was waiting for her back at the station. A sobered, shell-shocked Mike. The solution had shocked the entire team. The scene of bloodshed at Hardacre, the discovery of Ruthie’s body. These had been scenes none of them would ever forget. The Incident caravan would be towed away but the memories would be triggered every time any of them were called to an isolated, outlying farm.

  Joanna sat at her desk and rolled a pencil to and fro between her fingers. ‘Do you know when I really knew?’

  ‘No.’ Mike was in sober mood. Even though the case had been solved relatively quickly. ‘I only know,’ he added, ‘that it was something to do with that ruddy statue, the Tree Man.’

  Joanna nodded. ‘We all saw the resemblance to Jack Summers. But Jack was stupid. He didn’t have the necessary fanaticism nor the brains nor the evil disregard for life. He could never have put property, inheritance, before a life. He had neither the intellect nor the direction. But somehow Mothershaw picked up something he thought he had seen in Jack’s face. But it wasn’t there. What he had picked up on was the family resemblance. And it was in the face of the aunt, Hannah Lockley. It was a sort of amoral determination, a putting of the farm above the lives of the people who inhabited it. Or more precisely putting safe inheritance over the lives of the farmer and his son. The trouble was, she was wrong.’

  Mike stared moodily into the distance.

  He left her at lunchtime to join the others for a celebratory drink. She didn’t go. The solution had been almost worse than the crime. Instead of pleasure she felt depressed and knew it was more than work that had depressed her.

  For how long could she pull the wool over Matthew’s eyes? She would never want a family. Never.

  And he did.

  When the phone rang she was glad of the interruption and the estate agent’s smooth voice. ‘If you don’t mind, Miss Piercy, we do have to gain entry to the property.’ He had a nasal voice, a vague, London twang. ‘Without measuring up we cannot print your details. Without details we have very little hope of selling your delightful little cottage. And without selling your most lovely place that super little place in Waterfall is going to slip right through your fingers.’

  ‘That’s right,’ she said.

  ‘And I do have other interested parties.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said and put the phone down.