Palmer-Jones 01 - A Bird in the Hand

by Ann Cleeves

  “Peter Littleton,” he said in a tone of stage surprise. “I never thought to see you on the mainland again. What has happened to the bulb trade, and where is the delectable Barbara?”

  Tina had reached them by now, and Rob bowed towards her and towards the newcomer in a charade of formal introduction.

  “This,” he said, “is Peter, the friend who deserted me for another. He had the courage, the audacity, the common sense to marry the girl we all adored.” He was talking very loudly and the group of bird watchers were quickly becoming an audience. “Everyone who stayed on St. Agnes dreamt of the delectable Barbara, barmaid and beauty, tantalizing temptress of the Tavern’s public bar. Only Barbara relieved the tedium of birdless, beerless afternoons, Barbara, daughter of the largest landowner on Scilly, Barbara…”

  The man interrupted. “Shut up,” he said tightly. “Have you got a car?”

  “No, but George here has.”

  “Then get him to drive me to the pub.”

  Molly, opportunely thinking too about the pub, wandered vaguely up the path, still reading her plant book. George found himself driving through the narrow, tangled lanes to the village.

  “What the hell’s the matter with you?” Rob shouted from the back of the van. “ You didn’t even see the bird.”

  The car was rattling over a bumpy track. Peter was crushed in the front between Molly and George.

  “The delectable Barbara has divorced me,” he shouted back. “Besides, I’ve seen greenish. Many times.”

  “Oh.” Rob was shocked. He considered this. “ So you’re not living on the bulb farm on St. Agnes?”

  “No bulb farm.”

  “No rarities on your back lawn?”

  “No more rarities.”

  “Welcome back to the real world, mate.”

  In the pub Pete told the story of the delectable Barbara and his exile from Scilly with a mixture of genuine regret and irresistible humour. George had never met him before, but had heard of him from Rob and found him larger than life, immensely appealing. Under his flippant description of his life on St. Agnes and his marriage, there was an honesty and a real sadness.

  “We were married about six years ago. You came to the wedding, Rob.”

  Rob nodded.

  “I remember it well. At least I don’t remember much after the reception, but I’m sure that I enjoyed it. There was real champagne, lots of it. And a very attractive bridesmaid.”

  “It was a whirlwind romance,” Peter said nostalgically, not quite seriously. “ Barbara is gorgeous to look at: dark hair and eyes, an almost oriental face, a beautiful body, lovely bum. But my love for her got mixed up with my love for the island. I mean St. Agnes is so lovely, and I’d always dreamed of being able to live there, that I think I conned myself into loving her. I didn’t mean to. I didn’t do it on purpose, but I knew that if I married her I’d be able to stay there.”

  He grinned lecherously at Rob. “ It was real enough at the time though—midnight swims, romantic walks along Wingletang, love in the bracken.”

  Rob sighed theatrically, enviously.

  “In fact she was a bit dense and really boring. She had an incomprehensible passion for country and western music. Then she started to go out with the manager of the Dolphin, that dreadful new pub on St. Mary’s. I didn’t mind. I knew that she was starting to realize that she’d had a pretty rough deal too. I wasn’t very good as a farmer. It might have been easier if they’d kept animals, but I could never get enthusiastic about bulbs. They sell them before they get pretty.

  “But I think we would have survived. As I said, I loved St. Agnes, and I would have put up with a lot to stay there. Every Thursday she went to St. Mary’s to the country and western club. She told me that she was spending the night with her friend Nancy, but I knew that she was staying with the manager of the Dolphin. I always thought of him as Nancy after that. Remarkably appropriate. He walks very oddly, I suppose because of the strange cowboy boots he always wears. I think she was fond of him, but we stayed together. I knew that she would never leave me for him. She liked being married. Even to someone like me. It gave her some sort of prestige on the island. We’d probably still be together now if I hadn’t played her at her own game.

  “I was faithful for ages, honestly. It seemed a part of the bargain. But then I met a girl who was very different from Barbara. Not specially beautiful, or even clever, but she was kind and I could talk to her. And talking led to other things. She seemed to care for me. I suppose I was in love with her. Then Barbara found out and played a big scene. The girl left the island quite suddenly, before I could decide what to do. Perhaps she wasn’t as serious as I’d thought. Barbara magnanimously forgave me and we settled back into married life, although it was never quite the same. Last October I was thirty. I felt that my life was slipping away in compromise so I got very drunk, hit her father on the nose, wrote “ Barbara Littleton is a whore” in red paint on the outside wall of the post office and drove the new tractor into the harbour. Since then I’ve been sorting out the divorce. And as from today, I’m a free man.”

  “So what are you going to do now?” asked George, amused and intrigued.

  “I’ve been accepted to do a postgraduate teaching year at the University of East Anglia.”

  George found it difficult to picture this apparent madman as a teacher, but Peter seemed quite serious.

  “Until the course starts in the autumn, I think I’ll become a twitcher,” Peter continued. He grinned. “ I’m not badly off. Barbara’s family are quite wealthy and I came under a lot of financial pressure not to mention Nancy at the divorce hearing, or to spread any rumours on the island. I reluctantly allowed myself to be persuaded.

  “I thought that I’d try to find somewhere to rent in Rushy. I hear it’s turning up some good stuff these days. Is old Tom still up there?”

  Then the humour disappeared and Rob quietly and undramatically told what had happened, and despite the tick they left the pub before last orders had been called.

  Chapter Three

  The probation office in Skeffingham was next to the police station, in the same tall, red-brick building, and the waiting room there, with its smell of stale cigarette smoke and sweat, reminded him of a police cell. The receptionist was surprised to see him, but not very surprised: criminals come in all classes—or perhaps, she thought, he was a product of the divorce court. A little old to be worrying about access or custody, but possibly hoping for reconciliation. She was-sympathetic, automatically polite, apologetic as she showed him into the bare waiting room. As he waited George could see the plump, middle-aged receptionist watching him and wondering. She spoke on the telephone, then came out of her office, still polite, still curious.

  “Miss Kenning has someone with her just now, but she says that she can see you in ten minutes if you don’t mind waiting.”

  He thanked her and watched her back to her typewriter. His friends in the Home Office had helped him to trace Jennifer Kenning to the small area office in Skeffingham, and had given him a brief description of her. She was twenty-six and had been qualified for two years. Her confirmation report had said that she was “very competent and enthusiastic, but with a tendency to over-relate to clients.” It had seemed likely that she was the Jenny in whom Tom had decided to confide.

  The ten minutes of waiting turned into twenty, but George was patient. Jennifer Kenning was still talking to her client as she followed him down the stairs. She was telling him off in a friendly, exasperated sort of way. It seemed to be a continuation of the interview. The boy listened tolerantly. He had green hair and was clothed in leather and chains. He waited for her to draw breath, then made his escape, hurrying out of the door with obvious relief, turning to grin at her as she shouted after him with the date and time of the next appointment.

  She still looked like a student: she had long fair hair and was wearing a flowered skirt, T-shirt and sandals. Giving him a welcoming smile and asking him to follow her, she seemed
very young and somehow undaunted by her work. In contrast to the waiting room her office was bright, pretty, with posters and plants and yellow paint. She was very comfortable there, quite relaxed, and sat not behind her desk but in an easy chair beside it. She motioned him to take the other one.

  “How can I help you?” she asked.

  “I want to talk to you about Tom French.”

  “Oh.” She was angry, but also disappointed. She had wanted to help him. “Are you a policeman?”

  “No.”

  “The press.” There was even more disappointment, and contempt.

  “Certainly not the press,” he said firmly.

  “How did you know that I was supervising Tom French?” For the moment this was more important than to find out who he was. “The police got my name from their records but Tom was obsessively secretive about the fact that he was on probation.”

  “The Home Office put me in touch with you.”

  She thought, then, that she understood:

  “It’s some sort of research is it, for the Home Office? The police have got all my records, but I’ll help you as much as I can.”

  He decided to be honest.

  “It’s not official research. I used to know Tom French. We shared an interest.”

  “Not twitching?”

  She was incredulous. She had believed all twitchers to be young, dissolute and probably unwashed. The gentleman before her was immaculate.

  Palmer-Jones ignored her amusement.

  “He explained it to you. Good. I used to work for the Home Office, and did some work for the police. The father of a young lad who is a twitcher too knew that. He’s worried about his son, and asked me to find out if Tom’s death had anything to do with twitching. That’s why I’m here. I really don’t want to ask you to do anything unethical, just to give me some personal impressions of Tom.”

  She was still uncertain.

  “Adam, the lad who’s causing his father concern, is very like Tom in many ways,” George said. “He’s very lonely, rather anxious. We all want to find out what happened.” He paused. “ Perhaps it would be easier if we were away from the office. Mr. Anderson’s generous expenses would pay for a good lunch.”

  As George held the door to show Jennifer out on to the street he was aware that the receptionist was watching them, and when he turned to smile a polite goodbye, her eyes were more curious than ever. Jennifer turned too and gave her a defiant wave.

  The very good lunch lasted for a long time, and George expressed some anxiety about her clients’ well-being.

  “I’ve nothing arranged, for this afternoon. There’s a team meeting. I worry about my clients, but I can’t get excited about team meetings. There are usually endless arguments about who leaves the tea room in a mess, and I really don’t care. Especially as I’m usually the culprit. I’ll tell them that there was a crisis. My clients are always having crises.”

  George thought it would be rather pleasant to be helped by Jenny Kenning.

  “The week before he died,” he said, “Tom told a friend that he was worried about his girlfriend and her child, and that he was going to talk to someone called Jenny. Did he come to see you?”

  “Yes. He phoned up on the Thursday morning before he died. I know because I had to check my records for the police. He was always very anxious about Sally and Barnaby; I thought that he worried unnecessarily. Sally attempted suicide once, more than six months ago. The doctors diagnosed a severe case of post-natal depression, and kept her in hospital for a couple of weeks. Besides all the chemical and physical causes, it’s easy to see why she got so depressed. She lived on her own and didn’t seem to know anyone. She said once that she came to Norfolk because she knew a few twitchers and had heard them talk about it, but she arrived in July and there are very few birdwatchers here in mid-summer. I got the impression that she had lived here a while as a child.

  “The only cottage she could afford to rent was cold and damp. She must have been so anxious about the baby. And Barnaby was incredibly demanding when he was very small. He never seemed to sleep, and only stopped screaming when he was picked up and cuddled. She was exhausted. And even then she never took her feelings of frustration and violence out on the baby. Only on herself.

  “But Tom never saw her depression as something natural which anyone else in the same circumstances would have experienced, a sort of safety valve, which at least allowed her to survive it. He saw it as a scar, an innate weakness which she’d carry around for the rest of her life. He was great when she first came out of hospital, very kind and supportive. He did a lot to make the cottage more comfortable. He played with Barnaby for hours, he even washed and changed him, to give Sally a chance to rest. He hated his work at the hotel, but carried on with it. He was trying to save so that they could get somewhere to live together, but I don’t think he would have managed to save very much. He was a terrible worrier and he escaped from worry by drinking. He smoked quite heavily too, and he was very poorly paid.”

  “Did you see him after he had phoned?”

  “Yes, I made an appointment for him to come to the office that afternoon. He was usually free in the afternoons and he sounded very overwrought.”

  “What did he want?”

  “It was the same unspecific anxiety about Sally’s inability to care for Barnaby. He said that she was withdrawing into herself and had refused to see him a couple of times, I tried to explain that Sally is normally a very independent person, and that she’d be feeling the need to break some of her ties with him, but he couldn’t accept that. He needed to be needed. He got very angry with me when I said there was nothing that I could do. He said that Barnaby was in real danger, and should be taken away from Sally. I said that was ridiculous. He threatened to go to the NSPCC and the social services, and to tell them things which would force them to take the baby into care. I said that if he had any real illustrations of Sally’s inability to care for the baby, he should tell me. He stormed out at that. It was quite unusual. He was generally a model client.”

  “And do you think that he would have been able to persuade the social services to remove the child from his mother?”

  She shrugged. “It would depend what he told them, but social workers are frightened now; there’s been so much publicity about battered children. They might be worried enough to take Barnaby into care, even if it were only for a short time. Sally wouldn’t have been able to cope with that.

  “In case there was something he hadn’t told me, I went to see Sally later that afternoon. I call in to see her quite often if I’m working in Fenquay. It’s a good place to get a cup of tea. She was fine and so was Barnaby. For the first time since I’ve known her she was making plans for the future. Tom didn’t have any place in those plans, and I’m afraid it was her new independence, her new freedom from him, that had upset him.”

  Jenny Kenning looked very firmly at George.

  “Sally’s a very strong lady, Mr. Palmer-Jones. If she’d wanted to get rid of Tom she would have moved away or told him to clear off. She would not have needed to kill him.”

  Palmer-Jones slowly drank the last of his coffee.

  “She must have been very strong,” he said, “ very strong or very strange, to have listened to threats that her child would be taken away from her without responding.”

  Jennifer got up abruptly. “There’s nothing strange about Sally,” she said very quietly. “ She may have responded to Tom’s threats but she did not kill him.”

  They were walking out of the hotel, a little strained together, not sure how to say goodbye. George took her arm in a small gesture of apology. “Thank you for your help,” he said gently. “ Do get in touch if you think of anything else.”

  “He would never talk about the offence.” She spoke suddenly, unexpectedly. “ He pleaded guilty at the court case. Some magistrates take a dim view of drug cases now, but it was a first offence and he got probation. But, ever since, he denied that he had ever taken drugs at all. He
refused to discuss it. He didn’t say that he was framed or anything like that. Just that the cannabis wasn’t his.”

  George watched her hurry off towards the office. She stopped once to speak briefly to a very young girl with a dirty toddler in a pushchair. He walked back to his car. Instead of taking the main road south to Norwich and London he drove west along the coast road, along the low cliffs to Rushy.

  All day Bernard Cranshaw could feel his blood pressure rising. When he walked into the staff room first thing in the morning there was a sudden silence and he knew that they had been talking about him. He hated them, hated all of them, even those who pretended to be friendly. They thought that he was inferior because he did not talk about books and plays. But he taught woodwork and metal work, not English literature, and he never heard them talking about his interests. He hardly talked to them now. He had nothing in common with them, these young graduates, with their strange hair styles and fancy ideas. He had gone to teacher training college in the fifties when they would take just about anybody. There had been more like him in the school then, ordinary men who would answer you straight, who could keep a class quiet.