The Murder at Skellin Cottage

by Amy Cross

  “I believe Vivian has admitted she lied about seeing you going to Skellin Cottage on the night of Deborah's murder. From what I gather, she's going to get a nasty lesson about wasting police time.”

  “She thought I should go to jail for giving her that scar,” he replied. “I guess she was still looking for an opportunity to make me pay, after all these years.” He paused again, lost in thought. “Maybe she had a point,” he added finally. “I never talked to Debbie about the whole thing, but maybe I should have. I think she might have understood what it's like to always be trying to make amends for something you did wrong in the past.”

  “You said it was an accident when you threw the mug at your ex-wife,” Jo pointed out. “If that's true, then -”

  “Don't tell me I shouldn't be too hard on myself,” he added, interrupting her. There was sadness in his eyes now, and maybe a little fear too. “I'm not going to run from my mistakes. If I've learned anything from Deborah's story, it's that you can never outrun your own actions. You have to face them someday.”

  Turning, he headed back into the farmhouse, before glancing back at Jo.

  “One more thing. Did you ever figure out which sick bastard was sending those stolen photos to Phillip Chesleford?”

  Jo shook her head.

  “Susannah, maybe,” he said with a sigh. “She could be vindictive at times. Still... I know Phillip wasn't quite right in the head, but I had no idea he could actually be dangerous.”

  “Me neither,” Jo muttered, turning and heading over toward her car before stopping again as she realized that despite everything else that had happened, there was no way Susannah Marriot would have sent those photos to Phillip.

  ***

  “We always get our man!” Jack Byron announced proudly, holding up his beer bottle so that the others could add theirs in a toast. “We might take a few wrong turns along the way, but we always, always get the bugger banged up or out of the way eventually. And that, my friends, is what makes our job so very rewarding. We keep the country safe for ordinary, decent folk. So I'd like you to join me in a toast to another job well done!”

  A smattering of applause broke out across the crowd, as children played nearby.

  “People sometimes ask me for advice,” Byron continued. “They ask me how they can sleep safely at night, when there are such awful people out there in the world. They ask me what things will be like for their children, when they grow up. And most of all, they ask me how honest, humble men such as myself are able to look into the seedy underbelly of human society and not get tainted ourselves. And to those people, I simply say that truth and honor are essential to the work of the police. I don't do this job in the hope of getting some kind of honor or fame, or an MBE one day to recognize all my hard work. No, I do it for more noble reasons.”

  “I'm sorry,” Sam said as he flipped some more burgers on the barbecue, and as Jack continued to give his speech, “I had to invite him. What with him being my brother-in-law, and all.”

  “Don't worry about it,” Jo replied, watching Byron and briefly catching his eye, and then smiling as he turned away. He was still speechifying, and as far as Jo could tell he wasn't even past the introduction yet. “It's almost worth it, just to see how uncomfortable he still is around me. He seems very pleased with himself, though. Maybe he's forgotten that at the time Phillip confessed, he had the wrong man sitting in a cell.”

  “And how are you doing?” Sam asked.

  “I'm fine.”

  “You saw a man plummet to his death.”

  “The official verdict is that he tripped,” she replied. “That he wasn't mentally capable of killing himself.”

  “You don't believe that, do you?”

  “It seems the great Lord Chesleford didn't want the stain of suicide on his family's name, so he applied a great deal of pressure to ensure that Phillip's death was ruled an accident. I guess money still talks.” She paused for a moment, before turning to Sam. “Phillip was his son, his only child, and he didn't really seem to have an emotional reaction at all when he died. Instead, he just viewed it as Phillip... tidying himself away.”

  “Most of those toffs are like that,” Sam muttered, turning some sausages. “Stuck-up, self-righteous wankers who only care about money and the family crest and all that bollocks. And did you see the state of that Chesleford Manor place? Plenty of cracks in the walls. If you ask me, old Chesleford's another of those mad old bastards clinging to the glory days. In fact, I'll make a bet with you. In ten years' time, Chesleford Manor will have been sold off to become some kind of fancy weekend leisure resort.” He sniffed as he cut into a sausage to test the meat. “From one type of stuck-up wanker to another. God help the human race, eh?”

  Jo opened her mouth to reply.

  “Joanna!” a voice called out suddenly. “I'm so glad you could make it!”

  Stepping up behind her husband, Laura Bartleby placed a hand on Sam's waist and leaned close to kiss his cheek, while keeping her eyes fixed firmly on Jo.

  “I was wondering where you'd gone off to,” she continued in a very sweet, very fake-sounding tone. “Why, I'd begun to think that we'd never see you around these parts again. In fact, I was rather worried that you might not ever make it back. I mean, you hear about people wanting to go away and face their mortality alone, don't you?”

  “Do you?” Jo replied, raising a skeptical eyebrow.

  “It's an animal instinct, isn't it? Like how cats crawl away and die in a corner.”

  “Um...”

  “But here you are,” Laura added, forcing a smile that was far too broad to ever be genuine, “gracing us with your presence once more. Fancy that, eh? How lovely!”

  “Fancy that,” Jo replied with a forced smile. “I'm not staying around. I was just working on something that brought me back here for a few weeks.”

  “Are you leaving?” Sam asked, clearly surprised.

  “I have another case to look into,” she told him. “I need to get up to Newcastle.”

  “When?”

  “Tomorrow.”

  Sam opened his mouth to ask another question, before shrugging.

  “Well, I suppose that's that, then,” he said after a moment, looking back down at the sizzling burgers and sausages. “It's not like you're tied down by the job anymore. I've heard Newcastle's nice. Lot of coal, isn't there?”

  “And you're working as a private investigator, I believe?” Laura continued. “So funny. I didn't think they were real, not in this country anyway. I thought they only existed in old American movies!”

  “There are a few of us knocking about,” Jo told her.

  “Well, good for you, not letting the cancer beat you down completely. How is the cancer, by the way?”

  “The cancer?” Jo just about managed to keep her smile, even though she felt sick inside. “It's still there. Still doing its thing.”

  “But you look quite well,” Laura continued. “All things considered. A little pasty, maybe, and...” Her eyes were briefly drawn toward the front of Jo's shirt, and then she broadened her smile as she looked at Jo's face again. “You must keep fighting the good fight, Joanna. There's no point letting a bad diagnosis get you down. You must use whatever time you have left and keep yourself busy! There's no point collapsing into a chair and wasting away until you absolutely have to, is there? I mean, there'll be time for that at the end.”

  “I guess there will,” Jo muttered, taking a sip of water.

  “Darling, do come and mingle,” Laura added, kissing Sam's cheek again. “Jack'll take over the meat. It might shut him up.”

  “I'll be there in a moment,” he replied.

  “Come on,” she continued, taking his hand. “I want you to talk to David and Louise Withers. They're so boring, it's almost hypnotic!”

  “I'll be there in a moment.”

  “But -”

  “Two minutes,” he added, slipping his hand free. “I promise.”

  “Right.” Laura hesitated, as if she
was considering grabbing his hand again, and then she seemed to realize that perhaps she was being a little forceful. “Husbands are such horrors,” she continued finally, rolling her eyes theatrically and then patting Sam's backside. “Joanna, sometimes I think you're the lucky one, being single and carefree. You only have yourself to care about. That must be so freeing.”

  She turned to walk away, before glancing back at Jo again.

  “And do pop by whenever you're in the area again,” she added. “If you make it back, that is. But no pressure. I'm sure we'll all understand if you don't get time before... Well, you know what I mean. Nice to see you, though! Charming, as always!”

  “Sorry,” Sam said as his wife wandered away into the crowd. “She, uh... She means well.”

  “I should be going, anyway,” Jo muttered, checking her watch.

  “I was surprised you came at all,” he told her. “Barbecues and parties were never really your kind of thing.”

  “I guess I felt like I didn't say goodbye properly when I left before. I kind of just took off, and a text message probably wasn't the right way to let people know.” She put the last chunk of hot-dog into her mouth and took a moment to chew, before swallowing and then chasing it down with a final gulp of water. “Newcastle's quite a drive, so I should get some rest before I set off.”

  “And you promise you're okay?” he said, reaching out and putting a hand on her arm as she began to step past him. “You know what I mean.”

  “I'm fine.”

  “And you'd tell me if you weren't? If there was anything I need to know?”

  She hesitated, before nodding.

  “What I mean is...”

  He glanced over his shoulder, as if to make sure they weren't being watched, and then he stepped a little closer.

  “You'd tell me,” he continued, “if...”

  She waited for him to finish.

  “If what?” she asked after a moment.

  “Well, you know, if you were... I mean, if you'd reached the stage where...”

  Again he hesitated, as if he couldn't get the words out.

  “That's a way off yet,” she told him. “Besides, either one of us could get run over by a bus tomorrow. Cancer isn't the only way to die.”

  “Yeah,” he replied, “I suppose that's one way of looking at it. But you're still fighting it, aren't you? There's still a chance of...”

  His voice trailed off.

  “I really should get going,” she told him. “Time, you know?”

  He paused, as if there was still something else he wanted to say, and then finally he let go of her arm.

  “Private detective, huh?” he continued with a smile. “Who'd have thought you'd get into that line of work? Then again, I should've known you wouldn't take forced medical retirement very well. I couldn't exactly imagine you sitting around with your feet up.”

  “I tried that,” she replied, with a faint smile. “I lasted about half an hour.”

  “And then you set yourself up as a private detective?”

  “I like being my own boss.”

  “Still, I can't believe that there are actually people around who hire private detectives. No offense, but it just seems a bit weird and old-fashioned. Like, I can't quite wrap my head around the idea that there are people like you out there.” He hesitated. “I don't mean people like you, I mean private detectives.”

  “I know what you mean.”

  “It's just odd to think about. But good too, in a way. That you're out there. I don't mean private detectives, I mean you. Well, people like you. Well, no, I mean...”

  His voice trailed off.

  “I think I know what you mean,” she replied with a smile, before spotting Laura watching her from over on the far side of the garden. “And now I think I really should get going, before your delightful wife gets a bee in her bonnet about me monopolizing your time.”

  “I just don't get guys like Lord Chesleford,” Sam said, as he placed a sausage in a bun and added some ketchup from a squeezy tube. “I mean, I know I've asked you before, and I know it's probably not nearly as weird as I think it is, but seriously... What kind of person hires a private detective?”

  “Someone who wants the truth to come out,” Jo replied.

  She turned to walk away, as Sam took a far-too-big bite from his hot-dog. And then suddenly she hesitated as a moment of realization reached her thoughts, and finally another word slipped from her lips.

  “Or...”

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Ten years ago

  “I have to!” Phillip said with a smile, before leaning close and kissing Suzie on the cheek again. “My dad'll kill me if I don't get into Oxford or Cambridge.”

  “Your dad,” she replied, leaning against the counter in the kitchen at Skellin Cottage, “is a bit of a dick. No offense.”

  Smiling, Phillip grabbed his helmet and headed toward the door, but Suzie hurried after him and grabbed his hand, causing him to turn back and face her.

  “One more time?” she suggested.

  “I can't.”

  “We could be quick.”

  “I'd spend the rest of the day here, you mean.”

  “Would that be so awful?”

  “You're never satisfied, are you?” He gave her another kiss, this time full on the lips and with passion. The kiss lasted several seconds until he finally pulled away. “How about Sunday? I'll meet you right here at Skellin Cottage on Sunday morning. How does ten sound? I'll tell Dad I'm going to see some friends. Sundays are just about acceptable for me to have a life. Besides, he's always drunk on Sundays.”

  “I can't wait until Sunday!”

  “One day,” he replied, “there'll be no waiting at all. I promise.”

  Biting her bottom lip, Suzie hesitated for a moment before leaning back against the wall.

  “Sunday's fine,” she told him. “It'll give me time to think of more things I can do to you when I get you back into that bed.”

  She followed him out into the yard, where his motorbike was waiting.

  “There's something I want to talk to you about on Sunday, too,” he told her as her put his helmet in place and climbed onto the bike's seat. “I think I've figured out how you can move with me when I go.”

  “Don't get my hopes up.”

  “I mean it. I'm not leaving you behind, Suzie. If I go, you're coming with me.”

  “That sounds good,” she replied, “but you know my bloody father wants me to start learning the ropes at the hotel so I can take over from him one day.”

  “Our fathers can want things all they like,” he replied, “but it's our lives. We're the ones who choose. I'm going to let anyone trap us here.”

  With that, he started the bike's engine.

  “Wait!”

  Hurrying over, Suzie reached into the top of his jacket and pulled out his half of the silver half-moon necklace, holding it against her half for a moment.

  “Almost forgot,” she said with a smile.

  “I love you,” he told her.

  “And I love you.”

  “Are you sure you don't want a ride into town before I head back to the pile?”

  “And risk us being seen together? Nah, I reckon the walk'll do me good. Give me a chance to think, you know? Besides, I don't want to get back to that bloody hotel a moment sooner than I have to. Dad wants to give me a lesson in filing. As in, how to organize a filing cabinet. I think I might scream.”

  “One day we won't have to sneak out to places like Skellin,” he told her. “One day we won't have to hide anything. We'll be together, on our own terms. I promise.”

  As Suzie stepped back, Phillip turned the bike around in the yard and began to drive out onto the main road.

  Glancing over his shoulder, he saw her waving at him, and then he turned to face the road ahead. He allowed himself to go just a little over the limit as he sped along the country lanes, but there was a part of him that wanted to just turn around and go straight back to the woman
he loved. He hated having to sneak away to meet her at the cottage, and he hated having to hide his relationship from his father. Still, he had a semblance of a plan, and he felt certain that eventually he and Suzie would be free.

  As he raced along the empty lanes, he felt as if he had at least a shot at a decent future.

  After a while he spotted Chesleford Manor up ahead, and he knew his father would be waiting to pepper him with questions about his afternoon. Phillip had no problem lying to the old man, and he knew he simply had to manage his father's temper and focus on the bigger picture. As he raced around the tight bend that led toward the house, he was already thinking about Sunday, about his next chance to speak to Suzie about the future. He'd been planning to ask her to marry him, but he'd chickened out twice so far. Sunday would be different, though. He was determined to find the courage and pop the question.

  For a moment, his thoughts switched to the ring in his jacket pocket.

  Suddenly a lorry appeared ahead, as if out of nowhere. Unable to stop in time, Phillip tried to turn, but the bike bobbed over a bump in the road and tipped, sending him skidding straight under the truck's wheels.

  As he fell, his helmet came loose and he let out a scream.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Today

  Stepping out of her car, Jo stopped for a moment and looked up at the grand facade of Chesleford Manor. The house's windows reflected the gray sky, but Jo's gaze was quickly drawn to the top of the building, where she saw the exact spot from which Phillip Chesleford had fallen to his death just a few days earlier. A shudder passed through her chest, but she knew she couldn't turn back now. With a heavy heart, she began to make her way toward the front door.

  ***

  “Lord Chesleford?” she called out, walking into the hallway and then stopping for a moment as she realized that the house seemed completely quiet. “Is anyone home?”

  Behind her, the large oak door slowly creaked shut.