A Brush with Death

by Ali Carter

  I asked Shepherd for the exact details, and we went through it again.

  ‘He definitely saw me,’ Shepherd finished up. ‘Tapped me on the shoulder as he left and said, “No telling Lady Greengrass about this, it’s my little secret, okay?”’

  Although some people might have taken it to the contrary, this snippet of information calmed my concerns about the secret meeting.

  Despite what Nanny says about the gruff manner with which Alexander treated his staff, I knew from personal experience that he was invariably kind and thoughtful towards his wife. In my experience, Diana was the one who rarely showed signs of affection and, as some firmly-rooted wives do, she consistently pecked at him.

  She would lose her rag at petty things; birthday presents and Christmas presents being a particularly favourite reason for a flush of ungratefulness and belittling of her husband.

  An exquisite ruby evening-watch: ‘What a bore to have to wind it up every time I want to wear it, you simply must return it.’ A magnifying glass with mother-of-pearl handle: ‘Am I expected to remove my perfectly adequate spectacles to use this relic?’ And that’s only the gripes that I had heard.

  In fact, Diana was routinely so ungrateful that Alexander’s persistence in the face of such an unenthusiastic response sometimes felt like his rather imaginative way of getting her to vent her anger on a thing, rather than with him. But, as charming as Alexander was (or at least I thought he was), now that I considered what I had seen of their marriage more deeply, I didn’t think he’d physically loved Diana for quite some time. Both had their own room, each down their own landing and on different floors of the house.

  Predictably, Shepherd was now regretting what he’d said to me. ‘He wasn’t doing something wrong, I am sure of that. Don’t tell Mary I told you, Madam. Please don’t.’

  I tried to mollify him. ‘Of course, Shepherd. I’ll keep it to myself. Thank you for telling me. I’m sure there’s a simple explanation that has no relevance to his murder.’

  As I pushed the front door closed I thought that this detective business was hard to get my head around.

  So many things that didn’t quite make sense, hardly any clues of substance, a string of suspects and very probably a few dead ends.

  Suddenly I felt drained and tired. I knew if I hung around in Rose Cottage much longer I’d be tempted to curl up in bed and have a nap.

  I had to get out and as there was time before lunch I decided to go and collect Henry’s bag from Antonia. It would clear my head to have a change of scene.

  I opened the door to leave Rose Cottage and a man in red jacket and shorts practically fell in on top of me.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ I said. ‘What timing!’

  He handed me an envelope, and I realised he was the postman.

  ‘I think you might be able to help me,’ I said. ‘I’m wondering if you’ve worked in this area a long time, and whether you might be able to tell me where Phil and Iona Yard moved to?’

  The postman looked at me.

  ‘I have a letter for them,’ I said, with such conviction that he didn’t question why, eighteen years after they had moved on, I wanted to send a letter to people I did not have the address of.

  ‘The Yards, of course I remember them. Out of my area now but only just. Little farm in Farby.’

  ‘What’s the address please?’

  ‘Little Farm, Farby.’

  It was cold, and I drove to Spire wrapped up in my coat and wearing gloves. I parked on the high street so I could walk directly through the graveyard.

  The area of Alexander’s death was still cordoned off with the blue and white police tape, and as I headed for the lych-gate in the yew hedge an empty fizzy drink can shoved into the corner caught my eye. I stubbed my toe as I leant down to pick it up and put it in my pocket, later to put in a bin; one of my pet hates is litter and I’m always retrieving it.

  I looked down at the ground and saw what at first I thought was a perfectly round and not particularly big stone. Picking it up, it was far heavier than it looked, and when I’d wrestled it from under the hedge I saw it was a stone orb topped with a cross, a Globus Cruciger.

  My goodness! At that moment I might have the very murder weapon in my hands. Certainly, in my admittedly somewhat limited opinion, it was heavy enough to deliver a fatal blow, and given the shape it might well not even break the skin.

  I trotted over to the nook where Alexander had died, slipped under the two-tier cordon and held up the orb to the stone Christ’s cupped left hand. It looked as if it would fit perfectly; my artist’s eye has made me very good with measurements.

  I quickly ducked back under the tape and stood staring at Christ, almost believing he might talk to me.

  I needed to get rid of the orb so hurriedly I chose a fresh spot in the hedge (I didn’t want the murderer coming back to remove his weapon) and pushed the orb far into it, making sure it was well hidden amongst the branches. Thank goodness I’d been wearing gloves. I walked away, relieved that no one could trace it back to me.

  Ding dong went the Codringtons’ front-doorbell and almost immediately I could hear Antonia’s long legs striding towards the other side of it.

  ‘Susie, how nice to see you, come in. Do you have time for a cup of tea?’

  ‘Yes please, that would be great.’ Holding up the Coke can I asked, ‘Mind if I put this in your bin?’

  ‘Sure.’ Antonia took it from me and I followed her in to the now familiar kitchen. The wood-burner was glowing and Situp, recognising me, got out of his basket and wagged his tail as he came to say hello.

  ‘That’s better, Situp,’ said Antonia looking at her dog with more fondness than I’d seen her look at her little girl Bella. ‘We were worried he was out of sorts when you were staying, but like an only child I just think he gets jealous when we have visitors and our attention is taken away.’

  ‘I can completely understand that.’ I was pleased to hear there was a reason for his behaviour as I’d thought too that he’d been a bit more subdued than I had expected for a youngish dog. Situp seemed to appreciate my thoughts, as he sat in front of me and solemnly offered me a front paw.

  ‘I think he likes you.’

  ‘He’s such a lovely dog.’ I patted his tummy as he sat as close as he could beside me and then leaned against my legs.

  ‘Yes, aren’t you a good boy?’ cooed Antonia to her enormous hound. Situp looked at her as if to say he was a very good boy indeed.

  ‘Home alone?’ I asked in the hope that we could have an open discussion.

  ‘Yes. May’s taken Bella to stay with my parents in Herefordshire to give us a break for a few days. Ben has a manuscript deadline at the end of the week and so he needs to have total peace and quiet.’

  ‘Is Ben here?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes, but not really… if you know what I mean? He’s locked himself out there in the office as he tends to do.’

  Antonia stood at the kitchen counter, spooning loose tea-leaves into her spotted teapot while the kettle boiled.

  I pulled a chair out from the table, took off my gloves and coat and sat down. Before I even had to prod, she started telling me the things I had wanted to hear.

  ‘Inspector Grey was round here this morning hoping to find more evidence. Not that we had any to give him. He’s sure Alexander was murdered in the graveyard. Ben thinks the murder malarkey is a false accusation, and that Alexander must have fainted and knocked himself out on a rock, but I’m not sure that would be enough to kill him. What do you think?’

  ‘I know he was a diabetic and at the time he fell his sugar levels were low,’ I replied. ‘But I agree with you. It seems unlikely that a pretty light bash to the forehead would have been enough to kill him.’

  I was selective regarding how much I told Antonia of what I knew. I’d been included by Diana in this morning’s meeting as a trusted friend, and it would be entirely wrong to share any of the information that I’d heard in the conservatory, however tempting
now.

  Antonia brought the tea and a biscuit tin to the table. ‘You have to have a bit of shortbread as it’s my alibi,’ she said in a conspiratorial way, as she sat down and pulled the lid off.

  I smiled as that seemed to be what she was wanting me to do.

  She pushed the tin towards me. ‘It’s quite funny really, considering I hardly ever do the cooking.’

  ‘How does it work then?’

  ‘Hear me out Susie!’ she said, and then launched into a lengthy explanation. ‘I started making shortbread when I got up on Sunday morning, but when the conversation of burying the bone aggravated me I put the dough in the fridge and went with Bella to let Minty out of her stable. By the time we returned you’d all left the house so I got the dough out the fridge and continued making the biscuits. It takes eight minutes to bake shortbread. I cut the shapes, put them on a tray and popped them in the oven. Six minutes later I heard a knock on the back door. I picked up Bella, put her on my hip and went to open it. Ronnie was standing on the porch step asking if he could speak to Ben.’

  ‘And you asked him in?’ I said, and then remembered that she wasn’t overly fond of Ronnie.

  ‘I couldn’t exactly say no. I didn’t want him to go looking for Ben and find him burying the bone.’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘But at the very same time that I was at the back door, Ben must have entered the front door to shut Situp in the kitchen.’

  ‘Didn’t you wonder why Situp was in the kitchen?’ I interrupted again, unable to stop myself asking questions.

  ‘Not at all. I assumed he’d been a nuisance and Ben must have brought him back. It’s quite usual. And then the cooker alarm went off, almost as soon as Ronnie was in the house. I rushed through to the kitchen, put Bella down, took the shortbread out of the oven, with Situp doing his best to get between my legs, and laid the shortbread out on cooling racks. Then we came to look for you in the graveyard, taking Bella and Situp along for the walk.’

  I saw that the eight minutes of shortbread-baking, and then the walk to the graveyard, covered enough time between 11.15am and 11.25am for Antonia not to have committed the murder. Not that I had ever really considered her to be a viable suspect; I couldn’t think of any possible motive.

  I couldn’t help myself blurting out enthusiastically, as I liked Antonia, ‘How brilliant to have such exact timings as to your whereabouts!’

  ‘Isn’t it just?’ she agreed.

  I reached into the biscuit tin and pulled out what was trying to be a duck but had lost its beak, one foot and the tip of its stumpy tail.

  ‘What did Ronnie want to ask Ben?’

  ‘Do you know, I never got round to asking him and now I wouldn’t dare. Ronnie is clearly the most obvious suspect. I can’t believe that only moments after the murder I invited him into our house.’

  ‘What makes you so suspicious?’

  ‘No one can vouch for his whereabouts before he rang our back-doorbell, so I hear,’ replied Antonia. I detected a slightly triumphant note in her tone.

  I was cross that I hadn’t worked this out myself.

  Indeed, it brought home to me that in future I must listen very carefully to every single detail of what someone is saying while they are saying it. I should treat people’s comments just like I do when painting a bird in the sky. One moment the bird is there ready for me to capture in my memory, whereupon I lock it there immediately, knowing that if I don’t, the next moment it will be gone for good.

  Antonia looked at me straight on. It was a look I assumed she held in board meetings with chief executives she was advising. One of such seriousness I knew what she was about to say was worth listening to.

  ‘Ronnie was wearing a scruffy, wax jacket when he came to the door and his hands were stuffed into the enormous pockets…’ She paused for a split second. ‘I remember, because he nearly went flying when he tripped on the step.’ Antonia took in a deep breath and finished her sentence with a sense of drama, ‘He could have been hiding a weapon.’

  I tried to keep my expression calm. Antonia had just given away what was very probably the hiding place for the Globus Cruciger, on its way to the hedge.

  ‘Seriously, do you really think Ronnie might have done it? Remind me again why you don’t take to him.’

  ‘Well, I don’t really know, if I’m honest, other than we’ve never really clicked. It isn’t as if we’ve lived here long, although we have been to the pub pretty regularly, or at least Ben has. Neither of us can believe Ronnie would really commit murder. But it feels a strange coincidence, him turning up at our back door for the first time ever, mere moments after Lord Greengrass’s death.’

  ‘What was he like when you saw him?’

  ‘Oh you know, just as he always is, flirting and smelling of booze.’

  ‘Do you know how long Ronnie has been running the Dorset Horn?’

  ‘Oh years. He could tell you anything about anyone in this village, that’s for sure.’

  ‘Where did he come from?’

  ‘No one knows, so I hear. I suppose he’s a bit of a dark horse in that respect.’

  ‘No one knows?’ I asked.

  ‘Someone – I can’t remember who – said that he doesn’t like to talk about it. He trots out this mantra: ask no questions, tell no lies; my past is past and future to come.’

  Antonia refreshed the teapot and we continued chatting, darting from one theory to another.

  I knew that if any of us were certain who had murdered Alexander, then we wouldn’t be idly conjecturing in this manner. But we didn’t, and so the thrill of speculating had got the better of all of us. It is characteristic of that unattractive trait that affects most people when circumstances are horrible and unexpected. It’s like driving past a car accident and being unable to stop yourself having a look. We all get a guilty kick out of it, but it’s human nature at its worst.

  I didn’t think it was wise for Antonia, a relatively new resident in Spire, to start accusing her neighbours of any wrong-doing, and so I changed the conversation before she could say something she might regret. ‘Nanny passed on to me your message about Henry’s bag.’

  ‘Oh good. I hope you don’t mind taking it back to Sussex.’

  ‘Not at all.’

  ‘I don’t think it’s urgent. He said there was nothing much in it.’

  Antonia pointed to a faded, canvas satchel sitting on the other end of the transparent table. ‘That’s the bag over there; it’s only small.’

  The prospect of being in touch with the handsome Henry had been for a little while mildly attractive. But now that I’d met Toby, I realised I hadn’t actually thought about Henry very much at all.

  After a lengthy dearth of attractive, single men in my life, who would have thought that two prime specimens would cross my path in the space of just a few days? According to my dear but not always very wise mother, this is how husbands appear.

  ‘More tea?’ Antonia broke my thoughts, holding up the spotted teapot.

  ‘Yes please.’ I pushed my mug towards her.

  ‘Have you been questioned, Susie?’

  ‘I have. I was called in to the station yesterday afternoon.’

  ‘So was Ben!’ exclaimed Antonia.

  ‘I know he was. I shouldn’t really say but at Beckenstale Manor this morning, Inspector Grey told the family that Henry, Ben and me are no longer suspects.’

  Antonia flung apart her long, thin arms, took in a deep breath and let out a large sigh. ‘Thank goodness. What a huge relief.’

  ‘Isn’t it?’ I said, nodding agreement.

  ‘Ridiculously, we both began to feel guilty when we thought it was going to be difficult to prove our innocence. Oh, Ben will be so much more relaxed now. And as for Henry, I have been feeling terrible that we got him involved. Although Ben reminds me every time I say this that Henry did ask himself to stay.’

  I helped myself to another bit of shortbread. It was even better than Geoffrey’s mother’s, despi
te the fact she was Scottish.

  Antonia wanted to know more. ‘Naturally I never doubted any of you for a moment, but how did the police come to the conclusion that all three of you are innocent?’

  ‘From what I can make out, it was all to do with the noise that Lord Greengrass was making when we first heard it. I can only describe it as a very deep gurgle, which at the time sounded almost inhuman. But apparently Inspector Grey has a doctor’s confirmation that what we heard was in fact Lord Greengrass’s last breath, and that’s why it sounded so unusual as actually that strange sound is what it does sound like. And by the time we had heard it there was nothing any of us could have done to save him.’

  ‘Yes, they’re right,’ said Antonia, as if she were convincing herself. ‘I read somewhere that it can take up to twenty minutes, from the time of death to when the system packs up, for a body to stop twitching and making disturbing sounds. I know, as I was once on a plane to America when a man had a heart attack and there was nothing anyone could do. We all sat there watching as his life left his poor body. It was a dreadful thing to see, Susie, absolutely dreadful.’

  I didn’t doubt it for a moment.

  Antonia continued, ‘I am so sorry that Situp ever dug up that damned bone.’

  ‘It’s not his fault,’ I reminded her. ‘Any dog could have done the same. And I’m sure it’s nothing to do with anything that caused Alexander’s death.’

  ‘I know. But all the same, I feel bad about you three being first on the scene.’

  ‘Don’t worry, we’re all grown up.’

  She smiled at me, pleased that I did not bear a grudge.

  ‘Isn’t it surprising,’ said Antonia, ‘how easily the police passed over that business with the bone. They didn’t seem to be bothered about it at all.’

  ‘Thank goodness.’

  I took a sip of tea. ‘I must go in a minute or else I’ll be late for lunch with Diana, but I was just wondering if you asked Ronnie about where he was before he came to your back door?’