by Kim M Watt
“He knows where we live,” Miriam agreed, and tried to swallow a giggle.
“I think we’d best go home,” Alice said. “We’ve had a long day.”
“Yes,” Ben said, scratching the back of his neck. “I can imagine.”
“You’ve got something just there,” Alice said, touching the corner of her mouth, and they left Ben scrubbing at the blue dye as they padded off across the green in search of their abandoned bags. Miriam wasn’t terribly surprised to find she was crying again.
3
DI Adams
“It can’t do that,” DI Adams said. She stood on the bank of the duck pond in a pair of sodden wellies, arms crossed, glaring at the car as if it was standing on its nose just to spite her. Late afternoon light turned the windscreen into a blinding beacon.
“And yet it is,” DI Collins said.
“Yes, but how? That’s got to be against the laws of physics or something.”
“Maybe it’s just really well balanced,” he offered, and she gave him a withering look that was entirely wasted, as he was inspecting a skinny greyish creature with slick green hair that had just surfaced among the lilies. “Hello.”
“Hello,” the sprite said, favouring him with a sweet, sharp-toothed smile before grabbing a frog that was pretending to be invisible among the reeds.
“Who’re you, then?” Collins asked. He’d been using a torch to inspect the inside of the car, and now he played it over the creature. She hissed, shielding her eyes with the frog. “Sorry. Are you photosensitive?”
“Collins, you’re shining it in her eyes. I’d hiss, too.” DI Adams checked for the uniformed officers, but they’d retreated to beyond the crime scene tape, letting the techs and inspectors get on with things. No one was close enough to overhear.
“Right.” Collins switched the torch off. “Sorry about that.”
“I’m Nellie,” the sprite said. “I don’t know you two.”
“We’re … friends of Beaufort,” DI Adams said, feeling that it was maybe more useful (and less incriminating) to say they were friends of the High Lord of the Cloverly dragons than friends of the W.I.
“Huh,” the sprite said, and examined the frog, apparently losing interest in them.
“So … Did you see anything unusual today?” DI Collins asked.
The sprite looked up. “You mean, apart from the bloody great car in my pond?”
“Well. I mean, anything that could have led to that.”
“I was minding my own business,” Nellie said. “I always mind my own business. Then there’s this horrible great crash, and there’s a car and a bunch of noisy humans thrashing about, scaring the fish.” She put the frog back in the reeds and it paddled away. “And so far I still have the same problem.” She gave them a pointed glare.
“We’re very sorry about that,” DI Adams said. “We’re going to try and get this cleared up as soon as possible.” She hesitated. “Only – well, how is the car stuck?”
The sprite sighed. “The pond’s bottomless sometimes. But it gets shy. So when all the people started running in and shouting, it stopped being bottomless.”
“It gets shy,” DI Adams said.
“It’s not very social.”
“The pond’s not very social.”
Nellie looked at Collins. “Is there something wrong with her?”
“She’s from down south,” Collins said, and Nellie said “Ah,” as if that explained anything.
DI Adams shook her head and watched the sprite lunge forward and grab a small brown fish, which flopped about in panic until she started stroking its belly. DI Adams decided not to wonder how a pond could be a) bottomless; and b) only bottomless sometimes. She also decided it was definitely best not to think about it being shy. That seemed like a slippery slope. What would be next? Passive-aggressive wells? Anxious becks?
She opened her mouth to thank Nellie for her time just as the sprite stopped petting the fish and bit its head off. Both inspectors gave voice to an involuntary Ew!
Nellie looked at them. “What?” she demanded, her mouth full of half-chewed fish. “What do you think I eat?”
DI Adams made some half-articulated sound, thinking that it least it hadn’t been the frog, and the sprite tossed her lank hair dismissively then melted into the surface of the water, taking the twitching body of the fish with her.
“Well,” DI Collins said. “That explains a lot.”
“The car?”
“That too. But there always were rumours that the duck pond was bottomless. I thought it was to keep us out of it when we were kids.”
DI Adams nodded. “I suppose it depends how shy the pond was feeling.”
“Evidently.” Collins turned away to watch the crime scene techs shaking the car cautiously, and DI Adams wondered how they were going to write that particular report up.
Rather them than her.
DI Adams rolled out of bed, threw the window open, and bellowed into the early light, “Shut up, you horrible bird!”
There was absolute silence for a moment, then the rooster crowed again, and someone tutted rather loudly. DI Adams looked down into the next-door yard and sighed.
“Not you,” she said to the woman in the pink dressing gown. “The rooster.”
The woman just tutted again and went back to hanging up her washing. DI Adams closed the window. There was no point trying to reason with anyone who was doing laundry at 5:30 a.m. on a Saturday.
She considering trying to get more sleep, but the rooster was still doing his best impression of an air raid siren, and at some point in the night Dandy had crept onto the little double bed and expanded to take up pretty much all of it. She poked him in the side and said, “Dogs don’t belong on beds.”
He rolled onto his back, exposing his dreadlocked grey belly, and panted at her happily. She still wasn’t sure what to make of him. She didn’t consider herself a dog person, but she hadn’t exactly had a choice in the matter when he adopted her in the spring. And, to be fair, he wasn’t exactly a dog. He was a dandy, and no one seemed entirely clear on what that was. What she did know was that he liked tummy rubs, disdained dogfood, and wasn’t exactly visible to most humans. Well, to any other than her.
She pulled a hoody on over her pyjamas and padded downstairs into the unfamiliar little kitchen of the terraced house, wondering again how she’d ended up in Skipton. Transferring from London to Leeds was one thing, but Skipton? Her youngest brother had asked her if she was having a midlife crisis and planning to buy Hunter wellies and a Labrador. She’d suggested he come up here and tell her that, then he could see what country jails were like. He’d responded by calling her Jeanette, which was actually her name, but didn’t mean he got to use it. She’d hung up while he was still snorting with laughter and offering to send her a Barbour jacket for Christmas.
It was all because of Toot Hansell, of course. Well, it was because of dragons, but the dragons lived in the general region of Toot Hansell, and somehow the Toot Hansell Women’s Institute had become ground zero for dealing with anything dragon-related. And as she and Collins were the only two people outside the W.I. who seemed to know about dragons, it made sense that they dealt with any police business involving Toot Hansell, the W.I., dragons, or any sort of magical carryings-on rather than risk someone else stumbling across the secret. And it was surprising just how many carryings-on seemed to come up. The village hardly looked like a hotbed of criminal activity, but she’d spent so much time out there since transferring up from London that her DCI hadn’t even been surprised when Skipton requested that she assist them. If fact, he’d been almost unseemingly happy, which DI Adams felt was a bit rude. But then, no one had ever accused DCI Temple – known unaffectionately as The Temper – of being particularly diplomatic. He’d just walked up to her desk and said, “Adams. Pack a bag. Skipton needs you on a case.”
She’d started to point out that she had a case, which was exactly what she’d said to Collins when he’d called her an h
our earlier, but the DCI had cut her off.
“Hamilton can handle it. I’ll supervise him. DCI Taylor’s an old friend, so if she says they need you, you’d best go.”
She’d considered protesting, but The Temper had evidently made up his mind, and Collins was texting her every five minutes with an update and pictures of cake, so it wasn’t as if she was getting any peace over it. She had a sneaking suspicion that her DCI was pleased to see the back of her. In addition to suffering from a lack of diplomacy, he was also a product of the school of stiff upper lips. Dealing with a new DI who had transferred from London following a work-induced mental health break was sufficiently out of his comfort zone that she was half-surprised he hadn’t packed her bag himself.
So she’d left Leeds an hour later with a gym bag and her coffee machine on the back seat of the car and driven straight to Toot Hansell, to be confronted with physics-defying cars. And now she’d been woken by roosters after spending the night in someone’s aunt’s holiday let, the place all done up with pink floral towels, knitted doll toilet paper covers, framed photos of kittens, and an extravagance of doilies and souvenir plates.
I’m only on loan, she reminded herself, plugging her coffee machine in and topping it up with coffee. This was for one case, and one case only. As soon as it was done, she was going back somewhere that didn’t have roosters in the backyard.
They ran before work, DI Adams listening to the fall of her feet and the harsh rhythm of her breathing, Dandy loping alongside her. His size was oddly variable, and today his head was almost level with her waist as he kept easy pace, grey dreadlocks flopping in the wake of his movement. The sun was already warm on her back, and the woods smelt of night-damp and rotting leaves and new growth. They ran the loop of the castle woods, the trees green and whispering, the river gold and the dirt track forgiving under her feet. Other walkers and runners nodded to DI Adams but gave her a wide berth without seeming to know why, and their dogs strained away in fright. Dandy ignored them, although apparently he wasn’t above chasing squirrels. The first time he’d raced off after one DI Adams had spent half an hour hissing at him to come down out of the tree, trying to look casual every time someone went past. Apparently, dandies were good climbers.
Back at the house, she took a moment to stretch at the gate, her eyes drawn to the fell that lifted itself above town. She seemed to be able to see it from almost anywhere, immovable grey stone and green grass like a monument to something unspoken. It was a constant reminder that the town was anchored to wild country, that the luminous green fields led to higher and less tamed places. She tried not to like it. She didn’t want to start liking things around here.
She was almost ready to go in when a car pulled into the spot in front of hers.
“Morning, Adams,” Collins said, as Dandy went to investigate the bag he was holding. “Good run?”
“Morning,” she said, then added, “Dandy, no.”
“Dandy what?” Collins asked, looking around in alarm, but it was too late – the bag was jerked from his hand. “Hey!”
“Put it— oh. Too late. Sorry.” Dandy gulped the bag down without bothering to even separate the contents, then stood on the pavement with his tail wagging softly, looking at Collins as if he might produce another.
“Does he have to be invisible?” Collins asked. “I wasn’t prepared for that.”
“I have no idea,” DI Adams said. “I know nothing about him.” Which was true. Dandy had adopted her during a rather bizarre case involving pheasants, elderly thieves, a suspicious death, and the W.I. Of course. And not even the dragons knew very much about him. The cat had opinions, of course, but the cat always had opinions. She was just glad that, unlike the cat, Dandy had so far shown no inclination to talk. “Do you want some coffee?” she offered.
“Don’t you have any toast?”
“I haven’t exactly had a chance to go shopping. Besides, I don’t want to have to cart loads of stuff back to Leeds with me.”
“You could be here a while.”
“You don’t know that.” She went through the gate to the front door, ignoring his snort.
Collins poked at her coffee machine and complained about the breakfast sandwiches the dog had stolen while DI Adams showered and changed into a suit and shirt. She tightened her hair more firmly into a bun, half-listening to him shouting up the stairs that buying a vegetarian sausage sandwich for her had seriously damaged his standing in the community. She poked at a stray curl and thought she should probably try straightening her hair again, but it took too long, and never worked anyway. She shoved a couple of extra bobby pins in for luck, then padded down the stairs.
“Is Dandy in here?” Collins asked.
“Under the table.”
“Well, bad dog,” the big inspector said, leaning over and shouting in the general direction of Dandy’s hindquarters. The dog looked at DI Adams – well, pointed his head in her general direction, his red eyes invisible behind the flopping hair, and thumped his tail.
“He looks very contrite,” she said, putting her to-go mug under the coffee machine spout. “Want one?”
“Sure. Why not.”
“Any news from the techs?” she asked, retrieving another mug from the cupboard.
“Other than the fact the car’s apparently concreted into the bottom of the pond?”
“Wow.”
“Yep. They haven’t been able to inspect it properly yet. It’s going to have to be cut out. But initial forensics on the deceased suggest a heart attack.”
“So maybe an accident?” she asked.
“Could be. Awfully sudden, though, not to pull over. And no brake marks, not even on the bank. He went in full-tilt.”
“And that was fast, especially for someone who knows the way the village works and would have wanted to stay in everyone’s good books.”
“Yep. And the last people to see him alive that we know of were the W.I.”
DI Adams sighed, and switched the coffee machine off. “Of course they were.”
DI Collins looked at the mug she handed him. “You have no food but you have two to-go mugs?”
“I have four. I only brought two.”
“That seems excessive.”
“I’m not going to lose one and then be stuck with no to-go mug.”
DI Collins got up and looked in the fridge, which was empty except for an elderly apple she’d transferred from the car. “Milk?”
“Sorry.” She pocketed her phone. “Toot Hansell, then?”
“Let’s see what the ladies can tell us. And if they can feed us.”
DI Adams led the way out into the crisp summer morning.
They took DI Adams’ car, and Dandy sat on the back seat with his head out the window. He seemed very put out that Collins was in the front, and kept breathing on his ear, making him yelp in surprise. DI Adams ignored his complaints, watching the world become greener and wider as the roads narrowed and the houses scattered to odd buildings and the occasional hamlet, watched over by red kites and sleepy-looking cattle.
“Just push him away,” she said, as Collins tried to wrestle his coffee back from the dog.
“How can I? I can’t even see him!” He gave up and let Dandy take the mug. “I don’t want it anyway. You’ll have slobbered on it.”
“But if you can’t see the slobber, is it really there?” DI Adams asked, slowing to pass a group of walkers in heavy socks, maps in clear pouches hung on string around their necks.
“Definitely,” Collins said, glaring in the general direction of the dog. “Although I’m starting to see why you have so many coffee mugs now.”
“No. I had that many before.” She went back to ignoring him poking Dandy as the dog sat there with the to-go mug in his mouth, wearing an air of long-suffering patience.
They went to Rose’s first, parking outside her little bungalow and letting themselves in the gate. An enormous volley of barking greeted their knock on the door, which Dandy entirely ignored. He was bus
y investigating the meadow of wildflowers that had once been a lawn.
Rose opened the door with her Great Dane, Angelus, bounding around behind her. The dog was almost as tall as she was. “Inspectors!” she shouted over the barking. “I heard you might be by!”
“Of course you did,” DI Adams said. Angelus forced himself past Rose without much difficulty, rushed into the garden, and stopped so suddenly his long back legs didn’t quite get the message. He pitched nose first onto the path, recovered himself, and bolted back into the house with a whimper. Dandy watched him go, flowers festooning his dreadlocks.
“I made scones,” Rose said, ignoring Angelus.
“Oh, thank God,” Collins said, and hurried after her as she led the way inside. DI Adams left Dandy romping in the flowers. He seemed happy.
Collins ate at least three scones with jam and cream at Rose’s, by DI Adams’ count, and by the time they’d visited Pearl and Teresa, Priya, Gert, Rosemary, and Jasmine both of them were awash with tea and DI Adams was fairly sure she’d broken her previous W.I. record for the amount of baked goods consumed in one morning. Dandy had been the willing recipient of some very stodgy banana cake that made DI Adams’ teeth go funny at Jasmine’s, and he had scared Jasmine’s little Pomeranian so much she’d gone under the sofa and refused to come out. Which DI Adams felt was an improvement, as it was a very nippy little thing. Jasmine had been terrified she’d poisoned the councillor with blue potato salad, and DI Collins had spent twenty minutes explaining that they already had the tub she’d made Ben take to the police lab, and it was absolutely fine, and she shouldn’t fuss herself. DI Adams made encouraging noises and tried not to check her watch.
What they hadn’t gained was any useful information. Everyone said the same thing: Thomas had seemed fine at lunch, he hadn’t rushed off, and he hadn’t talked about anything except communal gardens and chickens. Or possibly bees and wildflowers, depending on who you were talking to. Certainly nothing suspicious.