Death At Willows End

by A. B. King

  She stopped suddenly, and looked at me archly. “Well, I'm sure you understand how it is?” she finished with a knowing smile.

  “Of course,” I echoed, smiling knowingly in return. I didn't actually know, but I could certainly make an educated guess. She had gone down into the trees for a quick bit of 'nookie' with a boyfriend while her husband was engaged somewhere else.

  “Well, as near as I can recall, we had reached just about this point here,” she continued, coming to a standstill in the neatly tended spinney that formed the far boundary of her property. “As you can see, if you look between those two trees just here, you can just make out the river and the old footbridge that crosses it. The trees weren't quite so tall or bushy all those years ago, and you could see everything much more clearly. Anyway, I was leaning against this tree here, and Freddy was in front of me, and I could see past his shoulder. I remember looking down there because my attention was drawn to the movement of some people. I glanced across and noticed a couple of tents on the far side, and some people I assume were camping there. Nothing unusual in that of course; I've seen people camp there more than once over the years. I can never understand why anyone ever bothers with such an uncomfortable pastime, but there it is; people still do! They never bother us on this side of the river, although I have a suspicion that the farm somewhere over that way encourages campers; I expect they make a bit on the side catering for them. You know, milk, eggs and all that sort of thing.

  Anyway, after that quick glance I looked away, because my companion said something, although for the life of me I cannot remember what it was and I don't suppose it’s of any importance now. At precisely the moment I looked at him, flash, bang, and before I knew what was happening rain started to come down in proverbial bucketfuls. That downpour was so sudden my beautiful Aramani cocktail dress was positively ruined, and by the time we reached the marquee we were like a couple of drowned rats. It wasn't until the next day, or maybe it was the day after, that I heard about what had happened. Perfectly dreadful of course, but there it is.”

  “As you say, perfectly dreadful,” I agreed, with a sudden mental image of her with her back against the tree and enjoying what comes naturally (to film actresses of her type at least) when bang, if the earth hadn’t moved, it certainly did the next best thing.

  “And it all happened just as Freddy was getting to the interesting bit,” she mused half to herself.

  “You say you saw people,” I interposed swiftly, anxious to steer her away from the more explicit details of her past love-life. “Can you remember how many?”

  “How many?” she echoed in surprise, her mind obviously still on ‘Freddy’ getting to the ‘interesting bit’ and what all of that entailed. “How many what?”

  “How many people you saw?”

  “Dah-ling, this all happened fourteen years ago!”

  “Yes, I know I'm asking a lot of you, only as far as I am aware you are the only living witness to a terrible tragedy, and anything you remember may be of absolutely vital importance in this affair.”

  “Well,” she said dubiously, no doubt reluctantly letting go of her recollections of Freddy and everything else associated with him. “Let me see now. Yes, well, as far as I remember there was a girl standing near one of the tents by the river and facing towards the water, Oh, and there were two other people, I think they were both girls, standing fairly close to each other down by the bridge. I think they were all girls because I could just about make out their faces, and one was a little taller than the other. Oh, and I think there was a man walking across the bridge towards this side. There, does that help?”

  Chapter Nine.

  For the very first time since meeting Danny I started to seriously wonder if perhaps there might be something to her wild fantasies after all. Following her revelation of what she had seen that day I wasn't able to extract any additional information relevant to my purpose from the increasingly expansive Gloria Divine. Walking back towards the house through the trees, it taxed my ingenuity to the limit to extricate myself from her company. Only by a supreme effort on my part was a dignified retreat prevented from escalating into a panic-stricken rout as she became more and more, shall we say, 'intimate' in her conversation and gestures. The last straw was when she offered to re-enact the scene, with me taking the part of Freddy Ivanoff! It needed a considerable degree of tact on my part not to cause offence as I realised somewhat belatedly that a lot more than 'information' was about to be bestowed upon me. As a spotty teenager I would probably have fainted at the mere prospect of what could be mine for the taking, and as an adult I might well have done the same thing for entirely the opposite reason; the thought of all that surplus flesh writhing about me was enough to put me off the thought of sex for life! (Or at least until I should set eyes on Danny again) Pleading urgent appointments I finally escaped, but only after she had wrung a promise from me to return with the draft of my 'book' so that she could put it forward to a film producer who was ‘very well disposed' towards her. As far as I know she didn't notice how most of my fingers were firmly crossed as I gave her my 'solemn' word!

  As I walked down her drive desperately trying not to break into a sprint for the road and comparative safety, I eventually calmed my shattered nerves sufficiently to mull over what she had said. It seemed to confirm that if Danny was the figure seen near the tent, she may well have been facing away from it as I had surmised, and looking towards the river moments before the lightning struck. What stuck in my mind was that there had been no mention in Gloria Divine's version of anyone standing near the other tent, which is near enough where I had been led to believe Julia was supposed to have been. This suggested to me that one of the other two female figures seen by the footbridge had to be her, and the other presumably Dian. Most intriguingly, who was the man on the bridge? Was he just a casual pedestrian, or was he involved in some way with the campers? There had been no mention of a man in anything I had heard so far, and even if he wasn't directly involved, he was obviously much closer to what happened, and his evidence as to what actually took place could certainly clear matters up. Given that the observation of the man on the bridge only preceded the lightning strike by a matter of seconds he must have been very close to what happened. Where did he go, and why did he not come forward later? I really needed to ask these questions; yet how on earth did one set about finding a mysterious man glimpsed from a considerable distance on a footbridge, and some fourteen years earlier?

  I reluctantly tucked the information supplied by my one-time pin-up away into the back of my brain to be mulled over later as I tried to concentrate upon my self-imposed task of gathering 'evidence'! There was one other house in the vicinity, which was just a short distance past the lay-by, and I thought that I might just as well try my luck there whilst I was at it. With any luck it would not be inhabited by another sex-starved washed-out film-star anxious for a little 'diversion'! Feeling just a whisker more confident now about my abilities as an 'interviewer' I came to what appeared to be a nineteen twenties' style pseudo manor-house set well back in grounds laid mainly to immaculately kept lawns and geometrically precise flowerbeds. There was a set of heavy wrought-iron gates across the entrance, beyond which a paved drive was visible leading to a set of garages that appeared to have been built at some later date than the house they served. There was a speaker-box by the gate with a call-button prominently marked beside it. I dutifully pressed the button and waited.

  “Who is it?” rasped the box in a tinny parody of a man's voice a few moments later.

  “Good afternoon, my name is Hammond,” I announced glibly with so much conviction I could not conceive of anyone doubting my veracity. “I wonder if I might have a word with you on a private matter?”

  “Hammond who?” demanded the speaker.

  “Neil Hammond,” I explained. “Please do not be concerned, I'm not here to sell anything; I am a writer, and I need to speak to you on a purely personal matter. If you prefer, I will write to make an a
ppointment?”

  “Writer you say,” came the metallic voice from the box, “are you from a newspaper?”

  “Certainly not.”

  “How do I know that you are telling the truth?”

  “I fail to see how I can possibly answer such a question.”

  “Are you from the Ministry?”

  “Do you seriously expect me to reply to that over a Tannoy?” I admit I was getting a little cheesed off with holding such a ridiculous conversation with a metal box, particularly as it wasn't getting me anywhere. It was a bit like trying to hold a conversation with a paranoid Dalek.

  “Very well,” the box announced after a few moments, “I can grant five minutes, no more.”

  “That's very kind of you,” I answered, trying not to sound too sarcastic.

  The gates swung slowly open just enough to admit my person, and then they closed again, leaving me with the uncomfortable feeling that in some strange way I was trapped. I sauntered up the driveway, noting that there was not a single blade of grass out of place, nor a stray leaf, and certainly not so much as a suggestion of a weed; it was a bit like walking through one of the gardens often seen beautifully illustrated in books extolling the virtues of having a beautifully laid out garden, with no suggestion of the vagaries of weather to frustrate the would-be gardener or the sheer hard work involved. Me, I can't even control a single flower-pot. Noting how immaculate everything was, and bearing in mind the rather weird conversation I had already had, I wondered if the owner would be similarly pernickety. All things considered, I feared he might well be, and I'm afraid that subsequent events proved my presentiments only too well-founded.

  As I approached the highly polished wood-stained front door complete with polished brass hinges and gleaming furniture, it swung open without so much as a single squeak and a man of about five foot two or three inches stepped out and looked at me through a pair of old-fashioned horn-rimmed glasses. He was neatly dressed in a blazer and flannels supporting razor-sharp creases, under which was a white shirt with a silk cravat. He was about sixty or so years of age, bald apart from a fringe of hair just over his ears, and well tanned. His eyes, as I drew closer, were rather like steely grey gimlets, and they looked at me with open suspicion.

  “You claim your name is Hammond?” he snapped rather than asked as I came up to him.

  “Yes,” I agreed, because I didn't see any sense in denying the fact.

  “Do you have any identification?”

  “Identification?”

  “Exactly; how do I know that you are not a criminal seeking to worm your way into my home for an illegal purpose?”

  I was right; he was a pernickety so-and-so! “Well, I have a driving licence you may examine if you wish,” I answered, “although I don't quite see the point; if I was a criminal I might well have pinched the licence belonging to someone called Hammond just in case you asked me. If you are that concerned about your personal security, why bother to admit me in the first place?”

  I rather hoped my less than polite manner would effectively put him off, and then I could retreat with a clear conscience. Unfortunately he wasn't going to give in so easily.

  “I admitted you for the very sound reason that it will be exceedingly difficult for you to get out again unless I open the remote-controlled gate. I should perhaps warn you that the gate and perimeter fence are electrified, and that I have a direct line to the police who are always happy to assist with dealing with unwanted intruders. I will also advise you that I am fully trained in martial arts, and I am wearing a bullet proof vest. There is too much lawlessness these days, and I am determined to catch as many criminals as I can.”

  “Oh, so you are already convinced that I'm a criminal, is that it?” I snorted, by now getting quite fed-up with the little comic-book martinet that faced me.

  “You haven't proved otherwise to my satisfaction?”

  “So, what happened to good-old British 'innocent until proven guilty' policy that once prevailed in our fair land?” I asked sarcastically. Frankly, I was getting to the stage where I didn't much care whether I 'interviewed' him or not, the man was getting right under my skin.

  “It went out the window when people like you bulldozed us into the European Union,” he announced superciliously. “Not being content with such sacrilege you then advocated free immigration, abolished the death penalty, invented human rights, banned social discipline of any description, glorified criminals, penalised honest citizens, did your level best to tax hardworking and productive members of society such as myself out of existence, thereby producing the fractured, layabout-orientated quango-dominated society we now have to endure.”

  If my mouth had gaped much wider it would probably have scraped on his immaculate drive.

  “I think,” I said as icily as I could once I had recovered the power of coherent speech, “that this conversation is getting neither of us anywhere. I apologise for disturbing you and will be obliged if you will open your gate so that I may leave you in peace.”

  “Not so fast, young man,” he said haughtily. “I haven't finished with you yet.”

  Martial arts expert or not, I was becoming sorely tempted to land one right on the end of his aggressively outward thrust chin, but with an effort I controlled myself.

  “Maybe you haven't,” I retorted primly, “but I've certainly wasted quite enough of my valuable time listening to your highly offensive comments.”

  “You said that you wished to discuss something of a personal nature,” he reminded me, “or was that just a feeble ploy to gain admittance?”

  “It is what I said, but I fail to see that that is relevant now,” I retorted, still holding on to the last shreds of my disintegrating temper. I disliked the little jumped up twit more with each passing moment, and I very much regretted trying to see him. “Now, if you will kindly open the gate?”

  “Not until you tell me upon what subject you claim you wished to speak to me about.”

  I confess that at that point I was close to losing my temper completely and sorely tempted to land him one in the middle of his pompous face. Unfortunately, whilst that would have given me a temporary sense of satisfaction, it wouldn't open the gate. I warned myself that there are serious penalties in this country for laying out undersized pompous twits, irrespective of how gratifying it might be on the personal level.

  “If you must know,” I said with a last valiant effort at remaining at least mildly civil, “I am seeking to unravel what may be a serious crime.”

  “Ah, you are a criminologist!” he exclaimed, his face suddenly lighting up as if I had just explained that I was the heir-apparent to the British Throne travelling incognito!

  “Well-”

  “I thought as much,” he announced triumphantly, his face now transformed from a scowl of suspicion into one of pure delight. “I'm a great judge of people, and I suspected something of the kind as soon as I saw you, but I needed to be sure! Oh yes, very clever Mr Hammond; I like your style, a brilliant subterfuge! You are obviously hot on the trail of some master criminal who thinks that because the police are inherently stupid and far too busy manning radar traps and filling in forms explaining why they have no time to do the job they are paid for, that a true British Citizen can't smell a rat no matter how well it is hidden! By God, there are too many of these foreign crooks coming into our once fair land now, not to mention terrorists, feckless scroungers and agitators of every creed and description! By God, they are infiltrating every layer of society, riddling us with vice and corruption, mocking the teachings of the church and destroying the very fabric of our British Way of Life! By Heaven and St George, the more of them we can lay by the heels the better! What is it, illegal immigration? Prostitution? Drugs? Murder?”

  “Really!”

  “Oh, quite right my dear fellow, I fully understand; we must be discrete, even a corn-stalk has ears. (Just my little joke) Come, we will adjourn to my study, which is electronically screened, and where we will never be overhe
ard.”

  He turned on his heel and vanished though the doorway. I hesitated for a moment wondering how best to escape from someone I was now beginning to seriously suspect was a fugitive from an asylum, (all right, so they are all closed down now) but I knew there was no chance of getting away until I could persuade him to open the damned gate. I sighed and followed him into the building. I must have been totally mad to ever imagine that I could be a private eye! No sooner was I inside than he bolted and barred the door behind me. He then switched on what I assumed was a security system before turning once again to lead me across a hallway that would have shamed even a show-house. Moments later we passed through another door that was also locked behind me as we entered a room that I assumed was his study. Everything inside that room was geometrically laid out and precise, even the desk behind which he immediately went to sit down was exactly in the middle of the room. He gestured for me to take the chair opposite, which was again lined up exactly centrally with the desk. It suddenly struck me that Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot would have approved of that room, even if he might have deplored its inhabitant's oddly functioning 'little grey cells'!