Murder for Good

by Veronica Heley

  Rafael took off his glasses. ‘You said you had a slight acquaintance with three of these people, though not with Thornwell or one other. So how come they all knew about you?’

  ‘That’s just it,’ said Thomas. ‘It worries me. Another thing: I’ve had five cheques so far, in a short space of time. What if I get another tomorrow? You can talk about coincidences, but this lot is going too far.’

  Susan protested. ‘It must be all above board if it’s gone through solicitors.’

  Rafael shook his head. ‘Reluctantly, I must agree with Thomas. Too many coincidences.’

  Ellie held back a sigh. She could see that Thomas meant to return all the cheques. If he felt it was right to do so, then so be it. But if he did it was going to be difficult to replace the boiler and attend to the wiring.

  Perhaps there was something she could propose to save the situation?

  She said, ‘Thomas, couldn’t you have a little chat with the families of these people and find out how they all knew about your money troubles? We know you met three of them through your work. They were all elderly widows whom you befriended. If you don’t remember the other two, well, you meet dozens of people in your line of work and it may well be that you’ve forgotten that you picked one up off the street after a fall or ran an errand for another.’

  Thomas said quietly, ‘I admit I’d forgotten that I’d been to see Mrs Pullin, but I couldn’t forget two more completely. I haven’t time to run around asking the families of these people why someone has been sending me money. You know I don’t have a minute at this time of the year. Not counting my usual round of visits to people in need, for the next week I’ll be working hard to put the magazine to bed.’

  Ellie said, ‘Well, perhaps I could do it for you?’

  Now Ellie was also busy. Apart from the weekly meetings of her charitable trust, she looked after her youngest grandchild one day a week and kept in touch with old friends who had become housebound. She liked to potter around in the garden when the gardener wasn’t there, and … and … but this matter of the wills was more important, wasn’t it?

  Ellie said, ‘There’s no harm, is there, in my visiting the relatives to explain that Thomas feels diffident about accepting money from people he hardly knew? I can see how they react. If they all say how they’d heard what a good man you are, Thomas, and what bad luck you’d had financially, then you’d feel all right about it, wouldn’t you?’

  He rubbed his eyes. ‘I would feel happier, I suppose. Though not entirely so. There’s something about this which makes me uneasy.’

  Susan tried to joke. ‘Thomas, don’t tell me you smell fire and brimstone?’

  He nodded. ‘Yes, Susan. I’ve been trying to convince myself that everything’s all right but when it comes down to it, that’s exactly what I suspect.’

  Susan tried to laugh. ‘No one who knows you would think you’d take part in anything untoward.’

  Rafael shook his head. ‘That’s not the point, Susan. Thomas is right. It stinks.’

  Ellie’s spirits dipped to zero as she realized that Rafael agreed with Thomas that there was something seriously wrong about the situation.

  She braced herself. ‘Then we’re all agreed. I’ll go to see the families involved and sort it all out. Now, let’s talk about something else. Susan, aren’t you tired of living in Rafael’s bachelor flat? Haven’t you found a house you like yet?’

  Rafael said, ‘Susan’s picky. Wouldn’t mind moving into a penthouse overlooking the Thames but won’t settle for less.’

  Laughing, Susan threw a cushion at him. ‘You’re just as bad. You want some space, too.’

  Ellie said she quite understood. ‘We’ve talked about downsizing eventually but hate the thought of living in a little box somewhere without a garden.’

  So the evening passed, with no need to resort to television programmes for entertainment.

  As Thomas made his cup of instant coffee before they went upstairs to bed, he said, ‘We’re lucky in our friends, aren’t we?’

  And Ellie agreed.

  THREE

  Wednesday morning

  Ellie did not consider herself to be a good businesswoman, but she prepared meticulously for the weekly business sessions of the trust. She had an excellent general manager, and her wizard of a finance director had a brain which acted like a laser on financial problems. She also had a part-time secretary to take notes at the meeting, who kept tabs on what had happened, what was happening, and what they planned to happen in the future. Other people might be asked to attend the meetings now and then, but these three were the ones who made the big decisions and saw that they were carried out.

  Her general manager and finance director were so good that Ellie sometimes felt she was only needed to supply coffee and biscuits and to put her signature on things, because they always knew exactly what they were doing. However, she had learned from experience that if she came to a meeting unprepared, the session would last twice as long as it needed to.

  So that morning she read the paperwork and pondered this and that. She made a note to ask the trust if they could find somewhere for Hetty to live at a reduced rent. For a start, the trust owned a block of flats down by the river and a number of those were let to groups of friends who had decided to set up house together. Perhaps one of them might have a room for Hetty to rent?

  Oh, but would she fit in? Er, probably not.

  Ellie reflected that accommodation for single people wishing to live on their own was hard to come by in that area. Ealing was a pleasant neighbourhood, convenient for transport links and shops. The trust tried to keep the rents down but they had to cover their costs and keep a healthy balance against all eventualities. The demand for reasonably priced living space was high, and there were always more applicants than they could accommodate.

  She made another note to herself to ask if the trustees had any idea about what she should do about the upstairs flat, which would soon be empty once more. She and Thomas really didn’t need any living-in staff now. Years ago they’d inherited their first housekeeper along with the house, and that dear woman had been part of the family for years and been much missed when she eventually died.

  After her there’d been this person and that living in the flat, but somehow they’d never quite fitted in until bouncy, red-headed Susan had arrived. Her reign had been a happy one and she’d only left to marry Rafael.

  Hetty didn’t seem to fit in anywhere. By her own admission she’d never been able to stay long in the rooms she’d rented. Perhaps it was her loud laughter which caused her to outstay her welcome, or the odd hours she worked?

  There had always been a problem with the top storey of the house. Several times in the past Ellie had asked the council if she might install an outside staircase so that she could let the rooms out as a self-contained flat, but they’d always refused. Yet the pressure on the housing market increased year by year. Was it time to try again?

  Ellie’s thoughts were interrupted by a knock on the door.

  It was Hetty, pulling on a jacket. ‘Sorry to interrupt, but I’m just off and wondering if you need anything from the shops? I thought I could get some of that fish mix from the Avenue and make a nice big pie for us for tonight.’

  Ellie steeled herself. ‘No, don’t worry about that, Hetty. I’ve told you before, I like to cook at night.’

  ‘Oh, but it’s no trouble, and I know how hard you have to work to keep everything going, and I want to help.’ Her eyes were wild, and her lips trembled. Was she going to cry?

  Ellie produced a reasonably genuine smile. ‘No, Hetty. You must let me use my own kitchen. I don’t want to see you cooking in there again. Understand?’

  ‘Oh, but it’s the least I can do when you’re so good to me. I know I can never repay you for all your kindness, so if I can do anything, but anything—’

  ‘Dear Hetty. Stop right there. You’ll have Thomas and I declining into wheelchairs if you coddle us so much. You look after yourself f
or once, and don’t overdo it. Where are you working today?’

  ‘I’m back at the deli, although there’s been a spot of bother there because I had to tell the Saturday girl that she was wrapping the ham up wrongly, and she told the boss that I’d been taking home the ends of cheese, which she’d always let me have before and said nothing about it, and what am I supposed to eat, may I ask, when she only pays me the minimum wage?’

  Ellie was a frequent customer at the deli and was aware that the boss there had given Hetty a part-time job out of the goodness of her heart, because the rest of her staff were fully trained in such work and Hetty, unfortunately, was not.

  The problem was the same one that Ellie and Thomas faced. How could you help someone so helpless, who was working all hours to earn a living, and always falling short?

  Ellie’s eye fell on the folder for the trust meeting. ‘Well, Hetty, I know things have been difficult for you for a long time, but I’m going to see if I can find you a nice place to live at a reasonable rent—’

  Tears spurted. ‘Oh, no! You know I can’t afford anything around here! You’re never going to throw me out! You’d never be so hard-hearted!’

  Ellie wished she’d never started this. ‘Surely you want a place of your own? If you looked for something a bit further out, you’d be able to afford it, wouldn’t you?’

  Hetty sought for a hankie, in vain. ‘I don’t want to move far away. I thought you liked me and needed me! I don’t get in your way, do I? I’m always trying to do things for you and thinking what you’d like best.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ said Ellie, pushing a box of tissues towards the woman, ‘but living in someone else’s place is not like having your own home, is it?’

  Hetty gulped. ‘But I’ve been so happy here! You and Thomas have been just like a mother and father to me.’ A change of tone. ‘You’ve made it all up! You’re jealous of the way Thomas has been looking after me. I know he wouldn’t want to throw me out on to the street! Not Thomas!’

  ‘Both of us,’ said Ellie, feeling tired. ‘We’re agreed. You need a place of your own. I’m going to try to find you something suitable. We’ve been glad to give you a breathing space, but now it’s time for you to think of your own future.’

  ‘No! Oh, no! I can’t believe this is happening! Oh! Oh, I can’t bear it!’ Hetty ran down the corridor and out of the house, slamming the front door behind her.

  Ellie sank back in her chair, feeling worn out. ‘I should have handled that better. Poor woman. I feel so sorry for her, but … Ought I to have gone after her? No, I don’t think so. I mean, what could I have said that I haven’t?’

  Ellie switched off her computer. Now Hetty was out of the kitchen, Ellie felt free to make herself a sandwich for lunch. Of late, she’d found herself putting off making herself a cuppa when she knew Hetty might be pottering around in there, with the radio on full blast.

  Hetty loved a noisy environment.

  Ellie didn’t.

  After lunch Ellie checked the diary. Thomas was taking an elderly gentleman to a clinic and wouldn’t be back for a couple of hours, so Ellie was at liberty to start looking into the bequests he’d received.

  She collected Thomas’s file of letters and took it into her study. She turned her chair away from the window, because if she allowed herself to look out, she knew she’d want to be out there, mowing the lawn, dead-heading and tidying away the remains of the spring bulbs.

  She told herself that she’d allow herself some time to do that later when she’d finished work for the day.

  She fanned the letters out on her desk. Five people had died and left Thomas bequests, some little and some large. Ellie reflected that if there had been just one solicitor involved, that might have solved the puzzle of why Thomas had been selected for these bonuses. If someone was trying to think of worthy causes to leave money to, a solicitor might well have suggested Thomas.

  No, they wouldn’t. Solicitors couldn’t suggest worthy recipients. Besides, there were three different solicitors involved, none of them known to Ellie. So she hit that idea on the head.

  She considered the bequests in chronological order. Mrs This and Mrs That. Elsie and Lily. Two hundred pounds here and five hundred there. One had been a parishioner, and the other an elderly lady he’d visited now and then for the Age UK charity. He’d remembered both of them well. Yes, he’d been surprised when he’d received those two cheques, but had accepted the good wishes of the testators at face value. Number three. Ellie scrabbled among the letters to find that one. Thomas had received numbers three and four in one week. He’d shown them to her at the time, hadn’t he? Or no, that had been the week that their little granddaughter had been feverish, and it was quite possible – no, very probable – that Ellie had been so distracted that she hadn’t paid much attention to the details. She’d been pleased that Thomas had been given some more money, but she hadn’t read the letters herself. She’d had other, more important things to think about, such as how to bring the baby’s temperature down.

  Dear little soul. Am I looking after her one day this week? I don’t think I am. I must check with Diana.

  Back to the letters. Thomas said that he’d not recognized the name of the third testator. A man. Was this the drunken councillor whom Rafael had referred to? Think, Ellie! Thomas did tell you the name at one point, didn’t he? It was something ordinary, like Green. Or Brown. Or Smith. Or, perhaps, Harris?

  Ellie had known someone called Harris once upon a time, but it wouldn’t have been him. Or rather, her. For it had been the wife whom Ellie had known.

  She found the letter. The bequest had been from a Harold Harris of Argyll Road.

  Was it …? Could it be …? Yes, that was the address at which Ellie’s old friend Gwen had lived.

  Goodness gracious! Harold Harris had left Thomas some money? Really? How extraordinary!

  Thomas said he hadn’t known the man. Well, why should he? The two men had never met, had they? If Ellie had ever mentioned his name to Thomas – perhaps in connection with a chance encounter she’d had with Gwen – he wouldn’t have had any reason to remember it.

  Ellie sat back in her chair and sent her mind back down Memory Lane. How easy it was to lose touch with people whom you only saw every now and then.

  It must have been some twenty years ago, perhaps more, that she’d first met Gwen. They’d been working in the charity shop in the Avenue at that time. Gwen had been a real asset, patient with customers and always ready to make the tea and provide biscuits.

  Ellie had stopped working at the charity shop when her first husband died, and after that had only ever come across Gwen by chance. On those occasions, if they’d had time to have a coffee together, they’d still found plenty to talk about: their families, Ellie’s daughter, Gwen’s sister who’d been a bit of a pain, what they were doing for their holidays. That sort of conversation.

  Over the years Ellie, who had never been tall, had ruefully watched her figure thickening and her hair turning to silver, whereas Gwen had remained the same large and cheerful woman who’d coloured her hair bronze and never seemed to feel the cold.

  Nowadays women achieved higher education and managed to combine work with childcare, but when Gwen and Ellie had got married it was accepted that wives stayed at home and looked after the children while their husbands went out to work. True, opinions about what young married women could and could not do were beginning to change, but rather too late for either of them to have thought of carving out a career for themselves.

  Ellie’s first husband had held very positive views on this. He hadn’t wanted Ellie to have a life outside the home, and his sharp tongue had kept her under his thumb until long after he’d died.

  Ellie’s only daughter, Diana, was a chip off her father’s block. She was a successful businesswoman with a husband and two children under five, but she was still vocal in her amazement that her mother could be responsible for heading up a charitable trust. Diana thought Ellie’s place in socie
ty should still be that of mother and grandmother.

  Gwen Harris had been brought up to regard marriage in the same light, which perhaps accounted for her sticking to a man who hadn’t been able to open his mouth without saying something sarcastic or hurtful.

  How things had changed! Nowadays if you told a woman that her duty in life was to stay at home and look after her family, and that she must let the man of the house make all the important decisions in life … Well, you’d blow a raspberry, wouldn’t you?

  Ellie remembered when she’d first met Harold. It must have been soon after she’d left the charity shop. The three of them had met by chance in the Avenue on a Saturday morning.

  Not as tall as his wife, Harold had had a viper’s tongue. The first words he’d said to Ellie were to complain that his wife had stopped in the street to gossip with a friend. ‘I understand you’ve known my wife for some time? She doesn’t improve with age, does she?’

  Incredibly, Gwen had laughed as if he’d been making a joke. Which he had not.

  Ellie had been taken aback by his rudeness and made an excuse not to accept Gwen’s invitation to join them for a coffee and a catch-up.

  Over the following years there’d been other chance meetings. Ellie remembered an occasion at a school fete when Harold had called Ellie’s attention to his wife’s size, saying she was eating for two but unfortunately past the age of childbearing! He’d added that he was looking forward to the day that she’d be too fat to get up the stairs.

  At which Gwen had smiled and said, ‘Oh, you are a one, Harold!’

  Another time he’d told Ellie that he was thinking of trading ‘this big lump’ in for something he could really fancy carting around. As before, Gwen had laughed, and said ‘Oh, Harold, give over, do!’

  Ellie had concluded that Gwen must be one of those saintly souls who believed in keeping her marriage vows even when the relationship had descended into what most people would consider to be abuse.