Harold had been … what? An accountant? Something like that. Gwen had been proud of him, mentioning to Ellie over the years that he’d got a promotion in his job, or moved to another, better firm. They’d bought their large house in West Ealing before the prices had begun to rise and they’d never had any children.
Ellie thought that Gwen must be rattling around in that house now, or perhaps she’d sold it and moved away?
Ellie decided to try the old telephone number she had for Gwen. If her old friend were free, perhaps Ellie could call to see her that afternoon?
The phone rang and rang. Finally, Gwen answered.
Ellie said, ‘Gwen, it’s Ellie Quicke here. Something made me think of you, and I rang on the off chance you might be in. How are you doing?’
‘All right, I suppose. Up and down. You know?’ She sounded subdued.
‘Of course,’ said Ellie, who remembered very well how she’d felt when her first husband had died. It had taken a long time for her to come to terms with her new life. ‘It seems ages since we met and I wondered if you were still living in the old house. Tell you what, if you’re free this afternoon, I could pop over and we could have a good catch-up.’
‘Why not? I’ll put the kettle on, though I don’t think I’ve got any biscuits.’ Gwen put the phone down without another word.
Oh well. That was short and sharp. Ellie shrugged.
She put the Harris papers aside for a moment to look at the details for the other benefactors.
What about the drunken councillor, Thornwell? Ellie had an uneasy feeling that Rafael had not told everything he knew – or perhaps suspected? – about the man.
What reason would Rafael have for not being open about his dealings with him? Surely, none. However, she ought perhaps to check. Ellie dialled and was lucky enough to find Rafael at liberty to take the call.
She said, ‘Rafael, I’m starting to look into the bequests. You mentioned last night that one of the people who’d left Thomas money might have been had up in court for being drunk?’
‘Mmhm. Do you need the details? It was in the Gazette. I looked them up this morning. He was driving erratically and knocked over a child in the road outside the fish and chip shop in the Avenue. No harm done, and the child didn’t have to have hospital treatment. Thornwell was over the limit, which he blamed on some cough medication he’d been taking. The magistrates didn’t believe him, he lost his licence and had to do some community work. Not much. Not enough, in my opinion. He remained on the council for years, even after that.’
The information came flowing out without hesitation. Ellie told herself she’d been quite wrong to think that Rafael was withholding information.
A pause, and then he said, ‘I suppose I could dig around some more if you like.’
Alarm bells rang. Why would Rafael offer to do that? She said, ‘I’d be grateful. And for any other bits of gossip you can turn up.’
‘Gossip? Me? Would I!’
He aimed for a comical tone of voice, but something still scratched at the back of Ellie’s mind about Rafael’s attitude to the disgraced or disgraceful councillor. However, she said, ‘Thanks. I need all the help I can get. I knew the wife of one of the other benefactors slightly. I’m going to drop in on her this afternoon. I’m feeling a bit guilty about her, actually. I haven’t seen her for ages. I didn’t even know her husband had died. Ah well, it will be good to see her again, even under these circumstances.’
‘Best of luck,’ said Rafael, and switched off.
Yes, indeed. She would need some luck. Did it look like rain? Perhaps she’d better take an umbrella, just in case.
FOUR
Wednesday afternoon
On her way up the hill, Ellie tried to work out when she’d last seen Gwen and Harold. There’d been something odd about Gwen’s behaviour that day, hadn’t there? If only she could remember what it had been.
She’d been shopping in West Ealing and instead of taking two buses to get home had decided to walk back by way of the Argyll Road.
She’d been thinking about what she’d cook for supper when, entirely without warning, a car had turned off the road and came to rest across the pavement in front of her.
Ellie had pulled up short, her heartbeat going into overdrive.
A cheerful voice had called out, ‘Yoo-hoo, Ellie! Watch where you’re going!’ It had been Gwen, in the driving seat of the car.
Beside her sat Harold, half her size and twice as sharp. In a cracked voice Harold had said, ‘Watch what you’re doing, you stupid woman! Suppose you concentrate on getting us home safely instead of yakking to all and sundry. Give me strength!’
Gwen had kept her cool as she inched the car backwards and forwards across the pavement, through the gateposts, and finally managed to park in the forecourt of their large, detached house.
Throughout this manoeuvring, Gwen had kept talking to Ellie. ‘Don’t go away. Hold on a mo till I get this beast safely back home. I’ve been meaning to ring you for ages, catch up on all the gossip. No, Harold, I am not making you too late for your programme. It’s the golf, you know, Ellie, from America. Or is it the cricket from Australia?’
‘Gossip, gossip! That’s all you’re good for.’ Harold had ignored Ellie in order to keep up a running commentary on Gwen’s efforts to park their car. ‘Left hand down a bit, woman! Can’t you even remember which is your left and which is your … No, no, no! What idiot of a test driver ever allowed you to think you could …!’
Ellie had thought it a mystery how Gwen managed to keep a smile on her face.
As soon as the car had come to a halt, Harold had eased himself out and, leaning on a stick, thumped his way, still complaining, into the house. His wife opened the boot, revealing a mountain of supermarket shopping bags. ‘I haven’t seen you for ages, Ellie. Have you time for a cuppa?’
A spat of rain helped to make up Ellie’s mind. ‘I’d love a cuppa. Let me help you in with those bags.’
‘I was all for doing the weekly shop online but Harold says it costs more, and if it keeps him happy, who am I to argue?’ Gwen ignored the fact that nothing seemed to make Harold happy.
Ellie had assisted her friend in with the shopping and stayed for a cup of tea, interrupted by Harold complaining – first that she’d given him tea instead of the coffee he’d fancied that afternoon, and then that the biscuits she’d given him were stale.
When Ellie had said she really must go, Gwen had accompanied her to the front door. It was only then, in the light of the bright sun, that Ellie noticed the lines of strain around her friend’s eyes. But what would you do? Living with Harold must be difficult.
Gwen had put her hand on Ellie’s arm as they stood in the porch. ‘Keep in touch, won’t you? Perhaps we could meet up one day next week?’
At the time Ellie hadn’t read anything serious into her friend’s words, but in retrospect, she thought that Gwen had sounded almost desperate.
Yes, that was it! That was what had been different about that meeting. Gwen hadn’t brushed aside her husband’s sarcasm, but had shown signs of … what? Weakness? Fear? Never before had Gwen suggested making a proper date to meet.
At the time Ellie hadn’t found the invitation entirely welcome. Well, she was busy, wasn’t she, what with babysitting the new grandchild and the work for the trust? She’d said, ‘Yes, of course. We must do that.’ And hadn’t meant it.
What’s more, Gwen had understood that Ellie hadn’t meant it.
Oh, the guilt! I should have realized she needed help. There’s no excuse.
Well, Gwen didn’t ring her to suggest a date, so it can’t have been that important, can it?
You know perfectly well that you declined to make a commitment.
It wasn’t Gwen who died.
But maybe Gwen got so beaten down that she helped him to die?
Perish the thought. Anyway, Gwen ought to have suggested a date then and there. Instead, when Harold had shouted for his wife from inside the ho
use, Gwen had waved goodbye and Ellie had departed.
Oh, and I remember that all the way home I amused myself wondering why Gwen had never put weedkiller in her husband’s tea.
And then, he died. So perhaps Gwen had really …?
No. He hadn’t died from weedkiller. Had he?
Ellie realized that she actually had no idea how Harold had died or even when. It wouldn’t have been weedkiller, anyway. Ridiculous idea!
Perhaps he’d had a stroke, or been run over in the road, or accidentally taken too many sleeping tablets.
It was a little odd that Gwen hadn’t notified Ellie that her husband had died or given her details of the funeral. Ellie would have gone, if she’d known about it.
Not for the first time Ellie regretted that they had ceased to take their local newspaper which had supplied details of local births, marriages and deaths in copious detail. You were supposed to get all that information online nowadays, weren’t you? But that had never come naturally to Ellie.
So, where had Thomas come into Harold’s affairs? Ellie couldn’t recall a single way in which Thomas might have come into contact with the man. Not through church, or a local committee. On different occasions in the past Ellie might have mentioned to Thomas that she’d met her old friend Gwen that day and had had a coffee and a chat. On such occasions, Ellie might have made some derogatory remark about Gwen’s taste in men. Yes. But that was it.
Ellie and Gwen had known one another? Yes. But Thomas? No. So why the legacy?
The big house on Argyll Road looked much as Ellie remembered it. Evidently Gwen was not going to sell, for there was no estate agent’s sign outside.
A woman opened the door to Ellie’s ring on the bell, but this was not the old, bouncy Gwen. This was a subdued woman who seemed to have lost weight recently. ‘Lovely to see you, Ellie. Come on in.’
‘It’s been too long,’ said Ellie. ‘My fault.’
‘Time flies when you’re having fun,’ said Gwen, leading the way back down the hall and into the kitchen. She moved lethargically. She’d let her hair grow and the roots showed that she was going gray. A button was missing off her shirt.
The kitchen was clean but there was no sign of food preparation for an evening meal and the house felt chilly. Gwen gestured to Ellie to take a seat and poured boiling water into the teapot, placing it on a mat on the table. She added two mugs, a battered tin containing two broken biscuits, and a half full bottle of milk.
In the old days she’d have got out the bone china and never have dreamed of putting the milk bottle on the table. Also there would have been a good selection of biscuits to offer.
Gwen said, ‘I’d left him, you know. Ten days before he died.’
Ellie blinked. She hadn’t expected that. ‘You’d left Harold?’ Well, well. Wonders would never cease. And about time, too.
‘Yes,’ said Gwen. ‘My sister kept on at me to leave him, saying he’d come to his senses if I weren’t there twenty-four-seven to look after him. She said he wouldn’t starve because he could order food online and he had social services running around after him, and he could get a cleaner to look after the house and neighbours could drop in. I kept telling her it was the pain that made him so short with me. But I’d got a bit rundown, and he said something which upset me, which it shouldn’t have done if I hadn’t been going down with laryngitis, and I snapped back at him without really meaning it, you know?
‘He said I was to get out and I said I would. I packed a small bag and I was going to take the car, but he said it was his car and not mine – although he hadn’t been driving for quite some time, it was over a year since he’d stopped. I took a taxi to the station and got to my sister’s, and she put me straight to bed and I stayed there all that weekend, mostly asleep.
‘I felt better on the Monday and my temperature had come down a bit, so I started to worry about how he was coping without me, but my sister said to leave him to stew in his own juices. Of course I couldn’t do that, so I phoned to see how he was getting on, and he said he was fine and he’d got in a cleaner who was looking after him beautifully and he wasn’t missing me at all. So I stayed on with my sister all that week, and I did feel much better, almost my old self by the next weekend. Then I remembered he’d got an appointment at the hospital the following day, Monday, and I knew he’d never get there if I didn’t take him because he wouldn’t waste money on a taxi, would he?’
Ellie backtracked. ‘Why wasn’t Harold driving? Had he lost his licence?’ He wouldn’t have got drunk, would he? Mean old Harold wouldn’t have wasted money on booze, would he?
Gwen was shocked at the idea of Harold losing his licence. ‘Oh, no. It was his eyesight. Cataracts, you know? By the time they’d been dealt with, his right hip had gone. The pain was something dreadful. That’s why he hadn’t taken up driving again. Where was I? Oh yes, so I realized I’d have to get back to him that evening, and I asked my sister to drop me back at the station straight away and she did, and I got a taxi back from Paddington and then … and then …’ Her voice trailed away. Her eyes seemed fixed on the cooker built into the wall, though she probably wasn’t seeing it.
Ellie prompted her. ‘What happened?’
‘I found him. There was a hold-up on the railway, Sunday working, and I didn’t get home till about half past ten that night. He’s always in bed by then. I opened the front door and called out, “Yoohoo! It’s only me.” He didn’t answer, so I thought he must be asleep. We always left a light on upstairs on the landing in case he wanted to go to the loo in the night, and that was on, which was fine. Then, I’d not been sleeping well and I was so tired, though that’s no excuse, of course, but I tripped over my own feet in the hall and crashed into the hall table, and that silly Satsuma vase that Harold had bought in the junk shop, that he was so fond of – the vase, not the shop, I mean – anyway, it crashed to the floor and broke.
‘I was so upset, expecting him to wake up and tell me off, which I thoroughly deserved, being so clumsy. Only there wasn’t a peep out of him. The house was so quiet. And that’s when I realized that something awful had happened because he always sleeps lightly, and he hadn’t made a sound.’
‘You mean …?’
Gwen sniffed and used her hankie. ‘He was in bed, in his pyjamas and all. Just as he should be. It looked as if he was asleep, but I couldn’t hear him breathing. He snored a bit, you know? Not that he ever admitted it, of course, but he did. He was so terribly quiet. Not like him. I thought at first that if I got the paramedics they’d take him to hospital and bring him round, but they told me when they got here that he’d been gone for hours. He was cold. You know?’
Her voice wobbled, and Ellie patted her hand. ‘Don’t talk about it if you don’t want to.’
‘I’d like to. I was fine at first. I didn’t cry. I suppose it was the shock. It was like nothing was real and I was on automatic pilot. I told myself it had been a merciful release for him, and that he wouldn’t have wanted me to break down and become a nuisance to everyone. So I didn’t. He’d left instructions with his solicitor about his funeral, and a will as well. All I had to do was follow what he’d said I was to do. There was to be a small private cremation, nobody to come back to the house after. I had to get the death certificate, write to the utilities and the bank and … You know all that, don’t you? You’ve been through it yourself.’
‘I have.’
‘You know, for quite a while, maybe four or five weeks, I was quite all right. Harold had booked a holiday for us before I left him. Cruising on the Rhine. He’d thought he’d be able to manage even with his hip being so troublesome. I tried to get a refund but they wouldn’t play ball, although my sister says I should have been able to get one, so I decided to go on it all by myself. I had a blast, as my young nephew would say, and I enjoyed it so much, meeting new people and pretending I’d been a widow for ages. When I got back home I was full of good resolutions to lose weight and get a job.
‘I wasn’t away for long b
ut when I got back I was upset because the house was a tip. The cleaner hadn’t come in while I was away, though I thought I’d asked her to. Maybe I’d forgotten to ask. Head like a sieve, me. But I didn’t need her, did I? I could keep the house clean myself as I always had done in the past. So I told the agency not to bother, and set about it. Then I made a list of things to do, such as finding myself a part-time job. I kept thinking that Harold would have been so proud of me, pulling myself together like that. I went to three interviews, but apparently I’m too old and more or less unemployable because I’m no good on computers, and I can’t stand for long enough to do any shelf filling and that.’
‘You poor thing.’
Gwen began to weep. ‘To tell the truth, because I can tell someone who’s such an old friend, I can’t see any point in carrying on. My sister kept ringing me for a while, every night. She said I should go to stay with her for a bit, but she’s out all day, she’s still working, and her husband and the kids, they’re a noisy lot, and I didn’t think I could cope with that. Then she was angry with me for not going to stay with her and I don’t always pick up the phone when she rings nowadays. She’s always been a bossyboots, but I don’t have to put up with it any more, do I? She really ought to be more understanding.’
‘Dear me,’ said Ellie.
‘I wasn’t too bad really until oh, it must be about three weeks ago. I kept to my old routine, going to the shops even if I didn’t buy anything when I got there, and watching day-time television. I got quite interested in the soaps. Then I woke up one morning and started crying and couldn’t stop. And I couldn’t leave the house. After a bit my neighbour that’s on my right side – she’s a librarian, so nice, with three small children – anyway, she came round and told me I had to see the doctor. I didn’t want to but she bullied me into ringing for an appointment and she popped me in her car and took me to see him herself. The doctor said I was depressed and I’ve got these tablets but I can’t be bothered to take them. I know that if Harold were here now he’d tell me to snap out of it. He’d say, “Snap out of it, you silly old fool!” But I can’t.’
Murder for Good Page 4