Murder for Good

by Veronica Heley

  Ellie investigated.

  Yes, one felt different from the other. It felt lumpy. There was a zip down one side, hidden by a fold of fabric. Ellie ripped the slip cover open and eased out a second cushion which had been roughly tacked together out of a couple of tea towels. This improvised bag had been filled with objects of all shapes and sizes.

  Ellie pulled the tea towels apart and out fell a collection of packets of pills which would do credit to any pharmacy. Ellie picked one up. It had been opened and a couple of pills removed. She looked at the label. These were heavy painkillers, the sort you were advised not to take for more than a couple of days at a time. How on earth had Hetty come by them, why had she kept them, and what did she propose to do with them?

  None of the possible answers to these questions made Ellie feel comfortable.

  The next packet she picked up was almost empty. Ellie read the label and didn’t recognize the medication. The next one … the drug company’s leaflet advised these pills were sleeping tablets to be used under this and that circumstances only. Warnings about this and that were included. She stirred the heap. Some of the packets had the patients’ names on. Some didn’t.

  A door banged shut below. Ellie started up. Was that the front door?

  Hetty had returned? What would she do when she realized Ellie was in her rooms?

  SIXTEEN

  Saturday, noon

  Ellie put a trembling hand to her head. She was not good at facing down angry people, especially today when she didn’t seem to be firing on all cylinders. But perhaps there would be no need for it? Perhaps Hetty would be fine about Ellie breaking into her rooms?

  A scream of rage from below told Ellie otherwise. Hetty had spotted the door hanging open. ‘How dare you, Ellie Quicke! You come down here, this instant!’

  Ellie called out, ‘Hetty, is that you? I’m up here!’ Knowing that she sounded ridiculous but not knowing in the least how to manage a scene with an angry woman. How could she diffuse the situation?

  Perhaps the best thing to do was to pretend for now that all was well, and that she hadn’t found the packets. She could hear Hetty panting her way up the stairs, shouting, ‘You come out of my rooms! Now! This minute!’

  Ellie shovelled the pills back into the cushion and zipped it up. She pushed the cushion back into place and realized too late that two packets had fallen to the floor. She scooped them up. There wasn’t time to put them back into the cushion. What to do? Her skirt had no pockets in it. Why don’t they put pockets in skirts any longer? Where to hide the medication?

  She did what women throughout the ages have done. She popped them into the front of her bra and made it to the door of the sitting room just as Hetty reached the head of the stairs.

  Hetty was in no mood to play softly, softly. She was holding the discarded chisel in her hand and looked as if she were prepared to ram it into something, or someone. ‘How dare you enter my rooms without my consent?’

  ‘You forget,’ said Ellie, trying to keep calm, ‘that this is my house. You had no right to put a lock on that door, and I have every right to walk around my own house. Suppose there’d been a leak in the cistern, or the central heating man needed to get at the tank? Of course I need access. I’m afraid you didn’t think about that.’

  Hetty was not soothed. She advanced a step, holding the chisel up and pointing at Ellie’s throat. ‘I told you I’d give you a key but you wouldn’t listen, would you? I had a right to a spot of privacy and you had no business breaking my door down.’

  Ellie wanted to say that it wasn’t Hetty’s door that had been broken down, but didn’t. She made a soothing motion with her hands. ‘Well, no harm done. There’s no leak from the cistern and I see you’ve looked after your rooms beautifully.’

  Hetty’s chin came forward. ‘You deceived me. You invited me into your house and pretended to be my friend and now you’ve turned against me. You’ve been poking and prying in my things which is against the law, and I’ll have you for that, I will! After all I’ve done for you and Thomas, I might have known you’d turn on me in the end. You come across all high and mighty but you’re nothing but filth!’

  Ellie held up her hands. The chisel was a formidable weapon and Hetty looked as if she were fully prepared to use it. ‘Look, I’m sorry things haven’t worked out for you, but—’

  ‘But me no “buts”.’ Hetty gestured with the chisel. ‘Come away from that door so that I can see what damage you’ve done to my things.’

  Ellie stepped sideways into the landing and Hetty peered into the sitting room. And saw nothing amiss, except …

  Midge the cat had been disturbed by the shouting, and now jumped down from his chair.

  Hetty brandished the chisel. ‘What’s that mangy cat doing up here? I don’t like cats. Nasty, smelly things. Shoo! Shoo! Out you go!’

  Midge knew when he was being threatened. He wanted out of the situation, but his only way out and down the stairs was blocked by Hetty. He assessed the odds and streaked past her, ears flattened, tail bushing up … brushing past her …

  Hetty screamed and lost her balance … and fell against the wall, threatening to topple back down the stairs.

  Ellie leaped to Hetty’s side to drag her upright and further into the landing away from danger. ‘It’s all right. You’re quite safe!’

  Hetty shoved Ellie away. ‘You did that on purpose! You tried to push me down the stairs so that I’d be killed and you’d inherit my money! Murderess!’

  What money?

  ‘No, no! Hetty, please! Be calm! That’s not how it happened!’

  Hetty was not to be placated. ‘I see what it is now. You were nice to me till you’d got me in your power, and all along you’ve been plotting my death. Well, two can play at that game! Back! Back, I say!’

  She swung the chisel at Ellie, who cast a despairing eye in the direction of the stairs, realizing she couldn’t get round Hetty to reach them.

  Ellie retreated a step, calculating the odds.

  Hetty was twenty years younger and a lot fitter. There was no way Ellie could win a bout of fisticuffs, even if Hetty were not waving a lethal weapon around.

  ‘Back, back, I say! I’m going to put you in a safe place till I’ve packed my things and have well and truly gone. I’m not telling you where I’m going, and no, you’ll never find me, not if you search for ever! But till I’m safely away, I’m not having you ring the police and making up stories about me being a bad girl. Into the spare bedroom with you! Go and sit on the naughty step, that’s what they tell children who misbehave, isn’t it? That’s what you’re going to do. Sit and think about all the bad things you’ve done to me. Someone will let you out eventually, I suppose. That is if Thomas is ever released from hospital – I’m hoping they’ll keep him in because those pills can do you a whole lot of no good if they don’t agree with you, right? If he never gets out, then that’s going to be too bad for you, isn’t it?’

  With one smooth movement Hetty pushed Ellie into the spare bedroom and slammed the door on her. Ellie discovered she was trembling. She retreated to the bed and let herself down on to it, thinking that as soon as Hetty was occupied with her packing, she would creep out and down the stairs.

  The key turned in the lock on the door, and Ellie’s mouth shot open. She was locked in!

  Well, it was no big deal. Hetty would let her out when she’d finished packing, wouldn’t she?

  The woman didn’t mean to leave her there. No. Of course not.

  Well, she might. But if not, it was no big deal.

  For a start, Ellie could use her mobile phone to call for help … except that her phone was in her handbag somewhere on the ground floor, either in the kitchen or the sitting room. Ellie wasn’t sure where she’d left it, but it would not be leaping into her hand to fetch help.

  Ellie shook her head, trying to clear it. What was the matter with her? She couldn’t think straight. All that morning, she’d been feeling …

  She must be going
down with a virus.

  She glanced at the window, which did not look out on to the road but out over the back garden. It was still raining. The lawn was getting a good soaking. It wouldn’t be possible to mow it until it had dried out a bit. The garden was bounded by a high brick wall and masked by trees. If she opened the window and yelled, no one would hear her. Except Hetty, who was unstable.

  Ellie didn’t like to think about how many people had tried to help Hetty and then found themselves facing not a pet lamb, but a rabid dog.

  Ellie was so tired. She let herself lie down flat on the bed. Ah, that was better. Her eyes were closing on her. She could do with a spot of rest.

  From the landing came the sound of luggage being bumped out of the cupboard along the landing. One of the wheels squeaked. More banging. Noisy. Wardrobe doors were flung wide. Drawers were pulled open.

  Hetty was packing.

  Faintly from the hall far below came the sound of the telephone. Hetty wasn’t going to answer it, was she? Ellie hoped it wasn’t Thomas asking to be collected from hospital. What would he think if he rang and she didn’t pick up? Would he ring her mobile? But that wouldn’t get answered either, would it?

  The bumping and banging in the other rooms stopped. Hetty had worked her way along the landing, clearing out her possessions as she went. She would certainly take the contents of the cushion with her, and Ellie dreaded to think what use she might put them to.

  Moreover, if Hetty left with them now, Ellie would have lost any chance of discovering what exactly Hetty might have been up to, and how she might or might not have been linked to the people who’d sent Thomas so much money. The police needed evidence, and Hetty was going to walk away with the only evidence Ellie had come across.

  Oh, frustration! Oh well, what did it matter?

  Nothing mattered, much. She yawned.

  Finally, there came the sound of a large suitcase being bumped, step by step, down the stairs. A pause, the sound of someone climbing the stairs again, and then another piece of luggage was being bumped down to the first floor.

  Hetty had had one large suitcase, and a smaller carry-on bag on wheels in the cupboard. Anything else could probably go in a plastic bag or two.

  The phone rang again down below. Faintly. Ellie shrugged. She couldn’t do anything about it. Then there was a lot more silence, which was rather comforting after the racket that had been going on.

  Ellie told herself not to panic, though in fact she was feeling remarkably calm. Was Hetty really going to leave her in a locked room, alone in the house? No, surely not …

  She was roused by footsteps climbing the stairs again. And a knock on the door.

  Ellie tried to sit up. She was feeling decidedly groggy but happy that she was going to be let out. Of course Hetty wouldn’t leave her!

  The door didn’t open. Instead, Hetty spoke. ‘I’m leaving now. You’ve been such a bad girl, I think it’s best for you to stay where you are for the time being and consider how naughty you’ve been. I suppose someone will come and let you out eventually, although I don’t know who that might be. Thomas is still in hospital and, with what I put in his coffee, he’s not likely to come out in a hurry, if at all. As for those fly-by-night people you let sleep here last night, they’ll not think of looking up here for you. I’m using some heavy-duty tape to put the broken door back into place. No one will notice anything wrong, by the time I’ve finished with it.’

  Ellie managed, ‘Hetty, no …!’

  Hetty puffed out a laugh. ‘Are you on your knees, praying? Well, when I’m safely away I might feel like forgiving you and phone someone to let you out. Maybe. At the moment I feel you ought to suffer for what you’ve put me through. You’re going to have plenty of time to think about your sins. Even without food and water you’ll live for some days, maybe even a week.’

  ‘Hetty, they’re expecting me back at the hospital—’

  ‘No, they’re not.’

  ‘Someone rang just now, and you answered it.’

  ‘That was your fly-by-night friend Rafael and his bit of fluff. I told them you were very angry with them for leaving you alone and that if they came back here, you were not going to let them in again.’

  Ellie gasped.

  ‘And, I rang the hospital. I told them that you’d had a tumble and booked yourself into a nursing home for a fortnight, so if Thomas is ever going to be released, he’d better find himself somewhere else to go. They said they’d make sure he got the message.’

  Ellie said nothing. She knew that neither Rafael nor Thomas would accept those messages as genuine, but she could also see that under certain circumstances they might think there was enough truth in what Hetty said to leave Ellie alone for a while, locked up in the house.

  ‘As for your horrible cat,’ said Hetty, ‘if I can catch him before I go, I’ll wring his neck.’

  Ellie leaned back and closed her eyes. Midge, run for your life!

  Hetty banged on the door. ‘Are you still there? Answer me!’

  Ellie thought that if she didn’t reply, perhaps Hetty would open the door to see what was happening …

  ‘Be like that, then!’ A grating sound as the key was withdrawn from the lock, and Hetty’s footsteps retreated. Ellie could hear the woman descending the stairs … and thumping the ruined door into position. Presumably she was taping over the damage, so that at a casual glance, no one would see there was anything wrong.

  Again the phone rang down below.

  Hetty let it go to voicemail.

  A lengthy pause. Far away and down below, the front door slammed shut.

  Ellie prised open her eyes and looked over to the window. It was still raining.

  This wasn’t happening. It was all a dream.

  She thought of various ways in which people had escaped locked rooms in the past. They pushed a piece of paper under the door, knocked the key out so that it fell on the paper, and drew it back into the room so that they could let themselves out. Hetty had taken the precaution of removing the key from the lock. Anyway, the door fitted neatly and there was no room to pass a key or even a piece of paper beneath it.

  She was drifting away on a slow boat to China. Drifting into the Land of Nod.

  She could hang something out of the window. But there was no way anyone would see it, in the rain and across the width of the garden, the trees and the wall beyond. There were a couple of small windows in the hotel which looked this way, but at such a distance they might as well have been on Mars.

  She could flash a Morse code SOS with a mirror … but there was no one who would see it.

  She could tie the bedding together and let herself down from the window … except that there was no bedding on the unmade bed, and if there was one certain way to break your leg, it would be for an unfit sixtyish woman to try to climb down two storeys on a rope made of non-existent sheets. Ellie believed that this was how the Empress Matilda had once escaped from durance vile, but Matilda had been much younger and used to riding horses and hunting and so on.

  She could break a window. Fine. Who would notice it?

  She settled herself more comfortably on the bed.

  She could pray.

  Yes, she could do that. In fact, it was probably the most sensible thing to do. Some ideas might pop into her head if she did that. She was sure – well, she was pretty sure – that neither Thomas nor Rafael nor Susan would believe what Hetty had told them, but … well, it was good to take precautions.

  She told herself to breathe deep and quietly. And pray.

  Our father and all that … oh dear, I’m not making any sense at all. Dear Lord, I’m in trouble again. I don’t like to bother you when you must be busy looking after people in pain and danger … not that I’m not in danger, I don’t mean that, but …

  I’m not making much sense, am I? Sorry about that. To be absolutely frank, I’m in something of a pickle. I know you like us to help ourselves out of trouble, and I’m all for that but just at the moment, I’m o
ut of ideas.

  And look after Thomas, won’t you? Just in case …

  No, I’m not going to think bad thoughts. He is not going to die. He is NOT going to die.

  And Midge. Though I think I can trust Midge to look after himself.

  Rafael and Susan, too. And I’m sure the hospital will help Thomas … what did that woman say? That she’d fed him something … it was the coffee, wasn’t it? Remind me to throw away the rest of his jar of coffee. No point in risking …

  What time is it?

  It must be nearly lunchtime. I must admit, I could do with something to eat … and some water. I’m thirsty.

  Don’t think about it.

  Dear Lord, in your mercy …

  A feeling of general wellbeing stole through her. Incredibly, she relaxed, nerve by nerve. Her legs and then her arms. And finally her breathing. It was going to be all right. She didn’t know how. But it would be.

  She woke, thinking someone had called her name. She sat up, dazedly wondering where she was … and heard a door shut somewhere. She couldn’t think straight. She was in Hetty’s rooms. Why? Oh, she put a hand to her head. She remembered now.

  Thomas. Midge. Rafael and Susan. Where were they?

  Was that a door shutting down below?

  With an effort, Ellie pushed herself to her feet and, holding on to furniture, she made her way slowly to the window. It had stopped raining. The light looked different. She looked at her watch. Could that possibly be the time? Nearly four o’clock? What had happened to the day? And where was everybody?

  She decided she must still be asleep. And dreaming.

  She tried the door. It was still locked. She put her ear to it. Was that someone moving about downstairs? She banged on the door. ‘Is anyone there?’

  Yes, there were muted voices down below. Rafael and Susan, with any luck.

  She hammered on the door again. ‘Rafael? Susan? I’m up here!’

  Doors slamming. Voices raised. All in the distance. They hadn’t heard her.

  She raised her voice another notch. ‘Help!’

  At this rate, she’d have a sore throat in no time at all. The best thing to do was to go back to sleep. Yes, sleep it off …