A Cotswold Christmas Mystery

by Rebecca Tope

  ‘Do fairies live in caves?’ wondered Timmy.

  ‘Grottoes,’ said Drew.

  ‘That’s the same thing,’ said his pedantic daughter.

  Drew was making an effort as well. He had gone on his own private shopping expedition two weekends ago and come back with a large bag bulging in intriguing ways. ‘Don’t look!’ he ordered and hurried through to his office at the back of the house.

  The air was crackling with anticipation. So many new things were going to happen, one after another. For a start, Andrew and Fiona Emerson had been invited to join the Slocombes for drinks the next evening. Their daughter, who usually did the honours by having them to stay for several days around Christmas, had a new baby and was letting her in-laws take the strain. As an added novelty, Thea’s brother Damien had announced, with no consultation, that he and his wife and small daughter would be paying a visit to Broad Campden on the day after Boxing Day, hoping to stay overnight.

  ‘What!’ shrieked Thea, when he phoned. ‘What brought that on?’

  ‘It’s high time you got to know your niece. You’ve barely even laid eyes on her all year.’

  ‘I’ve been busy,’ Thea protested feebly.

  ‘It’ll be good to catch up,’ he said, brooking no argument. He was the eldest in the family and nobody had ever got the hang of arguing with him. Thea conveyed the news to the others with trepidation. ‘It’ll be like a state visit,’ she groaned.

  ‘It’ll be great,’ her husband assured her. ‘And Stephanie’s going to love the baby, aren’t you, pet?’

  Stephanie had blithely agreed that she would definitely relish the company of a baby step-cousin.

  ‘Not such a baby now,’ Thea reminded them. ‘She must be over two. Same age as Meredith.’

  ‘It’ll be great,’ said Drew again, as if saying it would make it so. Stephanie’s faith in him never wavered for a moment.

  For a family with very few close friends, the Slocombes were suddenly feeling alarmingly popular. Maggs and Den Cooper were coming at New Year, and Thea’s mother was making noises about hardly ever seeing her, with the clear implication that a visit was imminent.

  And then there was Jessica.

  Chapter Two

  Stephanie was the first to throw herself at the young woman who arrived the next morning, closely followed by the spaniel. Having parked her car some distance away, her appearance took them all by surprise. She stood there, big and fair, much more like her aunt Jocelyn in appearance than her mother. ‘It’s not even eleven o’clock yet,’ said Thea.

  ‘I left soon after eight. Nice, quick drive,’ said Jessica. ‘The M6 wasn’t too bad, considering everybody’s meant to be driving somewhere today. Not a single accident for a change. It was a bit slow, but at least it kept moving. Give us a kiss, Mum – if I can get out of this bear hug.’ She gave Stephanie a squeeze and then edged her aside so as to embrace Thea. ‘Happy Christmas, everybody.’ She crouched down to fondle Hepzie’s long, soft ears. ‘Same as always, doggie-doos.’

  Stephanie giggled. ‘That’s not very nice. Doggie-doos is rude.’

  ‘It’s chaos here already,’ said Thea. ‘But we finally got the tree decorated, didn’t we, Steph?’

  Jessica smiled vaguely. ‘I’ve got loads of things in the car. I left it by the church – was that right?’

  ‘You can probably squeeze it in next to the hearse, actually. There won’t be any more funerals till next week now.’

  ‘No hurry,’ said Jessica. ‘I just want to slob out for a bit.’

  ‘Come and see the tree,’ Stephanie urged. ‘It’s amazing.’

  ‘Where’s Timmy?’

  ‘In there. He’s counting the minutes.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Till seven o’clock on Christmas morning. That’s when we get our stockings. Dad brings them up to us. Tim’s working out how many minutes are left till then.’

  ‘Sweet,’ said Jessica with a little sigh.

  ‘You look tired,’ said Drew, appearing from his room at the back of the house. ‘Too many Christmas parties?’

  ‘Hardly any, actually. I feel perfectly all right – not really tired, just ready for a break, that’s all.’

  ‘Well, you can have a nice lie-in tomorrow. We’re all going to be charging our batteries before the onslaught. That’s the plan, anyway.’

  Jessica gave him a knowing look. ‘Don’t tempt fate. Your job’s like mine – you never know what the next phone call is going to bring.’

  ‘People aren’t allowed to die at Christmas,’ said Stephanie firmly. ‘We decided that already.’

  ‘Quite right,’ smiled her stepsister. ‘The undertaker’s closed for the holiday, and so is the police officer.’

  ‘Are you a sergeant yet?’

  ‘First week of January. Quicker than I thought. Takes me a step closer to moving up to CID.’

  ‘Hey! You never told me that,’ said Thea. ‘When did that happen?’

  ‘They only told me this week. Came as quite a surprise, what with one thing and another.’ Both women glanced at the child, careful to avoid saying too much. ‘I just hope I’ll be up to it.’

  ‘It’ll be fine,’ Thea assured her, characteristically optimistic to the point where she often refused to face real trouble. Even Stephanie found this attitude irksome at times, half aware that it was uncomfortably close to laziness. It took a certain kind of energy to accept and deal with problems, which Thea seemed to lack when it concerned her own family. Drew once observed that she could throw herself into amateur detective work when house-sitting without a second thought. But when it came to their own domestic concerns, all she could do was offer bland statements that things would work themselves out. All of which caused Stephanie to worry that there might be some secret reason to be concerned about Jessica’s promotion. Something in the air had changed when it was mentioned.

  ‘I brought food,’ said Jessica. ‘Nuts, figs, crystallised ginger – that sort of thing. And some decorations.’

  ‘Thanks,’ said Thea. ‘I only managed a box of dates and some satsumas.’

  Drew and Stephanie both looked at her in alarm. ‘You’re not serious?’ said Drew.

  ‘I mean – as the special extras. You know perfectly well I’ve got a turkey and mountains of vegetables. And stuffing. And wine.’

  ‘Mince pies?’ Again, father and daughter seemed anxious. ‘We finished the ones you bought before,’ explained Stephanie. A very subtle stress on the word bought conveyed an awareness of how things had changed since Karen had been in charge. A brilliant and enthusiastic cook, Drew’s first wife had made everything herself. Not just the pies, but the mincemeat that went inside them – as well as the pudding, stuffing, brandy butter, gravy and bread sauce. Thea just got everything from the supermarket. And last year she didn’t even bother with bread sauce.

  ‘I’ve got some of them as well,’ said Jessica. ‘We’re going to have a perfect old-fashioned Christmas with all the trimmings – you’ll see.’

  Before they knew it, the day was more than half over. Thea provided sausages and mash for lunch, followed by ice cream. Timmy talked about Pokémon and Drew lit the log fire. There was a sense of suspension, waiting for the day to be over. Stephanie buried herself in Through the Looking-Glass, which she was reading for the third time. She could recite ‘Jabberwocky’ as well as ‘The Walrus and the Carpenter’, which Thea said would have been old-fashioned even when she was a child. Stephanie had never even tried to describe the powerful sense of wonderment and delight she derived from the book. It didn’t fade with repeated readings – the opposite, if anything. Small details that she had previously missed came vividly to life. The knitting sheep, the alarming Red Queen, the elusive references to the game of chess, all held her in thrall. It was in every way infinitely superior to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, which seemed childish and thin by comparison.

  True to her word, Jessica slumped passively in the warm sitting room, toying with her phone now and then,
but showing no signs of restlessness. ‘You still haven’t moved your car,’ said Thea, at three o’clock.

  ‘And nobody’s walked the dog,’ said Drew.

  ‘I took her out after breakfast, actually,’ his wife corrected him. ‘She doesn’t need anything more than that.’

  It was already getting dark. None of the immediate neighbours had put Christmas lights outside, so there was little sense of festivity until you walked along the main street of Broad Campden. There, one or two houses had decorated their windows with snowflake patterns, and wound coloured lights round their garden trees. The pub had a lovely big Christmas tree as well.

  ‘I’ll go and bring my car down, then,’ said Jessica.

  ‘I’ll come with you,’ said Stephanie, allowing no scope for argument.

  They walked up the short lane to where the car was tucked neatly beside the church wall. Everything was quiet. It was December the twenty-second. ‘Shortest day yesterday – or maybe today. I’m never altogether sure,’ said Jessica. ‘That’s why they put Christmas at this time of year. By the twenty-fifth, they must have noticed that the sun was setting a minute or two later, and the seasons were turning again.’

  ‘I know. It was all pagan before the Christians came and monopolised it. Even the churches were mostly built on old pagan sites.’

  Jessica laughed. ‘I suppose you would know all about that sort of thing, living in a place like this.’

  ‘Why?’ Stephanie was genuinely bemused.

  ‘Oh – well, doesn’t it all seem incredibly ancient here? These rolling hills – wolds, or whatever they’re called. They seem like the graves of giants and prehistoric gods to me. Even the trees look about a thousand years old.’

  ‘More like two hundred. But there is a lot of history round here,’ Stephanie acknowledged. ‘Thea’s always going on about it.’

  ‘What about that one, then?’ Jessica was pointing at the very prominent tree growing on a grassy mound near the church. ‘It looks as if it’s been there for ever.’

  The tree was in shadow, only illuminated by faint light coming from the houses behind it. ‘That?’ scoffed Stephanie. ‘That’s a cherry. They don’t live very long at all.’

  ‘I stand corrected,’ said Jessica. ‘Now let’s get back. Mum might be making some tea by now.’

  She drove cautiously down the lane, and managed to manoeuvre the car into the scanty space in front of Drew’s hearse. ‘He’s sure he won’t need it, then?’ she asked.

  ‘If there’s an urgent removal, he’ll take Andrew’s van. That doesn’t live here. We’re very organised,’ Stephanie boasted.

  ‘You keep bodies here, do you?’

  Stephanie gave her stepsister a look, that was lost in the gloom of the back garden. ‘You know we do. But you can’t reach them from the house. You have to go outside and in again. There are regulations.’ She waved at the additional structure attached to the back of the house. It had been a utility room or scullery before the Slocombes moved in, but minor alterations had turned it into a very small mortuary. Drew was still tinkering with it, in the hope of finding space for better storage.

  ‘I suppose you get used to it,’ said Jessica, with a little shiver.

  ‘There’s absolutely nothing to worry about,’ said the child earnestly. ‘The dead really are no trouble at all. And besides, there’s nobody there now. We’re having a holiday from funerals – we told you that already.’

  Jessica was lifting a large cardboard box from the boot. ‘Here – you can give me a hand,’ she puffed. ‘Take that bag, will you? And shut the boot for me.’

  Stephanie gave her usual competent assistance and started to walk round to the front of the house. ‘Oh!’ she yelped, as she stepped out into the lane. ‘Who’s that?’

  A figure was moving quickly towards the field that opened out at the end of the drivable roadway. All she could see was a silhouette – which appeared to be a person with three legs. It proceeded purposefully without looking back, and was soon out of sight. ‘Did you see?’ she asked Jessica.

  ‘What? I can’t see anything over this box. I’m going to trip over something if I’m not careful.’

  ‘Somebody went down there. They didn’t want to be seen. They’ve gone now.’

  ‘Are you sure? Wait a minute. Let’s get inside and put everything down.’

  Stephanie tried to quell the feeling of panic, telling herself that anybody was allowed to walk along the lane, even if it didn’t lead anywhere. There were two more houses between theirs and the field – but she was sure the person hadn’t belonged to either of them. It wasn’t Mr Shipley from opposite, either. And it was dark. Nobody went out for walks in fields when it was dark – even if it was only four o’clock.

  Nobody wanted to listen to her thin little story, once they were back in the house. An hour or two passed in a kind of quiet aimlessness. Jessica forced Tim into a belated hug and another long discussion about Pokémon. As far as Stephanie was concerned, Pokémon was yesterday’s passion and anybody still obsessed with it was embarrassing. Thea was faffing about in the kitchen, rummaging in Jessica’s box of goodies and muttering to herself. Drew was – incredibly – on the phone to somebody in his room at the back. The dining room had been turned into his office, with a filing cabinet and shelves and phone and computer. Hepzibah was running back and forth, counting feet and making sure everybody knew she was there. Stephanie hovered in the hallway, trying to forget the figure she’d seen outside. After all, life was full of such moments, where there was an impenetrable adult logic to whatever was going on, and to reveal bewilderment was often to invite derision. Grown-ups didn’t mind the dark, especially in the countryside, she supposed. Except that they generally carried a torch – and wasn’t there a very strong suggestion that activities carried out in darkness were almost always unlawful, or at least suspicious? There was something horrible called lamping, for a start. And something even more ghastly called dogging that a boy at school had sniggered about only a few days ago.

  But it was that third leg that bothered her most of all. Because it was very likely to have been a gun – one with a long muzzle that was undoubtedly intended to shoot something. Or someone. Because wasn’t that the whole point of guns?

  In the Old Stables on the Crossfield Estate, at eight o’clock on Friday evening, the Frowse family found itself reduced to two. ‘Where’s your mother?’ asked Digby. ‘I haven’t seen her at all today. Or yesterday, come to think of it. Did she say she was going somewhere?’

  ‘She didn’t say anything to me,’ returned his son. ‘I guess she just took the car and went. She’s sure to have told you where and you’ve forgotten.’

  ‘What a weird lot we are,’ sighed Digby. ‘You’d think we’d have missed her before now. It did occur to me to wonder last night when there wasn’t any supper.’

  ‘She’s been out every evening this week, pretty much. I just assumed she was having a drink with some pals. There was all that stuff in the fridge, after all, for us to make supper with. Didn’t she come home to sleep?’

  ‘Didn’t hear her.’ The Frowses all had separate bedrooms, and unusually separate lives, although Ant couldn’t recall a time when it had taken a whole day, or longer, before noticing someone was unaccountably absent.

  ‘If she’s taken the car, that just leaves us with the van,’ said Digby crossly.

  ‘That’s okay, surely? Where do you want to go?’

  ‘I might fancy meeting a few mates for a Christmas tipple.’

  ‘If you were going to do that, you’d have gone by now. Look – the chances are Mum said where she was going, but neither of us listened when she mentioned it. I do remember something about a quick trip to London – but that was a week ago. Could be she was always meaning to go yesterday.’

  ‘Not very likely,’ said his father, with a small frown. ‘The roads are sure to be awful, and won’t London be absolute bedlam? Not her sort of thing at all, this time of year. It’d take all day to get there a
nd back. I wish we knew exactly when she went.’

  ‘She might have gone on the train. The car’s probably at the station.’ Ant was finding his father’s attitude contradictory. He appeared vaguely worried, while at the same time taking an entirely selfish line. ‘Why does it matter what time she went, anyway?’

  Digby sighed and pinched his nose. ‘Oh, I don’t know. I mean – I know she’s unpredictable, but doesn’t this seem a bit … unusual, even for her?’

  Antares looked around the disorderly house. Their constantly critical landlord did have a point – they did live like Gypsies. Or rather, like the old-fashioned, politically dubious idea people once had of Gypsies. The people the Irish referred to as ‘tinkers’, who set up camp in lay-bys and strewed a wide area with bits of scrap metal and other detritus. They set up washing lines and tied up ponies and dogs. Ant had seen just such a habitation in County Wicklow, when he was about eight. They’d been visiting Digby’s brother, who had moved to Ireland in his twenties. When he glanced out of the kitchen window now to view the front garden, the similarities were inescapable. Digby was a magpie, visiting local auction rooms and car boot sales and coming home with every kind of junk. Most of it was set down on the patch of grass between the house and the driveway and never attended to again.

  Inside was not much better. Digby and Beverley had moved into separate bedrooms around the time Aldebaran had died, and filled each room with paraphernalia. In Digby’s there was a computer, scores of books, stacks of printed-out text and boxes of junk that would decay or disintegrate if left outside. In the past year he had drifted into selling as well as buying, setting up his own car boot two or three days a week, weather and work obligations permitting. ‘This is my stock,’ he would say, waving vaguely at the boxes. He had begun to focus on old Bakelite radios and telephones, along with table lamps and car mascots. ‘People collect this sort of thing, you know,’ he asserted. Some of the lamps were so old they were fuelled by oil.