Smelling of dogs and damp, the living room, opening straight off the yard, could scarcely have been ten feet square. Unable to stand up straight, Felix lowered himself onto one of the superannuated car seats that passed for furniture and reached out to shake hands with the others. He was glad he hadn’t his sergeant with him. It would have been like bringing a young bull into the place.
‘Two things,’ he said. ‘The first was that I wanted to make your acquaintance, Mr Bates, and didn’t want to drag you out in the cold. How are you feeling now?’
‘Better nor I was, thank you, sir,’ said Jeremy, coughing. ‘’cept when I’m asked. Then it starts me off.’
Felix smiled sympathetically. ‘Well, I probably don’t need to formally interview you at the moment. Do you often go in the house?’
‘Only in the kitchen sometimes, and there’s allus someone there. No chance o’ poisonin’ anyone, I shouldn’t think.’
‘Not into the rest of the house?’
‘I’ve never been in the rest of the house.’
‘Never ever?’
‘No, I an’t. Her’d probably have wanted ter fumigate it if I had.’
‘Hmm, I see.’ He turned to Albert. ‘Mr Little, I do need a witness statement from you, I’m afraid. But first let me say that I spoke to my boss last night about your bit of trouble and since the reasons for it clearly have no bearing on this case, I won’t be touching on it with you or with anyone else. Would you be prepared to come back with me to the house so my sergeant can take it all down? And Miss Falkner, you may wish to accompany him. I shall need to talk to you in any case.’
‘Can you give us five minutes?’ said Alison. ‘We’ll catch you up.’
‘Did you get them?’ asked Rattigan.
Felix nodded. ‘Along in five minutes. She may want to prime him, of course, or agree their story, but I doubt if there’ll be much to it. I also called on Primrose the cow and had a little chat in passing with Beatrice, who happened to be milking her.’
‘Anything interesting?’
‘Probably not. I’d best fetch another chair.’
◆◆◆
‘Now then, sir,’ said Felix. ‘Your name is Albert Little, your age is forty-one, and you own and operate a milk delivery-round in Croydon?’
‘Yes, that’s right,’ agreed Albert.
‘Anyone delivering your milk for you, while you’re away?’
‘Yes, my brother-in-law. We share the round.’
‘That’ll be a relief for you, I expect. Now then. Just for the record, why did you come here?’
‘We’d been out of touch since before the war,’ said Albert. ‘Me and Alison, I mean. I took it into my head to write to her a week or two ago, and the upshot of it was we agreed I should visit over Christmas.’
‘Only to discover some hostility on Mrs Falkner’s part?’
‘Yes. I knew she didn’t like me in nineteen-fourteen but I foolishly supposed that was all forgotten. Clearly not.’
‘Why didn’t she like you?’
‘She didn’t like anybody,’ interposed Alison, ‘any man who showed an interest in us.’
‘You and your sisters, do you mean?’
‘Yes.’
‘And she kept tabs on them, even years afterwards?’
‘So it would seem. Tabs on Albert anyway.’
‘Were you surprised at that?’
‘I was, rather. I wasn’t surprised at her attitude though.’
‘How did she find out about Mr Little’s record?’
‘We think through the vicar’s wife,’ said Albert. ‘I still have relatives here.’
‘She’s a busybody,’ said Alison.
‘They so often are,’ agreed Felix. ‘Now, about the chocolates, Mr Little. You brought some with you for Mrs Falkner, I believe?’
‘Sorry,’ Alison told him. ‘I had to tell Dr Bartlett, so he could label them.’
‘I don’t mind him knowing,’ said Albert. ‘I never gave them to her anyway because I was never indoors and I wouldn’t have done neither if I’d know what she was going to say about me.’
Felix nodded. ‘Yes, I accept that. However, according to Dr Bartlett, all the boxes he found had been opened, which must include yours. We have no way of knowing if yours was the poisoned box. Was yours the poisoned box?’
Albert set his jaw. ‘How would I know? How would anybody know? I didn’t poison them anyway. Why would I have done that? I was here to see her daughter! Wouldn’t make a very good impression, would it?’
‘All right. Now, according to witnesses, Mr Little, you later stormed into the house, gave Mrs Falkner a piece of your mind and stated that she had ruined your lives. Why was that?’
‘Well, she had! If she hadn’t been so hostile, we might have been happily married all these years. If that’s not ruining your life, I don’t know what is.’
‘But she couldn’t have stopped you, could she? You were both of age.’
‘I . . .’ began Alison.
‘We drifted apart,’ said Albert, ‘the war.’
‘Any plans now?’
‘We’re getting married,’ said Alison with decision. ‘Better late than never.’ She turned to a suddenly beaming Albert. ‘And that’s a yes!’
‘Congratulations,’ smiled Felix sardonically. ‘Now, Miss Falkner . . . No, on second thoughts we’ll leave you for the time being. Go and celebrate.’
‘You could drive a coach and horses through that,’ said Rattigan, when he was sure they’d gone.
‘Yes, it was a poor effort. There’s something they’re not telling us.’ He sat for a while in contemplation, tapping a pencil on the table. ‘Grab me one of the lads, will you? I want to know where the sisters are now.’
‘Search the old lady’s room?’ suggested Rattigan.
‘One day,’ said Felix, ‘I’ll stop suddenly and you’ll knock me over.’
‘All in the kitchen,’ reported Nash, ‘Except Alison. I made out I was looking for Mrs Gray and Mr Bartlett, which we are anyway. We haven’t got their dabs yet.’
‘Never mind that now,’ said Felix, pushing back his chair. ‘Where’s Paul?’
‘I was packing up, sir,’ said Yardley, coming in.
‘All right. You two had best stay here for now. If we all go, they might smell a rat and I’d rather they didn’t know what we’re about at the moment. Come on, Teddy.’
They climbed the stairs quietly, so as not to be heard in the kitchen.
‘First problem,’ said Felix, ‘is to find the right room.’
‘Could be anywhere,’ said Rattigan, looking around him. ‘It’s a big place, isn’t it?’
‘Numerous servants and progeny, I expect. Listen, I hear voices.’
‘That one,’ said Rattigan, pointing.
It was Florence that cracked the door open and peered out. ‘Oh! Hello, Chief Inspector. Were you looking for me?’
‘Not at the moment, Mrs Gray,’ said Felix, ‘we were actually seeking Hannah Falkner’s bedroom. Not the one she used over the Christmas, her normal one.’
‘Not sure, which it is,’ said Florence doubtfully. She turned to look behind her but seemed to think better of it. ‘It’s only a guess but I think it might be the one at the end. The door was open earlier and there didn’t seem to be a bed in there. Not that I could see, anyway. It went downstairs didn’t it, for the Christmas?’
‘Thank you. We’ll try that,’ smiled Felix. ‘And it might pay you, you know, to keep your voices down, if you don’t want to be disturbed.’
Rattigan chuckled as he opened the door indicated. ‘If that lady’s not careful we’ll have another murder on our hands. Yes, this must be it.’
‘They’re all adults. It’s not for us to interfere,’ said Felix. He glanced around the simply furnished ro
om. ‘Not one for luxury, was she? Aha! A writing box, locked. Have a go at it, will you, Teddy? I’ll do the chest of drawers.’
‘Quite likely the daughters have beaten us to it,’ said Rattigan, getting out a bunch of keys.
‘Well, you never know. Now then, what have we got? Ah! The lavender bags. Might explain why they’ve been in here. Good stock of woollies, which I daresay you’d need, in this ice-box. Assorted other clothing, neatly folded; the usual terrifying foundation garments; an alluring froth of grey-flannel underwear.’
‘Worth searching that one,’ said Rattigan, trying another key.
‘Yes, it is. How predictable people are. Alas, nothing this time.’
‘Probably in here,’ said Rattigan, finally getting the writing box open. ‘Lined paper, ink, ruler, pencils. Ah! And letters. Quite a bundle.’
‘That’s more like it,’ said Felix. ‘Let’s scarper.’
‘Not the wardrobe?’
‘No, we’ll do a more thorough job later, if we need to.’
They re-joined the others.
‘All right, take a few each, said Felix, splitting the bundle of letters. ‘Lock the door, Teddy.’
‘What are we looking for exactly, sir?’ asked Yardley.
‘No idea. You’ll know it when you see it, I expect.’
‘These foolscap ones are from Walter Bartlett,’ said Nash after a while. ‘Figures to do with the farm. Looks like he might have been doing her accounts for her; income tax, wages and so on. Yes, and more of the same. They go back years by the look of it. Didn’t someone say he was an accountant?’
‘Here are some more,’ said Yardley. ‘This one’s dated March this year. The latest, presumably.’
‘All right,’ said Felix, ‘bundle those together and see what else we’ve got. We’ll look harder at them if we need to. What are yours, Teddy? Same?’
‘By no means,’ said Rattigan, polishing his spectacles with his handkerchief. ‘These appear to be letters addressed to the daughters. Hmm, yes. Quite a heap. Billets-doux, some of them. All very proper though.’ He passed one over.
‘“My dearest Rosebud,”’ read Felix, ‘“why have you not replied to mine of the twenty-third? I think and dream of you constantly. I am bereft.”’
‘Rosebud!’ chuckled Yardley. ‘Brave fellow to take that one on.’
‘Meant a young girl in her first bloom, in the seventeenth century,’ said Felix. ‘Rather charming. Not that he’d have known it, probably.’
‘There are several in that vein,’ said Rattigan, ‘all addressed to one or the other of them. They look pretty old though; the ink’s faded. One or two have dates but not the year.’
‘Hello!’ said Nash. ‘Here’s our Albert. I’d say written from the trenches by the state of it. Genuine Flanders mud. And here’s another. Quite a heap.’
‘Keep those out, John. They may prove useful.’
‘Confiscated, do you suppose?’ said Rattigan. ‘By Mother, I mean.’
Felix nodded. ‘It’s difficult to explain them otherwise, isn’t it? Without them knowing they’d received them, very likely.’
‘What a thoroughly vicious thing to do,’ said Yardley, with unexpected feeling. ‘I can imagine my mother-in-law doing that, odious woman.’
‘Another good reason to marry an orphan,’ said Nash complacently.
‘Suppose they’ve somehow found out?’ said Rattigan. ‘Something like that might be a motive for murder, mightn’t it?’
‘Might well be,’ agreed Felix. ‘The empty years go by — no home of your own, no children. Then, too late, you find your life could have been very different. But why now, assuming they never discovered these?’
‘Albert caught her out? They would guess there had been others, very likely.’
‘Yes, it has to be that, doesn’t it? No wonder they didn’t want to tell us.’
‘Wouldn’t look very good for them, would it?’ agreed Rattigan. ‘And we’d never have known about it without the letters. Get them in again?’
‘No, I think a shock is required. They’re not playing straight with us.’
Without ceremony, Felix opened the kitchen door and marched in. ‘You might care to look at these,’ he said, slapping the letters on the table.
‘Hello, Chief Inspector, do come in,’ said Beatrice sarcastically.
Rosie picked up one of the letters, read it, coloured, and passed it to Delia who was obliged to cast around for her spectacles. Soon they were all reading them, collating little piles of their own correspondence as they did so.
Beatrice started quietly to weep. ‘You found them in Mother’s room, presumably?’ she said, her voice harsh with emotion.
Felix nodded. ‘Yes. Her writing-box.’
‘We had no idea,’ said Rosie. ‘I mean that she’d kept them. Had we known we’d have pinched them back!’
‘Had we known, we wouldn’t even be here,’ said Beatrice. ‘I certainly wouldn’t anyway.’
‘But you knew what she’d done,’ said Felix. ‘You must have.’
‘We didn’t know,’ said Rosie, ‘only about Albert and Alison. It seemed likely she’d done it to the rest of us but we only knew about Albert because his letter came when Mother was laid up and Alison was able to open it for herself for once.’
‘And we certainly didn’t know she’d kept them,’ said Beatrice, knuckling away the tears. ‘That’s just awful.’
‘So, if you’re looking for a reason for us to murder her,’ said Delia tartly, ‘you’ll have to do better than that.’
◆◆◆
They were contemplating lunch when the local man arrived.
Constable Jim Peterson looked young for his twenty-eight years, tall, thin and fresh-faced, but he carried himself with authority and proved to be as capable as described. ‘Sorry I missed you, sir,’ he said. ‘Been investigating the theft of some sheep.’
‘Sounds serious,’ said Felix. ‘Hanging offence, would it be? Or transportation for life to the colonies?’
Peterson laughed politely. ‘It’s no joke around here, I can tell you, sir. They’ll be fifty miles away and hanging on a butcher’s hook before you can say knife and no-one to tell the difference. Must’ve been harder for them before motor lorries, I should think. Or they wouldn’t have taken ten at a time at any rate.’
‘Local man, are you?’
‘No, sir, Cheltenham. I like it here well enough but I’ll be glad to move on.’
‘Well, sit down and get the weight off your plates and tell us what you know about this poison business . . . No, on second thoughts, have you eaten? We were just off to refuel at the Sheep’s Head. This is the rest of the team, by the way, Sergeants Nash and Yardley.’
Comfortably ensconced in a private room, they ate and drank before getting down to business.
‘Thanks very much for the lunch, sir,’ said Peterson, ‘Much appreciated. Though I can’t tell you much, to be honest, not about the actual poisoning.’ He reached into his tunic for his notebook. ‘Do you want my report?’
‘I think we’ve got it haven’t we?’ said Felix, making room for his file among the plates and debris. ‘Yes, here we are. You did a good job with the chocolates by the way. I understand you gave Dr Bartlett a good ticking off about that.’
Peterson grinned. ‘I was cross, I admit, although I could see why he was concerned, what with there being a lively kid about the place. We could’ve put a crate over ’em or something but by the time I arrived it was too late of course.’
‘Well, he appears suitably contrite. I’m more interested in the background to the case — your impression of the family and so on. Did you have much to do with them, before this business?’
‘Not professionally, sir, no; unless you count asking around about lost livestock and that sort of thing. They’ve never been any trouble at all, no
t in my time anyway, though maybe you wouldn’t expect it, being as they’re respectable ladies and not young. Harry Falkner, the son, left here long ago, before my time, so I don’t know anything about him. We see them at church and they’re always very charming and friendly. I don’t include the deceased in that, though. She was an old misery, as anyone will tell you, and a proper tartar with the daughters. Used to order them about like children. Embarrassing it was.’
‘So I’m told. Had she always been like that?’
‘Apparently, yes. And never went out much after her husband died; except to church, as I’ve said. Never missed a Sunday by all accounts.’
‘That was thirty-six years ago. Hadn’t she any friends at all?’
Peterson considered this. ‘No, I don’t believe that she had. At least, I can’t think of any, unless you count Mrs Liversage, the vicar’s wife, but that’s just duty I daresay. Come to that, I’m not sure the daughters have any either, not close ones anyway. They do get about and chat to people, especially Miss Alison and Miss Beatrice, but I never heard of anyone going up there to visit. Not regular anyway. I expect the old lady put them off. Alf Brown used to visit sometimes, I do know that, but I can’t think of anyone else that did. You know he rents land from them?’
‘Yes, we’ve talked quite a lot to Mr Brown, as you can imagine. What is your opinion of him?’
Constable Peterson hesitated and blew out his cheeks, as one preparing to say something contentious. ‘Well, to be honest, sir, if I had to name the least likely person to murder anyone in this village it’d be Alf Brown. And not just because he’s a friend of mine, which he is, as we’re both on the cricket and darts teams. Salt of the earth, I’d call him, and I think most folk would agree. He does things for charity, you know, and has helped a lot of folk locally. Why, even at Christmas he had the Roberts boys out snow-ploughing the village with the Percherons. And he’s just got himself engaged as well. For the life of me I can’t see why he’d murder Hannah Falkner. I’ll tell you what, sir. I’ve only been here five years, but if you’re interested in going right back, you could talk to old Percy Watkins. He must be about the same age as she was and was Constable here until he retired. He probably didn’t miss much as went on in those days, and still doesn’t.’
Death Among the Kisses (The Inspector Felix Mysteries Book 10) Page 9