The Jackson Case

by Diana Xarissa

  “I think this seems high,” Fred said. “I don’t remember the auction raising that much.”

  Stuart named a few of the items that had sold for large sums. “Besides those, every gift voucher went for at least twice its face value, and many of the other items sold for hundreds of pounds,” he pointed out.

  “I’d still only put the auction at half that amount,” Fred said.

  “As I said, it’s only an estimate,” Stuart replied.

  “Surely they didn’t raise that much in casual donations,” Winifred said.

  “Actually, I’m fairly certain of those numbers,” Stuart said. “I counted three of the four donation buckets myself towards the end of the evening. People were incredibly generous.”

  “They were indeed,” Winifred said angrily.

  “I believe a number of people who came intending to bid on some of the items found themselves outbid. Several of them simply made large cash donations instead,” Fred said.

  “Did they, now?” Winifred asked.

  “Even if we discount a portion of my estimate on the auction proceeds, it was a very successful event,” Stuart said. “Imagine how wonderful it would have been to present the charity with a cheque for that sort of amount.”

  “I don’t know that we sold that many tickets,” Winifred interjected.

  “I took over a hundred at the door,” Alvin told him. “And I know a few people who purchased tickets and didn’t bother to attend as well. I think Stuart’s estimate is about right on that.”

  “I was sure that Norman told me we’d only sold about seventy tickets,” Winifred said.

  “Maybe he was hoping to hide the true amount of money that was stolen,” Stuart suggested. “Like I said, they took all of the paperwork, so we can’t prove any of this in court, if the men are arrested.”

  “Any chance of that happening any time soon?” Alvin asked.

  “We are pursuing a new lead,” Robert told him. “I’m sure you are all aware that in most cases the pair used a local accomplice. One of those accomplices has given us some information that is proving quite useful.”

  “And you think one of us was their accomplice here?” Fred asked.

  “I think it’s possible,” Robert replied. “But they were getting better and more confident in their con. This was their most successful event yet. It wouldn’t surprise me if they’d decided to stop using local assistance so that they could keep all of the money for themselves.”

  “That makes sense,” Stuart said. “Especially since I can’t see any of us being involved in something so unethical.”

  “That was my thought as well,” Fred said. “I thoroughly enjoyed working with you all and I can’t imagine that any of you would do anything criminal.”

  The silence that followed was interrupted by someone’s mobile ringing. “Ah, that’s me,” Robert said. “I need to take this.”

  Janet rushed back to the table and sat down. She picked up a biscuit and took a bite, hoping that it looked as if she’d been sitting there the entire time. Robert barely glanced at her and Joan as he walked past, already speaking into his phone. He was back a few minutes later. The dining room had been silent during his absence.

  “I’m awfully sorry, but I need to go,” he announced in the doorway. “I wish I could tell you what’s happening, but I can’t, not yet.”

  “You’ve had a break in our case?” Stuart asked.

  “I can’t really comment,” Robert told him. “But I’m cautiously optimistic.”

  With that, he turned and walked back through the kitchen. Janet walked with him to the front door.

  “I’ll be back in half an hour,” he told Janet before he left.

  When Janet got back to the kitchen, she took up her position near the kettle again. It sounded as if everyone was talking at once in the dining room.

  “It’s pointless to speculate,” Stuart said loudly over the noise. “We’ll just have to wait and see what develops. I’m just glad Robert doesn’t think any of us were working with them. If he’s found them, he’ll be able to find out for sure fairly quickly, at least.”

  “You think they’ll tell him if they had a local accomplice?” Winifred asked.

  “Of course they will,” Stuart said. “I’m sure they’ll try to blame the whole thing on him, and claim they were tricked into helping, or some such thing.”

  “But they’ll have all of the money,” Alvin pointed out.

  “They’ll have it all stashed away somewhere,” Stuart replied. “No doubt hidden in Swiss bank accounts or some such thing. They’ll probably claim they didn’t take anything, that it was all the accomplice’s doing.”

  “They wouldn’t do that,” Winifred said sharply.

  “There’s no honour among thieves,” Fred said in a serious voice. “Isn’t that how the expression goes, anyway? I’m sure Norman and Julian will do everything in their power to shift as much blame as possible to anyone other than themselves.”

  “Maybe they’ll turn on each other,” Alvin suggested. “Although, if they did have an accomplice here, I’d hate to be in his shoes right now.”

  An awkward silence followed Alvin’s words. After a moment, Stuart sighed. “I don’t think we’ll get anything else accomplished today,” he said. “Why don’t we adjourn the meeting for now? We can meet again once we’ve learned more about why Robert had to dash away.”

  “I think that’s an excellent idea,” Winifred said. “I’ve an awful lot to do, you know.”

  Janet heard chairs being pushed away from the table. She sat back down next to Joan as Alvin walked through the kitchen.

  “Thank you once again for your hospitality,” he said to the sisters as he went.

  Janet got to her feet to walk him to the door. Fred and Winifred were right behind Alvin. Fred nodded towards Joan, but was clearly distracted. Winifred didn’t say a word; he just walked through the kitchen as quickly as he could. Janet and the others followed. Once Janet locked up the front door, she hurried back to the kitchen, where Stuart was leaning against the wall with a stunned look on his face.

  “Are you okay?” Janet asked the man.

  “I’ve been better,” he replied.

  Joan put the kettle on again. “You need more tea, with extra milk and sugar this time,” she said.

  “I can’t quite believe it, but I really think Winifred helped those men steal all of that money,” Stuart said as he took a seat at the kitchen table.

  “From what I could hear, it sounded like that,” Janet agreed.

  “You should have seen his face,” Stuart told her. “As soon as I started talking about Norman and Julian trying to shift the blame to their accomplice, he turned as white as a sheet. We all noticed it, although we tried to pretend we hadn’t.”

  “We need to ring Robert,” Joan pointed out as she prepared the tea.

  “When he left, he said he’d be back in half an hour,” Janet told her. “He should be here any minute, really.”

  Chapter 10

  It was closer to an hour later when Robert finally turned up. Janet, Joan, and Stuart were all pacing in circles around the sitting room when he knocked on the door.

  “Sorry I’m late,” Robert said brightly. “I was held up by a few little things.”

  “It’s fine,” Janet said. “Just tell us what’s happening.”

  “After your meeting broke up, Winifred came down to the station to talk to me,” Robert said. “We’ve already released a statement to the press, so I can tell you that he’s confessed to having assisted Norman and Julian with their deception.”

  “I knew it,” Stuart exclaimed. “The look on his face when he saw the estimate of the money raised was the first hint.”

  “He was clearly upset, wasn’t he?” Robert asked.

  “Very. And he got more upset the longer the meeting went on,” Stuart said.

  “Have you found Norman and Julian?” Janet asked.

  “Not yet, but we really do have a lead,” Robert tol
d her. “Winifred is trying to help as well, but the phone number he had for the pair has been disconnected, which isn’t surprising under the circumstances.”

  “Did he give you any idea as to his motive?” Stuart wanted to know.

  Robert shook his head. “He’s trying to convince me, and probably himself, that he was mostly innocent, although that’s proving difficult. I should know more in a few days, I hope.”

  “Surely the motive was money,” Janet said.

  “Probably,” Robert replied. “But few things are ever entirely straightforward.”

  The foursome chatted about the case for a while longer, but Robert couldn’t answer many of their questions.

  “I’ll stop back in a few days with an update,” he promised. “For now, I need to get to Derby and help with the questioning.”

  “Winifred has been taken to Derby?” Stuart asked.

  “Once he was formally arrested, he had to be taken there for processing,” Robert explained. “I just stopped here on my way to tell you what I could.”

  Stuart didn’t stay long after Robert left. “I still can’t quite believe it,” he told them as he got up to go. “I really didn’t think anyone from our committee was involved, but I’d have almost put my name on the suspect list above Winifred’s. He just isn’t the type. He’s been in Doveby Dale forever. I just don’t understand it. I really don’t.”

  Robert was able to offer a possible explanation a few days later. He stopped to see the sisters and found them in the garden with Stuart.

  “Ah, there you are,” he said as he rounded the corner of the house. “I could hear voices when I was at the front door, so I knew you were here somewhere.”

  “We’re just planning a few changes to our garden,” Janet explained. “Stuart has some wonderful ideas for ways to get even more flowers into the space.”

  “More flowers, more colour, more scent,” Stuart said. “It’s going to be even more wonderful back here.”

  Robert nodded. “I’m sorry to interrupt,” he said. “But I’m glad you’re here. I was going to stop to see you next, Stuart. This way I can talk to you all at one time.”

  “I think we’re done out here,” Stuart said. “If we’re in agreement, I’ll go plant shopping in the next few days and start putting things in immediately.”

  “I’m happy with the plans,” Janet said.

  “As am I,” Joan agreed. “Now, how about tea and biscuits?”

  “Yes, please,” Janet, Stuart, and Robert all chorused.

  Only a few minutes later they were all sitting around the table with their drinks and plates of sweet treats. Robert ate his way through a few biscuits before he spoke.

  “Once Winifred decided to talk, we struggled to shut him up,” he began. “Unfortunately, I don’t think we’re any closer to finding Norman or Julian, but we do know a little bit more about how they operate.”

  “At least you’ll be able to warn other constabularies,” Janet said.

  “Yes, that should make a difference,” Robert agreed. “And maybe the next time they try to set something like this up, they’ll get caught before they manage it.”

  “I hope so,” Stuart said. “I hate the thought that all of our hard work profited them instead of a good cause.”

  “It is a shame,” Joan said.

  “Did Winifred offer any motive for his actions?” Janet asked.

  “He said he was tired of doing all the things he does and not getting any appreciation,” Robert told her. “Apparently running the Doveby Dale Historical Society is hard work and he didn’t feel that his work was being valued.”

  “So he justified stealing from a charity rather than just quit the historical society,” Joan sighed.

  “Yes, well, I believe he was going to do that as well,” Robert told her. “He was planning to move into a retirement community in Devon, actually.”

  “Devon?” Janet repeated.

  “That’s what he said. He had a number of brochures about the place in his home. He said he’d been in Doveby Dale for his entire life and he wanted to get far away,” Robert said.

  “I think he’s lost his mind,” Stuart said. “He loves Doveby Dale and its history.”

  “Who will I ask about Alberta now?” Janet wondered.

  “I assume someone will be taking over the historical society,” Robert said.

  “I suppose so, but Winifred actually knew Alberta,” Janet said sadly. “I don’t know that there is anyone else around who’s that old.”

  “That was another reason that he gave for taking part in the scheme,” Robert said. “He said he was old and he’d never even had as much as a parking ticket. It seems like he’d decided it was his right to do something criminal in his old age.”

  “Imagine if we all felt like that,” Joan said. “The country would be overrun by criminal gangs of pensioners.”

  “I don’t feel any particular need to do something criminal,” Janet said. “And I certainly don’t want to spend any time in prison.”

  “It isn’t a pleasant place to be,” Robert said.

  They talked a while longer about Winifred and his short spell as a criminal.

  “By the way, Winifred claims he was promised a third of the proceeds from the event,” Robert remarked as he was getting up to leave. “Norman and Julian gave him a thousand pounds on the night of the event. He’d been stationed at the door during the auction, so he didn’t know how much that raised. He was stunned by your estimate this morning.”

  “It was a little bit exaggerated,” Stuart said. “But even so, he was cheated out of a lot of money. I can’t believe he trusted them to be fair with him.”

  “They told him the auction raised about two thousand pounds and that seemed a lot to him, apparently. He didn’t really pay any attention to the donation buckets, I gather,” Robert said.

  “He wasn’t very good at being a criminal,” Joan said.

  “No, he wasn’t,” Robert agreed. “I’m surprised he didn’t confess as soon as the crime was discovered, to be honest. I think he thought he could simply move away and pretend it never happened.”

  “I almost feel sorry for him,” Janet said, shaking her head. “Even though he’s a disagreeable man who stole from charity, he was used by Julian and Norman and then cheated by them as well.”

  Robert nodded. “He’s a rather sad figure,” he agreed. “I got no satisfaction out of arresting him.”

  The trio walked Robert to the door and watched as he walked to his car.

  “What a strange and awful few days it’s been,” Stuart said. “Mary is still furious with me because of all the money I spent on the event. I’ve been sleeping on the couch, which is hard and lumpy, and hoping she’ll go away and visit one of her children soon. Unfortunately, her oldest son’s kids have chickenpox, her middle son is travelling for work at the moment, and her youngest had a huge fight with his wife and keeps threatening to come and stay with us.” He sighed.

  “You’re always welcome to stay in one of our guest rooms when they’re empty,” Joan said.

  “Oh, I couldn’t impose like that,” he replied quickly. “Especially not now, after everything that happened lately.”

  “Of course you could,” Joan told him. “We owe you a lot for taking care of the garden. It wouldn’t be an imposition, and maybe it would make Mary appreciate you more if you weren’t around for a day or two.”

  Stuart grinned. “I may just take you up on that one day,” he said. “But for today, I think I’d better go home and try to persuade my wife to forgive me. I was only trying to help a good cause. I’m sure she’ll come around.”

  “Good luck,” Janet said as the man opened the door to leave. “You’ll need it,” she muttered softly after he’d gone.

  Joan laughed. “I hope you don’t mind my inviting him to stay,” she said. “But I feel bad for him, having to sleep on the couch like that.”

  “I didn’t realise you liked Stuart that much,” Janet said.

&n
bsp; “He’s been wonderful since we bought the house,” Joan replied. “He keeps the gardens beautifully. Anyway, it isn’t so much about liking Stuart. It’s more about disliking Mary.”

  Janet laughed. “I don’t like her either, but she won’t be very happy with us if we let Stuart stay here when they’re fighting.”

  “I know, but I don’t think I care what she thinks,” Joan said. “She isn’t even in Doveby Dale that much.”

  Janet couldn’t argue with that.

  A week later, Janet was surprised to receive a letter in the post. She didn’t recognise the handwriting on the envelope. She was even more surprised when she opened it. After she’d read it through twice, she read it aloud to Joan.

  Dear Ms. Markham,

  You may be aware that I am somewhat indisposed at the moment however, I know you had questions about Alberta Montgomery. I hope I can answer a few of them for you.

  Alberta was a tragic figure from my childhood. We didn’t have much money and we were living in one of the terraced houses on the edge of the village. The Montgomery family seemed almost like royalty to me, and their home seemed almost a castle. Alberta was an only child and to say that she was doted on would be a considerable understatement.

  Her parents kept her under very close supervision at all times. She had a succession of nannies, none of whom stayed for more than a year at a time. I was told that her mother, Georgina, insisted on that so that Alberta could never become attached to any of them over her. I don’t know if that’s true or not.

  There were all sorts of rumours about Alberta, that she was mentally unstable or that she was simple, and as she was so sheltered, the rumours seemed to grow over the years. The whole village was excited when her engagement was announced, especially as she was marrying the younger son of a duke. A step up the social ladder for the Montgomery family could only be good news for Doveby Dale.

  A short while later, the rumours started again. This time people were whispering that Alberta had become involved with the gardener at Doveby House. I remember him as well. He was handsome, but common. All talk of the upcoming nuptials died down and the date kept getting pushed further and further back until we all discovered that Alberta’s intended husband had married someone else altogether.