Bridget looked at him suspiciously. ‘I don’t understand why you are even here?’
He frowned as if the answer was perfectly obvious. ‘I was looking for you.’
She looked surprised.
‘Not just you,’ he added. ‘All of you.’
‘You came by boat?’
‘It’s broken.’
‘Well, that’s not very helpful then, is it?’
‘I . . .’
‘I have no idea how you fit into all this but since you are here, you might as well be useful.’ She took the phone and began photographing.
‘Wait!’ Kemp moved towards her. ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing? I don’t want pictures of a dead body on my phone!’
‘Why not?’
He didn’t seem to have an immediate answer to this question but just looked at her as though it should be obvious.
She took a deep breath and let it out as slowly as an impatient schoolmarm. When she spoke, she picked out each word carefully. ‘We need a record of it as it stands now.’
Kemp looked at her dubiously.
‘Look, you do it.’ Bridget turned to me and held out the phone.
‘Why me?’
‘You’re young, you know how to do these things.’
‘What? Everyone knows how to take a photo.’
‘It needs to be a selfie, that way we have context. They’d usually use a newspaper in such shots but my watch shows the date and time and it’s still going.’
‘That would have been nice to know earlier,’ Mother said.
She shrugged.
I stared at Bridget in disbelief. ‘You’re kidding, right?’
‘Oh, I can assure you I know what I’m talking about. It creates a full record — a person discovering the body in this exact state and at this date and time. It is also conclusive proof of the person who took the photo. There can be no arguments at a later date then. It’s all there in one shot — scene, evidence, date, time and photographer who produces the exhibit. They can’t use the photo in court if they can’t prove who took it with certainty. If there’s any doubt, it’s out!’
Aunt Charlotte nodded. ‘It does sound sensible to me.’
‘Oh, that makes me feel so much more reassured. I’m not sure we should even stay here, let alone mess about being all Kardashian.’
‘Who?’ Aunt Charlotte looked at me. ‘Is that someone who photographs dead people?’
I frowned. ‘All I’m trying to say is this is a real dead man, meaning there’s a real killer somewhere and possibly very close by. We shouldn’t be hanging around taking selfies.’
Mother closed her eyes. ‘Just do it, Ursula, and then we can get out of this room.’
‘Really, Mother?’
‘What’s the harm?’
‘I’ll do it.’ Mirabelle stepped forward as if she was so much more capable than me. She reached for the phone and I instinctively pulled it away.
‘Don’t worry, it’s fine! I can do it.’ I held the phone as far away from her as possible.
‘Here, take the watch.’ Bridget held it out to me. ‘Make sure it’s visible and crouch down nice and low. You want yourself, the watch, the name in the dust and the dead body in the shot.’
‘Oh, is that all?’
‘Come on, girl. This is a crime scene. We need evidence, evidence, evidence.’ It sounded like the title of a new police drama with Kirstie and Phil. ‘We’ve got to start making a record of this. If we believe we’re going to get off this island alive, we’re going to have to explain all this. This is you recording exactly what we’ve found and when. Do you see?’
I stepped forward gingerly, looking around at them all, their expectant faces anxious and tight. ‘This is such . . .’ I murmured.
I squatted down, holding the phone out from me and trying hard to only look at the body through the screen. My hand was shaking and my greasy finger marks smeared across the glass. My pulse hammered in my ears.
‘Get the watch in, remember,’ Bridget prompted.
They all looked on keenly like students in an old-fashioned operating theatre.
I paused. Something had occurred to me. I looked at them tentatively. ‘You’re sure I’m not going to look like a killer taking a trophy picture?’
‘Don’t be so ridiculous,’ Bridget snapped. ‘Just take the picture.’
‘I can’t believe I’m doing this.’
I carried on looking at the shaking screen. The body with the long knife sticking out of it was in the bottom corner of the screen, the word in the dust just above. My hand was holding up the watch above his head, dangling in the top left. My finger hovered over the button but as I took the photograph, something seemed odd.
I quickly turned the phone to me and looked at it. All the elements were there, all just as I could see them in front of me now.
‘OK?’ Mother leaned over to look at the picture.
I nodded but still looked at the screen and then back again to the body.
‘Ursula?’
‘I’m fine. I’m fine,’ I said quickly and stood up. ‘Just not one for the album. I hope you’re satisfied.’ I gave Bridget a sharp look.
Aunt Charlotte leaned towards me. ‘Well done anyway, darling. Now, let’s get you downstairs.’ She put a warm, soft arm round my shoulders. It was reassuring but still I felt wary. Something was out of place. Something was wrong.
I tentatively handed the phone to Kemp on my way out.
‘Thanks.’ He looked at the photograph. ‘One for the kids.’
‘You’ve got kids?’
His face fell a little and he walked away.
CHAPTER 24: THERE ARE NO SILVER LININGS
We walked out the room in a solemn line. Aunt Charlotte murmured about checking the house for food again and the possibility of dying of starvation. To be fair, my stomach was cut through with hunger now. I was feeling sick and weak.
‘I’d keep my head down if I was you, Charlotte,’ Bridget smiled.
‘What?’
‘Well, today we’ve had Angel — A, then Bottlenose — B. You might be C.’ She laughed.
Aunt Charlotte looked nonplussed. ‘Why would she say that? Why?’
I took one last look at Bottlenose’s death scene before I closed the door.
Spear was still there, lingering in the thin pool of light by the grimy window. He stood at the entrance to the small bedroom where Angel had slept and died. The door to that room was open. The empty deathbed was all that remained.
‘We should think about what to do with Bottlenose’s body, I suppose.’ Spear was rubbing his forehead intently as if it might in some way help him to think.
‘Yes,’ I whispered.
‘He’d want us to do all the things he held dear.’ Spear looked down at his feet. ‘It’s all such a mess, isn’t it?’
‘A bit, I suppose.’
He looked at me. ‘I want to ask you something.’
I waited for him to speak.
‘Do you have someone you . . . Sorry, I mean, well, what I wanted to say was, why do you hang out with all those dreadful women all the time?’
‘You mean my mother, my aunt and my godmother?’
‘Yes. Right. Yes, I’m sorry. I hadn’t really . . . I didn’t mean to be rude. I’m stressed — ignore me. You just seem to argue . . .’
I smiled. ‘You’re right. They can be dreadful, and I suppose it is a bit strange, but . . . they’re all I’ve got left. And anyway, Mother needs me around.’
‘Really? She doesn’t act like it.’
‘Wait a minute, no one’s analyzing your relationships.’
He took a step back. ‘Oh, I think they are. My marriage has certainly needed a lot of explanation.’
‘Underneath it all, Mother is very . . . loyal.’
‘So are stalkers.’ He looked at me. ‘Sorry, that was . . . Look, I know you think I killed my wife. I know I’m a suspect. But I didn’t. She was all I’d got. We were done, but it doesn’t mean I was going to kil
l her.’
I shook my head. ‘I don’t think that at all.’ I’d made it sound very similar to a lie.
‘Let’s be honest, we all suspect one another. It’s that or there’s someone else here. Truth be told, I even suspect you and your ladies. I don’t understand anything about any of you and you definitely weren’t supposed to be on my boat.’
‘Fair.’ Something occurred to me. ‘The list. The list of people on your trip. You said Bottlenose had it.’
He shook his head. ‘It’s gone. I checked his pockets.’
‘Do the others know that?’
‘No. I wasn’t sure who to trust.’
I tried to imagine him, running into the house and up the stairs. Had there been time for him to check through Bottlenose’s pockets before everyone else came in? Bridget had been pretty precise putting Spear in the room for four minutes. Every time I came close to trusting him, he started looking suspicious again. Perhaps Mother was right to be wary of him.
We stared into the derelict bedroom that had been Angel’s last view of the world. The mattress hung with great shreds of faded pink silk that fell down in a mass of fine cobwebs. There was a delicacy to all this decay, a grandeur that had been left to age and die. I looked towards the window and could see the distant grim face of the small chapel, so full of lives that would no longer age. They were all young.
‘Someone hit me, I think.’ Spear’s hand went to his head.
‘I know.’
His eyes flashed towards me. ‘You?’
‘No.’
‘I walked in . . . I’d heard something. A noise. There were birds and I was surrounded, all over my head. I couldn’t see much. I could hear whistling. But a figure came from nowhere.’ He paused. ‘Then there was nothing. The next thing I knew, you guys were dragging me out. Someone was there before you came in — a shape. I’m sure of it.’ He drew a breath and then looked at me. ‘Ursula, I could have sworn it was a ghost.’
I watched him closely and there was no trace of a lie on his face. He was bewildered, lost in that moment.
‘I know that sounds crazy but I just had to tell someone. I saw someone, something in the corner of the room.’ This time he did look sincere and I think part of me was starting to believe him. This house, this island could make a person believe all manner of unnatural spirits stalked an unlit world, living in some sort of half-life around us.
My eyes travelled over the dim room. The remains of Angel’s jewellery speckled the floor with cheap beads and baubles, like the remnants of an abandoned Christmas. There were glimpses of silver and tinsel colours glimmering in the shadows. One caught my eye, the red beads still clinging to their threads. A bracelet perhaps. I thought of Angel lying there all adorned and bejewelled, a magpie dead in this dirty little nest. I remembered it there, on his wrist. I stepped forward to look but Spear’s hand went across the door and blocked me.
‘You don’t know what killed him.’ He looked earnestly into my face. ‘No more deaths, hey?’
I watched him closely. He didn’t move his arm.
‘Spear? We all moved him. No one got ill . . .’
He looked away quickly, back to the room.
‘I think I do know what killed him,’ I said. ‘The mercury. The necklace he wore with the silver phial. I’m sure of it. It makes complete sense.’
‘That’s very interesting.’ I swung round. It was Bridget. I don’t know how long she’d been there, but she’d definitely made sure she’d not made a sound coming up those stairs. I could have sworn she’d gone downstairs with the others. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe she’d been hiding out in one of the other rooms. Listening in to our every word. ‘Let’s hear what you’ve got to say then, Dr Scarpetta—’
‘Who?’ Aunt Charlotte popped her head out of the rocking horse room next to us. She’d been up here too. Were they all just lying in wait, listening at doors? Secrecy is very important to my family. They just don’t believe in it for others.
Bridget cleared her throat. ‘She’s a pathologist.’
‘Are you, Ursula? I did wonder what you did all day.’
I sighed. ‘No, Aunt Charlotte, she meant . . .’
‘So you’ve put together a little theory, have you?’ Bridget smiled. ‘You think that Angel’s love charm was anything but that. Is that correct?’
She nodded at me to continue.
‘Oh, for God’s sake, get on with it, Ursula.’ It was Mother this time, peering out of the bird room, already wearing The Look.
‘Mother! You’re up here too? What are you all doing?’
‘Gathering clues.’
This was like a bad game of hide-and-seek. I’ve always hated playing that. Whenever I used to play it with Mother, she’d slip out to the shop.
‘Come on then, let’s have it.’ Bridget was becoming impatient.
They all waited in expectation.
I began slowly. ‘Well, the thing round his neck — the azogue, I think he called it — I think it was mercury. It looked like quicksilver. I think he even said that himself and . . . well, his behaviour. He was all crazed and angry one minute, then joking around the next. He had the headaches and . . . and . . .’
‘Yes?’ Mother said.
‘Just hear me out. This is going to sound a little odd—’
‘You surprise me.’
‘Mother, please! It was what he said about mad as a hatter.’
‘Yes!’ Aunt Charlotte gasped. ‘I know exactly what you’re talking about.’
‘I doubt it,’ Mother muttered.
Aunt Charlotte continued. ‘Hat makers used mercury and it sent them doolally. That’s why people say “mad as a hatter”. Happened to Millicent Armitage, don’t you remember, Pandora?’
‘Millicent Armitage was already mad. Her ridiculous hats had nothing to do with it!’
‘She always used to say, “Charlotte dear, I’ve literally no idea who I am today!” Oh, we did used to laugh. Family was in toilets. Armitage Shanks. Went to work at Horse and Hound magazine, I think, as their resident millinery expert. Or it could have been bathrooms.’
Everyone paused.
‘The phial was empty round Angel’s neck,’ I continued. ‘He was acting very strangely. Jess’s phial is also missing. She says she threw it away but what if she used it on Angel along with his own? Or someone else could have found it?’
Bridget laughed at me and I’m fairly sure the dog did too.
‘Someone here knew what was in that charm and realized its possibilities. Angel had one, Jess had one she claims she chucked somewhere. Spear, your wife had one.’
‘Oh, here we go again.’ He looked away.
Bridget held up her hand. ‘I think it’s time we explained, isn’t it, Mr Bojingles?’
‘It was you and the dog! I knew it.’ Aunt Charlotte nodded firmly.
Bridget laughed. ‘Oh dear, aren’t they silly? Yes, mercury is a poison, Ursula. And it was undoubtedly the substance Angel wore around his neck and doled out like noxious little sweeties to all who took his fancy. Quicksilver, or azogue, he used the Spanish word, is well known as a spiritual talisman or charm.’
‘Is it?’ Aunt Charlotte looked bemused.
‘He did tell you that was what he was selling. You should really listen more and then you wouldn’t end up being so stupid.’ She turned to me. ‘Sadly, it won’t work in the manner you are suggesting, Ursula. Mercury takes a person piece by piece, very, very slowly.’ She smiled and ran her tongue over the roll of her bottom lip.
‘And how the hell do you know?’
‘Mr Spear, I went on a course.’
‘In how to poison people?’ He looked at her suspiciously.
‘It was actually a course about poisons not how to poison people. Although I’m sure people go on it for a variety of reasons.’ She laughed a little and it looked terrifying. She dabbed the corners of her mouth with a lacy handkerchief. ‘It was in Chelsea, actually, at some beautiful apothecary gardens there.’
Aun
t Charlotte suddenly stood up very straight. ‘I know it very well! The Chelsea Psychic Gardens.’
Bridget frowned. ‘Physic.’
‘What?’
‘Physic Gardens. The Chelsea Physic Gardens. Not the Psychic Gardens. How could a garden be psychic?’
Aunt Charlotte looked confused.
Mother was holding her head again. ‘Just bloody well get on with it.’
‘As I was saying—’ Bridget looked pointedly at Aunt Charlotte — ‘it is long-term exposure that is the problem with mercury. The simple act of opening that phial around the victim’s neck would not come anywhere near killing him immediately, nor would swallowing it usually. And if I’m not mistaken, which I never am, Angel’s erratic behaviour began well before last night and definitely before that phial was opened.’ She smiled as if she was enjoying something illicit. ‘No, no, something else killed him. Something much worse.’
The atmosphere had grown distinctly tense.
Bridget peeled off another vicious smile. ‘The mercury was your first red herring.’
‘Or silver herring.’ Aunt Charlotte laughed then stopped suddenly when she realized we were all silently staring at her.
‘What do you mean “first”?’ I said.
‘Oh, I’m sure there’ll be plenty more.’
There was a creak on the stairs and footsteps in the hall. We all looked over the banister to see Jess disappearing into the sitting room. How much had she heard? Had she heard me accuse her of perhaps poisoning Angel? Why hadn’t she let us know she was there?
Everyone looked around the group at one another. We’d reached that moment when everyone was afraid to speak. It was staring us in the face now. We were on an uninhabited island. Angel and Bottlenose had definitely both been murdered. The murderer was one of us.
CHAPTER 25: ALL THAT GLITTERS
‘So if the mercury didn’t kill him, what did? You know, don’t you?’
Bridget watched me, enjoying the moment. She nodded once.
‘Wait, you know what killed Angel?’ Mother was looking fierce. ‘And you didn’t say?’
‘I needed to be sure.’
‘Unbelievable! Utterly unbelievable. We’re dying and you decide to—’
‘Mother, perhaps we should let her speak.’
BODY ON THE ISLAND a gripping murder mystery packed with twists (Smart Woman's Mystery Book 2) Page 21
