A Colourful Death_A Cornish Mystery

by Carola Dunn

  “Here you go, madam.” Roscoe opened the door.

  Teazle shot out, and Eleanor lost the end of the string.

  The pavement, the Westie had been taught, was not a suitable place for relieving oneself. From a patch of lawn diagonally across the street, the sweet scent of greenery reached her quivering nostrils. She had also been taught to cross streets with caution, but desperate times call for desperate measures. Circling the group of detectives, she dashed between the grey saloon and the rear police car with Eleanor in hot pursuit.

  “Stop!” someone shouted. Heavy footsteps pounded after her.

  As soon as Teazle felt grass beneath her paws, she squatted. Half a dozen large policemen found themselves surrounding a small white dog and a small white-haired old lady.

  The tall, thin, balding man stepped into the circle. “What’s going on here?” he demanded.

  Eleanor had had enough. Irritably she cut through a babble of bass voices explaining that they had taken her for a murderer on the run.

  “My dog is answering a call of nature. These gentlemen seem to be extraordinarily interested in her bodily functions.”

  “Extraordinary, perhaps, madam,” he said gently, “but hardly unnatural. You came rushing out from a police station where a murderer is being held under arrest.”

  “He’s not under arrest. And he’s not a murderer.” Eleanor found herself in just the sort of argument she had advised Nick against.

  “Oh?” He had his back to what little light there was, so she couldn’t make out his expression, but she could hear his raised eyebrows. “You know more about the matter than I do?”

  “Yes.”

  “Excellent. Then let’s go inside and you can tell me all about it.” He bent down to scratch behind Teazle’s ears as she sniffed at his shoes. “What’s her name?”

  “Teazle.”

  “Come along, then, Teazle.” He took the end of the string from Eleanor. Teazle gave a short, sharp bark of protest. “What’s up? Don’t you want to come with me? But your owner’s coming, too.”

  “She’s hungry. She hasn’t had her dinner. And all the shops are long shut.”

  “You don’t live in Padstow? Ah, well, we’ll manage something. Pearce,” he said to the one remaining detective who hadn’t melted away, “doesn’t DC Wilkes generally have something edible in his pocket? A former Boy Scout, I believe.”

  “Yes, sir. I think I heard mention of a ham sandwich.”

  “That will do very well, won’t it, Teazle? I’m sure Wilkes will be happy to come to the rescue.”

  And so he should, Eleanor thought, considering how many meals she had fed the detective constable. She decided against informing this soft-voiced yet somehow alarming man that she was acquainted with Wilkes, though no doubt he’d find out sooner or later.

  As they went back across the street, he said, “I haven’t introduced myself. How very remiss of me. Detective Chief Inspector Bixby.”

  “Mrs Trewynn.” Eleanor would have preferred him to remain ignorant of her name. But after all, Trewynn—variously spelt—was quite a common Cornish name. He wouldn’t necessarily associate her with the LonStar affair. At least, not at once. Not until Sergeant Roscoe told him, she remembered gloomily.

  Why had she ever presumed that her retirement would be peaceful?

  SIX

  Roscoe stood at attention by the door of his station. He saluted as DCI Bixby approached with Teazle on her string and Eleanor at his side.

  “Sergeant Roscoe, sir. I hope it’s all right, sir, letting the lady take the little dog out for a minute.”

  “Unavoidable, I suppose, considering the alternative,” drawled Bixby. “Go and direct the lads in the van to the scene, would you, Sergeant? And that looks like Dr Prthnavi pulling up behind them.”

  Rajendra Prthnavi! The police surgeon was a friend of Eleanor’s, but she had forgotten he was bound to be called in to examine the body. Rajendra wouldn’t be fooled even for a moment by the red paint.

  “Yes, sir, right away. My report’s on the desk, sir.”

  “Excellent.” He gestured to Eleanor to precede him inside.

  The Rosevears and Stella were sitting on the bench. Nick stood apart, by the window, turning away from it to face Eleanor and her escort as they entered.

  “Detective Chief Inspector Bixby,” the thin man introduced himself. “And this is Detective Inspector Pearce, who will be in charge of the case, under my direction. I’ve already made the acquaintance of Mrs Trewynn and the delightful Teazle.” He handed the end of the string to Eleanor. “So I’d be grateful if the rest of you would be so kind as to give us your names?”

  Having spoken, Bixby crossed to the counter, sat down on the stool, and proceeded to read Roscoe’s report.

  While DI Pearce, a pale, plump man in heavy black-rimmed glasses, took down Margery’s name and address, Eleanor went to sit on the chair by the window, close to Nick. He put his hand on her shoulder and gave a slight squeeze, whether for comfort or warning she couldn’t tell. Teazle sat in front of her looking up hopefully.

  DC Wilkes separated from the group of large men—a mixture of detectives and uniformed officers—who had entered after Pearce. He came over, and Teazle immediately transferred her hopes to him. When he squatted down, she put her forefeet on his massive thigh so that she could reach to nose at his jacket pocket.

  He laughed. “Hungry, eh? Well, you’re in luck.” He took out a square package wrapped in wax-paper. “Ham and cheese do you? I better take out the pickle.” He looked up at Eleanor and whispered, “In hot water again, eh, Mrs Trewynn? That’s lah vee for you, as the Frogs say.”

  “Please, don’t tell Mr Bixby it’s ‘again’,” she whispered back.

  He winked. Grateful for his sympathy as well as his sandwich, she persuaded him to give the little dog no more than a quarter of the latter. “And perhaps you’d better take the top bit of bread off. I’d hate her to be sick on Sergeant Roscoe’s floor after he so kindly let us go out.”

  Wilkes took out a pocket knife. With the aid of the window-ledge and Nick, he managed to cut one half of the sandwich in half, rather messily. While they were at it, Eleanor listened to Stella arguing with DI Pearce about whether she should be addressed as Miss Weller or Miss Maris.

  “Honestly, Stella,” said Margery, exasperated, “how can you make a fuss about your name when Geoff’s lying murdered?”

  Stella buried her face in her hands and said in a muffled voice, “I just can’t believe it.”

  Margery put a comforting arm around her shoulders.

  Doug said plaintively, “What I can’t believe is that they’re getting fed while we’re starving.” He was staring towards Eleanor.

  “It’s just the little dog,” Wilkes told him, and hastily rewrapped the rest of his sandwich while Nick fed the mangled quarter to Teazle.

  Eleanor glanced at DCI Bixby, who looked as if he wished he had never suggested offering Wilkes’s sandwich to the dog. He called Sergeant Roscoe over to explain something in the report.

  Pearce had overruled Miss Stella Weller, on the grounds that the police couldn’t be expected to address her by her pseudonym while using her legal name in their reports, as required by regulations. He was aided by the fact that she was now weeping copiously into his handkerchief. He wrote down Douglas Rosevear’s name and came over to Eleanor and Nick. Wilkes hastily rejoined the group of officers at the door.

  “Your name, if you please, madam?” Pearce asked. He seemed to favour his boss’s soft-spoken approach.

  “Eleanor Trewynn, Mrs.”

  “Would you mind spelling that for me?”

  Eleanor complied. He wrote it down, then stared at what he had written.

  “Not … Where do you live, Mrs Trewynn?”

  “In Port Mabyn.”

  “Not, by any chance, at the LonStar shop?”

  “I’m afraid so,” she admitted.

  “Now look here!” said Nick angrily. “Just because—”
<
br />   “Hush, Nick. It’s not as though I have a police record or anything I desperately want to keep quiet.”

  Pearce had turned to Nick. “And according to what Sergeant Roscoe told us on the phone, you must be the person Miss Weller says stabbed the victim.”

  Nick bowed. “Nicholas Gresham at your service. Port Mabyn. Gresham’s Gallery, next door to the LonStar shop.”

  Frowning, the inspector gave them both a slow, thorough scrutiny. Eleanor had to resist an urge to poke at her hair, sure she must look as if she’d been dragged through a bush backwards. Usually her white curls stayed reasonably tidy through thick and thin—in her opinion if not in Joce’s—and she’d been in too much of a hurry to bother to check in the mirror in the loo.

  “Thank you.” With a nod, Pearce left them and went over to DCI Bixby. They spoke in low voices, with frequent glances at Nick and Eleanor.

  Just then, a uniformed constable came in and joined them. “Message from Superintendent Egerton, sir. Will you please call in at once.”

  Bixby reached for the telephone, then looked around the crowded room and drew back his hand. “Suppose I’d better take it on the car radio. You hold on here till I see what’s what, Pearce. Take a dekko at Roscoe’s report.”

  He and the constable went out. For a few minutes, the only sounds were the rustle of Pearce turning pages, the shuffle of feet, Stella’s sniffs, and Teazle’s nails scrabbling on the lino in a dream. She had fallen asleep after eating and was probably chasing rabbits on the cliffs. Eleanor wished she could follow her.

  Bixby came back. “Something’s come up,” he told Pearce. “I’ve got to go back to Bodmin right away. You can cope with this business. It looks pretty straightforward.”

  “With respect, sir, I should like at least to consult DI … you know.”

  “You really like to complicate your own life, don’t you,” Bixby said impatiently, moving towards the door as he spoke, with Pearce at his heels. “Have it your own way. Ring him in the morning. I must go. Tonight you’d better take statements from—” The door closed behind them.

  “That’s a good sign,” Eleanor said.

  “A good sign?” Nick asked with the gloom attendant upon an empty stomach with no prospect of food. “I haven’t noticed any. What is?”

  “That Inspector Pearce doesn’t agree that it’s straighforward. Bixby seems to assume you’re guilty.”

  “Oh, that. He’ll have to change his mind as soon as he gets reports from the forensics men and the pathologist.”

  “I suppose so. But first impressions are so important. Once someone’s made up his mind, it’s much more difficult to make him change it than to make him see reason in the first place, no matter what the evidence.”

  “True.” He smiled at her. “We’ll regard DI Pearce’s open mind as a good sign. I don’t particularly want to spend a night in the lock-up.”

  “Nick, surely not!”

  “If they believe I’m a murderer, they can hardly let me run loose. I might bump off the supposed eyewitness to my crime.”

  “Don’t joke about it.”

  “It’s not really a joke. The woman’s a menace to society. I could kill her. Metaphorically, of course,” he added hastily as DI Pearce returned at precisely the wrong moment and gave him a hard stare. “Damn, that’s torn it.”

  “Do you think he heard? You really shouldn’t talk any more without a lawyer present.”

  “I don’t seem to be able to stop putting my foot in it tonight,” Nick admitted ruefully. “I’m dog-tired.”

  They both looked down at Teazle, snoring peacefully in the sleep of the exhausted. They were both taken by surprise when Pearce said, close by, “It is my duty, Mr Gresham, to advise you that you need not say anything, but that anything you choose to say will be taken down and may be used in evidence.”

  “Oh hell!”

  Wilkes, at Pearce’s elbow, solemnly wrote it in his notebook. Nick was not amused.

  “I want to go home!” Stella wailed.

  “Inspector,” Margery appealed, “can’t I take her home? She’s just about had enough.”

  Pearce swung round. “I can’t let you go quite yet, I’m afraid. I’ll make it as short as I can. I must read the sergeant’s report, and then there’ll be just a few questions.”

  “We’ve already told Jerry Roscoe everything.”

  “Regulations, madam. It’s my duty to get the information first-hand. It will be taken down and used to prepare statements which you’ll be asked to sign. The signing can wait till tomorrow.”

  “I should hope so. We’re first in line, I hope.”

  “Inspector,” Nick intervened, “Mrs Trewynn should be first, on grounds of age and—”

  “Not infirmity, Nick. Besides, it doesn’t really matter, because I don’t see how I can get home tonight. The car’s on the other side of the river, the ferry must have stopped long since, and all the hotels will be closed. Not that I have any money with me. So I might as well stay here, where at least it’s warm. If Sergeant Roscoe will have me, that is.”

  “Happy to, ma’am. The missus’ll make you up a cosy bed on the sofa in our parlour next door.”

  “No need for that,” said Marge. “You must come up to the farm, Mrs Trewynn. There’s no one in the spare room at present.”

  “That’s very kind of you,” said Eleanor, with a doubtful look at Nick. She didn’t want to appear disloyal. “But I’m not sure—”

  “Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth, Eleanor,” he advised. When she had accepted the invitation and thanked the Rosevears, he added in an undertone, “You can do a bit of snooping around up there. After all, that’s where he spent his time when he wasn’t in his shop and studio. His bungalow’s on farm land. You might get a lead on who could have done the fell deed.”

  “How many people live there?” she asked, surprised.

  “I told you, it’s a sort of commune, an artists’ colony. There’s a certain amount of coming and going, but I should think there’s at least half a dozen or so in residence at any time.”

  “Mr Gresham!” Pearce, at the counter, looked up from Roscoe’s report. “If you won’t stop talking to Mrs Trewynn, you’d better come over here.”

  Meekly, Nick obeyed.

  Pearce quickly finished reading the report. He asked Roscoe about facilities in the office upstairs, then sent him home to his cottage next door, not to mention his wife and his dinner. Of the men still waiting, with varying degrees of patience, by the door—Bixby had taken a couple of them with him—Pearce sent one detective to King Arthur’s Gallery, to find out how the Scene of Crime team was getting on. Leaving a detective and a uniformed officer on guard, he ushered Stella up the stairs, followed by DC Wilkes, notebook at the ready.

  Eleanor was disappointed. She had hoped to hear what everyone said. She knew, though, that she was getting close to the point of exhaustion where she couldn’t concentrate anyway. It was very fortunate that she didn’t have to lie for Nick, because she’d never have been able to remember what she was supposed to say.

  Would she lie for him if she had any doubt about his innocence? He was a dear friend, but murder was murder. It would depend, she supposed, on the circumstances. She couldn’t imagine … any … possible … She jerked awake just in time to save herself from falling off the chair.

  “Eleanor!” Nick was there, on his knees, supporting her.

  He was a good friend. She had been thinking so when she nodded off. There was something else … but it was gone.

  “I’m all right, dear. Just closed my eyes for a moment.”

  Letting go of her, he stood up. “Officer—I don’t know which of you is in charge—Mrs Trewynn can’t go on sitting on this grotty chair all night. She’ll drop off and break her neck.”

  “I’d be all right if I was just allowed to talk to someone. Just something to keep me awake … A cup of tea, perhaps?”

  “I could do with one, too,” Doug observed querulously. “I’m a farmer
, up with the sun, and that’s early this time of year. And I just finished the haymaking this afternoon. I haven’t had my supper yet.”

  “I’ll go up and make another pot,” Marge offered.

  The plainclothesman shook his head. “Mustn’t interrupt DI Pearce. I daresay he’ll be calling for you, Mrs Rosevear, any moment. Mrs Trewynn, suppose I come and sit beside you and we have a nice chat.”

  He brought over the other metal chair and dropped into it with a sigh of relief as Nick moved back to lean against the counter. Teazle woke up and raised her head to inspect him.

  “I’m Detective Sergeant Weddell, ma’am.”

  “Have you been on your feet all day, Mr Weddell?”

  “Not to say all day, but a good bit of it.” He leant down to scratch behind Teazle’s ears and she rolled onto her back to allow him to rub her tummy. “You’ve been busy yourself, I dare say. This little girl, now, I bet she likes her daily walkies.”

  Teazle sprang to her feet with a short, sharp bark, bright-eyed and ready to go.

  “She does,” Eleanor agreed. “Not now, girl. False alarm. Lie down.”

  “Oops, should know better than to say that word,” DS Weddell apologised. “Me and the wife, we’ve got a spaniel, Welsh springer. Loves to swim in the river, he does. You can give him his exercise just standing on the bank throwing sticks. Not that he brings ’em back, half the time.”

  They talked dogs for several minutes. Then Stella came down the stairs, her eyes red and swollen. She ran across to Margery, who met her with open arms.

  DC Wilkes followed her down. Weddell went over to have a word with him.

  He looked at Eleanor and nodded. She hoped she was about to be summoned, but he said, “I’ll tell him, Sarge. Mr Rosevear, the inspector will see you now.”

  Doug tramped up after him.

  Eleanor no longer felt somnolent. Now, twitchy would be nearer the mark. She was anxious about what Doug was going to say to the inspector. Apparently, Stella had managed to convince herself that she had actually seen Nick stab Geoff. The question was, had she convinced Margery and Doug that they had witnessed it, too? Sergeant Roscoe had taken one look and backed out, sure he’d seen a lake of fresh blood. What evidence could the scientific people provide to refute such preconceptions?