Murder Among Us

by Ann Granger

  He reached out a hand and touched the sheet of typed paper which was signed in a bold hand "Meredith Mitchell." Her statement. The only time they'd had together on Sunday had been spent here in the station, waiting for it to be typed up. She had read it, signed it and then it had been "Thank you very much, we'll be in touch." Now it was his relationship with Meredith

  which was called upon to pay the price. She, at least, understood. That was cold comfort to him as she returned to the bosom of Whitehall and this scrap of paper remained alone behind as an epitaph on a dead weekend.

  Dead as Ellen Bryant. Markby picked up another report, the pathologist's. Since his life did not normally include such matters as needlepoint cushion covers and crocheted waistcoats, he had never encountered Mrs. Bryant alive nor been in her shop. He knew nothing about her before her death—and despite the unspeakable intimate intrusion of the autopsy, precious little about her now.

  She'd been in good health at the time of her death. She'd died quite quickly. Either the murderer had known just how to strike or the blow had been lucky. A slight deviation would have led the blade to be deflected by the collar bone. As it was, it had driven straight in, severing a jugular. A messy business. The woman's sweater had been sodden with blood and only the scarlet colour of the wool had disguised it. She had good teeth but no dental records in Bamford. She was registered as a patient at the local medical centre, but had never been there to complain of the slightest ache or pain. She wasn't a virgin; not unexpected as she had been forty-one years old and a married woman by the evidence of her ring and title. But there again, there was no sign of recent sexual activity. Everything about Ellen was negative.

  Another problem was that there was no next of kin to inform. Everyone has someone. But not Ellen. They'd been reduced to informing her shop assistant, Margery Collins. Wpc Jones had done that. Jones reported that Margery received the news with floods of tears, but her only voluntary comment had been that God would punish the evil-doer.

  In the meantime, Markby had to find the perpetrator of the crime and deliver that person up for punishment here on earth.

  Questioned, Miss Collins said that Ellen had told her she would be taking the Saturday afternoon off. She had

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  not said where she was going. She did not normally confide in Margery. Margery had the keys to the shop and Ellen lived in the flat above it.

  One piece of firm evidence they did have was the weapon itself. It was a cook's knife and it came from the kitchens of the hotel. It was identified and claimed by the chef, Richter, who declared that knives and other pieces of small equipment wandered frequently. Eric Schuhmacher had confirmed this. Richter had complained to him about it. In the circumstances, the setting up of new kitchens and a certain degree of chaos, Markby supposed it would be a mistake to make too much of that.

  Richter did say, however, that the particular knife in question had been used by him on the Saturday morning. It would have been lying about in the kitchen after that. Almost anyone could have picked it up and when one considered how many people had been in the vicinity on that Saturday, the day of the gala opening, the list of people who could have got to that knife was long. The handle of the blade had been clean, no fingerprints. Either the murderer had worn a glove or wrapped the handle in something or had leaned over the victim and carefully wiped the handle clean without removing it from the wound. That, if so, showed iron nerve and a high degree of callousness.

  "Come on, Pearce, ,, said the chief inspector. "We'll take a look at the deceased's flat."

  He picked up the bunch of keys found in Ellen's handbag. It had been the shoulder-strap variety and had still been wound round the dead woman's arm in the cellar. The motive for her death hadn't been theft. She still wore her wedding ring and an expensive wristwatch and although the shoulder bag had been unfastened, her purse and twenty pounds in fivers had still been in it. She may simply have left it unfastened herself, careless.

  Apart from purse and money, the bag had held a driving licence, a powder compact, lipstick and a shopping list of groceries scrawled on a scrap of paper. The driv-

  ing licence had supplied Ellen's date of birth, further corroborated by Margery Collins who mournfully recalled that Ellen had celebrated her birthday every year by bringing two sticky cakes into the shop for her own and Margery's ''elevenses/' Some celebration, thought Markby sadly. Nothing in the bag gave a clue to her private life. Ellen, alive or dead, had given nothing away.

  "One of these," he said, jangling the keys, "must fit the shop door."

  Bamford on a Monday was a quiet place. Only now, thought Markby grimly as he and Pearce got out of the car, in addition to a murderer there was a child molester roaming round. One reason why he was loath even to contemplate handing over to someone else was that he had proprietorial emotions about Bamford. It was his patch and just as he kept his garden carefully tended and free of weeds, he felt it was his duty to keep Bamford free of contamination, to dig out any evil that took root there.

  The two CID men attracted little curiosity as they stopped before the Tudor house and peered through the window at the stacked wools and array of tapestry canvases. A sign in the glass door read "Closed." Markby tried the keys and struck lucky at the second attempt. He and Pearce closed the door behind them, made then-way across the shop and began to climb the narrow staircase at the back.

  "Quaint old place," said Pearce. "I suppose she was interested in history since she belonged to that society."

  "We'll have to question the members of the society again. They seem to have been her only friends, if friends is the right word." So speaking, Markby opened the door at the top of the stair.

  He was encouraged to find the flat so neat. It should make it easier to find anything relevant. The desk was locked but another key on the ring opened it up. It contained account books and business correspondence, all

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  neatly clipped together or filed. There were no personal letters in the letter rack and no diary. He was especially sorry about the last. Diaries often provided vital clues.

  "Photo here," said Pearce, walking across with a frame in his hand. "Only one there is. No family snaps anywhere."

  The photograph showed Ellen standing outside Needles. Markby slipped it out of its frame to see if anything were written on the back and a newspaper cutting fell out. Any hopes this raised were quickly dashed. The cutting was a report on the opening of Needles and the photo was a print of one taken by the Bamford Gazette's photographer. The one interesting comment was in the report which spoke of Ellen being "a newcomer to Bamford." There was no date to say when this report had appeared in the Gazette, but the newspaper offices would be able to supply that.

  "If they'd only said where she came here from!" Markby growled, handing the photo and frame back to Pearce. He returned to the desk and rummaged further in the pigeon holes. "Hullo! What's this? Now, then ... now we're getting somewhere!"

  He withdrew a small booklet with a folded paper tucked into it. "A passport and what's more, an Australian one!" He opened it. "Ellen Marie Novak born June 6, 1951 in Melbourne. And this?" He opened out the folded paper. "It looks like a graduation certificate of some kind. 'School of Classical and Modern Dance.' What's the date on this? Hm, she would have been just sixteen. So she wanted to be a dancer! Perhaps she did work as one for a while. She carried her certificate around in her passport so that may mean she went after dance work around the world." Markby looked up. "We'll get on to Australia House. This passport was renewed by them last year and so they must have a record of her, though I doubt it's more than a name on a computer. A former dancer ... no wonder she was fit and healthy."

  He closed the passport and tapped it thoughtfully.

  "Perhaps she came here with a dance troupe and stayed on? Ballet? Chorus line? TV work? Night clubs? We'll try the theatrical agencies and the stage publications.''

  "She mightn't have worked as a dancer for yea
rs," said Pearce pessimistically. "And not at all in this country. She'd been quite a while here in Bamford and there's not much call for dancers in this town!" He looked slightly depressed at this thought.

  "Dancers' professional lives can be short. She may have got out while the going was good. Saved her money and bought this place. She had a business brain." Markby indicated the neat records in the desk.

  "So who," asked Pearce, "is Mr. Bryant? Or did she just choose that name and call herself Mrs.? She never got her passport changed."

  "Quite a lot of modern women find it easier to keep things in their maiden names. Or the marriage may have been very brief, some six-month teenage fling. He might be in Australia, probably remarried with kids, and the chances of finding him are probably nil."

  They searched on in silence for some minutes. The wastepaper basket and the kitchen bin yielded nothing of interest.

  "You know what?" said Pearce, after a hunt through the kitchen cupboards and the fridge. "She was a veggie. There's nothing but dried beans and wholemeal flour here, except for a load of fruit in a bowl."

  Markby crinkled his brow as he tried to recollect the items on the shopping list in Ellen's bag. It was like one of those party games, how many objects can you remember? Cheese, yes. Cereals, yes. Fruit, yes. No meat, bacon or lard. He was pretty sure.

  "Well done," he said to Pearce. "Where do you shop in Bamford if you're a vegetarian?"

  "There's a health food place in the High Street."

  "Then it might be worth your while to nip along there when we've finished here and ask if they knew anything about her. They might have got chatting over the lentils."

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  They took the paper bag out of the vacuum cleaner and emptied it carefully on to a sheet of newspaper. Pearce sneezed. ''Nothing/'

  Markby went back to the living room and stuck his hands in his pockets and sighed. This was going to be one of those frustrating cases where you had to fight for every snippet of information. He looked round the room again. She liked music—that was quite an expensive set of equipment over there. But then, she'd been a dancer.

  He walked across and bent down to examine the music centre. Then he frowned and got down on his hands and knees. A glimpse of something white had caught his eye. He reached out and withdrew a crumpled scrap of paper.

  "Eureka!" he murmured, unfolding it carefully.

  "Found something, sir?" Pearce asked, coming up to peer over his shoulder.

  "I fancy I have." Markby began to read aloud. " 'We can discuss this better face to face. It should be possible on Sat at SH. I'll see you there and let you know when there's a chance to slip away for a private chat. I really think this opportunity ought not to be missed.' "

  He turned the crumpled sheet of paper over. "Regular A5 typing paper. No signature. Typed message. SH I think we can presume to be Springwood Hall. Come on, Pearce. We've got to find the envelope."

  They searched desk, wastepaper basket, kitchen bin and vacuum-cleaner bag again. Pearce went downstairs and found a dustbin in the back yard. After a frustrating hunt through odds and ends of wrapping paper and tea-bags he came back to report no success.

  "Might have been hand delivered?" he suggested half-heartedly.

  "Unlikely. No, she must have destroyed the envelope. But how? It's not thrown away here."

  "Some people use envelopes as jotting paper—you know, write things down on them, telephone messages or—"

  "Or shopping lists!" Markby interrupted. "We're a

  pair of idiots. What's the betting that part of the envelope is back at the station—taken from her handbag with that shopping list on it! Come on—"

  He stopped. From below came a clatter and a faint gasp of breath.

  "Someone in the shop!" hissed Pearce. "I closed the frontdoor! How—?"

  Markby signalled him to silence and they waited as the footsteps began to climb the staircase to the flat.

  Six

  The door creaked open a couple of inches. "Who's in there?" asked a tremulous voice.

  "The police, madam/' returned Markby in best avuncular manner. Pearce grinned.

  There was a sigh of relief. The door was pushed right open and Margery Collins appeared. "I thought I'd just look in on the shop to see everything was all right," she gabbled. "I mean, I've still got the keys. Perhaps I ought not to have. But I came in and then I heard your voices up here. I couldn't think who it was. I was scared stiff but I felt responsible, if you see what I mean ... I wondered if I ought to call the police, but then, you are the police ... so it's a good thing I didn't, isn't it?" Margery was panting slightly by the time she reached the end of her speech.

  Markby eyed her thoughtfully. He supposed she must be in her mid to late twenties. She was quite tall but painfully thin, arms and legs sticklike almost to the extent that a casual observer might have thought her prey to some wasting disease. Eyes and nose seemed too large for her pointed face and her complexion was drained of all colour. This last was not because of fear but because Margery had one of those matt white skins admired a hundred years ago but in today's world, where golden tans and beaming health were considered desirable, looking unhealthy. Yet for all that it was a fine, unblemished skin and she had thick reddish-brown hair with a tendency to natural curl. It was very badly cut, but cut well and with better clothes and a dash of make-up and a few pounds extra weight she would have been quite

  attractive. She was wearing black, presumably as a mark of respect for her late employer.

  4 'What are you looking for?" Margery glanced round the room and her expression became mistrustful again when she saw the open desk and disturbed papers.

  "Clues, I suppose you'd call it!" Markby said humorously. Serious again, he went on, "We're trying to establish a motive for Mrs. Bryant's murder." He held up the letter. "She seems to have received this shortly before her death. Would you happen to know where the envelope might be? Did she discuss the contents with you?"

  "No—she didn't, she wouldn't have—I don't know about the envelope!" He might just as well have accused Margery of some horrendous crime. Her eyes fixed him saucer-like. "I don't know anything about her correspondence. She was a very private person."

  "What time does the day's post arrive at the shop?"

  "About nine-thirty. The postman brings it in and Ellen takes—took—charge of it. I never saw any of it, either business or personal. Unless you count an occasional invoice when we had a delivery. Ellen was like that. I don't mean secretive exactly. Just private, as I said. She would never have discussed anything with me she didn't consider strictly within my sphere of activity. She'd talk about new stock or a display for the window or whether some item was slow moving and could be offered at reduced price. But Ellen didn't go in much for sales. She bought very carefully. She always said too many sale tickets take a shop downmarket. It looks as if you can't sell the stuff and customers begin to think there must be something wrong with it."

  Markby drew the conversation firmly back to the letter. "So she didn't discuss this or any other letter with you? You never overheard a telephone conversation? It's quite all right to say so, if you did. No one will think you were eavesdropping. All information is very important, even little things."

  She shook her head but was staring curiously at the crumpled sheet of paper in his hand. "What does it say?"

  "Well, it—" Markby hesitated. "It's an arrangement between the writer and Ellen to meet, probably for the day of her death, although the letter isn't dated. Can you think of anyone likely to write and make an arrangement like that? A friend of Ellen's?"

  "I don't know about her friends. Anyway, most people phone, don't they? If they want to arrange something."

  Markby nodded. True enough. But this person hadn't, fearful perhaps that the wrong person might answer the call—Margery here for example.

  "It might have been someone in the historical society!" Margery said suddenly with the anxious air of someone trying desperately to
be helpful.

  "Why one of them?"

  "Because that's where she was going on Saturday, to Springwood Hall with the rest of the society to protest." Margery's mouth set primly. "I was amazed that Hope Mapple could behave so disgustingly and I'm really astonished that Ellen could be a party to it."

  "As far as we know she didn't approve of it and she left the scene to avoid witnessing Miss Mapple's, er, demonstration. In the light of subsequent events, it seems she left to keep an appointment with her killer. Perhaps she would have been wiser to have stayed."

  This presented Margery with a moral conundrum. Her brow furrowed. "But she didn't know, did she, that she was going to—to meet a lunatic with a knife?"

  "That's who you think did this? A deranged person?"

  "Don't you?" asked Margery simply. "Normal people don't behave like that. Unless, of course, they're wicked. That's possible, too. The devil is real and among us, Mr. Markby."

  "I've never doubted it, Miss Collins. Now then, you said 'because that's where she was going,' but I be-

  lieve in your statement to Wpc Jones you said Ellen didn't tell you where she was going."

  4 'No, she didn't. But we all know now she went to Springwood Hall, don't we?"

  Markby sighed. Margery Collins was a nice girl, but she couldn't help. "I'd be obliged, Miss Collins, if nothing were disturbed in the shop or up here in the flat. You weren't contemplating opening up for business, were you?"