Buried in the Country

by Carola Dunn

  THIRTY-ONE

  Saturday was a perfect April morning, warm and sunny. Blackthorn and gorse were in full bloom outside the back door, sweetly scenting the air. Crookmoyle Lighthouse stood out against the cloudless sky, with gulls soaring round it in the currents created by the cliffs. Down at the harbour, frills of foam rolled in and broke in sparkling froth against the quay.

  Eleanor took Teazle for a walk through the opes and up the little stream that now and then rose and flooded the meadow. She might miss the shops, but the bakery at least would stay open all day now that the tourist season was getting under way. She could have a pasty for dinner today, and baked beans or chicken noodle soup tomorrow. She always had a few cans in the cupboard for emergencies. There was always toasted cheese or scrambled eggs, too.

  Returning home later than intended, she hastily changed into a respectable dress and shoes, then went round to Nick’s—or Nick and Megan’s, as she was beginning to think of it.

  She took Teazle with her, after some havering. The dog hadn’t been specifically invited, but nor had she been specifically disinvited. Alan Freeth had welcomed her into his office. She was a good girl and might even serve to lighten the atmosphere if things got over-emotional.

  Nick wore paint-free jeans and a blue shirt with only a single small splotch of purple on one cuff. Megan, in a plain dark dress and jacket, looked as if she wasn’t sure whether to be a police officer or just a guest.

  “I hope it’s a purely social occasion,” she said forebodingly. “I don’t want to have to butt in to break up the party to prevent things being said that we want kept quiet for the moment. Nor to have to whip out my notebook and start taking notes.”

  “Don’t borrow trouble, dear. Surely they wouldn’t have invited you if Alan intended to reveal anything problematic. Are you ready to go? Here are the Stearnses.”

  The bell on the street door of the gallery jangled as Jocelyn came in alone. “Timothy’s had to cry off, as I expected,” she said. “Sunday’s sermon is in its usual Saturday muddle. Shall we go?”

  What with shoppers and the early-tourist traffic, they had to go single file on the narrow pavement. A breeze had started up and tiny puffs of white cloud were scudding in from the west. Eleanor was glad she’d walked Teazle earlier. When they reached the lawyers’, Roland Bulwer came down in response to the doorbell. He ushered them up to the sitting room.

  Alan Freeth pushed aside the ottoman he’d had his feet on and stood up to greet them. Pale and thin, he couldn’t be said to look in the pink of health, but considering he’d been at death’s door not so long ago, Eleanor thought he was making a remarkable recovery.

  Jocelyn apologised for the vicar’s absence. Everyone sat down except Roland, who bustled about pouring drinks, sherry for Eleanor and Jocelyn, bitter lemon for Megan—in case she had to consider herself on duty at some point—beer for Nick.

  “Top up your brandy, Alan?”

  “No, thanks.” Alan visibly braced himself. “I … I had a speech prepared, but in the end, all I want is to tell you about Rosie. You were all caught up, one way or another, in the”—he took a deep, shuddering breath—“in the horrible events—”

  “Alan!” Roland put out a shaking hand. “You don’t have to do this.”

  “I owe them an explanation. I owe it to Rosie’s memory. I can’t let her remain in the minds of my friends—I hope, my friends—”

  Eleanor joined in a murmur of assent. She was afraid Megan had not.

  “I don’t want you remembering her as a shadowy figure somehow associated with vicious criminals, not when I owe her so much.” Alan stopped, and seemed to be trying to reassemble his thoughts.

  “Start at the beginning,” suggested his logical lawyer partner with a sigh.

  “The beginning. Yes. Roland and I were articled to the same firm in London. I’m a Londoner. He’s a West Country man. When he qualified, a year ahead of me, he joined this practice, just one elderly man looking for someone to take some of the burden off his shoulders. Roland wanted me to join him when I had taken my articles.” He fell silent.

  “Alan, you don’t have to—”

  “I do. I want everything out in the open at last. I’m tired of living in ambiguous shadows, pretending, wondering whether people know who—what I am, whether they’ll mind if they find out. I’m sorry, but I do have to.”

  With a nod, Roland raised one hand to his brow and bowed his head, concealing his eyes.

  Alan turned back to his rapt audience. “You must understand, things were different then, the law, people’s attitudes. Not that it’s all smooth sailing today. I didn’t want to admit, to myself or anyone else, that I’m gay, as they say nowadays. Gay! Not a word I’d have chosen. Be that as it may, Roland came down here and I stayed in London and a year later went to work for another firm. I did all right, started collecting clients, including George Carpenter, an extremely prosperous dealer in objets d’art, as he called himself.”

  “Mr. Freeth,” Megan interjected, “I trust you don’t intend to—”

  “I’m telling my personal story, Sergeant. Miss Pencarrow. What I have to say will not impinge on current police investigations, you have my word.”

  “Thank you.” Megan subsided, though she remained alert.

  “Carpenter invited me to his house, and there I met Rosie. Much as I wished to prove myself ‘normal,’ I don’t suppose the notion of marrying would have crossed my mind if he hadn’t pushed us together.”

  Married! thought Eleanor. So that was the elusive connection between the two. She hadn’t even considered the possibility.

  “He gave me more work,” Alan continued, “encouraged me to take Rosie out for a stroll, to tea, to the cinema, and finally dinner and dancing. I didn’t mind. She was very sweet. Her mother had died some years earlier, and her father had doted on her and sheltered her. It never seemed to occur to her not to follow his orders, couched as gentle suggestions.”

  “What about her brother?” Eleanor asked. Freddy Carpenter had shown no signs of having recognised Alan, hadn’t even said he looked familiar.

  Megan frowned at her. “He’s very much part of a current case, Aunt Nell.”

  “But we’re talking about long ago.”

  Megan made a resigned gesture.

  “I never met him,” said Alan. “He was abroad, carrying out some shady business or other for his father. I didn’t discover until Rosie and I were married that George Carpenter was a crook. I assume I can say that, Miss Pencarrow, as he’s dead? He expected that once she was my wife, I’d be his tame solicitor, dealing discreetly with his breaches of the law and advising him how to skirt it.”

  He glanced at Megan, who looked grim but didn’t stop him. George Carpenter was beyond the reach of the law.

  “I refused to involve myself in skirting the letter of the law. That was part of the reason I couldn’t stay with Rosie. She loved her father. She had no idea then that he was a criminal. He kept his legitimate business well separated from the crooked. I couldn’t disillusion her and remove her from his influence. Or so I told myself.”

  Jocelyn was incredulous. “She must have suspected something was wrong.”

  “Not as regards her father’s business ethics, and I never said a word against him. But innocent as she was, she could hardly help knowing there was something wrong with our marriage, even though we were … very fond of each other. The truth is, I couldn’t go on living the pretence, and I realised how much I loved and missed Roland.”

  His partner raised his head with a faint smile.

  Alan didn’t appear to notice. His faraway look was focussed on the past. “My poor Rosie, all along the line she got the short end of the stick. I told her to divorce me, promised I wouldn’t contest anything she said. She had my bank’s address if she needed to get in touch, to get papers signed, or if she needed money, but I didn’t tell her where I was going. I had to make a clean break, more with her father than with her. I didn’t hear from her again t
ill last month.”

  “She didn’t ask for money?” Nick asked.

  “Not a penny. She went back to her father, as I’d assumed she would.”

  “No papers to sign?” The vicar’s wife was still—or again—incredulous. “In a divorce, there are always papers to sign.”

  “How do you know, Joce? You’ve never—”

  “I’ve held the hands of weeping parishioners while they signed. The Church does not approve of divorce, but straying sheep are the more in need of shepherding.”

  “There are always papers to be signed,” Roland confirmed, “though in the case of desertion, where the deserting party cannot be found, they are not always signed. But Alan left a forwarding address.”

  Alan and Megan exchanged a glance. He shrugged and gestured to her to proceed.

  “There’s no record of a divorce,” she confirmed. “But there is of her second marriage, in the name of Carpenter, to Victor Stone.”

  “So Rosie is—was still your wife, Alan?” Bigamy, Eleanor supposed, frowned upon by law, religion, and culture. She continued her thoughts aloud. “In Nepal, polyandry is customary, and of course polygamy is common all over the world.”

  “Really, Eleanor!”

  “Saying ‘really’ doesn’t change the facts, Joce.”

  “The fact is, Aunt Nell, bigamy is against the law in Britain. However, it’s not likely it would ever have come to our attention if Mrs.… Freeth had not been murdered. The lack of a divorce was at least in part responsible for her death.”

  “It’s not the fact that’s important,” Alan said impatiently. “It’s her reason. It was for my sake Rosie didn’t divorce me. She was afraid that what came out might wreck my career, or even land me in gaol. She didn’t tell her father why I left her, and let him assume she had got a divorce. When he decided she should remarry, she didn’t dare explain.”

  “You say he loved her,” Nick objected. “I can see why he might want her to remarry, but why pick a monster like Stone?”

  “The Yard did some research for us,” said Megan. “At the time, he needed a hard man, or thought he did. He’d crossed a competitor and he wanted a bodyguard he could count on. We reckon he felt a son-in-law was more reliable than a hired man. I can’t comment on whether he loved his daughter, but his own skin was certainly more precious to him.”

  “What about her brother?” Eleanor asked. “He cared for her, or at least that was his excuse for—”

  “Aunt Nell!”

  “Oh, sorry. He probably didn’t have much influence with their father anyway.”

  “It wasn’t long after the wedding that Freddy did time—in prison,” Megan elucidated for Jocelyn’s sake. “For fraud. He was never a bullyboy. And he wasn’t present to see how Stone treated her.”

  “According to Rosie,” said Alan, “that was when her father more or less kicked him out of the family. He said he didn’t mind whether Freddy was straight or crooked as long as he was competent at it. That was what opened her eyes to his own unlawful activities, and to his using her to keep Stone’s allegiance.”

  “He may have bought his son-in-law’s allegiance,” Megan said sceptically, “but the Sandman went on taking outside jobs. They’d only been married a couple of years when he was arrested for murder, though convicted of manslaughter, I’m sorry to say. He got out a couple of months ago. And the present case begins at that point, so I can’t tell you anything more.”

  “You’re ahead of me, Sergeant. I’ll go back to Rosie’s story. A couple years after her husband was incarcerated, her father died, leaving a large fortune to her and not a penny to Freddy. That was when she came to Cornwall, not knowing I was here.”

  “Did she say why she chose Cornwall?” Eleanor asked.

  “She wanted to be far away from London. She’d heard that many people retire here, because of the climate, so she wouldn’t stick out like a sore thumb. She bought the house, using the ‘Mason’ alias. She didn’t want anything to do with her brother, straight or crooked, but she made him an allowance, knowing that if she gave him a share of the inheritance, he’d just lose it gambling and come begging. And she was afraid of Stone.”

  “With good reason,” said Nick, rubbing his shoulders.

  “Nick!”

  “Sorry, darling.”

  “Rosie had covered her tracks,” Alan said, “but when Stone was due to be released—”

  “How did she find out?” Jocelyn asked.

  “She knew how long his sentence was, Mrs. Stearns. She was afraid he’d find her in spite of her efforts at concealment.”

  “How right she was!”

  “She decided to consult a lawyer, and when she asked her bank for advice, one of the names they suggested was mine.”

  “Sir, I think that’s far enough.”

  “Not quite, Sergeant. There’s one more thing I want everyone to know about. It’s a public document, so I don’t believe there can be any objection.”

  “Not until after probate.” Megan sighed. “All right, but Nick, Aunt Nell, Mrs. Stearns, please keep quiet about it till after the inquest. If you talk, the guv’nor will have my head.”

  “I do not gossip, Megan,” Jocelyn said stiffly.

  “Her will, of course,” said Nick. “I saw the envelope when she sent me to her drawer for sketching paper. Stone found it, presumably. Is that why—”

  “Nick, shut up! If Freeth insists on telling us about it, that’s one thing. Speculating about Stone’s motive is out of bounds.”

  “She had never made a will. When I urged her to do so, the two points she was clear on were that she wanted her brother provided for and she didn’t want Stone to inherit as her presumed husband. The will I drew up cut him out in definitive terms, denying that their marriage was valid.”

  “No wonder he— All right, Megan, I won’t say it.”

  “Further, it acknowledged that she and I were still husband and wife. I tried to persuade her against that, but in the end she was adamant. The most time-consuming part was setting up a trust for her brother. She kept changing her mind about the terms, the main reason the whole business took several days. It was complicated, too, as she wanted to ensure his being able to access the principal to pay for lawyers if he got into trouble again.”

  “Still more complicated now,” said Roland. “The law prohibits his profiting by her death if he caused it, which is a moot question until after the trial.” He noticed Megan’s scowl. “My apologies, Miss Pencarrow. I must also apologise for having troubled the police with a report that Alan was missing. I was unaware of his marriage, you see, let alone that his … wife was in the vicinity. That’s why he didn’t let me know.…”

  “It’s a very good job you called us in, sir. If you hadn’t, I wouldn’t have been on the spot to witness … events.” Megan turned back to Alan. “Are you finished with the terms of the will, sir? Because, if so—”

  “Not quite. It’s a large estate. Wisely, she’d kept her father’s very sound investments and lived almost entirely on half the interest and dividends, added to what she made with the bed-and-breakfast business. The other half paid Freddy’s allowance. That will go into the trust, whatever becomes of it. Her half, though I argued strenuously against it, comes outright to me.”

  “Good lord,” said Nick, “assuming Stone found the will—”

  “He did,” said Megan. “DI Eliot says he burned it in her fireplace.”

  Eleanor was puzzled. “But if it was destroyed…”

  “I’d already posted a second signed copy to myself here.”

  “If he’d known who you were, sir, it’s unlikely you’d have come out of the adventure alive.”

  “Believe me, I know I’m lucky to have survived.”

  “I doubt you would have,” Megan said flatly, “if Nick hadn’t hung on to you in the van.”

  “So that’s what strained your shoulders, Nick?” Eleanor guessed.

  “Megan, I asked you not to tell!”

  “I didn’
t. Aunt Nell did.”

  “Don’t squabble, children,” said Eleanor. “Alan, you were saying? About the will? Won’t you go on? Rosie left you half the estate?”

  Alan and Roland were gazing at Nick as if they’d never seen him before. Alan pulled himself together.

  “I can’t keep it, of course. Apart from other considerations, most of it is probably the fruit of ill-gotten gains. There appears to be no way to make restitution. So I’ve decided—Roland and I have decided—to give it to LonStar.”

  Eleanor was flabbergasted. So, judging by her face, was Jocelyn.

  Jocelyn recovered first. “Ill-gotten or not, on behalf of LonStar, we are extremely grateful, and you may be sure it will be put to good use.”

  Eleanor added her thanks. “How very, very generous.”

  “You have all been more than kind to us,” said Roland. “Gresham, I can’t express—”

  “Then please don’t,” Nick begged. “Honestly, it was not an enjoyable exploit and I never want to hear another word about it.”

  Jocelyn tactfully intervened. “The vicar asked me to tell you he’s most concerned about your arrangements for Mrs.… Freeth’s funeral service. He’s very willing to officiate if you wish, unless … Did she have a church affiliation in London, perhaps?”

  “My dear Mrs. Stearns,” said Alan, “I’m much obliged to the vicar, but I won’t need to trouble him. Rosie was a Londoner, born and bred, but she wanted to be buried at St. Materiana’s, in Tintagel. The church was good enough to grant her request. The service will be on Monday, if any of you would like to attend. Roland arranged everything. You see, Rosie made us joint executors.” His voice wavered. “She said she wanted to show she didn’t hold a grudge against either of us.” He broke down in tears.

  Roland Bulwer crossed the room to sit on the arm of his partner’s chair and put his arm round his shoulders. Their guests quickly finished their drinks and departed amid muttered good-byes, thanks, and promises to attend the service.