Music to Die For (The Falconer Files Book 6)

by Andrea Frazer

  They headed straight out to the back garden, where they found the dog asleep under the apple tree again. Walking softly, so as not to wake it, Falconer asked Carmichael to show him where he’d seen the plant, and they walked right to the very perimeter of the south-west corner, where two walls joined, to enclose the back garden.

  ‘There it is, sir, between those two, and slightly behind it.’ Carmichael pointed in the direction he had indicated, and waited for confirmation of whether his identification of the specimen had been correct.

  ‘That’s it, Carmichael. Well done! We’ll just have another little search for the other plants used, but I think this one’s the clincher, and then, I think, we’re going to have to go in and make a nuisance of ourselves,’ announced Falconer, a severe expression on his face. This should have been one of the most satisfying parts of his job, but he found that he loathed it. Telling someone that you were going to lock them away for a very long time was never a pleasant task, even though he knew they deserved it.

  All the necessary ingredients for the brew that had done for Vanessa Palfreyman proved to be present and correct, with the exception of the valerian – they would have to ask her where she had obtained that – and they took themselves back into the house to do what had to be done.

  II

  Myrtle came quietly, in the end, realising that there was little chance of her escaping justice. She knew that Myles was aware of her infidelity with Vanessa, and would have stood by her, but the fact that she was a murderess was beyond the pale.

  He’d pleaded with her to explain why she’d gone to such lengths, as he’d known about it anyway, and wouldn’t have cared who found out, but he couldn’t stand by her after this. There was no place in his heart for someone who had taken a human life, for no other reason, than that there may have been gossip about her.

  It was Myles’s reaction that reduced Myrtle to an acquiescent state, where she offered no resistance to be taken away to be questioned.

  They left the house, Myles sitting stunned on a dining chair, unaware of anything in his state of shock and disbelief.

  III

  Afternoon

  Under questioning, Myrtle was co-operative, and informed them that she had collected the valerian growing wild when she had taken Acker for his walks in the nearby woodland. She said that all she had wanted to do was to end their ‘pointless’ relationship by ceasing their holidays together, but Vanessa had taken it badly, and in the end, had threatened to expose their once-a-year relationship.

  ‘I couldn’t have borne that,’ she confessed, ‘Not now that we were hoping to start a family. And Myles has a position in this village, and I didn’t want to tarnish it. You don’t know how stuffy small communities can be. If you don’t toe the line with your behaviour, they can destroy you socially, and in your domestic happiness.’

  ‘So Myles didn’t know what had been going on between you and Vanessa?’ asked Falconer.

  ‘The same way as I didn’t know he was taking photographs of Gayle Potten naked! It had been that sort of marriage, up to now. What didn’t really matter had a blind eye turned to it, and was never discussed. But the thought of being parents – again, for Myles, and for the first time for me – put a totally different light on the situation, and we decided, tacitly, and without any actual discussion, to clean up our respective acts, and start living the lives of respectable people, with no sexual secrets or quirks.

  ‘Myles was even going to give up wandering around the house and garden naked when we had a child – that was what broke up his first marriage, you know. His wife didn’t think it was a suitable thing for him to be doing when the children got older, and he couldn’t understand what she found unacceptable in the naked human body. I think he realised that children eventually learn to talk, and ask questions about why their daddy is different, or tell their friends about how different things are at home.

  ‘Well, I’ve blown it now, good and proper. I’ll no doubt spend the rest of my reproductive years in prison, and will never be a mother; never hold a child of my own in my arms. Oh God, I feel sick … now!’ But it was too late. A fountain of vomit projected from her mouth, and just missed Falconer on the other side of the table.

  ‘Oh, God! I’m so sorry! It was too quick to do anything about it.’

  ‘It’s all right, Mrs Midwynter, I’ll get someone to clean it up, and we can move to another interview room. Interview suspended at …’ Falconer stopped the recording and summoned help, suggesting that a doctor should be summoned to examine Myrtle. He didn’t think there was anything really wrong with her, but he didn’t want to take the chance that she had managed to ingest one of her own poisonous garden products while she was getting ready to leave The Grange.

  Once settled in the room next door, the tape-recorder running once again, he began to introduce the subject of Dashwood’s death, and how offended she and Myles must have been, to have had their pet project whisked from under their feet without a by-your-leave, but Myrtle immediately began to protest vehemently.

  ‘Neither of us had anything to do with that man’s murder. We may have felt like killing him, but, I can assure you, we did nothing – nothing at all. That church door was left unlocked by Harold – silly, forgetful old man – and anyone had the chance to nip in there and help themselves to my cello spike.’

  ‘I’m afraid that’s just not true, Mrs Midwynter. The vicar has told us that he sent his wife to fetch something from the church while the band members were in The Leathern Bottle, and it was locked up, tight as a drum. Harold did lock it, when he went over to join you, so that leaves just you and Myles in the frame, I’m afraid.’

  ‘No it doesn’t, you stupid man. Can’t you see what’s right under your nose?’ she screeched at him, making him sit back in his chair, apprehensive that she might just reach across the table, and grab him by his lapels, in her vehemence.

  ‘Harold could easily have waited until he got home to oil his valves, and there’s hardly ever a hymn book or service book out of place after a service in that church. The vicar’s got his congregation too well trained for things not to be returned to their proper places, after services. If Harold stayed behind, you can bet your boots that he had an ulterior motive.’

  ‘Are you suggesting that Mr Grimes was the one who killed Mr Dashwood, Mrs Midwynter?’ asked Falconer, the penny finally dropping.

  ‘Yes I bloody well am!’ she shrieked back at him, rising slightly in her seat.

  ‘Now, calm down, and tell me what’s on your mind. You’ve obviously got some theory or other, and I’d like you to outline it to me, quietly and calmly,’ he requested.

  Myrtle dropped back into her chair, took several deep, shuddering breaths, and looked him straight in the eye. ‘Harold Grimes put himself in the position of being the only person left in that church, with the express objective of stealing my cello spike.’

  ‘You can’t know that, Mrs Midwynter,’ said Falconer, surprised at her certainty.

  ‘He was one of the band members most at risk of being dropped because he couldn’t really read music. Let’s start with the trivial reasons, shall we, Inspector?’ she asked. ‘He only came along to band, and started to learn that blasted instrument, because he was so besotted with his girlfriend Gayle Potten – God knows why, because she looks like a hippo on the game to me.

  ‘He adored her, and would have done anything for her. Let me finish,’ she instructed, holding up a hand to Falconer, who had opened his mouth to speak. ‘I know much more about them than you do. Harold was irate, whenever Dashwood criticised her. He could probably have coped, if it was only criticism of her playing, but when the man ridiculed the way she dressed, deeming it inappropriate in the extreme, and asked her to moderate her dress for future rehearsals, I saw Harold’s face, and it was murderous.

  ‘I don’t know if anyone has told you, but he spent his life in the army before he retired. Oh, he never reached a respectable rank, because every time he got promoted, he did some
thing that got him busted back down again. In fact, he told us, that on one application for promotion, the commanding officer simply wrote, ‘This man is a rogue!’ across it, and that was i for Harold as far as internal promotion was concerned.

  ‘He’d served in Northern Ireland, and was well trained in unarmed combat. It would have been no trouble for him to subdue Dashwood, and then stab him with the spike. He may be getting on a bit, but he has a tremendous amount of wiry strength – he still runs and exercises to keep fit. I suggest that you’ll find the murderer of Cameron Dashwood at number two, Honeysuckle Terrace.

  ‘You’re not pinning that one on me, because I had absolutely nothing to do with it. Harold only lied about leaving the church unlocked because he knew that that would provide the police with a wider field of suspects, and give him a chance to blend into the background, given how we all felt about that dreadful man.’

  ‘Thank you very much for what you’ve told me, and I’ll certainly look into it. Now, let’s get you somewhere a bit more comfortable, and see if that doctor’s arrived yet.’

  Chapter Twenty

  Wednesday 21st July – later that day

  I

  When Myrtle Midwynter had been seen safely off to be examined by Dr Christmas, Falconer and Carmichael waited in the office, digesting what had been suggested to them, and working out a plan of action.

  ‘Well, I’ll be blowed!’ exclaimed Falconer. ‘He nearly had one over on us, there – that Grimes. If the vicar had thought that the church being locked as it was supposed to be, meant nothing, we’d have been stuffed. Thank God I told him that Harold had confessed (ha ha!) to lying.’

  ‘It would’ve come out in the end, sir,’ Carmichael assured him. ‘I guess it’s just lucky that you brought up the subject when we were at The Parsonage.’

  ‘But we didn’t see the significance of it, until it was pointed out to us. I feel such a fool!’

  ‘Well, you shouldn’t, sir. We’re going to clear up two murders, and have two murderers in custody by the end of the day. That’s pretty good going, in my opinion.’

  ‘Thank you, Carmichael. That does make me feel a bit better. It really is ‘Midwynter Murders’ out there at the moment – at least, it would be if the body count was a bit higher!’

  There was a rapid, light knock at the office door, and Falconer called out, ‘Enter!’ and Philip Christmas came into the room looking very chipper. ‘Hi there, Philip. Got any news for us? She’s not suffering from any fatal condition, is she?’

  ‘Not quite. She’s pregnant – not very far gone, but I’ve done a test, and it’s positive.’

  ‘Good grief!’ exclaimed Falconer.

  ‘That means she will get her baby after all,’ stated Carmichael, looking slightly pleased.

  ‘Yes, but it means it’ll be a prison baby: not exactly what she’d planned for her little game of happy families.’

  II

  Falconer and Carmichael set off for the village of Swinbury Abbot in Falconer’s car for what they hoped was the last time, with PC Merv Green following behind them in a patrol car. When they had made their arrest, Carmichael would travel in the rear of the patrol car with Harold Grimes on the drive back to the station.

  Harold, too, was rather matter-of-fact about being found out, and was almost unnaturally calm, as he explained to them exactly how things had happened.

  ‘I did it on the Sunday night. I just couldn’t come to terms with the things he’d said about my Gayle. Not only was it very un-gentlemanly, but it was extremely spiteful, cruel, and hurtful, and my little lady cried herself to slee, when we finally got back to her place that Friday night.

  ‘Well, I wasn’t having that. Criticise her playing, he might, and he might even have been musically experienced enough to justify what he said, but what she wore, and how she wore it, had nothing whatsoever to do with him. I was in a blind rage about it, and it didn’t go away either.

  ‘So, on Sunday evening, I got out a metal clarinet that I’d bought on the internet, and decided to go round to show it to him; ask his opinion, like, make him feel important and clever. I even wore a pair of the white gloves that you use when you’re cleaning a silver or brass instrument, so you don’t leave dirty great greasy fingerprints all over it.

  ‘He asked me in, when I told him why I’d come round, he took the instrument from me, in the kitchen. He never invited me any further into his house, and I’d used the back door, because there would be less chance of me being seen by anybody.

  ‘He held it up in the light, to examine it, and started telling me all the reasons why I should never have bought such a battered old instrument, but me – I never waited for him to finish his diatribe. I chopped him one on the throat, when he had the instrument in the air and was looking up at it, criticising the hell out of it for the sheer pleasure of making me look like a fool.

  ‘He fell back into the chair he’d been sitting on, while I was listening to him spouting forth his opinion, and I had the cello spike ready in my pocket, already wiped clean of fingerprints. It didn’t take long to push it into him. I was aiming for the heart, by the way, just in case he had one. Then I just left him there to fester.

  ‘I thought someone would have found him sooner, but he obviously had no friends to speak of, so it had to be us, and I had to keep the ladies away, what with all the hot weather we’d had in the meantime, and I made sure to put my fingerprints on the door, so that if any more were found, I’d have the explanation of having gone into his cottage to see what was wrong. I even used a double negative when I spoke to you, saying that ‘I hadn’t done nuffink’, and you didn’t pick me up on it.’ ( Chapter eleven, section II, if you’re like me, and would now drive yourself to distraction by looking for the line) ‘I honestly thought I’d got away with it. What gave me away?’

  ‘Lying about having forgotten to lock the church door. That narrowed the field considerably,’ explained Falconer.

  ‘Dammit! I knew that lying was a risk, but how did you find out about the lie? I thought I’d covered my tracks pretty well,’ Harold asked, eager to learn where he had gone wrong, in his plan for the perfect murder.

  ‘The vicar sent his wife round to collect his travelling Communion set from the church, and the church was locked. He’d forgotten to tell her he’d given the key to you, so she didn’t know, to come over to the pub, to collect it.’

  ‘Bloody bad luck!’ Harold exclaimed. ‘If it hadn’t been for that, I’d probably have got clean away with it, and I was going to ask Gayle to marry me, when all this had blown over. But, I suppose I spent so much time in the glasshouse when I was in the army, that I won’t find prison much different.’

  III

  Thursday 22nd July

  Myles Midwynter was never one to brood about anything, and he wasn’t even going to let the arrest of his wife make any difference to his plans. He was a less sentimental man than many may have thought, and he telephoned all the band members, reminding them that it was band practice round at The Grange on the following evening.

  They all thought that this was a little premature, in the light of all that had happened since Friday of the previous week, but he assured them that all would be well.

  To Cameron McKnight, he explained, as he had to all the other band members, ‘I know we’ve lost Vanessa and Myrtle, but we’ve still got three others playing strings, and without Harold, Lester will have to make that deep, rich, brass sound on his own. Gayle Potten has offered to come round to do the cooking – I’m more than happy for her to do that – and we can get things back to normal, at last.’

  ‘Cold-hearted bastard!’ was Cameron’s opinion, as he ended the call, but knew he couldn’t resist going, just to see what would happen, and what the current gossip was, and he fancied that the others would feel exactly the same as he did.

  Having got everything arranged, Myles sat, lost in contemplation. He’d watched Gayle Potten eat on several previous occasions, and been an enthusiastic onlooker. She didn
’t eat so much as devour. She used her fingers, licking, both them, and her lips frequently, and she never stopped eating until her inner-piggy squealed for mercy. Then she looked soft and contented, but with just a hint of a twinkle in her eye, as if she had other appetites to satisfy as well, and wouldn’t mind doing so, when she had digested a bit. Watching her eat was an absolute pleasure, and he had, if he was honest with himself, found it an almost sexual experience.

  Gayle was a fine figure of a woman – ‘a real handful’, would be a particularly apt description, and if her cooking proved to be up to snuff, he wouldn’t mind comforting her, while she mourned Harold’s arrest. They could comfort each other, and – well, who knows what might become of it?

  He smiled, as his thoughts progressed, and decided that he was really looking forward to tomorrow evening. It was time his ‘inner lecher’ came out to play.

  He hadn’t really wanted to start a new family, at his age. There would have been too much disruption, too many broken nights, too much mess, and far too much expense, and by the time any child he and Myrtle had produced had grown up, he’d be an old man, trying to fund a university education on pensions, at a time when he would possibly need to pay for extra care for himself. No, he was well out of that!

  IV

  In number three Columbine Cottages, Gayle Potten was rubbing her hands together with glee. The thought that Myles had asked her to cook for the band rehearsal was enough to start her trembling with anticipation.

  She had been reasonably happy with Harold, but he was getting on a bit, even though he was generous enough when it came to unexpected gifts and the like, but Myles was just that little bit younger, and he had that fabulous house, which she’d always coveted.

  She’d seen him look at her on many an occasion, when they had been having their pre-practice meal, and he had looked as hungry for her, as she was for the food. He wasn’t a bad-looking chap, and, not being one who dwelled on the past, or on the negative things in life, she could already see a rosy future ahead.