The Serpent Pool

by Martin Edwards

  ‘I’d be amazed if she didn’t. Very pretty girl.’

  As you keep telling me, Hannah thought.

  ‘You think she was fibbing?’

  ‘Dunno, it just didn’t ring true. My guess is, she didn’t fancy a night out in a big crowd. She doesn’t strike me as a party animal.’

  ‘So, Cassie is like me?’

  He considered the question as he gulped down the last of his crumpet, and opted for vagueness. Or tact.

  ‘Um. Sort of.’

  ‘So, what’s the latest on George Saffell?’ Marc asked.

  They were in Hannah’s Lexus, driving through the darkness. Their destination was south of the Hawkshead ferry, a modern mansion hidden among the trees on the slopes above Windermere. Marc drove half as many miles in a year as she did, but he wasn’t a good passenger, and she never enjoyed chauffeuring him. When she’d owned a car with a manual gearbox, he twitched with every change of gear. Now she drove an automatic, he twitched all the time. She might have passed her advanced test, he might have picked up a couple of speeding tickets, but if she rounded a bend at speed, his intake of breath sounded like a pistol shot. If she took too long to set off when the lights turned green, his heel drummed on the floor mat in reproach.

  ‘Still dead, last I heard.’

  ‘You know what I mean.’ The habitual impatience flared, quick as the strike of a match. Hannah blamed his mother for spoiling him. Even this Christmas, the old lady hadn’t been able to resist the urge to straighten his collar and brush imaginary bits of fluff from his coat at every opportunity. She’d been in her forties when he was born and she couldn’t stop treating him like a precious gift. ‘Has Fern Larter figured out if it was murder?’

  An old Beach Boys hit played on the in-car CD player. Smooth harmonies, a song about heroes and villains.

  ‘It’s for the coroner to decide, and the inquest was adjourned.’ She felt a flash of irritation. Why didn’t he show the same interest in her own investigations? But perhaps her reaction was unfair. After selling books to the man for years, he was bound to be intrigued by George Saffell’s bizarre demise. It wasn’t every day that one of his most valued customers was roasted alive. ‘Last time we spoke, Fern had pretty much ruled out an accident.’

  ‘Not surprised. Strange accident, huh? To incinerate yourself and your prized possessions. You think he killed himself?’

  ‘Funny way to do it,’ she said. ‘Burning yourself to a crisp, with no chance of second thoughts once the flames take hold.’

  Saffell’s boathouse had been built of wood. Luxurious enough to feature in glossy lifestyle magazines, but never meant for round-the-year occupancy. Why would Saffell want to spend dark winter evenings there when he had a lovely place out at Troutbeck?

  ‘Books obsessed him,’ Marc said. ‘Perhaps he thought it was a fitting way to go.’

  ‘You’d have to be very unhappy to choose that ahead of an overdose of painkillers.’

  ‘Yeah, he hated pain. According to his wife, even a twinge of toothache made him whimper.’

  ‘You know her?’

  They hadn’t spoken much about Saffell when they first learnt of his death. After initial expressions of shock and dismay, Marc lamented the loss of business. Not so much callous selfishness, as naked human nature. The two men were acquaintances, not friends. When a customer died, there was usually the prospect of buying his collection from the widow at a knock-down price, once a probate valuation at a pittance had been agreed. But even that consolation was denied. Four thousand books worth a small fortune, reduced to ash. For Marc, the destruction of rare books was a crime worse even than murder.

  ‘Wanda Saffell?’ Was it her imagination, or was he weighing up how much to say? ‘I’ve met her a few times, haven’t I mentioned it?’

  ‘Doesn’t ring a bell.’

  ‘You probably weren’t listening after a long day at Divisional HQ,’ he muttered.

  ‘I’m all ears now.’

  ‘Wanda was his second wife, the first died young of breast cancer. They married four or five years ago. She was a divorcee who shared his love of books.’

  ‘Another collector?’

  ‘No, she runs a small printing press as a hobby, publishes an occasional limited edition. Funded by George, but I get the impression they led separate lives.’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ he said vaguely.

  ‘They hadn’t split up?’

  ‘Don’t think so. I kept my nose out.’

  Having aroused her curiosity, he’d failed to satisfy it. Typical man.

  ‘The boathouse was gutted long before they brought the fire under control. It stood at the end of a track through woodland, and the alarm wasn’t raised until someone on the other side of Ullswater saw the place engulfed in flames. So Forensics didn’t have a lot to go on. There wasn’t much left of your customer, let alone all those books you sold him.’

  Marc flinched in the passenger seat, and for once she thought it wasn’t on account of her driving. He didn’t lack imagination – how could he, a man who loved books so much? – and it didn’t do to dwell on the agonies that Saffell must have suffered. Even a few seconds before the final loss of consciousness must seem like an eternity while you burnt to death.

  ‘But they found traces of accelerant. Petrol.’

  Marc groaned. ‘He may have kept fuel for a boat.’

  ‘Yeah, but there are signs that his wrists and ankles were tied.’

  This was confidential, but Marc wouldn’t shoot his mouth off. He knew when to be discreet.

  ‘Jesus.’ He shivered. ‘Murder, then.’

  ‘Looks like it.’

  ‘Who would want to kill someone as harmless as George Saffell?’

  ‘Is anyone truly harmless?’

  ‘That’s a bit profound, Hannah, don’t you think? He was a quiet sort, nothing like the stereotype of a brash estate agent. Old George wouldn’t hurt a fly.’

  ‘Even so. He must have had an enemy.’

  ‘I can’t believe it.’

  Hannah swore as a car raced up behind them, its full beam dazzling in her rear-view mirror. It overtook them before a bend, cutting back in so sharply that she had to jam her foot down on the brake. She had the impression of a sports car, low and sleek. Tyres squealing, it disappeared into the darkness.

  ‘Stupid bastard.’

  Marc clicked his tongue.

  ‘Someone’s worried about arriving late for the party.’

  ‘For God’s sake. For all he cared, we could have crashed.’

  ‘What makes you think the driver’s a man?’ He seemed about to add something, but changed his mind. ‘Anyway, we survived. And here we are.’

  Hannah pulled up in front of a long, narrow driveway that reached through an avenue of dark trees. The gates were open and the lights on top of the brick pillars shone bright. She peered at the house name, carved on a sign made of slate.

  ‘Crag Gill.’

  ‘Named after Miss Thornton’s house in The Picts and the Martyrs,’ Marc said, as if that explained everything.

  The title of the book stirred a memory.

  ‘Arthur Ransome? The Swallows and Amazons man?’

  ‘Spot on. Stuart has catholic tastes, but he’s especially fond of children’s classics. He has every Ransome in first edition. Mind you, the stuff Ransome wrote for adults is even rarer.’

  ‘I didn’t realise he wrote for adults.’

  ‘Believe me, his study of Oscar Wilde is fabulously rare in dust wrapper. Lord Alfred Douglas sued him for libel, and even though Ransome won the case, the controversial bits were censored from the later editions. Then there was his book on Russian folklore. You know he married Trotsky’s secretary?’

  It sounded wildly improbable, but Marc loved showing off the extraordinary range of trivia he’d accumulated about books and bookmen. She decided to give the answer he hoped for.

  ‘You’re kidding.’

  ‘It’s
true, I swear it.’ He enjoyed the idea of startling her – perhaps because she was a sceptical police officer. ‘A dealer I know reckons that Ransome personally inscribed his collection of Russian folk tales to his chum Lenin. If it ever shows up, Stuart will be desperate to lay his hands on it, and he’s a man who likes to get what he wants. He’d trade his granny if he could get that book.’

  ‘So, he’s a true lawyer,’ Hannah murmured. ‘Caring and unselfish.’

  ‘You’re not going to be sarky with Stuart, are you? Chill out. Don’t forget he’s not just our host, he helps pay our mortgage.’

  ‘Trust me.’ She pressed her foot down and the car moved forward. ‘I’ll be on my best behaviour.’

  * * *

  Marc was right, she needed to chill out. Another New Year’s resolution. But an upmarket party wasn’t the best place to turn over a new leaf. From the moment a flunkey whisked away her coat as she stepped through the door into the vast living room of Crag Gill, Hannah realised she was out of her depth. She wasn’t accustomed to how the other half live.

  A singer who had reached the final of Britain’s Got Talent was crooning ‘This Guy’s in Love with You’, accompanied by a pianist who bore a spooky resemblance to the late Liberace. Hannah overheard a perma-tanned presenter moaning about the demise of regional television to a quiz show hostess who was even more scantily clad off the screen than on. A pair of muscular foreign blokes dripping gold and jewellery were presumably premier league footballers. As Marc vanished into the crowd, she was plied with champagne by a handsome waiter who gave her a casual appraising glance before his eye roved past her, in the direction of a group of pretty girls in very short skirts, no doubt invited to keep the footballers onside.

  Well, half a glass wouldn’t do any harm.

  As she took a sip, a hand squeezed her wrist. It hurt a little.

  ‘Hannah, we meet again! And if I may say so, you’re looking lovelier than ever.’

  Stuart Wagg was a lawyer, so Hannah supposed he was well versed in the art of embellishing the truth. He had the knack of blending flattery with a self-mocking smile, and as she withdrew from his grasp, she felt a surge of amused satisfaction at the compliment, rather than annoyance at slick and superficial charm. The halter-neck top had been a good idea, and she was glad she’d chosen the dangly earrings and charm bracelet. Marc had bought them as extra Christmas presents; along with a bottle of unexpectedly subtle perfume, they compensated for the tarty underwear.

  ‘How are you?’

  He treated her to an ironic smile. ‘Keeping the wolf from the door.’

  The entertaining room had a double-height glass wall overlooking the lake, but even with the curtains drawn apart and the terraced garden illuminated by complicated electronic gimmickry, the water was lost in the darkness. Despite its nostalgic name, Stuart Wagg’s home was defiantly twenty-first century, a triumph of modernist design. It was like a bunker cut into the hillside, boasting a seeded grass roof and constructed of timber and traditional stone. Stuart was six feet four and he’d made sure his home suited tall people. The armchairs were vast, even the sink in the cloakroom was set high. Instead of doors, archways separated the rooms, so the living space seemed almost endless. Six months ago, the place had featured in The Independent’s property supplement. Hannah recalled the journalist drooling over the white walls, plain elm floorboards and luxurious fabrics, positively swooning over the green silk and suede throw that adorned two L-shaped sofas. After weeks spent mining interior-decor magazines for cheap solutions to design challenges, she recognised ‘no expense spared’ when she saw it.

  ‘I see the economic downturn hasn’t touched the legal profession.’

  His dark eyebrows jiggled. ‘It’s all about keeping up appearances.’

  Stuart Wagg was lean and fit; she’d heard that, when he wasn’t chasing rare books to add to his collection, he spent his spare time tramping on his own across the fells. Black open-neck shirt, white trousers, big bare feet. A legal eagle without socks or shoes? No mistaking him for your average Lake District lawyer, toiling away over house conveyances or a neighbours’ boundary dispute in the county court. Stuart acted for millionaires, drafting wills and trusts so as to keep their fortunes out of the taxman’s clutches. His clients included sports agents and pop music impresarios and he was more at home lunching with media moguls at the Ivy in London than snacking in the cafeteria opposite his firm’s main office in Bowness. He avoided the hoi polloi in the criminal courts unless, as a rare favour, he agreed to represent a celebrity faced with a driving ban for racing his Ferrari along the A591 as though competing in the Monaco Grand Prix.

  ‘Is that so?’

  ‘Of course. We all take care about the picture we present of ourselves to the outside world. What lies beneath is much more fascinating, don’t you agree?’

  He held her gaze, as if daring her to guess what was in his mind. Better not to know. All around were people talking at the tops of their voices. Stuart was a famously generous host and the Veuve Clicquot loosened tongues. With the heating on full blast, the crush of bodies made even this airy room seem stuffy and oppressive. Her head ached with the din and the lack of oxygen. Marc seemed captivated by a young redhead who was offering drink, canapés, and a generous display of tanned flesh.

  Stuart’s eyes rested on a dark-haired woman in the throng. She was chatting to a tall, gaunt man in a white linen suit. Hannah recognised them both. The man’s mugshot had appeared in the local media following his arrival at the Cumbria Culture Company. Stuart Wagg’s firm had sponsored his recruitment, to run a literary festival in aid of cancer charities. Stuart fancied himself as a patron of the arts and worthy causes. With shaven head, tanned features, and coal-coloured eyes, the man’s looks were striking, but it was the woman who seized Hannah’s attention.

  As she watched, a woman in a black dress joined the couple. Her blonde bob and glacial elegance would have set Alfred Hitchcock panting, but the champagne had brought a flush to her cheeks. Something about her was familiar, but Hannah couldn’t place it. Her arrival prompted the darkhaired woman to edge away through the crowd towards Stuart and Hannah.

  ‘There you are!’

  Stuart Wagg took her arm, lazily proprietorial. As if she were a book in his collection that he might trade in for a finer copy.

  ‘I was starting to worry that you might have had a better offer,’ he said, with the smug self-deprecating smile of a man confident that such a thing could never happen.

  The woman squeezed his hand and said in a disbelieving tone, ‘From Arlo Denstone?’

  ‘Good-looking feller,’ he teased.

  ‘Not my type.’

  ‘Phew, that’s a relief. Now, let me introduce you to Detective Chief Inspector Hannah Scarlett, one of Cumbria Constabulary’s finest. Hannah, please meet a dear friend of mine. Louise Kind.’

  Louise looked her straight in the eye, but Hannah didn’t want to be the first to blink. This was the sister of Daniel, and daughter of Ben. Two men who meant a good deal to her, though she’d always been reluctant to ask herself why. She wore a belted, Grecian-style dress with a plunging neckline and a discreet diamond necklace that must have cost a fortune. The last time Hannah had seen her, Louise had been encased in a shapeless jacket and corduroy jeans. Admittedly, that had been out of doors at a skydiving display, but even so, the graceless duckling had transformed into a glamorous swan.

  ‘We’ve met before.’

  ‘Really, darling?’ Stuart Wagg’s bushy eyebrows skipped again in their quizzical dance. ‘You never told me you were in cahoots with the local constabulary.’

  ‘My brother introduced us. It’s a small world. Hannah used to work with our father. Isn’t that so, DCI Scarlett?’

  ‘Small world is right.’ Hannah nodded. ‘Good to see you again, Louise.’

  She was conscious of her host’s scrutiny. It made her feel like a courtroom exhibit, or an ill-drafted codicil to a miser’s last will and testament. Her cheeks bur
nt, though surely it was ludicrous to be embarrassed by meeting the sister of Daniel Kind.

  ‘Must circulate.’ Stuart Wagg gave Louise a nod of dismissal. ‘See you later.’

  ‘So, you and Stuart are together?’ Hannah asked when he was out of earshot.

  ‘Sort of.’ Louise fingered the necklace in an abstracted manner. A Christmas present from Stuart, no doubt. He’d probably just walked into the jeweller’s and asked for the priciest necklace in the shop. ‘It’s a very recent thing. We met at a legal conference. You might remember, I used to lecture in Manchester. I’ve only just arrived up here.’

  ‘You’ve moved in?’

  ‘Mmmm…’ An evasive smile. ‘Let’s say, it’s too far to commute with comfort and I didn’t only want to be a weekend visitor. We’ve just spent our first Christmas together, and I feel extra lucky. I start a brand-new job at the University of South Lakeland next term.’

  ‘Congratulations.’

  ‘Well…let’s see how things turn out.’ Louise fiddled with her bracelet. ‘How come you know Stuart?’

  ‘My partner Marc owns a second-hand bookshop.’ Hannah caught sight of him on the other side of the room, accepting the waitress’s offer to replenish his glass of champagne with a broad grin. ‘Stuart’s one of his best customers.’

  Louise tapped the side of her head. ‘Doh! I should have made the connection. See, I never inherited those detective skills.’

  It was on the tip of Hannah’s tongue to say: Not like Daniel. But she didn’t want to be the first to speak his name.

  ‘Your father taught me all I know about detective work.’

  ‘He’d have been proud of your success. Head of the Cold Case Review Team? A top job.’

  ‘It’s a backwater,’ Hannah said. ‘I was steered into it after I messed up on a case, and I haven’t managed to worm my way out of it.’

  ‘But you enjoy being a detective.’ A statement, not a question. ‘Daniel was sure you did.’

  Hannah clenched her fist, as if she’d scored a goal. Louise had mentioned him first.

  ‘He was right. I was always ambitious. Driven, your father said.’