Swallow Hall Murder

by Noreen Wainwright

  He’d be here all day at this rate. Still, it was good that the inspector was back to himself, back at base camp. It felt like when, as a child, his mother had taken to her bed with some ailment, and then, she’d been up again when he got home from school, and everything was back to normal.

  “I’ll tell you what, lad. I’ll get the missus. She’s more observant than me. She served Sean and the woman. Happen she noticed more about the woman.”

  Yes. Something… anything positive. This felt like a wild-goose chase, but at least if he’d now established that she’d come by train, he could speak to Denis Harvey and pin-point when she’d come here. It was small, but something concrete, to take back.

  The landlady was loquacious, and as her husband said, observant.

  “She had a lovely costume on, Sergeant. A fine tweed, small pattern, beautifully tailored. It reminded me of one of those Paris outfits, is it Coco Chanel? You see them in the fashion magazines.”

  Well-dressed then. There was nothing unusual to Brown about this woman taking notice like this, but casting a glance at the husband you could see that he was frowning in perplexity. A suit would be just a suit.

  “You’d never seen her before?”

  “No…I don’t think so.”

  There had been a second’s doubt, though.

  “I don’t think I’ve seen her, but she did remind me of someone.”

  Brown sipped at his drink and looked down into the glass. Give the woman a chance, that was it. If he pressed, she’d doubt her own memory.

  “She reminded me of someone out of the cinema, I think. I can’t be sure, but she had the look of that actress about her. Celia Johnson.” Her voice grew more assured.

  “That’s it. She was a well-spoken woman with one of those refined voices, and she dressed and looked like someone else altogether. I mean not local to here.”

  * * *

  “It’s not right, Sylvia. Those two at it like hammer and tongs. I thought it’d be a different house now. It’s not nice to say it, but I thought with Miss Elizabeth gone that we’d have peace. What on earth is the matter with them upstairs, now?”

  “I know. There’s you and me down here, at the mercy of old Mrs. Turner and God knows what will happen to us in the future, and we manage to rub along together without tearing lumps out of each other.”

  “Looks like it’s continuing down into the next generation. Miss Serena wanted her cousin to come and help manage the aunts and old Mrs. Turner. But, maybe when it comes to it, her nose is out of joint.”

  “Maybe so,” Ivy wasn’t sure. It seemed more vicious than that and more personal too.

  This time, she’d blundered straight in on them. Her mind had been on other things as it was all the time since Miss Elizabeth’s death. Going over and over things, until she’d come back to herself again and realise that she hadn’t been paying attention to anyone or anything around her.

  Miss Serena was having a day off from the hospital. Presumably, they would have given her compassionate leave because of her aunt if she’d asked but no, she’d gone out to work the next day just as usual.

  She’d rang and asked Ivy to bring tea. She was on her own in the small breakfast room, looking out to the garden, to where the man’s body had been found, just out of sight. The breakfast room was almost like a glass conservatory and was possibly the only part of this house that Ivy liked. It was a Victorian feature, Sylvia told her when she first came to work here. One of the ancestors must have wanted to add light to the dim building.

  Serena didn’t look like she’d seen light or sun for a while. “Could you bring me some tea, Ivy? And maybe a second cup. My cousin is joining me. Here again, as you know.”

  The voices weren’t raised much beyond a whisper when Ivy came back. It was a loud whisper, though.

  “Oh, be honest with yourself, Serena, and stop playing the martyr. Stop using grandmother and your mother and…”

  “Shut up, Hester. Just shut up. I’m sick of you coming up here and coming the high and mighty and causing trouble…”

  “Well, stop bloody asking me to come up, then…You can’t have it all ways, Serena. But, then again, that’s what it’s always been about, isn’t it? Serena having her cake and eating it.” She wasn’t whispering now, fury making her voice louder and harsh.

  Ivy coughed, feeling a complete fool. “Miss Serena…the tea.”

  She pushed the trolley in, and both women got up for some reason, and Serena was red in the face.

  “Thank you, Ivy.” It must be obvious that she’d overheard them. Miss Hester looked as cool as ever.

  Both of them started to the trolley and Ivy left them to it.

  “It’ll be a hustle for power, now. You mark my words, Ivy. The old guard is under attack. Even the old lady can’t go on forever. And Miss Mary hasn’t been the same at all since her sister died.”

  It was true. For the first couple of days after Elizabeth’s death, it was as though Mary had a new lease of life as if she could now come into her own after being overshadowed all her life. That hadn’t lasted long. Now, Miss Mary had become more dithering and vague than ever.

  This morning, Ivy had had to help her find her stockings though they were there, in plain sight, in the usual drawer.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Julia’s voice over the telephone was breezy, light, a change that Edith was getting used to, though she still hadn’t heard anything from her about the new relationship.

  “So, Hester is back again, as you know. Her aunt’s funeral…according to Hester, the results of the post-mortem showed that she’d taken an overdose…”

  “Really?” That went against everything she’d heard about Elizabeth Turner. But, people never ceased to surprise. Something she’d learnt in her time at St. Bride’s, brief though it had been, was that suicide wasn’t only something depressed victims such as poor Esther Kirk committed. Sometimes, people just couldn’t live with what they’d done. Perpetrators. The talk was that maybe Elizabeth Turner had killed Sean Bracken and couldn’t face the consequences. It was an unlikely scenario; one that made Edith shudder, because there was something creepy about a woman on the other side of middle-age suddenly showing a Herculean strength and carrying out such a destructive act. But someone had killed the man and an unrelated suicide in the very house, just days later was a coincidence too far.

  “So, are you able to come round for tea, or later for drinks, if you like? I have something to tell you.”

  There was an undercurrent of excitement in Julia’s voice.

  “Now you’ve got me wondering.”

  “Well, you’ll just have to wait. It’s good, though, all good.” She paused, and there was an odd silence for a few seconds. “It’s probably wrong of me, tasteless. There’s that poor man dead and Hester’s aunt and…”

  “Julia.” In a flood of urgency, all Edith’s petty resentments about Julia not confiding in her earlier disappeared.

  “Julia, don’t say that. Grab at any happiness. If there’s anything the last few years have taught us, it’s that. Hester will say the same, I’m sure. I’ll come after supper, and we’ll make it drinks if that’s all right with you. This place is busy now, so I had better go.”

  She had her own news for Julia. Though, maybe not. She’d told Archie she’d keep his plans to herself, so that’s what she’d have to do for now.

  * * *

  “We’re in the sitting-room, if that’s OK? I thought the conservatory but it’s too cold. I lit the fire.”

  Edith grinned. “You made the fire. Get away with you. You mean some poor servant made the fire.”

  “No, I laid the fire in here, and I lit it. Sometimes, you confuse me with some lady of the manor, Edie. Look, I’ve even made cocktails, or assembled the ingredients. Fair enough, I had a bit of help from the kitchen with that.”

  Edith raised her eyebrows. “Celebrating something, are we?”

  Julie turned such a smile on her that all you could do was to smil
e back. Whatever her own worries, at the moment, mainly about her brother, how could you fail to be happy for Julia after all this time of grief and unhappiness?

  “Tell all, Jules. Who is he?”

  “It’s Peter Taylor. You must have met him. He was a good friend of Giles.” She swallowed and for a second looked away, into the fire. “He was Giles’s best friend. I think one of the few people who understood how his mind worked, especially after the war…he got in touch with me the odd time since, he and some of the others Giles used to meet up with occasionally.”

  Edith wracked her brain. There had been a bunch of young people. It was strange, apart from Alastair and Giles and a few more, their faces merged. Then it struck her. “Quiet, but when he did speak, he talked about his family a lot. Father a vicar. Grew up in Thirsk?”

  Julia nodded, her face vulnerable as if she was waiting anxiously for the right response.

  Well, for once that was easy. Edith went over to her and put an arm around her friend. “He’s a good man. I’m so happy for you.” That was all that was needed. Julia lit up. Wasn’t it uplifting to have something that was just good and right happen for a change? Now that she’d heard about it, there was something obvious about this couple getting together. He would be a quiet and kind foil to Julia’s occasionally mercurial temperament.

  “I wanted to tell you before Hester got here. I will tell her. But, I knew it would mean more to you. I would have mentioned about it before, but we had to think about how and when to tell the children. That’s one of the best things about this, Edith. We told Daisy, and she asked if Uncle Peter would make her some jumps for her pony. Then we took the boys out from school and told them, over tea. Their response was more reserved, maybe. But it was fine. They know him, you see, Edith and trust him. He’s been a background figure, their whole lives, so…”

  There was a tap at the door, and a young girl wearing a white apron and little cap came in and said that a Miss Turner had arrived, and she opened the door to allow Hester through.

  Funny, not long after Julia was trying to be an ordinary woman who lit her own fires. Edith smiled.

  One cocktail in and Edith’s body was as relaxed as it could be, almost as if she was about to drop off to sleep.

  “How’s Archie?” Julia asked, her tone neutral

  “I’m not too sure how to answer that. The good news is, as I said, that he hasn’t had a heart attack, though that’s what it looked like to me. He is seeing patients, despite the fact that he’s supposed to be having some time off. In fact, it was he who was called out to Hester’s aunt…”

  This was awkward. The elephant in the corner of the room. They had talked about Elizabeth’s death, or rather both of the other two women had offered the conventional condolences, and Hester had smiled tightly and nodded. It was as clear as it could be without words that she didn’t want to pursue the subject.

  “Yes. I think Serena called him.”

  Silence fell, and all the pleasant alcohol glow departed from Edith. “I suppose it’s got to be difficult for her…I mean she’s sort of stuck. I know you come up as much as you can, but…” Oh, why on earth had she started down this track and with every word she spoke she was digging deeper.

  “I wouldn’t waste any time feeling sorry for my cousin. No-one has made her stay in Yorkshire and believe me, Serena suits herself. She’s always done what’s best for her.”

  * * *

  Brown hoped and prayed that the inspector would be at the station when he returned. If he’d gone off yet again, on one of his personal outings, Brown might burst. It was far too much of a coincidence for the pub landlady to have noted exactly the same resemblance as he’d done. The woman who had come looking for Sean Bracken not much more than a month before his death had been Hester Turner. There is was. Inspector Greene’s view that the murder was connected to Swallow Hall. They knew about the relationship—first denied by her—with Serena Grant. But no-one mentioned any connection with her cousin. It was hard to think of an innocent explanation for keeping that quiet.

  “Mmm, back to Swallow Hall - again. This is becoming a habit.” Inspector Greene hadn’t gone overboard on Brown’s findings or his detecting skills—naturally. But, he’d still been at the station, and he was receptive and ready to act on what he’d been told. That was enough.

  “Telephone first, this time. We haven’t got the time to waste. She goes back and forwards to London at the drop of a hat, it seems.”

  Ivy Moss answered the telephone and told them Hester had gone out. Naturally, she didn’t know where and there was a delay while she went off to see if anyone else knew.

  “She’s gone round to Mrs. Etherington, sir. Old friends from years ago, it seems.”

  Greene frowned, craggy face, even more furrowed than normal. “Mrs. Etherington? What was it I said about a pattern developing? I might have known there would be a connection with our former VADs. No doubt Miss Horton will be there, as well, when we call round.”

  * * *

  Though they talked about everything—which in their case involved the past, and people from the past and a little bit about London life, which seemed oh, so remote—Sean Bracken and Hester’s Aunt Elizabeth may have been there in the room with them. Edith eyed Hester when she failed to answer a question from Julia about her job, about whether there were any other women in the same position.

  “Sorry, no, not quite, but it is getting better. Now that woman with degrees are not such a rare specimen, then, yes, I think it will change.”

  Her face twisted just for a second, and Edith wondered about the change in the woman who had joked a few weeks ago about rushing off back to London. She wasn’t making any jokes this evening.

  As though, she felt Edith’s eyes upon her, she gave a little laugh. “I’m sorry, girls. I’m terrible company. It’s difficult to know what to do for the best back at the Hall. Despite what I said about Serena, it isn’t fair to leave it all to her and her mother. I’m going to have to make some decisions.”

  They all looked to the door at the tap. The maid returned, a look on her face that was either scared or apologetic.

  “It’s the inspector, Mrs. Etherington, and Sergeant Brown.”

  Edith inhaled sharply before she could stop herself and her heart beat too fast.

  For some reason, as though orchestrated, the three women got to their feet.

  “I’m sorry for intruding on your evening, Mrs Etherington. But, we need to speak to your friend.”

  “What is it, Inspector? What’s happened?” What had possessed her? The second the words were out of her mouth, Edith knew she’d got it wrong. Another black mark against her in Inspector Greene’s book. She let the wave of heat creep over her face, pretending not to notice the look the inspector gave her.

  “Miss Turner. We do need to have a word with you.”

  “You can speak to her here, surely? There’s somewhere you can speak to her privately. That’s not a problem.”

  Julia was showing the same belligerent attitude to Greene as she had every other time they’d encountered each other.

  He hesitated. “It would be best if you came to the station, Miss Turner. If you need a lift home, the sergeant here will take you.”

  So, they weren’t arresting her or anything then. That was something. Edith’s mind was in overdrive. They must have good reason to come out here in the evening and to insist—more or less—that she needed to go to the police station. Hester? It was ludicrous to think that she could have anything to do with either her aunt’s death or what had happened to Sean Bracken. The big obvious question was: why?

  Hester wasn’t arguing, though. That was odd. She was a strong, intelligent woman, not someone who could be easily intimidated.

  She looked…stunned, that was it. Her forehead creased in a frown and her bottom lip gripped in her teeth, she looked around for her bag, her coat.

  “The maid took your coat to hang outside, Hester. Look, your bag is there, on the chair.”


  Her eyes flinty, Julia stood in front of the inspector. “Is this absolutely necessary? Couldn’t you speak to her here, leave it until tomorrow, even. It’s after eight o’clock at night. You’re treating Hester as if she’s some dangerous criminal.”

  Edith sensed that Julia might be about to step over a line.

  “Would it be all right if one of us came with her to the station, Inspector?” She turned immediately to Hester. “Would that help?”

  Hester nodded. She’d gone very pale.

  Inspector Greene sighed.

  “I’ll go and take my own car and then I’ll be able to give Hester a lift back to Swallow Hall. Is that all right?”

  Julia nodded. “Of course. If the inspector here insists on hauling her off…”

  Edith sighed. Not that there was any love lost between her and Greene, but she was the best person to go to the station. Every word Julia uttered made her more sure of that. “I’d just better give Archie a quick ring on the way out if that’s all right,” she said quietly to Julia.

  * * *

  “Am I under arrest?”

  “No,” the inspector said.

  Brown looked at the small window behind Miss Turner and wondered if he dared open it. His throat was scratchy again, and a dull, throbbing ache had lodged in the bridge of his nose and forehead. His cold had come on with a vengeance -just what he needed.

  Assertively, he went behind the woman’s chair and opened the top window a couple of notches, saying something about letting air in.

  “Miss Turner, we find, that contrary to everything you said, you were well acquainted with the murdered man, Sean Bracken. Now, that makes my antennae quiver. I ask myself why you’d need to lie about something quite straightforward.”

  Hester Turner looked down at her hands, which were interlaced, as though she was a supplicant. “I didn’t exactly lie.”

  Greene made an angry little snorting noise. “Don’t be pedantic, with me, Miss Turner. I’m sure you know all about sins of omission, an intelligent woman, such as you. You led us to believe that you didn’t know the deceased man. Why?”