The Killings at Badger's Drift

by Caroline Graham

  ‘You won’t be able to eat these now, Phyllis -’

  ‘I can pick up a few sweets, thank you. Leave me alone.’ She was cramming fluffy cubes anyoldhow into the box. She still didn’t look at the two men.

  ‘You’ll show Chief Inspector Barnaby out then, will you?’ Receiving no reply Katherine turned to leave, saying just before she closed the door, ‘It’s about Miss Simpson.’

  At this remark Barnaby noticed the colour rush back into the older woman’s cheeks but unevenly, leaving the skin mottled, as if she had been roasting her face by the fire. She gushed at them, ‘Of course, poor Emily. Why didn’t I think? Sit down . . . sit down both of you.’

  Barnaby selected a fawn fireside chair and looked around him. A very different atmosphere from the drawing room downstairs. Not uncomfortably furnished yet quite lacking in individuality. There were no ornaments or photographs and hardly any books. A few copies of The Lady, a couple of insipid prints and a dying plant on the windowsill. Apart from the television set it could have been any dentist’s waiting room.

  Phyllis Cadell switched off the box and sat facing them. Any anxiety she may have felt at their arrival was now firmly under control. She turned a bland but concerned gaze upon them both. If it had not been for the knees, far too firmly clamped together, and the cords standing out in the soft, flabby neck Barnaby might have thought her quite relaxed. She was affably forthcoming as to her movements on the seventeenth. In the afternoon she had been in the village hall setting up the tombola. And she had spent the evening ‘quite blamelessly I assure you, Chief Inspector’ watching television.

  This did not surprise Barnaby. He found it hard to picture the matronly figure, flesh springing free from rigorously confining corsets, rolling and frolicking in the greenwood. He did not of course discount the possibility. The most unlikely characters have stirred others to romantic yearnings. How often had he heard his wife say ‘I don’t know what he sees in her’? Or, less frequently, the reverse. No, the count against Phyllis Cadell being the woman in the woods was not her unglamorous appearance but the fact that she had nothing to lose by discovery. She might even, taking into account society’s attitude towards unattached middle-aged females, have a lot to gain. So, in that case, why had she been so frightened when they had first arrived?

  ‘And what time did you leave the hall, Miss Cadell?’

  ‘Let’s see’ - she tapped her top lip with a tallow-coloured finger - ‘I was almost the last to go . . . it must have been half-past four . . . quarter to five.’

  ‘Did you leave with Miss Lacey?’

  ‘Katherine? Good gracious no. She left much earlier. Was hardly there at all, really.’ She caught the glance that Sergeant Troy turned on to Barnaby’s unresponsive profile. ‘Oh dear’ - she made an arch little moue of false regret - ‘I hope I haven’t said anything I shouldn’t?’

  ‘And did you go out at all after you’d returned home?’

  ‘No. I came straight up here when we’d finished dinner. Wrote a couple of letters, then as I have already stated, watched some television.’

  As I have already stated, echoed Troy to himself, transcribing carefully. People often said things like that when they were talking to the police. Formal jargony sorts of remarks they’d never dream of making any other time. He listened as Miss Cadell proceeded to give details of all the programmes she’d watched, then, as if this in itself might be thought suspicious, added, ‘I only remember because it was Friday. The gardening programmes, you see?’

  Barnaby did see. He watched them himself whenever he was home in time. He said, ‘Do you have staff living in here?’

  ‘No. We have a gardener and a boy. Between them they look after the grounds, clean the cars and do any maintenance. And there’s Mrs Quine. She comes about ten o’clock. Does the general cleaning, prepares any vegetables for dinner, cooks a light lunch, then goes about three. I cook in the evening and she will clear away and wash up when she comes the next day. I do hope Katherine will keep her on. She brings her little girl and not everyone will accept children. Oddly enough we shared her with poor Miss Simpson. She went there for an hour each morning before she came to us . . .’

  ‘And will you continue to live here after the wedding, Miss Cadell?’

  ‘Good heavens, no.’ A strangled yelp which might have been a laugh. ‘A house cannot hold two mistresses. No, I’m being pensioned off. Henry has several cottages on the estate. Two have been . . . I believe the term is knocked together. There’s a small garden. It’s . . . very nice.’

  Not as nice as being mistress of Tye House, thought Barnaby, picturing again the splendid vista previously seen through the orangery. Not nearly as nice.

  ‘Has Mr Trace been a widower long?’ There it was again. As clear and bright as a match struck in a darkened room. The flicker of fear. Phyllis Cadell looked away from him, studying the more nondescript of the two landscapes on the wall.

  ‘I don’t see how that can possibly have any relevance to Miss Simpson’s death.’

  ‘No. I beg your pardon.’ Detective Chief Inspector Barnaby waited. In his experience people (hardened criminals apart) who had something to hide and people who had nothing to hide had one thing in common. Faced by a policeman asking questions they could never remain silent for long. After a few moments Phyllis Cadell began to speak. The words tumbled out as if she couldn’t wait to be rid of them and done with the matter.

  ‘Bella died about a year ago. In September. A shooting accident. It was a terrible tragedy. She was only thirty-two. There was a full report in the local paper at the time.’

  All that on one breath, thought Barnaby. And through lips the colour of milk. He said, ‘Is that when you came to run the house?’

  ‘Not at all. I moved here just after the wedding. Bella wasn’t really interested in the domestic side of things. Country pursuits were her forte. Riding, fishing. And looking after Henry, of course. They’d been married nearly five years when she died.’

  ‘Miss Lacey seems to be very young to be taking on so much?’ hinted Barnaby, but in vain. Her emotions were now as tenaciously confined as the swoop of her pouter-pigeon chest.

  ‘Oh I don’t know. I should think she’ll make a charming lady of the manor. And now’ - she got up - ‘if that’s all . . . ?’

  She led them briskly down the staircase to the front hall, then stopped suddenly between two old, once-gilded wooden figures. For a moment they all stood on the black-and-white-tiled floor like chess pieces, useful but impotent until nudged into play. Phyllis shifted from one foot to another (beleaguered queen) then spoke.

  ‘Umm . . . you must have thought I looked quite startled to see you . . . taken aback . . . when you first arrived?’

  Barnaby looked politely interested. Troy established eye contact with the taller of the two figures; a king with a soaring crown and traces of lapis lazuli still on his pupils.

  ‘The truth is . . . I . . . well it’s my car tax. You know how it is . . .’ A nervous smile twitched into being, showing strong stained teeth. ‘One always means to make a note of these things . . .’

  ‘Yes,’ agreed the chief inspector, ‘that is a sensible idea.’

  As the door closed quickly behind them Troy said, ‘Pathetic.’ He could have meant the woman’s appearance, her position in the household or the awkward and obvious lie about the road tax. Barnaby could only agree on all three counts.

  Katherine Lacey wandered slowly across the cobbled yard, watching the two policemen walk away. In spite of the heat of the day she felt cold. Benjy whined sadly from the shelter of the first silo. She crossed over and picked him up. He started to struggle in her arms. His fur slipped over his ribs as if there were no flesh at all to separate them.

  ‘Darling . . . ?’ She heard the soft bump as Henry negotiated the kitchen step and wheeled himself towards her. She put the dog down. ‘Is something the matter?’

  She strove to compose herself before turning to him. She didn’t reply, just shook he
r head, the bell of glossy dark hair swinging over her face.

  ‘Is it Benjy? You must give way on that you know, Kate. We’ve both tried everything we can. He’s simply not going to eat. Please . . . let me call the vet . . .’

  ‘Oh - just another day!’

  ‘He’s an old dog. He misses her too much. We can’t sit here and watch him starve.’

  ‘It’s not just that.’ She turned then, crouching clumsily by the chair. ‘It’s . . . I can’t explain . . . oh Henry . . .’ She seized his hands: ‘I’ve just got the most terrible feelings . . .’

  ‘What d’you mean?’ He smiled down at her, his tone indulgent. ‘What sort of feelings?’

  ‘I can’t say exactly . . . just that things are going to go dreadfully wrong for us . . . the wedding won’t happen . . .’

  ‘I’ve never heard such nonsense.’

  ‘I knew you’d say that. But you don’t understand . . .’ She broke off, studying his face. Kind, handsome, a shade complacent. And why shouldn’t it be? The Traces went back to Norman times. Effigies of Sir Robert Trayce and his wyffe Ismelda and her cat rested eternally in the cool of the thirteenth-century church. Traces had shed a modest amount of their landowning blood in the two world wars and returned to their squirearchical duties garlanded with honour. The words security of tenure were meaningless to them. They had never known anything else.

  ‘. . . You don’t understand,’ Katherine repeated. ‘Because you’ve never wanted anything you couldn’t have you can’t see that life isn’t always like that. I think these things that are happening . . . Miss Simpson dying . . . and now Benjy . . . and Michael refusing to come on Saturday . . . I think they’re omens . . .’

  Henry Trace laughed. ‘Beware the Ides of March.’

  ‘Don’t laugh.’

  ‘I’m sorry, darling, but there’s no one squeaking and gibbering in the streets that I can see.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘And as for Michael . . . well . . . he’s hardly an omen. You must’ve known for weeks that he’d probably refuse to give you away. You know what he’s like.’

  ‘But I thought . . . on my wedding day . . .’

  ‘Do you want me to talk to him?’

  ‘It won’t make any difference. You’d think after all you’d done for us it would -’

  ‘Hush. You mustn’t talk like that. I’ve done nothing.’ As she got up, leaning on the arms of his chair, he said, ‘Poor little knees, all dented from the cobbles.’ He lifted the hem of her dress and touched the dimpled flesh tenderly. ‘Dear little knees . . . Henry make them better.’

  At a window above their heads Phyllis Cadell turned abruptly away. She switched on the television set and slumped into the nearest armchair. Voices filled the room. On the screen a couple, mad with ecstatic greed, were struggling to embrace a mountain of consumer durables whilst an audience, hardly less ecstatic, screamed abuse and encouragement. Wearing a fixed insane grin, the woman slipped, dislodged a can and brought the whole pyramid crashing to the ground. Phyllis pressed her remote control and got a besotted duo in love with each other’s breakfast cereal. Button three activated a bucolic scene showing an elderly couple saturated with contentment reading their golden wedding telegrams, surrounded by their loving family. Button four brought an old black and white movie. Two men were holding a third by the arms while Sterling Haydon battered him to bits. A left to the jaw, then a right. Smack. Crunch. Then two to the belly, breath sucked in, an agonizing whistle. Then a knee to the groin and a punch in the kidneys.

  Phyllis settled back. She seized the box of fudge and started cramming the gritty, fluff-embellished cubes into her mouth. She packed them in fiercely and without a break as if making an assault on her jaws. Tears poured down her cheeks.

  Chapter Four

  ‘I expect the wedding’ll be a posh do. Marquees and all that?’ Troy looked to the horizon as he spoke, casting a green eye on Henry Trace’s assets. Miles and miles and miles of waving money.

  ‘No doubt.’ Barnaby turned left as they walked away from Tye House, making for the terraced cottages. Troy, not wishing to receive another put-down, did not ask why his chief was going in for a bit of mundane door-to-door. But in the event Barnaby chose to enlighten him.

  ‘That bungalow’ - he nodded towards the end of the terrace - ‘is what interests me. There’s someone there keeping a very sharp eye on things. I’m interested to hear what the neighbours have to say.’

  ‘I see, sir,’ was all Troy could think of in reply, but he felt warm with satisfaction on receipt of this small confidence.

  The first cottage was empty, the occupants, as a very old lady next door informed them, being outsiders from London who hadn’t been down for at least a month. And the man in the last cottage was out till six every weekday teaching in Amersham. Troy took his name for the evening checkers. The old lady was taciturn about her own affairs, simply saying she hadn’t been out at all on the day in question. Then she jerked her head over the neat box hedge at cottage number three.

  ‘You want to ask her where she was on Friday. She’d poison her grandmother for a haporth o’ nuts.’ Next door a window slammed.

  ‘And the bungalow . . . ?’

  ‘Don’t know nothing about them.’ She shut the door firmly.

  ‘That’s a bit odd, isn’t it?’ said Troy as they walked down the path. ‘A tiny place like this and she doesn’t know anything about the people two doors down.’

  ‘It is indeed,’ replied Barnaby, arriving at the next cottage, lifting a grimacing pixie by the legs and letting go smartly.

  An even older lady appeared and gave them roughly the same spiel, the only difference being that here the blood money came out as two pennorth o’ cheese. Then she laid a freckled bunch of weightless bones on the chief inspector’s sleeve. ‘Listen, young man,’ she said, suddenly appearing to him much the nicer of the two old ladies, ‘if you want to know what’s going on - or what’s coming off either’ - she gave a dry chuckle, shockingly lewd through withered lips - ‘you have a word with Mrs Rainbird next house down. She can tell you what’s in your hankie after you’ve blown your nose in the pitch dark behind locked doors. Spends all her time up in the loft with a pair of binoculars. Says she’s a ornyowzit. Camouflage.’ She repeated the word, tapping him on the lapel. ‘In my young day you hung over the gate and gossiped in the open. I don’t know what the world’s coming to and that’s a fact.’ She then confided that Mrs Rainbird had a son in the box and casket trade. ‘And a slimy little wart he is an’ all. They reckon he keeps his knickers in the fridge.’

  Sergeant Troy snorted and turned it into a cough. Barnaby, having met Mr Rainbird, could only assume that they were right. He thanked the old lady and withdrew.

  The bungalow was called Tranquillada. Barnaby thought this suggested a slightly relaxed version of the Spanish Inquisition. The name suspended from the neck of a large ceramic stork killing time on one leg by the front door. There was quite a large garden, beautifully kept and full of ornamental shrubs and roses. The silver Porsche was parked in the drive. Sergeant Troy chose the bell rather than the knocker and got a brief shrill earful of the dawn chorus. Dennis Rainbird appeared.

  ‘Well hullo again.’ He seemed delighted to see Barnaby. ‘And you’ve brought a friend.’ He gave Troy a radiant smile which bounced off the sergeant’s stony countenance like a ping-pong ball off a concrete slab. ‘Come in, come in. Mother,’ he called over his shoulder, ‘it’s the constabulary.’ He prounced it constabewlery.

  ‘Oh but I was expecting them.’ A gentle fluting from some distance away.

  The bungalow seemed much larger than the outside suggested and Dennis led them past several open doors before reaching the lounge. A kitchen that gleamed, a bedroom (all white and gold) that glittered and a second bedroom adorned with lots of red suede and shining brass.

  ‘I’m in the lounge, Denny,’ carolled the voice. It managed to sound every vowel the word possessed, then generously tossed in another
O for good measure. As they entered Mrs Rainbird rose from her downy cushions as if from a nest.

  She was very, very fat. She spread outwards and towered upwards. At least a quarter of her height seemed to be accounted for by her hair, which was a rigid pagoda-like structure: a landscape of peaks and waves, whorls and curls ending in a sharp point like an inverted ice-cream cone. It was the colour of butterscotch instant whip. She wore a great deal of makeup in excitable colours and a lilac caftan, rather short, revealing bolstery legs and tiny feet. The chief inspector fielded her welcoming glance, direct and sharp as a lancet, and introduced himself.

  ‘I knew you were on your way. I saw a car drive by whilst I was studying some swallows on the telephone wires. Such a charming arrangement. Quite like notes of music.’

  ‘Ah . . . perhaps it was you I glimpsed the other morning when I was in Church Lane? In your loft I think. An excellent vantage point.’

  ‘Hide is the term we ornithologists prefer, Mr Barnaby.’ A nip in the air. Barnaby begged her pardon. She waved a sparkling hand. ‘Won’t you sit down?’ Barnaby sank into an armchair thickly barnacled with bumps of crochet.

  ‘And what about you, dear?’ Dennis danced around Sergeant Troy. ‘Don’t you want to take the weight off those legs?’

  Bristling with machismo, Troy selected the hardest chair, sat in it bolt upright and produced his pro-forma pad. A piercing whistle filled the air.

  ‘Denny? Pot to kettle.’ As he disappeared she said to Barnaby, ‘You’ll need to be fed and watered.’ Then, overriding his protests, ‘Now, now. Don’t tell me you’re not absolutely exhausted asking all those people all those questions. It’s quite ready.’

  And so it was. Moments later, a gentle rattling preceding him, Dennis entered wheeling an overwrought trolley built along the lines of the altarpiece at the Brompton Oratory. This was loaded with tiny sandwiches in the shapes of playing card symbols and rich creamy cakes. Mrs Rainbird filled a plate for Detective Chief Inspector Barnaby and handed it over.