Manna from Hades

by Carola Dunn

  When Eleanor reached it, old Mr Penmadden was there, wizened and weathered, basking in the early sunshine but bundled up warm in his reefer jacket over a seaman’s blue jersey, peaked cap on his head. She couldn’t pass him without a word.

  Penmadden had a Cornish accent as softly opaque as a sea mist, but Eleanor had years of practice at understanding unorthodox English, besides having grown up in the Duchy. As long as he didn’t stray too far into the wilds of dialect, she understood him perfectly well. Few people took the trouble.

  “Lovely morning, Mr Penmadden,” Eleanor greeted him.

  He gave a sharp nod. “Aye, that it be. And a good thing, too. These lads nowadays—” He gestured contemptuously at the boats in the harbour, preparing to set out with the ebbing tide before they got stranded on the muddy sand. “They can’t cope wi’ a spot o’ weather, for all their motors and their wireless radios! Least bit of a blow and they go running down to Padstow for shelter. In my day . . .”

  Eleanor, realising she’d let herself in for a new Rime of the Ancient Mariner, sat down beside him. The stone struck chilly even through her tracksuit. He fixed her with a faded but still alert blue eye and said unexpectedly, “I heard tell as how you found a corpse.”

  “That’s right, I’m afraid,” she admitted, resigning herself to questions instead of reminiscences.

  “Must ’a’ bin a nasty shock for a nice lady like you.”

  “It was, a bit.”

  “Though living in furrin parts like you done, I daresay you seen the like afore. Ah, there’s many a tale I could tell about pulling drownded corpses out o’ the sea.”

  The Rime of the Ancient Mariner with an emphasis on corpses didn’t bear thinking about, though Eleanor vaguely recalled Coleridge having a good deal to say on the subject. Wasn’t there a working crew of dead sailors at some point in the poem?

  Old Penmadden surprised her again. “But you’ll ’a’ had enough o’ corpses for now. Going out in your little car, are you?”

  “Yes. The police are letting us open the shop today, so I’m going out collecting.”

  “You come round our place later, my lover. I found a couple o’ they glass ball floats t’other day. Harry up the Wreckers wanted ’em for his lounge bar. I told him he can buy ’em from your shop, same as any Christian.”

  Eleanor was touched, knowing that the pensioner could have sold the floats or exchanged them for several pints. Thanking him, she promised to listen to his stories of shipwrecks and men overboard at a later date, when the recent unhappy event had faded from her memory.

  He winked at her. “Don’t tell my girl. She don’t like me talking about such. Digging up dead men’s bones, she calls it. What I say is, they didn’t ought to be forgot.”

  A good deal could be said for either point of view. Eleanor promised not to tell his daughter, who was her own age if she was a day, and went on her way.

  On the far side of the bridge, upstream, the only flat piece of ground in Port Mabyn stretched along the bank of the brook for a hundred yards or so. It was safe from development because in the winter it was often under a foot or two of water. That was not a problem for the car park, as visitors were few and far between at that season. At spring tides with an onshore wind, or at a forecast of heavy rain likely to swell the stream, Eleanor would drive the Incorruptible up to one of the car parks at the top of either hill. At present the ground was somewhat soggy, but the daisy-starred turf was thick enough to reduce the hazard of getting stuck in mud.

  Teazle scampered over to sniff at the rocks set along the edge of the stream. Eleanor had scarcely set foot on the grass when she was hailed.

  “Mrs Trewynn, can you spare a moment?” called Mrs Davies.

  Turning, Eleanor stifled a sigh. She wasn’t afraid the Methodist minister’s wife would start interrogating her about the murder, but there was no knowing what she wanted. A keen worker at the shop, she resented playing second fiddle to Jocelyn, although she hadn’t half Joce’s organising ability. Worse, she regarded the work as an extension of her or her husband’s “mission.” They had nearly lost several volunteers who objected to being asked to pass out a Methodist tract with every purchase. Eleanor had had to intervene between the vicar’s wife and the minister’s wife, an uncomfortable position she hated.

  LonStar was a strictly secular organisation for any number of excellent reasons. They worked in countries with a wide variety of religious traditions, and the last thing they wanted was to have their efforts impeded by any suspicion of proselytising. Likewise, many of their employees and volunteers were people of strong faith, who naturally would not put up with being preached at by those of differing faith. Nor did the non-believers among them care to be regarded as if their sincerity were suspect.

  All in all, it was best to keep religion out of the picture, but there were always some, like Mrs Davies, who found it difficult.

  “Huw and I have been praying for you,” she said in a sombre tone. She was a young woman, not more than a couple of years older than Megan, but her mousy demeanour and her penchant for drab, old-fashioned clothes—cheap but new, not from LonStar—made her seem middle-aged.

  “That’s very kind of you. Don’t you think, though, that the murderer is more in need of your prayers?” Eleanor immediately wished the words unsaid. Thank heaven at least she hadn’t suggested prayers for the victim. It was only Catholics who believed in praying for the dead, wasn’t it? She refused to become embroiled in a theological argument. “Did Jocelyn tell you yet?” she went on hastily. “The police are letting us open the shop today.”

  “Yes, Mrs Stearns telephoned. It’s her day today. It’s my day for visiting.”

  “You’ll be at the shop tomorrow, though?”

  “Y-yes. Oh, Mrs Trewynn, I don’t think I can bear to go into the stockroom!”

  “He was taken away long ago, you know. And if there are any signs at all left, I’m quite sure Mrs Stearns will clean everything up today. There will be nothing to see.”

  “No, but . . .” She shuddered. “He was struck down. What if his spirit . . .” Her voice trailed away.

  “Oh dear, you believe in ghosts?”

  “No, of course not. But just suppose . . . I mean, no one really knows, do they?”

  “It’s one of those unknowables, yes. Perhaps your husband could conduct an exorcism?” Though what Jocelyn would say to that beggared the imagination.

  Fortunately, Mrs Davies exclaimed, “Oh no! Methodists don’t . . . You won’t tell Huw I was talking about gh—spirits, will you?”

  “Good gracious, no!” Eleanor promised. “The less said the better. I don’t see why you need go into the stockroom for a while, though. You’re in charge. You can send someone else back if anything’s needed. You’re supposed to have two people on the premises at all times.” Which was another bone of contention, as the rule didn’t apply to Jocelyn. But with luck, Mrs Davies’s helpers would be less imaginative than she was. “Now, I’m on my way to get the car out. Can I give you a lift anywhere?”

  “Oh no, thank you. I’m just going up there.” She gestured at the houses spreading up the hill away from the street, inaccessible to any vehicle bigger than the vicar’s moped.

  “Goodbye, then. I’ll see you tomorrow I expect. Come on, Teazle.”

  Ghosts! Just what she needed.

  FIFTEEN

  When Megan arrived at her desk in the Launceston police station on Friday morning, it was already covered with a blizzard of paper. As she dropped aghast onto her chair, Jennifer, the day-shift switchboard girl, brought in another two memos.

  “Bloody hell, Jen, what is this lot?”

  “You asked for it.” She perched on the corner of the desk. “Every daily had the victim’s photo in it,” she said. “And most of ’em the car’s licence plate, too, though we haven’t had any calls on that yet. But I reckon twenty-five percent of readers all over the country think they recognise your bloke, and a quarter of those rang up their nearest cop-shop
right away and another quarter will ring in the next day or two, and the other half won’t bother.”

  “Thank heaven for the other half! At least, I hope they’re not the ones who really do know him. I mean”—she waved at the desk—“these can’t possibly all be right.”

  “Photos in the papers are always pretty bad, and it wasn’t the greatest to start with, and he didn’t have any warts on his nose or birthmarks on his cheeks. Most of these, the caller claimed to have seen him yesterday or the day before, so you can count them out. I tried to keep those on this side of the desk, but it’s been a madhouse and the pile fell over twice—Oops, there goes the phone again. Have fun!”

  “Thanks, Jen.”

  Megan stared at her desk, wondering where on earth to start. Then she heard Scumble’s voice, speaking to the desk sergeant. It didn’t matter so much what she did, she decided, as that when he walked in she should be doing something and give the appearance of knowing what she was doing. She reached for the heap Jennifer had told her were impossible sightings.

  The inspector burst into the room. “Driscoll says the—Ye gods, every nut in the kingdom’s called in! Hell, if the Great British Public were always this cooperative, we wouldn’t have any crimes to solve. What are you doing?”

  “I thought I’d start by winnowing out the people who claim to have seen the deceased on Tuesday or Wednesday, sir.”

  “They’re forwarding—? Does every sodding copper in the rest of the country think the Cornish police have nothing to do?”

  “Could be they just think we’ll want to judge for ourselves?”

  “Doesn’t look as if we’ve much choice. When’s this laddie from the Yard going to turn up to swipe our jewelry?”

  “He didn’t give a time, sir.”

  “Never mind. The super will want to deal with him. Maybe the CC, too. There were murmurs last night about handing over the case to the Yard.”

  “Oh no!” The prospect of being seconded to assist DS Kenneth Faraday, or worse, to act as liaison between him and DI Scumble, appalled Megan.

  “Probably not. We’re not doing too badly considering, and I shouldn’t think they’d be interested. They have a finger in the pie, though, with this jewel robbery being in their territory. All right, this lot needs dealing with whether or not. Let’s get on with it. If you’re starting over there, I’ll take these.” His large hands scooped up a pile of memos and he retired to his own desk, where he sat rustling paper and muttering irritably.

  Megan was surprised at how quickly they whittled down the heaps to a manageable level, in spite of a continuing trickle from Jennifer. Besides the obvious impossibilities, there were sightings in Liverpool, Durham, and other northern parts on Monday afternoon. Though these were highly unlikely, they were not quite inconceivable and would have to be kept on file.

  Having thus increased the clutter on her desk by dividing one stack into two, Megan moved on to the next lot. She and Scumble worked steadily for some time. She had nearly finished winnowing her last lot when he sat back with a sigh, easing his back.

  “Bet you a quid a good half of these didn’t look past the long hair. They see that, they think beatnik, and the stereotype is all that sticks in their minds.” He sighed. “I’ve got a couple of dozen that’ll need to be gone into. How about you?”

  She glanced through the remaining three memo sheets, set them aside, and picked up a pile about the same as his. “These seem possible—”

  His phone rang and he picked it up. “Scumble here.”

  Megan could hear Jennifer saying, “Sir, Exeter thinks they may have found your car.”

  “May have?” Scumble snarled. “Don’t they know how to read a number plate?”

  “Fits the description—dark grey Hillman Minx in bad repair—but the plates’ve been removed. They say do you want to send someone over to search the area.”

  “I could go, sir,” Megan suggested. Even slopping around in ditchwater—somehow searches always involved ditches—was preferable to facing Ken.

  Maybe she sounded too eager. He gave her a suspicious look, waved at the papers they had just sorted and said, “I need you on the telephone. A couple of uniforms can do it. If it’s really ours. Where is the car, Jennifer, and how long has it been there?”

  “Exeter station, in their car park. This time of year they let it go for a couple of days before they start to give them grief. So sometime Monday night, Tuesday morning.”

  “Right. Peters’ll have to go to do it over for dabs. Tell him and Farley I want ‘em here pronto. But put Exeter through first. I’ll have a word with them.”

  While he talked to someone at the Exeter police, Megan appropriated his final pile of sighting reports and quickly went through them. Based on what he considered worthy of further investigation, a few of hers could be moved to the back burner. By the time he got off the phone, she had whittled down the numbers to something that looked almost feasible. However, a dismaying number of the public-spirited citizens had not provided telephone numbers.

  When she pointed this out to the inspector he said, “You’ll have to ring back the station that sent us each report and ask them to get further details. If you have any trouble, remind them that this is murder, not a parlour game. Got it?”

  “Yes, sir.” Megan pulled the telephone towards her.

  By lunchtime she had eliminated half the list, was waiting for call-backs on a quarter, had failed to contact several more individuals, and had two real possibilities.

  “Both in Bristol, sir,” she reported to Scumble. “Doesn’t that make it more likely they’re the real thing?”

  “Could be.” He scarcely glanced up from the report he was perusing. His desk, like Megan’s, looked as if a blizzard had hit it.

  “One’s the proprietor of a pub. The other’s a tobacconist. He’s pretty sure it’s a boy who comes—used to come in for cigarette papers but never bought tobacco.”

  That got his attention. “Sounds like our lad! I just read the forensic report—where is it?” He scrabbled through the detritus. “Traces of cannabis in his clothes, hair, and under his fingernails. The pathologist mentioned it, too, in his system. I didn’t take much notice. So many kids smoke the stuff these days. But it’s a link.”

  A pretty tenuous link, Megan thought, wondering what percentage of young men with long hair smoked pot. She didn’t say so, nor did she propose that someone, namely herself, ought to go to Bristol and check the only leads they had to the victim’s identity.

  Her discretion was rewarded.

  “Someone’ll have to go and talk to these blokes,” he growled. “I’ve got to stick around till this bright spark from the Yard turns up, so you’re elected. Likely the tobacconist and the pub are on the wrong side of Bristol so take Dawson.”

  “I can manage on my own, sir.”

  “Take Dawson! That’s an order, not a suggestion. Let’s see, it’s quite a drive. You’d better plan on spending the night, in case you actually get something useful out of them and have to follow up. But before you leave, send someone out for pasties for both of us. You stick by the phone in case any of those calls you’re waiting for come through.”

  They were halfway through their pasties, and a couple of phone calls had knocked another two tips off the list, when a rumpus in the town square outside drew them both to their open window. The centre of the square—actually a triangle—was used as a car park, with narrow one-way streets on three sides. The street below the window was blocked by a large van, a rectangular, solid-looking vehicle that the constable on duty was urging to move along please and stop holding up the traffic.

  A man in a dark grey suit jumped lithely down from the cab, announcing, “Police business,” as he took something from his pocket and held it up for the constable to examine. They couldn’t see much of him except his corn-gold hair, trimmed short but which Megan knew, if left to grow, would burst into wild curls.

  “DS Faraday, sir.”

  “From Scotland Yard?
Ye gods, they’ve sent an armoured car! What do the silly buggers think we’ve got here, the Crown Jewels?”

  “We don’t actually know what they’re worth, sir,” said Megan, realising too late that she was giving the inspector the false impression that she cared what he thought of Scotland Yard.

  Below, the desk sergeant had come out and added his voice to the dispute. Scumble ignored them. He turned to Megan with a glint in his eye that she instinctively distrusted, though she couldn’t guess what it might portend. “Know him, do you?”

  “We worked together in T Division before I moved back to Cornwall.”

  “And now he’s at the Yard,” Scumble muttered. “Must be highly thought of.”

  Megan didn’t consider it necessary to respond.

  “Fancies himself, does he?”

  “Well . . .” God’s gift to women, that was Ken. “. . . I suppose so.” What was the inspector up to? She didn’t trust him an inch.

  He leant out of the window and shouted down, “Get that bloody van out of the road. Now!” Without waiting to see if he was obeyed, he pulled his head back in, saying gloomily, “Now the super’ll be getting complaints about language from all the old biddies.”

  “Shouldn’t be too many about, sir. The shops are closed for lunch. The van’s moving.”

  “You don’t care about ‘language’?”

  He seemed genuinely curious, so she told him, “Compared to what I heard daily in London, it’s nothing.”

  “Ah. We’re old-fashioned, here in the country.” His voice was more self-satisfied than discontented. He cocked his head at the sound of footsteps running up the stairs. “Here comes the boy wonder.”

  And that put Ken firmly in his place. Megan faced him without qualms as he knocked on the door and came in. He was as tall and broad-shouldered as the inspector, considerably slimmer, twenty years younger, and all too good-looking.

  “DI Scumble? Sorry about that, sir.” The boy wonder sounded not in the least repentant. And he had still not managed to get rid of his public school accent. “My driver’s used to central London where there’s never any parking spaces and we coppers stop wherever we need to. DS Faraday reporting. The Yard sent me to pick up the loot.” He looked around as if he expected diamonds and rubies to be spread out on one of the desks. “Oh, hello, Megan.”