Death Plays a Part (Cornish Castle Mystery, Book 1)

by Vivian Conroy

  Oliver came to stand beside him and peered in as well. ‘It looks like plant material. I remember that Haydock was wearing boots. That must have come off the soles.’

  ‘The path up to the castle is cobbled,’ LeFevre observed. ‘How would plant material end up on the soles of his boots?’

  ‘I have no idea. Maybe he had been hanging around the gardens, looking for something? He did treat the place like it was already his.’

  LeFevre studied Oliver. ‘You sound like you really didn’t like him.’

  ‘I didn’t kill him if that’s what you think. Guinevere was with me the whole time.’

  Guinevere nodded. ‘That’s true. Oliver had to stand in for the local playing the judge and I helped him rehearse his lines until the re-enactment started.’

  ‘And where were the others?’

  Oliver made a dismissive gesture. ‘Can’t be sure. My father was down here to lock the door. Everybody else was getting dressed, I suppose. Medieval garb and all that.’

  ‘Of course,’ Guinevere said, ‘Kensa and Tegen came already dressed. They need not have changed at all. They had time to …’ She let it hang. If LeFevre had little time for the case, it was important they handed him some starting points that would pique his interest.

  LeFevre studied the scene again as if he was trying to impress it all upon his memory. Then he said, ‘And this Kensa and Tegen live on the island?’

  ‘Sort of,’ Oliver said.

  LeFevre hitched a brow. ‘Sort of?’ He repeated the cryptic reply.

  Oliver said, ‘Kensa inherited the B&B on the island from her husband’s parents. She runs it in the summertime when the tourists pour in. In the winter she lives on the mainland. Her daughter Tegen has to go to school of course, so she’s on the mainland most of the time. She can only be here in the holidays.’

  LeFevre said, ‘So Kensa also has a house on the mainland?’

  Oliver nodded. ‘Her husband left her quite a bit of money when he died.’

  ‘Widow,’ LeFevre said pensively. ‘And Tegen is her only child?’

  ‘No, she also has a son: Lance. Six years older than Tegen. He’s just finished university. I don’t know exactly what he plans to do now.’

  ‘I see. But this Lance wasn’t here tonight, right? And you also said that one of the locals who was supposed to be here wasn’t here this evening?’

  ‘The judge in the play: Jago the boatman.’

  ‘Jago who?’ LeFevre asked.

  ‘His official name is Jago Trevelyan. But nobody ever calls him that. He’s Jago the boatman and we all know who’s meant. He’s run a fishing business for decades and provides services for people to cross to the island. His sons have the fishing business now but Jago still comes to Cornisea most every day. He’s a famous figure in these parts, with a beard like a hermit, so it seemed fitting to make him the judge in the re-enactment. He only has to stop smoking his ever-present pipe for the duration of the play, which according to him is pure torture. He seems to have been born with that thing in his hand.’

  LeFevre had listened with a keen interest. ‘A pipe, you say? And you’re sure that this Jago Trevelyan really wasn’t here on the island tonight? He didn’t pop up later? Or you didn’t notice a shadowy figure outside?’

  Oliver hitched a brow. ‘You think Jago might have been watching us? Waiting for a chance to stab Haydock?’

  ‘I’m just looking at all possibilities. And I did find some tobacco near a path. Fresh. And probably coming from a pipe.’

  Oliver pursed his lips. ‘Interesting. But you’ll have to ask him yourself where he was.’

  ‘Of course.’ LeFevre rubbed his hands together. ‘Oh, and when I called at the castle’s front door, a sort of butler type opened the door.’

  Guinevere perked up. She had forgotten all about him. The quiet little man, in dark clothes. Someone you just didn’t notice. Used to moving around noiselessly, almost invisibly. That came with his work.

  Oliver looked sceptical. ‘Cador has been with my father for all of his life. Surely you don’t think that he –’

  LeFevre cut across him. ‘He was here at the castle at the time of the murder. That’s all I’m taking into account right now. Whether he had a motive … But as you say he was with your father for all of his life, I assume he didn’t like Mr Haydock bargaining to get the castle away from the Bolingbrooke family. That’s all for tonight. I’ll find my own way out. Oh, and I want that plant material in the cage analysed. I’ll send Eal in to get it. Please leave the lanterns on for him.’

  He stalked off, disappearing up the steps.

  ‘What an arrogant chap,’ Oliver said.

  ‘I think he’s pretty good at what he does. And he listened to our suggestions. That’s more than Eal did, you know.’

  Guinevere suddenly felt the draught in this chill place and hugged Dolly closer. The dog had kept very quiet during the inspector’s investigation, as if she sensed it was serious.

  Or maybe she was just tired and had been dozing off.

  Guinevere herself longed for her bed in the tower. And a peek at the letter Mr Betts had given her to read when she was all settled in. The first night was a little early maybe, but under the strange circumstances she itched to know what he had written.

  She said to Oliver, ‘I’d better turn in. Will you stay here to see to Eal coming to collect that plant material from the cage?’

  Oliver nodded. ‘Sure. But I don’t see what it has to do with the murder.’

  ‘Maybe we’ll find out later.’ Guinevere turned away.

  Oliver caught up with her at the bottom of the steps, arresting her arm. ‘If you think LeFevre is so capable and he’ll handle the case like a pro, we need not continue sleuthing. We can just let my father await the verdict of the police.’

  Guinevere looked up into his eyes. They seemed to flicker in the light of the lanterns. Was he already tired of working with her?

  Or was he actually daring her to continue?

  Guinevere said, ‘LeFevre is good but he doesn’t know too much about local sentiments and he doesn’t have the time to dig in deep. Eal is a native, but he won’t help LeFevre. So we can be LeFevre’s eyes and ears. Just gather some information that might help. If we think we’re close to the right solution, we can just deliver our findings to LeFevre and let him deal with it. We need not … run any risk of confrontation with the killer.’

  Oliver nodded. ‘My thoughts exactly. Well, sleep tight then, and I’ll see you in the morning.’

  Guinevere went up the steps. In the dimly lit corridor she held Dolly tighter against her. She had no idea who had killed Haydock. Whether that person was with her in the castle right now or somewhere else on the island or on the mainland nearby.

  Could his or her guilt be proven?

  The tower steps seemed even steeper than they had been this afternoon, and Guinevere was glad when she was at her room’s door. She went in and stood a few moments to steady her breathing.

  Dolly wriggled to be released, and Guinevere put her down. The dog ran straight to the bed and hid under it.

  ‘I know how you feel, girl,’ Guinevere said. ‘I wish I could crawl under there as well.’

  Guinevere put a chair in front of the door and put her empty suitcase on it. If anybody tried to get in during the night, the suitcase would fall off and create a racket.

  Then she went to her handbag and got out the letter Mr Betts had given her to read when she was all settled in. She slipped her finger under the flap and ripped it open, then extracted a sheet full of Betts’s dense handwriting.

  ‘Dear Gwen and Dolly,’ she read aloud.

  At hearing her name, Dolly’s head appeared from under the bed, listening to what came next.

  Guinevere continued, ‘You’re reading this, so you must have arrived. I hope you find Cornisea every bit as appealing as I did as a lad. I grew up there, and my sister Meraud still lives there. Hers is the bookshop you have no doubt noticed in the harbour area.’<
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  Guinevere looked at Dolly. ‘Do you hear that? The Cowled Sleuth belongs to Mr Betts’s sister. It looked like a great place to browse.’

  Dolly now crawled out from underneath the bed completely. She dashed over to her and sat down in front of her, looking up with a squeak as if to urge her to continue reading.

  Guinevere scanned to find her place again and read, ‘Don’t be afraid to ask her for any book you might like to borrow. Especially if it’s about local history and archaeology – she knows it all. I must admit that I set this whole thing up with Oliver. I just wanted to know where you’d land as you left for the summer. I wanted you to be in a safe place.’

  Guinevere cocked a brow at Dolly. ‘A safe place, right, girl. Where a murder has just happened!’

  Shaking her head, she continued reading: ‘The others also asked me, one by one, as they heard the news of the renovations going through: “Where will Guinevere be going? What will happen to her?”’

  Guinevere smiled to herself. They were her family, and as family you cared for each other. ‘We have to buy postcards for them, huh,’ she said to Dolly. ‘We have to send them all our love soon.’

  Then she read on from the letter, ‘I wanted you to experience the individuality of the world that Cornisea is. A place that can exist almost on its own, drifting in the sea. People may need to get to know you first before they confide in you, but you have a way of winning people over. In any case, Dolly can help you.’ She winked at the doggy. ‘See, girl? Mr Betts has every confidence in you.’

  She turned over the sheet and continued, ‘And the castle … What can I say about that? It’s a heritage. It deserves keeping. You’ll understand that better once you’ve lived in it for a while. Explore its secrets. Look beyond what you first see. Under the surface. Behind the masks. You know how to do it. You are one of us, after all. Don’t hesitate to call me, should you need anything. Love from all.’

  Guinevere had to make out the last few words through a blur. Her eyes were a bit wet after reading this. She looked away from the sheet to the view outside the window. Through her tears she caught a glimpse of something. A flash. On and off.

  She blinked and focused better.

  A little light on the beach below. Lighting, dimming, lighting, dimming.

  Like the light was being swung to and fro.

  A lantern?

  In the hand of a wandering man?

  Branok the Cold-hearted, who haunted the beach?

  A shiver went down her spine for a moment, and she wanted to back away from the window.

  But then she steadied her nerves and forced herself to look at the light. Nonsense. Branok was long dead, resting in a grave, not wandering. It had to be something else.

  There. It was gone already.

  Guinevere tried to take a deep breath and calm her fluttering heartbeat. ‘This place does make you a little jumpy, hey, Dolly?’ she said.

  Looking over her shoulder, she discovered that the dachshund was under the bed again, just her nose peeping out.

  Guinevere didn’t reproach her. It all seemed oddly ominous.

  Branok was dead, and now the man who had played him for the trial re-enactment was dead as well.

  Chapter Six

  Guinevere came down to the invigorating scent of sausages, scrambled eggs, and fresh coffee. But in the dining room where they had gathered before the re-enactment nothing stirred. She told Dolly to follow the food smells and rushed after the doggy who was running with her ears flapping against her head.

  Dolly led Guinevere to a smaller room with a kitchen unit against the wall. Oliver was just scraping the scrambled eggs from the frying pan onto a plate. He hadn’t shaved yet and he wore a baggy grey T-shirt and sweatpants. His feet were bare.

  ‘Good morning,’ Oliver said, digging a fork into the egg mass. ‘Excuse me while I refill the protein stash.’

  ‘Have you been exercising?’ Guinevere asked, seating herself on a chair. Dolly was exploring the room, searching for the origin of the sausage scent.

  Oliver nodded. ‘Just a quick jog on the beach.’

  ‘Did you see anything there suggesting that … someone was there last night? Footprints or something?’

  ‘Nothing particular but then I wasn’t really looking.’ Oliver frowned. ‘How come?’

  ‘I thought I saw a light from the tower.’

  Oliver grinned. ‘See.’

  ‘No, it wasn’t Branok – I’m sure. Who else might go there at night?’

  ‘Any of the inhabitants, I suppose. Fishermen do work overnight. Maybe it was one of them?’

  ‘I thought you said locals avoid the beach because of the Branok legend?’

  ‘Some do. Not all, I suppose.’

  Oliver wolfed down the eggs on his plate, then put it down with a plunk. ‘Can I make you some too?’

  ‘Yes, please. And do I smell sausages as well?’

  ‘In that pan on the table. Help yourself.’ Oliver looked at Dolly. ‘There’s dog food here and bowls. Have a look to prepare something for her.’

  While Guinevere made Dolly her breakfast, Oliver poured them coffee. Not from a machine but from a pot under a real filter.

  ‘Here. Best I’ve ever had. You need coffee to function.’ He handed her a mug. ‘Even in the jungle I carried my coffee. I was famous for it among my colleagues.’

  She noticed he was talking in the past tense.

  Oliver said pensively, ‘If your life’s very irregular and always changing, you get attached to the things that stay the same.’

  ‘Like this castle.’

  Oliver looked at her. ‘Yes, like this castle,’ he repeated. He reached up and rubbed his chin. The stubble made a scratching sound under his fingernails. ‘I have to shave and dress up. I’m meeting a lawyer to get some advice about my father’s position. I want to know if he could really be charged.’

  ‘I see. Well, as soon as I’ve finished with this delicious breakfast, I’m going to explore the island. I want to call on Meraud too. At the bookshop. She’s the sister of Mr Betts, my theatre director.’

  ‘Oh. Happy exploring.’

  Guinevere had a slightly guilty feeling as if she was leaving Oliver with the legal hassle and was walking off to have fun in the sun, but in reality she wanted to use the opportunity to glean some information about Arthur Haydock and possible motives for wanting him dead.

  While Oliver was away to get changed, the man who had let her in the other day entered the room. Guinevere recalled that his name was Cador. She had to get used to all of these Cornish names. Cador had a sturdy, reliable ring to it that seemed to fit a man who spent his entire life serving someone else.

  She smiled at him as he poured a coffee. ‘I’ll take this up,’ Cador explained, ‘to Lord Bolingbrooke. He’s still in bed. The murder must have shaken him. He’s always up early and at work before even I’m around. But now he’s just lying there like the world has ended.’

  Cador sounded vaguely worried.

  Dolly ambled over and sniffed at his shoes. They were made of leather, Guinevere noticed, and shone as if they had been polished recently. Rubber soles, she bet, and Cador had rather small feet, for a man.

  Focusing on her coffee mug, she said casually, ‘Where were you last night when the murder happened?’

  Cador turned to her and studied her with his light blue eyes. He didn’t seem offended by the question. ‘I was in the library upstairs, getting the books ready that the master wanted to show to you today. You’re here for the books, right?’

  There was a slight emphasis on the question as if he wondered if she was really here for another reason.

  Guinevere felt a flush come up. ‘Yes, of course. But if Lord Bolingbrooke is still in bed, he had better take it easy today. I’ll go see the island. I’ve never been here before and I really want to get a better idea of it. I understand that a lot of the books collected here have to do with regional history and folklore and it will be easier for me to work with them whe
n I know a thing or two about it.’

  Cador nodded. ‘Cornisea is a beautiful place.’

  ‘You’ve lived here for all of your life?’

  ‘Yes. I couldn’t live in any other place. I need to see the sea and feel the wind on my face. I need to dig into the garden and feel the dirt between my fingers.’

  ‘There’s sea along the entire coast,’ Guinevere countered gently, ‘and dirt in most gardens.’

  ‘Yes, but it isn’t my sea and it isn’t my dirt. This is my place. Everybody is born into a place to call his own. And this is mine.’

  Cador spoke quietly but with a possessive undercurrent that warned Guinevere to take it seriously.

  How had he really regarded Haydock’s interest in the castle, the pressure on Bolingbrooke to sell, or at least make the castle available to the public?

  Had Cador been angry about it?

  Angry enough to kill maybe?

  The door opened, and Oliver stepped in, wearing a neat light blue shirt and impeccable jeans. He smiled at her. ‘I’ll walk down to the harbour with you to meet the lawyer. I don’t think he’s ever been out here.’

  ‘Great. I’ll take along one more sausage. They taste great, just like my grandmother used to make them.’

  Guinevere put Dolly on the leash, and they left the castle’s yard. Birds were singing overhead, and they could see boats on the water. Guinevere said to Oliver, ‘You must have felt so lucky to grow up here.’

  He scoffed. ‘On an island? With hardly any friends?’

  ‘The castle must have been one big playground to you. You could be a knight, a pirate, an adventurer, an archaeologist. Didn’t you look for hidden treasure?’

  ‘It’s not as much fun when you have to do everything by yourself.’ Oliver looked her over. ‘I bet you grew up with a bunch of brothers and sisters. A whole gang.’

  Guinevere shook her head. ‘I’m an only child. I was always outside, trying to find out where animals lived or what they did. I had notebooks full of little stories about them. Growing up here must have made you interested in wildlife. Given you the idea to travel the world and look for rare species.’