Torch Song

by Jo A. Hiestand

  “Suggesting some sort of treachery or violence occurred before death and she died before the fire.”

  “As good a finger-pointer as any.”

  “And this head depression…”

  “I’d say the blow could produce a concussion and unconsciousness.”

  “The blow…you mean someone struck her?”

  “That’s possible, certainly. But it’s also just as possible that it was an accident, that the head injury occurred if she fell of her own accord, falling backwards and slightly to the side. There was an iron sculpture in the studio, and some of her furniture had solid, rounded edges. If she fell against any of those objects, that may also have caused the head injury.”

  “So you didn’t think it particularly suspicious to find that head wound.”

  “Not at all. Not with the items in her studio. I thought it unlikely it was murder or foul play.”

  “Did you match that sculpture or the furniture to the head depression? You’d know then if she fell or was struck.” He didn’t say it, but he couldn’t see someone slamming Janet’s head against the edge of the desk. If anything, the murderer would pick up the sculpture or something else small and strike her.

  “I tried.”

  “Sounds as though you couldn’t come up with a particular item.”

  “The wound slightly matched the microphone in her studio. I found one section that fit the ball end, but the iron sculpture also had a similarly sized ball, which also matched. There was a smaller straight section of one millimeter which didn’t correspond with anything that might have been in the studio.”

  “At least nothing that anyone remembered as normally being there.”

  “True. Whether the fire consumed that object, or your murderer took it with him, I don’t know. But that, in part, is why the coroner made his decision. I couldn’t be conclusive it was foul play or accident, Mike.”

  “You said the skull was indented. Anything else?”

  “There was a curved indentation of the soft brain tissue. Bearing in mind the overall circumstances, you shouldn’t be surprised that the coroner recorded an open verdict.”

  “Bloody helpful.”

  “The official police statement ran something like, ‘We’ve gone as far as we can and, without further evidence, we cannot take the investigation further.’”

  “That’s safe.”

  “Mike, forget I was the Home Office Forensic Pathologist performing that PM examination. No senior investigating officer, I don’t care what rank he is, would go against the opinion of the H.O. Forensic Pathologist. If the SIO doesn’t like and trust that there are grounds for believing the report may be wrong, then you might consider a second opinion and go for a second post mortem examination with a different H.O. forensic pathologist. But in all my years working in this job, I have never even heard of that happening.”

  “So you’re saying I should take this as read.”

  “Not because I did the examination.”

  “Because the coroner’s verdict has pretty much stalled the investigation.”

  The silence lay between them as they thought of the fire and its consequences. Finally, Cheryl said, “She couldn’t have suffered, Mike. She wasn’t cognizant. That should bring you some peace, if that’s what you’re thinking about.”

  “That’s what I’m thinking about. Thanks.”

  * * * *

  McLaren took the back roads as he drove to Janet’s house in the village of Darleycote. A few puddles remained from yesterday’s rain, the water sprawled within deep ruts along the verge or in small depressions in the road. Several tree branches had fallen from the wind and lay like strange deer antlers among the lifeless leaves and other debris of the wood. The tree branches and trunks held the darker colors of brown and black where the bark was still damp. McLaren breathed deeply of the scents, thinking it one of the best fragrances he knew.

  His car tires splashed through puddles and threw water onto the windscreen. He ran the windscreen wipers until he emerged onto a dry section of road and was happy when the sun poked through a line of gray clouds. The house, if he remembered the directions correctly, was only minutes away.

  Nora Ennis had assured him that the present homeowners gave their blessing to any investigation, official or unofficial, and wouldn’t mind him poking about in the back garden or wood that nestled up to their property line. They even gave permission to peer through the windows into the kitchen. Anything to help solve the murder, they had said, and McLaren wished there were more people like them.

  He punched the Play button on his car’s tape player, and as he turned onto the road outside his driveway he was singing along with his folk group, adding harmony to his lead in ‘The Meeting of the Waters.’

  Darleycote was nearly straight south of his home outside Somerley in Derbyshire’s high peak district. It would have been faster to zip down the A6 to Matlock and then drive the short distance north to the village. But the warm autumn sun and the feeling of hope mixed in his heart, and McLaren had no desire to dispense with either too quickly. So he took the B6049 south, connected up with the A623 and meandered down several more B roads to Darleycote.

  As he turned onto the B5057 and approached the village the tape rolled on to ‘Nut Brown Maiden,’ and McLaren was well into the first verse before he realized he was thinking of Janet:

  Her eye so brightly beaming,

  Her look so frank and free

  In waking or in dreaming

  Is evermore with me.

  Evermore with me, he thought as he parked the car outside her former house and gazed at the structure. Her photo had that effect on me last night. Her singing does, too. Is she going to be with me always, a companion while I grow old, married to me spiritually and emotionally even when I’m married to Dena? Can I keep this feeling a secret from Dena, or will she find out? Will she understand or become jealous? Should I stop now, abandon the case and save my sanity, for that’s what I’m in fear of losing, he realized, speaking aloud.

  He turned off the engine and sat still for a moment, letting the song play itself out. Janet’s voice crept into the vocals, overpowering his voice at times, providing a soft background at others. He stared at the house sitting at 124 Paddington Lane. A tan stone building, it mirrored the architectural style and 18th century-age of its neighbors farther up the lane. Her house sat in the back, as Jamie had said, on an elevated plot, hugged by trees and nearly dissolving into the wood. A blaze of reds, yellows and oranges from autumn chrysanthemums and ornamental grasses ran across the length of the house’s foundation, waking up the drab stone and injecting a spark of normalcy into the strange visit. Even as the cassette tape squeaked to the end, Janet’s voice still echoed the words, in waking or in dreaming is evermore with me. He closed his eyes for a moment, lost in the velvety richness of her voice, the hint that he was losing his mind. Of course he had never met her, never knew her. She had died five years ago, when he was in his early thirties. But she seemed as real to him as if she stood by her door, inviting him inside.

  A quick search on the Internet via his iPad gave him additional information about the case. A photo of the house and back garden sprang into vivid life on the screen. As though not trusting the newspaper article, McLaren glanced at the house’s façade. The two matched. He read the rest of the article, jotting down notes in his small notebook, then shoved the notebook into his trousers pocket.

  He opened his email and found that the police photos and sketches of the house and crime scene had been sent. He studied them closely, noting areas that he had questioned when he had first read Nora’s account. The various reports he had requested had also arrived. All except the fire report, which Jamie suggested might be on Harvester’s desk, since he’d just spoken with Nora Ennis. McLaren spent nearly a half hour reading the emailed reports and jotting down notes in his notepad, then logged off and closed the laptop.

  The tape clicked over to the other side, the leader wrapping around the empty take
-up spool and squeaking irritably. Before it could start a song, McLaren turned the key in the ignition, shutting off the power to the recorder, and got out of the car. He walked up the hill and around to the back garden, his mind now completely focused on the crime.

  Although Nora had said the current owners would welcome him, he knocked on the back door. No one appeared. He scribbled a note announcing his investigation on a notebook page and placed it on the back step, using a stone as a paperweight. Then he followed the path into the forest.

  The wood held the dampness of yesterday’s storm, not just in the bark of the trees but also in the sogginess of the moss. It held his shoe imprints as he walked along the path. It had not been used much, he thought. Seedlings of pine and oak had sprouted and now stood a foot tall beside their mighty parents. Ferns glistened bright green or pale yellow in the light and cast off occasional droplets of water in the slight breeze. McLaren rubbed against an exuberant fern and looked down in surprise on feeling the wetness seep through his trouser leg. He shook off any excess and stepped over a rotting log. The trail was littered with broken boughs, and lichen and mushrooms had taken hold of the dead limbs and shade-wrapped rocks.

  He stopped several yards inside the wood, turned, and looked back at the house. Of course, he knew he wouldn’t find anything after five years. And the death had occurred inside the studio. But he needed to stand within the fringe of trees, bracken and ferns, looking back at the house, imagining what had happened there. Besides, the murderer may have used this path as an escape route.

  That Janet had met a violent death, he didn’t doubt. But would she not have smelled the studio burning? Even if she had unwisely chosen to burn rubbish that day, the smell of paper and cardboard and gardening waste would be different from a painted wooden structure. She had to have known the building was on fire. Had she truly stumbled, as the police report suggested? McLaren needed to find out.

  Minutes later—he didn’t know how long—he walked over to where he supposed the studio had been. Farther back in the garden, farther up the hill, its roof probably had been barely discernable to O’Connor. Despite the present owners’ effort, there was a depression in the soil. About four times the size of a large tool shed, he thought. The area had not been built up, but held an ornamental statue, flowers and a teak bench. More of a monument to Janet, he thought, than a relaxing spot in the garden.

  He stood in the depression and alternately looked at the house and the site of the fire.

  For the briefest of seconds when McLaren had read Nora’s generalized report he had hoped someone else had died in the fire and that Janet was in hospital, suffering from amnesia. But dental records had confirmed it was her body in the fire, and his hope that she would heal and return to torch singing had died.

  He walked back to his car and turned off the cassette tape player, driving to Matlock in silence.

  SEVEN

  Nora stood in the strong afternoon sunlight slanting through her kitchen window. The day had been tiring even with the euphoria of engaging Michael McLaren’s investigative services. Most any activity was fatiguing these days. The hope McLaren had mutely given her when he accepted the check had now lapsed into exhaustion, draining her physically, mentally and emotionally.

  The screech of the kettle broke her reverie. She poured the boiling water into the teapot and noted the time. She was a stickler for proper steeping of tea. There were few things in life she could control or make to perfection, but the brewing of tea was one, and she reveled in that ability.

  Janet had been another perfect creation. Not that Nora or her husband had had one hundred percent control in forming Janet’s character and morals. Janet hadn’t been a puppet or a doll that they had fabricated from man-made materials, but she had emulated her parents’ values and taken their life lessons to heart. The result had been a beautiful woman who attracted many friends and who influenced others with her convictions.

  The steeping time being up, Nora drew the teabag from the pot and set it on a saucer. She poured the tea into a mug and added sugar and milk to the hot liquid. She settled the tea things onto a metal tray, added a plate of chocolate biscuits, and carried them into the front room.

  The room, designed to catch the morning sunlight, held the chill of afternoon and her burgeoning concern that McLaren might give her the same account that the police had: accidental death. She rubbed her arms and knotted the silk scarf around her neck, but the cold still clung. Is it cold, she wondered, getting up and walking to the fireplace. Or my inner self warning me about a possible disappointment? But Verity Dwyer had recommended him without hesitation. The man had such a fine track record while in the police force and now, on his own. He can’t let me down. She gazed at her daughter’s photograph on the mantle and said a quick prayer. Surely, with God’s help, McLaren would succeed.

  She grabbed the mug of hot tea and cupped her hands around it, but it did not relieve the chill deep within her. Perhaps it’s the décor, she thought, giving the room’s interior a good look. It could hardly be said to be cheery. The dark hues of the walls and furniture didn’t help with psychological warmth, the pieces old and handed down from Victorian-age ancestors. She made a mental note to change the wallpaper to a lighter design next spring—it might help lessen her depression—turned on the electric fire, and settled back into the sofa.

  The heat from the tea and the fire melted some of her body-numbing weariness but something picked at her mind, making her feel unusually anxious. She got up, went to the stereo system, and put on Janet’s CD recording. Seconds later, her daughter’s voice filled the room and Nora’s soul. She returned to the sofa and lost herself in “The Very Thought of You.”

  Had it been just a terrible accident, Nora thought, staring at Janet’s photograph. Am I truly pestering the police for no reason? Have I grown into an old woman who has nothing better to do with her remaining years than to fabricate fanciful scenarios and bend the ears of anyone I can corner?

  She leaned back and closed her eyes. “Stormy Weather” eased into the room and Nora realized she was thinking about Charlie Harvester. The man irritated her, angered her at times. Like a permanent dark cloud hovering on the horizon, endangering the picnic. His flippant treatment of her distress probably was the most infuriating, though. And disrespectful. That arrogant smirk that he tried unsuccessfully to hide nearly goaded her at times into smacking him across his mouth. And that frightened her. She’d never been a violent person. Even immediately after Janet’s death, when her grief threatened to consume her sanity and eternally cloister her from the world. She had struggled through each day, feeling as though she’d never escape the blackness engulfing her, as though her heart would explode from pain.

  But the agony had lessened—everyone told her it would—yet the resolve still burned as fiercely as ever. Perhaps more fervently after each encounter with Charlie Harvester, the poster child of the quintessential 1960s cop who lauded his macho makeup, and perhaps, leaned slightly toward racism and sexism. Just one of the boys flexing his Paleolithic muscles. Girlie pictures on the office walls and loud laughs at off-color jokes.

  As if access to Nora’s thoughts, Janet crooned “I Wanna Be Around,” bringing a startlingly real quality to Nora’s mounting anger. “Sing it, Janet,” she said, her voice barely audible against Janet’s deep-throated taunt. “Give that man the same thing he’s wishing to give me.” Nora stared at Janet’s photograph, reassuring herself of her surroundings. The familiarity of the room soothed her fast-beating heart, but Janet’s face confused her, the features slipping into the late afternoon shadows now filling the room.

  Nora blinked, uncertain of the time or how long she’d been sitting. The clock did nothing to lessen her confusion. She couldn’t remember when she’d come into the room…and was that a new photo of Janet? Her wedding picture, maybe? Why had Janet changed from her white dress for the photo, and where was Tom? He should be in the photo. Janet’s dark brown eyes seemed to stare from the picture
, alive when the rest of the face was little more than a shadowy oval. It wasn’t the picture she remembered. What had happened to Janet’s braids and Girl Guide uniform? What year was it?

  Janet’s rendition of “Crazy” pulled Nora through the years. She lay suspended in a nebulous half-world of past and future, faces and voices and music tornadic in its intensity.

  “Janet, where are you?”

  “Hide and seek, Mum. Come and find me!”

  “I can’t see you—you’re in the shadows.”

  “Better in the shadows than in the fire.”

  “But you sing torch songs, darling. That’s part of the fire.”

  “They only burn the heart, though, Mum. The pain is in losing the man you love.”

  “Tom loved you, didn’t he?”

  “It died as I died.”

  “I loved you.”

  “And I loved you, but it’s not the same. It’s not like a man’s love.”

  “There’s one here who doesn’t love you, Janet. Do you know Charlie Harvester? He won’t seek you, even though I’ve asked.”

  “Michael McLaren can find me, Mum. Leave me to him.”

  “But if you’re hiding…”

  “Fire doesn’t consume everything. McLaren will seek where others won’t.”

  “I hear the fire bell, darling. It’s coming for you. Don’t go.”

  A ringing, insistent and shrill, broke through the cacophony. A hand seemed to reach out to her and pull her back to her front room. She swept her fingers slowly across the sofa cushion, as if the tactile action anchored her in the present. Another jab of the sound woke her sufficiently for her to reach for the phone on the side table.

  “Hello? Yes? Janet?”

  A brief hesitation greeted her questions and she repeated Janet’s name. The caller cleared his throat, somewhat unsure of his answer. In the brief silence he could hear a woman singing.

  “Mrs. Ennis?” He paused again, wondering briefly if he had dialed a wrong number.

  Nora replied, her voice cracking and the tone uneven. “Janet? Have you come home?”