by Agatha Frost
“I think I’m going to throw up,” Janet said, clutching her mouth as she backed away from the door. “I don’t think that’s a bird.”
“I don’t either.” Alan glared into the dark hole of the attic as he pulled the folded wooden ladder down from the door. “I’ve smelled this before. I’m going to have a look.”
The ladder kept Claire from helping Sally and Damon wrestle the curtain and get out of the bath. Instead, she watched as her father attempted to climb onto the first step. His left foot dragged, catching on the wood. He tried three times, his face growing darker with each failed attempt. Some days were worse than others, and today, apparently, was a bad one.
“It’s alright,” Claire said, resting her hand on his shoulder. “I’ll look.”
Claire could sense her father’s reluctance, but he nodded and stepped aside. She pulled her denim shirt up over her nose and mouth and climbed upwards. The descending flies were thinning out, but she still had to swat a few away from her face as she climbed the rickety old ladder. A cold draft trickled down as the rain pattered onto the roof above.
As her head left the light bathroom for the pitch-black attic, the smell was unbearable, even through the denim. The natural daylight shone up enough for her to see the white plastic light switch on the wooden beam above. She climbed to the top step, her entire upper half-submerged in the darkness, and flicked the switch.
“What do you see?” her father asked immediately.
Claire squinted into the dark. The dim lightbulb, twenty watts at most, flickered on. The densest concentration of flies all buzzed and dove around a single source.
It wasn’t a bird.
The lightbulb popped and shattered, sending the attic into darkness again. Claire scrambled down the ladder, realising precisely what she’d seen for those brief seconds. She ran into the hallway, her mind spinning like she was about to wake up from a nightmare at any moment.
“Claire?” Her mother clutched her shoulders and shook her. “You look like you’ve just seen a ghost!”
Claire forced her breathing to slow. Her stomach slowly churned. Now that she knew its real source, the stench was beyond unbearable.
“I think it’s a dead body,” Claire whispered, eyes locked on her father. He didn’t look surprised. “I think it was Jane.”
CHAPTER THREE
T hough the rain stopped and the sky brightened in the following hours, thick clouds lingered over the mood in Northash. The atmosphere had never been more collectively sombre.
Claire laid the flowers outside the shop, adding to the pile already so high it nearly touched the window ledge. The orchid on the windowsill cast its shadow against the newspaper on the glass. Technically, the shop was still hers, but the notion had barely entered her mind since her attic discovery.
This was Jane’s Tearoom.
Everyone knew it.
Crouching, Claire read a couple of the sympathy cards between the masses of flowers. Some contained vague ‘Rest in Peace’ messages, but most were filled with memories of the café. Claire had opted for ‘I’m sorry’, unable to think of any other words to explain how she felt about what she’d found.
None of the cards seemed to venture any deeper below the surface. On a personal level, Claire knew little about Jane, and yet she’d been there, a part of the village, for Claire’s whole life.
Had she not asked enough questions?
She immediately felt guilty despite everyone else being in the same boat. Some of the cards had resorted to listing their favourite menu items like they were trying to leave an order for Jane’s baking greatest hits.
Feeling the eyes of her audience burning holes in the back of her raincoat, Claire stood. She crossed the quiet road and joined her parents, already on the bench opposite the shop in the village square. The clock tower struck noon, its familiar melody filling the square for a moment, its chimes a comfort.
Claire couldn’t stand how quiet everything was.
All the shops in the square had closed out of respect for Jane, though The Hesketh Arms pub and Marley’s Café stayed open, more out of public service than anything. There were, after all, currently more people in the square than Claire had ever seen without a planned village event to bring everyone together.
People lingered in clusters, whispering to each other as they sniffled into their tissues. From young adults to people with canes and everyone in between, men and women alike shared expressions of the same stunned devastation currently writhing in Claire’s gut. All eyes were trained on the shop as police and forensic officers came and went continuously through the front door.
Claire couldn’t help but think about how it should have been her coming and going, carrying all of her stuff into the shop.
“I’m going to slap that look off her face in a second,” Janet hissed, nodding at Agnes Reid, who stood outside the closed chippy to the left of the shop with her twin, Jeanie. “She hasn’t stopped staring at us.”
“She’s not the only one.” Claire pulled her mother up off the bench. “Let’s go to Marley’s and get a cup of tea.”
“And hide?” Janet yanked her sleeve out of Claire’s hand. “We haven’t done anything.” She stood and straightened, turning to Agnes. “We only found her, you know.”
Alan swiftly stood and rested a hand on Janet’s shoulder before saying, “I think Claire’s right. A cup of tea and a slice of cake at Marley’s is much needed right now.”
“But they’re looking at us like we have something to do with this,” Janet said, loud enough so that everyone within earshot could hear if they were eavesdropping – which, of course, everyone was. “You’re not the only ones who have lost someone. I liked her too.”
Janet bit into her bottom lip, her eyes focussing on the clear sky above. For a split second, Claire thought her mother might cry. It would have been shocking enough to see her as on the verge of tears at home, let alone in public. As though realising this, Janet sniffed hard and cleared her throat.
“Let’s get out of here,” she said, looping arms with Alan.
People watched closely as the three of them crossed the square. Some of the stares were judgemental, a handful were sympathetic, and quite a number seemed to be watching them out of morbid curiosity. Claire couldn’t blame the latter group. If she’d just heard that several locals had found the body of a beloved tearoom owner everyone believed to be sunbathing in France, she’d have a hard time looking away too.
Thanks to everyone gawking in the crowded square, the café was almost empty, with only Marley and Eugene Cropper, the husband-duo owners, manning the fort. Eugene, a retired politician in his seventies, was a tall, broad, theatrical man with a mane of thick grey hair, a twirled moustache, and an abiding love of crushed velvet. He enjoyed eating the cakes more than serving them and had the figure to match. Marley, not quite at retirement age yet, looked more like a monk compared to his lion of a husband. With a bald head, a deep olive tan, and a preference for colourful loose linens, he looked precisely like Claire’s mental picture of an owner of a vegan café.
“Marley, get the water boiling!” Eugene announced in his booming voice when they took the two steps up into the café. “Oh, you poor souls! We heard what – who – you found. Is it true? Was she really . . . ? Was she really . . . ?”
“Excuse my husband,” said Marley, the quieter of the two, “he’s always had morose inquisitiveness.”
“It’s human nature.” Eugene puffed out his chest, tracing his finger around the charity box on the counter before asking casually, “They’re saying you found her in the attic?”
“I can’t speak to the validity of the rest of the local gossip, but unfortunately, it’s true,” Alan answered as they took their usual round table in the corner of the café by the window. “Whatever cake is sweetest, please.”
“I recommend my husband’s new carrot cake,” Eugene said as he eyed up the spare chair at their table. “How did she . . . how did she look?”
“Eugene!”
“I’m sorry!” Eugene slapped himself on the wrist before dabbing at his face with a burgundy pocket square. “Sometimes, I just can’t help myself.”
Marley whizzed around his husband with a tray and a most apologetic look on his face.
“On the house,” he whispered as he put the tray on the table. “I’m sorry about him.”
Marley zoomed off to leave them alone, dragging Eugene with him as he went. They disappeared into the kitchen at the back. The layout, Claire noticed, was almost identical to Jane’s Tearoom, only slightly smaller.
Claire didn’t mind Eugene’s curiosity. He was a harmless, loving, giving man – although she did appreciate Marley’s tact. The local consensus seemed to prefer Eugene because of the energy he radiated, but Marley’s heart was just as big, if quieter.
“Stop looking, love,” Alan whispered to Janet as he cut into the whole carrot cake Marley had given them. “You’re only giving them what they want.”
Janet had picked the only seat at the table that looked out on the side street’s opening – and through that, a narrowed view into the square. Her gaze didn’t move until Alan placed a thick slice of carrot cake in front of her. She looked down at it with a frown. Claire braced herself for one of her mother’s classic tirades on the sugar content in cakes, which was only acceptable when she baked things for the Women’s Institute or local church fêtes. But she didn’t. She picked up her fork, speared off the tip of the wedge and ate it.
“Do you remember Tony the postman?” Janet asked, her eyes fixed on the dark stream of tea Claire was busy pouring into the three cups.
“Now that’s a name I haven’t heard in a while.” Alan chuckled, plopping two sugar cubes into his milky tea. “He was an old man when I was a lad. I can’t believe he worked as long as he did. The poor fella could barely drag the postbag by the end.”
“Wasn’t he the one who never delivered things to the right houses?” Claire remembered, a memory from her childhood resurfacing. “He delivered those purple rollerblades that you got me for Christmas to Mrs Beaton.”
“We’d never have found them if we hadn’t seen her whizzing around the cul-de-sac on them on Christmas Eve,” Alan added some sugar to Jane’s tea and pushed it towards her. “I think that was the first of her hip replacements.” He sipped his drink, chuckling at the memory. “Why the sudden mention of old Tony?”
“Oh, it feels silly now.” Janet frowned into her tea. “He used to get our mail mixed up, that’s all. I’d get her Jane letters at the post office, and she’d get my Janet ones at the tearoom. It’s how we met when I first started.”
“Jane’s Tearoom was there when you started at the post office?” Claire asked after sipping her sweet tea. “You’ve been there for nearly forty years.”
“Oh, Jane’s been there almost as long as me and your mother have been alive,” Alan answered. “She was already settled in when I was a little boy. You’re not the only one who doesn’t remember a time before Jane’s Tearoom.”
“She must have been so young when she started.” Janet’s brows pinched tighter. “She spent an entire lifetime at that tearoom, and . . . and . . .”
“It’s okay, love.”
“And all I have is a poxy story about swapping letters!” Janet’s fist tightened and banged the table slightly; her teacup rattled on its saucer. “It’s not right. I’m not one to call people my ‘friends’, per se, but I liked Jane. I know life’s not fair, but this is . . . this feels worse than what Pat did!”
Hearing her uncle’s name caught Claire off-guard. She choked on her tea and followed it up with a disguising cough. Her eyes darted straight to her father. She could tell he was trying his best to remain calm at the mention of his brother.
Since Pat had murdered Nicola Warton, the previous owner of the candle factory Claire and her uncle both worked at, his name never came up. Purposefully. Claire, having been the one to uncover her uncle’s murderous ways, found it especially challenging to speak of him, especially in her father’s presence.
A welcome distraction came when a red car the size of a shoe pulled up in front of the café. DI Ramsbottom, the rotund owner of the comically tiny car, struggled out. His obvious toupee, gold next to his grey sides, dragged against the car frame but miraculously didn’t budge. Did he glue it down with the same superglue Claire used to glue wicks into jars? Something even stronger?
“I hoped I’d find you all in here,” he panted as he hauled himself up the two steps into the café and clicked his keys to lock his car. “Terrible business. Terrible, terrible business.”
Rather than joining them at their table, he made a beeline for the counter and, more specifically, the display cabinet full of Marley’s vegan cake creations. After jabbing his finger at a couple of things and ordering a gigantic hot chocolate with cream and marshmallows, he squeezed himself into the chair between Claire and her father. They both edged away slightly to give him more room.
“Much obliged,” he said as he slapped the tray containing his hot chocolate, a sandwich, and a large slice of lemon drizzle cake on the table. “Hope you don’t mind if I help myself to a spot of lunch while we chat. It’s been pandemonium out there! Haven’t eaten a thing since breakfast!”
Claire glanced at the clock. It wasn’t much past noon. She assumed he must have had a very early breakfast, although the badly rubbed away ketchup stain on his pale pink satin tie still looked fresh enough that a spin in the washing machine would get it out.
“I’m not here on official business,” he said after a deep slurp of his hot chocolate. “The statements you made at the station were more than enough. We know you’re innocent parties in all of this. You’re just the unfortunate souls who had to be the ones to find her. If not you, it would have been someone else.”
“Thanks for saying that, Harry.” Alan patted his shoulder and smiled at Janet. “Make sure people know it, will you?”
“Of course!” He bit into his cake. “The last thing you need is more folk gossiping after that terrible business with Pat.”
Once again, the name threw a cold bucket of ice over the table. Alan went as far as to wince this time. No one said anything, but DI Ramsbottom didn’t seem to notice. He wasn’t the most observant of detective inspectors when it came down to it. He took a bite of his sandwich.
“I can’t be doing with this vegan food,” he mumbled through his mouthful as he parted the bread to show the leaves and tomatoes. “I can’t stomach salad at the best of times, let alone on a sandwich. What’s wrong with a nice slice of ham, or even a bit of cheese? Never hurt anyone, did it?”
“I don’t think that’s the point,” Claire whispered, smiling awkwardly at Marley and Eugene, who, standing behind the counter in the quiet café, were still clearly within hearing range.
“It fills a corner,” he said before shovelling in the rest of the sandwich half, which he chewed and swallowed in the seconds it took to pull his notepad out of his top pocket. “Now, back to this terrible business. DI to retired DI, I know you’ll be curious, so I thought I’d try and fill in some of the blanks for you. I’ll expect the same courtesy from whoever takes my place one day.”
Harry flicked through a couple of pages, leaving greasy fingerprints. Over his shoulder, Claire saw a mixture of scribbled notes along with what appeared to be shopping lists.
“Based on the level of . . .” He gestured vaguely. “Erm, what’s the right way to put it? You saw her. You know what I mean. Her state, shall we say? Based on her state, they’re already estimating she’s been there for a good few months, although they won’t know more until they get her on the slab and have a look around.”
“For goodness sake!” Janet snapped, her usual tone returning as she stood. “You can’t say the word ‘decay’, and yet you can allude to her autopsy? I think I might excuse myself from this conversation.”
Janet slipped away from the table and locked herself in the tiny bathroom.
“I meant
no offence by it,” Harry mumbled through a lemon drizzle mouthful. “You know me, old chap. Never could keep my foot out of my mouth, which is ironic because I’d never be able to get it in there in a month of Sundays.”
DI Ramsbottom nudged them as he laughed at his own joke. Claire offered a meagre smile, but her father wasn’t trying to hide his irritation, which surprised her. Alan had always been mild-mannered, and he’d once been friends with Harry, his successor. Claire wondered if the DI’s unprofessionalism was the source of his sour look. If the tumour hadn’t messed with his foot’s nerves, her father would still have been the one with the DI badge.
“I can’t believe the poor woman never got her sunshine retirement,” Harry continued, seemingly oblivious to the awkward silences as he finished his cake. “I had some of the computer whizzes look into her movements around the time she was supposed to be leaving Northash. It’s sometimes harder to trace the older ones because they’re not always drawing money out with their plastic cards and using mobile phones, but from the looks of it, the trail goes dead around the same day she was due to leave. January 15th, if I recall.”
“What was her final movement?” Alan asked.
“Funny you should ask that.” He nodded at the bathroom as he swirled his hot chocolate around. “Jane drew her pension from the post office. I wanted to ask your wife if she noticed anything suspicious, but I have a feeling she won’t come out until I leave.”
Harry drained the rest of his hot chocolate before slamming the cup down. He looked at the remainder of his salad sandwich but pushed the plate away before standing. The sudden movement of his stomach shook the table, rattling the lid of the teapot.
“Ask her for me, will you, old chap?” Harry asked, slapping Alan heartily on the back. “If she says anything of interest, you know how to reach me.”
Harry pulled ten pounds from his wallet and slotted it under his tray before leaving. He squeezed back into his tiny red car and performed the sloppiest three-point turn Claire had ever seen, almost reversing through the café window in the process. Claire had done something similar on her final of three attempts at trying to pass her driving test, although in her case, she’d reversed right into a bus stop.
