by Ruth Rendell
Wexford picked up the report and stabbed at the second paragraph with his thick forefinger.
'It came to me in the night,' he said, 'in the interval between Whitman and Rossetti - sound like a couple of gangsters, don't they? Sweet Christ, Mike, I ought to have thought of it before! Parsons said his wife came here when she was sixteen and even then it didn't dick. I assumed, backwoods copper that I am, that Mrs Parsons had left school by then. But, Mike, she was a teacher, she went to a training college. When she was in Hagford she must have gone to school! I reckon they came to Hagford just after she'd taken her School Cert., or whatever they call it these days, and when she got here she went right on going to school.'
There are only two girls' schools around here,' Burden said. The Kingsmarkham County High and that convent place in Sewingbury. St Catherine's.'
'Well, she wouldn't have gone there. She was a Methodist and, as far as we know, her aunt was too. Her daughter got married in a Methodist chapel at any rate. Ifs just our luck that’s it’s Saturday and the school's shut.
‘I want you to root out the head - you can dip out on the inquest, I'll be there. The head's a Miss Fowler and she lives in York Road. See what you can dig up. They must keep records. What we want is a list of the girls who were in Margaret Godfrey's class between September 1949 and July 1951’
‘It’ll be a job tracing them, sir’
‘I know that, Mike, but somehow or other we've got to have a break. This just might be it. We know all about Margaret Parsons' life in Balham, and by the look of it it was mighty dull. Only two sensational things ever happened to her as far as I can see. Love and death, Mike, love and death. The thing is they both happened here in my district. Somebody loved her here and when she came back somebody killed her. One of those girls may remember a boy friend, a possessive boy friend with a long memory’
'I wish,' Burden said, TJvvish some decent public-spirited cop-loving citizen would walk in here and just tell us he knew Mrs P., just tell us he'd taken her out in 1950 or even seen her in a shop last week.' He brooded for a second over the Balham report They were an unhealthy lot, weren't they, sir? Cancer, coronary thrombosis...'
Wexford said slowly: 'When Parsons was telling us a bit of his wife's history I did just wonder why he said, "Her uncle died, he wasn't killed." If s a small point, but I see it now. Her parents were killed, but not in the way we mean when we talk about killing’
After he had gone across the courthouse behind the police station Burden telephoned Miss Fowler. A deep cultured voice answered, carefully enunciating the name of the exchange and the number. Burden began to explain but Miss Fowler interrupted him. Yes, Margaret had been at the High School, although she could scarcely remember her from that time. However, she had seen her recently in Kingsmarkham and had recognized her as the murdered woman from a newspaper photograph.
'Honestly, Inspector,' she said, 'what a very shocking thing!' She spoke as if the killing had offended rather than distressed her, or. Burden thought, as if the education meted out at her school should automatically have exempted any pupil from falling victim to a murderer.
He apologized for troubling her and asked if she could let him have the list Wexford wanted.
‘I’ll just give our school secretary, Mrs Mortlock, a ring,' Miss Fowler said. ‘I’ll get her to nip along to school and have a look through the records. If you could call on me about lunchtime. Inspector?'
Burden said he was most grateful.
'Not at all. It’s no trouble,' Miss Fowler said. 'Honestly.'
The inquest was over in half an hour and Dr Crocker's evidence occupied ten minutes of that time. Death, he said, was caused by strangulation by means of a ligature; a scarf possibly or a piece of cloth. Mrs Parsons' body was otherwise unbruised and there had been no sexual assault She had been a healthy woman, slightly overweight for her height. In his evidence Wexford gave his opinion that it was impossible to say whether or not there had been a struggle as the wood had been heavily trampled by Prewett’s cows. The doctor was recalled and said that he had found a few superficial scratches on the dead woman's legs. These were so slight that he would not care to say whether they had been made before or after death
A verdict was returned of murder by person or persons unknown.
Ronald Parsons had sat quietly throughout the inquest, twisting a handkerchief in his lap. He kept his head bowed as the coroner offered some perfunctory expressions of sympathy and indicated that he heard only by a slight movement, a tiny nod. He seemed so stunned with misery that Wexford was surprised when he caught up with him as he was crossing the flagged courtyard and touched him on the sleeve.
Without preamble he said, 'A letter came for Margaret this morning’
'What d'you mean, a letter?' Wexford stopped. He had seen some of Mrs Parsons' letters; advertisements and coal bills.
'From her cousin in the States,' Parsons said. He took a deep breath and shivered in the warm sun.
Looking at him, Wexford realized that he was no longer stupefied. Some fresh bitterness was affecting him.
‘I opened it'
He spoke with a kind of guilt She was dead and they had plundered her possessions. Now even her letters, letters posthumously received, were to be picked over, their words dissected as meticulously as her own body had been examined and exposed.
‘I don't know... I can't think’ he said, ‘But there's something in it about someone called Doon.'
Have you got it with you?' Wexford asked sharply.
In my pocket.'
'We’ll go into my office’
If Parsons noticed his wife's books spread about the room he gave no sign. He sat down and handed an envelope to Wexford. On the flap, just beneath the ragged slit Parsons had made, was a handwritten address: From Mrs Wilbur S. Katz, 1183 Sunflower Park, Slate City, Colorado, U.S.A.
That would be Miss Anne Ives’ Wexford said. 'Did your wife correspond with her regularly?'
Parsons looked surprised at the name.
'Not to say regularly’ he said. 'She'd write once or twice a year. I've never met Mrs Katz.'
Did your wife write to her recently, since you came here?'
‘I wouldn't know. Chief Inspector. To tell you the truth, I didn't care for what I knew of Mrs Katz. She used to write and tell Margaret all about the things she'd got - cars, washing machines, that sort of thing ... I don't know whether it upset Margaret She'd been very fond of her cousin and she never said she minded hearing about all those things. But I made it plain what I thought and she stopped showing me the letters’
'Mr Parsons, I understand Mrs Ives' house was left jointly to your wife and Mrs Katz. Surely-?'
Parsons interrupted bitterly: 'We bought our share off her. Chief Inspector. Every penny of seven hundred pounds we paid - through a bank in London. My wife had to work full-time so that we could do it, and when we'd paid the lot, just paid off the lot, the council bought the place off us for nine hundred. They had a sort of order.'
'A compulsory-purchase order’ Wexford said. ‘I see’ He stuck his head round the door. 'Sergeant Camb! Tea, please, and an extra cup. ‘I’ll just read that letter, if you don't mind, Mr Parsons’
It was written on thin blue paper and Mrs Katz had found plenty to tell her cousin. The first two pages were entirely taken up with an account of a holiday Mr and Mrs Katz and their three children had spent in Florida; Mrs Katz's new car; a barbecue her husband had bought her. Mr and Mrs Parsons were invited to come to Slate City for a holiday. Wexford began to see what Parsons had meant.
The last page was more interesting.
Gee, Meg (Mrs Katz had written), I sure was amazed to see you and Ron had moved to Kingsmarkham. I'll bet that was Ron's idea, not yours. And you have met up with Doon again, have you? I sure would like to know who Doon is. You've got to tell me, not keep dropping hints.
Still, I can't see why you should be scared of Doon. What of, for the Lord's sake? There was never anything in that. (You know what I m
ean, Meg.) I can't believe Doon is still keen. You always had a suspicious mind!!! But if meeting Doon means trips in the car and a few free meals I wouldn't be too scrupulous.
When are you and Ron going to get a car of your own? Wil says he just doesn't know how you make out...
There was some more in the same vein, sprinkled with exclamation marks and heavily underlined. The letter ended:
... Regards to Ron and remind him there's a big welcome waiting for you both in Sunflower Park whenever you feel like hitting Colorado, U.SA. Love from Nan. Greg, Joanna and Kim send hugs to their Auntie Meg.
This could be very important, Mr Parsons’ Wexford said. ‘I’d like to hang on to it'
Parsons got up, leaving his tea untasted.
‘I wish it hadn't come’ he said. ‘I wanted to remember Margaret as I knew her. I thought she was different. Now I know she was just like the rest, carrying on with another man for what she could get out of him'
Wexford said quietly: I'm afraid it looks like that. Tell me, didn't you have any idea that your wife might be going out with this man, this Doon? It looks very much as if Doon knew her when she lived in Flagford and took up with her again when she came back. She must have gone to school here, Mr Parsons. Didn't you know that?'
Did Parsons look furtive, or was it just a desire to hold on to some remnants of his private life, his marriage broken both by infidelity and by death, that made him flush and fidget?
'She wasn't happy in Hagford. She didn't want to talk about it and I stopped asking her. I reckon it was because they were such a lot of snobs. I respected her reticence. Chief Inspector.'
‘Did she talk to you about her boy friends?'
That was a closed book,' Parsons said, 'a closed book for both of us. I didn't want to know, you see.' He walked to the window and peered out as if it was night instead of bright day. 'We weren't those kind of people. We weren't the kind of people who have love affairs.' He stopped, remembering the letter. ‘I can't believe it I can't believe that of Margaret. She was a good woman. Chief Inspector, a good loving woman. I can't help thinking that Katz woman was making up a lot of things that just weren't true, making them up out of her own head’
'We shall know a bit more when we hear from Colorado’ Wexford said. ‘I’m hoping to get hold of the last letter your wife wrote to Mrs Katz. There's no reason why it shouldn't be made available to you’
Thank you for nothing’ Parsons said. He hesitated, touched the green cover of Swinburne's verses and walked quickly from the room.
It was some sort of a break, Wexford thought, some sort of a break at last. He picked up the telephone and told the switchboard girl he wanted to make a call to the United States. This had been a strange woman, he reflected as he waited, a strange secretive woman leading a double life. To her husband and the unobservant world she had been a sensible prudent housewife in sandals and a cotton frock, an infants' teacher who polished the front step with Brasso and went to church socials. But someone, someone generous and romantic and passionate, had been tantalized and maddened by her for twelve long years.
Chapter 9
Sometimes a troop of damsels glad...
Tennyson, The Lady of Shalott
Miss Fowler's was an unacademic bookless flat. Burden, who was aware of his own failing of cataloguing people in types, had tried not to expect old-maidishness. But this was what he found. The room into which Miss Fowler showed him was full of hand-made things. The cushion covers had been carefully embroidered, the amateurish water-colours obviously executed with patience, the ceramics bold. It looked as if Miss Fowler could hardly bear to reject the gift of an old scholar, but the collection was neither restful nor pleasing.
‘Poor, poor Margaret’ she said. Burden sat down and Miss Fowler perched herself in a rocking chair opposite him, her feet on a petit-point footstool. 'What a very shocking thing all this is! That poor man too. I've got the list you wanted.'
Burden glanced at the neatly typed row of names.
Tell me about her’ he said.
Miss Fowler laughed self-consciously, then bit her lip as if she thought this was no occasion for laughter.
'Honestly, Inspector’ she said, ‘I can't remember. You see, there are so many girls ... Of course, we don't forget them all, but naturally if s the ones who achieve something, get Firsts or find really spectacular posts, those are the ones we remember. Hers wasn't a very distinguished year. There was plenty of promise, but none of it came to very much. I saw her, you know, after she came back’
'Here? In Kingsmarkham?'
It must have been about a month ago’ She took a packet of Weights from the mantelpiece, offered one to Burden, and puffed bravely at her own as he held a match to it.
They never really grow up, he thought.
'I was in the High Street,' she went on. It was just after school and she was coming out of a shop. She said, "Good afternoon. Miss Fowler." Honestly, I hadn't the faintest idea who she was. Then she said she was Margaret Godfrey. You see, they expect you to remember them. Inspector.'
Then how did you... ?'
How did I connect her with Mrs Parsons? When I saw the photograph. You know, I felt sorry we hadn't talked, but I'm always seeing old girls, but I honestly couldn't tell you who they are or their ages, come to that. They might be eighteen or thirty. You know how it is, you can't tell the ages of people younger than yourself.' She looked up at Burden and smiled. 'But you are young,' she said.
Again he returned to the list The names were in alphabetical order. He read aloud slowly, waiting for Miss Fowler's reactions:
'Lyn Annesley, Joan Bertram, Clare Clarke, Wendy Ditcham, Margaret Dolan, Margaret Godfrey, Mary Henshaw, Jillian Ingram, Anne Kelly, Helen Laird, Marjorie Miller, Hilda Pensteman, Janet Probyn, Fabia Rogers, Deirdre Sachs, Diana Stevens, Winifred Thomas, Gwen Williams, Yvonne Young’
Under the names Mrs Morpeth had written with an air of triumph: Miss Clare Clarke is a member of the High School teaching staff!!!
I'd like to talk to Miss Clarke’ he said.
'She lives at Nectarine Cottage down the first lane on the left on the Stowerton Road’ Miss Fowler said.
Burden said slowly, Fabia is a very unusual name’
Miss Fowler shrugged. She patted her stiffly waved grey hair. 'Not a particularly unusual type’ she said. Just one of those very promising people I was telling you about who never amounted to much. She lives here somewhere. She and her husband are quite well known in what I believe are called social circles. Helen Laird was another one. Very lovely, very self-confident. Always in trouble. Boys, you know. Honestly, so silly! I thought she'd go on the stage, but she didn't, she just got married. And then Miss Clarke, of course...'
Burden had the impression she had been about to include Miss Clarke among the failures, but that loyalty to her staff prevented her. He didn't pursue it She had given him a more disturbing lead.
'What did you say happened to Helen Laird?'
‘I really know nothing, Inspector. Mrs Morpeth said something about her having married a car salesman. Such a waste!' She stubbed out her cigarette into an ashtray that was daubed with poster paint and obviously home-baked. When she went on her voice sounded faintly sad. They leave, you know, and we forget them, and then about fifteen years later a little tot turns up in the first form and you think, I've seen that face before somewhere! Of course you have - her mother's’
Dymphna and Priscilla, Burden thought, nearly sure. Not long now, and Dymphna's face, the same red hair perhaps, would revive in Miss Fowler's memory some long-lost chord.
'Still,' she said, as if reading his thoughts, 'there's a limit to everything and I retire in two years' time.'
He thanked her for the list and left. As soon as he got to the station Wexford showed him the Katz letter.
It all points to Doon being the killer, sir,' Burden said, 'whoever he is. What do we do now, wait to hear from Colorado?'
'No, Mike, we'll have to press on. Clearly Mrs Katz does
n't know who Doon is and the best we can hope for is to get some of the background from her and the last letter Mrs P. sent her before she died. Doon is probably going to turn out to be a boy friend Mrs P. had when she was at school here. Let's hope she didn't have too many.'
I've been wondering about that,' Burden said, 'because honestly - as Miss Fowler would say - those messages in Minna's books don't look like the work of a boy at all, not unless he was a very mature boy. They're too polished, too smooth. Doon could be an older man who got interested in her.'
‘I thought of that,' Wexford said, 'and I've been checking up on Prewett and his men. Prewett bought that farm in 1949 when he was twenty-eight. He's an educated person and quite capable of writing those messages, but he was in London on Tuesday. There's no doubt about it, unless he was involved in a conspiracy with two doctors, an eminent heart specialist, a sister, God knows how many nurses and his own wife.
'Draycott’s only been in the district two years and he was in Australia from 1947 to 1953. Bysouth can scarcely write his own name, let alone dig up suitable bits of poetry to send to a lady love, and much the same goesior Traynor. Edwards was in the Army throughout 1950 and 1951, and Dorothy Sweeting can't possibly know what was going on in Minna's love life twelve years ago. She was only seven.'
Then it looks as if we'll have to ferret out what we can from the list,' Burden said. ‘I think you'll be interested when you see some of the names, sir.'
Wexford took the list and when he came to Helen Laird and Fabia Rogers he swore fiercely. Burden had pencilled in Missal and Quadrant, following each surname with a question mark.
'Somebody's trying to be clever’ Wexford said, 'and that I won't have. Rogers. Her people are old man Rogers and his missus at Pomfret Hall. They're loaded. All made out of paint. There's no reason why she should have told us she knew Mrs P. When we talked to Dougie this Doon angle didn't seem that important But Mrs Missal ... Not know Mrs P. indeed, and they were in the same class!'
He had grown red with anger. Burden knew how he hated being taken for a ride.
