Strawfoot

by David Hodges

  ‘And where is your wife now?’

  He made a face. ‘Still in bed. Too much vodka, you know.’

  ‘So what time did Melanie Schofield leave here?’

  ‘Must have been around eleven. Dickens of a bust-up too. She just went for poor old Ed like some she-cat. Had to pull her off him.’ He grinned again. ‘Highlight of the evening, don’t you know.’

  ‘Didn’t anyone go with her?’

  He made a face. ‘Sorry but not as far as I know. We were all pretty plastered by then and Ed had gone back to bed with Sis.’

  ‘And would your sister be able to confirm this?’

  ‘You bet I would,’ a husky voice replied from her left and she turned to find a young blonde woman in her twenties standing there. She was barefoot and wearing just a shortie nightie which left very little to the imagination. ‘Best lay I’ve ever had,’ she went on and smirked, lighting up a cigarette. ‘Poor old Mel never knew what she was missing.’

  ‘And you are?’ Kate said tightly.

  ‘I’m Sis,’ the girl replied, throwing a critical glance in the direction of her brother. ‘Sally Turner.’

  ‘And you live here as well?’

  The blonde shook her head and snorted. ‘No way. I’m a Cheddar girl. I live up near the Gorge.’

  ‘You do realize Melanie has been murdered, don’t you?’ Kate grated.

  The girl shrugged. ‘Tragic,’ she said. ‘But these things happen, don’t they? Part of life and all that.’

  ‘Like the joints you were all smoking, you mean?’ Kate snapped back.

  Sally Turner stiffened and straightened off the wall she was leaning against. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ she muttered.

  ‘No?’ Kate replied. ‘Then you won’t mind if I have our drug squad take a look around in here?’

  ‘You can’t do that!’ the brother cut in quickly. ‘You haven’t got a warrant.’

  Kate smiled. ‘No but I could easily get one. Then what would the neighbours say?’

  Sally Turner glanced at her brother again, then back at Kate. ‘We haven’t done anything wrong. We just had a party here, that’s all.’

  ‘One that ended in the murder of an innocent girl,’ Kate reminded her. ‘And if I find out later that either of you have been lying to me about what happened, smoking cannabis will be the least of your worries.’ She produced her pocket book and a pen. ‘Now, I need a list of everyone who was at this so-called party – names, addresses and so forth.’

  Josh Turner gaped, then glanced at his sister again. ‘Sorry,’ he mumbled, ‘but – but that would be impossible. It was a sort of open event. There must have been over forty here – didn’t know half of ’em.’

  Kate nodded. ‘Then you can get me the details of the half you did know,’ she replied, ‘and after I’ve gone, you can sit down with your wife and Sis here and try and remember the names of the rest. I’ll leave you a card so you can ring the incident room with all the names when you’re done.’ She gave a thin smile. ‘Some strong coffee might help the process. I’ll see myself out.’

  Kate was still seething about the Turners as she headed back out on to the Levels to re-visit the scene of the murder. What a couple of arseholes, she mused. Totally self-interested and unaffected by the violent death of someone they had once allegedly called a friend. Their attitude just beggared belief. As for the sister, what a brazen little slut. If that pair were representative of the so-called upper middle classes, then God help the rest of society.

  Her irritable mood lasted the duration of her short journey and it was not helped by the press reception she received when she arrived at the Schofield house. There were around half a dozen reporters, plus a two-man camera crew, milling about in the driveway entrance – prevented from going any further by bolted iron gates manned by a couple of police community support officers. They were around the car like hornets when she pulled up to the gates and she saw camera bulbs flash repeatedly. Fortunately the PCSOs seemed to recognize her car and opened the gates to wave her in but she almost crushed one of the reporters against the left-hand gate pillar when he tried to squeeze between the pillar and the car as she drove through.

  Unsurprisingly, Daniel Schofield was not happy to see her again. His body language made that abundantly clear as he stood in the doorway, blocking her way, and she had to make a supreme effort to put the interview of the Turners behind her and suppress her rising frustration in order to win him over. In the end, however, a combination of tact and feminine persuasion overcame his natural hostility and he reluctantly stepped aside to show her through into the living room, where his mother and father were now sitting.

  Ironically, the elderly couple seemed very pleased to see her, despite the situation they had found themselves in, and she formed the impression that their son had been more than a little over-protective. She gained very little from the interview, however. They were both clearly suffering from a considerable degree of trauma, their whispered replies at times no louder than the sound of rustling paper, and, though they did their best to be helpful, they could offer no information about their late daughter that was of any real use to the police inquiry.

  She was a good girl. She never stayed out too late. She helped in the house and kept the horses exercised and the stables clean. She was always bright, cheerful and full of life and was liked by everybody who knew her. A perfect virginal teenager, in fact – as most teenage daughters are to their doting parents. There was absolutely no reason why anyone would want to harm her.

  Kate didn’t enlighten them as to the manner in which she had died and it was plain that Daniel Schofield had so far managed to keep that distressing information from them too. But they were keen to find out – particularly the father – and he pressed her doggedly until his son, for once on Kate’s side, extricated her from a very difficult situation, ostensibly to meet her request to see his sister’s room.

  The bedroom was cool and faintly perfumed, unlike Ed Shearing’s, with neat whitewood furniture and a gold-framed bed with a large fluffy toy dog lying on the pillows. Daniel watched, tight-lipped, as Kate went through the chest of drawers and the double wardrobe, clenching his fists when she found the dead girl’s diary and started flicking through the pages. But again, there was nothing of interest – just girlie talk about music, fashion and boyfriends. Ed Shearing was mentioned several times, and reference made to his sudden bouts of temper and his wandering eye but overall she seemed quite fond of him and nothing in the diary would have put him anywhere near a dock in the Crown Court. Most important of all, Kate found no trace of any corn dollies, which closed one particular avenue in her thinking, and she left after just half an hour no wiser than when she had first entered the room.

  It was raining as she crossed the paved yard to her car and a newly risen breeze set the yellow crime-scene tape still secured across the now-closed doors of the barn fluttering like a twisted yellow and black snake. She stood for a moment, her hand on the door of the car, trying to visualize Melanie Schofield walking up the long driveway on the last fateful night of her life. There was a suggestion of mist in the air again now and she shivered. Was someone waiting for the young girl in the barn or had the killer followed her in there? Why had she gone into the barn in the first place? What had attracted her to it on a gloomy misty night when most girls would have hurried straight indoors? Maybe they would never know but Kate was determined to do her level best to try and find out.

  CHAPTER 5

  Another small crowd was milling about at the front of the police station when Kate got back. Smelling more press, she drove quickly down the side of the building and into the yard at the back but was then forced to sprint through the rear door as a young woman with a microphone in her hand chased after her.

  After an hour-long painstaking search on the internet, she came up with a big fat zero. OK, so there was a lot of reference to corn dollies but it was all to do with folklore and European pagan superstitions, and the Somerset L
evels never received a mention. It was said that the harvest was believed to make the spirit of the corn homeless, so the hollow shape made from the last sheaf was set aside to provide a winter home for the spirit until the next season, when it was ploughed back into the first furrow in the hope that this would produce a good harvest for the ensuing year. Different customs throughout Britain and Europe were covered and descriptions provided of the various types of corn dolly. But there was nothing to suggest why one might have been forcibly inserted in the mouth of a corpse and in the end, with time running out before the incident room briefing, she gave up and braved the waiting press to try one last avenue.

  The new Levels Community Library had been established two years before by a group of local writers, historians and arty types to provide a literary ‘window’, as they had called it, on all things Somerset – particularly in relation to the Somerset Levels. It was funded by a generous bequest from a well-heeled local philanthropist who had died in a tragic car accident and it had proved to be a very popular alternative to the more traditional public library as a place for specialist research. For Kate, therefore, it was the most obvious first port of call and she reasoned that if the Levels Community Library did not have the information she was seeking, then nowhere would.

  The formidable-looking assistant behind the desk was a tall, angular woman of about fifty, with straggly grey hair and pink-framed spectacles on a cord around her neck. She offered no smile of greeting but raised her eyebrows when Kate pushed through the double doors of the imposing building, produced her warrant card and asked her for any information she had on corn dollies.

  ‘Corn dollies?’ she said. ‘And this is an official police inquiry? Goodness, whatever next?’

  Kate chose not to enlighten her, even though she could see that the woman’s nose was twitching, and she followed her through to the reference section and nodded a polite dismissal when she was directed to a couple of shelves in a corner dealing with arts and crafts.

  She found several books on corn dollies but these covered much the same ‘folklore’ ground as the internet and then went on to provide helpful hints on how to make the hideous things. Not exactly what she was looking for.

  Slipping the books back on the shelf, Kate was about to give up on the whole thing and return to the police station when she spotted an adjoining section on ‘Local Folklore’ and glimpsed the image of a corn dolly on the spine of one of the books. As it turned out, the book was not predominantly about corn dollies but was a historical account of local superstitions and legends ‘of old Somerset’. Curious, she thumbed through it. There was quite a lot about witches, marsh sprites, goblins and hauntings – not really her bag – but there was also a long chapter on corn dollies so, with a rueful smile as she thought of the cold lonely nights she faced at home until Hayden was discharged from hospital, she took the book to the library assistant’s desk.

  ‘Sorry,’ Pink Glasses said, ‘but that section is reference material. Can’t be loaned out, I’m afraid.’

  Kate grimaced. ‘I’m sure you wouldn’t want to impede a police inquiry?’ she said quietly.

  The woman started, her eyes widening behind the thick lenses of her spectacles. ‘No, of course not but—’

  Kate placed the book on the desk. ‘I’ll only keep it a couple of days,’ she said. ‘Then I’ll bring it right back.’

  The other compressed her lips tightly for a second before giving a reluctant nod. ‘Most irregular,’ she snapped. ‘But I suppose we have no choice.’

  She glanced at the title of the book, evidently curious to see what all the fuss was about, and at once her demeanour softened slightly. ‘Oh, that’s one by Will Fallow – local historian. Lives over in Cocklake village. Often comes in here. Such a nice man.’

  Kate nodded. ‘Thanks. I’ll look after it.’

  The woman grunted. ‘You’d better,’ she said and, making a note of the book, handed it over, adding with heavy sarcasm, ‘I hope you enjoy nightmares.’

  Kate shrugged, thinking of the current murder inquiry. ‘I don’t need to read a book to get those,’ she replied grimly. ‘I spend half my life living them!’

  The incident room was already filling up when Kate pushed through the double doors – uniform and plainclothes officers lounging in chairs, sitting on the edges of desks and on window sills, an atmosphere of expectancy hanging the air. Roscoe was already there, standing by a pair of recently erected whiteboards, which carried the first scribbles of the investigation, staring out of the window and obviously waiting until everyone was present and settled before he kicked off with a preliminary briefing. His hands were in his pockets, his head thrust forward like the old bulldog he was and when he turned, apparently sensing Kate’s arrival or maybe spotting her reflection in the window, she saw that he was chewing even more furiously than usual.

  He beckoned her over. ‘So, what have you got for me?’

  She made a face. ‘Zilch on the research front. Nothing of value on the internet and precious little at the new library.’

  He glanced at the book she still held under one arm and evidently read the title on the spine. ‘Clutching at straws with that one, aren’t you?’ he commented.

  She gave a short laugh at what was plainly an unintentional pun. ‘Or straw men, Guv,’ she retorted, remembering a reference to scarecrows she had seen in the book. ‘Local historian wrote it, apparently.’

  ‘Might be worth asking him about corn dollies then?’ he said.

  She nodded. ‘I intend to.’

  He made a wry grimace. ‘So, what about Shearing’s mate, Turner?’

  Her expression hardened. ‘Saw him and his sister. Nice couple of beauties,’ she replied. ‘But they back up his story a hundred per cent, so it looks like he’s off the hook. I’ve got a few names of those attending the party but apparently it was an open-season bash – around forty there – so we’re unlikely to pick up many more.’

  ‘And did you manage to re-visit the Schofields?’She nodded and he raised an enquiring eyebrow. ‘What did they have to say?’

  She shrugged. ‘The usual. She was a good girl with no enemies – that sort of thing.’

  ‘Did you check her bedroom?

  ‘Of course but zilch there too. Just a typical teenage girl’s room. No corn dollies either.’

  He swore under his breath. ‘So nothing. I would have liked at least something before the senior investigating officer joins us tomorrow.’

  ‘Tomorrow?’

  He nodded. ‘Yeah, can’t get here before then apparently.’

  ‘Who is it?’

  He gave one of his fierce grimaces. ‘Believe me, you really don’t want to know,’ he said.

  He followed her with his eyes as she went to join her colleagues now sitting in groups, talking and laughing, at the far end of the room, then cleared his throat and studied them all for a moment. ‘OK, you lot,’ he barked. ‘Listen up and let’s get this bloody show on the road.’

  Detective Constable Hayden Lewis was lying flat out in the hospital bed in a small private room, with just one pillow under his head, when Kate arrived for a brief evening visit. His hair, which in normal circumstances had been described as looking like an uncut hedge – resembling that of London Mayor, Boris Johnson – was in an even worse state than usual and he had spilt something orange-coloured down the front of his pyjama jacket. Unshaven, with heavy-lidded eyes and a nasty crusted gash on his forehead, Kate thought uncharitably that her new husband looked more like a dosser who had been picked up off the side of the road after an accident than a former public schoolboy and police detective.

  ‘You look like shit,’ she commented tightly, dropping a couple of classic car magazines on to the pedestal beside his bed and bending to kiss him on the cheek.

  He gave her a lopsided grin. ‘Well, thanks for that, old girl,’ he drawled, ‘but why don’t you say what you really mean? No point in beating about the bush, is there?’

  ‘The boys and girls send t
heir regards,’ she continued, ignoring his sarcasm and pulling up a chair.

  ‘A few guffaws, I suppose?’ he said.

  She snorted. ‘You’d better believe it! Doing your back in on your honeymoon? It will give the wags enough ammunition to last a month.’

  He chuckled, then winced. ‘Told you I shouldn’t have jumped off that blessed wardrobe,’ he said.

  She didn’t even smile. ‘So what have the doctors said?’ she queried.

  He flicked his eyebrows. ‘Chipped bone, they think, and maybe a displaced disc but they’re waiting for the scan result. Not serious apparently but they want me to rest as much as possible.’ He grinned again. ‘I’ve asked for a Swedish masseuse – preferably blonde, about twenty-five.’

  ‘Male, I hope,’ she retorted, a wry smile on her face for the first time. ‘How long do they expect you to be in here?’

  ‘Couple more days, they reckon. Then it’s home to Burtle for a loving wife to take care of me.’

  She snorted. ‘You’ll be lucky. I’m on another murder inquiry – teenager strangled and left half naked in a barn.’

  ‘A barn?’

  ‘Yes. Peculiar job too.’ She frowned at him, a sudden thought occurring to her. ‘You don’t know anything about corn dollies, do you?’

  ‘Corn dollies? Hardly – I played with toy soldiers when I was a lad. Why?’

  ‘One was found rammed halfway down the girl’s throat.’

  ‘Kinky!’

  ‘You majored in early modern history at uni, though, didn’t you?’

  He pursed his lips. ‘True but I don’t think corn dollies came up much. Mainly kings, queens and lots of battles.’

  ‘Pity.’

  ‘But I do remember that we touched on local superstitions – witchcraft and that sort of thing – and I can recall reading something about dolls being fashioned out of straw and so forth and stuck with pins by witches as a means of stiffing people they didn’t particularly like. Might be a connection there?’

  Kate looked thoughtful for a moment. ‘You could be right. I’ll think about that.’