A Cotswold Killing

by Rebecca Tope

  It did. The door was opened by a girl of about fifteen. She had red eyes and hunched shoulders. ‘Who are you?’ she said in a wan little voice, looking past Thea as if to work out how she’d got there, across the filthy yard.

  ‘My name’s Thea Osborne. I’m looking after the Reynoldses’ house. It was me who found…’ She didn’t know how to phrase it.

  Had Joel been this girl’s father? Brother? Possibly, though this was stretching it, her husband?

  ‘Oh.’ The girl frowned. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I wanted to come and say how sorry I am.’ The words were not well chosen, but this was the usual cliché, and she couldn’t think how else to express it.

  ‘Sorry? Why? You don’t know us.’

  ‘No. But I know what it’s like when somebody dies suddenly. People often stay away from you, just when you’d like somebody to talk to.’

  ‘Are you talking about Uncle Joel?’

  Ah. ‘He was your uncle?’

  The girl nodded.

  ‘Do you live here?’

  ‘Not really. I live with my mum. We’ve come to see to Gramps. Mum!’ She turned and called back into the house. Thea began to feel sorely out of her depth. These people were not going to thank her for the intrusion. And she was going to feel extremely silly floundering back through the thistles to regain the homeward track.

  Then the girl’s mother appeared. She was clean, tidy, made-up and calm. ‘Who’s this, Lindy?’ she asked, with an expression full of forced encouragement and dutiful interest.

  The girl didn’t respond, so Thea introduced herself again. ‘I’m really sorry for the intrusion. I just thought you might…well…’ It sounded weak and silly in her own ears. The truth, and she knew it, was that she’d come in order to keep her own demons at bay. Taking a share in other people’s was always the better option.

  ‘Come in. How did you get here? Look at your shoes! Isn’t this place abysmal!’

  Her accent was almost as BBC as Joel’s had been. A strong sense of disorientation descended on Thea as she stepped into the house. Without consultation, she undid the slimy laces of her shoes, and left them inside the door. Something about padding across the hall in purple socks seemed to generate at least a potential for increased intimacy.

  Barrow Hill Farmhouse was heavily furnished in a style that could not be neatly categorised. Big old furniture dusty and unpolished. Good quality carpets that had withstood years of feet and grit and animal hairs. Thea noticed for the first time that no dogs had accosted her. Now it seemed there was a strong family preference for cats. At one glance she could count four on various perches around the room. Thank Christ she’d left Hepzibah behind.

  Mother and daughter were watching her, their expressions identical. Thea suddenly felt very silly indeed, to the point where she could think of nothing to say. ‘Gosh, well…’ she floundered. ‘I just thought…’

  ‘She’s staying at the Reynolds’ place,’ said the girl. ‘She must be the woman who found Uncle Joel.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Thea.

  ‘Poor you. It must have been a shock.’ Lindy’s mother had not yet given her own name. ‘Everything’s in a state here, I’m afraid. Those bloody bullocks in the yard. Gramps won’t put them back in the field – says it’s too soft for them. It makes living here like being under siege. How did you manage?’

  Thea tried to laugh. ‘I came round the back.’

  ‘You were determined!’

  ‘No, not really. I just didn’t want to turn back. I should have worn boots. It’s my own fault.’

  ‘Lindy, make some tea, will you? There’s a good girl.’

  Lindy slouched out of the room, and started to run a tap and make a metallic clattering sound.

  ‘You don’t live here?’ Thea asked.

  ‘Oh no. I was married to Joel’s brother. Paul. He was killed in February – did you know? I can’t believe history’s repeating itself like this. It’s really knocked us sideways. It’s the end for the farm, of course. Gramps is out there, mucking out the cowshed, pretending everything’s all right. They weren’t coping before this, not really. Now it’s going to be completely hopeless.’

  Thea entertained notions of land-hungry neighbours committing murder in order to achieve possession of Barrow Hill.

  ‘But Paul – wasn’t he farming here as well?’

  ‘He was until a year ago. Then we moved away to Cirencester. There wasn’t enough money coming in to keep us all here. Paul got work at the garden centre, and I went full-time. We were doing all right.’

  ‘I can’t imagine what it must be like. Are there other brothers or sisters?’

  The woman laughed harshly. ‘They’d be pretty scared by now, wouldn’t they! No, it was just the two boys. Their mum went off with a fertiliser rep when Paul was fourteen and Joel twelve. I don’t think Gramps has been the same since, to be honest.’

  ‘There are milking cows here, is that right? Joel came over to talk to me on Saturday afternoon. He said he’d have to go and get on with the milking. That’s going to be hard work.’

  ‘It’s impossible. We’ve found a relief chap to come and take over. They cost a fortune, of course, but Gramps can’t do it. Except he did do it yesterday morning, when he couldn’t find Joel.’

  Thea recognised the indiscriminate babble that came with the shock. All those disconnected thoughts that flew at you from all sides – When? What? How? The compulsion to keep the basic functions operating, the desperate urge to create some sort of narrative to explain events as they hurtled you into a whole new reality. The need to assure yourself that your surviving loved ones were safe, while at the same time resenting them for being the wrong loved ones. She spun on her heel, overwhelmed by the returning sensations and insights, in the presence of another sudden death.

  ‘The poor man. How did he manage?’

  ‘He won’t give in. He can hardly stand up for more than a few minutes, with his hip. So he took a stool out to the milking parlour, and rested between each cow. It took him hours, but he got them all done. But he couldn’t do it again. We had the relief last night and this morning, but the expense…I don’t suppose you…?’ For a moment there was a flicker of irrational hope on the woman’s face.

  ‘No,’ said Thea. ‘Sorry. I’ve been on farms quite a lot, but I’ve never actually milked a cow.’

  ‘Do you do much of this house-sitting?’

  Thea smiled. ‘Well, actually, this is my first time.’

  Lindy came back, with two mugs of tea. ‘There’s a car coming down the lane,’ she said. ‘Looks like police.’

  ‘Oh! I’d better go, then,’ said Thea. ‘I’ll be in the way.’

  ‘They’ll want to ask more questions,’ said the woman. ‘They’ve really got the bit between their teeth now. Trying to work out why both brothers should get themselves killed.’ Her tone was bitter. ‘Pity they didn’t work a bit harder two months ago. All that evidence from the hedge – you’d think they’d have got the bastard right away. But once they’d done the house to house stuff round all the villages, they seemed to give up on it. Said it must have been a poacher from Birmingham or somewhere, and it would have to be a slow, careful investigation, whatever the hell that means. Anyway, this shows how wrong they were.’

  ‘You think it was the same person both times?’

  The woman shrugged, but her reddening cheeks made the gesture seem false. However much she knew or suspected, it was not the sort of knowledge conducive to a shrug. Thea gave the matter her undivided attention and came to the quick conclusion that the wife and sister-in-law of two murdered brothers must surely have some ideas as to who and why.

  Thea was torn between wanting to leave this bizarre household, and wishing she could stay and hear the full story. ‘I’m sorry – I don’t think I caught your name,’ she said, more as a ploy to regain the woman’s attention, as she gazed out of the window.

  ‘Oh – June. I’m June. Look, I think you probably should
go. It might upset Gramps to find you here. Come back another day. I’ll make sure the yard’s clear next time. God! Look at that wretched man. He’s up to his ankles in shit.’

  Thea put down her tea, untasted. The mug had struck her as disconcertingly unclean. ‘I’ll go the back way again, shall I?’

  ‘Up to you,’ said June, plainly indifferent. Her initial concern had disappeared completely, leaving Thea feeling very much surplus to requirements.

  She retraced her steps through thistles that seemed to have grown in the past half hour. What had she learnt in her visits to the neighbours – Helen Winstanley as well as June Jennison? Two very different women, both amiable enough when confronted by a stranger who was only expected to be here for a few weeks. Amiable, but distracted. Their attention had been very much elsewhere, in both cases. Perhaps it was the distraction that provoked Thea’s stubborn streak. She wanted to get under their guard, to earn their confidence and learn a bit more about what was going on in this apparently typical English village.

  It seemed to take an age before she was hopping over the stone wall back into the lane leading up to the road and the place she was beginning to think of as home. Finding a stretch of wall that was level and not defended by nettles or brambles proved tricky. Just as she’d selected a place, a voice greeted her.

  ‘Will you hang on a minute, Mum says.’ It was Lindy, wearing wellington boots, coming through the gate from the mucky yard. ‘She wants to ask you something.’

  Thea felt weak. Surely she didn’t have to make the stupid roundabout journey all over again. ‘Don’t worry,’ Lindy assured her. ‘She’ll come out here, in a minute. The police want to talk to Gramps. They’ve gone out to the shippon to look for him.’

  Thea waited, beginning to notice the cold penetrating her light jacket. A wind had sprung up and the sky was grey.

  June Jennison emerged from the house, and made an assertive passage through the yard, elbowing cattle aside impatiently. ‘Oh, thanks for waiting,’ she said. ‘This is silly, isn’t it. I’ve a good mind to send them out into the field right now. It’s not muddy, is it?’ She peered over the wall at the thistles. ‘They might eat some of those weeds, if we’re lucky.’

  ‘They’re not donkeys, Ma,’ said Lindy.

  Thea had a sense of a world on the edge of chaos; the relentless needs of farm livestock presenting a distraction from the pain and shock of a sudden death, forcing the family to continue at least a token imitation of normal processes. But Gramps was supposed to be retired, his hip wouldn’t allow him to stand for more than a few minutes, both his sons were dead, and his yard was ankle deep in muck.

  ‘Er…’ she said, wishing she could just go.

  ‘Oh, sorry. Listen – I do want to talk to you. You must have been the last person to see Joel, apart from Gramps. I want to know what he said, exactly. Did he mention Paul at all? Did he tell you anything?’

  Thea inhaled slowly. June Jennison seemed smaller, out of doors. Much the same age as Thea herself, she was greying and plump. She wore a neat knitted garment that stretched over ample breasts. But she had taken care with her appearance, for all that. There was lipstick and eyeshadow, and nail varnish. Everyone in this family, Thea concluded, was impossible to categorise. Educated, apparently, but by no means affluent; working with their hands, but not therefore artisans. What had Paul been like, she wondered – and when was she going to meet Gramps – Mr Jennison Senior?

  ‘I don’t think he told me anything important,’ she said. ‘He seemed to just want to introduce himself.’

  ‘What time was it?’

  ‘Just after four.’

  ‘But that’s milking time,’ June said with great earnestness. ‘He wouldn’t have gone visiting then. Was he dressed up?’

  Thea had to abort a peal of laughter. ‘I think he was in his milking clothes,’ she said.

  ‘Then he wasn’t just visiting,’ June said. ‘He wanted to tell you something – to warn you, or ask you for help. Take my word for it, he was there for a very good reason.’

  CHAPTER SIX

  June’s words echoed in Thea’s head, as she walked back to Brook View and tried to apply herself to the job she was supposed to be doing. Clive’s lists were beginning to acquire a life of their own.

  However many times she read them, there always seemed to be some instruction she’d overlooked. Check telephone for recorded messages (1571) was one she had failed to obey thus far. Choosing the machine in the study, she lifted the receiver and listened for the broken tone that indicated a message. Sure enough, somebody had called.

  Keying in 1571, she listened, pencil in hand, for the recording, which gave its time as 1.30pm on Saturday. Thea had been remiss in not checking for calls earlier. She wondered where the Reynoldses had been when the phone rang, shortly before her own arrival. ‘Clive? It’s only me. Have you left yet for the great adventure, I wonder? I suppose you must have done. Anyway, just to say I saw the piece in the paper, and hope Jen wasn’t too bothered by it. These things happen – nobody’s going to think badly of her. Give us a shout when you get back, and we’ll have a drink or something. Bye for now.’

  Thea dropped the pencil without using it. The caller had not given his name, but she thought she recognised the voice as that of Martin Stacey with his London/Essex vowels. She didn’t make a note, not quite sure enough of the caller’s identity to say for certain that Stacey had called. The message itself didn’t seem to be the sort you needed to pass on, three weeks later, either. She did rather wonder what had been in the paper concerning Jennifer Reynolds, all the same. The woman was beginning to sound like a person rather susceptible to being upset. Hadn’t Helen Winstanley implied as much? That the whole point of the cruise was to mollify her, after Clive’s regrettable fling? Thea brought Jennifer to mind: tall, narrow-shouldered, stony-eyed. A habit of tucking her small chin into her neck, making her seem stern and critical. Not at all a vulnerable person to be protected from wounded feelings.

  Well, it shouldn’t be too difficult to find a copy of the local weekly paper – and surely that was the most likely periodical to which the phone message referred? In fact, Thea realised, with a small jolt of pleasure, she could quickly and easily check it on the laptop, which had been sitting where she left it on a chest in her bedroom ever since she’d arrived. A search for ‘Jennifer Reynolds’ would save her hours of trawling through pages of newsprint. It would be a little task saved for a quiet evening, she decided.

  A few minutes later, she had to answer the door to the police again. She had noticed their car arrive and assumed they were returning for another look at the field. It was a surprise when an officer rang the doorbell.

  ‘Mrs Osborne, sorry to trouble you again. We’ve just come from Barrow Hill, where I gather you paid a visit a little while ago?’ It was the less talkative one from Sunday morning. He had a very short haircut that looked all wrong on his wide head.

  ‘Oh, yes?’ She spoke brightly, taking care to present an open expression, eyes wide, slight smile on her lips. ‘Would you like to come in?’

  ‘Thank you.’ He stepped into the room, but only a little way. His uniform looked unyielding, inhuman. ‘So – You didn’t see Mr Jennison, did you?’

  ‘You mean the old man? No, he was outside, doing something on his tractor. I spoke to June Jennison and her daughter.’

  ‘She told us,’ he nodded. ‘She believes you must have more information for us than we’ve had so far. That Mr Joel Jennison possibly came here on Saturday with something urgent to say to you.’ He was speaking slowly, trying to make himself clear as much to himself as to Thea.

  ‘He didn’t give an impression of urgency. June thinks what she does because he was wearing his working clothes. I wonder whether she’s right? Perhaps he didn’t think it was worth changing just to pop over here for a few minutes. Perhaps he’d been delayed by something, so there wasn’t time to change.’

  ‘Mrs Osborne, we’ve had the results of the post-mortem now
. Mr Jennison didn’t die of drowning. I’m not at liberty to give you the full picture, but I can tell you that he died somewhere else, and was subsequently dumped face down in that pool.’

  Thea’s eyes grew wider. ‘But…’ She tried to calculate the implications of this news.

  ‘We haven’t got an accurate time of death, unfortunately. But it was a considerable interval prior to your finding the body.’

  ‘So…What does that mean? What about that scream?’

  ‘The scream could have been him. He could have been attacked close to the house, left there for a while, and then placed in the water at a later time. But we found no traces of an attack in the garden or field. There would have been blood loss.’ He avoided her eye, wary of her reaction.

  Thea was not distressed by the mention of blood in itself, but a renewed stab of guilt assailed her. ‘Didn’t anybody else hear anything?’ She already knew the answer to that. Who could there have been, close enough to the spot at that time of night? The neighbours she had somehow believed must exist were in fact much further afield than she had first thought.

  ‘Not that we’re aware.’

  A short silence ensued, during which Thea tried to remember whether she had left any questions unanswered. She didn’t think she had.

  ‘I had a call from Clive Reynolds this morning,’ she offered. ‘He doesn’t want to come home early, does he?’

  The policeman’s face remained blank. ‘So it would seem,’ he said.

  ‘You can’t really make him, I suppose? Not unless you think he did it.’

  ‘That isn’t strictly the case. If we felt he was an important witness, we could subpoena him.’

  ‘It would be a pity to ruin the holiday for them.’

  ‘Unfortunate,’ he agreed.

  ‘So you won’t?’

  ‘Not at present, no.’

  She could tell it was an awkward situation, probably leading to arguments in high places. It was possible to imagine a Saturday afternoon scenario in which Clive Reynolds doubled back to Duntisbourne, murdered Joel and then somehow zoomed off to Heathrow for his flight. Except…