Juliet held out her hand for the paper.
“I suppose there’s a list of her ‘qualities’, too, though it’s been rubbed out. But the word beginning with P is clearer on this one: I think it says ‘Punishment’.”
Nick stooped to peer over her shoulder.
“You’re right.”
“The list of dates is longer, but the entries cover a shorter period of time. They only start in 1889. What do you think ‘btg’ means?”
Nick paused. Juliet looked up at his face. It had contorted with the effort of trying to manage powerful emotion.
“I’m afraid that it stands for ‘beating’. I think that these women were physically chastised, perhaps for trivial offences, perhaps for some more sadistic reason.”
Juliet sat, silent, for a long time. She struggled to prevent it, but her eyes were filling with tears.
“I have over-tired you and I should know better,” said Nick gravely. “You must go to bed now. Try to forget about this until tomorrow.”
He stood up slowly and began to gather his possessions. Juliet knew that if she stood, too, he would kiss her good night. She remained seated, with the result that Nick merely brushed the hair back from her face and gave her another circumspect peck on the cheek.
“Goodnight. I will call in tomorrow evening. We may find out a little more when we look again. Promise me that you will not brood over the papers in the meantime.”
Juliet nodded.
“Good night, Nick. And thank you. I really mean it.”
As the door shut behind him, she stooped to retrieve the little mauve card from under the sofa.
Welcome home. Best wishes from Dr Wu and Dr Butler.
The card had been written in ballpoint, in the nondescript handwriting of the florist’s assistant, not Louise Butler’s precise and elegant hand. Nevertheless, Juliet was now in no doubt about who had really sent her the flowers.
Fifty-Six
It was two days after Nick had helped Juliet to release the indenture documents. She’d divided her time between resting and searching the Internet for more information about Cecil Rhodes. She’d read with fascination about the Jameson Raid in which he was involved, but at first couldn’t understand why Rhodes might have wanted to name his slaves after such a fiasco. The Jameson Raid had been a foolish plot to overthrow Paul Kruger, the political leader of the Transvaal, and seize Johannesburg’s reserves of gold by force. Of all his exploits in Africa, it had come closest to discrediting him. But, by following further links, she discovered that Dr Leander Star Jameson (some name!) was one of Rhodes’ oldest friends and also the doctor who attended his deathbed. The slaves might have ‘belonged’ to Dr Jameson or Rhodes might have named them in his honour.
Technically speaking, there were no slaves in the Cape in the second half of the nineteenth century. The indenture forms did not specify the status of the women; they were similar to the contracts drawn up for servants, with one glaring omission: neither of them specified a wage or any of the other entitlements – such as new sets of clothing – that were usually part of such contracts. This and the fact that they had identical names persuaded Juliet that these women had been slaves in all but name.
If two of the skeletons that had lain for a century in the cellar at Laurieston had belonged to the two Louisa Jamesons, how had these women come to be in England? Juliet didn’t know the answer to that. She could only guess that she and Katrin had been correct when they’d surmised that Frederick Jacobs and Cecil Rhodes were friends and that somehow this accounted for it. There was plenty of evidence to show that Frederick Jacobs had spent long periods of time in Africa and travelled extensively there. Cecil Rhodes was known to have made lengthy visits to England on several occasions in the 1890s, including 1896, the year in which Frederick Jacobs had married Florence, but there was nothing that actually proved that he’d ever been a guest at Laurieston, even though an imaginative reader might believe that the journal hinted at it. It was true that Rhodes’ Aunt Sophy had lived in Sleaford and likely that both he and Frederick Jacobs had attended the school and possibly been treated at the sanatorium there, so they probably knew each other, but it was doubtful that Juliet would ever be able to prove that Cecil Rhodes had not only visited Laurieston, but also arrived there accompanied by three black women. Although this was the only explanation she could think of for the presence of the skeletons, even to herself it seemed far-fetched. The rural Lincolnshire of the period was not only intensely conservative – as witnessed by Florence’s journal – but very short on news and gossip. More than a hundred years later, local people were still calling Laurieston ‘Sausage Hall’ after its first owner. It beggared belief that the presence of three black women in a village the size of Sutterton had failed to provoke comment or some kind of record in local folklore.
Most of Cecil Rhodes’ biographers seemed to think that he was a closet homosexual. There was little doubt in Juliet’s mind that this description also fitted Frederick Jacobs. Was either of them attracted to women? Whatever his sexual preferences, Frederick had managed to fulfil his mother’s notion of duty by marrying Florence and siring a son. Tucked away in one of the accounts of Rhodes’ life she’d found a footnote that said that one of his friends had asserted that Rhodes had liked ‘low-life females’. It would be fair to assume that in that period of South Africa’s history it was probably a way of referring to black women. Another acquaintance, speaking many years after Rhodes’ death, had said that he liked ‘rough’ sexual encounters. Was it conceivable that the three black women had been sexual prisoners? That they’d been taken to Laurieston in secret and held there in order to fulfil Rhodes’ brutal sexual fantasies? Had his friend Frederick Jacobs also participated in them? It would not have been possible for them to hold the women there when the house had contained other occupants. Even Florence, the ever-obliging wife, would have been unprepared to turn a blind eye and Lucinda Jacobs would have sent Rhodes and his unwelcome companions packing at once. But, according to the journal, Lucinda and the pregnant Florence had spent several months at the seaside in 1896. And Frederick had left them there and gone to meet Rhodes; had they both returned to Laurieston House for their own illicit purposes? And how had the indenture documents come to be hidden in the journal, which had eventually been given to Jackie Briggs by her grandmother, Florence’s last housekeeper?
Juliet remembered that Kevan de Vries and Jackie Briggs had both met Florence Jacobs when she was a very old lady. She wondered if either of them had memories of Florence that might help to solve the mystery. Bothering de Vries was out of the question while he was still mourning his wife and helping Tim Yates with two murder enquiries. Jackie was likely still to be upset by the possible arrest of her husband. Nevertheless, returning the journal to her was long overdue and would give Juliet the perfect excuse for calling on her.
She was still taking medication and, on balance, a little shaky, but she decided she felt well enough to drive. It would be easier than taking the bus and much less stressful than ordering another taxi. She arrived in Sutterton a little before midday. She was intrigued to see two police cars parked in the drive at Laurieston House and even more curious when she spotted Patti Gardner’s small white van, but technically she was on sick leave and acutely aware that she had no official business there. She parked her car in the lay-by on the green, removed the bag containing the journal and walked the short distance to 1 Laurieston Terrace, hoping that none of her colleagues would emerge from the de Vries house and spot her. She opened the wrought-iron gate and walked up the narrow pathway that bisected the neat garden as briskly as she could, glancing nervously at the small stream to her right as she went. It was a bright day and there were no rats in evidence.
Jackie Briggs opened the door almost as soon as she’d pressed the bell. She was wearing her pinafore dress, the high neck of her blouse once again primly fastened with the large brooch.
“Hello!” said Jackie with forced brightness. “I thought it was you. Are you feeling better?”
“Much better, thanks,” said Juliet.
“Would you like to come in? I expect you’ve come to ask me some questions about Harry.” The smile vanished and Juliet glimpsed bleak misery in the woman’s eyes before she lowered them. “He didn’t do it, you know. Oh, I’m sure that he was mixed up in some of those things – too easily led, too fond of the betting-shop, and he always looked up to Tony Sentance – but Harry’s no murderer.”
Juliet stepped into the cool, dark hall. The smell of lavender polish was as strong as she’d remembered from her previous visit.
“I haven’t come to talk to you about your husband, Mrs Briggs,” said Juliet quietly. “I’m not back at work yet and I’m no longer part of the case. I’m sorry for you, whatever the outcome. I know how unhappy you must be feeling.”
“Yes, well, fine words butter no parsnips,” said Jackie Briggs brusquely, a catch in her voice. “If it’s not about Harry, why are you here?” She’d turned to face Juliet now, as if barring the way further into the house.
“I’ve come to return this,” said Juliet. “You kindly lent it to DI Yates and he asked me to take a look at it while I was in hospital. It’s fascinating. Thank you.”
She handed over the bag containing the journal, deciding in a split second that she wouldn’t tell Jackie about what she and Nick Brodowski had found concealed under its covers.
“Oh,” said Jackie, taking the bag from her and looking inside it. “The diary. I’d almost forgotten about it. Myself, I didn’t think it was particularly interesting, except that it gives you a glimpse into what life was like in those days.”
“You told me that you met Florence Jacobs when you were a child. Can you remember her?”
“I saw her quite a few times when my grandmother was working there. Not every time – sometimes she was ill, or had visitors. She was bedridden by then. Her room was where the drawing-room is now.”
“What was she like?”
“Dull. Sullen. She didn’t say much. She had white hair in tight curls – permed, probably. And one of those pouchy faces that women get when they’ve put on weight and then lost it again.”
“But did you form any impression of her? Of her personality, I mean?” Juliet persisted.
“Like I say, she struck me as dull. You’d have thought she was not too bright, except that she had that shut-in look that people have when something’s made them wary.”
“You think that there was some tragedy in her past?”
Jackie shrugged.
“There might have been. She didn’t have much to be happy about. She’d been a widow for a long time and her son, Gordon, rarely visited. My grandmother would lose patience with her sometimes. Said that she gave herself airs and graces because she’d come from a poor background; that real ladies didn’t behave like that. But she could be kind enough when she wanted to be.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Sometimes I’d be sent in to see her and she wouldn’t say anything. I’d try to talk to her and she’d just lie there for half an hour or so until my grandmother rescued me. But occasionally she’d show more interest and odd times she’d talk to me – just a few words – and give me things, too. She had several boxes and purses in the cabinet next to her bed. This brooch was one of the things she gave me,” said Jackie, fingering it. “She said that it had been given to her by a very bad man. I took her to mean that it was someone who’d made a pass at her, or worse. It was hard to believe then, but she’d been quite a looker in her day. You could see it in the photographs she had by her bed.”
“May I see the brooch?” asked Juliet.
“Yes, but be careful with it. The stone is solid enough, but the gold is delicate. It gets bent out of shape easily. Silly idea, making a brooch in the shape of a spider, but I’m attached to it. It’s just costume jewellery, but you don’t get anything like it nowadays.”
Juliet took the brooch and turned it over. A tiny assay mark had been engraved on the pin. The large, brilliant cut stone was pale pink. Juliet walked to the still-open door and stood on the step, holding it up to the light.
“Mrs Briggs,” she said. “I may be mistaken, but I think that this stone is a diamond. A very large, pink diamond. I think you should get it valued. If I’m right, my guess is that it’s worth a great deal of money.”
And if I am right, thought Juliet, it was almost certainly Cecil Rhodes who gave it to Florence Jacobs. A very bad man, indeed.
Fifty-Seven
Despite the fact that the tip had come from Kevan de Vries and was therefore slightly suspect, Tim was convinced that he’d been correct in suggesting that both Sentance and Harry Briggs were headed for Hull. He believed they were almost certain to try to leave the country and that getting on a ferry from Hull was their best option; they might well be travelling, hidden by the driver, in one of the de Vries lorries, which took the North Sea crossing on a daily basis. The alternatives would be to risk going further to another port or airport, or holing themselves up in the Fens somewhere. Given what he knew of both men, he thought that their choosing either of these possible courses of action was unlikely. Sentance, in particular, would want to escape with the money. No doubt Harry Briggs had made sure of his own hefty cut and, as Sentance was physically afraid of him, Harry was probably calling the shots.
Tim thought that they’d try to meet, either en route somewhere or once they’d boarded a ferry. He made a number of phone calls to the Humberside police and the transport police who patrolled the docks at Hull. He asked Ricky MacFadyen to get a photograph of Harry from Jackie Briggs and had it scanned and emailed to the police at Boston and Hull. Ricky had established that Harry had a passport which Jackie could not find. Although she’d said she didn’t know where to look for it, the fact that she couldn’t lay hands on it only served to confirm Tim’s suspicions.
Tim felt restless. He couldn’t decide whether to go to Hull himself, purely on a hunch, or drive back to Spalding to take part in interrogating the supervisors. He realised with a pang of guilt that he’d barely seen Katrin during the past forty-eight hours and gave her a call. She seemed quite calm.
“How are you feeling?”
“A bit better, at last. Juliet came out of hospital a couple of days ago. She thinks she’s made some kind of breakthrough with Florence Jacobs’ diaries. She needs to talk to you about it.”
“Great. But it’s going to have to wait until tomorrow. We’ve just made some arrests and I’ve got another suspect on the run. Could you call her and say I’ll be in touch tomorrow? And I’ll catch you later. I’ll come home for dinner, but it might be late. Don’t wait for me.”
“OK. I love you.”
But Tim had already gone.
On balance, he decided not to go to Hull, much as he enjoyed the thrill of a chase. Given the levels of vigilance that he’d now instigated, he knew it was unlikely that Sentance and Briggs would be able to embark unnoticed on one of the ferries from Hull. Interviewing the eight staff from the Sutton Bridge plant would be a much trickier operation than hanging around in Hull. He was certain that they’d all instruct solicitors before they agreed to say anything at all. The evidence against them was still only circumstantial. He’d had the Sutton Bridge plant shut down and police from Boston and Spalding were combing it for clues.
His decision to return to Spalding was timely, because, when he arrived, Superintendent Thornton, whose normal demeanour exhibited reasonable but impatient testiness, was indulging in one of his rare out-and-out rages. On approaching his office, Tim could hear him storming at Andy Carstairs.
“You’d better speak up, DC Carstairs! Why have you arrested all these people? And what’s happening about Kevan de Vries? I hope that you haven’t been troubling him with your enquiries . . .”
Tim tapped at
the door and walked in.
“Yates! Would you kindly tell me what is going on?”
As soon as Tim had explained that another murder had taken place on the Lincolnshire side of the county boundary and that it was probably linked to the Norfolk murder, the superintendent quietened down. He shot Andy a baleful look.
“You could have told me that, Carstairs,” he said. “It would have saved a lot of trouble. Well, get on with it, both of you. I’m still dubious about bringing in so many suspects all at once. I hope you know what you’re doing. Just make sure you handle it carefully. Give them legal help if they ask for it. And, Yates, I still expect you to debrief me later about what is going on in the de Vries household.”
In the event, the interviews went even more smoothly than Tim could have wished. The supervisors were terrified of being charged with murder and opened up without too much difficulty when they were interrogated separately and under caution. Some even said more than advised by the solicitors appointed to safeguard their interests. Only Molly held out for a while before giving her own, sparser, account, but all their stories tallied and this time Tim knew they had not been able to collaborate in advance; on the last occasion they’d met alone they’d had no intention of admitting their guilt.
When all their accounts had been pieced together, Tim realised that the police already held much of the information they disclosed. It had been given to them in snippets by Sentance and by Kevan de Vries himself. Whether or not with de Vries’ permission – and Tim suspected that he would never know the truth on that point – Sentance had pursued his idea of recruiting young women from Eastern Europe to work in the ever-expanding de Vries plants. He’d encountered much more red tape than he’d expected. The solution that he’d come up with was to supply them with bogus British passports.
Sausage Hall Page 30
