The Chessman

by Dolores Gordon-Smith

  ‘I don’t like those, I must say,’ agreed Ashley. ‘It’s a sort of mockery, isn’t it?’ He shook his head in perplexity. ‘I reckon we really are dealing with a lunatic. The way the body’s been treated would make me think that anyway, but these lilies are the finishing touch.’

  Jack nodded. ‘It’s nasty, isn’t it? Looking at these injuries, anyone would think that we’re dealing with someone with several screws loose. On the other hand, it’s certainly going to make the body difficult to identify. That’s rational enough.’

  He leaned forward and pointed to the arm that was slung across the torso. ‘The skin’s been hacked off on his upper arm.’

  ‘I wondered if that was to conceal some sort of mark.’ Ashley turned to Jack. ‘I think he had a tattoo.’

  Jack nodded. ‘I bet you’re right. Again, it looks as if the murderer’s trying to conceal his victim’s identity.’

  ‘So you think the murderer is entirely sane?’

  Jack clicked his tongue in dissatisfaction. ‘I don’t think he’s entirely sane. I can understand him trying to conceal who the poor bloke was, but I can’t explain the lilies. Perhaps the murderer associated the idea of lilies with churches and funerals. We could be looking for someone with an anti-religious kink, or maybe someone who’s got a personal grudge against the vicar.’

  ‘That’s an idea,’ agreed Ashley. ‘I’ll ask Mr Dyson.’ He stood back. ‘I suppose the lilies came from the church? Mrs Stanton and Mrs Castradon were doing the flowers when they found the body.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ said Jack absently. He looked again at the flower in his hand. ‘Actually, I don’t think they did, you know.’

  He picked up more lilies and examined the stems. ‘Look at this, Ashley. These flowers haven’t been cut, they’ve been picked. Picked very roughly, too, if you look at the stems, as if they’ve been wrenched out. If they came from the church, Isabelle or one of the other ladies who do the flowers would have picked them, and I can’t believe any of them would pick flowers in such a careless way. They’d use secateurs or a knife, surely.’

  ‘I see what you mean,’ said Ashley. He rubbed the stem of a lily between his fingers. ‘These stems are tough, aren’t they? I think it’d take some strength to break off handfuls of these flowers.’ He shuddered. ‘If the flowers were brought here on purpose, that makes it worse, in a way. I think we’re looking for someone who’s off their head. It’s the only explanation I can think of. They might appear rational enough, but I think there’s a big streak of insanity at the bottom of this.’

  He stepped back. ‘Is there anything else you want to see, or can I have the body taken away?’

  ‘There’s just one thing,’ said Jack. ‘Can you smell something odd?’

  ‘I can smell rather too much for my liking.’

  Jack nearly smiled. ‘No, I don’t mean the body or the lilies. There’s another smell, isn’t there?’

  Ashley breathed in deeply. ‘If you say so,’ he said dubiously. He put his head to one side. ‘Actually, I just caught a whiff of it then, a sort of sweet, sickly smell.’

  Jack nodded. ‘That’s it. It reminds me of the East, for some reason.’ He shrugged. ‘We might find something to explain it once you move the body.’ He stepped back. ‘Okay, Ashley. I don’t think there’s anything more I can add.’

  ‘Right you are. We’ve got a van waiting outside.’

  He walked down the passage and summoned the two uniformed policemen who were waiting by the church door. ‘You can take it away now, men.’

  ‘What about the crowd outside the gate, sir,’ asked one of the policemen. ‘Shall I move them along first?’

  ‘No,’ said Ashley. ‘Leave them be.’ He glanced at Jack. ‘I want a look at that crowd. If I see anyone gloating when we take the remains out, I want to know who they are.’

  ‘Good idea,’ said Jack. ‘I’ll keep an eye on everyone with you.’

  The policemen, their shapes black against the brilliant sunlight of the open door, walked towards them. They unrolled a stretcher and with a nod to each other, lifted the body out of the cupboard and placed it on the waiting canvas.

  Ashley took the torch back from Jack and turned it on, so the light fell on the shelf of the cupboard. ‘The knife’s not in there, is it?’

  ‘No, but something else is. It’s a chess piece.’

  Using his handkerchief, Jack reached into the cupboard and picked up the chess piece. It was a black knight with crystal eyes, heavy for its size, carved out of marble. If it hadn’t been for the torchlight, they might have missed it. ‘This is an interesting find.’

  ‘I suppose I’d better keep it,’ said Ashley doubtfully. ‘Although it probably belongs to the church.’

  Jack shook his head. ‘I don’t think so. It looks as if it’s from far too expensive a chess set to be kept in a church cupboard.’ He made a rapid search of the other shelves in the cupboard. ‘There isn’t a chess set here. There aren’t any board games at all. There’s no sign of the knife, either.’

  Ashley sighed. ‘I went through this church with a fine toothcomb earlier on. If the knife’s not in the cupboard, I’m fairly certain it isn’t here at all. The murder obviously took place elsewhere. If we can trace how the body got here, we might find the knife abandoned at the spot.’

  He glanced up at the two policemen. ‘Give me and Major Haldean a couple of minutes to get to the gate before you bring the body out. And cover it up, will you? I don’t want anyone in the crowd fainting on me.’

  They walked down the path and, joining the two policemen who had guarded the entrance to the churchyard, stood either side of the lichgate. The rise in the ground gave them a good view of the waiting knot of onlookers.

  The crowd fell silent as the body, its nakedness now covered by the tartan rug, was carried past. The men, moved by an innate sense of propriety, took off their hats and caps. Jack saw interest, sympathy and decently disguised excitement on the faces around him but nowhere could he see that evil and unholy joy that Ashley had speculated upon. Whoever the murderer was, he was willing to bet they weren’t here.

  The stretcher was loaded into the van and the crowd fell back as it drove off.

  ‘Move these people along,’ said Ashley to the policemen. ‘There’s nothing more to see. Stay on duty and make sure nobody enters that church until I say so.’

  Jack stepped back into the churchyard. In one way it was idyllic, with the sun gilding the old stones of the ancient, hummocky graves and the daisy-rich grass, bright with buttercups, rustling gently in the breeze. However, the churchyard’s very air of otherworldly peace, enclosed as it was by high hedges, made it very secluded. The grave’s a fine and private place … The line of poetry ran through his head. The graveyard was a fine and private place, too. You wouldn’t be overlooked here.

  ‘Have you searched the churchyard, Ashley?’ he asked. ‘I wonder if he was bumped off out here?’

  ‘I had the same idea, Haldean. I ordered a thorough search this morning and had a good look round myself. There’s no traces whatsoever. I think we can rule out the churchyard.’

  ‘So it wasn’t a living man but a dead one who was brought here,’ said Jack thoughtfully. ‘How did the body arrive? By car?’

  ‘A car’s the obvious answer,’ agreed Ashley. ‘However, I’ve searched the road and couldn’t find a thing.’

  He led the way down the path, out of the lichgate. St Luke’s stood on a corner plot, with the main road running past the churchyard at the front, with a tree-lined lane to the left. The lichgate opened onto the lane, a broad, dusty corner of road that quickly narrowed into a grassy path with overhanging trees.

  The main road running up from the village, with its grass verges and ditches, was wide, its surface of earth and chalk showing deep ruts from farm carts and tyre tracks. It carried, as Ashley said, most of the traffic in and out of the village.

  The other road, Coppenhall Lane, widened out at the lichgate of the church, but quickly narrow
ed into a narrow, pebbly path with grass growing up the centre.

  ‘You can see the problem for yourself,’ said Ashley. ‘It’s been at least three days, perhaps more, and the chances of finding an individual car track, especially after the crowds that have been here this morning, are just about nil.’

  ‘I’m sure if there was anything to be found, you’d have found it,’ said Jack. He returned to the lichgate, looking closely at the hawthorn hedge that grew round it. ‘There’s nothing there that I can see.’

  Keeping on the road, he stepped past the entrance of the gate and examined the hedge on the other side, the side coming from Coppenhall Lane. ‘Where does this lane go to, Ashley?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s nothing but a footpath, really. It’s fairly wide here, but, as you can see, you couldn’t get a car along it. It’s a short cut to the village proper. It comes out not far from the Red Lion and the village green.’

  Jack crouched down, looking at the glossy green of the hawthorn with its spiky thorns that grew up beside the church wall and spanned the narrow ditch. A thread of red and yellow caught his eye and he gave a little grunt of satisfaction.

  ‘Ashley! Come and have a look at this.’

  Ashley looked to where Jack was pointing and grinned. A few red and yellow threads were caught on the thorns. Taking a pair of tweezers from his pocket he detached the threads and laid them flat on the palm of his hand. ‘I bet they’re from that tartan rug.’

  ‘I bet they are too,’ said Jack as Ashley placed the threads in an envelope. He crouched down again, examining the grass beside the gate.

  ‘This grass has been flattened and some of the buttercups have been broken. The grass is dry enough to show traces. If the murderer closed the gate behind him, he’d have to put the body down to do it. Do we think the body was placed here?’

  ‘That seems reasonable enough. Hullo! What’s that?’ Ashley stooped to where the grass grew in a long fringe under the hedge, parting it with his fingers. He picked up a small square silver box with a flip-top lid. ‘It’s a silver matchbox. I caught the gleam of it just then.’

  Ashley picked up the box by the corners and held it up to view. ‘It’s a nice little thing, isn’t it?’ He held it out so Jack could see. ‘There’s the initials E.C. engraved on it. It can’t have been here long, otherwise the silver would’ve tarnished.’

  ‘It looks like a nice, solid sort of clue,’ said Jack approvingly.

  ‘It could be. As I see it, the murderer put the body down by the hedge and opened the gate. He could’ve easily have dropped the matchbox then.’

  ‘True,’ agreed Jack. He clicked his tongue. ‘On the other hand, E.C. could’ve come out of the gate as a perfectly innocent churchgoer and lit his pipe or a cigarette before heading home. He might not have been into the church at all, but simply stopped for a breather.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ admitted Ashley. ‘Still, it’s near enough to where the threads were snagged to make me want to keep it.’ He put the matchbox into an envelope, put it in his bag and stepped back. ‘Those threads are on the wrong side of the gate if we’re assuming the murderer came up the main road.’

  Jack turned and looked down Coppenhall Lane. ‘So the implication is …?’

  ‘That the body was brought along the footpath, I suppose.’ Ashley’s forehead crinkled in a frown. ‘You couldn’t get a car along here. The murderer would have to have some strength to carry or drag the body along the path.’

  ‘I’ve come across a murderer who moved a body in a wheelbarrow before now.’

  And so he had. Figuratively speaking, Betty had been involved with that murder and that wheelbarrow, he thought with a rush of tenderness. It was rum that something that had started so badly should end so well. He was supposed to be taking her out to dinner tonight.

  ‘A wheelbarrow?’ said Ashley, recalling him to the here and now. ‘That’s an idea. Let’s have a look along the lane, shall we?’

  Coppenhall Lane was flanked by the tall hedges of the church on one side. Across the road was a grass verge, a ditch and trees. In the bright sunshine it was pleasantly shady, but at night it would be pitch black. You could move a platoon of bodies along here at night without being seen, but, on the other hand, you’d have to be very confident of being able to find your way.

  They walked slowly along the path, round the corner that led to the village.

  About four hundred yards down the path, they came to the low stone walls of the backs of three substantial early Victorian villas, each set in their own large garden.

  A vigorous climbing rose, cut back to allow the gate to open, virtually concealed the wall of the first house.

  Jack looked at the rose and grinned. ‘This is rather nice, isn’t it? Are you interested in roses, Ashley?’

  Ashley looked to where Jack was pointing. A few red and yellow threads were caught on the thorns. ‘I’m interested in those roses,’ he said, brightening. Using the tweezers, he picked the threads off and added them to his collection in his bag.

  ‘Who does this house belong to?’ asked Jack.

  Ashley paused, getting the geography right. ‘These houses face onto the village green. This first house is the Vicarage, but I don’t suppose the vicar had anything to do with it. Dr Lucas, the doctor who’s performing the post-mortem, has the middle house in this row. He uses the front rooms as his surgery. The end house belongs to Mrs Castradon and her husband.’ He stopped abruptly. ‘I say, Haldean! Mr Castradon’s Christian name is Edward. E.C.! Those are the initials on the matchbox.’

  ‘Steady on,’ said Jack with a grin. ‘That matchbox could be nothing more than a blind alley. I don’t really believe in murderers who drop their initialled property at the scene of the crime.’

  ‘You’d be amazed at the mistakes criminals make. However, it could be a coincidence. Come on. Let’s see if we can find anything else.’

  Despite a careful search, the rest of the lane yielded nothing and, a couple of hundred yards on, they came out onto the village green.

  ‘Well,’ said Ashley, ‘we’re a bit further forward. We know the body was brought along Coppenhall Lane.’ He turned and looked at the backs of the houses thoughtfully.

  ‘It’s tempting,’ said Jack, ‘to assume that the body was brought out of the back gate of one of those houses. However, there’s plenty of space round the green to park a car. The murderer could’ve parked here and taken the body along to the church along the lane. On the face of it, that seems to argue local knowledge but really, there’s nothing that a ten-minute stroll round the village couldn’t tell you.’

  ‘True enough. But that doesn’t answer the big question, does it? Why was the body left in the church in the first place?’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Jack, ‘the vicar will be able to shed some more light on that. Let’s go and see him, shall we?’

  FIVE

  It was easy to see which one of the three houses which fronted the green was the Vicarage. Mrs Dyson, a stout, friendly-looking woman, was in the garden, with a trowel in hand and a wicker basket beside her. She straightened up and waved them over with a flourish of the trowel.

  ‘Do come in, Mr Ashley,’ she said, coming to the gate. She looked inquisitively at Jack as Ashley introduced them.

  ‘Major Haldean? It’s a pleasure to meet you. You’re Mrs Stanton’s cousin, aren’t you? I’m so glad her husband was here to take care of her.’

  ‘She was very grateful to you as well, Mrs Dyson.’

  ‘It was the least I could do,’ said Mrs Dyson with deep concern. ‘She and poor Mrs Castradon were terribly upset, poor things. Frederick and I brought them to the house and I made sure they both had a cup of strong tea with a drop of brandy in it, but really, there was nothing we could do. Poor Frederick was very shaken, of course, as we all were, but, being a man, he doesn’t like to say as much.’

  ‘Male pride, eh?’ said Jack with a grin. ‘Anyone would be shaken, after a sight like that.’ He took the marble black knight from
his pocket. ‘Incidentally, Mrs Dyson, we found this in the cupboard. I don’t suppose you recognize it?’

  She took the chessman from him and, taking off her glasses, examined it closely. ‘No, I can’t say I do. We do have a chess set and other board games, of course, for the Scouts and Guides and Frederick’s Lads’ Club, but they’re all kept in the parish hall,’ she said, handing it back to him. ‘This looks as if it’s from an expensive set, Major. All our board games are made of boxwood, so they’re cheap enough to replace if any pieces get lost.’

  ‘Is Mr Dyson at home?’ asked Ashley. ‘We’d appreciate a word with him if he can spare the time.’

  ‘I’m sure he’ll be glad to see you both,’ she said, wiping the trowel and putting it in the wicker basket. ‘It seems as if we’ve got a lunatic at large, but I can’t think of anyone who’d do such a thing. There are a couple in the village who are wanting, as the expression is, but they’re not mad, just poor souls who are simple-minded.’

  She stopped, her naturally rosy face paling. ‘What I saw in the church this morning seemed evil. That’s a strong word, but I don’t think I’ve ever come across real evil before.’ She looked at the garden helplessly. ‘That’s why I came out here. I simply had to find something physical to do to take my mind off it.’

  ‘Of course you’re upset, Mrs Dyson,’ said Ashley kindly, laying a hand on her arm. ‘It’s only to be expected, having something like this happen on the doorstep, as you might say.’

  ‘That’s the worst of it, Mr Ashley,’ she said, leading the way up the path. ‘It more or less has to be someone who’s on the doorstep. I did wonder if it could be someone so unhinged they’ve got a grudge against the church or even Frederick, but it really doesn’t seem possible anyone would go to such lengths.’

  ‘It’s funny you should say that, Mrs Dyson,’ said Ashley. ‘That’s more or less what Major Haldean and I wondered ourselves, isn’t it, Haldean?’

  Jack didn’t answer. His attention had been caught by a scrubby bank of white flowers. ‘Look over there,’ he said quietly.