Murder in the Goblins' Playground (DCI Arthur Ravyn Mystery Book 1)

by Ralph E. Vaughan

  “It’s not good talking about the stones like that,” Alfred said, starting to rise from his chair. “Not right.”

  “Time for a drink on your host, and to settle down,” Woodcock said. He had no interest in saving the Major from his own folly, but he did not want anyone to go for six in the snug. “We’re all mates here, so let’s lift our glasses and…”

  The door to the outside burst open. Every gaze whipped about at the sharp bang. It was ancient, heavy as a vault door with thick diamond-shaped panes of leaded glass set in a lattice panel, so smoked over they were almost opaque.

  Back in more modest times, it was the door through which the parson or an unaccompanied lady might enter without being seen. Nowadays it served more to keep the flashier crowd from being offended by riffraff in work togs and muddy wellies.

  At first they saw only misty darkness. Woodcock, thinking the door had somehow been blown open by a stray gust, came from behind the bar. A figure hove into view. He stepped back, then frowned when he saw who it was.

  “You been barred!” the publican bellowed. “You get yourself back out of here, Allan Cutter! You’re not welcome here!”

  Cutter stood just inside the door, left hand pressed to his chest. He looked slowly around the small room, but his eyes seemed unfocussed. His mouth was open, as if on the verge of protesting his being barred, again, from the Three Crowns, but no sound emerged. He reached toward Woodcock with his right hand.

  “Listen, now, I don’t want no trouble from you,” Woodcock began. “You been barred for…”

  Woodcock’s words ended in a ragged gasp. His eyes widened as he watched blood seep through Cutter’s fingers and drip to the rough wood floor. He stepped back, felt the hardness of the bar in the small of his back.

  Cutter collapsed to the floor.

  The men who had been frozen by Cutter’s sudden entrance into the snug now leaped from their seats, even Lenny who sallied forth unsteadily. Chairs tumbled. Only Woodcock did not rush to the side of the fallen man. He remained against the bar, still trying to push his way back, as if he could, through an act of will, pass through the bar and hide on the other side.

  “Stand aside,” Westerham ordered, pushing his way forward. “Let me through. Give him some air. This man’s been injured.”

  “No, he ain’t been injured,” Tom said, standing, taking several steps back, looking at the smears of blood on his big hands. “He’s been murdered.”

  “Don’t be daft!” Westerham cried. “Who would want to murder Allan Cutter?”

  Who wouldn’t? Woodcock thought.

  And in that thought he was not alone.

  Chapter 2: The Path to Hob’s Lane

  “A single wound, narrow and very deep, at least eight inches, not a knife though,” said Lena Penworthy. She stood from the body. “At first I thought dagger, dirk, something along those lines, but it’s round. At first glance, you understand, nothing official.”

  Detective Chief Inspector Arthur Ravyn nodded. He stood, brushed some imagined dust from his left knee, and took a step back. He stared at the body, taking in every detail of dress, every aspect of position. He looked around the snug, saw Stark interviewing the pub owner, saw the other witnesses set apart but still eyeing each other. He looked back to the pathologist.

  “How long did he survive after being stabbed, Doctor?”

  “I really won’t know until after the postmortem,” she replied.

  “An educated estimate,” he urged.

  “I’d really rather not guess, Chief Inspector.”

  “An estimate is not a guess,” he pointed out. “The entry wound is near the heart, but obviously the heart was not penetrated, else he would have dropped immediately. It seems a precious small amount of blood, Might we conjecture a fair amount of internal bleeding?”

  “Well, yes, the amount of blood is scant,” she admitted. “It’s certainly possible. If an artery were nicked, most of the bleeding might be internal.”

  “And if it were indeed nicked?” he suggested.

  She sighed, detesting the way he elicited generalities, when she preferred absolutes. He was a damned infuriating man, and most infuriating of all was the way his instincts usually led up the right paths. Prior to his comment, she herself was thinking of nicked arteries and internal bleeding. Were this the Seventeenth Century rather than the Twenty-first, she mused, DCI Arthur Ravyn might be swinging in a warlock’s noose. But in Hammershire County, the past had a way of intruding upon the present, so anything was possible. She had always been something of an optimist.

  “If an artery were nicked, death would be slow…” she began.

  “But sure?” Ravyn interjected.

  “Very sure,” she replied. “Even a minor arterial nick would result in massive blood loss. The more he moved, the more blood lost, though if internal, as does seem to be the case here, he might not have realised the seriousness of his injury. Shock would ensue. He would become more confused, and by the time he understood he was dying, if he ever did, he might instinctively head somewhere he saw as a place of shelter.”

  “Such as his local,” Ravyn said.

  “Quite.” She looked at the way his bespoke dark suit clung to a body still mostly trim. “Most men would.”

  “And how long would that…” He paused. “How long could that be, Doctor?”

  She spread her hands before her, then clasped them together as if she were praying for escape. Ravyn’s steadfast belief in her skills was as flattering as it was frustrating.

  “At a rough, very rough guess…”

  “Estimate,” Ravyn corrected.

  “As little as a few minutes,” she said. “As long as a half-hour.”

  “No longer?” he asked.

  She crossed her arms resolutely. She had given him what he wanted, and she was not going to let herself be badgered any further. She was already far enough out on a limb that she imagined she could hear it cracking under the weight of supposition.

  “Very well,” he relented. “I suppose I’ll have to wait until you have conducted the postmortem.”

  “I suppose you shall.”

  “And when will that be?” he asked.

  “Are you planning to attend?”

  He smiled thinly. “No, Stark will represent me.”

  “Yes, I am sure he will,” Penworthy said. “Tomorrow at ten.”

  “You couldn’t make it eight, could you?” Ravyn asked. “I’d like Stark to get here as soon as possible.”

  She sighed. “I suppose I could switch one or two of my other ‘clients.’ I doubt they will mind. All right, Chief Inspector, eight it will be.

  “Good night and thank you, Doctor,” Ravyn said. “A pleasure, as always.”

  Leaving Penworthy to attend to the details of removing the body, Ravyn moved toward Stark and the pub owner.

  Detective Sergeant Leo Stark saw Ravyn out the corner of his eye, leaving Dr Penworthy and moving toward him. He had heard rumours that Ravyn and the pathologist had been an ‘item,’ for all of two or three weeks, but saw nothing in their actions that gave the rumour legs. Besides, from what he knew of Ravyn and had heard of Penworthy, each was unlikely to penetrate the other’s shell. He returned his attention to Woodcock.

  “So, Cutter was barred, you say?”

  “Aye, for life,” Woodcock answered.

  “Why come here?” Stark asked. “He knew you’d be hostile.”

  “Hostile?” Woodcock said. “He’s come here all his life. Not likely to stop just ‘cause he’s dying, is he?”

  “But you said he was barred,” Stark pointed out. “For life.”

  “Well, it’s not like it’s the first time he’s been barred.”

  “For life?”

  “For life.” Seeing confusion writ large on the young man’s face, Woodcock added: “It’s what you have to do to a man like Cutter, to keep him in line, bar him for a few days when he gets rough.”

  “And for life?” Stark prompted.

  �
��Week, maybe two,” he replied. “Believe me, Sergeant, for a man like Cutter, a week is a lifetime, two borders on eternity.”

  “Heavy drinker?”

  “Does the Queen have a hat?”

  Stark frowned, jotting in his notebook. “Why the snug? Why not the public? More chance of getting help there.”

  “Not his kind of people in the public,” Woodcock replied.

  “In what way?”

  “Well, most of them are respectable, aren’t they,” Woodcock said. “And the rest are flash, either part of the crowd that wants to develop the village or punters looking for a piece of the action.”

  “Develop Ashford?” Ravyn asked, stepping forward. “Why in heaven’s name would anyone want to do that?”

  Woodcock looked at the newcomer and shrugged his beefy shoulders. “Money. Isn’t that what everything is about?”

  “Mr Woodcock, this is DCI Ravyn,” Stark said.

  Woodcock squinted. “Do I know you, Mr Ravyn?”

  “You know Aunt Althea,” Ravyn said. “There’s quite a keen resemblance, so I have been told.”

  “Althea Haven?” Woodcock smiled broadly. “Ah, yes, I’ve known your aunt for donkey’s years. Taught me as a nipper at the primary school. I was in the last class before she retired.”

  “Yes, she mentioned you during my visit,” Ravyn said.

  Woodcock shifted nervously, remembering what a handful he had been, what they had all been. He wondered just what she had told the Chief Inspector, and when.

  “We did not actually meet then, Mr Ravyn?” he ventured.

  “Not likely, I think.” Ravyn knew for a fact that Woodcock’s face was not in his memory, though it would be forever now, but it was best to let the man wonder a bit. “I stayed with Aunt Althea a few weeks one summer many years ago. Except for running some errands for her, I tended to spend my time indoors. Auntie thought unoccupied boys got themselves into trouble, therefore she kept me occupied, old lesson plans, recitations and the like.”

  Woodcock nodded. He glanced between the two men. They were a study in contrasts, Ravyn the older of the two, appearing as if he had stepped from a tailor’s shop, Stark wearing a suit a size too big and a grey overcoat that looked like it had been tossed by a charity shop. By his clipped tones, Stark marked himself an outsider, an outcast from London, while Ravyn spoke more slowly and had the slightly rounded vowels that marked the typical Hammershire accent. Stark was a know-nothing, while Ravyn was a man with a background very much like his own. He would much rather be questioned by a juggins like Stark than a man like Ravyn.

  “Sergeant, I have a few questions to ask Mr Woodcock, if you do not mind,” Ravyn said. “Interview the other witnesses please. Get their stories, their contact information, then send them home. The snug is closed.”

  “Yes, sir,” Stark said.

  “After you’ve done that,” Ravyn added, “check with the two constables at the public door. If they’ve done what they were told, they should have a list of anyone who left or came in.” He looked to Woodcock. “Tessie still work the bar?”

  “Yes, still working,” Woodcock answered.

  “Get Tessie to make out a list of everyone in the public bar and about how long they’ve been there,” Ravyn instructed. “She’ll know the locals and how to contact them. If she doesn’t know someone, or how to contact them, ask for identification.”

  “Yes…”

  “Ah, Mr Ravyn, is that totally necessary?” Woodcock cut in. “I can help you with any Tessie doesn’t know. I was in there till just minutes before Allan Cutter came in, so there’s no need to have your sergeant bother my guests, is there?”

  “Is there a reason he shouldn’t?” Ravyn asked.

  “They’re just folk having a good time,” Woodcock explained. “This has nothing to do with any of them, surely.”

  “Get going, Stark.”

  “Yes, sir,” Stark sighed, moving off to do his guv’nor’s bidding.

  “Who doesn’t need to be bothered, Mr Woodcock?” Ravyn asked when they were alone.

  “I don’t get your drift.”

  “Of course you do,” Ravyn said. “You don’t care about locals. Where else will they go for a pint that doesn’t involve a trek or a trip? The punters? Well, they’re like locusts, aren’t they? Good for a quid or five before they’re off to some other picturesque haunt. So, who is it in the public bar that you don’t want Sergeant Stark to annoy?” He waited a moment. “We don’t like to annoy people ‘less we have a reason, but we can always find a reason.”

  “Oscar Lent,” Woodcock finally said.

  “So, it’s Lent with his finger in the pie, is it?”

  Woodcock nodded.

  “What’s Oscar up to in Ashford?”

  “It doesn’t have anything to do with what happened to Cutter,” Woodcock protested.

  “I’m sure it doesn’t,” Ravyn said, smiling, his voice softer than usual, almost like a serpent’s hiss. “What’s his game?”

  “The plan is to develop Red Cap Woods,” the publican said. “It’s a complete plan—housing estate, Tesco, retail park, even a green belt with trails and paths to keep the mentals happy. It’s a big thing, good for everyone.”

  “Red Cap Woods?”

  Ravyn pursed his lips contemplatively. Aunt Althea had filled his mind with dark tales of those woods and the beings who called the deepest part of the forest home. She called them Elementals, but other of his aunts had called them Elves or Goblins. Aunt Agatha told him they were survivors of ancient British tribes who had hid from the Romans and later invaders. Auntie Dorcus, however, claimed they were relics of a pre-human past, survivors from a time when monster-gods ruled the Earth. Of course, he had more than a few aunts who deemed them ‘stuff and nonsense,’ and by even harsher terms.

  “I doubt that has endeared Oscar Lent to anyone here.”

  “The Regional Planning Council is in favour of it,” Woodcock defended. “They’ve held public meetings.”

  “I’m sure they are, and that they have,” Ravyn remarked. From personal experience, he knew the RPC could be easily bent one way or another, depending on which direction the money flowed. “But I imagine it’s a hard sale here?”

  “Very hard,” Woodcock admitted. “I think I’m for it myself. ‘Bout time Ashford got dragged into the Twenty-first Century, I say. I’m looking forward to increased trade.”

  Ravyn glanced at the rough-hewn men Stark was interviewing. “That what you tell your snug customers on a cold winter’s night when the wind is roaring through the woods?”

  Woodcock grimaced, thinking of the drift the conversation had taken in the snug just before Cutter’s manifestation. Yes, they knew he rather agreed with the developer’s plans, but he made sure no one knew just how much he agreed. Accommodating the enemy by awarding special favours was one thing, he knew, but actually climbing into bed was entirely different. One was an infraction, the other a treasonous offence in a small village.

  “I tend to keep my opinions to myself,” he said.

  “Good for business?” Ravyn elbowed Woodcock in the ribs with easy familiarity, like two old mates sharing a secret.

  “Uh, yes, uh, very good, Mr Ravyn,” he admitted uneasily.

  “How long had your customers been in the snug before Cutter appeared?” Ravyn asked, his voice abruptly sloughing off any hint of affability.

  “They all came in early,” Woodcock answered, “about dusk or a little after. Once in, they stayed.”

  “Just these four?”

  “It’s always a small clientele for the snug, just locals,” the man explained. “I let them run a tab, pay as they can rather than as they go. Not the money-maker the public bar is, but they’re regular, and most of them wouldn’t want to go to the other side, any more than they would be wanted there.”

  “Just want a place to get quietly drunk with people they know,” Ravyn said. “Say what they want away from wife and mum?”

  “I suppose you could put
it that way.”

  Ravyn took another quick survey of the snug customers. Stark was on the verge of cutting them loose after the customary warning.

  “One of these is not like the others,” Ravyn said.

  “I don’t follow you, Mr Ravyn.”

  “Come now, Mr Woodcock” Ravyn said. “You’ve played the children’s game. Tell me abut your odd duck.”

  Comprehension spread across Woodcock’s face like a hot wave. “Oh, you mean the Major…Westerham, John Westerham.”

  “Doesn’t have the Ashford look, does he?”

  “Yeah, he’s easy to peg as an outsider, I suppose,” Woodcock agreed. “He’s a newcomer, moved here about twenty or so years ago. Retired from the Army. Royal Logistic Corps, I think, though he gets pretty vague when pressed for details.”

  “Looks a little too reputable for the snug.”

  “Likes drinking here.” Woodcock shrugged. “Truth is, I’d be just as happy to have him in the public, but…” Again, he shrugged.

  “Oh, why is that?” Ravyn prompted.

  “A bit of a troublemaker, he is,” Woodcock said softly, leaning forward. “A bit too quick to jump in when he doesn’t know what he is talking about. Like tonight, I had to get on to him about…” He paused as he recalled that Ravyn was not some bosom mate, but, rather, a copper. “Well, I don’t suppose that has anything to do with anything, certainly not the murder.”

  “No, I don’t suppose so,” Ravyn agreed. “Bit of a row going on, though, was there?”

  “Wouldn’t call it that, no,” Woodcock said. “As you say, the idea of developing them woods is a hard sell, and hardest with this lot. Entrenched. Set in their ways. Don’t like change.”

  “Change is bad,” Ravyn murmured, invoking a common mantra in Hammershire County.

  “That’s exactly right with these lads,” Woodcock confirmed. “They don’t have vision. I may be just as born and bred as they, but I don’t let that cloud my eyes.”

  “Talking up Lent’s plan then, were they?”

  “They got going when they heard merrymaking on the other side, then worked up when they learned Lent was hosting a do,” he said. “It was all I could do to keep them in their seats, and then the Major pops his corker.”