by Agatha Frost
And they’re not yours.
“An agenda?” Dot risked another question, and the probing looks followed. “What agenda was she pushing?”
“Like I said,” Ethel replied, still avoiding Dot’s gaze, “it doesn’t matter now. She’s not here to push it.”
“But you said her agenda wasn’t obvious until recently,” Dot said, feeling braver despite the stuffier silence. “So, you must have discovered something as a group that cast Penelope in a different light.”
“I said no such thing.” Ethel dismissively waved her hand as she pushed all her coins into the pile in the middle of the table. “All in. Who’s with me?”
A couple threw in their coins, but most folded. Dot looked down at the hand only one king away from a royal flush.
“Yes, you did,” Dot insisted, adding all her coins to the bet. “You can’t deny it. We all heard you.”
Dot searched the room for someone with some sense. None braved her eye, not even Amy Clark.
“I don’t think that’s what I heard,” Martha said, picking up another card. “It doesn’t sound like something Ethel would say.”
“None of this matters,” Ethel said, laying out her cards. “What matters is that we have an opportunity to move forward on a better foot. Four of a kind. I take it I’ve won this round as well, ladies?”
“Royal flush.” Dot laid her cards on the table and scraped the coins towards her. “And for your information, I am the woman who started another group. I’m somebody, and I have a respectable team, including a newspaper editor. Amy’s in it, too, so you can count her out of your half-baked revival.”
Dot scooped her winnings into her handbag, counting at least twenty individual shiny pound coins amongst the more minor change.
“Amy, are you coming?”
Amy hesitated, but she folded and followed Dot to the door.
“Thanks for all you said.” Dot was barely able to conceal her grin. “You’ve given us a lot to investigate.”
“What on Earth are you talking about?” Ethel demanded, meeting her eye again.
“Penelope’s murder,” she said, pushing up her curls. “My as-yet-unnamed group are looking into the murder.”
“Neighbourhood watch groups don’t solve murders!” Ethel laughed. “You silly woman.”
The rest followed like nervous hyenas.
“Mine does.” Dot ripped open the front door. “And you’ve just put yourself at the top of my list of suspects.”
The gaggle of women went on cackling, but Dot could barely hear them over the theory boiling in her mind. Julia’s joke about Dot being behind the murder to start a rival group. Still, the theory wasn’t so preposterous when attached to Ethel.
“That woman is power-mad,” Dot said as they hurriedly walked away from Ethel’s cottage. “Did you see how they ignored their ears and bent around her delusion just to please her? It was insane! Why didn’t you back me up?”
“Oh, I, erm . . .” Amy scratched at her hair. “I’m sorry, Dot. I panicked. Ethel scares me.”
“Scares you?” Dot cried. “Grow a backbone, woman. She’s a charlatan and a mediocre poker player. But no matter. That went much better.”
“Better than what?”
“No need to dwell on the failings of the investigation,” Dot said. “A successful interview has just been conducted, and we have some important details to add to our board.”
“Right then.” Amy stopped, and Dot realised they’d reached the corner of her street. “You’ll be wanting to get back to that. I’ll see you at the meeting tomorrow?”
“Yes.” Dot clutched the strap of her bag in both fists. “Unless you wanted to come back for another scone?”
Amy’s face lit up, and they continued together. Though Dot hadn’t previously given Amy much of her time, and Amy had lost her ability to speak when Dot needed back up, at least she’d been loyal enough to follow.
“I’m sorry about that,” Dot said as they walked through the village. “You might need to find a new bridge club.”
“It’s alright. I was going to quit anyway. I always lost money.”
“We’ll show them, Amy,” Dot said, looping her arm through the organist’s, scratchy pink cardigan. “Just you watch. We need to discover what this secret agenda is. It’s the key to all of this, I know it.”
5
T he pleasant spring weather continued into the next day, prompting Julia to stow a picnic basket in the bottom of Olivia’s pram before leaving the cottage. The graveyard hadn’t been her intended location to eat scones, but it was as good a place as any.
“I should have brought flowers,” Julia said aloud, pulling back the plastic of the now-crinkled bouquet she’d left on Mother’s Day.
Barker licked cream and jam from his lips as he set his scone on his plate. Dot and Percy had replaced Katie and Brian for the previous night’s scone production factory line at the cottage. Under Julia’s guidance, most of the new batch had turned out just as well as the first when forgetting the burnt tray that had gone straight into the bin.
“Someone’s been here recently,” he said, turning over the card attached to the fresh-ish red roses leaning against the stone. Setting his reading glasses on the end of his nose, his lips pricked into a smile as he traced the words. “‘Still thinking of you, Pearlie.’ They didn’t leave a name, but I recognise the handwriting.”
Julia didn’t need to hear a name or ask who the handwriting belonged to. Only her father had ever referred to her mother, Pearl, as ‘Pearlie’.
“If I die, will you still come to visit my grave decades later?” Julia asked, pulling Olivia back from belly-crawling off the edge of the blanket.
“You’re not allowed to die before me,” he said through a mouthful of jam and cream. “And thanks. I was starting to forget how morbid this place was until you said that.”
Julia scanned the graveyard as she finished assembling her scone, but she didn’t pick up on any morbid energy. The cemetery had well-tended grass; shade from the early afternoon sun thanks to Howarth Forest; and a soundtrack of bright, bubbly birdsong. In the dead of winter, perhaps she’d understand. On such a lovely day, the place was as alive as the green or Mulberry Lane, and they weren’t only picnickers, either.
While most seemed to be visiting relatives they’d come to terms with having lost, across the graveyard, nearer the imposing shadow of the church, fresh grief and raw pain hung in the air.
Julia couldn’t see the skinny lad’s face under the shadow of his black peaked cap, but his shuddering shoulders betrayed his stifled sobs. When she wondered if her mere observation might be an intrusion, the young man crouched. His black outfit blended into the shadows, and the staggered rows of stone hid him well.
For the best.
Julia found it challenging to look away from such pain. Not to stare. She could easily recall similar pain from her life, and it triggered her instinct to help, stranger or not.
“Wasn’t Penelope found over there?” Julia asked before biting into her scone.
Barker smiled wryly as he dabbed at the corners of his mouth. Craning his neck, he followed Julia’s gaze to the rows nearest the back of the church. He nodded.
The boy reappeared, kissed his fingers, and pressed them against the stone before walking off with his chin tucked into his chest. Rather than heading to the exit as most people would have done after a visit, he went towards the village hall.
“I had a feeling that’s why you wanted to come here.”
“Olivia and I come here all the time,” Julia protested, even as an arched brow joined Barker’s smile. “Okay, so perhaps I was curious.”
“Perhaps?” Aided by the stone, Barker pulled himself upright and scooped up Olivia before she could attempt another great wriggle for freedom. “Knowing this village, I’m surprised people aren’t forming an orderly queue to see the place where Penelope Newton died.”
After finishing the chocolate orange scone, which wasn’t quite as tasty
as the ones Katie made, Julia packed up the pram. She touched the cold stone and promised she’d bring flowers the next time.
“Gerald Martin,” Barker stated when Julia caught up to him and Olivia with the empty pram. “1912–1952.”
Despite the length of time since Gerald’s death, a fresh sea of flowers lay at his headstone. Julia wondered if any had been laid for the plot’s original tenant. With one hand on the pram’s handle for balance, she pulled back the tag of the top bouquet, one of the simpler bunches, comprising of pink and white carnations.
“‘You were right’,” she read aloud, showing Barker the sloppy handwriting. “That’s all it says. No name. What do you think that means?”
“Maybe she had a bet with a friend over who would die first?” Barker suggested, glancing in the direction the lad had gone. “Do you think they’re from that guy?”
“I couldn’t see if he had any in his hands.”
Julia put the tag back and ran her fingers along the engraved dates. Gerald Martin was only forty when he died, the same age Julia was now. She felt nowhere near ready to die, but she doubted Penelope, though thirty years her senior, had either.
“Mining accident,” Barker explained as he placed Olivia in her pram. “Christie dug into the guy’s background looking for connections to Penelope or anyone else in her group, but he seems to be unrelated. He was an only child who never had children.”
As she passed Olivia her favourite rattle, Julia couldn’t look away from the headstone. Decades of rain had darkened it, and moss had crept up through the grass as though trying to reclaim the material. No cracks or blood remained behind to attest to Penelope’s fate, but she hadn’t expected any. The crime scene cleaners were always meticulous. If not for the flowers and the grass being more trampled here than anywhere else, she might have walked past without knowing this was the spot where the horrific event had happened only nights earlier.
“If this headstone doesn’t mean anything,” she mused, eyes darting from picnicker to picnicker dotted amongst the neat stone rows, “why kill someone here? It’s so open.”
“According to Christie, her phone records show that a withheld number called approximately half an hour before the estimated time of death.” He paused, acknowledging a woman with a nod as a giant husky bounding forward on a short rope lead dragged her past. “They’re trying to trace it. From the camera footage they’ve stitched together, it looks like Penelope came straight here. I think it’s safe to assume the phone call is what brought her here.”
“But by who, and why?” Julia stepped back and looked around the graveyard. “Presumably someone she knew if she came here voluntarily?”
“Very good.”
“I’m just thinking about where we are.” She stepped back and tilted her head to look up at the church. “Why do people come to graveyards?”
“To mourn the dead,” he replied when she paused. “Go on; I’m intrigued.”
Julia gathered her thoughts as Olivia’s rattle-shaking gave way to a nap, right on schedule.
“People come to mourn during the day,” she said, tucking a blanket around her sleeping daughter. “At night, it’s still a big, empty, open space with no camera coverage. Aside from dog walkers and maybe kids hanging around, I can’t imagine many other reasons to come here.”
“So, you’re suggesting Penelope might have met someone here because she was scared of them and wanted to feel safe while still having some privacy?”
“Maybe.” Julia shrugged. It had made more sense in the shower, with a brain still muddled by early morning sleepiness. “Or the killer chose this place knowing it would be empty.” She shook her head. “Although, there’s something about smashing the head on the stone.” She acted out a simplified version of what she imagined the move would have entailed. “This doesn’t strike me as a particularly premeditated method of killing someone, which lends some credit to my gran’s theory that one of Peridale’s Eyes did it. Penelope stormed out of their final meeting. Maybe she thought she was meeting someone here to resolve whatever caused the bust-up?”
“I’d say it was resolved, alright.”
“We still don’t know what that argument was about.”
“The way Christie was talking on the phone this morning, you might not have to wait much longer for an answer,” he said, lowering his voice despite the nearest person being several rows away. “Your gran isn’t the only one sniffing around Peridale’s Eyes. Christie swears he’s on the brink of getting a confession out of one of them. Wouldn’t say who. Sounds like they’re all co-operating, and he wants to keep it that way.” He cleared his throat and, louder, said, “But you’ve made a good point. It could go some way as to explaining why the graveyard.”
“And the forest,” she said, nodding to the edge of the treeline. “An easy getaway, whether or not it was a premeditated murder.”
Barker smiled from ear to ear. When he didn’t speak, she looked around to see what she’d missed.
“What?”
“Nothing.” He shook his head. “It’s just nice to see this side of you again. It’s been a while.” He hitched up his sleeve to check his watch. “I should get going. I said I’d meet Christie at the café for a catch up, amongst other things.”
Julia opened her handbag to hunt for her phone; she was surprised her gran hadn’t yet called to remind her of their meeting today.
“Other things?”
“Your father and Katie’s buyer,” he said. “I wanted to verify a few details, and it’s been a while since he gave me any divorce updates. Lost something?”
“My phone.” She patted down her pockets. “Did I leave it at the cottage?”
“You took a picture of Olivia when we first sat down,” he reminded her. “I can go and get it for you.”
“No, it’s okay.” Shielding her eyes from the sun, Julia looked back to her mother’s grave. “It’s not far.”
While Barker pushed the pram around the side of the church to wait by the gates, Julia weaved through the headstones to the familiar location of her mother’s headstone. The sun’s reflection beamed off the glossy glass screen of her phone, half-tucked under the crinkled flowers.
The phone reacted to her touch, lighting up to show the picture she’d snapped. Olivia’s gummy grin beamed at the camera, still toothless. According to the midwife during her last weigh-in appointment, the first tooth could come in any time now. Julia hadn’t expected to be the mother who took pictures of her child several times a day, but Olivia did cute things far too often not to capture them. She forwarded the picture to Jessie, who immediately replied with a yellow face with hearts for eyes.
“King!” a woman’s voice cried from within the forest. “Get over here right now! Don’t make me chase after you!”
Four headstones down, the husky that had passed them earlier bounded out of his owner’s grasp with a stretched grin and a full mouth. He circled several graves, and he was big enough that his salt and pepper fur grazed the tops of the headstones. He dropped his prize and flattened himself to the ground.
“King . . .” The woman’s warning caused him to bounce up and down as she emerged from the trees, her knitted rainbow hat making her hard to miss. “This isn’t a game.”
King obviously disagreed. He nuzzled his treasure, and despite seeming almost as tall as Julia’s vintage car, his steps were light. His owner waved half a frayed lead at him; the other half trailed from his collar.
Julia almost left then, armed with the story of a dog being adorable that she could tell her gran to stop Dot thinking she hated the species, but King’s prize grabbed her attention. Both owner and dog looked up at her with very different eyes. She couldn’t quite make out the woman’s, but King’s were brilliant white lined in black, with tiny pupils.
Nothing like Lady and Bruce’s eyes.
Everything like the colouring of the dampened shoe between his paws.
“Second one this month,” the woman said, brandishing the piece of r
ope. “They’re supposed to be for horses. I love the big teddy bear to pieces, but I’m starting to think I may have overcommitted to—”
“Maybe don’t touch that shoe,” Julia interrupted as the woman reached out. “Unless it’s yours?”
“I think he found it in Howarth House,” she said, frowning at Julia as she changed direction and curled her fingers into King’s thick leather collar.
While the woman attempted to connect the two halves of the lead with a knot, King flopped onto his side and let out a soft howl. As cute as he was, Julia’s gaze turned towards the forest. The fresh spring leaves on the dense trees limited visibility beyond the very edge.
A twig snapped under Julia’s foot.
She hadn’t realised she’d stepped forward.
Whether from memory or the house being so big, Julia could just about make out the house’s outline, and it was drawing her in.
“Did you find it?”
Barker’s voice pierced through the spell, breaking it, and she retreated from the forest as he approached with the pram. The woman had her rope tied together. However, she was staring at Julia with all the suspiciousness she likely deserved at that moment. She tugged on King’s lead, and he dragged her back into the forest.
“Is that what I think it is?”
“The elusive other shoe.”
Barker stared up at the unbroken blue above.
“It didn’t fall from the sky,” she said, nodding towards the trees. “According to King’s owner, it was in Howarth House. Could it be a coincidence?”
Though the white trainer with black piping was generic, it matched the scruffiness of the one Barker had found on the night of Leah’s break-in; the only difference was a coating of mud.
“Probably isn’t. Let’s be real.” Barker let go of the pram, squinting towards the treeline. He stepped forward, looking down as he snapped the two halves of Julia’s twig into quarters. “I’ll have a look. Wait here.”
By the time Barker got to the edge of the forest, Julia was already trundling along behind with the pram. Not only were there walking trails and plenty of people using them, but it was broad daylight in a busy graveyard.
