Crisis in the Cotswolds

by Rebecca Tope

  ‘It’s that magic word, “vulnerable” that set everything ringing. Rosa knew enough to use it to extremely good effect. She’s been around the system long enough, after all.’

  ‘But Juliet’s gone missing before,’ Thea remembered. ‘I mean – she was constantly going off on her own when I knew her in Stanton.’

  ‘She hadn’t done it recently. Everything was so settled, at least in Rosa’s mind. Job, independent living, even a dog of her own.’

  Thea shivered. ‘Who’s got it now?’

  ‘Rosa, of course. She’s carrying it around with her, as if it was a piece of Juliet.’

  ‘So she went off without it on Tuesday?’

  Gladwin hesitated. ‘That’s a good question. I’ll have to check. I didn’t see the housemates – one of the uniforms went round for a chat with them. They didn’t have a lot to say, other than that Juliet never came home on Tuesday, and by the end of Wednesday they were getting seriously worried and contacted Rosa, who came to us. I don’t recall any mention of the dog at that point.’

  ‘So she was out for four nights,’ said Drew.

  ‘Right.’

  ‘But it is the merry month of May, after all,’ he went on. ‘People do funny things in May, even these days. Especially country people. Not just the birds, but the early sunrise and the new flowers – all that business. They sleep out, to watch the wildlife. Foxes and badgers and rabbits and hares. I would guess that Juliet might have been into that kind of thing.’

  The two women looked at him blankly. ‘I have no idea,’ said Gladwin.

  ‘Nor me,’ said Thea. ‘Where did you get all that stuff from, anyway?’

  ‘Simple observation,’ he shrugged. ‘And I think I read something about rough camping in France. You can’t really do it here any more, which seems rather a shame.’

  The word camping rang a bell with Thea. Somebody had told her he was going to camp out. A second later she recalled Clovis Biddulph’s assurance that he was absolutely not going to miss his father’s burial, even if he had to camp out in Drew’s field. She opened her mouth to mention it, and then changed her mind. No need for that sort of complication.

  Gladwin squared her narrow shoulders. ‘So, that’s about it for now. You’ve got visitors, haven’t you? You’ll be wanting to get back to them. The timing’s never good when this kind of thing happens, is it?’

  ‘They’ve gone out for the morning. We’ll probably go and meet them somewhere for lunch,’ said Thea, feeling no enthusiasm for renewed socialisation with the Coopers. She knew perfectly well where her real interest lay, and that was here with the police detective, trying to understand the who and the why and the how and the when of Juliet Wilson’s murder.

  ‘What a mess,’ moaned Drew as they walked back to the house. ‘I forgot to ask whether all that police activity would be gone by Tuesday. I’ve got Mr Biddulph then – I hope. Linda still hasn’t said for certain whether we can go ahead. But the complications are going to be bad enough, without blue tape and forensic chaps in white overalls.’

  ‘It’s three days away. They’re sure to be gone well before then. But what about the Biddulphs? There couldn’t be any connection with Juliet, could there? All these people are fairly local, after all. We don’t know who knows who.’

  ‘Oh, stop!’ he begged. ‘First you’ve got the Flemings involved, and now the Biddulphs. You’re always so obsessed with making connections, when there usually aren’t any. Mr Fleming lived in Stow. The nephew is local, admittedly. Nice chap, from what I saw of him. He was very good yesterday, carrying, lowering and being nice to his aunt. Linda and Lawrence Biddulph are from Ebrington. Clovis and his mother and brother apparently live over towards Oxford, according to Linda. She might be out of date about that, though. She says she’s had no contact with them for fifteen or twenty years.

  ‘They all live in three different places, I suppose. The sons must be well over forty by now. They won’t still be at home with their mother.’

  ‘He said he was going to camp out, so as to be sure not to miss the funeral,’ she said in a small voice. ‘I presume he knows enough to find the field and keep watch over it, even if not literally in a tent.’

  ‘He? You mean Clovis?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So you’re thinking he came here yesterday, or early this morning, and murdered Juliet – for what reason? Misplaced rage about his father? Or what?’

  ‘I didn’t say that at all. I’m just pointing out what he said to me, and how it might actually be a relevant detail. I do have to remind you that quite often the connections I make actually do turn out to be important. Very often, in fact.’

  ‘I’ll take your word for it. Gladwin obviously thinks you’re a born detective, anyway. Maybe you are. But I’m not. I hate the whole business, and wish I never had to see a person from the CID ever again.’

  ‘And you an undertaker,’ she teased, hoping to lighten the mood. ‘How’s that going to work, then?’

  He said nothing until they were in their lane, the house only half a minute’s walk away. ‘I was thinking in the night that maybe Maggs has got a point,’ he then said. ‘That maybe this line of work isn’t very wholesome, in the long run. I mean – undertakers are undeniably strange. It has to have an effect, doing it over a lifetime. What does it do to the kids? Stephanie made it perfectly clear that she couldn’t bear to have her mother’s grave right outside her window. There was a message there, which I chose not to hear.’

  Thea went cold, and silently cursed Maggs Cooper. ‘What else would you do?’ she asked him.

  ‘No idea. Don’t panic. I expect I’ll settle down again soon enough. It’s just a midlife wobble. I’ll be forty next year. Forty!’

  ‘Shut up. You’re just a baby. It’s fifty that’s worrying me.’

  They both laughed, and squashed together in an awkward side-by-side hug. Back indoors, they enjoyed ten whole minutes before the gathering crises on all sides intruded yet again.

  Chapter Eight

  Three things happened in rapid succession. First, Anthony Spiller phoned to talk about his discovery of a body close to Drew’s burial ground. He seemed to feel he’d inadvertently got the undertaker into trouble. ‘I’m so sorry,’ he repeated. ‘I just wanted to go and sit with Uncle Dicky for a bit, and listen to the birds with him. That’s all. I never dreamt …’

  ‘It must have been a horrible shock,’ Drew sympathised.

  ‘It was unreal. I mean – there was me, sitting by a grave, and suddenly there was this other body, just a hundred yards away. I still can’t believe it.’

  ‘No,’ said Drew. ‘I can imagine.’

  And so it went on for another minute or two.

  Secondly, Maggs called to arrange where they should meet for lunch. ‘Make it about one,’ she suggested. ‘We’ve got lots still to see here. And it took longer to get to than we expected. Do you know any good eating places?’

  Thea and Drew consulted briefly. ‘They’re mostly rather pricey,’ Drew said. ‘Gastro-pubs.’

  Maggs snorted. ‘Well, it is the Cotswolds,’ she said, with a hint of a sneer. ‘But there must be somewhere that’d give us sausage and chips, preferably in a garden. It’s quite warm.’

  ‘The trouble is, they change all the time. What’s cheap and cheerful one minute goes all upmarket and fancy-schmantcy the next. We can’t keep up with it. I think the best idea is for you to come back here when you’re done and we can go to our local.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Maggs slowly. ‘Seems a shame, though. We thought it’d be nice to explore a bit.’

  ‘We’ll take you to Chipping Campden this afternoon,’ Drew promised. ‘And we might go to Cirencester or Winchcombe tomorrow. I’ll drive.’

  ‘Rash promises,’ Thea remarked, when he’d finished. ‘You don’t know what else you might be doing by tomorrow.’

  He blinked at her. ‘Like what?’

  ‘Like applying for a training course in helicopter flying. Or signing up for the ar
my. Or even teaching. Who knows?’

  ‘Yeah, yeah. The trouble is, I’m too old for any of those.’

  ‘I think they’d still consider you for teaching.’

  ‘Stop it, okay? I wish I’d never said anything now.’

  ‘I wish you hadn’t, too,’ she said sourly.

  Thirdly, there was a knock on the door that took them by surprise. Hepzie barked, as usual too late to be of any use. She had been left alone in the house while her people went to meet Gladwin, and was feeling neglected. ‘Shut up,’ Thea told her.

  Drew opened the door. A man was standing there, his handsome face shadowed by a mixture of dark emotions. ‘You’re the man who does the burials,’ he told Drew. ‘Don’t try to deny it. I can see the hearse.’

  ‘Why would I deny it?’

  ‘Because that’s what you people do. Liars and cheats, the lot of you.’

  Thea came forward, having recognised the voice. ‘You must be Mr Biddulph,’ she said. ‘Mr Clovis Biddulph, right?’

  She met his gaze, and was astonished at the effect it had. He was of middle height, with black hair and blue eyes fringed with long lashes. He was of roughly her own age. And when he stared into her face, holding the connection for several long seconds, she felt that never before had she really seen another person so completely.

  ‘Do you two know each other? Have you met before?’ asked Drew, conscious of something troubling in the air.

  ‘Oh – no, I don’t think so,’ said Thea. ‘Just spoken on the phone. You are Clovis, aren’t you?’ she asked again.

  ‘That’s right.’ His initial rage was already less apparent.

  Thea had always been pretty, and men had always looked twice at her. She was so used to it that she barely even noticed by the time she reached her thirties. She knew it gave her an advantage in social situations, with even other women showing due appreciation. While aware that it was nothing more than a superficial accident of proportion and bone structure, she also understood that it was an inescapable part of her person. Small and pretty trumped every other permutation when it came to sex appeal and interactions with other people.

  And this man had the same fortunate mixture and he knew how to use it. She knew already that he was not vain, or unintelligent, or self-obsessed. He probably wasn’t as good a man as Drew, nor as controlled in his emotions. There was something Latin about him. No English man had ever given her a look like the one she’d just experienced.

  ‘You’d better come in,’ said Drew. ‘Now you’ve found us.’

  The words echoed in Thea’s head and she was seized with terror. No! she wanted to cry out. Send him away before he destroys us.

  It was ridiculous, overwrought, adolescent nonsense, she told herself wildly as she let Drew lead the man into his office. She held back and hoped she could remain hidden away in the kitchen, or even perhaps the garden shed, until he’d gone. Except they didn’t have a garden shed, because the hearse and van took up too much of the available space.

  It was approaching twelve o’clock. An hour before they were due to meet the others at the Bakers Arms. Would Clovis Biddulph stay talking to Drew for all that time? What, after all, did he have to say? Drew wasn’t a family therapist, even if he did listen to a great many accounts of domestic dysfunction. Realistically, his only role was to give the man’s father a dignified burial – and if family conflict made that impossible, he would be well within his rights to simply walk away and wash his hands of them. The only reason she could think of for the man to be here at all was to force Drew to admit that the burial was to be in Broad Campden, and to supply the day and time appointed for the funeral. But newly bereaved people did not always need reasons for what they did. They acted out of extreme emotion, often assisted by alcohol and a sense of high drama. She had also been made aware of a frequent sense of urgency – an atavistic knowledge that dead bodies were acutely time-limited and that their disposal could not be unduly delayed. Especially where alternative undertakers who abjured embalming were involved.

  All this went through her mind as she lurked in the kitchen with the spaniel. ‘I suppose we could go for a walk,’ she muttered, to the dog’s great delight. But before she could put the idea into practice, the door opened and Drew looked in.

  ‘Oh, there you are. Do you think you could join us for a minute? Mr Biddulph thinks you ought to be included.’

  ‘What? Why? Didn’t you tell him it was nothing to do with me?’

  Drew had a look of a man out of his depth. He came further into the room. ‘He says that since you were the person who spoke to him when he phoned, you have a responsibility towards him. Something like that. He’s very insistent.’

  ‘Has he calmed down at all?’

  They were speaking in whispers, but still Thea worried that they could be overheard. Drew had not closed the door of the office.

  ‘Oh yes. You needn’t worry about that. Why – were you scared of him?’ He looked almost hopeful, as if this would be one of the easier scenarios to cope with.

  Yes! she wanted to shout. ‘Of course not,’ she said. ‘Well, come on, then. Let’s get it over with.’ Her heart pounding, she followed her husband along to the room at the back of the house.

  Clovis Biddulph was sitting in one of the padded chairs Drew provided for his clients. His legs were crossed at the ankles and he looked outrageously comfortable. No wonder poor Drew didn’t know what to make of him, thought Thea.

  ‘Ah – Mrs Slocombe. I’m sorry to drag you here, but it seemed quite wrong to leave you out of the picture. I should probably mention that I spent some considerable time yesterday in tracking you down online. There’s a surprising quantity of material – nearly all of it concerning murder investigations. You were a house-sitter, I gather, until recently. I have to say I was most intrigued to meet you.’

  She did her best to avoid looking directly at him, but there was no possibility of succeeding. ‘Well, here I am,’ she said faintly. She and Drew sat down awkwardly. The strange man was so completely in charge, it almost felt as if he had a gun pointing at them.

  ‘Yes,’ he agreed pleasantly.

  Drew jumped into the awkward pause. ‘The thing is, there really isn’t anything I – or my wife – can do about your family issues. I can’t give or withhold permission for you to attend the burial. At most, I can make a plea that you don’t cause any trouble. My first loyalty is to your … the current Mrs Biddulph. She’s your father’s next of kin, and she gave me my instructions for the funeral.’

  ‘She and her precious son,’ said Clovis, with an unnatural lack of bitterness. His easy manner was far more unnerving than anger would have been. ‘I dare say she told you that my little half-brother has no idea that I exist. Nor our other brother, Luc. And the misguided woman apparently wishes to keep it that way.’ His laugh was every bit as relaxed as his words. ‘We’ve always known about him, of course. My mother made sure of that. She would have been delighted if we’d approached the brat and made our existence known to him – but we never did. Couldn’t really see the point, I suppose. And Luc’s … well, you might not be aware that Luc has problems.’

  ‘Oh?’ said Drew, apparently more than happy to let the man talk, as was Thea.

  ‘He smashed himself up in a car five years ago. In and out of hospital ever since. They don’t think he’ll ever manage to walk again.’ Finally, a flash of anger crossed his face. ‘We contacted my father about it, and got no response whatsoever. Not a word. How do you think we felt about that?’

  ‘Not good,’ Drew suggested. ‘So – when did you last see him? Your father, I mean.’

  ‘Thirty-six years ago,’ came the prompt reply. ‘I was ten and Luc was seven. He just walked out one day. It turned out, of course, that he’d been seeing Linda for a while, and just went off with her. My mother didn’t tell us the whole story until we were older. She had a sort of breakdown at the time, from the shock. She made him wait five years for the divorce. The moment it came through, he marrie
d Linda. They’d already got a son by then – Lawrence.’

  Drew made a wordless sound, expressing sympathetic interest. Clovis went on, ‘So you’re right when you say she’s his next of kin. We don’t dispute that for a moment. But there’s Luc to consider, you see. I don’t mean financially, but he’s been trying to sort himself out emotionally, and a lot of stuff’s been coming to the surface. We’re not claiming that some of the old man’s estate should come to us. He never paid a penny in child maintenance, you know. But by the time we were old enough to think of confronting him about it, we were both past needing it, quite honestly. Luc was only just out of school, but he’d got a good job at British Aerospace – training scheme and so forth.’

  Drew gave him an enquiring look, and Clovis smiled. ‘Yes, I’ve done all right for myself as well.’ He stroked a hand down his expensive-looking shirt.

  Thea was wondering whether she might manage to slip out again, while the man was in full spate. But he seemed to read her mind, abruptly stopping his monologue and giving her a searching look. Her knees trembled, but she returned his look steadily. ‘I really don’t think I need to be here,’ she said. ‘What you’re telling us is all very interesting, but as Drew says, it doesn’t actually change anything, does it? Your father seems to have behaved badly towards you, and now he’s died before you can confront him, that must be frustrating. But none of it is Lawrence’s fault, is it? Can’t you just let them have the funeral, before you … well, shatter his illusions?’

  Drew inhaled noisily, letting it be understood that her plain-speaking was not the way he would have done things. ‘Er … well …’ he stammered. ‘Perhaps we ought to leave that side of things up to you. It’s not for us to dictate …’

  ‘Mrs Slocombe obviously has a perfect grasp of how things stand,’ purred Clovis Biddulph. ‘And she’s not afraid to say so. That’s very impressive. I am extremely impressed.’ He beamed his approval from his clear blue eyes, and smiled with his sensuous lips, and Thea’s knees almost melted.