Aunt Bessie Likes

by Diana Xarissa

  “Yes,” Amy replied. “Although here I go again. I’m not sure I want to know. Maybe, once we have all of the answers, I’ll feel differently, but right now, after all this time, I just want to bury my baby and move on.”

  “Surely you don’t want to see someone get away with murder?” Doona asked.

  “Someone already has,” Amy told her. “Whoever did it has had thirty or so years of getting away with it. My Helen never got to grow up, get married, have children of her own. Whoever killed her has probably done all those things. Throwing him or her into prison won’t change that.”

  “It might stop him or her from killing again,” Bessie suggested.

  Amy looked surprised. “Killing again? But, that is, I mean,” she took a deep breath. “I hadn’t even considered that as a possibility,” she said. “I suppose I just assumed that, well, that something happened, more of an accident that murder. You don’t think the killer has killed more than just the three girls?”

  “I think the police need to investigate thoroughly, find the responsible party and make sure that he or she is locked away,” Bessie told her. “And I would feel that way even if there was only one victim.”

  Amy sighed. “I’m not thinking clearly,” she told Bessie. “I haven’t been since nineteen-seventy.”

  Bessie patted her arm again. “I can’t begin to understand,” she said. “But I’m sorry.”

  Amy drew a sharp breath. “I think that’s my cue to leave,” she said, getting to her feet. “It was nice to see you again.” Before Bessie or Doona could speak, the woman was on her way to the door. Doona looked at Bessie with a questioning look in her eyes. Bessie scanned the room.

  “Ah, that must be Harold,” she said. “I’m not sure I would have recognised him if Amy hadn’t reacted that way.”

  Doona glanced at the man who was standing at the bar next to Joanna. “All little old men look very similar,” she said as Bessie got to her feet.

  “He and James look a lot alike, but they are brothers,” Bessie replied. She took a few steps towards the man, but stopped when someone touched her arm.

  “Bessie Cubbon?” a voice said. “After not seeing you for thirty years, this makes twice in a week.”

  “Peter Clucas,” she said. “It’s lovely to see you again. Bessie introduced Doona. “If I hadn’t just seen you the other day, I don’t know if I would have recognised you,” she told him. “You’ve changed a lot over the years.”

  The man frowned down at the glass in his hand. It was half full of an amber liquid. “Maybe not as much as I should have done,” he muttered.

  “I understand you’re doing great things for the island’s youth,” Doona said.

  “I try hard,” Peter told her. “I have a lot of my own mistakes to try to make up for, after all.” He took a sip of his drink and then put the glass on the table. After a deep breath, he pushed the glass a few inches away from himself.

  “You and Matthew were good friends,” Bessie said. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  “We were friends many years ago,” Peter said. “But we hadn’t spoken for quite some time. We had a bit of a falling-out at one point and we never really sorted it out.”

  “That’s a shame,” Bessie said.

  “It happens,” Peter shrugged. “We really only had drink in common, so once I quit drinking, we would have drifted apart anyway.”

  “It was nice of you to come and pay your respects,” Doona said.

  Peter smiled at her. “I don’t remember you from my childhood in Laxey. Of course, you’re much younger, but you don’t look familiar.”

  “I grew up in the south of the island,” Doona told him. “It’s only in the last three years that I’ve come to appreciate what Laxey has to offer.”

  “I’m in Douglas now, but I do miss it up here,” he replied.

  “I really need to have a word with Harold,” Bessie told the other two. “It looks as if he might be leaving. I’ll be right back.”

  She didn’t wait to see if Doona would protest. Harold had been talking to Joanna, but while Bessie had been watching, he’d turned and begun to head for the door. It only took Bessie a few steps to catch up with him.

  “Harold?” she asked. “How are you?”

  The man looked at her and blinked slowly. “Can’t hear a bleeding thing in here with all this noise,” he shouted. “I’m going outside for some peace and quiet.”

  Bessie nodded and then followed the man to the door. When she walked outside with him, he looked surprised. “Didn’t know you were coming, too,” he said loudly. “What did you want?”

  “I just wanted to say hello,” Bessie replied.

  “Pardon?” he said, cupping his ear.

  Bessie repeated herself, more loudly. “It’s been a long time,” she added.

  “Oh, aye, a long time,” he replied. “It’s Bessie Cubbon, right? I remember you from Laxey in the old days.”

  “Harold, turn up your hearing aides. You’re shouting.” The woman who’d just joined them was another who looked only slightly familiar. Bessie placed her as much from context as appearance.

  “Brandy?” she asked.

  “Yeah, it sounded a lot sexier when I was twenty-two,” Brandy laughed.

  Bessie couldn’t help but agree. The name didn’t really seem to suit the woman, who was plump with grey hair and thick glasses. “How are you?” she asked.

  “Oh, we’re getting by,” Brandy replied. “He’s deaf as a post, really, but he doesn’t think he is.”

  “Pardon?” Harold asked. “You should speak up,” he told Brandy.

  “I was talking to Bessie,” Brandy shouted at him. “Don’t you worry.”

  Harold nodded and then shuffled a few steps away from the women.

  “He’s getting a bit senile as well,” Brandy confided. “He doesn’t know about the bodies. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t tell him.”

  “It isn’t my place to tell anyone anything,” Bessie told her. “Will you tell him if they identify Helen?”

  Brandy sighed. “I don’t know,” she said after a moment. “I think he ought to know, but I’m not sure that he’ll understand. I might leave that decision up to his son. I’d leave a lot more of his care up to Henry as well, if the man would step up.”

  Bessie knew better than to get involved in that particular argument. “Have you told him about Matthew, then?” she asked.

  “Someone else did,” Brandy replied. “And then he insisted on coming to see Joanna. He was quite lucid today, actually. He talked a lot about Matthew and how sorry he was that he’s passed. I don’t know if he’ll remember any of it tomorrow, but at least he was able to share some memories with Joanna tonight.”

  “I’m sure this is difficult for all of you,” Bessie said.

  “I thought I knew what I was getting into, marrying a man with children,” Brandy replied. “I never once imagined that one of my stepchildren would vanish. Harold has never really recovered from that, you know.”

  “It must be awful for you,” Bessie said.

  “It’s awful for me,” Harold boomed. “It was my daughter, not hers. She doesn’t understand.”

  Bessie gave Brandy a sympathetic look before turning to Harold. “I’m sorry,” she said. “About Helen and about Matthew.”

  “I always thought Matthew knew what happened to Helen,” Harold said. “And now he’s dead and we might never know. That’s what makes me sad about his passing, you know.”

  Bessie patted his arm and murmured something, wondering at his words.

  “We should go,” Brandy said, taking Harold’s arm. “We’ll have a cuppa and a digestive when we get home.”

  “Or whiskey,” Harold replied. The pair walked away, arm in arm, while Bessie watched thoughtfully. When they were out of sight, she turned and went back into the pub.

  Doona was still sitting with Peter where she’d left them. “Is everything okay?” Doona asked as Bessie slid back into her seat.

  “It’s f
ine,” Bessie assured her. Before she could speak again, the pub door swung open and the room fell strangely silent.

  “That’s my cue to get out of here,” Peter muttered, sliding down in his seat.

  Bessie watched as Jonas and his wife crossed the room to Joanna. The conversation looked tense as everyone around the room seemed to be watching the interchange.

  “Let me get the next round,” Jonas said loudly as he turned away from Joanna.

  “Not necessary,” Peter Yates called from behind the bar. “But what will you and your lovely wife have?”

  Jonas steered Tara to the bar.

  “Maybe he won’t notice if I sneak away,” Peter said from his seat beside Doona. “If he looks my way, create a distraction,” he said to Doona. His tone was joking, but his face was serious.

  “Why don’t you want to speak to him?” Bessie asked.

  “He’s another one that I had a bit of a falling-out with,” Peter explained. “Although ours was rather more serious.”

  While Bessie watched, the man headed towards the door, seemingly deliberately keeping to the darkest edges of the room as he went. Both Doona and Bessie blew out breaths as he escaped from the pub.

  “That was odd,” Bessie said.

  “He was trying to get my phone number before you came back,” Doona reported.

  “Was he? He has a son,” Bessie told her.

  “I know,” Doona replied. “His wife passed away some years ago and he’s been single ever since. He seems really nice, but, well, I’m not looking for a man just now.”

  Bessie couldn’t help but wonder how much John Rockwell played into Doona’s reluctance to get involved with anyone, but she didn’t voice the question. Instead, she turned her attention back to Jonas and Tara, who were making their way around the room. Jonas was greeting everyone as if they were long-lost friends, while Tara sipped her drink and looked bored.

  “Ah, Bessie Cubbon,” he said when he reached their table. “It’s delightful to see you after all these years.”

  “You’re looking well,” Bessie told the man.

  “Life’s been good to me,” Jonas replied. “But have you met my wife?”

  “I don’t believe I have,” Bessie replied.

  Jonas introduced her, and Bessie did the same for Doona.

  “I’m sorry for your loss,” Bessie said once the introductions were out of the way. “I know you and Matthew were good friends once.”

  “He and I had a lot of fun together,” Jonas replied. “I haven’t had a friend quite like him since, if I’m honest. We always pushed one another to try increasingly outrageous things.” The man laughed. “I suppose I should be embarrassed, really, by some of the things we got up to, but it was all just youthful hijinks, really.”

  Bessie thought about the stories she’d heard about the young men. Much of what they’d done had been criminal and not at all what she would classify as “youthful hijinks,” but she bit her tongue.

  “The police are being awfully quiet about what happened to Matthew, aren’t they?” Jonas asked. “I mean, I heard he committed suicide, but no one will confirm that.”

  “I’m sure I haven’t heard anything,” Bessie replied.

  Jonas looked around furtively and then leaned in close to Bessie. “I’ve even heard a rumour that he topped himself because he was going to get charged with murder. They’ve found the bodies, as I understand it.”

  “I’ve heard that the police have found some bodies,” Bessie said. “But I don’t know anything beyond that.”

  “You don’t know much, do you?” Jonas snapped. He took a long swallow of his drink and then spoke again. “Sorry, but this whole thing has me feeling unbelievably stressed. The thought that Matthew might have killed those girls? They were my friends, I was even seeing one of them. I have to imagine that they turned down his advances or something.” Jonas shook his head. “I knew Matthew for most of his life and I would never have imagined that he was capable of murder.”

  “I don’t think anyone is suggesting anything of the kind,” Bessie said coolly.

  “I have my sources,” Jonas told her. He glanced at Doona and then looked back at Bessie. “I can tell you that he was quite jealous of my success with women. Maybe that was behind some of it, maybe why he targeted Karen. I’m not sure we’ll ever know.”

  With that he turned on his heel and strode away. Tara was gazing vacantly into the middle distance and didn’t seem to notice. Jonas had taken four or five steps before he looked back.

  “Tara,” he snapped. The woman glanced over at him, a terrified look on her face. She nearly ran the short distance between them, and Bessie could hear the apologies spilling from her lips when she reached Jonas’s side. Grabbing her arm, Jonas dragged her across the room.

  “I don’t like him,” Doona said.

  “I don’t either,” Bessie replied. But that doesn’t make him a murderer, she added to herself.

  Half an hour later the pub was clearing out. Bessie and Doona decided that they’d had enough excitement for the evening and headed for the door themselves. Bessie stopped to give Joanna another quick hug on their way.

  “I’m rather very drunk,” Joanna told her, enunciating carefully. “It’s what Matthew would have wanted.”

  Bessie wasn’t able to argue with that. She and Doona made their way to the door, where a man who’d been sitting on his own in a dark corner all evening joined them.

  “I hope you have some interesting things to tell me,” John Rockwell murmured to Bessie as the trio left the building.

  “Come back to mine for tea,” Bessie invited him. “We can talk there.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Doona drove Bessie home with John following close behind. At the cottage, the women sat in the kitchen while John did a quick inspection.

  “No one hiding under my bed?” Bessie asked when he joined them.

  “Just a few dust bunnies,” John replied.

  “There aren’t,” Bessie retorted. She worked hard to keep her small cottage neat and tidy. The idea that there might be dust under her bed wasn’t worth thinking about.

  “Actually, there aren’t,” John agreed. “How do you keep the cottage so clean?”

  “I’m only one person,” Bessie said. “I don’t make much mess.”

  John looked around the compact kitchen and nodded. “I suppose, if I made more effort to tidy after myself every day, I wouldn’t have as much cleaning to do when I do clean.”

  “But you work very hard,” Bessie pointed out. “You don’t have much time at home. Maybe you should hire a cleaning service.”

  John shrugged. “I’m not happy with the idea of having strangers in my house,” he told her.

  “I’ll just put the kettle on,” Doona said. “Maybe a few biscuits as well?”

  Bessie chuckled as she sat down. “Of course my guests also look after themselves,” she told John. “And of course we’ll have biscuits,” she told Doona.

  Doona found a box of expensive chocolate ones at the back of Bessie’s cupboard. “Oh, I don’t suppose we should open these,” she said.

  “I think that’s all I have in at the moment,” Bessie replied. “I haven’t been shopping or baking. Open them up and let’s see if they are good as they should be.”

  Doona made a pretty arrangement with the sugary treats while Bessie worked on the tea. They all sat down together a few minutes later.

  “So, what did you learn tonight?” John asked after they’d all had their first biscuit.

  “That these were worth every penny,” Bessie said, gesturing towards the plate in the centre of the table. “And nothing much else.”

  “You seemed to talk to a lot of people,” John said.

  “I did,” Bessie agreed. “And I don’t think any of them like Jonas Clucas, but I’m not sure that’s news.”

  “Not really,” John said. “But it’s still a long way from there to seeing him as a murderer.”

  “Some people seem to t
hink he was involved,” Bessie said. She took another biscuit and then walked John back through her evening, recounting each conversation as well as she could remember.

  “There are lots of rumours flying around, then,” John remarked when she was finished.

  “That’s hardly surprising, under the circumstances,” Bessie said.

  “We’ve just sent a press release to the local paper,” John told her. “If you’re interested in an update, I’ll tell you now what’s being released.”

  “Of course I’m interested,” Bessie told him.

  “We’re still digging on the site, but we know for a fact that we have the remains of at least five individuals,” John said.

  “Five?” Bessie repeated.

  “Yes, all young women, somewhere between thirteen and twenty as an approximate.”

  Bessie shook her head. “But how is that possible?” she asked.

  “We won’t know for certain until we identify them all,” John replied. “We’re reasonably certain that we’ve found Karen Kelly, though.”

  “I thought DNA testing took a week or more,” Bessie said.

  “It does,” John told her. “But Karen suffered from several broken bones in her short life, including a bad break in her right arm that left the bone broken in three places. One of the skeletons shows evidence of the same injury.”

  “She was hit by a car,” Bessie remembered. “She was about ten, I think, and already a little bit wild. She and her family were at the beach in Port Erin and she wanted ice cream. It was something like that.”

  “As I heard the story, she ran off with some of her mother’s money to get herself an ice cream and ran straight into oncoming traffic. She was lucky to get away with a badly broken arm, really,” John told her.

  “If Karen is there, that suggests the other two are as well,” Bessie said, sadly.

  “It does,” John agreed. “We’ve also made a tentative identification on one of the other bodies.”

  “Really?” Bessie asked. “Who was she?”

  “A young runaway from Liverpool,” John said. “She disappeared in nineteen seventy-one.”

  “So after the Kelly girls,” Bessie mused.