Trevega House

by Will North

  She walked around the leeward side of the house and found a low stone shed easily forty feet long and roofed in corrugated metal. It sat perpendicular to the house along one side of a large penned yard in which milled what she guessed were easily a hundred noisy, plump snow white ducks. Standing amongst them, a short balding man was slinging feed to the birds and talking to them.

  “Mr. Kerrow? Billie?” She called above the din.

  He turned his head and stared, motionless, as if his feet were nailed to the yard. A lifelong bachelor, he was not accustomed to female visitors, especially ones as comely as this one.

  “I’m Terry Bates, sir. Police,” she called from the fence. She waved her warrant card. “Might we have a quick chat? It’s about Mary Trevean.”

  Finally, he moved, wading knee deep in complaining ducks to reach the yard’s gate. She expected him to step out, but instead he waved her in.

  “Feeding time,” was all he said and turned back to the ducks. White pinfeathers littered the yard like a late frost.

  Though still new at her job, she’d never had her detective’s badge so summarily ignored. At the same time, she was charmed by the affection the man clearly had for his flock, talking to them softly, stroking one here or there. They followed him like pets. While Billie went about his task, she looked in at the long shed. It was built in two parts, the floors covered in clean straw. One section, by far the biggest, was empty, apparently where the grown ducks sheltered. The other section was penned and filled with still-maturing ducklings milling about and pecking absently for seeds in the straw. Their feathers were only just beginning to turn white from a golden yellow.

  She didn’t hear him approach. “Pekins, they are. Much prized for their meat.”

  “Peking ducks?” she asked, turning.

  “Hell, no. That’s some kinda Chinese dish, I heard. Never had it. These here are the Pekin breed. I tried Muscovy’s for a while, but these lot fare better up here.”

  “I suspect that’s because you take such good care of them; I watched you.”

  He gave her a shy nod, like a boy caught out.

  “Now, what you be wanting from me about that Mary Trevean,” he said finally, staring at his boots. “Hardly knew her. Lost her husband, you know. Bert. He were a fine man. Regular at church Sundays, too, despite the work of all them cows. I ring the changes there.”

  “Sorry? Changes?”

  “You know, the bell peals. I pull the tenor. At St. Sennara’s.”

  It was the first thing he’d actually volunteered, and Terry smiled, though she had no idea what he was talking about.

  “You say you hardly knew Mary. But wasn’t she a regular at the Tinners on Saturday evenings?”

  “She were, but I don’t stay for the games; not my cup of tea. Too many people shouting and whatnot. But I heard from Eldridge that she were very good at them. Quick-witted. Close those two were.”

  He looked away for a moment. “Mighty pretty she were, too,” he mumbled.

  “What?”

  He looked back. “Nuffin’.”

  “Had she many friends?”

  “Can’t say. She were known along this coast, that’s sure. Well, we all are; not that many of us, you see. But I reckon her best friends were the Biggins’s. They looked after her when Bert passed. Know them, do you?”

  “I’ve just been chatting with Alice this afternoon.”

  “Well then…”

  “Mr. Kerrow…”

  “Everyone calls me Billie…”

  “Billie, then: can you think of anyone who might have wanted to harm her, anything she might have done to anger someone?”

  “Me? Nah… Popular, she was. And made a tidy living off them cottages is what I heard. Maybe someone were jealous?”

  “Someone else who rents vacation cottages, you mean?”

  “Nah. None of them nearby. Couple of bed and breakfast rooms at a few other farms, but not self-catering cottages like hers. Handsome they are, too. Bert showed me when he’d finished them. Proud he was, as well he should have been. Built to a fine standard.”

  “After Bert died, did you ever visit Mary?”

  “Left some flowers at her doorstep right after. I’m not the visitin’ type. Got my ducks for company, see. I like that fine.”

  Terry had never met anyone quite as walled off from the rest of the world as Billie Kerrow. Was it shyness? Trauma? She didn’t know how to ask. Morgan would have, though. She was a tougher interviewer.

  Twenty-One

  JEREMY RHYS-JONES SAT on the edge of the plush bed in his room at the vine-covered Garrack Hotel. It was late Saturday, and the setting sun gilded the west-facing stone walls of St. Ives far below. He was so worn out from running he didn’t know whether to sleep or shower. He’d spent Friday aimlessly hill walking and had slept in a cheap boarding house in Penzance where no one knew who he was. But he was done with that. He was not meant to be a dosser. And no one knew where he’d been or what he’d done. He’d taken care of that. Staring out toward the ocean he replayed his steps. Yes, he’d taken care of all of that.

  The gracious old Garrack, built of big granite blocks just after World War I, stood high on a hill on the southern edge of St. Ives. There had been a cancellation and he was lucky to get a room this night, but there were vacancies once the weekend guests left the next day. He’d registered using his false Italian passport and name and was vague about his departure date. His room, gracious but a bit cluttered in that country house sort of way, had an expansive view of the famous little fishing port and artists’ haven to the north, the shining sands of Porthmeor Beach, and the sun spangled ocean beyond. Nicola had told him, years before, that it was the way sun played off the crystals in the sand at St. Ives that created the luminous light that had attracted artists here since the late eighteen hundreds.

  But he wasn’t there for the view. He needed a haven, but one close to home. Things had got out of control. He had worked so carefully, so invisibly, toward his end. His plan had been brilliantly executed, step by step, threat by threat, almost surgical in its precision. Then everything suddenly went all pear-shaped, thanks to Mary Trevean. What he did know was that she had put him at great risk. He could be discovered.

  And yet all he’d ever wanted was to go home again: home to be with Caprice. She’d first taken him to her bed at Trevega House when he was barely fifteen. His father preferred London. At Trevega, he and Caprice had been inseparable, except when some other lover showed up. But she always came back to him. Always.

  He worshipped her. As an adult, he’d tried to get the same adoration and passion from other women, including Nicola and that dark-haired currency trader in Milan, but they’d all disappointed. A fury rose within him when they did; it was like a fire in his head. So, he punished them. All he could see when he had been with them was his dear Caprice, riding him hard, head arched back, crying out. No one else mattered or measured up.

  Home. He needed to go home, to their special place. To the gracious, high-ceilinged bedroom they’d shared.

  And he’d got so close. So close.

  Until Mary…Sweet, dangerous Mary.

  “HE’S DONE IT again!” Morgan barked into her mobile the next day.

  “Good morning, Morgan,” Calum said to his hands-free phone. Though it was Sunday, he was on his way to the Bodmin Hub, leaving his girls, once again, with their gran, Ruth.

  “Who’s ‘he’ and what has he done again, if I may be so bold as to ask?”

  “Penwarren, dammit. Do you want the news or not?”

  “I am hanging on your every word, my dear…”

  “There was indeed sputum on the cushion, as Jennifer Duncan surmised at the scene.”

  “Forgive me for saying so, but wasn’t that to be expected in this case?”

  “I am not done!”

  Calum pulled into the oval brick drive in front of the recently-built Bodmin Hub, its glassy, three story façade fiery in the morning sun. They’d had a lovely run of mostl
y fine weather.

  “Do go on then…”

  “There’s DNA on the other side of the cushion as well, Might be spit, might be sweat. Just traces. But we’ve got it.”

  Calum switched off his engine. “Yes, well, but the question is what have we got and whose?”

  “Do you honestly think you can be ahead of me?”

  “Never, of course. I bow to your higher rank and intelligence. But may I suggest my team reinvestigate the Trevean house and that bleached chicken coop? Maybe there’s more…”

  He could almost see Morgan shaking her head. “I’ve already put in the request,” she said before ringing off.

  LATER THAT AFTERNOON, West’s SOCO team found a partial print, a forefinger they reckoned, on the underside of a bin lid behind the Chicken Coop cottage, like someone had used just a thumb and finger, daintily, to lift and close it. The top of the lid had been wiped, but someone in a hurry hadn’t considered the underside. Everything else in the rental cottage, as before, was nearly antiseptic. But in the main house, in Mary Trevean’s sitting room, West’s people found another set of prints they’d missed before, curiously high on a wall, as if someone reasonably tall had suddenly lost their balance and tried to steady themselves.

  DETECTIVE CHIEF SUPERINTENDENT Malcom Crawley was back in Penwarren’s office in Bodmin midday on Monday. As usual, he was in high dudgeon.

  “May we offer you a seat, Malcolm?” Penwarren asked, smiling. Crawley hated being addressed by his given name. Penwarren knew it and did so intentionally. For him Crawley’s visits were like a circus act, one involving a toothless aging lion with mange.

  “We shall stand.”

  “As you wish; we shall remain seated.”

  “This Trevean murder, Penwarren, what have you got? The brass want me to hold a press conference at headquarters tomorrow morning, and how the hell did this happen?” He slapped a copy of the morning’s edition of The Cornishman onto Penwarren’s conference table. “We are tired of motoring all the way down here to get answers when the press already have them, dammit!”

  Penwarren had long since noted that “dammit” ended many of Crawley’s sentences like a normal punctuation mark. The DCS’s impatience was almost as legendary as his fecklessness. Penwarren figured it was fear, especially fear of being caught short in the information department by the big boys in Exeter. Crawley had to appear engaged: thus, his trip south.

  “If you examine it, Malcolm, you will discover that there is absolutely nothing of substance in that story, only conjecture. That reporter has left messages here almost hourly, desperate for details. We have not responded. I am pleased to report, however, that we have some new information which may make your press conference a success…or at least buy you some time.”

  Crawley rolled his eyes skyward like a vaudevillian in the footlights: “Enlighten me, then.”

  “Mary Trevean was suffocated. Of that there is no question.”

  “That’s old news.”

  “Not to the press it isn’t, if I may remind you. And we are narrowing in on the kind of person who may have committed this murder. For example, Mary Trevean did not operate a bed and breakfast, which means she did not have random visitors from who knows where seeking overnight accommodation, right? She had three self-catering rental cottages. Her guests registered through her agency, usually for a week or more, but sometimes for just a weekend break, like the couple who found her. So, reason tells us this was not something done by some passer-through. Are you with me, sir?”

  “Of course. Am I an idiot?”

  Penwarren ignored the opening.

  “So, whoever visited her that night wasn’t likely to have been a stranger. It was someone known, yes?”

  “I am following, Penwarren, but do please get on with it.”

  “And just yesterday afternoon, West’s people found new prints in two unusual places: on a wall of her home and on a rental cottage’s bin lid. They’re being analyzed. And the lab found trace DNA on both sides of the cushion used to kill Mary Trevean. They’re being analyzed as well.”

  “Who are your persons of interest?”

  “We’ve just got this evidence, Malcolm; investigation is the next step.”

  “Well, get on with it; we can’t hold the brass off forever, dammit, and we want the press vultures off our back!”

  Penwarren loved the image of vultures on Crawley’s back: Crawley as dead meat.

  “I shouldn’t think just over three days since the discovery of the dead woman could be labeled ‘forever,’ Malcolm. We have procedures, as you well know. We have protocols to follow which, should we violate them, will cause problems for the Crown Prosecution Service. I’m not interested in losing a case on hurried, slipshod investigation and I can only assume you feel the same way. Our job is to get convictions, unless I’ve missed something during my long career. You might emphasize these points in your press conference. Now then, was there anything else, Malcolm?”

  Penwarren was angry and struggling to control it. He’d had it with Crawley. Every time he dealt with the supercilious bastard he thought about retiring.

  “We want results!” the older man sputtered. “And soon!”

  “As do I Malcolm, as do I,” the DCI said with forced calmness. He smiled: “Now, if you will be kind enough to let me and my team get on with our job…?”

  From his window a few moments later, he could see Crawley stomp across the car park. His car lurched backward from its space, stalled, started again, and then sped to the exit to the main road. Penwarren worried about other drivers heading north into Devon.

  A YOUNG WOMAN, dark hair, business suit, a civilian administrative assistant, approached Morgan’s desk at the Bodmin Hub the same Monday morning and stood quietly.

  “Yes?” Morgan demanded, not even looking up.

  “Sorry to interrupt, ma’am.”

  “It’s not ‘ma’am,’ dammit! It’s ‘Inspector.’ Got that?”

  “Um…yes…Inspector.”

  “What do you want? I’m busy.”

  “You asked our research department for banking information on Mary Trevean and Eldridge Biggins. As it happens, they both bank at Lloyds, 13 High Street, St. Ives. I contacted the branch. I have their account numbers. That was all I could obtain from the bank without further authority…Inspector.”

  Morgan took a breath, looked up, and managed a smile. “Thank you…Ms.?”

  “Best. Jackie Best.”

  “Well named, it seems. And well done, Ms. Best. Unless you haven’t already heard, though I doubt that possible in this building, I can be a bit short when I’m on a murder case with all of Exeter HQ breathing down my neck. But I am grateful for your work and this information.”

  Jackie nearly curtsied and left.

  There were several national bank branches in St. Ives: Barclays, Nat West, and HSBC, as well as Lloyd’s. Morgan wondered at the coincidence that Biggins and Trevean used the same one. She checked the database and found the number Best had given her matched the account the SOCO boys had noted when they collected Mary Trevean’s personal papers. She made a note to ask West if those papers had been checked for prints. Then she called the bank branch.

  “Lloyds St. Ives,” a cool-voiced receptionist answered. “How may we help you?”

  “This is Detective Inspector Morgan Davies, Devon and Cornwall Police. Please connect me with your bank manager.”

  After a pause, the voice said: “Of course. I’ll just check to see if he is available. Please hold the line…”

  “Holding the line” was about the last thing Morgan was capable of tolerating, but almost immediately she heard another, deeper voice: “This is Roderick Nelson. How may I be of assistance, Inspector?”

  “That’s entirely up to you, Mr. Nelson. A woman, Mary Trevean, was murdered just south of St. Ives a few days ago. I’m sure you’ve heard. It’s in The Cornishman this morning.”

  “Yes, yes I saw it. But the story had no details. Is it true? We knew her her
e. She was a client.”

  “I know that or I wouldn’t be calling, would I? We need access to her recent bank records and also those of another significant person of interest in this investigation, a Mr. Eldridge Biggins who, like Mrs. Trevean, also banks with you. And if Mary Trevean had a safety deposit box containing anything else of possible significance, we will need that evidence as well. I am hoping, as she was your client, and has been killed, you will help us in this enquiry and not force me get a formal warrant. That takes time and we are under pressure to solve this case. Lack of cooperation, if I may be blunt, would be considered obstructing the course of justice in a capital murder case. Do you follow me?” Morgan was working way beyond her remit, as usual, but she hoped the bank manager would respond.

  After a pause, Nelson said, “I am new with this particular bank branch, Inspector, but not new to Lloyds. Your request is highly irregular, as I am sure you know. But ours is a small community and we aim to care for our customers. They give us their trust. We owe them ours as well, even after death. Maybe especially after death. So, what I am saying is that, yes, I will try to help, within the limits of my authority.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Nelson. And I mean that,” she said, while silently pumping her fist in the air. “I am at the police operations hub up in Bodmin. Do I need to come down there to obtain this information or can we do this electronically?”

  “I shouldn’t think a special trip would be necessary in a case such as this. I am less certain of what we can divulge should she also have a safe deposit box here. But give me your contact information and I shall get on this immediately.”