Murder on the Moor

by Julianna Deering

  “What’ll you have?” Drew asked.

  There was a flare of belligerence in the gamekeeper’s eyes. “So please you, Mr. Farthering. I’d have thought you’d do your drinking up at the Lodge.”

  “I’m not much of one for drink, to tell the truth,” Drew said, taking the seat opposite him. “But I’m not averse to an evening spent in good company.”

  Delwyn laughed softly. “Nothing like the devil’s brew to loosen tongues, eh? Well, the pump is well-primed. What would you like to know? There’s nothing much I don’t see or hear about round these parts.”

  “Looks as if I’ve come to the right place, then.”

  The gamekeeper gave him an almost-regal nod.

  “How is it you ended up here?” Drew asked. “You can’t deny the Welsh in your voice.”

  “Nor would I,” Delwyn said, his accent suddenly more pronounced than usual. “God didn’t make a truer, wilder, more beguiling place in all His green earth for a man to live and die.”

  “And yet you left it.”

  “My mother came back to her people when my father died.” The fierce passion in the swarthy face faded. “I was a boy yet, and when I got older, I had her to look after. And after her there was . . .” He shrugged negligently. “I’ve lived here near fifteen years. It would be a strange thing if I hadn’t any attachments by now.”

  “Attachments that can’t leave Yorkshire?”

  “Or won’t,” Delwyn said.

  “Attachments with their own attachments.” Drew nodded. “I see.”

  “Do you now?” The gamekeeper’s eyes gleamed with dark humor. “Do you indeed?”

  A cheer from the other side of the room broke the moment.

  “The very man!” someone shouted, and they all gathered round a weathered, stoop-shouldered fellow with lank black hair and a ferretish look to him. Beside him was the rogue Tom Selden. Drew made sure not to look his way, but later he would have to find the time to meet with “Tom” to hear about what he’d discovered so far.

  “If there’s mischief on the moor,” Delwyn said, leaning closer to Drew as the ferretish man ordered a round for his friends, “he’s the one behind it.”

  “That’s Midgley, is it?” Drew studied him a moment. “Seems he’s everyone’s darlin’ just now.”

  “Oh, to be sure. You can buy any number of friends with fourpence.”

  “He must do well for himself if he can afford that many friends.”

  Delwyn’s eyes narrowed again. “Sure sign he’s up to something. Usually he hasn’t two bob to keep each other company. Mostly he don’t get a drink unless someone takes pity on him or just wants him to go away. But I’d just about swear in church that if there’s something bad going on, he’s back of it somewhere.”

  “Such as what?”

  Delwyn shook his head. “That’s something I can’t say. He might be more rotten than last week’s fish, but he’s a sly devil. The whole county knows he makes his living poaching from Lodge property and from Westings’, but he’s never once left so much as a whisper behind him.” He took a deep drink of his ale and made a wry face. “I spent a whole month one summer determined I’d have him, and what do you think?”

  “Nothing?”

  “Not hide, hair, nor feather. Not Jack Midgley.” Delwyn darted a glance toward the boisterous group at the bar that surrounded the man. “Why, butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth, he was that cool. ‘Come inside, Rhys,’ he’d tell me. ‘Have some tea or stay to supper. It’s chicken done up in a pie today.’ And I knew it weren’t no more a chicken than I am, but pheasant and grouse and whatever else he’d took from Lodge land, but by then there were no proving it, and he knew it. I’ve been near a year trying to catch him out for all the good it’s done.”

  On the other side of the room, Midgley cursed the fog. “Well as I know the moor, hang me if I didn’t end up more than a mile out of my way today. I wonder I didn’t go off Merlin Hill, it was so hard to see. Never know what you might see in such weather.” He smirked in the general direction of Drew’s table. “Or who.”

  “There’s worse as happens at sea,” one older gent said. “I recall a time back in ’87—”

  A groan went up from the others, along with some indulgent catcalls as the man launched into his well-worn story.

  Drew shifted his attention back to the gamekeeper. “I understand I am in your debt.”

  Delwyn looked momentarily puzzled, and then he shrugged. “Not really. Though Mrs. Farthering might be wise to stay off the moor on days like this. Mrs. Bloodworth as well, though she’s not one to take advice.” His mouth twisted into a sneer. “Not from the likes of me anyway.”

  “She does seem rather determined to have her own way,” Drew said. “What do you think she might run into out there? Or perhaps I should ask, what did she run into out there?”

  Delwyn snorted. “There’s nothing out there. Nothing that’s not perfectly ordinary.”

  “No hound?”

  “Foolishness. All of it. Folk like to scare one another with tales of ghosts and demons. Always have.”

  “My wife says Midgley mentioned a barghest.”

  The gamekeeper nodded. “That’s what they call him round here, the demon hound. Sometimes he’s headless. Sometimes he’s invisible altogether and rattling chains. Haunting the crossroads where the gibbets used to stand. Or where murders were done. Particularly fond of strangers wandering the moor at night.”

  “I see.”

  Delwyn rolled his eyes. “Utter rubbish.”

  “I don’t doubt my wife when she says they heard something following them.”

  “I won’t argue the point with you, sir. I found them afterwards and couldn’t say what they might have seen or heard by then. But if there was something, it’s likely got a reasonable explanation.”

  “Such as?”

  “Might have been Baxter. He was old Mr. Bloodworth’s mastiff, big as a child’s pony and black as night. Ran off after the gentleman passed on and been wild on the moor since. I haven’t been able to catch the rogue, and he’s a wily one. If Mrs. Bloodworth’s little terrier had wandered into his path, there mightn’t be anything left but a handful of white fur and the collar.”

  “You’ve seen it?” Drew asked.

  “A time or two,” Delwyn said with a frown. “From a distance, and that’s months ago. He wasn’t letting me near if he could help it. He never had much use for anyone besides the old master even at the best of times.”

  “And that’s what started the tales of a demon hound on the moor?”

  Delwyn smirked. “I’d wager those have been around a bit longer. At least since that Sherlock Holmes fellow’s tale got about. Probably before. This wasn’t always a God-fearing land. Perhaps it isn’t yet.”

  “How about you?”

  “Me?” Delwyn laughed, but there was a flush of color in his swarthy face. “Nah. Interferes with my drinking, eh?” He drained his mug and thumped it on the table. “Mr. Jenkins, if you please.”

  “Same again?” the barman called back. “Right you are.”

  Delwyn grinned at Drew, a certain boyish mischievousness in his usually brooding expression. “Drinking and other things.”

  “Like Mrs. Bloodworth?”

  Delwyn sniggered at that. “You want to lose me my job.”

  “Not I, I can assure you. That’s left up to your own wise choices. Or lack of them.”

  “Mrs. Bloodworth.” Delwyn’s mouth twisted up on one side. “Nothing soft about her. Still, who’d say no to that if asked?”

  “And were you? Asked, I mean.”

  The gamekeeper grinned slyly. “A man ought never tell tales of a woman, sir. Isn’t gentlemanly. But then you’d know that without being told, eh?”

  “And of course you’re against poaching.”

  “By trade, sir. By trade. But is it poaching when the pheasant comes to you?”

  Drew gave him an indifferent shrug. “One might point the poor creature back toward its
nest and no harm done.”

  “I’ll leave that sort of thing to you God-fearing men,” Delwyn said without rancor. “For my part, I let Him alone, and He fairly much doesn’t bother me. I expect we both like it that way.”

  Drew lifted an eyebrow. “Fairly much?”

  “You’re a persistent devil . . . sir.”

  “Just curious.”

  Delwyn chuckled as the barman replaced his empty mug with a fresh one. “Life story then, eh? All right. My mum took me to church. Obviously it didn’t stick. Too many ‘thou shalt nots’ for my taste. What’s God care if we have a bit of fun?”

  “I expect it grieves Him to see how we treat one another,” Drew said. “And ourselves.”

  The gamekeeper looked studiedly bored.

  “Did you never see someone you care for persist in doing something that couldn’t bring anything but pain?” Drew asked. “To others, of course, but more to that person himself?”

  Delwyn’s expression turned grave, and for a moment he said nothing. Then he gave a curt nod. “I suppose I have.”

  “I daresay you’d tell that person not to do it, if he’d listen,” Drew suggested, wondering who might be on his mind just now. “Not for your sake, but for his.”

  “Yeah,” Delwyn said. “If he’d listen.” He was silent a moment, and then a sardonic little gleam came into his eyes. “And maybe, after I’d given my sermon, I’d take up a collection, too. If I could get it.”

  Drew laughed. “From what I’ve heard of him, I think the vicar would have liked you.”

  “He did,” Delwyn said, his expression turning grim. “He was a good man and we got on well, religion or no. It’s a dirty shame someone had to go and kill him.”

  “Who do you think might have done it?”

  Delwyn frowned. “Hanged if I know, sir. Nor about the old lady either. I can’t say I wouldn’t like it to have been Jack Midgley there and have him swing for it, but I can’t see how. There’d be nothing in it for him, and he’s not one to work up a sweat when there’s no profit to be had.”

  Drew glanced over at the poacher. “I hadn’t considered him. No motive, as you say. Do you know for certain he couldn’t have killed the vicar or Miss Patterson?”

  “I can’t say about the vicar,” Delwyn said after a thoughtful pause, “but he couldn’t have done for the lady.”

  “Why’s that?”

  The gamekeeper shook his head, making the thick curls at the back of his neck brush his collar. “He was here that night from suppertime till past midnight, drunk as five lords, not in a fit state to hold his head up much less murder anyone.”

  “Here in the Hound and Hart?”

  Delwyn nodded.

  “You don’t think he might have pretended? To give himself an alibi?”

  The gamekeeper laughed low. “I saw myself what he put away. There’s nobody could have drunk that much and not felt it.”

  “And then he went home?”

  “Trenton let him sleep it off in the jail.”

  “I suppose that lets him out,” Drew said with a sigh. “As you say, there was no reason for him to kill her in the first place. But maybe he knows something about the guilty party. I’d like you to introduce me to Mr. Midgley. If he’s in back of the local mischief, I’d like to have a word or two with him.”

  The gamekeeper looked faintly disgusted. “You’re a gentleman, sir. It would be an insult for you to be acquainted with his sort.”

  The surrounding chatter abruptly died, and Drew looked around to see Midgley himself staring in their direction.

  “Minding my business for me again, are you, Delwyn?” The poacher rose and came across the room, eyes glazed over and a spot of red in each weathered cheek. “I’ll make my own introductions, I thank you. Mr. Farthering, my name is Midgley. Jack Midgley, jack of all trades, at your service, sir, and your lady wife’s. If I might tell you friendly in your ear, you ought keep better watch over her if you don’t want something unfortunate to happen.”

  Drew got to his feet, but before he could open his mouth, Delwyn stood and pushed him aside.

  “You shut your mouth, Midgley,” the gamekeeper spat. “You know nothing about how a decent man treats a woman. Nothing.”

  “And what would you know, Rhys Delwyn, about how a decent man does anything?” Midgley laughed. “You take your morals from Jenkins’s tomcat.”

  He flinched as Delwyn lunged toward him, but Drew caught the gamekeeper’s arm and pulled him back.

  “Don’t let him bait you into a night in jail.”

  “Come back and have another drink, Jack,” Nick said in his guise as Tom Selden. “Let him toady for the toff if he likes. What’s that to you?”

  Midgley snorted. “True enough. True enough. Wouldn’t want to waste my knuckles on his like.”

  “Come on,” Drew said quietly, turning Delwyn back to the table. “I want to know—”

  Without warning, Midgley struck the gamekeeper with a crushing punch to the jaw. Delwyn went down in a heap, and there was a sudden commotion. Nick pulled Midgley away as the barman hurried over, his heavy face red and shining.

  “None of that! None of that, Jack Midgley! I’ve warned you before.”

  “I was provoked,” Midgley said. “You heard him. All these lads will say the same, eh?”

  There was a general murmur of agreement, but the barman shook his head. “You hadn’t ought to hit him from behind.” He looked nervously at Drew. “Do we need to have the doctor in, sir?”

  By then Delwyn was struggling to sit up, muttering darkly, clearly woozy.

  “How is it, Delwyn?” Drew asked. “Do you need a doctor?”

  “Doctor?” Delwyn huffed. “For the likes of him? No fear.”

  Drew hauled him to his feet. “Come on. You’d better go home and lie down.”

  Protesting, Delwyn let Drew help him outside and into Beaky’s car. He managed to give Drew clear enough directions to get them to the cottage that had long been the residence of Bloodworth Park Lodge’s gamekeepers. Drew turned off the engine, hopped out of the car and went round to the passenger side, but Delwyn was already struggling to his feet.

  He threw off Drew’s helping hand. “I’m all right.” He swayed as he stumbled toward his door, and Drew caught him. “I’m all right,” Delwyn muttered again, but then leaned heavily against Drew’s shoulder until they’d reached the armchair that sat before the fireplace. He sank down into it, throwing his head back against the worn floral print and closing his eyes with a groan.

  Drew took a moment to scan the room. It was tidy, though far from immaculate. There weren’t many books, but what was there was worth the reading. Drew had to hide a smile when he noticed a well-worn copy of the adventures of Sherlock Holmes, including The Hound of the Baskervilles. It took him a moment to notice the little tabby shrinking back between two volumes of Victor Hugo’s works.

  “Hullo, sweetheart,” he said gently. “Don’t worry. I won’t bother you.”

  He stepped back, slow and careful, and she watched him with wide sea-green eyes, ready to bolt at the slightest provocation.

  “Oh, don’t be such a numpty, Lizzy,” Delwyn told her. “Nobody’s after you.” He shook his head and immediately regretted it. “She hardly sees anyone but me, and sometimes I think she’s sure I’m going to roast her and eat her.”

  Drew chuckled and turned to Delwyn again. “Come on. I’d better help you get to bed.”

  The gamekeeper glared at him blearily. “I said I was fine. I don’t need any help.”

  He was certainly feisty enough. That ought to be a good sign. “Is there anything I can get you?” Drew asked. “Anything I can do for you?”

  “No.” Delwyn managed to focus on him for a moment. “You should have let me see to him in the first place.”

  “Maybe so. I didn’t think he’d blindside you like that. I’m sorry I interfered.”

  Delwyn grinned faintly. “It’s your job, isn’t it? Interfering?”

  “I s
uppose it is. Well, if there isn’t anything I can do, I suppose I ought to be getting back to the Lodge.” Drew started to leave, but then turned back to Delwyn. “Oh, I say, I don’t suppose you can tell me where that blighter lives, can you? I’d love to catch him at something. Something punishable by fine or imprisonment or both.”

  Delwyn’s grin widened, and then he winced and put his hand up to his jaw. “He’s got a cottage out on the moor. Hold on.”

  He steadied himself, sat up straighter, and took a pencil and a used envelope from the small table to his left. With a few swift strokes he drew a map showing the Lodge and the stream that ran across the moor toward Westings and the cottage that stood about halfway in between.

  “It’s not hard to find,” he said. “Just take care. Midgley’s a sly devil.” He gestured to his swollen face. “As you see.”

  Drew folded the map and secured it in his waistcoat pocket. “I’ll do that. Put a beefsteak on that if you’ve got one.”

  “I’ll get one,” Delwyn said.

  Drew went to the door and then turned, meaning to tell him to make sure he did. But then he saw the tabby creep over and settle herself in Delwyn’s lap, so he very quietly let himself out.

  Nine

  Drew took a long time to make the short drive back to the Lodge from the gamekeeper’s cottage, trying to sort through the tangle of questions in his mind. At first he tried to focus on the murders. The vicar and the nanny. Both of them old, both leading quiet lives, possessed of little more than enough to keep them alive and decently comfortable. Who would kill either of them, and why?

  If it weren’t for material gain, perhaps it was for something they knew. A man of the cloth was often confided in, asked advice of, confessed to. Perhaps someone with a guilty conscience had said more than he or she ought and then later regretted it. But why kill Miss Patterson, as well? Had she heard or seen something untoward? What was it she had wanted to tell Beaky? What could an elderly former nanny know that was intimate, delicate, or damaging?

  Again Drew couldn’t help but wonder about Delwyn and Sabrina. If Delwyn was the scoundrel everyone said he was, it seemed rather strange that he would call Midgley out over his treatment of women. What women, and how had he treated them? He’d have to ask Nick about that once they had a chance to talk again. There might be something he’d heard about the village that would explain things further. At any rate, there certainly seemed to be more than a suspicion of poaching between Midgley and Delwyn, something that must have been festering between them for a long while now.