Stone Dead

by Jennie Melville

  There was evidence of some quiet prosperity in the establishment. There must be some more solid, profitable, work done here because, for sure, the shop in Gallows Passage had not brought much reward.

  But that was for sport, Charmian told herself; Mary Ansell, alias Victoria Janus, was having a joke. She was laughing at the white witches, and possibly, if she knew of their friendship, she was laughing at Charmian also.

  ‘Where is Miss Janus?’

  ‘The boss? Out back.’ And he nodded towards a door in the further wall. As he spoke, the door opened and the woman herself came through.

  Charmian walked forward. ‘ Miss Janus? Or should I call you Miss Ansell?’

  A hand was held out and gripped her own firmly. Charmian, whose mind was on hands at that moment, looked down. No silken gloves here, but hands that looked as if they did practical things. Gardening. Or murder.

  ‘Janus, please. I know now that Ansell was never my real name.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Oh, it was my parents’ name, and they gave me the name Mary, but I always knew it was not a name that was a good match … Perhaps you noticed that yourself?’

  ‘No, I can’t say I did. I was thinking of other things.’

  Victoria Janus gave her a brief unaffectionate smile, just a flash of large teeth. ‘Of course. How I understand. Indeed, I too had other things on my mind … but once it was all settled, I knew that as Janus, I had found a name I could live and work with.’

  ‘And Victoria?’

  ‘Just a little flourish of my own, but it goes well. I see myself as a shaman, an intermediary between the shadowy spirit world and this one.’

  Knowing she was being laughed at, Charmian said: ‘And your business here?’

  ‘It is one I can do with dignity while using my own appropriate skills. I have some lovely doubles here. My outfit is one of the best in the business. You’ve seen some of them.’ Charmian acknowledged that she had. ‘I think crime fiction writers will be a good seller, makes people laugh, you see. Nothing serious. I have a lovely Dorothy L. Sayers in mind, a new one, I shall have to approach him carefully.’

  ‘Him?’

  ‘Oh definitely, dear. And then I might go into villains. Dr Fell et al.’

  With a dignified wave of her hand, she led Charmian to the sofa. ‘Coffee, Tody dear.’

  Tody the silent twin departed silently.

  ‘Superintendent Hallows will be interviewing all the witnesses to the discovery of the body in Gallows Passage. And as I was in the neigbourhood, I thought I would call on you.’ Lie number one, thought Charmian. See if you can pick that up, shaman dear. ‘She has now been identified as one of the missing women. Daisy Winner.’ She looked at Victoria Janus to see if the expression on her large features changed. No, she looked mildly interested but no more. ‘Did you know her?’

  V. Janus shook her head … Charmian was casting around for the way she could name the woman to herself. No name really fitted her, not even Mary Ansell; she really was an awkward customer.

  ‘It seems she worked as a temporary secretary around the Windsor area as well as acting; never worked for you?’ asked Charmian.

  ‘No, I do all my own secretarial work.’

  Tody had returned with the coffee which he was handing round. His talkative brother had disappeared.

  From the door in the back wall which seemed to lead to offices and possibly a back exit came a tall, fair-haired young man; he moved forward quietly to stand behind Janus, who felt his approach and put out a loving, searching hand. He accepted the hand, but Charmian, who could see his face which the other woman could not, felt that he accepted it obediently rather than with enthusiasm.

  ‘Hello, love.’ He put feeling into his voice. Probably he felt safe in company, although observing the still embracing hand, Charmian wondered.

  The telephone rang on the table in front of Victoria, she ignored it. Tody reached forward to answer it, but Victoria stopped him. ‘I am out. Remember: for the moment I am out.’ Charmian asked a few more questions to justify her visit, got the bland answers she expected which left her no more knowledgeable, except of a deep dislike of Victoria Janus or Mary Ansell.

  The woman accompanied her to the door and walked to the road with her. On a side driveway was a large white car in need of a clean. Charmian looked at it.

  ‘I do my own driving,’ said Victoria. Her mobile phone rang. She reached into her pocket to draw it out. A voice could be heard, thin and penetrating, although Charmian could not make out the words. ‘ Later, please,’ said Victoria.

  While she was engaged, Charmian opened the door of the boot. ‘May I?’ she said quickly. It sprang up.

  Inside was a spade and a pile of plastic carrier bags.

  ‘Do your own digging too?’ asked Charmian.

  ‘Just for gardening,’ said V. Janus.

  Charmian made her way to the Porterhouse substation where Hallows was glumly meditating on the unpleasantness of his life.

  She had waited by the car in Oakley Road until the team she had ordered had arrived.

  She broke into Hallows’s cogitations at once.

  ‘I have had the car belonging to Victoria Janus taken in and ordered Forensics to go over it. I think it is worth a thorough study.’

  Hallows gave no indication that he had heard what she said. ‘There’s something here you ought to see.’ He moved to the telephone. ‘Have a look at this while I ask Forensics to let me have a full report too. Agreed?’

  He held out a page protected by a plastic envelope.

  Charmian looked at what he was showing her. It was a map of Ledbourne Park, Cheasey. The map was not hand drawn but had been photocopied from a book on local history.

  On it was a large, red X.

  Cut from a newspaper headline large letters proclaimed:

  BODY HERE

  ‘Sid Chance is already on the way there with a team, I faxed him and he thinks, from what he knows of the place, that it’s worth a look, and Deast has been alerted.’

  ‘Do you believe it yourself?’ Scepticism came easily to Charmian.

  ‘I am inclined to, I’m not risking ignoring it.’

  ‘No. Could it be a joke?’

  ‘I don’t think so. Do you?’

  Charmian had been weighing it up. ‘No,’ she said at last. ‘ I don’t think it’s a joke. Hasn’t got the feel of a joke somehow. Any idea who sent it?’

  ‘None,’ said Hallows with feeling. ‘None whatever. The postmark was Hounslow, addressed to me, here. The newsprint might give us something, but I doubt it. It will be sent to the Document Department, of course, but I wanted you to see it first. Here is the envelope.’ He held out a long, white envelope, addressed in letters cut from a newspaper. This too was protected by clear plastic. ‘Off to Forensics as well, but probably not much to be got from it except the postman’s fingerprints and my assistant’s and all the others who handled it on the way through.’

  ‘I doubt if the killer sent it … assuming there is a body … so it has to be someone very close to the killer.’

  ‘You’re probably right. You need telepathy in this business, but I don’t think we’ll be consulting Miss Janus. Or the white witches … Do you think one of them could have sent it?’

  ‘It is possible,’ said Charmian slowly. ‘It would mean they knew a good deal more about the missing women than they have admitted so far.’

  ‘Can’t rule them out. One of their outfit, possibly another white witch.’

  ‘It’s just a loose network of friends,’ said Charmian. ‘Nothing rigid or fixed about it.’

  ‘Someone who knew to send it to me and here,’ commented Hallows.

  ‘It’s been in the local papers. They printed your photograph.’

  ‘That is true.’ Hallows gave vent to one of his long sighs. ‘Ah well, we will be bringing Miss Eagle and Miss Peacock in for questioning. And Miss Janus. Interesting discovery of yours. All those things in the boot of the car; all her pa
st. You think she is implicated, don’t you?’

  ‘I wouldn’t go as far as that. Let’s say that like Joe Davy, she’s got the right profile … No sign of him, I suppose?’

  ‘We’re looking. Mustn’t forget him. He’ll be found. Not the most popular guy in town. Cut up an animal and people really mind.’ Hallows started to move about the room. ‘But no, this might be the breakthrough … I always knew that something would have to come from outside. Very often – nearly always, in fact – it’s just a question of going from door to door asking questions, but it was clear from the start that it was not the case here.’

  Hallows had a marvellous talent for producing the obvious as a fresh minted truth; this trait had probably helped him to promotion, although producing jokes among his younger colleagues.

  ‘I agree,’ said Charmian, who thought that the Superintendent had a handful of stock attitudes which he produced on demand while his mind was working on another problem. She did not underrate the man.

  He picked up his car keys and his mobile phone. ‘Let’s get going. I’ll drive.’

  Ledbourne Park was the gift to the district of an Edwardian millionaire who had made his fortune in the colonies and then had been looking for a peerage. Or at least a knighthood. History had not been kind, and all that was left of him now was his name on a small oval of trees, green grass, flower beds and a paddling pool. It had a sad, dejected air as if no one went there who could find somewhere better. All the same it had its clientele: the homeless and dispossessed by day, and the glue-sniffers at night. In the day, a few mothers would lead their young children to the paddling pool, muttering that they hoped it was cleaner than it looked.

  They approached the spot in the area of the trees and scrubby bushes that had been marked by the red X.

  Chance had emerged from his car the minute he saw them, ready to walk with them.

  ‘As soon as Hallows faxed me the sheet, I knew where the spot was, and I thought it was worth a look. The soil has been disturbed, but I thought it best to wait until you got here, ma’am. Archer’s Piece, they call this bit here. Where archers practised, in the old days.’

  The area of the trees had already been ringed off to protect it from the three men and two women with pushchairs who were standing waiting for the show to begin. They were not likely to get much of a view because Chance’s team was already erecting a screen all around the area.

  A loud female voice proclaimed that that meant a body.

  ‘Ought to close the park,’ said Hallows, never one to make welcoming noises to the general public.

  Chance shrugged. ‘Can’t. No gates, they were nicked about five years ago. If there is a body, I will set up protection.’

  Deast came up to them from behind. ‘ Funny smell round here.’

  ‘A dead body with any luck,’ said Chance.

  Hallows clucked his teeth with disapproval.

  Chance’s experts had brought with them the specialized equipment that could help them identify where a body might be found.

  It was careful, meticulous, and slow work, as Charmian knew from experience.

  ‘Going as fast as they can,’ she said, noticing Deast’s impatient look.

  ‘A spade and a team of diggers would be quicker,’ he grumbled morosely. ‘All right, all right, I know, this is more scientific, mustn’t let the boffins think we don’t know it.’

  One of Chance’s efficient officers had arrived with flasks of coffee and plastic mugs which he was filling and offering round.

  Charmian refused the offer and strolled around the park. Looking back at the area where the excavation might begin at any minute, she observed that the trees crowned a very small hill, more of a mound, and then the turf rolled away to the right where a wide path led to the way out and roads outside. This path, a small road really, bisected Ledbourne Park.

  Charmian could imagine that in the rosier, richer days when the park had been created, some of the wealthier inhabitants of the now run-down suburb might have driven a pony and trap through it along this path.

  Perhaps her mind was moved that way by the sight of a large stone trough, once filled with water for the thirsty horse and now home to some sad-looking geraniums.

  Chance, mug of coffee in his hand, came up to her. ‘Having a look round?’

  ‘Just waiting. Any progress?’

  ‘Not as yet. They haven’t found any indication of where to dig but they are still looking.’ He studied the horse trough. ‘Old Ledbourne had that built … Well, he would do, made his money out of horses and cattle, had a string of knacker’s yards. That’s how he started out in Australia. Then he moved into horse omnibuses … went over to petrol and charabancs later on. Made a mint. That’s the tale, anyway.’ He went up to the trough. ‘Lasted well, hasn’t it? Still, my grandmother’s older.’

  Hallows had disappeared behind the screen. He was followed by Deast.

  ‘Looks as though there may be something,’ said Chance. He moved off. Charmian followed more slowly.

  Chance turned back as he moved through the protective shelter, and gave a nod. ‘They’ve got something. It’s spade work now and then trowel and spoon as they get closer.’

  Charmian thought she could imagine Deast’s face if work went on at spoon pace. She moved through the canvas curtain to stand beside him, confident of some sharp, acerbic comments. If she had been a journalist looking for a story then Deast would have been the man she would have made for.

  As it was, he was standing there, staring straight down at the ground which was being slowly worked over. Shovels, then the trowels, then the gloved hands slowly sifting away the earth.

  A shape shrouded with dust began to appear.

  ‘Not buried deep,’ said the excavator. ‘But been here a long time.’ He looked closely, assessing the uniform. ‘Since the war, I’d guess. My grandpa was in that war, and wore that gear. He showed me a photo.’

  ‘A Jolly Jack Tar,’ said Chance. ‘And he never went back to sea.’

  Hallows was relieved. ‘This is one for you, Sid, right on your patch, but I doubt you’ll find the killer after all this time.’

  ‘We don’t know how he died yet,’ said Chance. ‘Oh well, it’s all part of the job, but someone sent that map with the X on it. So someone knew.’

  ‘If that X meant this body,’ said Charmian.

  ‘Two bodies?’ Chance recoiled. ‘No, I won’t have that.’

  Charmian pointed beyond the canvas enclosure. ‘Get your lads to look in the horse trough.’

  When the layer of dying geraniums was removed, a damp brown length of sacking was revealed. A covering, a shroud. When this was peeled away, the body was beneath.

  They looked down to see a face, already bruised by decay, the skin darkened, the brown hair cropped.

  The nose was swollen, and where the right eye had been was a hole. Long eyelashes, and a curved eyebrow, but underneath a black pit.

  Charmian turned her head away from the damaged face, images of Lord Nelson and Philip of Macedon surging in her mind. Or Samson, eyeless in Gaza and at the mill with slaves.

  But those were men and this was a woman, a young one too.

  ‘So now we have the eyeless one,’ said Sid Chance with his usual good taste.

  ‘Shut up, Sid.’

  ‘We came looking for her, now we’ve got her. Which one do you think it is?’

  ‘She’s quite young, I think.’ Charmian was running over in her mind the ages of the missing women.

  ‘You can’t always tell these days … I suppose she could be mid-twenties. So that might be Lily Green from Bredon. One for you, Deast.’

  ‘A friend or a colleague will have to identify her,’ said Inspector Deast. He was studying the face. ‘ Not very nice for them, if it is her, with the eye gone … No bag over the head, I notice.’

  ‘Her head is resting on it. Underneath. He wanted us to see the eye missing.’ Charmian was beginning to know the killer’s mind. He (or could it be ‘she’?)
wanted, needed to be heard. Although the message was unclear. ‘Just in case we hadn’t taken in the other one as significant. Not an accident. Nothing by chance with this one.’

  ‘Glad to hear it,’ said Hallows. ‘Let’s hope it makes it easier to pick him up. All we are getting so far are his victims.’

  ‘It’s a start,’ said Sid Chance. He never minded shocking Hallows, did it on purpose. ‘Have to get her identified. May not be Lily Green, you know, it’s hard to tell age in these circumstances. I agree she looks under thirty. The hair … clipped and short like that, and the clothes—’ – he assessed the jeans and shirt – ‘they look like the clothes of a youngster.’

  ‘Kind of a uniform for all ages,’ suggested Hallows.

  ‘Agreed. But this could be either Louise Sherry or Lily Green … Apparently the right age.’

  Charmian summoned up her memory of the photographs they had in the file of all the missing women. ‘ More like Sherry,’ she said, ‘she had shortish hair. Maybe shorter than this.’

  ‘A girl with long hair maybe, and the killer might have cut it, of course,’ said Chance. ‘These kinky buggers will do anything.’ He turned away, more moved by his imaginings than he wanted to show. ‘There may be something on the body which helps identification … Forensics will help. Be your team in Windsor, I take it, ma’am?’

  Charmian nodded. ‘The police pathologist is working on Winner; he’s not fast, but he’s good.’

  ‘Dr Lily? Don’t know him, he’s new round here, isn’t he? Pal of Tiger Yardley,’ said Hallows.

  Charmian was surprised. ‘You know Tiger?’

  ‘Not really. Saw him box in his youth. He was good but not first class … Nice chap, but avoid his coffee.’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘They go in twos in this case, have you noticed: first the skeleton … where is he, by the way?’ asked Chance.

  Charmian had noticed. ‘ Being reconstructed or rebuilt by an expert in archaeological skeletons.’

  ‘No trouble to us then, but now the sailor, what do we do about his body? Is he for you or me?’