And Great Danes were scarcely dogs at all, by any normal standards. Embarrassed by their own size, only lightly endowed with brains, they strolled along beside their owners thinking their own thoughts and being very little trouble. Thea had known one as a child, and remembered the huge head towering over her, gazing into the middle distance and declining to play.
She couldn’t stop Cheryl, even if she wanted to. Just as she couldn’t stop Higgins going on the same errand to the house on the other side. Passing the buck, essentially, in both cases, she thought irritably. Calling on strangers to watch over her and make sure she lived through the next twenty-four hours or so, when she’d insisted she’d be all right. The whole thing was humiliating. The strangers wouldn’t take kindly to the request – why should they? For a start, they would understandably shy away from the risk of contagion.
She glimpsed a figure passing the front window, vaguely brown in colour, and assumed it was Cheryl on her mercy mission. Then she closed her eyes for a moment, noticing how giddy that made her feel, and how strange swirling shapes were lurking on the back of her eyelids. She watched them as if hypnotised.
Cheryl was back in what seemed like barely a minute. Thea heard the door slam, and a slight rustling sound which she supposed must be the removal of her coat. Seconds later, she was in the sitting room, breathless and with a puzzled frown on her face. ‘She’s not answering the door,’ she reported. ‘But I can hear voices inside the house.’
‘Maybe the bell doesn’t work.’
‘It does – I heard it. And I knocked as well. Don’t you think that’s odd?’
‘She’s probably too upset. Or drunk. Got the telly turned up loud and wants the world to go away.’ Thea remembered something similar in her own case, when her husband had died.
‘Even so. Don’t people always answer the door?’
‘Of course they don’t. There’s no law says you have to. A person’s home is his castle, or whatever it is. You can pull up the drawbridge any time you like.’
‘Well, I’ve never done that.’
‘Never mind. You tried. The man on the other side knows about me. It’ll be fine. You must be wanting to get on.’ She sagged after this burst of self-reliance and dignity, but stuck to the point. ‘Honestly. You’ve been very kind.’ She levered herself upright, and prepared to give up the comfort of the sofa. The role of invalid was already wearing horribly thin.
‘Nosy, more like,’ Cheryl countered. ‘Seeing you in that police car – well, I did wonder …’
Thea’s heart gave a startled thump of suspicion. This woman knew who she was! She knew that Thea Osborne, house-sitter, had a reputation for getting involved in nasty crimes. She had been intrigued and curious, not just about what might be going on in Stanton, but about all Thea’s earlier adventures. The flu had diverted her from what she had really come to discover. She must be feeling very disappointed now. ‘It wasn’t anything interesting,’ she said. ‘Just my poor old car, which has never given me a moment’s trouble.’ She sighed. ‘I expect I’ll be hearing any time now what’s going to happen next about that.’ She stood up, with a faint intention of locating her handbag and telephone, in preparation for returning to normal efficiency.
As if in a kind of cosmic synchronicity, there was a knock at the front door, alerting both Blondie and Caspar, who barked in loud unison. ‘I’ll go,’ said Cheryl, but Thea heaved herself up and followed her. She didn’t like the way the woman was taking over, and she wanted to be sure her spaniel didn’t get embroiled in any skirmishes. If the newcomer also had a dog, things might become complicated. She took a step towards the door, pleased at the return of steadiness.
‘Wait a minute,’ she said. ‘Let me put the dogs in the kitchen.’ She herded Blondie and Hepzie clumsily into the room and shut the door. ‘Okay,’ she said.
It was the man from the neighbouring house; the one Higgins had spoken to an hour or so earlier. Thea could see half of him, past Cheryl and her Great Caspar, and heard everything that was said. ‘Oh!’ he began. ‘I was told … I didn’t know you were here. What about the house-sitter? The one with flu?’ Cheryl was holding her dog tightly and Thea saw the man take a step back. ‘I thought I saw her with a spaniel …’
‘That’s right. I’m only here for a few more minutes. I don’t know Mrs … the house-sitter very well at all.’
You’ve even forgotten my name, thought Thea.
‘I see,’ he said, plainly not seeing at all. ‘So everything’s all right then, is it?’
Thea moved forward. ‘Do you know the woman on the other side?’
A rictus of disdain crossed his big face. He was a portly man, with a double chin and beefy hands. He wore a pale-grey waistcoat and tan-coloured jacket that looked expensive. ‘Only as much as one knows a neighbour,’ he replied pompously. ‘We don’t socialise.’
‘Weren’t you at the funeral do, then, yesterday?’
‘I was at the church, and then I went to support Mrs Callendar, as all right-thinking people should have done. The fiasco next door was a social gaffe, to say the least.’ He threw a look at Cheryl, as if expecting her to agree, before adding more quietly, ‘In any case, what does the funeral have to do with anything?’
Cheryl gave her dog a wholly needless jerk, apparently wanting to regain centre stage. ‘She’s not answering the door,’ she said.
‘Who? Natasha? I’m not surprised.’ The man had plainly come out of duty because a police detective had asked him to. Further than that, he saw no reason to go. ‘Well,’ he concluded, looking at Thea, ‘My name is Dennis Ireland, and I will be here at least until about ten tomorrow morning. In case of emergency, that is. I wouldn’t want Philip and Gloria to accuse me of neglecting my obligations. I would have taken care of the animals and so forth, if it hadn’t been for my promise to my family. I think they understood that.’ He sounded almost forlorn to Thea, who thought he had a nice face. ‘Do have a good Christmas,’ he finished, with a quaint flick of a finger at an invisible hat.
‘That’s very good of you,’ Thea rewarded him, from behind Cheryl. ‘I am poorly, but not so bad I can’t manage the dog and answer the phone. I’m bound to be better tomorrow. Cheryl was worried about me and called in, that’s all. She’s not staying.’
He had been on the brink of leaving, but he paused, still somewhat confused. ‘You know each other?’
‘No, no, not at all. The dogs do.’ Thea laughed at herself. ‘I mean, we bumped into each other yesterday morning, that’s all. She’s been very kind.’ She sighed gently. Kindness was draining when you were on the receiving end of it. Thea sometimes suspected she handled it badly, and should make more effort to receive it gratefully, instead of resisting as she did. She knew there were claims that it was the chief of all the virtues, but she could never quite see it. The much less arguable case that its opposite was the greatest vice was not enough to convince her.
He departed and they heard the faint sound of his own door closing in the next house. Cheryl released her dog, which mooched aimlessly into the living room and flopped down on the floor. ‘Don’t get settled, my lad,’ its mistress said. ‘We’re going soon.’ She looked at Thea. ‘If you need help, I advise you to opt for Natasha. That man is not what he seems.’
She was interrupted by a violent sound erupting from somewhere outside. Glass had broken. ‘What was that?’ asked Thea.
They both peered out of the window, Cheryl bending awkwardly over the sofa to do so. Thea, some inches shorter, had to actually kneel on it to get any kind of a view. There was nothing at all to see, except for a woman standing very still on the other side of the street. She was looking intently in their direction. ‘What on earth was it?’ Thea asked again.
‘I can see glass,’ reported Cheryl. ‘A window must have broken, I think.’
‘Where?’
‘Next door. I’ll go and see.’ She was gone before Thea could climb off the sofa again. The Great Dane remained on the hearthrug which it had adopted w
ith an injured air. Thea had a feeling the dog didn’t really like its mistress very much. Her joints were complaining as she tried to follow Cheryl outside – knees especially.
Two more people had appeared by the time she got outside. They were all staring at some shards of glass on the ground beneath a large window at the front of the next house. ‘It’s been broken from the inside,’ said a youth, who looked like a student home for the Christmas break. Thea could hear a TV or radio from inside the broken window.
‘So somebody is in there,’ said Cheryl, with a triumphant glance at Thea. ‘Hello?’ she called loudly. ‘Are you all right?’ She went closer, and put her face to the broken pane, peering through the hole. Then she screamed. A short, low-pitched sound of alarm; a kind of howl, in which Thea heard horror and disbelief and sheer astonishment.
‘What?’ said the youth and joined her, nudging her aside for a look. ‘Fucking hell. Is that blood?’
Cheryl staggered away. ‘Call the police,’ she gasped. ‘Quickly. Her attacker might still be in there.’
Thea blinked. ‘Obviously somebody is. Why – what have you seen?’
The youth stepped away and spoke to Thea. ‘It’s Natasha Ainsworth, covered in blood. I think she’s dead,’ he said.
Chapter Six
‘But who broke the window?’ Thea asked the question for the third time, of nobody in particular. Chaos had quickly developed, with Dennis Ireland summoned back only minutes after he’d gone into his house, to help the student and another man break down the front door, in case there was still hope of saving the injured woman’s life. People emerged from houses up and down the length of the main street, and asked the same questions over and over. Someone had been holding a mobile phone, inevitably, and had called 999. In the intervening fifteen minutes before an ambulance arrived, there was noise and confusion, with people wantonly trampling blood and glass in and out of the house, as they made clumsily noble attempts to revive the woman. ‘No, don’t,’ Thea bleated vainly, as she realised what a mess they were making of what could be a crime scene. ‘You shouldn’t go in there. You shouldn’t touch anything.’
‘But she might not be dead,’ Dennis Ireland paused to explain, with some indignation. ‘The first priority is to save life.’ Drama had rendered him even more pompous, it seemed.
Thea had not managed to catch a glimpse of the victim. It was of course feasible that she was alive, and should therefore be resuscitated if remotely possible. If there was no one else in the house, then she must have been the one who broke the window, and that required animation. But a second person might have done it and then made a hasty exit through the back of the house and over the garden wall.
The ambulance men added more trampling, taking what appeared to be an almost perverse satisfaction in covering themselves in the woman’s thickening blood. When they emerged from the house to be confronted by the crowd, they were shaking their heads and rolling their eyes, expressing defeat and a belated admission that they had been dealing with a murder victim. They were paler than they had been when they went in. The police car that arrived at that moment was greeted with serious looks and muttered information that had a galvanising effect. Onlookers, some of whom had caught the words ‘foul play’ and ‘knife wound’ and repeated them loudly to others further back, were told to go away. Blue tape was strung across the doorway and Thea braced herself for the questions that must inevitably follow.
Except – why should they? She had nothing whatever to do with it. Cheryl, yes. Cheryl had banged on the door, peered through the broken window, and then fetched Dennis Ireland from his house. Cheryl had taken charge and authorised the demolition of the front door. It might even have been she who phoned the emergency services. All Thea had done was stand limply on the doorstep of the Shepherds’ house and ineffectually try to warn people not to contaminate any evidence.
None of which would count for anything once DI Higgins or DS Gladwin got to hear about it. They would assume she was involved, if only as an unusually observant bystander. Or failing that, they would want to take her into their confidence, as a sounding board while they tried out various theories as to precisely what had taken place.
But I’m poorly, she whined to herself. Her headache had come back worse than ever, and her thoughts were sluggish as a result. Standing up became more and more difficult, not only because of the aching knees but the bouts of shivering did something to her balance. Besides, it already seemed self-evident that the person who had killed Natasha-the-girlfriend must have been Marian-the-wife. Far from being friends, as Higgins had surmised, they must have been arch enemies throughout. When Natasha threw the funeral party, Marian’s rage and humiliation must have driven her to a frenzy, the result of which was a savage knife attack on her rival.
‘But who broke the window?’ asked Thea again, as she automatically went back into the house with Cheryl. The woman made no reply, but focused on her legs in dismay. ‘I’ve got blood on my trousers, look. How horrible.’
‘The whole thing was absolutely terrible,’ said Thea, trying to summon the rightful levels of horror and outrage. ‘Did you kneel by the body, then?’
‘No, but I suppose I did get quite close. I knew her, of course. She was well liked. Quite young.’ Her voice was fading, and Thea couldn’t decide whether Cheryl was choking with shock or she herself was clouding over with flu.
The expected visit from a senior police detective did not take place. Somehow it was five o’clock, and dark. Cheryl had gone home, leaving instructions about keeping up fluid intake and not taking too many pills. She had settled Thea on the sofa with the television on, having fed the dogs and rats. More than that could not possibly be demanded. But instead of a promise to return next day with further succour, she dropped the bombshell that she was due to take a train to Exeter the following afternoon, where her sister had invited her to spend Christmas. This detail had been withheld until the final doorstep moment, and Thea experienced a pang of something like resentment. How soon she had allowed herself to become a helpless patient, she realised miserably. ‘Well, thank you for all you’ve done,’ she murmured. ‘I hope the police will let you go as planned.’
‘What? Of course they will. Why shouldn’t they?’
‘They’ll want to get a proper statement from you about Natasha. I expect they’ll do it in the morning.’
‘I’ve already told them everything.’ She stared at Thea aggressively. ‘Why would they want me again? They never said anything.’
‘I’ve probably got it wrong then.’ She wasn’t up to an argument about it. Besides, she couldn’t say for certain what was in the official mind. She couldn’t even say for certain that Natasha had been murdered. She might have deliberately slashed herself with broken glass, for all Thea knew. ‘Thank you very much,’ she managed, with a wan smile.
‘I’ll leave my details for you, shall I? Just in case.’ Without waiting for a reply, she had found a notepad by the phone and written on it. ‘Here,’ she proffered the result.
Thea glanced at it, barely registering the address, having focused on the first name. Cheryl Bagshawe. Old Mill House, Wood Stanway. ‘Oh – it’s Cheryl with a C. Fancy that. I thought it must be an S.’ Somehow it made a difference to her view of the woman. Cheryl was at least a real name, whilst Sheryl was not.
‘You think I should pronounce it Cheryl?’ said the woman, hardening the ch. ‘Most people in this country do, I know. I think it’s an awful name, either way, quite frankly.’
‘I rather like it,’ said Thea woozily. ‘I was just confused about the spelling.’
Her visitor left Thea in the living room and finally departed with her dog. Thea watched them pass her window, a coat folded over the woman’s arm, as if she felt too warm to wear it, and the dog’s short lead grasped firmly in the other hand. Thea breathed a sigh of relief. The television was trying to impart the alarming news that the flu statistics were reaching new highs, with many millions of people affected. Whilst not an esp
ecially threatening strain of the virus, with reassuringly few deaths reported so far, it was debilitating, and the number of people failing to turn up for work was causing difficulties. If it hadn’t been for the fact that it was Christmas, and therefore a slack time for most industries, the consequences for the GDP might have been a lot worse. Dozing fitfully, Thea took some solace from knowing that she was one of millions. There was official advice not to bother the doctor, who could do little but offer the standard advice to keep warm and stay away from crowds. The severe headache that was a feature of this particular virus was unpleasant but not dangerous. Aching joints, fever, and mild depression were all to be expected, and would pass within a few days. Anyone in a normal state of health would be very unlikely to suffer lasting damage. A forced cheerfulness on the part of the newsreader appended a laughing injunction to just lie back and make the most of it. Think of all those wonderful old films being shown on TV over Christmas, he said fatuously.
The day would have been distressing and exhausting even without being ill. The trouble with her car alone would have put a blight over everything. And Cheryl Whatnot had not exactly been an ideal companion for an afternoon. Bossy, argumentative, abrupt – any kindness had been obscured by her manner. What’s more, Thea belatedly realised, Cheryl had given away virtually nothing about her own life. An ex-husband, a married son and a sister, scattered around England – that was all she’d revealed. What was her job? Who were her local friends, if any? What had impelled her to chase after Thea, anyway, having seen her in a police car? What was so alarming about that? Had it been simple concern, or something more sinister? Over the past few years, Thea had learnt that it was unwise to take anybody at face value. There were depths of past history and dark resentments that a newcomer couldn’t hope to fathom on one brief encounter.
Trouble in the Cotswolds (The Cotswold Mysteries) Page 7
