Murder in the Cotswolds (The Sheriff Chick Charleston Mysteries Book 5)

by A B Guthrie

  “No bet.”

  “A little fun never hurt an investigation, did it?”

  “Just laugh in the face of murder?” Charleston grinned as he spoke. Perkins imagined Chick was enjoying the exchange. For that matter, he was himself.

  “I’ve learned to laugh at many things,” she replied, sobering. “Had to, you know.”

  Charleston nodded. “Yes, I know. We all do. Now what about the murder of Mr. Smith? What can you tell us?”

  “I hear a knife was stuck in him. Rose said she found him dead. That’s the sum of my knowledge. Just hearsay, I suppose.”

  “What about surmises?”

  “That’s too strong a word. I haven’t any.” A slender hand waved the suggestion away.

  “Let’s approach the matter in another way, if you will.”

  “If I will, Mr. Charleston? You mean you will.”

  “Forgive the loose language.” A grin came and went on his face. “Was there anything about Mr. Smith that struck you particularly? Anything in his manner? His expression? Anything?”

  “He liked women.”

  “So do most men, including myself.”

  Her hand fanned at him in disgust. “You know what I mean without my spelling it out. He was woman-crazy.”

  “Some woman in particular?”

  “All women in general so far as I could observe. Any woman would know. Around us he put on such a winning manner while his eyes seemed to see under our clothes.”

  “A lecher, was he? Any success?”

  Her laugh pealed out. “How would I know? I can speak just for myself.”

  “And?”

  “You’re just too nosy, Mr. Charleston.” She was still laughing. “If I had succumbed to his charms, I would deny it, wouldn’t I? So what’s the purpose in denial when I’m innocent? He tried me, and I chilled him. That’s the fact.”

  “What about the other women in their party of five? No, just the one other woman, since Mrs. Post is his sister.”

  “Mrs. Witt?”

  “Yes.”

  “Again, how would I know? But I got the impression that she merely endured him, and that by the hardest.”

  Perkins sighed silently. For no sensible reason the suggestion of a union there had disturbed him.

  Charleston went on, “What about the men? How did they behave toward him?”

  “Mr. Witt seemed friendly enough. But Mr. Post, that was different.”

  “How so?”

  She was silent for a moment, then took a breath and answered, “It’s my notion that Mr. Post couldn’t stand him. They never spoke to each other. They were like enemies. You could feel the heat just being around them.”

  Charleston rubbed his jaw, nodded his head, and said, “Did you notice any strangers in or around the inn on the night of the murder? Anyone to suspect? And did you hear any strange noises that night?”

  “No to the idea of strangers, Mr. Charleston. And I sleep in a cottage on the grounds, so I wouldn’t have heard anything.”

  “You work here, but you’re more than paid help. Is it fair to say that?”

  “I suppose. We’re lifelong friends, you know. And since that heart attack Mrs. Vaughn hasn’t been up to much. She’s so nervous, for one thing, afraid of everything, anything official especially.”

  “Is it because she might get in trouble as an innkeeper, because Peter Tarvin got drunk in her bar?”

  “I doubt that. Who’s going to complain? You?”

  “Not likely.”

  “I just hope she can keep on with the inn.”

  “Who has keys to the inn?”

  “I don’t. I think only Mrs. Vaughn and the night porter. That’s to the best of my knowledge. You’re asking yourself how anyone got inside, if anyone did.”

  “Right.”

  “But there are no close trees with handy branches, no convenient downspouts.”

  “And no signs of a break-in,” he said.

  “Wizard at work.” She smiled at him.

  Charleston rose and extended his hand. “I believe that ends the inquisition, Mrs. Witherspoon, but let’s play word games again sometime.”

  “And remember how useful is that word ‘discreet.’”

  Perkins held up a hand. “We’ve got no statement from you in the files, Mrs. Witherspoon. Sergeant Goodman will type out this conversation, show it to you, and ask you to sign it if it’s not in error.”

  “I’ll bend my mind to it,” she answered and went out.

  At the desk Perkins thanked Mrs. Vaughn for the use of the room and asked if the Posts and Witts were in.

  She said they were. Perkins consulted his watch and said to Charleston, “’We have time for one more before lunch. Take your pick.”

  “Mrs. Post then, if you agree.”

  “I’ll phone her. Ask her to come over. How about waiting for her, Sergeant?”

  “Sure thing.”

  The sky was clear, though a trifle misty. The incidents room smelled stale. Perkins had no sooner opened the windows than Mrs. Post and Goodman came in.

  “It’s kind of you to appear again,” Perkins told her. “Won’t you have a seat? Mr. Charleston has agreed to do the talking today.”

  Mrs. Post was dressed in dark clothes again, a suit too heavy for the weather. She wore a small, black beret and little earrings set with red stones. Her shoes appeared new but workaday.

  “I know you think we’re being a nuisance, Mrs. Post,” Charleston began, “but we are determined to find out who murdered your brother. I’m sure you want us to do that.”

  She gave a bare nod, her face impassive. The dead, inexpressive face of a statue, Perkins thought. Didn’t anything ever get to her?

  “After all, it was your brother who was killed,” Charleston reminded her. “Surely you want to see justice done?”

  She sat mute, her eyes on him.

  “Is there a reason behind your silence?”

  He persisted when she didn’t answer. “Your husband hated him. Is that why you don’t answer, for fear your husband killed him? Speak up, Mrs. Post. Are you shielding Mr. Post? What are we to believe?”

  This was really bearing down, Perkins thought. This verged on the brutal. He had started to shake his head when Mrs. Post bent forward, shoulders hunched. A small despairing sound came from her. It was impossible, this big hulk of a woman, this piece of statuary, to be folded and weeping. Even as he thought so, a great sob shook her, and sobbing words came out. “It’s so hard, so hard. No one can know.”

  Charleston sat quiet, letting her cry, but on his good face was a look of misery. He took a handkerchief from his pocket and pressed it in her hands.

  She began speaking again, the words choking out, spaced by short breaths. “He was good to me. Always good. His little sister. He called me that … even when I grew up. His little sister.”

  No one spoke. It seemed no one breathed except Mrs. Post. She raised her head then, the handkerchief against a cheek, and said, “I’m sorry.”

  “No, Mrs. Post.” Charleston might have been speaking to a child. “No need to be sorry. You’ll feel better by telling.”

  She lowered her head again. “Ben came, and I loved him, and we got married. He’s a good husband.” She put the handkerchief to her eyes again and tried not to cry. “Such a good husband, and it’s been so hard, and I’ve tried and tried. God knows I’ve tried.”

  Charleston’s voice was still soothing. “We’re sure of that. Rest easy there.”

  “And we moved to America. Ollie joined us about three years later, and Ollie and Ben went into business, sometimes together, sometimes with Walter Witt, sometimes alone. He did well, off and on, Ben did.”

  Perkins loaded his pipe but didn’t light it. Maybe it had been wrong to load it. Any distraction might end the spell in the room.

  He needn’t have worried, for Mrs. Post went on, raising her head, then bending it again. “Then Ben concluded that Ollie had done him wrong in some deal or other, and he set out to
whip him.” Her head moved back and forth. “I was there. I tried to stop it, but Ben kept hitting Ollie, and then Ollie … he was terribly strong—put his arm around Ben and brought one of Ben’s arms up behind his back and, holding him and bringing the arm up more, made Ben say he’d had enough. Then Ollie let go his hold and slapped Ben’s face, slapped it again and then again while tears streamed down Ben’s face.”

  Abruptly she fell silent and seemed to wilt until Charleston asked, “Would you like some water, Mrs. Post?”

  She didn’t answer but bowed her head again while fresh sobs shook her. “There’s no one alive left to grieve. No one but me.”

  Goodman came forward with a glass of water and put it in her hand, then stepped back to his chair.

  “No one, Mrs. Post? No one at all?” Charleston asked. “No family?”

  “No one.”

  “Aren’t there other Smiths around here?”

  “Plenty, I suppose, but no kin of ours.”

  “Your parents are both dead?”

  “A long time ago.”

  “No aunts, uncles, cousins living?”

  “None living. We had an aunt. She married a German and went to live there. We lost track of her. I think she’s dead.”

  “Go on, Mrs. Post.”

  “There was an uncle, too. He was a sailor and lost at sea in 1917. A bomb or something. No children.”

  “I see. Thanks. Now about your brother. Didn’t he ever marry?”

  Tears still shimmered in her eyes. “Yes. After Ben and I went to America. It didn’t work out.”

  “Did you know his wife?”

  “I never met her. I don’t know her maiden name and not even when they were married. I don’t know for sure that they were, but I guess so.”

  “Didn’t your brother ever speak of her?”

  “He was bitter, so bitter. I could tell that. He kept it to himself.”

  “Any children?”

  “I think one child, from something he let drop, but I never could get anything more out of him.”

  “We’re grateful to you, Mrs. Post. We’ll have to consider what you’ve told us, see whether it helps us.”

  “That’s what I was afraid of. That’s why I didn’t want to tell you. You think Ben killed him. You think my husband killed my brother. But I swear to you that isn’t so.” Her voice rose. The words came faster. “It can’t be true. It doesn’t fit.”

  “Why not, Mrs. Post?”

  “Because that kind of killing, that stabbing with a knife, wouldn’t have satisfied Ben. It wouldn’t have eased his humiliation one little bit. To feel right, to feel proud in his head again, he would have had to whip him with his fists. He would have had to make him say ‘enough’ and slap his face afterwards.”

  She rose, wiped her eyes once more and tossed the handkerchief on Perkins’s desk. She straightened, reassembling her being, and stepped to the door, herself again, a whole woman. Maybe.

  Chapter Twelve

  Constable Rendell, whom Perkins had asked to scout around on the chance of picking up something significant, joined them before they reached the Stag and Hind. Perkins steered him to the side of the walk out of the foot traffic. “Had lunch?” he asked.

  “Just a little while ago.”

  “So. Anything?”

  “Two items. Among the strangers, a professional man, so he seemed, here in Upper Beechwood on the afternoon of the murder. He kind of stood out. No sign of him since. Two, a young fellow, a stranger, was around on the same day, too. He bought cigarettes, and the clerk that waited on him said he talked like a Cotswold man but was dressed up pretty fancy, like for a wedding or feast.”

  “Yes?”

  “That’s all, except the young bloke seemed interested in girls, them that might listen to reason.”

  “Good work, Rendell,” Perkins said. “Now look in the records and see if you can find anything relating to the marriage of Oliver Smith. The bride’s name. She may have been from around here. Children, if any. Dig it out, Constable.”

  At the pub Perkins absently ordered pork pie and a pint and went with Goodman and Charleston to a table.

  Later, back in the incidents room, he reported what Rendell had told him. “Maybe something, maybe not a damn thing.”

  “Professional man, as distinct from a businessman,” Charleston said, stroking his jaw. “Did he make that point?”

  “More or less, I’d say.”

  “Sergeant,” Charleston said, “the names of the men who lodged at the inn that night. You understand, murder night. Are they in your file?”

  “Yes, sir.” Goodman came over, leafed through the reports, and said finally, “Here they are. Thornton, McCarthy, Burroughs—”

  “Stop right there.” He turned to Perkins. “Clayton, Clayton and Burroughs. That’s Post’s firm of solicitors in London, Sergeant?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The inspector said, “I will be damned.”

  “Isn’t it likely that Smith used that firm, too? Why not? No conflict. Stands to reason.”

  “Right. We’ll tackle him.” Perkins smiled without much mirth. “We move forward. Perhaps not forward, but we’re moving. So now, that young fellow Rendell mentioned, we’ll hear more from him on that. Let’s go. I want to see Walter Witt.” He didn’t say that he wanted to see Mrs. Witt, too, to close the afternoon with the sight and sound of her in his senses. Damn foolishness, but there it was.

  Goodman rose and went to the door, saying, “I’ll see where he is. I notified him earlier.”

  “That man Burroughs,” Perkins said. “No time like the present.”

  He lifted the phone, dialed, and after a few minutes, was given the firm’s number. A minute after that he said, “Mr. Burroughs, please.” Then, “Mr. Burroughs, this is Detective Chief Inspector Fred Perkins at Upper Beechwood. We’d like to talk to you.” He quit speaking and listened. “Oh, yes, so you do know. Could we come to your office for a chat? Burford? Tomorrow? About noon? That would be fine. I’ll have my sergeant and an American officer with me. He’s helping in the investigation. Charles Charleston is his name. Right. The Lamb Inn.”

  “Well, that’s arranged,” he said, hanging up the receiver. “Convenient for us. Burroughs has an appointment in Burford. That’s better than London.” Goodman entered with Witt then. “Good afternoon, Mr. Witt. Have a seat. We have some questions.”

  Witt was dressed in a lightweight, gray suit, complete with vest. With his gray shirt he wore a blue tie. His wire-framed glasses glinted in a slanting shaft of light. He sat facing Perkins, as alert as a sparrow. Behind his glasses his eyes seemed to be smiling. Perkins looked from him to Charleston to Goodman, who was ready with his notebook. “My colleague here, Mr. Charleston, has the questions. Don’t be irritated if you’ve answered the questions before.”

  “Repetition leads to conviction, as our late Nazi friend, Dr. Goebbels, was wont to say.” He looked around pleasantly. “In other words, say a thing often enough, and it becomes popular belief. Fire away, Mr. Charleston.”

  “A few things then. You’ve already given Inspector Perkins your full name and address?”

  “Right you are. And accounted for my presence here.”

  “So you say.” Charleston folded his hands and for a long instant studied the man. “What about the others? What about your companions?”

  Witt smiled. He wasn’t a sparrow. He was a banty rooster. “I assume you will consider the presence of my wife as being in the nature of things.”

  “Quite.” Charleston cast an amused glance at Perkins as he said the word. “And is it, was it, in the nature of things that Mr. Smith should be with you?”

  “He had some business here. More than that, he was born in the Cotswolds and hadn’t been back since he left England years ago.”

  “And Mr. and Mrs. Post?”

  “As you know, she is, or was, Oliver Smith’s sister. Like him, she wanted to see the Cotswolds again.”

  “Very cozy, Mr. Witt. Very ni
ce indeed. So you all got together, you great friends, and decided to come in a sort of close family group?”

  “Now, Mr. Charleston, I see no need for sarcasm. It just turned out to be convenient for us to come together.”

  “So convenient that I wonder.”

  “Do you also wonder about people on a tour, how they get together? People from here and there, from near and far, and there they all are on a coach or plane, friendly as next-door neighbors.”

  “You were hardly that friendly. We are told that Mr. Post hated Mr. Smith, and I suppose vice versa. That must have made for merriment.”

  “They kept their feelings under good control. I don’t ask that my friends be friends with one another.”

  “Were they personal or merely business friends of yours?”

  “I suppose you could say both. Off and on I’ve been in business with them, together or singly, a good many times.”

  “Do you have any idea what business Mr. Smith had here?”

  “Not really. Something to do with an estate. He didn’t confide in me. He was a close-mouthed man.”

  “We have gathered in our questioning that you, almost alone, were on friendly terms with Mr. Smith.”

  “Was I?”

  “Don’t dodge the point, Mr. Witt. Why was he disliked?”

  Witt’s gaze went from Charleston to Perkins to Goodman. He wore a small smile. “Why not consult Dr. Freud? He might know. I don’t.”

  “I’m not so sure of that. Now what’s beyond my understanding is why Mr. Post, hating Mr. Smith as he did, should consent to travel with Mr. Smith at the mere urging of his wife?”

  “Perhaps you don’t appreciate her powers of persuasion.”

  Charleston grunted. “Maybe so,” he said. “There are other things I don’t appreciate. Your explanations, for instance. I find them leaky.”

  “I swear that is too bad—when the truth won’t hold water. And I’ll add just this, for your enlightenment. We have venture capital and are looking for opportunities for investment. And I hope you haven’t overlooked the fact that my twin brother lives here, and I wanted to see him again.”

  “Capital for investment. Where? Here?”

  Mr. Witt smiled tolerantly. “Not here. In London perhaps. On the continent maybe, or in South America.”