Death at Coombe Farm

by Phillip Strang

  ‘Detective Inspector, we need to wrap up the other murders,’ Clare said.

  ‘There were only two people who knew of Old Ted and Mrs Selwood. Mrs Selwood wasn’t going to tell anyone, although Old Ted had. If he had told his wife or even Molly Dempsey, then he could have told Cathy. Old Ted was a very moral man who had sinned, the guilt of it haunted him. And then Cathy comes along. She treats him as a friend, something he had not had for many years. He talks to her, opens up. He may not have mentioned about sleeping with Mrs Selwood, but he mentions that Gordon is probably not a Selwood.’

  ‘On the day of his death, Cathy was in a strange mood,’ Gordon said. ‘I asked her what it was, but she wouldn’t tell me. She left the house early that day and went for a walk. Cathy liked to walk, and sometimes she’d be gone for an hour, sometimes two. I didn’t worry that she was gone for so long, and I never thought any more about it, not until now. Cathy was a Selwood, the same as my mother. She would do anything to protect the good name of the Selwoods, to protect me.’

  ‘Even murder?’

  ‘Even that,’ Gordon said.

  ‘We’ll never prove this,’ Tremayne said.

  ‘Then I’m pleased she’s dead. I loved her, you know that. I couldn’t bear the thought of her being locked up in prison.’

  ‘Who killed Cathy?’ Clare said. ‘It’s the same rifle. Where is it?’

  ‘It’s in the barn at the top of the hill,’ Marge Selwood said.

  ‘How do you know this?’

  ‘It’s where Old Ted kept it. He kept it hidden, just in case there were foxes in the area. I knew where it was.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘I was up there once when he took it out. He must have shown it to Cathy.’

  ‘Did you kill Old Ted?’

  ‘No, that would be Cathy.’

  ‘And Cathy?’

  She wanted to take me away from the farm, away from my son. I couldn’t let her. I shot her, and I killed Molly Dempsey.’

  ‘Mother, how could you?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Gordon,’ Tremayne said, ‘but Cathy was a murderer as well. If her fingerprints are on the rifle, then we’ll have our proof.’

  Rose Goode, the new matriarch of the family, took control of the situation. She assisted Marge, accompanied by a uniform, into the living room and sat her down. She then returned and told the four Selwood men to sit down. ‘We need to make plans for the future. Nicholas and William are your brothers, Gordon. You’ll need to make provision for them. William, we want you here to run the farm. Nicholas, if you don’t want to be involved, we’ll understand. And as for Gordon, if he wants to run his vintage car business from here, then that’s what he can do.’

  ‘And my grandmother? Crispin said.

  ‘We’ll make sure she’s treated well, whatever happens.’

  The End

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  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Phillip Strang was born in England in the late forties, during the post-war baby boom. He had a comfortable middle-class upbringing, spending his youth, a time of innocence, in small town seventy miles west of London.

  It was in the days before mobile phones, the internet, terrorism and wanton violence. He was an avid reader of science fiction in his teenage years: Isaac Asimov, Frank Herbert, the masters of the genre. Much of what they and others mentioned has now become a reality. Science fiction has now become science fact. Still an avid reader, the author now mainly reads thrillers.

  In his early twenties, the author, with a degree in electronics engineering and a desire to see the world left the cold, damp climes of England for Sydney, Australia – his first semi-circulation of the globe. Now, forty years later, he still resides in Australia, although many intervening years were spent in a myriad of countries, some calm and safe, others no more than war zones.

  Author’s Website: http://www.phillipstrang.com

  Email; phillip@phillipstrang.com

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