Trouble in the Cotswolds (The Cotswold Mysteries) (5 page)

At first she thought the juddering came from her, and not the car’s engine. But the truth was quickly apparent. It coughed and slowed, and gave every impression of a dying horse as she kicked down on the accelerator. In a narrow stretch of road, with a blind bend only a few yards ahead, her car came to a decisive halt. She turned off the ignition and then on again. It fired and caught, and she felt a wary optimism. But when she put it in gear and released the clutch, it merely gasped and stalled.
Perhaps this is a dream,
she thought. If it was real, then she was in danger of some vehicle coming round the bend and hitting her. Even travelling at thirty miles an hour, it would be hard-pressed to stop in time.
Thank goodness I haven’t got the dogs with me,
she thought next.

In her purse somewhere was a card issued by the AA. There was also a mobile phone in the bag. She had all the modern necessities for getting out of a crisis with minimal inconvenience. All she had to do was call the
number on the card and report her situation. A kind man in a truck would appear and either mend the car or tow her home.
First things first,
said her inner voice, and she took the pack of painkillers from the front passenger seat and opened it. It wasn’t easy to swallow the tablets without any water to wash them down, but she did it. They left a bitter tangy aftertaste that was at first revolting and then oddly pleasant. If she could quell the headache, everything would be very much less complicated.

Then she tried to make the phone call. There was a long number across the middle of the card, which she carefully keyed into her phone. When nothing happened, she did it again. Only on the third try did she realise she was using her membership number and not the 0800 telephone number that appeared in even larger figures on the back of the card. An automated message eventually filtered through to her throbbing head, to the effect that all operatives were busy, but they would attend to her at the very earliest opportunity. The voice told her that if she was in danger of being struck by traffic, she should leave the car and stand well clear of it. That made sense, and she got out of the car, thinking how lucky she was not to have been killed already.

At last a real person spoke to her. She had to give her name and membership number, plus mobile number and car registration. Then she had to try to explain where she was and what the trouble was with the car. ‘It just conked out,’ she said. ‘For no reason at all.’
Directions to the exact spot turned out to be infinitely more difficult. A small country road off the A424, to the west, leading down to the A4077, seemed clear enough to Thea, but the person on the phone thought differently. ‘Haven’t you got a
map
?’ Thea demanded. ‘It should be obvious, from what I’ve told you.’ The effort had drained her, and she felt tears of frustration lurking somewhere.

The woman made soothing noises and asked a few more questions. When it was ascertained that she was there on her own, as well as leaving little or no space for other traffic to pass, she was promised priority attention. She would be called back with an estimated time of arrival, but should expect someone to be there within the hour.

That wasn’t good enough by a long way, to Thea’s mind, but it would have to do. Unless she walked back to the main road, scarcely a quarter of a mile distant, and tried to flag down a likely rescuer, she was doomed to a nervous wait in the cold, afraid to sit in the car in case something came along and hit it.
I’ll probably die out here,
she thought melodramatically.
One way
or another.
The pills had not made any discernible difference to her headache, and the way she felt, death was not such a terrible prospect.

The bare hedges on either side of her bordered featureless fields, with no sign of habitation. Patches of woodland on skewed hillsides were visible away to the right, where she guessed Snowshill must be.
She remembered abrupt ridges and sweeping stretches of fairly level ground on the approach road to that village. Little roads ran in every direction, making it all too easy to get lost. She had been there in summer, everything green and lush. Now it was bare and brown and she was put in mind of her stay in Hampnett, when it had snowed and she had been scared. That was a year ago now, and she had never gone back there. Perhaps she should have done, to check on the poor mindless dog she’d taken care of, and the inscrutable donkey.

She slapped her hands together, although she wasn’t cold. This had been an easy winter so far, with no hint of snow and hardly any ice. Her own internal thermostat was badly misbehaving, and she could feel sweat running down her body under the three layers of clothes. When she touched her face, it was clammy – the skin warm under a layer of chilly moisture. She should have told the AA woman she was ill. It hadn’t crossed her mind to do so.

She heard the approaching car from some distance away, but her slow wits prevented her from acting until it was too late. She should have gone to the bend, and waved them down. That’s where she should have been standing from the start; it was obvious now. They’d come round it at forty miles an hour and hit her poor little Astra, as it sat there so helplessly. The driver would shout at her. There might be a small child on the back seat, thrown against its restricting belt
and damaged. Ever since she’d been obliged to strap Jessica into a confining contraption, she’d had a vision of a neatly quartered infant, sliced up by the beastly constraints when the car hit something unmoving and sent physics into a new cosmos where none of the usual rules applied. Or perhaps there would be a dog, not restrained at all, sitting up tall on the passenger seat and mashed face first against the windscreen. The visions flashed feverishly through her mind in the seconds before the vehicle came into view.

‘Stop!’ she called uselessly. ‘Oh,
stop
.’

It did, with a generous six inches to spare.

By some dreamlike chance, it proved to be a police car. Not only that, but she recognised the man in the passenger seat. ‘Higgins!’ she gasped. ‘Jeremy Higgins.’

He frowned uncertainly up at her through the car’s open window. ‘Um …’ he began, before realisation dawned. ‘Mrs Osborne!’ he remembered. ‘Lower Slaughter … your sister …’

‘That’s right,’ she laughed, wanting to hug him. ‘And Phil Hollis. Don’t worry – it’s okay to mention that. It’s been more than a year now.’

The ginger-haired, bull-necked Detective Inspector got out of the car. ‘Is this yours?’ he indicated to the Astra.

She nodded ruefully. ‘It conked out. The AA are coming.’

‘We can’t leave it here. Kevin – come and help me push,’ he ordered the uniformed officer in the driving
seat. ‘What’s wrong with it anyway?’ he asked Thea.

‘I have no idea. It was fine – and then it just died. I’m staying in Stanton,’ she added helpfully.

Jeremy went to the front of the car and peered in at the scatter of shopping, purse and bag on the front seat. ‘Just died, eh?’ he murmured, sniffing the air. ‘With no warning?’ He straightened and looked at her. ‘Is that a garage receipt I can see? Did you just fill her up?’

‘Yes. At the garage on the main road, a mile or two away.’

‘Does your car take diesel?’

‘What? No – it’s unleaded. Oh!’ She put a horrified hand to her mouth. ‘No! Surely I can’t have been so stupid. I wasn’t thinking. My head – I’m not very well, actually. But – oh, God – what happens now? How did you know?’

‘I
am
a detective,’ he grinned at her. ‘I can smell diesel, can’t you? It’ll have to be towed to a workshop and drained. That’s a job for the AA. Have they said they’ll take you home afterwards?’

‘I think so. Isn’t that what they do? I’ve never called them before.’ She had a thought. ‘But I don’t want to go home. They have to take me to Stanton.’

‘You’ll be in trouble without the car, if you’re house-sitting,’ he observed. ‘With Christmas coming.’ He looked at her more closely. ‘And you’re ill, are you? What’s the problem?’

‘Flu, I think,’ she said miserably. ‘My head’s killing me and everything aches. And I’m all hot and cold.’

‘We’ll have to sort you out, then,’ said the kindly man. Thea recalled how gentle he had been with her in Lower Slaughter, and how he probably knew much more about her than she realised. ‘I’ll have a word with the AA people and then we’ll take you back to Stanton, and let the mechanic chap deal with the car as quick as he can. He’ll probably just tow it to a garage.’

‘That’s very nice of you,’ she said. ‘Thanks.’

‘First we’ll have to move it. There’ll be a pile-up if we’re not careful.’ Higgins issued instructions to the wordless Kevin, and within two minutes the Astra was on the narrow verge and the police car had reversed around the bend to provide ample warning of an obstruction. They had scarcely finished before a blue Transit van materialised and had to be helped through the narrow gap between Thea’s car and the opposite hedge. Then a phone in the police car warbled and Kevin hurried to respond. He briefly reported their rescue mission, and told the DI, ‘We’re wanted in Broadway, but no great rush.’

Higgins nodded, and addressed Thea. ‘Get in,’ he ordered. ‘It’s cold out here.’

The car was snug and airless, with a male smell that Thea could detect even through her virus-ridden senses. Coffee, clothes, self-importance. Even the benign Higgins could not avoid this last. People were at his mercy, whether he liked it or not. Within seconds she was huddled in a corner of the back seat and her eyelids
were drooping. Somebody else was in charge now. It felt like heaven.

She was faintly aware of Higgins walking back round the bend to her car, talking as he went. He seemed to be gone for some minutes, while Kevin sat stolidly in the driving seat, saying nothing, for which she was grateful. She sank into a mindless state, waiting passively for whatever might happen next.

A door closed with a muted thunk, then the car reversed and turned in a wider part of the lane, bumping slightly on a muddy rut. ‘Makes you think of Lower Slaughter, doesn’t it?’ said Higgins, looking over his shoulder at her.

The events they had shared had involved a muddy country road, it was true, but Thea couldn’t see any real connection. ‘Mmm,’ she said.

‘Hey! Don’t go to sleep on me,’ he said sharply. ‘It’s bad enough waking my kids when they go off in the car. A grown woman with flu would be a lot worse.’

‘You’ll get my germs,’ she mumbled. ‘Just in time for Christmas.’

‘Occupational hazard,’ laughed Higgins, but Kevin gave a sort of squawk and started to lower the window beside him. ‘Stop it, Kev,’ said the detective. ‘If you get it, you get it. There’s not a lot you can do about it.’

‘So what’s the Stanton story?’ he pressed Thea. ‘Nice house, is it?’

‘Average. A lovely big dog. Rats.’

‘What? Where?’

‘In a cage. Pet ones. One of them’s called Petulia.’

‘And the dog doesn’t eat them?’

‘Nope.’

‘Man near Stanton died. In his bath,’ volunteered Kevin. ‘Silly fool.’

‘I saw it in the paper,’ Thea agreed. ‘I’m in the next-door house.’

‘No, no, that can’t be right. Doug Callendar lived halfway up a hill in a mansion, with no neighbours for a mile in any direction,’ Higgins corrected her.

‘Oh.’ She forced her mind to work. ‘But the funeral was next door. I saw all the people. Yesterday.’

‘Blimey!’ laughed Kev. ‘So the girlfriend got her way, then.’

The others were silent for a moment. Then ‘Explain,’ Higgins encouraged.

‘Come on, sir. You know the story. Everybody this side of Oxford must know about it by this time. Callendar’s wife is Marian Callendar the magistrate. He lived with her, but he’s also got – had, I mean – a girlfriend in a house in Stanton. Bold as brass he was, making no secret of it. Marian’s always put a brave face on it, making her own life and getting all her rightful perks as the wife. When he died, all the talk was whether they’d both sit up at the front for the funeral. Surely you’ve heard about it?’

‘Sorry. Unless there’s a crime I mostly ignore gossip.’

‘You shouldn’t,’ said Thea softly. ‘Stuff like that
often leads to crime. And it certainly explains a lot, after a crime has happened.’

‘You think the wife – a very respectable woman, I might add, who I do know rather well – bumped him off?’ Higgins grinned at her. ‘You would think that, I suppose.’

She tried to summon some protestation. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, you’re very often around when something like that happens. It must make you suspect foul play every time a bloke dies. Worse than a copper, you are.’

It felt very unfair. ‘I’m not,’ she said childishly. ‘I never said anything about the wife killing the man in the bath. That was you, not me.’

‘The question is – did Marian go to the wake at the girlfriend’s?’ Kevin summarised. ‘You know what women are like – they’ll surprise you every time. You never know, they’re probably best buddies now.’

‘Could be they bumped him off together, then, and shared out the loot. Plenty of it, from the sound if it,’ said Higgins, belatedly entering into the spirit of the conversation.

‘Nearly there,’ Kevin alerted them. ‘This is Stanway.’

‘Stanton, not Stanway,’ said Thea.

‘Right. I know that. But there’s barely half a mile between them. Look at that place!’ He slowed as they passed the elaborate entrance gate to Stanway House, with the church modestly set back behind and to one side of it. ‘Ever been in there, sir?’ he asked Higgins.

‘Once, years ago. Don’t remember much about it.’

‘It’s got lots of history,’ said Thea, struggling to focus.

‘I prefer the cricket pavilion,’ said Higgins, bizarrely.

Thea wondered if she was momentarily dreaming. ‘Pardon?’ she said.

‘Haven’t you seen it? You must have driven past it. It’s here, look.’ He pointed out a large wooden shed on the edge of a big field, with handsome old trees standing guard over it.

‘I didn’t notice,’ she said. ‘When I’m better, I’ll come for a look.’

‘You do that. Oy, Kev – watch out for the great hound.’ Walking along the side of the road was the dog Thea had seen outside Stanton church the day before, with its woman holding it on a short chain.

‘It’s a Great Dane,’ she said. ‘I met that woman. Sherry, she’s called. Something like that. She doesn’t like Blondie.’

‘Blondie’s a dog?’ checked Higgins.

‘Right. I wonder if she did go to the funeral. She was dressed for it. But what about the dog?’

‘You’re delirious,’ Higgins said kindly. ‘The sooner we get you indoors, the better.’

‘Oh! I forgot my shopping. And my bag. Oh, damn it.’ She almost wept at the thought of the honey and Lemsip left behind in her car.

‘No, you didn’t. I’ve got them here. And I phoned the AA for you, telling them what’s what. They should
manage to see to everything without you being there, even though it’s against their usual practice. I pulled a few strings. They’ve got your mobile number, so they’ll keep you informed of what’s going on. I hope,’ he added almost inaudibly.

Thea blinked in bewilderment. How had she missed all that? ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Thank you. That’s fantastic.’

‘You’ll be hungry,’ he went on. ‘It’s well past lunchtime.’

‘No, it isn’t. I set out early. I’m sure I did. It must be only a bit after eleven.’

‘It’s half past one,’ he corrected. ‘These dark days, it feels like dawn at nine in the morning. I bet it was after eleven before you even left the house.’

‘Could be,’ she said dubiously, trying to remember. ‘But I’m not hungry.’

‘Feed a cold and starve a fever,’ said Kevin, still eyeing the massive dog in his rear-view mirror. ‘Isn’t that what they say? If it’s half one, we ought to be in Broadway soonish,’ he added.

‘What’s in Broadway?’ asked Thea, thinking she’d missed something else of significance.

‘Some bit of bother at the Methodist church. Flowers missing from a grave, would you believe?’

‘Willersey, not Broadway, to be completely accurate,’ said Kevin.

‘Another funeral,’ Thea mused. ‘Eva. That’ll be Eva. How can people steal flowers? That’s beastly.’

‘Beastly,’ echoed Higgins in a gentle mockery.
‘Perfectly beastly. What do you mean – that’ll be Eva?’

‘I had a visit yesterday from her relations. Aunt and cousin, I think.’

Higgins hooted in disbelief and astonishment. ‘Hollis was so right about you,’ he crowed. ‘You’re like a magic talisman – always at the scene of a crime ten minutes before it’s even happened. That’s what he said.’

‘Rubbish,’ she snapped crossly. ‘That’s a horrible thing to say about me. It just so happens that they’re friends with the people who own the Stanton house. The daughter’s not quite right – whatever you’re supposed to say these days. Schizophrenia or something.’ She slurred the word drunkenly, hearing it rebound inside her foggy brain. ‘Gets into very complicated arguments. She likes the rats. The cousin died. Cystic fibrosis, apparently.’

‘And do you know who stole the flowers?’

‘Of course I don’t. Besides, isn’t it slightly beneath your pay grade?’ she wondered. ‘Aren’t you’re an inspector?’

He cocked a cautionary eyebrow at her. ‘Yes, I am. The fact is, this is Kevin’s shout. I’m just along for the ride. Where he goes, I have to follow, at least for today.’

‘Here we are,’ she pointed to the Shepherds’ house. ‘It’s called Woodside House, officially, in case you need to make a report. Not sure which wood it’s supposed to be beside, but there you go. Most house names are daft when you think about them.’ She was rambling. She could feel her own voice drifting along with scarcely
any conscious thought behind it. ‘You can leave me now.’

‘I’m not sure we can.’ Higgins was suddenly showing serious concern. ‘You’ve got a temperature, that’s obvious. Your car’s going to be out of action for at least the rest of today, so you’re stuck here.’

‘How will I get it back?’ she wondered. ‘Will they bring it for me, when it’s mended?’

‘The AA won’t, but the garage might. Keep an eye on your phone. There’ll be a text any time now, I shouldn’t wonder, telling you where they’ve taken it.’

‘Oh, Lord,’ she wailed. ‘How could I have done such a stupid thing? Will it need a new engine, do you think?’

Kevin snorted and gave an exaggerated look at his watch. Higgins made reassuring noises, but was obviously losing patience, as well as his colleague. Thea opened the door and started to climb out of the car. ‘I’ll be fine,’ she said, more to herself than to the men. It was extraordinary how heavy her arms and legs had become. ‘I don’t have to do anything or go anywhere. The dogs can make do with the garden for today. I’ll be much better tomorrow. Thanks, Jeremy. I don’t know what I would have done without you.’

‘Given your germs to the AA man,’ Kevin muttered with ill-concealed resentment.

Higgins continued to look concerned, as he had done since he’d first found her. ‘Tell you what,’ he said. ‘I’ll just pop next door and tell them the situation, get them to keep an eye on you. They’re neighbourly
people round here, especially at this season of good cheer. You’ve got to have some sort of safety net. Unless you’ve got somebody who’ll come and stay with you?’

‘My daughter’s scared of rats,’ said Thea. ‘And Drew’s got children. And my sister …’

‘Yes, I know about your sister,’ he said gently.

‘No – not Emily. The other sister, Jocelyn,’ she corrected earnestly.

Higgins waved the subject aside as irrelevant. ‘I’ll just be a minute.’ He was addressing Kevin, who sighed theatrically.

‘Not that side,’ Thea told him, pointing to the house where the funeral party had gathered the previous day. ‘That’s where the dead man’s girlfriend lives.’
See
, she wanted to boast
I’m still keeping up with everything.

‘Okay.’ He gave the house a long slow examination that surprised Thea. Then he trotted to the door of the one the far side and rang the bell. Thea stood unsteadily beside the car, aware that her dog was scrabbling at Gloria’s net curtains in the living room.

A man came to the door, listened gravely to Higgins’ explanation and threw a somewhat unengaged glance at Thea. ‘I’m afraid I’m going away myself tomorrow,’ he said, quite loudly. ‘But of course, if there’s a problem in the meantime, do give me a shout.’