Burying the Past (24 page)

‘Postcards. That's all,' Kim declared, patting a heap of individual evidence bags. ‘I told her to invoice us for her time.'

‘She's gone, then? But who'll put the cabinet back together?'

‘Oh, she's already done that. Quicker than my brother can do a Rubik's cube. What's the problem?'

‘Nothing,' Fran lied, resisting a strong urge to kick the desk and scream. ‘OK, these cards – what do they tell us?'

‘Sod all. Pretty seasides, nice stately homes. Very strange mix.'

‘Is there one of Verities?'

‘That National Trust place? First place I thought of. But there isn't. Just these.' She picked up a pile and let them slither back on to her desk.

Fran thought she showed great forbearance when she said quietly, ‘They just demand a bit of old-fashioned detective work, don't they?' But she couldn't resist adding, like an overkeen rookie, ‘Give me a list of the places they show and I'll see if they ring any bells with me. Actually, give them to me in order – the order they were placed in the drawer,' she added as Kim blinked at her. ‘You have kept them in order, haven't you?' She took a deep breath so that she could explain without swearing or shouting. ‘You see, if someone went to this trouble to conceal them I regard anything – everything – about them as significant.'

Everything about Kim said she hadn't bothered. But she declared, ‘Of course. No problem. Though maybe Ms Townend could remember any particular arrangement I've missed.' After a breath, which Fran could count in seconds, she continued, ‘I'll give her a bell.' Grabbing her phone, she headed off, shutting the door behind her so Fran couldn't hear the ensuing conversation.

Not unless she put her ear to the crack. She got enough to prove her suspicions horribly right. However, never one to cry over spilt milk, and taking care not to change the order herself, she leafed through them. The first thing she noticed was that not all were commercial cards, though all were much the same size.

It looked as though Dr Lovage, assuming it was she who'd concealed the cards, had been a National Trust buff, even if they hadn't so far been able to connect her with Verities: her travels had taken her to Felbrigg and Blickling; Lanhydrock and Cotehele; Little Moreton Hall and Erddig. So far, all very pretty and no use at all. Still nothing from Verities to connect her with Grange. Dunstanburgh – looking particularly bleak. London's Docklands – but this was a photo, not a card. So was a view of Carcassonne. A chic place in what looked like the Cotswolds. Then there was another: a weathered gravestone.

Sacred to the memory of Thomas Parkinson, JP

Born 1815

Taken to the bosom of our Lord, 1877

And to his dearly beloved wife,

Anna, 1820 – 1840,

And his second wife,

Elizabeth Jane,

Mother of Herbert,

both taken to a better place in 1842

IN THEE WE TRUST

Could they be some of Lovage's ancestors? But she'd have had others, and there were no similar photos. She had an idea that from wherever she was currently based, Dr Lovage was having a sardonic laugh.

Before she could summon Kim back and give her the bollocking of her young life – not on record, not the sort of rebuke that would stick with official glue throughout the rest of her career – her phone rang.

‘Fran? Fran Harman?' The voice was slightly overloud, as if the speaker was a little deaf, or simply didn't rely on his tiny mobile to carry the volume he wanted. ‘Bill Baker here.'

‘Bill – oh, Gardening Society Bill.'

‘We were hoping you'd come along to last night's meeting, only my wife tells me you and your fiancé were tied up with the telly.'

‘We were indeed. I'm really sorry, Bill – the meeting went clean out of my mind. Not being a great gardener,' she added.

‘Yet,' he corrected her quickly. ‘When you've mastered that patch of yours you will be. Anyway, I've got the comments we made all signed as true, and I could drop them over to your place tonight if you like.'

‘I don't like to put you to any trouble,' she said truthfully.

‘No trouble. I like a bit of a walk, and to be honest I'd love a nose round.'

‘You'd be more than welcome. Make sure you wear heavy boots, if you've got any. I'll ask them to leave a spare hard hat. Very keen on the regs, my builders,' she added, almost apologetically.

‘As they should be,' he said sharply. ‘About seven suit you?'

It would give her a very good excuse to tear Mark from his desk – and herself, of course, from hers, or at least these photos. Meanwhile, she must have an apologetic word with Don and Jill, and see if Cynd had been released from hospital. But first, before all else, she needed a cup of tea and the loo – in whichever order.

The latter was a good choice, because that was where she ran into Jill. ‘I'm sorry. Should have been your collar. Stuck my nose in.'

Jill responded with a laugh. ‘Fran, the day you stop sticking your nose in, I shall consider retiring myself. Cynd will be discharged late this evening, or early tomorrow, with the proviso she's properly fed and watered at regular intervals.'

‘Who's collecting her?'

Jill put her hands up in mock surrender. ‘OK, OK – I'll do it myself.'

‘Can you go via Janie's ward?' She waited while Jill tapped the details into her phone. ‘She's too ill to have to worry about anyone else's well-being. Be sure to tell her about the feeding and watering. The poor kid won't have to graze on others' leavings while she's here, at least.'

‘Nor in prison,' Jill agreed soberly.

With Mark grumbling that he'd meant to stay later and work through his personal emails in peace, but pacified by the promise of pub grub after Bill Baker's conducted tour, they arrived home – home! – with minutes to spare, pulling aside the inimical furls of plastic tape to improve his welcome.

Not that Bill seemed in any way fazed by the mess. Having handed over the notes he'd promised, he peered around the site with something like a nostalgic smile. ‘I used to scrump here when I was a kid. Never got caught, thank God. Later on, when Dr Lovage took over, I did a few odd jobs. It was like painting the Forth Bridge, mind – though we can't say that any more, now they've got that special long-life paint. At the start I mostly worked in the garden – heavy digging and cutting back trees.'

‘Not the bean patch!' Fran said.

‘Oh, she let me go long before she started on her kitchen garden. She was a slight little thing, but she didn't half muscle up – not in a bad way, mind, don't think of her as some Russian shot-putter. Toned, that's what she was – all because of her gardening. She'd be up and down ladders, too – like those girls working on the place now. Self-taught, she said.'

‘So she'd be capable of digging that trench?'

‘That's what I'm saying. She even borrowed – and I'm sorry, it's been clean out of my mind till I look at the place now – she even borrowed a pickaxe of mine to tackle some of the hardest ground. And a big axe so she could chop her own logs. A mighty independent woman, so it was strange she should be beholden for something like that.'

‘You don't remember when?'

Baker shook his head. ‘What I do recall is her breaking one of them. And replacing it with a brand-new one – top of the range, as you'd expect from her, for all it was one of my grandfather's she'd broken.' His bright eyes scanned their faces. ‘I'm digging her grave, saying this, aren't I?'

Mark ushered him inside. ‘I don't think telling the truth can ever do any harm, especially when someone's dead and gone. We're not going to scoop her ashes from the wilds of Dartmoor and cram them back in an urn and bury it at a crossroads with a stake through the middle. But – I'm right here, aren't I Fran? – I don't think they've found a possible murder weapon yet, and it would help Fran's team if you could remember what it was you lent and when.'

Fran nodded. ‘I'll be honest with you, Bill – I do think she killed him. We've got enough to satisfy the coroner. But I want to know why. I like justice – even if it's only to someone's memory. Now,' she added, ‘try this hard hat for size, and come and see what the Pact women and their subcontractors have been up to.'

‘I'll talk you through those notes as well. I'd forgotten she'd been on telly. Yes, some minister visited the school to sing her praises – but really to make them sound as if they were all the government's idea. Just about the time she borrowed my axe . . .'

‘Hot? Your house is hot? Hot enough to worry Dave? It's good you've got him on side, by the way – well done.'

Mark returned her smile, lifting his half-pint glass to toast her gin and tonic. They'd walked back to the village with Bill, who'd accepted a quick half but then nipped back to watch some TV cricket. They'd stayed on to eat. But before Mark could tell her about his day, Ollie appeared, carrying bowls of local chicken and pea risotto.

‘Sorry about Dad before,' Ollie said. ‘You're about a month too late, I reckon, maybe two. I'll have a go at him myself if you want – but I don't want him rattled by new faces.'

‘Talk to him if you can, Ollie – but we're not in the business of upsetting people for no reason,' Mark said, taking the lead with Ollie as they'd tacitly agreed.

He seemed inclined to stay and gossip, but soon a group of youngsters came in, and he wandered off to serve and incidentally control them. ‘I'll bring you your wine as soon as I can,' he added, over his shoulder, to Fran.

She smiled: no problem.

‘A house she won't let you into. Dave can only get into the hall – no further. What are you thinking, Mark?'

‘I'm hoping it's malice, as Dave suggested. That's the father in me. The cop – soon to be ex-cop, if my suspicions are correct – says get the house under surveillance and alert the drugs teams.'

‘Ex-cop? You slid that in neatly!'

He smiled apologetically, hoping she'd never find out he'd told Dave first. ‘I can't stay if my own home's being used to grow cannabis. Can I? She's made me a laughing stock over the eviction and then with her TV moment. Wren's as furious as such a cold fish can be. Shit. Can a little bird be a cold fish? Even if I wanted to stay, if he were appointed permanently, he'd be reminding me of my inadequacies every moment of every damned meeting. So I'm sorry to break it to you like this, Fran, but I think – I know – it's time for me to go. I can simply retire. Lump sum useful, pension generous. And the exercise of bringing the garden back from the dead will do me good.' When to his terror she said nothing, he added, ‘Will you mind very much? Do you mind? My leaving?'

‘Mind? I think it calls for champagne,' she declared. ‘If it's a decision, not just a possible decision?' She took his upturned hand. It was shaking as much as hers.

‘Conflict of interest. How can I enquire into my own property? It'll look like a devious way of getting Sammie out without having to recourse to civil law. Actually, I'm going to talk to Adam tomorrow morning. See what he thinks about the timing. But – and this sounds really selfish of me – I wonder if you should stay put a bit longer? Or it might look as if we're throwing our toys out of the pram.'

She grinned. There was no other word for it. ‘One at a time it shall be, Mark. To be honest, I'm so wrapped up in these two murders, I wouldn't have time to write a resignation letter. But I'll support you in anything – in everything – you do. You know that.'

‘Even if it means heading back into work with me so I can check my emails? And my bank accounts? Just in case the electricity people have removed a huge sum by direct debit, as they're entitled to do.'

‘Of course. And tell Ollie to hold the wine, too. I've an idea we may be about to need very sober heads.'

‘Y
ou want me to force my way in?' Dave demanded, his voice squeaky over the phone, which Mark had switched to conference.

Mark leaned back from his desk and took Fran's hand. ‘No. Absolutely not. But it'd save some, if not all, of my face if you could ask Sammie what she's up to. I'm going to have to resign – retire, whatever – after this debacle. I can see that now. But it'd be better for me if I had something more than an astronomical electricity bill to go on. And I mean astronomical, Dave. The direct debit payment they took emptied my bank account, though this month's salary had just gone in, and even tipped me into the red. I've managed to talk my way into an overdraft.'

‘An overdraft? And your finances in their current state? Jesus.'

‘The question is, Dave, what is she heating?'

‘You're the policeman, old-timer, not me. Tell you what, I'll ride shotgun for you – only joking! – if you like. I go to the door, gain admittance, and then you barge in after – I'll even unlock the door for you. It's late, but I don't see why we shouldn't do it now. Having the kids in bed might make things easier.'

‘I'll meet you there.' Fran was gesticulating like a dervish: the gist seemed to be to cut the call. ‘Just park up and wait for me. Don't do anything till I arrive. Anything at all. OK?' He hung up. ‘What's up?' he asked her, tetchily.

‘I didn't want you to cut the call. I wanted you to abort the project. I don't like it,' Fran said. ‘I just don't. I just think a police operation should be conducted by police officers, not by – well, you and Dave. Too dangerous, in terms of the operation and the possible publicity outcomes. I'm dead against it.'

‘I gathered that. But I'm committed now.' He got to his feet and opened the officer door. ‘I'm going. Are you?'