Cursed Inheritance (31 page)

‘You think Gwen Madeley killed him?’

‘Or he ate there and he met someone else afterwards. Either way, we’ve got to find her.’ He thought for a moment. ‘I’m going to have a word with Trish. She took Kirsty Evans for a cream tea and there’s something I want to ask her.’

Wesley left Gerry Heffernan staring into space. A few minutes later he retlimed, fmding the chief inspector just as he’d left him. He didn’t seem to have moved a muscle during Wesley’s short absence.

‘Trish asked Kirsty Evans if she could remember anything her husband said about his trip to North Yorkshire. Kirsty said he’d seemed quite excited when he came back but that wasn’t unusual if his researches were going well. And apparently he mentioned something about dahlias, but she can’t remember what.’

‘Dahlias? You mean the flowers? You think he might have found our elusive gardener after all?’

Wesley grinned. ‘It’s a possibility. Now all we’ve got to do is fmd him ourselves. ‘

ff

228

Penelope came to my dwelling last night, late and in

secret. I was resolved not to admit her at first but my

best intentions vanished at the sight of her lovely face.

She looked to me to be so pure, so innocent, yet in my

mind I kept seeing her with Isaac Morton.

When we were alone she kissed me, gently at first

then with a passion that aroused me. She told me that

Isaac had forced himself upon her and that she had

yielded because she feared him, which was as I

thought. She said that now Isaac is dead we can be

man and wife, as soon as custom and propriety allow

and left my dwelling in the guise of a modest widow.

She doth dissemble as if it is a thing of ease. I have a

great longing for her and yet I know not what to do.

It may be that I should not marry for I fear the curse

upon our blood.

Today Henry Jennings and Richard Smith - both

members of our council - died of the bloody flux. I

pray for the health of those living and the souls of

those dead.

Set down by Edmund Selbiwood, Gentleman, at

Annetown this thirtieth day of September 1605.

The skeleton lay there on the bench. AR 2. NeiI Watson

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w,mdered how the man with the musket ball lodged in the cavity where his brain had once been would have felt about b’~ing reduced to two letters and a number. Surprised, perhaps. Or angry. He had existed in an age of names, an age of certainties.

Neil stared down at the bones for a while before walking briskly out of the laboratory. He had gone there to seek refuge from the humid warmth of the spring Virginia morning in the lab’s air-conditioned interior. Or at least that was the excuse he had made to himself. In reality he had wanted to see the skeleton; out of curiosity perhaps. Or something deeper. Something he didn’t understand himself.

After telling Chuck that he had something important to do on the other side of town he made for the pick-up and climbed into the driver’s seat. He was accustomed to driving on the right now and it felt quite natural as he steered through the wide streets towards Max’s house.

He checked that Brett’s car wasn’t there before parking up: The last thing he wanted was another confrontation. He felt nervous as he opened the gleaming white wooden gate and walked up the garden path towards Max’s front porch. What if Brett was there? What if he had parked around the corner for some reason?

He climbed the wooden steps up to the porch, pressed the bell push and waited. He pressed the bell again and strained to listen. But the only sounds he could hear were birdsong and the distant hum of a lawnmower. Max wasn’t in. Neil felt disappointed. He had wanted to discuss Max’s trip to England, his journey to see Jean for the last time. He had a sudden vision of them as he had seen people in mono-chrome wartime photographs. Dancing, walking together arm in arm. The young GI who had sailed across the Atlantic to encounter possible oblivion on the Normandy beaches and the pretty Land Army girl who had learned to live for the moment. Sex and looming death must have been a heady combination.

Neil rang the doorbell again, just to be sure. He heard

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nothing. But then he touched the door gently and it moved. Cautiously he touched it again and it opened a few inches. It was unlocked.

He pushed the door open further and walked down the hallway on tiptoe, feeling as nervous and furtive as a novice burglar and wondering why the old man had been so careless with his security precautions. He called Max’s name, first softly, then louder, walking from room to room, listening to the mellow ticking of Max’s clocks.

The room at the back of the house that Max used as a study was smaller than the other downstairs rooms. It was a cosy room with dark red-striped wallpaper, polished furniture the colour of chestnut and a rich Turkish rug on the floor. It was a man’s room: Max’s territory.

Neil found it empty. But he spotted a package lying in the centre of the neatly ordered desk. His name was on it, written in bold capitals. Dr Neil Watson. Care of the Association for the Preservation of Annetown Antiquities, Annetown Archaeological Project. Neil picked it up and felt it. The packet was bulky and he assumed it contained the documents Max had promised to give him to pass on to the museum. Neil wondered whether he should take them. But, on the other hand, he didn’t want Max to find they were missing and panic, thinking they’d been stolen. It would be better to come back another time and do things by the book.

He stood for a while, staring at the packet, before decid-ing to check the rest of the house. From the kitchen window he could see the garden that Max always referred to as the back yard, even though it was a large grassed area with shrubs and trees. But unless Max was hiding up a tree - difficult at his age - he wasn’t out there.

Neil knew that if Brett caught him creeping about the house uninvited, it would confirm all his worst suspicions. But, as he reached the foot of the stairs, he had an uneasy feeling that things weren’t right.

The wooden staircase creaked under his weight, the noise loud as a gunshot over the gentle rhythm of the clocks

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ticking the time away in every room. ‘Max,’ he shouted, louder this time. Perhaps he was having a lunchtime doze.

Neillooked in the bedrooms. He had never been upstairs before. Like downstairs, the decor was dark and rich in a colonial style that somehow fitted the house. It had probably been Max’s late wife’s choice: women tended to make the decisions where interior decoration was concerned.

He pushed at the third door off the landing and it opened a foot but no further. Whatever was blocking it gave way slightly with each push and Neil’s heart pounded as he managed to open the door far enough to see inside the room.

Max Selbiwood was lying on the red carpet just behind the door, staring upwards with unseeing eyes. And Neil knew at once that he was dead.

When Wesley had broken the news to Pam that he was staying overnight in Yorkshir~, she had appeared to take it philosophically and had invited her mother over to keep her company. But Della had pleaded a prior engagement with a man fifteen years younger than herself; a date that couldn’t possibly be broken. So much for mothefIy devotion.

If only Pam understood how important the investigation was. If only she hadn’t looked at him as though he was King Herod at a kiddies’ party. He felt he was being cast as a villain just for doing his job. And that wasn’t fair. As he drove down the hill to the police station he felt a wave of helpless frustration. It had been so different once. Pam had understood … once.

He picked Steve Carstairs up at the station. He viewed the prospect of a long journey with Steve with some trepidation but he was the only officer working on the case who was available at that moment. Recently the two men had reached an uneasy truce; an agreement to live and let live .. But Steve still wasn’t Wesley’s travelling companion of choice.

‘Have you seen anything of that Serena lones?’ Wesley

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asked innocently as they turned on to the Ml.

‘No.’

From the way Steve said the single syllable, it was obvious that the subject was off limits. Wesley suspected that Serena Jones had used Steve for her own ends and he had been stupid enough to supply her with information, probably in an effort to impress her, not realising that she was a journalist with a job to do and ambitions to leave Devon and head for Fleet Street.

‘Victor Bleasdale said he broke his journey and spent the night of the murders at a motel near Nottingham. I think we should check whether the place actually exists … or existed. Fancy taking over the driving soon?’

‘Yeah. Whatever.’

Wesley glanced at the clock on the dashboard. It would be another couple of hours before they were anywhere near their destination. Not for the first time Wesley wondered why he hadn’t stuck to archaeology when he had the chance.

Somehow Wesley had expected the Earl of Pickrington’s estate manager at Gristhorpe Hall to speak with a Yorkshire accent so he had been mildly surprised to find that he was Welsh. David Pugh was a stocky, red-headed man, slightly below average height, and he was one of those people who exude energy, always restless, never still. Even as Pugh sat at the huge oak desk beneath the window of the estate office - a monumental piece of furniture used by their Lordships’ stewards for the past two centuries - he fidgeted with pens and straightened papers.

The cavernous office was situated next to the stable block of the large eighteenth-century hall. There was no modem office furniture; no beech filing cabinets or work stations. Instead there were heavy oak cupboards and bookcases built against the cool green walls, reminders of the days when trembling tenants would have shuffled over the stone-flagged floor, touching their caps, pleading for more time

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to pay their rents. The modern computer on the desk and the photocopier in the corner of the room looked out of place, as did the selection of brochures piled on the table at the far end of the room advertising the joys of corporate shooting weekends and the delights of the main house as a luxury wedding venue. Everybody had to make a living these days, thought Wesley. EVen earls.

‘You’ve come a long way to see us, Inspector,’ Pugh said. ‘Must be something serious.’

Wesley cleared his throat, searching for the right words: something grave but not sensational. ‘We’re investigating a murder and we believe it may be linked to six killings that took place in Devon back in 1985. One of the people involved in the case travelled up here on the day of those deaths. to take up a post here. He was a gardener.’

Pugh sat back with a look of satisfaction on his face, as though he was one step ahead of him. ‘You mean Victor Bleasdale? You’re the second person to ask me about him.’

‘Who else asked you?’ He thought he knew the answer but it was as well to have it confirmed.

‘An author it was … name of … Hang on, I’ve got his business card here somewhere … ‘ He began to rummage in a wooden box on his desk. Wesley sat patiently and watched, wondering how much progress Steve was making down at the local police station. He had sent him there to try to fmd the officer who took Bleasdale’ s original statement. But he didn’t hold out much hope.

‘Here it is,’ Pugh ˇsaid, holding up a small rectangle of white card triumphantly. ‘Patrick Evans. Author and freelance journalist. Address in London.’ He said the name of the capital city with what sounded like contempt.

‘Can you tell me what was said at your meeting? You see, Mr Evans has been murdered and we think his death may be linked with what he discovered about Victor Bleasdale. ‘

David Pugh looked alarmed. ‘Oh dear. Of course I’ll help in any way I can.’ He scratched his head. ‘Oh dear.

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Let me think. Yes, he came here a few weeks ago - rang up to make an appointment like. Asked me all about this gardener Bleasdale, he did. Now I had to tell him that I don’t remember much about the man. I was Deputy Estate Manager in those days … very much the dogsbody. I seem to remember Bleasdale wrote to us asking if there was a job going. He had very good references and the head gardener had been moaning on about being overstretched for months. We wrote offering him the job. Somewhere in Devon I think he lived.’

‘You mean he wasn’t coming here to be head gardener? You see, he was head gardener back in Devon and it was assumed that he was coming here for promotion, to be in charge of a bigger garden.’

Pugh chortled. ‘Well, if he thought that he was in for a disappointment. Sid Crouch was head gardener. Then there was Geoff Clayton, who took over when Sid retired. Bleasdale was only third in the pecking order. Maybe that’s why he left so suddenly. Perhaps there was a misunderstanding and he expected to be top dog.’

Wesley sat forward. ‘He left?’

‘Like I said to that author fellow, there isn’t much to tell. He just upped and left. Cleared his things out of the cottage that went with the job and disappeared into thin air and nobody heard from him again. Sid Crouch was furious. Not that he’d been impressed with his work. He’d had to have words with him on several occasions. Even threatened him with the sack if he didn’t pull his socks up.’

‘What was wrong with his work?’

‘Why don’t you ask Geoff. He’s in charge of the gardens now. That author fellow talked to him.’

‘Where will I find him?’

‘I know it’s Saturday but I’d try the greenhouses. Very fond of his geraniums is Geoff. We have a fine display here in the summer when the house and grounds are open to the public. ‘

‘And Sid Crouch? Is it worth talking to him?’

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Pugh assumed a solemn expression. ‘Sid passed away a year after he retired. Mind you, he was eighty-three. His Lordship had to let him go in the end. Couldn’t be helped.’