Dead Man Riding (22 page)

Although I tried to sound confident with the others, I worried about having to give evidence at the inquest because I knew it might not be a simple matter of standing up and telling the truth. Not that I'd lie, of course, but there was the question of precisely how much truth to tell – as if it could be weighed out like sugar or dried peas in the shining scale pan on the grocer's counter. I'd found the Old Man. True. His hands and feet were tied. True. But then the weights started dipping. Could he have tied the knots himself? (I had an idea, from my tentative law studies, that they couldn't ask me that in a criminal case because it involved expressing an opinion. But inquests were different and coroners could probably ask pretty much what they pleased.) I didn't know – that was safe enough. What had happened to the knots after the bonds had been cut? I didn't know that either. I surely wasn't obliged to add that I'd thought of that, looked for them and not found them. Then there was the question of the Old Man's suicide attempt on the beach the day before he died. I hadn't told the police about that in my first statement, mostly from an instinct to keep things simple. But if I were asked at the inquest about his state of mind, surely I'd have to tell them. And that would make a suicide verdict more likely and leave everything as tidy as it was ever likely to be. But then just suppose that my Mawbray theory was right. In that case, by giving evidence to support a verdict of suicide, I'd be helping a callous killer get off scot-free. On the other hand, there'd be no point whatsoever of dropping a bombshell at the inquest by accusing a respected chairman of magistrates of murder unless I had strong evidence and I hadn't even a shred of it unless you counted a deep hoofprint in dry ground. My mind chewed away at it all that long hot day and got nowhere. I'd have liked to discuss it with Meredith. I nearly did that morning when I saw him walking back across the yard to the house in his shirtsleeves, his hair wet from washing under the pump, but then I thought he might think I was just making an excuse to be alone with him, so I let him walk on.

*   *   *

By mid afternoon, with heat haze trembling over the fields and the hens plumped down in the patches of shade cast by Dulcie's washing on the clothes line, I was so tired of going over the old facts that I decided I must have some new ones. There was nobody around, but a steady thumping sound from the open window of the kitchen meant that Dulcie was in there working as usual. I walked through the porch and into the kitchen. The fire had burned low and the windows were too narrow to let much sunlight in, so the room was shadowy and even seemed a little cooler than the yard outside. Flies circled lazily round a spiral of sticky paper hanging from a rafter that already held dozens of bodies of their predecessors. The Afghans were lying head to tail on the rug, the way they'd been on the first evening. At the big wooden table Dulcie, with her sleeves rolled up, was kneading a mass of oatbread dough, picking it up, turning it and thumping it rhythmically back down. She looked at me and gave her usual little smile and didn't seem at all put out that I was standing there watching. I said it was hot and she agreed. Talking to Dulcie was like hitting tennis balls into a feather bed. She absorbed what you said but nothing came back to you.

‘You'll miss Mr Beston,' I said.

‘Ah will that.' She picked up a metal cannister from the table, dredged flour over the dough and thumped it again.

‘How long have you been working for him?'

‘More than a year since.'

‘Is it right you were working for Major Mawbray before?'

Her face and the rhythm didn't change. She nodded.

‘Did you like Major Mawbray?'

‘He was a good enough man most ways.'

‘But you left him and came to work for Mr Beston. Was Mr Mawbray annoyed about that?'

‘He'd no cause to moan. He'd turned me off before the maister took me on.'

‘Turned you off?'

‘Didn't want any more of me, so I came up here and took work with the maister.'

She rubbed flour on her hands, tore off a piece of the dough and slapped it into a little flat cake. I watched, pleased to have got this much from her but wondering what it meant. Assuming that ‘turned off' meant she'd been dismissed by Major Mawbray, that didn't go with the theory that the Old Man had stolen her from him but it would have been indelicate to enquire further in that direction.

‘What about Robin? Was he already working for Mr Beston when you got here?'

Another nod. ‘The maister found him at Appleby horse fair the year before. He'd come over with a lot from Ireland.'

This seemed to dispose of the idea that Robin might be her son. It was soothing in the kitchen. I stood watching as she transformed the whole mass of dough into little discs. Then she took a griddle pan out of the grate, floured her hand again and pressed down some of the little discs on it until they were flat pancakes.

‘There's those fettled.'

She swept the trimmings from the table into the pig bucket and rubbed little slivers of dough off her fingers. It left her hands pink and very clean. Then she rolled down the sleeves of her blue cotton blouse and buttoned them at the cuffs. I'd got as much as I was going to get, so I said I'd see her later and walked out into the yard.

It was nearly time to check the water buckets for the mares in the loose boxes so I strolled through the arch and into the stable yard, with something nagging at my mind. It wasn't anything she'd said, it was something I'd seen, something out of place. And yet as far as I could remember the kitchen had been just as it usually was. I thought of her pink, capable little hands and saw them buttoning down the cuffs after a job well done. She'd roll up the sleeves, of course, so as not to get things on them when she was cooking – anybody would. Only she had got something on her cuff in spite of her care. I'd noticed it at the time but my mind hadn't registered it. I sat on the edge of the horse trough, closed my eyes and tried to call it back. Clean pink fingers, blue cotton cuff, something sparkling when a ray of sun from the window caught it. Not the button. That had been an ordinary bone button, no sparkle to it. Round, though, and much smaller than a button, two or three of them sparkling in the sun when she moved her wrist, like fish scales. Not even like – that was exactly what they were: fish scales. Nothing to get excited about then. Dulcie was the cook, after all, and even though she was careful, fish scales do stick to things. Only we hadn't eaten fish. We'd been there ten days or so and in all that time there'd not been as much as a whiff or a fin of a fish. Where would she have got fish anyway? Dulcie hadn't been down to the town since we'd been there and no fishmonger would make the journey out to Studholme Hall on the chance of selling a herring or two. I wondered if the scales might have been there from before we arrived but dismissed the idea. Dulcie might be casual in her clothing but she was quite cleanly. There were two or three of her blouses on the washing line in the yard. The thing worried me unreasonably all the rest of Sunday, but there was no point in talking about it because everybody would have thought me quite mad. Then on the Monday morning we had two visits that put it out of my head.

*   *   *

The first to arrive was a police constable in a gig soon after breakfast. He introduced himself as the coroner's officer, come to notify Alan that the inquest on his uncle would be opened at ten thirty the following morning. Only Alan would be needed as a witness on this occasion, to make formal identification of the body, then the inquest would be adjourned and re-opened later when the police had finished their inquiries. The policeman was unthreatening, even friendly, and offered Alan condolences on his sad loss but it brought the reality of the thing nearer.

The second visitor came at midday. The air around the house felt thick and heavy and I was taking a stroll up towards the road, so happened to be the first one to meet the lawyer. He didn't look like a lawyer and we hadn't been expecting one. I suppose it should have occurred to somebody that wills and lawyers come after deaths but we weren't experienced in these matters. Also the domestic arrangements of the Old Man had been so far from luxurious that we didn't think of him as a man of property. So when I saw a young, rather plump man freewheeling down the track towards me, bouncing in and out of potholes, I assumed he was a touring cyclist who'd lost his way. Just before he got to me he yanked on the brakes and jammed a booted foot down, nearly overbalancing.

‘Excuse me, is this Studholme Hall? I've come to call on Mr Beston.' Then, hastily, ‘Mr Alan Beston, that is.'

He looked hot enough to melt in his black suit, topped incongruously with a tweed cycling cap. A briefcase and bowler hat, very dusty from the journey, were tied on to a carrier behind the saddle. When I told him that Mr Beston was at home he propped the bicycle against the fence, untied the bowler and brushed it with his sleeve then substituted it for the cap.

‘Good morning. I'm John Stone, solicitor to the late Mr James Beston. Come to offer my condolences and um…'

I introduced myself, adding that I was one of a party of friends staying at the house. John Stone seemed hardly of the age to be a fully fledged solicitor, only a few years older than I was, and very nervous. We walked together down to the house, he pushing the bicycle and apologising for arriving in such an unprofessional way, only his uncle had taken the gig to Workington.

‘And he's very much the senior partner, you see, so he gets first use of it.'

‘I don't suppose the old Mr Beston would have objected,' I said. ‘From what I saw of him, he wasn't a conventional person.'

‘I should say not.' His hot face glowed even redder. ‘I've never met anyone like him. I must admit I liked the old boy, even when…'

‘Even when people were saying he'd killed somebody?'

He nodded, professional discretion fighting a losing battle with good nature.

‘He was my first client, to be honest. I think uncle gave him to me because he didn't want to offend his other clients by taking him on himself.'

‘Did you know him well?'

‘Only ever met him twice in my life, but he was the kind of man who made an impression, wasn't he? Even without all this.' He made a little flapping gesture towards the briefcase.

I said, ‘I hope it's not more bad news for Alan.' Not nosey, I told myself, only wanting to soften things for him and even more for Imogen. Discretion won a partial victory.

‘That depends on what he thinks of as bad news. Still, I suppose he knew what his great uncle was like.'

It didn't sound reassuring. There was nobody in the yard and I suggested that he should wait in the kitchen while I went to find Alan. Mrs Berryman would probably find him some ale or lemonade. He must have been as thirsty as a camel after that uphill ride from town, but he sounded alarmed at the idea.

‘Oh no, don't bother Mrs Berryman yet. I'll wait out here.'

I found Alan in a shady corner of the stable yard with Imogen, Midge and Meredith. They'd brought out a table and chairs and a few books were scattered around, but they didn't look as if they'd been working hard. I told Alan, carefully not looking at Meredith, ‘Your uncle's solicitor's here. He wants to speak to you.'

Alan stood up, looking bone-weary. I took him through to the other yard where John Stone was waiting and introduced them. It was difficult to tell which was the more nervous of the two. When they'd disappeared into the house I went back to join the others.

‘Trouble?' Meredith asked, looking straight at me. How had he picked that up?

‘I'm afraid it might be but I don't know what.'

‘Isn't it just reading the will?' Midge said. ‘If he asked for Alan, that must mean he's the heir.'

I took the seat Alan had left. Their pretence of reading Greek was given up and we talked about what had happened, going over and over the same things, not adding anything. Meredith said nothing about my investigations under the trees. After a while Kit and Nathan joined us. The angle of the shadow changed and we moved the chairs round. Somebody mentioned fetching water to drink. The pump was there but that would have meant fetching glasses from the kitchen and we were all avoiding the house, not wanting to interrupt whatever was going on inside. It was almost two hours before Alan came out. He was holding some papers rolled up in his hand and he was smiling, but not happily.

‘Waiting for the next act in the drama? Well, gather round and curtain up.'

He swept some books aside and hitched his leg over the corner of the table, stagily deliberate. Imogen said warningly, ‘Alan,' but for once he took no notice of her. He slapped the roll of papers against his thigh.

‘I have here a copy of the duly witnessed and attested last will and testament of my great uncle, James Beston. I'll read it to you. It's not very long.'

Meredith said, ‘Are you sure you want to?' but Alan ignored him as well.

He unrolled the papers and started reading in a clear, controlled voice:

This is the last Will and Testament of me James David Beston of Studholme Hall, Cumberland. Being of sounder mind than most people, I appoint my great nephew, Alan Charles Beston, to be the executor and trustee of this will.

To the said Alan Charles Beston I give and bequeath a.) my horses, my tack and all stable equipment and b.) the sum of five thousand pounds in the currency of the realm. I also request him to carry out my instructions for the disposal of my remains set out in the codicil below.

Imogen gasped, ‘Five thousand pounds.'

That was enough for a house, enough to live on for years while they established themselves in professions. The Old Man, unknowingly, had given them their freedom to get married.

‘Wait,' Alan said.

To Robin O'Kane, of Studholme Hall, I give and bequeath the sum of one hundred pounds and my silver-mounted hunting crop.