The Crow Trap (45 page)

Vera had liked Mrs. Gregory. She was a soft, motherly woman whose children had all grown up and married. Even when Hector had stopped paying Mrs. Gregory to look after her, Vera had treated the Station House as a second home. When the junction was closed and the Gregorys had moved away she’d cried, though she’d never let Hector see.

She got out of bed and opened the curtains. Her room faced away from the track over a low meadow towards the hills. Now the grass was long and mixed with buttercups and clover. The rain had stopped but everything was wet, gleaming. She looked at her watch. Six o’clock.

Too early to phone Ashworth. Just.

Since the Gregorys had moved the Station House had changed hands several times. Recently a couple in their forties, vaguely New Age in character, had taken over. They’d bought the field on the other side of the lane and grew vegetables and kept animals. From her window Vera could see a tethered goat and a wire mesh chicken run. The cockerel crowed. Perhaps that was what had wakened her.

She lay in the bath and planned her day. If she hadn’t been used to it the room would have depressed her. The bath had chipped and scaled enamel. The walls were white tile with greying cement. There were dead flies trapped in the frosted glass bowl which covered the light bulb. Apart from burning the contents of the spare-room wardrobe she hadn’t made any changes in the house since her father’s death. Plans but no changes.

By the time she was dressed it was ten to seven and she thought, Bugger it. If he’s not awake by now he ought to be.

Joe Ashworth answered immediately, but with the shocked voice of someone startled in the middle of a dream.

“Didn’t wake you, did I?” she said.

“Yes.” He was short. It wasn’t like him to be bad-tempered.

“I thought babies got up early.”

“He’s been awake all night with his teeth. We’ve only just got him back down.” “Sorry,” she said. Meaning it even if it didn’t sound as if she did.

“What can I do for you?”

“There are a couple of things I want to sort out this morning. Can you get over to Holme Park? Start putting together a list of the people who were there yesterday afternoon. Lily Fulwell should have one. See if there are any names we recognize.”

“Like who?”

“Anyone connected with the quarry. Godfrey Waugh, Peter Kemp, Neville Furness. They were business acquaintances of the Fulwells. It’s possible they got an invite.”

“Wouldn’t Mrs. Preece have mentioned seeing them?”

“I didn’t ask. She was very shocked still. And there was quite a crowd milling around. She might not even have noticed.”

“Can I ask what you’ll be doing?”

“Me? I’ll be going out for coffee.”

The night before she’d arranged for an officer to visit Rod Owen. He’d supported Edmund more than the family and deserved to be told personally about his death. With what she thought of as great consideration she waited until after she’d finished her Shredded Wheat before phoning him. She presumed that restaurateurs kept late hours.

When he answered, however, he sounded brisk, businesslike. “The Harbour Lights.”

She started to give her name but he seemed to recognize her voice and broke in. “Any news?”

“Not yet. A question though. Did Edmund have a regular day off?”

“Yes. Right from the beginning. Since he started working here again after leaving hospital. He didn’t have much routine in his existence but it was something he hung on to. A sort of superstition I think.”

“What day was that?”

“Wednesday.”

“Do you know what he did?”

“Not specifically but he always went out. Even if he’d been on a bit of a bender he usually managed to spruce himself up, have a shave. He’d leave the flat by about ten thirty.”

“But he worked for you all those years and never told you where he went?”

“I didn’t ask. None of my business. It could have been some sort of therapy, couldn’t it? Personal.”

“It must have been somewhere local because Edmund didn’t drive. If it was therapy, after care, would that have been held in St. Nick’s?”

“He definitely didn’t go to the hospital. He told me it still gave him the jitters walking past and he never wanted to step foot in the place.

Actually I don’t think it was anywhere in town. I saw him once in a queue at the bus stop near the harbour.”

“Do you know where the bus was going?”

“You must be joking. It was years ago. Even if I’d noticed I wouldn’t remember now.”

On her way into Kimmerston, Vera passed the woman from the Station House. She was climbing over the wire mesh of the hen-run, carrying a shallow basket of eggs. She waved, then gestured a pantomime to show that she had plenty spare if Vera wanted any. The couple had rather taken Vera under their wing. She wondered if they knew what she did for a living and if they’d be quite so friendly if they found out.

The police station in Kimmerston was red brick and gloomy, set right onto the pavement opposite the bus station. There was dusty blue paint and the brass handles on the outside doors were tarnished. Vera was tempted to stop and find out the times of the buses from the harbour to Kimmerston on a Wednesday morning. She thought that from her office window she could have seen Edmund get off one of the brown and cream buses. If this was where he was heading. Which she felt in her bones that it was.

But she didn’t stop. If she went into work now she’d never get away.

She drove on past the police station towards the car park near the shopping precinct. It was nearly nine o’clock and the traffic was heavy. She felt her blood pressure rising, resisted the temptation to hit her horn or stick up a finger at the slick young man in the silver Mondeo who pulled out in front of her.

There was only one cafe in the shopping centre. Despite the delay, when she got there it was still closed. It faced into an enclosed square in the precinct. Sunlight streamed through the glass roof, formed patterns on the concrete as it shone through raindrops. There were white plastic tables and chairs on the paved square outside the shop, but they were piled one on top of the other. Patience had never been one of Vera’s virtues. She rattled the locked door of the cafe and began to bang on the glass.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

A middle-aged woman with a straight back and a fierce expression came up to her from behind.

“What does it look like?”

“We don’t open until ten. There’s a machine in the arcade if you’re that desperate.”

“I don’t want coffee,” Vera snapped. “I want the answer to some questions.”

She showed her warrant card. The woman was unimpressed.

“Well, you should know better,” she said. “What sort of impression does it give to the youngsters? This used to be a well-mannered town.”

Vera muttered under her breath, stamping her feet impatiently as the woman unlocked the door and followed her in.

“I might as well have a cup of coffee while I’m here,” she said.

Belligerently.

“You’ll have to wait until I get the machine going. Unless you can make do with instant.”

“Instant’ll do.”

The woman plugged in the kettle, spooned powder into a mug. She took a green overall from a drawer and put it on, then set the steaming mug in front of Vera.

“That’ll be sixty pence.” Vera wanted to argue but thought better of it and paid up.

“It’s about some of your customers.”

Despite herself the woman was curious. She stopped fidgeting with crockery in the kitchen and sat at Vera’s table. “What about them?”

“I’m interested in a woman called Bella Furness. She came in here regularly on a Wednesday.”

The woman shook her head. “Wednesday’s our busiest day and I don’t know many customers by name. Not even the regulars.”

Vera took out a snap which she’d nicked from the bedroom at Black Law.

“That ring any bells?”

“Oh aye. I remember her. Every Wednesday as regular as clockwork. A toasted tuna and sweet corn followed by a chocolate meringue. Until a couple of months ago. She hasn’t been in lately. I wondered what I’d done to offend her. She was a bit on the brusque side. The sort who might take offence.”

“She died,” Vera said. “Was she here on her own?”

“No. She usually met a gentleman friend.”

Out of her large floppy briefcase Vera took a photograph of Edmund Fulwell, the one which had been shown in the local paper requesting information and which today would be on the front page of all the nationals. The woman apparently wasn’t interested in the news. At least she made no comment about having seen the photo before. “Aye,” she said. “That’s the one.”

“When you say gentleman friend, did you have the impression that they were romantically involved?”

As she waited for an answer Vera wondered what Rachael would make of that. St. Bella having a bit on the side. It could ruin her faith in human nature.

The woman considered the question. “Hard to say. She was usually here before him. He arrived flustered as if it had been a bit of a rush. He always gave her a kiss. Only a peck on the cheek but at their age anything more wouldn’t have been seemly. Still, these days … Folks always seem to be kissing and hugging, don’t they? Even people who’ve only just met. So I don’t really know.”

Vera contained her impatience. “But what’s your instinct? After having thought about it. You work with people all day. You must get a feel for things like that.”

She was flattered, which was what Vera had intended. “I suppose you do. On balance then, I’d say close friends. Not lovers.” She paused.

“If anything I’d say he was more attracted to the other one.”

“What other one?”

“The other woman. She wasn’t in very often -perhaps three times all together. But when she was he made a fuss of her.”

“Any idea of her name?”

“None at all.” She seemed pleased that she couldn’t help.

“What did she look like?”

“She was younger than them but not that much younger. She knew how to dress if you know what I mean. Perhaps a bit overdressed. Too smart for town on a Wednesday.”

“Anything else you can tell me?”

But the woman had already lost interest. She looked at her watch.

“No,” she said. “I can’t really remember her. Just the impression that I got of her at the time.”

“But if I showed you a photo you’d be able to say whether it was the woman or not?”

“No, not a chance. Like I said, Wednesday’s a busy day.” Thanks, Vera thought, for nothing.

Chapter Fifty-Six.

Vera walked back through the precinct to her car. The town was busier now, mostly with elderly people who couldn’t use their bus passes until after nine o’clock. One couple stood outside the grocer’s shop bickering about whether they should buy cabbage or turnip to go with their dinner.

Vera had a stab of recognition which made her stop in her tracks. For a moment the woman, overweight, aggressive, seen reflected in the shop window, looked very much like her.

What’ll I do when I retire?” she thought. I’ll not even have anyone to fight with.

Then a young woman pushed a buggy into her shins. Vera turned and glowered and the brief moment of despair passed.

She had intended to go back to the police station but at the last minute changed her mind and took the familiar road out of Kimmerston towards Langholme. Now that she had evidence that Bella and Edmund Fulwell had kept in touch since they’d left the hospital, she wished she’d listened more carefully when Rachael and Edie had been wittering on about the Nobles. But she thought she’d be able to rattle Charlie’s cage.

The stables were quiet. A teenage girl in a green sweater with KIMMERSTON EQUESTRIAN CENTRE emblazoned on the breast was forking mucky straw into a barrow. Two stout middle-aged women prepared to mount their horses. Vera thought it all looked very prosperous and well-ordered. There was a customers’ car park, properly laid with tarmac, marked with white lines and bordered by wooden tubs full of bedding plants. Charlie had turned into a canny businessman just like his dad.

She approached the girl.

“Mr. Noble?”

The girl looked at her dubiously. Vera was wearing her floral crimplene dress and her sandals. “Do you want to book a ride?”

I want to talk to Mr. Noble.”

“I think he’s in the house. But he doesn’t really like being disturbed in the mornings.”

“Why? What does he get up to?”

The girl blushed, confused.

Only joking, pet,” Vera said. “Never mind, I’ll find my own way.”

She strode on, past the newly converted stable block to the freshly painted house, thinking that if she smelled anything at all, it was money.

Charlie Noble himself opened the door. She didn’t think she’d have recognized him if she’d bumped into him in the street. He was younger than her. When she’d last seen him he’d hardly looked more than a schoolboy, spotty, graceless, obviously cowed by his bully of a father.

He had the same expression but now he was old, stooped, bespectacled.