The Stranger House (21 page)

“Which is why you asked me here, right? To improve my chances?”

“I don’t know if I can, my dear, but if I can, I will. First you must tell me what it is you are truly seeking for.”

He settled back in his chair, fixed her with a keen unblinking gaze, and said quietly, “In your own time, my dear.”

Nothing had changed, at least nothing you could factorize. But somehow it felt to Sam as if Melton had switched elderly eccentricity off and an interrogation tape on. She was beginning to think this wasn’t a guy to mess with. On the other hand, unless he started after her with a rubber truncheon, she saw no reason to give more detail than she’d already put on public record.

She said, “Like I said in the pub last night, I’m looking for information about my paternal grandmother. All I know is she was called Sam Flood, she came from England to Australia in spring 1960, and she might have some connection with Illthwaite.”

Melton took a notebook out of his jacket pocket and made a note.

He said, “Did she sail with other members of her family?”

“No. She was part of that Child Migrant Scheme there was all that fuss about when the details came out a few years back.”

“I remember,” he said, “Isn’t there a Trust that gives advice and help?”

“Tried them. Nothing positive.”

Not directly anyway, and it seemed best to keep things direct.

“Have you found anything to support this possible connection since you got here?”

“Only the name Sam Flood carved on the churchyard wall.”

He showed no reaction, which must mean he’d known about it too.

“It struck me as odd that no one made any reference to it,” she went on, “But I’ve just been talking to that guy Thor Winander and he filled me in on the story and now I guess I can see why people don’t want to talk about it.”

“Yes, he tells a good tale, Mr Winander,” murmured Melton, “So now you’re happy it’s just coincidence? Mission accomplished? No link?”

She thought about this then said, “Almost. But once you write stuff on the board you can’t just scrub it off.”

He looked puzzled then said, “Are we talking mathematics here?”

“That’s right. Sometimes you do a calculation on a blackboard. Blackboards are good because it means you can see the whole thing at once. Most calculations aren’t aimed at finding something out but at arriving somewhere you want to be. But you don’t always get there. Maybe you’ve gone wrong. Maybe you started in the wrong place. But even if you wipe the board clean, all that stuff’s still in your mind to go over again and again, maybe for years, maybe forever. Sorry, does that sound crazy?”

“Sounds like good detective work to me,” he said, going to a tall mahogany bureau that occupied almost the whole of one wall. From his pocket he took a bunch of keys attached to his belt by a chain. He used three of the keys to unlock the bureau cupboard doors which swung open to reveal lines of files and a stack of cardboard boxes.

“My blackboards,” he said, “Nowadays it would be disks, but I’m a paper man.”

He removed one of the files then dragged out a box which seemed too heavy to lift. He sat down and opened the file on his knee.

“Samuel Joseph Flood. Appointed curate of St Ylf’s in August 1960. Found drowned in Mecklin Moss in March 1961. Inquest held in April … Here we are.”

He took out a folder which held some typewritten A4 sheets stapled together.

“What is that stuff?” demanded Sam, impressed.

“Record of the inquest.”

Jesus, when he said he had connections, he meant connections.

“How’d you get a hold of that?”

He said, “I told you. I was Head of CID for fifteen years. All cases of sudden death came under my remit. Any linked to Illthwaite I took a personal interest in.”

She was starting to think there was something just a bit scary about Noddy Melton. Not the scariness of insanity, maybe, though it might have something to do with its near cousin, obsession. But if it prompted him to help her, why knock it?

“Now, what do we have?” he asked, studying the report, “Cancelled Bible class that afternoon. It was a Sunday. At two o’clock the vicar, Mr Swinebank, took Sunday School with the younger kids in church while at three Flood held a Bible class for the eleven-pluses in the church room attached to the vicarage. That day the kids found a notice on the door saying the class was cancelled … no one much bothered till he failed to turn up for evensong … the vicar might have got worried a bit sooner but he was distracted by a family emergency … checked
Mr Flood’s room in the vicarage after the evening service … no sign … reported his concern to PC Greenwood circa 7.30 p.m.… Greenwood mounted a search but soon had to call it off because of darkness and foul weather …”

“PC Greenwood? Your successor?”

“Next but one. The one that followed me didn’t take, so they got him moved.”

“Who’s ‘they’?”

“The power brokers—Woollasses, the vicar, Joe Appledore at the Stranger—”

“You mentioned him before. What’s his relationship to Mrs Appledore?”

“Joe was her father.”

“Then why’s she called Mrs?”

“It seems she went off to catering college in Lancashire. Did her course, fell for one of her tutors, they got wed and set up in business down there. When her dad died she and her man—Buckle was his name—came and took over the Stranger. I gather Buckle didn’t like it round here. He wanted to sell up and move back south. That can’t have gone down well. There’s been Appledores running the Stranger for centuries and they don’t like change in Illthwaite. But, to general relief, he died before anything was decided. Heart attack. They said. So Edie stayed put. Pretty soon folk were back to calling her Appledore, with the Mrs tagged on in acknowledgement she was a widow.”

“Weird,” said Sam, “What about her mother?”

“Died when Edie was fourteen. After that she ran the house and helped out in the pub.”

“With all that hands-on experience, why did she need to go to catering college?”

“Good question,” said Melton approvingly, “Story is she
had a disappointment. Round here that can mean anything from cut out of a will to crossed in love. Anyway, same result, she almost got away, but the tendrils snaked out and pulled her back in.”

Like you, thought Sam.

“You were telling me about the local power brokers?” she prompted him.

“Oh yes. A lot of voices, but ultimately it’s the Woollasses who really make things happen. Local power’s nothing unless you’ve a line to the big power sources outside. Committees, dinners, charities, old-boy networks, that sort of thing. Upshot was that in the end they got the kind of policeman they wanted. Sandy Greenwood. Stayed here for nigh on twenty years till they pulled the plug on village bobbies.”

“So he’d know the patch pretty well?”

“He’d know which farm would dish up the best tatie-pot and how many free pints he could sup after hours at the Stranger and still be able to cycle home,” said Melton scornfully, “Likely if they’d told him not to worry about the curate going missing he’d have done nothing. But people were worried. The missing man was very popular. It was established that there’d been three sightings. One as he came out of the vicarage gate, the next along the main road through the village, the third and last on Stanebank, the track that leads up by the Forge and the Hall. If you keep going where the track bends round to Foulgate, you get to Mecklin Moss. First thing next morning the search was concentrated up there, and about nine o’clock a cross belonging to Flood was found. They kept on looking and the body was recovered at quarter to eleven.”

“Poor bastard,” said Sam, “And he’d definitely drowned himself?”

“Didn’t seem any doubt. No note, but they found that Flood’s pockets were filled with stones. I’ve got them here.”

Out of the box he pulled a Hessian sack which he opened to let Sam see inside. It was filled with smooth rounded stones, black and white and gold and ruddy brown.

Jesus! she thought. What else had he got in there? Skulls and body parts?

“About four kilos, I’d say,” said Melton, “Enough to counter the natural buoyancy of his clothes. No point hanging about when you’ve made up your mind. No marks of violence on the body, evidence of an agitated state of mind … Hard to make it accidental death, so the coroner reluctantly brought in a suicide verdict.”

“Why was he reluctant?” said Sam, dragging her gaze away from the sack.

“Serious business in those days, suicide. You could go to jail for it.”

An old police joke, she guessed. Maybe it had once been funny.

He went on, “In addition, Flood was a Man of the Cloth. Farmers can top themselves in droves and it’s regarded as a risk of the job, but vicars are expected to show a better example. Also everyone who gave evidence went out of their way to say what a splendid young man he was … beloved by everyone … a picture of perfection …”

“Balder,” said Sam, recalling Winander’s story.

“Sorry?”

“Nothing. Any explanation of this agitation?”

“None offered formally. Law says all relevant information has got to be supplied to the coroner. What’s
relevant is up to the investigating officer. In this case it was an old boss of mine, DI Jackson. Good man, Jacko. Not much got past his beady gaze. Dead now. His missus told me after the funeral, take anything you want, Noddy. As a souvenir. I had a ratch around. Jacko was a bit of a trophy man. Liked something positive to remind him of his cases. His wife was going to junk it. Don’t blame her. Some of the stuff …”

He shuddered. Pot calling the kettle black, thought Sam.

“That’s where you got the stones?” she said.

“That’s right. The Illthwaite connection. But what I really wanted was this—”

He delved in the box again and produced a battered notebook which he opened.

“You can learn a lot from a good cop’s notebook. Jacko might have had his little quirks, but he was good. Now, let’s see. The vicar, Mr Paul Swinebank, that’s Rev. Pete’s dad, gave a glowing testimonial. His explanation was that maybe his curate felt the woes of others too intensely. In some ways—his words—he was too good for his own good.”

“Much good it did him,” said Sam.

“Eh? Oh yes. The inscription. The anti-clerical Mr Winander. Took a non-believer to get really indignant that they wouldn’t give him a church burial.”

“What did the vicar say about the way Flood was acting the day he died?”

“He appeared quite normal during the morning services and at lunch. The vicar left shortly before two o’clock to go to the church in preparation for the Sunday School. He was accompanied by his housekeeper, Mrs Thomson. He was a widower, by the way. Mrs Thomson’s duties
included acting as monitor at Sunday School. I gather some of the kids used to get restless during his analysis of the Church’s Thirty-Nine Articles.”

He uttered his ironies deadpan in a neutral monotone.

“Any suggestion he was screwing her?” asked Sam.

The old man looked at her blankly for a moment, then grinned.

“Jacko did write
Query jig-a-jig
alongside their names, which I wasn’t going to mention out of delicacy but I see I needn’t have bothered. Who knows what goes on under a cassock? But I doubt it. Rev. Paul was old school. St Ylf’s didn’t need central heating. His description of hell could get you sweating on the coldest winter day.”

“You knew him?”

“Oh yes. He was in charge when I arrived. Not a comfortable man. To him pastoral care meant getting your Sunday roast carved before the gravy went cold. His son’s a different kettle of fish, like he’s trying to compensate. Real helpful to everybody.”

Not to Aussie visitors asking awkward questions, thought Sam.

“To continue,” said Melton, “On their return shortly after three, he and Mrs Thomson were surprised to find a note cancelling the Bible class pinned to the vicarage door. About fifteen minutes earlier, the curate had been seen coming through the vicarage gate by two boys on their way to Bible class. Silas and Ephraim Gowder.”

“The Gowder twins?” exclaimed Sam, “Jeez, no wonder they don’t bother with names. Which is which?”

“How would I tell you?” said Melton, “You’ve obviously met them.”

“I saw one of them digging a grave when I visited the
church yesterday. And I’ve got a feeling the other was up on the church tower.”

“Before your accident? Which I heard was caused by the wind blowing the trap shut. But you suspect a human agency?”

“I’m probably wrong. Why should a Gowder want to harm me?”

“The thought processes of the Gowders are mazy and hazy,” said Melton, “They strike me as a throwback to some race which preceded man. They are not brutes, they are not malevolent, but they act and react instinctively, which means that sometimes their actions can appear both brutish and malevolent. I shouldn’t care to provoke them.”

“Which I did by climbing up the ladder?” said Sam incredulously.

“Hard to credit, but not impossible for a Gowder. I doubt he meant to harm you.”

“Then he shinned down the ladder and left me for dead? Sounds like harm to me.”

“All he would see was trouble for himself if he tried to help you or summoned aid. But to return to their evidence: they declared that Mr Flood stopped when he saw them and told them the class was cancelled. They didn’t notice anything odd.”

“Would they, being the Gowders?” said Sam.

He said, “Oh, they’re sharp enough, believe me. Next witness was Miss Clegg, district nurse. At five past three she passed Flood walking down the main road. They spoke briefly, a conventional exchange, she said, but he seemed rather agitated.”

“That’s two down,” said Sam, “Who was it who saw him going up Stanebank?”

“That was Dunstan Woollass from the Hall. He was driving down the Bank about three thirty when he spotted Flood. He wound down the window to say hello. The curate just nodded and went on by. He looked very pale, the squire thought. On his return that evening when he learned that Flood was missing, Mr Woollass contacted the police and that’s why they concentrated the search on Mecklin Moss.”

Sam ran her eye along a mental blackboard, checking the equations so far and trying to compute where they might lead.