Chapter 4
DI Hayley Gibson arrived minutes behind the ambulance. She was shown in by Garforth, who was, it turned out, the colonel’s butler. Who even knew that people still had butlers?
The spacious study was starting to feel distinctly cramped, with Biddy and Emily, Julia and Jess, Beth and her large belly, and of course the butler, Garforth.
And now Detective Inspector Hayley Gibson and Detective Constable Walter Farmer, as well as the man and the woman who had come with the ambulance.
And not to forget the colonel, still lying behind the sofa.
‘Can everyone please leave the room and wait outside to give the medical team the space to do their job?’ Hayley said, precipitating a shuffle out of the door, into the passageway.
‘But please don’t leave the premises. When DC Farmer has taken your name and details, you can go and wait in the sitting room or the kitchen. I’ll find you when I need you.’
Julia was about to follow the little crowd out into the passage, when Hayley motioned to her to come back.
‘Do you want to tell me what the set-up is here? Why are you and Jess here? What’s going on?’
Julia explained about Marigold’s death, the donation to Second Chances, Wilma being away, and the plan to pack up the deceased woman’s belongings.
‘Did you meet Colonel Loxton? When he was alive, I mean.’
‘Briefly this morning. And then again when he was dead. I heard the scream and I ran in. Emily was standing there in front of the sofa. He was lying on the floor behind it. After a minute or so, I saw the beginning of the bruise – that’s when I called you.’
‘You did the right thing. We’ll see what the forensic investigation shows, but it looks suspicious.’
As if on cue, Bob Jones the forensics chap arrived, ushered in by Garforth who stood stiffly by his side.
‘What have we here?’ Bob asked Hayley.
‘The home owner, Colonel Loxton, was found dead. Initially thought to be natural causes, but there appears to be a bruise on the left side of his head.’ She glanced at Julia.
‘Right,’ said Bob, bending down. ‘Well, as you say, that does indeed look like a bruise. Has the scene been protected?’
Hayley made a harrumphy noise. ‘On the contrary. Everyone you see outside has been stomping around the place. Bloody disaster for forensics, a mob like that, I’m sorry to say. Although, to be fair, no one suspected it was anything other than natural causes.’
‘There’s something else,’ said Julia. ‘The colonel’s shoe. It had come off and is lying next to him. And his foot seems… not quite right.’
Hayley looked over to where Bob was crouched by the body. ‘I see that. The toe is at a funny angle.’
A sniff alerted everyone to the continued presence of Garforth. He remained ramrod straight, but a single tear teetered in his right eye and Julia could hear him breathing in a laboured way, as if struggling to keep control.
‘Oh dear,’ Julia said, reaching into her handbag for the little packet of tissues she always carried. She handed it over. ‘It’s a terrible shock, I’m sure, Mr Garforth. I’m so very sorry for your loss.’
He nodded, too overwhelmed to speak. Julia felt terrible for mentioning the colonel’s foot, which seemed to have set the butler off. She stepped away from the group, leading him a little away from the body. ‘Would you like to sit down?’
‘No, thank you. It was just a momentary… I’m fine.’ He did seem to have regained his composure.
‘Were you with the colonel for a long time, Mr Garforth?’
‘It’s just Garforth,’ he said. ‘And yes, I was with him for many years. Known him for decades, in fact.’
Julia was taken aback. Garforth was one of those slim, rather featureless people whose precise age was difficult to determine.
The kind of man who looked prematurely elderly at thirty, and then much the same for the next thirty years.
Even so, he must have been a youngster when he came to Greystone Manor.
Hayley came over. ‘Do you feel up to answering a couple of questions, for some background?’ she asked.
‘I’ll do my best.’
Hayley looked at Julia, who stepped away.
She didn’t quite know where to go, given that they’d all been told not to leave.
She hovered next to the bookshelf, reading the spines.
The dead man had an extensive collection of military-related books – memoirs, history books, novels – from a number of different ages and wars, with a particularly large collection of Gulf War tomes.
She wasn’t eavesdropping, exactly, but if she was very quiet and she strained her ears, she could hear Hayley and Garforth’s conversation going on in the background.
‘Full name?’
‘Edwin Frederick Garforth.’
Julia’s brain, finely honed on word games and crossword puzzles, noted that his initials would be consecutive letters of the alphabet. E, F, G. She wondered if it had been deliberate, on the part of his parents.
‘Am I correct in thinking that you were Colonel Loxton’s butler?’ asked the detective.
‘That’s correct.’
‘How long have you worked for Colonel Loxton?’
‘It will be twelve years in June.’
‘You just said decades,’ said Julia, unable to bite her tongue.
Garforth raised his eyebrows. ‘I said I’ve known him for decades. I’ve only worked here for twelve years.’
Julia wanted to ask more about this strange distinction, but stopped herself when she saw Hayley looking at her with irritation.
‘And what are your duties, exactly?’ said Hayley, taking up the questioning again.
‘Well, looking after the colonel’s personal needs in the broadest sense.
Arranging his diary. His wardrobe. Ordering anything he might need.
Running errands in the village. Some tasks related to his properties and investments.
I welcome his guests, and see them to his office, or to the sitting room. That sort of thing.’
‘Can you tell me what you did for him today?’
‘Well, I sorted his mail, and put it ready for him when he came down to breakfast. Polished his shoes. I let in the visitors…’
‘Which visitors?’ Hayley cut in, quickly.
Garforth paused. ‘Mrs Bird and her daughter.’
‘Anyone else?’
‘No.’
‘As far as you know, was Colonel Loxton in good health?’
‘He was,’ said Garforth. ‘He’d recently had a full medical examination, and he boasted that he passed with flying colours.’
Bob Jones interrupted their conversation to say, ‘Excuse me, Detective. The toe is definitely broken. We’ll know more when we do some X-rays, but it looks as if significant force was involved.
A bad fall, or kicking something large and immobile, like a boulder.
That sort of thing. Might be useful information. ’
‘Thank you, Bob,’ Hayley said.
Julia pushed a book of First World War poems back into the bookshelf. While she was tempted to hang about listening to Hayley’s questions, she knew that Jess would be upset and stressed by the events of the day. She needed to get back to her daughter.
‘Hayley, is it all right if Jess and I leave? We’ve had a long day, and we won’t finish the packing up today. I’ll have to make another arrangement.’
‘Yes, of course. I know where to find you. I’ll be in touch later or tomorrow.’
‘Okay, thanks,’ Julia said. ‘Goodbye, Garforth. And once again, I’m sorry for your loss.’
Julia found Jess with Biddy Glenn in the kitchen, bringing the last corner of a sandwich up to her mouth. Julia looked at it with unbridled desire.
‘I saved you one,’ said Biddy. ‘It wasn’t easy. I had to fend off ravenous hordes. You must be starving; it’s hours after lunchtime.’
‘I absolutely am!’ Julia said.
Biddy reached behind the bread bin to retrieve a plate covered by a clean tea towel, which she whipped off to reveal a brown bread sandwich, stuffed with deliciousness.
She handed it over, and sat down at the table with Julia.
Julia thanked her and sank her teeth into the generous layers of ham, cheese and tomato, humming with delight.
She finished the sandwich in an unseemly amount of time, probably measurable in nanoseconds, and thanked Biddy profusely.
‘A lifesaver, you are,’ she said, which sounded rather awkward, given the recent death.
Jess picked up their empty plates and turned towards the scullery.
‘You can leave them on the table, dear. I’ll clear up,’ said Biddy.
‘Let me do it. You’ve had a horrible shock,’ said Jess.
‘Thank you, Jess. And she’s right, Biddy, you must take care of yourself,’ said Julia, over the sound of the tap. ‘It’s so awful, so sad for you. And so unsettling, I imagine. What do you think will happen? What will you do?’
‘I’ll have to wait and see, but I presume Greg and Beth will now own the manor house.
It’s been in the family for generations, passed down from eldest son to eldest son, for at least a hundred years.
Beth’s expecting the baby any day now, and it’s a lovely house for a young family.
I’ve been here forever, and between me and Garforth, we run the place, so they’ll probably want us to continue.
Although the young people, they might want something different I suppose.
They’re… well, I don’t know what they’ll want, those two. ’
Her voice faltered and her brow furrowed with concern.
‘Don’t worry too much now,’ said Julia, patting her hand. ‘It will all unfold in due course.’
‘That it will,’ said Biddy.
‘We found some notebooks that we think belonged to Marigold,’ said Julia. ‘Do you think Emily would want them?’
‘She’s taken what she wants, she says. She told me to organise that everything else was cleared out. You can throw out anything you can’t sell.’
Julia knew all too well how recently bereaved people often made bad decisions about what should go and what to keep – she hoped that Emily didn’t live to regret this decision.
Jess came in from the scullery, wiping her hands on a tea towel which she hung over the handle of the oven door.
‘Good girl, thank you,’ said Biddy. Jess smiled.
Julia glanced at her watch and saw it was after three o’clock.
‘We should be going. My dog Jake will be wondering where we are. We’ll get our things from the Coach House and I’ll take a few of the boxes we packed, whatever fits in the car.
Might as well get them out of your way. And you let me know if and when you want us to come and finish boxing up, Biddy.
No rush. I quite understand that you and the family have got more important things to deal with right now.
Those poor children… The funeral… I’ll come back and deal with the rest when you’re ready. But as I say, no pressure.’
‘Thanks for that,’ said Biddy. ‘Don’t come tomorrow, but once you’ve started, you might as well finish when you can. I expect the family will want to get to that sooner rather than later. But I’ll be in touch when I know. And there might be more to be cleared out after this.’ Biddy sighed.
Julia patted her shoulder. ‘Whatever we can do to help. But there’s no pressure. Don’t worry about it now. You take good care of yourself, Biddy. It’s an awful thing, just awful.’
Marigold’s apartment, which had been so bright and beautiful when they arrived, seemed touched by the gloom of the day. The books in their boxes had a sad abandoned look.
‘We’ll be able to fit four or five boxes in the back seat and the boot of the car. Let’s take the novels, they sell fast,’ Julia said to Jess. ‘We can arrange to come back for the rest when things have settled down a bit.’
Together, they hefted the first two boxes of books outside, then the next two.
They went back inside to fetch their things. Jess spotted the pile of letters and notebooks they’d brought down from the high shelf.
‘I’m going to take these,’ she said. ‘Marigold’s pictures are so lovely, I want to have a look at them.’
‘Biddy told us to throw them out, but I suppose that’s all right,’ said Julia.
‘I’ll toss them when I’ve had a look. Unless I find something the daughter might want.’
Jess took the little pile of notebooks out to the car while Julia went upstairs to fetch their handbags.
She stopped for a minute to gaze out of the window, taking in the gravel driveway and the trees and the fields beyond. It really was a lovely view.
When she’d looked out of that window earlier, it had been a different world.
The master of the manor had been alive – or, at any rate, had not yet been known to be dead.
The house had seemed benign, its inhabitants going about their business.
People arriving and leaving. She suddenly remembered the bird’s-eye view of a man in the grey hat.
That one grey trouser leg disappearing into the car, the slam of the car door, and the sound of tyres on gravel.
Who was he? Garforth hadn’t mentioned any other visitors but Jess and Julia, when DI Hayley Gibson had asked that morning. Perhaps he wasn’t a visitor. Maybe the man in grey was a supplier or family member, or some such.
Still, it was odd that he hadn’t been mentioned…
At the edge of the garden, she saw Emily talking to Ian, the gardener.
They were like something out of a period drama, both so beautiful, and framed by the exuberant summer flowerbeds.
But Emily was gesturing at Ian, and Ian was, for once, not smiling.
He was looking down at his shoes, avoiding her eyes.
Emily gave a little stamp of her foot – it was as if her character in a drama was not happy – and turned to walk off.
Ian looked up and watched her go. Julia couldn’t be sure, but he looked sad. She wondered what that was all about.
‘Mum?’ Jess shouted up the stairs. ‘What are you up to? Are you coming down?’
‘Yes, sorry, I was just having a last look around,’ she said, and grabbed their bags off the chair in the bedroom. Something was bothering her, but she couldn’t put her finger on what.