Chapter 8
‘The detective phoned this morning. She wants to see us to tell us about the forensics. The post-mortem and so on,’ said Greg.
‘Oh God,’ Clara shivered. ‘There’s a post-mortem? I didn’t know. I hadn’t thought of that. Poor Daddy.’
Greg opened the door to DI Hayley Gibson. ‘Do come in, Detective Gibson. This is my sister, Clara,’ said Greg. ‘Oh and…’ He waved in Julia’s direction. He seemed to have forgotten her name, or even that she was there.
‘Julia Bird and I know each other well,’ said Hayley. She caught Julia’s eye with a questioning look, surprised to see her in the little welcoming party.
‘I was just on my way out, I’ve been—’ Julia was interrupted by Clara, speaking sharply.
‘What do you mean by forensics? And why was there an autopsy? Is that usual when an old person dies?’
Hayley Gibson answered: ‘Not unless there are questions to be resolved, or reason to think that the cause of death might be… more complicated. And your father wasn’t especially old, to be fair.’
‘Complicated? Like what? Surely it was a heart attack, or a stroke?’
‘Perhaps we should sit down and—’
‘We don’t need to sit, just tell me. What’s going on? How did Dad die?’
Hayley Gibson took a deep breath and said, ‘The evidence indicates that he died from a blow to the head.’
‘A deliberate blow to the head?’
‘So it seems. We are treating this as a murder investigation.’
‘Oh my. I can’t… But who…?’
Clara’s face took on a swooning sort of look, and Greg helped her to an uncomfortable-looking wooden chair in the entrance hall. She sat down heavily.
‘Can I get you a glass of water?’ asked Julia. Clara nodded.
In the kitchen, Julia found Biddy cleaning the countertops with fast, hard circular motions, and muttering crossly to herself. She looked up when she heard Julia’s footsteps.
‘Oh, it’s you, Julia. Hello,’ she said. Her face softened a bit.
‘Hi, Biddy. I need a glass of water. Clara’s had a funny turn, it’s the shock, I think. The police are here,’ Julia said, reaching for a glass from the shelf.
‘I saw the detective’s car in the driveway. Are there any new developments?’
There was no sense in holding back information. Everyone would know in minutes anyway. ‘The police are treating the colonel’s death as suspicious. They’ve opened a murder investigation.’
‘They think someone killed him… on purpose?’ Biddy was incredulous.
‘Yes. Sorry, Biddy. I know it’s horrible to think about. But he suffered a blow to the head, apparently.’
‘It is awful. And I can’t imagine who would want to kill the colonel, and why.’
‘The police will find out. Usually love or money, I’m afraid.’
‘Money? Oh dear, I hope they don’t think it’s any of us,’ said Biddy anxiously.
Julia waited.
‘It’s just that I heard from the lawyer today that the colonel left me a bequest in his will. The will was changed recently to include me, as well as some others.’
‘I can imagine he valued you greatly. Well, that’s good news amongst the sadness.’
‘Yes, it is nice. I just hope the police don’t think any of us had anything to do with it.’
‘You? Why would you have anything to do with it?’
‘Inheritance, I suppose. People in detective shows are always killing people to get their hands on their inheritance. Me and Garforth, we both got something.’
Biddy had a funny look on her face, the sort of stiff and awkward expression a person gets when they are holding in a yawn – or a piece of information.
‘Oh Julia, I do feel guilty…’
It wasn’t a yawn.
‘I was very touched when I heard the colonel had left me a nice sum. And then I discovered that Garforth got five times as much. Five times! And then, instead of being pleased and grateful, I was irritated and resentful. And now I’m cross with myself for that.
I mean, how rude and small-minded of me.
Especially seeing as poor Ian didn’t get a thing, and you’d think he would have been taken care of.
Especially when he was invited to the reading of the will…
And now it turns out the colonel was actually killed and I feel even worse. ’
‘I can quite see why you felt annoyed; it does seem unfair,’ said Julia. ‘Don’t be hard on yourself. It’s only natural to compare and feel slighted.’
‘It’s silly of me, anyway. He and Garforth go back a very long way. He saved Garforth’s life, you know? In the army.’
‘Yes, you said. It’s a special relationship, I suppose, when you’ve been through something like that together.’
‘Yes, indeed. Anyway, I’d best be getting back to work.’
‘And I should take the water to Clara, but I’ll be in touch soon, and Jess and I will come and finish up. And don’t beat yourself up about your very human reaction.’
‘Thanks for listening. See you soon.’
Julia delivered the glass of water to Clara, who was calmer, the colour returned to her cheeks.
‘Thank you,’ she said, taking a long sip of water. ‘Sorry, Detective, what were you saying?’
‘I was asking about the man who was here on Monday. The man with the grey hat. Who was he?’
‘Oh yes. Well, I wasn’t here on Monday, I only got in today, from my work in Malawi, so I’ve no idea.’
‘I was here, as you know, but I didn’t see anyone,’ said Greg. ‘The person to ask is Garforth; he would have answered the door.’
‘Not this time, apparently,’ said Hayley. ‘Neither he nor Ms Glenn let anyone of that description in or out of the house.’
‘Well in that case, it seems your information was incorrect. Perhaps whoever thought they saw such a man was mistaken,’ said Greg.
Hayley gave Julia a warning look – not that she was going to own up to being the person who saw the mystery man. But she was not mistaken, thought Julia, of that she was certain.
‘I’ll be in touch when I have more information,’ said Hayley. ‘Good day.’
‘I’d best be going too,’ said Julia, getting up to follow Hayley out.
When they were out of earshot, she said: ‘Someone’s lying. I definitely saw him on the day the colonel was killed.’
‘I believe you saw him, Julia. And I’m sure we’ll be able to track him down, in spite of the phoney details. But the thing is—’
‘The thing is, someone else must have seen him, too. So whoever let him in is lying about it.’
‘Exactly. And the next question is, why?’
That evening, using the back of the knife, Julia sent the heap of chopped tomatoes tumbling into the saucepan.
They sizzled and splattered in the olive oil in which a chopped onion had softened gently, along with sliced garlic.
She stirred the mixture with a wooden spoon.
It was a pleasant, meditative movement. All her worries about the murder at the manor house seemed to disappear as fragrant steam wafted up, warming her face.
She felt her nerves untangle and her shoulders soften and relax after a long, eventful and tiring day.
It was only since she’d moved to Berrywick that cooking had become a pleasant, creative pastime, rather than a bit of a chore.
From the early days of their marriage, it had emerged that her ex-husband Peter was a more eager and creative cook than Julia.
He would pull out all the stops for a dinner party, and make the occasional inspired dinner, but it had usually fallen to Julia to do the daily meals that seemed to be required with alarming regularity.
It was different now. She and Peter were divorced, of course.
She had more time on her hands now that she was retired.
And then the Cotswolds offered the loveliest local ingredients to work with, from artisanal cheese, to free-range lamb, to organic vegetables.
Rather too many vegetables, in this instance.
While the tomatoes from her neighbour’s garden were cooking down for soup, bushels more from Julia’s own plants were in the fridge and on the vine, awaiting their turn.
She would offload some of the tomato glut on Sean.
He loved home-grown just-picked tomatoes, and she knew for a fact that he hadn’t planted any himself this year.
Jess came in from the garden with a sprig of fresh basil leaves. ‘I am going to make pesto for the top of the soup,’ she said. ‘And Dylan is bringing a sourdough loaf that he made.’
‘That all sounds just soup-er, darling.’
Jess rolled her eyes, but in an ironic, friendly way, not like the exasperated teenage eye-rolls of yore.
‘And Tabitha is bringing something sweet,’ Julia added.
‘Cool,’ said Jess. She turned on the tap to rinse the basil, then patted it dry on a tea towel. Julia was pleased that Jess seemed to have bounced back from the shock of seeing a dead body.
Dylan and Tabitha, both naturally reliably punctual, arrived at exactly the same time, six thirty, as per the invitation.
Julia opened the door to find them standing together on the mat, Dylan with a loaf and Tabitha with a golden crumble – blackberry and apple, it seemed, to judge by the deep purple of the juice oozing at the crisp edges.
There followed a brief bustle in the kitchen.
The young got going on transforming the basil leaves into a bright green paste, fragrant with garlic and thickened with olive oil and toasted pine nuts.
Julia whizzed up the tomatoes with a vegetable stock she’d made a while ago and frozen.
Jake set to work getting under everyone’s feet – a task he accomplished admirably.
Only Chaplin elected not to partake of the busyness.
As soon as Tabitha sat down at the kitchen table, he jumped up onto her lap, and settled down in anticipation of her attentions.
She obliged, stroking him from the top of his head to his tail.
‘I would get up to help, but I don’t like to inconvenience His Lordship,’ she said to Julia, who was stirring a generous pouring of cream into the smooth, bright soup which was warming on the stove.
‘Of course not,’ said Jess. ‘That poor kitty has had a long, hard day following patches of sun around the house and snoozing in them.’
‘Brutal,’ said Dylan with a smile.
‘Anyway, no help needed; it’s just a simple meal and it’s about ready,’ said Julia. ‘What do you say we eat our soup and bread first, and then pudding while we’re playing?’
The plan was to have a games night. All four of them liked board games, but lacked either the opportunity or the willing opponents.
Sean didn’t enjoy games, and his son shared his disinterest. When the idea of a games night had been discussed, Jono had seemed genuinely mystified by the appeal: ‘I mean, if there was money at stake, or a ball involved, I could see the point, but…’
The soup was devoured to great sighs of appreciation – those garden tomatoes really did have a wonderfully deep, fresh flavour – and the bread, still oven-warm, was enthusiastically demolished, although Dylan insisted that he had a lot to learn.
With the table cleared and the soup bowls stacked in the dishwasher, the Scrabble set came out. The set was an old one, with wooden tiles, and the particular clinking sound they made knocking against each other in the green drawstring bag was instantly familiar to Julia.
‘Oh, I remember this Scrabble set so well!’ said Jess, handing each player a tile rack.
‘It’s been a while since we used it. I remember the rules, but I’m out of practice,’ said Julia.
‘Prepare to meet your doom, foes,’ said Jess in a booming, low voice. ‘I’m feeling wordy tonight.’
‘I remember now why we stopped playing Scrabble,’ said Julia with an exaggerated sigh, and reached for the bag. ‘Closest to letter A starts.’
The game was fun and just competitive enough to keep everyone’s interest, except for when it had to vie for attention with Tabitha’s apple and blackberry crumble.
Jess played boldly, and was well ahead until about halfway through the game, when Tabitha got about a million points for ZILLIONS on a triple, using all her letters in the process.
She was impossible to beat from then on.
Julia was pleased with her best word, which also used up all seven letters for a fifty-point bonus, but it was not enough to catch Tabitha.
Dylan suffered from a few rounds of terrible picks – all vowels, followed by a rack full of tricky consonants and not a vowel in sight – but he got a run of decent words at the end of the game and managed to come last by just three points.
‘Oh, what fun. I did enjoy that,’ said Tabitha. ‘Well played all.’
‘There’s no shame in being beaten by a librarian,’ Dylan said, tipping the tiles into the green bag. ‘All those words seeping out of the books into your brain all day.’
‘Yes, well done, Tabitha,’ said Jess. ‘We should play more, Dylan.’
‘We will.’ He laughed and nudged her. ‘My new hobby. Getting thrashed at Scrabble by my girlfriend.’
Julia noted the terminology – she hadn’t been sure whether they were boyfriend and girlfriend, or even what those terms meant to them.
But she noted the easy affection and playfulness between them.
They seemed happy. Jess seemed happy. It was all a mother could ask, really.
Julia felt content, until she thought about the funeral that she would need to attend on Friday.
She always found that funerals had a funny way of revealing the truth.