A Death in the Woods Page 8

  ‘Come and see my latest multi-media display!’

  He led the way across the gravelled courtyard, around the fountain – where Nell Gwynn had reputedly cavorted and an infant Jess had most definitely wee-weed – and into the outbuildings.

  Repurposed as a Visitors’ Centre, the barns were chicly carved up with glass and steel. Josh, unlike his ancestors, had come into a legacy that was big on kudos but low on cash. He had made the manor a going concern. There were Fun Days. There were Ye Olde Jousts. There were local teenagers serving Kidbury Kream Teas for the minimum wage.

  ‘Ta-daa!’ Josh pressed a button in a darkened corner.

  ‘What are we looking at, Lord Joshy of Joshington?’ Mary squinted at the glaringly bright screen that jumped into life.

  ‘It’s every single Lord Kidbury since the first one, in 1727.’ Josh beamed at the scrolling display of antique oil paintings as if they were family snaps. ‘Get him, eh, Jess? Sir Barnaby loved his wigs, didn’t he?’

  ‘They’re all men, of course.’

  That remark was one of the reasons poor Josh avoided the fairer sex. AKA the more sarcastic sex, in his family. ‘Good point,’ he said, biting his thumbnail. ‘Look! Granddad!’

  ‘Uncle Seb,’ smiled Jess. Iris’s husband was perfect casting for an English aristocrat.

  ‘And lastly – me!’ Josh struck a pose in front of the last image, a photograph rather than an oil painting. ‘Do wish I’d gone on a damn diet before that photographer chappie came round.’

  ‘Hang on,’ said Jess. ‘Your grandfather, then you? What about your father? What about David?’

  ‘Couldn’t find a decent portrait of Dad.’ Josh seemed nonplussed again. ‘He didn’t hold the title for long; maybe there wasn’t time to have his portrait done.’ He looked at the floor. ‘Seems a shame.’

  ‘Doesn’t have to be an official picture, does it?’ Jess always identified with the underdog. Even a titled one. ‘Why not use a family photo? Iris has hundreds.’

  ‘Not of Dad.’

  That was true. Why had Jess never realised that?

  ‘Odd,’ said Jess.

  Or was it? It was possible that Iris, in her grief at losing her only child before he was out of his twenties, had destroyed them all.

  Ever gallant, Josh walked Jess and Mary back to the car park. They took the back route. The public got to wander through the knot garden and the wildflower meadow. The lord of the manor made do with a route past the bins. Moose studied these bins with the air of an aficionado. They emerged by two signposts. One said, ‘To the Herbarium’. The other, ‘To Kiddie Korner’. Jess and Iris often muttered darkly about Josh’s crimes against spelling.

  ‘What was your da like?’ asked Mary, putting her arm through Josh’s.

  Once he’d smothered his small squeak of alarm – Josh hadn’t touched a woman since his nanny died – he said, ‘I don’t really remember him.’

  Josh was jolly about it. He’d be jolly about facing a firing squad, so that wasn’t saying much.

  ‘Do you wish we talked about David more?’ Jess asked. Or at all.

  ‘It upsets Grandma. That’s why I didn’t dig too deep looking for a portrait.’

  ‘It was tragic.’ Jess’s choice of melodramatic word was justified. ‘Falling off his favourite horse.’

  ‘If he’d held on tighter, he might be here now.’ Josh stopped. Looked at Jess. ‘How odd. Dad’d be old.’

  ‘And you’d be . . .’ She was about to use the term ‘free’. ‘You wouldn’t be a lord. Not yet.’

  Josh shivered, as if somebody had walked over his grave. ‘Truth is, I call my stepdad “Dad”. When I see him.’

  ‘He’s a one, isn’t he?’ Jess recalled the second of Josh’s mum’s three husbands; he was ‘interesting’, to use the Judge’s diplomatic description.

  It was obvious that Josh was privileged, but he was also a fatherless child.

  ‘If I’m honest,’ said Josh, ‘I brought myself up.’

  Mary, soft-hearted beneath the khaki, said, ‘You made up your own story, babe.’

  They had reached the Morris Minor.

  ‘We all do that,’ said Josh, disengaging his arm. ‘Even you, Jess.’

  This glimpse of an inner life was unexpected, and welcome. Jess preferred to go deep rather than glide about on the surface. ‘Look after yourself, Josh.’

  An outbreak of woofing erupted, and two Pointers bounded around the corner.

  Moose went berserk. If he’d had a hat, he’d have thrown it in the air.

  ‘Pin! Spelk!’ Jess greeted the dogs as old friends. Not far behind, she knew, would be her aunt.

  A fisherman’s hat at a rakish angle on her white waves, Iris wore her long-dead husband’s raincoat like couture. ‘Come to check up on me?’

  Iris could always read Jess’s mind. She’s more of a witch than Abonda.

  Iris smiled, and Jess felt forgiven. ‘Fussing’ was one of the Dowager Lady Kidbury’s pet hates. ‘I assure you I’m doing awfully well. For a pensioner. No sign of the Kidbury Kannibal here.’

  ‘The what?’ Jess made a growl in her throat. ‘Don’t tell me. The Echo’s nicknamed the murderer.’

  ‘Exactly so.’ Iris turned. ‘Come on, girls. Walk the dogs with me.’

  ‘You two go on.’ Mary threw up the hood of the antiquated car, which was far older than she was. She knew every spark plug and every valve. It was only Mary’s expertise that kept it on the road.

  Jess and Iris walked the fenced perimeter of the civilised portion of the estate. Here the grass was mown and the manor was never out of sight. The main house had been passed to Josh, and Iris lived in a small apartment above the stables, decked out with mementoes of her time in Africa and a library of jazz 78s.

  ‘I like this time of year,’ said Iris. Slender, strong, she not only kept up with Jess, but possibly slowed down for her benefit. ‘Bare trees. Fewer tourists. God, I missed British winters when Seb and I were in Kenya.’

  ‘I suppose you heard about the second murder.’

  Pin and Spelk romped, noses to the ground.

  Moose dragged his bottom along the grass.

  ‘Do try not to end up in a showdown with a homicidal maniac this time,’ said Iris. ‘One worries, darling.’

  ‘When do you start spending your angel’s money?’

  ‘No doubt Josh will waste it on a virtual rollercoaster experience, or somesuch. Young people are keen on experiences, it seems. So long as it’s on a screen. I’m assuming he showed you his newest toy. All the lords. Quite a collection.’

  ‘None of them had a chin until the nineteenth century.’

  ‘Who needs a chin,’ said Iris, ‘when you own everything you can see out of your window?’

  ‘Actually, not all the lords were represented.’

  The house was insubstantial in the mist. Its edges not so certain.

  ‘Dandan Wong,’ said Iris, as if Jess hadn’t spoken, ‘goes to my yoga class. Poor woman. Her husband was, I believe, very hard, a strict father and a demanding husband, but she relied on him. Winter has made another widow. Has your Mr Eden charged Steven Norris yet?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘Really? I thought the Wongs’ history of bad blood with the Norrises would have pointed to him.’

  ‘Bad blood?’ Jess felt a jump in her nervous system she recognised from the summer murders. Her senses tingled.

  ‘Dandan hates Abonda. Even so, she asked her for a spell or a charm or whatever the women sells, to help with planning permission to extend their takeaway restaurant.’

  ‘The Silver River on Fore Street,’ Jess snorted. ‘Nobody gets planning permission for Fore Street.’ The council were proud of their listed streets; every doorknob was sacred. She recalled the scaffolding and said, wonderingly, ‘But the Wongs did.’

  ‘Mr Wong refused to pay up. Said it was coincidence, and Abonda was a fraud.’

  ‘Ouch.’ This was pure gold. A nugget to lay at Eden’s sensibly shod feet
.

  A coach made its cumbersome way up the drive, the noise of its engine reaching them through the mist. ‘Another charabanc,’ said Iris. ‘All come to stare at dead people. Why we can’t just give the manor to the council and let them develop it into social housing is beyond me. If this lot like paintings of limp-wristed noblemen, they’re in for a treat.’

  Ahead of the women, the dogs reached the perimeter of Blackdown Woods. They paced, going backwards and forwards. Jess found herself hoping they stayed this side of the tree line.

  A noise, like a whip, as cruel and as sharp, made women and dogs alike jump.

  ‘Gunshot,’ said Jess.

  Birds rose like smoke from the woods, cawing and angry.

  ‘Pin!’ called Iris. ‘Spelk! Here!’

  They slowed.

  ‘Not all the lords are represented in the display, are they?’ It felt reckless, but necessary, to bring that up.

  Iris, the tip of her nose pink with cold, kept her gaze on the dogs. And the trees. And the fog.

  ‘David’s my – what, second cousin?’

  ‘Dogs! Here!’

  The Pointers turned.

  Jess lost confidence. Then rallied. This mattered. ‘He’s like a missing full stop in a paragraph. I know so little about him.’

  ‘What is there to know, darling?’ Iris was dismissive, as the gun dogs loped up the slope towards her. ‘We live. We die.’

  ‘Well, yeah, but my whole professional life is spent looking at the marks people make on the world. We all leave something behind.’ Jess saw Moose plunge into the trees. ‘Moose!’ He wasn’t obedient like the Pointers. A golden flash, he was swallowed by the dark. ‘Oh bums,’ said Jess. She hurried towards the wood. Turned to find her aunt was not beside her. ‘Iris?’

  Iris remained where she was. ‘You fetch him,’ she called.

  ‘Come on, Aunty. It’ll be an adventure.’

  Iris wasn’t simply reluctant. She was rooted to the spot. ‘I never go into the woods,’ she said. It was both a statement of intent and an admission of defeat.

  It took Jess a couple of minutes to find Moose in the murk. Another couple to persuade him to stop snuffling among the oaks and beeches. It felt like longer.

  The shadows were as close as her skin. It was alive in there. A symphony of tiny noises. A galaxy of tiny lives. For a second, she lost her bearings, and wheeled around.

  Dots joined up. Jess didn’t like the picture they drew in her panic-stricken mind. Abonda had spoken of somebody trapped in the dark, trying to reach out.

  She doesn’t know about David. She couldn’t.

  It would be agony to be in the twilight forever. To be condemned to eternal November. In the belly of the wolf, as it ate the sun, gulp by gulp.

  Paws. Panting. Not a hellish wolf, but a Golden Retriever.

  Moose plunged past. She followed him and stepped out into famished grey daylight. David’s spectre vanished, exposed as superstition.

  ‘There you are!’ Iris seemed relieved.

  Jess puffed as she reached her aunt. ‘Seriously, Iris, I’d love to hear a story about David’s childhood.’ Iris had always been frank about the tricky stuff; her light touch had helped during Harriet’s last, long illness.

  ‘Jess, I’m tired,’ said Iris.

  This was a trick that worked with the rest of the family. Not Jess. She knew her elderly aunt could run a marathon in her heels. ‘But—'

  ‘But but but! Why,’ said Iris, her voice cold and testy, ‘must you always push too hard?’

  The dogs led them home.

  CHAPTER 8

  No Llamas Allowed

  Thursday 5 November

  The furtive sound of the front door opening and closing woke Jess.

  She was grateful to be dragged from her dreams. They had been foggy, oppressive, with flashes of lightning in a soggy mist, and a man who may or may not have been David always just out of her eyeline. She had smelled suffering.

  It took a second or two for her sleepy brain to realise that the noise of the latch was out of place in the pale dawn. Harebell House had been breached.

  But no. When she crept to the window, she saw her father walking down the drive, away from the house. Moose was at his side. In his arms he held an exuberant bouquet, blood red against the pale morning.

  It was the sort of arrangement he used to buy for Harriet’s birthday – and only her birthday; the Judge was an undemonstrative husband. It made no sense; where was he headed with a bunch of roses before even the birds were up?

  More footfall. Jess craned her neck to see who was coming round the side of the house. She expected it to be Norris, because that man had grown larger than his outline in her imagination, and might turn up at any time, bearing a small animal’s innards.

  But no. A young guy, shoulders hunched against the dew in last night’s party clothes. He looked exhausted, like most of Mary’s departing gentleman callers.

  After another hour of trying to sleep, Jess gave up and dressed.

  Black knickers. Black bra. Black tee. Black jeans. Black jumper with holes in.

  Bogna was up. She was an early riser. She was singing. A dirge, Polish, and not catchy.

  ‘Good morning sleepyhead,’ she said.

  Jess blew a raspberry, wondering why early risers think themselves so virtuous.

  Mary, at the table with a mug of tea and a poached egg on Bogna’s homemade rye bread, said, ‘You look like death.’

  ‘Good morning to you, too.’ Jess sat heavily.

  ‘Remember, remember, the fifth of November, isn’t it,’ said Bogna, adding, ‘you want eggs.’ It wasn’t a question. There was no menu. You got what you were given, and what you were given was invariably delicious.

  Pulling the latest copy of the Echo towards her, Jess drank in the warm kitchen smells and leaned back into the domestic noises. Then jumped when Bogna snatched the paper away.

  A small ad on the folded back page was ringed in red. Jess saw the words ‘For Sale’ before Bogna slammed down her trusty old Nokia phone on the circled ad. Still, Jess made out two letters of the item for sale. Not many words, she thought, begin with LL. ‘Adding llamas to your menagerie, Bogna?’

  ‘Menajawhat?’ said Bogna.

  Mary ran interference for the housekeeper, asking Jess to give her a hand in the barn. ‘You’ve barely set foot in there since I started work on it. Come on, I’ll give you a hammer and a nail and show you what to do.’

  Jess thought of hands, and their fragile bones. ‘Can’t, sorry,’ she said, pushing through her friend’s disappointed huff. Jess knew she was letting Mary down. The barn had been conceived as a joint project. Letting people down was a bad habit Jess couldn’t seem to break.

  ‘I’ll take down that stud wall today,’ said Mary. She mimed swinging a mallet. ‘A good seeing-to always gives me tons of energy.’

  ‘Remember,’ said Jess, ‘when we thought your ladybits were a curse?’

  One of Mary’s conquests had been murdered back in the summer; she’d blamed herself.

  ‘That was terrible.’ Mary crossed herself. ‘Put me right off sex for a while.’

  ‘Can’t say I noticed.’ Jess was chaste. A medieval nun. Not necessarily from choice; sex was complex and tricky and brought as much pain as pleasure when you’re an introverted over-thinker who lives half her life in the mystical past.

  After the eggs, after the customary teasing of Bogna about her superannuated Nokia and its outmoded buttons, after Mary had overshared about last night’s erotic shenanigans, Jess pulled on a coat and gloves and what even she knew was an impressively unflattering beanie.

  ‘I need a lift.’ This was Mary’s way of asking.

  ‘Druid’s Head?’ Jess was happy to help. Mary’s company, although spiky and spicy, was so familiar it acted as a comfort blanket. As much as Jess could ever be said to be herself with another person, she was herself around Mary. It was a respite from that aloneness. The family trait passed on from David. The defecti
ve gene.

  Taking the lead, Mary stopped so abruptly in the porch that Jess collided with her. ‘Don’t look,’ she said.

  Jess looked. A small red blob disfigured the bonnet of her beloved Morris Minor.

  More death. Another snap of the wolf’s teeth.

  ‘It’s Dad’s wig.’ Jess recognised the rolls and coils of the Judge’s ceremonial headgear.

  ‘Drenched in something’s, somebody’s, blood.’ Mary prodded it. It dripped scarlet ribbons down the aquamarine paintwork. ‘It’s not blood,’ she realised. ‘Jess, it’s been dipped in paint.’ She looked around her. ‘Norris!’ she screeched. ‘Come out and face us, you feckin’ coward!’

  ***

  Fireworks Night was, to Jess’s mind, a Johnny Come Lately tradition. She liked her folklore ancient, not a measly five hundred years old. The guy slumped outside the Spinning Jenny was disconcertingly realistic. In its pinstripe suiting, it could be her father lying there. All the same she tossed a coin into the hat; she never passed a beggar without giving.

  Jess knew the Spinning Jenny menu inside out. Yet she had been staring at it for some minutes.

  Meera’s pad was at the ready. ‘We’ve some lovely specials on.’

  ‘I’m waiting for Rupert.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Meera, knowingly.

  The café door opened, and there he was. Flustered, overnight bag in hand.

  Jess stiffened. ‘You didn’t say you were going away.’

  Rupert sat. Unfurled his scarf. ‘Only found out myself half an hour ago. Jack’s set up a meeting with an Edinburgh solicitor.’

  ‘This Jack’s a whirlwind.’

  ‘True.’ Rupert smiled. He seemed to like Jess when she was churlish.

  ‘Something’s happened,’ she said.

  ‘Something nice?’ Rupert dropped the levity when she didn’t respond. ‘Another offering from Norris?’

  ‘We don’t know it’s Norris.’

  ‘Don’t we?’ Rupert waited, and she told him. About the wig. And the red paint.

  ‘It wasn’t Dad’s wig, though.’ She’d found the original on its stand. ‘That would’ve been even worse.’ The thought of Norris creeping about her house was insupportable.