A Market for Murder (11 page)

Den and Karen both looked at her. ‘Do they?’ Karen said. ‘I’ve never heard it.’

‘It’s only that they’re all such strong independent women, I suppose. And they make things happen. And they’re all the same age, within a few weeks. They’ve known each other all their lives. Thick as thieves, as they say. If one of them coughs, the other two reach for the Fisherman’s Friends.’ Della laughed. ‘They’re amazing, really.’

Karen shook her head slowly. ‘I had absolutely no idea it was like that,’ she said. ‘I’ve hardly seen them together, except Hilary and Geraldine at the markets, of course, but they never seem unduly pally.’

Della shrugged. ‘You wouldn’t expect them to be arm in arm. It isn’t like that. More like sisters, in a way. They know each other’s there in a crisis, and they probably go out for drinks together now and then. But they always know what’s going on
with the other two. And if someone upset one of them, the others would rally round like a shot.’

‘Geraldine’s nearly sixty, then, is she?’ Karen felt an unreasonable surge of relief at finally finding an answer to that particular question.

‘They’re June, July and August, if I remember rightly. My mother was roughly the same, plus Maggie as well. In the same class at school, except for Geraldine. She went to a private school. Hilary’s the oldest, then Mary, then Geraldine, I think. I remember they had a huge village party the summer they all hit forty. It was spectacular.’

Den and Karen exchanged glances. ‘Village life,’ he sighed. ‘There’s nothing like it.’

‘Oh, well,’ Della said, ‘you incomers are never going to catch up with all the cross-currents. Everything connects, you see.’

‘But nearly everyone’s an incomer these days,’ Karen objected.

‘Not as many as you might think, actually.’ Della smiled mysteriously. ‘And there are some who leave and come back again, which muddies the waters a bit. Like Joe Richards, for a start.’

‘What about him? I thought he’d always lived here.’ But before Della could explain further, there was a howl from Todd; the kettle boiled; Den moved suddenly and his elbow caught a pot of chives perched on the worktop,
sending it crashing to the floor; and Stephanie burst in with a scratched finger.

Mugs of tea and maternal sympathy filled the next ten minutes, and Den, having done his best to salvage the chives, realised he was about to be late for Maggs. He looked at Karen, his frustration clear. ‘I wanted to have a word with you about last Tuesday,’ he said.

‘Don’t worry, I’m going,’ said Della, snatching the mug from her lip, as if her hand belonged to another person. ‘See you tomorrow, Kaz. Come on, kids.’

In a whirl she was gone. ‘Kaz?’ Den echoed. ‘I thought only Drew called you that.’

‘Some people can’t spare the time for two syllables,’ she said, sounding cross.

‘She seems quite nice,’ he said tentatively. ‘Good with kids.’

‘She’s all right. Steph and Timmy like her, which is the main thing. She ought to have been a primary teacher, really. She has plenty of good ideas. They learn a lot from her.’

‘Listen …’ Den urged her. ‘This murder, they don’t seem to be getting anywhere with it. Ironically, there aren’t enough witnesses. Nobody actually
saw
anything, except you.’

‘What’s it got to do with you?’ She said it gently, trying not to sound rude.

‘Nothing, really. Except I met my old
colleague, Danny Hemsley, at the Incident Room, and got my interest up. Daft, I know. I’ve been out of the police for ages. It’s just that murder … well …’

‘You’re as bad as Drew,’ she sighed. ‘Can’t leave it alone.’

‘It’s the background that’s puzzling them, Danny says. They don’t get how the Food Chain network operates, and who does what. Basically, they don’t understand anything that’s even slightly alternative. I used to be just as bad. Even perfectly normal groups like the Quakers threw me, at one time.’

‘Scary,’ Karen nodded. ‘They see sinister implications in anything they don’t understand.’

‘Right. So would you say there
are
any sinister implications in Geraldine and her food politics?’

Karen picked at a front tooth before answering. ‘Well, there might be,’ she said slowly. ‘Actually, yes, there do seem to be. Den, I don’t know whether I ought to tell you about it. I haven’t said much to Drew. I don’t know what good it would do to involve you. I mean – in what capacity are you asking?’

He rubbed a long-fingered hand down the plane of his cheek. ‘Good question,’ he said. ‘Amateur sleuth, I suppose.’

She sighed. ‘Join the club, then. Well, there’s some talk about a new sort of GM experiment
going on in this area. You know how strongly everybody feels about that sort of thing. It’s to do with fruit trees, apparently. And Peter Grafton grew apples. But there’s another angle, too. Not directly related, as far as I can tell. He was going to sign a contract to supply the supermarkets with juice. That’s a real sell-out, in Geraldine’s eyes. Like Daphne Plant selling to SCI. A betrayal. I don’t think he’d have been allowed to get away with that.’

‘But they wouldn’t
kill
him for it, would they?’

She spread her hands. ‘Somebody did kill him, Den. That’s the big fact here, that we can’t get round. Who knows why?’

‘Find the
why
and you usually find the
who
,’ he muttered.

‘So I believe,’ she nodded.

There came a sharp knock on the door, which then opened, and a voice shouted, ‘Den! What’s going on? You’re late!’

‘Coming,’ he called back. ‘What’s the rush, anyway?’ he added more quietly.

Maggs came into the room. ‘I heard that,’ she said. ‘I’ve been sitting in the car for the past ten minutes.’

‘Sorry. I wanted to talk to Karen. And we need a couple of lettuces. I’m doing a salad this evening. I got some eggs on the way.’

‘Meat, Den. I want meat. We haven’t had any for ages.’

‘Aha! Well, I’ve got a surprise for you there. When I went in to Hendersons for the eggs, I got chatting and the upshot was that we’ve ordered half a pig, in return for fixing his barn roof.’

‘But you don’t know how to fix roofs.’

‘Of course I do. It’s obvious. You just nail down new sheets of corrugated iron, from the top of a long ladder.’

‘Oh. You’re OK with tops of long ladders, are you?’

‘Perfectly OK,’ he said bravely.

‘Well, come on, then. Say bye bye to Karen and let’s get home.’

‘Bye bye Karen,’ Den said.

Drew hadn’t intended to talk about the new funeral over supper that evening, but somehow they were onto the subject before he knew it. ‘Such a coincidence,’ he marvelled, as much to himself as to his wife.

‘What is?’ she prompted.

Even then, his brain didn’t properly engage. ‘This new woman, from the nursing home. You know they said she had a friend buried here? Well, it’s Gwen Absolon.’

‘The woman who was murdered and dumped here before we opened?’

‘The very one.’

Karen fell silent for so long that Drew eventually realised something was amiss. ‘That was an awful time,’ she said softly.

‘We’d just discovered you were pregnant again,’ he remembered.

‘It wasn’t that, Drew. I thought for a few days that I was losing you. I was terrified.’

He stared at her, his jaw slack. ‘What? What do you mean?’

‘That Genevieve. You were obsessed by her.’

He blustered desperately. ‘No I wasn’t! What a thing to say.’

‘You didn’t even try to hide it. You just thought I was so busy being pregnant I hadn’t noticed. But I had, Drew. Is she going to come to this funeral?’ Karen’s eyes had grown suddenly large, the skin beneath them heavy.

‘No, no. She’s moved somewhere, miles away. My God, Kaz, why didn’t you say something?’

‘It was three years ago. The longer it went on, the less it mattered. I just packed the whole thing away. I don’t often think about it now. But I’m learning, gradually, that nothing ever really goes away. We just carry a bigger and bigger bundle on our backs, the older we get.’

‘Well, you can throw that particular bundle right out of the window,’ he assured her. ‘It’s not worth thinking about.’

‘Did you ever sleep with her?’ The question came out with difficulty.

‘No! Honestly, I swear, absolutely not. She was nine months pregnant, for God’s sake.’

‘Not the first time. When she wanted our house. I knew then that you fancied her.’

‘That was just a flirtation. And she was trying to manipulate me, to get her husband the house he’d set his heart on. All her loyalties were towards him.’

‘I know I’m being stupid,’ she burst out. ‘That only makes it all worse. Jealousy is so
demeaning
. It makes us do and think the most idiotic things. And it drives a wedge between people.’

He got up and stood behind her, wrapping his arms round her shoulders. ‘Stop it, sweetheart. What can I say? I’m here. I love you. I’ve never touched another woman. I’m never going to. OK?’ He bent down and nuzzled her neck. ‘OK?’

‘I know that, in my head. I trust you. Of course I do. But it happens so often. It seems as if
everybody
is being unfaithful. Why should we be different?’

‘Because we’re special. Because neither of us would do that to the kids. I was stupid and weak over Genevieve. I knew that even at the time. I embarrassed myself. Can we forget it now? Now we’ve cleared the air?’

‘Probably,’ she sighed. ‘Sorry to be so wifey. I should never have said anything.’

‘I’m glad you did. We shouldn’t have secrets like that. They eat away at our foundations,
like death watch beetles. They turn a marriage sour. Imagine if you’d gone on wondering for another twenty or thirty years! Wouldn’t that be terrible!’

‘Fairly normal, though, I would guess.’ She rubbed her eyes, and turned to face him.
‘Very
normal, if you can believe all the books and plays and things. They’re always talking about ancient secrets finally coming out when the people are old.’

‘Are they?’ He was vague. ‘Well, not for us. Put jealousy in the dustbin, where it belongs.’

‘All right then,’ she agreed. ‘Now, it must be bathtime. Where are those kids?’

Maggs was frosty with Den on the drive home. ‘What was all that about?’ she asked again.

‘It wasn’t about anything, really. The murder, mainly. You’ve heard it all already. What’s bothering you?’

‘Oh, I don’t know. I’m restless. It’s probably hormones.’

Den did not fail to apprehend this buzzword. ‘Really?’ He looked at her quickly. ‘As in female reproductive hormones?’ The glint of excitement in his eye was impossible to ignore.

‘Yes and no,’ she said cautiously. ‘The body’s one thing, the mind quite another.’

‘And what the hell does that mean?’

‘It means I’m a healthy female of an age to reproduce. My body acts accordingly. But in my head, I do not want to cooperate. I don’t want a baby. I have other plans entirely.’

‘And this conflict puts you in a bad mood,’ he summarised. ‘Yes, I can see that. Understand, I mean. It sounds uncomfortable.’

‘I can handle it,’ she said stoutly. ‘Don’t let it worry you.’

‘But the same sort of thing is going on for me,’ he persisted. ‘I’ve got hormones, too, you know.’

‘Yes, but you’ve got a different conflict. You
want
babies, but you can’t find a woman who’ll cooperate. It’s tough being a man.’

‘At least we understand each other,’ he said, feeling glum.

‘So did you glean anything from Karen about the Grafton murder?’ She changed the subject hurriedly.

‘Sort of. There’s some hush-hush project underway, to do with GM crops. She thinks Grafton could possibly have been involved.’

Maggs turned glittering black eyes on him. ‘Wow! That’s new news, isn’t it? Does your friend Danny know about that?’

‘I doubt it. Not unless the police have been asked to protect the site, wherever it is.’

‘Do you know where it is? I might go and join
the riot myself. Is there a website or something?’

‘I have no idea. Karen wasn’t very sure, really.’

‘She’d probably been ordered not to tell you. I’m surprised she said anything at all.’

‘Well, I’m harmless these days,’ he sighed. ‘No longer one of the enemy.’

‘Come on; it’s not like that round here.’

‘Maybe not. Anyway, I am fairly fired up now, about the whole business. I thought I might take a week off work. They’ll probably let me, even though it’s short notice.’

‘Aren’t you meant to apply in triplicate, ten months ahead?’

‘Theoretically. But nobody really does.’

‘Where will you start, Mr Detective?’

‘Maybe we could have a go at the computer?’

‘What computer? We haven’t got a computer.’

‘No, but when I cut Mrs Graham’s hedge last year, she said I could use hers any time, in return. And seeing as how she’s only next door, that should be quite easy and convenient.’

‘Surfing the Net?’ She grinned at him.

‘Something like that. I’m not sure they call it that any more. It’s time I got a bit more up to date on the subject, anyway. I feel as if I’m being left behind.’

‘OK, give it a go. But no chat rooms, right? I
know what that can lead to. My mum’s been having some bother in that department, ever since my dad got himself online. It’s terrible, you know.’

‘Don’t tell me,’ he groaned. ‘What your dad gets up to is none of my business. Or yours, come to that.’

‘I don’t suppose you’ll find anything, anyway,’ she said. ‘You’d be better off walking round the countryside using your own eyes and ears. Talk to people, have a look at what’s growing in the fields.’

‘You might be right,’ he said.

‘It’s beginning to look like a team exercise,’ she went on. ‘All four of us trying to solve the mystery. We can’t fail, really.’ She paused. ‘Are you going to tell your friend Danny everything we come up with?’

He gave that some thought. ‘Why? Do you think I shouldn’t? Are we in competition with the police?’

She dimpled. ‘It’s more fun that way.’

‘Maggs, my angel, that’s not a good attitude, as you very well know. You worked with the police when that little girl went missing, last year. I remember it well.’ He gave her one of his soft looks, that she always thought of as
leans,
because he leant over her when he did it.

‘Don’t call me your angel,’ she said. ‘It sounds idiotic. And patronising.’

‘It’s meant sincerely,’ he persisted. ‘And you
have
been my angel. You rescued me from a lonely miserable existence.’

‘I know I did. They say it’s a mistake to take up with a man that nobody else wants. There has to be something wrong with him.’

Den sighed. ‘That’s true,’ he said. ‘I’ve got all the character defects you could wish for.’

‘Nothing that can’t be changed,’ she said briskly.

Drew took a phone call at eleven that evening, notifying him of another death. ‘You’re happy to keep him with you overnight, are you?’ he asked the new widow. She and her husband had been in to pre-arrange the burial, five months previously. It would be an easy funeral to conduct. She agreed that was not a problem, and he promised to collect the body next morning.

‘Sad,’ remarked Karen, half asleep beside him. ‘Dying in May when the weather’s so lovely and summer getting going.’

‘May’s often quite busy,’ he told her. ‘It’s August when it goes quiet. Though you can never really predict.’

‘Funeral on Friday? Or Thursday?’

‘I’ll have to try and keep him until Friday. We can’t leave Grafton longer than Thursday.’ He smacked himself on the forehead. ‘I must be half
asleep. We’re collecting
him
tomorrow morning, first thing.’

‘Can’t you do them both in one journey?’

‘I suppose we can. I’ll have to put the shelf back in the van. Haven’t used it for ages. I can’t even remember where it is. We ought to have a shed for things like that.’

‘There’s nowhere to put a shed. We need all the space for garden and graves.’

‘Maggs’ll probably know where to find it. She probably knows how to fix it in the vehicle, too.’

‘Early start then,’ Karen said. ‘Better get some sleep.’

Tuesday morning was a whirlwind of activity, compared to the usual pattern for Peaceful Repose. Some of the urgency was generated by Maggs arriving late – another breach of the usual scenario. Den had dropped her outside the gate and turned the car around with undisguised haste. He was just as obviously late for work.

‘Come on,’ Drew urged her from the office doorway. ‘There’s loads to do today.’

She moved heavily up the path, eyes unfocused, hair in a tangle. Drew knew without even thinking about it that she’d only recently climbed out of a warm connubial bed. And good luck to them, he told himself conscientiously. And it wasn’t strictly connubial, either, he
supposed, since they weren’t actually married.

‘Three bodies in the cool room at once!’ She woke up slightly at this prospect. ‘That’s serious overcrowding.’

‘Three graves to dig. Three families to keep happy. Three lots of paperwork. And we still don’t know what two of them want, in any detail. Grafton’s going to be church first, I should think.’

‘Surely you asked the wife when she came to see you?’

He sucked his teeth for a moment. ‘No, she didn’t seem to want to talk about that.’

‘Well, the vicar’s not going to be too pleased if you don’t fix it with him right away. He likes a bit more notice than that.’

‘And he knows he won’t get it with us. Damn it, this country’s gone so sloppy over the timing of funerals …’

‘Don’t start that again,’ she interrupted. ‘Save your breath for these phone calls you’re going to have to make.’

He looked at his watch. ‘We should be at the Royal Vic by now. Gary’s going to be fractious with us.’

‘Calm down, Drew,’ she ordered. ‘This is not helping. You go and phone the vicar. I’ll get the shelf thingy for the van. I know exactly where it is.’

‘Where? Just for future reference.’

‘Behind the cardboard coffins. I’d have thought that was obvious.’

‘Right. Well, go on then.’

Suddenly everything fell into place, and by lunchtime all three funerals were arranged, with times, details of the ceremonies themselves, paperwork filled in and bodies safely stored in the cool room next to the office. There were several more tasks to be performed during the afternoon, such as ordering a special woven basket for Mr Lancaster, the most recent customer, but Drew felt he was in control again.

The willow baskets were an odd development, Drew sometimes thought. They were quite difficult to handle, and resembled nothing he’d ever come across in his browsing through the funeral customs of other societies. The only advantage he could see was that the body would quickly decompose, as air and water and underground organisms passed freely through the spaces in the weaving. The basket itself would not degrade very rapidly. But they looked quite nice, and a number of his clients requested them.

Peter Grafton’s body was, as anticipated, not particularly pretty. Although it was
near-miraculous
the way a face and head could be restored after a post-mortem that involved
removing the top of the skull and taking out the brain to be weighed and analysed, the throat and mouth closely inspected, there were additional problems in this case. The injury from the crossbow bolt was not the neat hole Drew had hoped for. The pathologist had cut it free, widening the wound considerably. Lower down, he was a mass of crude repair suturing, the assumption being that nobody was going to look beyond the head and face. As his temperature rose in the not-very-cool room, he became unavoidably malodorous.

‘This isn’t very good,’ Drew worried to Maggs. ‘What if Mrs Lancaster wants to come and see Mr?’

‘Make her wait until Thursday afternoon. She had him with her all last night. I’d think she’d leave him be for a couple of days.’

‘Thank goodness Elsie Watkins hasn’t got any family. We can park her in the corner. This room isn’t really big enough for three, is it?’

‘It’s OK. Nobody expects us to have four star facilities. That’s the whole
point,
Drew. Sometimes I think you forget that.’

‘You’re right,’ he laughed. ‘As usual.’

Karen was having a busy day herself. Without the children she felt obliged to pack as much constructive activity into the day as she could.
There was another farmers’ market due on Friday, and she was worried there’d be a shortage of produce to sell. Vigorous watering and weeding might just bring a few extra lettuces on by last thing Thursday, when she would pick them and pack them up ready for the early start the next day. Except, she suddenly realised, there was no certainty that the market would actually happen this week, thanks to Peter Grafton’s funeral.