Bricks and Mortality: Campbell & Carter 3 (32 page)

‘Elderflower?’ enquired Muriel politely.

Equally politely, they declined. Muriel sat down heavily beneath the slanted seascape and gazed at them thoughtfully. She had taken off the gumboots she’d worn for her walk to the farm. Her feet were now clad in purple woolly socks and thrust into an ancient pair of mules whose once-velvety finish of plush had rubbed almost completely bald over the years.

‘Funny thing,’ she said. ‘When things start going wrong, they carry on going wrong, only more so, if you see what I mean? All the wrong things pile up …’ Muriel waved at an untidy heap of newspapers by way of illustration. ‘You start with one and you end up with dozens, all making one big heap; and all of ’em wrong, through and through.’

Carter asked, ‘If we look in the pile of newsprint, Muriel, shall we find some lettering has been cut out?’

‘I haven’t got to that yet,’ said Muriel resentfully. ‘I haven’t begun.’

‘Before you do,’ he told her, ‘I feel I must caution you. You are not obliged to tell us anything now, but if you don’t tell us something you may later rely on in court, it may harm your defence.’

‘With a caution like that, you can’t lose, can you?’ Muriel retorted with her customary asperity.

Carter smiled at her.

She blinked. ‘Good-looking fellow, aren’t you?’ she remarked, assessing him.

‘You’re too kind, Miss Pickering,’ he told her.

‘No, I ain’t. I’ve never been kind. Are you married?’

‘No, I once was.’

‘Divorced, eh? That’s it, people walk away from bad situations nowadays.’ Muriel frowned. ‘I never have. I should have done, perhaps, but I never did. That’s why I’m sitting here and you’re sitting there and everything’s gone to hell in a handcart, as Father used to say.’

Jess had taken out her little tape recorder. Muriel made no comment on that other than a snort of derision.

‘Take your time, Muriel,’ Jess prompted her.

‘Time? Time doesn’t mean a thing. Nothing ever really changes. That’s what makes it so difficult to say when things start. In a sense they’ve always been there. They just grow, like plants from seeds, do you understand what I’m saying?’

Jess found herself shifting in her seat beneath Muriel’s sharp eyes. ‘Yes, I think so,’ she managed to say. She felt Carter look at her. ‘Shall we say it all started with Sebastian Crown – or before that, with your father?’

Muriel scowled. ‘Sebastian Crown? Yes, you’re right there. An awful lot of what’s happened is down to him.’ Unexpectedly, her weather-beaten features lit up in a smile. ‘I danced on his grave,’ she said.

‘I can understand you weren’t sorry to hear he’d died.’

‘No, no, you misunderstand me!’ Muriel said crossly. ‘I wasn’t speaking metaphorically; I’m not that sort of fancy speaker. I was speaking literally. I did dance on his grave. I went down to the churchyard in Weston St Ambrose and jumped up and down on that stone they put over his ashes. I did it when no one else was around, of course.’

Carter passed a hand over his mouth. Hamlet stiffened and peered at him suspiciously.

‘Muriel,’ Jess invited her, ‘Why don’t you tell us about the day Warwick was injured?’

‘Heard about that, have you?’ Muriel nodded at her. ‘I must say, you don’t miss much. As snoops go, you’re an expert, aren’t you? It was that young blighter Gervase Crown’s doing, of course. Wherever Crown men go, they cause trouble and grief. It’s like sowing dragon’s teeth. Gervase was about nineteen at the time, maybe twenty. He was young, but not innocent or harmless. He’d been at the bottle, too, I afterwards learned. I was out walking Warwick, my dog back then. He was quite an old dog and stiff in the joints, so we never walked far and always slowly. But he liked to be out and about, have a good sniff round.’

Muriel’s voice and eyes were sad. ‘The road was empty, everywhere peaceful, birds singing, all that sort of stuff. Then, like a bat out of hell, young Crown roared on to the scene, driving like a maniac all over the place. I leaped to safety and got tangled up in a mass of blackberry bushes. Poor old Warwick wasn’t nimble enough. He was knocked clean off his feet, poor old chap, flew right up in the air. Gervase careered on down the road and a few minutes later caused a pile-up of cars. But I learned about that afterwards. I didn’t see it and I couldn’t now tell you whether I even heard it. I should have done, but I was concentrating on trying to free myself from the brambles and cussing Gervase fit to bust. Warwick was lying in the road. I thought he was dead. Then I saw he was breathing but blood was coming out of his nose. He never regained consciousness. I managed to pick him up and carry him home here. He weighed a ton. I thought my arms would drop off. I put him in my car and drove him to the vet. But there was nothing he could do. So it was curtains for poor Warwick.’ She paused. ‘I told the vet it was a hit and run. That bit was true. I didn’t tell him whose car it was. Don’t ask me why. I wasn’t protecting young Gervase. I just wanted the vet to concentrate on Warwick.’

Muriel straightened up and spoke more briskly. Hamlet turned his head towards her. ‘It was after that day that I took to wearing that yellow suit, trousers and jacket, that you’ve seen me in, whenever I walk my dog. Gervase probably hadn’t even noticed me, and I wanted to be sure that another motorist would.’

Carter spoke. ‘You say you didn’t tell the vet it was Gervase Crown’s car that struck your dog. You also think Gervase might not have seen you. But word got round even so, didn’t it? That he was responsible?’

‘Oh, yes, word got round,’ Muriel nodded. ‘Pretty damn quick!’

‘Did you tell Mrs Trenton?’ Jess asked.

‘Poppy? Yes, I did, but later, and it wasn’t Poppy who told Sebastian Crown about the whole business. She said she didn’t and I believe her, because she always had a soft spot for Gervase on account he had a lonely childhood.’ Muriel snorted. ‘I could tell you something about lonely childhoods! But I’ve never made mine an excuse for anything. I fancy the way Sebastian got to hear about Warwick was that the vet told him. I think the vet heard about the smash Gervase had the same day, about the same time, and he put two and two together. Sebastian had made his fortune out of what he liked to call canine health products. That meant everything from conditioning shampoos to pills for bad breath. So he, Sebastian, was very thick with local vets and dog breeders, that sort of person. Sebastian was pally with anyone he thought might be of use to him.’

Muriel paused and Hamlet, having decided he’d maintained a state of alertness for long enough, uttered a gusty sigh and settled down with his nose on his paws. Carter and Jess waited.

‘I’d never been of use to Sebastian. He didn’t like me because I’d befriended his wife … and because he’d guessed I knew his nasty secret.’

‘You mean by that, you knew that he beat his wife?’ Jess asked for the benefit of the tape recorder.

Muriel jerked her head. ‘Just so. But now Gervase was in trouble and Sebastian needed me on side. He came to see me here at Mullions. He sat there, where you’re sitting.’ Muriel pointed at Carter. ‘There, in Father’s chair. My father was dead and gone by then, had died about two years earlier.’

‘Muriel,’ Jess asked suddenly, as a thought occurred to her. ‘How did your father die?’

The question did not appear to surprise Muriel. ‘He fell in the river while out fishing. I found him floating face down. Silly old fool must have had a giddy turn. I told the coroner he used to get them. Accidental death, that’s what he ruled. I took Father’s ashes down to the river where he used to fish, and scattered them on the water, right there where he tumbled in.’

‘That was a nice idea,’ Carter told her. He glanced at Jess meaningfully as he said it. They had both had the same thought, but after all this time there would be no point in reopening the inquiry into the sudden death of an elderly fisherman, found floating by his devoted daughter.

‘I didn’t do it to be nice!’ snapped Muriel. ‘I did it because I couldn’t afford a stone in the churchyard. And that’s it, you see. I don’t have any money, never had any and Sebastian knew it. He offered me a large sum in compensation for the loss of my pet. That’s how he put it. He also offered a lifetime’s supply of any canine health products produced by his company that I might need for any future pets. He then had the effrontery, the sheer brass neck, to remind me how fond I’d been of Amanda, and how it was Amanda’s son who was in trouble now, charged with being drunk at the wheel of a motor vehicle and causing the crash. Gervase couldn’t deny he was drunk; he’d been well over the limit. So the expensive legal team Sebastian had got on to it were trying to make a case that, even fuddled with booze, Gervase hadn’t been driving recklessly; the other drivers had. They had a very slim chance of getting away with that! But they wouldn’t get away with it at all if I stood up and told them about my being forced into a blackberry bush and poor Warwick. Plus, I might be able to sue Gervase for my loss and my injuries. I was a mass of scratches from those brambles. So what Sebastian really meant when he talked about compensation – what he proposed paying me for – wasn’t the loss of my dog, it was my silence. He didn’t want me to go to the police and report how wildly Gervase had been driving just before the crash. Plus he didn’t want the whole business rehashed if I decided to sue.’

Muriel fell silent, her expression stony. ‘Mullions is an old house. It needs a lot doing to it now and it needed a lot doing to it back then. At the time it was the roof that was leaking. I had buckets all over the place up there in the attics. So I took the money. Perhaps it was a little for Amanda’s sake, too, making my silence a kind of gift to her, wherever she was by then. I never knew what became of her,’ Muriel finished sadly.

‘I understand that Gervase Crown saw his mother not long ago, and that she’s well,’ Jess told her impulsively.

Muriel brightened and looked at her with gratitude. ‘Is she? I’m glad to hear it.’ Her expression darkened again. ‘But it was the wrong thing to do, wasn’t it, to take the money? I should have told the police. It was blood money, poor Warwick’s blood. And then, of course, that wretched young man went on to smash up another car, this time with poor young Petra Stapleton in it. I shall always feel it was partly my fault.’

‘You weren’t responsible for that crash!’ Carter exclaimed.

Muriel contradicted him. ‘You’re wrong. I did my little bit to pave the way to it when I took that money and kept quiet. It encouraged Gervase to think he’d always get away with it, that he could drive round the countryside causing mayhem and that money would always talk. That’s why I had to put things right, you see.’

‘Perhaps, Miss Pickering,’ Carter suggested, ‘you’d like to continue this at a police station?’

‘Are you arresting me?’ asked Muriel with a sort of detached interest.

‘Yes, I’m arresting you for threatening Inspector Campbell with a pitchfork and attempting to prevent her removing possible evidence. As for arresting you for anything else, you’ve made vague references but given me no details, so we’ll talk about that in official surroundings.’

‘I shouldn’t have taken Sebastian’s money, should I?’ muttered Muriel.

Carter hesitated before he replied. ‘Of course, you should have come forward as a witness at the time of the first crash when your dog was killed. But you were very shocked and distressed at the time, and it’s hardly a criminal offence. I really don’t think you should blame yourself for accepting the payment Sebastian Crown made you. You weren’t thinking straight.’

‘Good of you to say so,’ Muriel told him, ‘not that it makes any difference to how I feel. I’ll tell you the rest, at a police station if you like. I’ll have to sign a statement, won’t I?’

They all got to their feet and Hamlet stood up too. Muriel nodded towards the dog. ‘We’ll have to stop by Ivy Lodge on the way so that I can leave Hamlet with Poppy. We’ll have to take his bed and bowl and a bag of dog biscuit, if you don’t mind. I have an understanding with Poppy about any dog I might have. If ever I’m ill, or drop off the twig, can’t look after my animals, Poppy will take my dog. I walked over to the farm earlier to make a similar arragement with Ray Preston about the hens and the old cockerel. I told Ray I might be going away for a bit.’ She glowered at Jess. ‘I knew you’d come, sooner or later. Snooping around like you do, you were bound to ferret it all out.’

The image that had been haunting Alfie’s subconscious mind was that of the rat, scuttling along the inner wall of the garage. He had dreamed of it the night before. In his dream, the rat had grown to monstrous size and reared up to stand on two legs. It had also worn a waistcoat and a bow tie. In the way of dreams, this had made perfect sense at the time. In this form, it had stood at the end of his bed, watching him with its beady eyes. He could glimpse its razor-sharp front teeth. It had not made any threatening move but it had been worse, somehow, to have it just stand there, clad in its waistcoat and tie, watching. He had not known – in his dream – what it intended and so could not make any countermove. All he could do was cower down between the pillow and duvet and keep his eyes fixed on the rat. He knew that if he ever took his eyes off it, then, and only then, would it make its move.

He had awoken sweating, his heart thumping in his thin chest. He’d reached out to switch on the bedside lamp and had succeeded in knocking it over. It had fallen to the floor. He’d rolled out of bed in a blind panic and found it, terrified it would be broken and he’d have to brave the darkness between his bed and the wall switch by the door. But when his searching fingers found the lamp and he pressed the switch, a dim light flooded the room and he gave a deep sigh of relief. The rat was gone. But he left the lamp on for the rest of the night.

It was not that Alfie was afraid of rats. He rather liked the type he encountered in the wild. They were feral creatures and he was himself something of a feral human. When setting his rabbit snares he often met a rat scuttling through the undergrowth. He always ignored it and it ignored him, because neither was interested in the other’s business. In his experience, that type of rat was not aggressive unless cornered and Alfie took care never to corner one.