The Coniston Case (26 page)

‘Rubbish!’ said Kathy and Melanie in one voice. ‘Total rubbish,’ added Kathy.

‘They just do what they think they can get away with,’ Melanie elaborated. ‘It’s not the same thing.’

‘Next year, I think I’ll go away for the first half of February,’ said Simmy. ‘And miss Valentine’s altogether. It obviously makes everybody crazy.’

‘No you won’t,’ laughed Melanie. ‘You’ll be madly in love with somebody yourself by then, and as gooey as everybody else.’

Simmy found nothing to say to that, thinking about the suffering DI Moxon, and how careless she had been with his feelings over recent days.

‘I bet you I’m right,’ Melanie went on. ‘I even bet I know who it’ll be.’

‘That police detective, I suppose,’ said Kathy. ‘He’s obviously keen on you.’

‘Please don’t say that. It makes me feel terrible.’

‘I wasn’t thinking of him, anyhow,’ said Melanie.

Angie and Russell reacted very badly to the appearance of a damaged daughter on the doorstep. ‘Is that blood on your leg?’ Russell demanded, as she stumbled into the kitchen and lowered herself into the chair by the Rayburn.

‘Just a little cut,’ she said. ‘It probably isn’t even mine. It’s been a perfectly horrible day, Dad. Everything got a bit out of control, I’m afraid.’ She gave a brief and rather garbled account of events to her appalled parents.

Angie was at first incredulous, then furious. ‘I can’t
believe
you’d be such a fool,’ she shouted. ‘It’s as if you
deliberately
put yourself in danger. Why must you do that? What perverse spirit possesses you?’

‘It wasn’t deliberate,’ Simmy argued calmly. ‘One thing led to another, and at no point did I feel I had a choice. There were men with knives, for God’s sake. They threatened us. And I had to rescue Kathy. There was definitely no choice about that.’

‘None of this makes the slightest sense,’ complained Russell. ‘Why was Kathy in Coniston in the first place? Who
are
all these people?’

‘It doesn’t matter, really. Except one of them killed a perfectly nice man, who was a friend of DI Moxon. Now he’s in hospital, fighting for his life. Moxon, I mean. The nice man is dead.’

‘Fighting for his life?’ repeated Angie sceptically. ‘That’s tomorrow’s headline, is it?’

‘Probably. He was stabbed in the chest and nearly died. I was collateral damage, you might say.’

‘You should have stayed right out of it.’

‘I know. I agree. I have no idea what I thought I was doing. It just seemed unfair that he should be hurt when he was only doing his job. Actually, that isn’t really true. I didn’t think anything at all at the time. It was all just instinct. I dislocated the murderer’s arm,’ she added proudly. ‘Moxon was trying to arrest him, and he pulled out this awful knife.’

‘If the murdered man was his friend, shouldn’t he have been taken off the case in the first place?’ asked Russell.

‘Possibly. But apparently nobody was too worried about it. I’m still not sure why he was in Coniston at all. Somebody must have phoned him.’ An idea occurred to her. ‘Most likely the man on reception. He was obviously suspicious when Baz took us all up the mountain with him.’

‘I wish I knew some of these people,’ Angie complained. ‘What was the motive, anyway?’

‘Ben says it was all about solar panels, and climate change not really mattering, and renewables being doomed to oblivion. But it wasn’t just that. Basically, it was all about love.’ She sighed. ‘Most crimes are about that, aren’t they?
When it comes right down to it. Jealous love. Frightened love. People terrified of losing somebody they depend on for their happiness. If that’s threatened somehow, they see red. It’s amazing, really, how powerful it is.’

‘Can’t see that stuffed-shirt of a detective ever falling in love,’ remarked Angie.

Simmy sat up and glared at her mother. ‘He’s not a stuffed shirt. Not at all. He’s totally human, with a full set of emotions. Melanie thinks, believe it or not, that he’s in love with
me
.’

Angie stuck to her guns. ‘Sounds as if every man involved in this case was trying to impress a woman. Bloody fools.’

Russell put a hand on his wife’s arm. ‘Steady on, old girl. It’s not all bad, you know. From what I can understand, it hasn’t worked out so terribly, by and large.’ He smiled at Simmy. ‘I know there’s a lot more you haven’t told us, but for now, you need a bit of peace and quiet.’

‘Okay,’ she agreed. ‘But before that I need
food
. I haven’t had a thing since breakfast.’

On Sunday afternoon, she went with Ben and Melanie to visit Moxon in Kendal. Melanie drove Simmy’s car again, Russell having made a sterling job of mending the wing mirror with gaffer tape. Ben insisted on coming, overriding the protests from his mother. ‘She doesn’t really care,’ he said. ‘She just wants people to think she does.’

Moxon was in a single room, with the usual array of wires and monitors, and a mask over his face. His eyes were open and they brightened considerably at the sight of Simmy.

‘I’m terribly sorry,’ she blurted, before she had even sat down. ‘It was all my fault.’

He pulled the mask away, and gazed earnestly at her. ‘How do you work that out?’

‘I got in the way.’

‘You saved my life. I was totally unprepared for such an attack. He’d have got me in the heart without you.’

‘Oh. Surely not? You must have done self-defence training.’

He smiled. ‘I was paralysed,’ he admitted. ‘It all went right out of my head. I’ve always been more scared of knives than any other weapon.’

‘They’ll easily get him for it, won’t they? There’s the knife. Traces of his hair or skin or whatever in the Coniston house. Evidence from Selena and even Daisy. Even I can see there’s an excellent case. Whatever he says, you’ll nail him with all that against him.’

His eyes twinkled. ‘I’m sure you’re right,’ he mumbled from inside the mask.

When she got back to Windermere, Kathy turned up to say goodbye before driving back to Worcester. ‘
Can
you drive?’ wondered Simmy. ‘With your arms so stiff?’

‘Jo’s coming, too. She’ll take the wheel. And look – I wanted to show you this.’ She revealed a large pottery vase. ‘It’s one made by your friend Ninian. I went to his cottage this morning and bought it.’

‘You
what
? How did you know where it was?’

‘I asked Melanie. It’s lovely up there, Sim. You really ought to go and see it.’

‘I keep meaning to. I just haven’t got round to it.’

‘Well, he says to tell you he’ll come in and see you today. Probably any minute now. Listen, Sim – I really
am terribly sorry for all the trouble. I used you, in a way. I was more worried than I let on to you about what Jo was doing. Claudia had warned me there was something I should worry about, after she’d gone to see Jo at college a few weeks ago. She wouldn’t say much. Didn’t want to be disloyal, and she could see how besotted Joanna was. I was out there hoping to bump into Baz, when he popped out of that mineshaft. It never crossed my mind that he’d turn out to be such a nutcase. I really did think he’d stab me if I gave him any cause. I was a complete wimp. I had absolutely no idea how terrifying it can be when somebody breaks all the usual rules of behaviour. It just turned me to a jelly.’

Simmy thought about her own reckless assault on Goss, and wondered. ‘Don’t worry about it,’ she advised. ‘Jo seems to be taking it quite well.’

‘Maybe,’ said Kathy dubiously. ‘Although I doubt if she’ll speak to me all the way home.’

Ninian turned up ten minutes after Kathy had gone. He was clean and brushed and profoundly concerned. ‘I made you something,’ he said, producing a piece of pottery.

It was an intricately fashioned porcelain rose, painted yellow. Each petal was perfect in shape and colour, the whole a piece of artistic splendour. Perched in the centre was a small bee.

‘It’s my version of a Valentine,’ he said, shyly.

Simmy’s smile, as she met his eyes, was every bit as shy. ‘Thank you,’ she said.

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R
EBECCA
T
OPE
lives on a smallholding in Herefordshire, where she plants trees and watches wild birds, but also manages to travel the world and enjoy civilisation from time to time as well. Most of her varied experiences and activities find their way into her books, sooner or later.

www.rebeccatope.com

T
HE
L
AKE
D
ISTRICT
M
YSTERIES

The Windermere Witness

The Ambleside Alibi

The Coniston Case

T
HE
C
OTSWOLD
M
YSTERIES

A Cotswold Killing

A Cotswold Ordeal

Death in the Cotswolds

A Cotswold Mystery

Blood in the Cotswolds

Slaughter in the Cotswolds

Fear in the Cotswolds

A Grave in the Cotswolds

Deception in the Cotswolds

Malice in the Cotswolds

Shadows in the Cotswolds

Trouble in the Cotswolds

T
HE
W
EST
C
OUNTRY
M
YSTERIES

A Dirty Death

Dark Undertakings

Death of a Friend

Grave Concerns

A Death to Record

The Sting of Death

A Market for Murder