The Fall Girl (16 page)

“Dad and I just thought it was a bit of a joke at first," Rowana continued. "Until Gabby had been out with him about five or six times, then Dad started to worry that it might be getting
too serious. So he invited Russell round to the flat for afternoon tea. That usually spelt doom for Gabrielle’s relationships. But Russell was completely immune to Dad’s eccentricity,
and the general peculiarity of our place. In fact, I don’t think he even noticed. He and Dad spent the whole time talking about combustion engines.

“After that, Dad seemed quite happy to let things go along – that was until we found we were losing the business and Gabby announced that she was going to marry Russell, and get him
to buy us out of trouble. Dad went mental. He’s got a really strict moral code." She lowered her voice. “I hate to think what he’d have done if he found out I’d been
practising ceremonial magic.”

They heard the particular slosh from upstairs that indicates someone getting out of a bath.

Rowana started speaking more quickly. “Gabrielle decided she was going to get married anyway, so she went to Russell’s house, with me in tow, trying to talk her out of it. He lives
in South Kensington – really posh.”

Lexy knew. She used to live there herself until three months ago.

“Anyway, when we got there, we were standing outside, hiding behind a pillar, because his house had pillars, and I was still arguing with Gabby. Then Russell suddenly came out of the door
with an incredibly beautiful blonde woman. They jumped into his car, he kissed her, and off they went, straight past us without even noticing.”

“How did Gabrielle take it?”

“She was devastated. Russell had given her a ring, you see. She didn’t wear it on her engagement finger because of Dad, but apparently he’d made all kinds of
promises.”

“Typical.”

“Anyway, all the way back on the Tube she was trying to get this ring off, but it was stuck tight. We tried everything. I reckon people stayed on past their stops just for the
entertainment. In the end we told Dad and he levered it off with engine grease.”

Lexy winced.

“She sent it back to him, and told him she never wanted to see him again. The following day we packed up and moved out of the flat to a rented place in Clapham. She changed her phone
number so he couldn’t ring her. She was like, really, really mad. And upset.”

And just ripe to be taken for a ride by a farmer’s son with dodgy intentions.

Rowana delivered a plate of sandwiches to Steve in the shed. Lexy carried the tea. Steve was only partially visible under the car.

“You do know it looks like something Noddy might have driven, Dad?” said Rowana.

He poked his head out. “How dare you? It’s a Frogeye Sprite.”

“It still looks like something Noddy might have driven.” Rowana headed back to the kitchen.

Steve watched her through the shed door. “Perhaps I’d better dig out my blue hat with the bell on it.”

“Hold me back, someone,” said Lexy.

“Cheeky.”

She was aware of his eyes on her back as she crossed the lawn to the cottage.

Lexy went into the living room. She needed to try and continue with her search for whatever the Gallimores might want from the cottage. She went methodically through the bookcase. Elizabeth had
a good collection of books on flora and fauna. Lexy began checking them at random to see if Elizabeth was in the habit of concealing notes or photographs between pages.

She pulled out a gold and white bound tome entitled
The Language of Flowers
, and flicked through it. It was an illustrated copy of an original Victorian book.

On the inside cover were a few handwritten lines.

Elizabeth,

Nor hath the blossom such strange power,

Because it saith ‘Forget-me-not’,

For some heart-holden, distant spot,

Or silent tongue, or buried hour.

(Charles D. Roberts).

As you know, I can never truly thank you enough,

Your loving,

Jackie

December 1990

Jackie. Rowana’s mother. Must have been written not long before she died. Lexy pondered the words.
Some heart-holden, distant spot, or silent tongue, or buried hour.
Words
suggestive of a secret, that had meant something to the two women.

Lexy replaced the book and went into the studio across the hall, where Rowana was sorting through tubes of paint.

“Can you remember much about your mum, Rowana?”

The girl shook her head. “I was only a baby. I’ve got photos back in London. She looked like me. On the small side, but not so skinny. Same hair. Dad never says much about her.
Gabrielle remembers her vaguely. She said she was very quiet. I think she might have been depressed – something to do with her illness. Perhaps she knew about it before my dad did.”

“What was it?”

“Breast cancer.”

“I’m sorry.”

They heard Steve call. Rowana gave Lexy a quick smile, and they went through to the kitchen.

“I’ve changed your plugs,” Steve told Lexy, wiping his hands on a rag.

“Thanks!” Lexy fetched her bag and handed him some of Rowana’s cash.

“Dad and I are going back to Clopwolde now, to get some clothes,” Gabrielle announced, appearing on the threshold. “Are you coming, Rowana, or are you going like
that?”

“I haven’t packed my ball gown, if that’s what you mean.”

Nor had Lexy, funnily enough.

She looked down at herself. The Gallimores were going to have to take her just as she was.

In her jeans, and on her guard.

By late afternoon, the weather had turned fine and fresh.

Lexy sat on the kitchen doorstep in a meditative state. Kinky had unearthed a long-buried knuckle bone from the flower border. It was larger than he was, but he’d managed to drag it to the
shelter of a hydrangea, where he was gnawing the revolting thing with relish.

Lexy looked around her. A beautiful tranquillity hung over the whole hill. The only sounds were birdsong, the rustle of breeze in ash and sycamore, the distant boom of the sea, the grinding of a
chihuahua’s teeth on unyielding bone...

She shook her head. She couldn’t get the previous evening’s conversation with Milo out of her mind. In particular, his alert, thoughtful look when she had told him that Steve had
been away from home the night Rowana had carried out her magic ritual.

Lexy took the photo of Steve, Gabrielle and Rowana out of her pocket yet again and scrutinised it. Why would Elizabeth have this photo? Had she gone up to London and taken it herself? It seemed
the obvious answer. But why so secretive? Had she fallen out with Steve when Jackie died?

The sound of an approaching engine made her stuff the photo back into her jacket pocket. Kinky growled and dragged his prize further under the hydrangea, as if he was expecting the bone
confiscation squad.

He wasn’t far wrong. Lexy watched as a white estate car came to a halt behind the Panda.

DI Milo unfolded his lanky form from the front seat. He was wearing shades, a white shirt and a black tie.

“Everything all right?” he asked.

“More or less. On your way to a funeral?”

“Just got back from one, actually. One of my arson victims.”

“You confessed to it yet?”

“Sorry?”

“Never mind. Want a drink?”

“I’ve done some digging.” Milo settled back with his glass.

“So has Kinky,” said Lexy. They glanced over at the partially hidden dog and bone. “Hope you managed to find something less grisly than he did.”

“Depends on how you look at it. I checked out this business with the Gallimores in France. You know – the mother’s fall from the high wire.”

“And?”

“Unfounded. Just a grievance from the clown she was having an affair with. Nothing proved.”

“Their mother was having an affair?” Milo removed his shades. “Yup.”

“With a clown?”

“Yup.”

“As in Coco the?”

The detective waited patiently for Lexy to stop laughing.

“We are talking about a circus here. When the mother fell, there were no safety nets in place. That’s how she died. Apparently it happened early one morning after an argument with
her son.”

Lexy sobered up immediately. “Her son? Which one?”

“Tyman. He blamed his mother for the marriage breakdown and they were having a loud barney in the big top. Anyway, the story goes that she suddenly swarmed up the scaffolding tower to the
high wire in a rage. She started to cross, lost her balance and fell.” Milo stood up and brushed his trousers. “The clown reckoned that Tyman followed her up there and pushed her. Tyman
denied it, and had the backing of his father and brother, and a collection of circus people willing to confirm this. No reason to believe otherwise.”

Lexy got up too, wanting to detain Milo. She was still trying to assimilate this news. Had the clown lover been right? Bruce’s words of warning from the day before rang in her ear.

Any road, keep Tyman away from her. You know what he’s like.

Did he know what his younger son was really capable of?

“So, with all that high wire stuff in mind, do you reckon the Gallimores had something to do with Elizabeth’s fall?" she said, using the word fall deliberately.

But Milo wasn’t to be drawn. “I’m struggling for a motive. I can’t find any links between Elizabeth and the Gallimores, certainly nothing that would make one of them want
to kill her." He paused. "Except for that one incident with the pigs, and by all accounts, that blew over. By the way, the deeds to Pilgrim’s Farm specify that the Gallimores own the grazing
rights on Freshing Hill, but they also state that the hill is not to be sold or used for any other purpose than grazing. So there’s no obvious financial reason why they would want the cottage
badly enough to actually do away with the occupant.”

That put paid to her golf course theory.

Lexy frowned down at the neat farm buildings below. She still didn’t trust the Gallimores. The bark of a dog in the yard travelled across the clear air to them. A ferocious returning growl
emanated from under the hydrangea.

“Did you know that Four Winds was built by one of the former owners of Pilgrim’s Farm?" Milo continued. "It was sold to Captain Robert Cassall in the 1980s. You know,
Elizabeth’s husband, who was killed in the Gulf War."

Lexy thought again of the photo of the stern young man in army uniform in the front bedroom. "Poor Elizabeth.”

“She doesn’t seem to have had the best of luck all round. You staying here again tonight?”

“Too right I am.”

“Call me, won’t you, if there’s any problem."

“OK." If she could get a signal.

“Right – I’m off, then."

“Will I see you.
..
?
"
The roar of an engine made her break off.

“Who’s that?” Milo was on his feet and off round the corner.

“... later?” Lexy followed him gloomily.

Gabrielle was just alighting from the van, wearing a dark red and gold sarong which made her look sickeningly glamorous, a fact of which she was very well aware.

“Hello, again,” she simpered at DI Milo. “Are you coming, too?”

“Coming where?”

“We’ve all been invited to Pilgrim’s Farm for dinner.” She made it sound like the Queen’s Garden Party. “Lexy, too.”

Lexy gave her a withering look. Milo was going to find it just a little odd that she was waltzing off to dinner with the same family she’d just been accusing of threatening to bump her
off. And of killing Elizabeth, for that matter. Unfortunately now wasn’t the time to start explaining that the only reason she was going was to find out where all three Gallimores were at
nine o’clock on the morning Elizabeth died.

Milo shot a look at her. “I’ve got a heavy workload tonight.”

He replaced his shades, and made for his car, nodding at Steve and Rowana.

“Bye,” said Lexy.

He turned to her, but she couldn’t see his expression.

“Goodbye, Lexy,” he said.

“Thanks for the...”

But his car door slammed, and he was gone.

“Oh, crap,” said Lexy.

“Right, are we all ready?” said Steve.

“Hang on,” said Gabrielle. “We need to get the suitcases in.”

“Suitcases?”

Steve gave Lexy an apologetic smile. “Gabrielle’s twisted my arm. We’re going to stay at the cottage for the next couple of days, until we go back to London. After all,
who’s going to object?”

“Oh. Right.”

“We need to save as much money as possible.” Steve lugged a backpack, a sports bag and a large pink suitcase from the back of the van, together with some plastic carriers.

Lexy helped carry it all in. If the Gallimores didn’t like
her
being in the cottage, how were they going to take to this?

“We can walk down the footpath to the farm, now that the bull’s under lock and key,” said Gabrielle, clearly eager to be off. “I know the way.”

“What, and walk back up in the pitch dark?” said Rowana.

“Oh, Ward will give us a lift.”

She was confident.

“Come on, Kinky,” said Lexy to the hydrangea.

She was greeted with silence.

She bent down and peered under the foliage, then jerked back. “Oi – don’t you growl at me, you little...”

“What’s the problem?” inquired Steve.

“He dug up a bone earlier. Haven’t been able to part him from it ever since.”

Steve bent down to look. “Blimey, that is a big one!”

“Er... what are we waiting for?” Gabrielle’s voice broke in.

“Can’t leave him here,” said Lexy. “Going to have to get it off him.”

“OK, in that case – you distract him, and I’ll grab it.” Steve crouched low and flexed.

Kinky started snarling.

“Trick is not to let him know we’re scared,” said Lexy, shuffling around on her knees so that she was behind the dog. His eyes bulged ominously, and he tried to drag the bone
further out of sight.

“He’s the size of a fridge magnet,” said Steve. “What’s to be scared of?”

He clearly wasn’t familiar with the breed.

“Ready?” Lexy tweaked Kinky’s tail.