Authors: Kaye C. Hill
“What?”
“I mean, what caused her to fall?”
“No.” He shook his head, face pale. “But perhaps if I’d been there earlier...”
Lexy let up. After all, she herself knew what it was like to stumble on a recently dead body. Something you don’t forget in a hurry.
Tyman glanced at his watch.
“Can you tell me a bit about Elizabeth?” Lexy said quickly. “I mean, what she was like as a person? I didn’t know her, and... well... I guess I’m just
curious.”
He seemed to consider this, squinting down the hill towards Pilgrim’s Farm.
“Elizabeth was quite intense,” he began. “Mad about our four-footed friends...” He gave a nod at Kinky. “And well into her causes. Animal charities and the
like.” A humourless laugh escaped him.
“Well, that’s good, isn’t it?”
“Generally, yes.” Tyman shaded his eyes against the sun. “Trouble is, she was a little on the over-zealous side. Especially where we were concerned.”
“Why?”
“Oh, there was this... misunderstanding about six months ago. Elizabeth was under the impression that we were mistreating the animals on the farm.”
“Which you weren’t?”
“God, no – they live like royalty. Much better than we do, in fact. Unfortunately, Elizabeth happened to come down to the farm the day we were shifting one of our Tamworth sows, a
particularly bad-tempered one, from her nursery pen into a paddock. She’d taken it into her head to make a run for it, and my dad was sort of...” He searched for the right word.
“Sort of grappling with her in the yard. So, there she was, screaming the place down, and all her eleven piglets running mad. Blood everywhere where she’d bitten Dad’s hand open.
Looked like a battle scene. Anyway, Elizabeth took a photo, and it got in the paper. You know.
Suffolk farmer brutalises pig.
That sort of thing. Took a hell of a lot of sorting
out.”
Lexy suddenly found herself trying not to laugh. She saw that Tyman was trying not to, as well.
“When we finally managed to persuade the farms inspector that the old man wasn’t a direct descendant of Caligula, Elizabeth had to come down and apologise to us. Damned nearly killed
her.”
His hand flew to his mouth. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to say that. But it meant that we never really saw eye to eye after that.” He smoothed out the loose threads around a tear in
the knee of his jeans.
“Then one day,” he continued, “a few weeks ago now, I ran into her on the path. There was a barn owl perched in an oak tree nearby – she pointed it out to me. Beautiful
thing. We got talking, and, well, after that I saw her most days. Dad had put a flock of sheep out on the hill to graze, and I came up past her house every morning to check on them.” She
watched a muscle twitching in his cheek. “So we put our differences behind us.”
It was as Lexy was contemplating this that the second stranger suddenly appeared.
She jumped in alarm, but Tyman actually leapt to his feet, striking an almost defensive pose. Explained why he’d kept glancing up the path.
The newcomer stared at the two of them from the gateway. He was about Lexy’s age, a large, dark, brooding presence, with narrow, watchful eyes. At his side was a large, dark, brooding
dog.
Lexy grabbed Kinky’s collar, just as the chihuahua broke into a storm of snarling barks.
The stranger regarded him with contempt.
“What’s going on?”
“Ward – this is Lexy,” said Tyman, speaking loudly and quickly over Kinky’s continuing racket. “She’s a friend of the new owners of Four Winds.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Four Winds Cottage is in new hands.”
Lexy caught the disbelief that flashed momentarily across the other man’s face.
“Apparently, Elizabeth left the place to a distant relative in her will,” Tyman gabbled. “Bit of a surprise, eh? Lexy’s been staying here. Lexy, this is my brother,
Ward.”
So this was big brother. Lexy could see the family resemblance now, in the arched brow and straight nose. Just seemed that Tyman had inherited all the charm.
“Hi.” She stood up, still holding the enraged chihuahua. Ward barely glanced at her, his attention fixed on his brother like a stoat with a rabbit. Lexy felt a rattle of
resentment.
“We need to talk. Now.”
“Yeah – I know.” Tyman stepped back, upending the mug and sending tea splashing around their feet.
He threw a helpless look at Lexy. “God. Sorry. Do you want me to... ?”
“Just leave it, Tyman. Django, heel.” Ward turned abruptly and began striding back up the path in the direction he had come from, the dog keeping pace beside him as if its nose was
velcroed to his trousers.
“Something I said?” Lexy enquired.
“No – it’s just that we’ve got... stuff to do.” Tyman grimaced at his brother’s disappearing back. “Sorry about him. He’s under a lot of pressure.
Er...incidentally, it’s all private land round here, except the cottage and its access road. That is, Pilgrim’s Farm owns the peninsula, and, you know, with the sheep and
everything...”
“Don’t worry, I’ll stick to the cottage,” Lexy lied. “Guess that’s why you want to buy it. So you’ll have it all?”
Tyman gave her an apologetic smile, turned and hurried after his brother.
She watched them go, feeling the tension crackling in the air.
What a look of shocked disbelief there’d been on each of their faces when they learned that the cottage had been left to the Patersons. They had obviously been banking on getting it
themselves – Tyman had said as much.
Was that why they didn’t like the idea of her being in the cottage? Well, tough. If Lexy had any lingering doubts about remaining at Four Winds Cottage they were gone now. She wanted to
find out all she could about this Gallimore family.
An impatient bark reminded her that she had more immediate things to attend to.
“Come on then.” Lexy grabbed her bag, locked the back door and headed for the car.
She flipped her wallet open. She’d go and get a few supplies from the village store and check her phone messages while she was there. There might be one from Rowana.
“I hope you don’t think you’re going home,” she warned Kinky as they set off. “Because you’re going to be sadly disappointed, mate. I’ve got the bit
between my teeth now.”
He threw her a long-suffering look.
They bounced along the track under the thick canopy of oak and sycamore. Rain water from the evening before lay in deep ruts, dappled by sun shining through the branches.
At the bottom of the hill, they turned on to the tarmac lane, and went past the farm. The trio of weird sheep had been joined by some white geese, tearing at the grass with gusto. In a further
field, a big flock of more ordinary brown and white sheep were moving restlessly around.
At the gate Lexy turned into the lane, sunk deeply between hedges thick with late summer flowers, and after just half a mile the village of Nodmore came into view.
It was clustered around a green. There was an old-fashioned pub called the Unicorn; a small church with a walled graveyard shaded by yew trees; a garage with one petrol pump; a general store
– hallelujah – with a garish sign; a rash of unimaginative grey bungalows; a couple of original Suffolk long houses, the type built by Dutch settlers and settled by rich Londoners, and
a mellow-stoned thatched cottage.
Lexy and Kinky got out of the car and headed for the shop.
“Bet I’ll be served by a plump middle-aged woman with a face like a currant bun, who’ll call me ‘moi luvver’, and ask all sorts of awkward questions,” Lexy
predicted, as she tied Kinky up outside. She’d been to these rural outposts before.
A bell jangled as she opened the door. Standing behind the counter was a plump, middle-aged woman with a face like a currant bun.
“Morning, moi luvver,” she smiled.
“Hi.” Lexy picked up a basket and wended her way around the crowded interior, breathing in the indefinable smell of the small grocery.
“Ah, I can see you’re a proper cook, like me,” said the woman, as she scanned the items Lexy had put in the basket. “What is it tonight? Lentil soup? And you’re
making your own bread, are you?”
“Yup.”
“Not local, are you?”
“No.” Lexy picked up a newspaper.
“On ’oliday?”
“Sort of.”
The shopkeeper raised her eyebrows.
“Got somewhere to stay?”
“Er...”
“There’s a nice guest house down Mill Road. My sister runs it. I’ll get you details if you like.”
“No, thanks very much, I’m sorted.” Lexy put down the paper.
“Somewhere round ’ere? Where’s that then? I thought my sister ’ad the only guest house round here.” The curranty eyes bored into hers. Lexy felt like asking her if
she fancied a job as a private investigator’s assistant. She’d make a bloody good one. “I’m staying with friends.”
“Oh – in Nodmore?”
Lexy shot a look through the glass door at Kinky, willing him to make a scene. He lay on his side, basking in the sun, eyes half closed.
“Just up the road, actually. A... er... relative of theirs died recently. They’ve come down to sort out the estate, and I’m staying in her cottage, making sure
everything’s ticking over.” There – will that shut you up, you nosy bat?
“Died, you say? Who was that, then? If you don’t mind me asking, that is.”
Feeling almost hypnotised, Lexy found herself admitting, “Elizabeth Cassall.”
“Oh, yes, ’er up at Four Winds. That was tragic, that was. Woman like that in her prime shouldn’t ’ave taken a tumble like she did. If you ask me, there’s something
more to that business than meets the eye.”
“Really? How do you mean?”
The woman’s face suddenly took on a distrusting expression.
“I didn’t think Elizabeth ’ad no relatives. ”
“Distant relatives,” said Lexy. “Very distant. Must dash.”
The voice called after her. “You going up to Four Winds, then?”
Lexy jumped into the sanctuary of her car.
“’Strewth, Kinky! Do you reckon she’s ex KGB?”
The chihuahua pawed at her. She opened a box of dog biscuits. “Special baked bean flavoured ones, just for you. Only kidding.”
She tore open a packet of crisps for herself, then, finding she had a signal at last, checked her phone for messages. There was just the one, from Milo.
Where r u?
Lexy tapped in a reply.
Nodmore. Want to meet at the Unicorn tonite?
She didn’t want to tell him exactly where she was staying – although anyone in Nodmore village would likely be able to supply that
information for him tonight after that interrogation in the village shop – but it would be nice to have some company for a couple of hours.
The reply came almost immediately.
Be there at 8
.
Was that a promise or an order? Lexy sat back with a grin.
She watched idly as the door of the thatched cottage opened. A man stepped out and stooped to pick up two bottles of milk. He stood up, coughed, then defiantly took a puff of the cigarette in
his hand. He glanced over at her car, and Lexy got a sudden jolt. It was the man Elizabeth had painted. The picture hanging on the upstairs landing. She’d caught his decadent expression to a
T. Was he someone she knew well?
He turned and disappeared into his cottage. Lexy made a mental note to find out who he was. Someone in the pub would know.
Lexy drove back towards the cottage, her mind turning over what the woman in the shop had said.
There’s something more to that business than meets the eye.
Did she know something? Perhaps there was talk in the village.
She turned on to the tarmac lane that led to Pilgrim’s Farm. The gate was still firmly fastened, and a farm worker was carrying out some fencing work next to it.
Well, he would be as good a start as anyone, if she was going to start asking around about Elizabeth. And he could open the gate for her. She stopped the car and wound down the window, smiling
brightly.
The man was bluff and burly, with a bushy moustache, a large drinker’s nose, and a ruddy complexion. He was dressed in a frayed waxed jacket, worn corduroys and green wellington boots.
“Can I ’elp you?” He sounded like the only way he wanted to help Lexy was out of his sight. To her surprise he wasn’t a local – sounded more like a
Yorkshireman.
She held the smile. “I’m just on my way up to Four Winds Cottage. Would you mind getting the gate?”
A frown settled on his brow, making him look like a satyr.
“And what business might you ’ave up there?”
“Er...” Lexy wasn’t expecting that. “... I’m just looking after things for the new owners.”
“’Ow do you mean, new owners?”
She was getting a bit fed up with this. “The woman who used to own it left it to a family called Paterson in her will.”
The man visibly paled under his wind-blasted patina. “Elizabeth l-left the cottage to someone?” he stammered.
“That’s right,” said Lexy, briskly.
He stared at her for a moment longer.
“Apologies. Let me introduce m’self.” He offered a meaty hand. “Bruce Gallimore. Owner of Pilgrim’s Farm.” In spite of his obvious unease, he indicated the
buildings and paddocks behind him with a grandiose gesture.
Lexy blinked. This was the father of lithe, charming Tyman? Although now she looked closer, she realised she could see Ward Gallimore in the narrow, suspicious eyes.
“I’m Lexy Lomax.”
“Will you be up at the cottage long?” Bruce enquired.
Now Lexy was really curious. What was up there that the Gallimores didn’t want her to find?
“Just a couple of nights.”
The wiry black eyebrows shot up. “A couple o’ nights?”
“Yup.”
Bruce Gallimore pulled at his moustache and glanced up the hillside in the direction of the cottage. “Bit remote up there. No phone signal. You’d be better off in’t village.
There’s a guest house out on Mill Road.”
Lexy set her jaw.
“Yeah. I know. Someone’s already told me,” she replied. “But I’m fine up at the cottage, thanks.”
His face set.
“That was a strange business with Elizabeth, wasn’t it?” Lexy remarked.
The narrow dark eyes burned into hers. “Nowt strange about it. It were just an accident. That’s what the verdict will be.”