Useful quote:

Use the talents you possess, for the woods would be a very silent place if no birds sang except the best. - Henry van Dyke, poet (1852-1933)

28 Nov 2015

Episode 3 - Mrs Coppins

Wednesday May 3rd


On Wednesday morning Chris Marlow delivered the initial forensic report to Gary Hurley. It stated categorically that the stab wounds had been delivered soon after death but were not the cause of death. Though they had made a lot of mess, they were relatively superficial and probably only meant to mislead. The police were to believe that Kitty Oldfield had been stabbed to death by an intruder.
The cause of death was probably poisoning, but the definitive analysis was not yet available. The poison theory was Chris’s own, but there was already evidence to support his suspicion. Forensics had confiscated a cup and spoon from the draining board. Unsealed jars and containers had been removed. Test samples of foodstuffs and liquids in the kitchen had not shown any sign of poison, but a cup contained traces of arsenic. The DNA test would tell whether Mrs Oldfield had drunk out of the cup. Since the cook had also been viciously stabbed, it was probably a revenge or hate killing. Someone had wanted the woman out of the way.
Gary was sure that narrowed down the list of suspects, but when he told Cleo about Chris’s findings she remarked that there was a much larger choice of suspects, since theoretically all the girl students could have done it, not to mention Mrs Baines (less likely) and Jessie Coppins (more likely).
“Even if it was a one-off killing, we need much more information on those two women since they frequented the kitchen most,” Cleo told him. “Dorothy has already tracked down Mrs Oldfield’s best friend, or someone who says she is the best friend, but as best friends go she had little to offer in the way of information and had liked the cook. She had been quite tearful. Do you have anything in the records that could point to Mrs Baines, Gary?”
“No, but I’ll look,” said Gary.
***
Cleo decided that she would get on with the job herself rather than wait for Gary to get results. Undeniably, the affair between the two of them was not going well. Cleo wanted to ask Gary why, but she suspected that he was wrapped up in Sybil Barnet, whom he had set up in a job at a boutique and for whom he had organized a flat where she could have her daughter Anna with her. Gary lived alone. He swore that his relationship with Sybil was only platonic, but Cleo was dubious and would have broken with Gary had she not loved him almost to distraction.
Her marriage to Robert was going better than she expected, fortunately, after Gary had predicted that it was time she cut loose from the family butcher. Not only was Gary upset that Cleo had run into a loveless marriage out of a sense of duty, but he was giving her the impression that he had moved on. They were both cut up about the situation but seemingly unable to patch things up at least on a friendship level.
***
“I’m going up to the school this morning,” she said. “It would have been nice to be armed with information, but I’ll manage without. Something has got to happen.”
“You have my blessing!” said Gary, acting neutral since the sarcasm was directed at his dearth of communication.
On his part, Gary was sure the murderer must have come from outside, been let into the kitchen by Mrs Oldfield herself, accepted a drink into which a fast-working poison was dropped, watched her die, then took the first available kitchen knife and stabbed her in the back.
However, he would not tell Cleo about this theory. Every murder case she had helped him to solve had in the end been solved by her intervention representing the Hartley Agency, though Dorothy had a knack of contributing mind-boggling hunches that were often on the mark.
This case was going to be the exception. He would win though strictly speaking, he should not have been competing when solving the case was vital and not who solved it. He could not stop Cleo investigating. Mrs Baines had set that ball rolling. Was that a blind? Was Mrs Baines capable of such brutality?
***
Of course, it would have been better if Cleo and Gary had compared notes, since for the moment they seemed to be harbouring more or less the same theory. What Cleo had not told Gary was that she was more interested in Jessie’s activities than in Mrs Baines’s. She thought Jessie had the strongest motive. Gary might be fooled by Jessie’s girlish charms, meagre and disgusting though they were, but Cleo was not taken in. Jessie was a sly, cunning individual and Cleo was sure that the drunkenness the previous day had not been entirely genuine and thought she should mention that to Gary.

“Just one thing,” she started.
“Go on” replied Gary, sounding resigned to the good advice Cleo usually imparted.
“Did you test Jessie Coppins’ alcohol level on Monday?”
“No. She was obviously drunk.”
“She might have been play-acting.”
“I doubt it.”
“It’s a thought though, isn’t it?”
Gary thought that a young woman who dressed like a vamp and behaved so vulgarly would not be a capable of acting, let alone murder.
Cleo let Gary’s opinion stand. He would have noticed that her idea was a criticism, which it was, and may have reacted to it, but how, given that Jessy would have recovered from any alcohol indulgence by the time she could be tested. Cleo had taken care not to call the lack of breathalizing negligence, but it was.
***
Cleo wondered if the gaudy outfit Jessie had been wearing was the result of changing clothes in a hurry, but after Gary’s reaction to the play-acting idea, did not make that suggestion.
After all, the person who stabbed Mrs Oldfield must have had blood on his or her clothing after the vicious attack, and would no doubt have wanted to change it, so Cleo's first call would be at the address she had made out for Jessie’s family, where Jessie still lived, in chaotic conditions, as it turned out.
***
“She’s not ‘ere,” said her mother at the door. Mrs Coppins was reluctant to let Cleo in, but eager to hear the news about Jessie’s new job that she assumed was the reason for Cleo’s visit.
“She’s a good girl most of the time,” Mrs Coppins volunteered, tidying clothes and other objects from a chair before inviting Cleo to sit down. “Like a drink, Miss?”
“No thanks. I’ve just had breakfast.”
“A drink is always welcome. Are you from overseas, Miss?”
“Chicago, but I live here now.”
“You aren’t the new headmistress, are you? She’s white, isn’t she, and you’re sort of brown?”
“No. I’m just helping out,” Cleo explained.
“Mrs Oldfield’s murder came as a shock,” Mrs Coppins went on, pouring an inky brew into Cleo’s mug, which was stained from many previous brews. “Help yourself to sugar and milk.” Since Cleo had refused a drink, she was not quite sure what to do next. She was not entirely sure whether it was tea or coffee in that mug. She would drink it out of politeness. If she let it cool a little, it would not taste quite as fierce as it looked. There were nine chairs round the table at which Cleo and the woman were sitting. Mrs Coppins saw Cleo looking around the room. Washing hung from a wooden contraption you let down from the ceiling. The house was old, built long before central heating was fashionable. In those days washing was draped over the wooden slats and the contraption was pulled up on a pulley. Even then the simplest wives must have known that heat rises, Cleo thought.
“Jessie did some washing on Monday night. It’ll all be dry by now.”
Mrs Coppins pulled the washing down and took it off the slats.
“Jessie can iron it later. It’s mostly hers anyway.”
“I expect Jessie is at work now,” said Cleo,, thinking that her clothes-change theory was being confirmed on that level.
“Oh yes. She’s in charge now,” Mrs Coppins replied with pride in her voice. "Isn't that what you’ve come about?"
"Not exactly."
“The other kids are at school or working, and he scarpered,” Mrs Coppins added.
“He?”
“Went off with a woman he fancied at the pub”
“And left you with eight children?”
“Six. Two are Jessie’s. She’s ‘ad bad luck with men. She’s concentrating on her career now.”
“She had a free afternoon on Monday though, didn’t she?” said Cleo.
“Monday? Let me see. That was the day of the murder, wasn’t it? Came in and went out, then came in again and went out all dressed up. I asked her where she was going in all in her finery and she said to work and then meeting Tom. That’s her current fella.”
So Jessie had a boyfriend.
“Is Tom the school gardener, Mrs Coppins?”
“Yes. A really good catch, Miss Hartley. Especially …. Well, he’s a good catch.”
“Do you remember what time she came home on Monday afternoon, Mrs Coppins?”
“About two, I think, then much later when she was phoned by Mrs Baines and told she had to work. But ask her yourself. What do you want to know for, anyway?”
“Mainly curiosity.”
There was a shout from upstairs.
“Are you comin’ up, Betty, or shall I fetch you?” a man’s voice shouted.
Mrs Coppins shouted back that she was on her way. Then she decided to explain.
“When the kids are out I need a bit of fun myself,” she said. “You’ll have to go now. He gets narky if I don’t look after him.”
Cleo got up and made for the door. So the mother had a boyfriend, did she? One for when the kids were out. Mrs Coppins wasn’t bad looking and only about 38. My age, Cleo decided.  Cleo wondered if Mrs Coppins was indulging in a bit of prostitution. Should she hang around and see who the guy was who visited Jessie’s mother during school hours? Was it relevant or was that merely curiosity on her part?
***
Back outside, Cleo decided that Mrs Coppins did not suspect her daughter of any wrongdoing. Jessie was at home for some of the time on the afternoon of Mrs Oldfield's murder. She would have reacted differently to the questions about Jessie's whereabouts if she had wanted to hide something. It was quite fortunate that the man upstairs had demanded her attention because it had stopped the woman asking questions that Cleo might have found it difficult to answer truthfully. As it was now after 11 a.m., the Huddle Inn would be open, so Cleo decided to ask a few questions there.
“Beer, m’dear?” asked Molly Moss, proprietor of the pub.
“Just mineral water, please. I’m driving,” said Cleo.
“Fizzy?”
“Yes, please.”
“Are you American?”
“Yes, but I live in Upper Grumpsfield.”
“I think I’ve seen you around.”
“I’m memorable with my dark skin,” said Cleo. She found it easier in this backwater to come straight out with the skin factor.
“And you came here for a drink? They’ve got a good pub in your village. New-fangled though. Calls itself a bistro now. They do that Japanese thing with microphones.”
“Karaoke. I just happened to be driving past up here.”
Molly did not believe her, but If she knew exactly who Cleo was, she was not going to let on just yet.
“Oh yes? A little bird told me you were parked outside the Coppins’ place.”
News travels fast here, thought Cleo.
“About that murder at the school, I suppose.”
“Murder?”
“Pull the other one. I know who you are, Cleo Hartley. Jessie Coppins wanted that job and now she’ll get it.”
“Why didn’t you come straight out with my name?”
“I didn’t want to be forward,” said Molly. “Anyway, you didn’t use my name, either.”
“I thought you put on quite a good act of not knowing me,” said Cleo. “Now we’ve got our identities straight, may I ask if you suspect Jessie Coppins of murder?”
“Do you?”
“Well, she does have a motive.”
“She’s too timid, Cleo. What about that boyfriend of hers?”
“Boyfriend?”
“The one she shares with her mother.”
“Shares?”
“Didn’t you see him when you were there?”
Cleo decided to promote Molly’s eagerness to talk by talking herself.
“I heard a man’s voice,” she said conspiratorially. “But it sounded too old for the boyfriend of a girl like Jessie. Isn’t she friendly with the school gardener?”
“Possibly, but Jessie also goes in for older men. She’s got two kids from two men old enough to be her father if it wasn't him. What did her father scarper for, is what I’d like to know,” said Molly. “And with my barmaid. You’re a detective. Can’t you find out where Polly is?”
“You need DNA samples for establishing fatherhood,” Cleo explained. “Mrs Coppins doesn’t seem to know where her husband is.”
 “I don’t suppose she wants to, either,” said Molly. “Jessie’s kids look just like Mrs Coppins’ kids. They were all born before she branched out, and she’s bringing them up as her own.”
“Branched out?” said Cleo.
“Don’t they call it hookery in the USA?”
“I don’t think so, but I get your meaning,” said Cleo. “Jessie’s mother’s genes are enough to explain the likeness.”
"Anyway, between you, me and the gatepost, I think Jessie is Patrick Kelly's daughter or even that solicitor. He didn’t just solicit wills, Cleo."
"Do you mean that scruffy Irish farmer on the Lower Grumpsfield Road?"
"That's him. Betty Coppins carried on with him round about the time Jessie was thought of. Then Betty ditched the farmer and went for Joseph Coppins instead. She probably couldn't face farm work."
"Awesome, what these villagers get up to," said Cleo, wondering if Robert knew the story.
"Then Magda turned up and got into Kelly’s good books. She was a prostitute, too. Patrick Kelly likes experienced women.”
Cleo wondered if Molly knew that from personal experience.
“No, I didn’t and I wasn’t,” said Molly, reading Cleo’s thoughts.
 "So Betty Coppins was also a hooker before she turned respectable," said Cleo.
"Believe me, they never turn respectable. Betty didn't, either, even when she was having kids one after another, and she’d had two boys with Coppins before Jessie came."
Those words rang in Cleo’s brain-. What would Molly have said about Sybil?
“Penny for your thoughts, Cleo. Things not going well with that cop?”
Cleo frowned and shook her head.
“It’s that woman, isn’t it? Sybil. I’ll bet she gives him a run for his money.”
“He says it’s platonic, Molly.”
“And you believe him?”
“I’m concentrating on my marriage.”
“That’s the best thing you can do, Cleo. Robert is a kindly man and you could do worse.”
***
"Getting back to Jessie, do I understand that Mrs Coppins pretended that Coppins was Jessie’s father?" said Cleo.
“We’re back on that, are we? Well, you can always talk to me about the other, Cleo. My lips are sealed,” said Molly. “I think that’s why Mrs Coppins kept quiet about the incest gossip, Cleo.”
“Incest?”
“If Coppins isn’t Jessie’s father, she isn’t related to him, so her kids are not incestuous, are they?”
"Of course, it was only incest if he thought the girl was his daughter, but thinking or not thinking she was would not stop that kind of guy from molesting a girl, would it?” said Cleo.
 "It’s a moral mess, Cleo. I suppose Mrs Coppins did not want to admit she’d had sex with Kelly."
“But that was before her marriage, wasn’t it?”
She was carrying on with both of them, Cleo.”
Molly loved an audience. Her performance had become more enthusiastic by the minute.
“On the other hand, Betty Coppins has never admitted anything. It could have been a client,” Molly said. “I don’t listen to gossip, but I could tell you a lot about the Coppins woman. There’s always a chance that she got money for sending Jessie to have sex with men old enough to be her father or grandfather. Mrs Coppins had it off with all the local men before she started her new business.”
“Business?”
“Massage,” said Molly.
“You mean, she invites men in and gives them massages?”
“Let’s call it treatment. Sounds more respectable and less dodgy than soliciting.”
Cleo wondered what stories were still waiting to be told. Molly was now in full swing.
“I’ll tell you something else. This district is a black hole of deep, deep...” 
Molly had difficulty in finding the right word.
“Depravity?”
“That’s it. I wouldn’t work here if trade wasn’t so good.”
Cleo did not leave the pub without giving Molly her office visiting card and promising to call in again for some more news about this and that. She had declined the offer of a pub lunch because it was Wednesday, the only afternoon when she and Robert had time to catch up on essential shopping.
As she got into the car a thought occurred to her. The pub would probably be getting supplies from Robert that day, so she decided to offer to meet him when he delivered to the pub that very day. She phoned Robert and he said he’d meet her there.  Cleo could not resist asking Robert how well he knew Molly so she went back into the pub.
“I know all my customers, Cleo. It’s my business. But I’m not about to trade you in for one of them! I’ll be there in a few minutes and I’ll bring Gloria. I’ll enjoy seeing what she makes of Molly.”
“What about the shop?”
“Business is over for the day, Cleo. No one comes in at lunchtime on a Wednesday.”

After phoning Dorothy and inviting her to supper that evening so that she could tell her about Mrs Coppins., Cleo told Molly, who was surprised that Cleo had come back, that she would have lunch there after all. There would be three of them. The chef, an Egyptian named Ali who was fascinated by Molly and happy to share her bed, would serve something stupendous.
At twenty past one Robert arrived with Gloria.
“Nice to be here for a meal, Molly.”
“Why, it’s Mr Jones!”
“You ordered steaks and sausages, Molly, so I’d have come anyway.”
“I’m Gloria Hartley,” said Gloria. “And that’s my daughter over there.”
 “I didn’t know for certain that you were married until Cleo came in and told me, Mr Jones,” Molly fibbed. “Congratulations!”
“Thanks Molly. But didn’t you call me Bob last time I saw you?”
“I just thought you might not like that, seeing as you’ve got your wife here.”
Molly was being coy, though she had no reason to be.
“Hey, Molly, Bobby’s taken,” Gloria said.
“So am I, Gloria,” replied Molly.
“I hope you are not being taken in,” said Gloria, laughing wickedly.
Some regulars who had been listening to the repartee found it all very amusing. 
Molly was a bit put out.
“What are you drinking?” she asked.
 An hour later, after a really tasty North African seasoned lunch, the threesome moved to leave. Cleo did not think Molly would contribute any more helpful information. What she had said about Betty Coppins was rather shocking, but probably true.
Molly had been understandably careful about giving information on that two-timing boyfriend. Business of any kind was welcome at the pub and Mrs Coppins often sent her clients over for a drink or a meal. Most men who go in for that kind of erotic interlude do not want to be caught out, so they choose venues where they won’t be recognized. Cleo wondered how Mrs Coppins found her clients. Cleo would find out more about Jessie Coppins’ boyfriend soon and by other means. Did the young woman know what her mother got up to?
“Remember me to Ali!” called Robert over his shoulder as they left the pub. “That steak was a real treat even with the fancy trimmings.”
“That butcher delivers good steaks, Bob!”
“Thanks. Phone your next order in Molly. I’ll bring it a.s.a.p.”
***
“Who’s Ali?” Gloria wanted to know as they drove down the steep hill to Upper Grumpsfield.
“An Egyptian guy. Cooks at Molly’s”
“And shares her bed, no doubt,” said Gloria.
“Molly runs the pub, Mother.”
“Ali is a respectable Muslim, Gloria,” said Robert.
“He’s a man,” retorted Gloria.
Cleo was glad her mother had been quiet at the pub. She might not have been had she known more about Ali.


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