Thursday cont.
then Friday
Cleo’s realised that she would have to talk to Molly
again, since Molly was well informed about what went on in her village, so she
drove back to the Huddle Inn. Molly was wiping tables and generally tidying up.
“Of course,” she replied. “Coffee? It’s on the
house. I need some myself. Espresso. Genuine Italian, Cleo. When I leased this
place, the first thing I did was to install an espresso machine.”
“So it is your business, Molly?”
“It has been for some time.”
“Well, you do a great job, and that cook of yours
is a genius.”
“Want to meet him?”
“I’d like to thank him personally for that
wonderful steak,” said Cleo, “but I really came to find out who the girl is who
ran away with Mr Coppins.”
“Now why would you be interested in that sorry
tale, Cleo, or should I call you Mrs Jones?”
“I kept my own surname, Molly, but please just
carry on calling me Cleo.”
“Oops. Very modern, but nice. Saves changing back
when you get a divorce.”
“I’m not planning to get a divorce, Molly, but Mrs
Coppins is, I hope.”
“Oh, it’s like that, is it?”
“No one seems to know where the guy is.”
“Perhaps I can help you there, Cleo.”
“How?”
“The girl’s name was Polly Spencer, and her mother
was very upset, especially when the girl had a baby and still wouldn’t say where
she is. In confidence, there was trouble at the Spencer home. He brought a
young woman home and insisted on Mrs Spencer letting her stay. Then, all of a
sudden, Mrs Spencer was dead, Cleo. Natural causes, they said. Mr Spencer married
the girl. ”
“How awful.”
“You’d better forget I told you that.”
“I would never reveal what I am told in confidence,
Molly,” said Cleo.
“Let me try
to find out more,” Molly offered. ”That household is a wasp’s nest.”
“I’m not surprised. Let me know if you have any
success.”
“Of course.”
Cleo drank her coffee appreciatively. There was
something not right about Polly’s father and his new wife. Cleo wondered if
Gary had any information on the mother’s death, then remembered that she was
going to cut down the contact to HQ. She could not help thinking that far from
wanting to cut Gary out of her life, she really needed any excuse to get near
him. Life would be a lot less complicated if she could get that man out of her
hair.
Molly got up and went to the hatch between the bar
and kitchen.
“Ali? Cleo Hartley wants to meet you,” she called.
“I’m flattered, Cleo,” said Ali in cultivated
English as he entered the saloon.
“How do you do, Mr....”
“Lewis,” said Ali. “OK, I know I don’t look
British, but I was adopted as a baby.”
“People have the same trouble with my skin colour,”
said Cleo. “Some even think I won’t understand proper English. That’s really
annoying.”
“I know what you mean. You’re married to Robert
Jones, aren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Excellent butcher – one every chef dreams of. And
his new assistant is a hit.”
“I think you’re talking about my mother, Ali.”
“Really? Congratulations on having such a fine
family!”
“And thanks for being such a great chef.”
“My pleasure,” he said. “I have to get back to the
stove now. They eat early in Huddlecourt Minor.”
***
The day was still not over for Cleo. Now she knew a
bit more about the Coppinses, she could ring Gary and ask him to look in the
archives. She would ask Robert’s daughter, Julie, and her boyfriend, Colin, to
have supper with them at short notice. Then she could ask Colin if he had full
access to data at HQ archives, where he now worked, and hoped that would be
prepared to supply her with some classified data.
Cleo reflected that it looked like she was going to
ditch Gary. Inviting Colin would be good for the Hartley Agency and help her to
bypass Gary. As an additional bonus, having Julie to supper would be good for
Robert, who saw too little of his daughter.
Cleo would not ask Gary to supper, not least for
diplomatic reasons. He and Julie had broken up after a very brief ‘platonic’ relationship
and were not friends. Colin Peck had been Julie’s boyfriend, gone to London to
join the Metropolitan Police Force, and recently returned to run the archives
at HQ. He had immediately taken up with Julie again. Although Colin was no
longer on the Hartley Agency staff, his law studies and experience in London
were invaluable, both inside and outside Middlethumpton HQ.
***
What Cleo had not reckoned with was that Robert had
already invited Gary to supper. Gary was bringing his new partner, Sybil, or
was it Moira? Robert did not know which.
“Boy, is that going to be a sticky wicket,” Cleo
commented.
“You should have consulted me first,” said Robert.
“Or you me,” retorted Cleo.
“We’ll just have to make the best of it. We’re all
adults, after all.”
“I guess so.”
“Gary’s presumably happy with his new woman,
Julie’s happy with Colin, and I’m happy with you. What can go wrong, Cleo?”
Famous last words, thought Cleo.
***
Despite her determination to forget Gary the lover
and concentrate on Gary the cop, Cleo was finding it increasingly hard not to
think of Gary as the love of her life. He was flaunting his various affairs
with her, as if to say ‘you don’t want me but someone else does’, which was not
strictly true. He and Cleo did have an occasional one-night stand, which
invariably ended with him wanting her to ditch Robert, with Cleo refusing and
saying they would have to kick the habit of sleeping together and develop a
normal friendship.
One-night stands were not her style, she would
insist. Normal relationships seemed not to be in Gary’s repertoire, Cleo noted,
at least, where she was concerned. It was something of a triumph for him that
Cleo could not resist meeting him, resulting in impassioned hours usually spent
in Romano’s guestroom above his restaurant. Gary only laughed at her guilty
conscience.
“You married a guy you don’t love. You sleep with a
guy you do love, and then you feel bad about it, Cleo,” he would argue. “It
just does not make sense.”
“I can’t let Robert down.”
“But you can let me down,” Gary would argue. “One
day I’ll make you eat your words, Cleo Hartley.”
“Shall be honest, Gary?” Cleo invariably said. “I
damn well hope you do, but I can’t think of what could make that happen.”
“A baby, Cleo.”
“Could be his.”
“But he doesn’t want any.”
“Then I’ll do without,” said Cleo.
“Not with me, you won’t,” said Gary.
Memories of dialogues like that one invariably
overcame Cleo whenever she set eyes on Gary. His searching looks were like a challenge
she did not yet have the strength to resiat.
Gary arrived with Moira after seven, belatedly
making up the party. Moira was very beautiful; you could describe her as
aggressively decorative.
Gary enjoyed the company of decorative women. Moira
was dressed flamboyantly and Cleo recognized her at once. It was Sybil, Anna’s
mother. Why was she calling herself Moira and why was Gary going along with
that?
“Do you have a twin sister, Moira?” Cleo asked on
impulse.
Gary looked perplexed.
“Yes, I do,” replied Moira. “How do you know?”
Before Cleo could say any more, Gary's mobile rang.
It now sported a Martin’s horn as ringtone.
Gary looked at the number. “It’s Chris, folks. I’ll
have to answer it.”
***
“Gary, where are you? There’s a man’s corpse on
Upper Grumpsfield common.”
“Oh, no, not now.”
“Kids playing football found it. Ran home and
someone rang the police. They rang me and now we’re at the scene of the crime.”
“Do you need me?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
“Thanks.”
***
Chris rang of and Gary did not attempt to hide his
annoyance. He explained why.
“I’ll go with you, Gary,” said Cleo, to Gary’s undisguised
pleasure.
“So will I,” Colin volunteered.
“Would you do that?”
“It’s my job,” said Colin.
“And my curiosity,” admitted Cleo.
“Well, Ladies, that just leaves us,” said Robert.
“We’ll survive, Dad!”
“I’m glad to be here,” said Moira.
“Do you have children, Moira?” Julie asked.
“Yes, a little girl, but my mother is looking after
her tonight,” said Moira alias Sybil , who left Anna at the vicarage during
weekdays and at weekends when Gary was not busy. Sybil alias Moira had an
itinerary that was known only to herself. Robert had taken on board the idea
that she was Sybil’s twin.
“I wouldn’t know what to do with a child if I had
one,” said Julie.
“You’d bring it here, Julie,” said Robert, who realized
Moira was Sybil, but decided it was none of his business if Gary was playing
along with the twin nonsense. Was Sybil a bit potty?
“More wine, Ladies?” he offered.
***
Gary, Cleo and Colin walked at a brisk pace to
Upper Grumpsfield common. It wasn’t the first corpse to be found there. Upper
Grumpsfield Common seemed to be a magnet for murderers.
***
“Who is it, Chris?” Gary wanted to know.
“No identification on him.”
“How did he die?”
“Stabbed in the stomach. Probably internal
bleeding.”
“How horrible,” said Cleo. “Quite a good-looking
young guy, too. Who could have wanted him dead?”
“Ask me another. Stabbing in the stomach is usually
deadly at any age unless something is done immediately,” said Chris. “We’ve
found the knife. It’s quite a common pound-shop purchase, but it’s sharp and
sturdy, so you could use it for a hobby like woodcarving. People buy tools at
the pound shops because they are usually as good as the ones with labels on
them. That means that not only hard-up people buy them, though it may be a clue
at a pinch.”
“We don’t keep a database of criminals’ hobbies,
Chris. Where is it now?” said Gary.
“In the van.”
***
It was the third corpse Chris had dealt with
recently on Upper Grumpsfield common. The other two cases had been solved and
the assassin was behind bars. Apart from that, those two had been shot cleanly
in the back. Somehow, this case promised to be a lot messier.
“There was definitely a fight,” said Chris. “A
superficial examination revealed bruising on the arms and chest and it wouldn’t
surprise me if whoever did it has one or two black eyes, and maybe even a
broken jaw. The fists of this dead guy are bloody.”
“So DNA testing would help,” said Cleo.
“Yes. Once we find the guy who might have done it
and we can compare his DNA with that on the corpse’s knuckles, there is a
chance. But there’s always a possibility that the dead guy dug into his own
wounds with his fists. Simple blood tests will detect that.”
“That’s terrible.”
“But it happens, Cleo.”
“I suppose there are thousands of those knives around,”
said Colin.
“Foreign import; cheaper than made in the UK.
There’s a pound shop in Middlethumpton. AS I said, those knives are bought by
all sorts of people, especially youths. The blade can be retracted into the
handle so the knife can be carried around in a pocket or handbag.”
“Aren’t such knives banned?” Cleo asked.
“Using them as weapons is banned, Cleo,” said Gary.
“You can’t ban knives in general.”
“Thanks for telling me that,” said Cleo, and Chris
wondered what had happened to the two of them to make them so cool to one another.
“And you say it was a guy did this, Chris?” Cleo
asked, turning away from Gary.
“I can’t imagine a woman having the strength to get
through the dead guy’s resistance, Cleo. He looks as if he’s spent many hours
at the gym.”
Colin and Chris took photos from all angles.
“I’ll take some photos of my own,” said Cleo,
getting her cell phone into position.
“That’s a good idea,” said Gary. “Ask around
please, Cleo. The sooner we know who this guy is, the better.”
“Always assuming he’s local.”
***
A couple of hours later, Cleo, Colin and Gary were
back at the cottage. The three left there had put away a bottle of wine in the
meantime. Fortunately none of them had to drive. Robert had enjoyed his
daughter’s company and been relieved that Gary had found someone who was actually sexier than Cleo, though his interest
in that side of things was minimal. He hoped that Gary would now ogling his
wife. Robert was also quite impressed with the amount Gary’s new flame could
drink.
***
Gary led the inebriated Sybil alias Moira out to
the car. He was rather embarrassed. In a drunken state, the young woman was no
longer quite as decorative. He would ditch her a.s.a.p. if she was as fond of alcohol
as she appeared to be. Why did he keep on getting involved? This affair was not
therapeutic for his burn-out. He had been advised to get his private life
straightened out, but he only knew one therapeutic woman, and that was Cleo,
and she only wanted him now and again.
In truth, Gary was not very good at human nature.
Cleo had been jealous to see Gary with Sybil and could not avoid the
schadenfreude at seeing that the woman was considerably less desirable when she
was drunk. She wondered why Gary put up with the name charade. He seemed to
have found the woman rather repulsive as he pushed her to his car.
***
“God, that woman can drink,” Robert commented later.
“You kept on filling her glass, Dad!” said Julie.
“She kept on emptying it,” retorted Robert.
“Come on, Julie. You can see these people are tired,”
said colin. “Let’s go home.”
Julie was sober. She took Cleo aside.
“Isn’t that Sybil?” she said.
“I’m sure it is. I don’t know why she’s using a
different name and I haven’t had time to ask Gary. Maybe she’s trying to find a
new identity. But maybe there is a twin.””
“Or she’s leading some kind of doubt life,” said
Julie. “Like having a multiple personality, where one personality does not know
about the others.”
“I thought of that, too,” said Cleo. “But why would
Gary go along with that?”
“Ask him, Cleo. I can’t. You can see how
embarrassed he is with me. It’s really time you left my dad and went to him,
then we’d all be better off.”
Cleo was appalled that Julie also knew about their
affair.
“I‘m married to Robert and it’s staying that way,
Julie.”
“Even if you are making three people unhappy?”
“Am I?”
“Of course, you are.”
Colin came up to Julie before the dialogue could
proceed.
“Let’s go home now. Julie,” he said forcefully.
“But I need to talk more to Cleo.”
“Tomorrow, Julie.”
“OK, Colin. I can see that you’re tired too.”
“Julie embraced Cleo and she whispered that Gary
had told her was going to wait forever, if necessary.”
“I’ve told him not to,” Cleo whispered back.
“He doesn’t believe you and neither do I, Cleo,”
were Julies parting words.
***
When every sign of the meal and subsequent nibbles
and coffee had been cleared away, Cleo opened her laptop and edited and printed
the photos she had taken, though Robert protested that midnight was not the
time to start working. Cleo told him she was driving to the Huddle Inn next
morning and needed the photos for identification purposes. If anyone could talk
about the locals, it was Molly. She might know the guy on the photo.
***
Robert was well away into the land of nod by the
time Cleo got to bed. She was glad. It always disturbed her to see Gary
socially, even with a drunken hooker on his arm. She had no right to be
jealous, but she was. She did not want intimate relations with Robert and he
was not interested, but she kept her marriage going because she was grateful to
him for always being kind and caring to her and she did love him in a way,
though more as a friend than a marriage partner. And now she knew for certain
that Robert’s daughter had seen through her emotional quandary. She was sure that
Julie would keep her knowledge to herself, but for how long?
***
Cleo was back at the Huddle Inn early on Friday
morning. Molly had just laid the tables for lunch and the espresso machine was
making its first brew of the day.
“I didn’t expect to see you again so soon,” said
Molly. “Espresso?”
“Yes, please. I need your help.”
“How?”
“Last night a young man was found stabbed to death on
Upper Grumpsfield common. He had no identification on him. I took photos and I
hope you know who it is.”
“Show me.”
“It’s Tom Crowe, Cleo. It’s definitely Tom Crowe.”
“Jessie’s boyfriend?”
“That’s him all right, but he's not only her boyfriend,”
said Molly. ”Poor girl.”
“Maybe I shouldn’t be telling you this, but Jessie
discovered the guy in bed with her mother,” said Cleo. “She told me she was
going to tell him off.”
“I’d have murdered him on the spot," said
Molly. "The Coppins woman is a hussy.”
So murder could have been in Jessie’s heart, Cleo thought.
“You don’t think Jessie could have killed Tom
Crowe, do you?” Molly asked as if she had read Cleo’s mind.
“I don’t know, Molly. The forensic guy did not
think a woman could inflict that kind of wound.”
“Even if she was hopping mad?”
“I’m just telling you what the forensic guy said,”
said Cleo. “But what if Jessie had pretended to forgive him, got close up, and
then stabbed him? That would also tie in with the wounds being at the front. He
would have been taken by surprise.”
“Heaven help the girl,” said Molly, crossing
herself. “It’s funny how we all think of Jessie as a girl, though she’s in her
twenties.”
“She’s very immature, Molly. That’s probably the
reason.”
“Not too immature to have two kids.”
“How old are they?”
“I think she was about 15 when she had the first.
She thought she was getting fat.”
“Wow.”
“The second one came about two years later.”
“And Mrs Coppins is bringing them up as her own,
you said.”
“Seems like it. They call her Mum.”
“So Jessie’s officially the older sister.”
“That’s how they arranged it.”
“That makes it all even more sordid.”
“Some think those kids are the result of rape by
Coppins. He was forced out by his wife in the end because he started molesting
the younger kids.”
“Was that reported?”
“No one reports anything in this village.”
“You could have done, Molly.”
“I had no evidence. Have they found Mrs Oldfield’s
murderer?”
“Not yet. There isn’t much I can do there,” said
Cleo. “A lot will depend on blood analyses. She was poisoned and then stabbed.”
“Would it be the same person as killed Tom?”
“Again, I’m telling you this in confidence, Molly.
Mrs Oldfield was definitely dead when she was stabbed.”
“Gracious! Same method, though.”
“No. Mrs Oldfield was poisoned. Tom Crowe seems to
have died in a fight or just after,” said Cleo.
“It’s a bit frightening to think that Mrs Oldfield
was killed in her kitchen. That’s where she was found, isn’t it? It was in the
paper this morning. But there was no mention of poisoning.”
"No, but tests have shown that a cup was
contaminated."
"The one Mrs Oldfield drank out of?"
“That remains to be seen, but forensics think
that’s what happened.”
“So someone dropped poison into Mrs Oldfield’s
coffee? That school is a dangerous place to be, Cleo.”
“That’s why more parents have removed girls from
the school. They are queuing up to collect their offspring.”
“That doesn’t surprise me, but what if one of those
dreadful girls poisoned Mrs Oldfield? Teenage girls are figure-conscious and
Mrs Oldfield fed them on a diet of stodge, Cleo.”
Cleo did not say anything about Ali going to help
out from the following day. She did not know if Ali had told Molly of his
intention or, if he had, whether Molly approved. Then Molly announced that Ali
was going there to help out, so she did know, after all.
“We’ll manage here,” she said. ”Ali will only be at
the school till lunchtime, so we’ll serve muscle-building pie, pickles and
potato chips to the regulars for a while. We don’t get many gourmets in until
evening. He’ll cook sensible meals for the girls and be back here to cook by
then and the regulars will eat what’s available.”
“That sounds like a good solution.”
“Ali’s helping to find a replacement for the
school, but it has to be a woman and she has to get past the new school
director’s interview.”
“I shouldn’t worry about that. I know Beatrice
Parsnip. She can’t cook for jelly beans. She’ll be grateful for any help she
can get.”
“Then she’ll be spoilt by Ali’s brilliant cuisine!”
“It’s a good job he doesn’t qualify for that job,
Molly.”
“You can say that again,” replied Molly, winking
broadly at Cleo.
“Let’s hope those girls don’t molest him, Molly.
They seduce the local lads when they should be in church.”
“I doubt whether those lads need seducing once
they’ve been to massage sessions with Mrs Coppins, Cleo. Anyway, Ali and I get
on like a house on fire.”
Molly winked again.
***
“To get back to Tom Crowe, Molly. The forensic guy
said Tom Crowe was bruised and there was blood on his fists, so he might have
been trying to fight off his assassin.”
“The blood might be Tom’s own blood,” said Molly.
“It’s possible. It’s also possible that someone
bragged about fighting him here.”
“I’ll keep my ears open,” said Molly, “though I
suppose you’ll need to be Sherlock Holmes to deduce what really happened.”
“There was no DNA testing in Sherlock Holmes’s
day.”
“How long does DNA testing take?”
“A few days, I think. Blood tests are faster and
that will be enough to say if the blood is someone else’s. The only problem is
that if several people are involved we’ll have to find them all.”
“We?”
“The homicide squad and Gary Hurley.”
“You pet cop, Cleo?
***
Despite her determination to forget Gary, Cleo
found herself telling the whole saga to Molly.
“It’s as if he’s taunting me with other women,
Molly.”
“He is, Cleo. Robert is a nice guy, but you are not
his nursemaid.”
“I owe him so much, Molly.”
“You owe him the truth, Cleo.”
“I can’t, Molly. Let’s get back to the reason I
came.”
***
Molly changed the topic instantly.
“The whole business of Tom Crowe sounds horrifying,
Cleo. The murderer might be hanging around somewhere near.”
“That’s why I want you to be on your guard, Molly.
I hope it will help me, too”
“Why do you get mixed up in stuff like this?”
“It started with Mrs Oldfield’s death this time.”
“Are you going to tell Mrs Coppins about Crowe?”
“No, but I’ll have to go to the school and tell
Jessie. If she has not seen a paper, she’ll hear about the murder some other
way. I think she should hear about Tom’s fate personally.”
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