A Market for Murder Page 12

  ‘They wouldn’t have a chap shot, and they’d hardly blow their own place up with a bomb,’ Drew pointed out. ‘You don’t really change, do you,’ he added.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Same wild ideas, half-baked guesses, farfetched conclusions.’

  ‘But I’m quite often right, all the same,’ she said, with a straight look. ‘Aren’t I?’

  ‘You’ve been right once or twice,’ he conceded. ‘But usually for the wrong reasons.’

  ‘Ha!’ she snorted.

  At four forty-five that Monday afternoon, Den Cooper and Della Gray met for the first time, with Karen and four children stirred in for good measure.

  Della – tall and slim, with a long stride – had walked through the village, just as Karen habitually did in the other direction. It was a warm day, summer announcing itself deafeningly with birds and airliners working up to a crescendo. New bright green leaves thronged the hedgerows and livestock gorged on young fresh grass.

  Den unfolded himself from the driving seat of his ageing Fiat, giving his legs the remedial shake he generally did after sitting in cramped conditions. Most conditions were cramped for him, being of abnormal height. He observed the young woman walking up the path to the Slocombes’ cottage, and hesitated in his purpose.

  He had fifteen minutes or more to fill, and hardly anything to lose. He even had his opening line rehearsed, in which he would ask Karen if she had any lettuces to spare, as well as enquiring as to the progress of the other vegetables.

  He strode after the woman. ‘Hello,’ he greeted her. ‘Come to see Karen?’

  ‘I’m collecting my kids,’ came the friendly reply. ‘She has them every Monday. How about you?’

  He looked into the clear eyes, enjoying the unusual sensation of a woman barely six inches shorter than himself. She had nice skin, he noted, and smelt of something natural like apples. ‘My girlfriend works with Drew. I’m a bit early, so I thought I’d have a little chat with Karen.’

  ‘Maggs? You’re Maggs’s partner? Funny I haven’t seen you before. I’m Della.’

  The name meant nothing. He smiled in acknowledgement of the introduction. ‘Den,’ he offered in return.

  Before either of them could knock, Karen had pulled open the front door. Two small boys stood in front of her, making her bend awkwardly over their heads to get the door open. She moved them aside with deft and not entirely gentle movements of her feet and legs. ‘Hey, you two! Get out of the way,’ she scolded them.

  The children scampered forward, to wrap themselves around Della’s legs instead. ‘Mummy!’ they cried, in a parody of affection.

  ‘Get off,’ she said. ‘We’re not going for a few minutes yet.’

  ‘Oh-h-h-h,’ they whined in unison. ‘I want my supper,’ added the larger one.

  ‘Have they been horrible?’ Della asked Karen.

  ‘No more than usual,’ she smiled. ‘Oh, hello, Den. Are you coming in?’

  ‘I thought I might,’ he said. ‘I was hoping for a couple more lettuces if there are any.’

  ‘Small ones,’ she warned him. ‘But fairly hearty. This weather should bring some more stuff on. Isn’t it fabulous!’

  Somehow they all got through the door and into the kitchen, including the children. Della sat down without invitation, and Karen filled the kettle. Den hovered uncomfortably. None of his planned conversation was going to happen at this rate.

  Then Karen managed to move things on quite dramatically. ‘You’ll be wishing you could help with the murder investigation I expect,’ she said to him, almost idly. ‘It must feel a bit odd being out of it all.’

  ‘Absolutely!’ he agreed with fervour. ‘I come over all peculiar every time I walk past the Town Hall, knowing it’s where they’ve got the Incident Room set up.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ Della asked, her attention on little Todd.

  ‘Den used to be in the CID. He worked on a few murders around here, before giving it all up. He’s with Social Services now.’ She flicked a bright look at Della, then an identical one at Den. ‘Hey!’ she added. ‘Della used to know Peter Grafton. She was really upset when she heard he’d been killed – weren’t you?’ The image of the tall capable Della fainting returned to Karen, but she refrained from telling that part of the story.

  ‘It was a shock,’ Della admitted in a low voice.

  Den remembered the previous Tuesday. ‘Oh, that was you,’ he said. ‘You fainted, and Drew had to go and collect the children. Are you all right now?’

  Della laughed. ‘Oh yes. It was nothing. I was better about ten minutes later. Poor old Karen, she did panic a bit.’

  Karen pressed her lips together and said nothing. Den cleared his throat uncomfortably and reverted to the earlier topic. ‘I’ve had a word with the DI handling the investigation, actually,’ he disclosed. ‘I used to work with him. I told him I knew you, and one or two others who seem to be involved.’

  ‘Who else do you know?’ Karen frowned curiously up at him.

  ‘Well, everybody knows Hilary Henderson and Geraldine Beech, I suppose. And Mary Thomas.’

  ‘The three witches,’ said Della. Then she clapped a hand over her mouth. ‘Oops! That was a bit rude, wasn’t it. Everyone calls them that, though.’

  Den and Karen both looked at her. ‘Do they?’ Karen said. ‘I’ve never heard it.’

  ‘It’s only that they’re all such strong independent women, I suppose. And they make things happen. And they’re all the same age, within a few weeks. They’ve known each other all their lives. Thick as thieves, as they say. If one of them coughs, the other two reach for the Fisherman’s Friends.’ Della laughed. ‘They’re amazing, really.’

  Karen shook her head slowly. ‘I had absolutely no idea it was like that,’ she said. ‘I’ve hardly seen them together, except Hilary and Geraldine at the markets, of course, but they never seem unduly pally.’

  Della shrugged. ‘You wouldn’t expect them to be arm in arm. It isn’t like that. More like sisters, in a way. They know each other’s there in a crisis, and they probably go out for drinks together now and then. But they always know what’s going on with the other two. And if someone upset one of them, the others would rally round like a shot.’

  ‘Geraldine’s nearly sixty, then, is she?’ Karen felt an unreasonable surge of relief at finally finding an answer to that particular question.

  ‘They’re June, July and August, if I remember rightly. My mother was roughly the same, plus Maggie as well. In the same class at school, except for Geraldine. She went to a private school. Hilary’s the oldest, then Mary, then Geraldine, I think. I remember they had a huge village party the summer they all hit forty. It was spectacular.’

  Den and Karen exchanged glances. ‘Village life,’ he sighed. ‘There’s nothing like it.’

  ‘Oh, well,’ Della said, ‘you incomers are never going to catch up with all the cross-currents. Everything connects, you see.’

  ‘But nearly everyone’s an incomer these days,’ Karen objected.

  ‘Not as many as you might think, actually.’ Della smiled mysteriously. ‘And there are some who leave and come back again, which muddies the waters a bit. Like Joe Richards, for a start.’

  ‘What about him? I thought he’d always lived here.’ But before Della could explain further, there was a howl from Todd; the kettle boiled; Den moved suddenly and his elbow caught a pot of chives perched on the worktop, sending it crashing to the floor; and Stephanie burst in with a scratched finger.

  Mugs of tea and maternal sympathy filled the next ten minutes, and Den, having done his best to salvage the chives, realised he was about to be late for Maggs. He looked at Karen, his frustration clear. ‘I wanted to have a word with you about last Tuesday,’ he said.

  ‘Don’t worry, I’m going,’ said Della, snatching the mug from her lip, as if her hand belonged to another person. ‘See you tomorrow, Kaz. Come on, kids.’

  In a whirl she was gone. ‘Kaz?’ Den echoed
. ‘I thought only Drew called you that.’

  ‘Some people can’t spare the time for two syllables,’ she said, sounding cross.

  ‘She seems quite nice,’ he said tentatively. ‘Good with kids.’

  ‘She’s all right. Steph and Timmy like her, which is the main thing. She ought to have been a primary teacher, really. She has plenty of good ideas. They learn a lot from her.’

  ‘Listen …’ Den urged her. ‘This murder, they don’t seem to be getting anywhere with it. Ironically, there aren’t enough witnesses. Nobody actually saw anything, except you.’

  ‘What’s it got to do with you?’ She said it gently, trying not to sound rude.

  ‘Nothing, really. Except I met my old colleague, Danny Hemsley, at the Incident Room, and got my interest up. Daft, I know. I’ve been out of the police for ages. It’s just that murder … well …’

  ‘You’re as bad as Drew,’ she sighed. ‘Can’t leave it alone.’

  ‘It’s the background that’s puzzling them, Danny says. They don’t get how the Food Chain network operates, and who does what. Basically, they don’t understand anything that’s even slightly alternative. I used to be just as bad. Even perfectly normal groups like the Quakers threw me, at one time.’

  ‘Scary,’ Karen nodded. ‘They see sinister implications in anything they don’t understand.’

  ‘Right. So would you say there are any sinister implications in Geraldine and her food politics?’

  Karen picked at a front tooth before answering. ‘Well, there might be,’ she said slowly. ‘Actually, yes, there do seem to be. Den, I don’t know whether I ought to tell you about it. I haven’t said much to Drew. I don’t know what good it would do to involve you. I mean – in what capacity are you asking?’

  He rubbed a long-fingered hand down the plane of his cheek. ‘Good question,’ he said. ‘Amateur sleuth, I suppose.’

  She sighed. ‘Join the club, then. Well, there’s some talk about a new sort of GM experiment going on in this area. You know how strongly everybody feels about that sort of thing. It’s to do with fruit trees, apparently. And Peter Grafton grew apples. But there’s another angle, too. Not directly related, as far as I can tell. He was going to sign a contract to supply the supermarkets with juice. That’s a real sell-out, in Geraldine’s eyes. Like Daphne Plant selling to SCI. A betrayal. I don’t think he’d have been allowed to get away with that.’

  ‘But they wouldn’t kill him for it, would they?’

  She spread her hands. ‘Somebody did kill him, Den. That’s the big fact here, that we can’t get round. Who knows why?’

  ‘Find the why and you usually find the who,’ he muttered.

  ‘So I believe,’ she nodded.

  There came a sharp knock on the door, which then opened, and a voice shouted, ‘Den! What’s going on? You’re late!’

  ‘Coming,’ he called back. ‘What’s the rush, anyway?’ he added more quietly.

  Maggs came into the room. ‘I heard that,’ she said. ‘I’ve been sitting in the car for the past ten minutes.’

  ‘Sorry. I wanted to talk to Karen. And we need a couple of lettuces. I’m doing a salad this evening. I got some eggs on the way.’

  ‘Meat, Den. I want meat. We haven’t had any for ages.’

  ‘Aha! Well, I’ve got a surprise for you there. When I went in to Hendersons for the eggs, I got chatting and the upshot was that we’ve ordered half a pig, in return for fixing his barn roof.’

  ‘But you don’t know how to fix roofs.’

  ‘Of course I do. It’s obvious. You just nail down new sheets of corrugated iron, from the top of a long ladder.’

  ‘Oh. You’re OK with tops of long ladders, are you?’

  ‘Perfectly OK,’ he said bravely.

  ‘Well, come on, then. Say bye bye to Karen and let’s get home.’

  ‘Bye bye Karen,’ Den said.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Drew hadn’t intended to talk about the new funeral over supper that evening, but somehow they were onto the subject before he knew it. ‘Such a coincidence,’ he marvelled, as much to himself as to his wife.

  ‘What is?’ she prompted.

  Even then, his brain didn’t properly engage. ‘This new woman, from the nursing home. You know they said she had a friend buried here? Well, it’s Gwen Absolon.’

  ‘The woman who was murdered and dumped here before we opened?’

  ‘The very one.’

  Karen fell silent for so long that Drew eventually realised something was amiss. ‘That was an awful time,’ she said softly.

  ‘We’d just discovered you were pregnant again,’ he remembered.

  ‘It wasn’t that, Drew. I thought for a few days that I was losing you. I was terrified.’

  He stared at her, his jaw slack. ‘What? What do you mean?’

  ‘That Genevieve. You were obsessed by her.’

  He blustered desperately. ‘No I wasn’t! What a thing to say.’

  ‘You didn’t even try to hide it. You just thought I was so busy being pregnant I hadn’t noticed. But I had, Drew. Is she going to come to this funeral?’ Karen’s eyes had grown suddenly large, the skin beneath them heavy.

  ‘No, no. She’s moved somewhere, miles away. My God, Kaz, why didn’t you say something?’

  ‘It was three years ago. The longer it went on, the less it mattered. I just packed the whole thing away. I don’t often think about it now. But I’m learning, gradually, that nothing ever really goes away. We just carry a bigger and bigger bundle on our backs, the older we get.’

  ‘Well, you can throw that particular bundle right out of the window,’ he assured her. ‘It’s not worth thinking about.’

  ‘Did you ever sleep with her?’ The question came out with difficulty.

  ‘No! Honestly, I swear, absolutely not. She was nine months pregnant, for God’s sake.’

  ‘Not the first time. When she wanted our house. I knew then that you fancied her.’

  ‘That was just a flirtation. And she was trying to manipulate me, to get her husband the house he’d set his heart on. All her loyalties were towards him.’

  ‘I know I’m being stupid,’ she burst out. ‘That only makes it all worse. Jealousy is so demeaning. It makes us do and think the most idiotic things. And it drives a wedge between people.’

  He got up and stood behind her, wrapping his arms round her shoulders. ‘Stop it, sweetheart. What can I say? I’m here. I love you. I’ve never touched another woman. I’m never going to. OK?’ He bent down and nuzzled her neck. ‘OK?’

  ‘I know that, in my head. I trust you. Of course I do. But it happens so often. It seems as if everybody is being unfaithful. Why should we be different?’

  ‘Because we’re special. Because neither of us would do that to the kids. I was stupid and weak over Genevieve. I knew that even at the time. I embarrassed myself. Can we forget it now? Now we’ve cleared the air?’

  ‘Probably,’ she sighed. ‘Sorry to be so wifey. I should never have said anything.’

  ‘I’m glad you did. We shouldn’t have secrets like that. They eat away at our foundations, like death watch beetles. They turn a marriage sour. Imagine if you’d gone on wondering for another twenty or thirty years! Wouldn’t that be terrible!’

  ‘Fairly normal, though, I would guess.’ She rubbed her eyes, and turned to face him. ‘Very normal, if you can believe all the books and plays and things. They’re always talking about ancient secrets finally coming out when the people are old.’

  ‘Are they?’ He was vague. ‘Well, not for us. Put jealousy in the dustbin, where it belongs.’

  ‘All right then,’ she agreed. ‘Now, it must be bathtime. Where are those kids?’

  Maggs was frosty with Den on the drive home. ‘What was all that about?’ she asked again.

  ‘It wasn’t about anything, really. The murder, mainly. You’ve heard it all already. What’s bothering you?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. I’m restless. It’s probably hormo
nes.’

  Den did not fail to apprehend this buzzword. ‘Really?’ He looked at her quickly. ‘As in female reproductive hormones?’ The glint of excitement in his eye was impossible to ignore.

  ‘Yes and no,’ she said cautiously. ‘The body’s one thing, the mind quite another.’

  ‘And what the hell does that mean?’

  ‘It means I’m a healthy female of an age to reproduce. My body acts accordingly. But in my head, I do not want to cooperate. I don’t want a baby. I have other plans entirely.’

  ‘And this conflict puts you in a bad mood,’ he summarised. ‘Yes, I can see that. Understand, I mean. It sounds uncomfortable.’

  ‘I can handle it,’ she said stoutly. ‘Don’t let it worry you.’

  ‘But the same sort of thing is going on for me,’ he persisted. ‘I’ve got hormones, too, you know.’

  ‘Yes, but you’ve got a different conflict. You want babies, but you can’t find a woman who’ll cooperate. It’s tough being a man.’

  ‘At least we understand each other,’ he said, feeling glum.

  ‘So did you glean anything from Karen about the Grafton murder?’ She changed the subject hurriedly.

  ‘Sort of. There’s some hush-hush project underway, to do with GM crops. She thinks Grafton could possibly have been involved.’

  Maggs turned glittering black eyes on him. ‘Wow! That’s new news, isn’t it? Does your friend Danny know about that?’

  ‘I doubt it. Not unless the police have been asked to protect the site, wherever it is.’

  ‘Do you know where it is? I might go and join the riot myself. Is there a website or something?’

  ‘I have no idea. Karen wasn’t very sure, really.’

  ‘She’d probably been ordered not to tell you. I’m surprised she said anything at all.’

  ‘Well, I’m harmless these days,’ he sighed. ‘No longer one of the enemy.’

  ‘Come on; it’s not like that round here.’

  ‘Maybe not. Anyway, I am fairly fired up now, about the whole business. I thought I might take a week off work. They’ll probably let me, even though it’s short notice.’