Echoes in the Cotswolds Page 21

  ‘Is Andrew any better?’ Thea asked. ‘I forgot to enquire about him yesterday.’

  ‘He’s still delicate, but he says he can drive. Not that that’s much use. It’s carrying and lifting I need him for.’

  ‘This is déjà vu,’ she pointed out. ‘It’s last week all over again. We can’t go on like this indefinitely. You’ll have to find another person, if he’s not better soon.’

  ‘I know. Andrew knows as well. He feels awful about it. But he insists it’ll get better before long and he’ll be fine.’

  ‘I wonder. It’s going on rather a long time. Maybe there’s something more serious the matter with him. Either that or he’s just being a wimp.’

  Drew gave her a very severe look. ‘I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that. More likely there is something more serious wrong with him, that the doctors can’t find.’

  Thea had experience of people with bad backs, and the capricious nature of their sufferings. Doctors were very often no help at all. ‘But you told them you’d come, did you? The nursing home, I mean.’

  ‘I did. Luckily it’s like the one last week – a small person, and there’s a couple of strong nurses willing to help. The real problem is that it makes me look so amateurish.’

  ‘Make a virtue of it,’ said Thea. ‘I told you that before.’

  ‘I’ll try,’ he said meekly.

  The phone call and subsequent conversation roused Stephanie, but not Timmy. When Drew was in the bathroom, the child went to ask Thea what was happening. ‘He’s got a removal,’ she said from under the duvet. ‘It’s a nursing home that won’t wait.’

  ‘Mean things.’

  ‘My thoughts exactly. Do you want to snuggle in with me for a bit? We don’t have to get up yet.’

  At twelve, Stephanie was very close to being too old for such intimacies, but nobody had said so yet. Thea was pleased at the level of acceptance it represented, when one heard such awful stories about stepfamilies. Whilst snuggle might be overstating it, they lay comfortably side by side, chatting quietly. Drew pulled an exaggerated expression of envy when he came back to get dressed.

  ‘All right for some,’ he said.

  ‘I dreamed about Hepzie catching the murderer,’ said Stephanie, when he’d gone. ‘She was with a whole lot of little kids, and they were running across a field after him.’

  ‘Did they catch him?’

  ‘I don’t know. It never seemed to get anywhere. Like in the Alice books – just a lot of running. Probably that’s where the dream came from, actually.’ Stephanie was profoundly attached to the works of Lewis Carroll.

  ‘Could you see who it was that they were chasing?’

  Stephanie laughed. ‘You think I dreamed the answer to the murder, so we can just tell the police who to arrest? No, sorry. The person didn’t have a face – just straggly hair and big boots.’

  ‘I think I dreamed about small children as well,’ Thea remembered. ‘A girl. I told you about Millie Latimer, didn’t I? I think it might have been her in my dream.’

  ‘The one who knew Ollie,’ Stephanie nodded. ‘I made a note of her name – and her father’s. We didn’t really go over her whole family, though.’

  There was a reason for that, which Thea did not explain. The slight suspicion that there could have been something unwholesome in Ollie Sinclair’s interest in the very young children at a local private school rang inevitable alarm bells – which she had not wanted to repeat to a twelve-year-old. There was a convoluted and unlikely scenario in which the outraged father, learning of something along those lines, had taken it upon himself to remove Ollie from the picture. It seemed very likely that this line of thinking lay behind her dream.

  ‘When will Dad be back?’ It was Timmy in the doorway, with rumpled hair and eyes still crusty with sleep.

  ‘Probably in an hour or a bit less,’ Thea told him. ‘Did you hear him go?’

  ‘No, but I saw the van was gone, from my window. And then I heard you two talking.’ He cast a wistful look at the bed. Thea felt a pang of remorse at the way the little boy had been excluded, while knowing it was really nobody’s fault. To some extent, over the years, this had been the story of his life. His mother had been struck down when he was still little more than a baby and he had no memory of her as the energetic campaigner she had once been. Lingering in a very much reduced state over the next few years, her image in Timmy’s memory was of somebody who read him a lot of stories, went to bed very early and did not always understand things very well. Whilst Thea was entirely acceptable, she would never fully replace his mother – and getting into bed with her would never feel right.

  ‘We’d better get up,’ Thea announced. ‘I have a feeling it’s going to be a busy day.’

  The feeling was strengthened when a second phone call came at eight o’clock, ten minutes after Drew finally presented himself for breakfast. ‘I don’t believe it,’ he said. ‘It’s a conspiracy.’

  This time the call was from a GP who had just attended a death at home. And this time there was no special hurry, although the new widow wanted to speak to him that day, to discuss her options for the burial. And if it was all the same to him, could Drew perhaps manage the removal before nightfall? There would be a sturdy nephew on call to help him, if necessary. ‘She just offered,’ marvelled Drew to Thea. ‘I didn’t even have to ask. The GP just came out with it.’ He paused. ‘I bet she’d heard through the grapevine from the nursing home or one of last week’s funerals that I’m short-handed. That’s not going to be good for my image.’

  ‘I told you before, not to worry about that,’ Thea advised. ‘Have you ever met this family?’

  Drew didn’t even have to think. All his clients, whether waiting for their demise or already buried in his field, were engraved on his memory. ‘A year ago. He’s done well to last as long as he did. They’re nice people.’

  ‘You always say that,’ Stephanie reminded him.

  ‘Yes, well. People nearly always are nice, when somebody dies. It makes them think about their behaviour, and they make more of an effort to be pleasant – when it’s too late, you might say.’

  Thea cast her mind over the people in Northleach, wondering whether she had only seen them at their best, once Ollie’s body had been found. The theory did not hold up very well, she decided.

  ‘When will you go for him?’ Thea asked.

  ‘This afternoon, I suppose. I’m to phone the wife at ten o’clock and we can agree a time then.’

  ‘So if we were all to go out for the day, we’d have from about half past ten to mid afternoon?’

  ‘Something like that,’ he agreed distractedly.

  ‘Hm,’ she said.

  ‘So what are we doing about lunch?’ asked Stephanie, pragmatically. ‘Are we going to a pub or what?’

  ‘We are,’ said Drew. ‘I’m still in the mood for spending, after such a busy week. Especially as we’ve got work for next week now, as well.’ As a rough rule of thumb, Drew reckoned to make about five hundred pounds clear on every funeral he performed. With an average of eighteen or twenty a month, the family income was more than adequate. But the sheer unpredictability of it was the main problem, as he regularly pointed out.

  Thea and Stephanie were reading each other’s minds. Make something happen! they were both inwardly shouting. There were people to question, mysteries to be solved, dreams to interpret and here they were in limbo, unable to plan their day. Timmy ate his Cheerios obliviously, and Drew tried to juggle competing priorities. Outside there was no sign of the sun.

  ‘It’s not a very nice day,’ Thea observed. ‘Looks windy.’

  ‘Blustery showers,’ Stephanie predicted, having consulted the tablet. ‘Just how Hepzie likes it.’ It was true – the spaniel went manic when the wind lifted her long ears and made her feel she was flying.

  ‘I’m going to phone Caz,’ Thea announced, all of a sudden.

  ‘Half past eight on a Sunday morning?’ Drew queried. ‘She won’t thank you. What are
you going to say?’

  ‘I’m going to say we have a whole family sitting here ready and willing to assist the police investigation in any way she can suggest. She might have a long list of ideas.’

  ‘I can’t imagine what,’ said her husband, with a long-suffering smile. ‘And I have to request that you do not include me in your offer. We all know I’m hopeless at that sort of thing.’

  ‘Don’t let Maggs hear you say that,’ Stephanie protested. ‘She can tell a whole lot of stories about how you solved the killing of that woman in the Peaceful Repose field – remember?’

  ‘She exaggerates. And don’t pretend you can remember, because you weren’t even a year old.’

  ‘And Den says the same. When there was that little girl covered in bees.’ Stephanie shivered. ‘That was horrible.’

  ‘It was. And he never should have told you about it.’

  ‘I never really heard the details,’ said Stephanie.

  ‘Nor did I,’ Thea realised. ‘It was all before my time.’

  ‘It all began when I got the job with Plants, all those years ago. I was twenty-six or thereabouts. It was a baptism of fire. They teased me mercilessly.’

  ‘Twenty-six!’ Thea tried to visualise it. ‘And you were a nurse before that?’

  ‘Yes. They called me “Nurse Drew”. Some very antediluvian attitudes prevailed amongst some of those men. And my own father wasn’t much better.’

  ‘I thought it was the undertaking he didn’t like.’

  ‘That was the final straw. He never got over the idea of a male nurse, either. He wanted me to be an accountant. I think he kept expecting me to see sense and mend my ways.’

  ‘Hopeless,’ sighed Thea. ‘Why are we being so nostalgic, all of a sudden?’

  ‘It was me,’ said Stephanie. ‘I like hearing these stories. We don’t do it often enough.’

  ‘It’s a Sunday thing,’ said Thea. ‘Nothing so evocative as an English Sunday.’

  ‘Not these days,’ Drew argued. ‘Most things just carry on the same as every other day.’

  ‘Which means I can phone Caz with impunity,’ she decided.

  Chapter Seventeen

  It was still not quite nine o’clock when Kate Temperley came to the door. Drew opened it, and cocked his head in half recognition. ‘Hello?’ he said. ‘Haven’t I seen you before?’

  ‘You buried my grandfather eight months ago,’ she confirmed. ‘Sorry if this is outrageously early. It’s actually your wife I wanted to see.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Drew slowly, unable to hide his bewilderment. ‘She’s right here.’

  Before Drew could call her, Thea came unobtrusively out of the kitchen, assuming the visitor was there on funeral business. ‘No – I came to see you,’ the woman insisted, when Thea tried to go upstairs. ‘My name is Kate Temperley. I’m a staff nurse at the John Radcliffe. I spoke to you on the phone.’

  ‘Did you? What about?’ Her mental cogs only then began to connect. ‘Oh – about Lucy Sinclair, was it?’

  ‘That’s right. It was my uncle who drove her home. Except she wasn’t going home, was she? She came here instead. I’ve been thinking about it ever since he told me. Something’s not right,’ she finished, clasping her hands together in an attitude of disquiet. ‘I know I shouldn’t be here. everything’s so confidential nowadays, I’m not really allowed to say anything at all. But I can’t rest until I talk to someone. We can say I came about my grandad, if anybody asks. A tree for his grave or something.’

  ‘No problem,’ said Thea, who regarded data protection laws as the work of the devil. ‘Come and sit down somewhere.’

  There followed a hesitant story about Lucy Sinclair’s collapse on the morning of her scheduled operation. ‘She came in very early, as arranged, and we did all the pre-op business. She seemed very stressed, as people usually do. Especially with backs. Brains and backs frighten patients more than anything.’

  ‘Understandably,’ said Thea.

  ‘I know. Now I must make it clear that I did not personally witness what happened next, but what I gather – and what it says in her notes – is that she simply lost consciousness about a minute after the first of the sedatives went in, so everyone assumed it was an allergic reaction. But I’m thinking it might have been just psychosomatic.’ She put a hand to her mouth. ‘I shouldn’t say just,’ she corrected herself. ‘But you know what I mean. Extreme emotional overload. Her mind using her body to get out of having the operation.’

  Thea regarded the woman pensively. In her early thirties, plump, open-faced and guileless, she seemed to have no ulterior motives in making this visit other than a need to voice her concerns. ‘That worries you, does it?’ she asked. ‘Enough for you to drive over here on your day off?’

  ‘It did when my uncle told me what happened on Friday. I can’t stop thinking about it.’

  ‘Oh?’ Thea was only then becoming aware of all the questions she had never thought to ask Lucy. About her connection with Vicky, for one. And exactly how she had persuaded Hunter Lanning to drive her to Oxford so early on Wednesday morning.

  ‘She was making phone calls for most of the way, and after the last one, she changed her mind about going home. She made him bring her here instead. He said it was the call that did it. Her voice got all shrill and it was obvious she was scared of something. “I can’t go back there now,” she told him. “So where do you want me to take you?” he asked her. It took her a minute to decide on Chipping Campden. Then she made him put her down by the church, and said she’d go and have some lunch at a hotel or somewhere. He didn’t mind – it was only a bit further for him to drive. But he was worried about just dropping her in the street like that. He’s very conscientious.’

  ‘He sounds sweet,’ said Thea.

  ‘He’s the kindest man in the world. He tried asking her what the problem was, and whether she ought to call the police if she felt threatened, but she said she’d be all right here with you.’

  ‘I made her go home,’ said Thea with a grimace. ‘I thought she was just being paranoid.’

  ‘When? On Friday?’

  ‘That’s right. I did mention it to a police detective, so they’ve probably been keeping an eye on her. We’d have heard if anything bad had happened. Really, I think you can put your mind at rest about her. It sounds to me as if she’d got herself seriously worked up about the operation, and it all stems from that.’

  The nurse tilted her head sceptically. ‘It would be easier to think that – but then I started wondering how you come into it. I mean, are you a close friend or what? You didn’t drive her in or come to collect her. You wouldn’t let her stay the night here. And I’m getting a feeling that you don’t even like her very much.’

  All good questions, Thea acknowledged. ‘She wanted me to guard her house,’ she said, anticipating the response that came all too predictably.

  ‘But why? What was she afraid of?’

  ‘She said she didn’t trust the neighbours. They didn’t get on, and she seemed to think they might damage her property somehow. I house-sat for her before, when she lived in Hampnett. Now she’s in the middle of Northleach.’

  ‘Where there’s been a murder,’ said Kate Temperley heavily. ‘Of somebody with the same surname as her. So perhaps it’s not very surprising that she’s scared – don’t you think?’

  ‘I was assuming that most people in Northleach are fairly scared,’ said Thea. ‘There’s been so much media coverage of the murder, and so little progress by the police, that they must all be feeling twitchy.’

  ‘But Mrs Sinclair’s related to him – the boy who was killed. That must make it far worse.’

  ‘He wasn’t a boy,’ Thea corrected her. ‘And he wasn’t a blood relation. He was the son of her ex-husband, and it doesn’t sound as if she had much to do with him.’

  ‘Is that what she told you?’

  ‘She didn’t tell me anything much. Ollie’s girlfriend was a lot more forthcoming. Honestly, I know hardly anything
useful. I’ve met her neighbours and a few other people – and Ollie’s father. He’s the most important one, I suppose.’ She was going over it again as she spoke, wondering whether the killer could be anyone she’d met, and whether Lucy Sinclair was justified in feeling so apprehensive. She watched Kate’s face as her thoughts swirled. ‘Actually, I’m not at all sure why you’ve come like this. What do you want me to do?’

  ‘I think I want you to understand why I’m so worried about her. Nobody at the hospital is bothered – except over the fact that she wasted a theatre slot, and Mr Mehta was furious. There wasn’t time to move everybody up or call someone else in. They’re gold dust, you know.’

  ‘Sorry? What are?’

  ‘Chances to have him do your surgery. His waiting list is enormous. Nobody just drops out like she did.’

  ‘She didn’t do it on purpose.’

  ‘No,’ said Kate Temperley slowly and unconvincingly. ‘I don’t expect she did.’

  It still wasn’t entirely clear what she wanted Thea to do, other than simply listen, but there was a dawning inkling that the idea was for her to go to Lucy’s house and make sure she was all right. This became increasingly definite, until the woman said so in as many words. ‘I mean – I can’t go, can I? What would I say to her?’ was the disarming cry.

  Thea understood the irony of the situation. She and Stephanie did want to go to Northleach, but under no circumstances did they want to meet Lucy. At least Thea didn’t. All she really wanted was to be in the centre of the action, prepared for anything, standing by for a call from Higgins or Barkley as they followed leads or had sudden insights. Being stuck out in Broad Campden with nothing to do made her seem irrelevant and useless in her own eyes. And the link, of course, was Lucy Sinclair. Lucy was her introduction to the town and its people. Visiting her was the only viable pretext for going there again.

  ‘All right,’ she said. ‘I’ll go down again and make sure she’s all right. Probably later this morning.’