Death of a Friend (15 page)

Den looked at him sympathetically. ‘And it doesn’t sound to me as if any of them has really taken your fancy,’ he said gently.

Roddy frowned, his dark brows coming together. ‘There’s no hurry,’ he said defensively and swung the stick he was carrying.

‘Well, must get on. Will you tell Lilah I dropped in? I’ll see her this evening, anyway.’

‘Okay.’

The interlude had unsettled him and distracted him from his pursuit of Charlie Gratton’s killer – but it had also given him a perspective on the case. Most people in this village, and others in the area, cared little for the death of a man eight miles away, even if he had been killed deliberately. They had their own troubles. Even now, in the age of technology and worldwide communications, their insular lives encompassed the same small area they always had. Some of them might have access to email and Internet, carry mobile phones and have offspring on the other side of the world, but the focus of their daily lives was on the land that they could see and feel and cover in an hour’s walk. Lilah was discing – breaking up the clods of ploughed earth ready for seeding – giving the job her undivided attention. Den liked the picture this conjured; the timelessness of farming reassured him. The machinery they used might
change, but the tasks remained the same. If only she could be persuaded to let him join in, then everything would be perfect.

‘Did you ever meet Nevil – Nina’s husband?’ Den asked Lilah, soon after she arrived at his flat that evening. She frowned thoughtfully, then nodded.

‘Once or twice. He didn’t make much of an impression. I remember Hugh missed him, though, when he was on his travels. Talked about him all the time, when he was little.’

‘Nevil’s mother’s minor aristocracy, apparently. Takes the boys over in the summer holidays, to give them a change of scene. Compared to most, they’re horribly privileged.’

‘For all that, they go to the local schools and muck in with everybody else. Martha’s got her feet on the ground – she wouldn’t let them get above themselves.’ She delved into a plastic carrier bag which she’d dumped on the floor on arrival, and produced two large mackerel. ‘Look what I got at that fish van. Aren’t they gorgeous! I hope you know how to cook them.’

Den narrowed his eyes. ‘What are they?’ he demanded. ‘I’m not very good with fish.’

‘Mackerel, you fool. I think you cut the heads off, open them flat and grill them. I saw it on the telly – but I thought you’d know.’ He could see her disappointment, and did what he could to
summon enthusiasm. His memories of mackerel included a lot of bones, a pungent flavour and acute indigestion afterwards. He doggedly returned to the former conversation, the death of Charlie Gratton very much a priority.

‘The boys – what must the other kids make of them, coming from such a weird family?’

Lilah shrugged. ‘Families ain’t what they used to be,’ she said, with a rueful grin. ‘No one’s normal these days. Who else have you seen today?’

‘I caught up with Polly Spence this morning and made her late for work. The only thing worth noting was that she seemed passionately fond of Nina and hardly less so of Charlie.’

‘Maybe she’s one of those people who gushes over everyone indiscriminately. I saw her at Nina’s funeral, talking to Martha. She’s very attractive, isn’t she?’

‘The sort who turns heads,’ he agreed. ‘But she struck me as a bit shallow. Never been married, no sign of a boyfriend. Must be something wrong.’

Lilah hissed disapprovingly. ‘Careful,’ she warned. ‘Maybe she prefers women.’

He considered for a moment. ‘Maybe she does,’ he nodded. ‘If so, it could be Val Taylor she’s paired up with. People do seem to talk about them as an item, now I come to think about it. I haven’t seen Ms Taylor yet.’

‘Well it sounds as if you’re well stuck in,’ Lilah encouraged.

He shrugged. ‘At least the DI seems pleased with me, Christ knows why. We haven’t got any hard evidence to point us at anybody. It’s just a lot of guesses and hints and nothing concrete. The sort of case every policeman dreads, I suppose.’

‘Clive Aspen sounds the most sinister one to me,’ she interrupted as she sawed through the mackerels’ spinal columns to remove their heads. ‘If all Quakers are like him, I’m going to stay well clear of them.’

‘They’re not,’ he defended hotly. ‘Not at all. Hannah, Dorothy, Barty White – they’re all, I don’t know,
centred
might be a good word for it. They don’t play games like most people. It sounds naïve, I know, particularly in the present circumstances, but I’m sure they’re saying what they mean and giving me the truth as they see it. Clive Aspen is a recent convert and he’s got a history of disturbance and trouble. They’re not all like him, definitely not. Even Miriam Snow and Silas Daggs and Bill Gratton – they might not be perfect human beings, but there’s a
simplicity
about them. It’s very refreshing.’ He stopped and eyed her anxiously; she’d suspended her attack on the fish and was looking at him with raised brows.

‘Okay,’ she said. ‘They’re not all like Clive.’

‘He’s going to have to be watched,’ Den admitted, slightly embarrassed after his emotional outburst. ‘Particularly as he and Mandy both ride horses. And he wasn’t too keen to volunteer that information – she butted in before he could stop her.’

‘Everybody in this case rides horses,’ she said. ‘My dad always said horses were useless parasites. He’d drive right up close behind them, if he came across them on the roads. Their muck’s not much good, either. Makes the ground sour.’

‘Your dad—’ Den began, and then shook his head. Lilah’s father was still a tangible presence nearly a year after his untimely death. She talked freely about him, constantly quoting him, copying many of his ways of doing things. Den could never decide whether the man had been a monster or simply too clever and too energetic for the sleepy Devon countryside he’d found himself in.

‘Phil went to see the riding school where the Aspens hired their mounts,’ he said. ‘They weren’t particularly helpful, apparently. Gave cast-iron promises that their beasts wouldn’t hurt a fly. Obviously they’d be unlikely to admit it, even if someone brought a horse back with blood on its hooves and murder in its eye. The trouble is, there
are just too many of the damned things to even begin to inspect them all. I met three on the road only today. Phil’s interviewed some more hunt people, and he’s still got a list a mile long. That’s the obvious place to look. Some of those animals are
huge
.’ He shuddered, remembering yet again the strong, shapely head of the horse that had killed Nina Nesbitt, its height and weight such that a mere nudge from the sharp nose bone had been fatal.

The mackerel were surprisingly good, and the evening passed pleasantly. Lilah stayed the night, but set the alarm for six. ‘My turn to do the milking – again,’ she sighed, carefully adjusting the buttons on the clock. ‘We’re going to have to make some changes at this rate. I don’t like having to be in two places at once.’

‘There is an obvious solution,’ he mumbled sleepily. ‘But now isn’t the time to bring it up.’

She poked him painfully in the chest. ‘Say it,’ she ordered.

‘I could come and live at Redstone.’

She was quiet for too long. He raised his head from the pillow to look at her. She was sitting up, hands crossed over her chest defensively. ‘What?’ he asked.

‘It wouldn’t work,’ she said softly. ‘With Mum there all the time, and Roddy in and out. Sorry, but we’ll just have to stick with things as
they are. Which means I’d better get to sleep this minute.’

Which she did, leaving Den to lie wakefully beside her thinking darkly about her remarks.

As it happened, Den was quite happy with the six o’clock alarm call; he had dropped off to sleep eventually, only to dream about a killer horse which was besieging his flat. Waking to a cold, drizzling April morning after about four hours’ sleep was a decided relief.

They parted warily, conscious of the minefield between them. ‘I’ll see you tonight,’ she promised. ‘Same time as usual?’

‘I’ll be here,’ he nodded. ‘Unless something develops on the Gratton case. I’ll phone you if that happens.’

Wednesday morning’s briefing was repetitive and conducted under a cloud of depression. As far as Den could see, they hadn’t uncovered a single new fact since the previous morning, and the trail of the killer got colder by the hour. Den once more summarised his enquiries to date, by making three verbal headings. ‘One, the Quakers and the animal rights stuff. Let’s lump all that together since there are people who fall into both groups.’

‘Seems reasonable,’ nodded the DI. ‘Go on.’

‘Group Two is the Cattermole family. Nina’s husband was Charlie’s friend – or so he says. His mother rides to the hunt and has a fair bit of contact with the two boys. She hasn’t been interviewed yet. She lives near one of the bridges over the Tamar, if I’ve read the map correctly. Looks nice.’

‘Nice, Cooper? Are we working for the Devon Tourist Board now? Make sure there’s an interview report on her by the end of today.’

‘Yes, sir. I was going to, sir. I’ve been wondering what she thought of Charlie. It can’t have been anything complimentary, to say the least.

‘Thirdly,’ Den continued, with a flourish, ‘comes the Gratton family itself. We’ve got four people – the chief mourners, if you like. His father, Bill; aunt Hannah – who was in effect his mother – cousin Silas, and brother Frank. They’ve all been interviewed, but I think we should see them again. That’s it.’ He sat back with a sigh, but then jerked forward again. ‘Oh, yes, I nearly forgot. Martha Cattermole tells me that Frank Gratton is Nevil Nesbitt’s godfather. He was only fourteen or so when the kid was born, but their mothers were apparently best friends. I can’t see that it’s remotely significant, apart from proving that the link between the two families goes back a long way.’

DI Smith narrowed his eyes and stared at the floor for a long minute. ‘Hmm,’ he said. ‘That does surprise me. Can’t say quite why, except I understood that the Nesbitts were aristocracy, near enough, and the Grattons are … well, something else.’

‘They’re not exactly ordinary, though,’ Den said. ‘Silas Daggs owns some pretty good stuff – grandfather clock, antique table and chairs. Frank must have had a bit of cash to get those stables going. And women make unlikely friends when they’ve got little kids.’

Inspector Smith shook his head. ‘It still feels odd,’ he said heavily. ‘And those headings of yours have left one big staring gap.’ He looked at Phil, like a schoolteacher waiting for the right answer.

‘Horses?’ Phil said, as if the answer were blindingly obvious. ‘Isn’t this whole thing to do with horses?’

Den began to reply. ‘Yes, of course, but—’

‘But you haven’t actually got them listed, have you?’ Smith observed. ‘Fair do’s, it’s Phil’s side of the business, but you two need to pool findings. Half-complete lists are no good to anyone. Right?’

‘Right, sir,’ chorused the two detectives in unison.

‘That means we go on looking for connections
between Charlie Gratton and the hunt, anyone with a powerful horse, stables, and so forth,’ their superior spelt out.

Between them they shared out the day’s interviews. ‘Makes a change from house-
to-house
,’ Phil commented, as they scrutinised the map. ‘I’ll be spending half the day nice and warm in the car by the look of it.’ His schedule included as many prominent members of the hunt as he could locate. Den was to see the Grattons again, as well as Hermione Nesbitt and Val Taylor; he also had to follow up the addresses given him by Nev.

‘Oh, yes – and have a think about money,’ Smith added as they were leaving the room. ‘Sounds to me as if there’s quite a bit of it about. Keep rummaging around for any
links
– okay? That goes for both of you. I want links. The way it feels to me, at this stage, is we’re missing something. I’m not getting any feeling for Charlie Gratton as the object of anyone’s hatred. You don’t ride a horse over someone and chuck him dying in a ditch if you don’t loathe him pretty fiercely. Off you go, then, boys. Same time tomorrow, unless you’ve got something that won’t wait. You know where you can find me.’

Den retained the impression that the investigation was running out of steam. They were already repeating themselves, chasing up
dead-end leads which had all the promise of an over-chewed stick of gum.
Maybe
, he thought grimly,
nobody killed the bloke at all. Maybe it was just another freak accident.
And how foolish they’d look, wasting all this time pursuing a murderer that never even existed.

Waiting for a mug of coffee to cool, Den sat down at the computer and began to do a search on names. He started with
Gratton
, ignoring the well-studied file on Charlie and finding no further entries under that name. He then tried
Cattermole
, entirely fruitlessly. Almost idly, he entered
Nesbitt
, knowing there would be a recent report on Nina’s sudden death and forthcoming inquest. He was surprised, however, to find a second entry under the same surname, with the same address.

Den sat back in his chair with enough of a thump to bring the front legs off the floor.
Anonymous informant?
He went back over his
first visit to High Copse, thinking of the moment when the younger boy came hesitantly into the room and had been treated with such gentleness by Martha. The boy was pale, small for his age, quiet. But then, his mother had just died – Den had naturally assumed that he was suffering from shock and sadness and bewilderment. If, however, this was how he
always
looked, then it wasn’t difficult to understand how someone – a teacher, or the parents of another child – might worry that something was wrong. Especially these days, when abuse was suspected if a kid had a grazed knee.