Murder at Dead Crags Read online

  ‘Come here, Jones.’

  He gestures with a cursory flick of his fingers, and then he drags the chair away from the desk and opens the journal that still lies upon the blotter. He locates the most recent entry, and taps the page. DS Jones joins him at his side, and obediently reads.

  ‘What is it, Guv?’

  ‘It’s Declan’s bird log.’ He stands back. ‘Look at the times.’

  DS Jones pores over Sunday’s entry. Then she starts as the implications strike home.

  ‘He went bird-watching between 11.55am and 1.35pm?’

  ‘And he had time to write up his notes.’

  DS Jones begins to leaf back through the pages.

  ‘This is genuine, Guv?’

  ‘Jones – keep going and you’ll find the birds he spotted on your birthday – and I mean birth day. It’s genuine, aye.’

  She looks up at her superior.

  ‘So Declan couldn’t have been killed at noon?’

  Skelgill’s features are a grim mask. He need not reply.

  ‘Guv – do you think someone changed the clock – turned it back two hours?’

  ‘I know someone changed the clock.’

  DS Jones pushes off from the desk, rounds it and takes a few steps across the room. The carpet has been removed for forensic examination, and her heels rap on the polished wooden boards. She places her hands on her hips and considers again the clock, head tilted to one side. She is wearing a crop-cut leather jacket and matching pointed ankle boots, and stretch black jeans – an ensemble that accentuates her figure and makes her look rather less of a sensible detective sergeant and more like a sexy biker chick. Skelgill’s eyes narrow as he follows her movements.

  ‘Why would they do that, Guv?’

  Her question breaks his reverie, though he blinks several times before he can fashion a reply. And, true to type, he immediately rows back from the premise she might wish to propound.

  ‘Playing silly buggers.’

  DS Jones spins on her heel, drawing a squeal of protest from the floorboard beneath. She is frowning – but prudently she resists the urge to gainsay him. Instead she moves on to what is the next logical question.

  ‘When could it have been done, Guv?’

  Skelgill inhales deeply, in the manner of a reformed smoker, and pulls his gaze away from his colleague. He closes the logbook and gently pats its worn leather binding.

  ‘Take charge of this.’

  ‘Will do.’ But she waits unmoving for Skelgill’s reply.

  After a moment he looks up, his features a little strained. ‘I arrived at three. I reckon I was in here for fifteen minutes. The garden door was fastened, the key blocking the lock – so there was no way in from the outside. I locked the hall door and took the key. I gave it to Leyton when the crew arrived about an hour later.’

  ‘So – between 3:15 and 4:15?’

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘And there’s no spare key?’

  Skelgill grimaces.

  ‘Not according to Thwaites.’

  DS Jones turns up the palms of her hands.

  ‘It seems unlikely, Guv.’

  But Skelgill continues to scowl. He may be playing devil’s advocate – though he shows no inclination to inspect the panelled walls or the bookcases for some mysterious secret door. Now DS Jones folds her arms, her brow becoming furrowed.

  ‘The times in the logbook, Guv – they also mean Dr Herdwick’s assessment is wrong.’

  Skelgill emits a scornful exclamation.

  ‘Wouldn’t be the first time he’s skimped on a Sunday. He likes his pint in The Queen’s Arms.’

  ‘Doesn’t he go to Evensong – I heard he was in the church choir?’

  ‘Aye – you and his missus.’

  DS Jones raises her eyebrows – but her tone is forgiving.

  ‘I suppose he did say there were variables that made it difficult to be accurate – the age of the victim and the room temperature falling significantly after the fire burned down.’

  Skelgill glances cursorily at the hearth; cold grey ash is all that remains of what might have been a sizeable blaze – it is something he ought to confirm with Thwaites.

  ‘Jones – if the murder took place at 2 p.m. Perdita is in the clear.’

  DS Jones nods pensively. She inhales to speak but then she checks herself.

  ‘Aye?’

  She half turns away and slides her hands into her midriff pockets, her elbows angular.

  ‘I’ve read most of her books, Guv.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘She’s a good writer.’ DS Jones looks down and reflectively kicks one sharp toe of a boot against the other. ‘The plots are a bit clichéd – beautiful downtrodden mistress of the house falls for hunk of a manservant – but they kind of draw you in and you feel like you’re there – amidst the sweat and the fear of the slaves.’

  ‘Sounds like our HQ.’

  DS Jones chuckles.

  ‘She calls the setting the Venusian Islands – an archipelago in the Caribbean. Fictitious I suppose.’

  Skelgill is swiftly losing interest. But now DS Jones seems to want to make the point that she had hesitated over, and he reads sufficient of her body language to offer a prompt.

  ‘What, Jones?’

  ‘It’s just that –’ She casts a tentative sideways look, as if she anticipates his disapproval. ‘You would think to meet Perdita she’s not got a bad bone in her body.’

  ‘Aye?’

  ‘But as Rowena Devlin – I’d say she’s pretty ruthless, Guv.’

  Her unintended oxymoron seems to captivate Skelgill – his gaze now drifts away, to the view through the nearest of the two windows. There is little to see but snow and conifers, though he stares unblinking – until his musings are interrupted by an impatient rap upon the door. Without invitation it opens and – to Skelgill’s evident dismay – a man peremptorily enters and marches towards him. Skelgill shoots out a palm at arm’s length, like a traffic policeman warning a renegade motorist to halt.

  ‘Hey up, pal – this is a crime scene!’

  The interloper stops dead in his tracks, but his obvious agitation only becomes compounded. He thrusts his hands onto his hips and tilts forwards at the waist. It is Martius Regulus-O’More, the man who had first admitted him to Crummock Hall yesterday.

  ‘Inspector – this is my... my home!’

  Skelgill for a second seems to waver – a rekindled sense, perhaps, of his destiny to serve. His reply is stilted.

  ‘I shall have to ask you to leave the room.’

  But it is plain that Martius is determined to stand his ground.

  ‘Look here, Inspector – this is becoming intolerable – I can’t just wait while you and your colleagues sit around drinking tea – I have an important dinner at Guildhall this evening.’

  Indeed, he is wearing a camel polo coat and a pinstripe suit beneath, as though he might be due at his City of London office any minute. His unseasonal suntan apart, his features are rather nondescript, and bear little similitude with striking younger sister Perdita. His fairish hair is combed back from a receding hairline, and held by a slick of cream. Close set mid-blue eyes, rosebud mouth, small nose and weak chin – they cluster in Churchillian surroundings. It is not a face built to strike fear into an opponent – a stark contrast to Skelgill’s rugged countenance. But his inner seething boils over as a froth of spittle at the corners of his mouth.

  Skelgill does not immediately reply, and in this hiatus Martius notices DS Jones, who stands a couple of yards apart. He regards her with equal hostility, but cannot conceal a sly hunger in his eyes, and his gaze lingers excessively. It sparks Skelgill’s intervention.

  ‘Aye – tea’s a thought. Jones – see if you can rustle up Thwaites while I have a word with Mr Regulus-O’More. Get him to take it to the drawing room. I’ll lock up here – for what it’s worth.’

  Martius bridles as DS Jones nods obediently and slips quickly past them. That this uncouth officer, who ba
refacedly requisitions Crummock Hall’s services, exposes his covetousness serves only to stoke his ire. He appraises Skelgill’s outfit disparagingly, and his polished tone ascends to a new level of outrage.

  ‘Didn’t I see you at the funeral?’

  His delivery might have been more fitting had he accused Skelgill of urinating into a potted plant. Skelgill’s reply is forced between gritted teeth.

  ‘I was representing Cumbria Constabulary – Sir Sean O’More was a supporter of our charity, Care of Police Survivors.’

  Martius’s reaction is one of indifference. Skelgill has wondered if he would be recognised – not merely from the funeral, but from times long past. As the eldest of the family – in fact two years his senior – Martius would be most likely to remember him. But if he does, he shows no inclination to renew what was a tenuous acquaintance, Skelgill a mere irritant, some unwashed juvenile itinerant who had the cheek to sneak about their property and entertain his more gullible siblings with lizards and newts and birds’ eggs, or whatever else he had in his grubby pocket that particular day.

  ‘This is preposterous. We need to know when our great uncle can be buried. I shall complain to the relevant authority.’

  His demeanour does not soften. But then neither does Skelgill’s.

  ‘You were the first to come into the study, sir?’

  By means of the ostensibly deferential title ‘sir’ – employed for the first time – Skelgill contrives to create the impression that Martius is being questioned under caution. The man might be on home turf, but Skelgill has authority on his side. And Martius shows himself to be uneasy.

  ‘Yes – well, no – not before Thwaites – he found the body. And then Cassandra alerted me – look, I have already provided this information to some overweight buffoon of a sergeant.’

  The fingers of Skelgill’s left hand, hanging slack at his side, twitch. And perhaps his eyes measure the distance to the chin of Martius Regulus-O’More. If so, the latter cannot appreciate quite how close he is to an impromptu nap. When Perdita confessed to possessing a combustible temper, Skelgill’s ears were surely burning. In an ideal world he would offer a withering verbal riposte – but this is not his forte. Never mind that he is no match for a man for whom debating in some august hall came as part and parcel of his expensive education. By comparison, such scholarly disagreements as Skelgill experienced were settled behind rusting cycle sheds with a rather less urbane exchange of oaths and fists. Yet perhaps some inkling of this inequality is conveyed across the class divide, for Martius breaks the silence.

  ‘I’d jolly well like to know what you’re doing to catch this intruder – hadn’t you better unleash your bloodhounds – or whatever the heck you get up to in the sticks?’

  Despite the incremental slur, Skelgill suppresses a small smirk of satisfaction.

  ‘There’s no evidence to suggest it was an intruder, sir.’

  For a moment Martius appears confounded. Now a hint of alarm, a hunted look, even, narrows his eyes.

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous, man – who else could it have been? There is clearly a lunatic at large.’

  Skelgill is implacable.

  ‘Did you move the body at all, sir?’

  ‘Of course not – it was plain he was stone cold dead.’

  Despite his tone – which remains at once insulting and tinged with dissent – that he has answered tells he understands that cooperation is the prudent exit strategy.

  ‘What about ornaments, furniture – did you disturb anything?’

  ‘I had neither desire nor opportunity – Cassandra was half... half hysterical,’ (hysterical is evidently not the word that first came to mind), ‘And Edgar appeared looking like he’d seen a ghost – I shepherded her out and sent Edgar to phone 999.’

  Skelgill gestures casually towards the garden door.

  ‘What about that door, sir – was it locked?’

  Martius turns and glares in the direction indicated.

  ‘What? Yes – no – I don’t know – I locked it.’

  ‘You don’t sound sure, sir.’

  With a scowl Martius wipes perspiration from his upper lip.

  ‘I can’t remember – it might already have been locked – I checked it and I know it was locked when we left the room – when Edgar returned from the lobby I told him to go round the whole place and make sure all the entrances were secured.’

  ‘Then what did you do?’

  ‘I took a shotgun and we gathered in the drawing room. It wasn’t so long after that you made your dramatic entrance. Lucky for you I didn’t have it to hand when you kicked in the door.’

  Skelgill does not respond to this latest slight.

  ‘Thwaites tells us there are no spare keys – in particular for this study.’

  ‘I wouldn’t have the faintest idea – thankfully I only visit the damned place once in a blue moon.’

  Now Skelgill affects surprise.

  ‘I’d have thought you’d be looking to take over, sir – as the eldest of the family.’

  Martius recoils, his expression instantly belittling.

  ‘Don’t make me laugh, Inspector – have you the first idea about estate management? Crummock Hall barely washes its face – the electricity bill alone probably exceeds your salary.’

  There is another twitch from Skelgill’s left hand and his eyelids momentarily droop. Perhaps he sees in his mind’s eye a little fantasy – if so, it seems to placate him sufficiently to terminate the encounter, surely for the benefit of them both. He moves across to the study door and opens it, standing aside to indicate that the man should depart.

  ‘Be good enough to keep us informed if you intend to leave the country – that will be all for now, Mr Regulus-O’More.’

  ‘It’s just Regulus, I’ll have you know – Martius Regulus.’

  7. CASSANDRA – Monday 11am

  ‘You okay, Guv?’

  ‘Aye.’

  But Skelgill is sullen; DS Jones hesitates.

  ‘You just look a bit... peaky.’

  Uncharitably, he shrugs off her concern.

  ‘I could murder a cuppa.’

  ‘It’s on the table by the fire, Guv.’

  Skelgill inclines his head in acknowledgement but makes no move in that direction. Instead he saunters across to the grand piano where the family photographs are arrayed. He selects another group portrait; the children are older in this, ranging from an imperious Martius at perhaps sixteen down to impish Perdita at ten. It would likely have been the final year that they came. The photographer has induced cheesy grins, but there is a certain strain in their eyes; only young Perdita seems truly at ease, and Edgar does not even smile.

  ‘Memory lane, Daniel?’

  Skelgill swings round. Rosy blotches begin to break out at his cheekbones. Enter Cassandra.

  Although it is yet mid-morning she carries a half drunk aperitif in her left hand and a cigarette trailing smoke in her right. Before Skelgill can speak she has accosted him – he still holds the framed picture, two-handed, defensively – but she is long-limbed for a woman, almost his height, and before he can react she leans in and plants an air-kiss on either cheek, while he stands stiffly to attention, as though immobilised by her fragrance. DS Jones, who has correctly interpreted Skelgill’s implied command to pour his tea, gazes with some amazement – such that Cassandra throws her a line of explanation.

  ‘One never forgets one’s first crush, darling.’

  DS Jones instinctively returns the woman’s amiable grin – but she becomes aware of a glowering Skelgill and ducks back into her duties. Skelgill mutters under his breath, a rejoinder intended for Cassandra’s ears only.

  ‘I shouldn’t like to have overstepped the mark.’

  ‘Oh yes you would, Daniel!’ Now Cassandra lets loose a peal of liquid laughter. ‘But I shall spare your blushes – I can see your colleague already has ample ammunition to embarrass you back at your headquarters.’

  She understands that she shoul
d be seated opposite DS Jones, and she floats across the carpet marooning Skelgill like a tardy cockle picker consumed by the flood tide, uncertain which direction offers a sure footing. She flicks her cigarette into the fire and declines graciously as DS Jones motions the offer of tea. Of an age with Skelgill she has worn well, as the saying goes, and sports the smooth sun-kissed skin and glossy hair that speak of a privileged lifestyle. In her features there is a marked likeness to brother Martius, though she lacks his incipient corpulence, and in consequence her proportions seem more regular and appealing. Her hair is shoulder length, blonde streaked with gold and bronze highlights, natural enough looking, but exposed as an expensive coiffure by the photograph, which reveals her at fourteen to be a brunette. She settles back into the familiar curves of the sofa, seemingly unconcerned that her cocktail dress rides up to reveal more of her tawny thighs.

  There could now be some cause and effect at play, for Skelgill wrenches himself free of his inertia. Rather uncharacteristically he seems self-conscious about his attire – his faded ski trousers and creased lumberjack shirt of his rescue mission yesterday – and he wades ponderously to sit beside DS Jones. But Cassandra pays no heed to such trivia, and engages him expectantly, her lips parted to signal her anticipation. He lifts his cup without the saucer and takes a couple of big gulps. Then he wipes his mouth on his cuff. He seems lost for somewhere to begin. DS Jones is looking at him – also willing him, it seems, to make the first move. At last he appears to realise he is still clinging to the photograph. Now he raises it rather absently.

  ‘I believe it’s some time since you were in these parts.’

  That he omits his customary ‘Madam’ – but also refrains from using her name – is a further indication of his discomfited state.

  ‘A good decade – I last visited Crummock Hall with my first husband, the late Freddy Remington-Smythe.’ She takes a decorous sip of her drink. ‘He was trampled by his horse, poor fellow.’

  Skelgill looks none the wiser. DS Jones has placed the notes from DS Leyton’s initial interviews on the table between them, and now he leans to squint at the top sheet.

  ‘We have you down as Cassandra Goodchild – I take it that’s from your second marriage?’