It was gone ten when Vera and Charlie arrived back at Kimmerston and the team was still waiting for the evening briefing. No energy now. Everyone desperate for bed and food. She sat on the desk in front of them.
‘Right. Quick as you can and no messing. Just the important stuff. We’ll go into more detail in the morning. Joe?’
‘Everyone at Valley Farm has the same story. They’d got together for supper and drinks in the Lucas house. Everyone had too much to drink. Janet O’Kane went to take out the Carswell dogs. The dogs sniffed out the body. She screamed and they ran out to see what was going on.’ Joe paused and looked up at her. ‘It’s a long way for a scream to carry, but they’d all have to be in collusion if they’re not being straight about that, and why would they lie?’ Another brief pause. ‘Annie Redhead’s the only person who admits to knowing Shirley Hewarth – they met up yesterday morning to discuss Lizzie’s release from prison.’
Vera felt like a spider in the middle of a web of information. A very large, black spider. Who needed the Internet? ‘OK. Hol, how did you get on with Shirley’s ex-husband and son?’
‘I met them both at the university. All three seem to have been on very good terms, even after the divorce. A nice family. Jonathan last saw his mother a week ago for Sunday lunch. He said she seemed quiet, but put it down to her feeling a bit under the weather. She contacted Jack during the week and asked if they could meet for a drink – she’d had a bad couple of days and needed to chat to him about something. In the end a crowd of her friends came into the pub and they didn’t get the chance to talk.’
‘Pity.’ Vera tried to assess the significance of that. Shirley obviously had other friends and colleagues. Why would she turn to an ex-husband if she wanted a shoulder to cry on? ‘Well, Charlie and I have had a very pleasant day out in the country visiting Alicia Randle and her bloke. Who is very classy, if not exactly my type. Some kind of representative of Her Majesty’s Government overseas. Or he used to be, before he retired. Alicia couldn’t shed any light on how there was an envelope with a Wychbold postmark in Shirley Hewarth’s kitchen, but luckily it seems that Patrick was very green. He saved all his paper for recycling. And in the box in his bedroom I found this.’ Vera waved the letter in its transparent evidence bag. She already knew it off by heart and recited it word-for-word. ‘So it seems the correspondence between Patrick and Shirley went both ways.’ Now she spoke almost to herself. ‘Why on earth would this pair be writing to each other? If we know that, we’ll know who killed them.’
Vera was alone in her office. The team had dispersed for the night, but she was still fizzing and not ready for home and sleep. Listening to her voicemail – the requests for statistics and completed overtime forms, replies from technicians and scientists to her own demands for speedy updates – she felt a little calmer. There was nothing new. Nothing that needed immediate action. Then she was surprised by another voice. This was someone unused to leaving a voicemail message, very different from the rattled-off information from a colleague who no longer expected to speak to a real person. The caller didn’t even give his name, but after a couple of seconds she recognized the hesitant voice: Percy Douglas, the old man who’d stumbled across Patrick Randle’s body.
‘Inspector, you asked me to call you if I came across anything. Well, it wasn’t me, like, but my Susan. It’s probably not important, but it’s secret, like. I can’t see it can have anything to do with these murders, but I thought you’d be interested in anything secret. Can you come along in the morning? I’ll stay in until I’ve spoken to you.’
Vera replaced the receiver and smiled. Oh yes, Percy Douglas, I’m interested in anything secret.
It was another glorious day, more like June than April. Early sun slanting across the valley. In the big house’s garden the bluebells had opened even more, forming a lake under the trees. Vera found Percy and Susan eating breakfast. A smell of bacon that made her mouth water as soon as she opened the door. Susan was on her feet, sticking another couple of rashers under the grill. ‘You’ll manage two eggs? Janet’s hens are doing so well she’s giving them away.’ No offer of coffee, but a big pot of tea in the middle of the table and a mug set down beside the guest. Vera’s idea of heaven. Why would I ever want to retire from doing this?
‘I feel bad.’ It was Susan again. Percy still hadn’t said a word, just given Vera a quick grateful nod when she walked into the kitchen. ‘Dad dragging you all the way out here, when you must be so busy.’
‘It’s worth coming for the breakfast.’ Vera knew Susan couldn’t be hurried and she couldn’t be made to feel guilty. Let her tell her story in her own time.
‘It’s not that it’s anything sinister.’ Susan stood by the sink and put the frying pan to soak, then finally turned to face Vera. ‘And it’s not as if I was snooping. But nothing’s been said. I’m not even sure that her husband knows. I mean, I can understand her wanting a bit of privacy, but not telling your husband…’
Vera’s mouth was full of bread and egg and she didn’t say anything.
‘Just get on with it!’ Percy was almost yelling. ‘Let Mrs Stanhope know what you found.’
Vera smiled, but didn’t correct him.
‘When I was cleaning last week-’
‘Before the murders at the big house?’ Vera thought it had been a mistake to interrupt, but she needed to make the facts clear.
‘Yes. Tuesday morning’s when I do Valley Farm, so it would have been the day Dad found young Patrick’s body.’ Susan came to a stop again. Her father nodded for her to continue. ‘I found a letter.’
‘Where?’
‘In the Lucas house. Nigel and Lorraine were out and I thought I’d give the place a bit of a blitz. It’s that time of year, isn’t it?’ Another hesitation. ‘There’s a room upstairs that Lorraine uses as a studio. For her art. She tells me not to bother doing in there. “It’d only get mucky again and, besides, I don’t like my things to be disturbed.” Not even Nigel goes in without knocking, and that’s always seemed weird to me. I mean, a married couple – it doesn’t seem right.’ Another pause.
‘But you thought you’d take the opportunity to give it a proper spring-clean.’ Vera had finished eating and pushed her plate to one side so that she could sit with her elbows on the table. ‘While they were both out.’
‘Yes!’ Susan sounded grateful. ‘I thought there wouldn’t be any harm just going in. See if there were any cups that needed washing. Lorraine often took her coffee upstairs.’
‘So this letter?’
Susan had begun to blush. ‘It was in the drawer of the big pine table she uses for her paper and stuff.’
‘And what did it say, this letter?’
‘It was a hospital appointment. The Department of Oncology at the Freeman in Newcastle. Inviting her in to discuss her options. It must have come a while ago.’
‘So Lorraine Lucas has cancer.’ Vera pictured the woman she’d seen in the old farmhouse. Skinny and pretty. Still all her own hair, as far as Vera could tell, but that didn’t necessarily mean anything. ‘Why do you think she hasn’t told her husband?’
‘Because it’s never been mentioned. I remember her going into town the day of the appointment. It was a couple of weeks ago. Nigel didn’t go with her. Lorraine said she was going shopping; she wanted to buy some summer clothes because the weather was so warm.’
‘Do you remember the name of the consultant?’ Vera didn’t think this could have anything to do with the murder of three people. Cancer brought its own terror. But Douglas had been right. Secrets were always interesting, and it might say something about the couple that Lorraine hadn’t confided in her husband.
‘Robinson,’ Susan said. ‘I think that was it.’
‘What did you do then?’
‘I put the letter back in the drawer and went downstairs. I knew I shouldn’t have been in there. It was only me being nebby.’ The blush deepened. ‘I didn’t tell Dad about it until yesterday. I knew he’d be angry about me snooping.’
‘Then I phoned you.’ Percy looked at Vera, wanting to be reassured that he’d done the right thing.
Vera nodded. ‘Quite right.’ She turned to Susan. ‘Is there anything else you’ve come across?’ Trying not to accuse the woman. It seemed almost like an illness itself, this need to pry into other people’s business. ‘Best to tell me now. You’ve already said that Nigel had applied to become a magistrate.’
Susan only shook her head.
‘You’ll probably know those people as well as anyone,’ Vera said. ‘In their homes every week, and I expect they take you for granted and hardly realize you’re there. They probably say things in front of you that they wouldn’t tell anyone else.’
‘I’m like the dust-fairy.’ Susan gave a small, sharp smile. ‘You’d think their houses get clean as if by magic. Never any thanks. Not like Mrs Carswell, who’ll sit down for a chat when I’m finished.’
‘So is there anything you can tell me about them? Do they really all get on as well as they say?’
Susan shrugged. ‘They put on a good show.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, it’s all sweetness and light in public. In their own homes it’s a bit different. Professor O’Kane’s the worst. He doesn’t have anything nice to say about anyone. He’s arrogant; thinks he’s better than the rest of them because he knows about the past. All snide comments.’
They sat for a moment in silence.
Vera got to her feet. ‘Nobody else must know about Lorraine’s illness,’ she said. ‘It’s private. Not our business.’ At least not your business.
‘I don’t gossip. Not really.’ Then a confession of sorts. ‘I don’t have much of a life here, just me and Dad. I’m just interested in other people’s lives.’
‘Ah, pet, you and me both.’
As Vera was pulling away from Percy’s bungalow she was met by a car driving down the track towards Gilswick. Nigel Lucas. Maybe he was just on his way to the village to pick up the Sunday papers, but it seemed like a sign. Lorraine would be in the house on her own.
It took Lorraine a while to open the farmhouse door, and she was still in her nightclothes with a dressing gown pulled over the top. It was the first time Vera had seen her without make-up and she looked grey and very tired.
‘I’m sorry.’ Vera was sympathetic, but she was inside the door already, taking no chances. ‘I got you out of your bed. I wanted to chat to you on your own.’
‘What’s this about? Your sergeant was here yesterday to take statements. We told him everything we know about that poor woman dying.’
‘Shall I put the kettle on? Make us some tea?’ Vera walked through to the kitchen, letting the woman follow. There was a granite breakfast bar with ridiculously high stools. She wasn’t sure she’d be able to hoist herself onto them. Or get off, once she was there. ‘Let’s take the tea up to your studio, shall we? We know we won’t be interrupted there. Why don’t you lead the way?’
Lorraine shrugged. She seemed to have no fight in her. Vera wondered if that was down to the illness or the cure. They walked up the polished wooden stairs to a landing with a view of the hall and the kitchen, and then Lorraine pushed open a door into her studio. It was the size of a double bedroom, with one long window looking north towards the hill. An easel and a set of white-painted cupboards. The scrubbed pine table that Susan had described. Along one wall a chaise longue in faded grey velour. ‘I noticed that, in the Kimmerston saleroom when we first moved up here,’ Lorraine said. ‘Nigel saw that I liked it and went to the auction and bid for it. A surprise, until it was delivered.’ She paused for a beat. ‘He’s such a kind man.’
‘Is that why you haven’t told him you’re ill? Worried he’ll kill you with kindness?’ Vera took a seat on a chair that looked as if it had once belonged to a teacher in a village school. Lorraine sank onto the chaise longue.
‘How did you know?’
‘We poke around into everyone’s business in a murder inquiry. That’s our job. Not all the secrets we dig up are relevant to the investigation, but we can’t ignore them.’ From her seat Vera could see into the back gardens of the houses on each side. Janet was feeding her hens. Annie was hanging washing on her line. It occurred to her that Lorraine had kept the secret of her illness because nothing else could be hidden here. She had so little control over what was going on in her body; at least she could take control of the how and when she shared information about being ill.
‘I told Nigel when I was first diagnosed with breast cancer.’ Lorraine gave a little smile. ‘I couldn’t really hide it from him; he found the lump, dragged me off to the GP.’
‘That was before you moved here?’
‘It was what prompted the move. Nigel’s business had grown since he first started it. I thought he liked the success, setting up branches all over the country. Then, when I was ill, he decided to sell up. “Someone’s made me an offer I can’t refuse, Lorrie. Let’s call it a day and give ourselves a bit of quality time.” I was going through chemo and didn’t have the energy to think it through. So I said: why not? A move to the country, more time to paint. All that sounded great to me.’
‘Did it live up to expectations?’
‘At first. Nigel loved planning the renovations to the house. Now, I’m not sure. He’s used to the challenge of problems at work. Having the power to take decisions.’ She looked at Vera. ‘He’s just been accepted to be a magistrate. He’ll be good, I think. He’s got all the right experience. That might help give his day a bit of focus and make him feel more useful. I encouraged him to give it a go. At the moment I can tell he’s bored, fidgety, looking for projects. He doesn’t say, because he knows I love it here. It’s a beautiful place to die.’
‘When did you find out that the illness had come back?’
‘Six months ago. I still had to go for regular checks. At first everything seemed fine; then it seemed that, despite the surgery, they hadn’t got rid of the tumour. It’s spread. It’s just moved into my spine. They’ve offered more chemo, but there’s no chance of a complete cure. I’d just be buying a bit more time. I feel remarkably well at the moment, and I’d much rather enjoy the life that I have than keep dragging back to the hospital for unpleasant treatments. Inconvenient and time-consuming, and taking more than the life I’d gain.’
Vera thought she’d probably have made the same decision. ‘But you decided not to tell Nigel?’
‘He’d be devastated. And as you said, he’d kill me with his fussing. I will tell him, but when I’ve reached a state when I can’t pretend any longer.’
‘Isn’t it a strain, all this pretence?’
Lorraine gave a little laugh. ‘All couples pretend about something. We’d go mad if we were honest all the time. Successful relationships are made up of white lies, small attempts at flattery, aren’t they? We want our partners to be happy, so we tell them the stories they want to hear.’
There was a sound in the house below. The front door opening. ‘That’ll be Nigel back from the village. You won’t tell him, will you?’
‘Not unless I have to.’ Vera couldn’t see how Lorraine’s illness could be relevant to the inquiry, except that it gave an insight into a relationship she’d previously struggled to understand.
They went downstairs together. Nigel was still in the hall. ‘I was just showing the inspector my studio,’ Lorraine said. ‘She was wondering what I might see from the window. I told her only the neighbours’ gardens.’
The words came easily. She even sounder brighter, less tired. Vera hoped that the other residents of Valley Farm weren’t such proficient liars. Otherwise she shouldn’t believe anything that she’d been told.