A Killer Ball at Honeychurch Hall (22 page)

“I'll drive you to the Carriage House.”

“No, really,” I said. “I'm going to the stables, actually. It's not far.”

“Remember what I—” but I didn't hear the rest of it. I'd already closed the door.

I set off at a fast walk. The only thing I was certain about was the theft of the Hollar drawings. It would take the police hours, if not days to screen the footage—wouldn't it? By then, Alfred would have put them back—I stopped in my tracks. No, of course he couldn't put them back! What was I thinking? It was better, far better for them to disappear altogether. But—damn—would Edith try to claim on insurance? She didn't know about the scam.

My head began to spin. I suddenly thought how apt that the woman who had started all this had been called Pandora. Discovering her body in a tomb-like box had certainly unleashed a lot of misfortune.

Hopefully, Alfred knew what he must do.

 

Chapter Twenty

“Ah, Katherine!” Lavinia poked her head out of Thunder's stable. “Any idea where Alfred is?”

“He's not
here
?” I said, feigning surprise.

“No. Why else would I be asking?” Lavinia said coldly. “We've been waiting around for the last half an hour. Alfred didn't even tack up the horses! It's frightfully inconvenient.”

A sense of foreboding swept over me. This was most unlike Alfred. Of course, Alfred didn't have a mobile phone. He didn't need one. His new life was living above the stables in his little flat.

“Maybe he's taken Jupiter down to the paddock?” I said hopefully. But even as I scanned the yard, I knew he hadn't. All the loose box doors were shut.

“Alfred's not answering!” came a shout from above. I looked up to see Harry, dressed in his Biggles flying helmet, goggles and white scarf, standing at the top of the stone steps that led up to Alfred's flat.

“Oh, this is so
maddening
!” said Lavinia. “Alfred is usually so reliable. I hope this isn't going to become a habit.”

It dawned on me that perhaps Alfred had been thinking what I'd been thinking and had already gone to get rid of the drawings. But no, of course he couldn't. Mum's car was at the pound and he didn't have the keys to mine.

“Perhaps Alfred had to go down to the bottom paddocks for Edith?” I suggested.

“No. Edith went to church,” said Lavinia. “Though what possessed her I have no idea. She's never been before—apart from Christmas and Easter, of course.”

“Did you go inside Alfred's flat?”

“Good heavens, no,” said Lavinia.

“I'll go and look. Maybe he's fallen—”

“Fallen?”
Lavinia looked horrified. “Why ever would you think that?” She shook her head incredulously and stomped off to the tack room muttering, “Have to do everything myself.”

I took the stone staircase and met Harry coming halfway down. “It looks like Flying Officer Bushman went out on a secret mission this morning and didn't tell his commanding officer!”

“Oh dear!” I said with forced heartiness. “He'll have to be severely reprimanded when he returns to base.”

“Now, Stanford…” Harry gestured for me to come closer and lowered his voice. “I'm sending you on a mission of vital importance.”

“Yes, sir.”

“It's about that spy we saw yesterday,” he whispered. “I think I know where he is hiding out.”

“That's very disturbing, sir,” I whispered back. “Where?”

“Behind the walled garden,” said Harry. “Spotted his bunker. He did a poor job of trying to disguise it. The man knows nothing about camouflage in hostile territory.”

“May I ask which of our agents saw the—er—bunker and when he saw it, sir?”

“Yesterday afternoon,” said Harry. “Agent Chips—”

“Ah, Agent Chips.” I stifled a smile. Agent Chips being the Jack Russell terrier.

“We were patrolling the boundaries and he raised the alarm,” Harry went on.

“Did you see the enemy, sir?”

“I got close but I had to retreat. When a man's been in the field for as long as I have, you get an instinct, Stanford.”

I felt a tiny knot of fear. Had Harry seen anything?

“What happened, sir?”

“Someone was watching from the woods,” Harry went on in his alter ego. “I thought I'd go back this afternoon for another look.”

The last thing I wanted was for Harry to go anywhere near Bryan's camper van—if it was still there—by himself, especially if the police had found it and cordoned it off. “I'll go, sir.”

“Good man.” Harry nodded. “Take the gate next to the hothouse, but be careful. It could be a trap.”

“Harry! Don't just stand there!” Lavinia emerged from the tack room with a saddle in her arms. “Come and help me!”

“I'm happy to help,” I called out.

“No, thank you, Katherine,” said Lavinia frostily. “We do not need your help.”

I gave Harry a salute and he jumped down the last few steps and dashed over to where Lavinia was holding Thunder's bridle.

Once Lavinia and Harry had ridden out of the yard, I tried Alfred's door. It was unlocked.

The flat had been built under the eaves but was fairly spacious. It was furnished simply with a two-seater sofa, coffee table and bookcase. A TV sat on top of a sideboard against the end wall. There was a small kitchen table with four chairs, a kitchenette, a bathroom leading off and one bedroom.

I took a quick look around. It was neat and tidy. Alfred had very few possessions and as far as I could tell, everything was still there. He hadn't packed up and fled.

How well did I really know my mother's stepbrother? Mum said a leopard never changed its spots and that didn't just apply to affairs of the heart!

The more I thought about it, the more I was convinced that Alfred must have gone to move the drawings.

Taking the shortcut through the pine forest, I was back at the Carriage House in fifteen minutes. To my relief, my Golf wasn't there. I was right. Alfred
had
gone off to move the drawings. What's more, he must have hot-wired my car because I still had my car keys in my tote bag.

I glanced at the singing bird clock. Mum wouldn't be back from church for at least another hour.
Church!
Another strange development—and Edith insisting my mother go with her was just plain odd.

It was the perfect time to go and see if Bryan had indeed left his camper van behind the walled garden.

The Victorian walled garden looked dreary on this wet February afternoon and even more neglected than usual. Within the ivy-clad walls were wide borders that were bounded by a perimeter path that had two main central paths. One ran north to south, the other east to west, dividing the garden into four equal sections. A line of glasshouses stretched along one side. Behind them, hugging the boundary wall, were abandoned hothouse furnaces, potting sheds, tool rooms and a henhouse. It was easy to imagine how beautiful this would have been in its heyday.

I found the wicket gate and passed through into the field behind.

Bryan's camper van was still there. It was screened from the Hall, Honeychurch Cottages, Eric's scrapyard and Mum's Carriage House. As yet, there was no sign of the police.

I peered into the windows. I'd always thought that VW camper vans had a lot of charm and as a child had loved the idea of sleeping under the raised striped canopy roof. Perhaps I had inherited my mother's genes for life on the road, after all.

It started to rain again. I tried the door and to my surprise, it was unlocked. I stepped up inside and was hit by the smell of stale cigarettes mingled with alcohol. A duvet and pillow were scrunched up and shoved under one of the seats. I was right. It looked like Bryan had been sleeping here.

Although I was wearing gloves, I didn't want to get into trouble with Shawn for touching anything but when I spotted two plastic long-stemmed champagne glasses in the small sink, I couldn't help myself.

Bryan had been entertaining.

I opened the door under the sink and there, in the rubbish bin was an empty bottle of champagne.

My mother drank champagne.

I couldn't stand not knowing the brand. It sounded silly but I knew her tastes. I carefully took out the bottle. It was Freixenet—a cheap sparkling Spanish wine. Mum said she only drank real champagne but with everything that had happened over the past twenty-four hours, I was ready to believe anything. I'd never seen her drink brandy but she'd been knocking that stuff back last night as if it had been going out of fashion.

Suddenly, a phone rang and it wasn't mine. I searched to see where it was coming from but the ringing stopped only to start up again a few seconds later.

It seemed to be coming from the driver's area.

I made my way to the front of the camper van and in the console between the seats was a mobile phone. I nudged it. The screen lit up. There was no password needed. I saw twelve missed calls, three voice mails and 10 percent of battery remaining.

Someone had been trying to get ahold of Bryan. Someone who couldn't possibly know that he was now dead.

In the passenger foot-well was a cardboard box containing a set of headphones and some magazines. I could just make out two of the titles—
Treasure Hunting
and
Searcher.
There was also an ordnance survey map and an exercise book.

It began to dawn on me why Bryan had come back to Honeychurch Hall and when my foot caught the coil of a long metal shaft, I knew.

It was a metal detector. Bryan's return had had nothing to do with wanting to find work.

I thought back to Rupert's comment earlier that morning. Bryan had been trespassing last August. That was around the time that the underground tunnel was discovered in Cromwell Meadows.

I remembered how quickly Bryan had turned up out of the blue on Friday. He must have heard about the double-hide on the radio and come straight away to nose around. I bet he was looking for the missing Honeychurch silver coins.

I picked up the ordnance survey map and spread it over the bench seat.

It was a detailed map of the Honeychurch Hall estate.

Bryan had painstakingly labeled everything—the Hall, the Carriage House, stable yard, Jane's Cottage, Eric's scrapyard and caravan, the Honeychurch Hall cottages next to the Victorian walled garden, Edith's equine cemetery, the Victorian grotto, the sunken garden, stumpery—even a boating lake and boathouse that I did not know existed.

Illegible hieroglyphics in tiny spider scrawl were scattered across the map. A blue line had been drawn in to mark the underground tunnel from the Hall to the exit on Cavalier Lane. A grid covered Harry's pillow mounds behind Jane's Cottage. It looked as if Bryan had been systematically working his way across the field.

Of course he had wanted to talk to Joan Stark. She'd lived at Jane's Cottage with her family and he probably thought she might have had a lucid moment and remembered something important.

The camper van door opened with a crash. Startled, I leapt to my feet and promptly hit my head on the roof, tripped over the coil again, lost my balance and fell onto Shawn who then lost his. We both tumbled out onto the muddy grass in an embarrassing heap with my face practically buried into the crotch of his trousers.

“I'm so sorry,” I mumbled and struggled to push myself away without touching his legs only to collapse on him face-first
again
.

“Your elbow!” Shawn yelped.

“Oh God!” I was utterly mortified and hurled myself sideways, straight into a puddle of muddy water.

“Here, take my hand,” said Shawn in a voice that definitely sounded a couple of decibels higher than it had this morning.

“I am so sorry,” I stammered. “You startled me.”

“So I see,” he squeaked.

“I was going to phone you about the camper van but it started to rain—”

“I hope you haven't touched anything.”

I held up my gloved hands that were now soaked with muddy water. The rain started to come down again.

“Let's get inside.” Shawn gallantly helped me back into the camper van and pulled the door shut behind us.

“You've got mud on your nose,” he said shyly.

“So do you.” And he had.

We both self-consciously touched our noses.

It was the second time that day that I had found myself in an enclosed space with Detective Inspector Shawn Cropper. This time I was acutely aware of a strange tension between us. Shawn's face was flushed. His curly hair was wet with the rain and I knew that mine had expanded into a wild bush, just as it always did in wet weather.

“You look like Electra, the Twenty-seven-thousand Volts Girl,” he said lightly. “I can certainly feel the electricity in here, can't you?”

I blushed and felt oddly pleased. Was he actually flirting with me?

“What's that?” he asked on spotting the ordnance survey map and our moment was broken. “I told you not to touch anything.”

I was going to lie and say that the map had already been there but decided against it.

“So this was what Bryan was up to,” said Shawn. “I had my suspicions.”

“And the tools that were found in the double-hide must have confirmed that the Honeychurches really
had
minted the coins here,” I said.

Shaw donned his disposable latex gloves and started going through the cardboard box. At the bottom was a Ziploc bag.

“Ah-ha!” he exclaimed. “I can never resist a Ziploc bag.”

“What is it?”

“It looks like a receipt book,” Shawn said with growing excitement. “Bryan was onto something. Has anyone told you about the role the Earl of Grenville played in the English Civil War?”

“I've heard bits,” I said. “Rupert felt that the coins had been buried somewhere on the estate when the Royalists had to retreat.”