A Colourful Death: A Cornish Mystery (22 page)

“Did you pass by King Arthur’s Gallery?” Megan asked.

Mrs Rosevear hesitated before answering reluctantly, “Yes. In a place that size, you can hardly help it.”

“Was it open, did you notice?”

“The closedsign was up. I’m sure of it, because a couple were looking at the pictures in the window and I wondered if Geoff was missing a possible sale.”

“You don’t happen to know what time that was?”

“Haven’t a clue. If I put my mind to it, I could probably work out which shops I was walking between.”

“Leave it for now, but you might give it some thought later. Do you know the names of any of the shopkeepers who served you?”

She knew them all. They, as well as the librarian, might be able to say whether she had seemed flustered or disturbed.

“Did you see any of your friends, or meet anyone else you know?”

“Only Jeanette, crossing the Market Square, but it was just after four by then, because I’d heard St Petroc’s clock strike. We went back to the shop—the co-op—together, and Oswald made us a quick cuppa before Tom came to pick us up. Otherwise, no one but shopkeepers. And swarms of emmets, of course. The tourists seem to arrive earlier every year. Perhaps I’ll turn the bungalow into a holiday let-by-the-week after all. Do you know, after using the word ever since I came to live in Cornwall, I’ve just discovered
emmet
is an old English word for ant, not real Cornish at all.”

Megan ignored the digression. Margery Rosevear had regained her composure now, but judging by her emotion when speaking of a two-year-old slight, if she had killed Geoffrey Clark, it had not been a cool, calm, cold-blooded murder.

Eleanor finished her recital of the events of the previous evening (omitting Teazle’s adventures) with a warm encomium for Margery’s calm, practical kindness.

Scumble had listened with remarkably few interruptions. Now he bestirred himself, glared at Nick, who was whistling “Land of Hope and Glory” again, and said, “Calm, was she? As if she wasn’t shocked, or even surprised, to find Clark apparently weltering in his own blood?”

“I wouldn’t say that,” Eleanor protested. “Dealing with my stupid faintness distracted her from taking in the murder properly.” Doubt crept in. After the treatment Margery had received at Geoffrey’s hands, one couldn’t expect her to be overcome with grief—and one could only thank heaven she hadn’t succumbed to hysteria, like Stella. But her voice had been so very cool and unmoved when she told Doug to ring the police.

Still, Eleanor had been in no condition to detect the surprise that surely must have been there. She pointed this out to Scumble.

He made a sceptical noise. “Douglas Rosevear didn’t come into the studio till after he’d phoned the local copper. He knew Clark was dead before he saw the body. Yet he seemed shocked and horrified, you say.”

“I don’t think anything can prepare you for a sight like that. It really did look like blood, you know. I’m sure he wasn’t pretending.”

“I agree,” said Nick. “I rather doubt Doug is capable of pretence, certainly not convincing pretence. He’s a very straightforward sort of bloke. He’d had a few beers, too, which doesn’t make it any easier to put on an act.”

Scumble nodded, not, for once, blasting Nick for speaking out of turn. “Heavy drinker, is he?”

“Not at all. But he works damn hard, begging your pardon, Mrs Stearns, and when he manages to get to a pub, he likes a few beers. He wasn’t drunk, just a bit fuzzy.”

Eleanor guessed Scumble already knew Doug had been at a pub. For the first time, she wondered just what had brought the Rosevears and Stella to King Arthur’s Gallery at precisely the moment when she and Nick discovered the body.

They had probably told DI Pearce last night, so Scumble must know, but it was useless for Eleanor to ask him. He would just say it was his business to ask the questions and hers to answer them. She didn’t like to ask Margery, either. It would really be nosy-parkering. Megan might tell her, but she didn’t want to get her niece into trouble—

“Mrs Trewynn!”

“Sorry! I was thinking.”

“Mr Scumble asked you,” Jocelyn began, “to—”

“Thank you, Mrs Stearns, I’m quite capable of repeating my own question, if I now have Mrs Trewynn’s attention. What were you thinking, Mrs Trewynn?”

“Nothing I need trouble you with, Inspector.”

“Something entirely unrelated to my investigation?”

“Not entirely, but—”

“Never mind. I want you to go over again exactly what you heard from the moment you and Mr Gresham entered King Arthur’s Gallery.”

“I’m not a parrot, Inspector. I can’t promise to repeat it exactly.”

“To the best of your recollection,” he clarified through gritted teeth. “Concentrate on the words and don’t worry about people’s movements, or the tone of voice—”

“But I remember the words much better if I think about the tone of voice.”

“All right, all right! Think about it as much as you like. I said don’t … Never mind. Just get on with it. Please.”

Eleanor complied. With each repetition, she found, the horror faded a little and her memory grew clearer. Perhaps there was some sense in Scumble’s requests for the same information over and over again. Otherwise, of course, he wouldn’t waste time on it just to be irritating.

She reached the point where Stella had burst into tears.

“She hadn’t cried up till then?” Scumble asked.

“Not that I noticed. She may have had tears in her eyes. I wasn’t observing very clearly. But I would have heard if she’d been sobbing, I’m sure.”

“Grief and hysteria take many forms,” Jocelyn put in.

“I’m well aware of that, madam. Miss Weller seems to have gone through most of them, though not the maniacal laughter.”

“Thank heaven!” Eleanor exclaimed.

“What was said next?”

“That was when the local sergeant came in,” she said doubtfully. Hadn’t there been something in between? If so, it was gone. Scumble’s interruption had made her lose the thread. He really ought to know better by now.

“That’ll do—”

“Good,” said Jocelyn. “I’m taking Eleanor home.”

“—For now,” the inspector continued irritably. “If you have any reason, Mrs Trewynn, to leave North Cornwall, or to leave Port Mabyn for more than a few hours, I am here and now giving you specific instructions to inform me in advance of where you’re going. Make a note, Wilkes.”

“I will,” Eleanor promised guiltily. Not that she felt terribly guilty for the time she had evaded him—and DC Wilkes, she remembered, shooting him a look of apology. He grinned. “But Joce, my car’s in Rock.”

“I’ll take it home for you,” said Nick. “I’ve absolutely got to get to work.”

Eleanor felt in the pocket of her skirt for the keys. “Oh dear, here are the keys to the flat, but I wonder where—”

“I’ve got ’em.” Taking the car keys from his pocket, Nick tossed them jingling in the air and caught them.

“Oh good.” A folded piece of paper had come out of her pocket with the keys and fluttered to the ground, unfolding on the way down. Wilkes reached for it, but his figure was not conducive to bending in the middle. Eleanor got there first. “What on earth is this?”

The upper side was a blank receipt form, printed in blue, numbered in red, with Nick’s gallery’s name, address, and telephone number stamped blurrily at the top. With a sinking feeling, Eleanor turned it over.

“Here you are, Mr Scumble,” she said, as brightly as she could manage, handing it to him. “It’s Stella’s note.”

Scumble turned a curious shade of purple. Letting out his breath with a whoosh, he said in his most sarcastic voice, “I suppose I should be grateful you found it before my men had to search through every rubbish bin in Port Mabyn. You don’t by any chance have Mr Gresham’s train ticket stub or a London bus ticket concealed somewhere about your person?”

“Certainly not.” All the same, Eleanor emptied her pockets: a clean (luckily) handkerchief, a small comb, nothing else. “No, I haven’t.”

With a sigh, Scumble said, “You and Mr Gresham had better each make a formal statement that this is the note you found in Mr Gresham’s shop.”

“Why?” Nick demanded. “I already told you exactly what it said. What do you need another statement for?”

“You leave that to me, sir.”

“Don’t argue, Nick. Let’s get it over with.” Solemnly Eleanor took the note back from Scumble and stated to Wilkes when and where she had last seen it.

While Nick was following suit, Jocelyn said, “Eleanor, I’ve just remembered, one of Timothy’s parishioners who’s been ill is staying not too far away from here. It wouldn’t be far out of our way, if you don’t mind my dropping by to see how she’s doing.” Her tone challenging, she added, “And if Mr Scumble doesn’t mind, of course.”

He shot her a suspicious look. Obviously he had not forgotten that she had once aided Eleanor in eluding the police. “As long as you go straight back to Port Mabyn afterwards,” he said grudgingly.

“Naturally. I hope you don’t insist on my giving you the name of the person concerned and the address. It would be a gross breach of privacy.”

“That won’t be necessary. Mr Gresham, did Mrs Trewynn’s statement by any chance remind you of something you’d forgotten?”

“No, ’fraid not.”

“Well, keep thinking, will you? All right, you’re free to leave. I’ll find you in your studio when I need you, I take it.”

“When, not if? Yes, I’ll be there.”

“Come along, Nicholas, I’ll give you a lift into Padstow.”

“Thank you, Mrs Stearns,” Nick said meekly.

“Are you ready to go, Eleanor?”

“I didn’t bring a bag, not expecting to be away overnight. But I must say good-bye and thank you to Mrs Rosevear.”

“Not if Pencarrow is still interviewing her!”

“In the circumstances,” said Jocelyn dryly, “I feel sure a bread-and-butter letter will suffice.”

Eleanor didn’t feel it was appropriate any longer simply to walk in through the back door. When they reached the courtyard, Teazle trotting patiently at their heels, the front door of the house was open. She couldn’t tell whether Megan was still there, though, without interrupting if she was, so she decided a letter would indeed have to do.

A uniformed constable was leaning against the doorpost of the pottery, chatting to someone—presumably Tom—inside. He made no move to stop them.

They took Nick down to the quay in Padstow, where the ferry was about to cast off. Eager to get back to work, he jumped out of the car with a quick word of thanks and ran to catch it.

Jocelyn drove out of the village back along the Wadebridge road, green, well-wooded country with an occasional glimpse of the River Camel on their left. Something about the sight jogged Eleanor’s memory.

“The place where Stella works must be somewhere along here,” she said. “Near Wadebridge, they said.”

“What? What place? I thought she was an artist.”

“And a nurse, in a convalescent hospital. It’s just dawned on me: I wonder if that’s where your parishioner is staying, the one you want to visit. Old Mrs Batchelor, is it? She fell and broke a couple of ribs, I remember.”

“Yes, she’s in a convalescent home near here.”

“I definitely think you ought to pop in and see her while we’re nearby. What’s the name of the place? I’m sure I’d recognise it.”

“Riverview.”

“That’s it. Riverview Convalescent Home.”

“A very nice private hospital, I believe. Not National Health, I mean. Her son’s paying for it because there really isn’t room for a private nurse in her cottage, besides the stairs to worry about, and she didn’t want to go and stay with him in London. Doesn’t get on with her daughter-in-law.”

“Then I’m sure she’d appreciate a visit.”

“What have you got up your sleeve, Eleanor? That Man would be furious if he found out.”

“Not if we go before he does, and he doesn’t know we know Stella’s there. He did say you could call on your parishioner.”

“If he asks whether I knew beforehand about Stella, I’ll have to tell him.”

“I doubt he’ll ask. In any case, he can hardly say a vicar’s wife is not to visit a sick parishioner, wherever she may be. Don’t you want to see if we can find out a bit about Stella’s other life?”

“Really, Eleanor!”

“I don’t like the way she accused Nicholas of murder,” Eleanor said stubbornly. “If you’re afraid of Inspector Scumble, you can wait in the car, or go for a walk.”

“No, I’ll come with you. You’re right, it’s my duty to call on Mrs Batchelor, come what may.”

“I call that sophistry. If not downright Jesuitical!”

“Nonsense.” Jocelyn was silent, negotiating a tricky blind S-bend. As the road straightened, a discreet sign on the north side indicated a gravel drive, leading down the hillside, to the Riverview Convalescent Home (Private). Jocelyn braked and turned in. Continuing without hesitation down the slope, she said forebodingly, “But if you ask me, it won’t make the slightest difference to That Man that I’m a vicar’s wife, or whether we visit the place before or after him. Either way, when he finds out, he’s going to throw forty fits.”

Megan emerged from the cool dimness of the farmhouse into the hot afternoon. In the enclosed courtyard, it felt more like mid-August than June. She decided to begin with the studios on the south side, facing north.

The door of the nearest was closed. A glance at the window showed only her own reflection and that of the building opposite. The circumstances did not justify peering, so she plied the piskie-shaped door knocker.

No one within responded, but a red beard poked out of the studio at the far end. “Fuzz? We’re all in here. Most of us, anyway. Did you want me in particular?”

Walking towards him, Megan decided to try to get the sympathetic female touch business over with before Scumble reappeared, except for Stella, whom he’d said to take last. “Ladies first, please, sir,” she said, wondering what the whirring noise had been. She hadn’t noticed it till it stopped.

He turned back to the room. “Jeanette, you’re first.”

“Me?” It was a wail. “Why me?”

“Because you’re the only ‘lady’ present and the police set great store by etiquette.”