Closer to Death in a Garden (Pitkirtly Mysteries Book 10) (6 page)

Chapter 8 Following up on the alpacas

‘We just want to check out the sequence of events with you, regarding this alpaca incident,’ said Keith. Ashley poured his fruit juice into a glass for him and handed it over. She had insisted on borrowing some plates from the staff tea-room for the sandwiches. Lunch was turning out to be a little more civilised than Christopher had expected. It was probably thanks to Ashley. Women had a knack for that kind of thing.

He had been a bit surprised that Keith had brought Ashley with him, but Keith had explained it wasn’t another interview but an informal follow-up chat and he wanted to see how Ashley’s and Christopher’s stories fitted into the big picture.

Christopher was surprised all over again to find there was actually a big picture for them to fit into. It seemed like the usual jumble of unrelated stuff to him.

‘It wasn’t exactly an incident,’ he protested mildly. ‘We were looking for Amaryllis, and I happened to come across the alpaca. In the woods.’

‘Can you tell me anything about why you were looking for Amaryllis?’ said Keith. ‘Thanks, Ashley,’ he added, accepting his plate and picking up his sandwich.

‘She phoned me to say she was going into the alpaca farm.’

‘Why was that?’

‘Well,’ said Christopher, wrinkling his brow as he cast his mind back, ‘I think she was worried about the alpacas. Or maybe about their owner.’

‘Do you know why that was?’

‘Jemima had told her about the one that strayed on to the road in front of them, and she wondered if they’d caught it yet.’

Keith said, through a mouthful of ham and lettuce on wholemeal bread, ‘Has that woman never heard of curiosity killing the cat?’

‘Probably,’ said Christopher, taking a swig of apple juice. ‘I’m sure it’s cropped up before.’

Ashley nibbled daintily on a cream cheese bagel. Did they really have bagels in that supermarket? Christopher couldn’t remember having seen them. He must ask her where she had got it. She chewed and swallowed neatly before saying, ‘It’s really odd. Mrs Blyth-Sheridan takes such good care of the alpacas. I can’t remember ever seeing one out on the road before.’

‘There’s always a first time,’ said Keith. ‘Have you ever been into the place, Ash?’

She shook her head. She took a tiny mouthful of mango and peach juice and swallowed it. ‘I’ve seen her, of course. She came round to the garden centre once or twice on Sundays to complain we had too many customers and they were blocking her car in. She claimed they were disturbing the animals as well. We just listened to her – me and Mr Anderson – and didn’t say anything, and then she went away after a bit.’

‘They shouldn’t have been blocking her drive though,’ Keith pointed out. He took a long drink of his orange juice, and turned his gaze on Christopher again. ‘You went into the garden with her and the alpaca, didn’t you? Did you notice anything unusual in there?’

‘I was in the house as well,’ said Christopher. ‘It was very clean and tidy. Nothing on the worktops.’

‘That isn’t unusual with people like that,’ said Keith with authority. ‘They have help.’

‘No – she said something about Madeleine being away on holiday. She made me coffee herself.’

‘Do you know this Madeleine?’ Keith asked Ashley.

She shook her head. ‘I don’t think so. I don’t think she’s been into the garden centre. But then, she wouldn’t do. They get all their gardening done for them by somebody in a van from Kincardine. They don’t need to buy any of our plants.’

She delved into her large handbag and brought out a packet of muffins with lemon icing, which she put on yet another plate – there would be quite a bit of washing-up to do after they had finished - and offered them round to the two men as if she were officiating at some sort of children’s tea-party.

‘They’re skinny ones,’ she said. ‘In case you’re worried about putting on weight.’

Christopher immediately began to worry that she thought he was already overweight, but Keith winked at him reassuringly. ‘She’s the only one who worries about that,’ he said affectionately, patting Ashley’s knee. ‘And there’s no need for that, Ash. You’re the perfect shape for your size.’

She smiled mistily at him.

Just as well Amaryllis wasn’t around, Christopher reflected. She might easily have been tempted to spoil the moment with retching noises or something, like an embarrassed teenager. Even he was slightly tempted. He wasn’t used to people staring into each other’s eyes in his office at lunchtime. The nearest thing to it had been when Charlie Smith and his dog had been in a couple of days before. But even then, Christopher had suspected the dog’s adoring look was directed at the bone-shaped dog biscuit Charlie was holding up in front of its nose.

‘... don’t suppose they do their food shopping locally either,’ Keith was saying gloomily. ‘Nobody seems to know much about them.’

‘They maybe get it delivered,’ Ashley suggested. ‘But then, anybody can do that now. My Mum orders all hers on the internet.’

‘But can’t you just go and interview them if you need to?’ said Christopher, puzzled. ‘Like you did with me this morning.’

‘Sorry to have bothered you so early in the day,’ muttered Keith.

‘It’s all right. You probably wanted to catch me before I came into work.’

‘We can’t get any reply at the house,’ Keith admitted. ‘Nobody’s answering the door. The two constables who went round there didn’t think anybody was in.’

‘What about the alpacas?’

‘In the stables...’

‘Maybe they’ve gone into Edinburgh for the day or something,’ said Ashley. ‘You’d better send somebody round again this evening.’

‘Not sure if we can get the overtime authorised,’ said Keith.

‘That’s just stupid,’ Ashley commented. ‘You can’t expect to catch people at home during the day. What if they were out at work? Or away on holiday?’

Keith sighed. ‘That’s just the way it works. I expect we’ll catch them in tomorrow. They won’t both be out at work all day every day with those animals to look after. Then there’s this Madeleine. When she comes back from holiday, that is.’

Keith’s phone rang at that moment. He went out to the corridor to take it, and a few moments later they saw him out in the car park, pacing to and fro as he spoke. His face seemed to get grimmer and grimmer as the time passed.

‘Oh, dear,’ said Ashley. ‘I wonder what’s happened. I hope the alpacas are all right.’

When Keith came back into the office, it was evident from his expression that the alpacas were the least of his worries.

‘Sorry, we’ll have to cut this short,’ he said. ‘Stay and finish your lunch just now, Ashley. I’ll see you later on.’

Christopher went to the office door with him.

‘I can’t tell you anything,’ said Keith. ‘Thanks for the information, Mr Wilson. You’ve been very helpful. We may need to speak to you again at some point.’

Christopher nodded, and Keith left, with one more apologetic glance at his girl-friend. She gave him a little wave.

‘It’s all right,’ she said to Christopher before he could speak. ‘I’m used to this.’ She picked up a few skinny muffin crumbs and tidied them away into an empty sandwich packet. ‘It comes with the territory. I wouldn’t have started going out with a policeman if I hadn’t known that.’

He would almost have preferred her to burst into tears. Almost, but not quite.

Chapter 9 Grilled

Jemima was cross with herself, and she had translated that into being cross with Dave.

She still didn’t feel quite right after her night in hospital. In some corner of her mind she remembered reading about all the illnesses you might catch just by being in hospital, regardless of what was wrong with you in the first place. She hoped she wasn’t coming down with something like that.

It was obvious that Dave wasn’t feeling quite right either. Neither of them had gone out of the house the day they came home, and now it didn’t look as if they would go anywhere the following day either. This was quite unusual for them. Even if Dave didn’t want to drive, they would still pop down to the fish shop or to the Queen of Scots. Maybe by this evening they would feel like going there. In the mean-time Jemima couldn’t summon up the energy to go out, but she deeply resented being trapped in the house.

She was pleased to see Keith Burnet when he arrived on the doorstep halfway through the afternoon. That new Chief Inspector, the woman, was with him. It was strange to think of a woman being high up in the police force, but that was progress, of course.

‘Sarah Ramsay,’ said the woman helpfully, holding out a hand. ‘Chief Inspector. And you know Keith, I’m sure.’

They went into the front room. The Chief Inspector glanced at Jemima’s family tree chart on the wall.

‘I heard you were keen on family history,’ she commented. ‘That’s quite impressive.’

‘I had help from some other people in the family,’ said Jemima. ‘I have a lot of cousins.’

‘Just not as many as you had at one time,’ said Dave, laughing.

‘It’s nothing to joke about,’ Jemima snapped. Several of her cousins had been murdered a few years before. Although she hadn’t known most of them up until then, it had still been a shock, particularly when the murderer turned his attention in her direction. She shivered suddenly.

Dave put his arm round her shoulders and she moved away and sat down.

‘Would you like a cup of coffee?’ said Dave to the others.

Neither of them wanted anything. It sounded very much as if they were going to treat this as a very official occasion. Jemima sat up straighter.

‘Sorry to hear you’ve both been in hospital,’ said Sarah Ramsay. ‘We just need to ask you a few questions about the garden centre. We’ll be as quick as we can.’

Keith took out a notebook. He seemed to be acting as the Chief Inspector’s assistant in this case. Jemima wondered how he felt about that. But then, he had endured a spell working as Charlie Smith’s dogsbody, so he must be used to it.

‘When did you begin to feel ill, Mr Douglas?’ asked the Chief Inspector. After Dave replied, she added, ‘Can you run through the sequence of events? As far as you can remember, anyway. I understand you were only semi-conscious some of the time.’

‘I was a wee bit out of things,’ Dave admitted. ‘But I still gave those paramedics a good run for their money.’

Jemima sighed. She didn’t want to remember Dave’s escape attempt. It had just been embarrassing. But at least it was a further sign, if that were needed, that he had never really been at death’s door in the first place. Maybe it was just as well they had taken him to hospital after all. At least he had more or less got a clean bill of health out of it. But she hoped it wouldn’t stop him from taking his blood pressure pills.

She became conscious of a silence around her, and glanced up.

Chief Inspector Ramsay was looking at her expectantly.

‘Sorry,’ said Jemima. ‘I must have missed a bit. Were you asking me something?’

‘Yes – I wonder if you could run through events as you remember them. In case there’s something your husband didn’t notice, or has forgotten.’

‘Well, we went round the side of the garden centre building,’ said Jemima. ‘There was a very rude man there – Mr Anderson. I didn’t think he had any need to say what he said...’

Sarah Ramsay took her back over the account again, this time asking her to talk about the alpacas and the woman with them, and then she sat back in her chair and asked, trying to appear casual, ‘And when did Amaryllis Peebles come along?’

Jemima wasn’t convinced by the casual air. She had the feeling this had been what the Chief Inspector had been leading up to all the time, and that all the previous questions had been designed to mislead them about her true purpose in interviewing them.

‘Oh, not until much later,’ she said. ‘It was when Dave was in the ambulance. She drove me to the hospital, you know. I don’t know what we would have done without her. She drove us home again the next day too.’

‘Hmm. Do you know why she came to the garden centre in the first place?’

Jemima glanced between Keith and his superior in surprise. ‘I thought she heard about what had happened from Keith, and wanted to help.’

‘Yes,’ said Sarah Ramsay. ‘That’s what she’d like everyone to think.’

‘Amaryllis doesn’t lie about things,’ said Jemima, ‘even if she does break into people’s houses sometimes and make toast, and play tricks on Christopher, and make Charlie Smith angry.’

The Chief Inspector blinked. ‘She makes toast?’

‘Not every time,’ said Jemima.

Keith Burnet, face bright red, intervened at this point. ‘With all due respect, Chief, there’s no reason to suppose...’

Sarah Ramsay glared at him. ‘Just don’t think for a minute that because we were at school together I’m going to be doing Ms Peebles any favours. She’s a serious suspect here, and – oh, damn!’

Jemima got to her feet. She was now feeling even more cross than she had earlier in the morning. So cross, in fact, that she didn’t care any more what she said or did. She raised an arm and pointed to the door of the room. ‘I’d like you to leave now, Chief Inspector Ramsay. If you’ve got any more questions for us, David and I will come to the police station to answer them. You aren’t welcome in our house now.’

She hoped the Chief Inspector and Keith wouldn’t assume that just because she wasn’t shouting and screaming at them she didn’t mean every word of it. She decided they had got the message, though, when they got to their feet without saying anything and more or less scuttled out of the room. She stayed where she was until she heard the front door slam.

Dave put his arm round her again, and this time she didn’t move away.