Murder in the Afternoon (6 page)

She nodded. ‘It’s this way then.’

We set off down the hill that led to Great Applewick. In future, I must make sure I go to the local police first. If it had turned difficult in the quarry with the nasty piece of
work, I could have found myself on the wrong side of the local bobby, and I need all the support I can get.

Someone was walking uphill, a working man carrying a canvas bag.

‘It’s Raymond,’ Harriet said as the young man surefooted his way towards us, swinging his arms like a soldier.

‘Raymond your dad’s apprentice?’

‘He’s a mason now, like Dad. But will never be as good.’

I would have liked to talk to him alone, in case he was as abusive as his father. Now that we drew close, Raymond slowed his pace, eyeing me cautiously. Thin and pale, like a long streak of whitewash, he wore baggy brown trousers and jerkin.

‘You been in the quarry, Harriet?’ he asked gently. ‘You know it’s dangerous.’

‘It ’int dangerous to me,’ Harriet said, still on the defensive after our encounter with Raymond’s father.

‘I asked Harriet to bring me. How do you do? I’m Mrs Shackleton, a friend of the family.’

We shook hands. The coldness of his touch matched his cautious aloofness. I held onto his hand, determined to melt him a little.

‘You’re Raymond Turnbull,’ I told him, as if he needed to know. ‘We just met up with your father.’

‘Oh,’ he said, and coloured with embarrassment as he glanced at Harriet, guessing our treatment at the hands of his father. ‘I suppose he …’

‘It’s all right. I knew I wouldn’t be welcome and intended to look round before you all started for the day.’

‘Dad’s always early.’ Raymond turned to Harriet. ‘I’ve just come for my tools.’ Lightly, he touched her shoulder.
‘I’m off up to the Hall to start another sundial to be ready in time for Mrs Ledger’s birthday. It’ll only be in sandstone mind, not that lovely blue slate.’

Harriet said nothing.

He was ready to walk away, but hesitated, and looked once more at Harriet, as if he wanted to say something kind, but could not find the words.

His fondness for Harriet would give me an advantage, and encourage him to talk.

She held out the cap. ‘Dad’s cap was under the bench.’

‘We didn’t see that Saturday night,’ Raymond raised his eyebrows. ‘Course it was getting dark.’

I disguised my question as a sympathetic comment. ‘It must have taken you ages to search the whole quarry.’

He nodded. ‘Sergeant Sharp dragged us out of the pub.’ He looked at Harriet quickly. ‘Not that we needed dragging. We wanted to help.’

‘Did you …’ Harriet began. She stopped.

‘Did us what?’

‘The pool …’

He reached out, but stopped short of touching her. ‘No, don’t think that, Harriet. That little lagoon, it’s just run off groundwater. Once we get a spot of sunshine it’ll be gone.’

Harriet stared. ‘But I thought it was right deep. I thought all pools in the quarry was deep.’

He shook his head. ‘This one ’int. We say that to keep kids out, because some of them lagoons are deep, in the old quarries where they’ve turned to lakes. Don’t let on, Harriet. You’re sensible, but there’ll be daft kids coming in and getting themselves in bother, wanting to paddle.’

‘Oh.’ Harriet bit her lip.

‘Raymond, what time did you last see Mr Armstrong on Saturday?’

‘I worked till one o’clock and then went off for dinner, like everyone else. Ethan was still working on the sundial.’

‘Did everyone leave the quarry at one o’clock?’

‘Dad stayed a while. He always leaves last, being foreman. But he was in the pub by twenty past,’ he added quickly, taking a sudden interest in the canvas bag he carried, not looking at us.

Raymond’s precision disturbed me. It sounded uncannily like an alibi. Foreman Josiah Turnbull had been last to leave. Mary Jane had said that Ethan and Turnbull were at loggerheads over the vote for a strike, only days before, with Ethan urging action, but Turnbull coming out on top. I could easily imagine Turnbull goading Ethan. But I must stick to the facts. As casually as I could, I asked, ‘How much longer do you think it would have taken Ethan to finish the sundial?’

Raymond frowned. He struck me as the kind of young man who would teaspoon out information without feeling the need to expand. To do any more would smack to him of stating the ruddy obvious.

Harriet came to the rescue. ‘I wish Dad had finished it and come home.’

‘So do I, Harriet. It would have been finished too, if your dad hadn’t decided to add some little flourishes. He sent word up to Colonel Ledger to come and see it.’

‘Colonel Ledger?’ I asked.

‘He owns the quarry. No one else would dare send for him to come, even though he’s a man you can talk to. But that’s your dad, Harriet. He stands on ceremony to no man. The sundial was for Mrs Ledger’s birthday, see, and the colonel had drawn out the pattern. Ethan is used to working to finely drawn specifications. We don’t just hew stone.’

He puffed with pride as he let me know his level of skill.

‘I’m sure you don’t. I’ve great respect for the mason’s craft. Tell me, did the colonel come?’

‘I don’t know.’ Raymond shrugged. His mouth turned down as he looked at Ethan’s cap, as though it dawned on him for the first time that something bad may have happened to Ethan.

‘Did you see Ethan again between one o’clock on Saturday and today?’

‘No. I haven’t seen him since.’ He glanced at Harriet, as if more than anything he wanted to come up with some explanation. ‘He might have tramped in search of another job.’ He gulped, and looked away, as though what he regretted most in the world was being put on the spot. ‘Anyhow, his tools is gone.’

Harriet raised her head and looked from Raymond to me. ‘If Dad’s taken his tools and gone somewhere, that’d mean I was mistaken about seeing him like that, in that way.’

We both looked at Raymond for confirmation of Harriet’s hope. Her father may be safe, well, and chipping away with his mason’s chisel somewhere.

‘You could be right, Harriet,’ Raymond said at last. ‘Your dad could get a job anywhere. For two pins he would have gone to work on York Minster last year. He was offered it.’

I pushed Raymond a little further. ‘Work like that would be very enticing for a skilled man. Why didn’t he take the job?’

Raymond nodded at Harriet. ‘Mary Jane didn’t want to move, kids changing schools and all that.’

This puzzled me. After all, Mary Jane had been at pains
to tell me how much she disliked the cottage, with its well in the garden. They might have moved somewhere that had indoor plumbing.

The three of us stood in an awkward and silent circle. Harriet tossed her head. She looked at me reproachfully. She wanted me to find her dad, and here I was, asking useless questions. ‘I’ll let you catch me up.’

She began to walk slowly down the hill.

‘What’s going on?’ Raymond asked. ‘Where is Ethan?’

‘That’s what I hope to find out. You mentioned York, and work at the Minster. Do you really think he may have gone off in search of some other job, without saying anything?’

I had to explore the possibility, in spite of still holding to Harriet’s belief that she saw a body.

Raymond coloured up. ‘You mean because I wouldn’t be sorry to see him go?’

‘No I didn’t mean that. But is it true?’

‘Ethan lives in Mason’s Cottage. That house always goes to a quarry worker. I’m getting wed on Saturday. If Ethan doesn’t come back, we’ll have somewhere of our own to live.’

And your nasty father wouldn’t have to keep you and your wife under his roof.

‘Thanks, Raymond.’

For a moment we stood, neither of us wanting to move off first in case there was more to be said.

Raymond sighed. ‘I hope you find him.’

‘So do I.’

I caught up with Harriet who was walking slowly. I wanted to know about her visit to the farm, but that would wait. She had been grilled enough and needed her breakfast and her sup of tea.

We walked in silence to the end of the High Street. If she wanted to tell me more, she would.

On the other side of the road, a greengrocer chalked produce and prices on his window. A van driver climbed from his cab, opened the back of his vehicle, took out a stack of newspapers and carried them into a shop.

‘Do you have children?’ Harriet asked.

‘No. Only a cat.’

‘Why don’t you have children?’

‘My husband didn’t come back from the war.’

‘That was a long time ago.’

‘Yes it was.’

‘What is your cat called?’

‘Sookie. Do you have a cat?’

‘No.’ Without missing a beat, she added, ‘Should I have gone to the village when I saw Dad? Should I have run for the doctor instead of going to the farm? Should I have gone straight home for Mam?’

‘You did the right thing, going for the nearest adult.’

We crossed the High Street and turned into Easterly View, which had no view at all except the chemical works, but may once upon a time have had an easterly view. The sandstone houses stood in rows of six. Rounding the corner, we came to Town Street where church and chapel gazed sombrely at each other from opposite sides of the road, competing for the occupants of the pairs of well-built larger than average houses. One of these bore the West Riding Constabulary plaque.

‘That’s the police station, over there, near the church.’

‘Thanks, Harriet. You go home now. You’ve done really well.’

She looked past me and then closed her eyes as if the sight were too much. ‘It’s Miss Trimble, the vicar’s sister.
She’ll ask me three hundred questions. I’m off home.’

Harriet turned, and ran.

From the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of a spare, grey woman bearing down on me from the direction of the church. Yes, I’ll speak to you later, Miss Trimble. But first I must clear the decks with the local police. The knocker on the constabulary door hammered loudly enough to twitch every net curtain in the street.

The door opened, and I stepped inside.

A jowly face with small eyes peering from nook and cranny sockets, gave the man the appearance of a bulldog.

‘Good morning, officer,’ I said as he closed the door behind me. I glanced at the stripes on his uniform. ‘You must be Sergeant Sharp. I’m Mrs Kate Shackleton, a friend of the Armstrong family. Mrs Armstrong has asked for my help.’ I handed him my card. His eyebrows arched high enough to let a train of hostile thought pass. ‘I wonder whether you would be so kind as to spare me a few moments.’

He considered this request, taking in my appearance, reasonably well-to-do; my voice, educated; my demeanour, absurdly confident. He glanced pointedly at my card. A female investigator. His look said, It’ll be talking monkeys next.

I could not rely on his knowing that my father is superintendent of the West Riding Constabulary, but I would be willing to flaunt family credentials. There is a trick to giving the silent impression that you have something up your sleeve. He gave way.

I followed him along the hallway, and into a front room that was designated as police headquarters.

He was a man recruited in the days when height and bulk was all, and any officer of the law worth his salt would tip the scales against a heavyweight champion.

His thinning hair lay neatly combed. There was enough flesh on his cheeks to make a second face.

As soon as we were in his office, he said in a cheerful voice, ‘You’d better take a seat.’

He walked slowly round to the other side of his desk where he sat down in a padded swivel chair. Leaning forward, his forearms on the desk, fingers playing a tune on the blotter, he said, ‘Do you have some information for me?’

‘No. But after speaking to Mrs Armstrong and Harriet, I visited the quarry this morning. Harriet found her father’s cap. Naturally Mrs Armstrong is very concerned and on her behalf, I wonder if you could tell me what line of enquiry is being pursued.’

‘Mrs Armstrong lost the use of her legs has she?’

‘She’s exhausted and drained. I said I’d help as I’ve had some experience in tracking down missing persons.’ I paused, giving time for my boast to make an impression. He did not look impressed. ‘Would you tell me candidly, Sergeant Sharp, is this a missing person enquiry, or a murder investigation?’

‘Murder?’ His jowly jaw dropped. I caught a good look at the gold fillings in his bottom molars. ‘Well, if it’s murder, there’s one person was spotted near the quarry in the afternoon and that’s Mrs Armstrong herself, in her Scotch cape. Only she’d not be strong enough to carry a body and hide it somewhere.’

The image of Mary Jane hauling my suitcases up the stairs gave the lie to his belief, but I kept that to myself.

‘And I can tell you,’ he checked my name on the
business card, ‘and I can tell you, Mrs Shackleton, that there’s no sign of Ethan Armstrong in Great Applewick, alive or dead.’

‘Mrs Armstrong hasn’t seen her husband since Saturday morning. She wasn’t near the quarry in the afternoon.’