The Mill on the Shore (6 page)

‘They’re sort of detectives,’ Ruth said at last. ‘Mum wants to find out how your father died so she’s asked these people to come and look into it. That’s all.’

‘But the police came before,’ Tim said. ‘That morning we found him. The fat one must have been a detective because he wasn’t wearing uniform.’ The logic seemed to him unanswerable. He considered. ‘ He didn’t
do
very much though,’ he said at last. ‘He sat in the kitchen with Rosie and Jane all morning drinking tea and eating flapjacks. He talked to Mum in the flat but he didn’t see anyone else. Not as far as I know.’

And he would know, Ruth thought. Tim knew everything that went on at the Mill.

‘Mr Palmer-Jones isn’t that sort of detective,’ she said. ‘ He’s not a policeman. He’ll have time to ask questions and find out what actually happened.’

‘But we know what happened,’ Tim objected. ‘Dad killed himself some time that evening when we thought he was in the study working on his book.’ His face was pinched and Ruth thought that uncertainty and muddle would make it harder for him to accept James’ death. What was Meg thinking of?

Emily had finished her picture. She set the paper aside and began to peel strips of dried glue from her fingers.

‘I don’t think he killed himself,’ she said calmly. ‘I think Mum’s right.’

She stood up and went to wash her hands in the deep sink under the window. Before Ruth could ask what she meant the bell rang for dinner and the children ran off.

They ate in the field centre dining room which could hold eighty people at six large tables. Now only one was laid. It was covered by a white linen cloth and set with heavy cutlery and glasses. Most of the lights in the room had been switched off. The table where they sat was in one corner, lit by a single bulb on a long flex covered by a wicker shade and by candles. The shadowy space beyond them seemed vast. The room was rather cold and their voices seemed to echo.

Molly wondered at the formality of the occasion. With such a small number wouldn’t it have been easier to eat in the kitchen? At least there it might have been warm. But Meg seemed concerned to maintain the ritual of the Markham communal meal. She had changed from her sweater and skirt into a soft grey wool frock and there were pearls around her neck. Molly, who had felt liberated from the need to consider clothes with the coming to fashion of the track suit and who was still in the navy joggers and sweatshirt she had worn for travelling, felt decidedly underdressed.

‘We always try to eat together in the evening,’ Meg was saying as the children came in. ‘Family and students together when the courses are running. I like to think it typifies the atmosphere of the place. Now let me introduce you to my wonderful brood.’

And they were, Molly saw at once, all too wonderful for words. It was as if each child had been moulded with a different personality only to reflect Meg’s creativity and range of interests. There was Ruth of the good sense and the brains, artistic Caitlin, the boy who was being groomed to be a biologist. And the youngest girl? Molly wondered. What does Meg intend for her? Then it came to her in a flash that Emily would be the carer, the home-maker. She would be expected to look after her mother in her old age. The work of art that was Meg’s family was complete.

‘Ruth’s preparing for A levels,’ Meg was saying, completing the introductions. ‘We’re very proud of her. She’s hoping to go to York to read French. I’m not convinced of the value of A levels of course – so much rote learning still – but the way the university entrance system’s organized at the moment I suppose exams are essential.’ She beamed at them all.

Where did Jimmy fit into all this? Molly wondered. What need did these children have of a father? She felt suddenly as she had done when her own children were teenagers. Each Christmas a school friend sent a circular letter extolling the virtues of her model family, their achievements during the year, the exams they had passed, the musical instruments they played. Molly had read these letters with a mixture of envy, guilt and shame. Where had she gone wrong? Her children dabbled in drugs, got drunk and threw up on the carpet, threatened to drop out of college. They had turned out all right in the end of course, were now almost frighteningly decent and respectable, but then she had read the woman’s smug letters with fury, as if their complacency were an accusation of her own incompetence. Meg aroused the same emotion.

With relief Molly turned her attention from the children to a latecomer, who hovered awkwardly at the edge of the pool of light.

‘Aidan,’ Meg said, ‘come and join us. This is Aidan Moore, our most famous tutor and great friend. You’ll know his work. Aidan, perhaps you’ll have met George Palmer-Jones. He’s here to help sort out what happened to James.’

And me, Molly thought. I’m here too. But having showed off her children Meg ignored her throughout the rest of the meal.

The food was served by two cheerful young women who sat together later at the end of the table to eat. They were competent and energetic, the sort of girls, George thought, you’d expect to find running riding stables. Very healthy and fit with strong, red hands.

‘You’ll have to talk to Rosie and Jane,’ Meg said. ‘They run this place between them. Jimmy and I always said that we’d never manage it without them.’

The young women smiled politely. They were not taken in, George thought, by the flattery but were too good-humoured to resent Meg’s patronizing manner. They ladled home-made soup into bowls which they carried deftly round the table on trays. The bread, Meg said proudly, had been baked by them this morning.

As the excellent dinner progressed George found it increasingly difficult to imagine James in this setting. The Jimmy Morrissey he knew had never been able to sit still for the length of a meal. He would jump to his feet between courses and move restlessly around the room, even if he were in a restaurant. In a private home he would pick up objects of interest: a book from a shelf, a photograph, then discard them immediately. He had considered food as a fuel, eating ravenously whatever was to hand if he was hungry. It would not have mattered a jot to him if the bread had been baked that morning or bought from a supermarket the week before.

George listened with detachment to the conversation going on around him. Meg led it all. Without her prompting they would probably have eaten in silence. The talk was of local people, the children’s school work and domestic problems related to the field centre. They really would have to buy in new sheets and towels before the summer, she said as if it were a matter of extreme importance. And if Florrie wasn’t more reliable this year they’d have to consider someone else from the village for the cleaning. She was obviously determined to make a go of the Mill on her own.

James would have been bored to distraction by the subjects under discussion and George wondered if at last he had found a convincing motive for suicide. Perhaps it was triggered by nothing more sinister than the tedium of his life here, the endless family dinners. Then he thought that James had other means of escape. He had never cared much for convention. What had there been to stop him just walking out and leaving Meg to carry on the show alone? Or had his bouts of depression made him too dependent on her to run away?

‘And James?’ George asked, interrupting Meg in full flow. ‘Did he always eat with you?’

‘Of course,’ she said, but at the same time Caitlin across the table broke in with, ‘Not if he could help it!’

It was the first spontaneous statement of the evening and they all stared at her.

‘Well it’s true,’ she said defensively. ‘He hated this kind of thing.’

‘Sometimes he didn’t feel up to it,’ Meg conceded. ‘Since his accident he sometimes felt uncomfortable in a crowd. Then Rosie or Jane took him something on a tray to the flat.’

There was an awkward silence.

‘Is it all right if I go out tonight?’ Caitlin said, taking advantage of her mother’s lack of composure.

‘Where do you want to go?’

‘Rosie and Jane are going to the Dead Dog. They said I could go too.’

There was another silence.

‘You may go,’ Meg said at last, ‘if Ruth will be there too.’

‘Oh, Mum, she’s not my minder!’

‘And no alcohol.’

Caitlin appeared to sulk but she had got her way, and she left the table happily.

After dinner Meg took George and Molly to her flat for coffee. The younger children had been sent to bed. Heavy brocade curtains had been drawn across the large window, and the room was warm.

‘Now,’ Meg said bravely. ‘ George. I expect you’d like to ask me some questions.’

‘Thank you,’ George said. ‘I’m sure Molly and I
both
have questions to ask.’

The dear, Molly thought. He’s learning!

‘Of course,’ Meg said. ‘Of course.’

‘Did James eat with you on the evening of his death?’ George asked. It was a development of the conversation begun in the dining room.

‘No,’ Meg said reluctantly. ‘He decided not to come in to dinner that night. He said he was engrossed in his autobiography. He could see the end of it, he said, and he wanted to crack on until it was done.’

‘So somebody brought him a meal on a tray?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I believe Rosie took dinner to him in his study.’

‘Where is that?’

‘It’s on the ground floor,’ Meg said. ‘As far away from the guests and the family as he could manage.’ She smiled but could not hide her resentment.

‘What time was dinner?’

‘At seven o’clock,’ she said. ‘We always eat at seven so the children can join us.’

‘You and the children ate with the guests as usual?’

She nodded.

‘Did you come back to the flat for coffee?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Aidan was here too. He needed a break occasionally from the students.’

‘But James didn’t join you?’

‘No. I went in to see him after dinner. He seemed preoccupied, excited. He’d hardly touched his meal and when I asked him about it, it was clear he’d forgotten it was there. I asked him to have coffee with us. The study’s close to the front door and rather draughty. I thought he might like to come and get warm by the fire. It was a freezing night. There’d been snow.’

‘But he didn’t come?’

She shook her head. ‘He said: “It’s nearly finished, Meg, and I’m not going to stop until it’s done even if it takes me all night.” So I asked Jane to take him coffee to the study.’

‘Did he drink it?’ Molly asked. ‘Did you find the cup the next day? Was it empty?’

Meg seemed surprised and confused by the question. ‘I’m not sure,’ she said. ‘One of the girls in the kitchen might know.’

‘Do they do the cleaning as well as the cooking?’

‘They supervise,’ Meg said. ‘A couple of women come in from Markham Law for a few hours to do the bulk of the cleaning but I leave the organization to Rosie and Jane.’

How very convenient! Molly thought. It must be much easier to be a wonder mother without having to worry about the cooking and the cleaning.

‘What time was that?’ George asked gently. ‘What time did you ask Jane to take the coffee in to James?’

Meg shrugged. ‘ I’m not sure. Eight thirty. Nine o’clock. I’d read to Emily and Tim and put them to bed.’

‘Did you see your husband again that evening?’ George asked.

She shook her head. ‘ I didn’t want to disturb him,’ she said. ‘He seemed so involved.’ She paused then added hurriedly: ‘ Before I went to bed I walked down to his study. I knew he was there because his light was on but in the end I decided not to go in. He was always accusing me of fussing. I thought he’d be angry if I interrupted. So I came back to the flat and went to bed.’

‘What time was that?’

‘Ten thirty,’ she said. ‘I read for a while, hoping that he might join me then I must have fallen asleep.’

‘Did James have any other visitors that night?’

‘I wouldn’t know,’ she said. ‘ He didn’t mention anyone when I asked about the coffee. Someone might have come to the study later but I don’t think he would have encouraged the disruption.’

‘What about Aidan? Did he spend all evening with you?’

‘Yes. He left at about ten.’

There was a silence. George tried to picture the events of that night. The atmosphere of the Mill must have been very different when it was full of students. Presumably some of them, like Rosie and Jane, must have been tempted to visit the village pub.

‘Was the front door of the Mill left open?’ he asked. ‘Or did the students have their own keys?’

‘It’s locked at midnight,’ Meg said. ‘Usually by Rosie who doesn’t mind staying up late. If a student wanted to be in after that we’d give them a key.’

‘But before midnight anyone could have got in?’

‘Oh yes,’ she said. ‘Anyone in the world.’ She got up from her chair by the fire and filled their cups with coffee.

‘Had James seen anyone earlier in the day?’ George asked. If this was suicide, he thought, something must have triggered it, something must have made that day different from all the rest.

She paused. ‘Grace Sharland, the nurse, came at about three,’ she said at last and added lightly: ‘ James always seemed to find time to talk to her.’

‘That was the woman who encouraged him to write the autobiography?’

‘Yes. Our GP arranged for her to visit when we first moved here. After his accident James had suffered from spells of depression and anxiety and the doctor thought it might help. For some reason James seemed to take to her and she came every month even when he wasn’t feeling particularly low.’

‘Was this one of her regular visits?’

‘No.’ Her voice was even but he sensed her irritation. ‘I was surprised to see her.’

‘Did you ask why she had called?’

‘No,’ Meg said frostily. ‘She made it clear from the start that her interviews with James were confidential. I suppose he must have phoned her. He did that occasionally. I think he liked the attention.’

‘You didn’t ask James why he’d sent for her?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘It never came up.’

George did not believe her. From her attitude it was clear that Ms Sharland had been a subject of contention, an unwelcome intrusion. He thought there would have been arguments. Meg would have wanted to know what the visit was about.