Springtime for Murder Read online

  He sighed. “So I’ve left her to sleep it off, and I’ll go back in a while to make her some coffee and a sandwich to get her back on an even keel. She wouldn’t have been no use to her mother in that condition. But I don’t want to go drawing attention to it, so you keep it to yourselves, or else folk will say she’s not fit to be her mother’s carer, and that would break both their hearts. And don’t tell Dr Perkins, whatever you do.”

  Half expecting him to spit on his palm to shake on the deal, I was relieved when he kept his hands in his pockets.

  “We don’t want nothing said against Kitty,” he continued. “Otherwise that bullying brother of hers, Paul, will be putting Bunny in one of his care homes and turning Kitty out on her ear.”

  A creak at the shop door heralded the arrival of Dr Perkins. He marched straight past us to wash his hands at the sink in the tearoom with the thoroughness of a pre-op surgeon and dried them on the nearest tea towel. I made a mental note to put it straight into the laundry basket when he’d gone.

  Then he sat down at an empty tearoom table. “I think I’ve earned a cappuccino, don’t you, Sophie?”

  Billy came over to sit opposite him. “What’s your prognosis for my Auntie Bunny, Doc?”

  “I’ll tell you what I can after my coffee,” said the doctor.

  As I dropped the first capsule into the coffee machine, Hector joined them, while Tommy hovered hopefully nearby, till the doctor spotted him.

  “Tommy, well done for raising the alarm this morning,” he said, and the boy grew taller with pride. “Now, how would you like to do another good deed for the day? Could you fetch that old wheelchair from the churchyard and return it to the Manor House? Don’t go bothering Kitty. Just leave it in the porch. They might need it when Bunny comes home from hospital.”

  The doctor reached into his pocket and pulled out a couple of pound coins. “And here’s some money to buy sweets from the shop. But only once you’ve done it, mind.”

  “Wow, thanks, Doc,” said Tommy, beaming. “You can rely on me.”

  Dr Perkins waited till Tommy had left the shop before continuing. “Patient confidentiality forbids me from telling you the details, but I’m pretty sure Bunny Carter will pull through. She’s made of stern stuff. I have a copy of the paramedics’ report, which I shall drop in to Kitty now. I’m guessing you couldn’t persuade her to leave the house, Billy?”

  Billy’s eyes widened. “You could say that, Doc. You know what she’s like.”

  The doctor sighed. “I do wish she’d drop this silly charade about being agoraphobic so she can visit her mother in hospital. They’re bound to keep Bunny in at least overnight for observation, even if the x-rays confirm my diagnosis that she’s not broken any bones. It’ll take a day or two for the bruising to come out. She’ll probably end up looking as if she’s been in a punch-up.”

  “I’ll drop the report off for you if you like, Doc, to save your legs,” said Billy hastily. “I’m going back up to the Manor House in a minute.”

  The doctor raised his eyebrows. “The paramedics entrusted it to me. It’s my responsibility to deliver it to Kitty as next of kin.”

  He produced the neatly folded report from his inside jacket pocket and held it up as evidence.

  “Patient confidentiality again, I suppose,” I said, hoping to save Billy embarrassment.

  “I’m almost as much her kin as Kitty is,” said Billy. “What’s wrong, is there something on the report that you don’t want me to see?”

  “Nothing, nothing,” replied the doctor.

  “Oh well, don’t rush your coffee, Doc,” said Billy. “No point in hurrying to be the bearer of bad news. Allow the poor woman to remain in blissful ignorance a little longer.”

  He sat back in his chair, clasped his hands behind his head, and began to whistle a leisurely tune.

  “By the way, how did Kitty take the news?” asked the doctor. “Had she realised that Bunny had gone out on her own? But wait, what am I thinking, lingering here over coffee when she may be having a panic attack? I ought to get up there straight away. Delivering the paramedics’ report will give me the excuse I need to call on her.”

  He began to gulp down his coffee, though it must have been too hot to drink comfortably.

  Billy stared. “Don’t you worry, Doc. She was very relaxed when I left her.”

  I nearly choked on my own coffee at his smooth cover-up of Kitty’s incapacity.

  “I’ll be there for the rest of the day, working on her garden,” he continued. “I’ll keep an eye on her.”

  “Yes, but you’re not a medical professional,” said the doctor, scraping back his chair. “I’m only doing my duty. Well, not official duty. I keep forgetting I’ve retired. But if not duty, conscience calls. It’s really no problem. I had nothing else planned today.”

  “What about insurance?” asked Hector, ever practical. “If you’re retired now, are you still insured to practise? Don’t let your kind heart get you into trouble.”

  “Oh, for goodness’ sake, Hector, it’s not as if I’m giving her brain surgery. I’m being little more than a messenger.”

  Billy stood up. “Well, they shoot messengers, don’t they? But I’m family. You give it to me, Doc. If you don’t want me to read it, just put it in an envelope. Hector, you must have envelopes behind that desk of yours, haven’t you?”

  Billy whisked the paramedics’ report from the doctor’s grasp while Hector scurried behind the counter to fetch an envelope. Billy stuffed the report inside it, licked the flap to seal it, and slid it into his trouser pocket.

  “I’ll be off, then. And don’t worry, Doc, Kitty’s younger than both of us. She’ll be fine.”

  The doctor pursed his lips. “After a lifetime in my profession, I can tell you that illness and death are no respecters of age. There’s no pecking order. Life’s not like taking a pleasure boat out on a lake: ‘Come in, number 93, your time is up.’ You know that from the graves you’ve dug over the years, Billy.”

  “More coffee, doctor?” I said brightly, buying time for Kitty as Billy headed for the door. “It’s on the house.”

  5 Ham-Fisted

  As the number of customers dwindled towards lunchtime, Hector put Stravinsky’s Rites of Spring on the sound system and came over to the tearoom to join me for lunch. Just as we started to eat our sandwiches, there came a knock at the shop window. Hector laughed and pointed. Tommy, seated in Bunny’s wheelchair, was waving cheerfully at us as he propelled himself down the High Street in the direction of the Manor House. He was having fun.

  “He makes it look easy,” said Hector, “but Bunny wouldn’t have the strength to do that.”

  I picked up a spoon to stir my coffee. “I’m glad whoever wheeled her down there had the sense to wrap her up in a fur coat. At her age, she’ll feel the cold. But why those ridiculous bunny ears?”

  I passed Hector the spoon.

  “Spring fever? An eccentric old lady’s whim to entertain passing children? She’s very fond of children. Though that doesn’t explain the pink slippers.”

  I waved my hand dismissively. “The slippers don’t need explaining. Old people’s feet swell up easily, and they like comfy slippers. In a wheelchair, she wouldn’t need outdoor shoes.”

  I took a sip of coffee. “Who else helps look after her? Does she have any other carers besides Kitty and Billy? If it was an accident or a domestic dispute, as the doctor seems to think, maybe someone other than Kitty was responsible. A new and inexperienced carer might have persuaded her to go out in the wheelchair for once, but then lost control of it. They might have tipped her into the grave by mistake, then gone to fetch help.”

  Hector took a mouthful of tea. “Not unless they’ve arrived in the last week, since my most recent delivery to the Manor House, or Bunny would have told me about them. And if they went to get help, they took their time about it. And where are they now? Don’t forget Tommy and Sina were playing with the empty wheelchair for some time before they discover
ed the body. It wouldn’t take that long for someone to fetch help.”

  I nodded. “Besides, most people these days carry a mobile phone, so they’d be more likely to ring for help rather than abandoning the poor old soul to fend for herself in a grave.”

  He set down his cup. “And if their phone battery was flat, they could have shouted for help to the next person passing by on the High Street. It’s not as if they were in an isolated spot.”

  I grimaced. “Perhaps they just panicked. If they thought they’d accidentally killed her, they might have run off to hide.”

  Hector picked up the second half of his sandwich. “I suppose one of her other children might have come to see her and persuaded her to take a spin in the wheelchair.”

  “How many children does she have?”

  “About ten, I think, from her three marriages.”

  “Ten children? My goodness!”

  Hector grinned. “How do you think she acquired the nickname Bunny? Endless reproducing in her younger days. My dad told me she was a once bit of a goer.”

  “No wonder she’s too tired to go out now.”

  Hector laughed, then turned more serious. “Sadly, only the two boys from her second marriage, Paul and Stuart, still live locally, and they’re down in Slate Green. I know them to say hello to, but that’s about all. I think they’re the only ones she has any contact with these days, apart from Kitty, the youngest. A few of the others emigrated to Australia, and the rest are scattered about the country.”

  “My goodness, how awful to have such a large family, but lose so many one way or another.” As an only child, I could barely imagine her sense of loss. “What about the husbands? Are they all dead?”

  “I hope so, because they’re all buried in the churchyard. If you want chapter and verse on them, ask Joshua. He and Bunny are about the same age. They probably went to school together.” He put the remains of his sandwich on his plate for a moment. “Nice ham, this.”

  I popped a stray sliver into my mouth. “I know, I keep thinking about going vegetarian, but every time I see Carol’s lovely ham in the village shop, I postpone the idea.”

  “Bunny’s just gone vegetarian, and made Kitty do it too, though I got the impression Kitty wasn’t keen.”

  “How do you know that?” I asked.

  “Bunny asked me to take a very expensive vegetarian cookery book round to her a few months ago. I had to order it in specially. The shop does well out of Bunny Carter, considering she never sets foot in it.”

  I swallowed hastily, not wanting to speak with my mouth full. “But if they’re both vegetarians, what on earth was Bunny doing wearing a fur coat?”

  Hector stared at me. “Good God, you’re right. Bunny is vehement about animal cruelty, and her vegetarianism is only the tip of the iceberg. On her kitchen table are piles of letters from every animal charity imaginable. She told me she doesn’t open most of them as she can’t bear to read about animals suffering, or to see the horrific pictures. She just keeps sending money to the charities in the hope of making it stop.”

  I frowned. “So Bunny would never wear a fur coat . Perhaps it was someone’s idea of a practical joke.”

  “A cruel one in appalling taste,” said Hector.

  “If it wasn’t her fur coat, I wonder whose it was?” As I spoke, I remembered noticing a dry-cleaning label attached to the sleeve with a safety pin. I kicked myself for not checking the name, but at that point I’d assumed it to be her own. “Poor Bunny. Why would anyone want to be so unkind to an innocent old lady?”

  Hector grinned. “Being an old lady doesn’t make you innocent. She’s got up to all sorts of mischief in her time, playing her children off against each other something rotten. For example, she’s refused to tell Kitty what’s in her will. She was just as much a tease to her three husbands, too.”

  “Oh my! Not all at once, surely? Or do you mean she was a bigamist? Or is it a trigamist, if you’ve got three husbands at once?”

  He laughed. “No, she only married one at a time, and each died of natural causes. So don’t go jumping to any conclusions about her being a serial husband-assassin, although rumour has it the second and third were lined up on a promise before their predecessor was cold. She married each of them within months of being widowed.”

  “She was probably keen to secure a provider for her growing brood of children,” I said. “Women had to be more pragmatic about marriage in those days.”

  I recalled the wizened figure swamped by the fur coat, trying to picture what she must have looked like when she was young and beautiful.

  The door swung wide open, and a babble of eager voices filled the shop as a family of regular customers entered. The four children scurried to different age-appropriate shelves, and the mum to the historical fiction section, while the dad sauntered over to our table to catch up with Hector.

  “Back to work,” said Hector cheerfully, as he pushed back his chair and got up to speak to him. “Hi, Hugh, I’ve got just the book for you – a stunning collection of aerial views of the mountains of the world. The Battersby rep brought in a copy this morning.”

  Hugh’s dark eyes lit up. “That blonde woman who was in here last week when I came in? The one who brings you presents.”

  Hector grinned. “The very same. She is lovely, isn’t she?”

  Hugh winked at him. “She must be keen if she visits you on a Saturday. Going for the more mature type now, are you?”

  Hector let that comment go unremarked. “Now, let me find that book for you,” he said, leaving me to clear away our lunch things.

  So, the Battersby rep was some gorgeous blonde, was she? And while most reps visited quarterly or monthly at most, her visits had become weekly, and in her own time at weekends? No wonder Hector had been so keen to get me out of the shop when she was due earlier that morning. The previous Saturday morning he’d despatched me to the Post Office to post a parcel. I’d wondered why we’d started stocking so many of Battersby’s huge, colourful coffee-table books, far beyond the unit price of our average sale. Hector had slapped a ‘£10 off RRP’ sticker on every one, so they wouldn’t have been making us much profit. Perhaps he was just trying to shift the stock quickly to give the rep an excuse for another visit.

  I gazed down at my half-eaten sandwich. Suddenly I’d gone right off ham.

  6 Cousinly Love

  I’d decided to continue my enquiries after work with a strategic call on my next-door neighbour, Joshua, but I didn’t need to wait that long for more gossip about Bunny. As I walked home past the village shop just after five, Carol beckoned me inside.

  “I’ve been hearing all day long about this business with poor Bunny Carter,” she hissed before I’d even closed the door behind me. “What a palaver! And wearing my Easter bunny ears, too. She’s my cousin, you know. Admittedly a very distant cousin, but some kind of relation. I don’t know where she got those ears from. Certainly not from me. Whatever was she thinking at her age?”

  “It does seem a bit odd, even for Wendlebury.”

  When she shot me a reproving look, I realised I needed to live longer in the village to gain licence to make fun of it. After all, I’d only moved in the previous summer. Some days it felt like much longer.

  “Maybe someone was trying to frame you,” I said in jest. “Everyone in the village would recognise those ears as your handiwork.”

  Carol was not amused. “Why would anyone suggest I’d be so cruel to poor Bunny?”

  “Rich Bunny, actually,” said a voice from the back of the shop. It was Bob, the policeman who lived a few doors up from Hector’s House. “She’s got to be pretty rich living in that big house. She inherited it from her third husband, and everyone said he was loaded. My mum said that’s why Bunny married him, to get a big house for all her kids.” He spoke without malice or envy, just as a statement of record.

  “You make her sound like the old woman who lived in a shoe,” I said.

  He grinned. “Apparently she was a
bit, when they all lived at home with her. But it’s a fabulous house. There’s plenty of people who’d like to get their hands on it when she passes. Like Paul, for a start.”

  “Bunny’s son, Paul?” Encouraging a serving police officer to gossip felt naughty, but I told myself I was only establishing the facts.

  “One of her sons. He’s got his own building company and also runs care homes for a living, develops and builds them, too. It’s no secret that he’s got his eye on the Manor House to add to his empire when his mother dies. Not that it’ll necessarily go to him. Bunny likes to keep people guessing about who she’s leaving it to.”

  Carol put one hand to her cheek in thought. “Wendlebury could do with a care home. Then the old people wouldn’t have to leave the village when they get too inert to look after themselves.”

  “You mean infirm,” I corrected her gently. “It would save them having to depend on the next generation, too.” Carol had spent her prime looking after her ailing mother at home. “I don’t know what it’s like on the inside, but from the outside it looks as if it would make an excellent care home, after a bit of tarting up. It seems a bit run down.”

  “Yes, but not while Bunny’s still in it,” said Carol. “Paul shouldn’t be pushing her out of it for the sake of his business interests.”

  “I’ve heard she doesn’t make best use of it,” said Bob, coming to join us and placing his shopping on the counter – his usual essentials: a four-pack of lager, a bag of dry-roasted peanuts and a large bar of chocolate. “I see Paul in Slate Green occasionally, when I’m at work, and we’ve had the odd pint together. He told me that Bunny and Kitty hardly use any of the rooms, and the rest of it is falling down about their ears. I can see his point of view. He’s offered to do it up and give her and Kitty a room each, and all their needs would be catered for – meals, laundry, entertainment.”

  “Kitty’s not old enough to be in a care home yet, surely?” I’d pictured her as a young woman, but if Bunny was Joshua’s contemporary, even as her youngest child, Kitty could be around retirement age.