Fox Evil (12 page)

To Mark, for whom the entire issue was a confusing collage of grays, this was an extraordinarily simplistic argument and he wondered what she'd read at Oxford. Something with defined parameters; engineering, he guessed, where torque and thrust had defined limits and mathematical equations produced conclusive results. In fairness, she hadn't heard the tapes, but even so… "Reality is never so black and white," he protested. "What if both sides are lying? What if they're being honest about one thing and lying about another? What if the event they're disputing has no bearing on the alleged crime?" He jabbed a finger at her. "What do you do then… assuming you have a conscience and you don't want to shoot the wrong person?"

"Resign your commission," Nancy said bluntly. "Become a pacifist. Desert. All you do by listening to enemy propaganda is compromise your morale and the morale of your troops. It's
bog-standard
tactics." She jabbed a finger back at him to stress the words. "Propaganda is a powerful weapon. Every tyrant in history has demonstrated that."

Eleanor Bartlett was satisfyingly bullish when Prue phoned to relay the news about travelers in the Copse. She was an envious woman who enjoyed a grievance. Had she been wealthy enough to indulge her whims, she would have taken her grievances to court and been dubbed a "malicious litigant." As she wasn't, she contented herself with destabilizing relationships under the guise of "straight-speaking." It made her generally disliked, but also gave her influence. Few wanted her as an enemy, particularly the weekenders whose absences meant they couldn't guard their reputations.

It was Eleanor who had urged her husband to accept early retirement in order to move to the country. Julian had agreed reluctantly, but only because he knew that his days with the company were numbered. Nevertheless, he had serious doubts about the wisdom of leaving the city. He was content with where he was in life-senior-management level, a decent portfolio on the stock market which would pay for a cruise or two during retirement, like-minded friends who enjoyed a drink after work and a game of golf on weekends, easygoing neighbors, cable television, his children by his previous marriage within a five-mile radius.

As usual, he was overruled by a mixture of silence and tantrums, and the sale four years ago of their modest (by London standards) home on the outer fringes of Chelsea had allowed them to trade up to a more impressive address in a Dorset village where inflationary city prices overwhelmed provincial ones. Shenstead House, a fine Victorian building, lent tradition and history to its owners where 12 Croydon Road, a 1970s construction, had not, and Eleanor invariably lied about where she and Julian had lived before-
"down the road from Margaret Thatcher"
; what his position had been within the company-
"director"
; and how much he had been earning-
"a six-figure salary."

Ironically, the move had proved more successful for him than it had for her. While the isolation of Shenstead, and its tiny resident population, had given Eleanor the status of a large fish in a small pond-something she had always craved-those same factors had made the victory a hollow one. Her attempts to ingratiate herself with the Lockyer-Foxes had come to nothing-James had avoided her, Ailsa had been polite but distant-and she refused to lower herself by befriending the Woodgates or, worse, the Lockyer-Foxes' gardener and his wife. The Weldons' predecessors at Shenstead Farm had been depressing company because of their money problems, and the weekenders-all wealthy enough to own a house in London
and
a cottage by the sea-were no more impressed by the new mistress of Shenstead House than the Lockyer-Foxes had been.

Had Julian shared her ambitions to break into Dorset society, or made more of an effort to support them, it might have been different, but, freed from the shackles of earning a living and bored with Eleanor's criticism of his laziness, he had cast around for something to do. A naturally gregarious man, he homed in on a friendly pub in a neighboring village and drank his way slowly into the agricultural community, unconcerned whether his boon companions were landowners, farmers, or farm laborers. Born and bred in Wiltshire, he had a better idea than his London-born wife of the pace at which things happened in the countryside. Nor, to his wife's disgust, did he have a problem sharing a pint with Stephen Woodgate or the Lockyer-Foxes' gardener, Bob Dawson.

He did not invite Eleanor to join him. Spending time with her and her sharp tongue had made him realize why he had viewed retirement with such reluctance. They had been able to tolerate each other for twenty years because he had been out of the house all day, and it was a pattern he stuck to now. Over a period of months he resurrected his boyhood love of riding, took lessons, reappointed the stable at the back of his house, fenced off half the garden as a paddock, purchased a horse, and joined the local hunt. Through these connections he found satisfactory golfing and snooker partners, enjoyed a sail now and then, and after eighteen months pronounced himself entirely satisfied with life in the country.

Predictably, Eleanor was furious, accusing him of wasting their money on selfish pursuits that benefited only him. She harbored a continuing resentment that they had missed the housing boom by a year, particularly when she learned that their ex-neighbors in Chelsea had sold an identical house two years later for a hundred thousand more. With typical doublethink, she conveniently forgot her part in the move, and blamed her husband for selling out too soon.

Her tongue grew teeth. His redundancy hadn't been that generous, in all conscience, and they couldn't afford to splash out whenever they felt like it. How could he waste money on doing up the stable when the house needed redecorating and recarpeting? What sort of impression would faded paint and shabby carpets make on visitors? He'd joined the hunt deliberately to scupper her chances with the Lockyer-Foxes. Didn't he know that Ailsa supported the League Against Cruel Sports?

Julian, intensely bored with both her and her social climbing, advised her to try less hard. There was no point getting uppity if people didn't socialize the way she wanted, he said. Ailsa's idea of a good time was to sit on charitable committees. James's was to shut himself in his library in order to compile his family's history. They were private people, and they weren't remotely interested in wasting time on trivial chatter or dressing up for drinks and dinner parties. How did he know all this? Eleanor had asked. A chap in the pub had told him.

The Weldons' purchase of Shenstead Farm had been a life-saver for Eleanor. In Prue, she found a bosom pal who could restore her confidence. Prue was the admiring acolyte with a circle of contacts from her ten years on the other side of Dorchester that Eleanor needed. Eleanor was the sophisticated London steel in Prue's backbone that gave her permission to voice her criticism of men and marriage. Together they joined a golf club, learned to play bridge, and went on shopping expeditions to Bournemouth and Bath. It was a friendship made in heaven-or hell, depending on your viewpoint-two women in perfect tune with each other.

Julian had remarked sourly to Dick some months before, during a particularly dire supper party when Eleanor and Prue had ganged up drunkenly to abuse them, that their wives were
Thelma and Louise
going through menopause-but without the sex appeal. The only mercy was they hadn't met earlier, he said, otherwise every man on the planet would be dead-irrespective of whether he'd found the nerve to rape them or not. Dick had never seen the movie, but he laughed nonetheless.

It wasn't surprising, therefore, that Prue distorted the facts when she spoke to Eleanor that Boxing Day morning. Julian's "passing the buck" became "a typical male reluctance to be involved"; Dick's "idiocy in phoning Shenstead Manor" became "a panic reaction to something he couldn't handle"; and the solicitor's "abusive calls" and "slander" became "cowardly threats because James was too frightened to sue."

"How many travelers are there?" asked Eleanor. "It's not a repeat of Barton Edge, I hope. The
Echo
gave a figure of four hundred for that."

"I don't know-Dick went off in a huff without giving any details-but there can't be many or their vehicles would be clogging the street. The traffic jams to Barton Edge were five miles long."

"Did he call the police?"

Prue gave an irritated sigh. "Probably not. You know how he shies away from confrontation."

"All right, leave it with me," said Eleanor, who was used to taking control. "I'll have a look, then ring the police. There's no point wasting money on solicitors before we have to."

"Call me back when you know what's happening. I'm in all day. Jack and Belinda are due this evening… but not till after six."

"Will do," said Eleanor, adding a cheerful "goodbye" before going through to the back porch to find her padded candy-stripe jacket and designer walking boots. She was a few years older than her friend, rapidly approaching sixty, but she always lied about her age. Prue's hips were spreading disastrously, but Eleanor worked hard to keep hers in trim. HRT had kept her skin in good condition for eight years but she was obsessive about keeping her weight down. She didn't want to be sixty; she certainly didn't want to
look
sixty.

She sidled past her BMW in the drive, and thought how much better everything had been since Ailsa died. There was no question who was the leading lady of the village now. The money situation had improved by leaps and bounds. She boasted to Prue about bull markets and the wisdom of investing offshore, while being grateful that her friend was too stupid to understand what she was talking about. She didn't want to answer difficult questions.

Her route to the Copse took her past Shenstead Manor and she paused to fire her usual inquisitive glance up the driveway. She was surprised to see a dark green Discovery parked in front of the dining-room window and wondered who it belonged to. Certainly not the solicitor, who had arrived in a silver Lexus on Christmas Eve, nor Leo, who had driven her around London a couple of months ago in a black Mercedes. Elizabeth? Surely not. The Colonel's daughter could barely string a sentence together, let alone drive a car.

Mark put out a hand to hold Nancy back as they rounded the corner of the house from the garage block. "There's that bloody Bartlett woman," he said crossly, nodding toward the gate. "She's trying to work out who your car belongs to."

Nancy took stock of the distant figure in its pink jacket and pastel ski pants. "How old is she?"

"No idea. Her husband admits to sixty, but she's his second wife-used to be his secretary-so she's probably a lot younger."

"How long have they lived here?"

"Not sure. Three years… four years."

"What did Ailsa think of her?"

"Called her Tokeweed'… common as muck, pokes her nose in where it isn't wanted, stinks to high heaven, and lives in a bog." Mark watched Eleanor move out of sight, then turned to Nancy with a grin. "It's a poisonous plant in America. Gives you headaches and nausea if you're unwise enough to swallow it. Your mother probably knows about it if she's interested in global flora. Ailsa certainly did. It has pretty berries and edible shoots but the root and stem are poisonous."

Nancy smiled. "What did she call Prue Weldon?"

"Staggerbush. A poisonous shrub that affects sheep."

"You?"

He moved out onto the drive. "What makes you think she called me anything?"

"Instinct," she murmured, following him.

"Mandrake," he said dryly.

It was Nancy's turn to laugh. "Was that meant as a compliment or an insult?"

"I was never too sure. I looked it up once. The root is said to look like a man and gives a terrible shriek when it's pulled from the ground. The Greeks used it as both an emetic and an anesthetic. It's poisonous in large doses and soporific in small ones. I prefer to think she looked at my name, M. Ankerton… saw Man… and added drake."

"I doubt it. Pokeweed and Staggerbush are brilliantly evocative, so presumably Mandrake was intended to be, too. Man. Drake." Her eyes twinkled again as she made a deliberate separation between the words. "Doubly macho, therefore. I'm sure it was meant as a compliment."

"What about the poisonous aspect?"

"You're not giving credit to its other properties. It's fabled to have magical powers, particularly against demonic possession. In the Middle Ages people put the roots on their mantelpieces to bring happiness and prosperity to their houses and ward off evil. It was also used as a love potion and a cure for infertility."

He looked amused. "You've got Ailsa's genes as well," he said. "That's almost word for word what she said when I accused her of lumping me in with Pokeweed and Staggerbush."

"Mm," she said coolly, leaning against her car, still indifferent to her genetic heritage. "What did she call James?"

"Darling."

"I don't mean to his face. What was her nickname for him?"

"She didn't have one. She always referred to him as 'James' or 'my husband.' "

She crossed her arms and stared at him with a thoughtful expression. "When she called him 'darling,' did she sound as if she meant it?"

"Why do you ask?"

"Most people don't. It's a term of endearment that means very little… like: 'I love you with all my heart.' If someone said that to me, I'd stick my fingers down my throat."

He recalled how often he'd called women "darling" without thinking about it. "What do you like to be called?"

"Nancy. But I'm happy to accept Smith or Captain."

"Even by lovers?"

"Particularly by lovers. I expect a man to know who I am when he shoves his prick up my fanny. 'Darling' could be anyone."

"Christ!" he said with feeling. "Do all women think like you?"

"Obviously not, otherwise they wouldn't use endearments on their men."

He felt an irrational need to defend Ailsa. "Ailsa seemed to mean it," he said. "She never used it for anyone else… not even for her children."

"Then I doubt James ever lifted a finger against her," Nancy said matter-of-factly. "It sounds to me as if she used names to define people, not reinforce their violence with pretty words. What did she call Leo?"

Mark looked interested, as if her more objective eye had seen something he hadn't. "Wolfsbane," he said. "It's a form of aconite, highly poisonous."

"And Elizabeth?"

"Foxbane," he said with a wry smile. "Smaller… but no less deadly."

Eleanor felt only irritation as she walked toward the barrier and saw a fire smoldering in the middle of the deserted encampment. It was the height of irresponsibility to leave burning wood untended, even if the ground was frozen with ice. Ignoring the "keep out" notice, she put a hand on the rope to lift it, and suffered a pang of alarm when two hooded figures stepped out from behind trees on either side of the path.

"Can we do something for you, Mrs. Bartlett?" asked the one to her left. He spoke with a soft Dorset accent, but there was nothing else to judge him by except a pair of pale eyes that watched her closely over the scarf that covered his mouth.