Shades of Murder (3 page)

‘How do you like the new house now you’re settled in?’ she asked, deflecting him.

Geoff looked round the room as if seeing it for the first time. ‘Fine. It’s what Pam wanted. I find it a bit cramped myself but that’s modern housing for you.’

Pam, passing by with an empty tray, caught the last words. ‘We needed somewhere smaller. The children are at college. The other house was a rambling place and made a lot of work. Some people don’t like these new estate houses but I haven’t got the time to renovate an old place. I know you’ve done up your cottage, Meredith, and very nice it is too, lots of character and all the rest of it. Or it was nice before that unfortunate business which left it vandalised. But I’ve got plenty of other things I want to do outside the home. It’s no use asking Geoff to decorate or fix anything, he was never a handyman. I wanted just to move in, unpack my stuff, and get on with living. Time to move, now or never, that’s what I told Geoff.’

Geoff was nodding at all of this but still had objections up his sleeve. ‘She said she wanted smaller, but now we haven’t got room for everything and Pam won’t throw anything away!’

‘I can’t throw away things the children might want one day,’ said his
wife vigorously. ‘And you won’t part with a single one of your books!’

To Meredith, she added, ‘I admit the rooms did look so much bigger when we saw them empty – but we’ll settle ourselves, given time.’

She vanished into the kitchen with her tray. Meredith, looking round the room, thought how obvious the newness of it all was. It hung in the air in the whiff of wood and fresh paintwork. Even above the smell of food and drink, it was possible to discern that particular odour which clings to new carpets and curtains with its hint of chemicals. Not only had the owners to settle into the house, time would be needed for the house to settle about them.

‘Arsenic!’ said Geoff with a melodramatic leer. Now his wife was out of the way, he’d returned to his pet topic with boomerang inevitability. ‘The great poison of the Victorian age. It was so handy for them. Nearly every household kept a preparation containing arsenic to keep down the vermin which infested even the best houses.’

‘Surely,’ said Meredith, ‘that made it rather obvious?’

‘Not all doctors recognised it,’ said Geoff. ‘Quite a few deaths probably slipped through the net confused with symptoms of medical ailments. Even if the law thought they had a case, proving it was the difficulty.’

‘Nothing changes, then,’ said Alan Markby ruefully.

Geoff seemed not to hear this. ‘As recently as the early 1960s, the notorious Black Widow of Loudun walked free from a French court largely because doubt was thrown on the forensic evidence – and she was accused of having wiped out half her family and a few of her neighbours!’

James Holland’s substantial frame loomed up beside them. ‘Perhaps,’ he said tolerantly, ‘she was innocent.’

‘Perhaps she was,’ Geoff agreed. ‘But a number of people who were hanged for arsenic murders in Victorian times could have been innocent. Arsenic was also commonly used in such things as green dye. If you have a very old book with a green cover, wash your hands after handling it. There is a theory that Napoleon, on St Helena, was slowly poisoned by his green wallpaper.’

This appeared to appeal to Father Holland. ‘Candlelight,’ he said fondly. ‘Gaslight. Hackney carriages. Women in those thumping great crinolines.’

The others stared at him.

‘Victorian melodrama,’ he explained. ‘I love it. All those fog-filled London streets and great gloomy mansions. Throw in a bit of poisoning and I’m hooked.’

‘That’s not what I’d expect from someone in holy orders!’ Markby grinned at him.

‘I like a rattling good yarn,’ said James complacently.

‘Mushroom vol-au-vents? Oh no, Geoff, you’re not still going on about poisons?’ Pam had reappeared with a fresh tray.

‘Books, said Markby quickly. ‘We were discussing our favourite reading.’ He looked past her to a young woman standing just behind her. ‘What about you, Juliet? What do you like by way of light reading?’

The woman addressed moved into their circle. A stranger glancing at her for the first time would probably have judged her much younger than she was. The long braid of fair hair hanging down her back, the round schoolgirl glasses and fresh-complexioned skin embellished with very little make-up all suggested twenty. Only when she spoke and the listener paid closer attention, would he have increased his estimate to thirty. Juliet Painter was, in fact, thirty-four. She wore a three-piece outfit, straight but loose in shades of chestnut brown. The design was simple but, Meredith judged, expensive. The cost lay in the cut and in the material.

‘Don’t read much,’ she said carelessly. ‘Don’t have the time. I wouldn’t read the sort of thing James is talking about, anyhow.’

‘Then you don’t know what you’re missing,’ said James Holland, unperturbed by this put-down. They exchanged grins in the way old friends and sparring partners do.

‘You estate agents too busy to open a book?’ asked Geoffrey, fixing her with a mocking look.

They saw her flush and the snap of anger behind the round lenses. It was echoed in her voice as she replied, ‘I’m not an estate agent, Geoff! I don’t know how many times I’ve told you. Though I shouldn’t need to remind you, you know it perfectly well. I’m a property consultant. I advise people and go house-hunting for them. I have got a talent, if I say so myself, for running down suitable properties, I sometimes go to house auctions and bid on clients’ behalf. I enjoy doing it. I don’t actually flog the houses myself,’ she concluded sharply.

‘Never had a kick-back from an estate agency with a mansion on its hands?’ Geoffrey drained the last of his wine and looked round for somewhere to stand his empty glass.

‘Shut up, Geoff!’ said his wife with even more force than usual.

‘That’s damn near actionable,’ Juliet said savagely, ‘as well as stupid. How could I afford to risk my reputation by recommending an obvious dud? If anyone else had said that to me, I’d sue. Just because you’re my
brother, don’t think you’ll always get away with it, Geoff. One of these days you’ll go too far. You always had a weird sense of humour.’

‘And you, little sister, always rose beautifully to the bait.’

‘Geoff,’ said his wife firmly, ‘people are running out of drinks. It’s time for you to see to the booze.’

Geoff gave them an apologetic look and took himself off to open bottles, his wife in close pursuit.

James Holland chuckled in the depths of his bushy black beard. ‘Something tells me poor old Geoff is getting an earful in the kitchen at this moment.’

‘Poor old Geoff, nothing,’ Juliet Painter retorted. ‘He’s had too much to drink. I wish he wouldn’t keep on about his poisons. It unsettles people – haven’t you noticed? I think Pam has. I always think . . .’ She hesitated. ‘I always think one oughtn’t to talk too much about bad things in case they happen.’

‘Speak of the devil,’ murmured James Holland, ‘and he’ll appear.’

‘That’s right. I expect I sound superstitious, but I’m not.’ Juliet tossed her long fair braid so that it swung to and fro like a horse’s tail flicking away flies.

‘It’s not superstition,’ Alan Markby said. ‘It’s the human subconscious at work, picking up the vibes that tell a person there’s danger ahead. A legacy of our primitive past. Now, where have you been lately, Juliet, or who have you been talking to, that’s resulted in your cavewoman instincts being reawakened?’

‘Don’t,’ she said uneasily.

The door swung open and Geoff reappeared, brandishing a bottle in either hand. ‘Top up? Red or white? I’ve promised to behave myself. Sorry if I upset you, Sis.’

‘You’re an idiot,’ said his sister by way of accepting his apology.

‘You don’t know of someone who wants to rent a house, do you?’ Meredith asked her.

Juliet looked surprised. ‘I always know of people who want to rent. Where’s the house?’

‘Here in Bamford. It’s my place in Station Road – just an end of terrace early Victorian cottage. It’s not the sort of splendid place you usually deal with, but it’s just been completely redecorated and refurnished.’

‘Such a dreadful experience to find your place vandalised like that, as Pam was saying.’ Geoff shook his head in commiseration.

‘Yes, it was.’ Meredith couldn’t keep the revulsion from her voice.

Juliet, only an occasional visitor to the town, asked, ‘What happened? I didn’t hear about this.’

‘Someone didn’t like me,’ Meredith said. ‘She thought I’d done her a bad turn. So she did me a bad turn back.’

‘Scary,’ said Juliet in sympathy.

‘You better believe it. She daubed red paint all over the place and chopped up my clothes. Anyway, since then I’ve been sharing Alan’s place. At first I planned to move straight back in once my house was fit for habitation again, but somehow I don’t fancy it and Alan I have been thinking . . .’ She glanced at Markby.

‘That we might look for somewhere together,’ he said. ‘My place was all right for me on my own. It doesn’t really suit the two of us.’

Meredith thought he sounded just a little defiant, as if people might not believe what he’d said. Those who knew them well had said things like, ‘Thought you two were each too independent,’ or even, ‘It’s taken the pair of you long enough’. With the defiance there was just a touch of satisfaction. He’d got what he wanted. She still didn’t know if it was what she wanted, too.

Juliet eyed them both, business acumen written all over her. ‘What sort of place do you want?’

‘Hang on,’ he protested mildly. ‘Can’t afford your fees.’

‘I wasn’t proposing to charge you a fee. I agree, you probably wouldn’t want to pay me what I’d ask. But I hear of things on the market, you know, surplus to my requirements, or my clients’ requirements. I could drop you the word.’

‘That’s very decent of you,’ he said.

Juliet was staring thoughtfully at Meredith. ‘I’ll let you know about your house. I’d need to have a look at it.’

‘With pleasure. Let me know when you want the key. It’s near the station if anyone wanted to commute, like me, to the Great Wen every day.’

‘Still at the Foreign Office, then?’ asked Juliet.

‘Still stuck there at a desk.’ She was aware of an apprehensive glance from Alan. She wondered if he was still afraid, after all this time, that should some mandarin relent and offer her an overseas posting, she’d take it like a shot, be off.

Would I? she wondered. Is that why I’ve been so unwilling to tie myself into any permanent relationship, even with Alan? He knows, even though we’re at last sharing a roof, that what finally made me move in was my place being rendered temporarily uninhabitable.

Beside her, Alan was fidgeting. He was backed against a bookcase and wedged there by Meredith on one side and James Holland’s bulky frame on the other. ‘Nice to see you down here from the big city,’ he said to Juliet, easing his elbows free.

‘I couldn’t miss the grand house-warming!’ A little ruefully, she added, ‘I also had a business visit to make – to Fourways House.’

‘The Misses Oakley?’ Geoff exclaimed. ‘Don’t tell me one of your wealthy Middle-Easterners wants to live at Fourways and is ready to buy out the Oakley ladies with wads of cash?’

‘No – A Middle-Eastern client wouldn’t look at the place. It’s far too dilapidated. The reason I went there was because Damaris Oakley wrote to me and asked me to call.’

She hesitated. ‘It’s hardly a secret that both Damaris and her sister have been struggling for years. They’ve decided to sell up for whatever they can get and move to a suitable retirement flat, preferably on the ground floor and by the seaside. I admit I did look the place over pretty thoroughly while I was there. Partly to give myself an idea of the sort of money they’d be able to spend on a flat if they sold up, and partly because I did think at first it might suit a client. But not after I’d looked at it.’ She pursed her lips. ‘Frankly, the property is going to be difficult to shift in its present state but they need to sell because it’s the only capital they have.’

‘I expect the gardens are in a mess, too,’ observed Alan Markby, seizing on the aspect of the situation which interested him.

‘Actually, they’re in rather better state than the house. They’ve got an old boy who does the garden for them,
gratis
. It’s his hobby.’

‘Ron Gladstone,’ nodded James Holland. ‘I was responsible for that arrangement. It seems to have worked out well, apart from the odd squabble about whether to put down crazy paving.’

Juliet turned to her brother. ‘The Oakley sisters are an excellent example of the sort of people I can help, Geoff. They don’t own a car, and they wouldn’t have the physical strength to go haring around the country looking at flats. Damaris asked if I would do it for them. I said I would.’

‘No offence,’ said Geoff, who’d learned his lesson at least for the time being, ‘but don’t they need to sell at a reasonable price if they’re to pay your exorbitant fee?’

This time she didn’t react badly. ‘As it happens, I’m not charging them a fee. I’ve known the old ducks all my life, for goodness sake! I ought to be able to fit in looking out for a retirement flat for them with
tracking down property for other clients.’

‘You’re a dear girl,’ said James Holland. ‘It’s very kind of you to give your time to help out the Oakleys.’

‘I am not,’ she said militantly, ‘your dear girl. Or
anyone’s
dear girl! Don’t patronise me, James.’

‘Would I ever?’

‘If you’re interested in Victorian poisonings, James . . .’ Geoff began.

‘You’re going to tell them about the Oakley case, aren’t you?’ Juliet interrupted him. ‘Don’t you think it’s best forgotten?’

‘Ah, the mysterious death of Cora Oakley,’ said Alan Markby. ‘I’m familiar with that one. But I won’t spoil your fun if you want to tell it again.’

‘I don’t know it,’ said James Holland.

‘Nor I,’ added Meredith promptly.

‘It’s a horrible story,’ objected Juliet. ‘Don’t tell it, Geoff, please.’

‘James and Meredith would both be interested,’ said Geoff obstinately. ‘Well, if I can’t tell it, I’ve got copious notes on it, if either of you would like to borrow them. You probably know I plan to write a book on controversial trials one day? When I get the time, if ever. Mind you, I got no help from the family. They let me know in no uncertain terms they didn’t intend to rattle the bones of the family skeleton for me. But it just so happens I unpacked the Oakley research only yesterday. It’s on the desk in the study. Would one of you like to take it with you when you go? I have it all saved on disk.’