03 - Murder in Mink (16 page)

Susan finished breathlessly. Clara couldn’t express how
angry she was feeling at that moment, thinking of the Reverend Draper standing
up in church giving his sermons. Knowing all the time he had sent girls to that
rat-hole of a place to experience a travesty in the name of medical help. Susan
was clearly not aware of the implications of the matter, did not know how close
she had come to taking a most appalling risk with her life. Clara was well-read
and not just newspapers, but the reformist journals and medical works. She
liked to think herself politically aware and she had read about illegal
abortion parlours and the horrors that occurred in them. Many women did not
survive an abortion. Though she had never seen a victim personally she had
heard stories from the other nurses when she had worked in the hospital during
the war. Some of them had seen girls ravaged by infection, or just bleeding to
death before their eyes. It was horrible and this vicar was participating in
such a crime? And taking money for it?!

“Clara, you are very quiet?”

Clara let out a long breath.

“I’m very glad you walked away Susan, so very glad.” She
clutched Susan’s hand tightly, “I will do all I can to help you through this,
but you must be honest with your father. There really is no other option.”

“He’ll be angry.”

“Then he will get over it.”

“And if he doesn’t?”

Clara paused.

“You shall come and stay with me in Brighton. You shall
have the baby and then we can decide on what you want to do.”

“I’ll have no money!” Susan started to pull at her hanky
again.

But she would have money, thought Clara, because Eustace
had said as much. He had made sure Susan and the other children were secure for
the future. But she couldn’t say that aloud.

“I’m sure we can arrange something.” She said instead.

Before she could offer Susan more comfort there was a
furious knock on the door and Glorianna burst in.

“There you are Clara! There is a police constable at the
door saying he is to see you, why is he here?” Glorianna was frazzled, the
morning was going exceptionally badly and now there was a policeman on her
doorstep, “Did you ask him to come?”

Clara got up from Susan’s bed and ushered Glorianna out
of the room, to preserve her stepdaughter’s privacy.

“It is nothing to worry over Glorianna, I told the
inspector I had been thinking over the case of the unfortunate Shirley Cox and
had created a list of ideas on the matter. He was too busy to listen over the
phone so he said he would send a constable over to pick up my notes. I fear he
is humouring me again.” Clara gave a self-deprecating smile, she was becoming
perturbed by how easily she lied to people these days.

“Is that all?” Glorianna was pulling at her fingers
agitatedly, “Nothing to do with Eustace?”

“Eustace?” Clara put on a perplexed expression.

“Oh, listen to me, I am being so silly. The last few days
have wrecked my nerves. Of course it is nothing to do with Eustace, of course.
It’s just with those men coming to collect his body and the room in a mess and
I can’t find the jug.”

Clara looked innocent.

“Jug? What jug?”

“The glass pitcher Eustace had by his bedside. I was
seeing that the room was tidy and the jug is gone. How can it have gone? It is
always in that room. I asked the servants and none of them know anything about
it.”

“Perhaps someone else took it.” Clara offered.

“Why? No one would take it.”

“There was a little water left in it. Perhaps Hogarth needed
a drink after the shock of seeing his brother that way and took the pitcher to
his room?”

Glorianna’s eyes looked ready to stand out from her head.

“Oh no, he wouldn’t do that? Would he?” She suddenly
turned and ran off to her room.

Clara headed for the stairs musing on what she had just
seen and heard. A non-suspicious mind would think the shock had turned
Glorianna’s head and had her running about after inconsequential things. Clara
did not have a non-suspicious mind. Instead she believed she had seen the
fumbled panic of a guilty conscience. And that was very worrying indeed.

Clara found the police constable idly kicking his heels
in the hall.

“Come with me.” She motioned with her hand and led him
towards the back of the house. For the first time she was rather relieved the
family had ensconced herself and Tommy in bedrooms on the ground level. It
meant they were out of sight of the main bedrooms and, for the moment at least,
a safe distance from the family.

Clara unlocked the door to her room and headed inside.
The constable hovered on the threshold. Clara motioned with her hand again, but
he shuffled from foot to foot and glanced anxiously about. This was no time for
worrying about manners. Clara grabbed his arm and dragged him into the room.

“It’s not right miss!” The poor constable squeaked as she
pulled him away from the door and shut and locked it behind them.

“No time for propriety now!” Clara hissed at him,
listening for anyone nearby, “A murder has taken place!”

“Murder?” The constable was as perplexed as ever and
wondering desperately why the sergeant had to pick him to come to the house.

“I’ve gathered two vital clues which I think need
examining.” Clara had left the pitcher and jar on a chest of drawers, out of sight
from the window, “You need to take them both back to the inspector at once.”

The constable looked at the large pitcher and his face
fell.

“But I came on my bicycle.”

Clara resisted the urge to groan. It should not be this
hard to get evidence to the police. She frowned at the policeman.

“Do you have a basket?”

“No.” He was rather sheepish under her stern stare.

“Well how are you going to get these to Jennings?”

The constable gave a small shrug. Clara was just about to
give in to her frustration when she heard the front bell ring again.

“Wait! Quickly, who would the doctor send to collect a
body?”

“Undertakers, they have the hearse.” The constable
shrugged again as if it was obvious.

“Even if he wanted to conduct a post-mortem?”

The constable nodded as if to say ‘who else?’

“Is the hearse motorised or horse-drawn?”

“Horses. Miss, if I can’t help you…”

“But you can. We shan’t send you back by bicycle.”

“We shan’t?” The constable felt his anxiety peaking
around this strange woman who spoke fast and seemed full of odd ideas.

“You will return in the hearse, then you can carry the
jug and jar.”

“I shall not!” The constable was horrified, “That’s for
dead people!”

“Constable, a crime has been committed here, I am sure of
it. You must bring this vital evidence to the inspector it is your duty and if
that means riding in a hearse then I am afraid that is how it must be.”

The constable grimaced and tried to make one last
desperate stand.

“I have a thing about dead people.”

“You’re a policeman!” Clara gasped at him in exasperated.

“Well yes, but you don’t get many dead people around
here.” The constable scratched at his head, “Do I really have to ride in a
hearse?”

Clara looked at the unfortunate young man, she supposed
he could be no more than twenty or twenty-one, very boyish still in his
manners. He probably hadn’t been with the police long and had spent most of his
time on the thankless task of ‘walking the beat’. What little crime they had
around the area would be petty stuff, burglaries, fake postal orders, nothing
particularly messy. The constable was green about police work and very new to
the idea of murder.

“Yes, I’m afraid you do.”

He gave a little sigh, but conceded defeat.

“All right miss, what should I do?”

“Go around the side of the house and come to this window.
I shall pass you the jug which we must avoid being seen by the family at all
costs. I shall bring the jar myself. Wait for me by the hearse.”

The constable gave a nod and she let him out the door.
Clara waited impatiently for him to appear at the window, wasting the time by
tearing some cotton tape-ties from the edge of a pillow case and using that to
secure the cloth over the glass jug. It wouldn’t prevent the water leaking out
if there was an accident, but it might catch the strange grains lurking at the
bottom. Besides, it helped to conceal the pitcher.

Overhead she could hear thumping about in Eustace’s
bedroom. They were trying to negotiate his large girth onto a stretcher by the
sounds of it. She wished the constable would hurry.

She was just ready to go out and look for him when the
policeman gave a light rap on her window. She pulled up the sash and smiled at
him.

“Take this carefully, but be quick.” She handed him the
pitcher and watched as he carried it gingerly back around the house. Then she
snatched up the jar and holding it low in her hands hurried for the door.

In the hall she was confronted with the sight of four men
trying to wrestle Eustace’s corpse down the staircase. The weight and height of
the man was making it difficult, though they were all robust individuals
themselves. Transporting the body was proving very tricky. The man clutching
the bottom corner of the stretcher stepped too far to the right and Eustace
thudded into a picture hanging on the wall. Glorianna was just behind the men
and gave a little shriek.

“Be careful!”

Clara spotted her and made a dash for the door. She saw
the hearse – unadorned for the time being, the horses without their usual gay
apparel – and went around to the far side. Putting the vehicle between herself
and the house. The driver was sitting on his seat at the front; an older man
whose days of heavy lifting were behind him. He glanced at Clara curiously.

“Would you mind ever-so giving a policeman a lift in your
hearse?” Clara asked, “It is very urgent.”

The driver was about to open his mouth when the constable
appeared from the side of the house.

“This constable, in fact.” Clara gestured to him as he
drew beside her.

The driver eyed the policeman suspiciously.

“Why?”

“Vital evidence needs to be carefully escorted to the
station.” The constable spoke before Clara could, making her smile, “This is
police business, I hope you understand? Might I ride in the back of your
hearse?”

The driver turned his head and gave a long look at the
vehicle behind him, as if it might have an opinion of its own, then he turned
back to the constable and gave a shrug.

Eustace had arrived at the front door, but there was
apparently a problem negotiating him outside. Clara was relaxing a little as
the drama of the moment seemed past. She moved to the edge of the hearse and
peered round, watching the proceedings at the door. It occurred to her, in that
moment, that death was a very undignified state of affairs. There was lots of
talk about respecting the dead, honouring them and doing what one could to
ensure they were well looked after, but somehow it never really worked. At the
end of the day a body had to be moved from a building, several stone of dead
weight had to be dragged out and carried. That was awkward in itself, like
man-handling a wardrobe down a flight of stairs; there was no way of doing it
without it seeming something of a shambles. It seemed until you were in your
coffin dignity had to lay sway to practicality.

The police constable came and stood behind her.

“Is he the one you think was murdered?” He asked.

“Yes.”

“And the pitcher?”

“Full of poison, I fear.”

Clara watched the men struggling with Eustace another
moment and then had a thought. She glanced at the constable.

“Do you know much about Reverend Draper?”

“Not a lot. We don’t go to church, not since my dad came
back from the trenches.” The constable answered simply.

“Have you heard anything about him?”

The constable narrowed his eyes and looked at her,
curious.

“Well, he’s a vicar. I hear he does, you know,
reverend-things.”

Clara let the matter drop. The constable was too young to
yet understand the value of gossip in an investigation, nor to appreciate why a
policeman never take anyone at face value.

Eustace was finally squeezed out the door and the
wheezing men humped him to the hearse and slid him inside. Just as they were
done Clara held up a hand for them to pause before closing the doors. The
constable hesitated, then hoisted himself into the back of the hearse. The men
from the undertakers were unfazed, it was a strange part of working with death
day in and out that life stops surprising you. They took the introduction of a
live person into their hearse as just another example of the oddities of
mankind and went to find a place next to and behind the driver.

Clara handed her jar to the constable. His eyes had
fallen on the corpse, considerately covered with a large bedsheet but still
obviously there. Any pretence of the policeman’s authority he had managed
before the hearse driver was now gone, the constable was trembling slightly sat
next to a dead body. Clara felt sorry for him.

“Now constable, I have entrusted you with a vital task.”
She said, distracting him temporarily, “A murder is one of the most serious
crimes and can’t be left unchallenged. You have the responsibility of bringing
in the evidence that might just catch the killer. Inspector Jennings, I am
sure, will be impressed and the accolade it will bring to you might even mean
promotion.”

A flicker of hope buoyed in the constable’s eyes.

“Promotion?”

“Yes, but as we all know police-work is a business full
of ups and downs. Sometimes the ups can only come after a down.” Clara
refrained from nodding at the corpse of Eustace, but she felt he was getting
her message, “A policeman isn’t made by the number of hours he marches on the
beat, but by the risks and discomfits he endures to ensure a criminal is
brought to justice.”

The constable was listening keenly.

“Promotion.” He whispered to himself again.

Clara patted his sleeve.

“I’ll bring your bicycle back to the station myself.”
Then she stood back from the hearse and before he had too much time to think
about his plight she closed the back doors with a clunk.

The driver gave her a look like the ones old and weary
cattle give to a stranger in their field, deciding whether they are worth the
energy to worry about. Then he clicked his reins and the horses started off,
quickly rising to a fast trot, beautifully in time with one another. Clara was
enjoying the sense of relief that the calamity was out of her hands (for the
moment) when she turned and looked straight at Glorianna.

“Did that policeman go off in the hearse?” Glorianna
snapped.

Clara wondered how astute the woman was, how much had she
glimpsed?

“He came over a little queer.” Clara lied quickly, “Sort
of… faint.”

“What was he carrying?” Glorianna pressed.

“Oh, only a bowl. The driver refused to take him unless
he had one. He didn’t like the idea of him being ill in the back of the hearse.
I’m sure he’ll be fine.”

Glorianna gave Clara a hard look, it seemed she was
boring into her skull and reading her thoughts. Then she turned abruptly and
marched into the house. Clara let her breath out slowly. Had Glorianna rumbled
her? She couldn’t be sure, but she was going to be much more careful about what
she ate and drank over the next few days.

Clara went and leaned against the front wall of the
house, fanning herself lightly with one hand. It was a new experience having a
murder occur under the very roof she, herself, was sleeping under. There was a
lot to think about, perhaps too much. She glanced down at the bicycle, what a
bother she had to deliver that back. She would have to cart it all the way into
town, unless…

Clara stared at the bicycle a little longer. She had to
go see the vicar, not a far walk if he was at the church, but then she needed
to get into town as fast as possible. Perhaps as fast as if she was on a bike?
Pushing herself away from the wall Clara went to find Tommy.

Within a few minutes they were both outside the gates of
the Campbells’ house looking at the policeman’s bicycle. It was black and a
little rusty in places, but Clara had tried the brakes and they seemed
sufficient. Tommy had a slight smirk on his face.

“A bicycle, Clara?”

“I took my cycling proficiency at school when I was
thirteen.” Clara answered curtly.

“You didn’t pass though.”

Clara glared at her brother.

“Do you intend to help me or don’t you?”

“I’m not sure its right to unleash you into the world on
a bicycle.”

“If you won’t help...”

“Oh don’t be so sensitive.” Tommy wheeled himself forward
a bit, “Do you remember the basics?”

“Most of it.” Clara gave the brakes another experimental
squeeze, “It’s the mounting I’m having trouble with.”

“Well for a start its left foot on the left pedal, that’s
it. Now push off with the right foot and when you have a little momentum going
swing over the right leg.”

Clara gave herself a short thrust forward, testing the
balance of the bike as her foot briefly left the ground. She wobbled
dangerously.

“A little more speed!” Tommy called.

That was all Clara needed, she was already working out
the best places to fall over should she need to. The hedge looked a good
option, soft and springy, could prevent any nasty injuries. The bicycle wheeled
on quite happily, going at a steady speed, but Clara was having trouble
relinquishing the ground from beneath her right foot.

“Clara, get your leg over!” Tommy yelled loudly.

Clara was mortified by the shout, the phrase had so many
coarse connotations and she couldn’t help thinking that someone might have
overheard. But oddly it also distracted her from being off-balance and, hardly
giving it a thought, she lifted her right leg and mounted the bicycle. A wave
of relief and delight came over her. The last time she had ridden she had been
wearing a long schoolgirl’s skirt and she remembered the tense moment of
apprehension that she wouldn’t be able to swing her leg in the confines of her
clothes. But the years had moved on. Her skirt was shorter and her movement
freer. Clara suddenly realised she was riding a bicycle.