Small Town Secrets (Some Very English Murders Book 2) (8 page)

She nodded, and told him what she knew of the urban
exploration he had been doing. Drew’s eyes widened. “Do you think it’s linked?”

“Perhaps. But there’s also angry Eric from the camera
club.”

“What did they argue about?” Drew asked.

“I think about Warren and Eric’s daughter Nina, and how
Warren would have been his usual overbearing self, but that’s only a gut
feeling. You know what Warren was like with women, though.”

“No, not really. What was he like?”

Penny stared at Drew, open-mouthed. “Everyone knew! He was
horrible. He came on to everyone.”

“Did he?”

“Oh.” Penny realised that Drew simply wouldn’t have known
that. After all, Warren wouldn’t have made a pass at him. “Well, yes, he did.
He was well known for it. He did it to me. And he would always get really angry
when women turned him down. He had this old-fashioned idea about men being in
charge, but it went deeper than just courtesy and good manners. He didn’t think
a woman ought to refuse a man a date.” She shivered.

“Oh, one of
them
. A man with a sense of
entitlement,” Drew said. “I’ve met a few of those in my time. Yes, it fits with
what little I knew of Warren. Did he ever force himself on women, though?
Properly … you know what I mean. Forcing sort of force.”

“No. To his credit, he did not. Or at least … not to
anyone’s knowledge. So, maybe…”

Drew stood up, and studied her face for a moment. “You’ve
got a problem, then,” he said. “You didn’t like Warren, did you?”

“Nope.”

“Don’t let that cloud your judgement. Maybe he pressed
himself on Eric’s daughter, and maybe he didn’t. Would that be enough for Eric
to kill him? Don’t project your own … uh, well, dreams … onto Eric. It’s not
that I am saying you wanted to kill Warren yourself, but …”

“No, I understand. Come on. It’s actually getting chilly in
the shade. You said we were coming out onto the fields soon?”

“This way.”

Soon they were at the edge of the woods, and looking down
from a high ridge over a vast, open field. There were no hedges or borders; it
was just crops, and at the far horizon was a low-flying wide-winged aircraft.

“What’s that spraying?” Penny asked in alarm.

“Pesticides, most likely, and no, you’re not going to die
from it.”

She was sceptical but kept her thoughts to herself. She
looked down at the field margin. “I thought the weeds were dying from lack of
water,” she said. “It’s so dry.”

“Just wait until some of the fields get harvested and
ploughed. The wind will come and whip up the dust into great clouds. Sometimes,
we get red Saharan sand dumped on us too; everyone’s cars will be coated in it.
Keep an eye on the sky and get your washing in!”

“Really?” One minute it was black flies coating her bed
sheets, and the next it was going to be red sand? Lincolnshire was weird.

“Yup, really,” Drew said. “I’ll take you out one day, out
onto the fens properly. You can see the dust clouds from miles away as they
move over the land.”

“I thought the fens were all boggy.”

“They were,” he explained, “and they still are, in places.
But the peat areas have shrunk as they have been drained and farmed, and now
much of it is below sea level. I’ll show you the networks of pumping stations
and drains that keep the fields from flooding.”

“I cannot think of anything less exciting than a trip
around some pumping stations and drains,” Penny said dryly.

Drew huffed. “Well, you just don’t appreciate our local
history. There are some interesting buildings out there. You know, for your
urban exploration stuff.”

“I’m sorry. I’m teasing. I’m only getting into urbex to try
and find out more about what Warren got up to, anyway. Oh! Look at that plant.
Hang on. I want to photograph that. What is it?”

“Bindweed, that’s all,” Drew said as she hunkered down and
started to scroll through the camera’s settings. Where was the “amazing flower”
setting? “Macro” would have to do, she decided.

“It’s really architectural,” she said, zooming in on the
curling strands.

He stepped backwards to move his shadow out of the way of
her shot. “I designed some gates for someone once, all based on bindweed. It
worked quite well, as it happens.”

Probably better than her photography, she thought. “Are you
still going to keep your hand in, with the blacksmithing?”

“I think I ought to. Now it’s not my main income, I enjoy
it again, too. Not the farrier stuff – no, I never got on with being at the
stampy end of a horse. Or indeed the bitey end. But I do like ornamental
ironwork. I’ve got a job on at the moment, out of the blue, and it’s fun.”

“Really? What are you doing?”

“Well, the situation itself isn’t fun,” Drew said. “There’s
an old chap in a house on the far side of Upper Glenfield, and he’s being
harassed, so I’ve been putting up a decorative pole that he can have CCTV at
the top of. He has a lovely garden and didn’t want to wreck it with some
horrible, functional security system.”

“Oh … Cath told me about someone who was being subjected to
harassment. This must be the same man. Ron? Rod?”

“Reg. Reg Bailey. He’s a military-sounding old stick, very
formal and proper and severe, but he’s nice. You know exactly where you stand
with Reg.”

Penny gave up on the photography, and stood up again. “What
sort of harassment is it?” she asked.

Drew sighed with disgust. “It’s really minor but irritating
vandalism. You know I said his garden was lovely? So they dug holes in it. They
egged his garage door. Cut down his bulbs just as they flowered in spring and
arranged the stems on his front lawn to spell out a rude word. Which wasn’t
even spelled correctly.”

Penny was appalled. “How long has it been going on?”

“Apparently, years, but it has been escalating lately. He
was too ashamed to tell anyone for a long time.”

“That’s sick.”

“I know,” Drew agreed. “Because although no threats have
been made, there’s always that worry, isn’t there? How far will the perpetrator
go? And why? He confessed to me that he was beginning to feel vulnerable, and
that’s not like Reg. It takes a lot to make a man like that even admit to
feeling that way.”

Penny shivered. She remembered the other case that Cath had
mentioned, about the young girl in Lincoln who was also being watched. Maybe it
was just some crush from a classmate.

But what if it wasn’t?

What if it was linked?

“I wonder how much stalking actually goes on,” she said.

“Lots, I’d imagine. I just don’t think it gets reported,”
said Drew. “Although I bet most of it is online.”

She turned away. She’d had three messages to her online
dating profile already, but she hadn’t replied to any of them.

After all, she’d only made the profile so she, herself,
could stalk someone.

Stalking a dead man. Her flesh rose in goose-bumps. “Shall
we move on?” she said.

Penny was in a light-hearted and hopeful mood for the rest
of Thursday. Drew went off to plan some “edible wild plant” sessions, and Penny
went home to walk Kali. Then, after her evening meal, she settled down with her
laptop on the sofa next to her, and her dog at her feet. The room was slowly
darkening and she had one lamp lit in a corner, casting a soft glow.

She felt at home, a feeling that had been growing slowly
since she had left London, and it was nice.

She logged in to her email and deleted all the spam. There
was a brief message from her parents; they had landed back in the UK for a few
weeks, but were planning on visiting Estonia at some point. She smiled.

There was also a returned email.

Francine.

Penny chewed her lip. Her old London friend had been the
only one to stay in touch when she left the capital, and she’d even visited
Penny just after she’d moved from London. Though they’d not been close when
working together, since Penny retired, she’d valued their friendship more. Yet
for the past few weeks, Penny had been unable to contact Francine. At first
she’d assumed that Francine was busy – perhaps working away on location. But
the email had bounced back as “undeliverable” and that was concerning.

She’d have to call her, but she’d leave it until the
weekend in case Francine was simply out of the country and had let her email
inbox somehow fill up.

She hovered over a notification from the dating website;
apparently, Shaun71 wanted to send her a message. Did she want to go and look
at Shaun71’s profile? She decided not yet, no.

She spent an hour sprucing up her own website which she’d
been developing since she started her tiny crafts business. She uploaded some
of her better photographs and was pleased with how they looked. Framed and
arranged, all in a line, she began to see what worked and what didn’t. She felt
proud when she surveyed what she had already achieved.

It was a shame that a handful of the other local craft
workers didn’t seem so pleased. She’d been all but cold-shouldered at the last
fair, but that was the fault of the organisers. They knew how many fabric artists
were coming; surely it had been unfair to let so many attend, with similar
products. As the new person on the scene, Penny had been ostracised by the
well-established fibre and textile artists on nearby tables.

Still, she’d made contacts with a picture-framer who could
source local wood and create the right sort of frames for her stencilled
images, and a friendly spinner had exchanged details and brought her a cup of
tea when she’d appeared to be flagging.

And she’d made a fair amount of money, too.

The website looked fine, she decided.

Feeling even more buoyed by that success, she opened Facebook,
and found she had been accepted into the local urbex group. One of the admins, “Lee
Lincsurbex”, sent her a brief welcome message and outlined the rules of the
group.

Lincsurbex, she thought, staring at it. Oh – that’s not his
real name. As she glanced down the list of sixteen members, she saw that the
majority of them had fake-looking names. What were they all so paranoid about?
Or was it all part of the mystique, she wondered. They were playing at being
secretive and edgy.

Lee’s message also urged her to share her photos into the
group albums. She felt she had to prove her credentials, so she flicked through
her digital folders and found four images that could be considered “urban
exploration.” She doctored them a little in a digital editing software program,
and then tentatively uploaded them.

Like, like, like – three notifications popped up in quick
succession and she grinned to herself. “Not bad” commented someone calling
themselves “Blue Foryou.”

“Thank you” she typed back, adding a smiley face.

Then it went quiet for a bit. She decided to introduce
herself in the group, and so she posted, “Hi, thanks for the add. New to the
area. Hoping to explore and meet some of you soon.”

Penny’s back was aching from the rather un-ergonomic
posture she was sitting in, so she got up and stretched, and decided to make
herself a cup of tea while she was up. When she got back to the laptop, her
heart flipped in excitement.

She had been invited out.

That night.

By the urbex group.

* * * *

Penny’s hands were shaking as she tried to zip up her black
anorak. She had dashed upstairs and changed into dark clothing, grabbing her
camera and leaving the house before she really allowed herself time to think
about what she was doing, and before Kali was alerted to the possibility of a
new adventure. Kali was always excited if there was the suggestion of anything
novel.

Penny was usually excited at first … until she let rational
good sense kick in, as it began to when she left the house.

Still, the police were right, Penny thought. She was able
to go places that they could not. She had to take this chance. She had to prove
Detective Inspector Travis’s confidence in her was well-founded.

She knew she should tell someone before she went out. Drew?
He might not understand, she thought. Cath? She’d be concerned.

So she simply left a note on the living room table,
explaining where she was going and when. If something happened, Kali’s barking
would rouse the neighbours after a while. She had to trust that it would be
enough.

She had a hazy idea of where she had to head for. She left
Upper Glenfield, walking quickly to the south-west, over the river and past the
posh gastro-pub that lay at the southern end of the bypass. She’d eaten there
once, with Drew; it was all tiny portions and strangely-shaped plates. Quite
nice though, in a restrained and somewhat overpriced way. As a rule, she
avoided eating at places that served things in “jus” instead of gravy.

“Turn right down the track by the blasted oak,” she’d been
told. “We’re raiding an Anderson shelter tonight.”

She didn’t like the word “raid” but she couldn’t miss out.
She walked quickly, shivering in spite of the hot flush that was making her
back sticky with anxiety.

There were only a few street lights on the main road. She
cursed her own stupidity for not bringing a head torch. She dug out her phone
and found the “flashlight” app. The passing vehicles meant she didn’t need the
extra light yet, but she was grateful for it once she found the old oak tree
which she hoped counted as the “blasted oak” and turned along the rough track.
It was wide enough for one car, but it wasn’t tarmac. She prayed that she was
on the right path.

She strained her eyes up ahead. It was full dark now, as it
was only early summer and the very long days and short nights were yet to come.
The sky above was deep velvet blue-black, with sparkling stars and a few wispy
white clouds scudding like tattered rags high above. The hedges either side of
the track were solid black shapes and if she let her imagination have free
rein, she could easily see hunched shapes and clawing hands there. She clamped
down on her waking daydream. No. Don’t get carried away, she instructed
herself. I’m on a mission, remember?