The Corpse in the Cellar (17 page)

Jack paced around the room looking at the pictures on the walls, mostly cheap prints of Landseer paintings. The
Monarch of the Glen
was at one end of the mantelpiece and a portrait of a Newfoundland dog was at the other.

Edmund Ravenswood bustled back into the room followed by his wife Edith, who was carrying a tea tray. He waved Jack to take a seat, and sat down himself at the end of a settee.

‘How do you like your tea, gentlemen?' he asked as if this was just a social call from old business acquaintances.

As we gave our orders and Mrs Ravenswood took up the teapot to pour our cups, the bank manager continued, ‘I'm sorry, but all I can remember from our last meeting is that two of you are named Lewis and one Morris. Is that correct?'

‘I'm Major Lewis,' said Warnie, ‘British Army. This is my brother Jack—he's an Oxford don—and this is our friend, young Tom Morris. We only got tangled up in this infernal business because we're on a walking tour in the district and I (rather carelessly, I'm afraid) dropped Jack's wallet into a fireplace so he needed some cash.'

‘It's an awful business, as you say,' Ravenswood agreed. ‘But I don't quite understand why you've called in to see us—unless it's to commiserate over this whole dark cloud of tragedy.'

He shook his head sadly, looking, I thought, rather like a second-rate actor in a small provincial company trying to give the socially appropriate response to bad news.

‘The police won't let us leave the district,' Jack explained, ‘but we've been walking this morning in the country lanes around the town—and we came across the Proudfoot's farm.'

A silence followed Jack's announcement as he paused to sip his tea. Then he resumed, ‘We were rather surprised to see it's already for sale.'

Edith Ravenswood dropped her teaspoon into her saucer with a loud clatter.

‘Oh, Edmund!' she exclaimed, ‘You haven't? Not already? Poor Amelia Proudfoot . . . '

‘Bank business is none of your business, Edith,' Ravenswood snapped. ‘I've told you that before.'

‘But surely you could have waited,' she protested feebly. A furious glance from her husband silenced her. Edith Ravenswood struck me as an excessively timid and nervous woman.

‘It does seem all very swift,' said Jack gently, smiling over the top of his tea cup.

‘The bank makes the rules, not me,' replied Ravenswood in a voice that was a sullen grumble.

There was a still, and rather tense, silence following this remark—a silence that lingered on. Finally Ravenswood broke it by saying, ‘Anyway, I spoke to Amelia Proudfoot myself. She was quite happy for the farm to be sold. With young Nicholas dead it holds too many memories for her. She was happy to get rid of the farm and get away from the place.'

‘When did you speak to her, Edmund?' his wife asked. ‘I didn't know you'd been out to their farm.'

‘I don't report my movements to you, Edith,' he replied in a way that suggested he was struggling to suppress his anger. In fact, this whole conversation seemed to be provoking him until he looked like a small volcano in a bad mood that was trying hard not to explode while there was company in the house. ‘You knew I was out in the car late yesterday,' he said, ‘and I don't have to report to you on where I go or who I see.'

‘No, Edmund,' she said meekly, turning her head away.

Finding ourselves in the middle of a stormy low pressure system on the domestic front, I looked for something else to talk about.

‘You don't happen to know where she's gone to, do you?' I asked. ‘Mrs Proudfoot, I mean. It's just that when we were out there the place seemed to be deserted—already completely empty.'

‘How should I know?' barked Ravenswood abruptly. ‘I'm not her keeper. She wanted to get out of the place, that's all I know.'

He took a sip of his tea and then seemed to pull himself together. ‘Sorry if I snapped at you then, Mr Morris,' he said. ‘This whole awful business is getting to me. Getting to all of us, I suppose. Nerves on edge—that sort of thing.'

I told him to think nothing of it, but then I repeated my question, adding that she must have packed and left in an awful hurry.

‘All I know is that she wanted to get away from the memories the place held for her,' Ravenswood said. ‘I believe she has relatives up north somewhere. I can only assume she caught an early train and is on her way to them even as we speak.'

Jack raised one eyebrow and asked quietly, ‘Even before her husband's funeral?'

‘Well . . . she'll . . . obviously come back for that,' Ravenswood blustered.

‘But who'll make the arrangements?' asked Warnie.

‘Not our concern!' snapped the bank manager. ‘Anyway, nothing can happen until the police release the body and that won't happen until after the inquest.'

‘And she'll have to come back for that,' I speculated.

Edith Ravenswood opened her mouth as if to make a comment, but catching her husband's eye she thought better of it and said nothing.

We finished our tea making awkward small talk, thanked Mrs Ravenswood and made our departure.

We were still talking about the swift sale of the farm and the immediate departure of Amelia Proudfoot as we walked back into the bar parlour of
The Boar's Head
.

Frank Jones was behind the bar and he heard our conversation as he pulled three pints of bitter.

‘If it's Amelia Proudfoot you're asking about,' he said, handing us our beers, ‘you should ask Ettie, our parlour maid. She's Amelia's cousin. She might know something.'

When we asked where we might find Ettie, the publican told us to go into the front parlour and he'd send her in to us.

Five minutes later a plump fifteen-year-old came into the parlour looking terrified.

‘Mr Jones said you gentlemen wanted to talk to me,' she said in a voice just above a whisper.

‘Just about your cousin, m'dear,' said Warnie in his hearty manner, trying to put her at ease. ‘Amelia Proudfoot—she is your cousin, I take it?'

The girl nodded.

‘We were out at the Proudfoot farm this morning,' Jack explained, ‘and found the place deserted. We wondered where she might have gone. Mr Ravenswood said he thought she might have gone back to her relatives somewhere up north.'

‘Oh no, sir,' said Ettie. ‘She called in here this morning, first thing. She had her suitcase with her. Poor thing . . . it were clear she'd been crying. She wanted to borrow a few bob off me, but I didn't have any money so I couldn't help.'

‘That must have disappointed her,' said Jack, with a puzzled expression on his face. ‘Did she say what she wanted the money for?'

‘She said she wanted to get further away,' replied Ettie in her quiet, nervous voice.

‘Further away than where? Where was she going to?' Jack persisted.

‘She's gone to the coast. She's at Plumpton-on-Sea. That's where she's gone. She said if she had a few more bob she could get further away. But like I say, I couldn't help. She took it bad, did poor Amelia. She said she had no choice then, and walked off to the railway station. If you want to talk to her, that's where you'll find her, sir—she's in Plumpton-on-Sea.'

Jack looked more puzzled than ever as Ettie resumed her story. ‘Maybe she'll have a bit of money after the sale of the farm goes through. Unless the mortgage swallows up the whole of the sale price, that is. But I assumed she just wanted to get away from her sad memories and anything that reminded her of Nicholas. Poor thing. When she left here she were as limp as a rag and looked fit to collapse.'

When Ettie left us, we drank our beer in silence for some minutes. Then Jack said, ‘We have to interview Amelia Proudfoot. Behaviour as odd as this must be connected to the two murders.'

‘Whose behaviour is odd?' I asked. ‘The bank's in foreclosing so quickly, or Amelia Proudfoot's?'

‘It was Mrs Proudfoot I was thinking of,' Jack said. ‘The day we spoke to her she was clearly hiding something. And then the moment the sale of the property is announced she leaves. Perhaps it's not too much to say she flees. From the bank's point of view surely she could have stayed at the farm until the sale went through.'

‘But—but—you can't imagine she might be the murderer?' spluttered Warnie. ‘We've both seen her. She's just a slip of a thing.'

Jack shrugged his shoulders and said, ‘Women have killed before—remember Constance Kent and the Road Hill House murder?'

‘Well, it's possible, I suppose,' Warnie mumbled. ‘It might explain why she's fled from the district in such haste.'

‘That's a thought,' I added. ‘I wonder if Inspector Crispin knows she's gone. Surely he ordered her to stay around the district, just as he did us. Should we tell him?'

‘No,' said Jack, thoughtfully and carefully. ‘Let's follow this up ourselves. If Amelia Proudfoot really is the killer, or knows the killer, then both murders would have been intensely personal. She's no threat to the wider community. We need to get down to Plumpton-on-Sea and have a chat to her.'

‘But there's a problem,' I said. ‘According to Inspector Crispin we're not to leave the district. So how can we get down to the coast to interview Amelia Proudfoot?'

‘I'm sure there's a way,' Jack said with his conspirator's smile, ‘if we just apply our minds to it.'

‘Sneak off? That sort of thing?' chuckled Warnie.

Jack nodded, but then said we could do nothing today because of the inquest into the death of Franklin Grimm, which we'd be expected to attend. But later—tonight perhaps—well, he said, let's see what was possible.

We went out to the beer garden—the lawn behind the pub—and took our places at a table in the sunshine where we could watch the River Plum sparkle and gurgle just a few yards away. It looked like a ribbon of rippling silk—like a dressmaker's finishing touch at the foot of a gown.

Mrs Jones brought us out a tray of bread and cheese with a jar of pickles and we ate a leisurely lunch. The bread was still warm from the bakers, and exactly the way I like it—soft and fresh on the inside, crusty and golden on the outside.

Jack, who always ate faster than Warnie and I, gulped down a cheese and pickle sandwich and disappeared into the pub. He returned a moment later carrying a local railway timetable.

Spreading this out on the table, he said, ‘There's a milk train that leaves Market Plumpton just before midnight tonight. One of us might be on it while the other two stay here in plain sight of Constable Dixon or whoever's keeping watch on us.'

‘Is he?' asked Warnie. ‘Keeping watch, that is? I didn't see him in the street. Do you think the police might have put a plain clothes spy in the pub to watch us?'

‘I don't think we're quite that important,' said Jack. ‘I suspect our friendly publican has taken over as the eyes and ears of the police for the moment. Perhaps a police officer will take over from him after dark. But my point stands. As long as two of us remain here—as long as there is no mass exodus—I'm sure one of us could slip away quietly late tonight and be on that milk train when it leaves.'

‘Where does it go?' I asked.

‘The village of Plumpton is the first stop,' replied Jack, consulting the timetable, ‘then Plumpton-on-Sea, then it goes on to Tadminister.'

‘Which of us should go?' I asked.

‘Well, as the youngest of us, Tom,' replied Jack with a broad grin, ‘I thought this is something that calls for your youthful energy and spirit of adventure. Besides which, both Warnie and I need a good night's sleep.'

The last thing I felt like volunteering for was a late night trip on a slow train, but I could hardly say no. Instead I asked, ‘What's the plan then?'

‘There'll be a back door to this pub. We need to find it without appearing to be too inquisitive. Then tonight we all retire to our rooms. When it's late enough for the pub to have closed and Frank Jones and his wife to have retired for the night, you slip out quietly—Warnie and I will keep watch. Keep to the shadows and the back streets and make your way to the railway station. Make sure there are no policemen on the platform watching for absconding suspects, board the train and get off at Plumpton-on-Sea. You'll be there very early, probably well before sunrise, so you'll need to find a comfortable spot to spend an hour of two, and then begin your investigation.'

‘Yes, that's the tricky bit. What am I supposed to do?'

‘Go to the boarding houses, guesthouses and pubs—ask for Amelia Proudfoot. In case she's not using that name, describe her to them. Ask if anyone matching her description has arrived in the last day or so. I'll tell you what you need to ask her when you find her.'

I nodded glumly. It sounded like an uncomfortable night ahead with very little sleep for Tom Morris. As a result I ate the rest of my meal in silence while Warnie told a story about what had happened in the officers' mess the week before last.