Aftermath. Part 7

*No, no I didn't . . . but he would have needed one. There isn't a bus service to speak of . . . isn't now and there wasn't then. Two buses a day into York and two back again, it's the York to Driffield service, they run about once an hour but four times a day, a bus takes a detour into Milking Nook . . . two going to York, two going from York . . . and they alternate, in-out in-out . . . but that man was a car owner, he had the look of money about him, he wasn't worried about the time.'

*The time?'

*Missing the last bus. If you miss the last bus you are stranded in Milking Nook or York until the next day, unless you miss the last bus in or out on Sat.u.r.day, in which case you are stranded in either place until Monday morning, depending which way you are travelling.' Jeff Sparrow paused. *You know, I think there is something else as well. He must have known about the estate. I mean about Mr Housecarl abandoning the grounds and the garden. He seemed to be on a recce mission.'

*That's a good point, a very useful observation,' Yellich smiled. *That could help a lot.'

*It could?'

*Yes, I would think so . . . a stranger who knew that the grounds and garden of Bromyards had been recently abandoned but not the house itself. Yet all the employees of the estate, the gardeners and the domestics, all live in the village. And no sign of a car?'

*None, but he could have left it in the village and walked to the estate. He seemed a fit man.'

*Age . . . about?'

*Middle-aged . . . possibly fifties.'

Yellich tapped his notepad. *You say that the driveway to the house from the public highway is a mile long?'

*Yes, sir.'

*Was he near the driveway?'

*Yes, he was, as I recall, not on the driveway itself but only a few yards from it . . . about fifty yards when I saw him.'

*How far along the drive?'

*About halfway.'

*So he was well inside the estate grounds?'

*Yes, well inside, a definite trespa.s.ser.'

*I see . . . and appreciate it's going back ten years now . . . but was there any direction to his interest?'

*Seemed to me that he was going towards the house, he was in no hurry but he was making for the house.'

*All right,' again Yellich paused, *and you know of no employee of Mr Housecarl who lives in York . . . Driffield?'

*No, but we all know people outside the village. I know my son who lives in York, like I just told you, and also another elderly couple, but just on Christmas card terms, that would most likely be the case for all the villagers. One would tell someone about Bromyards and he would tell someone else, the news would get out . . . not just to York or Driffield but to all the neighbouring villages as well.'

*Yes, it's the sort of news that would travel.'

*And it did travel. We got boys coming to try their hand at poaching the grounds, till our village boys put them right about just who owns Bromyards . . . from a poaching point of view that is.'

*So, a tall man in his fifties knew about the abandoning of the grounds but also about there not being an imminent sale of the property,' Yellich pondered aloud.

*Possibly . . . just the ideal sort of place to hide a few bodies, but that is for you to say, I'm a retired gardener not a retired copper . . . but if I were to hide a body or a couple of bodies, I would go as near the house as possible and the kitchen garden would be ideal.'

*Oh?'

*Yes, the poachers didn't go near the house out of respect for Mr Housecarl, they didn't want to alarm him by firing shotguns under his window. It seemed like there was an agreed "no man's land", a zone round the house about a quarter of a mile wide, no one poached inside that zone.'

*So no poacher would go near the house, let alone into the kitchen gardens?'

*That's right. Ideal place to hide a body or two, but they'd be found eventually . . . had to be . . . once Mr Housecarl died, they'd be found.'

*As you say. Can you describe the man you saw?'

*Not in any detail, I was three hundred yards away, but tall, like I said.'

*Beard, spectacles?'

*No to both . . . clean shaven, no spectacles. Well built . . . muscular rather than overweight, as I recall. Important that you remember we are going back ten years, so can't be sure how accurate the description I give is.'

*Understood.'

Tang Hall Housing Estate, York YO11, was a development of medium rise slab-sided buildings in the tenement-style favoured in Scotland and Europe; an area where old cars were parked in the street and powerful motorbikes were chained to lamp posts, and the Pike and Heron public house, in the centre of the estate, was the only hostelry. The Pike and Heron was rough on the outside and rougher on the inside. It was brick built in an angular, flat-roofed-style and was known locally as *The Fortress'. Inside *The Fortress' Carmen Pharoah and Thomson Ventnor sat opposite Piers Driver. The hum of conversation that had ceased when Pharoah and Ventor entered had, by then, resumed at a lower volume, but the two officers continued to invite hostile looks.

*You're quite happy to be seen talking to the likes of little us in here?' Ventnor asked in a hushed tone. *We could arrest you and take you in for questioning if that would look better.'

*We need information,' Pharoah added, *so the last thing we want to do is make things difficult for you. People seen talking to cops on this estate have been known to wake up in hospital.'

*That depends on who you talk to and what you say,' Driver growled. *It's OK; they know I won't be gra.s.sing anybody up.' Driver was a tall man, as Susan Boyd had described. He had a hard, lined face, short black hair, tattoos on his neck and hands. He sat in front of a half-consumed gla.s.s of lager which stood on a circular table that was sticky with spilled alcohol. *But they'll still want to know what you wanted. It'll be about Veronica.'

*Yes,' Carmen Pharoah said, *yes, it is. We understand that you knew her . . . Veronica Goodwin of Cemetery Road . . . that Veronica . . . just to be certain we are talking about the same person.'

*Yes, I meant her. She's been found.' Driver nodded to the television set perched high on the wall in a corner of the room, which at that moment was showing motor racing with the sound turned down. *I watched it on the news . . . at home there's a lot of coverage, can't miss it . . . not here; here it's always sports, always with the sound turned down, unless it's an important football match or something like that.'

*Yes, she was found along with a few other women.'

*I saw that too . . . chained together but died at different times . . . that is weird.'

*But you knew her?'

*Yes.'

*You were prosecuted for a.s.saulting her.'

*No, I wasn't. You should check more thoroughly. Yes, I have previous for a.s.sault but not against her, I was too fly.' Driver grinned at Ventnor and withdrew his attention from Carmen Pharoah.

*It has been said that you were quite free with your fists.'

Driver leered. His flesh seemed to the officers to be ingrained with dirt, he wore a baggy tee shirt which also seemed in need of a wash, as did his jeans which were sufficiently faded that they were nearer white in colour than their original blue. His feet were encased in torn red and yellow sports shoes. His nicotine-stained fingers spoke of heavy smoking and his missing front teeth and heavily scarred left jaw line spoke of street violence. *It was for her own good.'

*And where have I heard that before?' Carmen Pharoah said quietly and wearily.

Driver glared angrily at her once and then forgot her again. His att.i.tude said that he was a man who did not like women in general and he particularly did not like Afro-Caribbean women, and very especially did not like them if they were police officers. *It was though, for her own good I mean.' He gasped and Ventnor received a blast of alcohol laden breath mixed with halitosis.

*Meaning?'

*Meaning that she had a problem.'

*A problem?'

Driver flicked his index finger at the gla.s.s of lager so that the nail struck it causing a soft *ping'. *A problem with this.' Driver shrugged. *All right, so I take a drink when I can afford it . . . but with her it was a problem, a real problem.'

*Oh?'

*Yes, a very serious problem. You've visited her mother in Cemetery Road?'

*Yes, of course, but she didn't mention anything about a problem with the booze.'

*She wouldn't. I mean, she wouldn't would she, even if it meant finding her killer? She . . . Veronica . . . she was her only daughter. In her eyes she was little Miss Perfect, even if she is just kidding herself on, just to keep the memory of Veronica that she wants to keep, not the memory of who she actually was. But take it from me, pal, she had a problem. She hid it quite well but she had a problem that she could not hide forever. You know, some of the people all of the time . . . and all the people some of the time . . . but she couldn't hide it from all of the people all of the time, though she tried to.'

*Secret drinking?'

Driver nodded. *Voddy . . . she was one for the vodka. It suited her if she was hiding it from herself as much as other people.'

*No hangover, you mean,' Ventnor suggested. *Is that what you mean?'

*That's it. Spend the evening drinking red wine or stout and in the morning you feel like your head is being crushed by a steamroller, but spend the night on vodka, you wake up the following morning feeling like you had a dry night. She could get up for work each day you see, and, if she stayed in in the evening, she'd have a bottle in her room and hide the smell on her breath with toothpaste so her old mother never cottoned on, or if she did, she ignored it.'

*I see.'

*So I smacked her a few times . . . gave her a slap, like where it wouldn't show. I was trying to scare her into not drinking but it didn't do no good . . . all her money went on voddy. She hadn't got hardly any left to buy my lager . . . and that was more important.'

*You think so?'

*Well, I'm the man, she's the woman . . . she was the woman . . . we need it, they don't. It's the way it is. Ask anyone in the pub. That's why all the punters in here are men, it's because the women are at home . . . stands to reason. And anyway, she was working, I wasn't, she had to buy me beer, but she couldn't buy me beer because she spent her money on vodka so I slapped her around a bit. It was for her own good.'

*Or for your beer, not her own welfare?'

*Same difference. Alcoholics Anonymous was no help to her, no help at all.'

*She went to AA meetings?'

*Yes, but like I said, no good it was. She just didn't want to stop, see? They all say the same thing; you've got to want to stop and Ronny . . . she just didn't want to stop . . . not at all. She'd sooner go without food than go without vodka. I mean, she just didn't know when to stop, did she?'

*I don't know,' Ventnor replied icily, *didn't she?'

*No, she didn't.'

A large man in an unironed white shirt and white summer trousers suddenly broke away from a group of men who had been standing at the far end of the bar and ambled slowly but purposefully over to where the officers and Piers Driver were sitting. *All right here are we, pal?' he growled menacingly.

*Yes, boss. These be the law.'

*I know,' again said with a menacing growl.

*They want to know about Veronica Goodwin . . . that la.s.s I knew . . . she was one of the women found in the grounds of that big house in the Wolds, been all over the news.'

*That's all?'

*Yes, boss.'

*All right then.' The man turned and walked back to the bar, and as he approached, the group of men parted to allow him access. He reached out a meaty paw and wrapped it around his beer gla.s.s and was heard to say, *Seems all right, but watch him anyway.'

*Yes, boss,' two of the men answered simultaneously.

*So we split up, me and her,' Piers Driver continued, *and that was that. She went her own way and I went mine. Then I heard she had vanished into thin air . . . about two years ago. Mind you, I had hooked up with another chick by then . . . a real player.' Driver grinned at Thomson Ventnor.

*You mean she had plenty of money to buy you drink,' Ventnor responded coldly.

*Yeah . . . she still does,' Driver replied with a wink. *She still does.'

*She was indeed a very pleasant, a most pleasant young woman.' Megan Farthing revealed herself to be a warm, motherly sort of woman, or so found Carmen Pharoah who was relaxing very quickly in her presence. Megan Farthing was warm of manner, gentle of speech and seemed comfortable to be in her middle years, wearing a three-quarter length skirt and a *sensible' pair of shoes and a richly embroidered blouse. She sat behind the desk in her office on the top floor of Gordon and Moxon's Household Goods Store. *We were all saddened to hear of her disappearance and frankly, after a few days, we all expressed doubts that she would turn up alive. Young women like her don't run away, so we began to think that she'd be at the bottom of the river . . . now we know what happened to her, poor girl. So young, so much to live for . . . it was all ahead of her.'

*What was she like as a worker?' Carmen Pharoah sat back in the chair which stood in front of Megan Farthing's desk.

Megan Farthing smiled a tight-lipped smile, *Well . . . she was an employee with an issue . . .'

*Oh?'

*Yes . . . she was pleasant, well liked . . . not a management problem but she had an issue with alcohol which surfaced eventually.'

*She came to work drunk?' Carmen Pharoah gasped.

*No . . . no . . . she never did that . . . but she left in that condition. She had a flask in her handbag.'

*I see.' Carmen Pharoah glanced round the office and thought it softly decorated and homely, with photographs of children and infants above a bookcase which stood against the wall of the office, a gla.s.s vase on the desk contained flowers in water, behind it on the wall were prints of Yorkshire landmarks, Robin Hood's Bay, the Ribblehead Viaduct, York Minster, and a sweeping panorama of Swaledale.

*You see, Veronica would bring a flask to work each day concealed in her handbag, as I said, and she would be a very efficient employee in the forenoon but she became more unsteady as the day wore on. By lunchtime she'd be taking sufficiently frequent trips to the ladies toilets to take a nip . . . and by the early afternoon she'd be walking unsteadily on her heels and slurring her words. Now . . . this is a good company to work for, it was founded in Victorian times and has resisted takeovers from larger chains which do not care for their workers as we care for ours. We have retained the Victorian att.i.tude of paternalism to our workers. If you work for Gordon and Moxon's it works for you . . . you belong to the family . . . it's a very good employer. If an employee cannot work for an extended period through no fault of their own we will hold their position open for them. If they require money for things like school uniforms we will issue an interest-free loan and take the money back a little bit each week or month, and in such small repayment amounts that the employee won't feel it . . . financially speaking.'

*Not bad.'

*Not bad at all . . . and we do other similar things for our own, but at the end of the day we have to make money and so we have to have workers, not pa.s.sengers. Veronica was one of the telephonists and as such she was in direct contact with the public . . . paying customers . . . voice only but that is still direct contact.'

*Of course, it's vital for the telephonists to have a pleasant speaking voice.'

*Yes . . . Veronica had, in the forenoon, and only in the forenoon. In the afternoon her voice was slurred and she became short-tempered. So . . . verbal warning at first, given by me in my capacity as Personnel Manager, and then when she didn't alter her ways . . . or when she could not . . . because I understand alcoholism . . . I have had personal experience of it.'

*I see . . . I'm sorry.'

*Long time ago now but it gave me insight into the illness.' Farthing paused. *Well, anyway, she received a second written warning and strong advice that she seek help from her doctor or by joining Alcoholics Anonymous. She was then taken from the switchboard, for everybody's sake, and given a job in the stores on a reduced income . . . and that was a real comedown for her. The stores have invited some very cruel names from the workforce. "The bat cave" being one of the kinder ones. It's where the disadvantaged people work. Again, it's Gordon and Moxon's policy to engage people who would, for one reason or another, find it difficult to get a job but we can't put them on the sales floors.'

*Appreciate that.'

*So our senior store clerk is a man who is in a wheelchair because he was born without legs, and d.a.m.ned efficient he is too. Another employee has a glandular problem and rapidly starts to smell of sweat. He has to bring a change of clothing with him each day and take a shower at lunchtime. He's also a very good worker. And so taking Veronica from the switchboard, where the telephonists regard themselves as a bit of an elite in the company, and sending her to the stores, was a ma.s.sive comedown for her but it was the only thing I could do, short of dismissing her, and I also thought it might be the jolt, just the sort of wake-up call she needed.'