The Merchant's House Part 19

There was a noise behind him, the opening of a door. Stan turned and saw her. She stood in a long white nightgown, her hair uncombed, her eyes staring and sedated. He was reminded of that poem he'd done at school; the one by Tennyson. 'The curse has come upon me, said the lady of Shalott.' Her face looked blank, exhausted, showing all the empty despair of the d.a.m.ned. Some curses were worse than Tennyson's.

As Wesley followed Rachel into the entrance hall of the police station, he nodded to Bob Naseby on the desk and noticed that Bob was looking him up and down speculatively.

'Sergeant Peterson, can I have a quick word?'

'Sure. What about?'

Bob leaned forward confidentially, as if it was important that Rachel didn't hear. 'Do you play cricket at all?'

Wesley, whose mind had been firmly fixed on murder, was unprepared for the sudden change of subject. 'Er, it has been known ... but I'm no Brian Lara. Why?'

'We're a bit short of men for next season. Wondered if you fancied ...'

'Can I give you an answer nearer the time, Bob? We've only just moved here and ...'

'Oh, don't worry, I quite understand. You think about it. What are you, then? Batsman, bowler, all-rounder?'

'Er, bit of everything, but I wouldn't go so far as to say I'm an all-rounder. I'll have a think about it and let you know.'

When he'd made his escape, Rachel looked at him. 'Cricket, was it?'

Wesley nodded.

'Bob's what's known as a fanatic. Take my advice and don't get involved. Your wife won't thank you for it. It's not like football, ninety minutes then it's over. It goes on for hours, days on end. Your wife's got her career she won't want to hang about a muddy field all weekend making sandwiches in her spare time. Just like I didn't. I speak from experience.'

Wesley detected bitterness in her voice. So that's what had happened to Rachel's last relationship. He had wondered.

'I told Bob I'd think about it. I didn't say I'd do it. Anyway, I doubt if I'll have the time.'

Rachel smiled. She was a pretty girl; she reminded him a bit of Pam when they had first met.

'How did you get on at that clinic?' she asked gently. 'Have they said anything?'

'Pam's got to go in for an investigative operation.'

'My sister-in-law had the same trouble, you know. She had all the tests going and they found nothing wrong. Then the doctor told her to relax and forget about it 'cause it's quite common, apparently, for people to adopt or give up hope then find they're pregnant once the pressure's off. She's got three kids now little horrors, all of them.'

Wesley smiled at Rachel. If only Pam possessed her gift of common sense. They walked on.

Rachel still refused to go to Queenswear by car. Why pollute the place when you could take the ferry and get a bit of exercise into the bargain? she explained to Wesley, who had to accept the logic of her argument. They took the boat across the river.

Wesley was becoming used to travelling by water. He would have to, living in Tradmouth: the whole town centred on the river. The mouth of the Trad had been mentioned as a haven in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and the port had thrived in the Middle Ages and beyond, but, unlike the inspector's native Liverpool, it had been spared the curse of nineteenth-century expansion by its relative inaccessibility. If Wesley wanted to settle here, he would have to learn to live with water and the noisy seagulls that screeched overhead.

When they got to Queenswear, Rachel and Wesley climbed the steps to number 38 and rung the bell to Flat 1. Of the two residents, Wesley reckoned that Mr Jackson would be the more amenable. Fortunately they found him in.

'Sorry to bother you again, Mr Jackson. If we could just ask you a few more questions?' Jackson let them in and mumbled something about putting the kettle on. He seemed resigned to their presence but not nervous.

They looked around the flat. The carpets were good-quality Axminster, but old and unfashionable. The furniture was an eclectic mixture; the type picked up over the years in second-hand and junk shops: no better than the contents of the flat in Morbay, but no worse either.

When Jackson brought the tea in on a cheap tin tray decorated with stylised 1970s orange flowers, Wesley decided on the direct approach.

'This furniture, Mr Jackson ... is it yours?'

'Good Lord, no. My wife kept all the furniture everything. She got the lot,' he spat out bitterly.

'So where did it come from?'

'It was already here. It's a furnished flat.'

'We were told it was let unfurnished.'

'Oh, no. I don't know where you got that from.'

'So this furniture was here when Sharon Carteret lived here?'

Jackson shrugged. 'Must have been.'

Wesley leaned towards Jackson, taking him into his confidence. 'I must admit, Mr Jackson, we haven't got a search warrant at the moment. But we would like to have a look for anything that might have been left behind by the dead girl. Did you find anything yourself?' Jackson shook his head. 'Now you must realise that we're not interested in any of your possessions and ...'

'Go ahead. Search wherever you like,' said Jackson, indifferent.

Wesley thanked him. He felt sorry for Jackson, a man defeated by life.

The search was concentrated on forgotten places: the backs of drawers where objects might have fallen unnoticed; the rear of the airing cupboard; behind chests of drawers. Wesley wished he hadn't worn a suit, and the dust made Rachel sneeze. They tried to ignore Jackson's spa.r.s.e belongings. From what they had gathered, the man had been through enough without having the police nosing through his personal effects.

The harvest of finds was meagre: a cheese grater fallen behind the kitchen drawers; two pairs of washed-out Marks and Spencer's knickers behind the dressing table in the bedroom. It had been a good idea of Rachel's, but...

The living room was last. There was very little in it apart from a green Dralon three-piece suite and a television and of course the bureau. The bureau was the only piece in the room Wesley would have described as a decent bit of furniture. It was dark wood, probably 1920s, with a sloping front that dropped down to form a desk. In contrast to the rest of the room's contents, its quality and solidity shone out. It was surprising that Sharon hadn't taken it with her. Perhaps she had left in such a hurry that she had had to travel light. Wesley began to take the drawers out. This was the last thing; they had searched everywhere else.

He found the address book wedged behind one of the small drawers in the top part of the bureau. Torn and bent, it had probably been discarded and forgotten when a new one was acquired. He picked up the small, tattered book and looked inside, making certain it didn't belong to Jackson. Then he called Rachel over and showed her his prize. Her face lit up with triumph. 'Has it got her name in?'

'Right here, in the front.' Wesley popped it into a plastic bag.

Jackson crept shyly into the room. He had been keeping out of their way. 'Did you find anything?'

'Yes, thank you, Mr Jackson. We found an address book behind one of the drawers in the bureau. You've not seen it before?' He held up the bag containing the book.

'No. I just put my things in the drawers. Didn't pull them out. You don't, do you?'

'No.' Wesley felt it was time they were going. 'Thank you again, Mr Jackson. You've been very helpful.'

Jackson smirked shyly and looked at his feet. 'I was glad of the company. Will you stay for a cup of tea?' The invitation was pathetically eager.

Rachel looked at Jackson, a man in a grey cardigan whose wife had robbed him of everything including his dignity. 'I'm sorry, Mr Jackson, but we are on a murder inquiry. Thanks for the offer anyway.' She gave him her sweetest smile and hoped it wouldn't be misinterpreted.

'Shall we pay Mrs Hughes a visit?' she asked significantly. 'I think she's in. I heard the floorboards creak above the bedroom.'

Wesley nodded.

They hadn't far to go to their next port of call. Once outside the front door, Wesley rang the doorbell for Flat 2. There was no answer.

Upstairs, behind the net curtain, Mrs Hughes stood very still, watching, hardly daring to breath. she could see Rachel's face clearly and the plastic bag containing something that looked like a diary in her hand. They had found something. Why, she asked herself, hadn't she searched the downstairs flat thoroughly when she had the chance? she watched the two police officers until they disappered out of sight down the road.

Chapter 20.

Last night as I lay with Jennet, after I had had my pleasure of her, she did tell me that she was with child. I know not what I should do. Elizabeth doth suspect nothing of that I am sure.

Extract from the journal of John Banized,

1 July 1623

That evening Pam thought it was about time she made an effort. She put on her jeans and some make-up and walked arm in arm with her husband, as they had done when they first met, down the narrow streets to the Tradmouth Arms. She had felt better since her visit to Dr Downey; ready to face the world again.

And she was looking forward to seeing Neil again. She wondered if he'd changed at all after these many years.

Neil waved as they entered the pub. He still wore his hair long and straggly and his clothes looked like Oxfam's rejects. He hadn't changed ... in appearance at least.

He greeted Pam with an apprehensive kiss. She smiled at him in a friendly way but then her feelings had never matched his own. Once they had sat down he began telling her about the dig and the Banizeds' house. It was best, he thought, to keep to impersonal matters. When Wesley had tried once or twice to tell her, she had been in no state to take it in, but this time she listened with interest.

'So the skeleton might be this Jennet, whoever she is? She must have been murdered and buried in the cellar by ... well, I suppose the master of the house is the main suspect, don't you think, Wesley? Come on.' She nudged him. 'Wake up. We need your professional advice.'

Wesley, who had been contemplating the Sharon Carteret case over his beer, came back to the past with a jolt. 'What advice?'

'Pam wants to find out about our skeletons in the cellar,' Neil said. 'Your turn to get a round in, Wes.'

'Where are Matt and Jane tonight?'

'Gone to see a film in Neston. It's off and on with those two.' Neil finished his drink and returned to the subject that interested him much more than his colleagues' love lives. 'I've been back to the museum. They've turned up some wills. Got the copies here.'

Neil produced a few photocopied sheets and handed them to Wesley. Pam leaned over to see. Against her expectations, she was finding it quite interesting. 'This one's John Banized's will.'

'Yes.' An idea suddenly came to Wesley. Obvious he should have thought of it before. 'JB, on the ring John Banized.'

'Could be. Now there's a thought about the right date too. In his will he left everything to his second wife and his son, Thomas, who eventually became mayor. He left small legacies to servants and relations as well but there's no mention of a Jennet.'

'Well, there wouldn't be if he'd b.u.mped her off and hid her down in the cellar, would there?'

'It's the ring that bothers me to Jennet with all my thanks. What was he thanking her for?'

Pam giggled. 'Services rendered, I should think.'

'I don't think he'd bother to say thanks. In those days the master of the house probably considered it well within his rights to tumble a few maidservants.'

'Maybe she wasn't a maidservant. Or perhaps he wasn't that type. Perhaps he had a conscience.' Wesley drained his gla.s.s.

'Someone killed her,' said Pam. 'Conscience or no conscience. We'll probably never know.'

'We might if we can find the journal.' Neil sat back, watching the effect of his words.

'What journal?' asked Wesley, suddenly interested.

'It's mentioned in all the wills since the middle of the seventeenth century. They all say more or less the same thing to my eldest son the journal of John Banized, to be kept privy. It seemed it was pa.s.sed from father to son. Probably contained some dreadful family secret.'

'Jennet's murder?' Wesley wasn't a detective for nothing.

'Could be. It's not mentioned again after the middle of the eighteenth century. I'd love to know what happened to it ... if it still exists.'

'Mmm.' Wesley got up to go to the bar. 'Keep digging, Neil. You never know what might turn up.'

Pam sat back, relaxed. For the first time in months she felt able to take an interest in what was going on around her; she even found herself interested in the Banizeds and Jennet. The drink had gone to her head slightly and she felt a glow of wellbeing.

On the way home, she hardly noticed the steepness of the streets. She and Wesley walked arm in arm again. And when they went to bed that night they made love as if it was their first time.

'You look as if you're in a good mood, Wesley,' observed Rachel as he walked into the office the next morning. 'You can give us a hand ringing round some of the numbers in this address book.' She threw a typewritten list at him good-humouredly.

'Any progress?'

'I've tracked down one of her old friends. She told the same story as that woman, Dot, at the building society. As soon as Sharon took up with this Chris character, she dropped her old friends like hot bricks.'

'Did she have many friends?' He found himself feeling sorry for the girl.

'Those she did have she seemed to lose when this Chris came on the scene. She must have been very easily led.'

'Or infatuated. Love is blind, as they say.'

Love had so far never rendered Rachel even mildly short-sighted. She shook her head. 'I've found her grandmother's address in here too, by the way.'

'Did you contact her?'

'I'd need a medium. She's dead.' Rachel studied the sheets. 'The rest seem to be people like dentists, work colleagues, hospitals, that sort of thing.'

'Keep at it.' Wesley moved to his own desk and shifted round some paperwork. After a few minutes contemplating his workload, he spoke to Rachel again. 'That Mrs Hughes ... hasn't it struck you as odd that she didn't mention Sharon being pregnant?'