Murder in the Afternoon: A Kate Shackleton Mystery Read online

  My fist clenched, ready to land a knuckle punch on the door. But I did not need any more complications in my life. Mary Jane had butted in and got in the way of other plans.

  Tomorrow I would visit the insurance offices, take on an assignment, I hoped. I would write a letter to my lover, arrange to meet him again soon. On visiting day, I would go to Catterick Hospital to … I did not let myself fully acknowledge that I would look for Gerald among men who had lost memories, suffered such injuries that they would forever desire to turn away from the world. Some smaller hospitals in various parts of the country had finally closed their doors, men moved to Catterick. It was an outside chance, but all the same …

  The brown door of the second house on the right in White Swan Yard took on a life of its own. Every other feature in the courtyard faded to nothingness. There was just me, and that door.

  If there were voices indoors, would I hear by inching nearer? Perhaps Mary Jane had taken my advice and even now was telling her mother all her troubles, including reporting the uselessness of that sister who was given up. They’d done the right thing, getting shut of her.

  No sound.

  What if she dies tonight, this woman who gave birth to me? Would it matter that I never saw her? I could choose not to knock. All I had to do was leave the yard, turn right, walk back to my motor, and drive home.

  Dad was right. Let the police help Mary Jane. If ever a matter was a police matter, this was it. I’d said so from the beginning. When the dust settled, then I might come back here, and knock on the door.

  Besides, I should tell my real mother first, the woman who brought me up, the one who nursed me better when I was poorly. The one who always moans that no one but me will go to the pictures with her. It’s not true of course, but she says it to bring me back.

  The sleepy dog on the pavement became bored with staring at me and shut its eyes.

  I knocked on the door.

  And the window was so close; I could look through it, across the gap between the curtain and the blind. There she was, sitting in a chair by the hearth. Some leisure then, she enjoys a sit down, peace and quiet.

  She pushed herself up from the chair, a gaunt, grey-haired woman in a long dark skirt, a navy tabard over a long-sleeved jumper. I glanced away so that she would not see me looking. And then the door opened.

  We stared at each other for a moment. Her skin under her high cheek bones was as lined as the tram terminus, criss-crossed with fine wrinkles. Her eyes narrowed, as if she thought she ought to recognise me.

  ‘Mrs Whitaker?’

  ‘Who’s asking?’

  ‘Kate Shackleton. You may know me if I say Catherine Hood.’

  Her hand went to her heart. What an idiot I am. She could drop dead from shock and it would be my fault.

  At the second house on the right in White Swan Yard, a woman dropped dead from shock today when confronted with her long lost daughter. A person close to the family said …

  Sorry, Mary Jane. I didn’t manage to find your missing husband, but gave your mother a nice enough heart attack. Perhaps when Ethan’s body turns up you could arrange a double funeral.

  But she did not drop dead. Instead, she opened the door wider.

  ‘You better come in.’

  As she spoke, she glanced at the mantelpiece as though there might be a clock, to mark the precise moment of the infant Catherine’s return. There wasn’t.

  She did not blink or look in the least surprised but said in a conversational way, as though picking up a topic she had just dropped, ‘I thought for a minute I was looking at my aunt Phoebe. You take after her.’

  ‘I was just passing,’ I said. ‘I won’t keep you.’

  No more than you kept me.

  I glanced around the house. There were few comforts. Apart from the chair she sat in, only a couple of buffets and a table.

  She saw me looking. ‘You were well off out of it, lass.’

  I hadn’t meant it to come out in the way it did. ‘You had eleven children? Here?’

  ‘Ten, without you. Will you sit down?’

  I saw that she meant me to take the chair, but I pulled a buffet from the side of the table and sat on that.

  She returned to her chair. ‘You were just passing?’

  Thirty-two years it had taken me to “just pass”.

  ‘I met Dad for a bite to eat in Websters.’

  ‘Very nice.’

  ‘I asked him about you. I thought it was about time we at least said hello. I hope that’s all right.’

  ‘It’ll be all the same if it’s not. You’ve said it now.’ She looked at me from top to toe, my hat, coat, stockings and shoes. ‘Did he tell you how it came about that you were taken to live with them?’

  ‘Yes.’ She did not use the word adopted. ‘You were widowed.’

  She sighed. ‘Aye, that was it. And I’m sorry you was widowed by the war. Our Barbara May told me.’

  ‘Barbara May seems to know quite a lot about me.’

  She nodded with pride at Barbara May’s extensive knowledge. ‘There’s always one knits the family together, remembers birthdays, marriages, deaths, the bairns’ names. In our family it’s Barbara May. She runs rings round us all. She found out where you live. She said she’d take me up there to see, and we could look through the window if you weren’t in. I said no. But now you’re here. Is it down to Barbara May that you’ve come?’

  ‘No. It’s because of Mary Jane.’

  ‘Mary Jane?’ She drew back her head, pulling her chin into her neck, as if a little more space was needed to take in this piece of unlikely information.

  ‘She came to see me.’

  ‘Did she now? Then she must be in bother. She never goes to see no one unless she needs summat. What’s up?’

  I wished now I had kept Mary Jane out of it. I wished now I had left this visit to another day. ‘You don’t see much of her and the children then?’

  ‘No. Mind, Ethan calls in. He’s a good lad. If he’s at one of his meetings roundabout, he makes a point of coming in, and never empty handed. Allus a couple of eggs, or a corner of ham, or a pound of flour. Once he brought me a chicken.’ She chuckled at this extravagance. ‘By, it took some plucking.’

  I smiled, and stood to go. ‘I’ll call and see you again another time, if that’s all right.’

  ‘If you like. If you’ve a mind to.’

  ‘Well, goodbye.’

  What should I do? Shake her hand, kiss her cheek, or touch her hair? I did nothing. As I stood by the door, she put her hand on my arm.

  ‘What’s up with Mary Jane that she came mithering you?’

  There was no point in lying. She would find out soon enough.

  ‘Ethan’s gone. She hasn’t seen him since Saturday.’

  She reached round me and unhooked a coat from the back of the door. ‘I better go to her.’

  ‘No really, I’m sure …’

  ‘I’m the one she should have come to. Will you take me there? I know you’ve got a motor car. It’s blue.’

  Barbara May must have told her.

  ‘Pass that shopping basket, eh?’

  I picked up a shopping basket from the side of the table.

  ‘We can call and get one or two items, since she won’t be expecting us – me at any rate.’

  I could say no. I should say no. What the hell was I doing here?

  We were outside. She was locking the door and letting the key on its string fall back through the letter box.

  The dog looked up. It hauled its old body from the pavement and stood wagging its tail.

  As we left the yard, the dog trotted behind us.

  ‘That dog’s following us.’

  ‘Oh aye. Benjie’s my dog. He won’t be left behind.’

  At the greengrocer’s, and the butcher’s, Mrs Whitaker asked for the shopping to be put on the slate, but I paid. Why did I have the feeling I would go on paying, and not entirely in cash?

  *

  She sat ramrod
straight for the entire journey, motoring blanket round her shoulders, the large dog in her lap, only its head peering out from the blanket. Sometimes it looked with a worried gaze as we passed through quiet lanes, occasionally barking at nothing. When we were in the noise and smoke of the city, it relaxed and shut its eyes.

  This is the best thing I could do, I told myself. Now Mary Jane will have someone who really is family to be with her, and the police to investigate Ethan’s disappearance. I can bow out.

  It was turning dark when we reached Great Applewick. I followed the familiar road to Mary Jane’s cottage. The curtains in the downstairs room were drawn back, the blind up. A candle burned brightly on the window sill, as if to beckon Ethan home.

  Mrs Whitaker opened the blanket and out jumped Benjie. The dog ran to the door of the cottage as though he knew all along this was our destination.

  I helped Mrs Whitaker from the car and we walked together to the door of the cottage. She opened it and walked straight in. The children were in their pyjamas. Mary Jane sat at the table, drinking tea and smoking a cigarette.

  She looked up in surprise. ‘Hello, Mam. Didn’t expect you.’

  ‘When were you going to tell me?’ Mrs Whitaker asked, unbuttoning her coat.

  ‘Grandma!’ Harriet ran to Mrs Whitaker who grabbed her and kissed her.

  The dog had been relieving himself against the apple tree. He came rushing in. The room grew smaller.

  I hovered in the doorway.

  Mary Jane looked at me accusingly. ‘You said you wouldn’t come today.’

  ‘I can’t do any more, Mary Jane. The West Riding Constabulary are looking into Ethan’s disappearance. It’s out of my hands. When I’ve something to tell you, or there’s something I can do, I shall be here.’

  Harriet was all ears. Mary Jane stood up and came outside with me, shutting the door behind her, saying, ‘Little pigs have big ears.’ When we were out of earshot, she said, ‘Nothing? Nothing?’

  ‘I haven’t abandoned the case.’

  ‘The case? So I’m a case?’

  ‘You know what I mean.’

  ‘Mam’ll love this. Turning up here, bossing us all around. That stinking dog of hers. Have you smelled its breath?’

  ‘The children like the dog. It’ll divert them.’

  ‘Oh it’ll do that. They’ll have it on a string taking it round the village.’ She drew on her cigarette, the tab so small it must have burned her nicotine-stained fingers. ‘Thanks for nothing.’

  I opened the door and called goodnight to Mrs Whitaker and the children. Mary Jane went inside, shutting me out.

  Just as I climbed in the motor, Harriet ran across, barefoot, holding something. ‘Raymond brought this for you. It’s pieces of slate from the sundial.’

  She handed me a cloth knotted at its four corners, with something hard inside. These would be the flowers that Ethan had carved to disguise the flaw in the slate. If there were four, he had completed it. If three or less, he had been interrupted before the work was finished.

  One more piece for the jigsaw, or perhaps not. I put the package on the seat beside me.

  ‘Thanks, Harriet.’

  ‘I’m glad you brought Grandma.’

  ‘So am I. Goodnight then.’

  ‘Goodnight.’

  She was still standing in the road when I started the motor. ‘Go inside. You’ll catch cold.’

  ‘Do you believe me? Do you believe what I said about seeing Dad, because Sergeant Sharp thinks I’m a little liar.’

  ‘Yes, Harriet. I believe you.’

  ‘Has someone killed Dad? And Miss Trimble?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘And do you think …’

  ‘What?’

  ‘If I’d taken Dad’s dinner to him sooner, would everything have been all right? Is it my fault, Auntie Kate?’

  It was the first time she had taken up my invitation to call me auntie.

  ‘None of this is your fault, Harriet. You ask your grandma. She’ll tell you the same.’

  Four

  It was after eight o’clock when I arrived home to a house in darkness. I switched on the light in the hall. The second post lay on the hall table. I walked through to the kitchen, where a mean little fire gave off a sulky glow.

  When I tapped on the door to her part of the house, Mrs Sugden did not answer. Back in the kitchen, I built up the fire, turned on the gas ring and filled a kettle.

  On the kitchen table were two notes. Note one read,

  6 o’clock. Sookie fed and stroked. Looked in three times at two hourly intervals. Kittens satisfactory. Eliz. Merton.

  Elizabeth Merton lives across the street. The professor’s sister, she acts as his housekeeper.

  Note two lay sealed in a manila envelope, with my name on the front, in Mrs Sugden’s neat round hand. I took out the small ruled sheet of writing paper.

  You are right. It is all hands to the deck in such a case. Taking tram to terminus. Meeting at Spiritualist Church in Great Applewick this evening.

  PS – Your appointment with Mr Wright of Yorkshire Mutual Insurance tomorrow 9.30am.

  PPS – Have taken overnight bag, just in case.

  I’d said no such thing about all hands to the deck. Mrs Sugden had got bored with her knitting, run out of library books, and fancied a little nosey sleuthing.

  The doorbell rang. I hurried to answer, expecting a weary Mrs Sugden, exhausted by fleeting spirits and the return tram journey, lacking the energy to delve into her bag for the key.

  ‘Hello. You look how I feel.’

  It was Sykes. He took a parcel from the saddlebag of a bicycle which he then wheeled into the hall. ‘I brought us a fish and chip supper.’

  Never had I been so glad to see him. ‘Come through to the kitchen. Did you know Mrs Sugden has gone off sleuthing?’

  ‘Aye. She called round to tell Rosie. She said that she knew of a spiritualist church out there, and if she paid a visit, it might yield dividends.’

  ‘What kind of dividends?’

  ‘She reckons that the people who visit the spiritualist church to commune with the departed know everything there is to know about the not yet departed.’

  I mashed tea.

  Sykes opened the newspaper parcel. In an instant, the kitchen smelled like a fried-fish shop.

  I put the teapot and cups on the table and turned to open the cutlery drawer.

  ‘Forget knives and forks. Don’t make washing up.’ Sykes divided the fish and chips. ‘Do you have pickled onions?’

  I opened the cupboard door. ‘Pickled onions on the top shelf. You’ll have to reach them.’

  I found a pickle fork, giving it a thorough rinse under the tap; Mrs Sugden goes overboard on the silver polish.

  As we tucked into our supper, I broke the news to Sykes that Dad had warned me off investigating on behalf of Mary Jane. ‘I’m just glad he didn’t have men there today, falling over you and me and Mrs Sugden.’

  ‘You went across?’

  ‘I took Mrs Whitaker to Mary Jane’s.’

  ‘Mrs Whitaker?’ Sykes speared an onion.

  ‘Mary Jane’s mother.’ And mine, of course.

  ‘Ah.’ The onion fell back into the jar. Sykes had difficulty recapturing it. He wore his What am I supposed to say next look.

  I sighed, and explained. ‘I screwed my courage into my knuckles and rapped on Mrs Whitaker’s door.’

  White Swan Yard, Wakefield, second house on the right.

  ‘Was this the first time you’ve seen your … Mrs Whitaker?’

  ‘Yes, and to hand it to her, she was off to Mary Jane like a shot. A friend in need and all that. It’s likely Mary Jane and the children will get more from her visit than from anything I can do.’

  What I avoided saying was how I felt about Mrs Whitaker. Sykes would not expect some heartfelt outpouring and I still felt too uncertain of my feelings to know what to think, much less what to say.

  ‘Was Mary Jane pleased to see h
er mother?’

  ‘Not enchanted, no.’

  Sykes offered me a pickled onion, which I accepted. He forked out two more for himself.

  I could tell by the concentration with which he munched his extra scraps of crunchy fried batter that he had more to tell. He made a tightly screwed up firelighter of his portion of greasy newspaper. ‘I saw Mary Jane today, first in her doorway, waving the kids off to school after their dinner. And then she came out in a smart grey coat and a hat with a flower on and took the train to Horsforth Station.’

  ‘Horsforth? I wonder if that’s where the oracle sister Barbara May has fetched up? She’s the one that keeps tabs on the whole family.’

  ‘Not unless Barbara May wears a mohair suit, sports a cashmere coat, drives a Wolseley and goes by the alias of Colonel Ledger. They disappeared into a private room at the Station Hotel.’

  A chip stuck in my throat. ‘I suppose it had to be her, if you followed her from the house?’

  He went to the sink, turned on the tap and washed his hands, keeping his back to me. ‘You have a similar way of walking. Don’t take this wrong.’

  ‘Go on. I won’t throw pickled onions at you.’

  ‘How to describe it? Gliding, upright, as if you’ve got a cooking pot on your head.’

  ‘Thanks.’ So what I imagined was my fine deportment, encouraged by Aunt Berta, also belonged to Mary Jane. I would have to ask her sometime whether she was ever made to walk with a dictionary on her head. ‘How do you know the man she met was Colonel Ledger?’

  ‘The waiter’s a friendly chap, especially if he’s given a pair of stockings.’

  Little wonder Mary Jane had been cagey with me. Perhaps she had been having an affair with the colonel all these years. The Station Hotel. Colonel Ledger must be worth a fortune, and Mary Jane made do with the Station Hotel.

  ‘Did the waiter say whether these are regular gettogethers for the pair of them?’

  ‘I didn’t push it. But I’m sure I could find out.’

  I wiped the kitchen table, giving myself time to think. ‘Put another cob on the fire would you?’ I wanted to show him Ethan Armstrong’s papers, and the pieces of the sundial, but I needed time to take in his information about Mary Jane. ‘I’m going to check on Sookie and her kittens.’