"Jury. I'm with Scotland Yard."
"Are you? You're a detective?"
He had thought they had got that sorted out long ago. "That's right. I'm sure you heard about the woman found in the Horndean wood this morning."
She nodded. "Beastly, wasn't it?"
"We're trying to ascertain just who she was."
"I'm sure she was a stranger. No one I've talked to ever saw her before. That is, from what we could tell from the Craigies' description."
"Don't you think it odd a stranger would be walking in the Horndean wood?"
They were in her patch now-murder and mayhem-and she relaxed. She even put down the cracker. "Maybe she was killed somewhere else. And taken to the wood." She shoved her glasses back on her nose and regarded him in a getting-down-to-business way.
"We don't think so."
"Where was she on her way to, then? No one goes there except the R.B.W.'s-the birdwatchers."
"Maybe we ought to add a mystery writer to the team. Cigarette?"
She accepted both cigarette and compliment in grand fashion, sitting back, smiling, crossing her legs. Good smile and good legs, he noted. "I've been thinking about it. A lot."
"Tell me what you think."
"Okay. First off, there's the fingers." She held her own hand up, fingers spread. "Why would anyone want to cut off one hand? Couldn't be fingerprints-"
"Some people seem to think it's a psychotic."
"No, no, no." The dark curls shook. "If you were going to dismember a body, you wouldn't stop with five lousy fingers."
Her way of looking at it was refreshingly clinical. "True."
"It could be a red herring."
"True again."
"Making people think it's a madman. Of course, it could be some sort of odd revenge. Symbolic maiming. Like the Mafia in America. To warn off others." She leaned back and closed her eyes to fix the mental image. "Horndean wood. Early morning. No, evening, wasn't it? Mists, peaty soft ground and her feet sinking in as she walks. Marshbirds. An early owl. And him waiting-or her. I rather like the idea of a woman's doing it, don't know why. The victim stops, hears something. But it's only the owl. Mists close round her. Murderer steps from behind, and-" Suddenly Polly Praed raised her arms and brought the imaginary slasher down with what would have been a deadly crash had she been holding a real one. Both Jury and Barney jumped. "Oh, sorry. One gets carried away." She sighed, puffed on her cigarette, swung her leg. "I wonder if it had anything to do with those letters-" She stopped suddenly, as if she could have bitten her tongue. "You haven't, ah, read . . . ?"
"Yes. Rather silly, they struck me. Someone casting about for things to accuse people of."
She looked a bit relieved. "Well, I wish they hadn't cast about in my direction. Have you thought of blackmail?" It had been Gere's suggestion. Jury shook his head. "Supposing someone finds out you've done something appalling. He threatens to tell the world." She leaned toward Jury, her self-consciousness forgotten in the throes of a fresh plot. "What you do is, you write a lot of spurious letters accusing people of perfectly dreadful things, so that when your blackmailer starts publishing your sin, no one will believe him." Her glasses were up on her head now and the amethyst eyes glittered. "Really, it's quite a good plan."
He had to admit he admired the eyes more than the plan. "Hmm. I see what you mean."
She studied her nails. "I guess you're here because you think I wrote them. I bet a lot of people do, because I'm a writer."
"I don't think they're nearly imaginative enough for you."
That flustered her. She asked again, "What'd you say your name is?"
"Jury. And besides, had it been you, surely the Bodenheims would have got several apiece." He smiled. "Do you assume it was one of them who wrote the letters?"
"I doubt they can write."
"Where were you, Miss Praed, two nights ago?"
"Oh. Here it comes. I've no alibi, of course. I was sitting in here, writing." She looked away.
"Did you know Katie O'Brien?"
"Katie? Whatever are you asking about her for?"
"Littlebourne seems to be having its share of bad luck, doesn't it?"
"You don't think she had anything to do with those letters?"
Jury shrugged. "It's doubtful, as they were postmarked the day after she was attacked."
"I admit they are rather adolescent and Katie was awfully put upon by Mary. I mean, repressed. But poison-pen stuff, no. She was too nice. I mean is-You see, we're talking about her as though she were dead. It's awful. If you want to know about Katie you really ought to talk to Emily Louise Perk. They weren't anywhere near the same age, but I always saw them about, after school or on Saturdays. It's probably because they're both so good with horses. Though, of course, Katie's not a patch on Em when it comes to that. No one is. She takes care of the Bodenheims' nags, too. Emily knows everything that goes on in this village. Though it's not easy to get things out of her unless you've something to trade."
"Trade?"
"Umm. Bits of information for goodies. You cost me two hot cross buns this morning."
"I did?"
"She knew who you were before you'd had both feet out of the car, I bet."
So she hadn't really needed to ask him twice what his name was. "It's a compliment to know you thought me worth two hot cross buns."
Blushing, she studied the plate of cheese again. "And a cup of tea," she said, weakly.
EIGHT
I
"EXEMPLARY lives, sir. Exemplary lives!" said Sir Miles Bodenheim in response to Jury's question about the letters. And the tiny smile that accompanied Miles's modest evaluation of the Bodenheim family did double duty: Scotland Yard could take it as gospel or Scotland Yard could take it as proof of Miles Bodenheim's ability to have a little joke on himself. Either way, the Bodenheims won the Littlebourne Character Sweepstakes.
From the moment of entering the Bodenheim drawing room, it had been fairly clear to Jury why Polly Praed was writing The Littlebourne Murders. Three heads-those of Miles, Sylvia, and the daughter-had turned toward him as if he were royalty's looking glass; the fourth didn't turn much at all. It was too busy looking bored. Derek Bodenheim sat slouched in a chair, his fingers slowly turning a tall glass of something, his expression insolent, as if he were already disagreeing with whatever Jury might say.
Having offered Jury a thimbleful of sherry, Miles Bodenheim sat down and reclaimed his cup of tea. He was wearing a fawn jacket and black ascot with tiny white polka dots and that morning's egg hardening in its folds. When Jury declined the sherry, Sylvia Bodenheim must have felt it incumbent upon her to make an offer of tea. But the voice trailed off so weakly and the hand fell so short of the pot that Jury didn't even bother to say no.
"Who was she, d'ya know yet?" asked Derek, slouching down in his chair. Having inherited what there was of his father's looks, Derek managed to dissipate them across a face that looked so soft and malleable it could have taken the imprint of a thumb.
"That's what we're trying to establish. No one seems to have seen her here in the village."
"Except for Daddy and that silly birdwatching group, no one goes into the wood," said Julia. She managed to lift her head as if it were quite the handsomest thing Jury would be likely to see in Littlebourne. Ever since he'd got there, she'd been having trouble arranging her expression and her person. She had tossed him enigmatic glances and thrown her long hair about as if he were a fashion photographer.
"Silly? Nothing silly about the Royal Birdwatchers, my dear. Do you good to join it yourself," said her father.
Julia rolled her eyes upwards and tried to find an even more striking pose on the velvet couch, chosen, no doubt, because the blue matched both her shirt and her eyes.
Sylvia set aside her teacup and reclaimed her knitting needles. Her thin hands flew as she said, "There's no earthly reason for the woman to have been in the Horndean wood. None." Ergo (she made it sound), the woman wasn't there.
"It's been suggested this person was on her way to Stonington."
Sylvia gave Jury a smile as thin as the cucumber on the sandwiches. "Why on earth would she be going there? And not through the wood. That's absurd. And not to see Lady Kennington, I daresay. I was at Stonington not three days ago to see if she wouldn't do something for our church fête. But as always it was quite useless. The woman's a veritable recluse. Now her husband, Lord Kennington, seemed pleasant enough. . . . You heard, I expect, about the theft of that jewelry about a year ago."
"Yes. Apparently the secretary came under suspicion."
Sylvia sniffed. "And no wonder. Not a nice sort, at all. You knew him a little, didn't you, Derek?" She turned to her son, who did not bother to recognize her. "Yes, police assumed he must have done it, though they could never prove anything because they never found that emerald. It was extremely valuable. Egyptian, I believe. One of the old ones." Sylvia somehow made it sound as if the Bodenheims had all of the new ones.
"Clever chap," said Derek, determined to say whatever might upset the rest of the family. "Always did think so. It's never turned up, you know. And he's dead. So there's nearly a quarter million quids' worth of emerald gone missing, and the fellow who knows where it is got hit by a car. What an irony."