The Killings at Badger's Drift(59)
‘Good afternoon, Mr Lacey.’
‘Whoops.’ Michael Lacey stopped in his tracks and stared at them. ‘It’s our friendly neighbourhood sleuths. Leaping out of the hedgerow to startle innocent passers-by.’
‘Would you mind telling me where you’re going?’
‘I’m taking a short cut to the Black Boy. Still, as far as I’m aware, not a criminal offence.’
‘A little early, isn’t it?’
‘She opens the jug and bottle if you knock on the shutters. ’ And before Barnaby could reply he had walked quickly away.
‘I don’t believe this,’ murmured Troy. ‘Not a single question as to what we’re doing here. Why, half the village is gawping outside the house. How uncurious can you get?’
‘Incurious. And he wouldn’t know about the crowd if he’d come straight from Holly Cottage through the woods and up Church Lane.’
‘Still, why dash off like that?’ Troy pursed his lips shrewdly before adding, ‘The murderer returns to the scene of the crime.’
‘Hardly ever, Sergeant,’ replied the chief inspector, ‘at least in non-domestic matters. As your experience should have taught you by now.’
‘But they are connected aren’t they, sir?’ continued Troy. ‘The two deaths?’
‘Oh yes.’ The two men stepped back on to the concrete path. Barnaby could see through the french windows into the lounge. It seemed to be crammed with people milling aimlessly about. In fact, as Barnaby knew, the most precise cataloguing and analysis were taking place. And today the scent was warm. Discoveries would be made. No one killed without taking something (usually unintentionally) from the scene. Or leaving something behind.
He made his way to the kitchen door, stopping when he got there, glancing back the way he had come. He thought how impossible it was for a gardener to attempt to conceal his personality. Telling one’s dreams could hardly be more revelatory. Unsophisticated harmony for Miss Simpson; tangled exuberance for Miss Bellringer; whilst here . . . He looked at the showy shrubs, the billiard-table-baize lawn, the pond with a concrete cherub peeing mechanically on a plastic lily. Here was ostentatious vulgarity, literally in full bloom.
He entered the hall. A pair of black Oxfords appeared just above his head and made their way down the pine steps from the loft, followed by tweed trousers, a short-sleeved shirt and a bearded, hot-looking face.
‘Finished up there?’ asked Barnaby.
‘We have. Lots of prints. Looks as if they’re all from the same person, though. Soon see.’
Barnaby climbed the stairs. There were about a dozen of them, broad and solidly based, quite unlike the capricious aluminium approach usually leading to a conversion. The opening had been enlarged, no doubt to accommodate Mrs Rainbird, and there was a rail on two sides of the entrance about three feet from the floor. Barnaby heaved himself up and Troy followed.
The loft was very large. The beams were unpainted, the walls white, the floor covered with a porridge-coloured tweed carpet. At either end of the loft was a round window. Directly beneath each stood a plain wooden chair. They also each had a narrow sill holding a notebook and ballpoint. On the seat of one of the chairs was a magnificent pair of Zeiss binoculars. There were two large grey filing cabinets and that was all. Barnaby, who had been expecting either the usual piles of lumber or a wildly baroque spare room, looked about him in some surprise. He picked up the binoculars and looked out at the Street.
A face in the crowd sprang at him in the most astonishing detail. Open pores, nostril hairs, pink plastic rollers, petals on a flowered scarf. He adjusted the focusing ring and got a broader sweep. The forecourt of the Black Boy was now packed. More cars were pulling up by the minute. All human life seemed to be out there. And it was not a pretty sight.
‘Empty those cabinets, Sergeant. Start taking the stuff downstairs.’ He put down the glasses and flicked through one of the notebooks, picking a day at random. The entries read:
Barnaby closed the book. Mrs Rainbird’s daily occupation did not surprise him. He never underestimated the tremendous satisfaction that knowing all a neighbour’s business gave to some people. A passionate interest in everyone else’s affairs seemed to him a very human characteristic hardly reprehensible enough to be called a failing, let alone a sin. If he himself wasn’t endlessly concerned with other people’s behaviour he wouldn’t be doing the job he was. He watched Troy lowering himself down through the loft opening, pulling a stack of envelope files after him.
No. What interested Barnaby was not the revelation that Mrs Rainbird watched human beings rather than waxwings but what she did with the knowledge she so obtained. There was something very pared down, almost ruthlessly functional about the room he thought as he collected the rest of the files and the other notebook and prepared to follow Troy. Downstairs all was voluptuous indulgence but this place was something else. This place, thought Barnaby, taking a last look round, meant business.