“The investigation continues,” the reporter finished his piece. He turned to look back at the river and nearly toppled in himself, so surprised was he to see the body of Mr. Newman as it rose from the depths, just a few meters from the tributes to Lennie. The camera operator was quick enough to shift the focus from the reporter to the river, making both of their careers.
Chapter Eleven
“So, it wasn’t gambling debts,” Mrs. Billings said to me of Mr. Newman.
“Unless his loan shark chased him and shoved him in,” I suggested, but Mrs. B didn’t seem convinced and there wasn’t much point pushing that theory anyway: It wasn’t going to stand up to scrutiny.
“Poor, poor Doug,” Mrs. B said. “And Jo and them kids. And Meg, especially Meg. She’s not a young dog.”
Mrs. Billings put the radio on; it was time for a bulletin. The report was long, but with little of note so far about either Lennie or Mr. Newman, just that the police were treating both deaths as “unexplained.”
“And unexplainable.” Mrs. B shook her head sadly and I realized that, from her point of view, there was a lot that was not known, such as, did they die together or at different times? There was nothing on the bulletins about the state of decomposition. How did they die?Had Mr. Newman come across Lennie’s body, or had he—could he have—been hiding him? That would be a good lead to get out there, with all the barns and outhouses around the farm. “They’ll want to do a postmortem,” she said.
“On whom?” I asked and she thought for a minute, before saying:
“Both of them.”
I wondered what that would bring to light. Would Lennie’s cuts and bruises still be visible? Had he broken any bones in the collision? Would Mr. Newman be written off as an accidental drowning? Or would a spade mark in the middle of his face give the lie to that?
When I said, “Do you think there’s anything in the kidnapping theory for Lennie Green?” Mrs. B didn’t take the bait.
And so we carried on. All that Mrs. Billings and the local radio station could talk about was the bodies, but no one came to Langley Hall asking about them.
Mrs. Billings wore black for days, along with a remembrance poppy for some reason.
“If anyone hurt either Lennie Green or poor old Doug, I’ll string them up myself,” she said.
I wondered exactly what that entailed and what her chances of achieving it were, particularly if I fought against it, which I would. Maybe if she got Mr. B involved? Would he help?
“Have them police officers been back here?” she asked me. “The ones who came because you were at the same party?”
“No,” I said. “Why would they?”
“Just wondered,” she said, pulling biscuits, sugar, and milk from her bag and switching the kettle on. I was annoyed to see she had brought Bourbons, although I had been clear in ordering Rich Tea.
I watched carefully for any sign of what she was thinking. Mrs.Billings wasn’t an idiot. Not only was I sure she had Lennie’s phone, but she’d been reading his memoir; it was unrealistic to think she knew nothing. I wondered if I was going to have to bump her off as well. She would certainly be easier to do away with than James, one good shove down the stairs should do it, and with the way she wielded the vacuum cleaner, it would be a simple thing to pass off as an accident.
Maybe that was the moral of this story: Think twice before you hide a body because you’ll end up hiding more. But as I watched Mrs. B enjoying a Bourbon, her favorite, the idea of dispatching her made me feel sad.
I told myself she must be waiting for a simple explanation to emerge. After all, she’d known me all my life, she was friends with my mum, and James was from a respected village family—his mum was asupervisorat the SPAR and his dad was on the council for years. Surely, she wouldn’t think that James and I had done what we actually did.
Or, maybe she was keeping quiet out of loyalty to my mum and the history we had. I didn’t like to think about how far that loyalty may or may not stretch. If I took too long to act, circumstances could overtake me, then I’d have years in a prison cell to reflect on what I should have done. And looking on the bright side, if I did help her shuffle off this mortal coil, it would be an opportunity to hire a cleaner who actually cleaned.
But I still didn’t want to, so I decided to monitor her for signs and hints about what she knew and what she was going to do.
***
After a decent gap, to make it look like I had other things to do, I delivered the T-shirt I had made for Arty.
“I love it!” he said. He tried it on there and then, as “Rivers of Babylon” serenaded us from his phone, jiggling to the music, and I must say, he did look good. He also looked good without a shirt at all. On the way back to the house, I tried to forget I’d had that thought.
“What do I owe you?” he asked.
But he owed me nothing; the cost of the materials was small, I still had plenty left over, and the pleasure of delivering it was payment enough. “Would you like another T-shirt?” I asked and he said he would.
Within a couple of weeks, there were two of us on the estate dressed like rag dolls. I branched out into waistcoats, shirts, and a couple of cravats, just in case he had a special occasion. I couldn’t bring myself to offer to measure him for trousers; I felt the blood rushing through me at the mere thought of it and wondered if this was passion or a hot flush.
Thinking about Kaboolu, I started making small labels with “Daisy Daydream” written on them and sewing them into the clothes. I remembered my mum saying that one day people would envy us for what we could do with a needle and thread.
