Murder to Music - Libby Sarjeant Murder Mystery Series Page 4

  ‘Perhaps he thought it would be over-egging the pudding?’

  ‘Maybe. But it’s odd. In fact, it’s more than bloody odd,’ said Libby, ‘it’s terrifying. If that disturbed part of the garden is a recent grave it isn’t a legal one.’

  ‘Murder.’ Fran stared at her friend.

  ‘Oh, bloody hell, not again,’ said Libby.

  They took the keys back to Riley’s, which was just about to close. A young woman took Libby’s credit card and refunded the deposit.

  ‘Have a nice day,’ she said, as she locked the door behind them.

  Fran and Libby looked at each other in surprise.

  ‘She didn’t ask us anything about it,’ said Libby. ‘Why not?’

  ‘They’re obviously used to people not wanting the place after they’ve seen it. It must be a regular thing for them to let viewers go on their own.’

  ‘But not recently. It doesn’t come up on their website, remember. They’re hardly advertising it.’ Libby looked thoughtful as they turned back down the high street. ‘And you’d have thought they would be pushing it to get rid of it. I wonder if they’ve told the police?’

  ‘If they’ve heard the piano music, they should have done.’

  ‘No, I meant about the grave.’

  ‘If no one’s been to view they wouldn’t know. It hasn’t been there long.’

  ‘Well, do we tell the police, then?’

  ‘Would they listen?’ Fran looked dubious.

  ‘Ian might.’

  ‘Oh, poor Ian.’ Fran laughed. ‘We can’t do it to him again.’

  ‘He’s our pet policeman,’ said Libby. ‘We can just ask him a question.’

  ‘He isn’t our pet policeman. He’s a friend.’

  ‘Poor bugger. But he was – and still is – a policeman first. He only became a friend because he fancied you.’

  ‘Well, yes, I suppose so. But he wouldn’t be able to do anything. I would imagine White Lodge is out of his jurisdiction. He’s still working out of Nethergate.’

  ‘We could just ask him a question, as I said. Hypothetically.’

  ‘And he would immediately ask why we wanted to know.’

  ‘I don’t care. I’ll ask him if you won’t.’ They stopped outside Coastguard Cottage. ‘I’ll ring him tonight. Better if I do it, anyway. Then Guy won’t be jealous.’

  ‘Don’t be daft,’ said Fran. ‘Guy never gets jealous.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Libby unlocked the car. ‘Well, anyway. I’ll ring you later and tell you what he says.’

  It occurred to Libby that she ought to ring Ben, having been far longer than she had expected that afternoon.

  ‘It’s all right,’ he sighed. ‘I guessed you were out on the trail with Fran. Find anything?’

  ‘Well, sort of,’ said Libby. ‘I’ll tell you when I get back. And,’ she added as an afterthought, ‘get your advice.’

  She arrived back at Allhallow’s Lane to find Ben preparing his signature stir fry, a glass of red wine already poured for her.

  ‘Rice is on,’ he said, ‘so come and sit down and tell me all about it.’

  So Libby told him. ‘And what I want to know,’ she finished, ‘is should I phone Ian to tell him?’

  Ben frowned. ‘If you heard that music then it isn’t, as Fran said, anything paranormal. So someone’s there. And if that is a grave, then you must tell the police.’

  ‘Fran thought they wouldn’t listen to us.’

  ‘That’s why you wanted to tell Ian.’ Ben nodded. ‘I think you should.’

  Libby sighed and drained her glass. ‘I’ll do it after dinner, then.’

  An hour later, she rang Detective Inspector Connell’s mobile number.

  ‘Libby? Is this a nice surprise or a nasty one?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Ian. Am I disturbing you in the middle of something important?’ asked Libby as sweetly as she could.

  ‘Only the first night off I’ve had to myself.’

  ‘Oh.’ Libby was genuinely regretful. ‘In that case, I really am sorry.’

  ‘That means you weren’t before. Come on, what is it? You only call me when you want something.’

  Guiltily, Libby acknowledged this. ‘But honestly, Ian, I really think I ought to tell you, and so does Ben.’

  Ian’s voice sharpened. ‘Ben does? All right, what is it?’

  Libby outlined the facts as succinctly as she was able. ‘And we don’t know that it was a grave, just that it had been cleared comparatively recently.’

  ‘And that was the only patch like that?’

  ‘I’m afraid we didn’t look any further. We were spooked by the piano music.’

  Ian was silent for a moment. ‘And you’re sure it was real? And no one was playing the piano?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then it was probably one of the only sensible things you’ve done. Someone was trying to scare you off the place.’

  ‘So will you look into it?’

  Ian sighed. ‘I suppose I’ll have to, although strictly speaking we haven’t much to go on. If I take it to the Chief he might not want to waste any time on it.’

  ‘Really? When it might be a murder?’

  ‘I might have to do a bit of snooping around on my own.’

  ‘Snooping? Oh, we’re good at that!’ said Libby.

  ‘I know you are, but you stay out of it until I say so. Why were you there in the first place, anyway?’

  Libby told him about Rosie and the dreams.

  ‘Then she needs to be questioned. You said even Fran thought she must have been there in the fairly recent past.’

  ‘But why would she want Fran to investigate? Or me, for that matter?’

  ‘I don’t know. Perhaps you should go back and ask her. Meanwhile, I’ll bring it up with the Chief and see what he says. I’ll get back to you.’

  ‘Well, that’s that,’ said Libby, switching off the phone. ‘I suppose Fran and I should go back to Rosie.’

  ‘Perhaps not until Monday?’ suggested Ben. ‘Then we could have a nice relaxing weekend.’

  ‘We always have nice relaxing weekends,’ said Libby. ‘Except that, if you remember, we invited your mum and dad to Sunday lunch here for a change.’

  Libby and Ben usually went up to the Manor for one of Ben’s mother Hetty’s legendary Sunday lunches, sometimes with Peter, who was Ben’s cousin and Hetty’s and Greg’s nephew, Harry, of course, sometimes Peter’s younger brother James and very occasionally Adam. However, on summer Sundays Harry kept The Pink Geranium open, so neither he, Adam nor Peter would be there and James was somewhere in Europe with his latest girlfriend.

  ‘Why won’t that be relaxing?’ asked Ben.

  ‘Because I’ll have to cook and I shall be nervous in front of Hetty. She’s the gold medal winner of Sunday roasts and I’m certain I won’t do it properly.’

  ‘Then cook something else. It doesn’t have to be a roast.’

  ‘They’ll think it’s sacrilege,’ said Libby.

  ‘No, they won’t. Tell you what – compromise and do that lamb shanks thing you did for Fran and Guy. That’s a roast in a way.’

  Libby brightened. ‘Oh, good idea. And I can do dauphinoise spuds and – what veg have you got in the Manor garden?’

  ‘I’ll have a look tomorrow,’ said Ben. ‘And now, phone Fran and tell her what Ian’s said and then come and watch television.’

  Fran agreed they should go back and talk to Rosie and volunteered to ring her the following morning.

  ‘We’ll have to leave it to her to suggest the time. She’s very busy.’

  ‘I thought your creative writing classes had finished for the summer?’

  ‘She does write books, Lib, she doesn’t just teach.’

  ‘Oh, yes. OK, I’ll leave you to make the arrangements.’

  ‘Oh, and let me know if you hear from Ian.’

  ‘I have a feeling I will,’ said Libby. ‘I think he took it seriously, even if his Chief might not.’

  Sure enough, whi
le Libby was doing her Saturday morning blink-and-you’ll-miss-it dust and vacuum ritual, the phone rang.

  ‘I was right,’ said Ian. ‘I had to phone the Chief at home and he didn’t think we’d got enough to make an official enquiry. He did say, though, that if I can come up with anything more he’ll review it. Which means – do it on your own time, Inspector Connell.’

  ‘Well, that’s good, isn’t it?’ said Libby.

  ‘I’m glad you think so. I do have a private life, you know.’

  Suppressing a desire to ask exactly what private life, Libby apologised. ‘But you know what I mean. Fran and I are going to see Rosie again, and we could always ask for a return viewing of White Lodge.’

  ‘That would be just plain daft. If someone was trying to scare you off yesterday they might get even heavier a second time.’

  ‘You know,’ said Libby thoughtfully, ‘that’s a puzzle. Because how did they know someone would be viewing the house?’

  ‘Two reasons come to mind,’ said Ian. ‘One, they’ve fitted up some kind of trip switch to start up a mechanism when it’s triggered, or two, and more worrying, is that someone in the estate agent’s office is passing information.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t think so. After all, they seem to be keen to allow people to view the property unaccompanied. To then scare them off is a bit of a contradiction in terms.’

  ‘Possibly.’ Ian didn’t sound convinced. ‘Anyway, no going back there unless I’m with you.’

  Libby sighed. ‘You know best,’ she said, privately thinking that he didn’t. ‘But I’ve had an idea. I told you about Jane mentioning children, and Fran being sure they were buried in the garden? And that she didn’t think they were workhouse children?’

  ‘Yes?’ Now Ian sounded wary.

  ‘Well, I thought, how about County Records? See if there’s a historian or something in the archives? Or an archaeological survey or something?’

  ‘You’re not getting Time Team in, Libby.’

  ‘No, I know,’ said Libby, wishing she could ask television’s favourite archaeology programme to come and do one of their three-day investigations, ‘but don’t you think it would be a good idea?’

  ‘You can go and root about in County Records all you like,’ said Ian. ‘Just stay away from White Lodge until I say so.’

  Chapter Six

  FRAN CALLED TO SAY Rosie had agreed to see them on Monday afternoon and the lamb shanks in red wine went down very well with Hetty and Greg on Sunday. On Monday morning, Libby went online to see what she could find out about County records. Unfortunately, searching the archives meant physically going to Maidstone and the County Library. She looked up “Archivists”, but no names were given. Stumped, she went back to looking up Cherry Ashton and White Lodge, hoping that something would leap out at her.

  Eventually, she had the brainwave of putting “Cherry Ashton child deaths” into the search engine. However, all this produced was a proliferation of genealogy sites. “Infant mortality” simply produced unconnected articles containing mainly statistics. “Workhouse deaths” came up with a mixture of the two and several of the pieces she’d found before.

  ‘I know,’ she said out loud. ‘Archaeology societies.’

  This produced enough results to keep her busy for an hour, jotting down names and numbers. Before going any further she decided she ought to confer with Fran, but, wary of pushing too hard, felt it would be better to leave it until the afternoon.

  ‘Well,’ said Fran that afternoon, while driving toward Rosie’s cottage, ‘it’s an idea. What we really want is a local amateur historian. They always find one on Time Team.’

  ‘That’s the second time Time Team’s come up.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Ian mentioned it. But I had thought how great it would be if they could come in. I mean, they’re always finding remnants of things they didn’t know were there, and bodies that don’t match the evidence.’

  ‘That’s what you’re thinking, is it? About the bodies – the children?’

  ‘Yes. And I don’t understand what’s so mysterious about them. If Jane knows about it, and Campbell McLean knows too, even though he didn’t come back to us, he must, it must be general knowledge, so why isn’t it coming up in searches?’

  ‘Someone will tell us. Perhaps Rosie knows.’

  ‘In that case why didn’t she tell us in the first place?’

  ‘Why,’ said Libby darkly, ‘didn’t she tell us a lot of things?’

  Rosie received them a little less enthusiastically than the first time, but took them through to the garden again, where once more tea things were set out.

  ‘Have you made any progress?’ she asked, after pouring tea.

  ‘In a way,’ said Fran, ‘but we’ve got several questions.’

  ‘Questions?’ Rosie looked wary.

  ‘First,’ said Libby, ‘when did you first see the house?’

  Rosie seemed taken aback. ‘Oh, years ago. Then I was driving that way to see a friend and I saw it again. And it was after that I started dreaming about it.’

  ‘See, the thing is,’ said Libby, ‘in your dreams you saw the place empty, and described it to us exactly as it looks now. And we don’t think it’s been empty more than a couple of years. So how would you know?’

  ‘You’ve been there?’ Rosie avoided the question.

  ‘Yes, we’ve been there.’ Fran kept her eyes on Rosie’s face. ‘And, as Libby says, it’s exactly as you described it. And if you’re a psychic, why did you ask me to investigate?’

  ‘I’m not a psychic.’ Rosie avoided their eyes and took a sip of tea.

  When no more seemed forthcoming, Libby said, ‘In that case you have to tell us what’s behind all this. And why you don’t know the history of the house. It was easy enough to find out, even for us.’

  ‘At least, part of it was,’ said Fran.

  ‘What do you mean, part of it?’ asked Rosie, looking up. Ahh! thought Libby.

  ‘That White Lodge was part of the Cherry Ashton workhouse.’

  Rosie looked embarrassed. ‘Yes, I knew that.’

  ‘Right,’ said Fran, ‘so now tell us the rest of it.’

  ‘The rest of it?’ echoed Rosie.

  ‘Yes,’ said Libby firmly. ‘How you know exactly what the house looks like, inside and out, and why you bothered to get us involved. Are we some kind of research for one of your novels? How to hoodwink two gullible middle-aged ladies?’

  ‘Libby!’ said Fran, shocked.

  But Rosie was looking even more embarrassed. In fact, a slow blush was creeping up her neck.

  ‘All right, I’ll confess.’ She leant back in her chair and cradled her cup in her lap. Her long hair had escaped from its clip and drifted over her shoulders. She looked, thought Libby, like the good witch from a fairy tale.

  ‘First, what I told you was quite true. I’m positive I have a connection to White Lodge, although I have no idea what it is. As soon as I saw it – oh, must be a year ago now – I remembered seeing it before, years before, as I said. But then I started dreaming about it. Not empty, as I told you, but mainly the outside and that garden, although it wasn’t overgrown. So I looked it up, as you must have done, on the internet, and found it was for sale.’

  She paused for another sip of tea. ‘So I made an appointment to view. The agent who took me seemed strangely ambivalent about the viewing, as though she didn’t want to go, but on the other hand was keen for someone to buy it.’ She looked at Fran and Libby. ‘Is that how it seemed to you?’

  They nodded.

  ‘So we went to see it. I knew the minute I went inside I’d been there before. And all the time we were going round the house I was aware that the agent was very uncomfortable. I was fine. Whatever she felt, I knew the house had been happy at one time.

  ‘She didn’t want to take me upstairs, so I went on my own, and saw that room with the bath and the kitchen sink. And then –’ she paused ‘then I thought I could hear piano music.’
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br />   Libby and Fran both drew a deep breath and Rosie nodded. ‘So I went downstairs to ask the agent if she could hear it, but she was already outside the front door. I insisted we go round the back and, very reluctantly, she let me lead the way. Then we saw the garden.’ Rosie stopped and looked away towards the trees, although Libby felt she wasn’t actually seeing them. ‘And I heard the music again – very faintly. So I turned to ask the agent if she could hear it, and there she was, the other side of that rotting gate, looking terrified. Of course she could hear it.

  ‘Anyway, she said she knew nothing about it, knew nothing about the house except that it was a probate sale, and hightailed it back to her car. I stayed and prowled round the garden for a bit, but the music had stopped and I couldn’t find anything else except those stones.’

  ‘So why didn’t you tell us all this to start with?’ asked Libby.

  ‘I didn’t want to prejudice you. I thought if I told you about the music you would be expecting to hear it, or you’d think I was a mad old fool.’

  Libby’s expression could have told anybody that was exactly what she did think.

  ‘And about the workhouse?’ asked Fran, after giving Libby a warning glare.

  ‘Yes, of course I knew about that. But it was closed at the beginning of the last century.’

  ‘Demolished, actually,’ put in Libby. ‘In 1909.’

  ‘Right.’ Rosie looked at her with respect. ‘So what did you mean about half the history?’

  ‘The children,’ said Fran. ‘Everyone else seems to know about the children, except us. And they’re nothing to do with the workhouse.’

  ‘How do you know?’ Rosie was wide-eyed.

  ‘I don’t know, but everybody else does. So what about them? Who are they?’

  ‘Actually,’ said Rosie, after a minute of staring at her feet, ‘nobody does know. It all stems from one body being unearthed years ago and unsubstantiated rumours about a child’s ghost in the garden.’

  Libby looked dubious. ‘Is that all? When was this body unearthed, and how?’

  ‘By accident, as far as I can tell, when something was being done to the garden. Must have been sometime in the fifties, or perhaps earlier.’

  ‘And why did they think there were more?’