A Cotswolds Murder Read online

  A COTSWOLDS

  MURDER

  A gripping crime mystery full of twists

  (Inspector John Crow Book 6)

  ROY LEWIS

  Revised edition 2019

  Joffe Books, London

  www.joffebooks.com

  FIRST PUBLISHED AS “A PART OF VIRTUE” IN 1974

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organisations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental. The spelling used is British English except where fidelity to the author’s rendering of accent or dialect supersedes this. The right of Roy Lewis to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  We hate typos too but sometimes they slip through. Please send any errors you find to [email protected]

  We’ll get them fixed ASAP. We’re very grateful to eagle-eyed readers who take the time to contact us.

  ©Roy Lewis

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  THERE IS A GLOSSARY OF ENGLISH SLANG IN THE BACK OF THIS BOOK FOR US READERS.

  CONTENTS

  NOTE TO THE READER

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  INSPECTOR JOHN CROW SERIES

  FREE KINDLE BOOKS AND OFFERS

  Glossary of English Slang for US readers

  NOTE TO THE READER

  Please note this book is set in the early 1970s in England, a time before mobile phones and DNA testing, and when social attitudes were very different.

  CHAPTER 1

  Andrew found the cheap, black-and-gold tin trinket box in the corner of the suitcase pushed under the bed. If there had been a key to it, it had been lost years ago. A Christmas present from his mother, the box had been intended to serve as a money-box, but he had always used it for his personal possessions — those possessions that held secret memories for him.

  He hadn’t changed over the years.

  The box contained a thin pile of photographs, half a dozen cuttings from newspapers, a piece of faded silk — he had no idea where that came from — and a ticket to a concert in the Albert Hall. He picked up one of the cuttings and read it.

  ‘On Saturday, at St Giles’s Church, Andrew Keene to Sara, only daughter of John and Phyllis Rowland.’

  He remembered the contrast between the greyness of the massive stone church with its hundred-feet tower, and the intense blue of the Saturday morning sky, washed clean by an overnight storm for his ten o’clock marriage. He could recall walking from the hired car and staring at the battlemented and pinnacled nave roof, wondering how it was he had never really looked at the church before. Then there had been the stained glass explosion of colour inside, a sharp dagger of light picking at his father-in-law’s thinning hair, exposing the pale scalp, and glinting on the red rims of his mother-in-law’s spectacles. Dead now, both of them, within a year of the marriage of their only daughter to Andrew Keene. A car crash, after visiting Andrew and Sara, still quarrelling, probably, such a final way of expressing disapproval of a marriage they had thought should never have taken place.

  It had left Sara without the buttress of her mother and father; Andrew was the only person to rely on, to lean on when she wanted to lean.

  He picked up the pile of photographs and there he was, thin and insubstantial as a sapling, dark-suited, pale-faced, squinting anxiously into the camera and clutching Sara’s hand as the small wedding group clustered behind. Sara looked magnificent, as always. Tall, almost as tall as he was; a confident smile on her face — a handsome face rather than a beautiful one — and the tiny hint of panic in her eyes. It was the sun, she used to say, but it wasn’t. Andrew knew it wasn’t, because he knew about the uncertainties wriggling around beneath the display of strength and confidence. They made a fine pair, people had said, both young and eager and happy, such a well-matched pair. But they said it with the urgency of disbelief, papering over the cracks of their surprise when they saw Andrew’s shyness and diffidence and lack of colour.

  Behind their hands they would whisper, ‘What on earth does Sara see in him?’

  Andrew put down the box and looked through the rest of the photographs. There was the shot of the lurid sunset he had taken from the window of the van — it had been the first week they had been here, when they had been excited as children, at their new, compact home, their first home. Then there was the view from the farm down the lane, looking up across the field where they saw the hares in the early dawns and late evenings, the dark line of the trees hiding the main road, the cream caravans lined up martially beyond the hedge as though daring the complacent cattle to intrude. Carefully, Andrew counted the vans in the photograph. Thirty, most of them unoccupied, as he remembered. Their caravan was just to the left of centre in the photograph, near the trees. There were only about twenty vans on the site now, eight of them not lived in.

  The park had never really been a financial proposition, he was sure of that. Not enough people, not enough money coming in. He and Sara, they had thought it would be different — maybe that was the trouble really. They had seen the new site in a glowing haze two years ago — their first home, they would make it a loving home, and they’d watch as others came to the site, children arrived, a clubhouse was built, a swimming-pool . . . a community.

  If it had happened, maybe things would have been different. Somehow, with only twenty vans on the site the gaping vacant areas were depressing, and if the rabbits did come capering through the grass at night, eyes glinting in the flashlights, it was little compensation.

  He heard a step behind him.

  ‘For Christ’s sake, Andrew, what are you doing?’

  Sheepishly, Andrew put down the box, rose to his feet and followed Sara out of the bedroom into the living area of the van. Mr Forsyth was sitting in the far corner with his left shoulder leaning against the window, the cup of coffee Sara had made him half-finished on the collapsible table in front of him. He was about fifty years of age, dressed in a respectable bookmaker’s suit, discreet check, blue shirt, stained tie, white handkerchief in his top pocket. The strips of bushy hair that made him look like a tonsured monk were matched by thick furred brows that were just now ridged into a frown of discontent. Stubby fingers drummed unhappily on the table; his red-veined nose twitched vaguely as though sniffing for suspects; his whole appearance was one of faded belligerence. He would like to be angrier but as yet he had no grounds; he would like to be stern, but he lacked the energy; he knew right was on his side but could not yet prove it, and meanwhile he was unhappy, and nervous, and upset, and disinclined to drink any more coffee.

  Andrew stood above him, leaning forward slightly, always afraid his head would touch the roof of the van, though it never did. ‘I’m sorry, Mr Forsyth, I don’t seem to be able to put my hands on it right now.’

  ‘You looked everywhere?’ Forsyth asked in a regimental bark.

  ‘Everywhere I can think of.’ Andrew looked towards Sara, seeking support, but she was staring fixedly at Forsyth, her arms folded, resting over the bulge of her stomach, her mouth expressing discontent matching that of Forsyth, her eyes holding that old hint of anxiety he knew so well. ‘I’m sure it’ll turn up,’ Andrew added lamely.

  The stubby fingers changed to a marching air, the drums of an advancing troop. The bushy eyebrows grew closer together as though seeking moral support.

  ‘You appreciat
e my position,’ he announced gruffly, a statement not a question.

  ‘Naturally,’ Andrew murmured.

  ‘I mean, if you haven’t got it, what proof is there?’

  ‘I’m sure it will turn up, Mr Forsyth.’

  ‘Yes, but in the meanwhile, what’s to be done? You sure you’ve looked everywhere?’

  Andrew gestured vaguely towards the small bedroom. ‘If it’s anywhere, it’ll be in there. I mean, there’s not many places to look in a van, Mr Forsyth.’

  ‘Quite. Quite so. But it leaves me in a difficult situation, you’ll understand that.’ He drummed away again, impatiently. ‘Two years, you say?’

  ‘That’s right,’ Andrew said. ‘We got married at Easter and then we moved into the van here almost right away. You know, we had a brief honeymoon, and then came down to look at these vans. We liked the site — the trees, and the view across to the hills, we were taken by it, you know — so we put down a deposit straight away because we understood Easter would be a time when lots of people would be thinking of buying vans, before the summer, you know—’

  ‘Humph.’

  Andrew paused, but Forsyth added nothing to his comment, so he went on. ‘Then, about a month after we’d moved in, the question of a hiring and later purchase was no longer necessary, because, well, Sarah got some money and we were able to buy the van outright.’

  ‘I gave the money to you,’ Sara said almost accusingly.

  ‘And I bought the van,’ Andrew said. Their eyes met for a moment, as they both thought of Mr and Mrs Rowland, excited and angry here at the van that last night, then driving homeward to a collision with a lorry and death. There had been so little money, enough to buy the van outright, £800, and then about two thousand pounds as a building society investment they didn’t want to touch until the baby came.

  ‘But there’s no receipt,’ Forsyth said.

  ‘There was a receipt, I’m sure of it,’ Andrew replied.

  ‘But you can’t find it.’

  Andrew opened his mouth but there seemed to be nothing to say so he closed it again. He stood there feeling vaguely foolish, not knowing what to do, what to say. He would have offered Forsyth another cup of coffee but he hadn’t finished the one in front of him. Forsyth heaved a deep, disappointed sigh.

  ‘I don’t understand it.’ He peered out of the window towards the vans on the slope below. ‘This has never gone the way it should have. An investment this was, for me. I gave up the farm down there, kept this field as an investment, good open site, chance to make a regular income, but you know, it’s been hopeless. Oh, I tied the ends up all right—’

  ‘I’m sure you did, Mr Forsyth.’

  ‘Tied them up by putting in lights, concreting the sites, getting a site manager, advertising, but somehow the people never came. Dammit, what’s happening to the holiday industry? You’d think here in the Cotswolds there’d be people enough to want to stay overnight, weekends, couple of weeks maybe. All right, I only took out twenty licences for permanent residents because I wanted the overnight trade, but as it’s gone on I’ve got neither. Not enough permanents, not enough overnighters, not enough weekenders. I wish I’d never started the damn thing.’

  Forsyth looked around the van as though blaming it for his own troubles. ‘And you’ve got no receipt to show me,’ he said mournfully. ‘You understand my position?’

  Andrew made a vague gesture that could be interpreted as assent or dissent, whichever struck the right chord for Forsyth. Sara glared at him, her dark eyes suddenly snapping with an anger that had overridden her uncertainties.

  ‘No, I don’t understand your position, Mr Forsyth. I know our position. We own this van. We paid good money for it.’

  ‘But the receipt—’

  ‘Andrew signed several papers,’ she interrupted. ‘If we can’t put our hands on the receipt for the moment that’s one thing, but I don’t see how it affects you in any way at all really. I mean, you haven’t told us why you want to see the receipt anyway.’

  ‘Proof of ownership, I suppose,’ Andrew said. Sara’s eyes snapped at him, warning him to stay quiet now she was launched, and whose side was he on anyway?

  ‘We bought this van for eight hundred pounds,’ Sara said stubbornly. ‘The receipt will turn up, believe me, if I have to take the place apart. But I don’t see why I have to. Why can’t you just ask Chuck Lindop?’

  Forsyth’s eyes were small and red-rimmed.

  They half closed now, as though wanting to shut out the realities of the world. He pursed his lips, sucked in his breath thoughtfully, until there was a light whistling sound between his teeth.

  ‘My site manager doesn’t seem to be on the site today. Nor was he here last week when I called. In fact, he always seems to be otherwise engaged when I try to contact him.’

  ‘There’s the phone, Mr Forsyth,’ Sara said, almost rudely.

  ‘When it works,’ Forsyth replied non-committally.

  ‘Well, I think you’ll just have to ask Mr Lindop,’ Sara insisted. ‘It’s not for us to produce a receipt. We’ve been living here for two years now, and it’s obvious we own the van. We don’t pay hire-purchase, do we? All we pay is the usual ground rent, once a year, and a few charges that Chuck Lindop put up at the park entrance, and I don’t agree with those either, but as far as a receipt is concerned why don’t you just ask Lindop? It was he who sold the van to us, anyway. It’ll be there in his books, and he’s supposed to be site manager, even if he isn’t here half the time, so I think it’s him you ought to chase up, not me and Andrew.’

  Forsyth thought it over briefly. His little eyes flickered around the van, almost possessively, and then he shrugged. ‘I suppose so. But I’d be grateful if you could look out that receipt. I’ll get out of your way now, anyway, and wait up at the office for a while. I suppose my manager will condescend to return soon.’

  The coffee cup almost went over as he struggled to rise from behind the table. He righted it, nodded a short goodbye and stepped out of the van. Andrew stood in the doorway and looked down at him.

  ‘I’ll look for it again, Mr Forsyth.’ Forsyth nodded grumpily and walked across the grass towards where his Rover was parked on the flinty roadway that had been laid through the site but never completed with tarmac. He stared moodily at his tyres before getting into his car. He drove the sixty yards to the green-and-cream van that served the site manager as an office, then killed the engine, lit a pipe and sat silently in the car. Andrew turned back into the van. Sara was still standing against the partition that screened the gas cooker and the tiny sink from the living area.

  ‘I could do with a coffee,’ Andrew said. She made no reply. She was staring fixedly at the thinly carpeted floor as though she had never seen it before; there was a fierce intensity in her gaze that told him trouble was boiling up again. He filled the kettle, lit the gas, boiled the water and made two cups of instant coffee. He set them down on the table.

  ‘Sara—’

  ‘You make me sick!’

  Andrew sat down. He gestured vaguely towards the table.

  ‘Your coffee—’

  ‘Stuff the coffee! What the hell’s the matter with you, Andrew? Why didn’t you tell that man Forsyth what to do with his bloody receipt? Just because he owns the site, it doesn’t mean he can come poking his nose here, into our van, demanding this and that—’

  ‘He didn’t demand—’

  ‘What does he want the thing for anyway? I suppose you did get a receipt from Chuck Lindop! I wouldn’t put it past you if you didn’t. Why the hell I didn’t see to that myself at the time I can’t imagine, but I suppose in love’s young dream I was still in the position where I thought it was the husband who did things! I’ve learned a bloody sight different since, I can tell you. I mean, did he give you a receipt?’

  ‘I’m pretty sure—’

  ‘Pretty sure!’ she mocked him. ‘For God’s sake, Andrew, do you have to be so stupid? And when you were there in the bedroom looking for it
— this non-existent receipt what the hell were you up to? On your knees looking at bloody photographs! You know, I despair, I really do. I guess that’s how you were at work, that’s really why you got the push, they found an excuse and got rid of you not because you were redundant but because you simply day-dreamed all the day. When are you going to pull yourself together? When are you going to recognize your responsibilities? Not only to me damn it, pretty soon there are other responsibilities with the baby coming, and I just can’t cope if I’m going to be messed about with worries, like this man Forsyth coming in here and unsettling things worse than they are—’

  There was a light thump just inside the door. Andrew looked up and there was the mongrel, Patch, grinning at him. Andrew managed a grin back and as though by way of salute Patch lifted a leg and urinated against the cooker.

  * * *

  ‘You naughty beast!’

  Ruby Sanders came in through the doorway like an overdressed tornado, grabbed up the happy dog and pitched him out through the door. Almost in the same movement she turned, reached for a cloth and a plastic bowl and ran the tap as she announced, ‘Don’t worry, love, I’ll see to it. My dog, my problem, it’s just that he likes Andrew, gets excited when he sees him and away he goes. Don’t fret, I’ll wipe it up, over in a jiffy.’

  ‘That’s the washing-up bowl,’ Sara wailed in helpless fury. ‘And the cloth!’

  ‘Need a new one anyway. Drop one in this afternoon. Got some on offer in the supermarket at Stowford yesterday.’

  She was crouching beside the cooker, bowl of water on the floor, mopping up Patch’s contribution, seemingly unaware of Sarah’s furious silence. She was a short, compact woman with china blue eyes that held an innocence at strong variance with her language, experience and inclinations. Her mouth was wide, usually open, often talking, and generous in its offerings. Her hair was always elaborately coiffured and firmly subjugated by lashings of lacquer and her clothes were just a centimetre too tight or too short or too revealing. She had a predilection for frills which were unbecoming; today she was wearing pale blue trousers that clung to her thighs, hips and bottom in a desperate attempt to retain a fibrous contact under the threat of splitting, and her blouse was ruffled absurdly at throat, bosom and wrist — an odd amalgam of party best and working impracticality. She rose, her slacks sighing and rustling with relief, squeezed out the cloth, deposited it in the waste bin, threw the water out of the doorway, washed her hands and smiled brightly.