Malice in Cornwall Read online

  Harris spoke in a monotone. “The bones look like they've been sawn through cleanly at the knees.”

  Powell was incredulous. “Sawn? With a saw. you mean?”

  “It looks like it.” Had Harris's manner stiffened?

  “Well, that certainly puts a different light on matters,” Powell mused. “And then there's the rope.”

  Harris shrugged.

  Powell suddenly remembered the sample he had collected the previous night. He fingered the vial in his pocket. The Day-Glo bit, as Butts had put it. “When I first saw the body, it seemed to be giving off a faint phosphorescent light, just as it was described in the newspaper reports. Can you think of any explanation?”

  “No natural explanation, if that's what you mean. If you hadn't seen it yourself, Chief Superintendent, I might have concluded that the power of suggestion was a factor.”

  “Who wrote the bloody newspaper stories?” Butts muttered.

  Powell reddened. “Yes, well, I collected a sample. I'll have it analyzed straight away.” His initial doubts about the increasingly mutinous Chief Inspector had begun to blossom into a feeling of full-blown animosity. He turned abruptly to face Sergeant Black. “We'd better get Sir Reggie out here to examine the remains as soon as possible. In the meantime let's get the body to the mortuary in Truro. Chief Inspector Butts will fix it with the local coroner.” An incipient snort from Butts at this breach of protocol. “Sir Reginald Quick,” Powell added for the benefit of Dr. Harris, “is the Home Office pathologist.”

  Harris looked at Powell with penetrating blue eyes. (Sailor's eyes, Powell fancied.) “I sincerely wish him luck. And you, as well, Chief Superintendent, because I cannot emphasis strongly enough the necessity of getting to the bottom of this foul business with all due haste or, mark my words, there will be a price to pay!” And with that ominous pronouncement he turned on his heel and strode to his car.

  They stood in silence as Harris drove off in a spray of gravel. Something Harris had said stuck Powell as rather curious. He turned toward the guesthouse, his train of thought interrupted. This time he was certain; the curtain in one of the upstairs windows had stirred slightly.

  CHAPTER 6

  The Head was doing a modest business that night, and from the odd snippet of conversation Powell overheard, the discovery of the body on the Sands the previous night was the hot topic. Tony Rowlands seemed agitated about something as he went about his business delivering drinks and food orders and snapping commands at the long-suffering Jenny behind the bar. Powell sat with Jane Goode and Sergeant Black at what had become their regular table in front of the fire. They had just finished a decent meal of rabbit stew served with local new potatoes.

  Jane Goode sipped her wine eagerly. “Now, I'll tell you about mine if you tell me about yours.”

  “I beg your pardon,” Powell inquired modestly. Nothing like a good double entendre to liven up an evening.

  She smiled, mildly exasperated. “Your day, I mean.”

  Powell affected an air of disappointment and then drained his pint. “Oh, I see. You first, then.”

  “Not much to tell really. First thing this morning I showed Butts's men where the body had washed up, but the tide had been in and out, so I don't think they found much. Then I filed a story with my newspaper and spent the rest of the day working on my book.”

  ‘That's it?”

  “A fairly productive day, I'd say, all things considered. I'd be interested to hear how yours stacks up.”

  Powell summarized the results of Dr. Harris's examination of the body. “A bit of a riddle,” he concluded dryly.

  “Careful! I've got a proprietary interest in the use of that word.”

  “Looking at the thing dispassionately,” he continued, “there is still no evidence that a crime has been committed. An accident of some sort is the most likely explanation.”

  “Dispassionately is the only way to look at anything,” Jane Goode said pointedly. “But you can't be serious! Have you forgotten that it's had both its legs sawn off, not to mention the fact that it glows in the dark?”

  “There is that,” Powell admitted, “and I'm trying to keep an open mind. “But we need to do more forensic work before—”

  “You saw it yourself on the beach last night. There's something very weird going on and I don't need some geek in a white coat to prove it to me.”

  “It's possible that the body has been tampered with, but—”

  “Tampered with! That's the understatement of the year. I'm not sure what the proper legal term is, but I thought it was against the law to desecrate a human body. Look, Powell, I think I'm onto something big here and I'm not going to let you or anybody else put me off the scent.”

  “So that's it,” Powell rejoined.

  “What else did you think?” she snapped back, tossing her head haughtily.

  Sergeant Black seemed to be taking considerable pleasure in the proceedings. His head swiveled back and forth as if he were the umpire of a particularly spirited tennis match.

  ‘Tm just saying that we need to look into it a bit more before we rule out the more obvious explanations. I've initiated inquiries to see whether there have been recent reports of missing women anywhere in the country or any marine accidents off the south and west coasts.”

  She seemed to accept Powell's peace offering and signaled to Tony Rowlands for another round. “I'm sorry—I guess I'm just a bit tense. This deadline is killing me. I should be up in my room writing.”

  “You know what they say, Ms. Goode: all work and no play …”

  “Keeps the wolves at bay,” she concluded, slurring her words slightly. “And I thought I told you to call me Jane.”

  Powell smiled. “Yes, ma'am—I mean, Jane.”

  She turned to Sergeant Black. “What do you think. Bill?”

  Black regarded her with fatherly goodwill. “I'm thinking that I'd very much like to read your book, ma'am.”

  “You can call me Jane, too, if you like.”

  “Er, I'm more comfortable with Miss Goode, if that's all right with you, ma'am.”

  “Suit yourself.” She yawned hugely. “I think it's past my bedtime—”

  She was interrupted by a commotion in front of the bar. Tony Rowlands, his face an unhealthy shade of red and eyes bulging, was shouting at a slight, unshaven man who had the dark, slightly cadaverous good looks characteristic of many of the locals. “Don't you threaten me, you little bastard! Now get out or I'll break your bloody neck!”

  The smaller man swayed unsteadily. “Tha's right, have it yer way. But I'll be back in my own good time, don't yer worry.” And with that he wove his way precariously amongst the tables, muttering under his breath, and was gone.

  Rowlands stood where he was, breathing heavily for several seconds. Suddenly, he seemed to become conscious of his surroundings, and his eyes swept the room wildly, as if to say, What are you lot staring at? Then he turned abruptly and disappeared through the swinging doors that led to the kitchen, leaving Jenny Thompson behind the bar to fend for herself.

  There were a few whispered remarks and polite coughs, but eventually chairs scuffed and glasses clinked as the atmosphere in the pub returned to normal.

  Sergeant Black caught Powell's eye, a quizzical eyebrow raised.

  Powell got to his feet. “I'll settle up.” He walked over to the bar. “A bit of excitement this evening, Jenny,” he remarked casually.

  “Whatever turns you on, Chief Superintendent.”

  “Who was that bloke anyway?”

  She shrugged. “One of the locals. Nick Tebble, his name is.”

  “A regular, is he?”

  Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. “He comes in here once in a while. Why do you ask?”

  Powell smiled. “Force of habit. Does he usually carry on like that?”

  “Who?”

  “Tebble.” Careful. There was the possibility that the relationship between Thompson and Rowlands was not just a professional one.

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bsp; Jenny laughed carelessly. “He keeps to himself mostly, usually drinks alone. Tonight he just seemed to be in a bad mood. He must have said something to set Tony off like that,” she added, as if by way of an excuse.

  “Ah, well, all in a night's work, I imagine, dealing with patrons who've had a few too many.” Powell said. He tipped her generously. “Thank you, Jenny. Until tomorrow.”

  She fingered the note cautiously. “Ta.”

  Back at the guesthouse, after bidding his companions good-night, Powell wandered downstairs with the vague intention of perusing the Spartan library in the Residents' Lounge, hoping for more than a Reader's Digest omnibus. It was still early and he needed to unwind before he'd be able to sleep. He turned left at the bottom of the stairs and walked down the hallway, treading cautiously on the creaking floorboards as he had no desire to arouse Mrs. Polfrock. In fact, he had scrupulously avoided her since he and Sergeant Black started taking their meals elsewhere. He could hear a television blaring in a distant room and there was the lingering odor of fried fish. He shuddered. He stopped at the first doorway on the right. The door to the lounge was closed, a sliver of light visible through the crack underneath. He tried the knob; it turned, but the door appeared to be fastened on the inside. Mildly surprised, he tried a little more vigorously, the door rattling slightly on its hinges. There was a muffled scuffling inside the room, followed by a thump, a stifled oath, and then silence.

  Mysterious bodies washing up on the beach and now things that go bump in the night. Best to leave well enough alone, he thought. As he retraced his steps he briefly considered a stroll along the beach but decided on second thought that he'd better turn in; he had a busy day planned for tomorrow. He went up to his room and tried to get through to Marion in Canada, but there was no answer. Later, as he lay awake in bed, he couldn't help wondering what Jane Goode was doing.

  The next morning, after a brief tete-a-tete with Sergeant Black at a pleasant little teahouse overlooking the harbor, which Black had discovered the previous day (partially redeeming himself in his superior's eyes), Powell was treading the springy turf of the coastal path that traverses the high clifftops along much of the north coast of Cornwall. Thank God for the National Trust. Just ahead was Towey Head; on his left were lush green fields crisscrossed by dry-stone walls crowned with tamarisk bushes, their trunks and branches bent to leeward and distorted by the prevailing southwest wind. To his right the blue sunlit expanse of the Atlantic, its edges frayed by jagged rocks into white ribbons of surf that lashed at the cliffs below. Looking back, he could see the narrow strip of the Sands and towans, and in the distance the pastel-colored cottages of Penrick. He wondered if at that very moment Jane Goode was gazing out her window in the Wrecker's Rest contemplating the perfect gerund, or perhaps sitting on one of the benches along the harbor-side working out some nuance of plot.

  The path undulated gently. A few tattered clouds drifted across a blue sky; the trilling of birdsong and a fresh sea breeze enlivened his senses. Periodically, in the distance he heard the pop pop of a shotgun. Someone shooting pigeons, he guessed. Just ahead, the track veered inland to avoid an eroded section of cliff that formed a narrow valley descending steeply to the sea. At the head of the valley the path intersected a lane, which Powell knew branched off the main Penrick Road about a quarter mile farther inland. The lane plunged between tall hedgerows, and as he walked down it he tried to identify the various wildflowers that adorned the hedges like an intricate mosaic of stained glass. He could only name a few: golden celandine, barren strawberry and wood betony, campion, early purple orchis, and in the damp places pale carpets of marsh marigold.

  It struck Powell that the sparse quickset fences that passed as hedgerows in other parts of the country were but poor cousins to the Cornish variety. The hedges between which he now passed were in fact great mounds of earth and stones, perhaps eight feet high and five feet wide at the base, the whole held together by a profusion of grasses, ferns, and flowers. Substantial, uniquely beautiful and enduring, and imbuing a sense of splendid isolation from the rest of the world—much like the popular romantic conception of Cornwall itself. It was hard not to feel a certain empathy for a people who had once traded their tin for the golden crescents and blue stones of ancient Crete, but who were now almost completely dependent on tourists who descended each summer like a plague of locusts. Powell thought guiltily about his own summer sojourns to Bude.

  Deplete the fish stocks and close down the mines, force the young people to look for greener pastures elsewhere, and then expose the local traditions to inevitable erosion by the twin tidal waves of modern transportation and communication systems. In the end one was left with a museum piece—something rather quaint, perhaps, but hardly a living culture. Powell smiled to himself. He should run for local office, if they'd have him.

  He was perceptive enough to realize that there was something more at the root of his mental meanderings—a vague but persistent sense of insecurity about his own place in the world. He liked to give his old friend Alex Barrett a hard time about the Scot's sense of pride and place and his Celtic traditions. In actual fact, Powell was deeply envious. He, himself, had led the life of a gypsy as a boy. rattling around the world with his parents from one army base to another, never staying in one place long enough to put down roots. Because of this, he suspected he lacked something essential in his makeup—a kind of anchor to hold him fast in life's tempestuous seas. And most unsettling of all in the present circumstances, he usually tended to think about such things just before all hell broke loose in his life.

  It was in this pensive state of mind that Powell found himself at the bottom of the lane amongst the straggle of seaside cottages where Dr. Harris resided. A young woman was working in the back garden of the cottage next to Harris's that Powell had attempted to visit previously, a rustic stone building with a corrugated metal roof. It appeared to be older than its neighbors and, along with its various outbuildings, looked generally run-down.

  The woman stood up and turned when she heard the gate hinges creak. She wore a slightly tatty but gaily printed frock, which clung to the contours of her slim body. Long bare legs and a pair of mud-caked Wellies. The effect was striking, to say the least. She had a pretty face, but her eyes looked weary, as if she had seen it all before. She brushed a strand of dirty blonde hair from her face with the back of her wrist and stared at him in a boldly appraising manner. “Something I can do for you?”

  CHAPTER 7

  Powell introduced himself and managed to wrangle an invitation to tea. The interior of the cottage was even more decrepit than the outside. Grimy wooden floors, tiny windows insufficient to brighten the gloom, and between the main living area and the bedroom (there, a glimpse of jumbled bedclothes) a matchbox-thin partition adorned with peeling yellow wallpaper. In a corner in the kitchen there was a gas cooker flanked by two tiny cupboards, a table and two chairs in front of one of the windows, and no sign of modern plumbing.

  “Welcome to my castle,” the woman said, her voice thick with sarcasm. “By the way, my name's Linda Porter. Can I interest you in something a little stiffer?” She eyed him with a knowing smile.

  “Er, tea will be fine, thank you,” Powell said. “You have a lovely view here,” he added, peering out the window. Various bits of rusted machinery in the front yard and a gaunt group of curlews on the foreshore.

  “It's all right, I suppose. If you have time to enjoy it.”

  A hint of something in her voice as she busied herself with the tea things.

  “I understand from Jane Goode that you and your husband grow flowers for a living. It must be an interesting way of life.”

  She whirled to face him. “Interesting? Is that what you think it is?”

  Powell felt embarrassed. “Well, I've never done much gardening myself. My wife, on the other hand …”

  She laughed bitterly. “Gardening? Does your concept of gardening extend to gales and bulb fly and eelworm and mildew and mice and the cons
tant threat of one's entire livelihood ending up in the compost heap, not to mention buyers who are trying to screw you out of your profit?” As suddenly as she had lost it, she regained her composure. “I'm sorry. That was unfair. It's just that things haven't been going very well lately—with the crops, I mean—and I guess I just needed to let off some steam. Here, I'll get us our tea,” she added, as if by way of a distraction.

  With her first sip of tea, Linda Porter seemed to mellow. She explained that she and her husband, Jim, were from Manchester; five years ago they'd quit their dead-end jobs, as she put it, pulled up stakes, and come to Cornwall. She'd been a teacher and he an office clerk. (Once bitten, twice shy, Powell wisely resisted the temptation to mention, by way of small talk, that Marion taught anthropology at King's College, thus avoiding a diatribe on the contrasting academic environment that prevailed at the Chunder Road Comprehensive.) They had originally planned to settle on the southwest coast near Gunwalloe, where Jim had heard that you could make a living growing flowers and vegetables for the markets in London and Bristol. They had been unable to find a suitable property there, but then Jim heard about Penrick from an old schoolmate. It was love at first sight, and they had arranged to lease the cottage. The owner turned out to be Tony Rowlands, Powell was interested to learn. They had an acre of garden in the back and leased some clifftop meadows from a local farmer.

  It had all seemed very romantic at the time, but a sense of reality rapidly set in. First off, the north coast of Cornwall was not like the southwest coast. Exposed as they were foursquare to the Atlantic, they soon learned that growing ornamental flowers was, at best, a marginal and backbreaking proposition. Daffodils were hit-and-miss due to the prevalence of late-winter storms; moreover, the bulbs had to be dug up every three years and sterilized in hot water to kill the flies and the worms and then replanted. Anemones were susceptible to powdery mildew and were difficult to pick in warm weather before they became blown, or full open, and unmarketable. Violets, on the other hand, were their bread and butter. Cheap and easy to grow, each year's stock consisted of runners from the previous year's plants. Small growers like themselves could manage about four thousand plants on a quarter of an acre. They flowered from the end of September right through April and yielded weekly pickings of twelve dozen bunches for every thousand plants, twenty violets and two leaves making up a bunch. The Porters also grew potatoes and a few hundredweight of broccoli and cauliflower each year for local sale.