The Boat House Page 4

‘No glamorous new office?’

  ‘I fear not!’

  Minutes later they stood together watching him walk away.

  Davina’s eyes had narrowed, her husband noted with a sinking heart. She said, ‘Maybe it wasn’t an accident – Neil’s car crash, I mean. Maybe he killed his wife and the guilt drove him to suicide! He could have driven into something deliberately.’

  ‘And pigs could fly, Davina!’ He sighed loudly. ‘Make us another pot of tea, dear – it will calm you down.’

  Two days later, as Donald Watson waited at the reception desk in Henley’s police station, Detective Sergeant Ackrow walked past, paused and turned back.

  ‘Watson! Is that you?’

  ‘It is indeed and I was just asking for you.’

  The Detective Sergeant rolled his eyes. ‘What have I done to deserve this unexpected pleasure?’ Glancing at the clock on the wall he said, ‘I’m due at a meeting in half an hour but I can spare you a few minutes if it’s urgent.’

  ‘It’s urgent enough.’

  ‘Come through here then.’ He was a large man, large frame, large hands and feet and a large square face. His voice matched his size, and when he raised his voice, everyone sat up a little straighter. DS Ackrow led his visitor to a small room where they normally interrogated suspects. A gloomy room with sparse furniture and a single light bulb overhead from which dangled a sticky fly paper.

  ‘It’s about the Matlowe case,’ Donald explained, as they sat down. ‘And please spare me that look!’

  ‘What look?’

  ‘The one I recognize from seven years ago! There have been some new developments. I’ve had . . .’

  ‘Why do I know I’m not going to be happy about whatever this is!’ A look of resignation settled over the detective’s face, making him look lugubrious.

  ‘I’ve had contact with a young man named Richard Preston who is the—’

  ‘Preston? That rings a bell!’ He looked puzzled.

  ‘The younger brother of Leonora Matlowe née Preston.’ He watched the policeman’s eyes light up with recognition. ‘He’s now twenty-three and wants to find his sister. He’s been looking in America without any luck and now . . .’

  DS Ackrow held up his hand imploringly. ‘Haven’t I got enough on my plate? There’s a robbery, a suspected suicide beside Henley Bridge, a suspected arson at a timber mill on the other side of the town – a fireman died.’

  ‘I heard. Poor blighter.’

  ‘So if it’s not important I’d rather not hear any more, Mr Watson.’

  ‘He’s not asking you to reopen the case. Richard Preston has engaged me to check out everything we did before and find anything new that might be significant.’

  ‘What makes him so sure she’s still alive? We began to suspect foul play, if you remember. Mrs Matlowe stirred up a can of worms but when we switched our attention to her son she changed her tune – and by then he’d taken off.’

  ‘All I’m asking,’ Donald said patiently, ‘is to know whether or not there have been any developments or leads in the years between then and now that might warrant a follow up. He’s coming to England – might even be here already for all I know – and will be hoping for something, if not much.’

  The detective shrugged. ‘When I have a moment I’ll have a quick glance through the file and if I find anything worth passing on – which I doubt – you shall have it. Will that do?’

  ‘Most certainly will. Thanks.’

  ‘Just don’t drag us into it unless it’s something spectacular. We’re pretty well up to here at the moment.’ He held a hand up to his chin and stood up. ‘You at the same address?’

  ‘Yes.’ He stood up also and reached for his hat.

  The detective said, ‘I’ll send someone round tomorrow with anything I find.’

  It wasn’t much but Donald was satisfied. He’d worked with DS Ackrow and knew he was a man of his word. And so the search begins, he told himself with the familiar rush of adrenalin that he always experienced at the start of an investigation. The financial rewards of the work scarcely interested him, except as a way to pay the bills and keep the small business afloat. He loved his work and finding the solution to a problem was what he craved. The satisfaction of a job well done. As he stepped outside into the sunshine he was smiling.

  The next morning Marianne was told she would have the day to herself.

  ‘My sister telephoned late last night to invite the twins to a little party she is giving for the son of her housekeeper,’ her employer explained with a trace of irritation in her voice. ‘It seems the boy – Ivan or Ivor or some such name – has a birthday in a month’s time but is likely to die before then.’

  ‘Die?’ Marianne gasped. ‘How frightful!’

  Mrs Matlowe shrugged. ‘The child has gone downhill faster than expected, apparently . . . Oh it’s nothing infectious or I wouldn’t allow the girls to attend. Something he was born with – something unpronounceable to do with his brain.’ She sighed. ‘All a bit of a rush but Ida, my sister, is like that. Very impetuous. There will be two other children there – the son and daughter of a neighbour.’

  ‘How very kind of your sister.’

  Georgina rolled her eyes. ‘She means well, I know, but she lives on her own in a ghastly service flat and expects me to trail over there to see her, which entails travelling by tram.’ She sighed. ‘I always come home with a severe headache.’

  Marianne said, ‘The twins will be thrilled. They don’t mix with many children.’

  ‘I hope that’s not a criticism?’

  ‘Certainly not. Just a comment.’

  ‘I shall get away early by telling her the children have a strict routine and an early bedtime.’

  ‘Shall I get the girls into their party frocks?’

  ‘If you would – and tell them what’s happening. We shall have to get off the tram somewhere and buy two gifts for the twins to give him.’ She shook her head. ‘I shall ask the shop assistant to wrap the presents. Oh dear! Everything at the last moment – that’s my sister. Still . . .’

  An hour later Marianne waved the three of them off as they set off for the tram stop. It was going to be quite an adventure for Emmie and Edie, she thought, pleased for them.

  But what shall I do with my day? she wondered.

  Lorna, however, had no such decisions to make. As soon as the front door had closed behind her mistress and the girls, she hurried from the kitchen in search of the governess, her eyes shining with excitement.

  ‘Come on, Marianne,’ she said. ‘I’ve something to show you!’ She held up a key.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘You’ll soon see! Follow me.’ She led the way to the stairs and then rushed up them, leaving Marianne trailing a little behind her.

  ‘You’re like a mountain goat!’ Marianne told her as they hurried along the first-floor landing and set off again up another flight of stairs. This was an area of the house Marianne had never had cause to explore as her own room was on the first floor next to the twins. ‘More bedrooms?’ she asked. ‘Who uses them all? Does Mrs Matlowe ever entertain?’

  ‘Almost never, although her sister came once or twice and Mrs Brannigan next door says they had quite a lot of visitors after her son married that American woman, Leonora.’ She paused in the middle of the passage. ‘Mrs Brannigan says that on Leonora’s twenty-third birthday – when they’d only been here for about six weeks – they invited seven couples to a weekend house party but Mrs Matlowe disapproved and quarrelled with them over it. Neil insisted they go ahead – well, it was his wife’s birthday after all – but his mother refused to stay. She would have nothing to do with it and went away to her sister’s for the weekend!’

  ‘You mean she left them to their own devices?’

  ‘Yes! Left Leonora to plan it all, rearrange the bedrooms and everything. They even had to have caterers because Mrs Matlowe had given the cook and the maid the weekend off!’ Her eyes were like saucers.

  ‘That wa
s rather a nasty snub!’

  ‘A real snub!’ They had reached a door. ‘Here we are. Wait ’til you see this!’ With a flourish Lorna turned the key in the lock. She flung open the door and ushered Marianne into the room.

  ‘Good heavens!’ Marianne stood aghast.

  ‘We’re not supposed to come in here – not ever. Not even to sweep or dust or anything but she doesn’t know so how can it hurt?’

  The room was in semi-darkness because the heavy black curtains were almost closed but as Marianne’s eyes became accustomed to the gloom, she realized the room was some kind of shrine. Or else perhaps a private chapel.

  Lorna threw her arms wide to embrace the entire room, as though she had personally created it. She eyed Marianne with triumph in her eyes. ‘So – what do you make of it? Quite amazing! That’s what me and Cook think.’

  Lorna opened the curtains to give the room more light.

  Marianne’s shocked gaze took in the darkly striped wallpaper, the dark stained floorboards covered with dark rugs, and the chairs upholstered in black velvet.

  Lorna pointed a dramatic finger. ‘Look there. We think it’s an altar. Cook says there’s no two ways about it.’

  It seemed to be made up of a rectangular table with a raised portion in the centre. A white cloth covered it entirely and hung down on all sides, and a glass vase of white silk roses stood at each end. In the middle, on the raised portion, there was a model of Jesus on the cross. It looked expensive, thought Marianne – carved wood, exquisitely painted and decorated with gold leaf. To the left and right of the statue was a black candle.

  ‘But what is it in aid of?’ she asked, puzzled.

  ‘Her son Neil!’ Lorna watched her expression with satisfaction. She crossed herself and said, ‘God’s honour and hope to die!’

  ‘Good Lord!’ Marianne felt a rush of pity for her employer. Mrs Matlowe, who seemed so confident, so implacable, was in fact vulnerable where her son was concerned.

  ‘She started it as soon as he left the house and didn’t come back. Then she heard that he was dead. Things started to be delivered and brought up here but she didn’t allow us to see anything. And look at that!’

  Marianne saw the hassock in front of the altar.

  Lorna said, ‘She embroidered that herself – it’s got her son’s initials on it. To kneel on.’

  Marianne’s shock was giving way to sympathy. She said, ‘People deal with grief and loss in their own way. This must be hers. Losing your only child . . .’ She shrugged. ‘And in such dramatic circumstances. I don’t know how I would deal with something like that. Poor woman.’ She was struggling to reassess her opinion of Georgina Matlowe. Perhaps she had been too quick to judge her, she reflected guiltily. The claustrophobic room with its sombre undertones gave her pause for thought and she frowned. Was this room the early signs of paranoia? Had the events of Leonora’s defection and her son’s death turned her mind? She could imagine Mrs Matlowe on her knees before the altar, praying – her eyes closed, her hands clasped in prayer.

  Lorna pointed again. ‘Over there – all those photographs are of him – the son. Not one of Leonora and not one of the children. Cook thinks she’s got a guilty conscience.’

  ‘About what? She didn’t send Leonora away, did she? Leonora walked out.’

  ‘No, but Mrs Matlowe might have driven her away by hating her so much, thinking she was nothing but a gold-digger – as they call it in America. There were lots of quarrels. We think she was very jealous of her son. Maybe she hoped he would never marry but stay at home with her for ever.’

  ‘Some men do, that’s true.’ Marianne tried to make sense of it all. Possibly the son had blamed his mother for Leonora’s disappearance and could not forgive her. Then he went in search of his wife, assuming she may have gone to friends or even back home to America . . . but never did find her.

  She sighed. ‘All very sad. And the twins were orphaned . . . or were they? The father died, it’s true, but where is their mother? It would be a shock if she suddenly turned up again to claim them.’

  ‘I wish she would! Then they’d have a happier time than they do now.’

  ‘But the girls aren’t unhappy,’ Marianne protested.

  Lorna was staring at her. ‘Would you want to live with a grandmother like Mrs Matlowe? Can’t do this! Can’t do that! Don’t talk to the neighbours.’ She dangled the key. ‘We’re not to stay up here too long, Cook says.’

  Marianne nodded, giving the room a lingering look before preceding Lorna on to the landing.

  Halfway down the stairs Lorna said, ‘The old nanny thought the children should go to school when they were five and mix with other children and she told Mrs Matlowe. She said it wasn’t healthy for them to be shut away from other people. She was always on about what they did in America, so Mrs Brannigan says. She used to hear them arguing. Ivy something – that was her name. Ivy Busby! She may have been old but she wasn’t afraid to speak her mind.’

  ‘So did you ever meet her?’

  ‘Yes. She came over with the family and was still looking after the twins when me and Cook were taken on. The story was that she’d been widowed three days after her wedding – Ivy Busby I mean, not Mrs Matlowe – and she became a nanny and never looked at another man. Isn’t that romantic?’

  ‘It’s terribly sad,’ said Marianne.

  Lorna shrugged. ‘Anyway she was nice enough, I suppose, but very outspoken. A bit doddery – Cook thought she must be nearing seventy – but then Mrs Matlowe gave her the sack for interfering and the poor old thing had nowhere to go.’ She tossed her head indignantly.

  ‘So no one knew what happened to her?’

  Lorna nodded. ‘Then eventually the first governess came and went and then you came.’

  They stood at the foot of the stairs, finishing the conversation, until Cook called to ask if anyone wanted a cup of tea and a jam tart, and Lorna and Marianne hurried into the kitchen.

  THREE

  ‘Small but bijou’ was how Donald Watson liked to describe his office, and to him and his secretary, Judith Jessop, it was a second home. They both spent more than half their lives among the crowded furniture, sagging shelves and overflowing filing cabinets. The frosted windows were rarely cleaned, the floor was hardly ever swept and the two desks were never tidied.

  Judith Jessop told people that she and her employer saw to the cleaning of the office and that an office cleaner would muddle everything up and set back important investigations. Her maiden name was Judith Watson and she was, in fact, Donald’s cousin. At twenty-four she was a few years his junior and recently married to Tom Jessop. The cousins were vaguely similar to look at – she had the same friendly open face and warm smile – but whereas Donald was what she called ‘a plodder’, she was full of nervous energy and inclined to be hasty.

  ‘The stuff’s arrived from the police station,’ she called when he bowled into the office four days later, ten minutes after her own arrival. ‘One of the lads brought it round first thing.’ She tossed the slim package on to his desk and helped him off with his jacket. It was her philosophy that, simply because she was part of his family, it didn’t mean she need not give him the kind of respect another secretary might give. It irked him a little to be fussed over but Judith insisted. ‘I’m paid to be a secretary so I’ll act like one,’ was her frequent reply to his protests.

  He picked up the package, tore it open and settled down in his chair to examine the contents. ‘We have to come up with something new,’ he told her for the third time. ‘There has to be something we’ve overlooked. No one vanishes off the face of the earth without a good reason. Just one small clue, that’s all I need . . .’

  ‘You should have been born a bloodhound!’

  ‘So you keep telling me!’ He flicked through the pages which, hastily copied, had smeared in places but they were readable and he studied each sheet with concentration.

  Judith set a cup of tea in front of him – strong and sweet the way he liked i
t. She teased him that that was the way he liked his women but, to her disappointment, he rarely seemed to last long with anyone, whatever they were like.

  ‘Mrs Montini was in here yesterday, asking about her husband,’ she told him.

  ‘We have to tell her,’ he said. ‘Her husband’s been dead these last eight weeks. She went to his funeral. How can we go on looking for him? She’s mad as a hatter, that woman.’

  ‘I know, but she likes to believe it’s just a matter of time and maybe . . .’ She shrugged. ‘And the money’s useful.’

  ‘I don’t deny that, Judith, but it’s false pretences. Write to her today and ask her to settle the account – just a nominal sum because I haven’t been looking for him. Run off a copy of the death certificate and send it with the letter.’

  ‘I did that two weeks ago.’

  ‘Send another one. Make it sound final. I’m going to be tied up with the Matlowe business again and I can’t be sidetracked by Mrs Montini and her whims.’ When he saw her expression he said, ‘Do the letter!’

  ‘Yes, Mr Watson!’ She only called him this when she was piqued.

  He sipped his tea, reading eagerly but without discovering anything worthwhile until two pages from the end of the police report.

  ‘Judith, listen to this. Eight months after the disappearance, a body was found near here – close to the water’s edge in an area near Phyllis Court and . . .’

  ‘Phyllis Court? Should I know her?’ Judith tossed her head so that her auburn hair fluttered in its newly cut bob. Her husband liked it but her cousin had so far failed to notice it.

  ‘Don’t be flippant!’ He grinned across the desk at her. ‘Near the area where the Phyllis House stand is erected.’

  ‘Erected each year just for the regatta? Is that what we’re talking about?’

  ‘Exactly. The body of a young woman resembling Leonora Matlowe! Young, nice features and with blonde hair. The husband, Neil, had gone missing by then so they asked Georgina Matlowe if she would identify the body and she agreed.’

  Judith stared at him, shocked. ‘How is it we knew nothing about this?’