‘WHAT LINK?’ LIBBY SAID out loud to herself as she drove home. ‘How can there be a link between Paul Findon, the bricked-up cellar and the bodies in the barn?’
She began to review the whole case in her head so thoroughly that she found herself outside number seventeen with little knowledge of how she got there.
First, there was Rosie and the dreams. Then Fran and Libby had visited the house and heard the music and discovered the grave. That was another thing, that grave. Why was it a new grave with an old body? And who laid the flowers? After that, they discovered that Rosie had actually been to the house. Then came the advent of Andrew, the discovery of the archives and of Rosie’s relationship with Paul Findon. Ian’s further revelation of the legacy, Andrew’s claim that he and Rosie had become rather intimate and Rosie’s new, strange attitude.
Almost completely unconnected was Libby’s discovery of the barn, Fran’s suspicions about it and finally, the discovery of the poor mutilated bodies. And Sophie’s missing friend, Rachita, of course.
No. She shook her head as she opened the door and Sidney shot between her legs. There was absolutely nothing to connect the two cases.
Except – Libby stopped and stared hard at the fireplace. All the bodies were on the same estate. That was a given, no one had questioned it, but why were they? Simply because the barn had lain semi-derelict for years and someone knew about it? That could mean anyone in Cherry Ashton, though. So that was a non-starter.
She wandered around the cottage trying to make some sort of sense of the chain of events, then picked up her basket and left the house again. She arrived at the Manor five minutes later.
‘Het,’ she said following her knock into the kitchen, ‘have you ever heard of a Colonel Weston?’
‘Weston?’ Hetty looked up from her old-fashioned yellow mixing bowl. ‘Weston. Rings a bell, but it ain’t an uncommon name, so I coulda known lots of Westons.’
‘Do you think Greg might know? His father was a Weston out at Cherry Ashton.’
‘Go and ask him, girl. You know where to find him.’
‘Weston,’ Greg repeated, screwing up his eyes. ‘Yes, I do seem to remember a Weston. Had a son a bit older than Ben who went away to boarding school.’
‘That’s the one!’ Libby was delighted. ‘Do you remember what he did? We know he had a farm, but the tenant farmer looked after that.’
‘Good heavens, Libby! How on earth would I know that?’
‘If he’d been a – oh, I don’t know – a solicitor, for instance, you’d remember, wouldn’t you?’
‘I suppose so,’ said Greg, looking amused, ‘but I didn’t know the man. He was a good bit older than me. I believe at one time he was something to do with the old hospital -’
‘What?’ Libby almost bounced out of her chair. ‘The sanatorium?’
‘Honestly, Libby, I don’t really remember. All I know is there was a hospital – all right, sanatorium – over there somewhere, and I have the feeling that he was on the board, because they used to hold fund-raising events and he was always the driving force. I don’t know what happened for a few years because I was away, as you know,’ Greg had been in a prisoner-of-war camp during the second world war, ‘and when I came back I wasn’t too well. But I do remember him trying to save the hospital.’ He frowned. ‘That was after the war, of course. Before the war there’d been piano recitals by someone quite famous.’
‘Oh, Greg! I wish I’d talked to you earlier. The hospital was the Princess Beatrice TB Sanatorium, and the pianist was a former inmate, Paul Findon. He’s our friend Rosie’s uncle.’
‘Is he?’ Greg concentrated on a corner of the ceiling. ‘Findon. Yes, I vaguely remember. We had his recording of Clair de Lune.’
‘So Colonel Weston’s father was something to do with the hospital? Oh, this is marvellous!’
‘Why?’ Greg leant back in his leather chair looking interested.
‘Hasn’t Ben told you anything about what we’ve been doing?’ No? Well, you see this is how it all started…’
Ten minutes later Libby had explained the whole story.
‘And you say Fran asked what Colonel Weston’s father did? That’s what made you come and ask me?’ said Greg.
‘You were the only person I could think of, being a local landowner.’
‘I’ll tell you who else might be able to help, and that’s your friend over at Anderson Place.’
‘Sir Jonathan?’
‘When did he buy the place?’
‘He inherited it,’ said Libby. ‘Would he have known other businessmen in the area?’
‘He was – and is – a landowner. That’s the main point, didn’t you say? There’s the local hunt, for instance. I didn’t ever hunt, but I had applications to cross my land.’ He shrugged. ‘Couldn’t really refuse, although I wanted to. Sir Jonathan would have had the same and might have even hunted. Weston, I’m pretty sure, hunted.’
‘So they could both have been members of the local hunt?’ Libby was getting quite breathless with excitement.
‘It’s an idea, isn’t it?’ Greg watched her with amusement. ‘You’d better see what you can find out on that computer of yours.’
‘I will.’ Libby stood up. ‘Say hello to Ben when you see him.’
‘Aren’t you going to?’
‘Not till this evening.’ She went over to give Greg a kiss. ‘Thank you so much. There is such a wealth of knowledge and information in this village, I don’t know why anyone goes anywhere else.’
The local hunt did indeed cover the areas of both Anderson Place and Ashton Court and had an impressive website with an informative history page, where Libby was delighted to discover a Willoughby Weston as Master immediately before and after the war. It unfortunately didn’t say anything about his business interests, but now she had a name to search for.
She rang Fran.
‘Excellent!’ said Fran. ‘Are you looking him up?’
‘Yes. It’s mainly ancestor-type pages.’ Libby groaned. ‘Oh, God. We’ve been here before.’
‘I’ll do it. You go and make yourself some tea and I’ll call you when I’ve found something.’
‘Thank you,’ said Libby. ‘That coffee at George’s seems a long time ago.’
She’d barely poured her tea when the phone rang.
‘Got it,’ said Fran. ‘You’ll never guess.’
‘He was on the board of the sanatorium?’
‘No, you’d already guessed that,’ said Fran. ‘No better than that.’
‘Oh – I don’t know! What?’
‘He was also a director of Riley and Naughton.’
‘Wh-? God! The estate agents?’ Libby sat down with a thump.
‘Yes. And what’s more, he didn’t appear until after Paul Findon died.’
‘What do you mean he didn’t appear? What does that mean?’
‘Think about it. After Paul Findon died, however he died, the house was rented out. Then the body was discovered, the ghost was supposedly seen, and at the same time this Weston buys into the estate agency and the house falls empty. It doesn’t appear on anyone’s radar until it goes on to Riley’s website a year or so ago.’
‘After which it’s taken down,’ said Libby. ‘But not by Willoughby. He’s long gone.’
‘Supposing his father left Hugh Weston not only his whole estate but business interests, too?’
Libby was silent sipping tea and thinking.
‘Do you see what I mean?’ said Fran.
‘Yes, but that would mean that if Willoughby was involved in something nasty at White Lodge way back when, his son knows about it.’
‘And why not?’
‘You wouldn’t confess nasties to your children.’
‘Perhaps he found out? Whichever way you look at it, it’s suspicious.’
‘Doesn’t help us with finding Rosie, though.’
‘It does if Hugh Weston’s guilty of covering up his father’s crime, whatever it was.’
‘Doing trials on those poor girls, I expect,’ said Libby. ‘But what does that have to do with Rosie? She only knew White Lodge after Paul Findon bought it. She wasn’t here when those girls died.’
‘So what do we do now?’ said Fran. ‘I feel we ought to let Ian know, but I’m not sure how he’d take it.’
‘You never know – he might already know.’ Libby thought for a moment. ‘After all, he did warn us off this morning. Perhaps he was doing research and that’s why we beat him to it.’
‘Oh – hang on, the other phone’s going. I’ll ring you back.’ Fran switched off.
Libby took her mug into the kitchen. This was a turn-up for the books, and thank goodness for the internet. It was a wonder how detectives ever found anything out before the wonderful web came into being.
The phone rang again.
‘A bit of good news,’ said Fran. ‘Rachita’s back.’
‘Oh, thank goodness,’ said Libby, going quite weak at the knees. ‘Do we know where she’s been?’
‘Yes, apparently camping out with a friend. Rachanda’s being allowed out again now, so Sophie’s going to meet her. She said there’s quite a lot to the story.’
‘We might not get to hear about it, then,’ said Libby. ‘It might be personal.’
‘They’ve had to tell the police she’s home and someone wants to interview her, but there’s a problem there. Appropriate adults, or something.’
‘I expect they want her to be questioned without the parents and they don’t want that,’ said Libby. ‘The parents, I mean.’
‘Well, I’m sure Sophie will tell us what she can,’ said Fran. ‘I’ll keep you updated.’
‘And what do we do about Hugh Weston and Ian?’
‘Wait, I suppose. That’s all we can do.’
Libby wasn’t surprised not to hear anything from anyone for the rest of the day. The rain stopped, so she made a pretence of weeding, and, after preparing dinner, turned the television to a rolling news channel hoping for some mention of either of the local stories. There was none. The only vaguely local item was the fact that the two builders found murdered in Medway had been named. And they were both Asian.
There was absolutely no reason to connect this with the White Lodge murders, but it was inevitable that Libby would. She rang Fran.
‘Why should they be anything to do with our barn bodies?’ said Fran, who was trying to control a pan full of spitting oil.
‘They could be the murderers,’ said Libby.
‘Hired assassins?’ suggested Fran. ‘Oh, Libby, go back to the television and leave me to cook my stir fry.’
Hired assassins, thought Libby. Good one. I wonder if Ian’s thought of that?
But it wasn’t until the following day that Libby found out what Ian thought about anything.
On Friday morning Adam called.
‘Can you come down to the flat, Ma? I think we need a council of war.’
‘We do?’ Libby’s heart jumped. ‘What about?’
‘I’ll tell you when you get here.’
‘OK. I’ll be there in five minutes,’ said Libby, who was still in her dressing gown.
‘No, Ma, not there. Sophie’s flat.’
‘Oh, right. OK – half an hour, then.’
Head filled with all sorts of images, none of them good, Libby dressed hurriedly and set off for Nethergate, keeping a close eye on the petrol gauge which was hovering dangerously close to the red line.
The nearest she could park to Guy’s shop-cum-gallery was way beyond Coastguard Cottage. This was a Friday towards the end of August, and the holiday-makers and weekenders were out in force – as were their cars, parked like a shiny metal sea wall all the way along Harbour Street.
Guy was in the shop on his own when Libby pushed open the door. He jerked his head in the direction of the stairs and made a face. ‘They’re all up there.’
‘Don’t you want to go, if it’s Sophie…?’ Libby trailed off.
‘It’s not Sophie.’ Guy grinned. ‘It’s a case for Castle and Sarjeant.’
‘Right,’ said Libby in surprise, and made for the stairs.
In the little sitting room over the shop sat Fran, Adam, Sophie and a beautiful Indian girl.
‘Hi, Libby.’ Sophie stood up and came to kiss her. ‘This is my friend Rachanda. She’s told us some things that we think you ought to hear.’
‘Me? Why me?’
‘Because you know all about the case. I wanted to call you last night, but Ad said it would be better if we did it this morning when Rach could be here.’
Libby smiled at Rachanda, who smiled sweetly back. ‘It’s lovely to meet you, Rachanda, especially as we’ve heard so much about you.’
‘That’s why we thought you ought to know what’s been happening,’ said the girl in a barely accented voice. ‘You see, there’s more to Rachita’s adventure than we first thought, and I think we must tell the police. My parents won’t hear of it, though. They haven’t even allowed the police to interview her.’
Libby turned to Fran. ‘You said yesterday the police wanted to interview her. Why? She was a missing girl who’d turned up at home. Why would they want to see her?’
‘Apparently they always do,’ said Sophie. ‘In case the family are lying and the person hasn’t really come back, or the people who made the report weren’t telling the truth in the first place or in case something awful has happened while the person’s been away. It’s quite normal.’
‘So, what’s Rachita’s story?’ asked Libby.
‘I’ve heard it, so I’ll go and make more coffee,’ said Fran. ‘Or tea, anyone?’
Libby and Rachanda opted for tea, and Rachanda started her story.
‘Sophie says you all wondered if there was a boyfriend involved, although she didn’t think so. But, in fact, there was.’ She paused and looked into the empty fireplace. ‘And the worst sort of boyfriend, too. Not that any boy, unless chosen by my parents, would have been good enough, but this one was beyond everything.’
‘Amazing in this day and age,’ said Libby.
Rachanda smiled. ‘Not in our culture, as I expect you know. There are many women trying to change things and standing up to their families, but I wasn’t brave enough.’
‘Brave enough?’ repeated Libby. ‘Were you afraid?’
‘No, no,’ Rachanda corrected hastily. ‘I wasn’t brave enough to leave the community. A lot of women who do get away never see their families again. I didn’t want that. I love my family.’
Fran reappeared with a tray and handed out mugs.
‘Go on,’ said Libby. ‘Who was Rachita’s boyfriend?’
‘He was an illegal immigrant.’
‘Oh, no.’ Libby shook her head, remembering the last occasion she and Fran had investigated the illegal workers scams.
‘Yes. Sophie says you know something about them?’
‘A bit. Not a lot. Where was this boy from?’
‘Pakistan, we think.’
‘And where did she met him?’
‘He was doing some building work at an uncle’s shop. We have several uncles who are shopkeepers. The council said the facilities at the back weren’t correct, so Uncle Jaiman had to have an extension built.’
‘Health and safety,’ said Libby.
‘Exactly.’ Rachanda nodded. ‘And this Kiran was one of the builders. Rachita used to go there on the way home from school every day -’
‘Like we did,’ put in Sophie.
‘Yes. And they became friendly.’ Rachanda shook her head. ‘I didn’t know anything about it, none of us did, even Uncle Jaiman.’
‘Is that the only place they met?’ asked Libby.
‘No. You see, the extension was finished and Kiran and the other men left. But Kiran arranged to meet Rachita at the place where he was staying.’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘My sister says it wasn’t at all nice. But then, suddenly, Kiran sent her a message saying he had to leave. He didn’t say why. And so my silly little sister ran away to go with him.’
‘What made her come back? Is she disillusioned?’
Rachanda shook her head. ‘No. Kiran is dead.’
Libby gasped.
‘That’s why I said you needed to be here,’ said Fran. ‘The confirmation of a theory – if not quite the right one.’
‘What? You mean… one of those builders found in Medway?’
‘Yes.’ Rachanda nodded. ‘Two of them. Kiran and another boy – they were only nineteen. Rachita says they were hiding, but they wouldn’t say who from. Just that if they were caught they would be killed. She thinks it was something they had worked on that wasn’t right, somehow.’
‘How did she get home? Did she have any money?’
‘No. The place they were hiding was some old building, and the boys went out to find food. When they didn’t come back, Rachita went out at night, found a phone box and called my father. He went and picked her up. Then she heard about the two people murdered. Then, yesterday, they were named on the television news, although she’d already guessed it was them. She was hysterical.’
‘And your parents won’t let her speak to the police?’ said Libby.
‘No. They say it will bring shame.’
‘Oh, really.’
‘I know.’ Rachanda sighed. ‘It is ridiculous. This is why I told Sophie yesterday and she said we must tell you and her mother.’
Fran opened her mouth to correct this, but closed it with a smile at Sophie. ‘And you did the right thing Rachanda. So now we must tell the police. And if necessary, protect you from your parents.’
Rachanda nodded. ‘They will not be pleased. Neither, I think, will my sister.’
‘That,’ said Libby, ‘is not our problem.’