Suddenly While Gardening Read online

  As he swung along he toyed with the idea of doing the walk again the following year, this time with some sort of portable camping gear. It was maddening not to have time for detours to look at hut circles and a stone row described as ‘exceptionally fine’. But the silence, broken only by lark song filtering down and the occasional lowing of cattle, had an hypnotic effect on him. His mind seemed to drift happily from one topic to another without reaching any conclusions.

  Eventually another waymark indicated the best route through a rocky expanse forming the approach to Starbarrow. Suddenly realising that he was hungry, Pollard began to look out for a comfortable lunch spot. He rounded a large boulder and stopped dead. Fifty yards ahead of him, and farther up the slope, was a group of about a dozen people of both sexes and varied ages, equipped with rucksacks, cameras and binoculars. Their attitudes unmistakably expressed alarm and indecision. Two of them, a youngish woman and a grey-headed man, appeared to be having an argument. Another man caught sight of him and interrupted them. All heads were turned in his direction.

  He walked forward.

  ‘Anything the matter?’ he called, recognising with foreboding an authoritative note in his voice.

  It was obvious that others had recognised it as well. Most of the faces confronting him were expressing relief at the prospect of pushing responsibility on to someone ready to take it. The argumentative young woman, however, looked slightly annoyed.

  ‘Only a stupid practical joke,’ she said shortly. ‘Some idiot’s put a skeleton in this kistvaen. It’s a Bronze Age grave.’

  She turned and indicated a box-like stone structure formed by stone slabs on their edges with one acting as a lid. Its overall measurements were roughly five feet by four.

  ‘Students,’ someone remarked with finality.

  ‘That’s right,’ said an elderly woman. ‘Keep saying they can’t live on their grants, but all of them have cars, and go tearing all over the country.’

  The grey-headed man contrived to catch Pollard’s eye warningly.

  ‘May I have a look?’ Without waiting for an answer, Pollard advanced on the kistvaen. One of the upright slabs of stone was broken. He knelt on the grass and peered through the opening. After a prolonged scrutiny he got to his feet again.

  ‘This is a police matter,’ he said. ‘The Stoneham station must be notified at once. Where’s the nearest telephone?’

  ‘Really!’ the young woman retorted, now clearly very angry. ‘I’ve no idea who you are, but this party is on a guided walk led by me, and I’m the one to decide what’s to be done. The Friends of Cattesmoor are responsible for the Possel Way and the prehistoric monuments along it, and the proper person to notify about this — this outrageous nonsense is their Secretary, Mr Akerman. He’s the person to decide what steps to take, as the Chairman’s in America.’

  ‘I shall —’

  ‘Good Lord!’ the grey-headed man interrupted. ‘You are the police! Superintendent Pollard of Scotland Yard, isn’t it? I remember your photograph in the local rag when you were on that murder case over at Kittitoe a few years ago.’

  There was a sudden buzz of conversation.

  ‘Unfortunately I am a policeman,’ Pollard replied, ‘and, please note, I’m on holiday. My only responsibility is to see that the Stoneham police are notified about this business as soon as possible. Is there a telephone at the farm down there?’

  The young woman hastily climbed down with a rather forced smile.

  ‘Of course this quite alters the situation, doesn’t it?’ she enquired of no one in particular. ‘Yes, there is one, but the man who lives there is quite capable of refusing to let us use it.’

  ‘I hardly think he’ll go to those lengths,’ Pollard replied, writing a few lines on a piece of paper and signing them. ‘Will somebody take this note down to him, and then ring the police station at Stoneham to report what has happened? I must stay here myself until they turn up.’

  The young woman immediately volunteered, refused the offer of a companion, and hurried off. Several plaintive voices enquired if everybody had got to hang around until the police came. It transpired that the walkers had come out from Stoneham by bus along the road to Biddle Bay, getting out at a village called Cobbacott, and cutting up across the moor to the Possel Way, which they were to follow back to Stoneham.

  Pollard decided to take their names and addresses and let them go on. The grey-headed man who had actually discovered the skeleton contrived to be the last in the queue. He gave his name as Bill Worth.

  ‘I’m an artist,’ he said. ‘Address: 2, Hill Crest, Stoneham. I was the first to find the thing because I was walking on ahead and went to have a look at the kistvaen. Of course I saw at once that it wasn’t a bit of lecture room equipment, just as you did. It isn’t wired up, and it’s white — obviously a pretty recent vintage. But Miss Grant, who’s leading this walk, and everybody else immediately concluded that it had been dumped there as a student rag, and I was being shouted down when you providentially turned up.’

  ‘Did you say Grant? Is she related to a Miss Grant who was Chairman of the Friends of Cattesmoor, and died recently?’

  ‘Yes, a niece. She and her brother both lived with their aunt, and have been left the house. A lovely little Queen Anne affair called Upway Manor. You must have noticed the gates on the way up to the moor. Miss Grant senior was a sort of local queen-pin, and fanatically keen on conservation and whatever. The niece — Davina, she’s called — is obviously trying her hardest to step into her aunt’s shoes, and is finding them several sizes too large. Hence the weight-throwing, which won’t have escaped your notice... I say, this is really rather an odd business, isn’t it? Somebody not only getting hold of a comparatively recent skeleton, but managing to land it here, miles from anywhere. Except Starbarrow Farm, of course.’

  Pollard declined to be drawn. ‘I expect the Stoneham chaps will manage to sort it out. I shall report to them that you actually found the skeleton, and they’ll get on to you at an early stage, of course. In the meantime I’m sure you’ll agree that discretion’s called for. Here’s Miss Grant coming back.’

  ‘I’d better push on, then,’ Bill Worth said reluctantly. ‘Nice to have met you in the flesh.’

  Davina Grant seemed anxious to give the impression of being briskly competent. Mr Ling had been out, and his wife had made no difficulty about letting her use the telephone. The Stoneham police were coming out at once, and should be on the spot within an hour.

  ‘I directed them to come up here through Starbarrow Farm,’ she said. ‘It’s much the shortest way.’

  Pollard detected a note of satisfaction in her voice.

  ‘I understand that Mr Ling objected to the Possel Way going through his land,’ he said conversationally.

  ‘He behaved abominably...’

  As she talked, Pollard observed her critically. Somewhere in her late twenties, he thought, and quite attractive. She had a rounded face with rather full cheeks, good hazel eyes and attractively styled dark hair. A small, rather secretive mouth suggested the tension that the artist had talked about. Presently he cut into the recital of Mr Ling’s iniquities.

  ‘I mustn’t delay you,’ he said. ‘Your party has gone on, but they’ll be expecting you to catch them up for the rest of the walk.’

  ‘Won’t the police want to see me?’ she asked in obvious disappointment.

  ‘Probably they will, but I can let them have your address.’

  ‘They’ll know that, of course. Upway Manor.’

  Pollard thanked her, and solemnly added it to his list.

  As soon as she had gone off he fell on his long overdue picnic lunch with relish, and afterwards strolled down to inspect the right-of-way through the Starbarrow newtake. A narrow path barely allowing walkers to pass across it in single file had been clumsily fenced with a great deal of barbed wire. Still, he thought, the Friends of Cattesmoor would probably be only too thankful to leave it at that. He returned to the neighbourhood of th
e kistvaen, and lay down comfortably on springy heather, propping his head against his rucksack. It was maddening, he thought, to have got caught up in this affair. Somehow he must get a message phoned through to Holston. He was damned if he would give up the Possel Walk, having got this far…

  He awoke with a start to find a dark man with a large nose gazing down at him, a glint of amusement on his saturnine face.

  ‘Caught you napping, Chief Superintendent Pollard,’ remarked the new arrival. ‘Not a thing I’d ever have expected to do.’

  ‘Well, I’m blowed,’ Pollard exclaimed, struggling to his feet. ‘Superintendent Crookshank!’

  They shook hands, and briefly harked back to the Kittitoe case.

  ‘Thought I’d come along myself for old times’ sake,’ Superintendent Crookshank said. ‘What’s all this about a skeleton up here?’

  ‘Come and take a look,’ Pollard invited.

  As soon as he decently could he extricated himself, having given a concise account of his arrival on the scene and the steps he had taken, and handed over the names and addresses of the members of the guided walk.

  ‘It’s all yours,’ he concluded. ‘Now I’m off, two hours behind schedule. You’ll see that one of your chaps rings that number I gave you, won’t you?’

  Crookshank, now confronted with a decidedly bizarre situation, was reluctant to let him go.

  ‘Be seeing you, maybe,’ he suggested.

  ‘Not on your life,’ Pollard retorted.

  With a final wave of the hand he started off once more on the Possel Way.

  Chapter 2

  Two days later the Pollards returned to London, making an early start and arriving home by lunchtime. The afternoon was fully occupied in unpacking, and it was not until he was relaxing over a cuppa at teatime that Pollard picked up the evening paper.

  ‘Good Lord! Just look at this!’

  On the front page, under the caption ‘MODERN SKELETON IN ANCIENT MONUMENT’, was a recognisable photograph of Davina Grant and himself standing beside the Starbarrow kistvaen. ‘Detective-Chief Superintendent Tom Pollard on a hiking holiday stumbles on a macabre mystery and a pretty girl,’ he read.

  ‘Surely not the Stoneham police?’ Jane queried a couple of moments later.

  ‘Almost certainly it’s that know-all artist type, Worth. I remember he had a camera slung round his neck. I can just imagine him tooling off to the local press and spinning a good yarn. It’s a damn nuisance, though. The A.C. will certainly react.’

  ‘I don’t see how you can be held responsible,’ Jane began indignantly. ‘You couldn’t...’ The telephone bleeped, cutting her short. She answered it and passed the receiver to her husband, mouthing ‘The A.C.’s office.’

  The Assistant Commissioner was crisp.

  ‘I understand you’re back, Pollard. Have you seen an evening paper?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Pollard replied. ‘About three minutes ago.’

  ‘I should like an explanation of how you come to be involved in this affair then.’

  Pollard gave a succinct account of the events leading up to the taking of the photograph. The Assistant Commissioner listened in silence, and at its conclusion gave an audible sniff.

  ‘Most unfortunate,’ he commented. ‘If you hadn’t blundered into the business I don’t believe for a moment that the Glintshire people would be trying to push the enquiry on to us.’

  Pollard felt an odd sensation of having subconsciously known all along that he was by no means through with the Starbarrow skeleton. Why, he wondered, had he been so reluctant to face this? He was suddenly nettled by the A.C.’s attitude.

  ‘I really don’t see, sir, how I could help getting involved under the circumstances,’ he protested.

  ‘I’m not criticising the routine steps you took. I’m merely saying that it’s unfortunate that you turned up at that particular moment.’

  ‘I absolutely agree, sir. What reason is Glintshire giving for calling us in?’

  ‘Apparently the skeleton doesn’t match up with any recorded disappearance from their area, for one thing. Then they’ve clearly got cold feet. The chap was never buried, at least not in the usual sense of the word. Somebody must have stowed the body away about a year ago, and then for some reason decided to yank it out and dump it where it was bound to be discovered in a matter of days. Glintshire think they’re up against a lunatic, and possibly a psychopath.’

  Pollard asked if there were any signs of injury.

  ‘None. A few of the smaller bones are missing. Lost in transit, presumably.’

  There was a fairly lengthy pause, finally broken by the A.C. clearing his throat decisively.

  ‘Well, as I said, they’ve called us in, and asked for you to take over, on the grounds that you know them and the area from your Kittitoe case, and were involved in the discovery of the skeleton. You’d better go down with Toye tomorrow and look into things, I suppose. Only for God’s sake get on with it, Pollard. You can’t be spared to hang about for weeks if you feel you’re getting nowhere. As you know very well, we’re stretched to danger point up here.’

  ‘I realise that, sir. I’ll consider myself as doing a recce, and report back to you as soon as possible.’

  The A.C. was sufficiently mollified to enquire into the success of the family holiday. He finally rang off, and the door opened to admit Jane’s head.

  ‘Was the A.C. perfectly foul?’ she asked, coming into the room.

  ‘A bit bloody-minded to start with, but he came off it, and even ended up with asking about our holiday. I think he was chiefly hipped because Glintshire have asked us to take over the enquiry, and put in a request for me. I’m to go down with Toye tomorrow.’

  ‘Hardly worth coming home, was it? Still, there are worse places than Stoneham, I suppose.’

  They both turned towards the door as the twins marched solemnly into the room wearing shorts and tee shirts, and with improvised rucksacks on their backs. They progressed round it and went out again, heading for the garden. ‘What on earth are they doing?’ Pollard asked.

  ‘Walking the Possel Way,’ Jane replied. ‘It’s the in game at the moment.’

  He groaned and settled down to a stint of official telephoning. His first call was to Detective-Inspector Gregory Toye who had worked with him on all his big cases, and who, like himself, was due back from a fortnight’s leave on the following day. Toye received the news of their immediate assignment to an enquiry out of London with equanimity.

  ‘Nice part of the world down there,’ he commented. ‘What time will we be starting, sir?’

  ‘What you really want to know, of course,’ Pollard replied, ‘is whether we’re going by rail or road. Well, to keep you happy, we’d better make it road. We’re likely to be coasting round a bit, I imagine.’

  Toye, a superb driver with a passion for cars, remarked gloatingly that that would be the Rover, then.

  ‘Hope you’ll enjoy driving it across trackless moorland,’ Pollard said. ‘If you can bring your mind to bear on anything but the car, I’d like to get off at about seven tomorrow morning. I’ll brief you on the way down.’

  As they swept down the M4 in the early freshness of the following morning, Pollard roused himself with an effort from the enjoyment of being driven by Toye in a top car.

  ‘Well, I’d better let you have what gen there is,’ he said, and started on the potted history of the Possel Way. When he came to the end of the briefing he glanced round at Toye’s pale attentive face, rendered additionally serious by a large pair of horn-rimmed spectacles, and saw mental digestion in process.

  ‘How far off the footpath is this kistvaen affair?’ Toye asked presently.

  ‘It’s about fifty yards up the slope of Starbarrow. It’s quite conspicuous, and mentioned in the Friends of Cattesmoor’s pamphlet as a good specimen. The sort of people who’d be on the Possel Way would almost certainly go up to have a look. I’d intended to myself. What I’m getting at is that I’m certain the skeleton can�
��t have been there long. Somebody would have discovered it. And the bones seemed so — well, fresh, when I looked into the kistvaen. There were no spiders’ webs on them, for instance.’

  ‘I suppose the ground all around the kistvaen had been pretty well tramped over by the walking party?’

  ‘Yes. I don’t think Crookshank’s boys will have found anything useful. It seems to me that to start with, our best bet is to try and find out when the skeleton was brought there. It simply must have been by night. According to my aunt, quite a lot of people are using the footpath, and by day you could never be sure that somebody wouldn’t suddenly come round the corner, just as I did. And incidentally there was a full moon last Saturday. A public appeal to anyone who’s visited the kistvaen during the past couple of weeks, say, might narrow down the period we’ve got to cover.’

  ‘This artist chap Worth,’ Toye said after an interval. ‘Somebody wanted the skeleton found, and he found it, didn’t he?’

  ‘I’ve been thinking along those lines myself,’ Pollard replied. ‘I’m always a bit suspicious of these matey man-to-man blokes, and he was so careful to point out quite unnecessarily that Starbarrow Farm would have been a handy base for the dumping operation. We’ll certainly enquire into Worth and his activities.’

  ‘What beats me,’ Toye said, ‘is why a skeleton, which must have been tucked away safely for a year at least, should suddenly be thrown out where it was bound to be spotted.’