“Are you actually saying this? You saw John at the funeral - he was devastated. He wants to find out what happened as much as we do.”
“Maybe he’s a good actor. Who are we to know V and him aren’t together right now, planning on running away to London together once the buzz about Emma has died down a bit?”
I groaned. “You’ve been watching too many detective shows. I may not know what V is doing right this second, but I know her. So do you. She’d never hurt a fly.” I paused. “Crazy glass-throwing antics aside, anyway… she’d never even cheat on someone, it’s just not her. Plus, why kill Emma if that was the case? They could run off to London just as easily if John simply broke up with her.”
Silence followed and I looked up just enough to see Will nodding to himself, his pen placed in his mouth in thought. “I know, I’m just trying to fit everything together.” A pause. “Sorry, Beth.”
I sighed to myself. “It’s fine.”
“Maybe we’re thinking about this the wrong way. Maybe Emma broke up with John that night, and he followed her into the woods… or maybe she was planning on leaving Little Forest and he couldn’t let her go.”
I shook my head. “No way. I know she moaned about him all the damn time, but Emma was totally in love with John. Her locker at work is filled with photos of him.” I wondered briefly if Hannah was going to do anything about cleaning out her locker. Maybe she already had. “And she wasn’t planning on leaving the village.”
“How do you know?”
“One of the last things she said to me…” I paused again, “when we were in the toilets… was about having a plan to sort our boss out at work. Why would she be planning work stuff if she knew she was leaving?”
Will shrugged. “Maybe she was planning to leave in a few weeks, a few months, and John just found out about it that night?”
I shook my head again. “No, I don’t buy it. John was gutted, there’s no way in hell he was involved.”
“Gutted? Or guilty?”
Will looked impressed with his own mind. I wanted to thump him.
“No more John talk, OK? Just… no.”
He shrugged and went back to writing. I was listening to the soft sound of Will’s pen drifting across the paper when I sighed, a little longer and louder than I’d intended to. “We’re never going to figure out what happened.”
“Why not?”
“Because, Will, we’re not the police. We don’t have all their information, we don’t have the report on Emma’s death. I was thinking about that head wound - you’re so convinced that someone bashed her over the head with a rock? I bet they have ways of proving that she fell over and hit her head, like you always see on the TV. They probably measure the angle of entry or the shape and depth of the wound, all that stuff. All we have is naïve guesswork.”
“Sure. But I’d bet my beloved CD player that you’re smarter than most of the local police, and besides, we can investigate as civilians, we can find out more than any up-himself uniformed detective ever could. We can get behind enemy lines. And anyway…”
I was trying not to smile at his line about me being smart. “Yes?”
He shrugged, smiling, and held up his Evidence Book so I could see his notes. “It’s bloody fun, isn’t it?”
I smiled back. Fun it most certainly was.
Like our own little whodunit.
If only I’d known what was coming, I would have burned that damn book there and then.
***
After half an hour, we hadn’t got any further and the conversation had progressed onto other areas.
“You doing anything this weekend, then? Apart from the usual drinking yourself to death?”
Will laughed. “Like you can talk.” He hesitated, looking at the ground and fiddling with his hands. “Well, actually, it’s my birthday on Friday.”
I sat up. “It is? As in three days’ time? Why didn’t you tell me? What are you doing for it?”
Will shrugged, looking vaguely annoyed. “I don’t know, birthdays aren’t a big thing in my family. I’ve not got anything planned, so there’s not much point telling people.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “But it’s your twenty-first! It’s a rite of passage and all that crap. If this was America, you’d finally be able to drink legally! Seriously, Will. This is a big deal.”
He groaned. “Not to me. My parents stop celebrating birthdays pretty much once you’re an ‘adult’. Look, if you insist, we can go to the pub or something - if you’re not working.”
I pretended to give in. “OK, pub it is. I’ll buy you a drink.”
Will smiled and then looked at his watch. “Powers, I gotta go. Give me a ring if you have some kind of Connor epiphany, OK?”
“Sure.” I watched him go, then immediately got my phone out and started dialling.
“Rach? It’s me. Please don’t hang up, I need to ask you a favour. It’s not for me, it’s for Will.”
***
I hung up from talking to Rach - glad that she’d agreed to listen to me long enough to hear my plan - and looked around at the park.
From my position on the bandstand, I could see most of the flat expanse of grass, as well as the bird cages, bowls lawn, and the white Victorian bridge over the river. It was all deserted, probably due to the ominous clouds overhead.
I sat up a little straighter so I could see the church and graveyard, and a flash of black - weaving through the bleak grey headstones - caught my eye.
Without giving it too much thought I stood up and ran across the grass in the direction of the church, trying not to pay much attention to the butterflies that were currently making an appearance in my stomach.
Graveyards always had that effect on me, ever since Edinburgh.
By the time my shoes started making small hollows in the gravel ground next to the church, I was beginning to wonder if I’d actually find anyone in the cemetery. When all I could see were rows and rows of crumbling gravestones, I nearly turned back towards the park, not wanting to confront whoever or whatever it was that I’d seen.
Thankfully, a couple of seconds later, Reverend Kipling’s head popped up from behind a particularly large stone, a smile on his face and a twinkling curiosity in his eyes.
“Hello!” His voice was deep and booming.
He stood up and waved some withered red roses at me, before walking in my direction. “I was just making a sweep of all the graves, tidying them up.”
I smiled as best as I could. “You take the flowers away?”
“I don’t have to with most of them, a lot of these poor souls no longer have any relatives to bestow such treasures upon them.”
It took me a few seconds to get my head around what he’d just said; I didn’t know anyone who talked like that. I gestured to the roses. “Some obviously still do.”
He looked down at the flowers, a small smile playing around the corner of his mouth. “Yes, some do. She gets flowers every week.”
I didn’t need to ask who he meant. Norman. Doris.
“So, can I help you?” He shook his head, laughing to himself, before I got a chance to answer. “I’m sorry, you probably don’t know me, I haven’t seen you at church. I’m Reverend Kipling.”
I nodded. “I’m Beth Powers, and I do know you. I came to Emma Harris’s funeral, we… worked together.”
This time it was his turn to nod, head bowed down slightly, as if in respect. “Ah, yes. It certainly is terrible when they’re so young, when they have to leave this life so suddenly. I’m sorry for your loss.”
My mouth was incredibly dry; I hadn’t come here to discuss Emma, and I felt like I was using her death somehow as a way of getting the Reverend to talk to me. “Thanks. Actually…” I gestured again to the flowers, trying to sound natural. “That wouldn’t be Norman Carter leaving those for his wife, would it?”
The Reverend laughed, seeming surprised. “You know Norman?”
I tried to put on a sweet, innocent smile. I was
n’t sure I pulled it off. “Well, he’s friends with my parents, actually. To tell you the truth,” I lowered my voice and took a step closer to Kipling, “they’re kind of worried about him. He’s been acting, well, not himself lately. I know he spends a lot of time here, what with his wife and everything. I was just wondering if you’d noticed any change in him, or if he’s been acting strangely lately? If he mentioned any… issues he was having?”
The Reverend raised his eyebrows and looked at the roses again in silence. I hoped he wouldn’t find this too strange, or track down my parents and try to talk to them. I’d just given up hope of getting any kind of answer from him when his face transformed into a genuine expression of gratitude. “It’s young adults like you who keep communities like this going. Young people who still care. God bless you.”
I smiled again, feeling slightly sick. I wasn’t exactly lying to him, but I’m sure that using a vicar to try and get information wasn’t exactly a good thing, either. I just hoped that trying to find out what really happened to Emma would somehow allow me to redeem myself.
“Let’s see… he usually comes here once a week, puts flowers on her grave, and sits and talks for a while. A lot of people do: they find it comforting, having an object - like a headstone - to aim their words at. I don’t always see him, of course, he comes at different times and on different days, but if I do he’ll always stop and talk to me a while. He’s a good man, Norman.”
“I heard he had a bit of an argument here the other day with Connor, the new Irish guy.” It came out my mouth before I could stop it.
A flicker of something - anger or hatred - passed over Kipling’s features. “If there was such an argument, I can guarantee it wasn’t Norman who started it. I’ve met Connor’s mother, of course, lovely woman, but her son should stop picking fights with people who don’t deserve it.”
“You’ve met Connor?”
He shook his head, almost violently. “No. Norman, he’s just an old man with…” he cocked his head to one side, then back the other way, as if trying to decide what to say. “Let’s just say he’s got problems. And who is Connor to come waltzing in here, acting like he owns the place, and taking advantage of an elderly person?” The Reverend’s unique way of speaking seemed to be lost in his anger; he just sounded like any annoyed person now.
“Take advantage? How do you mean?”
Another shake of the head. “He shouldn’t be aggravating vulnerable people like Norman. He’s been through a lot these past few years, his wife’s death affected him horribly, he’s…” a slight hesitation, “a very confused man.”
I could tell Kipling was getting extremely flustered, and I thought I’d better not push him any further. “I’m sorry, Reverend, I didn’t mean to pry. I just wanted to try and help.” I smiled my sweetest smile at him again and he visibly relaxed.
“No, I should be apologising. It’s just difficult. I’ve got to know Norman quite well these past few years, and people confronting him in front of his wife’s grave is the last thing he needs.”
“I totally agree.”
“Well, Miss Powers, I’ll leave you now. I’m sure Norman will be fine, you can tell your parents to stop worrying.”
“I appreciate that.”
He nodded, gave a brisk smile, and then started wandering off away from the cemetery, no doubt towards a warm fire and endless cups of hot tea. Well, that’s what I’d do if I were a vicar.
I waited until the sound of his shoes crunching on the gravel had faded before walking over to where Kipling had been standing, or kneeling, when I first arrived. In front of me was a headstone, quite large in comparison to some of the surrounding slabs, and starting to get covered in dark green moss. I kneeled down and reached out to touch the cold, rough surface, feeling the deteriorating engraved letters as I did. Even a few years in this place was enough to make your last memorial rot and decay as much as the steadily decomposing corpse buried beneath. I shuddered and took my hand away.
‘In Loving Memory
Doris Ethel Mabel Carter
1927 - 2006
Survived by her ever-loving husband, Norman.’
As epitaphs go, it was no masterpiece, but when you thought about it, it said everything that needed to be said.
I thought of Norman spending hours here, in this very spot, talking to his wife’s headstone. I thought of Kipling’s reaction -‘He’s a very confused man’ - and the way he instantly turned on Connor for even daring to argue with him.
I supposed a lot of eighty-something’s probably were a bit confused sometimes, but I’d never once seen Norman dithering in the street wondering how he’d got there, or getting his order wrong at the bar, or forgetting to take his wallet with him, and he never, ever forgot when a football match was going to be on the TV.
He definitely seemed to be someone who not only had all his marbles, but who knew exactly how many and where they were at all times. I could only guess at what Kipling’s definition of ‘confused’ entailed.
I took my eyes off Doris’s headstone. I’d been staring at it for so long its words were now engraved in my mind, and I let my eyes wander over the surrounding graves, some of which looked like they’d been here for decades, even centuries.
Not far from Doris Carter’s final resting place were three small headstones, grouped together at the end of one of the rows. I walked over and crouched down, intrigued by their size and odd positioning. I could tell immediately that these pieces of stone had been exposed to the elements in this graveyard for a lot more years than Norman’s wife’s had; they were almost entirely covered in moss, and the grass was growing relentlessly taller and taller around them, almost dwarfing the little stones.
I checked no one was around before picking up a nearby stick and scratching at one of the stones, tearing off the moss and other foliage that had made these graves their homes before going on to the other two.
I felt slightly bad about doing it, but a part of me thought I was doing a good thing; I was finally allowing some light and some air to get through to the ancient stone, I was rediscovering the names that had no doubt lain in this cemetery undisturbed for years.
When I’d uncovered as much as I could, I stepped back so I could see all of them at once. Each stone had a name on, nothing wrong there, and I tried to decipher each of the old, decrepit letters. Lucy Browning. Katherine Browning. Marianne Browning. All born between 1889 and 1897, all died 1899. I could feel my throat getting dry again. What could have happened to three sisters all in the same year? Some kind of disease? A fire? Murder?
The dates, however, weren’t the most disturbing thing on the headstones. Not by a mile. I’d studied the Victorian era at school, and I knew that a lot of their customs were, well, creepy to say the least, but this was taking it a bit far.
Underneath the names and dates were two lines of poetry, made all the more troubling by their repetition on each individual grave.
‘Those that are young, prepare to die. For we who are young, beneath we lie.’
I shivered and took a step back from the words. Who on earth would put that on a child’s grave?
I looked around to see if I could spot any more Brownings but from what I could tell, they were the only ones. Of course, others could be under their own thick layer of moss and grime, but I didn’t really want to stay and find out.
I took one last look at the death poems and turned quickly away, some of the gravel from under my feet clattering against Marianne’s grave as I did. I walked quickly out of the row and down the main path towards the church, towards the park, towards some form of normality.
The sound of a child laughing stopped me in my tracks. It was high-pitched and bubbly; a laugh that would sound delightful coming from a little girl or boy who was playing with their friends or perhaps one of their parents. In its current surroundings, however, it sounded so out of place I felt a chill worm its way through me.
The graveyard suddenly seemed like a completely stupid place for
me to voluntarily hang out in on my own and I started walking again, faster this time, not daring to turn back to the Browning Sisters’ graves.
By the time I got to the end of the cemetery I was almost running, and I caught a flash of a name, noticeable for its position on a brand new, gleaming headstone, as I rushed past. ‘Emma Harris’.
The thought of Emma sharing the same soil as Doris Carter and the three Browning children - with only a few metres to separate them - was almost too much to bear.
I took one last look at Emma’s grave - smooth and white, sticking out like a sore thumb in a sea of withered grey - and wondered if it would too, one day, resemble all of the others. I supposed it would.
I supposed it was inevitable.
Shivering, I left the cemetery behind.
Chapter Six
The next day I got up early and caught the bus to the Green Tree shopping centre before my shift started. First I headed to Party Land to grab as many balloons, streamers and lame party hats as I could carry, then I headed to the electrical store next door to purchase a nice and shiny mp3 player and some new headphones.
I went to the card shop last and bumped into Veronica’s parents as I was going in.
There was an awkward moment when none of us said anything, then V’s mum plastered a big, toothy smile onto her face; it actually looked like it pained her to do it.
“Hi Beth, how are you?”
I didn’t really know what to say to that. “I’m OK thanks, and you?”
“Oh, not bad, not bad. You out shopping?”
What else would I be doing, loaded down with shopping bags? “Yeah, it’s Will’s birthday this weekend, I’m throwing him a surprise party at the Inn.”
“Oh, Will Wolseley?”
I nodded. “I’ve been hanging out with him more since V and I… you know.”
David and Laura Summers exchanged an apprehensive glance. “Will’s a lovely lad. Tell him ‘Happy Birthday’ from us.”
I wasn’t going to let them off that easily. “Sure. Although you could tell him yourself, it’s Friday night around seven. You could bring Veronica.”
David looked at his watch and gestured for Laura to hurry up. “Look, Beth, thanks for the invite. We’re in a real hurry though, so… see you soon.” They started walking off towards the entrance.