Death At Willows End Page 21

  Well, that was news to me. I mean, I knew she was pretty strait-laced, but that was inevitable, giving the very strict upbringing she had reputedly had as a child. I asked him how he knew this, and he told me that one of his college mates had succeeded in dating her about a year earlier, and thought initially she had been a pretty cold fish, he had been determined to break through her defences and find the real Julia. She eventually confided in him that she had been abused as a child, but as it was all her own fault, she knew that she should be punished. Well, he was the sort of extrovert bloke who was happy to oblige, figuring it was just her way of intimating that she liked a bit of rough play. He was up for any new experience and beat hell out of her, and according to him she responded like she had been waiting for him all his life! For a while it was a novelty, and they used to meet clandestinely in all sorts of out of the way places, and the ritual was always the same, she had to be ritually beaten and humiliated, and then she would submit to sex. Eventually he became tired of it and dropped her.”

  “Abused as a child,” I echoed in amazement. “Who by?”

  Andrew just shrugged. “If she said, it certainly wasn't repeated to me.”

  Frankly, I found the whole concept rather hard to swallow, and wondered if it was just a story made up by a group of teenage boys. I asked him if he seriously expected me to believe such a tale and he just shrugged his shoulders once again and said I could please myself. Moving on from that, I asked him how the dating went.

  “Judging from what was repeated to me later, mostly talk,” he said. “Tou and your sister came to the camp once you could elude Julia, after a while the four of you went off for a walk. I gather from what was said afterwards by Mark that he found your sister absolutely fascinating, and eventually they found a quiet place along the river bank to sit down and do a bit of romancing. I don't think it went very far, just a few cuddles and maybe the odd stolen kiss or something. Just as well really, with the pair of you still being legally minors, but by all accounts Dian and Mark were quite happy about things.”

  “So, what happened?”

  “What happened was that you turned up!”

  “Me?”

  “It seems your heart wasn't in it, and you only went along with things to keep your sister happy, and when Ralph tried to get a bit, shall we say, friendly, you chickened out like a would-be Julia! According to Mark there was a bit of unpleasantness between you and your sister because you wanted her to go back to the camp with you, and she was having fun, and rather reluctant to quit at that point. In the end you stalked off and presumably went back to your camp. Your sister stayed a bit longer, but by now the fun was gone, and eventually she left also. Some little while later the storm broke, and there was an almighty bang as the lightning struck down at your camp. We never actually saw where it struck, and it wasn't until the following day that we learned what had happened. We were all terribly upset by it, but of course there was nothing we could do.”

  Well, apart from learning that Julia was possibly a bit queerer than I had ever imagined I didn't feel that I was very much farther forward. I remembered what you said about the Reagan, so I asked him if he had been aware of anyone else hanging round the area that weekend.

  “No-one that readily comes to mind,” Andrew said after some thought. “Although I seem to remember that Mark muttered something about seeing a man near the footbridge when he was on the way back to camp after seeing your sister back to the outskirts of the camp.”

  “What sort of man,” I asked.

  “Now how the hell would I know?” he asked rather contemptuously. “I didn't see him, and all I can remember is Mark saying something about a man coming down the footpath towards the footbridge. He must have come down from the roadway.”

  Well, having decided that I might just as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb I asked him if he knew anyone who had owned a Reagan car at that time, mentioning that someone else had also told me that there was a 'suspicious character' lurking about who drove one of the things. He admitted that he had seen a Reagan in the village once or twice, but it definitely wasn't local, and he had no recollection of ever seeing it again after the tragedy, not that he connected the two things. I stayed chatting with him for a while longer, but I couldn't get anything else of interest from him and eventually left. By this time it was coming up for five, and that is when I phoned you.”

  “Excellent,” I said as she finished her tale of the day's exploits. “I couldn’t have done better myself!”

  “Naturally!”

  “I think,” I said, ignoring her dig, “I'm now starting to get a bit of a picture of just what went on.”

  “Well, I'm glad about that,” she commented, “because I don't see how it gets us much farther forward. Maybe if you tell me how you got on I may agree with you?”

  “Fair enough,” I agreed, and launched into a brief account of my own activities throughout the day. I started by mentioning Pete's visit, although naturally omitting his suggestion that Tanya had been planted on me as a spy! I still thought the idea a bit ridiculous, but working on the assumption that there was just an outside possibility it was true, I deemed it politic to 'forget' it for the time being. I related pretty much in detail what had transpired at Julia's, and I noted that Danny seemed to follow my every word with interest. When I mentioned the cane I had seen in the deceased husband's room I saw a flicker pass over her face.

  “I guess Andrew Parsons may have been telling the truth after all,” she commented, harking back to what she had so recently told me about Julia's alleged masochistic tendency.

  “Well, in view of what you have just related,” I agreed, “it is not a complete impossibility; she certainly seems to carry around an outsize guilt complex about everything. Not only that, in the light of everything else I have learned, she obviously wasn't telling me the strict truth about what happened, and that in turn suggests to me that maybe there is something to your original suspicions after all.”

  “I'm glad you think so,” she said in a slightly sarcastic tone of voice. “But if it was her that pushed my sister into the river, what on earth would make her want to do such a thing? I mean, it just doesn't make sense. If Dian had slipped in by accident I could just about understand it, and if it was an accident, why didn't she try to get her out? That's what gets to me; Dian was a strong swimmer, not like me who can't swim a stroke. Even without assistance she would have made it; she had certificates for swimming. If Julia had knocked her out it might explain what happened, but according to the pathologists report there were no marks on her not consistent with accidental death by drowning. The whole thing simply makes no sense, yet something I still don’t understand must have happened, because why else would Julia lie?”

  Something in what she had just said jarred on me for a moment, but at that point George reappeared to see if we required more coffee, and whatever it was vanished from my mind.

  “So, Sherlock Hammond,” she said as the waiter departed, “if you so certain that you are starting to understand all of this, where do we go from here?”

  Chapter Fifteen.

  It was a good question. I still hadn't quite sorted things out in my head, although I was starting to get a hazy idea about what may have happened. What I needed was time to think before shooting my mouth off. “I think it is a bit too public to talk matters out in detail here,” I said. “Perhaps, if we go back to the office we can decide on what the next step will be?”

  I knew exactly what I would like my next step to be, only it was also a bit to public to discuss that as well.

  “Frankly, I don't much fancy your office at this time of night,” Danny said candidly. “It's uncomfortable enough during the day. We can always go back to your flat for a chat if you like?”

  I would have liked that very much, but the thought of what might happen if 'The Hatchet' called in at what I hoped might be the crucial part of such a meeting quite took the shine off the prospect. “Tempting as that idea is, if you've no obj
ections, maybe we could go for a drive and talk as we go?”

  “Fair enough,” she responded. If she was at all put out by my refusal, or wary of what might happen in the car on a dark evening, she did not betray the fact by any change of expression. She signalled to George, and he obligingly came up with a slip of paper on a small salver. She didn't even look at it as she dropped her plastic on it, and a few minutes later he returned this to her, and we then took out leave.

  “We'll use my car,” I said, “and then I can bring you back here for yours when we've talked enough.”

  “Yours being more likely than mine to breakdown in a suitably secluded spot I suppose?” she quipped with a knowing smile. No, she wasn't fooled for an instant!

  “I'll have you know that even if the body is a bit knackered, the engine's sound” I retorted, and then added as an afterthought; “and much the same goes for the car.”

  “Maybe so, yet I wouldn't try entering into any sort of endurance rally,” she retorted mischievously.

  I couldn't think of a suitable reply to that and left it.

  It only took a matter of moments to leave the pub and safely into my car, and once Danny was settled in I started up and eased out of the car-park and headed off to a spot I knew on the brow of a hill that looked out over the city. It affords a real panoramic spectacle at night, and quite a few local people went there to look at the view if they were older, or to get all romantic if they weren't! (I put myself temporarily somewhere in the middle, labelled 'undecided') We conversed on incidental matters for the ten minutes or so that the journey took, and having found a semi-secluded spot with a good outlook we settled back and just took it all in for a few minutes. I was very conscious of her nearness, yet at the same time conscious of the gap that separated us, and just contented myself with actually being in her presence.

  “So, to repeat my question,” she said at last. “What's the next step?”

  “I think the 'next step,' as you put it,” I answered, finally thrusting all my useless romantic fantasies into the background, “is to try and figure out from the various bits and pieces we have collected just what actually transpired on that fatal night. The more I think about it, the less Julia's story hangs together with everybody else's. We know that the scouts were camping on the far bank before you arrived with her and your sister, and I think it is a pretty safe bet that neither group knew of the presence of the other until you all met up in the village; agreed?”

  “That's how I see it.”

  “Good; and it also seems pretty obvious that you and your sister agreed to meet up with two of the scouts later, and to do it without letting Julia know what you were up to. Given your age at the time, she would undoubtedly have squelched such arrangements had she known about them, particularly if she had known that you had lied about your ages. Given the difference in temperament, I would think it most likely that your sister was keener on this arrangement than you were, but never-the-less you went along with it. Judging by what you learned from Andrew Parson, it would seem that your heart was never really in it, or maybe you just didn't like the boy concerned. Irrespective of the reason, you soon decided that enough was enough, and decided it was time to return to base. It seems that you then tried, and failed, to get your sister to accompany you back to camp.”

  “Yes, I'm with you so far,” she agreed.

  “Good, then it starts getting a little bit confused as far as I'm concerned.”

  “Did she fall, or was she pushed?” Danny muttered as if talking to herself rather than addressing me.

  “And that,” I agreed, “is the real question. I mean, if you take the evidence of the first witness I interviewed, Mrs Grace, you were standing by the tent, and Julia was standing by the bridge with your sister. Now Julia made no mention of this fact either in her original statements or in what she said to me, so either she is lying about where she was really standing, or the shock of what happened has made her forget the fact. Also, her original claim that you were all together at the time for some sort of meal is not corroborated by anyone.”

  “You're right, and I'm surprised that fact wasn't picked up when the accident was first investigated.”

  “None of the people we have talked to came forward at the time, so the point was never mentioned, and I don't suppose it crossed anyone's mind on that awful night to see what was lying around at the camp-site. After all, what is more natural than people under canvas having a bit of a cook up? I mean, why would anyone have any suspicions about anything? There was a dreadful storm, you were critically injured by what was obviously a lightning strike which destroyed your tent, Julia was unquestionably in shock, and when your sister's body was eventually recovered there was absolutely nothing to suggest that it was anything other than a ghastly accident. The last thing anyone would be thinking of is whether there were the remains of a fire or a meal in evidence.”

  “I guess you're right.”

  “More importantly, there is no mention of this man on the footbridge, but I think it is fairly safe to assume that it was someone known to Julia, and when you consider the testimony of DeVere it seems fairly obvious that she kept a rendezvous with this unknown man that evening once she thought the coast was clear. Not only that, one or the other of you obviously had suspicions about Julia, and went out, most likely with the intention of spying on her. I think that either you or your sister then saw what she was up to, and came back to tell the other. Shortly after that, on the face of it, it seems that Dian went out to confront Julia on her return. My guess is that Julia got a bit heated when she rumbled that she had been spied on, and may well have given way to anger and given your sister a shove, and that would have pushed her into the river.”

  “But I keep telling you, Dian was a strong swimmer, and as I recall, the water isn't very deep close to the bank, she would have climbed out again easily.”

  “You are overlooking two things.”

  “I am?”

  “Firstly, you are ignoring the evidence of the witnesses concerning the man seen crossing the bridge, and being present after the lightning strike, He must have seen what happened, and if, as we surmise, Julia pushed your sister into the water, and she was swept away, maybe it was him that counselled her to keep quiet about matters?”

  “It still makes no sense, as I keep telling you; Dian was a good swimmer, even if as you say she got swept downstream a bit she would have got out somewhere, and I can't somehow see her ever agreeing to keep quiet about matters after getting a soaking.”

  “But she didn't get out, did she?” I said pointedly.

  “I know, and that's the bit I can't understand.”

  “Well, maybe I can help you there.”

  “How?”

  “Because secondly,” I continued in a more meaningful voice. “I don't believe it was Dian that went in.”

  She looked at me like I'd just slapped her in the face. “What are you babbling on about,” she exclaimed hotly, “of course she went in; she was drowned for God's sake!”

  “I'm sorry; I really don't think Dian ever went into the water.”

  “Neil, if this is some sort of joke-”

  “It was Danny that was drowned.” I said quietly.

  There was quite a long silence, and I was aware of her tight lipped scrutiny in the narrow confines of the car.

  “Just think about it for a moment,” I urged. “Dian is the outgoing twin. Dian is the one that would be most likely to give in to curiosity to find out what Julia was up to. Dian is the one who made all the running when you were kids, right?”

  “So?”

  “And as you keep reminding me, Dian was a strong swimmer, and no matter how many times she was pushed into that river, she would have soon pulled herself out on one bank or another. Danny, on the other hand, couldn't swim a stroke, and would quite likely drown.”

  “That still doesn't prove anything!”

  “But maybe this does! When I first met you after you had parked just off the ford, in getting out
of the car you got swept away briefly when you lost your footing, yet with a few natural strokes you had recovered. Unless you have learned to swim since the accident, that is something not easy to explain. At the age of fourteen you were seriously injured and suffered more or less total amnesia, that means that for all you or anyone else knew, you could have been either twin. Luckily you were 'identified' by the ring; Danny had a 'thing' about jewellery and wore it even after being told not to bring it to the camp. That was how Julia identified you after the accident, remember? I think it is highly likely that when the two of you conferred just prior to the storm breaking, the ring changed hands! I think that for reasons I can only guess at for the moment, Dian was hell-bent on confusing Julia, and probably put it to her sister that it was a good chance to play a joke on her. As I understand it, the pair of you often resorted to the fact that people couldn't tell you apart to pull stunts like this. If Dian did not relay the full circumstances of what she had seen to Danny it would add spice to the joke as far as Dian was concerned, because there would be two highly confused people to laugh at instead of one. I'd lay even money that is why the pair of you decided to swap the ring over; to confuse Julia, and for Dian to have the laugh on the pair of you!”