A Fatal Secret

He frowned slightly, wondering if he was doing the right thing in coming here. But damn it, he couldn’t just—

‘Dr Ryder can see you now.’ The secretary was back, holding open the door to the inner sanctum.

He nodded at her and strode in.

The first thing he noticed was the welcome fire, roaring away in the fireplace, and a rather fine landscape painting hanging on one wall. The man, who rose from behind a large and rather fine desk to greet him, seemed vaguely familiar.

Although it had been his land agent who’d testified at the inquest as to the condition of the Hall’s grounds – including that damned old well – Martin realised now that he’d seen the coroner around somewhere before. In a social setting.

At the golf club maybe? Or at the lodge? As he shook hands, he gave the Mason’s greeting, and was not surprised to have it reciprocated.

‘Thank you for seeing me,’ he said gruffly. ‘It’s a sad business I’ve come about, but then, I expect in your line of work, you’re used to that,’ he began pleasantly.

Clement inclined his head. ‘I’m afraid so. Please, take a seat.’ He indicated one of the padded chintz chairs that faced his desk, curious as to what could have brought the owner of Briar’s Hall to his office.

If he wanted to have any guilty feelings assuaged about the safety – or not – of the old wells on his premises, he was going to be out of luck. Clement was in no mood to play nanny to the landed gentry.

‘It’s about that poor boy, of course. Eddie.’

‘Yes?’ Clement said, discouragingly.

Martin de Lacey took a long, slow breath. He hadn’t mistaken that lack of empathy in the older man’s tone, and he knew he’d have to tread carefully now.

‘I’m not here to talk about the rights and wrongs of that well not being covered properly.’ He decided to take the bull by the horns. He’d always been pretty good at reading other people, and he sensed in the court official a man who wouldn’t suffer fools gladly. ‘We were at fault, and that’s that.’ He could see he’d slightly surprised Ryder with his blunt acceptance of responsibility, and felt a brief moment of pleasure. Martin was a man who liked to have the upper hand.

Feeling more intrigued, Clement settled back in his chair. Clearly his surprise visitor had something specific to say, and he rather thought it might prove more interesting than he’d at first thought.

‘So I’m not here to make excuses. I just wanted to get that clear.’ Martin de Lacey cleared his throat gruffly. ‘I’m here, in fact, not on my own behalf at all, but because of Vince. Vincent Proctor, that is, the boy’s father.’

‘Oh?’ Clement said, careful to keep his voice noncommittal. He recalled that the dead boy’s father worked as a farm hand on the de Lacey estate. But he wouldn’t have thought that that would put the two men on intimate terms – certainly not on the sort of terms that would allow Mr Proctor to think that he could ask favours of the lord of the manor. In the normal course of things, Vincent Proctor probably took his orders from the de Laceys’ farm estate manager anyway.

Except, of course, his son had just died, and in most people’s eyes, the head of the de Lacey family had to bear some responsibility for that. And that, of course, was enough to change the natural order of things somewhat.

‘Yes.’ The squire of Briar’s-in-the-Wold shifted a little uncomfortably on his seat. ‘You see, he came to see me yesterday and asked me to… well… to do something about his boy’s death.’

He now sounded as uncomfortable as he looked, and Clement raised one eyebrow in surprise. ‘Exactly what does he expect you to do about it? If he wants compensation, I’m afraid I can’t advise you…’

‘No, no, it’s nothing like that,’ Martin said, a shade testily now. ‘In point of fact, he doesn’t hold us responsible for his son’s death at all. And by us, I mean either my family, or the school teachers and WI members who organised the Easter egg hunt.’

Clement blinked, regarding his visitor intently. Martin de Lacey was becoming more and more interesting by the minute. ‘You mean, he accepts the fact that his son disobeyed the rules by straying outside the limits of the kitchen garden? That he was just doing what little boys did all the time – namely get into all sorts of trouble – when he tried to climb down or fell into that well?’

‘Yes. No. I mean…’ Martin took a deep breath. ‘The fact is, neither Vincent Proctor nor his wife believe that their son’s death could have been an accident.’

Clement slowly leaned forward in his chair and thought for a few moments. In the silence, the old clock on the wall ticked ponderously. ‘But if it wasn’t an accident, that only leaves murder – or manslaughter,’ the coroner pointed out.

‘Yes. And I know what you’re thinking,’ Martin de Lacey said heavily. ‘It’s the first thing I thought too, when he first came to me. I mean, if it is murder we’re talking about, who would want to deliberately kill a child?’

Clement blinked thoughtfully as the ugly question hung grimly in the air. There had been no signs of sexual violence on Eddie Proctor’s body – which was often the sad, disgusting cause behind the deliberate killing of most children.

The other most frequent cause of child death, as Clement and every police officer knew too well, was domestic abuse. But again, that tended to follow a certain pattern, and there had been no old injuries on Eddie’s body flagged up at the post mortem to raise the alarm. No broken bones that had been mended over the years. No faded scars, or more recent bruises.

After a few moments, Clement sighed. ‘Of course, it’s not unusual for parents to be unable to accept an accident or death due to misadventure,’ he said at last. ‘It all seems so arbitrary and unfair – they need to believe something more malign is at work. It makes more sense for them if they have somebody to blame.’

Martin de Lacey nodded. He would have to be even more careful now. It wouldn’t do to make a mistake at this point in time. ‘Yes. It was my first thought too,’ he agreed flatly.

Clement watched him carefully. He knew when someone was trying to manipulate him, and he was beginning to sense some other agenda was at work here. But that intrigued as much as it annoyed him.

‘Oh? And what was your second thought?’ he asked gently.

Martin looked at him, then quickly away again. Once more he shifted uncomfortably in his seat. ‘Look, I wish you’d come and talk to Vince yourself. And I might as well come clean straightaway. Er… I’ve rather taken it on myself to have a word with our Chief Constable.’

Clement went rather still. ‘Have you?’ he said mildly.

Martin de Lacey flushed slightly. ‘Yes. Look, I’m sorry and all that, but one of the chaps at the golf club told me that you… er… well, sometimes look into cases, police cases, I mean, after they’d been closed.’

Clement smiled grimly. ‘I’ve been known to meddle once or twice, yes,’ he admitted with a slight smile. He could well imagine the horror stories the Chief Constable could have poured into de Lacey’s ear.

As if reading his mind, the squire of Briar’s-in-the-Wold shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

‘Quite. Yes, so I… well, I took the liberty of asking Sir Penfold if he would mind arranging it with the officer in charge of Eddie’s case to, er, let you look into things a little further.’

‘Is that so?’ Suddenly, Clement’s smile grew wider, because he knew that DI Harry Jennings was officially in charge of the Proctor case. And the thought of his reaction on being informed that once again he would have to put up with Dr Ryder’s interference was too precious not to savour.

‘All right, Mr de Lacey. I’ll talk to the boy’s parents, and if I think the case warrants further investigation, I’ll be happy to oblige you,’ Clement said, suddenly tiring of the game. One or two points raised at the inquest had been bothering him, and he wasn’t at all averse to being given the opportunity to satisfy his curiosity.

Furthermore, it had been some time since he and Trudy had worked on a case together, and he was looking forward to another break from his usual caseload.

Martin de Lacey looked relieved and then, rather curiously, began to look uncertain. Finally he merely shrugged and smiled, stood up and shook the coroner’s hand. ‘Thank you, Dr Ryder.’

‘Not at all,’ the coroner said briskly, rising to see his visitor out.

He walked back to his desk, feeling distinctly rejuvenated. Just what the hell was going on? It was unusual for an influential family like the wealthy de Laceys not to simply sweep unpleasantness under the carpet and forget all about it. Was it possible the dead boy’s father had some sort of hold over the family that went beyond their feelings of guilt over an abandoned well? The thought was definitely an intriguing one.

Clement gave a mental shrug. Well, whatever it was, he and Trudy Loveday were going to have an interesting time finding out. For, of course, the first thing he’d demand of DI Harry Jennings was that he release her from her usual duties in order to assist him.

Chapter 6

Trudy’s heart lifted as she knocked on the door and then entered the now familiar outer room of the coroner’s office, where his secretary smiled up at her and quickly announced her expected arrival.

Needless to say, it had made her day when her sour-faced superior had called her into his office earlier that day and told her that she was being seconded, yet again, to Dr Clement Ryder for a few days. DI Jennings had stressed the ‘yet again’ with bitter emphasis, but in truth, he hadn’t seemed all that unwilling to let her go. In fact, Trudy rather suspected that he was glad to have her out from under his feet.

Trudy, however, wasn’t giving her grudging boss much thought as she walked forward and took her usual seat in front of the coroner’s desk. She was simply relieved not to have to continue her current task, which was helping the clerk in the records office.

Not that DI Jennings had said much about her latest assignment, only grunting something about it involving the death of the little boy she’d found down the well.

‘So,’ she said as soon as she’d sat down, ‘you really think there’s something odd about little Eddie Proctor’s death? Did something strike you at the inquest?’

‘Yes and no,’ Clement surprised her by saying crisply. ‘As far as I could tell, all the witnesses called were being honest and truthful – which is not always the same thing, oddly enough – and I have no real or solid reasons as yet to suspect that the verdict was incorrect.’

‘Oh,’ Trudy said, both stumped and a little dismayed. ‘So why am I here then?’

Clement relented slightly and smiled. ‘You’re here mainly because of Martin de Lacey, head of the family up at Briar’s Hall.’ He absently reached into his coat pocket, withdrew a roll of mints and popped one into his mouth. ‘He came to see me. Apparently, he’s not satisfied with the way things stand.’

Trudy blinked, thought about it for a moment or two, then frowned. ‘He’s feeling guilty about the well not being covered properly and he wants reassurance?’ she hazarded. She could understand why that might be so, but she felt rather put out that that was all there was to it.

‘You look like a child after someone’s just burst their balloon,’ Clement commiserated. ‘But for what it’s worth, I think there might – just might – be something more going on here than at first meets the eye.’

‘Oh?’ This time her tone was more hopeful.

‘Yes. Anyway, he went over my head and got the Chief Constable roped in before I knew anything about it. But since, for a change, this time I’ve actually been asked to do a little digging’ – his lips twisted in a wry smile – ‘I thought you might like to help. But if you’d rather get back to the station…?’

Trudy grinned unrepentantly at him. ‘You know I wouldn’t,’ she said crisply. In truth, she was just glad to see him in such high spirits and looking so undeniably well.

She had not told him about the existence of the letter claiming that he was ill, let alone that she’d read it and destroyed it. Instinct told her that he’d be both angry and indignant about its contents, but more than that, he wouldn’t be at all pleased to learn that she’d put her career at risk in order to do him a favour.

Dr Clement Ryder, she was beginning to know, would not take kindly to being in someone’s debt.

‘So where do we start?’ she asked. Forcing herself to concentrate solely on the matter in hand, she gave a slight frown. ‘The most obvious place is with Mr de Lacey, I take it? Presumably, he must have had something to go on, if he thinks there’s more that needs to be investigated?’

But Clement thought about that gentleman – and his very careful way with words, and, after some thought, slowly shook his head. ‘No. No, I think we’ll leave him for a bit. I have a feeling there might be something odd there…’ He paused, tried to put into words the cause of his nebulous misgivings about that gentlemen, and failed. Instead, he shrugged in dissatisfaction. ‘I just got the impression that he’s keeping something back, or that he’s got some sort of agenda of his own,’ he finally said. ‘And if that’s so, then at the moment we won’t stand a chance of worming out of him just what it is. No, I want to get a deeper understanding of things before we tackle him again.’

Trudy, recognising the coroner’s tone of voice, sat up a little straighter in her chair. Clearly, Dr Ryder meant business. And slowly her heart rate began to accelerate again. Perhaps this wasn’t going to be such a dead-end case after all? From very unpromising beginnings, was it possible that they might be on to something again after all?

‘All right, sir,’ she said. ‘Where do we begin?’

Clement smiled. ‘I keep telling you, you can call me Clement you know, when we’re not in public,’ he said, clearly amused by her formality.

‘Oh no, sir, I couldn’t do that,’ Trudy said firmly. Even if, sometimes in her own head, she did indeed think of this man as ‘Clement’, it would never do to forget herself and refer to him as such in front of her colleagues. Or even her parents! She’d never hear the end of it. ‘I don’t mind calling you Dr Ryder,’ she conceded generously.

‘Thank you,’ he said, perfectly straight-faced. ‘Well, I think the first place we need to start is with the parents. Martin de Lacey would have me believe that he came on their behalf. If that’s true, we need to find out why the boy’s father in particular is so convinced that the boy’s death couldn’t have been an accident.’

Trudy nodded grimly, rising from the chair and girding her loins for another heart-breaking encounter with the Proctor family.

Chapter 7

Doreen and Vincent Proctor, along with their remaining three children, lived in one of a row of small terraced cottages leading off from the village green, where the majority of farmworkers for the estate were housed.

As they climbed out of the car and looked around at the rich, arable land, Clement supposed that almost all inhabitants of Briar’s-in-the-Wold worked on the de Lacey estate in some form or other. Save for the odd private doctor or professional, of course.

The village boasted the usual square-towered Norman church, a small primary school and a pub called ‘The Bell’. A small puddle, probably fondly thought of as a pond by most of the villagers, played host to a few desultory mallards, but it was at least ringed with cheerful just-in-bloom daffodils. Pussy willow shed pale lemon pollen over them as an accent of colour.

A cold wind had the pair of them quickly hurrying up a neatly tended front garden and knocking at the Proctors’ front door.

‘Eddie’s brothers and sister might be back at school by now,’ Trudy warned, not sure how long the Easter holidays lasted. ‘If they are, do you want me to try and talk to them at some point?’

‘We’ll see,’ Clement said. ‘Children sometimes know more than we think they do – but they can also exaggerate, or just make stuff up to try and please you. Besides, it might be a bit too early to talk about their brother just yet. They’re probably still in shock.’

Trudy bit her lip, angry with herself for not thinking of that, then stiffened as the door was abruptly opened by the man of the house.

Vincent Proctor was a squat, powerful-looking man, with the hands of a farm labourer, a mop of unruly brown hair, and shaggy brows over large, cow-like eyes.

‘You were the coroner for our Eddie,’ he said at once, having recognised Clement from giving evidence at the inquest. ‘Mr de Lacey said you might call. Come on in out the wind. There’s a good fire in the kitchen.’

He led them down a small, dark entranceway to the back of the house, where a large, wood-fired stove gave off some welcome heat.

There was no sign of his wife. Evidence of the remains of a breakfast composed of bread and dripping were still out next to the draining board by the sink, however, and Trudy wondered if it had been the father of the children who’d seen them off to school with something inside their tummies.

‘The wife’s upstairs,’ Vincent Proctor said flatly, as if reading her mind, and Trudy, for some reason, felt herself flush. She had not intended to look in any way disapproving.

‘I’m sure she needs to rest,’ she said earnestly.

Vincent nodded, saying nothing as he set about putting the kettle on, but silently indicated the wooden, ladder-back chairs that surrounded the well-scrubbed kitchen table. Taking his wordless invitation to be seated, Clement and Trudy took opposite ends of the table and sat quietly as Vincent put a sugar bowl and a bottle of milk on the table, and then, a short while later, three steaming mugs of tea.

‘So, I understand you asked Mr de Lacey to come and see me?’ Clement began cautiously.

‘Yerse. I dunno how to go about these things myself, y’see,’ Vincent confirmed, staring down at his hands, which were wrapped around the mug of his untouched tea. His Oxonian country burr testified to the fact that he’d probably been born in the village and would be happy enough to die in it too. Probably his father before him had worked for the de Laceys, and no doubt he expected his sons to do the same. ‘But I knew Mr de Lacey would be able to get things done. Him bein’ squire, an’ all.’

Clement nodded. ‘Mr de Lacey wasn’t able to tell me much about what, exactly, you want us to do,’ he began tactfully. ‘He suggested I talk to you in person about what’s on your mind.’

Vincent nodded, but didn’t immediately speak. When he did, he was slow and deliberate, but sounded already weary, as if he didn’t expect them to take him seriously.

‘It’s like this, see. There was just no way our Eddie could’a fallen down that well, like you all reckon he did. O’course, you’d have to know him, like, real well, the same as me and his mother do, to understand that. And I know that important people like you’ – here he shot a look at both Clement and Trudy – ‘ain’t likely to just take my word for it. But…’

He shrugged helplessly. He looked so out of his depth, that Trudy felt her heart constrict. She couldn’t help it, but reached out to place her hand comfortingly on his.

‘Mr Proctor,’ she said gently, ‘I promise you that both Dr Ryder and I will listen to you. And we will do our very best to understand.’

He nodded, but the poor man looked so defeated already, and clearly didn’t believe her, that it made her heart ache. She looked quickly across at Dr Ryder, who gave her an infinitesimal nod to carry on. Almost imperceptibly, he leaned back in his chair, the better to watch and listen as the dead boy’s father began to speak.

‘See, for a start, our Eddie wasn’t really the daredevil sort,’ the boy’s father began. ‘Now if it had been our Bertie… now him I could just see taking a tumble down a well. T’would be just the sort’a daft thing he’d go and do. Right from the moment he was born – he’s our eldest, y’see – he was into trouble. No sense o’ danger, see? But Eddie weren’t like that. He wasn’t a namby-pamby lad, don’t get me wrong,’ he said earnestly, looking at Trudy as if it was important that she should understand that he was in no way criticising his dead son. ‘He were a proper lad, like. But… If, say, a tree had fallen down over the river, and he was gonna cross it, he would take time first to make sure it was a good strong tree. With lots of good footholds where he could stand without losing his balance, and good strong branches that spread all the way across to the other side. He wouldn’t just go at it all ’ell for leather, and then laugh if he was ditched into the water. See what I mean?’

‘Yes.’ Trudy smiled. ‘I see. Whereas his elder brother would have done just that.’

‘Oh, ar. But it’s not just that. Our Eddie wasn’t any too fond of heights, neither. He reckoned he went all dizzy, like, if he got too far off the ground.’

‘Some children do,’ Clement slipped in helpfully. ‘It’s called vertigo. It’s usually a problem with the inner ear, and nothing to be ashamed of.’

At this, as Clement had rather thought he might, Vincent looked rather relieved. It provided him with further proof that his lad wasn’t a namby-pamby.

‘Ar… A medical thing then… well, that’s different. Yerse. Poor little… But, see, that’s just another reason why I know he wouldn’t’a gone down that well then, ain’t it?’ he demanded challengingly. ‘Just looking down that far would have made him feel sick like. And another thing…’

He paused to take a sip of tea. ‘Eddie weren’t all that fond of chocolate. Oh, he’d eat it, but he’d prefer to have humbugs, or bulls eyes, or sherbet dabs. He was more of a sweetie kind of lad.’

He looked anxiously at Trudy, to see if she understood what he was saying.

To oblige him, she nodded quickly. ‘So you’re saying that the inducement to find chocolate eggs wouldn’t have been anywhere near strong enough to make him take chances?’ Trudy said.

The boy’s father frowned a little, clearly not sure what ‘inducement’ meant, but relieved to see that she was looking thoughtful. He glanced back at the coroner. Clearly for him, Dr Ryder meant authority and book-learning, and he was the man he needed to convince.

‘And that ain’t all,’ he carried on stubbornly. ‘Young Eddie was really pally with little Emily. Thick as thieves, those two.’

‘Emily?’ Trudy pressed, suddenly not following the conversation at all.

‘Emily de Lacey. The squire’s little ’un,’ Vincent elaborated. ‘Ten years old, and going on sixteen, that ’un. Smart as a whip, she is.’

Trudy blinked. ‘Really? The squire’s daughter and your son were friends?’ She glanced curiously at the coroner, who gave her a quick shake of his head, guessing at once the reason behind her scepticism. No doubt she thought it odd that a mere farmworker’s son and the little lady of the manor should be such bosom pals, but he knew, from his own childhood experiences, that in small villages, that sort of odd mix wasn’t at all unusual. Children from good, bad and indifferent families tended to live cheek by jowl up to the age of 11 or so, sharing the local primary school and all the village’s meagre social events.

Of course, it was tacitly understood by all concerned that it wouldn’t last into adulthood, and was thus not taken seriously. After the age of 11, they tended to sort themselves out into more familiar roles. No doubt, Emily de Lacey would soon be of age to attend a good girl’s grammar – or maybe even boarding school – and would grow up into a proper young lady. Whilst Eddie, had he lived, would have left the nearest secondary school at 14 or so and gone on to work on the land.

Thereafter, if they’d met, they’d probably have nodded and smiled and not given each other a single thought. But at 10 and 11, yes, they could have been very close indeed.

‘Is she a nice girl, Emily?’ Clement asked mildly.

‘Oh yerse,’ Vincent said at once, smiling for the first time Trudy had known him. ‘She and Eddie ran around the estate like little animals,’ he mused. ‘Playing cowboys and injuns, and whatnot. I think their latest thing was playing at spies and such stuff. They had a theory that one of the schoolmasters was a German agent, or some such. Emily had been reading that Thirty-Nine Steps book to him, and Eddie was all caught up in it…’ He trailed off with a gulp perhaps realising that, now, his son would never play at spies again.