positive Jean’s seeing him again,’ Dorothy averred with conviction, ‘though she swears she isn’t. She’s going out more in the evenings, all dolled up. She says it’s with girlfriends, but I’ll lay good money it’s not.’
‘Does Mrs Dalton know she’s seeing Shaun?’ Kelsey asked.
She shook her head. ‘I haven’t said anything yet, I don’t want to worry her. But I may have to say something if it goes on, she’s got a right to know.’
Kelsey changed the subject. ‘How’s your friend Alice?’ he asked with a smile. Once, in his early days at Elmhurst, when Dorothy was a young woman, he’d been sent up to her room with a message and he’d noticed Alice’s photograph, prominently displayed. ‘That’s my friend, Alice Upjohn,’ Dorothy had informed him in a tone of possessive affection. She had shown him other photographs, she had told him about her friendship with Alice, going right back to infancy. From time to time after that he would inquire after Alice and Dorothy would reply with a fond smile, giving him the latest tit-bit of information, showing him the latest snapshots.
Today, however, Dorothy gave him no answering smile, supplied no tit-bit of news but merely replied: ‘She’s very well, thank you,’ and left it at that.
Not content with his supermarket foray, Chief Inspector Kelsey spent part of Saturday afternoon shopping for more personal items in a department store in the centre of Cannonbridge. He left the store just before five-thirty, bound for the car park.
As he made his way along the crowded pavement, a bus pulled up a little way ahead. He saw Jean Redfern jump off the bus into the arms of a young man waiting at the stop. The Chief was briefly halted by the press of folk. The pair turned his way and came past him, arms round each other’s waists, laughing, chatting; they didn’t see him.
Jean looked flushed and pretty. The young man was tall and loose-limbed, undeniably good-looking. Three years older than when the Chief had last set eyes on him, but there could be no mistaking his identity: Shaun Chapman.
On Monday evening, as time drew near for her phone call to Alice, Dorothy Nevett kept a watchful eye on the clock. She didn’t want to use the phone in the front hall, which was far from private, so at 7.40, with Mrs Dalton nicely settled after supper and Jean Redfern absorbed in her TV soap opera, she went silently up the back stairs to the room Jean used as an office, next door to her bedroom. She was careful to close the door properly behind her – she had said nothing to Jean about using the office.
The instant her watch showed 7.45, she tapped out Alice’s number. The receiver at the other end was snatched up at the first ring.
‘Dorothy?’ Alice’s voice was brittle with tension.
‘It’s all right,’ Dorothy swiftly reassured her. ‘You can tell the solicitor the answer’s yes. We’re definitely buying the cottage.’
When Chief Inspector Kelsey had been back at work a week, he managed to arrange himself a few hours off on the Tuesday morning. The weather was spring-like as he turned his car in through the tall wrought iron gates of Elmhurst. The grassy banks bordering the drive were thickly clustered with daffodils, starred with primroses.
He had taken time and care to select a suitable birthday card and gifts, deciding at last in favour of a decorative basket of fruit and a box of Grace’s favourite Elvas plums.
As he pulled up by the house, he saw Gosling walking along a path with his father-in-law; they waved a greeting. The old man was leaning on a stick but he looked hale enough, with a bright eye and a fresh complexion. Kelsey went across to speak to them, promising to call in at the cottage after his visit to Mrs Dalton.
He was admitted to the house by Mrs Gosling. Kelsey had always liked her. When he first walked in through the Elmhurst gates she had been a young girl, working in the house. She had always been kind and friendly, had often slipped him some little treat from the kitchen. He stood chatting to her now for a minute or two before she took him along to Mrs Dalton’s room.
Grace was pleased to see him. She had been working on a piece of embroidery but put it aside as he came in. She lay on the sofa, propped up against cushions. She looked handsome and elegant in the ruby-coloured velvet housecoat Nina and Matthew had given her for Christmas.
She received the Chief’s congratulations and good wishes, his card and gifts with expressions of pleasure. ‘It’s lovely to see old friends,’ she said with a warm smile. ‘We’ve known each other a good many years now.’ She looked back for a moment at the old days, when the Chief was a bare-kneed lad weeding beds and borders for his shilling, picking up windfalls in the orchard. Bernard Dalton’s first wife had still been alive in those days, still mistress of Elmhurst. Grace had been Bernard’s personal assistant, she was often at the house. The two women had been the same age, they had always been on good terms.
‘Not many old friends left now,’ Grace added with a tiny sigh. Over the last few years the old vicar had retired and gone elsewhere to live. There was no vicar now in the parish which had been amalgamated with others, currently in the care of a very much younger man, a very different kind of cleric from his predecessor. ‘I fear I don’t see eye to eye with him on many aspects of the church,’ Grace said with a regretful shake of her head. What with that and her poor state of health, she no longer attended services.
She still missed the old solicitor who had died three years ago but she was getting used to his son. She had been delighted to see Dr Wheatley again. ‘Not that I’ve anything against Dr Surridge,’ she was quick to add. ‘I have a lot of faith in him.’ She looked up at Kelsey. ‘It’s a hard lesson to learn, but you have to accept change, you can’t be continually harking back.’ She smiled slightly. ‘You can’t afford sadness as you get older, it’s a debilitating emotion.’
She rang through to the kitchen for coffee and Jean Redfern brought it along without delay. She looked as quiet and self-effacing as the Chief had always known her at Elmhurst – not at all the lively, smiling girl he had seen ten days ago, jumping off the bus into Shaun Chapman’s arms. He exchanged a few words with her; she replied in her usual demure fashion.
When she had gone and they sat drinking their coffee – decaffeinated for Grace – the Chief asked if Barry and Verity were expected at the birthday celebrations. Yes, they were, Grace was happy to tell him. They would be coming a little ahead of the others, the arrivals were being spaced as far as was practical, to avoid undue excitement for the invalid.
‘They’re both doing well at their studies,’ Grace commented. ‘Verity’s in a little flat of her own now, she seems happy there.’ When Verity had first decided to take a course at the college, it was Esther Milroy – at Grace’s request – who had arranged for Verity to share a flat with two older girls, also students at the college – sensible girls, known to Esther; both came from families active in the church Esther attended. They could be relied on to keep an eye on Verity. ‘But she’s got to the stage when she wants to be more independent,’ Grace observed. ‘I have to be pleased at that, when I remember what she was like when she first came here, so nervy and withdrawn.’
She glanced at the array of family photographs on a nearby side table. Among them was the face of her schoolmaster father who had been in his last years a senior history master when Kelsey attended the Cannonbridge Grammar School. The Chief remembered him with respect and affection; a scholarly man, dedicated to his subject, his profession. On the mantelshelf stood a handsome clock presented to him on his retirement; Kelsey had been among those who had subscribed to it. Some years later he had been among the former pupils who had attended his funeral.
On either side of the
