Till Sudden Death Do Us Part Read online

  Robert came into the parlour, carrying a silver tray with the best china tea service. I got the feeling it didn’t get used much, these days. There was an assortment of traditional biscuits on a plate, and I grabbed a bourbon before they all disappeared. Penny came in after Robert, and nodded quietly to me that everything was quiet and secure. We all sat down, and Robert poured the tea. He took his time doing it, but his hands were perfectly steady. It was good strong tea. For a while, no one said anything.

  ‘There was a time I could have protected my own daughter,’ Robert said finally, not looking at anyone. ‘When I was in my prime I could have taken on any threat, human or not. You remember, Ishmael.’

  ‘I remember,’ I said.

  ‘I hate being old,’ said Robert. ‘Age takes so much away from you.’ He looked at me. ‘Do you at least feel old, sometimes?’

  ‘Sometimes,’ I said, to keep the peace.

  David looked at both of us. He could tell he was missing something, but he could also tell we weren’t going to talk about it. He shrugged, and gave his full attention to a custard cream.

  And then we all sat up straight and looked around as we heard footsteps approaching, heading up the lane towards the house. We all rose quickly to our feet, putting aside teacups and half-finished biscuits. The footsteps stopped. We all stood very still. There was a knock at the front door.

  ‘Don’t answer it!’ said David.

  ‘We have to,’ said Robert. ‘We need to know who it is.’

  ‘Everyone stay put,’ I said. ‘I’ll go.’

  I went out into the hall, and Robert was right behind me. I knew there was no point in telling him to go back. I turned on the hall light and went to the front door. I glanced back, and saw Robert had taken up a position at the foot of the stairs. Blocking the way with his body, so anything that wanted to get to Gillian would have to go through him first. Age might have taken his strength, but it hadn’t touched his courage. I turned back to the front door, slammed back the bolt, unlocked the door and opened it.

  It was Inspector Godwin.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ I said.

  ‘Relax,’ he said. ‘Nothing’s happened.’ He glanced past me at Robert, standing watching, and moved in a little closer. ‘I need to talk to you, Mr Jones. Outside.’

  I gestured for him to fall back, and then stepped out into the night. I left the door standing open just a little, to give us some light. I glanced down the lane, to make sure Godwin was on his own. The lane was dark and empty, and the night was very quiet.

  ‘What is it, Inspector?’

  ‘I have something for you.’ He pulled a folder from under his arm. ‘I walked all the way out here from town, to give you this. It contains every bit of background information I was able to pull up from the police computers, on everyone connected to the family or the wedding …’

  ‘How did you know I was here?’ I said, as I accepted the folder from him.

  ‘Please, I am a detective. You weren’t at The Swan, my first choice, so where else could you be? And, I saw Cathy’s taxi coming out of this lane. Which doesn’t lead anywhere, except to Mr Bergin’s house …’ He scowled at the folder I was holding. ‘I still can’t believe there’s anything in there that could have got Linda killed, but I wanted you to see it. Maybe you can spot something, some connection that I missed …’

  ‘Have you been to see Linda?’

  ‘Of course. I couldn’t move her, for fear of compromising any evidence. But I have sealed the church door with new crime scene tape. I knew she’d get into trouble some day, chasing after a story too big for her. She always did have more ambition than sense. But … You saw how she was killed. Horrible. People around here say the curse is cruel, and I’m starting to think they’re right …’

  ‘Any sign of Ian?’

  ‘Not so far,’ said Godwin. ‘But there’s only me to look. And I’ve been on my feet all day …’

  His voice kept fading out, as though he kept running out of strength.

  ‘You should take a break,’ I said.

  ‘How can I? With that vicious bastard still running around loose? I’m all there is, to stand between the town and a killer.’

  ‘With luck, this should all be over by morning,’ I said. ‘Are you starting to believe in the curse?’

  ‘No. The evil that men do is quite enough for me. Nettie said you all left together. You’re hiding out here till the wedding night is over, right? Would you like me to stick around too?’

  ‘Thanks, but no,’ I said steadily. ‘There are enough people here to keep track of as it is.’ And, I don’t want you to see what I might have to do to stop the killer; if it should turn out to be more than human. ‘I’ll talk to you again tomorrow.’

  Godwin nodded reluctantly, searched for something else to say and couldn’t think of anything. He turned abruptly and strode off down the lane. I watched the light from his torch go bobbing off into the night as he headed for town, just to make sure he was leaving, and then I went back inside the house.

  I locked and bolted the front door. Robert came forward to join me.

  ‘What did Peter want?’

  ‘He had a file he wanted me to take a look at,’ I said.

  ‘Why didn’t he come in?’

  ‘He had his reasons. Let’s get back to the parlour.’

  We went back in, and after I’d explained the reason for Godwin’s visit, we all sat down again and settled ourselves. Robert took over his own chair, while Penny and I sat on the sofa, with David perched on the end. Everyone looked curiously at the file I was holding.

  ‘Pity that Peter wouldn’t join us,’ said Robert. ‘We could have used a bruiser like him. You could always rely on Peter to get stuck into anyone who gave Gillian a hard time. One of the few good things about him, when he was at school.’

  ‘The only people I trust are right here in the house,’ I said. ‘Why complicate things?’

  The others went back to their tea and biscuits, with the air of hospital visitors resigned to a long wait. I leafed quickly through the pages in the folder. No real surprises, no big crimes. Just minor convictions and a few past sins.

  Robert had several parking offences, and a few speeding tickets, dating back to when he was still driving. Tom and David had several drunk and disorderlies, dating back to their days as students. Gillian had a few run-ins with the police, from going on marches and demonstrations as a teenager in London, with a previous boyfriend. Security had opened a file on her, but all the marching stopped when she broke up with the boyfriend. Cathy had been arrested for assault, after beating up a man in the town centre one night; but the victim dropped all charges before it got to court. There was a handwritten note, presumably from Godwin: he deserved it.

  The rest was just gossip. Various suggestions as to who Robert really worked for before he retired, all of them reassuringly wide of the mark. A report claiming that Tom had once slipped a laxative into another actor’s drink to sabotage his audition, so Tom could get a part he really wanted. David was supposed to have threatened one of Tom’s ex-girlfriends to make her go away, because he thought she was a bad influence. And a suggestion he might have done that with other girls he didn’t approve of. A report that Gillian had once thrown a drink in the face of a politician who propositioned her in the main House of Commons bar.

  I closed the file. Godwin was right; none of this was worth killing over. So what had Linda worked out, what had she thought was so important, that the killer couldn’t allow her to talk to me?

  David suddenly jumped to his feet and looked about him. ‘Did you hear that?’

  I threw aside the file and rose to my feet, listening hard. Penny got up to stand beside me, while Robert struggled out of his chair. We all stood very still.

  ‘What did you hear?’ I said.

  ‘It was something outside the house.’ David was so tense he was actually shaking. ‘It sounded like someone moving around.’

  Penny looked at me, and I
shook my head. I couldn’t hear anything.

  ‘Could it be the inspector, come back for something?’ said Penny.

  ‘He didn’t have any reason to come back,’ I said.

  ‘Could it be Ian?’ said Penny.

  ‘What would he be doing here?’ said Robert.

  ‘Turn out the light, Penny,’ I said.

  She hurried over to the door, hit the switch, and the room plunged into darkness. I moved over to the window, pushed back the curtains and looked out. I couldn’t see far into the dark, but the lane outside the house was definitely empty. The others crowded in behind me.

  ‘Can’t see a damned thing,’ said Robert.

  ‘I’m not hearing anything,’ I said.

  ‘Maybe they’ve stopped moving,’ said David. ‘They must know we heard something, because we turned off the light to look. Hold it!’ He turned away from the window. ‘I can hear something … by the front door!’

  I ran out of the room and into the hall. The others quickly joined me, and we all stood together in the gloom, staring at the closed front door. I strained my hearing against the quiet, but all I could hear were the rapid heartbeats and strained breathing of the people with me. I moved slowly forward, until I was standing right in front of the door.

  ‘Don’t open it!’ said David. ‘There could be anything out there!’

  My hands had clenched into fists so tight they ached. I wanted to open the door, and confront whatever it was, but I couldn’t risk letting anything in. I retreated slowly back down the hall to rejoin the others. Not taking my eyes off the front door for a moment. I spoke quietly to Robert.

  ‘Do you have any weapons in the house?’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘I thought I’d left that kind of thing behind me, when I retired from Black Heir.’

  ‘I still can’t hear anything,’ I said.

  ‘If it’s an invisible demon, it might be inaudible too,’ said Penny.

  ‘Then David wouldn’t have been able to hear it at all, would he?’ I said.

  ‘I can hear something moving, inside the house!’ David said suddenly, his voice rising. ‘The back door! It’s got in! It’s here!’

  ‘It can’t have got in!’ said Robert.

  ‘I can hear it!’ said David. ‘Check all the rooms! I’ll go upstairs, and make sure they’re all right …’

  ‘No,’ I said sharply. ‘You stay right where you are, David.’

  He spun round, to stare at me. ‘What? Why?’

  ‘Because the killer is inside the house,’ I said. ‘And it’s you, David.’

  I moved over to the light switch, and turned it back on. Everyone blinked at the sudden glare except me. Robert was looking at David, Penny was looking at me. I fixed my gaze on David, who was standing very still. His face was completely empty, as though it didn’t know what to do.

  ‘You’re crazy,’ he said.

  Robert looked at me. ‘Are you sure, Ishmael? David killed the Reverend Allen, and Karen?’

  ‘I wasn’t sure until now,’ I said. ‘You out-smarted yourself, David. We all heard Inspector Godwin walking up the lane to the house, because it’s so quiet outside. So why didn’t anyone but you hear the movement outside? And then you said something was moving around inside the house. I have exceptional hearing, David. So if I couldn’t hear anyone inside the house, that could only mean there was no one. Which meant you were lying. And then you wanted to send us off on a wild goose chase, so you could go upstairs on your own. To get to Gillian and Tom while they were at their most vulnerable. And once I thought that … everything just fell into place. All the things I’d noticed, but hadn’t put together till now.

  ‘The Reverend Allen was killed by a heavy blow to the back of the neck. And who was the only one of us with a reason to be angry at the vicar? Only you, David. Everyone else went out of their way to say how pleasant he was; but you saw another side of him. Everyone was coming and going at the church hall that evening, so no one paid any attention when you slipped away to confront the Reverend Allen. What did he say to you, David? This old-fashioned vicar who really didn’t like gay people?’

  ‘He told me I was an abomination in the eyes of God,’ said David. ‘That he wouldn’t allow the wedding to take place in his church, unless I was replaced as best man. I lost my temper and shoved him. Hard. He fell back and broke his neck against the altar.’

  ‘Hanging him on his own rope was an afterthought,’ I said. ‘To show what you thought of him, and to point at the curse; so no one would think to blame you. And of course, you knew all about the curse. You’d been reading up on it. But if the vicar’s death was an accident … why did you kill Karen, and Linda?’

  ‘Linda?’ said Robert. ‘She’s dead too?’ He stared at David in horror. ‘What have you done, boy …?’

  David didn’t react at all, just kept looking at me.

  ‘I think it was because after the Reverend Allen died, there was serious talk of cancelling the wedding,’ I said. ‘And you wanted that, David. So you saw your opportunity to make sure the wedding would never happen.’

  ‘Why would I want to do that?’ said David.

  ‘Because you love Tom,’ I said. ‘And you always have. Though he never saw it. And he never would, once he married Gillian. Once Tom left you behind, on your own. Linda got the gossip from Godwin, about you seeing off girls who got too close to Tom. But Gillian was made of harder stuff than that. You thought you’d lost him forever.

  ‘You killed Karen to make it look like the curse was still operating. That it was just too dangerous for Gillian and Tom to get married. You must have been sure another death linked to the curse would be enough to stop the wedding; but it wasn’t. And then Linda put two and two together about you, got scared, and called me. You must have overheard me talking to her on the phone at The Swan, leaped to the right conclusion, pretended you were going to the toilet again and left the hotel by the back door. Then you ran through the empty streets to get to the church before I could, killed Linda, and ran back to The Swan. Then all you had to do was pretend to be passed out in the Ladies’ toilet to explain your absence. You said champagne didn’t affect you, and you were right.

  ‘There were lots of clues that just fell into place, once I knew it had to be you, David. You were the only one of us on your own when Karen was killed. We all had things to do, in the company of others, but you said you were going to a teashop to work on your speech. How did you get Karen to leave the safety of her room, and join you at the church hall? I’m guessing you just phoned her room and said Gillian needed her there. Karen always was a sucker for being needed. And of course, she had no reason to see you as a threat until it was far too late.

  ‘But most of all, it was the manner of the killings that pointed to you. They were all so dramatic, so theatrical, so staged. Just what you’d expect from an actor. And finally, just now, I saw you pluck a stray hair off Tom’s collar. A friend wouldn’t do something like that, David; it’s an intimate act.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ said Robert. ‘Tom isn’t gay.’ He looked at David. ‘You must have known he was never going to …’

  ‘It isn’t always about sex!’ said David. ‘I loved him! We spent years together, as friends, and we were perfectly happy! But then Gillian took him away from me. I never planned any of this, but when I saw my chance I took it. Just once, I wanted what everyone else wants: a happy ever after with the one I love!’

  Someone screamed, upstairs. A man’s scream, shocked and raw and horrified. I charged up the stairs, taking them two at a time, and was on the landing while the others were still pounding up the steps. I ran to the room at the end. The door was locked. I kicked it in; and there was a huge werewolf, standing over Tom. He lay sprawled and naked on the bed, with bloody claw marks on his chest and a horrified look on his face.

  The wolf spun round to face me. Over seven feet tall, standing on two legs, the pointed ears on its lupine head brushed against the ceiling. Its thickly furred body was lean
and powerful, the long muzzle was crammed full of teeth, and the paws that were almost hands had vicious claws. Its eyes were yellow as urine, and its scarlet tongue lapped hungrily across jagged teeth as it looked at me. It growled, deep in its throat, warning me not to get between it and its prey. I stepped forward anyway. Tom raised himself painfully on one elbow, and called out desperately.

  ‘Don’t hurt her! Please! It’s Gillian!’

  The wolf crouched, growling threateningly as the others arrived and crammed into the doorway behind me. I stopped where I was and looked at Tom. When I spoke, I kept my voice calm and quiet.

  ‘What happened, Tom?’

  ‘We were in bed,’ he said. ‘We were … And then she changed! She didn’t understand what was happening! She didn’t know who I was … I reached out to her and she attacked me.’

  Robert stepped forward into the room, peering over my shoulder. The wolf snarled warningly. Robert stood his ground.

  ‘Gillian; it’s me. Your father. Listen to my voice. You know me. Everything’s going to be all right, Gillian …’

  He took another step forward, easing past me, and the wolf went for him. I threw Robert back with a sweep of my arm, and went to meet the wolf. Its clawed hands darted for my throat, but I grabbed hold of both hairy wrists and forced the wolf to a halt. Up close it smelled rank, and feral. It strained against me and I quickly realized I couldn’t hold it off for long. It was a lot stronger than me. Robert moved in beside me, and stamped hard on the wolf’s left ankle; an old infighting trick. The wolf cried out as its leg buckled. It went down on one knee, and I hit it hard in the side of the head. The blow didn’t even jar it. The wolf surged forward again, throwing me off balance. I fell back against Robert, pinning him to the wall. Tom cried out, and the wolf spun round to face him. David threw himself onto its back.

  ‘Get out of here, Tom!’ he yelled. ‘I’ll hold it!’

  The wolf spun round and round in the cramped space, trying to throw David off. He closed one arm across the wolf’s throat, trying for a strangle hold, but he couldn’t make any impression on the wolf’s thick neck muscles. It reached back with one overlong arm, and David cried out horribly as heavy claws sank deep into his shoulder. Blood spurted, and he lost his grip. The wolf bent sharply forwards, and David flew over its lowered head and slammed into the wall. He hit hard enough to drive all the breath out of him, and dropped to the floor. The wolf lashed out, and vicious claws ripped half his guts away.