So this, Yellich thought, as he entered the room, was where Marcus Williams died. It was a rectangular room with a deep, long bath set in the middle of the floor, as was often the style in Victorian houses - it was a bathroom, so let the bath dominate it. A shower attachment, obviously of much later design, was fastened to a stainless-steel support, very barrack-room basic.
It would not have lasted long if the house had had a woman to organize it, but it would, thought Yellich, suit the functional, no-frills needs of a bachelor. He noted the wooden steps leading up to the bath which were not attached but could be set apart if necessary, and a seat or a platform in the bath which was of wood and suspended from the sides. It was about three feet wide, and so, thought Yellich, more probably a platform for a person taking a shower, than an infirm person sitting on it rather than fully in the bath. Yellich turned to Lamb and said, ‘Thank you. I’ve seen enough.’
Outside, Pastor Cyrus stood motionless in the sun, awaiting his return. Yellich stepped out of the cool of the building and into the heat.
‘Computers?’ he said.
‘This is not an archaic church, brother Yellich. God wants us to keep up with His times.’
‘I liked him.’
Sam Sprie sat in an upright chair outside the front door of his small council house. Yellich sat beside him in a white plastic chair which had been brought from the rear garden for him. They sipped tea which had been pressed on them by an insistent Mrs Sprie who had then departed dutifully into the shade of her home, behind a multicoloured fly screen in the form of many thin strips of plastic which hung on the door of the house, not a permanent fixture, but put up and taken down as the need arose. The garden in front of Sam Sprie’s house was a sea of multicoloured flowers, mainly pansies, boarded by a small privet hedge, neatly trimmed, green at either side, yellow at the front. It was a gardener’s garden. ‘I hardly ever saw him.’
‘You hardly ever saw him, yet you liked him?’
‘That’s why I liked him. He allowed me to get on with my job and didn’t interfere, you can always tell whether your gardener’s working. So long as I shut the gates behind me, as Mrs O’Shea had to as well. We both had a key to the padlock on the front gate so we could let ourselves in in the morning and lock up behind us after we left for the day.’
‘So there was just Mr Williams in the house each evening?’
‘Each evening and each weekend. Mrs O’Shea and myself worked five days a week. Mr Williams could cook a meal if he had to, so he didn’t starve when Mrs O’Shea was ill, or on holiday, or each weekend. But no, he wasn’t alone strictly speaking, he had three Dobermans. He was safe, all right, the Dobermans knew me and Mrs O’Shea and Mr Williams but practically nobody else. The post was left in a box by the gate, as was the milk. The Dobermans would protect him, at least buy him enough time to phone the police.’
‘And how would the police get through the gate and past the dogs?’
Sprie smiled and nodded his head. ‘Don’t think he thought of that. He was a bit like those people who barricade their homes against burglars, which is all very well until you want to get out to escape the fire. Bars keep them out, but they also keep you in. But that was Mr Williams. A little…what’s the word?’
‘Eccentric?’
‘Aye, that as well.’
‘What sort of man was he?’
‘Better ask Mrs O’Shea that, she knew him better than I did. Like I said, if the garden was kept he never bothered me. I never saw him, save in passing, never went into Oakfield House.’
‘He drowned in the bath?’
‘You asking me or telling me?’
‘Asking.’
‘Aye…well, there’s some as says he did and some as says he didn’t.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Well, his death just didn’t seem right…he never took baths but I didn’t know that until after he died. Mrs O’Shea…she’ll…’
‘Aye…I’ll ask her.
‘He lived alone. A recluse?’
‘That’s the word. I’ve been thinking of him as a hermit but the word didn’t fit…recluse…yes, I like that word.’
‘No visitors at all?’
‘One or two over the years, a tall man would visit once in a while. I was told that was Mr Williams’s brother…first time I saw him he drove up in a car with a wife and a couple of children…I was close by that time…he went into the house looking worried, made the children and his wife wait in the car a good long while. Then came out looking pleased with himself, I saw him smile at his wife and tap his wallet…you know, his jacket breast pocket. His wife smiled back. Then they drove off.’
‘What do you think had happened?’
‘He tapped him for some money. That’s what I felt. Since then I’ve only ever had the impression of the brother visiting Mr Williams whenever he wanted money. Nothing regular about the visits…I mean, I’ve got one surviving brother and we see each other at the Sun each Sunday lunchtime. It was nothing like that. Mr Williams’s brother would visit as and when and stay for about half an hour then he’d not visit again for three, four months, then he’d turn up and leave again as though he’d got what he wanted. Didn’t take to him. Mrs O’Shea told me that Mr Williams was upset that his brother had kept his wife and children in the car when they visited that first time, he felt as if his brother was ashamed of him.’
‘Ashamed?’
‘Well, Mr Williams, he was about that high.’ Sam Sprie held a sinewy arm out level about three feet from the concrete path on which he and Yellich’s chairs stood.
‘Was he self-conscious about it?’
‘Well, if he was, his brother hiding him from his sister-in law and nephew and niece didn’t help, especially when the only reason they visited was to tap him for cash.’
‘It wouldn’t. I’m surprised he entertained his brother at all.’
‘He was a generous sort. He had a lake in the grounds.’
‘A lake?’
‘Very big pond, very small lake…it was circular, about from here to that tree from bank to bank.’ Sprie pointed to a magnificent oak tree in a field opposite the line of council houses. Yellich thought the distance between house and tree to be about two hundred yards.
‘Big enough.’
‘It was about ten feet deep with steep sides, it was excavated by the man who had Oakfield House built back in the eighteen-thirties. He created the lake and had it stocked with trout. Anyway, the lake hadn’t been fished for a while before Mr Williams moved in and when he moved in it was just teeming with fish. We were looking over the grounds after he’d taken me on and he told me he wanted the lake filled in. I asked him if we could take the fish, we have an angling club in the village…he said yes…we organized ourselves, no more than six rods at any one time, each man having a four-hour slot…and still it took us a week to fish out the lake. He was generous like that, but that week sticks in my mind because there were more folk in the grounds than ever before or since, and in that week I never saw Mr Williams once. But he was accepted well after that, people knew about him, and left him alone…not like the group of weirdos that are in there now…we don’t know what’s going in the house, aye.’
‘Any other visitors that you recall?’
‘Only one, a young man, called a few times…this was in the last year of Mr Williams’s life…a friend, a relative…I got the impression that he was calling on Mr Williams, not his money…he also liked the dogs and they took to him after a while…throwing sticks for them. He was seen in the village at about the time Mr Williams died. Not by me, by Sydney Tamm. He used to be the church warden at St Mark’s.’
‘Used to be?’