A few minutes later he was led up into a bleak, cold chamber, the very sight and feel of which made shivers run up and down his spine. If one wanted to kill oneself, or maybe even write a neglected masterpiece in a romantic sort of way, it would have been ideal. If you wanted a good and comfortable night’s sleep, it wasn’t right at all. When the barman—who did have the grace to look embarrassed—mentioned the price, his spirit rebelled.
And a useful idea came to him. A bit of a nerve, of course. On the other hand, she had offered.
He marched back up the road, turned in on the gates once more, encouraged by the fact that lights were burning cheerfully in a couple of rooms on the ground floor, and knocked with more certainty than he felt on the door.
“Hello again,” he said with an apologetic smile as it swung open and an enquiring face appeared.
“Jonathan! What a pleasant surprise. I was afraid you were the local burglar come to visit me at last. Do come in. I’m having my late-night cocoa by the fire. Trying to keep warm.”
“Is that why you’re wearing a mac?”
“Eh? Oh, no. I was bringing in some wood. Chopped with my own fair hands. It’s another skill you learn
when you’re privileged. Come in. Would you like some cocoa? Slice of cake?”
Try as he might to avoid salivating, something about him must have given off strong hints about what he thought of a mere slice of cake.
“Are you hungry?” she asked with a motherly concern.
“Umm,” he said hesitating between politeness and self-interest.
“You are, aren’t you?”
He smiled regretfully, abandoning the politeness option. “I am absolutely starving,” he said. “I’ve never felt so hungry in my life. I haven’t eaten all day.”
“Oh, you poor thing. The state of the cuisine in the pub doesn’t reach great heights, does it? It was the sausage rolls that put you off, I suppose?”
“A sausage roll I could have managed. The Scotch eggs, though…”
“Ah, yes. I ate one of those once. I can do you a plate of bacon and eggs, with some fresh bread and butter. Not wonderful, but I’m afraid that’s about all there is, until I go shopping tomorrow. But they’re fresh eggs, at least. I have a hen, you know. I keep it in the state bedroom.”
“You really mustn’t,” he said, hoping she would brush the objection aside as mere politeness.
Being a well brought up lady, she did exactly that. “Why not? The bedroom’s not used for anything else. And hens are quite clean, if you treat them properly. Now,” she went on, “come down to the kitchen and do as you’re told. This won’t take long.”
“Is there really a local burglar?” he asked as he settled himself down and surrendered to the comforting feeling that being cooked for by a woman old enough to be your mother brings with it.
“Oh, yes,” she said, as she broke the eggs and fiddled with the bacon. “At least, it strikes me it’s a local.”
“Why?”
“Because all the houses burgled belong to the foreign interlopers.”
“The Americans?”
“Lord, no. No one would dare. They’re convinced all Americans sleep with machine guns under their pillows. Just the English foreigners, if you see what I mean. The police reckon it’s because they have the bigger houses, but I think it’s the countryman’s revenge. No one’s bothered me, mind you. I’m not exactly thought of as a local, but a sort of resident alien. An honorary citizen, so to speak.”
“So who’s your suspect?”
“There’s a lad called Gordon. A bit wild. Lots of dubious friends who drive around in cars they can’t possibly afford on their incomes—not that many of them have jobs. He’s the one I’d put my money on.”
She put the eggs in the oven, and turned her attention to the bread, slicing thick lumps and putting it on the table. Argyll got down to business.
“I didn’t think they had crime in the countryside,” he said.
“Considering you may have discovered a murder this morning, that’s not very observant of you. It’s a bit like the wild West round here at times. You should see them getting drunk and beating each other up on a Friday night.”
“The locals do that?”
“When they’re not beating their wives.” She looked at him with a grin. “I can see you’ve never lived in the country. You think it’s all thatched cottages and cider and merrymaking in the hay.”
Argyll smiled at the absurdity of the thought.
“Not a bit of it, my sweet,” she went on. “All human life, red in tooth and claw, can be found in an English village. Incest, adultery, you name it. We even have one suspected axe murderer. He’s a church warden. Jane Austen didn’t know the half of it.”
“You’re joking.”
“Maybe. But he didn’t get on at all well with his brother, who mysteriously managed to cut off his own leg with a chain saw and bleed to death in a field. Many years back, this was. Conclusions, as they say, could be drawn. Not that the police bothered.”
“Didn’t his family protest?”
There was only his wife. And it was her affair with the brother that caused all the trouble in the first place. So they say.”
“Oh,” he said with his mouth full.
“You are hungry, aren’t you?”
He nodded. “But I hope you don’t think I came to visit in the hope I’d be fed.”
“I wouldn’t have minded if you did. Living on your own, children flown the coop, is all very liberating, but it occasionally gets a bit solitary in the evenings. Especially in this bloody great barn.”
“Ah.”
“Here’s your bacon and eggs and cocoa,” she said, changing the subject. Conversation lapsed while Argyll ate. After some consideration he decided that it was not merely because he was so hungry; they really were delicious. She had taken the bacon, cut it into strips and grilled it, then laid them in a thin blanket on the bottom of a dish. Then put a knob of butter and three fresh eggs on top, added a healthy slug of cream on top and liberally covered with fresh pepper. All into the oven to cook. Wonderful.
“Forgive me for asking,” Argyll said when his head, slightly yellowed round the mouth, finally lifted itself out of the bowl, “but have you ever lived abroad?”
“What makes you think that, Sherlock?”
“The bacon and eggs are unorthodox to the point of being heretical,” he said.
“Ah, yes. You’re right. It’s details like cooking that give me away, I’m afraid. You know: not boiling the beans for three quarters of an hour before eating them. Please don’t let on though; it’s bad enough the locals think I come from London. But I’m surprised you concluded that from my food.”
“Why?”
“Because you’ve evidently been to the pub. I would have thought they would have filled you in on my life history in the time it took for you to cast an eye over the food tray.”
“There was a comment or two,” he said. “Nothing scandalous, alas, although not turning up for the village fête seems to have knocked your reputation rather badly.”
“Oh, God, that,” she said despairingly. “I shall never live it down. It’s about the only village function I’ve missed since Veronica died, you know. I spend my life turning up to things. I never realized that being privileged was such a lot of work. I’ve admired so many prize peonies and babies and pigs I wake screaming in the middle of the night. And if I ever eat another scone again I shall throw up. I had to go away on the day of the fête. Simple as that. The vicar opened it instead and did a better job than me, I’ve no doubt. These people don’t realize that any form of life exists outside Norfolk.”
“I believe you.”
“Sorry. Sometimes this place drives me crazy. What else did they tell you?”