‘I’m like the dust-fairy.’ Susan gave a small, sharp smile. ‘You’d think their houses get clean as if by magic. Never any thanks. Not like Mrs Carswell, who’ll sit down for a chat when I’m finished.’
‘So is there anything you can tell me about them? Do they really all get on as well as they say?’
Susan shrugged. ‘They put on a good show.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, it’s all sweetness and light in public. In their own homes it’s a bit different. Professor O’Kane’s the worst. He doesn’t have anything nice to say about anyone. He’s arrogant; thinks he’s better than the rest of them because he knows about the past. All snide comments.’
They sat for a moment in silence.
Vera got to her feet. ‘Nobody else must know about Lorraine’s illness,’ she said. ‘It’s private. Not our business.’ At least not your business.
‘I don’t gossip. Not really.’ Then a confession of sorts. ‘I don’t have much of a life here, just me and Dad. I’m just interested in other people’s lives.’
‘Ah, pet, you and me both.’
As Vera was pulling away from Percy’s bungalow she was met by a car driving down the track towards Gilswick. Nigel Lucas. Maybe he was just on his way to the village to pick up the Sunday papers, but it seemed like a sign. Lorraine would be in the house on her own.
It took Lorraine a while to open the farmhouse door, and she was still in her nightclothes with a dressing gown pulled over the top. It was the first time Vera had seen her without make-up and she looked grey and very tired.
‘I’m sorry.’ Vera was sympathetic, but she was inside the door already, taking no chances. ‘I got you out of your bed. I wanted to chat to you on your own.’
‘What’s this about? Your sergeant was here yesterday to take statements. We told him everything we know about that poor woman dying.’
‘Shall I put the kettle on? Make us some tea?’ Vera walked through to the kitchen, letting the woman follow. There was a granite breakfast bar with ridiculously high stools. She wasn’t sure she’d be able to hoist herself onto them. Or get off, once she was there. ‘Let’s take the tea up to your studio, shall we? We know we won’t be interrupted there. Why don’t you lead the way?’
Lorraine shrugged. She seemed to have no fight in her. Vera wondered if that was down to the illness or the cure. They walked up the polished wooden stairs to a landing with a view of the hall and the kitchen, and then Lorraine pushed open a door into her studio. It was the size of a double bedroom, with one long window looking north towards the hill. An easel and a set of white-painted cupboards. The scrubbed pine table that Susan had described. Along one wall a chaise longue in faded grey velour. ‘I noticed that, in the Kimmerston saleroom when we first moved up here,’ Lorraine said. ‘Nigel saw that I liked it and went to the auction and bid for it. A surprise, until it was delivered.’ She paused for a beat. ‘He’s such a kind man.’
‘Is that why you haven’t told him you’re ill? Worried he’ll kill you with kindness?’ Vera took a seat on a chair that looked as if it had once belonged to a teacher in a village school. Lorraine sank onto the chaise longue.
‘How did you know?’
‘We poke around into everyone’s business in a murder inquiry. That’s our job. Not all the secrets we dig up are relevant to the investigation, but we can’t ignore them.’ From her seat Vera could see into the back gardens of the houses on each side. Janet was feeding her hens. Annie was hanging washing on her line. It occurred to her that Lorraine had kept the secret of her illness because nothing else could be hidden here. She had so little control over what was going on in her body; at least she could take control of the how and when she shared information about being ill.
‘I told Nigel when I was first diagnosed with breast cancer.’ Lorraine gave a little smile. ‘I couldn’t really hide it from him; he found the lump, dragged me off to the GP.’
‘That was before you moved here?’
‘It was what prompted the move. Nigel’s business had grown since he first started it. I thought he liked the success, setting up branches all over the country. Then, when I was ill, he decided to sell up. “Someone’s made me an offer I can’t refuse, Lorrie. Let’s call it a day and give ourselves a bit of quality time.” I was going through chemo and didn’t have the energy to think it through. So I said: why not? A move to the country, more time to paint. All that sounded great to me.’
‘Did it live up to expectations?’
‘At first. Nigel loved planning the renovations to the house. Now, I’m not sure. He’s used to the challenge of problems at work. Having the power to take decisions.’ She looked at Vera. ‘He’s just been accepted to be a magistrate. He’ll be good, I think. He’s got all the right experience. That might help give his day a bit of focus and make him feel more useful. I encouraged him to give it a go. At the moment I can tell he’s bored, fidgety, looking for projects. He doesn’t say, because he knows I love it here. It’s a beautiful place to die.’
‘When did you find out that the illness had come back?’
‘Six months ago. I still had to go for regular checks. At first everything seemed fine; then it seemed that, despite the surgery, they hadn’t got rid of the tumour. It’s spread. It’s just moved into my spine. They’ve offered more chemo, but there’s no chance of a complete cure. I’d just be buying a bit more time. I feel remarkably well at the moment, and I’d much rather enjoy the life that I have than keep dragging back to the hospital for unpleasant treatments. Inconvenient and time-consuming, and taking more than the life I’d gain.’
Vera thought she’d probably have made the same decision. ‘But you decided not to tell Nigel?’
‘He’d be devastated. And as you said, he’d kill me with his fussing. I will tell him, but when I’ve reached a state when I can’t pretend any longer.’
‘Isn’t it a strain, all this pretence?’
Lorraine gave a little laugh. ‘All couples pretend about something. We’d go mad if we were honest all the time. Successful relationships are made up of white lies, small attempts at flattery, aren’t they? We want our partners to be happy, so we tell them the stories they want to hear.’
There was a sound in the house below. The front door opening. ‘That’ll be Nigel back from the village. You won’t tell him, will you?’
‘Not unless I have to.’ Vera couldn’t see how Lorraine’s illness could be relevant to the inquiry, except that it gave an insight into a relationship she’d previously struggled to understand.
They went downstairs together. Nigel was still in the hall. ‘I was just showing the inspector my studio,’ Lorraine said. ‘She was wondering what I might see from the window. I told her only the neighbours’ gardens.’
The words came easily. She even sounder brighter, less tired. Vera hoped that the other residents of Valley Farm weren’t such proficient liars. Otherwise she shouldn’t believe anything that she’d been told.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Holly had moths on her mind. She’d been reading up about them in the brief time she’d had at home the night before. Sitting on the sofa with her laptop on her knee, drinking mugs of camomile tea, she’d stared at photos. There were huge creatures as big as butterflies, brightly coloured and fascinating, tiny micros that you could only identify by studying their genitalia under a microscope. It had come to her suddenly on the drive home that they’d forgotten about the part moths played in the case. They shouldn’t forget the natural-history connection. It had been more than a shared interest for Randle and Benton: more like a passion or an obsession for both of them. The set traps in the Gilswick Hall garden suggested that moths had drawn the first two victims together.