Nine

Juliet had picked up from conversation with Kevan de Vries that the Briggs lived next door to Laurieston House. They could hardly be described as close neighbours, separated as they were by the extensive garden and second gravel sweep of the larger house, as well as its high boundary hedge. There was also a small stream running along the hedge on the Briggs’ side. Mindful of Tim’s instructions that she should initially avoid Harry Briggs, Juliet had consulted Ricky MacFadyen’s report on the burglary, in the hope that Ricky would perhaps have noted a mobile number for Jackie Briggs. However, she could find no contact details for either Briggs except their joint address. She therefore had no option but to knock on the door of 1 Laurieston Terrace and run the risk of encountering Harry.

Situated at the side of the house, its door was a solid piece of Victorian craftsmanship. Two small twin panes of stained glass adorned its central panel. The shape that appeared, silhouetted, in these was too bulky to be Jackie’s. Damn, thought Juliet.

Harry Briggs unlocked the door and peered round it. Juliet saw a thick-set man in his mid-forties. A large dressing on his cheek was held in place by two crossed pieces of sticking-plaster. His complexion was ruddy, perhaps because he spent much of his time outdoors, although the spider veins around his nose suggested a likely alternative cause. He gave Juliet an uncertain smile, exposing yellowing smoker’s teeth.

“Yus?” he said. His voice was gruff and uneducated.

Juliet held up her identity card.

“Mr Briggs? DC Juliet Armstrong. I wondered if I might have a quiet word with your wife.”

He opened the door wider. Juliet was rather surprised to see that he was wearing no shirt, but an old-fashioned string vest. His workman’s navy-blue trousers were held up with leather braces. She remembered that farmworkers and men digging their gardens had sometimes dressed like this when she was a child, but she’d thought it old-fashioned even then. Beyond him, she could see a wooden banister that shone even though the hall was dark. There was a smell of lavender polish.

“She’s not ‘ere, m’duck. She cleans out ambulances of an afternoon.”

“Is there an ambulance station in Sutterton, or does she have to travel to somewhere?”

“It ain’t a station, really, just a garage. Down by the church.”

“So I could find her there?”

He shrugged.

“I suppose so. She’s meant to be working, mind.”

Juliet took a dislike to the man, but did her best not to let him see it. She smiled again.

“I’d be grateful if you’d give me directions. I won’t keep her long. Afterwards I’d like to come back and ask you a few questions, too.”

He looked defensive.

“Aye, well, I’ll be here for an hour or so. After that I’ll be going up the Quadring Arms. My darts team’s playing,” he added, as if the statement needed justifying.

“I’ll come back as soon as I can. I’d appreciate it if you’d wait for me. It’s important.”

“I told the other copper all I knew about that Panton bastard,” he said. He put his hand up to his cheek.

Juliet remembered that Briggs had been bitten while hanging on to the young burglar.

“How is your face?” she asked sympathetically.

“I’ll live,” he said dourly. “Now, d’you want me to show you where Jackie is?”

He emerged from the house, his feet clad only in his blue socks, and brushed past Juliet as she stood on his doorstep. He made his way to the end of the path with a curiously shuffling gait, though Juliet reflected that this might have been because the uneven stone of the path was uncomfortable for his unshod feet. He opened the black wrought-iron gate and turned to Juliet, who had followed him.

“I won’t come into the street, as I’ve no shoes,” he said, “but if you walk up to the roundabout and turn right, you’ll see the church. Before you get to the church, if you look across the road, you’ll see a big sign with MediFen on it, and a kind of biggish lock-up. She’ll be in there. She’s probably got the door open, but if not you’ll have to bray on it.”

“Thanks,” said Juliet. “I’ll look forward to speaking later.”

He threw her a hostile look, but she could tell that he’d taken the comment on board.

The afternoon was both still and warm. As Juliet embarked upon her short walk, she thought how perfect this village seemed. The jigsaw-style duck-pond and lush village green had probably remained unchanged for centuries. The postcard look was completed by the thatched cottage that stood beyond the green. No-one else was in sight. It could have been an enchanted place, marooned in the past as if in some fairy tale. Yet just beyond it she knew that the wheels of the massive de Vries empire were grinding ceaselessly away. Prosperity didn’t seem to have brought much peace to the de Vries family. She looked across at the windows of Laurieston House as she passed, but could see nothing stirring beyond them.

She reached MediFen in less than five minutes. As Harry Briggs had said, a large sign had been erected to the left of what looked like a triple lock-up garage with up-and-over doors. The door of the middle section stood open. A white station wagon with ‘ambulance’ printed in day-glo green had been parked on the tarmac, the front of its bonnet flush with the frame. The rear doors of the vehicle were both open. A woman was kneeling on a mat on the ground, her head and the upper half of her body hidden inside it. A bucket and a ‘Henry’ vacuum cleaner stood beside her. Her rump was swaying slightly, keeping time with the exertion of her arms.

Not wishing to startle her, Juliet tried to make as much noise as possible as she stepped on to the tarmac.

“Mrs Briggs?” she said.

The swaying halted. Jackie Briggs paused for a few seconds before edging herself backwards until her head and shoulders had emerged. She sat back on her heels and looked up at Juliet, her eyes crinkling against the sunlight. Her face was flushed with effort. She was holding a cloth in her pink-gloved hand. Recognition dawned.

“You’re the lady policeman who brought Mr Kevan home, aren’t you?” she said. “I’m sorry, I don’t remember your name.”

Juliet smiled at the description.

“I’d hardly expect you to. It’s DC Armstrong,” she said. “I hope I didn’t make you jump. I’ve just told your husband I was coming to see you. I thought he might have called you to say.”

Jackie Briggs got to her feet. She had changed out of the smart pinafore dress that she’d been wearing that morning and was now clad in jeans and a T-shirt, over which she had placed a tabard-like sleeveless overall of pink gingham. Her figure was trim to the point of gauntness. She looked puzzled.

“There’s no phone here,” she said. “It’s just a garage.”

“You don’t have a mobile?”

“No.” She said it with some vehemence, as if denying a vice.

“Is there somewhere we can go to talk? Somewhere with a bit more privacy than out here on the street?”

Jackie Briggs smiled as she glanced to her right and left along the road.

“Not much chance of getting overheard here,” she said. “The place is like a morgue during the day. There’s only the house next door on this side, and the old boy who lives there is a bit dulally, if you know what I mean. But if you’re worried, we can go and sit in the garage.” She gestured at the open doorway with her pink-gloved hand. “There’s a stool in there, and a kettle. I can make you some tea.”

Juliet nodded thanks. Jackie Briggs peeled off her gloves and picked up her kneeling-mat and the vacuum cleaner. She deposited them inside the garage door and led Juliet deeper into the building. A stainless steel sink stood at its far end. There was a kettle on the draining-board.

“No tea for me, thanks,” said Juliet. “Don’t let me stop you if you’d like some. And do take the seat. I’ve been sitting down for most of the afternoon.”

Jackie perched on the stool. She seemed quite at her ease with Juliet. She looked up at the policewoman expectantly. Juliet guessed that she was about forty-five, maybe a little younger. The shadows under her eyes and incipient crows’ feet might have made her look older than she was. Despite her sharp features, she had a pleasant face, but she seemed very tired.

“Is it about the burglary?”

“Yes. And I’d like to ask you a few more general questions as well, just to get some idea of the background to it. But tell me about the burglary first.”

Jackie Briggs wriggled to get comfortable and composed her face, solemn as a schoolgirl repeating a lesson.

“It was just after six o’clock on Sunday morning. I clean ice-cream vans for Mr Lusardi in the summer. Just the inside, like. He takes them to the car-wash for the outside. They’ve to be ready for when the drivers turn up at 7.30.”

“You’re a busy lady! Ice-cream vans in the morning and ambulances in the afternoon!”

Jackie gave a strange little laugh.

“You wouldn’t want to hear what Harry says about that! I suppose it is a bit funny, doing both. But the ambulances are year-round; the ice-cream vans only from March to October.”

“You’re Mrs de Vries’ housekeeper, as well?”

“That’s what she likes to call me. I’m not a proper housekeeper: I don’t live in and I don’t do the cooking. To be honest, I’m more of a glorified cleaner, though better-paid.”

“How do you fit that in with the ice-cream vans and ambulances?”

“Usually she doesn’t want me until about 10 o’clock. She’s not well, as you probably know, and she doesn’t get up early. It gives me time to have a quick shower after I’ve finished the vans. And I’m usually done there by two. If there’s time for some lunch, I nip home; if not, I come straight here. Occasionally she wants me to go back again in the evening, if she’s having people round.”

Juliet’s heart went out to this woman. She seemed to spend her life on a continual treadmill of menial tasks. She made a mental note to find out why Jackie Briggs had to work so hard.

“Sorry, I side-tracked you,” she said. “So you were going to do the ice-cream vans. Where are they?”

“Lusardi’s. They’ve a dairy on the other side of the duck-pond. The vans are parked in the yard. There’s usually someone in the dairy by the time I arrive, but if not I’ve got a key. The keys to the vans are hung on hooks in there. Anyway, on Sunday I didn’t make it, because I’d just got level with the entrance to Laurieston when I saw something move out of the corner of my eye. It was lucky, really, because another few feet and I’d have been past the gap where you can see in. The hedge gets much thicker further along.”

“Was the gate to Laurieston House closed?”

“No. It should have been. That’s maybe the reason that I thought to look across. It’s often left open during the day, but Mr Kevan likes it closed at night and when he’s away, although Harry says that’s advertising that he’s not there. But he’s the boss. What’s odd is that I was sure the gate had been shut the previous day. It’s Harry’s job to see to it.”

“Perhaps the burglars left it open?”

“Maybe. But not if they’d any sense. They’ll have climbed over the back wall, more like.”

“So did you go to look?”

“Yes. I walked a few steps into the drive. I could see a lad on the conservatory roof. He was kneeling, reaching down back inside for something. I couldn’t see the other one, but he must’ve been standing in the conservatory, passing whatever it was up to him. I’d tried not to make any noise, but the gravel’s deep and it must have scrunched under my feet. The lad on the roof saw me and leapt down. He ran off.”

“He didn’t come past you?”

“No. He headed for the back wall. As I said, that’s probably the way they came in, as well.”

“What did you do then?”

“I walked a few more steps towards the conservatory, which is when I saw the other one. He was standing on one of the cane tables in there, trying to make a grab for the skylight. That was when I went to fetch Harry.”

“How soon was he able to get there?”

“Pretty much straight away. I just ran back to our door and opened it to shout him, and he came out. He didn’t mess about.” She spoke with some pride.

Interesting, thought Juliet. She’d had Harry Briggs marked down as a bit of a layabout; yet he’d been up at 6 a.m. on a Sunday morning.

“He was already dressed?”

“Oh, yes.” She threw Juliet a look which plainly suggested that the question was eccentric. “He went belting over to Laurieston – I haven’t seen him run so fast in years. He caught the second kid with a rugby tackle and held him until the police got here. The kid bit Harry’s cheek – vicious little devil. He hung on, though.” Her pride in her husband was even more apparent now. If Harry Briggs had his shortcomings, they weren’t important to his wife.

“Did you follow your husband immediately?”

“Almost.” Jackie Briggs flushed. “I expect it was the excitement, but I suddenly had to – go, if you know what I mean?” She looked embarrassed. Juliet nodded gravely.

“Could you describe the scene when you arrived?”

“Harry already had the lad on the ground. He was struggling, but Harry’s strong.”

“So you weren’t there when your husband caught him?”

“No.”

Juliet cast her mind back to the statement that Ricky MacFadyen had taken. Jackie Briggs seemed to have nothing to hide, but what she’d said then had certainly implied that she’d watched the whole incident.

“Was your husband’s face already wounded when you reached him?”

“Yes. It was bleeding. I was worried about it. Fortunately, the police arrived quite quickly.”

Juliet thought back again to Ricky’s notes.

“Who actually called the police? Do you know?”

For the first time, Jackie’s face assumed a shut look, as if she was worried that she’d said too much.

“I’m not sure,” she said. “Does it matter?”