She could think of no justification for phoning Drew, despite all her efforts to come up with something. He had shown a polite interest in Donny, because he had thought he might be asked to perform the funeral. He had brought Harriet’s book because it was obviously of relevance in more ways than one. But he had not offered himself as confidant, joint investigator or go-between in any way at all. He had not said Call me if there are any interesting developments. He had more than enough to deal with as it was, with his damaged wife and demanding children. She could not call him. Drew was nothing to her beyond a casual acquaintance with some basic qualities in common with hers. And even if he had been more important than that, he wasn’t available. Thea believed in marriage without even needing to think about it. She came from one of those families where everybody stuck to their vows as a matter of course. It wasn’t especially virtuous – it was simply the way you lived. There had been rocky marital moments for all her siblings, but infidelity had never been the reason for them, so far as she knew.
So the perennial answer to boredom or frustration or confusion presented itself again. She decided to go for a walk, even though the beech woods had lost much of their appeal since the disappearance of the collie dog and her pups. That small tragedy still nagged at her at odd moments, the sudden loss a mystery she would like to have solved.
Perhaps she could pursue it further, by locating the farm the dog had come from. The man with the gun obviously lived locally, and there were not so many working farms still remaining in the area. It shouldn’t be difficult to work out the most likely ones and find a public footpath close by. Footpaths were everywhere, after all. Most of them ran from north to south, connecting Brockworth to Sheepscombe via the woods. In at least two instances she could see from the map that a path went right through a farmyard.
Despite a few unnerving experiences, she had little fear of farmers, or hesitation in venturing into their secretive worlds. For the majority of the population, there was an invisible but impenetrable barrier around the buildings and yards of a farm. The approach was often down a winding track between high hedges, with angry barking dogs at the end of them – or dangerous slurry pits, hostile cattle, loud machinery and the real probability of a defensive or aggressive man demanding an explanation for the intrusion. Very few people understood the workings of agriculture any more. Within two generations, a universal knowledge had been lost. When once almost everybody had a farmer somewhere in the family, now it was strange to the point where contact produced anxiety or bewilderment. Where once most institutions had given farmers precedence, consulting their convenience and serving their needs, now they were virtually forgotten. School terms had originally been constructed around the harvesting of potatoes, hay and corn. Weather forecasts had been aimed specifically at these same harvests. The timing of rent collection, the descriptions of engine size, the pattern and direction of roads had all been based on farming. Thea, as a historian, had a comprehensive knowledge of how things had once been. But she supposed that everybody knew it at some level. Or everybody over the age of around forty-five. Modern children did not learn that kind of history, although she had heard that fewer of them now believed that meat and eggs were made in factories, as they did a decade or so ago.
But, while not afraid, she was certainly cautious. She had no intention of marching up to the man from the woods, if she were lucky enough to find him, and accusing him of cruelty again. If he had retrieved his dog, he had every right to do so. It was even possible that he had spared the lives of her pups. All Thea wanted was to know what had happened, and that her interventions had not somehow made things worse for the animal.
Following some ill-defined instinct, she headed north on leaving the Manor. This meant crossing the common and passing the Black Horse pub. The woods rose majestically behind the buildings, the highest ridge running up towards Brockworth. Coopers Hill was the final flourish – a steep escarpment from which it was said the view was incomparable, despite several rivals within a few miles.
She saw very few people once in the woods, despite it being a sunny summer weekend. She had learnt that this was the norm for the Cotswolds. Coachloads of tourists were deposited in Stow and Broadway and Bourton, a lesser number of visitors ventured into towns such as Chipping Campden and Snowshill, with a dwindling trickle spreading as far as the smaller villages. The more remote corners remained almost entirely unvisited, which Thea found ridiculous. To her eyes, the most beautiful places in the area were Naunton, Northleach and tiny perfect villages like Duntisbourne Abbots, none of which appeared on the usual tourist routes. Whilst a wholesale onslaught would undoubtedly ruin them, it struck her as rather a waste that hardly anybody realised what they were missing.
The somewhat vague idea in her mind was that she could look down from the elevated ridge and identify possible farms to investigate. In reality this turned out to be a very poor plan. Trees obscured the views for much of the way, until she emerged an hour later on the summit of the famous Coopers Hill. The cheese-rolling contest had taken place less than two weeks earlier, despite an effort to cancel it by worried councillors. The crowds had swelled to alarming proportions over recent years, and a diligent risk assessment had concluded that it was impossibly dangerous. The angle of descent was almost vertical at times, the idea of hurtling down there with a crowd of other people very disconcerting, viewed in the calm light of day. The silliness of it struck her as perfectly, almost gloriously, English, although she suspected that other countries had their own versions of archaic rituals that were just as daft. Indeed, she had read somewhere recently that there was a town in America which staged a ‘zombie festival’ where people lurched around the streets with their faces painted white, bodies daubed in fake blood, uttering inarticulate cries. It was hard to come up with anything much sillier than that, especially as she doubted very much that there was the slightest vestige of historical significance to it. At least the cheese rolling could claim to stretch back, scarcely altered, through centuries of time.
Hepzie stood on the brink of the steep drop and looked over her shoulder at Thea, clearly asking Are we going down there?
‘No,’ said Thea decisively, turning back from the brink. ‘Definitely not. We’ll go back a different way, if we can find one, but not as steep as that.’
A footpath branched to the left, running parallel to the edge of the woods, and yielding glimpses of the fields below, which Thea thought must be in the direction of Great Witcombe – a settlement she had not yet seen. The prospect of another week in the area began to feel more enticing as she realised how much there was to explore, if she felt adventurous. The map showed a Roman villa on the same slope she was now observing, but experience had taught her that this often brought disappointment. There would be little or nothing to see, she was sure. There was also a suggestion that Witcombe Park might be worth a visit, laid out below the great hill of Birdlip, with its big road junction and special viewing areas.
It was one o’clock, and she began to reproach herself for not bringing food and drink with her. However many times she embarked on a walk, she seldom remembered to take provisions. Neither did she use proper footwear or carry a mobile phone. The increasingly burdensome palaver of setting out for a country stroll practised by serious walkers struck her as counterproductive and foolish. ‘Just go,’ she had always said, to anybody tempted to make excessive preparations. And to demonstrate, she habitually set out in sandals and T-shirt, admittedly with a large-scale map, but almost nothing else.
The sun was partly screened by a light layer of cloud, which kept the temperature pleasantly warm. There was also a slight breeze blowing. New paths regularly intersected with the one she had chosen, and with care she maintained a southerly trajectory, aware that the woods could be deceptive and it would not be difficult to get severely lost. A major track ran from east to west, broad and dry enough to allow vehicles to traverse it. It was clearly marked on the map, which was helpful. Rather to her surprise, she found one or two substantial houses tucked amongst the trees, in situations where modern planning officers would die rather than permit a new building. Perhaps, she mused, they had started life as tiny log cabins for gamekeepers or coppicers, and had gradually evolved into the much-prized residences they had now become.
And then, much more quickly than expected, she found herself once more in the middle of Cranham, the Black Horse unmistakable even from the back.
A quick inventory of her pockets assured her that she could afford a drink, and such was her thirst that she overcame her foolish shyness and went in to the main bar. It was only another few minutes to the Manor, but that felt more than she could comfortably manage. The inside of the pub was shadowy and her eyes took a moment to adjust. It was quite full, and she felt herself under scrutiny from several directions. Hepzie was securely on her lead, walking nicely to heel, and Thea hoped nobody was going to object to her presence. Other Cotswolds pubs had refused her entry in the past, much to her annoyance.
In an effort not to catch anybody’s eye, she stared at the stag’s head above the fireplace, its handsome antlers sporting a fine silk scarf, or so it appeared. ‘Been there since they tried to cancel the cheese rolling,’ said a voice in her ear. ‘Things got a bit excitable here that day and Susie Powers threw her scarf at the stag in a fit of rage. Looks rather fetching, don’t you think?’
It was Philippe, with his big grey poodle, smiling down at her as if they were the best of friends. He wore a short-sleeved shirt the colour of stewed damsons, and a pair of jeans decorated with gold embroidery. ‘I like the shirt,’ said Thea faintly. ‘Do you call it purple or puce?’
‘I think it’s burgundy, actually. My wife hates it, but Tamsin’s a big fan.’
‘Busy in here,’ she remarked. ‘You’d think they’d all want to sit outside.’
‘There isn’t much space out there. Can I get you a drink?’
‘Oh! Well, you don’t have to.’
‘I want to. Jasper would be delighted if you and your little spaniel would come and sit with us. He’s a great one for the ladies.’
‘Just a lemonade, then. I’ve been for a long walk and I’m gasping. Thanks very much.’
The poodle gave no indication of enjoying Hepzibah’s company. His aristocratic nose pointed in roughly the direction of the desecrated stag, as he sat stiffly beside his master.
‘Where did you walk, then?’ Philippe asked, as an obvious conversation opener.
‘Coopers Hill. Have you ever taken part in the cheese rolling?’
‘Certainly not. It’s usually raining, for one thing. The mud must have been unspeakable.’
‘I’m sure it gets horribly churned up,’ she agreed, with a giggle she would have liked to stifle. For some reason she disapproved of this man, and had no wish to encourage him.
‘Funny little place, don’t you think?’ He looked round at the bar, but Thea imagined he was referring to Cranham in general.
‘Surprising,’ she corrected him.
‘In what way?’
‘Well …’ she in turn looked round ‘… it isn’t nearly so pretty as most Cotswold villages, is it? Those bungalows, for a start. They’re completely out of place.’
‘Oh, Miss Architectural Purism, is it?’ he mocked. ‘What’s wrong with them? I’ll have you know I live in one of them.’
‘I don’t believe you,’ she said flatly.
‘Clever old you. But I might have done. You ought to be more careful what you say.’
The glibness of his lie made Thea wonder what else he might have told her that was false. What anybody might have told her, come to that, over the past week. ‘I expect you’re right,’ she said without repentance. ‘But you did ask me what I thought.’
‘And I do enjoy an argument. What else can we disagree about, I wonder?’
The obvious answer was Donny Davis, but she had no intention of giving him that satisfaction. Under that self-imposed restriction, she could think of nothing else to debate. She shrugged, and drained the lemonade. On the floor beside her, Hepzie squirmed restlessly, and Thea realised that she was probably thirsty as well. ‘I think my dog wants a drink,’ she said.
With no hesitation, Philippe jumped up, strode to the bar, and asked for a glass of tap water. Within thirty seconds he was back, pouring it into an anachronistic ashtray he had found on a window sill. Hepzie sniffed suspiciously at the offering, and took two half-hearted laps. He left the water on the floor beside her, and returned his attention to Thea.
‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘That was very gallant.’
‘Oh, but I am gallant.’ He pronounced it with a French accent, which ought to have sounded pretentious, but instead made Thea feel like a country yokel with no finesse.
She took a deep breath and refused to be cowed. ‘Do you have French connections?’ she asked, remembering dimly that his surname was something French-sounding.
‘French connections!’ he repeated with a laugh. ‘That sounds very funny. But yes, I had a French grandfather. I spent several summers there as a child.’
‘Must be your father’s father,’ she said slowly, mentally sorting the family and recalling the various names they had claimed. ‘But your mother’s surname is Hastings.’
‘Very true. Mr Hastings came after my Papa, who was in fact named Ferrier, which is more or less the equivalent of Smith.’
‘I see.’
‘Do you?’
‘Well, I think so. Your mother told me something about the house belonging to the family for centuries.’
‘That’s basically right. The house is actually nothing to get excited about. Its only claim to notoriety is its age. I’m sure you’d think it ugly.’
She forced herself to resist this provocation, telling herself he was quite wrong to think he could predict what she would think. But she had a feeling she had brought it on herself, making dogmatic comments about the local buildings. She should have known better. ‘There are some really nice old houses just here, by the pub,’ she said. ‘As good as any in the Cotswolds.’
He pouted exaggeratedly. ‘Too late,’ he told her. ‘The damage is done. Thea Osborne doesn’t like Cranham. We’ll never live down the shame.’
It ought to have been funny, but the sharpness beneath the jokey words could not be ignored. It hinted at anger or a threat of some kind. As if she came to the village to pass judgement on it. ‘That’s ridiculous,’ she protested. ‘What does it matter what I think?’
‘You have friends in high places. You come trailing clouds of influence.’
‘What? What on earth do you mean?’ She was genuinely bemused. Was he talking about Phil Hollis?
He cocked his head. ‘You really don’t know? Do you remember a lady by the name of Cecilia Clifton, down Frampton Mansell way? Not a million miles from here, of course.’
Ah. She knew the name Cecilia had rung bells when Donny had spoken about his daughter. It had conjured a fleeting image of a sturdy capable woman, which she had not bothered to examine in detail.
‘Now you mention it, I do. She was a college lecturer. My sister knew her ages ago.’
‘You made a big impression on her. And she makes a big impression on most of the people living between Stroud and Minchinhampton. She’s a veteran of a number of important councils and committees, let me tell you.’
Thea winced. Things had not ended very happily between her and Cecilia. ‘Oh,’ she said.
‘And then there’s Harry Richmond. I’m sure you remember him.’
‘Yes, I saw him just a few months ago. But he doesn’t live in the Cotswolds any more.’
‘But a lot of people know him. He comes back from time to time, and he talks about you. He’s been talking about you for two years now. And there are others.’
‘Fiona,’ she supplied. ‘Yes. Your mother mentioned her.’
‘So you see how it is. You’ve become rather a celebrity.’
The idea came as a startling revelation. She had somehow assumed that each house-sitting commission had been contained as a separate entity, with no overlap. The owners of the houses she occupied for a few weeks didn’t know each other. They contacted her via a website she kept minimally updated, and a presence in one or two directories of house-sitters – the less professional ones, which asked for little by way of guarantee or endorsement, plainly washing their hands of any responsibility for the outcome. She had inserted advertisements in local newspapers once or twice, when work was slow to arrive.
Not only was it startling, it was rather unwelcome. ‘Oh dear,’ she said. ‘I hope that isn’t true.’
‘Take Blockley,’ he went on, plainly enjoying himself. ‘Two deaths in the main street during your occupancy could hardly fail to raise your profile. And Cold Aston – now that was where you met the famous Ariadne Fletcher, if I’m not mistaken.’
‘I wasn’t house-sitting there,’ she flashed, before catching herself up. ‘Please stop it. I don’t know what you’re trying to do, but I don’t like it.’
He raised his shoulders and spread his hands like a true Frenchman. ‘All I’m doing is letting you know that I, and others, have been following your career with interest. Don’t worry – nobody hates you, or wants you to stop what you’re doing. It’s fascinating. But you do make people nervous – which I’m sure you can understand.’
She smiled feebly. ‘I think one or two positively hate me, actually.’
‘Oh well – you can’t please everybody. At least you’ve never been under suspicion yourself for any of the crimes you get involved in.’
Not yet, she thought ruefully, remembering Drew’s recent difficulties in Broad Campden.
A thought struck her. ‘Did Harriet know all this about me, before she engaged me?’
‘Harriet makes it her business to know things,’ he said obliquely. ‘I think of her as a spider, watching from the centre of a web that very few people can see. Harriet loves to make things happen.’
Thea was feeling more and more unsteady at so many revelations. ‘She knew about Drew as well, then? She knew it was likely that I’d introduce him to Donny.’ She frowned. ‘But how could she know that?’
He watched her face and said nothing. ‘I liked Harriet,’ Thea went on. ‘She seemed open and genuine. And I can’t believe she had any idea that Donny would die while she was away. She was his friend.’
‘She’ll be very upset about it, I’m sure. But I don’t think he was indispensable to her. There are plenty more where Donny came from.’
She frowned at him, wondering what he could possibly mean. ‘You make it sound as if she’s some sort of Frankenstein. Why does she need sick old men? What are you trying to say?’
‘She doesn’t need them. Don’t be stupid. She just likes to collect people to take an interest in. Grist to her mill, so to speak. She likes to study human nature.’
‘You’ve seen her book, I take it?’
His astonishment was gratifying. ‘Have you?’
She tried to minimise the breadth of her smile. ‘Oh yes.’
‘I bet she didn’t show it to you. Have you been snooping around the Manor? I’ll tell on you if you have.’ He said the last words with the sing-song lilt of a child in the playground. The fact that he was a heart surgeon returned to her with a sudden force. He simply could not be as frivolous and unengaged as he seemed. He was playing a manipulative game – and yet there was not the slightest hint that he cared about any of the people under discussion.
‘Do what you like,’ she said stiffly.
He seemed to catch himself up, giving himself a perceptible little shake. ‘No, but seriously – how did you find it?’
‘A friend of mine noticed it. I had no idea it was a secret. She uses her own name on the front cover, after all.’
‘True. But she felt confident that nobody in Cranham was going to come across it.’
‘Except you.’
‘I have special privileges where Harriet is concerned. Or rather, it’s the other way around, I suppose. I owe my daughter’s life to her, which tends to forge rather a substantial bond between us.’
‘That’s an interesting situation for a doctor,’ she remarked lightly. ‘What happened?’
‘Oh, the peanut thing. We had no idea Tamsin was allergic until one day when she was in the playground with some little friends, while I stood guard with Jasper. The bloody dog distracted me, and I left my post for five minutes. Tam was offered a piece of Lion Bar by somebody’s stupid mum, and by the time I got back she was in full-blown anaphylactic shock. Harriet was kneeling over her, keeping the airways open, while someone else’s big sister produced the epinephrine that somebody always carries these days. There’s me, a consultant surgeon, completely at a loss.’
The familiar sense of unfathomable connections and histories in the communities she touched for a week or two flowed through Thea. If she was lucky, she would be adopted by a knowledgeable individual and apprised of the basics, which helped her avoid some of the pitfalls. But in Cranham nobody had taken on that role. Never before could she remember being so at sea, so unable to judge truth from falsehood, benevolence from hostility. Never before had people’s motives been so obscure and difficult to read.
She rubbed her head irritably, and gave up the attempt to discern patterns or meanings in the things Philippe was saying. ‘I would ask you to tell me the whole story, but I don’t feel strong enough at the moment. I’ve just walked three or four miles, and it’s hot. Shouldn’t you be somewhere as well?’ For the first time, she wondered how it was he could escape from his family to go to the pub in the middle of a Saturday. She remembered her first impression of him, as a gay man, parading through Cranham with his peculiar dog, seeking to make an impression on whatever rare passers-by he might encounter. It seemed ludicrous now she knew that he had a wife and daughter and a very onerous profession.
‘I know what. Do you have any plans for tomorrow?’
She shrugged warily. ‘Not really.’
‘Come to lunch, then. You should meet my wife, for one thing, and Tamsin already took to you. Plus Jasper has something to show you.’
‘OK. Thanks very much. Tell me where you live, exactly.’
He gave her brief and easy directions. She felt a thread of anticipation at the prospect. She couldn’t remember when she last had a normal Sunday lunch in a house with a family.
‘Now I’m sure we should both get on,’ she said, wondering at her own restlessness.
‘I’m abandoned for the day,’ he said. ‘I’ve got all the time in the world.’
As if the Fates had been waiting for just this utterance, the pub door opened and a female figure appeared, quickly scanning the tables in the bar.
‘Philip!’ she cried, pronouncing the name in the English fashion, ‘I’ve been looking everywhere for you. I need you to come and look at my computer. The drive thingummy isn’t working again.’
‘Coming, Mother,’ he said brightly. ‘Just give me one minute.’
Thea savoured this echo of the episode at the Manor when an impatient Jemima had summoned Toby every bit as imperiously. Was it the universal norm now for women to show no finesse when instructing their menfolk? Or was it particular to Cranham?
She wished she’d had the gumption to order a meal in the pub when she had the chance. Left alone with the dog in the still-crowded bar, she could not face eating in solitude. Besides, it was probably too late now, her watch informing her that it was almost half past two.
‘Come on, then,’ she muttered to the dog. ‘Time to go home.’
It was true that she felt tired and somehow overloaded. Philippe had not been a comfortable companion, on the whole. He gave an impression of playing a game, acting a part, leaving his essential character unknowable. Thea disliked games of that sort. The older she got, the easier she found it to avoid them by deliberately turning passive and incurious. But this time, she had been drawn in further than she liked, to the point where she felt an imbalance, an unfairness, whereby the man was teasing her, exploiting her ignorance, while giving very little away. Even his dog had known better than to try to establish any kind of friendly relationship with Thea or Hepzibah. It appeared not to have much affection for its master, either, following him on its delicate little feet as if conferring a favour, its nose still aloofly pointing skywards.
There was, somewhere, a question of dignity. For a man of forty to be publicly summoned by his mother in such a way might be seen as humiliating. And yet he had responded cheerfully, somehow managing to make her appear the ridiculous one – and even more cleverly, letting his dog maintain a regal air on his behalf. None of the people in the pub who had witnessed the little scene showed any sign of thinking it laughable or worthy of comment. Thea caught one or two exchanged glances, slight smiles, but nothing more than an acknowledgement that Mrs Hastings had come to find her son, and he had willingly gone to sort out her computer problem, as any decent man might do.
She took the path leading to the common, forking right to Hollywell, and tiredly walking up the drive to the Manor. She passed little girls sitting in a huddle beside the front gate of a house, examining something with absolute concentration. It was a scene all the more appealing for its rarity in these days of captive kids, seldom permitted outside without supervision. But in the light of the alarming story about Tamsin in the playground, she had to concede that supervision was frequently a good thing. Certainly it could be effectively employed as an argument on the side of the risk-averse. Every child was so indescribably precious that much was readily sacrificed in the interests of their safety. Thea did not like it, but she could barely remember a time when it had been any different. Idly, she wondered how historians would look back at this period. Would they calmly comment that the actual levels of safety were so unprecedentedly high that people had to invent dangers for themselves? Would psychologists point out that without some sense of hazard, human beings could not properly function? After all, the vast majority of living creatures spent their lives in a state of acute alertness to danger. Or would the collective memory focus on maverick individuals who ignored the conventions of the time and went in search of challenge and adventure?
As always when such musings gripped her, she conjured her husband Carl, who had taught her to notice social changes and to kick against them if they met with her disapproval. Carl would definitely point out the scepticism that sprang up in response to establishment edicts. The fact that the establishment always won in the end would not subdue him. ‘It depends what you regard as the end,’ he would say. ‘In the end, right always prevails.’
Drew Slocombe would probably agree with him about that; she’d have to ask him sometime.