An Air That Kills Read online

  ‘I hadn’t thought of it like that,’ Philip said. ‘Makes it seem even worse.’

  ‘I’m better now.’

  ‘Is there something wrong? Something it would help to tell me?’

  Jill shook her head. She left it unclear which question she was answering. Philip seemed not to notice.

  ‘You know – a trouble shared, eh?’

  No. Jill thought. No, no, no.

  ‘Overwork, that’s what it is. And all those parties, of course.’

  ‘Philip – don’t mention it to Charlotte, will you? Well, do if you want to. It’s just that I don’t want to make a fuss.’

  ‘Of course.’

  After a few seconds, Philip started the engine, drove slowly out of the station yard and turned left on to a main road rising gently towards the town centre. After fifty yards he was forced to stop.

  ‘This is what made me late,’ he said. ‘There’s a demolition job over there. They’ve had to cordon off part of the road for their vehicles.’

  A youthful policeman was directing the traffic. Jill glanced at the warren of buildings on the other side of the road. Some of them had lost their roofs. Most of the windows were broken. The brickwork of the warehouse at one end of the site was blackened, as if by fire.

  ‘Bomb damage?’

  ‘Natural wear and tear. The Rose in Hand has been falling apart for centuries.’

  ‘The what?’

  ‘It used to be the name of an inn. See? That building with the tall gables. They’re pulling down everything from there to the warehouse, and there are some yards and outbuildings behind and at the side. And that’s just the first stage. The site’s part of an area called Templefields which stretches up to the town centre. It’s all very rundown. I imagine they’ll eventually pull most of it down.’

  ‘What are they planning to do here?’

  ‘There’s going to be a car park and some council houses. All part of Lydmouth’s contribution to our brave new world.’

  Jill glanced at him, catching the unfamiliar note of cynicism in his voice. ‘I’d have thought you’d approve of that.’

  His mouth twisted into a smile. ‘I do. But Charlotte feels the working classes have managed perfectly well without flush lavatories for centuries, so why start bothering now? Also, of course, she thinks it’s vandalism to bulldoze the existing buildings out of existence. She’s got a point. Some of them are very old.’

  Jill said nothing. She watched a file of workmen walking slowly along the narrow pavement from the warehouse. They were laden with tools and their heads were bowed. The rain fell steadily on them. They turned under an archway at the other end of the site.

  ‘Not much of a job, eh?’ Philip said.

  The policeman turned and waved them on. Philip let out the clutch. The Rover moved forward.

  ‘No,’ Jill said. ‘Not much of a life either.’

  Chapter Two

  There were four of them in the line. The three in the front were bunched tightly together. After a gap of a couple of yards, Charlie Meague followed. He had the ghost of a swagger and his eyes flickered from side to side. He was taller than the others, a dark, good-looking man wearing army boots and trousers below a shabby tweed jacket. He hadn’t bothered to shave or wear a collar. His flat cap was pulled down low over his face.

  Under the archway, Charlie hesitated. The other three walked on. He moved to the shelter of a doorway, rested the sledgehammer against the wall and took a half-smoked cigarette from the top pocket of his jacket. After he had smoothed it out, he lit it with a match. Staring at the traffic, he noticed the Wemyss-Browns’ Rover going up the hill. He exhaled smoke and spat across the pavement into the roadway.

  ‘Meague! Come on, you lazy bugger.’

  Charlie hoisted the sledgehammer on to his shoulder. With the cigarette in the corner of his mouth, he sauntered out from the archway and across the yard. The other men were picking their way through a ruined barn. Ted Evans, the foreman, beckoned impatiently. His mouth was pursed with irritation.

  Charlie followed them into the barn. The roof had gone and the interior was heaped with rubble and charred beams. Evans pushed the left-hand leaf of the huge double doors on the far wall. It moved a few inches. There was a rending sound as the top hinge parted company with the gatepost.

  ‘The wood’s like wet cardboard. Give me the sledgehammer.’

  Charlie passed it to him. Evans swung it at the lower hinge. A spark flashed as metal collided with metal. The gate groaned and swayed. Evans swung the hammer again. Wood cracked. The door tore itself free from its one remaining hinge and fell outwards.

  Beyond the barn was another yard. Heavy double gates, reinforced with iron and topped with spikes, were immediately opposite. To the left was a range of stabling. Other buildings, their original purpose harder to guess, had been reduced to mounds of stone, earth and dead and dying weeds. A leafless elder tree stood on one of the mounds. The roofs and gables of the Rose in Hand were visible on the right.

  ‘See that?’ Evans waved at one of the ruins. ‘We’re going to cut a trench through there.’

  ‘For God’s sake,’ Charlie said. ‘Why can’t they use the bloody digger? That’s what it’s for.’

  Evans stabbed a finger at Charlie. ‘Listen, Meague. You trying to tell me how to do my job?’

  ‘Just asking a civil question.’

  The foreman came a step closer. He was several inches shorter than Charlie, but his bulk and his long arms made him formidable. When he was angry, he lowered his voice rather than raised it.

  ‘A question? Then here are some civil answers. One, they’re already using the digger over there.’ He gestured towards the inn, on the other side of which lay the warehouse. ‘Two, we’re cheaper. Three, this is exploratory work, the sort of thing you need men for, not machines. The surveyor thinks there might be a culverted stream down there, and that’s got implications for the foundations and the drainage. Four, you give me trouble and you’ll be out on your ear. Got that, son?’

  Charlie stamped his foot and shouldered the sledgehammer like a rifle. He came to attention. ‘Yes, sir!’

  The rain pattered down from the grey sky. Evans stared up at Charlie’s face and Charlie stared back. A lorry changed gear on the main road.

  ‘Watch it,’ Evans said softly. ‘Just watch it.’ He turned to the others. ‘Right – we’ll start by clearing the rubbish out. Frank, you’d better fetch a barrow. Get another shovel, too. We’ll make a start in here.’

  Frank walked off the way they had come. Charlie flicked his cigarette away and followed the other two men through a low doorway into a small, stone-walled building which had lost its roof. A rat darted between his legs. He swore at it. The floor was visible at the end near the door, but a heap of rubbish had been thrown against the wall at the rear.

  ‘We’ll clear the bigger stuff first,’ Evans said. ‘Just pile it outside for now.’

  He picked up a pair of rusting jerry cans and lumbered into the yard with them. Charlie and the fourth man, Emrys Hughes, dragged a balk of timber from the pile and pulled it across the floor. Frank returned with the wheelbarrow, which they loaded with bricks and stones. Charlie worked mechanically, and also as slowly as he dared.

  Slowly the pile of rubble diminished. After thirty minutes’ work, they were almost down to floor level. Charlie tried to drive his shovel under a block of unsquared stone about the size of a car’s wheel. The stone was slightly higher than the level of the floor and about four feet away from the rear wall of the building. It was pinning down one end of a sheet of rusting corrugated iron which extended back under what was left of the rubble.

  The angle was wrong and Charlie couldn’t get any leverage on the stone. He brought the shovel closer to the vertical and dug down with all his strength. The end of the sheet of corrugated iron disintegrated under the pressure. The blade of the shovel disappeared and he lurched forward.

  ‘There’s a hole in the floor, look,’ Charlie said.
‘The stream?’

  Evans left the wheelbarrow by the doorway. The hole was no more than a crack. He squatted and tried to peer around the stone and the shovel.

  ‘Damned if I know. Help me move it.’

  He and Charlie rocked the stone to and for until they could ease it away from the shovel and back on to the nearest flagstone. Together they dragged out the sheet of corrugated iron which was still covered with bricks, smaller stones and earth. The sheet was larger than Charlie had expected: it stretched almost as far as the walls on either side of the building – about eight feet – and back to the rear wall. With the help of the others, they manoeuvred it into the yard.

  Charlie went back inside. Evans was already there, staring at the place where the corrugated iron had been. There were no flagstones below: instead there was a shallow depression lined with earth, shards of china and clay, old bricks and fragments of timber. The hole was the full width of the building and it went back to the rear wall; it reminded Charlie of a large, half-filled grave. A pair of eyes gleamed at them from the darkest corner and then vanished. Evans picked up a half-brick and threw it where the eyes had been.

  ‘What the hell was this place?’ Charlie asked.

  Evans ignored the question. Using the shovel, he scraped earth away from the edge of the last row of flagstones. Butting against the flagstones were the remains of wooden posts.

  ‘You’ve found a shithouse, boy.’ Evans glanced up at Charlie. ‘That’s an old earth closet, look, or maybe there was once a cesspool under all that. Those posts would have supported the seats. This was probably a two-seater. There’ll be a chamber underneath us, but it’ll be full of rubbish.’ He stooped and picked up a scrap of china. He brushed the dirt away: two flowers, one red and one green, appeared against a delicate grey background. He sucked his teeth. ‘That’s been there for a while. Bit of an old teacup, that is. What they call Lowestoft ware.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘My dad used to be sexton up at St John’s.’ Evans put the piece of china in his trouser pocket. ‘They were always turning up stuff like that. Old vicar used to say what it was sometimes.’

  He turned away and told Frank to bring the wheelbarrow in. Charlie thought Evans seemed embarrassed and annoyed – as if he’d made a confidence he hadn’t intended to make.

  ‘Come on,’ Evans said to no one in particular. ‘We’ll have to dig it out. Let’s get on with it.’

  ‘A shithouse?’ Charlie said. ‘No wonder the rats like it.’

  ‘Not much here for them now. I reckon this place hasn’t been used as a privy for years. Looks like they’ve been dumping builders’ rubbish since the battle of Waterloo.’

  They shovelled earth, bricks and small stones into the wheelbarrow. At intervals, Frank pushed the barrow away and dumped the spoil in the corner of the yard. Charlie noticed that he was going through the contents of the heap with the tip of his spade.

  ‘What are you looking for?’

  ‘Never know your luck, eh?’ Frank said. ‘Mate of mine in Bristol had a job digging out an old privy. Found a gold sovereign down there.’

  Emrys Hughes looked up sharply. ‘I reckon we should take turns with the barrow.’

  ‘You’re paid to work,’ Evans said in a voice so soft it was almost a whisper. ‘If you want to look for buried treasure, you do it in your own time.’

  Frank shied away as though Evans had hit him. ‘Sorry. I didn’t mean—’

  ‘Just shut up.’ Evans turned away. He nodded to Charlie: ‘Get hold of the end of that beam.’

  They had uncovered a worm-eaten and roughly squared length of timber which lay diagonally across the opening to the chamber with one end against the rear wall. It was nearly a foot beneath the level of the flagstones. Charlie pushed his shovel underneath and used it to lever it out of its bed of earth. Another rat darted out and ran over the handle of the shovel. With sudden ferocity, Evans brought down his own shovel on the rat as it was running for the doorway. Charlie glanced down at the inert bundle of fur. It was beginning to ooze blood over the grey flagstone.

  ‘That’s old, that is,’ Evans said calmly, nodding towards the beam. ‘Cut by hand, look. Maybe it fell in there when the roof caved in.’

  He pushed his shovel under the beam. He and Charlie eased it away from its resting place.

  ‘What’s that?’ Charlie said. He pointed at what looked like a wooden box, about eighteen inches long and twelve inches wide, which lay beside the wall. The beam had masked it completely. He scrambled over to the box: it was no more than six inches deep, and the wood was peppered with wormholes.

  ‘Bring it here,’ Evans ordered.

  Charlie shrugged, guessing that if there was anything worth finding, Evans intended to have a claim to it. He picked up the box and discovered that it had been lying upside down. The lid was still embedded in the earth. He passed the box to Evans and picked up the lid. There was a scrap of paper on it, some earth and a few fragments of bone.

  ‘I’ll have that too.’

  Holding the lid as though it were a tray, Charlie handed it to Evans. The foreman poked the collection of objects with a blunt finger. He picked up a handful of earth and crumbled it; inside was a piece of blackened and twisted metal which he tapped on the palm of his hand.

  ‘Look,’ Evans said. ‘There’s a pin on the back. Some kind of brooch, maybe.’

  He scraped at it with his fingernail and some more of the dry, powdery earth dropped away, revealing a shape like a squat figure of eight with a pair of prongs projecting from each of two opposite sides. The other three men had gathered round but, with a wave of his hand, he pushed them away.

  ‘You’re getting in my light. I think it’s silver.’

  ‘What’s it worth?’ said Frank quickly.

  ‘How do I know? I think it’s a sort of knot pattern.’

  Frank laughed. ‘A true love’s knot.’

  Charlie picked up the box itself and examined it. He frowned, because something nudged his memory. He turned the box over and over in his hands. At either end there were crudely made iron handles stapled to the wood. There had been no hinges – the lid had simply rested on the base.

  He put the box down and crouched beside the lid and its contents. He picked up one of the little bones.

  ‘What do you think they came from?’ he asked. ‘A cat or something?’

  ‘It is silver,’ Evans said. ‘Look, there’s a hallmark. What did you say, Charlie?’

  Charlie noticed that in the excitement of the moment Evans had called him by his Christian name. He said. ‘The bones – I wondered what they came from.’

  Evans glanced at them – at first without curiosity. Then his face changed: the features sharpened, and he stared intently at the cluster of grubby little objects. Still clutching the brooch, he crouched beside the lid and picked up a bone. He looked up at Charlie. When he spoke his voice was unexpectedly gentle.

  ‘I think they’re human, son. I think you’ve found yourself a dead baby.’

  Chapter Three

  Charlotte Wemyss-Brown raised the silver teapot. China tea trickled from the spout. Most of the tea landed in the cup, but some of it dribbled down the curving spout and landed on the lace doily which covered the silver tray.

  ‘Damn,’ she muttered.

  ‘Why the hell do we use that pot?’ Philip said. ‘It always does that.’

  Charlotte, who was sitting on a low armchair to the left of the fire, rotated the upper half of her substantial body towards her husband. The effect reminded Jill of a swivelling gun turret on a warship. Philip was standing behind the sofa with a cigarette box in his hand.

  ‘But it’s very pretty,’ Jill said. ‘Is it Georgian?’

  Charlotte’s attention swung back towards the visitor. ‘Yes – late Georgian. It was my grandmother’s. Most of our silver came from her.’

  There was a good deal of silver on display in the drawing room at Troy House. The milk jug, the sugar bowl and the teaspo
ons were silver; so too was the cigarette box in Philip’s hand and the frames of the photographs on the mantelpiece. Silver twinkled on the small, gilt-encrusted desk in the bay window. There was also a wall-mounted display cabinet containing an array of silver snuff boxes.

  ‘Philip,’ Charlotte snapped. ‘Aren’t you going to pass Jill her tea?’

  Philip bustled forward and gave Jill her cup. ‘Trouble with silver is the cleaning,’ he said. ‘Mrs Meague was telling me all about it only the other day.’

  ‘That’s one less cross you’ll have to bear, dear,’ Charlotte said.

  ‘Don’t tell me we’re getting rid of the silver?’

  ‘I was referring to Mrs Meague.’

  ‘She’s handed in her notice?’

  ‘No, dear. I was obliged to ask her to leave.’

  ‘Whatever for?’

  ‘First she wanted a loan. Came to me with some cock-and-bull story about needing money for an operation. She had the nerve to insinuate that she’d leave me in the lurch if I couldn’t help her. I said no, of course. Then later this morning I caught her slipping one of those snuff boxes into the pocket of her pinafore.’

  ‘What did you do?’

  Charlotte left Philip’s question hanging in the air and turned to Jill. ‘Mrs Meague has helped Susan with the heavy cleaning for the last few years. Not an ideal arrangement as far as I was concerned, but then it’s so terribly difficult to get any sort of help in the house these days.’

  ‘Have you told the police?’ Philip asked.

  ‘No.’ Charlotte hesitated and covered her hesitation by turning to add hot water to the teapot. ‘I suppose I should have done. It’s just that – she’s having rather an awful time at present. What with that son of hers.’

  Philip lit a cigarette with the lighter on the mantelpiece. ‘Charlie Meague’s one of our local ne’er-do-wells,’ he explained to Jill. ‘He moved to London after the war. But a couple of months ago, he decided to come back to Mum.’