dig.’
There was no answer to Jo’s persistent knocking. Worrying. She put her wellies beside the sandbag and tried the doorknob. It turned and she was able to step inside. The mat was damp to the touch of her bare feet. Some flood water, at least, had seeped into the cottage.
The interior was dark and smelt musty. But as her eyes adjusted she could see that it had been kept tidy. There was no hallway. You stepped straight into the living room. She could make out the traditional stone fireplace and stove, which was both cooker and water heater. Glass-fronted cupboards were stacked with china. The little kitchen was across the room to one side of the hearth. She felt the squelch of the carpet as she moved over it.
A small fridge was in the kitchen. The electrics didn’t seem to be working and she wasn’t going to risk trying them. She took off her backpack and put the milk and sandwiches into the fridge. To her right was a door that might have led somewhere, but on opening it she saw only steps almost entirely immersed in black water. A cellar, she supposed. This place would take months to dry out.
She stepped back, felt her heel touch something soft, and almost lost balance. She’d trodden on a dishcloth. In reaching out for support, she knocked a plate off the draining board into the sink.
A voice said, ‘Is someone there?’
She wasn’t sure where it came from, but she called out, ‘Miss Peabody, are you all right?’
‘I’m upstairs.’
Through the living room on the opposite side she found the staircase. ‘It’s all right,’ she called, to set the old lady’s mind at rest. ‘It’s only Jo from the garden centre, come to see if you need any help.’
She mounted the stairs.
‘This came to me when we were interviewing Rick,’ Hen told Gary. She was pink-faced with excitement. ‘It turns the whole case on its head. Everything has a different interpretation. This.’ She brandished the invitation card. ‘This was never intended to bring Meredith to Selsey and lure her to her death. I made a false assumption. The envelope was addressed to Dr Sentinel and intended for him. He led the dig. He should have been the guest of honour at the reunion. But of course Meredith was a D. Sc as well. She was Dr Sentinel, too, a brilliant student who got a first and went on to take her doctorate at University College. She thought the envelope was addressed to her. Her husband was away in St Petersburg and couldn’t possibly attend. The way it was worded would have appealed to anyone. Listen to this: “Free food, drink and eighties music. No reply necessary. To have fun with old friends just turn up… like the mammoth did.” Imagine Meredith reading that at a time when old sobersides was out of the country. A chance of a night out. She was up for anything. She got on a train and came down here.’
‘Why was she murdered?’
‘Question of the day, Gary. Get me Sentinel’s number.’
Miss Peabody was wearing her pink hat. A hat in your own home? Odd, certainly, but just because she was eccentric didn’t mean the poor old duck should be left to fend for herself. The blue twinset didn’t go too well with the hat. The tweed skirt? Well, it had seen better days.
‘The door was open,’ Jo explained.
‘I left it open deliberately, in case someone came,’ the old lady said. ‘When the water started to come in downstairs I collected any precious things I had and brought them up here.’
They were in her bedroom and the narrow single bed was heaped with letters, newspapers, books, and a few dry groceries.
‘Sensible,’ Jo said.
‘It’s not the first time. I’ve had three major floods in my lifetime, so I know what to do. It’s the clearing up that I hate. It takes months to dry out, even with help from the council.’
‘It’s deep in that cellar below the kitchen.’
‘That always floods first. It was used as an ice-store once, but I’ve got no use for it except to grow mushrooms. The walls leak. That’s the trouble.’
‘I heard the forecast on the car radio. I don’t think it will get much worse, if that’s any consolation.’
She stared at Jo’s feet. ‘Don’t you wear shoes?’
‘Wellies.’ Jo smiled. ‘Left them on the step. Can I make you some coffee while I’m here? I tucked a few things in the fridge.’
‘Tea would be nice. Milk and no sugar. The kettle is on the stove, so it should be hot. Have we met before?’
‘The garden centre.’
‘Oh, yes.’ She was a little forgetful.
When Jo returned with the tea on a tray, she said, ‘I have a friend called Gemma and you’re her Aunt Jessica.’
‘You know Gemma?’
‘We’ve done quite a lot together.’ And how! ‘I expect she would have come to make sure you’re all right, but I’m just up the road so I offered to look in.’
‘I don’t see a lot of Gemma these days.’
The very thing Mummy would say, given the opportunity. The older generation like to portray themselves as neglected. ‘She’s been really busy at work, having to take over from the manager.’
‘I’m her only living relative.’
Cue the plaintive violin music. ‘She told me.’
‘Her parents died when she was quite a small girl, you know. Killed in a car crash. Dreadful. Her mother was my sister, Angela. A lovely young woman. I’ve got a picture of her somewhere. It’s among the things I carried upstairs for safety. My photo album was the first thing I made sure was safe. You can’t replace such a thing and it holds so many memories.’ She spilt some of her tea turning to look over the old-fashioned eiderdown. ‘There it is. The big red book. Could you hand it to me carefully so that nothing falls out?’
Old people and old photos. Jo could see this taking longer than she’d expected. She didn’t really want to be looking at ancient snaps for the next hour.
‘I haven’t stuck them all in,’ Miss Peabody said, seating herself on the bed and opening the album on her lap. She’d drunk the tea hot and placed the empty cup back on the tray. ‘I’ve been promising myself for years that I’d do it. Well, that’s a bit of luck.’ She’d picked up a small snap in colours so faded that they were almost monochrome. ‘Here they are on their wedding day. They were married in that tiny little church at Upwaltham. A lovely setting for a wedding.’
Jo gave it a polite glance. ‘She was a beautiful bride.’
‘I was the maid of honour. I didn’t want to be called the bridesmaid. They’re usually much younger than I was. I had a pink headdress and a matching pink bouquet.’
That figures, Jo thought, wondering if the pink hat went back to those days. She handed back the photo and glanced at her watch. She’d been in the cottage twenty minutes already.
‘Carnations mainly.’ Miss Peabody was still on about the bouquet. ‘A hardy plant, the carnation. It can survive mild frost conditions and under glass it will flower all the year round.’ She started sorting through a mass of pictures. ‘Here’s one that will amuse you. Gemma at five years old with Terry. Look at her expression, as if she really could be doing something better than being made to pose for a picture with her little brother. Isn’t it a scream?’
Jo tried to show some enthusiasm. The small girl with chubby arms folded did have a pout, as if she would rather have been elsewhere. The curly-headed boy had managed a cute smile for the camera. ‘Very amusing.’
‘She was rather put out when Terry came along. It can be difficult for the older child.’
Fifteen minutes more passed and they’d only started on the photo collection. Jo was trying to think of ways of bringing this to an end without being hurtful. Outside she heard a vehicle stopping somewhere near. With any luck it would be the fire service or the police and they would take over.
No one knocked.
‘Oh, dear. Here’s the Chichester Observer report of the accident,’ Miss Peabody said, handing across a yellow press clipping. ‘It’s family history, so I kept it, but I didn’t know it was among the photos.’
Jo scanned it rapidly and then read it a second time:
