‘I see. How is your son now?’
‘Very ill, but thank you for asking, sir. He has something called “paranoid schizophrenia with complications”, so the consultant told me. He’s in a flat in a housing association tenancy in York. It has a controlled entry so that gives him some protection, and he gets an injection of his medication each week which keeps him. . level. . but that’s not the right word, that’s not the word the consultant uses.’
‘Stable?’ Yellich suggested.
Jeff Sparrow smiled. ‘Yes, that’s the word he used. And because he has his medication injected they know he takes it. I often think it’s like pruning or pollarding a fruit tree, or making sure a lawn is very closely cut, stopping the wild thing inside from growing. It keeps him acceptable, like a well-cut hedge. It’s just the way I think. I’ve never been anything but a gardener. . left school to become an under gardener at Bromyards. So it’s the way I think.’
‘Understandable.’
‘But he’ll always be ill, poor lad, he’ll always be a hedge that needs trimming, but he likes the nurse who visits and the other help that’s been linked in, someone to help him do his shopping. I call round but I know he’s embarrassed about his situation so I don’t visit too often. He had his breakdown in Australia and they put him in a hospital which was run like an army camp, where the patients had to address the nurses as “sir”, but we got him home. . me and Betty had him back. Betty is deceased now but she lived to see him home and settled in his flat, all thanks to Mr Housecarl.’
‘I’m sorry.’
Jeff Sparrow opened the palm of his right hand. ‘It can’t be helped, and she was the sort of woman who would have let Tom be a burden to her, even in her autumn years. It’s best that he’s as independent as he can be.’
‘I know what you mean,’ Yellich smiled. ‘I have a son who has special needs, he’ll always be vulnerable, never have a mental age of more than twelve years. He’ll always be dependent to some degree.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that, sir.’
‘Well, what can I say? We. . my wife and I, were disappointed of course, but he gives us so much. He’s so warm and generous and a whole new world has opened up to us, and for us, as we have met other parents with Down’s Syndrome children.’
‘I know what you mean, sir. You know I loved my son more when he became ill. I just don’t want him to be a future prime minister any more. . or an international sportsman.’
‘I feel the same. So, Bromyards. .’ Yellich brought the conversation back on track but he sensed he had developed a rapport with Jeff Sparrow. He sensed he had made an ally.
‘Aye, Bromyards. . the bodies. I saw the television news last night. . a rum do.’
‘You wouldn’t know anything about that?’
Jeff Sparrow smiled. ‘No, it’s ten years now since I left Bromyards. Mr Housecarl just shrank back into the house, lost interest in the garden. They tell me that he was living in just one room at the very end, poor old soul.’
‘He was,’ Yellich nodded and committed the ‘ten years’ to memory. It meant none of the remains could have been there for more than ten years.
‘I just don’t like that thought, the thought of him dying like that. Once he lived in the whole house and saw to it that the gardens and grounds were well tended. Then one by one the staff were let go, and he was generous, each man or woman got a year’s pay as a. . there’s a word. .’
‘Severance pay?’
‘Possibly that’s it. . but a whole year’s money. Generous. . I used my money to help Tom furnish his flat.’
‘Good of you.’
‘Well, there’s no pockets in a shroud.’
‘Indeed. So tell me about the kitchen garden.’
‘That was one of the last places to be abandoned. The lawn in front of the house was
‘Did it have a lock on the door?’
‘Yes it did, it was always kept well-greased against the elements but it was never locked. I mean, who’s going to walk a mile from the road to steal some carrots and walk a mile back? No need ever to lock the kitchen garden.’
‘So anyone could enter?’
‘Yes.’
‘Who would know it was there?’
‘All the estate workers. . whether gardeners or domestics. . they collected the vegetables.’
‘The domestics dug them up?’ Yellich was surprised at the notion.
‘No, we planted them, we dug them up when they were ready and stored them, the domestics collected them from the vegetable cold store.’
‘I see.’
‘It wasn’t a secret garden like in a children’s storybook.’
‘Could it be overlooked from the house?’
‘Not fully if I remember. If you stood by the door of the garden you could see the upper windows of Bromyards just above the far wall of the garden. So I would say that about two-thirds of the garden, that is the two-thirds nearest the house, could not be overlooked from the house.’
‘Got you.’
‘But I took up the last vegetables just before I left and then closed the door behind me. The old garden just got overgrown I suppose. . well, it would have done.’
‘Did you ever return to the house?’
‘Bromyards? Yes, I did. I used to walk up there to look at the gardens. I put my life into those acres, there’s a whole lot of me in that soil. So, yes, I used to walk up there, not so often now, but newly left I went up each week to walk the grounds. A lot of folk went to poach and I’d often meet someone I knew with a pair of hares slung over his shoulder. .’
‘Yes, Penny Merryweather told me that the estate became a good source of food for the village. She’s worried now, new owners will be moving in.’
‘Yes, we all see the end of a good time coming. I didn’t poach myself but I had a bit of cheap meat over the years, a good bit.’
‘So there were plenty of visitors to the estate?’
‘Yes. . dog walkers too. . it was a good place to take a dog and let him off the lead. . let him go exploring the grounds. More fun than letting him run on a playing field. Mind you, they were lucky not to snag a snare, but if they did, the owner was on hand to free them.’
‘Did you ever see anybody you didn’t recognize on the estate, anyone acting suspiciously?’
‘Just once.’
‘What. . who did you see?’
‘Tall bloke. . very tall. . just looking about the grounds but he was nowhere near the kitchen garden though.’
‘No matter,’ Yellich reached into his pocket for his notebook, ‘tall man you say?’
‘Yes. Six feet tall, probably more. . heavy set. . he caught my eye because he was a stranger and he wasn’t walking a dog and he wasn’t poaching.’
‘No?’
‘No, sir, no dog, and he was too brightly dressed for poaching. . and he crashed through the shrubs. No poacher would make that sort of racket; he’d have sent every pheasant and duck for miles around into the air, and every rabbit or hare down into their burrows. He was interested in the grounds, though he didn’t seem interested in the house. He wasn’t a burglar.’
‘That is very interesting, very interesting indeed.’ Yellich made notes.
‘Yes, I thought it was a bit funny. . you know “curious”. . if that’s the word. It certainly sank into my mind and
