‘I’ll see what Webster comes back with before I find a job for DS Yellich.’
‘Mr Yellich seems to be fighting his way through a mountain of paperwork at the minute, sir.’ Pharoah turned to leave Hennessey’s office.
‘Imagine he is. . but the Bromyard investigation has to take priority.’
‘Two p.m. tomorrow.’ Sydney Canverrie, by the nameplate on his desk, seemed to Webster to be doing very well out of the undertaking business and he further seemed to be untouched by the ever-present presence of death. He was a young man, still in his twenties, so Webster guessed. He seemed to be very well nourished, was expensively dressed in a blue suit and shirt and tie, and had what Webster thought was an inappropriately jocular attitude. He could only hope that the man adopted a more sombre manner when dealing with the distraught relatives of the deceased. The office in which both men sat was lined with light-coloured, highly polished pine wood panelling and a deep pile carpet of dark red. Canverrie’s desk was large, both long and wide, and he sat in a reclinable, executive-style chair. The window of his office looked out across a neatly cut lawn to a nearby brick built building which appeared to Webster to also be part of the premises of Canverrie amp; Son of York. ‘The deceased will be interred at Heslington Cemetery on Fordham Road after a brief Anglican service in the cemetery chapel. That is the new cemetery, not the old Victorian one.’
‘Yes, I know the one you mean.’
‘And it has some interest to the police?’
‘Yes, it does, but we are more interested in observing who might be attending, rather than paying our respects to the deceased.’
‘The old boy wasn’t a felon, surely?’ A note of alarm crept into Canverrie’s voice.
‘No,’ Webster held up his hand and gave a brief and slight shake of his head, ‘he appeared to have been a good man who led a blameless life, so you can bury him with all due dignity and reverence.’
‘Good,’ Canverrie seemed relieved, ‘we would do anyway, but it’s all an act. . it’s all for show.’
‘It is?’
‘Yes, it is all for show. It was my grandfather who started the company; my father is in fact the actual “son” of the name. The undertaking business is a display of ceremony, all very serious, but that is just the image.’
‘Oh really?’ Webster scowled.
‘Yes, really. . it all starts with my introducing myself to the grieving next-of-kin and saying, “Hello, my name’s Sydney and I’ll be looking after you today. .”, with me all dressed up in my grey pinstripe and tails with a top hat, looking every inch the Victorian gentleman or bank manager. Then I walk in front of the hearse for the first few feet of the journey to the chapel, as all the relatives and friend’s cars join the convoy, and then I get into the hearse, beside the driver, and we pick up speed. So, we drop the box in the ground or hide it away behind the velvet curtains, depending on whether it’s a burial or a cremation. Then we drop the rellies off at a pub where some grub has been laid on and that’s our job done, then we do the next job.’
‘That’s interesting.’
‘You think so? Damned superficial and sometimes excruciatingly embarrassing in the case of poorly attended funerals. . one coffin and just two mourners. . a full church or chapel and a well-attended funeral is less stressful, but I am here, for better or worse.’
‘Not a happy man, I think?’
‘I am here because I am expected to carry on the family business. I’d rather be a yacht broker on the Mediterranean coast, Spain or Greece, pulling down ten to fifteen per cent on every sale, and the same percentage of any charter fee I can negotiate. So no, I am not happy in my job but I would have been disinherited if I didn’t agree to sit behind this desk, cast into ye wilderness without a penny, no seed money for my yacht and powerboat brokerage.’
‘I understand you are, sir, a pressed man.’
‘Yes. I plan to sell the business but that will only be when I inherit it, and that won’t be for a likely time.’
‘How was it you were chosen to undertake Nicholas Housecarl’s funeral?’
‘The police called us. . you lot. It was just our turn on the duty rota to attend to the recovery of the body and convey it to the Chapel of Rest. No one came forward to instruct another undertaker, and so we made all arrangements and will send our invoice to Mr Hoursecarl’s solicitors. . they have contacted us and asked us to do that. We have no instructions to cremate Mr Housecarl and so we will inter the gentleman’s remains as is the established procedure. You can always dig up a coffin if, at some future point, a next-of-kin comes forward and instructs a cremation, but you can’t un-cremate if a next-of-kin wants a burial.’
‘Fair enough.’
‘So we will always bury, it’s the rule, always bury in the absence of a clear request from the family to cremate.’
‘So, when you recovered the body from the house-’
‘Amazing old building.’
‘Yes. . you didn’t notice anyone taking an interest in the removal of the body?’
‘No, we didn’t. . I didn’t. . it was myself and three of our employees, a police constable and the doctor. All very normal, no suspicious circumstances, natural death, old boy just expired.’
Reginald Webster walked out of the air-conditioned chill of the premises of the undertakers and into the heat of the midday sun. He made a mental note that that evening he would tell Joyce that should she ever have to arrange his funeral, she should not engage the services of Canverrie amp; Son. He did not want to be planted by an uninterested man who would rather be selling yachts on the Mediterranean coast of Spain or Greece.
The Goodwin home on Cemetery Road revealed itself to be a stone-built villa, dating from the late Victorian era, within a terrace of similar houses. It had a small and neatly kept front garden which abutted the pavement. The house itself was painted white; white door and white window frames, the rest was left as naked stone. The street on which the house stood was quiet and sun drenched, causing heat hazes to rise above the asphalt surface of the road. Carmen Pharoah parked the car close to the Goodwin home though not directly outside it. She and Thomson Ventnor exited the vehicle, leaving the windows open by a matter of an inch or two, thus allowing the passenger area of the vehicle to ‘breathe’ in their absence. They then walked solemnly up to the door of the house of Goodwin. They stood for a moment before the front door as Carmen Pharoah turned to Ventnor and whispered, ‘Here we go’, and then pressed the doorbell, which made a harsh continuous buzzing sound, ceasing only when she retracted her finger.
‘Prefer the “ding dong” type myself,’ she commented, half turning to Ventnor, ‘the ones powered with batteries rather than this type which is wired to the mains.’
‘So do I,’ Ventnor paused. ‘In fact, I have a tale to tell about a battery powered doorbell.’
‘Oh?’
‘Yes, it defies logical explanation, so it’s going to form the in-flight entertainment for the journey back to Micklegate Bar.’
‘Sounds intriguing. .’ Carmen Pharoah’s voice trailed off as the sound of a security chain was heard being unhooked from within the house.
The door was opened calmly and clearly, in her own time and on her own terms by a tall, though finely built middle-aged woman whose complexion drained of colour as she realized that Carmen Pharoah and Thomson Ventnor were police officers.
She collected herself, took a deep breath and said, ‘Veronica?’
‘Possibly,’ Carmen Pharoah replied, she paused for a second and then added, ‘in fact it’s more than possible. . we can say highly probable.’
The woman glanced downwards and then briefly closed her eyes. ‘You’d better come in.’ She stepped aside with a lightness of step, which both officers noticed, and allowed them to enter her home. She invited the officers to enter her front room, being evidently the ‘best’ room of the house, which stood to the left of the hallway. Ventnor and Pharoah entered a tidy and cleanly kept lounge containing a three piece suite of an immediate post-World War Two style, with deep seating between high-sided arms, a television stood on a mobile table in the corner of the room, a mirror hung above the fireplace and a bookcase stood in the alcove on the further side of the fireplace. The room was, thought Ventnor, very 1950s and it immediately reminded him of his grandmother’s house — she had refused to redecorate her house out of respect to her husband who died tragically young in 1960. The room smelled a trifle musty through under use, being the nature of ‘best’ rooms in houses such as those which lined Cemetery
