Scold's Bridle

Hughes didn't answer.

'Okay, what happened?'

'I heard the old lady coming round the path so I dived behind the coal bunker by the kitchen door.'

'Go on.'

'It wasn't her. It was some other bastard who was nosing around like me.'

'Male? Female?'

'An old man. He knocked on the back door and waited for a bit, then let himself in with a key.' Hughes pulled a face. 'So I legged it.' He saw the triumph on Jones's face. 'That what you wanted?'

'Could be. Did he have the key in his hand?'

'I wasn't looking.'

'Did you hear anything?'

'The knocking.'

'Anything else?'

'I heard a stone being moved after the knocking.'

The flowerpot. 'How do you know it was a man if you weren't looking?'

'He called out. 'Jenny, Ruth, Mathilda, are you there?' It was a man all right.'

'Describe his voice.'

'Posh.'

'Old? Young? Forceful? Weak? Drunk? Sober? Pull your finger out, lad. What sort of impression did you get of him?'

'I already told you. I reckoned it was an old man. That's why I thought it was her coming back. He was really slow and his voice was all breathy, like he had trouble with his lungs. Or was very unfit.' He thought for a moment. 'He might have been drunk, though,' he added. 'He had real trouble getting the words out.'

'Did you go round the front afterwards?'

Dave shook his head. 'Hopped over the fence and went back to the van.'

'So you don't know if he came by car?'

'No.' A flash of something-indecision?-crossed his face.

'Go on,' prompted Jones.

'I'd never swear to it, so it's not evidence.'

'What isn't?'

'I was listening, if you get my meaning. He gave me a hell of a shock when I heard him coming so I reckon I'd've heard a car if there'd been one. That gravel at the front makes a hell of a row.'

'When was this?'

'Middle of September. Thereabouts.'

'Okay. Anything else?'

'Yeah.' He fingered his shoulder gingerly where Jack's car door had slammed into it. 'If you want to know who killed the old biddy then you should talk to the bastard who dislocated my fucking arm last night. I sussed him the minute I saw his face in the light. He was forever sniffing round her, in and out that place like he owned it, but he made damn sure Ruth wasn't there at the time. I spotted him two or three times up by the church, waiting till the coast was clear. Reckon he's the one you should be interested in if it's right what Ruth told me, that the old woman's wrists were slit with a Stanley knife.'

Charlie eyed him curiously. 'Why do you say that?'

'He cleaned one of the gravestones while he was waiting, scraped the dirt out of the words written on it. And not just the once neither. He was really fascinated by that stone.' He looked smug. 'Used a Stanley knife to do it, too, didn't he? I went and read it afterwards ... 'Did I deserve to be despised, By my creator, good and wise? Since you it was who made me be, Then part of you must die with me.' Some bloke called Fitzgibbon who snuffed it in 1833. Thought I'd use it myself when the time came. Kind of hits the nail on the head, wouldn't you say?'

'You won't be given the chance. They censor epitaphs these days. Religion takes itself seriously now the congregations have started to vanish.' He stood up. 'A pity, really. Humour never harmed anyone.'

'You interested in him now then?'

'I've always been interested in him, lad.' Charlie smiled mournfully. 'Mrs. Gillespie's death was very artistic.'

Cooper found the Inspector enjoying a late pint over cheese and onion sandwiches at the Dog and Bottle in Learmouth. He lowered himself with a sigh on to the seat beside him. 'Feet playing you up again?' asked Charlie sympathetically through a mouthful of bread.

'I wouldn't mind so much,' Cooper grumbled, 'if my inside had aged at the same rate as my outside. If I felt fifty-six, it probably wouldn't bug me.' He rubbed his calves to restore the circulation. 'I promised the wife we'd take up dancing again when I retired, but at this rate we'll be doing it with Zimmer frames.'

Charlie grinned. 'So there's no truth in the saying: you're as old as you feel?'

'None whatsoever. You're as old as your body tells you you are. I'll still feel eighteen when I'm a bedridden ninety-year-old and I still won't be able to play football for England. I only ever wanted to be Stanley Matthews,' he