Ant was still breathing hard and quelling an urge to thump his father in the chest out of sheer frustration, when someone knocked on the front door. ‘Who’s that?’ said Digby. ‘Go and see, there’s a good lad.’
The tone was intolerably patronising, and brought to mind the ‘little boy’ comment made by Bronya that very morning. ‘I am not a lad,’ he snarled. ‘I’m thirty-five years old.’
‘Just answer the door,’ said his father, with a sigh.
A duo of uniformed constables was standing there, looking irritated and puzzled after struggling with the electric gate. ‘We didn’t have to speak to anyone before it opened,’ said one, waving back down the driveway.
‘Don’t worry about it,’ advised Ant.
The other man was staring wide-eyed at the obvious mismatch between the main house and the battered converted stable. ‘We’ve just come from talking to Mrs Blackwood,’ he said. ‘She told us we would have to phone you to gain access.’
Ant simply waited for them to explain their presence. The materialisation of police officers, when he had only just been suggesting he call them, felt like some sort of magic trick. And then as if by more magic, his father was at his elbow. ‘Morning, lads,’ he said, rather loudly. ‘What can we do for you, then?’
‘It’s concerning an item of jewellery that appears to have been misappropriated,’ said the first man stiffly. ‘It has been reported by the lady of the big house, who suggested we speak to you about it. In particular she mentioned Mrs Beverley Frowse.’
‘She’s not here,’ said Digby. ‘We heard that poor old Rufus lost track of his wife’s Christmas present. He’ll be in the doghouse, sure enough.’
Ant was slowly processing his father’s behaviour. The hail-fellow-well-met delivery was one of his favoured methods of addressing those in authority; a refusal to show any sort of deference. It was not that so much as the words, and the haste with which he spoke them. The implication was that Digby did not want his son to reveal the truth about Beverley’s disappearance and subsequent phone call. Ant was strongly tempted to ignore these wishes and dump all his worries onto these official shoulders.
He’s dead, you see, and I won’t be able to come home. Beverley’s words repeated endlessly inside his head, until it had reached the point where they had become almost meaningless. He wanted somebody to explain them to him in a way that would not mean trouble. Because on the face of it, they were very troubling indeed.
But the police had come about the stupid Blackwoods and their missing package. ‘Oh, yes,’ he said. ‘Her daughters spoke to me about that this morning. I bumped into them in town.’
‘You never mentioned that to me, son,’ said Digby. He smiled at the policemen. ‘Busy time, as you’ll appreciate. Trying to earn an honest crust in these last few days before the big event. Plenty of parcels and so forth going missing, I shouldn’t wonder. Shame you got called out for something so unimportant when you must have plenty of better things to do.’
This comment was allowed to drop without response. ‘We have to ask you, sir, whether you have any knowledge of the whereabouts of the item in question?’
Digby widened his eyes. ‘I don’t even know what the darned item is. Some tasteless piece of female ornament, I assume. Wasn’t it insured? Is Mrs Blackwood accusing us of taking it? That’s a bit rich, wouldn’t you say, son?’ He turned his wide-eyed gaze onto Ant.
‘We haven’t seen it, whatever it is,’ said Ant. ‘We’d be pretty stupid to steal something from our own landlord, don’t you think?’
It was impossible to misinterpret the look that passed between the two officers. People who live like this are capable of anything it said. The word ‘Gypsies’ was silently circling around. All four men were standing in the cluttered hallway of the Old Stables, the dog gazing suspiciously at the intruders.
Ant was still far more concerned about his mother than he was about some missing gewgaw. It seemed ludicrous to remain silent on the subject, when he had the police right there in front of him. They could find her, probably with ease, once they knew her car registration number. But now she had been named as a likely thief, it was all even more complicated, and he said nothing. They were perfectly capable of interpreting her words − assuming he quoted them, which he probably wouldn’t – as a confession to a killing. And if he didn’t quote them, there was hardly anything meaningful to say.
‘Well, then,’ the first officer finally concluded, ‘we won’t disturb you any longer. You’ll notify us if you happen to locate the item, won’t you?’
‘Of course. But that isn’t going to happen, is it?’ said Digby. ‘Now, have a happy Christmas, lads, and don’t worry about that infernal gate. It’ll open if you just push the red button.’
When they’d gone, Digby slumped back into his chair with a groan. ‘Takes more out of me than it used to – play-acting like that. Bloody Blackwoods, accusing us of taking their stuff. As if we ever would!’
‘You didn’t want me to mention Mum, then?’
‘Absolutely not. You did well, son. I was worried for a minute.’
Ant went back to obsessing about his mother’s phone call. He squeezed every conceivable interpretation from her words as the day wore on. She had killed someone and was afraid of being caught. She had been living a double life, married to two men at the same time, and the one who wasn’t Digby had died. The dead person had been suffering from Ebola and Beverley was afraid to contaminate her loved ones. Or it wasn’t a person
