A couple of days after her chat with Andrew, Kate met another resident of Seaview Grange: the one she was particularly keen to meet. It was during one of her daily walks with Barney; occasionally she liked to hike up the hill to Middle Tinworthy and stroll in the woods behind the old church. On this occasion she’d actually managed to persuade Angie to accompany her. And it was there that she came across a stocky, dark-haired man walking a French bulldog and a small black pug. Kate felt sure she’d seen the pug before and, as Barney sniffed round the pug, it started yapping.
‘Bloody animal!’ said the man.
‘Ugh, noisy thing!’ Angie remarked under her breath.
‘Have you had it long?’ Kate asked politely, indicating the pug, which continued to yap.
‘It ain’t mine!’ he said. ‘I’m walkin’ it for a couple of old girls up where I work.’ He nodded his head vaguely in the direction of Upper Tinworthy. ‘Hate the thing – yaps all the time.’ He grinned. ‘I bring it down through the woods so nobody sees me with the bloody creature!’
Kate laughed. ‘It wouldn’t belong to the Potter ladies, would it?’
He sniffed. ‘They friends of yours?’
‘No, but I’m a nurse and I had occasion to visit them recently.’
He studied her for a moment. ‘Would you be that nurse what got mixed up in them murders back in the spring?’
‘That’s me,’ Kate admitted.
‘She gets mixed up with everything,’ Angie put in as she stooped down to stroke the bulldog.
‘Well, you don’t want to get mixed up with this one! Somebody had it in for Edina Martinelli you know, but you’d be spoilt for choice.’
‘I would?’
He held out a grubby hand. ‘Stan Starkey’s the name.’
‘Kate Palmer.’ She shook his hand. ‘And this is my sister, Angie.’
Stan Starkey at last! She’d been wondering how to meet this man. ‘I work up there, see, and me missus does the cleanin’. She was the one who called the ambulance.’ He sniffed loudly. ‘Bloody place! Only good thing about it is the little house they gave us, what used to be the stables. It’s separate, at the back of the house, away from all them old codgers.’
‘I don’t fancy your job though,’ Angie said. ‘All those old people…’
‘God, Angie, you’re sixty! You could be living up there!’ Kate was annoyed at Angie’s comment. ‘That remark is ageist!’
‘No, it’s not,’ Angie argued. ‘I just don’t fancy his job, OK?’
Stan laughed. ‘I’m outside most of the time; it’s Sharon who has to deal with them residents. I only go in there if somethin’ needs fixin’.’
Kate sighed. ‘I met your wife briefly,’ she said, ‘because she let me into Edina’s flat when I called recently.’
She wondered what else she could say to get him back to the subject of the old codgers when he said, ‘At least there’s one less of them now!’
‘Yes, very unfortunate,’ Kate said.
‘Are you kiddin’?’ He rolled his eyes upwards. ‘Blessed relief, more like! You ever heard her warblin’?’
Kate shook her head.
‘No? Thought not. The racket she made would curdle the milk, drove everyone mad. I wouldn’t be surprised if they all clubbed together to get that stuff and finish her off.’ He paused for a second. ‘But we got a good idea who done it. There’s this weird writer bloke who lives in the next-door flat to Edina Martinelli, and he’s had to listen to her just through the wall. He writes all that crime stuff.’
‘Cornelius Crow?’
‘That’s him. Looks like somethin’ out of a horror film. And he’s an expert on finishin’ people off in his books. And I don’t blame him, mind.’
‘That’s very interesting, Stan,’ Kate said truthfully, thinking of her list.
There was no stopping Stan now. ‘Did you meet the tubbies?’ he asked.
‘The tubbies?’ He too appeared to be somewhat deficient in political correctness.
‘Yeah, the Pratts in Flat 3. And she, Gloria’s her name, hated Edina. Now you’re goin’ to ask me why? Well, I’ll tell you why. Her husband, Ollie, was forever hangin’ round Edina, doin’ little jobs for her and that. And it was because he fancied her rotten. She gave him all of them records and things, opera stuff you know? Played it from mornin’ to night, drove Gloria mad, it did, particularly when he tried singin’ along!’ He guffawed. ‘Gloria was jealous, see.’ He bent down and attached the lead to the pug. ‘Well, I’d best be goin’; can’t stand around here chattin’ all day, still got the grass to cut. Been nice meetin’ you.’
‘Nice meeting you too,’ Kate said.
‘Next time you’re up there come in and have a cup of tea. You can have a look at the wife while you’re at it. She has asthma really bad.’
‘I’ll bear it in mind,’ Kate said.
‘Not on your life,’ murmured Angie when he was out of earshot.
When Kate got home she consulted the nine names on her list again. At the top were the stepson, David, and the Reverend Edgar Ellis, who was reputed to be a randy devil but loved Edina, and whose late wife had died of food poisoning. At the moment he appeared to be the most likely candidate. Food poisoning was not altogether uncommon, but rarely did anyone die from it.
And now Stan had mentioned Cornelius Crow. Kate was conscious of the fact that Woody said it was unfair to be listing the macabre Cornelius purely because he wrote books on the subject. Then again, he must have had to do a fair amount of research on the various methods of annihilating his characters. And, if he had to listen to Edina’s warbling at close
