Perhaps Professor Markham could provide the answer.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Wednesday, May 15
The next morning, energized by the prospect of learning something useful about the green maiden legend at last, I set out for the Essex village of Hatfield Broad Oak. Professor Markham, retired university lecturer and scholar, lived west of Chelmsford and a few miles southwest of Dunmow Parva, the village where Lucy Villiers had been sent to live with her aunt.
Once off the main road, I passed signposts for Helion’s Bumpsted, Sible Hedingham, Duck End, and Molehill Commons. If they ever held a contest to see which English county had the quaintest village names, Essex might take the prize.
After two wrong turns, I found the address I was looking for—20 Bedwell Court. An elderly man, stooped and skeletal, answered my knock. Tentacles of greasy gray hair lay plastered across his scalp. His cadaverous complexion matched the tattered gray cardigan that hung on his bony shoulders.
“Yes? What is it?” He squinted at me with bloodshot eyes.
“I’m Kate Hamilton. Ivor Tweedy sent me. The Domesday translation.” I held out the wrapped box.
He pounced on it and shoved an envelope at me—the check, I hoped.
“Professor Markham.” I put out my hand to prevent him from shutting the door. “Might I ask you a few questions about—”
“I don’t have time for that,” he snapped, shutting the door in my face.
I stood on the stoop, wondering whether I should ring the bell again. He probably wouldn’t answer. He’d be ripping open the package to feast his eyes on his latest acquisition.
Collecting can become as addictive as a drug. What one collects doesn’t matter. I’ve seen people spend money they didn’t have for a rare comic book from the fifties or a particularly gruesome Victorian postmortem photograph. I’ve seen collectors sign over pension checks needed to pay rent and buy food. Come to think of it, Professor Markham looked like he hadn’t eaten for days.
Well, there was nothing I could do about that. I’d completed my task. Perhaps the elderly academic would respond to a letter or an e-mail.
Since I was only twenty minutes from Dunmow Parva, I decided to drive home through the village where Lucy Villiers had been exiled after her father’s death.
Ancient as it was, Dunmow Parva was a disappointment. Whatever medieval charm it might have once possessed had been replaced by postwar prefabs, faux half-timbered shops, and blocks of nondescript terraced housing. The village did have a cricket field, a pub called The Green Maiden—that was interesting—and a market cross, signifying the village had once been granted the right to hold a regular market. And it had an early medieval church.
If the village had fallen victim to an errant German bomb, at least the Church of the Blessed Virgin had escaped destruction. It was early medieval, flint and stone, with a porch of red brick and a red tiled roof. The circular bell tower, with lancet windows and a steep, conical roof, gave it the look of a castle.
The address I remembered hearing in Tom’s office was Lark Crescent—thirty-something.
I found the street several blocks from the church.
Rows of nearly identical roughcast terraced houses faced one another. A few satellite dishes jutted from the upper floors. The postage-stamp front gardens were enclosed by fencing or low brick walls. In one, a child’s bicycle lay in the mud. In several others, multicolored plastic rubbish bins waited to be collected. Several cars were parked on the street, but no one was out.
I found a parking spot and walked along the street, checking house numbers. I pictured Lucy’s bedroom at Hapthorn Lodge—the popstar posters, the denim quilt, the window seat overlooking the back garden. How had she coped with the abrupt change in her circumstances? And why, come to think of it, had Winnifred Villiers lived in this working-class neighborhood while her brother spent a fortune on works of art?
One house stood out from the others because the garden was well tended. Stone planters on the brick wall held pansies in purples, yellows, and whites. Fake stepping-stones led to the front door, which bore a pretty iron plaque with the words “River’s Edge Cottage” painted in gold. There wasn’t a river in sight.
A pale hand moved along the edge of a lace curtain. Foolishly I waved, embarrassing us both—the resident of the house for spying, me for intruding. The hand disappeared.
I was about to return to my car, when the door opened.
“Are you looking for someone?” The woman wasn’t young—in her late forties or early fifties, I thought—but attractive, with a friendly face and chin-length hair dyed a rich auburn red. A pair of tortoise-shell glasses hung from a chain around her neck. She wore black capris. Slim freckled legs ended in a pair of orange canvas slip-ons.
“I’m sorry to bother you,” I said. “I don’t suppose you know which of these houses once belonged to Winnifred Villiers.”
“I do, as a matter of fact. Winnie lived next door, number thirty-four. She was there when my late husband and I moved in more than twenty years ago. Like a granny to our kids—she was that kind.”
“My name’s Kate Hamilton. I’m staying in Long Barston for the summer, helping out in a friend’s antiquities business.”
“You’ve come about the murder.” She said it pleasantly, as if we were talking about a day at the seaside. “I read all about it in the papers.”
“That’s right. The police are trying to locate the daughter, Lucy. I understand she lived briefly in the neighborhood.”
“That’s what caught my interest.” She stepped back from the door. “I’m Sheila Parker,” she said, peering past me in both directions. “You’d best come in, luv. I live alone since the hubs passed away, and the neighborhood isn’t as safe as it once was. Drugs, you know.” Behind the glasses, her light brown eyes were magnified, giving her the look of a friendly Irish Setter.
“I’m a widow too.” Why was I telling her this?
“We have something in common, then,”
