however, would be something worth hiding from the circles in which she moved these days. ‘Were they lovers?’ he asked.
Ethel Stuke glared at him as though he had deliberately tried to offend her. ‘Of course not,’ she said. ‘Prisoners might occasionally get that sort of thing into their heads, but it’s knocked out of them before it starts. It’s certainly not something an officer would get involved with, not even Bannerman. But it did backfire a little—Vale ended up sticking to her like glue, which probably wasn’t convenient once Bannerman started aspiring to better things.’
‘Who else did Miss Bannerman associate with? Was she close to any of the other warders, or anyone outside the prison?’
‘No. You say goodbye to a social life when you take that job on. That comes hard to most people at first, but not her. The prison was her life—she didn’t seem to need anything else. A career was all she cared about.’
‘And what happened to Eleanor Vale?’
‘Bannerman cast her on the scrap heap as soon as she got this new job up north. I took over the lease on her house in Holloway, as it happens, but I told her I wouldn’t have Vale boarding there so she must have asked her to go. She gave me a note with her new address and wished me well, but she didn’t say anything about Vale, and I never heard anything more about her. I don’t know where she went. I wrote to Bannerman a couple of times in Leeds, but she never bothered answering. The next thing I know, her name starts turning up in the newspapers and she’s more important than the Queen.’
‘I don’t suppose you still have that Leeds address, do you? And the London house which you took on after she left?’
‘It’s probably somewhere about.’ She left the room and went next door, where Penrose guessed she slept; he doubted that she managed the stairs very often these days. When she returned, she was carrying a photograph album stuffed full of pictures and newspaper clippings; from what he could see, most of them were reports of major trials, and it seemed surreal to him to look down at the faces of convicted criminals where he would normally have expected to find family photographs or souvenirs of treasured holidays. ‘Here it is,’ she said, and handed him a piece of paper.
‘May I borrow this?’ he asked, and she nodded curiously. ‘Did you give this to Miss Baker?’
‘No. She wasn’t interested in anything else after I told her about what had happened in the prison.’
‘And did she show you a photograph from a magazine?’ She shook her head. ‘Then I’ve taken up enough of your time, Miss Stuke. Thank you—you’ve been very helpful.’ She looked almost sorry to see him go; in spite of her protestations, she clearly welcomed company if it involved the past, and that augured well for Josephine; the least he could do was pave the way for her. ‘A friend of mine is writing a novel based on the Sach and Walters case,’ he explained. ‘I wondered if you’d be kind enough to help her with her research.’
‘If it’s a novel, she’s hardly likely to be interested in the truth, is she?’
He was surprised by the vehemence of the response. ‘The two things aren’t mutually exclusive. Anyway, I couldn’t help noticing that you like crime fiction.’
‘I can’t bear it.’
‘But it takes up an awful lot of space on your bookshelf.’
‘Most of the things in here are what my sister left. I have read them, but they’re full of mistakes—not unlike her outlook on life in general.’
He couldn’t help the note of irritation in his voice. ‘So you read them to find fault with them?’
‘No one who’s touched real crime would give them the time of day,’ she said, and he wondered what she would say if she knew how much like Celia Bannerman she sounded. ‘So I’m afraid I can’t help your friend.’
As he stood up to go, his hat caught one of the plants and he remembered what Josephine had said to him. ‘Did Celia Bannerman put violets on the bodies after Sach and Walters’s execution?’ he asked as she walked him slowly to the door.
‘No. I did.’
He was astonished. ‘After everything you’ve said about punishment and paying for their crimes, you offer them a final mark of respect like that. Why?’
‘Because by that stage they were innocent again in the eyes of God,’ she said. ‘That’s the point—they’d paid the price and
Josephine was pleased to feel the air on her face after the long journey, and even more pleased to discover that she didn’t have to share it with a crowd of people; the narrow lane down to the estuary was almost deserted, and she was able to stand at the water’s edge and take in the view without any distraction other than her own thoughts. The tide was out, exposing wide expanses of glistening mud, much to the delight of the wading birds and wildfowl which wintered there, and across the river she could see the lighthouse and church tower which marked the boundaries of a nearby town. The ferry which might have taken her there was shut up for the winter, but she had no intention of gravitating towards anything busier than the bank she was standing on; instead, she set out along the beach, enjoying the crunch of the shingle beneath her feet and the unassailable sense of solitude.
The Suffolk horizon was dominated by the energies of sea and sky, and by the endlessly fascinating play of light on water. At first, the sea seemed flat and grey, but she soon noticed that if you looked at it closely, the water was flecked by hundreds of metallic shades of silver and gold, and she felt that it was the sea of childhood—felt it so strongly, in fact, that she wondered if her parents
When she could stand the cold no longer, she turned inland and used the imposing chimneys of a red-brick manor house to guide her back to the village. The Old Cottage Tearooms occupied a pretty, single-storey white building opposite the village green. The beams and floorboards were ingrained with centuries of living and, as she took a table next to the fireplace, she relished the smell of home cooking which filled the room. A bell over the door had rung when she walked in, and she sensed the proprietor hovering behind the kitchen door long before she emerged. ‘What can I get you, Madam?’ she asked, stoking up the fire.
‘Some tea, please—and crumpets if you’ve got them.’
‘Jam or cheese?’
‘Oh, just butter, thank you.’
She smiled, and Josephine knew what was coming next. ‘You’re not from round these parts with an accent like that,’ the woman said, brushing some imaginary crumbs from the table.
Josephine was tempted to claim her Suffolk heritage, but she didn’t want to encourage any more conversation than she had to. ‘No, I’m only visiting,’ she said. ‘A friend of mine’s calling on someone in the village, so I thought I’d have something to eat while I’m waiting for him. I don’t expect he’ll be long.’ The woman took the hint and disappeared into the kitchen, and Josephine breathed a sigh of relief. From where she sat, she could see across the green; there was no sign of Archie yet, so she took the envelope from her bag, found her glasses, and began to read. The handwriting was—as he had said—impossible, but she was growing used to it by now, and its quirks and idiosyncrasies were almost as familiar to her as her own.
‘
‘There you are—crumpets with plenty of butter, and a nice pot of tea.’ She unloaded the tray, and stood back to admire her own handiwork. ‘It’s something sweet you’re missing. I’ve just got a lovely cinnamon and walnut cake out of the oven—how about a nice slice of that?’
Josephine smiled stoically back at her. ‘Perfect,’ she said, willing to try anything that might keep the woman busy. She went back to her reading, conscious now that her time was limited and wishing she’d braved the cold to sit in a sand dune.
