‘What are you doing here?’
‘Just visiting…
Their friendship had been sealed on one of Billy’s weekend visits to Highfield when Lucy Madden had discovered, in the course of a walk they had taken in the woods together, that not only was the sergeant unaware of the existence of chiffchaffs, he didn’t even know the difference between a shrike and a shrew. Never having encountered such ignorance in an adult before, she had taken instant pity on him and made him the object of her special attention ever since.
‘Come and see the hogs.’ She dragged him by the hand over to the lorry. ‘They’re going to slaughter,’ she informed him with relish.
‘Slaughter?’ Billy eyed her doubtfully.
‘Yes, there’ll be lots of blood.’
George Burrows, apple-cheeked and sturdy, waved a welcome. His dark-haired daughter Belle stuck shyly to his side.
‘Is Mr Madden about?’ Billy called out to him.
‘Yes, he is…’ Madden’s voice came from beyond the gate where George was standing. He emerged from the darkness within, brushing straw from his trousers and stamping mud from his boots. ‘Billy, how nice to see you. I heard you were in the neighbourhood. Helen and I were hoping you’d find time to look in.’
They shook hands – or tried to. Lucy was unwilling to relinquish possession of the one she was holding, so Billy was forced to offer his left to Madden’s grip.
‘Billy’s come to visit us.’
‘Don’t you mean Sergeant Styles?’ Her father looked at her askance.
‘No… Billy!’ She swung on his arm.
‘I’ve been stuck in Guildford, sir, catching up on all the details. But I managed to get over to Brookham this afternoon, so I thought I’d stop in on my way back. I’m hoping to see Will, too.’
Before glancing down at his daughter’s golden head, Madden caught the younger man’s eye.
‘Mrs Burrows said to say your tea’s ready in the kitchen, Lucy,’ Billy told her. ‘Yours and Belle’s.’
‘Aren’t you coming, too?’ She clung to his hand.
‘In a minute.’
‘Run along now, darling,’ Madden said. ‘Both of you. Go and fetch Belle.’
They waited until the two little girls had left the yard, hand in hand. Then Madden spoke again, ‘I understand you’ve got a lead at last. Mr Sinclair rang me earlier this week. He said they’ve been given a list of names in London they’re working through, and the killer’s may be among them. He also said it was a feather in your cap.’
Madden’s grin of congratulation made Billy flush with pleasure. ‘I had a piece of luck, sir. The chief inspector sent me down to Henley last week. Did you know a girl’s body had been taken from the river there?’
‘Mr Sinclair told me that some time ago. But I’d like to hear the whole story.’ Madden clicked his tongue with impatience. ‘It’ll have to wait till later, though. I’m just off to pick up Rob. He’s been spending the afternoon with a friend in Godalming. You’ll stay for dinner, won’t you?’ Taking the sergeant’s pleased smile of acceptance for granted, he went on, ‘That’ll give us time to talk. But walk me to my car now. Tell me briefly how things stand.’
Only too happy to oblige, Billy embarked on a swift summary of his visit to Henley, relishing the grunt of approval he received when he explained how he’d come to hit on the idea of the killer making use of the car park at Waltham Manor. The esteem in which he held Madden had never lessened. Nor had he forgotten the debt he owed to his old mentor under whose once stern eye he had learned some of the most important lessons of his life. (And not all of them having to do with being a policeman, either!)
‘So he picked her up by chance. He couldn’t have known she’d be walking along that road. But he knew where to take her, all right.’ They had paused at the entrance to the yard. Madden’s scowl took Billy back a decade. ‘I can’t make up my mind about this man. At first I thought he must have seen the girl at Brookham and come back looking for her. But I doubt that now.’ With a sigh, Madden glanced at his watch. ‘Billy, I have to go. What was that you said about seeing Will Stackpole?’
‘I rang him earlier and told him I’d be looking in here. He said he’d try and come by.’
‘Good! Stay and have a cup of tea with May. You can talk to Will when he arrives. Then come over to the house.’ Madden walked briskly to where his car was parked. Smiling, he called back to Billy. ‘You could do me a favour and bring Lucy when you come. She’ll count it a treat to have a ride with you.’
‘You ought to hear Will on the subject of the search the Surrey police are making for that tramp, sir.’ Billy grinned. ‘He says they haven’t got the first notion how to go about it.’
Madden’s grunt was enigmatic. Crouched before the fire, he prodded the blaze with a poker. Lit by only a pair of lamps, the drawing room lay in shadow.
‘He says they don’t know the countryside, most of them, and don’t understand how these tramps can disappear if they’ve a mind to.’
Adding another log to the flames, Madden rose, brushing off his hands. He stood tall in the firelight, looking down at Billy, who was seated in an armchair. ‘It’s not like searching for a man in a town or city,’ he said. ‘There you go to his family and friends, or his accomplices, if he has any. You scour his neighbourhood. These tramps never stay long in one place, and once they decide to make themselves scarce, it’s hard to know where to begin looking for them.’
‘Will said, most likely he’s been getting help from other vagrants, other tramps.’
‘He’s right.’ Madden seated himself across the hearth from Billy. ‘Mind you, if Beezy had killed that girl, and they knew, they’d have given him up by now. Or at least not protected him. He’ll have needed food, of course, and that means someone’s been getting it for him. Topper, most likely. If you ask me, they’ve joined up again. I’ve tried to get word to him.’
‘To Topper, sir?’ Billy was all ears. ‘How could you do that?’
‘A lot of these vagrants call at Helen’s surgery: she let it be known a long time ago that they could get medical treatment from her if they needed it. I’ve sent messages by one or two asking Topper to get in touch with us. So far without result.’
Billy took a sip from his glass of brandy. It had been a day of many pleasures. Earlier, he had spent an hour at the farmhouse chatting to May Burrows while she strung beans in the kitchen. Looking at her pink, composed face, he’d remembered the teenage girl with bobbed hair whom he’d once had to question; now May was a young matron with two children of her own, the younger, a baby boy, still in his cradle.
She had seated him at the table where the two little girls were still occupied with their tea, a generous meal in the Burrows household, containing elements of both breakfast and supper in it, and where Billy had had no choice but to submit to the maternal instincts of Lucy Madden, which had taken the form of pressing on him spoonfuls of her soft-boiled egg and morsels of thickly buttered toast steeped in honey.
Later, another old friend had put in an appearance. Will Stackpole had cycled over from the village and Billy had spent some time discussing the case with the constable, whom he had first met years before, during the Melling Lodge investigation.
The autumn evening had been drawing in by the time he’d driven down the avenue of limes, clothed in yellow leaves now, to the Maddens’ front door, where Helen had been waiting to relieve him of Lucy’s still-voluble presence, returning with her half an hour later, bathed and clad in pyjamas, to say her goodnights, a process which the little girl managed to prolong by a series of well-honed stratagems, causing her brother, who was trying to do his home-work, to roll his eyes in despair. Finally, Helen had lost patience.
‘Lucinda Madden! That will do. Say goodnight now to Sergeant Styles.’
‘He’s not Sergeant Styles. He’s Billy!’
While Madden was helping his son wrestle with a problem of arithmetic, Billy had wandered outside onto the terrace and stood for a while gazing out over the garden at the dark woods of Upton Hanger, lit by a thin sliver of moon that evening, remembering a visit he’d made earlier that year when the air on this very spot had been sweet with the mingled scents of jasmine and roses. Now, only the faint smell of burning leaves reached him.
Helen had soon returned from putting Lucy to bed and before long it had been Rob’s turn to be dispatched upstairs. To his bitter disappointment: he was sure his father and Billy were going to discuss the Brookham murder and had hoped for an opportunity to eavesdrop on them.
With the children safely in bed, Helen had taken the two men in to dinner, where the conversation had turned
