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  She was intrigued, “I thought the church paid you.”

  He wistfully shook his head, “House for duty. They give me a house and pay the rates and in return I minister to the scattered flock in these parts. Wouldn’t be economic for them to give me a full stipend.”

  She walked into the lounge, “That’s really rather good.”

  He gave a small smile of pride, “I have to produce two a month, they go in the Complete Modeller magazine, if I can I also try and get one wooden model a month in the Models for Everyone Magazine, but they take longer to prepare. At the end of the year my agent puts all the stuff together in on cut-out book and markets it across India, apparently there’s a large market for such stuff there.”

  Sarah was intrigued, “Does it pay you enough to live on?”

  He looked away, “I guess so.”

  “You guess so?”

  He shrugged, “I never bother to check my bank account, but it seems to pay all my bills.”

  She stared at him in disbelief, checking the bank account for money, or lack of it, was a necessary chore for her towards the end of every month. He began to fidget with his pencil and took on the disposition of a lost and despondent child. The penny dropped and Sarah said, gently, “Anna used to do it.”

  He nodded and she decided to rapidly change the subject, “Had breakfast?”

  He nodded and then added, “There’s not much milk, we’ve not had a delivery for a few days.”

  “There’s plenty of evaporated milk in tins, want me to make some up?”

  “You can do that? I thought it was only for a sweet sauce on desserts and cooking.”

  “Well it’s not perfect, but it’s better than black coffee.”

  She left him and made for the kitchen. She was now sure that there was something wrong with him, surely he hadn’t been always like this? She wondered if he’d had a breakdown at sometime and instantly became acutely conscious of the letter in her back pocket. She began to wonder what would happen if he ever saw it, would it bring reality back to his life, or would it drive him deeper into his own world?

  Buster met Julia about a hundred yards from the farm, not that anyone could have seen as the snow was falling thick and fast. They struggled through the snow towards Ambrose House with Julia thinking how nice it was for him to have come for her and him thinking that he’d better stay close to her just in case – just in case whoever killed his employers decided to have a go at Julia, especially as the snow made for perfect cover.

  Jenny Flosse watched Julia disappear into the snowy murk and thought that, just as she was disappearing from view, she saw another figure next to her. Jenny sighed and wondered, not for the first time, about her daughter. She was almost thirty and, apart from a spotty youth during her second University vacation, she had never brought home a man or, as far as she knew, had a long-term relationship with a man. “Too self-contained by half,” said Jenny to herself. Only one of her children, Bill, was married, Mark was obviously seeing a woman and had hinted that they might move in together, if the length of phone calls was an indicator that would be sooner rather than later she thought. Norman showed no signs of any relationships with woman and Colin had been definitely scarred by his brief foray into marriage, but she somehow knew that both of them would form relationships at some time in the future. But Julia was a constant worry to her, Jenny longed to see her ‘settled’ and ‘settled’ happily.

  Ambrose House was just as Julia had left it, except the dining room was now spotless. She raised an eyebrow at Buster. He gave a crooked grin, “Not too difficult, there was enough wax on the floor to stop the blood seeping through and I mopped most of it up with kitchen towelling – I burnt it on that small fire in the lounge.”

  Julia wondered if he’d ever done this sort of thing before. “Now what?”

  “Now we have a nice hot cup of coffee and you tell me about the inhabitants around here, after that we’ll take a look in the safe.”

  “You know the combination?”

  “No combination, it’s got a pair of keys, both Jeremy and Maria had one of each.”

  They went into a medium sized clinical kitchen, all stainless steel and marble. Buster put the kettle on – it looked more like an Egyptian pyramid with a handle – and they sat on stools each side of a small jutting out breakfast bar. Julia realised that Buster had turned the heating down, it wasn’t cold, but it wasn’t as roasting as before. She involuntarily shivered. Buster grinned, “No heating in here. It’s all electric under-floor heating and Maria was worried that they’d all get electrocuted if she ever spilled anything – not that she ever cooked real meals you understand.”

  Julia caught the tone in his voice, “You didn’t like them much did you?”

  He shrugged, “They weren’t bad, just totally self centred. A lot of people in their game have an easy come easy go attitude and give money to local charities and that sort of thing. Not those two, if they couldn’t spend it on themselves they didn’t spend it.”

  “But they employed you.”

  The kettle boiled and he got up to make the coffee, “Maria liked to watch over the croupiers and one day a disgruntled employee broke her arm. In the same week my current boss died – of cancer – so I was free. I don’t think even then they would have employed me, but another disenchanted punter had a go at Jeremy with a walking stick and they came to me.”

  He put a mug of coffee in front of Julia, plus a small packet of biscuits. “Sugar?”

  “No.”

  He continued his tale, “We started on three months trail, two months in I stopped a rival from setting fire to Jeremy's car and it became permanent like.”

  Julia stirred her coffee, “I can’t believe that they won’t be missed.”

  He grinned and scratched his nose with a finger the size of a small cigar, “I’m not saying that they won’t be missed, but I am saying that the people who miss them won’t be busting a gut to find them – or report their disappearance to the police.”

  Julia sipped her coffee, it was all so surreal.

  Once the powwow broke up Colin donned a set of gumboots, wrapped himself up in a pair of jumpers and a duffel-coat, filled a thermos flask with piping hot coffee, put a huge chunk of his mother’s cake into a tin box and set off into the snow. Ten minutes later he was knocking at the door of the Crossing Keeper’s Cottage. Jill opened the door and let him in, as soon as he’d discarded his duffel coat he bent down, picked her up and gave her a big smacking kiss on the lips. She pushed him away, “You’re freezing cold, it’s like kissing an ice-cube.”

  She grinned as he put her down. She was only just over five feet tall and as thin as a rake, so she was used to him scooping her up. Only at the moment she wasn’t so thin as she was wearing two jumpers; perhaps it was her Asian genes, perhaps the thin walls of the house, whatever it was she felt cold, really cold. He proffered the thermos and the cake tin, and smiling he sarcastically retorted, “Ah heap big man wades through deep snow to bring food and drink to his loved ones.”

  Harriet, the spitting image of Jill, but a head shorter and two shades lighter, suddenly appeared in the doorway, “Cake? Did somebody mention cake?”

  Buster took another biscuit, “OK, now tell me about who lives here and who doesn’t live here, but is around for the moment.”

  Julia considered where to start and decided to start at home. “I don’t know about normal, but normally around her you’ve got my family; that’s my parents Harry and Jenny, plus my two brothers Colin and Norman – you must have seen them all on your rounds. My brother Mark is also snowed in with us, but he’s hardly a visitor.”

  Buster raised an eyebrow, “What does he do?”

  “Architect – specialised in bridges, especially wooden bridges. He’s also done some work with wooden roller coasters.”

  She gather her thoughts , “At the bottom of our farm track there’s Flosse Cottage, there’s a guy called Daniel in there at the moment. He’s got a six months lease and h
e’s two months into it. I believe he’s a singer in some sort of band, says he’s taking time out to try his hand at sculpture and recharge before his next tour.”

  Buster raised an eyebrow, “Describe him.”

  “About five foot six, thin, rat faced, got a tattoo of a naked lady on the side of his neck and a Mohican haircut.”

  Buster nodded and decided that it was a small world, Julia had just described Daniel De Foe, the so-called singer of a heavy rock band called Raven Madd. Jeremy had never employed him, but he was well known on the Birmingham circuit. Julia continued. “Next building is the crossing keeper’s cottage by the level crossing. Young mum called Jill Crow lives there with her daughter Harriet, been there since the new school years started.”

  Buster wriggled on his stool, “Is she the Asian one with really deep brown eyes?”

  Julia nodded, “Comes from Southall in London, ‘bout five foot one and as skinny as a rake. Daughter starts at senior school this year – her birthday is in October so she’s already twelve.”

  Buster seemed to be absorbing everything, “What brings them here?”

  Julia hesitated, she knew the real reason, and the given reason. “General story is that she wanted to get away from London, doesn’t matter where she works as she’s a software programmer and works from home.”

  “And the real reason?” Buster wasn’t missing a thing.

  “My Brother and her are what you might call an item, except that my brother keeps it a secret as my father doesn’t approve of his divorce, let alone him seeing another woman. She also wants it kept quite for the time being as her family want her to marry a nice Hindu boy.”

  “You know her well?”

  “Been there for a couple of evenings, it’s Colin she’s really interested in.”

  “How did they meet?”

  “At an agricultural conference, she was demonstrating some agro-management software.”

  “Must be keen on him to move up here in the middle of nowhere.”

  “They met two years ago and have mainly courted on the Internet, with Colin paying bimonthly visits to Mark, as far as my parents are concerned.”

  Buster nodded for her to go on, but she had other ideas, “Can we move somewhere else, these stools are killing my bum?”

  Buster laughed, “We can, but all the furniture here is designer stuff, that means it looks chic and is nowhere near practical, all form and no function as they say.”

  Julia leapt off the stool, “No function is just about right if I sit there any longer.”

  The front door opened and Hoof bounded about six feet into the hall and waited for Rupert to dry his paws on a towel that was draped over the hall radiator, Sarah wondered if it had ever been washed. “He’s well trained.”

  “Intelligent dog, well most of the time, just don’t let him near deer droppings, for some reason he always rolls in them.”

  “Coffee?”

  “Please.”

  She re-boiled the kettle and poured him out a cup of coffee and added some of the made up evaporated milk. He took a sniff of the steam that was issuing from the cup, “Have you phoned in today?”

  “Just hello and goodbye; I think my boss is on the verge of a nervous breakdown, as he puts it nothing is where it should be and everything is where he doesn’t want it to be.”

  He nodded and tried a sip, his face showed bewilderment, “This isn’t bad.”

  “Not if you have a sweet tooth.”

  He ignored the retort, “Should you phone anyone at home?”

  “No-one to ring. Neighbours stopped the milk for me and she’ll water my spider plant until I return.”

  She paused, “Bit sad really, all I’ve got to worry about is a spider plant that could probably survive a six month drought.”

  “What about your parents?”

  She shrugged, “They split up when I was ten; Mum took the baby and Dad took my brother, he was just about to leave school. I ended up in a foster home, good one though as my Foster mum treated us all as own; and before you ask she died last year.”

  Rupert gazed into his coffee cup and said softly, “Don’t wish for responsibilities, they only cause you pain and heartache.”

  Sarah shook her head, surely you didn’t think that when Anna was living here?” And instantly wished that she’d bitten off her tongue.

  He gazed into his coffee cup and she thought that he wouldn’t reply, suddenly he murmured, with real emotion; “You’re right, at first I thought that it would be a burden her living her, but it turned into a real joy. It was the closest thing I have ever come to having a family. It gave me a wonderful insight into how couples and families live.”

  He sounded so lost and lonely. Sarah was momentarily fazed, but she decided to probe a little more as, once again, she felt a discomfort around her back pocket. “What sort of insights?”

  He looked up, “How people live together in seemingly harmony when they have foibles that would drive anybody else crazy. I know that I’m messy, I hate tiding and yet I like a tidy place, Jenny didn’t seem to mind, she just tidied up around me and Peter. And she had this habit of singing the same line of a song over and over again. She’d wake up in the morning with a song on her mind, or hear one on the radio, and then sing the first line over and over again for hours, but somehow I didn’t mind, it reminded me that she was there and happy.”

  Tears started to trickle down his face and Sarah wondered if she had gone too far. He suddenly, and without warning, switched to his abstract flat voice, “I know hat I’ve got to talk about Anna and try to focus on the good times, but I’ve had no-one I could talk to, thank you for asking.”

  He stood up, “Please feel free to work in the kitchen – the real kitchen – it’s also something I’ve got to face, I’ve shut out that part of my life for too long.”

  He fled towards his study leaving Sarah wondering what she had started and would he ever finish what had begun?

  Chapter 9

  Enlightenment

  Julia wriggled on the plush leather settee, Buster was quite right it looked fabulous, but was terrible. The seat cushions, from front to back, were a good nine inches longer than her thigh bone, so if she tried to lean back she ended up at a preposterous angle that caused her to slide down the smooth leather. She tucked her legs up onto the cushions and pushed herself back against the upright cushions, they were so soft it was uncomfortable; it felt as if she was leaning against slippery porridge. She gathered her thoughts, “I suppose the next inhabited building is the vicarage. Rupert lives there, Rupert Greeve. He’s a sad case. His sister and her son used to live with him, but she died in a car crash and he had a breakdown, believe me he had a breakdown. For the first few months he used to wander around in his pyjamas oblivious of the fact that it was midday and freezing cold. I’m also pretty sure that he used to eat food straight from tins until my father persuaded the Diocese to put in a small kitchenette at the end of his lounge.” She paused as if wondering how much to say and decided to leave out the fact that her mother, Ma Jones and Ella Happleberry had taken hot meals to him in turn and that her father had, on occasions, given him a bath. However, she didn’t want the vicar on Buster’s hit list so she filled in a few more details. “He used to be vicar hereabouts and have some Diocesan Job, but after his breakdown he couldn’t continue and the Bishop let him live in the house to be Vicar to us without payment. That actually seemed to hone his mind a bit and he turned his hobby -–making paper models - into a job. But he’s still a few cans short of a six pack. He really cares about his parishioners, and he’ll do anything for them, he mucked out Mrs Herbet’s stables for six weeks when she broke a leg, but he’s terrible in the church itself on a Sunday. He loses his place in the service book, forgets where we are in the service and somewhat rambles when he preaches, but he is getting better, slowly.”

  “Why do you put up with him?”

  Julia gave Buster a withering look, “It’s a matter of Christian love, he cared for his s
ister when she was a mental wreck and shows real love and concern for us, so in return we care for him and help him along.”

  “Is he mentally unstable enough to kill anyone?”

  She hesitated, “No, I don’t think so, but once, years ago, a temporary tenant of our cottage said that young women who had babies outside marriage were worse than prostitutes; Rupert broke his nose.”

  Buster grinned, a vicar with attitude, that’s what he liked to hear. “I’ve met him and your right, he does care about people, but I got the impression that he doesn’t look after himself very much.”

  Julia looked him in the eye, “As I said he’s getting better.”

  Buster noted the defensive reply, “Who’s next?”

  “Mr and Mrs Happleberry in the end cottage near here. They seem to have been here for a million years. George used to work on the farm and Ella used to be dinner lady at the primary school in West Dereham; when they had one. Neither of them can drive; Ella never has, she used to cycle to work in all weathers, and George’s not driven since his second heart attack. Really they’re both too old and feeble to be on your hit list.”

  Buster moved about in his leather armchair, “I know them, I’ve talked to George when he’s in his garden.”

  Julia squirmed to try and get more comfortable, “That leaves the three visitors. Rupert’s got a female engine driver called Sarah staying with him, apparently her train’s snowed in. I know nothing about her. Staying at the farm we’ve got Petra Haston and Simon Jones. She brought him to view the Trembine arms and he dropped the rear wheels of his Mitsubishi in the ditch and flattened the exhaust pipe on the railway sleepers that run along the edge of the ditch – and which are supposed to stop people driving into it.”

  Buster suddenly took a keen interest, “What’s your impression?”