A Village Deception (Turnham Malpas 15) (33 page)

‘I’ll give him a shout.’

Bridget watched Alex as he walked down the stairs to greet her. She shook him by the hand and wished him every success with his exam results. ‘My word, you are so like your dad it’s unbelievable. Almost, but not quite as tall yet, and identical in looks. Are you following in his footsteps?’

Alex smiled. ‘No. I’m hoping to qualify as a doctor like my mother.’

‘Wonderful. Now, I must go. I’m just getting things sorted with your dad. I’m Bridget, by the way, Paddy’s mother. We’ll see you at the wedding? Come and enjoy yourself. It’ll be a real Irish wedding party. Love to your mother. Say I’m sorry she wasn’t in.’ And with that, Bridget swept down the hall and out of the house waving both hands above her head and shouting, ‘Bye!’

Before going back to Vince and Greta’s, Bridget decided to call in at the pub and have a quick drink, and see if there was anyone in there she’d already met.

Alan the barman served her drink and helpfully, for him, carried it across to the settle, which he remembered she liked the best. There were three other customers in, but she knew none of them.

‘Where’s Georgie? Day off?’

‘No, she’s just having a bite to eat before the rush begins. She won’t be long.’

And she wasn’t. Georgie burst into the bar, excitement in every inch of her. ‘He’s out! He’s out!’

Alan broke out of his somnambulist attitude to life and said, ‘Who’s out? What d’yer mean?’

‘Harry! He’s escaped. It’s on the radio. Just now.’

Georgie sat down on a bar stool and fanned herself. ‘I can’t believe it. He was taken to hospital for an appointment and, while he was there, he walked out, bold as brass.’

‘No! Honestly?’

‘I haven’t made it up, Alan, it’s on the news. Apparently the warder left for just the briefest of moments. Harry got dressed and hopped it, the warder came back and assumed he’d gone in to see the consultant, but Harry was away on his toes before anyone knew.’

‘D’yer think he’ll turn up at Zack’s?’

‘Alan! For God’s sake, he isn’t daft! It’s the first place the police would look for him.’

‘Would it be though? Maybe it would be the last place they’d look, them thinking he wasn’t daft.’

Trust Alan to have a skewed viewpoint on absolutely everything, thought Georgie. ‘Well, you may have a point.’

Bridget asked, ‘I take it this Harry is a rogue?’

The three customers, Georgie and Alan couldn’t wait to tell her the whole story.

*

Bridget laughed herself helpless when they’d finished. ‘He’s the kind of bloke I would love to meet. What a guy.’

The other people in the village were not as amused as Bridget by the situation, remembering how he’d duped them so cleverly. They were scandalised, but they didn’t find it funny. Would he come back to borrow money perhaps, or take someone’s car or … Finally they all decided that he wouldn’t dare, not after what he’d done. But they did remember to lock their windows, just in case, despite the hot weather.

Harry did arrive in the middle of the night at Zack and Marie’s house, tapping gently but persistently at the back door and eventually waking Zack.

He put his finger to Zack’s mouth the moment he stuck his head round the door. ‘Let me in.’

Zack, still half asleep and not thinking properly, opened the door wider and allowed him in. He whispered, ‘What the blazes are you doing, coming here? Marie’s frightened to death, all that knocking.’

‘I left some money here and I need to get it.’

‘Like hell you did.’

‘I did, Zack. In my bedroom. There’s not someone in it at the moment, is there?’

‘As luck would have it, there isn’t. We have got guests in, but not in your room. Luck of Old Nick you have.’

The kitchen door opened and there was Marie in her dressing gown. ‘Oh!’

‘It’s all right, Marie, I’ve not come to murder you. I’ve come to collect my money.’

‘What money? We don’t owe you money.’

‘The money I hid.’

‘Where?’ Marie demanded. She was so wild with him for
deceiving them that she honestly wondered whether it would be right to let him have it, wherever it was.

‘Under the floorboards.’ Harry was exhausted. He’d walked all the way from Culworth without any food since his breakfast.

‘In your bedroom, you mean?’

‘Yes. Is there a chance I could have a sandwich?’

Zack would have protested but Marie got in first and said, ‘Yes, you can.’

She rinsed her hands under the tap and began to prepare a sandwich for him, and she made a pot of tea too. The three of them sat round the kitchen table and drank tea and she and Zack watched him eat his sandwich. It was filled with fresh homegrown salad and a thick slice of Jimbo’s ham with mustard.

Marie told him where the ham had come from. ‘You shouldn’t have pinched from him, you know. He offered you a lifeline and you abused it. You should be ashamed.’

Zack shook his head at her to stop her belligerence because he didn’t want Harry turning nasty. He might even have got himself a gun, but Marie ignored him.

‘You really disappointed me, you did. I gave you a nice home, kept everything lovely for you and that’s what you did. What have you got to say for yourself then?’

Harry cleared his mouth of sandwich and said, ‘I can do nothing but apologise, Marie. I must have been mad.’

‘You did all right out of it though, didn’t you? Friendship, a job, the money that you stole, a roof over your head, a woman.’

‘Venetia, you mean. I love her and always will. She wasn’t my sort, but I couldn’t help myself.’

Marie put her oar in again. ‘She was someone else’s wife and now he’s paying for it, or he will do. That’s something else you should be ashamed of. Poor Jeremy.’

Harry put down the sandwich he was so desperate for and said, ‘To be honest …’

Marie spluttered her disgust. ‘You, honest! Huh!’

‘I am being honest. Right now. Under the floorboards I’ve got three thousand pounds to pay Jimbo back and the rest is yours. I’m giving myself up. OK?’

‘Well, now,’ said Zack. ‘That’s good to hear. But I don’t know that I want tainted money.’

‘The rest isn’t tainted, it’s what I saved from my salary. Honest.’

Again he used the word that so angered Marie, but this time she sympathised. ‘I do believe you mean it.’

‘I do. I’ve been an idiot. I’m thinking of turning Queen’s evidence, you see. I’ve had enough of being a liar. You and the people in Turnham Malpas have taught me that.’

‘Do you mean it, Harry?’ asked Marie.

Harry reached across the table to squeeze her hand. ‘Yes, I do mean it.’

Zack was understandably cautious. ‘I’m not too sure about giving us money we’ve done nothing to deserve. We might keep it for you, but I … that is, we … don’t want it. Thanks all the same.’

‘I’ll get it out, and give you the money for Jimbo. The rest you can hide for me, then you can ring the police and tell them you’ve found me.’

‘Oh no. You ring the police. It’s the first honest thing you’ve done in years. You do it.’

‘Me?’

‘Yes, you.’ Zack was emphatic about it.

‘It’s not quite the first honest thing I’ve done. I did truly love Venetia and I can’t bear her death.’

Harry leaped to his feet and set off for the stairs. ‘I’ll get it for you.’

He came back with it wrapped in a Turnham Malpas stores green carrier bag.

Zack found it rather ironic. ‘OK then. You’ve finished your sandwich and your tea, you’ve given me the money for Jimbo, now go to the phone and give yourself up.’

‘Is my car here still?’

‘No, they took it for forensic investigation so you can’t buzz off into the great blue yonder. Mine’s in Culworth in the garage having a service and MOT so there’s no easy escape for you. If you don’t ring the police quickly, I shall. Now, go and do it.’

They listened to his telephone call. Zack locked the back door again and put the key in his pocket because he still couldn’t believe that Harry would stay around long enough for the police to pick him up.

Marie whispered, ‘That’s not right,’ but the key stayed in Zack’s pocket.

They sat still and quiet, each of them mulling over the situation they found themselves in. Zack was furious, Marie distressed and Harry was wondering if he really wanted to be honest. But before he’d come to a decision, the police were at the door. He jumped up, his eyes darting around as though looking to make a run for it, but Marie looked him straight in the eye and shook her head. ‘Not this time, Harry, this is for real.’ She kissed his cheek and Zack went to open the front door. They put Harry in handcuffs and marched him out to the waiting police car. He took one look round at the houses as though sad to be seeing the last of them for some time, ducked his head, and sat in the car.

Marie waved to him and turned back to the house. ‘Zack, that poor boy.’

‘I don’t know how much sympathy he needs, or if he needs any at all. He’s no fool, he knew exactly what he was doing.’

‘I’m off to look for the money he’s left for us.’

She eventually found it underneath the floorboards in the wardrobe. Two hundred and seventy pounds.

‘Well I never.’

Zack said, ‘We don’t want none of it you know, Marie. It could bring us bad luck.’

‘I know. We don’t actually need it anyway. Well, we could
find a use for it, but best not.’ She carefully wrapped it up, carried it into their own bedroom and hid it under the clutter in Zack’s half of the wardrobe. As she closed the door she whispered, ‘But I can’t help but feel sorry for him. Losing Venetia in such a nasty way. I do believe he meant it about loving her.’

As she was climbing back into bed, Marie said, ‘Would you mind if I see Harry when he’s in prison?’

‘I’ll tell you what we won’t do, and that is tell anyone about him being here tonight. Not Vera, nor Sylvia, nor anyone.

Right? OK?’

‘I hear what you say, but Jimbo will have to know.’

‘We’ll tell him Harry smuggled a letter out and we found the money according to his instructions. But I tell you what, Marie, if a man on his own comes asking for accommodation again we’ll have to be a bit extra careful about ‘em. We’ve got off lucky this time, things could have turned out a lot worse.’

‘So what do I do? Ask for references? That would be the end of the B&B as we know it. Might I remind you that it was you who recommended that he come and ask for a room, not me. You never suspected anything.’

‘No, you have a point.’ Zack rolled over and put his arm round Marie’s waist. ‘Just remember, though. If there’s a man on his own, watch out!’

The following morning, on his way to begin his stint as verger at the church, Zack called in at the village store to find Jimbo already there with everything in full swing.

‘I thought perhaps you wouldn’t be here as early as this.’

‘It’s Tom’s day off. How can I help?’

‘I have this carrier bag for you.’ Mentally Zack crossed his fingers because of the lie he was about to tell. ‘You see, we had a letter from Harry that he smuggled out, and he told us where he’d hidden this. He asked us to let you have it. He says he owes you it. I have to say, I know what it is. Don’t open it in here in case someone comes in.’ Zack winked at Jimbo and left him to it.

Of course Jimbo couldn’t resist looking in immediately. To his amazement, it was filled with notes. He raced off into his own office and laid the money out in piles. He counted it twice and then collapsed onto his chair. My God! Just over three thousand pounds.

There came the sound of someone shouting from the front of the store, so Jimbo clapped his boater back on and raced to the counter. It was Willie Biggs paying for his paper.

‘I could set my watch by you, Willie. How do you do it?’

Willie laughed. ‘You look on top of the world this morning.’

‘Do I? I don’t know why.’

‘It’s as if you’ve had some good news.’

‘Me? No, not me. I never get good news.’

‘Right, I’ll be off for my breakfast. Croissants this morning. I love ’em.’

‘They taste best eaten in a cafe on the Champs-Elysées with a pot of coffee.’

‘Ah! Well, they’re not that bad in my kitchen prepared by Sylvia, along with a cup of tea from our shiny brown teapot. Bye!’

Jimbo watched Willie crossing the green and thought about Harry. So he’d turned up trumps at last. Whatever he’d done in the interim, he’d liked him right from the first. He was a bit surprised to find he was a full-scale robber, but there you are. There must be something good in him to give him back the money he owed him. Poor Harry. He really did seem to have loved Venetia. Poor Venetia. All the drama she had created while she was alive and she was still making waves, even from the grave. Well, not the grave because she hadn’t been buried yet. If the funeral was here in Turnham Malpas he for one would go, if only to say thank you for all the fun she’d caused. And the gossip, come to that.