Part 39 (1/2)

We arrived back at Sh.e.l.lerton before Tremayne returned from Chepstow. Fiona dropped Mackie off at her side of the house and I walked round to Tremayne's, unlocking the door with the key he'd given me and switching on lights.

There was a message from Gareth on the family room corkboard: 'GONE TO MOVIE. BACK FOR GRUB.' Smiling, I kicked the hot logs together and blew some kindling sticks to life with the bellows to revive the fire and poured some wine and felt at home.

A knock on the back door drew me from comfort to see who it was, and I didn't at first recognise the young woman looking at me with a shy enquiring smile. She was pretty in a small way, brown haired, self-effacing- Bob Watson's wife, Ingrid.

'Come in,' I said warmly, relieved to have identified her. 'But I'm the only one home.'

'I thought maybe Mackie. Mrs Vickers-' 'She's round in her own house.' 'Oh. Well-' She came over the threshold tentatively and I encouraged her into the family room where she stood nervously and wouldn't sit down.

'Bob doesn't know I'm here,' she said anxiously. 'Never mind. Have a drink?' 'Oh no. Better not.'

She seemed to be s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g herself up to something, and out it all finally came in a rush.

'You were ever so kind to me that night. Bob reckons you saved me from frostbite at the least- and pneumonia, he said. Giving me your own clothes. I'll never forget it. Never.'

'You looked so cold,' I said. 'Are you sure you won't sit down?'

'I was hurting with cold.' She again ignored the chair suggestion. 'I knew you'd come back just now- I saw Mrs Goodhaven's car come up the road- I came to talk to you, really. I've got to tell someone, I think, and you're- well- easiest.'

'Go on then. Talk. I'm listening.'

She said in a small burst, unexpectedly, 'Angela Brickell was a Roman Catholic, like I am.'

'Was she?' The news meant very little.

Ingrid nodded. 'It said on the local radio news tonight that Angela's body was found last Sunday by a gamekeeper on the Quillersedge Estate. There was quite a bit about her on the news, about how the police were proceeding with their enquiries and all that. And it said foul play was suspected. They're such stupid words, foul play. Why don't they just say someone probably did her in? Anyway, after she'd vanished last year Mrs Vickers asked me to clear all her things out of the hostel and send them to her parents, and I did.'

She stopped, staring searchingly at my face for understanding.

'What,' I asked, feeling the way, 'did you find in her belongings? Something that worries you- because she's dead?'

Ingrid's face showed relief at being invited to tell me.

'I threw it away,' she said. 'It was a do-it-yourself home kit for a pregnancy test. She'd used it. All I found was the empty box.'

CHAPTER 11.

Tremayne came home and frightened Ingrid away like Miss m.u.f.fet and the spider.

'What did she want?' he asked, watching her scuttling exit. 'She always seems scared of me. She's a real mouse.'

'She came to tell me something she thinks should be known,' I said reflectively. 'I suppose she thought I could do the telling, in her place.'

'Typical,' Tremayne said. 'What was it?'

'Angela Brickell was perhaps pregnant.'

'What?' He stared at me blankly. 'Pregnant?'

I explained about the used test. 'You don't buy or use one of those tests unless you have good reason to.'