Ruling Passion

‘I’m afraid he’s not here at the moment. I don’t know when he’ll be back. Is it urgent?’

‘I’m not sure.’

She stared hard at him and asked dubiously, ‘Are you a policeman?’

‘Well, yes. Yes, I am,’ said Pascoe. ‘Sergeant Pascoe.’

‘Sergeant? That ought to be all right then. I am Alicia Langdale.’ She paused. For effect? thought Pascoe. Is she the lady of the manor? Should I be impressed?

‘Yes?’ he prompted.

‘And it’s connected with my job, you see. That’s what makes it so delicate.’

‘What is your job, Mrs Langdale?’

‘Miss. Can’t you see? I’m a postman.’

Oh my God! thought Pascoe. That’s what the gear is! He could see he had lost what little ground the revelation of his rank had gained him.

‘Of course,’ he said with a smile.

‘My sister, Anthea, and I keep the post office. She takes care of the internal business and I look after deliveries. Normally what happens, of course, is that people post their letters, they are collected in a van and taken to the main post office in town where they are sorted.’

‘I see,’ said Pascoe.

‘But sometimes, if it’s a matter of local mail – things that I’m going to have to deliver anyway, you understand – some people just leave them on the counter or push them through our letter-box.’

She raised her chin and looked defiantly at Pascoe, who suddenly knew what this was all about. He took the letter Miss Langdale produced from her large pocket and stared down at Colin’s distinctive handwriting. J. K. Palfrey, Esq., The Eagle and Child, Thornton Lacey.

A flock of thoughts rose and fluttered around Pascoe’s mind. The proper course of action was clear. Take the letter to Backhouse who would then take it to Palfrey and require it to be opened in his presence. If it was not relevant to the inquiry that would be an end to it. But if it was … ! Pascoe did not feel somehow that Backhouse would be keen to let him read it.

He realized with a start that Miss Langdale was still speaking.

‘I was almost at the Eagle and Child this morning when I met Mrs Anderson who told me the news. She picks up everything very quickly, I’m afraid. Normally I pay no heed, but this was different. This was dreadful, dreadful. So I finished my round but kept this letter. Anthea and I have been discussing all day what we ought to do. It’s our duty to deliver the Queen’s mail, you see. But if, as seemed possible in the circumstances, it might cause distress … and in a sense, it had not in fact been posted, had it? So here I am. Will you give me a receipt, please?’

Her voice was suddenly brisk, businesslike. Pascoe looked round for a piece of paper and a pen. He had made up his mind to open the letter and damn the consequences. Every instinct in his body warned him against it, but told him at the same time how important the letter was. He had to see. This might be his only chance.

‘Receipt book’s in the top drawer, Sergeant.’

It was Crowther, standing quietly in the doorway. His chance had gone.

‘Interesting, this,’ said the constable, holding the letter before him after he had efficiently disposed of Miss Langdale. ‘I’d better let the super have it right away. Thanks for taking care of things.’

He put the letter in his tunic pocket, tidied up the papers on his desk, stared a long moment at the disturbed carbon copy of his notes but did not remove them, and left.

‘Damn! damn! damn!’ said Pascoe. But he shuddered to think of the dangerous course he had been about to steer on. The sooner he got back to Dalziel and other people’s losses, the better.

He went back into the living-room to collect Ellie and take her to the Culpeppers’.

Chapter 7 (#ulink_528dd1fb-9132-5530-977d-1995821ba112)

The Culpeppers’ house was an impressive structure. Built in traditional Cotswold stone, its lines and proportions were unequivocally though unobtrusively modern.

The gardens consisted principally of herbaceous borders and lawns running down to an encirclement of trees. Whether the Culpepper estate extended into the woods was not clear. The lawns themselves were beautifully kept. Only one of them, hooped for croquet, showed any signs of wear. Coming up the drive, Pascoe had glimpsed a bent figure in a bright orange coat slowly brushing away the leaves which the autumn wind had laid on one of the side lawns. A fluorescent gardener, he thought, and prepared himself for anything from a parlourmaid to a full-dress butler when he rang the bell. But it had been Culpepper himself, features etched with well-bred solicitude, who opened the door.

Pascoe could see that Ellie disliked him at once. He recalled his own reaction to Marianne Culpepper and groaned inwardly at the thought of the evening ahead. Not that much social intercourse would be expected of them, surely. Or sexual either, he added to himself as they were shown into separate bedrooms. The bed at Brookside Cottage with its ornamental pillow came into his mind. Half the local police-force would have seen it. It was a good job he hadn’t been having a bit on the side with the chief constable’s wife.

The frivolity of the thought touched him with guilt. This was the way grief worked. It could only achieve complete victory for a comparatively short time. But it filled the mind with snares of guilt and self-disgust to catch at all thoughts and emotions fighting against it.

Ellie felt the same. She had raised her eyebrows humorously at his as Culpepper opened her bedroom door. But it was a brief flicker of light in dark sky.

The evening’s prospects did not improve when Marianne Culpepper returned. Pascoe heard a car arrive as he was unpacking his over-night case and when he left his room a minute later to collect Ellie, he found her standing at the head of the stairs, unashamedly eavesdropping on a conversation below.

Culpepper’s neutral tones were audible only as an indecipherable murmur, but his wife’s elegantly vowelled voice carried perfectly. Pascoe was reminded of teenage visits to the local repertory theatre (now declined to bingo) where hopeful young actresses projected their lines to the most distant ‘gods’.

Even half a conversation was enough to reveal that Marianne Culpepper had no knowledge whatsoever of her husband’s invitation to Pascoe and Ellie. They exchanged rueful glances on the landing. Pascoe moved to the nearest door, opened it and slammed it shut. It might have been more politic to retreat for a while, but Pascoe found himself looking forward to putting all that good breeding below to the test.

‘Let’s go down, shall we?’ he said in an exaggeratedly loud voice.

The Culpeppers presented a fairly united front as introductions took place.

‘Didn’t I see you in the village hall this morning?’ asked Marianne of Pascoe. ‘I didn’t realize then. I thought you were just one of the policemen.’

Oh, I am, I am, thought Pascoe.

‘Look,’ the woman went on, ‘I’m terrible sorry about your friends. I hardly knew them, the Hopkinses I mean, but they seemed very nice people.’

Everyone speaks as if we’ve lost them both, thought Pascoe. Perhaps we have.

‘You’ll be tired of expressions of sympathy I know. They become very wearing.’ She paused as though communicating with herself only, then continued. ‘Which brings me to this evening. You are very welcome indeed to our house, but Hartley and I have got our lines crossed somewhere. I’ve asked a couple of friends along to dinner and a few more people may drop in for drinks later. Please, it’s up to you. If you’d rather duck out, have your meal early, and generally avoid the madding crowd, just say so. Don’t be silly about it.’