Martin Edwards - The Serpent Pool

‘At least they give me the chance to be a detective again. Your father warned me, the higher I climbed, the further away from real police work I’d find myself. The upper echelons are for political movers and shakers. Not people who simply want to solve crimes.’

‘I remember Dad saying that,’ Louise murmured. ‘Before he left us for his fancy woman.’

‘It must have been tough for you when Ben left home.’

‘For all of us. Daniel, me, our mother.’ Louise sighed. ‘It’s history now. As much in the past as the stuff Daniel studies.’

Hannah could resist temptation no longer.

‘So, what is he up to these days?’

‘You don’t keep in touch?’

Hannah shook her head. ‘He went to America.’

‘There’s always email.’ Louise pursed her lips, like a schoolmarm disappointed by a feeble answer from an otherwise diligent pupil. ‘He didn’t intend to be away for long, but one thing led to another and he finished up on a lecture tour. He only arrived back in England yesterday.’

‘He’s back in the Lakes again?’

‘At Tarn Cottage, yes. Brackdale is his home, don’t forget.’

‘I heard,’ Hannah said carefully, ‘that Miranda wanted them to move to London.’

‘Miranda?’ Louise didn’t bother to hide her scorn. ‘That’s over and done with, surely you heard? If you ask me, it was never going to last. Chalk and cheese. She wasn’t right for Daniel.’

Louise must already have had two or three drinks. The first time they’d met, she’d seemed buttoned up, someone who never gave anything away. Her candour was as unexpected as the low-cut Grecian gown.

Hannah took a sip of lemonade. Thank God the need to drive Marc home had kept her sober. She mustn’t give too much away.

‘Please pass on my regards.’

‘You can always lift up the phone yourself.’

That was more like the Louise of old. Awkward and blunt as a Coniston crag.

‘Perhaps, one of these days.’

‘I expect he’ll give you a call. He may even want to pick your brains.’

‘Unlikely, I think. An Oxford don…’

‘You’re an expert in murder, aren’t you?’

Hannah stared. ‘Murder?’

‘Didn’t you know? It’s his latest obsession, it’s the reason Arlo Denstone persuaded him to be keynote speaker at his Thomas De Quincey Festival. Murder considered as one of the fine arts.’

‘You mean-?’

A woman cried out, a sound of anger mixed with pain. Hannah spun round, in time to see the Hitchcock blonde lift her full glass of red wine and throw its contents at her companion.

Arlo Denstone’s white teeth maintained their sardonic gleam even as the wine dripped from his cheek and chin, and down his white jacket.

The woman made a choking noise, as though she’d been strangled, and ran for the door.

For a couple of seconds, nobody moved, nobody made a sound. Stuart Wagg was first to react. As the door banged shut behind the woman, he moved after her, followed by a handsome Asian man in a well-cut suit. Their swift, silent strides reminded Hannah of two panthers in pursuit of their prey.

The night blazed. Shell after shell cracked like gunfire, now bursting into stars of red and white and gold, now splitting into shoals of fish swimming through the darkness, now fanning out as silver snakes that slid across the sky.

Stuart Wagg stood in front of his guests as they watched the fireworks. Feet planted on a low brick wall that fringed a circular paved area, he was bathed in light cast by lamps set above the glazed doors, holding a microphone in his hand like a singer on a stage. That little drama indoors half an hour earlier might never have happened. Arlo Denstone had changed into a striped blazer borrowed from his host and stood admiring the display as if he didn’t have a care in the world. Stuart puffed his chest out like a benevolent Victorian squire, presiding over an assembly of tenant farmers.

Crag Gill basked in ever-changing coloured lights. To Hannah, it looked more like a spaceship than a home. She glanced over her shoulder. Away from the crowd, and in the shadows, Louise Kind shifted from one foot to another. Her expression was impossible to read. She didn’t like the limelight, unlike her lover.

Stuart lifted his champagne glass with a flourish and bellowed into the microphone.

‘Happy New Year, everybody!’

As people drank and marvelled at the cascades of fire above them, Hannah spotted Marc. His gait was unsteady and he kept spilling his champagne as he traced a zigzag route over the grass towards her.

‘Darling!’ Christ, he was slurring already. Just as well they’d arrived later than most of the other guests. He’d never been a hardened boozer, and it didn’t take much to get him pissed. ‘Happy New Year!’

She tilted her glass and turned her cheek to allow him to kiss it. Instead he fumbled for her backside.

‘Come on, Marc. You’ve had enough.’

‘Why must you always be such a spoilsport?’ His breath felt hot on her neck. ‘I mean, we can’t leave yet. It would look rude.’

She had to raise her voice to make herself heard above the din of the fireworks. ‘I don’t want you falling flat on your face. We’ve had one scene here already tonight.’

He chortled. ‘Excellent, wasn’t it?’

A barrage of coloured cornets shot into the sky, transforming into graceful palms, followed by candles that soared and roared and became golden branches, seeming to reach almost to the people gathered on the ground. They gazed up to the heavens and held their breath, wondering what might come next.

Hannah feigned covering her ears as another explosion echoed in them. How many thousands of pounds going up in smoke, right in front of their eyes? Stuart Wagg never knew when to stop. He had no restraint.

‘So, you know the woman who had the hissy fit?’

He smirked. ‘You’ll never guess her name.’

‘No need to guess, though I should have recognised her from the press pictures. Louise Kind told me she is Wanda Saffell.’

Yes, the recently widowed Wanda. Out on the razzle with her husband barely cold in the grave? A bit naughty, on the face of it, but Hannah knew better than to jump to conclusions. The fact the woman had chucked her drink at her companion and then run weeping from the room showed that her nerves were in bad shape.

‘You always know everything,’ he mumbled.

‘If only.’

‘All right, then. What was all the fuss about?’

‘Good question.’ Hannah found herself itching to know the answer.

‘Tell you one thing.’ He leant towards her. ‘You were wrong about the driver who nearly ran into us out in the lane. That wasn’t some boy racer, it was Wanda.’

‘You think so?’

‘A waitress told me she’d only arrived five minutes before us. Marched in and grabbed a glass of champagne, then knocked it back in a couple of gulps and demanded a refill.’

Hannah looked round. ‘Is she still here?’

‘Raj Doshi, one of Stuart’s partners, gave her a lift home. Said she wasn’t fit to drive in her sports car.’

‘We’ll make a detective of you yet.’

‘If you ask me, that woman has anger management issues.’

‘Psychologist as well as detective, eh? Come on, time to go.’

As she took Marc’s arm and headed back for the warm indoors, she recalled the sight of Arlo Denstone, fishing a handkerchief out of his pocket. Still with the hint of a smile on his face, he’d begun to mop his cheeks as a dull crimson stain spread across the front of his jacket.

Anyone would think Wanda Saffell had stabbed him in the heart.

New Year’s Day at Tarn Fold. The perfect moment, Daniel Kind told himself, to turn his mind to murder.