Martin Edwards - The Coffin Trail

‘So,’ she whispered in his ear, ‘you were adventurous enough to go for a Michelin-quality lasagne, then? Don’t deny it, I can smell the garlic. Not that you’ve quite managed to put me off, though. You lucky, lucky man.’

He felt her hair on his cheeks as he kissed her gently on the lips. ‘Eddie’s here early tomorrow, we need to get to sleep.’

‘Don’t think you’re getting off that lightly. Not when you’ve spent the entire evening with another woman. Is she gorgeous, by the way?’

‘She’s a police officer.’

‘That’s not an answer.’

Her hands began to roam as he said, ‘She told me a lot about my father that I didn’t know. And plenty about what happened to Tom Allardyce. But she obviously believes that history is bunk.’

Miranda giggled. ‘She’s out of date. Julian Barnes says that it’s burps. We keep tasting the onion sandwich it swallowed centuries ago.’

He spent much of the next day in the garden, scything down brambles. Left to spread unchecked, they would choke the begonias that he’d planted to add a splash of colour while he weighed up the garden’s long-term potential. It was the sort of job apt to induce myocardial infarction in the fittest, but at least it offered the reward of fast and visible progress. The lavender bushes filled the soft air with their scent, every now and then a squirrel scuttled up and down a tree and made the leaves rustle. The tarn was still and the heron invisible, but in the distance he could hear the tumbling waters of Brack Force.

In mid-afternoon, Miranda returned from an expedition to Tasker’s and they sat on the paved area, eating Magnum ice creams. She was agog with the news that Simon Dumelow was seriously ill with a brain tumour. According to rumour, he only had days to live.

‘Hannah Scarlett told me he was sick,’ he said. ‘But I didn’t know…’

‘He looked so fit when we went to dinner there. But remember when he stumbled on the stairs? I suppose it was a symptom and we never dreamed…’

He said slowly, ‘We talked about escapism.’

‘That’s right. Winter Holiday and all that.’

‘Yes.’ He remembered Tash blushing as they shared memories of the children’s book. Out of nowhere, a thought slapped him. ‘You’re right, she did understand.’

Tash Dumelow had aged ten years in the week since their encounter in Tarn Fold. She answered the door herself in T-shirt, denim jeans and trainers. Her pasty complexion had become a make-up free zone and the red-rimmed eyes were dull and expressionless. Daniel thought she’d put on weight. He could smell gin on her breath.

‘Hello, Daniel,’ she said hoarsely.

His throat was dry and he was wishing he’d prepared a script. Too late now. All the way over here, a voice in his head had nagged like a termagant.

You should be ashamed of yourself. The woman is grieving and you’re making a terrible mistake. Why didn’t you wait and think this through, instead of letting yourself be bowled along by excitement? What will you say if you are proved wrong? You’re ruining everything, not just for you but for Miranda as well. Why didn’t you listen to Hannah and mind your own business?

‘I — we were sorry to hear the news about Simon.’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Not good, is it? The nurse is with him now.’

He coughed and shifted from one foot to another. ‘I don’t want to intrude…’

It was a lie; he’d driven over here precisely because he was determined to intrude. But he didn’t know what else to say. If she said she wasn’t up to talking or slammed the door in his face, he didn’t have a Plan B. He would have to go away and decide whether he dared share with anyone the idea that had leapt unbidden into his mind. It was a credible idea, it made his spine tingle just like the comparison between nineteenth-century historians and Sherlock Holmes that had become the springboard for the book and then his television series. But as Hannah Scarlett said, there was a world of difference between academic theorising and building a case on the granite of evidence.

‘You must excuse me,’ Tash said. ‘I’ve forgotten my manners. What are you doing out on the doorstep? Come in for a few minutes. The nurse will be a while yet.’

‘I’m sorry to disturb you at a time like this,’ he said, following her along the hallway. Their footsteps echoed on the floorboards. ‘It must be very difficult for you.’

‘It’s outside my experience,’ she said, not looking over her shoulder. ‘The man I love is dying and I’m being forced to watch.’

Brackdale folk had never understood the Dumelows’ relationship, he told himself. Glib and easy resentment of a glamorous trophy wife missed the point. So did envy of the rich man who’d dumped his childhood sweetheart for a younger, prettier model. For once the truth was tinged with fairytale romance. This couple really were truly, madly, deeply in love with each other. But it wasn’t a fairytale with a happy ending.

‘Would you like a drop of something?’ she asked as they entered the living room. A half-empty bottle of Gordon’s stood on a silver tray next to a solitary glass.

And Tash herself, people had never understood her. The snide remarks that they exchanged behind their hands were ludicrously mistaken. This woman wasn’t a city sophisticate who regarded slumming it in the valley as the price to be paid for a cushy lifestyle. Look at the watercolours that covered the walls, the shimmering dawns and the purple sunsets, the blue meres and the mist-fringed mountains. They weren’t masterpieces, but they were painted from the heart. She was infatuated with Lakeland, still crazy after all these years. Brackdale was her special place, a private refuge, an oasis of safety.

‘No?’ She nodded at one of the vast leather armchairs. ‘Do take a seat. You won’t mind if I pour myself another?’

‘Of course not.’

Lifting the bottle, she said, ‘I know I’ve had enough. Too many, in fact, but who’s counting? This is the best anaesthetic I know. Kind of you to call by.’

‘I’ll be honest with you, Tash.’ He took a deep breath. ‘I came to ask a couple of questions.’

Until this moment, she’d seemed dazed. Dazed by the drink and the fate of the man who was dying in this house. But something in his tone seemed to slap her into watchfulness.

‘Questions?’

The warning voice whispered in his brain: You’re going to regret this. Keep quiet, make your apologies and leave her to weep. There is still time.

‘As a matter of fact, when I was a student, I spent a few months learning Russian, just for fun.’

‘And?’

The longcase clock was ticking in the background. He focused on Tash’s white face, so beautifully structured. Cheekbones to die for. They were so high; a Slavic inheritance, he’d assumed.

‘There was a proverb I came across. I don’t know if you’re familiar with it.’ He took a deep breath. If only his translation skills weren’t so rusty. ‘It goes something like this. Skazhi s kem ty drug, a ya skazhu kto ty takov.’

‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I’m way out of practice.’

He raised his eyebrows. ‘Your native tongue?’

‘It’s a mistake to live in the past,’ she said with a tight smile. ‘I think of myself as English now.’

‘Yes, that’s one thing everyone admires. The way you’ve assimilated yourself into the English way of life. You speak the language like a native, no one would ever imagine that you came from Russia. The proverb, by the way, means Tell me who your friend is and I’ll tell you who you are.’

She sipped at her drink, watching him in the way a zoo keeper might watch a tiger with a reputation for unpredictability.

‘In case you needed a translation,’ he said. ‘Some things cling on in the memory more than others, don’t they? Like the stories we enjoyed as children.’