The Blackwoods Farm Enquiry (An Ivy Beasley Mystery) (20 page)

INSPIRED BY THE
fruitful nature of Miriam’s memories, Ivy’s writing session in the afternoon at Springfields had gone very well, and now she produced a sheaf of papers and handed them to Roy.

“Chapter one,” she said triumphantly.

“How many chapters to go?” said Roy, taking it with a smile.

“Lord knows. And I mean that literally. I expect I shall carry on with them until the time comes for me to account for myself at the gate of heaven.”

“Very poetic, Ivy, my love! Have we discovered a hidden talent to add to all your others?”

“I doubt it,” said Ivy. “But it is a nice thing to do, looking back over a long life. I remember so much, good and bad, funny and sad. It is amazing how much comes back, once you start. Remember Miriam yesterday?”

“So where have you begun,” said Roy, shuffling the papers.

“Don’t mix them up! I’ll never get them back together again.”

“Have you ever thought of starting from now, and working backwards?”

“If you have nothing more constructive to say, Roy Goodman, you can give it here at once!” Ivy reached out her hand, but Roy evaded it.

“Only teasing, beloved,” he said. “Actually, I’m jealous. I tried to think of a single interesting memory yesterday, and my early life, and the rest of it, was as boring as hell! Village school, boarding school, agricultural college, Young Farmers Ball, rugby football, farming, retirement, and then Wham! I meet Ivy Beasley! That’s it, so far. Now, I shall read this after coffee, in my room, in peace and quiet, away from the hurly-burly of daily life in Springfields.”

Ivy laughed. “Have you noticed, dear, how our conversation becomes quite literary when we’re talking about such matters? But aren’t we going to church?”

“It’s holy communion, with that visiting canon in the pulpit. He could do with an editor when writing his sermons. There’s Evensong we can go to, with our own nice vicaress. Let’s do that.”

• • •

ROY WAS SITTING
peacefully in his room with Ivy’s memoir on his lap. It had fallen from his grasp as his eyes had gradually closed and he had drifted into sleep. Two pages had fallen on the floor, and as his telephone began to ring he jumped awake and sent the whole lot, sheet by sheet, tumbling off his lap.

“Hello? Um, no, I am not expecting a call, Mrs. Spurling. What name did you say? Jones? Well, better put him through.”

When Mr. Jones said he was calling from Boston, Lincolnshire, Roy snapped properly awake, and asked him his business. Mr. Jones proved to be the pork butcher Gus and Deirdre had met and talked with about the Winchens. When Roy asked how he had got this number, Mr. Jones said Gus had given him four numbers to contact, and this one was the first to answer.

Having straightened that out, Roy listened avidly to what Mr. Jones had to say.

“I was interested after talking to your friends about the Winchens, and decided to do a little research myself. Difficult family to track down! But one thing puzzled me more than anything, and that was what happened to Eleanor’s sister, Mary. Then I found amongst the old butcher’s accounts, a letter from, I think, Eleanor’s mother to a cousin—I think it was a cousin—in Australia. It was an old carbon copy, dropped in there by accident, I should think. Do you remember when we used a piece of carbon paper to keep a copy of our letters? The burden of this one seemed to be that she was sending a young woman—no name given—to live with the cousin’s family and settle down as an Australian citizen.”

“Good gracious! And do you think that young woman was Mary?”

“As I said, no name given. No trace thereafter of Eleanor’s sister. That’s it, all I could find. Your friends might like to trace it further, but I don’t know how. Perhaps you could pass it on? If I find out more, I’ll let you know.”

Roy thanked him profusely, and took his number. Then he picked up Ivy’s papers and set himself to finish her memoirs so far. It was more than his life was worth to return to the lunch table without having restored them to order and read them properly.

• • •

“WE SHOULD CERTAINLY
get Gus and Deirdre along to tea,” Ivy said. “Better than trying to remember it all in a phone call. Pinkers is on duty all day today, so no problem there. What an interesting morning!”

“Not too interesting to forget about a certain person’s memoirs,” said Roy. “An excellent start, beloved! Really gripping, and I couldn’t put it down until I reached the end. It was rather sad, though, the way your father was sent out to sober up in the garden shed with nothing to sit in but the dog basket.”

He forbore to mention that Ivy had always maintained they had cats, as her mother couldn’t abide dogs. The story was a good one, and who was he to quibble?

At teatime, Gus and Deirdre arrived promptly, and they settled once more in Ivy’s room.

“So what’s this important news?” Gus said.

Roy related simply and accurately what Mr. Jones had said to him. “Nice man, I thought,” he concluded. “Very friendly, and interested in everything you’d told him. I asked him why he rang me, and he had tried all four of us, and I was first to answer. So what do you think about this mystery person growing up in Australia?”

Deirdre pretended she had something in her eye, and dabbed away a tear. “It is very sad, isn’t it, whoever the young person was. Sent off to another country like a parcel. I wonder why? There must have been something very serious behind it. Think of the terrible journey she must have had. Probably ended up in the outback, working like a drudge on a remote farm.”

“Your imagination does you credit, Dee-Dee,” said Gus. “But equally, she may have been sent as a nursemaid, and settled in a leafy Sydney suburb with a charming doctor’s family. Ended up marrying the son of the house.”

“In that case,” said Ivy, “we must wait until you, Deirdre, make another appointment and ask Mrs. Winchen some important questions.”

“But where is this leading us, folks? What lead are we following? I really do think I shall have to ask Frobisher straight out if he thinks Eleanor tripped and tumbled to her death, or was pushed. To put it baldly. The results of an autopsy could be attributed to either, I reckon.”

“You weren’t here to listen to what Miriam said yesterday,” said Ivy. “The most interesting revelation was that Eleanor became pregnant, lost the baby, Mary came to look after her afterwards and went back home in—some said—disgrace. We need to know why, when and how.”

“In other words, I have to encourage poor Mrs. Winchen to forget her aches and pains and search her memory for some answers. Right?”

“Right, Deirdre love,” said Gus.

“And then shall we have another trip to Boston, Gus? Call on Mr. Jones again?” said Deirdre, looking hopeful.

“Good thinking,” he said. “We could take another look at the baptismal records in the Stump. Wonderful church, Ivy. You should take a trip with us and see it. From the top of the church tower you can see for miles and miles. From up there they used to have a beacon to guide travellers across the fens. There are still treacherous marshes on the edge of the Wash. Lonely country, where anything might happen.”

“Don’t get carried away, Gus,” said Deirdre. “Shall I book us in to the hotel again then? Two nights?”

“If you two ever get married,” said Ivy acidly, “you’ll know where to go for your honeymoon, won’t you?”

IVY WAS FIRST
to arrive at college on Wednesday morning, and Peter Rubens greeted her enthusiastically.

“Good morning, Miss Beasley! A fine day and my favourite student has made an early start. Excellent example to set to the other slackers.”

“I’ve got a reason, Mr. Rubens. Can you spare a minute? I want your permission to ask one or two of the day students if I could talk to their local families? They need to be in Barrington, or nearby. Not to put too fine a point on it, I want to pick their brains. How about it?”

“Is this concerning your own memoirs?”

“Yes, sort of. I need some farming background material, as instructed by Rickwood Smith. I myself come from the Midlands. Ended up here because of my cousin Deirdre. Lives at Tawny Wings—you must have met her?”

Peter Rubens’s eyes sparkled. “Oh yes, young Mrs. Bloxham. Very lovely person. We’ve met on a committee in Thornwell. Social work, with an emphasis on old people. I like to keep abreast, you know.”

“Right, well, I thought I should ask you. I hope there will be no objection?”

“None at all, Miss Beasley. I’ll get Stephanie to write a note of introduction for you. And if I can be of any help, do speak to me. I shall soon be staging a small drinks party for neighbours and friends who have been so kind to us since we opened up here. Perhaps Mrs. Bloxham might like to come along?”

Not a chance, you old idiot, thought Ivy. Mrs. Deirdre Bloxham is a rich and merry widow, and she has much bigger fish to fry than you, Peter Paul Rubens.

Thinking she would start with the young student who knew about farming, Ivy asked his name and planned to approach him at coffee time. Adam Broadbent, Rubens had said, and he confirmed that the lad was a day student and lived locally.

The first session of the day concerned source material for the memoir writer. Friends and relatives, old diaries and photograph albums, back copies of newspapers and magazines. In Ivy’s case, her contacts were few, and she had never kept a continuous diary. Her one very precious photo album was kept in a bag under her bed, and was seldom taken out. Perhaps this was the one occasion? She could show it to Roy, and hope that he was not dismayed by the small girl with skimpy pigtails and dark eyes hiding behind goggle-eyed spectacles.

And she was bandy legged! Over the years she had developed a habit of always wearing long skirts, well down her legs. “My skirts,” she would say, “cover a multitude of sins.”

She would do her best to remember what went on in the outside world, but back in Round Ringford, a tiny, isolated village in the middle of England, Ivy’s memoirs would chiefly concern her mother and father, and after her father’s death, life with a domineering, cruel-tongued mother.

Coffee time arrived, and Ivy sat down at the same table as Adam Broadbent. He held her chair for her and said politely that he had enjoyed the expedition she had suggested.

“A sad-looking place, though, isn’t it, Blackwoods Farm? Such a shame it has been allowed to deteriorate.”

“I agree. I did have a fancy that my dad might like to buy it for me, but times is hard and he couldn’t manage it.”

“I suppose your father remembers it as a useful going concern?”

“Not sure. You’d have to ask him.”

So, given this perfect opening, Ivy explained that she needed some background material for her memoirs. “You remember that Rickwood said we should interlace our own experiences with background material concerning the world at that time,” she said.

“Yeah, Dad’d certainly remember a lot about that.”

Ivy continued, saying that she needed someone with a farming background who could describe life back then, and Adam agreed to ask his grandmother if she could help. “She’d remember more than Dad. She lives with us, so you could come and have a cup of tea.”

• • •

BY LUNCHTIME, THE
group were becoming well versed in extracts from other memoirs, especially those where a certain amount of “embroidering” had gone on. Dialogue would be encouraged, as long as the voice provided colour and authenticity.

“The Suffolk accent is wonderfully mellifluous,” enthused Rickwood.

“It sounds nice, too,” said Ivy.

“It’s quite singsong, really,” volunteered Samantha. “Not like in the West Country, but Suffolk and Norfolk are very recognisable.”

“Remember the Singing Postman?” said Ivy. “Ha’ y’got a loyt, boiy?”

“Yes, well, we must get on,” said Rickwood, with an uncomfortable feeling he was being sent up. “My watch tells me it’s nearly lunchtime.”

“I expect Adam can produce a true Suffolk accent?” Ivy was enjoying herself.

“Oh, yeah. Here goes. ‘Where y’bin?’ ‘Bin t’swaff’m, t’do some thrashin’. All f’nuth’n. That’s s’uthn.’ Will that do, Miss Beasley?”

• • •

AFTER CLASS FINISHED,
Adam suggested Ivy should come along with him straight away.

“Dad always comes in for a cup around four,” he said. “He’ll be only too pleased to have an excuse to stay in the kitchen for longer, and he can get Gran going.”

“Shouldn’t you first ask your parents if they mind my coming?”

Adam pulled out his mobile with a flourish, had a few words with his mother, and smiled. “Fine. You’d be very welcome,” he said. “Grannie loves to talk about the old days.”

• • •

THE KITCHEN OF
the old farmhouse was warm, and smelt of generations of good cooking. Ivy sat comfortably in an old chair that left white dog hairs on her skirt, and listened to Grannie Broadbent reminisce.

“How clear your memories are!” she said, after a while. “I couldn’t possibly remember so much. Perhaps it should be you writing your memoirs!”

“It’s the farming community, I reckon,” he said. “We all know each other and swap stories when we meet.”

“I suppose you remember Ted Blatch and his family? Didn’t they live at Blackwoods Farm?”

“Oh, yes, Ted was a one with the ladies. He married an outsider. That’s what we called anyone coming in from more than twenty miles away! Pretty girl, Eleanor was, too. Shame she came to a sticky end.”

“Did she settle in all right?” persisted Ivy. “Must have been difficult, with her family coming from up north?”

“Yes, though we never met them,” said Adam’s father. I think her young sister, Mary, came down once, when Eleanor had a miss. Then the Blatches never had no more children, and that was a sore disappointment. No sons. Nor no daughters, either. Speaking of which, you would have loved a daughter, eh, missus?”

“Not too late, mind,” Grannie Broadbent added slyly.

Adam looked embarrassed, but Ivy laughed. “Never too late,” she said. “I suppose the Blatches went on trying?”

“Not sure.”

Ivy had a feeling they were clamming up on the subject of the Blatches, but ploughed on. “Eleanor must’ve needed friends. My mother always used to say you made friends at the school gate, waiting for little ’uns to come out.”

“Miss Eleanor died recently, as I’m sure you know,” said Adam’s mother, clearly attempting to draw a line under the subject.

“And Mary?” said Ivy. “What happened to her?” She held her breath, waiting for an answer.

With a quick look at Adam’s father, Mrs. Broadbent shook her head. “Mary who?” she said.

“Winchen. Eleanor’s sister,” Ivy reminded her. Goodwill was ebbing away.

“Oh, her,” said Mrs. Broadbent. Both she and her husband shook their heads, and even Adam looked absently out of the window.

“Don’t know nothing about Mary,” old Grannie Broadbent said finally. “As I said, we never met the Winchen family. Now, Miss Beasley, how about another cup of tea?”

• • •

“I AM SURE
they were hiding something,” said Ivy, as she sat with Roy in her room. “Definitely shifty, all three of them. Not hiding, so much as unwilling to talk about her. They would surely know about Mary Winchen now, though. A disabled lady living in Spinney Close?”

“Very likely. But village politics can be very tricky, as I’m sure you know. Still, you did your best, my love. Deirdre and Gus might have more luck up in Boston. I myself have not been idle.”

“Roy, my dear, of course you haven’t! Tell all.”

“That, Ivy, is an expression you have picked up from young Katya, and I am sure would be frowned on by tutor Rickwood. But I will tell you all that I have discovered from sitting in the lounge and listening to our fellow guests here in Springfields.”

Suitably subdued, Ivy pecked him on the cheek. “Never thought of that,” she said. “Old folks’ memories on our doorstep! Who did you speak to?”

“Well, I decided to tackle the dreaded Mrs. Cornwall. Very large, very fond of lavender water, and with a very loud voice and loud opinions. Mrs. Cornwall, the very same.”

“Oh lor, Roy. Very brave of you. How did you get on?”

“Well, as usual, my dear, with bullies, face up to them and they crumble. She was very pleasant and extremely helpful.”

“Has she always lived in Barrington?”

“Yes, from being born in a barn one winter’s night when her mother hadn’t time to get back to the house.”

“Very colourful,” said Ivy. “So come on, Roy, did she remember anything about Mary Winchen?”

“Yes,” said Roy. “She did.” He turned to adjust the cushion behind his back.

“Roy, I am breaking off our engagement if you don’t tell me exactly what she said!”

“We talked about the sad death of Eleanor, and then Mrs. Cornwall volunteered the information that Mary would get the money, after all. That’s all she said. Dropped off to sleep, then, or pretended to. I touched her hand, but she didn’t wake up.”

“Roy! That is very important. And fits in with what Mrs. Broadbent said to me not two hours ago. She mentioned the younger sister, Mary. We’ve always thought Eleanor was the eldest of the two, haven’t we, so we were right there.”

“Elder of two, eldest of many. I mention that only because you are now in the writing game.”

“Mm, but you don’t know that there weren’t more children than Mary and Eleanor. There might have been Tom, Dick and Harry as well.”

“There you are, then,” said Roy.