The Downstairs Maid (13 page)

Her fingers were clawing at his hand as he held her by the throat, her nails scraping the skin. She was gasping something, her face turning red and then purple. He shook her once by the neck, lifting her off her feet, and then let go. She fell to the ground like a stone and just lay there not moving, her long hair spread out on the ground. For a few seconds Derek stared down at her in disbelief.

‘Get up you silly cow. Keep your mouth shut and I shan’t hurt you. I was just teaching you a bit of a lesson. Get up now …’

Carla didn’t move. Derek caught his breath and dropped to one knee, bending over her. He turned her and her head lolled to one side. Her neck was broken. Derek didn’t know his own strength. He glanced at his large hands, as if he hadn’t known what they were capable of. He’d killed her. He hadn’t meant to do more than give her a scare, but she was dead. He was a murderer.

Derek could feel the cold sweat trickling down his spine. What was he going to do? Standing up, he looked about him. Had anyone seen him waiting for her? Had they been noticed as they walked to the field?

It was a cold night, too cold for folk to be standing about. He’d only seen those farm workers go into the pub and they hadn’t noticed him in the shadows across the road. Maybe he could get away with it – if he ran now. No, he mustn’t panic. If he was seen running people might put two and two together when her body was discovered. He must walk. He must go home and stay there – pretend that he’d been there all night if anyone were to ask him.

Who would ask? No one knew he’d been seeing Carla. She’d kept it secret because her father would have thrashed her if he’d known. All Derek had to do was to keep his nerve. Just go home and carry on as usual. After a few weeks he’d sell up and leave the area. He’d been thinking that it would suit him, to travel for a while – and he couldn’t live here now. It would haunt him, what he’d done … murdered a girl …

No, it wasn’t murder; it was an accident. Derek fought the panic that was rising inside him. He hadn’t meant to hurt her, not really. He didn’t know his own strength. It was her fault for struggling like that … if she hadn’t pulled away from him it wouldn’t have happened.

Derek had been walking for a few minutes. He was away from the site of his wicked deeds and now he couldn’t stop the panic. He began to run as fast as he could, across fields, scrambling over stiles and gates, avoiding the roads. The clouds had rolled across the sky and it was pitch black. From time to time he stumbled and once he fell face down, grazing his cheek, but he got up at once and kept on running, heading for home. He ran and ran and ran until his chest burned and he had to stop. Then he began to think. No one was going to suspect him. Why should they?

If he held his nerve he would be in the clear. He began to walk more slowly across the fields, and then he smiled. He’d shown that little bitch who was the master – and now he was free.

Derek spent the night hanging on to his nerves by his fingernails. He kept thinking the police would come and arrest him, but when morning came and still no one arrived, he began to relax. He worked on his farm, as always, speaking naturally to his neighbours and behaving as if nothing had happened.

No one could know he’d been seeing Carla, because she’d been too frightened of her father to tell anyone.

As the day wore on he began to feel safe. By evening he was sure he was going to get away with it and he laughed inwardly. He’d shown that little bitch! He was too clever to get caught and he decided that he wouldn’t run away, because that might look suspicious. If the police had any idea he’d been meeting Carla they would have been here by now.

He decided to walk to his sister’s home and see if Emily had come back from her night out with Harry Standen yet. If she were in her bedroom, he would stand in the yard and watch her undress. Emily always drew her curtains at night but the material was thin and if she had the light on he could see the shape of her body … he licked his lips at the thought and smiled.

He saw them standing outside the kitchen door smiling at each other. Derek couldn’t get close enough to hear what they were saying without risking being seen and he didn’t want anyone to know he was there. As he lurked in the shadows he saw Standen reach out and draw her close; their kiss was deep and intimate and it sent Derek wild with jealous rage. His hands balled at his sides and it was all he could do to stop himself going after Standen right then – but he had to wait until Emily went inside.

After she closed the door behind her, Standen stood outside grinning. Derek gritted his teeth. He would soon wipe the smile from that bugger’s face. He followed silently as Standen went off whistling.

Lost in his own thoughts, Derek’s victim didn’t realise that there was someone behind him until Derek jumped on him. In the dark Standen couldn’t see who was attacking him and he got little chance to fight back, because Derek struck him a blow on the side of the head with a brick he’d picked up. As Standen lay on the ground half conscious, Derek went in with the boot as hard as he could.

Derek was panting when he stopped kicking his victim. He’d lost his temper when he saw the damned scoundrel kissing Emily. If she’d pushed him away or smacked the rogue round the face Derek might not have been so angry, but to see her giving the rotten bugger what she had denied him made his guts boil with rage.

She was his! If he couldn’t have her he wasn’t going to let someone like this idiot spoil her innocence. Was she daft enough to think he would marry her – a man like Harry Standen? With all his money he could have anyone. He would take Emily down and then desert her – the way Derek had Carla.

The memory of what he’d done to Carla sent a chill down his spine. So far he was in the clear but for how long? He certainly couldn’t bring himself to visit the Golden Hen and hear the talk about Carla. Because he’d seen hardly anyone all day, he wasn’t sure if her body had been discovered, though he was sure it must have been. He’d left her lying where she fell and someone was sure to find her pretty quickly.

Derek’s throat went dry. He ran his tongue over his lips. In his fury at seeing Harry Standen kissing Emily he had forgotten he’d already committed one murder. Had his temper led him to kill again? He was about to bend down and examine his victim when he heard a groan. Harry Standen was still alive, though he would be black and blue from his bruises in the morning. Served him right for trying to turn Emily’s head. Well, Derek certainly wasn’t going to hang around and ask if he could get home on his own.

Setting off at a good pace across the fields, Derek felt pleased with himself. He’d shown that little bitch what he thought of her and now he’d given Standen a good hiding. The fool didn’t have a clue as to who or what had attacked him. It was like taking sweets from a baby. No one was going to come after him. He could do what he liked …

His feeling of invincibility began to grow in his mind as he strode through the darkness and he laughed. He was too clever for the law, too clever for Standen – and if he got a chance he’d show that stuck-up little miss where she stood too.

Emily wasn’t the innocent he’d thought her. To think he’d felt ashamed of what he’d thought about her that day in the dairy. She was just like all the other cheap tarts, gagging for it with the first man to notice her.

A smile touched his mouth. He wasn’t going to stay around here much longer so he didn’t give a damn what Stella thought. He’d bide his time until he was ready, but before he left he’d show Emily who was the master …

The local papers were full of the murder of Carla Bracknell and the story made a few of the nationals too. Emily was so shocked she couldn’t believe it had happened. People didn’t get murdered in their little village. Pa came home from Ely market the following Thursday shaking his head over the fact that something like that could happen to someone they knew.

‘I went to see Josh at the pub. He’s devastated, Em. You remember Carla, don’t you? She brought you a glass of lemonade out when I bought that Victorian love seat from her father.’

‘Yes, I remember,’ Emily said. She felt an icy chill at her nape as she recalled what the girl had said to her when they sat on Pa’s wagon outside the pub. ‘Do the police know who did it?’

‘They’re making inquiries. Apparently, Josh thinks it might have been a gypsy. He had a gang of them making trouble in the pub a few nights earlier and he sent them packing – but what he can’t understand is why she went outside at that time of night. Also, the police said the gypsies had left the area.’

‘Perhaps she went to meet someone – a man?’ Emily said. Ought she to tell what she knew? Her conscience nagged at her, because it might help find the killer, but Carla hadn’t told her much – just that she had a lover. But if she told her father it might stir up a hornets’ nest. Josh would be angry if anyone suggested his daughter might be no better than she ought to be. What good could it do to distress him further when Emily didn’t know the name of the man his daughter had been seeing?

Emily turned away to clear some dirty plates into the sink, feeling deeply troubled. Something else was nagging at the back of her mind but she didn’t know what it was. If she’d thought she could help the police it was her duty to speak up, but she might just be wasting their time. She decided that she would do better to keep her mouth shut on this occasion, because she didn’t really know anything.

She listened as her parents talked about the terrible tragedy. Ma was anxious and Pa was upset for his friend. Carla was only just eighteen and Pa was troubled as he looked at Emily.

‘It might have been anyone’s daughter … even you, Em.’

A pot was hissing on the stove. Ma made a dash to move it before it boiled over. They all looked at one another uncomfortably, the sense of menace close and frightening for a moment.

‘Emily doesn’t go out alone at night,’ Ma said, breaking the silence at last. ‘Harry Standen is a decent bloke. If I didn’t trust him I wouldn’t let her go …’

‘Yes …’ Pa nodded but still looked troubled. ‘Harry was attacked the other night but he’s all right. When I saw him in the market he said it was nothing … seemed a bit embarrassed over it.’

Emily frowned. Who would want to attack Harry? He was such a friendly, pleasant man. She would have liked to question her father further but the subject was closed.

‘You just be careful, Em. Don’t you go walking far from home on your own, until the police catch the culprit,’ her father warned.

‘I shan’t,’ Emily promised him. She felt shivery all over. Carla had struck her as being a rather silly girl, but she hadn’t deserved to be murdered. ‘Mrs Smith came for a jug of milk earlier, Pa. She said that Miss Amy Barton was going steady with Sir Arthur Jones. Do you know him?’

‘He has been in the shop a couple of times,’ Pa said. ‘That reminds me. Christopher wants to know if you’ll go to the tea dance on Saturday afternoon with him. I told him yes, provided he brings you home on the bus and walks you to the door. Was that all right?’

‘Yes, I suppose so,’ Emily said, though she felt a little guilty because she’d kissed Harry when he took her to the dance and she thought he expected her to be his girl. Christopher wanted her to go out with him too and she wasn’t sure which one of them she liked best. In any case it was much too soon to be thinking of marriage.

What Emily really wanted was to do something different with her life. She wasn’t sure what she could do, because she’d left school too soon to get a good certificate and she wasn’t trained for anything except helping Ma and Pa. She was good at adding up, subtracting, multiplying and division. If she’d stayed on at school a bit longer she might have found office work taking care of someone’s accounts – or she could have worked in a shop. Emily had tried for a position in a high-class dress shop in Ely without telling her mother but they’d turned her down. They were sorry but they were looking for someone with experience, their letter said. How was she to become experienced if no one would give her the chance?

‘You be careful, miss,’ Ma said. ‘Harry Standen is a good catch – if he thinks you’re playing around he won’t want to know.’

Emily went to the sink to fill the big copper kettle. She wasn’t sure how to reply but Pa answered for her.

‘Em isn’t seventeen until June. It’s too soon for her to be thinking of marriage. Harry’s all right but he’s just a friend – isn’t he, Em?’

‘Yes,’ she said without looking round. ‘I like Harry but I like Christopher too. For the moment I just want to have fun.’

‘I really enjoyed myself,’ Christopher said as they left the hotel on Saturday afternoon. ‘Dancing with you was wonderful, Emily. You looked so pretty and your shoes were lovely.’

Emily laughed and hugged his arm. She’d unpicked the dress she’d worn to the Christmas dance with Pa and made the brocade into a plain slim skirt that finished just above her ankles, wearing it with a cream artificial silk blouse that she’d edged with lace from the bolero. She knew it looked much better than the dress and this was only the third time she’d worn her shoes, twice to go dancing with Harry and now with Christopher. Because it was a tea dance, most people had danced with their partners the whole time and Christopher had been very careful not to tread on her shoes.

Emily had noticed a couple come in a little after she and Christopher arrived. She’d known Amy Barton and her escort at once but Miss Barton hadn’t looked at her. Not that Emily expected her to – why should she?

Miss Barton was smiling at Sir Arthur and he hardly took his eyes off her. Emily had thought how beautiful she looked in a blue wool dress and light cream suede shoes. She had a double row of pearls about her throat but as yet no engagement ring on her left hand.

Christopher had ordered both sandwiches and cakes with their tea and, as the food arrived just after Miss Barton and her escort, Emily was soon too busy enjoying herself to notice the other couple. Even when they danced by Christopher’s table, Miss Barton did no more than glance their way. She showed no sign of noticing Emily, perhaps because she was wrapped up in what her partner was saying to her.