Murder on the Moor - C. S. Challinor [59]
Churchill was Dalgerry’s nickname, apparently. Rex didn’t care if the chief inspector got all the credit. The important thing was to get Beardsley locked away for good. He led the two officers into the house and showed them into the living room.
“Any chance of a cup of tea for our law enforcement friends?” he asked Helen after the statements had been taken.
He joined her in the kitchen. “I’ll have a cup too, lass.”
“Do you think they’d like some of my ginger nut biscuits?”
“I know I would.”
Helen reached for the cookie tin. “Are we going to find out for sure who killed Moira?” she asked, placing the milk jug and sugar bowl on a tray. “I hope it’s Beardsley so we can be done with it. And, anyway, I don’t want it to be anyone else.”
“I canna guarantee it.”
“Can you give me an itsy-bitsy clue? By the way, what was that other clue you mentioned when we were out in the wood?”
“The pony.”
“So, the islet and the pony?”
“And, of course, motive,” Rex added while they waited for the kettle to boil.
“Would that be money?”
“Moira didn’t have any, remember.”
Helen turned off the flame beneath the whistling kettle and filled the teapot. “What about someone wanting to shut her up, like I said before? That leads us back to Hamish, because Cuthbert is basically harmless when it comes to women. I mean, he’ll try it on, but only because he thinks it’s expected of an old country laird to have his wicked way with anyone who takes his fancy.”
“You’ll see.” Rex grabbed a ginger nut cookie out of Helen’s hand and bit into it.
“Oh, you can be so smug sometimes!” she fumed.
“You were a big help,” he said, placating her with a kiss on the cheek.
Even so, a few details remained hazy and he would have liked to be better prepared. However, he could not detain his guests forever and the police officers were waiting. Draining his tea, he took up a position in the living room with his back to the window overlooking the loch. The guests fell silent and watched in rapt attention as he reviewed his notes.
“This morning we were involved in trying to determine who murdered Moira Wilcox,” he began. “Then we got sidetracked by another case. To begin with the facts: the coroner has confirmed that Moira drowned in fresh water and was dead before she reached the loch.”
He reiterated the events in detail for the benefit of the two officers seated in the room. “After Moira went up for her bath at around 11:45, I heard Hamish in conversation with her, a conversation which quickly turned sour as Moira tried to rebuff his advances.”
Rex noticed a sharp intake of breath from Shona and rapidly moved on. “Cuthbert spoke to Moira immediately afterwards and may have been the last person to speak to her.” Everyone’s glance shot toward Cuthbert.
“Oh, baa!” Estelle expostulated. “Why would any of us wish to harm the poor woman?”
Ignoring the outburst, Rex continued to plot his course. “Alistair and I went downstairs and saw Shona standing by the front door, acting suspiciously. It turns out she had just been oot for a smoke. At 12:15, she checked her watch, concerned that her husband would find out what she was up to. That’s when she heard the thud of a falling object. The timeline fits in with Beardsley’s comment about hearing a similar noise soon after he went to sleep. Alistair did not hear it because he was on the landing upstairs at the time. The library, where he was spending the night, is just below the bathroom, so he would have heard it otherwise.”
The policemen nodded, indicating they were with him so far.
“So, you see, there was a lot of activity in the house. Now,” Rex said, pacing in front of the window, giving onto a misty vista of loch and isolated fir trees. “Between 11:45, when Moira went for her bath, and 12:15, when a heavy thud was heard,