Page 16 of Murder in the Winter Woods (Julia Bird Mysteries #8)

‘Is there a tap or a bathroom where I can wash the dust off my hands?’ Julia asked, rubbing her perfectly clean hands together.

‘The bathroom is inside, on your right,’ said Geoff, without looking up from the scratch which he was attending to with vigour.

Julia walked into the workshop, past the little office area on the left, and was about to open the bathroom door when a woman walked out. It was Poppy. Julia recognised her from her social media. Her bright red hair – dyed to match her name? Julia wondered – made her instantly recognisable.

Julia stepped back and held the door to let Poppy pass.

The woman looked distracted, and walked past Julia without even making eye contact, let alone saying thank you.

It was as if she didn’t even see her. Julia had become accustomed to her invisibility as a woman of a certain age.

On a good day, she even appreciated it. It had its uses, on occasion – like now, for instance, when she was engaged in amateur snooping.

A man’s voice came from the workshop: ‘There you are, Poppy. Are you all right?’

Julia glanced behind to see a man coming towards the redhead. He took her in his arms.

Julia stepped into the little bathroom, leaving the door slightly ajar. She stood by the door, her ear to the gap, to catch their conversation.

‘Thanks for coming to fetch me, Ollie.’

‘It’s no problem. But what’s going on? Why didn’t you tell me about the accident?

‘I was confused. Upset. I didn’t want you to think…’ Poppy gasped between the words. ‘There was this horrible sound. I’ll never forget it.’

‘It was an accident, darling.’

‘I took a life…I killed a living being.’

‘It was an accident, Poppy. You wouldn’t even kill a mosquito, everyone knows that.’

‘Well, now I’ve killed something, and not a mosquito. A sentient being. I’ve committed a crime. A soul is dead.’

‘You need to go to the police, tell them everything.’

‘No, I can’t tell them…It’ll draw attention to us.’

‘They’ll find out.’

‘I can’t go to prison, Ollie. They eat meat there.’

Julia shut the bathroom door, her blood pounding in her ears. A confession! She needed to tell Hayley immediately. She washed her hands, shook off the drips, and dried them on the paper towel. She reached for her phone and dialled.

Hayley answered in two rings, rather to Julia’s surprise.

‘What’s up?’ she asked, with her usual brusqueness.

Julia described what she’d seen and heard. She told her about the blood, and was only halfway through relating the results of her bathroom eavesdropping when the detective cut her short.

‘Got it. Thanks. Tell the mechanic not to touch that car. The police will be impounding it. Can you come by the station, give DC Farmer your statement? And I’ll get onto this Poppy person.’

The protesters were outside the police station again.

There were eight of them now. The old chap, Fred, was there, still in his voluminous red puffer jacket.

The woman with the double pram wasn’t present.

Presumably, two small kids kept her too busy to be protesting every day.

Diane and the older hippy lady – Lorraine, that was her name – were bossing around the new recruits.

‘Oh, hello, Julia,’ Diane said. ‘Have you come to join us?’

‘Ah, no, although I support your cause. I’ve got other business today.’

‘Well, we’re here from twelve until one every day.’

‘I see, well, I might see you on another occasion. Right now, I’ve got an appointment at the police station.’

‘Ah, and what would that be…?’

Diane didn’t finish her question – which Julia was thankful for – because more reinforcements had arrived in the person of a middle-aged couple, one of them wearing a No to nuclear!

button badge which he’d presumably had in a drawer for thirty years.

His partner had a homemade sign saying Safe streets!

on one side, and Mind children, crossing!

on the other, which was a little confusing thanks to the comma placement.

It did remind Julia that she had promised the road safety committee that she would have her slogans to them this evening, so that the signs could be printed.

‘Right,’ said Fred, looking at his watch. ‘It’s twelve. Everyone ready?’

As they took up position along the pavement, hoisting their signs to their shoulders, Julia crossed the road to the station.

‘Thanks for coming in,’ said DC Walter Farmer.

‘No problem, Walter, anything I can do to help. How are you?’

The question was more than just a formality.

Walter was looking particularly harassed this morning.

His eyes darted about in his pale face, and a small rash of pimples stood out on his chin.

‘Ah, well, I’m all right,’ Walter said, not very convincingly.

‘There’s a lot going on with the two motor vehicle accidents… or, well, I should say, deaths.’

This was interesting. Had the police formally opened this as a murder investigation?

Before Julia could formulate the question, Walter had moved on.

‘And Amaryllis isn’t sleeping, on account of the pregnancy.

Her back hurts. And she’s up and down like a jack-in-the-box, which means I am too.

If I got four hours last night, it was a miracle. ’

The sound of what seemed to be singing floated in an open window. Someone must be driving by with their car windows open and the music on full.

‘Ah, that’s hard when you’ve got a busy day at work.’

‘Busy it is, Julia. Busy it is. Speaking of, I should get going on the job, shouldn’t I? DI Gibson is busy with the car and the forensics. She wants me to take your statement. Everything you know about the car at the panel beaters. And what you saw or heard.’

Julia recounted what she’d seen on the car. Walter scribbled furiously in his notebook. She then handed over her handkerchief, dropping it straight into the evidence bag Walter held open.

‘It certainly looks like blood,’ he said, peering at it through the clear plastic.

‘That’s what I thought.’

He placed the bag carefully on his desk, picked up his pen and notebook, and said, ‘Please, go on.’

When Julia started on the conversation she overheard from the bathroom, Walter squinted at her, his lips twitching with a smile for the first time since she had sat down. ‘Overheard, hey? That was a lucky coincidence.’ Like Hayley, Walter knew Julia well.

‘Yes. Right place at the right time, I suppose,’ said Julia.

The singing was still going on, and it seemed louder now. It couldn’t be coming from a car.

‘Well, thanks for coming in, Julia. I’ll give this to the boss, see if she needs anything else.’

‘Walter,’ Julia said, hesitantly. ‘You don’t think these two deaths were an accident, do you?’

There must have been half a minute’s silence, before he said, ‘It seems like too much of a coincidence. The same manner of death, in the space of a couple of weeks, within five miles of each other.’

‘And the forensics?’

‘Nothing substantial: just that very indistinct, quite small footprint.’

Julia tried to remember Poppy’s feet, but couldn’t. She wasn’t a big person, that much Julia knew. ‘Do you think it was the same print at both scenes?’

Walter’s phone rang. He held up his hand. ‘Julia, I have to get going. This is DI Gibson on the phone. She’ll be needing me, I’m sure. If you think of anything else, phone me.’

He took the call.

Julia left his office deep in thought. As she drew closer to the front door, the indistinct singing got louder.

Through the glass in the door to the police station, she saw Poppy and Ollie pause outside, as if putting off their moment of entry.

They stepped to the side, close together, their heads down.

Julia opened the door, keeping her head turned away from them.

She didn’t have anything to hide, exactly, but they might think it an odd coincidence, the same strange woman popping up at the panel beater and the police station.

She needn’t have worried, though: they were completely engrossed in their own world.

She walked slowly, trying to listen in. It wasn’t easy.

Lorraine was leading the motley crew of protesters in a tuneless version of ‘We Shall Overcome’.

They seemed a little unclear on the lyrics, and there was quite a lot of mumbling.

Ollie kissed Poppy tenderly, and said, ‘Now you go in. Just remember, tell them it was a fox. Just because they have called you in doesn’t mean that they know everything.’

‘I wish you could come in with me.’ Julia could hear the tears in her voice.

‘You’ll be fine. I’ll go and get rid of the evidence. This whole thing will be over by teatime. Now go.’

Julia quickened her step to avoid being seen by Poppy.

She heard the station door open and close, followed by the sound of footsteps coming quickly behind her.

As she got to her car, Ollie walked past her and got into the car parked two or three ahead.

The blue Renault pulled out, into the main road.

Lorraine had moved on to ‘Imagine’, which was an improvement (off a very low base), because the singers had a better handle on the lyrics this time. Fred, in particular, gave it a proper go.

As she got into her car, Julia wondered what John Lennon would think of his song being used by a grandad in the Cotswolds, protesting for safer roads. She reckoned he’d be quite pleased.

Julia slammed the door, muffling the sound of the singing, and phoned Walter’s number, to tell him about Ollie saying he would hide evidence.

The phone call went straight to voicemail.

Walter must be in with Poppy. Julia left a message for him to phone her back as soon as he got the message.

She tried Hayley, with the same result. She dithered for a moment, wondering whether she should go back into the police station.

It didn’t seem worth it, she decided. Presumably they would both be talking to Poppy and she’d be hanging around for ages waiting for them.

It had been a busy day, and the idea of hanging around for half an hour on those hard plastic chairs, reading the same old posters, didn’t appeal.

She’d go on home to her nice comfy sofa and her library book.

They would call when they could. She indicated, and pulled out of her parking spot.

As she joined the road, she found herself driving behind Ollie’s little blue car.

‘Ah well,’ she said. ‘Might as well see where he’s going.’

It was easy enough following Ollie. He was a cautious driver, who drove on the speed limit, and indicated in good time, giving her plenty of notice of his intentions.

There weren’t many cars on the road, but it was just busy enough that she didn’t think he would notice her behind him.

Julia wondered what evidence Ollie could possibly be on his way to destroy.

There wouldn’t be a weapon of any kind, given that the murder weapon of choice was a car.

Perhaps something like a letter – a threatening letter?

Or some incriminating personal item of one of the victims?

Or the shoes that had made that print, perhaps?

Julia was still mulling this over, not very successfully, when Ollie indicated left and pulled off the road.

She slowed, and saw an untarred lane leading into the woods.

She drove on a little way, parked well off the road, and walked back to the start of the lane.

Keeping to the tree line, she got close enough to see where Ollie had stopped the car.

He’d got out, walked to the boot, and opened it.

She couldn’t see what he was doing at that angle, but he reappeared in front of the car, walking into the woods, with a spade over his shoulder.

The brambles were too high for her to see much, and she dared not go closer.

The harsh metallic sound of a spade hitting the ground pierced the silent wood, and startled Julia.

She inhaled sharply. An insect or a piece of dust flew into her lungs.

She stifled the cough and edged away with her hand over her mouth.

Her lungs felt like they might explode. Staggering further into the woods until she was well out of sight of Ollie, she leaned against a tree, and allowed herself a big cough into her elbow.

Whatever had been causing the trouble was ejected, and she took a few welcome deep breaths. Her heart slowed and steadied.

Julia started towards the main road, and her car, eager to phone the detectives.

What would she tell them? She realised she would have to give them directions.

Stopping in the lane, she looked back to where Ollie’s car was still visible.

A telephone wire crossed a few yards beyond it.

Across the road from the car was a dead pine tree.

She made a mental note. At least she’d have markers for the police.

Back at her car, she phoned DI Hayley Gibson and told her what she’d seen.