Death in the Cotswolds Read Free Page B

important bit,’ I said lightly.
    They both looked at me expectantly, and I feltstrangely foolish. ‘I’m a pagan,’ I mumbled. ‘We’ve got a group here. I more or less started it.’
    ‘I didn’t know there was a group,’ said Phil. ‘Is it flourishing?’
    ‘Depends on what you mean. It’s healthy enough.’
    ‘I’ve always liked the sound of paganism,’ said Thea, not very convincingly. ‘Although I don’t know much about it.’
    ‘There’s no mystery,’ I said, with a look at Phil.
    Thea was still being gushingly polite. ‘It must have been wonderful to grow up on a farm,’ she said next.
    I smiled. ‘It was, actually. We mainly had sheep, and I didn’t get very involved except at lambing time, when I was in big demand. From when I was twelve or thirteen I was the best at it. More of mine survived than anyone else’s. It just seemed to come naturally to me. Plus I’ve always had strong hands.’ I was boasting shamelessly, trying to get a reaction from her, wanting her attention for some reason.
    She smiled at me, a fresh sincere smile. It was as if she kept a neatly laundered stock of them somewhere, ready to produce a new one every minute or so. ‘That must have been quite something. And you still do it now, do you?’
    ‘Yup,’ I agreed. ‘Still the best, ask anybody.’
    ‘Actually,’ said Phil, with typical male clumsiness, ‘I came over to ask you a favour.’
    ‘Oh yes?’
    ‘You know the attic in Helen’s house? Where you said there might be a lamp? Well, we can’t find how to get into it.’ He laughed. ‘Is there a secret door somewhere?’
    I’d forgotten that he had hardly even been to his aunt’s final home, even though she lived there for eighteen years. When he did visit, it was just for an afternoon, Helen treating him to tea and scones and gratitude for his trouble. His life had been on its own track, with wife, kids, parents, job.
    ‘Fine detective you are,’ I teased.
    ‘It’s really quite a big house,’ the woman defended. ‘I was surprised. I mean, just for one old lady. She must have rattled about in there.’
    ‘She loved it,’ I said, feeling a pain behind my left breast. ‘I’ve never known anybody love a house like that before. She was always polishing and dusting, and just – well, loving it.’ I sighed.
    ‘But Phil says she was quite old when she came here to live.’
    ‘She was sixty-eight. Her husband had just died. She wanted to make a new start in a new place.’
    Phil’s friend looked out of my kitchen window, where there was a view of open fields, stretching down the slope to the south. ‘It’s much more open than most Cotswold villages,’ she murmured. ‘The others I know all seem to be situated in hollows or valleys. There’s a lot more sky here.’
    I didn’t say anything. Phil drained his mug, and wriggled his shoulders inside the jumper. She read his mind instantly, and downed her own drink in one gulp.
    ‘Work,’ she said. ‘We’ve got work to do. Ariadne—’ she said it easily, with no sign of any effort or reluctance, which earned her a small hike in my estimation ‘—the attic. We really can’t find the way into it.’ She went to my front door and stared across at the house. It obviously had three storeys, although lacking the dormer windows that were such a common feature of Cotswold houses. A Velux skylight had been set into the steep roof, though, betraying the presence of a useable roof space. Thea shook her head.
    ‘It’s crazy – putting in a window like that and then hiding the access.’
    ‘It isn’t really hidden,’ I said and led them back to their side of the street.
    I showed them where it was with a ridiculous feeling of pride. There was in fact a narrow stairway to the upper floor, not some newfangled loft ladder, or removable rectangle of plywood covering a hole in one of the ceilings. To get to Helen’s attic, you pushed aside a tallboy beside the chimney breast in the third bedroom, and