A Body in the Village Hall by Dee MacDonald (best business books of all time .txt) 📗

And then she fell. The ground was so slippery that she skidded for several yards before she finally fell in an undignified heap, barely registering the graze on her knee. What did a grazed knee matter when she was about to die? She rolled herself into a ball and waited for the knife to penetrate somewhere. She was past being terrified.

But nothing happened. She lay there waiting for death, knowing there was no escape now. Instead someone was talking to her. A man.

Was she still alive?

Kate slowly tried to raise herself up, only to see Sandra a few feet away writhing on the ground, having dropped the knife.

And there, alongside a uniformed policeman, stood Woody, the Taser still in his hand.

‘Cuff her,’ he ordered, and the policeman headed towards Sandra with a set of handcuffs. Sandra – even in a diminished state – was having none of it and started trying to kick, necessitating Woody to grab her while the officer clipped on the cuffs. Another officer appeared from the gloom and, between them, the two policemen escorted a swearing, snarling Sandra down the hill.

Kate started shivering, her teeth chattering, the tears flowing.

Woody bent down beside her. ‘Kate,’ he said gently, ‘did she hurt you?’

Kate, between sobs, said, ‘I think she’s cut me a little, but I’m OK.’

‘Thank God,’ said Woody, helping her to her feet and then holding her loosely. ‘Can you walk a little, Kate? Are you sure?’

Kate nodded dumbly. Then she noticed the policewoman who’d come up behind him.

‘This is PC Mandy Williams,’ Woody said. ‘Mandy’s car’s at the bottom of the hill and she’s going to take you to the medical centre. I’d like to come with you but I have to deal with our friend here. But I’ll come up to see you later. Are you sure you’re OK to walk down? You’re injured and you’re in shock.’

Kate began to get her shaking under control. ‘Yes, I’m OK. But how did you know…?’

‘Angie rang me. She was worried,’ he said, stroking her cheek.

Twenty-Eight

Kate looked across the table into the deep brown eyes of the man who’d saved her life. They were dining at The Edge of the Moor again, not because they needed to hide their friendship anymore but because they both liked it there so much. Perhaps it was too early to think about love but she hadn’t felt anything like this for a very long time. It wasn’t that she was looking to marry again, but nonetheless she felt sure they had some sort of future.

As they sipped their drinks Woody said, ‘When did you know it was Sandra Miller?’

‘I think the penny started to drop the day I took Angie to tea at The Atlantic Hotel, and after that it was a process of elimination.’

‘What gave her away?’

‘It was the gloves and apron she was wearing that day at the hotel when she emerged from the kitchen. I remembered she had a rash at the quiz, and she could easily have put gloves on and helped Fenella cut the cake. But why agree to wear them if she was allergic? Because, wearing those, she’d have no blood on her, so she could have come back into the hall and made out that she’d only popped out for a cigarette. And there’d be no evidence to give her away. I saw how quickly she could peel off that apron and gloves and roll them up into a ball – easy to get rid of. And no doubt Kevin kindly offered to get rid of the evidence for her, for a price. It was when Jess described the package to me that I began to put two and two together. After what you told me about the barman from The Tinners seeing Kevin and Sandra outside together, it occurred to me that if Kevin had witnessed Sandra killing Fenella, it would be a compelling motive for Sandra to murder him. Nobody else seemed to have a strong enough motive for Kevin’s murder.’

‘So you were convinced it wasn’t either of the men?’ Woody raised a questioning eyebrow.

‘Yes, I was pretty certain neither of the men were guilty of the murders. Dickie Payne was too devoted to his wife to risk abandoning her to serve a jail sentence and then of course he finally had an alibi. And why would Seymour suddenly take against Fenella’s love affairs when he’d known about them for so many years? But once you told me about the footprint, I simply had to know who’d put the note on my pillow, and why…’

The waiter hovered while they made their choices from the menu.

After he’d taken their orders Woody said, ‘When Angie phoned to say you were “up to something” – that you’d taken her anti-attack spray with you on a horrible evening when the dog didn’t really need a walk – I guessed straight away you’d gone up to Penhallion to see someone.’ He sighed. ‘Kate, do you ever do what you’re told?’

She grinned. ‘But I needed to see Seymour to ask why he’d left that note.’

‘To confirm that he wasn’t the killer?’ Woody asked.

‘No, by then I was sure he wasn’t the killer.’

‘So, when you went up on the cliff you didn’t think there was any risk?’

‘I was pretty certain there was no risk – but then I didn’t expect Sandra Miller to have followed me up there.’

Woody picked up his glass and took a large gulp of wine. ‘So, did you get a satisfactory answer from Seymour about the note?’

‘Yes. He wanted me to stop meddling so that the whole thing would be settled and off the front pages. I did have a few scary moments wondering if I’d got it wrong and he was the killer, but everything seems so much more sinister in the mist, don’t you think?’

‘It certainly makes a favoured setting for scary movies,’