exactly, Sir.”
“Exactly what?”
“We found the duvet in a grave and we’ve got a tin soldier ...”
Excitement swung to annoyance at the other end of the line. “What are you babbling about. He didn’t kill a tin soldier. He killed a real one. Tin soldiers don’t bleed all over the place.”
“I just thought ...”
“I said call me when you’ve got the body, not when you’ve found something to play with.”
Bliss sensed that the superintendent’s phone was angrily heading for its cradle. “Sorry, Sir ...”
“Click.”
“Shit,” he muttered, hurriedly adding. “Pat – you stay here and work on the hospitals, I’ll go and see the widow.”
“Do you know where the place is?”
“No, but I’ll pick up Dowding from the cemetery – I can find my way back there. Oh, and I’d like to interview the last person who saw the Major alive.”
“That’d be the suspect, Jonathon Dauntsey.”
Bliss scrunched his face in mock pain. “Use your loaf, Pat.”
“Sorry, Guv. – I don’t think we know who saw him last, apart from those who saw him being dumped in the pick-up. I guess it was probably the landlady at the Black Horse.”
“I’ll go there after I’ve seen the widow.”
Daphne was hovering in the foyer with half an eye on the rain as he made his way out.
“Still here, Daphne?” he called cheerily, heading for the door.
“Just look at that weather, Chief Inspector. It’s getting worse and I didn’t think to bring a brolly today.”
Was she angling for a lift? “I’m going back to St. Paul’s churchyard, if that’s any help. I could give you a ride.”
“If you’re sure you don’t mind ...”
“Not at all, Daphne. Actually I wanted a word with you,” he said, scooping her in an outstretched arm and shepherding her out under his umbrella.
“How is Jonathon?” she asked as soon as they drove off.
“He seems O.K. Remarkably calm, though not what would call happy.”
“Never has been, that one. Always sour. I remember him as a kid. Always sour – always walking around with a face like a smacked bum.”
The wrought iron lych-gates were under heavy guard. Two bulky uniformed policeman, grateful to be out of the drizzle, were determined no-one would get through without authority while ignoring the fact that almost anyone could simply step over the two foot high stone wall forming the remainder of the cemetery’s perimeter. A few disgruntled mourners were clustered under a couple of black umbrellas close-by, discussing tactics, looking, thought Bliss, as if they were deciding whether or not to rush the gates and bury their dead anyway.
“D.I. Bliss,” he said, heading for the gap between the two uniformed men. They stood their ground and an arm closed the gap.
“Sorry, Sir. You can’t ... this cemetery’s closed today. Who did you say?”
“Detective Inspector Bliss.”
“I’m sorry ...”
“Oh, get out of the way you idiot,” snarled Daphne pulling off her plastic rain hood, pushing her way between them and opening the gate. “This is your new chief inspector.”
“Is that you, Daphne?” said one.
“Well, I ain’t one of the Spice Girls, if that’s what you were hoping?”
He turned to Bliss, “Sorry, Sir.”
“It’s alright; you were only doing your job – and I’m the D.I., irrespective of any promotion Daphne may bestow on me.”
“Yes, Sir.”
With the gate swinging shut behind him, Bliss paused to look along the ancient ranks of lichen covered gravestones lolling about like disorganised soldiers waiting for a drill sergeant to shout, “Ten ... tion!” An aura of sadness hung about him as he spent a moment imagining all the suffering that had preceded the erection of each stone, and the pain in his expression caught Daphne’s eye.
“What is it, Chief Inspector? Are you alright?”
“Ghosts, Daphne. Well, one particular ghost anyway.”
“I thought you hadn’t been here before.”
“I haven’t.”
“How d’ye know about the ghost then?”
“Whose ghost – what ghost?”
“The Colonel – Colonel Dauntsey.”
“I thought he was a major.”
“No. I’m not talking about him. Not Rupert Dauntsey – the Major. He’s the one you’re looking for now. I mean his father – the old Colonel. His grave’s over there, look – that posh job with the fancy statue on the roof.”
A white marble blockhouse stood out against the back wall and appeared almost floodlit in the murk. “The mausoleum?” he enquired.
“Yes, that one, Chief Inspector – anyway his ghost is supposed ...”
Bliss wasn’t listening as she steered him toward the mausoleum; he was reading the names off gravestones, half expecting to see “Mandy Richards” – knowing he wouldn’t. Knowing Mandy inhabited a cemetery a world away. Not for her the tranquillity of a country churchyard with overhanging beeches and chatter of birdsong. Even the vicar’s words at her funeral, “In the midst of life we are in death,” had been lost to the roar of a 747 struggling to escape the gravitational pull of Heathrow Airport.
They had reached The Colonel’s resting place and Bliss stood back to admire the statue soaring above the sarcophagus – a white marble winged chariot drawn by a team of flying stallions.
“Very mythical,” said Daphne, following his eye-line.
“That’s strange. Jonathon mentioned something about Homer’s Iliad. I wonder if there’s some connection?”
“What did he say?”
“It didn’t make any sense to me – something about letting fate choose. I don’t remember to be honest.”
“Probably the bit about Hector and Achilles ... ” she started, then cried in surprise, “Oh look! His name was Wellington ... Wellington Rupert Dauntsey.”
“Didn’t you know?”
“No. He wasn’t the sort of man who needed a name. He was just The Colonel. I suppose his family called him something, but I assumed Rupert – Major Dauntsey – called his father ‘Sir’ or ‘Colonel’ like everyone else.”
“‘Sir,’” repeated Bliss. “You think he called his Dad ‘Sir?’”
“Not a Dad, Chief Inspector. People like that don’t have Dads. Dads are warm friendly creatures who cuddle their children, take them on picnics, play silly games and make funny noises ... People like the Dauntseys have fathers who totally ignore them for eight years, then pack them off to a boarding school saying, ‘Thank God for that – children can be such an inconvenience don’t you know.’”
The ornately carved wooden door to the family tomb was locked, and the huge galvanised padlock demanded his attention. “I wonder who holds the keys,” he muttered, examining it carefully, noting that it did not look as though it had been opened recently.
“The family probably – The Major I expect,”