Episode 4 - Morning has broken

Wednesday 

Wednesday morning started at the Hartley cottage with a phone call from Gary. Robert had just extricated himself from his duvet and taken a cold shower to wake up.

“It’s seven o’clock in the morning,” Robert shouted down the phone. “Couldn’t you at least wait till after breakfast?”

Cleo came hurrying into the living-room, where Robert was standing wrapped in a fluffy bath towel and shivering. She threw a hand towel over his dripping hair, snatched the phone and screamed “Out of service hours Sweetheart” before slapping the handset down.

“He’s got a cheek,” said Robert as he went to finish his ablutions. “You sounded like a whore, Cleo.”

“I wanted to,” said Cleo.

“He must have upset you,” said Robert rather gleefully.

“Was it Gary?” said Cleo.

“You know damn well it was.”

“You’re right. It’s time I called Gary to order,” said Cleo. “I will not be at his beck and call! He probably had a date last night and forgot all about Mrs Coppins.”

***

The hypocrisy of Cleo’s reaction to the phone call and her deliberate provocation were very satisfying to Robert. He still trusted Cleo despite his jealousy. Cleo found that incredible and frustrating.

“Busy chatting up some girl or other?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised.”

The phone rang again. Robert picked up the handset. It was Gary again.

“Don’t hang up, damn it! Get me Cleo. It’s urgent.”

Robert shrugged his shoulders and handed over the handset.

“Gary, use my cell phone if it’s urgent.”

“Cleo, something has happened that you should know about.”

“So urgent that you slept on it, Gary?” Cleo said, and Robert nodded his approval and went to make breakfast. It was already late by his chrono-biological clock. Fortunately, Gloria was opening the shop.

“I didn’t find out till this morning. Is that ape listening in?”

“No. He’s in the kitchen.”

“I don’t know how you can stand him,” said Gary.

“Neither do I,” said Cleo and followed that with a strategic comment that Gary should get on with it if he planned to tell her something, just in case Robert was eavesdropping. She was glad that the second handset was in the bedroom and not in the kitchen.

“Compris … Jessie Coppins has escaped from the institution.”

“Inevitable, I suppose. When?”

“Sometime after tea yesterday afternoon.”

“And you didn’t get to know last night?”

“No, and anyway I was too busy with a very dear friend until quite late last night, Cleo!”

“I thought Jessie was being kept at a secure location,” said Cleo, aware that Robert was now listening in.

“She tricked the security guard.”

Shop-talk was always gratifying to Robert. She helped him along by saying to Gary

“That doesn’t surprise me. Jessie has oodles of criminal energy, though she doesn’t even know what that is. I remember that she once swore to kill her mother. What if that was still on her mind and she’s done it now?”

“We don’t even know if Mrs Coppins was murdered.”

“But that’s likely, isn’t it? How else did Mrs Coppins get into the pond? You heard Chris and Dr Mitchell say she had not drowned.”

“I still think it was Kelly,” said Gary.

“Don’t think, Gary. Kelly’s weird. The farm’s weird, but you can’t base your case on hunches. Get the facts and act on them... and find that girl, for heaven’s sake.”

“We’re hoping she’ll make for home,” said Gary. “Je t’aime.”

“Me too. I’m baffled!”

“We don’t want to alarm anyone by acting prematurely.”

“You’ve alarmed me, Gary, and you’ve really annoyed Robert.”

“You’re different.”

“How?”

“You’re a friend.”

“Friend?” said Cleo.

“Friend?” repeated Robert grabbing the handset. “Friends don’t need phone-calls at the crack of dawn, Gary.”

“Sorry about that. Give me Cleo again please, Robert. This is a business call and important. No need to listen in.”

Robert reluctantly relinquished the phone.

“Blast the guy,” he muttered.

“That hit the spot, Gary. What did you say?”

“He said it’s important business, Cleo. I’m off to the shop and wholesaler,” said Robert. “I’d better make sure that Gloria gets it all right. I’ll have missed the best steaks. Your breakfast is on the worktop.”

“You got up late, Robert, not me.”

Robert charged out of the cottage.

“Bye, Robert,” called Cleo, to indicate to Gary that Robert had gone.

***

 “God, what an ape,” said Gary.

“You said it, my love.”

“Can you look in at the Coppins’ house and see if everything is OK?”

“Jack got off work and made straight for home. I dare say he’s coping. He’d have called me otherwise, but he won’t know about Jessie unless she has turned up there.”

“Exactly. What if she turns up and he hides her?”

“Jessie loves the kids, Gary. She would never hurt them.”

Gary was again aware that Cleo was at least one step ahead. He hadn’t given the Coppins family a thought until that moment.

“I’m sorry about Robert. If I was a bit strange it was because he was eavesdropping,” said Cleo.

“That control freak should hear more to his disadvantage,” said Gary.

Cleo moved to the kitchen.

“I can see that he ate a panful of fried eggs swimming in butter and about half a loaf of toast. He’s a comfort eater.”

Robert’s idea of diet were on the lines of ‘the more calories the merrier’.

“Do you know what I think, Cleo? I think he’s a bastard.”

“He’s uncomfortable when you and I are working together. It just seems to add to the stress.”

“He’d be even more uncomfortable if he saw what else we do together.”

“I hope he won’t,” said Cleo.

“Hold on! Is his stress now caused by Jessie Coppins escaping?”

“No. It’s your phone calls that stress him out. He waited for you to ring last night and was surprised when you didn’t. He also got up late so he won’t get to the wholesaler’s in time for the best cuts.”

“Why would he be waiting for me to call, Cleo?”

“Because I said you might.”

“We said I should only call if I had news. Last night nothing happened except that you came and we … walls have ears, so I’ll skip that bit. I called immediately I heard about Jessie Coppins and that was 10 minutes ago-”

“Have you sent out search parties to find her, Gary?”

“I’m sure Jessie will make her way back home, Cleo.”

“OK. That gives you an area of only three square miles to search.”

“Don’t exaggerate.”

“That’s not an exaggeration. Don’t forget that she’s quite at home in the Priory ruins and in Monkton Wood and on Upper Grumpsfield Common and in the whole of Huddlecourt Minor. What if she didn’t go home and doesn’t turn up round these parts?”

“Let’s be optimistic, Cleo. Do you know anything about Kelly’s activities?”

“His new secret friendship with Betty Coppins was not new, of course, and not a secret. People had seen her going to Kelly’s and he had even called on her themselves once or twice when the kids were at school.”

“What people saw him?”

“They include Hilda Bone and Molly, the pub lady from Huddlecourt Minor.”

Gary gave those gossipy women little credit for anything. He was trying to think of something that would be more constructive.

“You could talk to Kelly again, Cleo. He’ll trust you.”

“The only person he’ll talk to is Dorothy and she’s busy today.”

“Sleuthing in her funny hat?”

“No. Catching up with her past.”

“You don’t say.”

“If you want to see what I mean, get to the Bistro round one o’clock and have a drink with me. I’m sort of on guard.”

“Intriguing!”

“It may be a one off with Dorothy. An old romance. Very old! She’s uneasy.”

“You make it sound as if she has a date with a gangster.”

“You said it!”

“Should I be investigating?”

“Not just yet, but the whole business is a bit odd.”

“Surely not. They are old fogies, not newlyweds.”

“That’s why she’s nervous. The romance was nearly half a century ago. It’s anyone’s guess how the guy made a living in Canada. He told her he had written to her, but she never received any letter from him.”

“That doesn’t mean he did not write.”

“Dorothy thinks he ditched her.”

“OK. I’ll bring my laptop and then we can contact the Canadian police and look up the wanted gallery together. By then I’ll have the first forensic report on Mrs Coppins and we’ll get to know what Dorothy’s old flame looks like. The Coppins report is on cloud so it’s easily accessible. We can look at it together and see what needs to be edited.”

“That sounds like cooperation, Gary. Chris will have sent me the report but I haven’t looked at it yet.”

“From now on you’ll be able to get into cloud storage and not have to depend on Chris.”

“I don’t mind that. I like talking to Chris.”

“Has Dorothy had a special hunch about that guy from Canada, Cleo?”

“I don’t know. I more or less forced her to make a date with him. I feel responsible. It’s me who has the hunch right now.”

“We’ll meet at the bistro if nothing dramatic happens in the meantime to distract me. Unless….”

“No Gary. I really have to catch up on myself this morning. Don’t you?”

“Theoretically, I suppose I do after last night’s thrills with a certain dame. I’ll go to HQ. Nigel is always pleased to see me.”

***

Cleo wondered what would happen if Jack Cooper was actually on that internationally wanted person list. She had probably exaggerated, she decided. That was not her style. She had no reason to think the Cooper guy was anything but a harmless senior looking for his past at the behest of someone else interested in his past. Would Gary smell a rat and even arrest Jack Cooper? He could if the guy was not squeaky clean. Mitch would be there to offer assistance and take photos, but she would warn him since it might all be just her imagination running riot.

All she really needed to do was to set Dorothy’s mind at rest. Alarming her by telling her something might not be quite kosher about Jack Cooper was not going to make things any easier for her. Cleo decided that the whole idea of Cooper being a fugitive was simply absurd, but it had captured Gary’s curiosity and hers, she had to admit. She would leave the research till later. Right now she had reports to write.