A Fatal Secret. Faith Martin

as he set about putting the kettle on, but silently indicated the wooden, ladder-back chairs that surrounded the well-scrubbed kitchen table. Taking his wordless invitation to be seated, Clement and Trudy took opposite ends of the table and sat quietly as Vincent put a sugar bowl and a bottle of milk on the table, and then, a short while later, three steaming mugs of tea.

      ‘So, I understand you asked Mr de Lacey to come and see me?’ Clement began cautiously.

      ‘Yerse. I dunno how to go about these things myself, y’see,’ Vincent confirmed, staring down at his hands, which were wrapped around the mug of his untouched tea. His Oxonian country burr testified to the fact that he’d probably been born in the village and would be happy enough to die in it too. Probably his father before him had worked for the de Laceys, and no doubt he expected his sons to do the same. ‘But I knew Mr de Lacey would be able to get things done. Him bein’ squire, an’ all.’

      Clement nodded. ‘Mr de Lacey wasn’t able to tell me much about what, exactly, you want us to do,’ he began tactfully. ‘He suggested I talk to you in person about what’s on your mind.’

      Vincent nodded, but didn’t immediately speak. When he did, he was slow and deliberate, but sounded already weary, as if he didn’t expect them to take him seriously.

      ‘It’s like this, see. There was just no way our Eddie could’a fallen down that well, like you all reckon he did. O’course, you’d have to know him, like, real well, the same as me and his mother do, to understand that. And I know that important people like you’ – here he shot a look at both Clement and Trudy – ‘ain’t likely to just take my word for it. But…’

      He shrugged helplessly. He looked so out of his depth, that Trudy felt her heart constrict. She couldn’t help it, but reached out to place her hand comfortingly on his.

      ‘Mr Proctor,’ she said gently, ‘I promise you that both Dr Ryder and I will listen to you. And we will do our very best to understand.’

      He nodded, but the poor man looked so defeated already, and clearly didn’t believe her, that it made her heart ache. She looked quickly across at Dr Ryder, who gave her an infinitesimal nod to carry on. Almost imperceptibly, he leaned back in his chair, the better to watch and listen as the dead boy’s father began to speak.

      ‘See, for a start, our Eddie wasn’t really the daredevil sort,’ the boy’s father began. ‘Now if it had been our Bertie… now him I could just see taking a tumble down a well. T’would be just the sort’a daft thing he’d go and do. Right from the moment he was born – he’s our eldest, y’see – he was into trouble. No sense o’ danger, see? But Eddie weren’t like that. He wasn’t a namby-pamby lad, don’t get me wrong,’ he said earnestly, looking at Trudy as if it was important that she should understand that he was in no way criticising his dead son. ‘He were a proper lad, like. But… If, say, a tree had fallen down over the river, and he was gonna cross it, he would take time first to make sure it was a good strong tree. With lots of good footholds where he could stand without losing his balance, and good strong branches that spread all the way across to the other side. He wouldn’t just go at it all ’ell for leather, and then laugh if he was ditched into the water. See what I mean?’

      ‘Yes.’ Trudy smiled. ‘I see. Whereas his elder brother would have done just that.’

      ‘Oh, ar. But it’s not just that. Our Eddie wasn’t any too fond of heights, neither. He reckoned he went all dizzy, like, if he got too far off the ground.’

      ‘Some children do,’ Clement slipped in helpfully. ‘It’s called vertigo. It’s usually a problem with the inner ear, and nothing to be ashamed of.’

      At this, as Clement had rather thought he might, Vincent looked rather relieved. It provided him with further proof that his lad wasn’t a namby-pamby.

      ‘Ar… A medical thing then… well, that’s different. Yerse. Poor little… But, see, that’s just another reason why I know he wouldn’t’a gone down that well then, ain’t it?’ he demanded challengingly. ‘Just looking down that far would have made him feel sick like. And another thing…’

      He paused to take a sip of tea. ‘Eddie weren’t all that fond of chocolate. Oh, he’d eat it, but he’d prefer to have humbugs, or bulls eyes, or sherbet dabs. He was more of a sweetie kind of lad.’

      He looked anxiously at Trudy, to see if she understood what he was saying.

      To oblige him, she nodded quickly. ‘So you’re saying that the inducement to find chocolate eggs wouldn’t have been anywhere near strong enough to make him take chances?’ Trudy said.

      The boy’s father frowned a little, clearly not sure what ‘inducement’ meant, but relieved to see that she was looking thoughtful. He glanced back at the coroner. Clearly for him, Dr Ryder meant authority and book-learning, and he was the man he needed to convince.

      ‘And that ain’t all,’ he carried on stubbornly. ‘Young Eddie was really pally with little Emily. Thick as thieves, those two.’

      ‘Emily?’ Trudy pressed, suddenly not following the conversation at all.

      ‘Emily de Lacey. The squire’s little ’un,’ Vincent elaborated. ‘Ten years old, and going on sixteen, that ’un. Smart as a whip, she is.’

      Trudy blinked. ‘Really? The squire’s daughter and your son were friends?’ She glanced curiously at the coroner, who gave her a quick shake of his head, guessing at once the reason behind her scepticism. No doubt she thought it odd that a mere farmworker’s son and the little lady of the manor should be such bosom pals, but he knew, from his own childhood experiences, that in small villages, that sort of odd mix wasn’t at all unusual. Children from good, bad and indifferent families tended to live cheek by jowl up to the age of 11 or so, sharing the local primary school and all the village’s meagre social events.

      Of course, it was tacitly understood by all concerned that it wouldn’t last into adulthood, and was thus not taken seriously. After the age of 11, they tended to sort themselves out into more familiar roles. No doubt, Emily de Lacey would soon be of age to attend a good girl’s grammar – or maybe even boarding school – and would grow up into a proper young lady. Whilst Eddie, had he lived, would have left the nearest secondary school at 14 or so and gone on to work on the land.

      Thereafter, if they’d met, they’d probably have nodded and smiled and not given each other a single thought. But at 10 and 11, yes, they could have been very close indeed.

      ‘Is she a nice girl, Emily?’ Clement asked mildly.

      ‘Oh yerse,’ Vincent said at once, smiling for the first time Trudy had known him. ‘She and Eddie ran around the estate like little animals,’ he mused. ‘Playing cowboys and injuns, and whatnot. I think their latest thing was playing at spies and such stuff. They had a theory that one of the schoolmasters was a German agent, or some such. Emily had been reading that Thirty-Nine Steps book to him, and Eddie was all caught up in it…’ He trailed off with a gulp perhaps realising that, now, his son would never play at spies again.

      ‘Ah. And why do you think this friendship between them matters?’ Trudy asked quickly, to take his mind off his grief. ‘What has that to do with Eddie’s… what happened to him?’ she asked, as delicately as she could.

      But instead of answering, the dead boy’s father shrugged and took a sip of his tea. Clearly he was feeling more uncomfortable now. It probably didn’t do to talk about the family up at the Hall, but Vincent was clearly determined to do right by his son.

      ‘I think them two told each other everythin’,’ he finally said. ‘And… I dunno. I think…’ He sighed heavily. ‘I think you should go and talk to Emmy, that’s all. Besides, she was at the Easter egg hunt, and if anyone knows why he went off on his own like that – when he’d been told to stay in the walled garden – she would.’

      ‘Eddie wasn’t the sort of boy not to do as he was told?’ Clement asked.

      ‘No,