Imaginative Experience by Mary Wesley Read Free Book Online

telling us, Tim.’
    Tim watched them go back to their car to collect the rest of their luggage, then let himself into the flat. Janet was asleep on her back, snoring; he finished what was left of the fish and chips, undressed disconsolately and got into bed beside her.
    In the flat above them Peter and Angie Eddison finished their unpacking and went to bed. Comfortably settled, Angie said, ‘Oh dear, do you suppose I should have gone up and seen the Piper woman?’
    ‘Tomorrow will do, surely,’ said Peter. ‘It isn’t as though we’ve ever been friends.’
    Angie said, ‘That’s true; she’s always been stand-offish. What heaven to be back in our own bed. I think it’s the best part of a holiday.’
    Some time in the night Julia Piper walked quietly down the stairs and let herself out into the street.

EIGHT
    M AURICE BENSON STROLLED OUT of the village keeping his eyes open, taking things in. He had left his car in the pub yard after a beer and sandwich at the bar, chatting with the landlord and a loquacious local. As he walked his binoculars swung across his chest, working a felty patch on the sweater worn under his Barbour jacket. Digesting his lunch and information gained, he paused from time to time to quiz the fields and hedges. This was not good bird country but as an inveterate twitcher he knew that the most improbable birds turned up in unlikely locations. There had, for instance, been a kingfisher in the pond near the railway station. But today birds were not his priority; his interest lay in Mrs May, mother of recently widowed Julia Piper.
    ‘Two cottages a bit on from the cemetery. The one with the privet hedge is Madge Brownlow’s, Mrs May’s friend, and soon after that, with a camellia hedge, that’s Julia’s mum. Cost a packet when she planted it. Her son-in-law, the one that was killed, put her up to it. That was before he married. They said he got a discount on the shrubs, he was that sort.’ The landlord’s laughter had contained a snort.
    A pair of magpies were at play in the cemetery, chattering and swooping among the headstones; Maurice paused to watch. Who was it had said they looked like croupiers?
    A woman tending a recent grave straightened her back and, brushing detritus from her hands, shouted, ‘Shoo, you horrors, shoo!’
    Maurice called out, ‘Two for joy!’
    She was in her fifties, square with a fussy beige blouse under a sensible beige cardigan, corduroy trousers of beige also, a good fit when bought, tightish now, and green Wellington boots. Her hair, rather mannishly cut, toned with her clothes. Staring at Maurice across the cemetery wall, she said, ‘Fat lot of joy,’ and briskly brushed her hands against each other.
    Maurice said, ‘Are you Mrs May?’
    She said, ‘I am Madge Brownlow. Who are you?’
    ‘A friend, an acquaintance really of—well—what a tragedy.’ He let his eyes rest on the grave (gravelly earth, awful stuff to work in for the gravediggers) under heaps of wreaths and bouquets of chrysanthemums tied with white ribbon, the words on the cards blurred by condensation under their Cellophane wrappings.
    Madge Brownlow said, ‘Thought you might be Press. Clodagh’s had them up to here. Go away!’ she shouted at the magpies, who had fluttered closer. ‘Shoo!’ She clapped her hands. ‘Birds of ill omen.’
    ‘They are like croupiers in a casino.’ Maurice watched Madge Brownlow. ‘Evening dress in the afternoon,’ he laboured. ‘Dinner jackets, tuxedos.’
    ‘I have never been in a casino.’ She left his joke still-born and bent to collect a trowel and fork which she put in a basket half full of dead flora. ‘Didn’t see you at the funeral,’ she said. ‘Were you a London friend?’
    ‘Scissors.’ Maurice pointed at the ground. ‘They might rust.’
    Madge said, ‘Thanks,’ and retrieved the scissors. Maurice held the cemetery gate open. ‘I’m doing this for Clodagh.’ Madge made sure the gate was latched. ‘She is still too