The Wild Wood Enquiry by Ann Purser Read Free Book Online

what I always say.” She folded her hands in her lap and looked pointedly out of the window.
    Miriam smiled. She was reminded of Miss Beasley and her friends in Enquire Within. After she had telephoned the police tomorrow morning, she would go to see Ivy atSpringfields and ask for help. She did not accept David’s suggestion that it might have been anybody, alive and well, hiding under the bracken. Although she had seen only the hand, there was something unquestionably dead about it.
    After the business of the meeting, when the expert had dismembered the pheasant, braised it and served it up with a dandelion salad and nettle sauce, and each member, except Miss Beasley, had had a taste and pronounced it delicious, Miriam and Rose walked back to Hangman’s Row together.
    “So will you let me know what the police say tomorrow?” Rose said. “I do need to go into town to do some shopping, but I can put it off if necessary.”
    Miriam had thought long and hard about tomorrow and now said she wondered if Rose herself should make the call to the police. “They’ll realise you’re a young mum with two boys to look after and a farm-manager husband and be more likely to take you seriously. Do you mind, Rose?”
    “Um, no, I suppose not. Can you come round, and we’ll do it together. I’ll do the talking and you can stand by.”
    “That’s great,” Miriam said, as they reached the cottages. “I’ll see you tomorrow—about ten? You’ll be back from taking the boys to holiday club then. And then I have to go out myself, unless the police have other ideas!”
    She returned to her house and turned on the television, now feeling much more relaxed. It would be much easier with Rose making the call, willing to describe what they had seen. She looked at her watch and saw that it was nine o’clock. Too late to telephone Miss Beasley? She feared Ivy’s sharp tongue and decided to do it first thing in the morning. The idea of private enquiries going on, whatever the police decided to do, appealed to Miriam, and since her lovely Gus next door was part of the Enquire Within team, she looked forward to working with them.
    As she locked up the house, she remembered Katherine Halfhide. She went upstairs to check the spare room and found no sign that she had returned. Miriam guessed she had gone back to London, without saying good-bye or offering to pay for her bed and board. Well, good riddance! It was unlikely, but if she came back and was unable to get in, she had been told where the spare key was hidden. Miriam continued to lock all the doors and finally went upstairs to bed. With a violent murderer about, she was taking no chances.

Ten

    IVY AND ROY had finished breakfast and were sitting in the lounge reading the newspapers. A royal engagement had just been announced, and all the papers were full of photographs and details of the couple’s private lives, down to the brand of toothpaste they used.
    “If you ask me,” Ivy said, “they should be stopped.”
    “Who?” said Roy, peering at Ivy over the top of his
Times
. “And what should they be stopped from doing?”
    “These newspapers, of course. How would we have liked it when we announced our engagement, if journalists had come pushing in here, wanting details of our private lives? And look at these family trees! What does it matter if dozens of her ancestors have been street sweepers? Jolly good thing, I say. Put a bit of new blood into that family. It’s like dogs. If you interbreed them, they end up weak in the head.”
    Roy started to shake, and then he put down his paperand roared with laughter. He leaned forward and took Ivy’s hand. “I don’t think the big wide world is in the least interested in us, my beloved,” he said. “But as to dogs, you are quite right.”
    At this point, Mrs. Spurling approached. “Telephone call for you, Miss Beasley,” she said. “Will you take it in your room, or would you like to come into the office?”
    “I’ll take