18. The One-legged Teacher

REMEMBERING REBECCA . Part 18

Detective Inspector Rosie Baur together with Detective Constable Sheila Robinson left Candice on the brink of tears and made their way to their car.

“What do you make of her, ma’am?” asked Sheila when she had started the engine and was pulling away into the road.

“She’s a damaged lady, and no mistake,” sighed Rosie, “and there’s no doubt that she has an endless fire of hatred burning inside her, one that would find no problem in dealing with the boy who took the life from her best friend, and if she associate that boy with the Reverend Roper and if she has access to a firearm I reckon she could shoot him, there’s no doubt in my mind that her life of torment has been painful enough for her not to think twice about it.”

“My thoughts exactly, ma’am,” sighed Sheila, “but what about her plans to spend the rest of her life in married bliss? I didn’t see much of a potential bride in her home. Or in her general appearance come to think of it.”

“Same here. I think that our next port of call should be Mr Samuel Styles, her husband to be if you’ve seen the right unlikely notice in the local press.” mused Rosie. “Let me see: an ex-teacher and did you say he was in the armed forces before training to be a teacher?”

Sheila nodded. “I did. It seems he was injured in the Falklands conflict. Most national leaders seem to want to have a war on their C.V. and Prime Minister Thatcher had the Falklands. He left the forces when it was clear he wouldn’t be fit enough to be an operational soldier and as you say, trained to teach. He retired a few years ago and was never married, though it seems he lived for a few years with a woman who he claimed was his nurse, a woman called Sylvia Greatorex.”

“From the sound of it you think she must have been more than just a nurse,” suggested Rosie.

“I have no evidence that she was anything more than the woman who changed his dressings, but it seems likely, don’t you think, people being what they are and she being with him, under the same roof, for several years?”

“I’ll disregard that, Sheila, though I know exactly what you mean. So he taught, you said, at Brumpton Primary School which is one hell of a coincidence when it seems that everything to do with the two cases appears to have their roots in the school sixty years ago. Look: pull in over there: I need to pop into that shop. It’s the one where Betsy Bullard, our second victim, worked for most of her adult life.”

“You think there might be some information available in there?” asked Sheila doubtfully.

“Who knows where the snippets might be found, but no, I don’t. I need a new pair of tights. I’ve snagged these that I’m wearing and in this summer frock a dirty great hole makes me look less than tidy, and I’ve bought them here before so I know they sell the sort I like.”

She left the car when Sheila stopped and set bells jangling as she pushed the shop door open.

“Why, Rosie,” the woman behind the counter said, “what is it this time? More tights I suppose!”

“I’ve snagged this pair,” sighed Rosie, then she paused almost theatrically, “does a Mr Styles come in here?” she asked.

“That’s the trouble with you coppers, always making enquiries, and yes he does if you mean the old man with an artificial leg.”

“I hear he’s planning to get married,” suggested Rosie.

“What? Him? A confirmed bachelor if ever there was one! When nurse what’s-her-name, the one as was paid to care for him, couldn’t take any more of his bachelor ways, she left him high and dry. Used to come in here, she did, and say the best thing for him would be if he joined the leg that got shot off, and then she’d have a bit more peace!”

“Poor woman,” sighed Rosie, and taking her new pair of tights she left the shop.

“Don’t look,” she told Sheila as she struggled out of her tights and replaced then with a pair that was, at least for time being, undamaged. “Right! Off we go!” she said with a warm smile, “the Super didn’t seem to mind me wearing this summer dress, but I’m sure he’d take exception to holy tights!”

“The dress is pretty though,” murmured Shelia from beind the wheel as she made their way down the road to where she knew the ex-soldier, ex-teacher lived.

“The shop keeper, I forget her name, didn’t seem to think that our Samuel was the marrying sort,” she said.

“So you were making enquiries?” smiled Sheila.

“A good policewoman doesn’t let a single opportunity for enlightenment pass her by,” laughed Rosie.

“We’re here,” confirmed Sheila, “how are we going to deal with it?”

“As it comes,” replied Rosie, “We’ll just start off with a general series of questions, you know, how we’ve noted that he went to the same primary school at the same time as three people murdered in the past week attended it, and we don’t think it’s a coincidence.”

“Gotcha, boss!”

“Now then Sheila, you know better than calling me boss! I tolerate ma’am, but when we’re out of the office I’m quite happy to be called Rosie, which was a name chosen for me by my parents, and they ought to have known what was best!”

“Sorry ma’ … Rosie,” grinned Sheila.

They made their way along a short path and arrived at a weathered front door with a huge brass knocker in the shape of a pistol on it.

“Ex-army,” whispered Rosie as she knocked the door with the awkward knocker.

The man who answered the door had the appearance that was very much military and Sheila couldn’t help wondering if his years as a teacher had mellowed him at all.

“Well?” he asked, keeping up the military appearance that a sharp moustache and crew-cut hair gave him.

“I’m Detective Inspector Rosie Baum, and this is Detective Constable Sheila Robinson,” announced Rosie, “and I wonder if you mind if we ask you a few questions?”

His eyes flickered warily. “Questions? Me? I haven’t done anything to be questioned about!” he declared in a voice that bordered on the pompous.

“Nothing to be worried about, nothing at all,” said Rosie, trying to create a warm smile and only half succeeding, “it concerns an event some time ago at Brumpton Primary School…”

His eyes flared.

“How dared you!” he snapped, “the boy was asking for it and I was too weak to resist! Now go away before I call the pol… go away!”

And he tried to slam the weathered front door, but Rosie’s shoe got in the way.

“That might have hurt me sir,” she said, “and either you let us in for a brief chat or I send for half a dozen uniformed officers to march you down to the police station in front of your neighbours. Now which is it to be?”

© Peter Rogerson, 23.1.21