The Ullswater Undertaking by Rebecca Tope (read dune .TXT) 📕

Christopher leant back and clasped Robin to his chest with both hands. ‘That’s disgusting,’ he said, making a poor show of flippancy. Simmy could see that he was serious.

‘I don’t see why. He can’t come to any harm.’

‘It’s immoral. Not just exploiting you, but an innocent child as well. Turning you into some sort of undercover informant, because the police haven’t the wits to do the job themselves.’

‘It’s not like that at all. There’s no way the police could ever solve this sort of murder without the co-operation of people who know the background and the history and how everything connects up. They’re always working in the dark, completely dependent on what people tell them. And if there’s no goodwill towards them and people won’t open up, they can’t function. I thought you understood all that.’

‘I told them about Fabian,’ he said defensively.

‘Bully for you. Anyway, I’m going to do what he asks, whatever you say.’

Christopher took a deep breath and rubbed the baby’s head with his chin. ‘Okay. I overreacted. I still haven’t caught up with the way you and that detective are with each other. But I don’t get how this could work. What are you going to do? Knock on some strange woman’s door with Robin under your arm, and say, “Look at my lovely baby. Can I come in so you can admire him?” Or what? How can you even think that would work?’

‘I haven’t thought it through yet.’

‘Well, I can’t see any choice but to use subterfuge. You’ll be deceiving this poor woman, whoever she is, into being all friendly and chatty, when all the time you’re storing up everything she says to tell the police. It’s immoral,’ he repeated ‘Whichever way you look at it. And it’s pretty silly, if you think about it.’

Simmy had to admit he had a point. ‘I expect I’ll lose her address if I’m not careful. He jotted it on a flimsy bit of paper.’ She pulled it out of her pocket. ‘Harriman’s her name.’

Christopher stared at her, as if she’d just told an outrageous joke that he was struggling to find funny. ‘You’re not serious? You don’t mean Chrissie Harriman, do you?’

‘I haven’t got a first name for her. Why?’

‘She’s only one of our most regular vendors. It’s a rare sale that doesn’t have ten or twenty lots from her. Cameras and binoculars mainly. We never can understand where she gets them all from.’

‘Can’t be the same woman. This one’s a grandmother who spends all her time minding small children. How old is your Chrissie?’

‘Sixty or thereabouts, I’d say. Very active, dashing all over the country. So no, it can’t be her. Very likely related, all the same.’

‘Husband’s sister, at a guess. I suppose the connection might be helpful. I could pretend I wanted Chrissie but went to the wrong house. Moxon said I should just show up and get chatting. It sounded quite easy, the way he said it.’ She pulled a rueful face.

‘Drop it, Sim. Don’t let him drag you into it. He’s got no right.’

‘I never actually said I’d do it. But if she does know things about Josephine that would get the investigation on the right track, then I really ought to have a go. That’s what Ben would say.’

‘Then let Ben do it,’ Christopher snapped.

‘That’s probably a very good idea,’ said Simmy placidly.

The afternoon ended with no firm plans made, and no real disagreements hovering over them. The builders went home, Robin enjoyed a lengthy feed and Christopher actually spent some time out in the garden, pulling out young buttercups and thistles, which Simmy conceded were unambiguously weeds and definitely undesirable. She lay back on the sofa and gave herself permission to go blank, merely gazing rapturously at her baby’s face. She had forgotten the appointment at the clinic next day and the fact that she was soon getting married. Ben and Moxon and Oliver and her parents all faded into the background for a whole blissful hour. This was all perfectly acceptable, because she was a new mother, and nothing was more important than that.

But it was only sustainable for an hour. Her brain came awake again in spite of itself. Questions were swirling and ideas about the Armitages and how they were the only credible suspects for the murder. Just as she was musing yet again on Uncle Richmond, the landline summoned their attention.

Christopher had just come in, and he answered it, but his monosyllabic responses left Simmy no wiser as to what the call was about. He did say, ‘No, no, we’ll come there. We might be a while,’ at one point. And ‘I hope he’s not causing you any bother?’

Could it be Ben, she wondered. Or, more likely, Fabian Crick. Impatiently she waited for enlightenment.

It came soon enough. ‘A man called Richmond Armitage is at the pub in Patterdale, asking how to find us. Luckily the landlady didn’t much like the look of him, so said she’d phone us. Can’t imagine how she found the number. I said we – or I if you don’t want to – would meet him there.’

‘Yes, I heard that bit. I gave her our number last week because she offered to put me in touch with a woman at Glenridding with a baby, who might like to go for walks or something. And yes, I’m coming. Robin can lie on my lap in the car just for that little way.’

‘No, he can’t,’ said Christopher with uncharacteristic firmness. ‘That’s just the sort of thinking that leads to disaster. If he’s coming, he’s got to go in his seat properly.’

‘You’re right,’ she conceded. ‘But you can strap him in, because he’s going to hate the person who does it.’

‘This is very weird,’ she continued a moment later. ‘It can only have been Fabian or Richmond’s sons who told his uncle about us, so why not give out our address as well? Did the pub lady say what he looked like?’

‘No, but I got the