Death at Rainbow Cottage by Jo Allen (novel24 TXT) 📕

wouldn’t have left any. All they’d have done would be to come in and pick up the laptop. And it was a straightforward burglary. Natalie stressed all these things to herself. Eventually she might almost believe them.

‘By the way,’ Jude Satterthwaite said, as an afterthought, ‘I meant to ask you. I don’t suppose either Len or Gracie had anything to do with your Rainbow Festival?’

Claud shook his head. It was his project, not Natalie’s. She left it to him to do the talking. ‘No.’

‘Does it go down well?’

‘Mostly. there’s always some opposition, of course. Every congregation has its unChristian homophobe, and they’re always the ones who shout the loudest. But those are the people we’re trying to reach.’ Claud paused. ‘You know one of them.’

‘Do I?’

‘Yes. I’ve remembered where I saw the fellow in the churchyard, the doctor. He was one of them.’ Claud’s lips curled in irritation.

‘Fascinating,’ the detective said, politely. ‘Anyone else?’

‘As I say. There’s at least one in every congregation. I couldn’t tell you their names.’

‘I daresay I can find out,’ Jude said, standing up to signal the interview was at an end. ‘Let me know if anything else comes up.’

‘Let’s go home,’ Claud said, when the detective had got them to initial his record of the conversation and then headed off past the remnants of blue tape on the churchyard railings (whistling, she noted, as though he hadn’t a care in the world). ‘I suppose in the great scheme of things that wasn’t something to make a fuss about, but we’re both a little bit stressed.’

He always tried to downplay her nerves. Maybe he thought if he did that his overt calm would rub off on her. She loved him for it, as if her life depended on it. ‘Yes.’ She tapped her wrist, desperate to run again. ‘Are you angry with me about the keys?’

‘No, of course not. I know I sounded a bit snappy to start with. But that was because I was worried about you.’ He turned around, frowned at the empty chair, where he always left his jacket. ‘Bastards!’ he said, shaking his head. ‘They’ve taken my coat. To wrap the laptop in, I suppose.’

She sighed. ‘It was about time you got a new one anyway.’ And he never kept anything worth having in the pockets.

‘Yes, you’re right. Now come on. Let’s get home.’

Chapter 18

Ashleigh had been sitting on a desk, running through the results of the constables whose door-to-door inquiries she was responsible for supervising. There were sheaves of notes and the PC who delivered them to her hadn’t picked up any obvious connections, but one name caught at her. A tiny thing, but worth exploring. When the constable had gone she jumped down and drifted across the incident room to where Jude was standing in front of the whiteboard. ‘Jude. Can I run something by you?’

‘Of course.’ He stepped back from the board. ‘Did the door-to-doors come up with something?’

‘I think they might have done. These are the interviews we have from the staff and patients at the hospital. There’s nothing in them that helps us directly. No-one has anything you might call a lead. But we talked to some of the patients on the elder care ward where Gracie worked. They all loved her to bits, and nobody can think of any reason why someone would have hurt her. But I think there’s something in here that implies that Gracie knew Giles Butler.’

‘Is that right?’ That stopped him in his tracks, though he should hardly be surprised. It was a small enough world, and people knew of their neighbours and their doings even when they’d hardly ever met. Giles lived in Kirkby Stephen and his paranoia over being recognised suggested he had plenty of contacts up in the Eden Valley.

‘Yes, though I wouldn’t get too excited about it. It’s just that one of the patients she spoke to is a Mr Butler.’

‘Not an uncommon name.’

‘No, but he mentioned that the last time he saw Gracie was on the day she was killed. He remembers it clearly, because it was the day his son came to visit him. He didn’t name the son, but we can check. The son doesn’t come too often, because he’s busy. He’s a GP. In Kirkby Lonsdale.’

‘We know Giles went up to visit his father in Penrith hospital. That’s where he met Len. How reliable is Butler senior?’

‘It’s possible he might be mistaken, but if he isn’t, that puts Giles Butler in Penrith on the day, though not necessarily at the time, that Gracie was killed.’

‘Right. You’ll need to get your guys to check that.’

‘I’ve got them on to it already. Butler is working just now, but I expect we’ll hear soon enough where he was — or where he said he was — on that day and at that time.’ It felt like progress, so much so that she was surprised at his lukewarm reaction to it, but she’d learned to tell when something was nagging at him. ‘And what’s on your mind? Are you inspired? Or baffled? You must have been standing there for five minutes.’

‘More baffled than inspired,’ he admitted, tearing his eyes from the maze of information and ironing out his customary frown. I spoke to Claud and he mentioned the Rainbow Festival again. It keeps coming up. Even though it’s only a suggestion, it seems to have inspired strong opposition.’

‘Can we pin that opposition to anyone we’ve already covered?’

‘Yes. Phil. Claud remembers him from a church meeting, though he wasn’t the only one. He said there’s opposition in every congregation, though not as great as the support.’

‘Okay,’ Ashleigh said. ‘If we have to go through every congregation looking for the one rotten apple, I’ll do it. I don’t care how many good Christian folk are upset.’

‘The good ones won’t