Читать книгу Murder in the Museum - Simon Brett - Страница 5

Carole Seddon decided there was no time like the present. The squabblings and confrontations at the meeting had only strengthened her resolve to resign from her Trusteeship. She couldn’t pretend the same level of interest in the fate of Bracketts that had been shown by the other committee members. It was time for a dignified withdrawal.

As they left the main building, Carole hurried to catch up with Gina Locke, who was walking determinedly towards the converted stable block which now housed the Administrative Office. The Director didn’t have the air of a woman who had just suffered a humiliating defeat.

‘Gina, I just wanted to say sorry . . .’ Carole began.

‘No need to say sorry to me. Nothing that happened in that meeting was your fault. I was glad to have your support.’

‘No, I didn’t mean—’

‘Sheila may reckon she’s won this round, but she won’t win in the long term. She no longer has any power at Bracketts, and soon she’s going to have to come to terms with that.’

‘She seemed to have power over that meeting,’ said Carole.

‘Oh yes, she won a cheap propaganda victory with the Trustees, but she no longer has any influence in the day-to-day running of the place.’

‘Your tone could almost imply that the Trustees aren’t very important.’

Gina stopped, adjusted her papers, and looked up into Carole’s pale blue eyes. She hesitated for a second, then seemed to make the decision that she was on safe ground. ‘It would be rather offensive for me to say that, wouldn’t it? To such a new Trustee?’

Carole shrugged, and gave a reassuring grin. ‘My back is broad.’

‘All right then, I’ll tell you.’ Gina smiled. ‘In the overall scheme of things here at Bracketts, the Trustees aren’t that important. They have to be there – that’s part of the terms of the way the charity was set up – and some of them have very useful contacts, which can make my job a lot easier. But a lot of what they do is just rubber-stamping decisions that have already been made. The Bracketts Trustees are a very typically British institution, a system of checks and balances . . .’

‘There to provide the illusion of consultation and democracy . . .?’

‘Exactly.’ The Director smiled at Carole’s ready understanding of the situation. ‘So while in my job it would be very foolish of me to antagonize the Trustees – and while on major issues I must bow to their decisions . . . at least for the time being – most of the time I get on with running Bracketts exactly as I think it should be run. For heaven’s sake, the Trustees only meet six times a year. There’s the occasional exchange of letters and phone calls between meetings, but most of the time I can get on with my own job without any interference.’

‘The use of that word implies you’d be happier if there was no Board of Trustees.’

‘No question about that.’ Gina’s response was so instinctive that she felt she should perhaps soften it a bit. ‘I’m sorry, that’s the knee-jerk reaction you’d get from anyone in my position. Professional administrators always resent the presence of amateur advisory boards. That’s just one of the rules of business – as true in the heritage industry as it is anywhere else. From my point of view, the Trustees are just a pain in the butt.’

‘Well, thank you for being so frank,’ said Carole in mock-affront. ‘For telling me that, as a Trustee, I am entirely redundant.’

‘Oh, I didn’t mean—’

‘Don’t worry. I’m not at all offended. In fact, what you’ve told me makes it rather easier for me to say what I was about to—’

‘No, the Trustees are a pain in the butt, but they exist, and that’s it. I have to work with them – which is why it’s so important that I get as many like-minded people on the Board as possible. Which is why I persuaded them to ask you to join, Carole. The more support I can get at those meetings from people like you, the easier my job becomes.’

‘Ah.’ Suddenly what Carole was about to say had become more difficult again.

They had reached the entrance to the stable block. ‘But if there’s something you want to talk about, come on in.’

‘Well . . .’

Carole’s indecision was interrupted by the ungainly arrival across the yard of a stocky young man in clean blue overalls. He moved with the suppressed excitement of a child with a secret to tell, and his face was childlike too. Though probably in his twenties, he had the flat face and thick neck that characterized Down’s syndrome. He was ruddy and freckled from outside work. Excitement sparkled in his watery blue eyes.

‘Gina. Gina.’

‘Yes, Jonny. Look, you can see I’m talking to someone,’ she reprimanded with surprising gentleness. ‘You shouldn’t interrupt.’

‘I know, but sorry, I . . . There’s something . . .’

‘This is Carole Seddon. Jonny Tyson.’

The young man held out his hand very correctly, then thought better of the idea, and wiped it on his overalls. ‘Bit dirty. Been digging.’

‘Jonny’s one of the Volunteers. They’re working in the kitchen garden, preparing the space where the Museum will be built.’ Gina smiled, again with great compassion. ‘We couldn’t manage without Jonny.’

His beam of gratitude for the compliment nearly split his face in half, but he was still agitated, bouncing uneasily on the balls of his feet, as if trying to contain the power of his muscular body. ‘Please, Gina. There’s something . . . where we’ve been digging. Could you come and have a look?’

‘Yes, all right, Jonny.’ The Director moved towards the stable block door. ‘I’m just going to have a word with Carole, and then I’ll—’

‘Please, it’d be better if you could come straight away.’

There was no panic in his voice, but the urgency communicated itself from the trembling intensity of his body.

‘All right. Carole, we can talk as we go along . . . if that’s all right with you?’

‘Fine.’

‘No, I don’t think . . .’ But the two women had already moved on before Jonny Tyson could articulate his objection.

The kitchen garden of Bracketts was between the main house and the field which had been tarmacked over into a car park, so it had the ideal position for a Visitors’ Centre. Every new arrival would have to pass by at the start of their tour, and as they left they would hopefully visit the gift shop to load up with Esmond Chadleigh mugs and tea towels, as well as copies of those of his books that remained in print.

Though the building of the new Museum would be done by professional contractors, the basic clearing and digging over of the space had been delegated to the Bracketts volunteer force. The kitchen garden had long ago given up its original function and been used increasingly as a convenient tipping ground. (The wall that surrounded it left tourists blissfully unaware of the accumulated mess.) Old farm machinery and garden implements had ended their life there; so had generations of superseded visitor signs. There were collapsed chairs and tables from the old tea rooms, broken glass display cabinets and rejected souvenirs.

When Carole had arrived earlier that afternoon, the clearing process was well advanced. Through the open gates to the kitchen garden, she had seen the Estate Manager organizing some half-dozen workers of various ages. All wore faded blue overalls palely emblazoned with the words ‘Bracketts Volunteer’ and the logo of some long-defunct or merged insurance company. They appeared to be enjoying their work. Piles of rubbish were being enthusiastically dragged to a large bonfire outside the walls. The acrid smell of burning plastic tainted the autumn air.

As Carole and Gina approached after the meeting, almost all the debris had been removed, and the fire subsided to glowing embers. Within the kitchen garden walls, freshly turned earth showed that a start had been made on digging over the surface soil.

But the work had stopped. The Bracketts Volunteers in their faded blue overalls were clustered round a corner near the gate, and turned uneasily at the approach of Jonny Tyson and the two women.

‘I found it,’ said Jonny, with a mixture of pride and trepidation. Then, treating the words as if they were too big for his mouth, he confirmed, ‘Yes, I found it.’

The Volunteers moved back, Gina and Carole looked down at the ‘it’ they revealed.

Though only partially uncovered by Jonny’s spade, ‘it’ was undoubtedly a human skull.