Before the Poison Read online

  Dr. Fox was also among the first gentlemen in Swaledale to purchase a motor car, a Rover 8, and such a spectacle did he make as he roared along the more remote Dales roads, wearing his pilot’s helmet and goggles, black bag secure on the seat beside him, that when people heard his approach, they came out on their doorstops to watch and wave.

  The years passed and the practice grew, yet still Dr. Fox had not entered into the holy state of matrimony. He had not yet found the right woman to make him a suitable wife, he responded with a laugh to anyone who inquired. Such close communities as Richmond, however, have their traditions and their expectations, and that the local GP should have a wife to send him out with a hearty breakfast inside him each morning, to darn the socks he wore out on his daily rounds, and to have his slippers warming by the fire on a chilly winter’s evening, were certainly among them. Dr. Fox cannot but have been aware of these rumblings.

  Thus it was an occasion of great joy in Richmond when Dr. Fox introduced to his partner Dr. Nelson and his wife Mary, on the 12th of June, 1936, seventeen years after his first arrival, a beautiful young woman of 23, by the name of Grace Elizabeth Hartnell, whose beauty, natural charm, domestic competence, cheerful disposition and delicate femininity soon conquered the hearts of everyone she encountered. If Ernest was the practical and dependable rock of the family, then Grace was its warm and gentle heart.

  Grace worked as a nurse at the Royal Victoria Infirmary, in Newcastle, and that was where she and Ernest began to meet more and more regularly for tea. They were already acquainted, as Dr. Fox was a friend of the Hartnell family, who hailed from Saltburn-on-Sea. In no time at all, Grace became a well-known and much-admired figure around Richmond, and the general opinion was what a wonderful doctor’s wife she would make. This step was finally accomplished on a warm, sunny 26th September, 1936.

  October 2010

  I had hardly been out of the house all week, except to buy some more food, wine and office supplies, so I decided to visit one of the local pubs I had found online, which was in the village of Kirby Hill, a couple of miles farther up the road at the end of my lane.

  Heather Barlow had rung earlier and told me that she and her husband Derek would be delighted to come for dinner on Saturday. After the briefest of pauses, Heather had gone on to ask me whether it was all right if she brought a friend, ‘to round out the numbers’. I detected a whiff of matchmaking in the air, but what could I say? Her name was Charlotte, Heather told me, and she was nice. A solicitor. I would like her. We would see about that.

  The piano tuner had come and gone, and he had done an excellent job. I had set up my office around the walnut escritoire, tinkered with a few ideas, themes and chord sequences at the grand, but I didn’t yet feel settled enough to immerse myself in the sonata I was hoping to write. I know that piano sonatas aren’t especially popular with composers these days – most opt for shorter, more impressionistic fragments – but I like the four-part structure with its intricate themes and variations, perhaps because it is similar to the way I approach my film score work. Schubert and Beethoven are my touchstones, but I haven’t ignored everything that’s happened in music over the last two hundred years, and I have great regard for Britten and Shostakovich.

  At least I had been sleeping much better. Though I still awoke occasionally to the strange night-time sounds, I became more adept at ignoring them and going back to sleep, saving my movie-watching binges for the long evenings. By the time darkness started to fall on Thursday, I felt lonely and restless and couldn’t even settle down to Peeping Tom, one of my old favourites, so I decided to venture out.

  I still found it hard to get over the sheer isolation of Kilnsgarthdale every time I drove along the bumpy one-track lane to the main road. It was only a mile and a half, but that’s actually quite a long way to be from civilisation. Perhaps not in the American West or the Australian outback, but in little old England it is. I couldn’t even see my neighbours a mile away behind me, over the hill. Even the main road was a meandering, undulating, tree-canopied B road two miles from Richmond to the south and, in the opposite direction, about the same distance from Kirby Hill, where I found the Shoulder of Mutton. The pub stood at a bend, opposite the church, where the road turned left into the village, and the view from the car park across the fields to Holmedale and across the A66 to the moorland beyond was stunning, with the last vestiges of sunset on my left, a Technicolor wasteland.

  The pub was moderately crowded, and in the room to the right of the small bar, a few people sat eating dinner. I walked over to the bar and ordered a pint of Daleside bitter and a packet of cheese and onion crisps from the young girl, who graced me with a shy smile. One or two of the regulars paused in their conversations and gave me surreptitious glances, as if they didn’t see too many strangers in there, or as if word of my presence in the area had spread around. It wasn’t quite An American Werewolf in London, but it wasn’t far off. I wasn’t sure whether I would get, or wanted, any conversation. Yorkshire people are notoriously contrary when it comes to these matters. They can be as friendly as you like, and bend your ear until you’ve had enough, or they can simply pretend you don’t exist. And you can’t always be sure which course they will take. I thought it was best to be prepared for all eventualities, so I took a book along with me.

  I carried my pint and crisps over to an empty table in the corner directly opposite the bar, close enough to the blazing fire to catch some of its warmth. The brass and polished wood gleamed. There were no machines or pool tables, no posters advertising quiz nights or karaoke, and, of course, no smoking. I tried to read the names of the single malt whisky bottles displayed on the plate racks around the room. A petite, energetic woman I took to be the landlady was dashing in and out of the bar, stopping to chat and joke with the regulars. She flashed me a quick smile and said hello as she passed my table.

  It was hard to concentrate on my book, an espionage novel by Alan Furst, even though I was enjoying it. I kept overhearing snatches of conversation, or the punchline of a joke, and one of the women at a busy table near by had a very loud laugh. As the place filled up, I watched people come in, and soon all the tables were taken. A couple about my age glanced at me from the bar and came over. The man asked whether the chairs were taken. I said no. I had seen them chatting with the landlady when they came in, so I guessed they were regulars, but I had no idea they knew who I was until the man opposite me said, ‘You’re the new owner of Kilnsgate House, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, putting my book down on the table.

  ‘I’m sorry to disturb you,’ the man said. ‘You were reading.’

  ‘That’s all right. I only brought the book because I didn’t know if there’d be anyone here to talk to.’

  ‘Or anyone who would want to strike up a conversation with an incomer?’

  ‘Well, yes . . . I suppose so.’

  The man leaned forward and whispered. ‘As a matter of fact, I’m not from around these parts. I’m an incomer, myself, a bloody southerner. Brighton.’

  I laughed. ‘Chris Lowndes,’ I said, holding out my hand.

  He shook. ‘I know who you are. I’m Ted Welland, and this is my wife Caroline.’ Caroline was a shy woman in a green cardigan, showing the bulge of a handkerchief over her skinny wrist. The tip of her nose looked red, and I guessed she was carrying the hanky for a purpose. She blushed and averted her eyes when we shook hands.

  ‘It looks like an interesting book, at any rate,’ Ted went on, glancing at the cover.

  ‘I’m a spy fiction fanatic. I cried when they pulled down the Berlin Wall.’

  Ted laughed. ‘I’m afraid I’m more of a non-fiction man myself. History, biography, that sort of thing.’

  I noticed Caroline roll her eyes, as if she recognised the beginnings of a boring lecture. ‘You’re a historian? You should—’

  ‘Good Lord, no! Just a curious mind, that’s all. An avid reader. Especially anything about the Second World War. Now that I’m retir
ed, I find I have plenty of time on my hands, and it keeps me out of mischief. Doesn’t it, darling?’

  He patted his wife on the knee, and she smiled. ‘I’d like to think so,’ she said, then she blew her nose.

  ‘Perhaps you can help me?’ I said.

  Ted Welland raised his eyebrows. ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘Do you know Kilnsgate House?’

  ‘I’ve walked by it on a number of occasions. I know where it is.’

  ‘There’s a funny sort of humped stone ruin on the hillside opposite, a folly or burial mound of some sort. Do you know what it is?’

  ‘The lime kiln?’

  ‘Is that what it is?’

  ‘You mean you don’t know why it’s called Kilnsgate House?’

  ‘Well, no, I suppose I don’t.’

  ‘It means “the way to the kiln”. That ruin is a lime kiln. They were used to make quicklime by burning limestone. See, it’s got an outer layer four or five feet thick, and inside there’s a kind of bowl made of brick or sandstone to withstand the heat, open at the bottom.’

  ‘I noticed a sort of arch, a crescent opening.’

  ‘That’s where you put the coal in. The “eye”. There should be one at the other side, too, though it’s probably buried in the hillside by now. It formed a sort of air tunnel, you see, to keep the fire burning. Above it, inside, there should be an iron grate. You layer crushed limestone and coal up inside, then cover the top with sod, put more coal in the bottom and set it alight. They used to burn for days. People used the quicklime to spread on the fields or for mortar in building, and maybe to get rid of a body or two.’ He winked. ‘Though I heard once that it can actually have the opposite effect and preserve a dead body. Anyway, there are a couple more kilns about two hundred yards farther along, on the same side of the dale as your house.’

  ‘When did they stop using lime kilns?’

  ‘The 1850s, or thereabouts. Demand got too high, so the manufacturing of lime became industrialised. The smaller kilns weren’t needed any more. Pity. You can imagine what a sight they must have been in the Dales, especially at night, the plumes of smoke and the fiery eyes.’

  ‘You seem to know a lot about the area for a Southerner,’ I said. ‘Do you live here in the village?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Ted. ‘Just over the road, by the green. Been here six years now. I worked in banking. Got out early, before the whole world started to hate us.’ He leaned back in his chair and narrowed his eyes. ‘I understand you’re something to do with Hollywood, the movie business? Famous, aren’t you?’

  ‘Word gets around,’ I said. ‘Though I’d hardly call myself famous.’

  ‘I’ve heard of you.’ Caroline sounded as if it had taken her a great deal of time and courage to let the words out. ‘You did the music for that last Sandra Bullock film, didn’t you? I liked it. I mean, the film, but the music, too. It was very romantic.’

  ‘Well, I’m grateful for that,’ I said. It wasn’t one of my favourite efforts, but it had a pretty theme, which in one scene played well ironically against the heroine’s tears of distress.

  ‘You don’t seem at all the way I pictured you,’ Caroline said.

  ‘Well, my studio photo’s a couple of years old now, but apart from a few more grey hairs I haven’t changed all that much.’

  ‘No, I don’t mean that,’ she said. ‘I’ve never seen any photos of you. I mean more . . . like a composer . . . like someone who’s . . . I’m sorry, I can’t really express myself very well.’

  ‘Well, I don’t look like Beethoven, that’s for sure. Not enough hair, for a start.’

  Ted rushed into the awkward silence with the panacea offer of another drink.

  I was thinking of saying no, that I had to go, but I thought Ted Welland might prove an interesting source of local knowledge. I still wanted to know more about the house I was living in, and the people who used to live there. ‘Pint of Daleside, please,’ I said. I didn’t imagine that one more pint would put me over the limit, and I doubted that there were many police patrols on this road, anyway. I had noticed that the car park was almost full, and nobody seemed to be sitting around drinking Coke or tomato juice.

  ‘Can I have a rum and blackcurrant?’ Caroline asked. ‘For my cold.’

  Ted patted her on the shoulder. ‘’Course you can, love.’ He made his way to the bar.

  After a short pause, Caroline asked, ‘Did you like living in America?’ She had a curious habit of glancing at me sideways when she asked me a question, sniffling occasionally, her hands clasped on her lap.

  ‘Most of the time,’ I said.

  ‘I’ve never been there. Are you working on a new film?’

  ‘Not at the moment. I’m taking a break.’

  ‘Must be nice. Is that why you came here? For inspiration?’

  It was an odd sensation, having a conversation with Caroline. I felt as if she really needed to ask her questions but had little or no interest in the answers. ‘Partly,’ I said.

  ‘Kilnsgate’s a big house just for one person, isn’t it? I mean, I’ve never been inside, but even from the outside . . . you can tell.’

  ‘Yes, it’s big,’ I said. ‘Probably too big. But I got used to having a lot of space in America. It suits me fine. I imagine it’s the kind of place that used to have servants and the like?’

  ‘It would have had once,’ said Caroline. ‘But it’s been empty for a long time. It’s too far off the beaten track, and nobody can afford big houses these days. Nobody from around these parts, at any rate. It’s the economy, you know.’

  Fortunately, Ted came back with the drinks, his hands wrapped around two frothing pints, yet still managing to hold Caroline’s rum and blackcurrant cordial with his fingertips. He bent to set the glasses carefully on the table and sat down again.

  ‘Your wife was just telling me that Kilnsgate House was empty for a long time,’ I said, as a way of bringing him back into the conversation.

  Ted glanced at Caroline, then back at me. ‘Yes, that’s right. Interestingly enough, during the war it was used for a while by some hush-hush military unit. The Special Operations Executive would be my guess. Cloak-and-dagger boys. They were mainly involved in overseas missions, supporting resistance groups, sabotage and the like, so I imagine they used the place for briefings and training. I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall for that.’

  ‘And later?’

  ‘Not so interesting, I’m afraid. In the fifties and sixties it was mostly just sitting there, going to rack and ruin. In fact, I even think some hippy commune took it over for a few years in the early seventies. Then the owner, or his solicitor, got a rental outfit to manage the property, but they had constant trouble renting it out. It just sort of stalled, more trouble than it was worth. You must have been a godsend, old boy.’

  ‘Why did nobody want to rent it or live there?’

  ‘Well, let’s face it, the place is hardly a cottage, and it is rather remote, isn’t it? Talk about Wuthering Heights or Bleak House. And it’s not a great spot for farming. Then . . . Do you know much about it, yourself?’

  ‘I know there was a murder there, if that’s what you mean.’

  ‘Right. Yes. Well, perhaps people were also put off by what happened there. I mean, it’s not everyone who wants to live in a house where there’s been a murder, is it? I’m sorry. I didn’t mean . . . you know.’

  ‘No need to apologise,’ I said. ‘I had no idea of its history when I bought it. All the negotiations were conducted from a distance, and my estate agent didn’t see fit to tell me.’

  ‘Can’t blame him, can you?’ said Ted. ‘Might have put you off.’

  ‘It doesn’t bother me, but it does interest me. Do you know much about the case?’

  ‘Not a great deal. I’m afraid murder isn’t my forte, so to speak. But it was back in the early fifties,’ Ted went on. ‘They lived there, I think, from about the mid-thirties until 1953. That was when she poisoned him. A woman’s method, if ever the
re was one.’

  Caroline had been following our conversation with that sideways gaze of hers, sniffling and blowing her nose from time to time. She took a sip of rum and blackcurrant and gave a little moue as Ted spoke. ‘Oh, Ted,’ she said. ‘Don’t be so chauvinistic.’

  ‘Well, it is! Name me one famous male poisoner.’

  ‘Dr Crippen,’ said Caroline.

  ‘He didn’t do it,’ Ted argued. ‘They’ve proved it wasn’t his wife’s torso they found under the cellar floor. DNA.’

  ‘That’s just a theory. Besides, it was someone’s torso, wasn’t it?’ Caroline argued. ‘And it didn’t get there by itself.’

  Ted had to concede that she had a point there.

  ‘Will you let me carry on, woman?’ he said. ‘As I said, they found traces of poison, arrested the wife, and that was that. She was hanged at Armley Gaol in April 1953. Got a fair bit of notoriety at the time, but it didn’t seem to linger in the national psyche like some murders do.’

  ‘Why do you think that was?’

  ‘I don’t honestly know,’ said Ted. ‘It had all the ingredients. Sex, intrigue, a mysterious, beautiful woman, a nice juicy murder. A hanging. Maybe she got overshadowed by Ruth Ellis a couple of years later? And, don’t forget, she also came between Bentley and Christie, too. They were both pretty controversial and sensational cases. I mean, not a week or so after she went on trial, they started finding the bodies in the walls at 10 Rillington Place. That’d blow everything off the front page, wouldn’t it? Whatever the reason, the Kilnsgate poisoner has been largely forgotten by posterity. I’m afraid she got short shrift in the famous murderers department.’ He gave a nervous laugh.

  ‘Do you know if there’s a written account?’

  ‘I do believe it was written up in Famous Trials. You might be able to find a copy in a second-hand bookshop somewhere. One of those old green-covered Penguins that turn to dust when you open them. Try that second-hand place in the market square. Richmond Books. I’d imagine it would be long out of print by now. There’d be newspaper accounts, too, somewhere.’