Page 32 of Murder in the Winter Woods
It was ghastly. But Julia smiled.
‘As red as the holly
The holly is jolly
And now I must go
Hoooooommmeeee.’
Julia wasn’t sure she could stand it if Hester moved on to the next colour, but she was saved by Hester finding the picture that she was looking for. She turned the book to face Julia, handed it to her and pointed: ‘Here he is, look at him. He was a fine-looking fellow, was Matthew.’
There he was, her elderly beekeeping neighbour, forty-odd years younger, in slim-fitting blue jeans and a neon shirt, his hair in a shaggy eighties mullet, a shy grin on his face, and a bass guitar slung around his neck. Julia found herself smiling as she thought back to her own shaggy eighties hairdo, and accompanying neon clothes. Matthew certainly had been a good-looking chap. A blonde girl and two other young men stood, similarly attired, similarly smiling into their glorious futures. Julia recognised one of them: the shortest and stockiest of the men, with the biggest grin, sitting behind a drum kit.
‘That’s Lewis Band!’ she said.
‘So it is. Lewis was the drummer. Look how young they both were. And now…Still, it makes me happy to see Matthew.’
‘He looks great there. Handsome and happy.’
‘I couldn’t believe it when he took a shine to me,’ said Hester with a laugh. ‘A chap like that? A girl like me? Heavens.’
‘Oh, I can see why he fancied you,’ said Julia. ‘You’re a natural beauty, with a kind heart.’
‘Ah, what a sweet thing to say. Funnily enough, that’s sort of what he said too. It didn’t hurt that he’d just come out of a relationship. He liked to joke that I was a rebound fling that lasted forty years.’ Hester’s laugh turned into a sort of strangled sob. She put on a ‘buck up’ voice and said, ‘You know what? I think it’s time for a slice of our homemade honey apple cake.’
‘Gosh, that sounds delicious.’
‘It is delicious, made with our own apples and our own honey,’ Hester said, getting to her feet. ‘Back in a jiffy.’
While Hester went off to fetch the cake, Julia held the heavy album in her lap, turning the pages slowly. Another photograph of the band caught her eye: in this one, they were squashed up on a long sofa with a few girls. It seemed to be a celebration. They each had a champagne glass – the old-fashioned bubble glasses, not the flutes – and they were larking about. The pretty blonde from the band sat on Matthew’s knee, her mouth open in what looked like laughter. Lewis was turned towards them, toasting them. Another girl with a halter top and spectacular afro stood behind, holding her glass towards the camera. A waif in a mini skirt stood with a foot up on the arm of the sofa, and her arms up. A few other men, who Julia took to be the other band members, or perhaps producers or some such, were caught in similarly celebratory poses.
Julia noticed the caption, the ink pale from all the years, but still legible.Jupiter Records!!!! London, May 1986, it said.Below was a string of names – some of them, like Lewis, so familiar that they were identified just by their initials or a nickname, all in a tiny, illegible scrawl. Julia leaned in and peered through her glasses at something like:M…Egg…L, Dom, M, K…
It was a lovely photograph, so happy and optimistic. Clearly, it had been taken before their record deal fell apart, with recriminations all round. Poor innocent young things.
Julia couldn’t imagine that a shared experience in an eighties rock band might connect two men killed in hit-and-run incidents in a Cotswolds village, but she reached into her bag for her phone, and took a photograph of the photograph. Because you never knew, did you?
17
It felt strange to be driving on the motorway, with a stream of other cars, all travelling at speed into London on a Saturday morning. Julia had once been used to whizzing along the motorways and around the city streets, dashing about to meetings and clients and courts all over town, but she’d become rather out of practice after her years tootling slowly around Berrywick and the neighbouring villages. They had debated taking the train, but both liked the freedom of having a car with them, and the ability to pack as much luggage as one wished. Julia concentrated hard and held the wheel firmly. She flicked her eyes between the road and the rear-view mirror. She kept a good following distance and indicated well in advance of any movement.
Sean, in the seat next to her, did most of the talking. ‘The last time I was on this road, it was to fetch Jono when he was chucked out of his London flat,’ he said, staring pensively out of the window. ‘It feels like a lifetime ago. So much has happened since.’
‘That it has. He was a very troubled chap when you brought him to Berrywick, but his time here, and being with you and Leo – and then with Laine – has really settled him.’
‘You’ve played a part too,’ Sean said. ‘He likes you and looks up to you. And you’re the one who suggested him for the job at the vet, which has been brilliant for him.’
‘You know what they say, it takes a village to raise a troubled young adult,’ Julia said, lightly. ‘And look, it’s paid off handsomely – we’ve got someone to look after all the animals this weekend while we’re in London for the party.’
Christopher, Julia’s ex-husband’s current husband, was turning fifty. Christopher had dithered about a celebration, torn between his horror at the clocking up of another decade, and his deep and abiding love of a party. The indecision had gone on for quite some time, driving poor Peter completely mad, but Christopher’s party-loving side had won out and an event had been hastily planned. (‘As if there was ever going to be any other outcome,’ Peter had said, in loving exasperation.)
As a result, on quite short notice, Julia and Sean had booked a night in the city, and Jono and Leo had agreed to move into Julia’s house with Jake, Chaplin and the chickens. Julia was used to managing the animals’ various schedules, diets and foibles, but when she wrote out the list of who did what, and ate what, when, and where they slept and played, and so on, she realised what a complex arrangement it all was. Jono had seemed completely unfazed and assured her it would all be fine.
The road got busier, and the countryside more built-up as they neared the outskirts of the city. ‘You’d better ask The Lady for directions now,’ Julia said to Sean. ‘We are getting close to the off-ramp.’
‘The Lady’ was the voice inside the map app. Sean had put in the address of their B&B earlier, and now he turned it on
‘In one mile, take the next exit,’ The Lady said, in the cool, plummy voice that inspired confidence and calm in Julia. The Lady deftly directed them, but failed to warn them of a double-decker bus stuck across the road, where traffic officers weredirecting them around a detour, much to The Lady’s distress. She similarly failed to mention a closed road, and she certainly knew nothing of the many cyclists who came weaving in and out of the traffic. Julia was sure that the cycling population of London had increased exponentially since she had left – soon it would be like Amsterdam, but without the convenience of cycle lanes. Somewhat late, and somewhat stressed, they arrived at the B&B, which was in walking distance of the hotel where Christopher was hosting his ‘little get-together’ that evening. Knowing Christopher, and having seen his event planning in action at his Cotswolds wedding to Peter, Julia fully anticipated a stylish affair, not so ‘little’, with good eats and the champagne flowing.
