The Truth About Kilmer St. Giles by Kate Twitchin, Poison cocktail

I slammed the front door, turned the key, and dashed through to the kitchen. I checked the door to the garden was still locked and the windows above the sink were securely fastened before releasing the Venetian-blind to clatter down to the windowsill. Flinging my jacket onto the sofa and kicking off my shoes, I ran up the stairs and into the bedrooms, then the bathroom, tugging on the window catches to make sure they were tightly closed and drawing the curtains as I went. Finally, I stood on the landing, breathing hard and trying to calm myself. I had to think rationally. What to do? What to do?

It was a quarter to eleven, too late to call anyone; there was nothing for it but to hunker down, try and get a good night’s sleep and start making some calls in the morning.

Not feeling particularly reassured but knowing there was nothing else I could do, I undressed, washed my face and cleaned my teeth. Unable to resist the urge, I checked under the bed before getting in, switching off the light and burrowing under the duvet. I knew the sensible thing was to sleep on it. Things always look better in the morning. I lay listening to the creaks and gentle sighs the old cottage made as it settled down for the night and which had, until that night, proved quite soporific. However, an hour later, I was still wide awake, the events of the evening going round and round in my head.

            I hadn’t been the first to arrive. A handful of others looked up and smiled but carried on with their conversations as I made my way to the sofa and sat down at one end of it. Opposite me, sitting on the window-seat, two women appeared to be discussing a car theft. Behind me, at the table in the dining end of the lounge-diner, a young man and an older woman were having a heated debate about a spate of shed fires on the allotments. A woman I recognised as the doctor’s receptionist was flipping through a notebook, muttering to herself about the lack of police on the streets these days. I hadn’t really known what to expect but I certainly didn’t like what I was hearing.

The door opened and a few more people walked in and made their way to the vacant seats. I remember thinking, I hope they’re not bringing more tales of crimes and misdemeanours. Little did I know.

“Let’s make a start. Welcome everybody.” Our host, Clive Merritt, clapped his hands and everyone stopped talking, albeit somewhat reluctantly I noticed.

“We were expecting Norman and Sue but I’ve just had a text to say something’s turned up and they send their apologies,” Clive announced.

The man who had come to sit next to me on the sofa leaned closer to the woman on his other side and whispered something in her ear which made her giggle. I couldn’t be sure but it sounded like: ‘Maybe they’ve found another body in their basement’.

Clive frowned in their direction and cleared his throat.

“I’d like to introduce you to a new neighbour. Some of you may already have met Clara, who has recently moved into the village.”

There was a murmur of hellos and welcomes directed at me, and a beaming smile from Hattie Jenkins, the librarian I’d met when I went to join the library the previous week. Hattie had been very helpful, handing me leaflets and booklets detailing all the activities going on in Kilmer St.Giles.

“And there’s a Neighbourhood Watch meeting at Clive’s on Tuesday. That would be an excellent opportunity for you to meet people,” she’d told me. “Jeremy will be there, he can tell you about the ukulele band. And Cynthia, she runs the U3A French Conversation classes, and Roger is our local historian…” Hattie listed on her fingers. “I’ll get Clive to give you a call, shall I?” she’d concluded and I’d left the library feeling very pleased and happy to be joining such a friendly and welcoming village.

“Right, let’s get on.” Clive rubbed his hands together and smiled at me. I felt a surge of panic that I’d be expected to speak first and was relieved when he asked the man seated nearest to the door, “Jeremy, what have you got for us?”

Jeremy, a middle-aged man with what looked like a permanently worried expression, started talking about an expensive car which had been vandalised whilst the owner was busy in her garden, turning her compost heap.

“Can you believe that?” He looked around the room, frowning. “I mean, in broad daylight? She might’ve walked around to the front at any moment and caught him red-handed.”

“If the victim didn’t see the villain, how did she know it was a ‘he’?” Hattie interrupted.

There followed a lively discussion in which everyone seemed to have something to say about prejudice, making assumptions, jumping to conclusions. It was a debate I couldn’t join in with because, frankly, I was speechless.

“Well, the person who broke into my summerhouse, making off with my new parasol, was definitely a man; there were footprints in the border, size elevens would be my guess,” the doctor’s receptionist said.

“Cynthia! What an excellent clue,” Hattie exclaimed.

“I hope you saw fit to protect the footprints. Did you cover them over until Forensics could get a look at them?” Clive asked. “It’s vitally important to secure the crime scene…”

“Yes, Clive, you’ve told us a hundred times. I’m sure Cynthia wouldn’t be so silly, would you, Cyn?” Shed-Fire-Man smirked and winked, actually winked, at the doctor’s receptionist.

All this talk of crime but still the atmosphere in the room was lighthearted and jocular. I was appalled. It’s television and so-called ‘social media’, I thought, they’ve inured us to the seriousness of today’s…

“Clara?”

I jumped as I realised Clive had asked me a question.

“Don’t be alarmed, you’re among friends,” he said. “So, do you have anything for us?”

Friends? I don’t know about that, I thought. With friends like you lot…

“Anything that’s keeping you awake at night?” he prompted.

Well, I thought, there wasn’t until I came here tonight. However, to show willing, I wracked my brains to come up with something.

“Well, I, not really, I mean…”

“Got anything fiendish and dastardly that you need our help with?” Shed-Fire Man asked, leaning forward eagerly.

“Well, there is something. It’s nothing really,” I paused. Was there any point in going on? What were a few roses when compared to vandalism, arson and burglary, not to mention bodies in basements?

Hattie caught my eye and nodded encouragingly.

“Someone’s been stealing my roses,” I blurted out and felt myself blushing at the insignificance of my ‘crime’. I wished I was back at home; not my new home but my old home where I’d spent so many happy years before having the fanciful idea of spending my retirement in a pretty little village.

“Roses?” Clive asked.

“Yes. Roses. At first I thought it was wind damage but the cuts are clean, made by something sharp…like secateurs…”

“What about clues — a shred of fabric caught on a thorn, maybe?” Jeremy asked.

“A thorn? Oh, er, it’s, um, it’s a thornless variety.”

“You’ll have CCTV footage, of course,” a serious-looking young man in heavy-rimmed glasses asked from where he was sitting, half obscured by a large rubber plant, typing on an iPad.

“Well, no, there isn’t; I mean, is it really necessary?” I asked.

“What about the gate? Good strong lock? Signs of forced entry?” Jeremy asked.

“The gate, I, I don’t think…I’ll have to check.” I had no idea. These people must think I haven’t the sense I was born with. 

“To tell the truth, I thought I’d imagined it, at first,” I confessed. “You know how stressful moving house can be.”

“That’ll be it. You picked the roses yourself and then completely forgot you’d done so,” Hattie declared.

“But that’s just it,” I explained. “I can’t have done. You see, I first noticed some were missing before I’d unpacked any vases so I’m sure I wouldn’t have…”

“Now, now, gang, let’s not subject Clara to an Old Bailey cross-examination on her first night,” Clive said, coming to my rescue at last.

I smiled my thanks at him as everyone except Heavy-Specs, who was scowling at his iPad, murmured kind words of encouragement.

“Would you like me to pop round tomorrow to see if I can help you with your mystery?” Hattie asked. “They don’t call me Miss Marple for nothing.”

The group laughed and joked, agreeing that I should take Hattie up on the offer. If anyone could make sense of a crime, Hattie could. I knew I should’ve been grateful but really, right then, I couldn’t wait to get away from those frightful people and have nothing more to do with them.

Clive brought the meeting back to order and, referring to his clipboard, reminded everyone about the Stolen Bicycles Auction at the Police Station in the nearby town on the following Saturday.

“And Police Community Support Officer McBride will be giving a talk to the U3A on all aspects of security, be that personal, household, vehicular, cyber, financial. Spread the word. Monday fortnight, the 16th, at the Millennium Centre, 7 o’clock sharp,” he concluded.

As the others made notes in their diaries, I bowed my head and, embarrassingly, used the sleeves of my jumper to surreptitiously dry my tears. This was not at all what I’d expected when I moved to Kilmer St.Giles. How could I have guessed the charming village, with its picturesque Norman church, delightful duck pond and neat little cottages, was a hotbed of crime?

“Clara?” Hattie was standing over me, already wearing her coat.

“I’m sorry, is the meeting over?” I asked, foolishly.

“Yes, and I was asking if you wanted a lift home. I know it’s not far but the nights are drawing in...”

“Yes!” I cried. “I mean, yes, that would be wonderful, thank you.”

Just get me home, I silently begged as I fumbled with the zipper of my jacket. Mumbling my thanks to Clive, I followed Hattie out to where she was waiting with the passenger door open.

The short journey home was a blur. I let Hattie’s chat about the village and all the things I could get involved with fade into the background. After what I’d heard at that meeting, I didn’t think I’d be joining any ukulele band anytime soon. I was suddenly nostalgic for the city with its blaring police sirens, ram-raided shops, litter, graffiti and menacing gangs of youths on every corner. That felt much more like home than this village of the damned. 

I awoke from a night of bizarre dreams. Car chases, drive-by shootings and the jangling of prison cell keys had disturbed my rest. At one point, I dreamt I was hiding in a shed, lying in wait for the rose thief, armed with a broom and a plant pot.

“It was all that talk of crime last night,” I told myself as I made a pot of very strong coffee.

Stirring milk and sugar into my mug, I looked out into the garden and sighed. It was so beautiful. The cottage was lovely too and, since I’d finished unpacking and rehousing all my possessions, it had really started to feel like home. I would be so sorry to leave but I really couldn’t see myself ever settling down in a place where so many unpleasant things happened and, more to the point, were treated in such a cavalier way.

“Yoo-hoo!”

“Christ!” I shrieked and dropped my coffee cup. Snatching a tea towel to dab at the hot liquid dribbling down my skirt, I ran through to the lounge where I’d left my phone. I grabbed it but it slipped from my trembling fingers to the floor. I started to sob as I crouched down, scrabbling to pick it up.

“Hello?” the voice called, accompanied by knocking on the kitchen window.

I stopped, my heart pounding, and listened. Get a grip, I told myself, since when did intruders call yoo-hoo and tap on windows?

“Clara? It’s me, Hattie.”

I scrambled up and ran to the kitchen door. Flinging it open, I fell into Hattie’s arms.

“What on earth?” Hattie asked.

“Oh, Hattie, thank goodness it’s you, I thought it was a burglar or an arsonist or…”

I dragged Hattie into the kitchen, slammed the door and turned the key, rattling the door handle to check it really was locked.

“Calm down, my dear, you’re overwrought,” Hattie said as she guided me to a kitchen chair.

“I have to leave. I can’t live here. I’m selling up and moving back to the city,” I cried.

“Not before you’ve told me what’s up,” Hattie said, pulling out another chair to sit down opposite me.

“I’m afraid,” I said.

“Afraid of what?” Hattie asked.

 What was I afraid of? What wasn’t I afraid of?

“I don’t know who’s been stealing my roses and I don’t know who stole Cynthia’s new parasol, or who would be so mean as to scratch Jeremy’s neighbour’s car and,” I paused to take a breath and sniff back tears, “and what about the bodies in Norman and Sue’s basement?” I gasped.

“Didn’t Clive tell you?”

“Tell me what?”

“About the Kilmer Killings, usually you can’t shut him up about…”

“The Kilmer Killings? Please, no!”

Hattie got up and took a step towards me.

“Keep away!” I yelled as I shot up, my kitchen chair crashing to the floor.

I took a couple of unsteady steps backwards, edging towards to the kitchen door. I’d let Hattie, a near stranger, into my house, trusting her, but what if…

“Leave, please leave,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady. Even in the state I was in I knew it wouldn’t do to show my enemy how terrified I was. “I don’t know why you’re here but I want you to go. I’ll have you know, I’m expecting the Estate Agent any minute now and I…”

“Estate Agent?” Hattie’s face was creased with concern.

“I’m leaving. I can’t stay here. I can’t live here. Call yourselves Neighbourhood Watch?” Not taking my eyes off Hattie, I reached the door and felt behind me for the key but then I…stopped. The key. Just the one key. Not an elaborate system of locks and bolts. Something wasn’t right. Something didn’t add up. If this was such an unlawful village, why hadn’t the elderly couple who owned the cottage before me had much better locks, CCTV, and a high gate with bolts and padlocks? Why had old Mrs. Cooper’s Welcome Card said, ‘We spent over forty wonderful years in Rose Cottage and know you will be very happy here’.

“Alright, let’s have it. What’s going on?” I demanded. “Last night’s meeting, all that talk of arson attacks, break-ins, petty theft…”

“I can explain,” Hattie began.

“Please do.”

“Well, we did set up a Neighbourhood Watch group years ago but it’s been so successful that nothing ever happens here, so we...”

“It doesn’t sound like nothing to me.”

“The Kilmer Killings were just a bit of fun,” Hattie grinned.

“You call bodies in a basement a bit of fun?” I asked.

“No, no, The Kilmer Killings was the title of an anthology of crime stories, all written by us. We sold copies to raise funds to keep the library open. Two of my stories were in it,” Hattie told her, proudly.

“So, all those crimes being discussed last night…” Clara began.

“Our works in progress. We get together to discuss our plots and suchlike. We help each other out with any problems we’re having with our stories.”

“Stories…” Clara repeated.

“It’s all fiction, we make it all up,” Hattie said. To be fair, she did look embarrassed.

 I moved to the table, picked up the fallen chair and flopped down onto it, stunned.

“That’s Clive for you,” Hattie continue. “He’s a bit scatterbrained to tell you the truth but a whizz at police procedure; ask him anything you like about forensics,” she shook her head fondly.

I thought about pinching myself to make sure I wasn’t still dreaming.

“Clara?” Hattie asked. “Can you forgive us? If we’d known that Clive hadn’t told you…”

“Of course, I forgive you,” I said. “Sorry I yelled at you but, what with one thing and another, I didn’t get much sleep last night.”

“You must have thought we were all nuts,” Hattie said.

“Something like that.”

“So, everything’s fine now, panic over?”

“Not quite,” I shook my head, “there’s still the matter of my roses. Someone really has been taking my roses. I didn’t make it up.”

“Of course, that’s why I came by this morning,” Hattie said. “The truth is, whilst we don’t have major crime in the village, our local kids do occasionally get up to a little bit of mischief. Thanks to the Neighbourhood Watch network and our good friend PCSO McBride, we can usually track down the miscreants quite easily and have a quiet word.”

“But I wouldn’t know where to start. I don’t have a clue,” I said. “No pun intended.”

“Ask yourself, what would Miss Marple do?” Hattie’s eyes gleamed.

“Let me see,” I thought hard. “Miss Marple. Maybe…she’d go about the village, innocently asking lots of searching questions, until she identified mothers who have recently had birthdays and received some lovely thornless roses from their sons or daughters?”

“Spot on,” Hattie exclaimed.  “You’re a natural. Welcome to the Kilmer St.Giles Neighbourhood Watch.”

About the author

  

Retired Administrator Kate is enjoying sitting around and making things up. She’s had short stories, Flash Fictions and poems published in print and online, and has been placed in a variety of competitions. She thinks she’d like to write a novel but can’t seem to stop writing shorts. 

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