Aftermath by Peter Turnbull Page B

became a good source of food for the village. She’s worried now, new owners will be moving in.’
    â€˜Yes, we all see the end of a good time coming. I didn’t poach myself but I had a bit of cheap meat over the years, a good bit.’
    â€˜So there were plenty of visitors to the estate?’
    â€˜Yes . . . dog walkers too . . . it was a good place to take a dog and let him off the lead . . . let him go exploring the grounds. More fun than letting him run on a playing field. Mind you, they were lucky not to snag a snare, but if they did, the owner was on hand to free them.’
    â€˜Did you ever see anybody you didn’t recognize on the estate, anyone acting suspiciously?’
    â€˜Just once.’
    â€˜What . . . who did you see?’
    â€˜Tall bloke . . . very tall . . . just looking about the grounds but he was nowhere near the kitchen garden though.’
    â€˜No matter,’ Yellich reached into his pocket for his notebook, ‘tall man you say?’
    â€˜Yes. Six feet tall, probably more . . . heavy set . . . he caught my eye because he was a stranger and he wasn’t walking a dog and he wasn’t poaching.’
    â€˜No?’
    â€˜No, sir, no dog, and he was too brightly dressed for poaching . . . and he crashed through the shrubs. No poacher would make that sort of racket; he’d have sent every pheasant and duck for miles around into the air, and every rabbit or hare down into their burrows. He was interested in the grounds, though he didn’t seem interested in the house. He wasn’t a burglar.’
    â€˜That is very interesting, very interesting indeed.’ Yellich made notes.
    â€˜Yes, I thought it was a bit funny . . . you know “curious” . . . if that’s the word. It certainly sank into my mind and it has stayed there these ten years.’
    â€˜Ten years?’
    â€˜About that . . . I was newly laid off and visiting Bromyards quite frequently, couldn’t separate from the estate very easily, had to keep returning in the early days . . . of retirement that is.’
    â€˜I see.’
    â€˜He probably didn’t know he was being watched, townies never do. Moving about . . . no attempt to camouflage himself . . . no green jacket . . . but I saw him and watched him close.’
    â€˜The fields have eyes and the woods have ears?’
    â€˜Yes, that was it. Only a townie would think he wasn’t being watched if he didn’t see anybody around him. A countryman would assume eyes are on him all the time. There is great truth in the expression you just used, sir.’
    â€˜Did you see a car?’
    â€˜No, no I didn’t . . . but he would have needed one. There isn’t a bus service to speak of . . . isn’t now and there wasn’t then. Two buses a day into York and two back again, it’s the York to Driffield service, they run about once an hour but four times a day, a bus takes a detour into Milking Nook . . . two going to York, two going from York . . . and they alternate, in-out in-out . . . but that man was a car owner, he had the look of money about him, he wasn’t worried about the time.’
    â€˜The time?’
    â€˜Missing the last bus. If you miss the last bus you are stranded in Milking Nook or York until the next day, unless you miss the last bus in or out on Saturday, in which case you are stranded in either place until Monday morning, depending which way you are travelling.’ Jeff Sparrow paused. ‘You know, I think there is something else as well. He must have known about the estate. I mean about Mr Housecarl abandoning the grounds and the garden. He seemed to be on a recce mission.’
    â€˜That’s a good point, a very useful observation,’ Yellich smiled. ‘That