Page 44 of Pressure Head
We took the left turn off the main road, towards Fallow’s Wood. It was all scrubby forest either side of us for a short way—if you come here in the spring, the bluebells are lovely—then we got to the first of the houses.
Fallow’s Wood isn’t much of a village, more a collection of posh houses, some with gardens measured in acres, scattered around a golf course. Opinions differ as to whether it’s part of Brock’s Hollow or a separate address in its own right. Me, I’m on the fence, which around there is around eight feet tall and made of freshly painted wrought iron with pointy gold bits on top. The place has got its own pubs, which is a point in its favour, but no corner shop. It’d piss me right off if I had to get in the car every time I needed a pint of milk, but I suppose the Fallow’s Wood residents have got to justify their three or four motors per family somehow.
Lionel Treadgood’s house was set at the end of a private road, which was unsurfaced and had more potholes than I’ve had hot dinners.
“You’d think with all the money floating around here, they’d do something about this,” I said as we rattled along in Phil’s car at ten miles an hour. “I suppose maybe they just see it as sort of low-tech traffic calming.”
“Or maybe they’re just tight-fisted bastards,” Phil muttered, his face set. Probably worrying about what the road was doing to his tyres and suspension. We’d have been better off bringing my van—it might not be smart, but it’s robust. When we got to Lionel’s wide driveway, Phil parked the Golf with a crunch of gravel and a vicious jerk on the hand brake, and we got out. The house in front of us was large, but it looked more like it’d been built for practicality and added to when necessary—at least, “necessary” by rich people’s standards—than architecturally designed to tone in with the surrounding countryside, or whatever the usual estate-agent guff was.
“Going to do your stuff?” Phil asked softly.
“What, out here? With that?” I nodded towards the swimming pool on the right of the house. Shielded by a high hedge, it hadn’t been visible from the road. “And I reckon they’ve got the river down the bottom of their garden. It’d be needle-in-a-haystack time. Must cost an arm and a leg to keep a pool that size heated this time of year.” I pursed my lips, looking at the steam rising gently from the water. There was a sort of summerhouse thing to change in, and a decking area where you could sit out with drinks when it was warm.
“The property market slump isn’t biting round here, that’s for sure,” Phil murmured, pursing his lips. “Wouldn’t mind one of those myself.”
I shivered. “You can keep it.”
Phil turned to stare at me, an incredulous look on his face. “Don’t tell me you’re scared of water? A plumber with hydro-bloody-phobia?”
“No,” I said, a bit indignant. “I’m not scared. I just don’t like swimming pools. Too much dead water. The vibe’s all wrong.”
“And it’s got your satnav on the blink?”
“I’ll be fine in the house. It’s just interference, that’s all.” We crunched up to the front door, and Phil rapped on it with the old-fashioned door knocker.
“Okay, remember—same drill as at the Easts’, all right? Except this time, pull your finger out and get back before he starts getting suspicious.”
“Tell you what, why don’t you shove a broom up my arse, and I can sweep his floors while I’m at it?”
“Stop being such a touchy little—”
I was saved from hearing the rest of it by the door opening.
Lionel Treadgood wasn’t quite what I’d been expecting. He was tall—around Phil’s height, but narrower across the shoulders and broader in the waist, without actually being fat. He looked like he kept himself in shape the old-fashioned way, with long walks in the countryside in between rounds of golf and persecuting small furry animals. Probably in his late fifties, or a well-preserved early sixties, he still had a full head of thick, iron-grey hair, darkening to steel in the middle. He wasn’t bad looking, if you like that sort of thing—not a patch on Robin East, mind. Even though Lionel was at home, he had on a proper shirt and tie. I wondered if it was for our benefit, but decided he’d probably been wearing it anyway. He was the sort who never took his tie off unless it was to put on his flannel pyjamas to go beddy-byes.
“Mr. Morrison? Good to meet you. Dreadful business about poor Melanie.” He shook hands with Phil, then turned to me with a polite question in his eyes.
“Thanks for agreeing to talk to us,” Phil said in his impressing-the-punters voice. “This is my colleague, Tom Paretski.”
I was a colleague, was I? Maybe I’d insist on getting paid this time.
Lionel grasped my hand in a firm, cool handshake and frowned. “Paretski . . . That sounds familiar, somehow. Have we met?”
“I don’t think so. But I’ve got family in the area. Ah! Maybe that’s it.” More likely he’d seen the van around, but I didn’t want to ruin Phil’s little we’re-all-professionals charade by mentioning the day job. “Well, do come in—don’t let me keep you standing on the doorstep.”
We trooped inside, my work boots clattering loudly on the tiled floor of the hall. Even Phil’s smart shoes made a little squeak as he trod, but Lionel’s expensive leather-soled brogues made no sound at all. I felt like I’d blundered in while looking for the tradesman’s entrance, and wondered if I should tug a forelock or something.
“This way, please,” Lionel said firmly, interrupting my gawping at the grandfather clock and the antique hunting prints on the walls.
He ushered us into a sunny room that wouldn’t have looked out of place in a five-star hotel. It was nice, actually—I mean, of course it was nice, but it didn’t just look posh; it looked comfortable too, with the old wingback chairs and antique tables carefully placed so you’d always have somewhere to put a cup of tea.
“Tea?” Lionel asked, making me jump. “Or would you prefer coffee?”
“Whatever you’re having,” Phil said politely.
“Tea it is, then,” Lionel said genially. “Do take a seat—I shan’t be a moment.” He swept out of the room.
I glared at Phil. “I was going to ask for a coffee.”
