The Cold Light of Mourning - By Elizabeth J. Duncan Page 0,38
cheese, an apple, and a bottle of water, change into comfortable walking clothes, and collect her pencils and notebooks. A few minutes later, she was crossing the town’s landmark three-arched bridge, and heading off in the direction of Gwyther Castle, where she knew she could find solitude and serenity in the newly restored formal gardens and enjoyment in the nostalgia of the way things used to be a century or two ago.
As she walked along the road she passed fields where sheep grazed contentedly. A few lifted their heads from their grassy task to watch her go by, and then returned to their munching. Her thoughts turned to Emma, and how deeply she missed her. She felt resentful that this messy and unexpected business with the runaway bride, or whatever she should be called, was distracting her, and other townsfolk, from mourning Emma with the dignity and respect she deserved. Penny wanted to be able to remember her friend in an uncomplicated way, for the lovely, cultured woman she was, and not have her memory tied in to all the disruption and unhappiness that this Meg Wynne person was causing.
She was also struggling with guilt and blaming herself that Emma had died alone. I’ve spent so many nights in that cottage, she thought. If only I’d spent that night there, that one night, I might have been able to do something. She could find no comfort in any of it.
In the hills above the town, seated in front of a small waterfall, she sketched in a distracted, perfunctory kind of way. Unhappy with what she had done, and unhappy with herself, she finally decided to pack it in. She returned home in the mid-afternoon, hungry and somewhat tired in a bored, restless way to find a telephone message waiting for her. Morwyn Lloyd of the Daily Post would like to speak to her and would she please ring her back.
Not until I’ve had a warm bath and maybe an early supper, my girl, thought Penny as the tub began to fill and a shepherd’s pie warmed in the oven.
An hour later, she called Morwyn and answered her questions honestly and openly, as that young police sergeant had suggested she should, without volunteering or guessing at anything.
Throughout the evening she tried to watch television, but found herself wandering around the small flat, picking up a book and putting it down again after rereading three paragraphs, straightening out and dusting things that didn’t need seeing to, poking around in the fridge and just generally feeling thoroughly miserable.
Eventually, it was time for bed and she was grateful to crawl into its welcoming warmth.
While Penny had been in the Welsh woods trying to concentrate long enough to produce a decent sketch, Morgan started looking through the videotapes the local constable had produced. The national bank on the Market Square had a surveillance camera trained on the outdoor cash point, and although it was positioned to capture the image of anyone using the automatic money dispenser, it incidentally videotaped everyone who passed along that busy street.
The bank manager had handed over the tape for Saturday, midnight to noon, explaining that the tapes were changed twice a day, held for a fortnight, and then recorded over. He didn’t know of any other surveillance cameras covering that part of the town, although he thought the garage owner had had one installed after an attempted robbery there a year or so ago.
“The major crime aspect of big city life hasn’t reached us, yet, thank God,” he said, “but all branches of this bank throughout the country have been fitted with them. We are a bank, after all, and people expect us to have them. Nobody takes any notice.”
In a corner of the large, windowless briefing room, where the television and VCR stand had been parked in a corner, Morgan sat down with a cup of coffee. The grainy black-and-white film showed the usual Saturday morning activities of any High Street in Britain—a well-dressed woman stopping for a quick greeting with a friend, a couple of teenage girls withdrawing a few pounds to buy a new lipstick at the chemist, and traffic moving slowly around the town.
Finally, just before nine, she saw a woman who fitted Penny Brannigan’s description of Meg Wynne Thompson round the corner into the square, pass by the bank, and disappear from view heading in the direction of the nail salon.
It was not possible to see her face, but Morgan was sure it had to