Scaring Crows by Priscilla Masters

run some ballistics tests on it but at the moment we think so.’
    â€˜Then what do you think happened? Who would have ...?’ She ran out of words abruptly.
    Mike’s dark eyes fixed on the woman’s face. ‘We wondered if someone had called Aaron back after he’d started bringing the cows in from the field. They were loose,’ he added.
    Hannah gave him a withering look. ‘Aaron never would have left the cows wandering. They’re valuable animals besides being his livelihood. He wouldn’t have done that.’
    Joanna pursued the point. ‘Then can you think of another explanation why the cows were out of the field and loose in the yard?’
    â€˜I can’t. But there has to be one. You’ve got your facts mixed up somewhere, young lady.’ The look she gave Joanna was reminiscent of her old headmistress. Severe, critical. It put Joanna firmly in the wrong.
    Mike pushed on. ‘From the scene of the crime it appears as though Jack was upstairs when his father was shot. We think he heard it, came down and ...’
    â€˜He got hit too.’ There was something cynical in the woman’s face. ‘But then Jack always was the fool.’
    Again both the detectives knew there was another dimension to the story. ‘It appears,’ Joanna said cautiously, ‘as though the person stood in the doorway and shot both of them from the same spot.’
    â€˜And they are both dead?’
    â€˜Yes. I’m afraid so.’ Joanna had learnt one could not express regret too often in situations like these. ‘Tell me, Miss Lockley, the gun ...’
    â€˜I told them it was a bad idea leaving it stood in the porch.’ A glimmer of humour softened the hard lines. ‘And if your lot had seen it there doubtless you’d have taken his licence off him.’
    â€˜We certainly would,’ Mike said firmly.
    â€˜Was it kept there loaded?’
    â€˜Oh I don’t know. I don’t know about such things. I have no interest in guns.’
    The bones of her knuckles were creamy white as she kneaded her hands. Joanna waited for the old woman to mention her niece. Eventually she did. ‘And Ruthie?’ Again that indulgent, sentimental note.
    â€˜We can’t find Ruthie. We’d hoped you might know where she is.’
    â€˜We’ve searched the farm,’ Mike said.
    Hannah’s gaze altered. ‘But you haven’t found her?’
    Something brought back to Joanna’s mind the girl’s bedroom, dead flowers in the vase, water long ago dried up, the flowers themselves desiccated, rattling dry. And the memory set alarm bells jangling in her head. ‘Do you have any idea where Ruthie might be?’ She might have pointed out the obvious fact that if Ruthie was alive and well she might be able to explain the facts surrounding the deaths in her family, but Hannah Lockley was still looking too bewildered to assault her with this.
    â€˜I don’t understand,’ she said, ‘where the girl’s got to.’
    â€˜We thought you would be able to help us find her.’
    Hannah looked blank.
    â€˜Could she be staying with friends?’ Mike suggested helpfully.
    â€˜Or other relatives perhaps?’
    â€˜Staying in the town?’
    The old lady’s eyes were bloodshot. Perhaps the shocking news had finally penetrated. She made a couple of false starts before completing her sentence. ‘You don’t ... you don’t really see it, do you?’ She looked from one to the other searching for some comprehension or empathy. ‘None of them. Not Aaron, Jack or Ruthie. They never went anywhere. They never went out except to the market. There is no need for any of us to go out. Except to get our food we stay here.’
    â€˜But she isn’t here,’ Mike pointed out cleverly.
    â€˜No she ...’
    â€˜And you haven’t seen her for ...?’
    â€˜A while.’ She was almost afraid to ask