by Alan Bradley
Could it be?
For a moment I thought that the woman beside Phyllis Wyvern was Marion Trodd. A much younger Marion Trodd, to be sure, but still …
In spite of my excitement I was having difficulty in keeping my eyes focused on the page. The air in the cupboard was becoming stuffy; the bare bulb giving off a surprising amount of heat. That and the fact that I was bone tired was making my head swim.
How long had I been huddled in this cupboard? An hour? Perhaps two? It seemed like days.
I rubbed my eyes with my fists, forcing myself to pay attention to the tiny type in which the caption was printed.
Perhaps there was something after all in Father’s insistence on having all of us outfitted with spectacles. I wore mine only when trying for sympathy, or when I needed to protect my eyes during a hazardous chemical experiment. I thought momentarily of running upstairs to get them, but decided against it.
I shook my head and read the caption again:
Phyllis Wyvern and Norma Durance freshen up between takes. Eyes front for the birdie, girls!
What a disappointment. I must have been mistaken. I had thought for a moment that I was on to something, but the name Norma Durance meant nothing to me.
Unless …
Hadn’t I seen that face a few issues back? Because the woman wasn’t photographed with Phyllis Wyvern I had paid her no attention.
I went back a couple of issues.
Yes! Here it was in Silver Cinema. The actress is in a barnyard, throwing a handful of grain from her gathered-up skirt to a mob of frenzied chickens.
“Pretty Norma Durance ably undertakes the part of Dorita in The Little Red Hen. We hear she’s not working for chicken feed!”
I held the magazine up to the light for a closer look. As I carefully studied the woman’s features, the top edge of the cover pressed for a moment against the lightbulb. In an instant the tinder-dry paper had browned, then blackened—and before I could blink, burst into flame.
It’s wonderful how the mind works in such situations. I remember distinctly that my first thought was “Here’s Flavia, her hands full of fire in a cupboard jam-packed with combustibles.”
It was the kind of thing of which front-page stories in the Times are made.
Smoldering ashes are all that remain of historic country house. Buckshaw in ruins.
And there would be a grisly photo, of course.
I threw down the burning magazine and stamped on it again and again with my feet.
But because of the waterproofing solution that Dogger applied so conscientiously to our footwear—a witches’ brew containing both linseed and castor oils, as well as copal varnish—my shoes burst immediately into flames.
I tore off my cardigan and dropped it onto my feet, stamping and bundling with my hands until the fire was out.
By now, my heart was pounding like a racing engine, and I found myself gasping for air.
Fortunately I had not burned myself. The fire had been quickly extinguished with little trace remaining other than a few black ashes and some lingering smoke.
I checked quickly to be sure that no sparks had lodged among the stacks of paper, then let myself out into the passageway, coughing as I went.
I was pulling on my singed sweater and scraping the toes of my smoking shoes on the floorboards when the kitchen door opened and Dogger appeared.
He looked at me closely without saying a word.
“Unforeseen chemical reaction,” I said.
An air of weariness had fallen upon the foyer. No one paid the slightest attention to me as I passed through. Everywhere, the people of Bishop’s Lacey sat staring blankly off into space, immersed in their own thoughts. In a corner, a card table with two chairs had been set up as an interrogation center, and Sergeant Graves was murmuring away with Miss Cool, the village postmistress and confectioner.
“Dazed” was the word for the rest of them. The earlier air of sharing in a jolly good adventure had worn off, pretense had vanished, and everyone had sagged, exhausted at last, into their real faces.
Buckshaw had been made over into a bomb shelter.
In the farthest corner from the police, the chauffeur, Anthony, sucked on a cigarette that he held concealed in a half-closed hand. He looked up and caught my eye, just as he had done when I’d dislodged the little avalanche of snow.
What was he thinking?
I sauntered casually off towards the west wing to have a look at the grandfather clock that stood in the corridor near Father’s study. It must be getting late.
The hands of the ancient timepiece stood at ten-seventeen! Where could the day have gone?
Even twenty-four hours seemed an eternity when one was cooped up indoors and the days were the shortest of the year, but the death of Phyllis Wyvern under the roofs of Buckshaw had turned time topsy-turvy.
The roofs of Buckshaw! My bucket of birdlime!
Time was running out. If I was going to carry out my plan—my plans!—I’d better get a bustle on. Christmas was nearly upon us. Father Christmas himself would soon be here.
And so would the undertaker.
Poor Phyllis Wyvern. I was going to miss her.
• NINETEEN •
A QUICK JAUNT TO the jakes was all I needed. With that attended to, I could get on with my plans.
The closest convenience was at the top of the kitchen stairs, two doors along from Dogger’s bedroom. When I reached it, I threw open the door and—
My heart stopped.
Naked from the waist up, Val Lampman was sitting on the toilet clumsily trying to wrap one of his muscular arms with surgical lint. They were both horribly scratched and torn. He was as surprised as I was, and as he looked up at me, startled, his eyes became suddenly those of an injured hawk.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t know you were in here.”
I tried not to stare at the matching anchors tattooed on each of his forearms.
Had he been a sailor?
“What are you looking at?” he demanded in a harsh voice.
“Nothing,” I said. “May I help?”
“No,” he said, momentarily flustered. “Thank you. I was trying to help the lads shift a flat in one of the lorries, and it fell on me. My own fault, really.”
As if he expected me to believe him! Who in their right mind would be moving scenery, bare-armed and bare-chested, in the back of a freezing lorry?
“I’m sorry,” I said, taking the roll of lint from his hands and unreeling a fresh length. “You’ve cut your chest, too. Here, lean forward a bit and I’ll wrap it round.”
My helpfulness allowed me to have a good look at his wounds, which were already lightly scabbed and red along the edges. Not fresh, by any means, but not old, either. They had been inflicted, at a guess, twenty-four hours ago.
And by fingernails, if I were any judge.
Even though I had been cashiered from the Girl Guides for insubordination, I had not forgotten their many useful teachings, including the mnemonic “P-A-D”: Pressure, Antiseptic, Dressing.
“Pad! Pad! Pad!” we used to shout, rolling about on the floor of the parish hall, mauling one another horribly, trussing our victims and ourselves, like fat white mummies, in the endless rolls of bandaging.
“Did you put iodine on these?” I asked, knowing perfectly well that he hadn’t. The telltale reddish brown stains of that tincture were nowhere in evidence.
“Yes,” he lied, and I noticed for the first time, in the refuse container, the blood-encrusted dressings he had just removed.
“It was very kind of you to help moving props,” I said casually. “I don’t expect many directors would do that.”
“It’s not been easy with McNulty injured,” he said. “Still, one does what one can.”
“Mm,” I said, trying to sound sympathetic, hoping he’d tell me more.
But my mind was already racing through the corridors of Buckshaw, up the stairs, back to the Blue Bedroom, back to the body of Phyllis Wyvern, ba
ck to her fingernails—
Which had been remarkably clean. There had been no shreds of ripped flesh beneath them—no sign of blood (although her scarlet nail polish might have hidden the stains).
I became suddenly aware that Val Lampman’s eyes were fixed on mine, as intently hypnotic as those of a cat on a cornered mouse. If he’d had a tail, it would have been swishing.
He was reading my thoughts. I was quite sure of it.
I tried not to think of the fact that the police might already have scraped out whatever bits of evidence were under Phyllis Wyvern’s fingernails; tried not to think that whoever had murdered her had taken the time to re-dress her, to paint her nails, and in doing so, to remove, before any of us got there, any matter that may have been lodged beneath them.
I tried not to think—not to think—but it was no good.
His eyes were boring into mine. Surely he had seen something.
“I’d better be getting along,” I said suddenly. “I promised the vicar I’d help with the …”
Although I could feel my heart pounding as it pumped blood into my face, I couldn’t think of a single word to complete the lie.
“… things,” I added weakly.
I had already opened the door and put one foot in the corridor when he seized my arm.
“Wait,” he said.
From the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of Dogger entering his room.
“It’s all right, Dogger,” I called out. “I was just showing Mr. Lampman to the WC.”
Lampman let go his grip and I stepped back.
He stood fixedly staring, the bandages on his chest rising and falling with every breath.
I closed the door in his face.
Dogger had already vanished. Good old Dogger. His sense of decorum kept him from intruding in all but the most extreme emergencies. Well, this hadn’t been an emergency.
Or had it? I’d talk to Dogger later, when I’d had time to think things through. It was still too soon.
Had I unmasked Phyllis Wyvern’s killer? Well, perhaps—but also perhaps not.
It seemed quite unlikely that someone as placid-seeming as Val Lampman should strangle his own mother, change her clothing, and apply stage makeup in order to have her looking her best when her body was discovered.
And those injuries on his arms and chest? Mightn’t he simply have got into a tussle with Latshaw, his surly crew chief?
There was no doubt about it. I needed to talk to Dogger.
Yes, that was it—we’d sit down together later over a steaming kettle and a pair of teacups, and I’d run fleet-footed through my observations and deductions, and Dogger would marvel at my accomplishments.
But until then, I had other things to do.
It was with a cheery heart that I lugged my pot of birdlime up the narrow stairs. Good thing I’d thought to bring a clothes brush from the pantry to clear away the snow from the chimney pots, and a stiffish wallpaper brush from the little framing room in the picture gallery, to slather the stuff on with.
If the door had been a chore to open earlier, it was now a beast. I put my shoulder against it and shoved, and shoved, and shoved again until at last the creaking snow yielded grudgingly, enough to allow me to squeeze out onto the roof.
The wind struck me at once and I cringed against the cold.
I trudged my way slowly across the snowy wastes to the west wing of the house, knee deep in drifts. Father Christmas would come down the drawing room chimney, as he always had. There was no point in wasting precious body heat and birdlime in painting the others.
With the snow swept away from the collars of the three stacks, it was possible—although not by any means simple—to pull myself up, slipping and sliding, onto each of the towering brick turrets in turn, although I have to admit that I gave no more than a lick and a promise to the smaller pots that connected to the fireplaces in the upper bedrooms. Father Christmas wouldn’t dare come down Father’s chimney, and as for Harriet’s—well, there was no longer any need, was there? Except for leaving myself a couple of narrow glue-free paths in which to maneuver without becoming stuck myself, the application of the stuff was quite straightforward.
When I was finished, I found myself frozen there for a moment on the roof, thinking, motionless in the bitter wind, a lightning-struck weather vane that points forever in the wrong direction.
And then, just as quickly, my spirits were restored. Wasn’t I, after all, within hours of being able to write “Conclusion” to my grand experiment?
As I fought my way back across the snowy wastes, I whistled a few bars of “The Holly and the Ivy” in sly reference to the sticky mess I had just applied to the chimneys of Buckshaw. I even broke into song:
“The rising of the suh-hun and the running of the deer …”
It was time to turn my attention to the Rocket of Honor.
“What are you doing?” Feely demanded, as I descended the last few steps into my laboratory.
Her fists were clenched and her eyes, as they always are when she’s angry, were several shades lighter than their normal blue.
“Who let you in?” I asked. “You’re not allowed in this room without written permission from me.”
“Oh, take your written permission and stick it up the flue.”
Feely could be remarkably coarse when she felt like it.
Still, “stick” and “flue” were uncannily descriptive of what I’d just done on the roof. I’d better be careful, I thought. Perhaps Feely, like Val Lampman, had found a way of peering into my mind.
“Father sent me to fetch you,” she said. “He wants everyone gathered in the foyer at once. He has something to say, and so does Val Lampman.”
She turned and strode off towards the door.
“Feely …” I said.
She stopped and, without looking at me, turned halfway round.
“Well?”
“Daff and I made a Christmas truce. I thought perhaps—”
“Truces expire after five minutes, come hell or high water, as you jolly well know. There’s no such thing as a Christmas truce. Don’t try to suck me into any of your sordid little schemes.”
I could feel my eyes swelling as if they were about to burst.
“Why do you hate me?” I asked suddenly. “Is it because I’m more like Harriet than you are?”
If the room had been cold before, it was now a glacial ice cave.
“Hate you, Flavia?” she said, her voice trembling. “Do you really believe I hate you? Oh, how I wish I did! It would make things so much easier.”
And with that she was gone.
“I’m sorry we’ve all of us been trapped, as it were,” Father was saying, “even though we’ve been trapped together.”
What the dickens did he mean? Was he apologizing for the weather?
“Despite their … ah … polar expedition, the vicar and Mrs. Richardson have done yeoman work in keeping the little ones entertained.”
Good lord! Was Father making a joke? It was unheard of!
Had the stress of the season and the arrival of the moviemakers finally cracked his brain? Had he forgotten that Phyllis Wyvern was lying—no, not lying, but sitting—dead upstairs?
His words were greeted with a polite rustle of laughter from the people of Bishop’s Lacey, who sat rumpled but attentive in their chairs. Clustered in one corner, the ciné crew whispered together uneasily, their faces like masks.
“I am assured,” Father was saying, with a glance at Mrs. Mullet, who stood beaming at the entrance of the kitchen passageway, “that we shall be able to muster up sufficient jam and fresh-baked bread to last until we are released from our … captivity.”
At the word “captivity” Dogger sprang to mind. Where was he?
I swiveled round and spotted him at once. He was standing well off to one side, his dark suit making him nearly invisible against the stained wood paneling. His eyes were black pits.
I squirmed in my chair, hunched and unhunched my should
ers as if to relieve stiffness, and standing up, stretched extravagantly. I sauntered casually over to the wall and leaned against it.
“Dogger,” I whispered excitedly, “they dressed her for dying.”
Dogger’s head turned slowly towards me, his eyes sweeping round the vast room, illuminating as they came until, as they reached mine, they were as the beam of a lighthouse fixed on a rock in the sea.
“I believe you’re right, Miss Flavia,” he said.
With Dogger, there was no need to prattle on. The look that went between us was beyond words. We were riding the same train of thought and—aside from the unfortunate death of Phyllis Wyvern, of course—all was well with the world.
Dogger had obviously noticed, as I had, that—
But there was no time to think. I had missed Father’s concluding remarks. Val Lampman had now taken the spotlight, a tragic figure who was hanging on to a lighting fixture, with the most awful white knuckles, as if to keep from crumbling to the floor.
“… this terrible event,” he was saying in an unsteady voice. “It would be unthinkable to go on without Miss Wyvern, and I have therefore, reluctantly, made the decision to shut down production at once and return to London as soon as we are able.”
A collective sigh went up from the corner in which the ciné crew was gathered, and I saw Marion Trodd lean forward and whisper something to Bun Keats.
“Because we are unable to communicate with the studio,” Val Lampman went on, putting two fingers to his temple as if receiving a message from the planet Mars, “I’m sure you will appreciate that this decision must needs be mine alone. I’ll see that specific instructions are handed out in the morning. In the meantime, ladies and gentlemen, I suggest that we spend whatever is left of this rather sad Christmas Eve remembering Miss Wyvern, and what she has meant to each and every one of us.”