The Scandalous Sisterhood of Prickwillow Place

by Julie Berry

  “What I don’t understand, Miss Barnes,” asked Mrs. Godding, “is why you poisoned Admiral Lockwood’s punch tonight.”

  Miss Barnes blinked. She gaped at Mrs. Godding. “You said he was all right. You said not to worry. He was tough as an old oak, you said!”

  Constable Quill replied with clipped words. “Admiral Lockwood died of poison.”

  Barnes’s gaze at Mrs. Godding dripped with betrayal.

  “You were in shock,” Julius’s mother said. “I wanted to spare you further pain.”

  “You needn’t have bothered,” said Constable Quill. “Clearly, Miss Barnes volunteered in the kitchen tonight in order to poison the drink. Isn’t that right?”

  Miss Barnes set her jaw tightly.

  All the fight went out of his captive. She nodded toward Stout Alice. “She killed my Aldous. She threatened to throw him out in the garden. Then, that’s where a grave appeared.” She sniffled miserably. “The stupid old admiral drank from her glass. The poison was meant for her.”

  CHAPTER 28

  The girls clustered together in a forlorn little knot and watched as the officers, with the help of the junior and senior Buttses, shackled Dr. Snelling and brought him to the police wagon. The machinery of official business and transport had taken over, leaving the girls feeling like spectators in their own home. Though it would not, Kitty thought bitterly, be their home for much longer.

  Kitty’s gaze shifted to the forlorn figure of Amanda Barnes, small and shackled, seated on the couch. Fury and pity, horror and remorse, swirled together in Kitty’s heart. Amanda Barnes had cooked their breakfast eggs, washed their beds, dusted their desks, and shined their shoes. She’d been as much a part of the rhythm of their daily lives as afternoon toast with tea.

  And now this.

  Kitty wondered what, if anything, might have saved Barnes. She remembered the thousand ways in which she and the other girls had taken Barnes’s service for granted. They hadn’t been rude or beastly, not especially, but at times they’d treated her like she wasn’t there. She was, after all, their domestic.

  Could more kindness from them have prevented this?

  Neither justice nor reason could ever suggest that their uneven kindness had caused this. But as for what might have happened differently, no one would ever know.

  Kitty thought of Mrs. Plackett in her abandoned grave. She was glad their garden burial would be undone. They’d worked so hard to hide it, but now she was glad Mrs. Plackett would finally have a proper coffin and burial service. She deserved so much more than that. Kitty had never felt any warmth for her headmistress. Dying, it must be said, had caused Kitty to see her with new eyes.

  Pocked Louise’s thoughts held much to occupy her as well. Her heart thrummed faster with the private thrill of victory. She had done it! She, youngest of them all, solved the puzzle. She doubted Disgraceful Mary Jane seriously thought she could, back when she nominated Louise to be their—what was the name again? Spurlock Jones? But victory, Louise noted, was bittersweet. True, she’d saved her friends from a cloud of suspicion, and justice would now be done. But their time together, she was certain, was at its end. It made her victory a hollow one. Losing the other girls broke her heart.

  “What will happen now, Kitty?” whispered Dull Martha.

  “I don’t know, dear heart,” Kitty replied. “The world’s gone upside-down.” She took Martha in her arms and kissed her forehead. The others followed suit, leaning on each other and linking elbows. Even Dour Elinor put her arm around Pocked Louise, whose eyes were red and brimming.

  “Is this the end of our sisterhood?” Louise whispered.

  “It mustn’t be,” Dull Martha said. “We can’t allow it to be.”

  Smooth Kitty pressed her lips together. “I’m not sure we have the power to stop it.”

  “Poor Barnes,” Alice whispered.

  “Poor Mrs. Plackett,” said Dear Roberta.

  “Louise,” said Disgraceful Mary Jane, “I shall never torment you about your drab clothing again so long as I live. You were marvelous tonight. The youngest, smartest sleuth in all of Cambridgeshire!”

  Louise tried not to smile, but her twitching lips betrayed her.

  The police returned for their next prisoner after taking Dr. Snelling to the wagon.

  “Wait.”

  The voice was Mrs. Godding’s. Amanda Barnes looked up in some surprise.

  Mrs. Godding took a deep breath. “Miss Barnes. I believe you were very much prevailed upon by my brother-in-law. I will speak to the judge on your behalf and express these thoughts to him.” She paused, and shook her head. “All the same, to take your mistress’s life … Was she unkind to you?”

  Amanda couldn’t meet her gaze. “Yes, ma’am, but … That is to say, in the way any mistress sometimes is.”

  “And the poor admiral, tonight. Miss Barnes, I don’t know what to hope for on your behalf, or for your immortal soul. But I will speak my mind, and I will pray for you.”

  “Come along, Miss Barnes,” ordered Constable Tweedy. “It’s time to leave.”

  The door closed behind them, and soon wagon wheels crunched over gravel. Mrs. Godding sank into a chair and buried her face in her hands. Julius stood close by and rubbed her shoulder.

  As he did so, he turned and looked searchingly at Smooth Kitty.

  How you must despise me now, she thought. What a terrible thing I’ve done to you. And I am the one to blame. This whole charade was my idea.

  She tried to console herself. After all, she’d only properly met him tonight, and she was sure to never see him again once this business was behind them. What difference did it make?

  Constable Quill entered the room once more.

  “Well, Freddie,” said Disgraceful Mary Jane, “you’ve done splendidly tonight, haven’t you? There’ll be new stripes on your uniform soon, I’ll be bound. A burglar, a bookie, and a murderer all in one night. They’ll be promoting you to Scotland Yard in no time.”

  Constable Quill ignored Mary Jane.

  “Mrs. Godding, Mr. Godding, we’re ready to leave for town. The vicar will accompany us. Will you, also?”

  “I shall remain here,” said Mrs. Godding. “Julius, I think, can hardly do so under the circumstances, so he will return with you and pass the night at the Lamb Hotel, where we have engaged rooms. Julius can return in the morning and bring me my things.”

  The constable nodded. “Just as I hoped,” he said. “May I, then, leave these young ladies in your custody?”

  A shock went through the group of girls. “Custody?” cried Disgraceful Mary Jane. “Exactly what do you mean, Freddie?”

  The constable went on as though they weren’t there. “Bodies buried in the backyard, impersonating the dead, conducting business transactions on her behalf … These are serious charges. I have a number of questions to ask these young ladies. But first I must attend to the more serious charges, against the two prisoners. I will be back in the morning.”

  “‘These young ladies!’” fumed Mary Jane. “Well, I like that! Suddenly we don’t exist. Why, only a few hours ago…”

  An anxious look passed over the constable’s face. “Good evening, ma’am,” he said hastily. “I will return in the morning.” He turned heel and fled.

  Julius Godding kissed his mother and followed the constable without a backward glance. Kitty watched him go, and swallowed hard.

  “Come along, girls,” she said. “Let’s go to bed.”

  CHAPTER 29

  Smooth Kitty sat on the edge of her bed and buttoned her dress. It was five o’clock in the morning, and she’d been awake since three. Between retiring to bed and three, she wasn’t sure what had happened. There might have been some fitful sleep. She couldn’t quite remember.

  The night before, the girls had huddled together in the room Kitty shared with Mary Jane, whispering absurd plans for how they might flee and escape prosecution, none of which would hold a drop of water. Finally Mrs. Godding had poked her head in the
door and, without a word, ordered them into their own beds, and silence.

  Kitty felt physically ill. It was rather late now to wallow in regret for her choices. I didn’t kill anybody, she told herself fiercely. I didn’t start any of this. All we wanted was to stick together. All I wanted, she thought, and here the selfish truth became painful, was to not go home. Now going home looked like the best she could hope for. Even her father’s icy indifference was far, far preferable to prison.

  She brushed her hair and twisted it into a bun, which she fastened with pins. She clipped her stockings to their garters, then pulled on and laced her boots. What would today bring, she wondered vaguely. Should she pack her things?

  It didn’t seem to matter what she did, so she let the idea pass. She spied her schoolbooks, stacked on a windowsill, and felt nostalgia for the days when they actually did wallow through their studies each day, under Mrs. Plackett’s bored and lifeless tutelage.

  She listened at the doorway but heard no signs of life. She opened her bedroom door and ventured out. Her steps led her down the stairs and through the long corridor.

  She opened the front door and stood on the stoop, breathing in lungfuls of fresh air. Over across the way toward Ely, the cathedral spires shone in early morning light. Curls of fog shifting low over the grasses gradually gave way to the searching sunshine. Nature neither knew nor cared about what had happened here just the night before.

  “Good morning, Miss Heaton,” said a voice behind her.

  She turned to see Mrs. Godding standing behind her with a mug of tea in each hand.

  “I didn’t realize you knew my name,” Kitty said.

  Mrs. Godding offered her a cup. “Someone mentioned it to me. It seems to be a fine morning. Will you join me outside in the garden?”

  Kitty followed her through the damp grass toward a pair of chairs in the rear garden, facing away from the cavity in the ground where the graves had been. Aldous chased along after them, bounding after grasshoppers.

  “He seems no worse off for his misadventures,” Mrs. Godding said, and sat down. “Here we are. Tell me about yourself, Katherine, or should I say Kitty?”

  Kitty sat carefully in the garden chair. “Katherine, please,” she said, then on an impulse added, “though you may use Kitty if you prefer.”

  The older woman took a sip of tea. “Well?”

  Kitty hesitated. There seemed so little to say, and no good place to begin. “I am an only child,” she said. “My mother died many years ago. I barely remember her.”

  Mrs. Godding watched her closely. “I am sorry to hear it. I lost my own mother when I was a young bride. I think of her often.”

  Kitty thought about this. “I wish I thought of my mother more,” she said. “There just isn’t much there.”

  Mrs. Godding nodded. She gazed thoughtfully at Kitty. “How does your mind work, Kitty?”

  Kitty hid her confusion behind a sip of tea. “I don’t know how to answer that question.”

  Mrs. Godding looked out across Farmer Butts’s fields. “The mind that chose to bury my brother- and sister-in-law in secret in the back garden was either a heartless and depraved one, with no proper respect for others, or it was … something else. I am not sure what.”

  Kitty’s father filled her mind’s eye. She pictured him at his desk in his office, marshaling clerks and secretaries and junior officers in the firm. How efficient he was. How effective. And how cold.

  How much was she fashioned in his image?

  “Mr. Godding was an unpleasant man,” Kitty said. “He was boorish and crude, and never treated us girls politely. We could sense, I think, the friction between him and his sister, though I don’t think any of us knew the reasons why. But that friction never stopped him from coming over often enough to eat all her food and drink all her wine.”

  Mrs. Godding nodded knowingly. “Some people never change,” she said. “When my husband and I first moved to India, I wondered if half a globe was distance enough between us and my husband’s younger brother.”

  “Mrs. Plackett was a respectable woman,” Kitty went on, “but there was never any warmth between her and any of us girls. She was harsh and cross much of the time, and preoccupied otherwise. I don’t think she ever enjoyed running a girls’ school.” Kitty wrapped her fingers around her mug and savored its warmth. “The strange part is, I feel we’ve gotten to know her better—at least her kinder qualities—now that she’s gone.”

  “Did she have kinder qualities, then?”

  Kitty looked at Mrs. Godding in surprise. “Well, didn’t she?”

  Mrs. Godding laughed a little. “I’ve often thought that the only thing that made my sister-in-law human was her inexplicable fondness for sailors,” she said. “She had rather a forbidding nature, even when I first met her.”

  Kitty smiled. She wondered what Mrs. Plackett would have been like twenty or more years ago when Mrs. Godding first made her acquaintance.

  “I think she tried to help her brother, even though she knew he was beyond help.”

  Mrs. Godding nodded. “It is often that way within families.”

  “I don’t say any of this to excuse myself,” Kitty said, “but perhaps it illustrates why we never felt we owed them special kindness when they died. Their deaths were quite horrible, you know. So sudden and astonishing. But we never cared a fig for either of them. And then we all realized we would be sent home, and I couldn’t bear the thought of going home. Nor of leaving my friends behind.”

  Mrs. Godding waited for Kitty to continue. Mr. Shambles strolled by, stalking through the tall grass and clucking to himself, until little Aldous caught sight of him and galloped off to bark at him.

  “I only thought of Mrs. Plackett as she related to me,” Kitty went on. “In other words, as a nuisance. And then, in the instant, the nuisance vanished, but if we told anyone, we’d be sent home. If I went home, Father would send me off to some other horrid school. Or worse, keep me home. I couldn’t bear being trapped there.”

  Kitty wondered how she could tell so much to this woman she’d met only yesterday.

  Mrs. Godding shifted in her seat and turned toward Kitty. “I comprehend,” she said. “Some women are born for more independence than society offers them. Perhaps all are, but some have not yet learned to recognize it.” She gazed off into the distance. “Before I married, I was a nurse, Kitty. I enjoyed four wonderful years of working in hospitals. In fact, my husband was one of my patients.” She smiled.

  “Yes, I knew you were a nurse,” Kitty said. “I think that’s wonderful. Julius told…” Her voice died away, and she felt her face flush with heat.

  “Did he, now?” Mrs. Godding seemed surprised and pleased. “Isn’t that nice.”

  “I don’t know what will happen to the other girls,” Kitty said, and for a sickening moment she feared she might cry in front of Julius’s mother. “They would all be so much better off if they hadn’t listened to my scandalous, unforgivable plan.”

  From behind them, inside the house, they heard some stirrings and signs of life. Out front, cart wheels could be heard crunching over the gravel of Prickwillow Road. Not even hidden corpses would stop Henry Butts from bringing the morning milk.

  “You give yourself rather a lot of importance, I think, Kitty,” Mrs. Godding chided gently. “To hear you talk, you deserve all the credit for the scheme, and your special reward is to enjoy all the blame.”

  Kitty gaped at her. What an enigmatic thing to say!

  Mrs. Godding watched Kitty thoughtfully then rose to her feet. “I’ve enjoyed our conversation, Kitty,” she said. “You’ve told me all I needed to know.”

  Kitty followed her indoors, sipping her tea and wondering what on earth that meant.

  CHAPTER 30

  An hour later the girls sat around the dining room table, staring at their plates in penitent silence. Mrs. Godding served up toast, eggs, mushrooms, bacon, and porridge. Stout Alice’s mouth watered at the sight of the food, while Dear Robe
rta thought the aroma of the bacon might be reason enough to faint with happiness. If only everything around them weren’t so terrible. Disgraceful Mary Jane willingly conceded that her own cooking might be traded in for better.

  Mrs. Godding joined them at the head of the table, and held out her hands. “Say grace, girls,” she said. They joined hands, bowed their heads, and held their private, guilty devotions. Then Mrs. Godding dumped a heaping spoon of brown sugar onto her porridge, and drizzled it with cream.

  “There’s nothing like breakfast,” she declared, “for making one think fond thoughts of lunch.”

  Any other day, Smooth Kitty would have smiled.

  The doorbell rang.

  Mrs. Godding pushed back her chair. “That will be Julius,” she said. “I’ll go.” She closed the dining room door behind her.

  The girls watched her leave, then turned to face each other.

  “Don’t sprain your ear listening to see if it’s him, Kitty,” said Disgraceful Mary Jane.

  Smooth Kitty halved her toast with a vengeance. “I thought you were already picking out the lace for your wedding veil, Mary Jane.”

  “That’s not Julius,” said Pocked Louise. “It sounds like a pair of men.”

  “Policemen!” squeaked Dull Martha.

  Kitty rose from her chair. “For heaven’s sake, let’s hear what’s going on.” She opened the door to find Mrs. Godding guiding two deliverymen in through the front door, each carrying supporting beams bearing a large wooden crate. Aldous barked furiously at their boots.

  “More of Mr. Godding’s things?” Stout Alice wondered.

  “Present,” gasped one of the men. “For Mrs. Plackett.”

  Word had not yet gone far, Kitty realized, that Mrs. Plackett no longer lived on Prickwillow Road, nor any other road, for that matter.

  “Set it right down here, gentlemen, in the drawing room,” ordered Mrs. Godding. “I thank you.”