by P. D. James
She had tried twice to ring Weaver’s Cottage but there had been no reply. Joan must be somewhere in the village or shopping in the town; but perhaps that was just as well. This was news best broken in person, not over the telephone. She wondered whether there was any point in ringing again to say that she would be home early, but even picking up the receiver seemed too much effort. While she was trying to rouse herself to action, the door opened and Miss Claudia put her head round.
‘Oh, you’re still here. The police are happy for people to go now. Didn’t anyone tell you? The office is closed anyway. Fred Bowling is ready to take you to Charing Cross in the launch.’ Seeing Blackie’s face, she added: ‘Are you all right, Blackie? I mean, do you want someone to go home with you?’
The thought appalled Blackie. Who was there anyway? Mrs Demery, she knew, was still on the premises making endless jugs of coffee for the partners or the police, but she certainly wouldn’t welcome being detailed to make an hour-and-a-half journey into Kent. Blackie could picture that journey, the chatter, the questions, arriving together at Weaver’s Cottage, Mrs Demery reluctantly escorting her as if she were a delinquent child or a prisoner under surveillance. Joan would probably feel that she had to give Mrs Demery tea. Blackie imagined the three of them in the cottage sitting-room, Mrs Demery giving her highly coloured version of the day’s events, garrulous, vulgar, solicitous in turn, almost impossible to get rid of. She said: ‘I’m perfectly all right, thank you, Miss Claudia. I’m sorry I was so stupid. It was just the shock.’
‘It was a shock for all of us.’
Miss Claudia’s voice was colourless. Perhaps the words weren’t meant as a rebuke; they only sounded like one. She paused as if there was something else she needed to say, or perhaps felt she should say, then she added: ‘Don’t come in on Monday if you still feel distressed. There’s no real need. If the police want you again they know where to find you.’ And then she was gone.
It was the first time that they had been alone together, however briefly, since the discovery of the body and Blackie wished she had found something to say, some word of sympathy. But what was there to say that was at once truthful and sincere? ‘I never liked him and he didn’t like me, but I’m sorry he’s dead.’ And was that really true?
At Charing Cross she was used to being borne along on the rush-hour stream of commuter traffic, purposeful and confident. It was strange to be there in the midafternoon with a concourse surprisingly quiet for a Friday and a muted air of indecisive timelessness. An elderly couple, overclad for the journey, the woman obviously in her best, were anxiously scanning the departure board, the man dragging a large suitcase on wheels, the case heavily strapped. At a word from the woman he jerked closer and immediately it thudded over. Blackie watched for a moment, as they tried unsuccessfully to right it, then moved across to help them. But even as she grappled with its unwieldy top-heavy bulk she was aware of their anxious and suspicious eyes, as if fearing that she had designs on their underwear. The task completed, they murmured their thanks and moved off, supporting the case between them and from time to time patting it as if pacifying a recalcitrant dog.
The board showed that Blackie had half an hour to wait, just comfortable time for a coffee. Sipping it, smelling the familiar aroma, comforting her hands around the cup, she thought that this unexpected and early journey would normally have been a small indulgence, the unfamiliar emptiness of the station reminding her not of rush-hour discomforts but of childhood holidays, the leisure for coffee, the reassuring certainty of getting home before dark. But all pleasure was now overburdened by the memory of horror, by that nagging, insistent amalgam of fear and guilt. She wondered whether she would ever again be free of it. But at last she was on her way home. She hadn’t made up her mind how far she would confide in her cousin. There were things that she couldn’t and mustn’t tell her, but at least she would be sure of Joan’s common-sense reassurance, of the familiar ordered peace of Weaver’s Cottage.
The train, half empty, left on time, but later she could recall nothing of the journey or of unlocking the car in the car park at East Marling, nor of the drive to West Marling and the cottage. All she remembered later was driving up to the front gate and what then met her eyes. She stared in unbelieving horror. In the autumnal sunshine the garden lay before her, violated, desolate, physically torn up, ripped and thrown aside. At first, disorientated by shock, confused by a memory of the great storms of earlier years, she thought that Weaver’s Cottage had been struck by a bizarre and localized tornado. But the thought was momentary. This destruction, more petty, more discriminate, was the work of human hands.
She got out of the car, her limbs seeming no longer part of her, and walked stiffly to the gate, clutching at it for support. And now she could see each separate barbarity. The flowering cherry to the right of the gate, its autumn palettes of bright red and yellow staining the air, had been stripped of all its lower branches, the scars on the bark raw as open wounds. The mulberry tree in the middle of the lawn, Joan’s special pride, had been similarly violated and the white slatted bench round the trunk smashed and splintered as if jumped on by heavy boots. The rose bushes, perhaps because of the spikiness of their branches, had been left whole but torn up by their roots and thrown into a heap, and the bed of early Michaelmas daisies and white chrysanthemums, which Joan had planned as a pale drift against the dark hedge, lay in swathes over the path. The rose over the porch had defeated them, but they had ripped down both the clematis and the wistaria, making the front of the cottage look oddly naked and defenceless.
The cottage was empty. Blackie went from room to room calling Joan’s name long after it was obvious that she wasn’t at home. She was beginning to feel the first prick of real anxiety when she heard the bang of the front gate and saw her cousin wheeling her bicycle down the path. Running from the front door to meet her, she cried out: ‘What happened? Are you all right?’
Her cousin showed no surprise at seeing her home hours before the usual time. She said grimly: ‘You can see what happened. Vandals. Four of them on motor bikes. I nearly caught them at it. They were roaring off as I got back from the village but they were away before I could get their numbers.’
‘You’ve rung the police?’
‘Of course. They’re coming from East Marling and taking their time. This wouldn’t have happened if we’d still had our village policeman. There’s no point in their hurrying. They won’t catch them. No one will. And if they do, what will happen to them? Nothing but a small fine or a conditional discharge. My God, if the police can’t protect us, they’d better let us arm ourselves. If I’d only had a gun.’
Blackie said: ‘You can’t shoot people just because they’ve vandalized your garden.’
‘Can’t you? I could.’
As they moved into the cottage Blackie saw with amazement and embarrassment that Joan had been crying. The signs were unmistakable; the eyes, unnaturally small and lifeless, still bloodshot, her blotched face an unhealthy grey mottled with raw red patches. This had been a violation against which all her customary calmness and stoicism were powerless. She could more easily have borne an attack on her person. But anger had now taken over from grief and Joan’s anger was formidable.
‘I’ve been back to the village to see what else they’ve done. Nothing much, apparently. They went into the Moonraker’s Arms for lunch but got so noisy that Mrs Baker refused to serve them further and Baker pushed them out. Then they began riding round in circles on the village green until Mrs Baker went across and told them it wasn’t allowed. By then they were being extremely offensive and jeering, revving up their bikes and making a great deal of noise. However, they did eventually leave when Baker went out and threatened to phone the police. I suppose this was their revenge.’
‘Suppose they come back?’
‘Oh, they won’t come back. Why should they? They’ll look for something else beautiful to destroy. My God, what sort of generation have we bred? They’re better fed, be
tter educated, better looked after than any previous generation and they behave like vicious louts. What’s happened to us? And don’t talk to me about unemployment. They may have been unemployed but they could afford expensive motor bikes, and two of them had cigarettes hanging out of their mouths.’
‘They’re not all like that, Joan. You can’t judge a whole generation by the few.’
‘You’re right, of course. I’m glad you’re home.’
It was the first time in their nineteen years together that she had expressed a need for Blackie’s support and comfort. She went on: ‘It was good of Mr Etienne to let you get away early. What happened? Did someone from the village telephone you to tell you? But they couldn’t have. You must’ve been on your way about the time it happened.’
And then Blackie, concisely but vividly, told her.
The news of this bizarre horror had at least the merit of diverting Joan’s mind from the violation of her garden. She sank into the nearest chair as if her legs had given way, but she listened in silence, making no exclamations of disgust or surprise. When Blackie had finished she got up and gazed fixedly for a long quarter of a minute into her cousin’s eyes as if to reassure herself that Blackie was still in her right mind. Then she said briskly: ‘You’d better stay sitting down. I’ll put a match to the fire. We’ve both had a bad shock and it’s important to keep warm. And I’ll get the whisky. We need to talk this over.’
As Joan settled her more comfortably into the fireside chair, plumping up the cushions and pulling over the footrest with a solicitude rare to her, Blackie couldn’t help noticing that her cousin’s voice and face expressed less outrage than a certain grim satisfaction and reflected that there was nothing like the vicarious horror of murder to divert attention from one’s own less egregious misfortunes.
Forty minutes later, sitting in front of the crackle of the wood fire, soothed by the warmth and the bite of the whisky which she and her cousin kept for emergencies, she felt for the first time distanced from the traumas of the day. On the rug Arabella delicately stretched and curled her paws in ecstasy, her white fur ruddy from the dancing flames. Joan had lit the oven before they settled down together and Blackie could detect the first savoury smell of lamb casserole seeping through the kitchen door. She realized that she was actually hungry, that it might even be possible to enjoy a meal. Her body felt light, as if a weight of guilt and fear had been physically lifted from her shoulders. Despite her resolution she found herself confiding about Sydney Bartrum.
‘You see, I knew he was due for the sack. I typed the letter from Mr Gerard to this headhunting firm. Of course I couldn’t directly tell Sydney what was being planned. I’ve always regarded a PA’s job as highly confidential, but it didn’t seem right not to warn him. Only married just over a year ago and now they’ve got a baby daughter. And he’s over fifty. He must be. It won’t be easy for him to get another job. So I left a copy of the letter on my desk when I knew he was due to see Mr Gerard about the estimates. Mr Gerard always kept him waiting, so I went out of the office and gave him his chance. I felt sure he’d read it. It’s human instinct to glance at a letter if it’s there in front of you.’
But her action, so alien to her character and normal behaviour, hadn’t been prompted by pity. She knew that now, and wondered why she hadn’t realized it before. What she had felt was a common cause with Sydney Bartrum; they were both victims of Mr Gerard’s barely concealed disdain. She had made her first small gesture of defiance. Was it that which had given her courage for that later, more disastrous rebellion?
Joan said: ‘But did he read it?’
‘He must have done. He didn’t give me away – at least Mr Gerard never mentioned the matter to me or rebuked me for my carelessness. But next day Sydney made an appointment to see him and I think asked if his job was safe. I didn’t hear their voices but he wasn’t in there long, and when he came out he was crying. Think of that, Joan, a grown man crying.’ She added, ‘That’s why I didn’t tell the police.’
‘About the crying?’
‘About the letter. I didn’t tell them any of it.’
‘And is that all you didn’t tell them?’
‘Yes,’ lied Blackie, ‘that’s all.’
‘I think you were right.’ Mrs Willoughby, strong legs planted apart, hand reaching for the whisky bottle, was judicial. ‘Why volunteer information which may be irrelevant and even misleading? If they ask you directly, of course, you’ll have to tell the truth.’
‘That’s what I thought. And we can’t even be sure yet that it was murder. I mean he could have died from natural causes, a heart attack maybe, and someone put the snake around his neck afterwards. That’s what most people seem to think. It’s exactly the kind of thing the office prankster would do.’
But Mrs Willoughby immediately rejected this convenient theory. ‘Oh, I think we can be reasonably sure that it was murder. Whatever happened to the body afterwards you wouldn’t have had the police there for so long, and at such senior level, if they had any real doubt. This Commander Dalgliesh, I’ve heard of him. They wouldn’t send an officer of his seniority if they thought it was a natural death. You say, of course, that Lord Stilgoe was the one who telephoned New Scotland Yard. Perhaps that may have influenced the police. A title still has some power. There’s always suicide or accident, of course, but neither seems likely from what you’ve told me. No, if you ask me, this was murder, and an inside job.’
Blackie said: ‘But not Sydney. Sydney Bartrum wouldn’t hurt a fly.’
‘Maybe. But he might swat something a great deal larger and more dangerous. Anyway, the police will check up on all your alibis. It’s a pity you went late-night shopping in the West End yesterday and didn’t come straight home. I suppose there’s no one at Liberty or Jaeger who can speak for you?’
‘I don’t think so. You see I didn’t buy anything. I was only looking, and the stores were very crowded.’
‘It’s ludicrous, of course, to think that you had anything to do with it, but the police have to treat everyone on the same footing, at least initially. Oh well, there’s no point in worrying until we know the exact time of death. Who saw him last? Has that been established?’
‘Miss Claudia, I think. She’s usually among the last to leave.’
‘Except, of course, for his murderer. I wonder how he managed to entice the victim up to the little archives office. I suppose it is where he died. Assuming he was strangled or suffocated with Hissing Sid, then the murderer must have overpowered him first. A strong young man doesn’t lie down meekly, allowing himself to be murdered. He could have been drugged, of course, or perhaps stunned by a blow sufficiently powerful to knock him out, but not strong enough to break the skin.’
Mrs Willoughby, an avid reader of detective stories, was familiar with fictional murderers adept at this difficult procedure. She went on: ‘The drug could have been administered in his afternoon tea. It would need to be tasteless and very slow-acting. Difficult. Or, of course, he could have been throttled with something soft which wouldn’t leave a mark, a pair of tights or a stocking. It would be no use for the murderer to use a cord, the mark would show very plainly under the snake. I expect the police have thought of all that.’
‘I am sure, Joan, that they have thought of everything.’
Sipping her whisky, Blackie reflected that there was something strangely reassuring about Joan’s uninhibited interest in and speculation about the crime. Not for nothing were there those five shelves of crime paperbacks in her bedroom, Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, Margery Allingham, Ngaio Marsh, Josephine Tey and the few modern writers whom Joan considered fit to join those Golden Age practitioners in fictional murder. After all, why should Joan feel a personal grief? She had only been to Innocent House once, three years previously when she had attended the staff Christmas party. She knew few of the staff except by name. And as she cogitated, the horror of Innocent House began to seem unreal, unfrightening, an elegant literary concoction, witho
ut grief, without pain, without loss, the guilt and horror disinfected and reduced to an ingenious puzzle. She stared into the leaping flames from which the image of Miss Marple seemed to rise, handbag protectively clutched to her bosom, the gentle wise old eyes gazing into hers, assuring her that there was nothing to be afraid of, that everything would be all right.
The fire and the whisky combined to induce a somnolent contentment, so that her cousin’s voice, fitfully heard, seemed to be coming from a long distance. If they didn’t begin dinner soon she would be asleep. Rousing herself she said: ‘Isn’t it time we thought about eating?’
30
They had met at 6.15 on the steps leading down to the river by Greenwich station between a high wall and the ramp of a boat-house. It was a good and private place to meet. There was a small gritty beach and now, driving home and far from the river, he could still hear the gentle splash of the small spent waves, the grinding and tinny clatter of the pebbles, the backward suck of the tide. Gabriel Dauntsey had arrived first for the assignation but hadn’t turned as Bartrum moved up beside him. When he spoke his voice was gentle, almost apologetic.
‘I thought we ought to talk, Sydney. I saw you letting yourself into Innocent House yesterday evening. My bathroom window overlooks Innocent Lane. I looked out by chance and glimpsed you. It was about 6.40.’
Sydney had known what he was going to hear and now when the words were spoken he heard them with something very like relief.
He had said, willing Dauntsey to believe him: ‘But I came out again almost at once. I swear it. If you’d waited, if you’d been watching for only a minute more you would have seen me. I didn’t get any further than the reception room. I lost my nerve. I told myself that it wouldn’t have been any use arguing and pleading. Nothing would have moved him, nothing would have done any good. I swear to you, Mr Dauntsey, that I never set eyes on him last night after I left my office.’