by Jess Kidd
Gazing at Bridie by firelight, Sir Edmund isn’t so sure. She sits comfortably in his study with her pipe in one hand and a sherry in the other. Sir Edmund doesn’t doubt that Bridie’s the sort of person who makes the most of every soft blessing. She is a riveting figure; Sir Edmund is riveted. A pleasantly stout, good-looking woman dressed in a purplish travelling twill. An outfit too warm for the room so that her face shines with perspiration, which, combined with her plump wool- swaddled breast, gives her the appearance of a delicious moist pudding. Her spectacularly ugly bonnet is curled up before the fire, bristling with feathers. She refused to give it up into the hands of the butler. Not that the butler was over-eager to take it. If it comes alive, Sir Edmund thinks, he will do for it with the poker.
Bridie Devine is a fairer prospect without her bonnet.
The red hair that peeps out from under her widow’s cap is rich in the firelight, is likely abundant. When she raises her dirty-green eyes to him his mind conjures images of fickle wood nymphs in dappled glades.
He wonders if he can trust her.
‘You could be an apparition, Mrs Devine,’ smiles Sir Edmund. ‘There’s something very other-worldly about you, ethereal.’
By a bookcase, Ruby stifles a laugh.
Bridie smoothes her skirts over her solid knees and throws Ruby a sharp glance. ‘I can assure you that I’m not an apparition, Sir Edmund.’
Sir Edmund looks at her closely and she looks back at him. How far can she see with those sharp brigand’s eyes: into his mind, yes, or into his soul?
God help him!
All Bridie sees is that Sir Edmund is a tall, shabbily elegant man with doleful eyes and stately whiskers. His study is as it should be: wood-panelled, leather-chaired, and cigar-scented, exuding grandeur and solidity. But the man who occupies it is unsteady. He’s like a rare vase, one that’s suffered a break, has been mended badly and now, near useless, has been relegated to an occasional table in the corner.
‘Dr Harbin outlined the particulars,’ Bridie begins. ‘I have the bones of the case but not the meat, if you’ll pardon the expression. A few questions for you, sir.’
Sir Edmund, who is usually pacing the herbaceous border at this time of the evening, wedges his hands under his knees to stop himself from rocking. ‘Go ahead, Mrs Devine.’
‘Do you have any enemies, sir?’
‘None, madam.’
‘Are you certain?’
‘Yes, entirely certain,’ says Sir Edmund, not looking at all certain.
‘Is there anyone you know who could have taken Christabel?’
Sir Edmund shakes his head.
‘And you’re confident about that?’
Sir Edmund nods, looking not at all confident.
‘Sir, I must ask you what Dr Harbin refused to tell me: why did you keep your daughter a secret?’
Sir Edmund rises slowly. He walks to the window. The rose garden awaits him, and the folly, and the orchard, and the road beyond. He has many miles to walk tonight. Sleep will come at dawn, or not at all.
‘I feared this would happen.’
‘You feared that your daughter would be taken?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why, Sir Edmund? Why would you fear that?’
The man’s face is bewildered.
‘The doctor mentioned that your daughter has singular traits. Could you elaborate?’
‘They are somewhat . . .’ Sir Edmund looks evasive. ‘Slippery.’
Bridie endeavours to remain patient. ‘Sir Edmund, if these singular traits somehow led to Christabel being abducted, then you must enlighten me – it may help me find and restore your daughter to you.’
Sir Edmund sighs. ‘On the subject of Christabel, madam, I cannot enlighten you.’
Bridie puts down her glass. She fixes the baronet with a flinty look. ‘Then let’s try this question, sir: why did you send for me, rather than seek the assistance of the local constabulary?’
The baronet reddens, opens his mouth and closes it again.
Bridie waits.
Finally: ‘Christabel makes you remember.’
‘Remember?’
‘Yes, memories you hardly knew you had. Not unpleasant, but’ – he falters, frowning – ‘then she also makes you think thoughts.’
‘Thoughts?’
‘Unfitting. Not entirely your own,’ he replies quietly.
Bridie glances at Ruby; he is tapping his temple with his finger.
‘It is hard to explain.’ Sir Edmund smiles a brief sardonic smile. ‘She looks at you and the thoughts come.’
With a sigh he gets up and goes to his writing desk, opens a drawer and takes out a silver-framed picture. He hands it to Bridie.
A fair-haired child sits in a chair, wearing a white floor-length gown. She seems to glow, the child, as if with a cold light. Not in the other-worldly way of Ruby, but as if she’s carved from bright marble. Bridie wonders if it is a photographer’s trick.
But her eyes are pale, too pale.
‘Is something the matter with her eyes?’ asks Bridie.
Sir Edmund takes the chair opposite, sitting forwards in the seat with his head bowed and his hands on his long knees; it’s a position of defeat. ‘Oh no, Christabel can see all right. That’s the problem. She can see too much.’
Bridie studies the picture carefully. ‘But they’re so pale.’
‘They change, actually.’
‘Change, in what way?’
‘From alabaster, to slate, to polished jet: quite remarkable.’
Bridie goes to hand the photograph back. ‘Eyes don’t generally change colour, unless of course the child is newborn.’
‘Christabel’s eyes do.’ Sir Edmund gestures at the photograph. ‘Keep it, for your investigations.’
‘These thoughts she makes you think. Can you explain them?’
Sir Edmund runs a hand across his forehead. ‘Perhaps they are not thoughts, perhaps they are feelings.’
‘Feelings, what sort of feelings?’
Sir Edmund considers. ‘Anger, chiefly.’
‘So that’s it: your daughter stirs up memories and thoughts, makes you feel angry and has stony, changeable eyes?’
Sir Edmund nods. ‘Yes.’
‘And physically, does Christabel have any distinguishing marks or features?’
‘White hair, strong teeth and she can hit shattering high notes.’ Sir Edmund regards Bridie somewhat defiantly. ‘And she can’t talk.’
‘She can’t talk?’
‘She understands everything perfectly well, of course.’
‘But she can sing, with the high notes?’
‘After a fashion . . . If that’s all?’ A brisk tone strides into Sir Edmund’s voice. ‘You’ll wish to question the servants, discreetly I trust, madam?’
Bridie, aware that the interview is over, assents. ‘And, with your permission, sir, I intend look over the house and grounds, starting with the nursery.’
‘Not the nursery.’
‘I beg your pardon, sir?’
‘The west wing is private, no one is to be admitted.’
‘Sir Edmund—’
‘My late wife objected to strangers in that part of the house. It was where she kept her quarters. I still uphold her wishes. Besides,’ Sir Edmund adds, airily, ‘there’s nothing to see.’
‘The nursery may give up valuable clues, sir, as to the identity of Christabel’s abductors.’
‘You believe several individuals were involved?’
‘In my experience, that is usually the case. On the matter of the nursery—’
‘There are no clues there. I’ve looked.’
Bridie frowns. ‘But the practised eye can detect—’
‘No, madam,’ says Sir Edmund, with surprising firmness. ‘You have permission to talk to my servants and to scrutinise the rest of my house and grounds as you wish, but you will not gain access to the west wing.’
Chapter 5
The servants’ hall is as it s
hould be: teapot on the table and gas-lights burning cosily. Mrs Puck, the housekeeper, joyless and trim with a halibut pout, eyes Bridie coldly. The staff will be available for questions but Mrs Puck will not. It is Mrs Puck’s evening off and she will not cancel it, not even if Queen Victoria herself turned up for supper at Maris House. Mrs Puck finishes with an astringent downturn to her mouth and a withering stare, which communicates that she has better things to do than be interrogated by some fast and loose lady inspector. Mrs Puck takes it all in: the propriety of Mrs Devine’s dress, her bold countenance, the steady step of a woman who can afford a well-made pair of boots. But then Mrs Puck knows an Irish accent when she hears one, however diminished, just as she knows the shape of a finger from an always-worn wedding band. She’d only have to look at her own wasted ring finger. This flame-haired widow may be a charlatan but she’s also the master’s guest, and as such, Mrs Puck can’t aim her out the back door as she’d like to. Mrs Puck informs Mrs Devine that if she wants the guided tour she can make do with Agnes, the housemaid. And with that Mrs Puck departs with a caustic curtsey and much tut-tutting and clinking of keys.
Bridie makes herself comfortable at the table. Finding her pouch of tobacco and her pipe she sets about having a smoke for herself. Ruby takes off his hat and perches on a stool next to her.
They sit in companionable silence.
Bridie strikes a match. The tablecloth moves. She encourages her pipe alight and blows out the match. The tablecloth moves again, further now, the teapot and milk-jug travelling two inches to the right.
Bridie lifts the edge of the cloth. A child is sitting under the table with her legs crossed.
She’s a plain child, even unappealing, around seven years old with a blunt upturned nose and a stodgy, well-scrubbed face. Her light-brown ringlets are scraped back into a ribbon and she wears a viciously laundered pinafore.
She is whispering angrily to a woebegone china doll that has lost an eye and most of its hair.
Bridie drops the tablecloth and waits.
The child emerges and takes the chair opposite. She squints at Bridie through chaff-coloured eyelashes.
‘I like your doll,’ ventures Bridie.
‘I like your pipe.’
‘What’s your doll called?’
‘Rosebud. She’s a caution.’
‘Is that right?’
‘You are Mrs Devine and I am Myrtle Harbin.’
‘Dr Harbin’s girl?’
Myrtle Harbin shrugs, as if she’s not bothered either way. ‘He’s upstairs.’ She raises her eyes to the ceiling. ‘Sir Edmund has nerves again.’
‘Has he, now. Does Sir Edmund have nerves often?’
But Myrtle is engrossed, rolling her doll along the table.
Ruby drifts over to the window. Bridie watches the dead man as he hitches up his drawers, adjusts the tilt of his topper and leans on the sill.
Myrtle follows her gaze. Then she eyes the window with an expression of mild curiosity.
Bridie lowers her voice. ‘Can you see something, Myrtle? At the window?’
Myrtle regards her coolly. ‘Not especially.’
Bridie waves the pipe in her hand. ‘You don’t smoke Prudhoe’s Bronchial Balsam Blend by any chance, do you?’
Myrtle shakes her head.
Ruby, who is tightening the waistband of his drawers, glances over and smiles.
Bridie studies the child with interest. ‘So, standing at the window is . . .’
Myrtle studies her back. ‘Nobody.’ She turns her attention to Rosebud’s booties, adjusting buckles.
‘You’re Christabel’s playmate, aren’t you?’ Bridie’s tone is light.
‘I’m not allowed to talk about Christabel.’ Myrtle kisses her doll’s face gently, on the side that isn’t broken.
‘What’s she like?’
Myrtle looks up at Bridie with eyes like dishwater. ‘That’s a secret.’
‘Could you tell Rosebud what Christabel is like? You could whisper in her ear.’
Myrtle pouts. ‘Why would I? Rosebud already knows her.’
Bridie continues with her pipe, watching the child out of the corner of her eye. Myrtle lifts her doll up, as if to throw her in the air in a game of catch. Rosebud glares down with her one good eye.
The girl’s sleeves fall back to reveal line after line of scars: healed puncture wounds, like blackened cat bites. Myrtle catches Bridie noticing her arm. She drops her doll and pulls down her sleeves.
‘You’ve been bitten, Myrtle.’
‘I haven’t.’
‘What bit you?’
‘Rosebud.’ She passes Bridie her doll, poking her finger into its mouth to demonstrate the sharpness of Rosebud’s china teeth.
‘Then she’s a fierce one.’ Bridie touches the doll’s dented head. ‘And she’s been fighting, here?’
‘No. Christabel threw her against the wall.’ Myrtle frowns and clamps her hand across her mouth.
‘Don’t worry, I’m even better at keeping secrets than Rosebud.’
Myrtle slumps in the chair, with the weight of the world on her small shoulders. ‘I doubt it. Rosebud can’t speak. She isn’t real.’
‘But she can bite?’ Bridie neatens the tie on the doll’s apron and hands her back to Myrtle. ‘I don’t suppose you know where Christabel has gone?’
Myrtle shakes her head, vehemently.
‘Are you quite sure?’
‘Quite sure.’ Myrtle nods with emphasis.
‘You must miss her. She’s your friend, isn’t she?’
Bridie smiles at the child: Myrtle wrinkles her nose.
‘Are you going to bring her back?’
‘I’ll do my best,’ says Bridie.
‘Don’t,’ Myrtle whispers. ‘Please don’t bring her back.’
Agnes Molloy has a mess of curly brown hair, hardly contained by her mob cap, and a sharp, freckled face. She has large feet for her size and hands swollen as if they are waterlogged. Mrs Puck maintains that the girl is a hoyden, but grudgingly concedes that she is good at her work (if being good at your work means taking greater pride in a clean floor than in the state of your own filthy, dirty apron). Agnes has been in England for five years and a servant for all of them. Agnes misses Ireland not at all, for here she has three good meals a day and a half-day off on Sundays.
Agnes is happy to conduct Mrs Devine around the house, despite having a few last grates to bright (Brunswick bloody Black to mix, which fair gets up the nose with the turpentine), beds to turn down, wash-stands to ready, the servants’ hall to sweep and the breakfast table to set ready for the morning, else Mrs Puck will roast her.
Agnes leads Bridie into the drawing-room, turning up the gas-lights. Ruby follows.
Agnes points at the window. ‘That was found open, Mrs Devine.’ She measures the distance with her hands. ‘This much. They said that’s how the kidnappers got in.’
‘Kidnappers?’
Agnes flushes. ‘I mean the robbers, ma’am.’
‘Say what you mean, Agnes,’ Bridie says. ‘Do you know why I am here?’
‘Begging your pardon, ma’am, but Mrs Puck said it was not her job to question the master, but what she could gather was that you are a lady investigator.’
‘Your master has asked me to find something very important to him. You know what has been taken, do you not? Please be candid, Agnes.’
Agnes looks at her shoes.
Bridie speaks kindly. ‘This is a delicate matter, I know. Anything you tell me will be treated with confidence and could help your master.’
Agnes nods, avoiding Bridie’s eyes.
‘So, then, around the time of the theft of the child—’
Agnes’s hands bunch her apron. ‘Begging your pardon, ma’am, but Mrs Puck told me not to talk to anyone about the theft.’
‘Did she now?’
‘If asked I must refer the asker to Mrs Puck herself, who will answer on my behalf, ma’am.’
‘I don’t want Mrs Puck’s
answers; I want yours. Have you seen Sir Edmund’s daughter?’
Agnes’s reply is hushed and accompanied by much blushing. ‘No, Mrs Devine, I have never laid eyes on her. But we all knew she was here, as we all knew she was taken.’
‘“All” meaning the servants?’
‘Yes, ma’am,’ allows Agnes. She picks her words with care. ‘It’s ever so hard to not notice things.’
Bridie goes over to the window. ‘You said the thieves got in this way?’
‘Not at all, ma’am, unless they flew in.’
Agnes opens the window. The day is nearly lost to them now but Bridie can make out a sprawling rose bush below.
‘Thorns on it, as long as your thumb, ma’am, and if they did come that way they left no footprints.’
‘You looked?’
‘Oh, yes, ma’am, I got in under the bushes there.’
Ruby nods over at Agnes. ‘She’s none too tardy, is she?’
‘Someone in the house helped them, ma’am,’ says Agnes, lowering her voice. ‘I’m sure of it.’
‘And then opened the window to make it look like a burglary?’ poses Bridie.
‘Yes, ma’am.’
‘You think a member of the household was involved?’
‘I have suspicions, Mrs Devine.’
‘Go on, Agnes.’
‘Now I’m not one to speak ill of a person, ma’am, but – the missing nurse.’ Agnes closes the window. ‘I’ve never trusted her. No sooner had the old nurse drowned – in a wash-tub, I ask you – then Mrs Bibby turns up. Hardly a day between! And there was this air about her.’
‘What sort of air?’
Agnes’s expression becomes troubled. ‘Oh, forgive me, Mrs Devine, but she was a nasty old thing, with these rough manners on her. Not at all what you’d expect of a child’s nurse. And this awful rotten leg.’
‘Which leg?’
‘Left, with a limp to it, ma’am.’ Agnes mimics, stiffly swinging her leg before her. ‘But at least she kept herself apart. Which Mrs Puck said was needful, given her position.’