I Could Murder Her

by E. C. R. Lorac

  The elderly gentleman who came across the room smiling at Veronica was what the latter described as “a dear old boy.” He was still very erect, thin and whipcordy in figure, with silver hair and merry blue eyes.

  “My father-in-law, Colonel Farrington,” said Anne. “Mrs. Coniston, otherwise Ronnie.”

  “Delighted,” murmured the Colonel; “but I feel a gatecrasher. Anne and I always have a date after tea, but it’s an understood thing that visitors have precedence. It’s all too easy to get into bad habits in a house like this.”

  “You’re not gate-crashing, Eddie.” said Anne. “I invited you. Now we’re all going to have a quick one while the going’s good.”

  “Ah . . . that reminds me. A little present,” murmured the Colonel, producing a flat bottle from his pocket. “Scotch, my dear. I won it. A: darts.”

  “But how clever of you,” put in Veronica. “D’you think I could play darts? Think how Tom’s eyes would shine if I won prizes like that.”

  “At the club?” asked Anne, laughing across at the old man. “Tell Ronnie about the club: she’ll love it, and she’s the world’s safest confidante.”

  “Your very good health, young lady,” said the Colonel, raising the glass Anne had handed to him. “My club? Well, it’s quite a story. When I left the Army I felt I must have something to occupy me, a man can’t hang around the house all day, and the money ran away too fast when I went to my club in St. James’s. So I got hold of an allotment, across the park there, towards Camden Town. Always wanted to be a gardener. Something very satisfying about gardening. Thirsty work, though, and gives you an appetite. So on the advice of a fellow allotment holder, I went to a pub—The Cow with the Crumpled Horn. A very good pub, too. I got interested in some of the fellows there. Very good chaps. Very lively conversations we have. They’ve got a Darts Club and I’ve worked my way up. I’m on the committee now, and proud of it.”

  “And when Eddie’s out, as he often is, all he needs to say is ‘The Club, my dear,’ ” chuckled Anne, “and it’s all so simple.”

  Colonel Farrington laughed. “It’s like this,” he said. “My wife’s an old-fashioned woman. That isn’t a criticism. I respect her for it. She’s only experienced one stratum of society, one sort of life, the life she was brought up to, bless her. Now, during the last few years—’39 to ’45, that is—I saw a different aspect of things. Got to know some very nice chaps and got interested in their point of view. As I’ve grown older I’ve begun to take an interest in all sorts and conditions of men, but my wife wouldn’t see my point. So I don’t tell her. Anne, here—well, she understands me and I understand her, and we have our private jokes. My club is one. See the idea?”

  “Yes, rather. I think it’s a jolly idea, too,” said Veronica. “Tell me about some of the other members.”

  “All sorts, all sorts,” chuckled the Colonel. “Railway men, vanmen, bus drivers, tradesmen, a house painter and a portrait painter, a lawyer and a communist. We have a regular debating evening now. Very enlightening. Much more interesting than St. James’s. I’ve learnt a lot this past year, learned how other chaps live, and what they really think of blokes like me.”

  “I think it’s amazing that you’ve got such an open mind,” said Veronica. “In my experience, real army men can never see any point of view but their own.”

  “I was lucky,” said the Colonel simply. “I had some of the crust rubbed off me in the Pioneers. We weren’t all regulars by a long chalk, and the spit and polish didn’t matter so much; but those chaps worked, by gad, they worked. But I’ve been doing all the talking. Tell me a bit about yourself.” “My husband’s an architect, and we’ve an infant of eighteen months. We live in a poky little flat off Baker Street and we’re pretty hard up and awfully happy. I think that's about all. I don’t often get a chance to leave the chores for a few hours, and it's been grand seeing Anne again. I do agree with you about one thing—seeing the way other people live is enormously interesting.”

  The Colonel nodded his white head. “It’s been an eye opener to me,” he said. “I’ve lived in this house for thirty years. I was brought up in an Oxfordshire manor house. During the past twelve months I’ve seen some of the slums in Camden Town, and I’ve been entertained to supper in a pre-fab. Makes you think. Some people have too much room, some have too little, but you never know' where you’ll find a home—a real home, with all the word implies. That prefab was a home, by gad, it was.”

  “And I’ve no doubt what Ronnie calls her foul flat is home, too.” said Anne.

  Veronica laughed. “It's two and a half rooms, mostly festooned with infant’s necessaries”—she laughed—“but come and see me there one day. I should love to have you.”

  “I will indeed,” said Colonel Farrington.

  “And now I must rush home and get Tom’s supper,” said Veronica. “It’s been such fun coming. I’ve loved it, Anne.” When Anne took her guest to “powder her nose” before leaving, Veronica said: “Eddie’s a peach, Anne. I simply love him”

  “Yes. He’s a dear. He’s the bright spot in this house, and I shall be sorry to leave him, because I know he’ll miss me. He and I have such a lot of fun, and he’s an astonishing old boy. He really enjoys his low-life acquaintances, and yet he never gets impatient with his wife. He’s amazingly tolerant, because she . . . Oh, never mind. I mustn’t harp.”

  Veronica laughed. “Hasn’t she a weak heart—or something?”

  “Oh, Ronnie, don’t say things like that,” groaned Anne. “She has got a weak heart, or pretends she has. It’s one of the things I dare not think about.”

  Veronica looked at her in consternation. “Anne, darling— I’m sorry. You ought to get away from here if you feel like that. It’s just too grim.”

  “Hoping? You’re telling me, Ronnie. But I will find somewhere to live, somehow, or else I’ll just beat it.”

  “I should beat it,” said Veronica. “Tony would follow after, wouldn’t he?”

  “I just don’t know, Veronica. But I’ll risk it. This isn’t any good.”

  “No. It just isn’t any good,” agreed Veronica.

  TWO

  “I’VE BEEN THINKING, MADGE, DARLING. About my birthday.”

  Mrs. Farrington walked into the great basement kitchen of Windermere House. Madge Farrington, immaculate in a freshly laundered white coat, was making pastry at the scrubbed kitchen table. Around her were pastry board, flour bin, and rolling pin, and condiments and enamelled tins were arranged in neat and shining array, as pretty as a still-life picture. Madge had strong white hands and shapely arms, and she continued rubbing the fat and flour together in a shining basin as she replied dutifully: “Yes, Mother?” “I always have a little celebration, darling. Eddie was suggesting dining out and going on to a theatre, but I’m afraid it would be too much for me. I find restaurants so exhausting these days. The noise and smoking are too tiring for me, and as for theatres—well, I must face it. I don’t suppose I shall ever see a theatre again.”

  She sighed heavily and wiped a tear away, while Madge went on with her pastry, efficient and unhurried. Seen thus, with eyes lowered over her work, Madge was not unprepossessing. She had thick dark hair, cut to a neat shingle bob, a very white skin, and regular features. It was her eyes which spoilt her looks. They were set too close together, and were reminiscent of boot buttons with their dark half-lustre.

  Mrs. Farrington raised her head and straightened her back. “But I mustn’t worry you with my little troubles, Madgie. I’ve had such a happy life, and you have been so good to me. Don’t think I ever forget it, darling, and when I’m gone you’ll be quite independent. Now, about my birthday. I thought of a little dinner: Tony and Anne, Joyce and Philip, and perhaps that nice child who came to tea with Anne, Veronica Coniston, and her husband.”

  “Did you mean to have dinner here. Mother?”

  “Why, yes, darling. I told you that I find restaurants too exhausting. It's not that I‘m thinking of myself, I’m the last
woman to do that, but if I turn faint or giddy, it spoils the evening for the others.”

  “You are suggesting having a dinner party for eight, Mother. You know I have no help in the evenings: daily helps simply refuse to do evening work.”

  “Darling, I’m so sorry. Won’t that nice Mrs. Pinks make an exception for my birthday? Would it be any good if I asked her?”

  “No. It would be no good at all, Mother. Mrs. Pinks has a sick husband and four young children to look after, and she has no patience with people who expect late dinner. She works hard for me in the mornings and I don’t want to lose her. She’ll leave at once if you ask her to do evening work as well.”

  “Oh, dear, how tiresome,” murmured Mrs. Farrington. “I can’t think what has come over all these women. Couldn’t you get a parlourmaid, Madgie? 1 always had such good servants in the old days.”

  “If you want a good parlourmaid you’ll have to -pay her three pounds a week, and then you’ll have to get a housemaid to keep her company at the same wages plus insurance,” said Madge evenly.

  “Really, it’s iniquitous,” sighed Mrs, Farrington. “But just for the one evening, Madgie, for my birthday. Could you manage if I helped with laying the dinner, and perhaps Paula could help you dish up?”

  “I had Paula in the kitchen once, and that was once too often,” said Madge. “I’ve no doubt she is a very good dancer, but at domestic work she is no better than a mental defective. I’m sorry, Mother, but the worm turns eventually. I will not cook and serve dinner for eight singlehanded.”

  Madge kept her voice low by a conscious effort, but even so there was an edge to it, a quiver which told of inner tension. Mrs. Farrington looked at her with well-expressed astonishment.

  “But, Madgie, how unlike you! You have always been such a dear unselfish girl. I have always thought of you as my chief blessing, darling.”

  Madge turned the pastry out onto her board and took up the rolling pin, thankful to have something to occupy her hands. Strangely enough, Madge was frightened of Mrs. Farrington, and it took her courage to say what she was determined to say.

  “I think one can go on being unselfish for too long, Mother. When the war started and I went to train in hospital I was twenty-five. Now I’m thirty-six. For eleven years I have worked like a drudge and had no life of my own. I think it’s time I had a sample of living.”

  “Darling, what do you mean? Are you not well, Madgie? How dreadful of me not to have realised it. I will phone Dr. Baring-”

  “Please don’t do anything of the kind, Mother. I am perfectly well. I have been thinking things over for a long time, and I think it’s better for me to say quite plainly what I have in mind.”

  “Very well, dear. I am listening,” replied Mrs. Farrington. Her voice was subtly different: still beautifully pitched, still gentle, but with an undertone that was ominous to her stepdaughter’s ears. Madge rolled out her pastry dexterously as she talked.

  “I worked hard in hospital, Mother. All nurses worked hard during the war, and eventually I crocked up. I admit it. It was the buzz bombs which finished me. . . . Anyway, after I’d had the nursing-home treatment and you came back here, I was very glad to run the house and cook for you. I enjoyed the peacefulness of working by myself in this kitchen after all the moil and toil and bitterness of hospital.”

  “Yes, darling,” put in Mrs. Farrington gently. “I remember how happy and contented you seemed, and I was happy, too, to see you well—and normal—again, after those dreadful days. I suffered for you. my little Madge.”

  “That’s all past history,” said Madge tersely. “I’ve been perfectly well ever since. The point is this: am I going to spend the rest of my life in a basement kitchen, running this house with inadequate help, and never getting anywhere?”

  “But, Madgie, this is your home. Our home. We have been so proud of it. And surely with Anne and Joyce doing the work of their own flats, it can’t be so very hard?”

  Madge slipped her pastry over the fruit in the pie dish and began to crimp the edges of her pie. “Between us, Mrs. Pinks and I clean this basement; we do your bedroom, my bedroom, the twins’ bedrooms, seventy stairs and five landings, the dining room and drawing room, and the outside steps and brass. And I cook as well. I don’t think you would find another pair of women who would do as much.”

  “Of course not, darling! I know how wonderful you are. I always tell everybody how proud I am of you, and if I haven’t realised that you are finding it too much of a strain, it’s because I’ve had so much trouble from this silly old heart of mine. I’m very glad we’ve had this talk, Madgie. I will see about getting some mere help for you, another daily woman. Or do you think one of those partially disabled men would be any good? Your father was suggesting getting one of them. I’ll tell him to see about it.”

  Madge was twisting thin strips of dough into an elaborate decoration around the pie.

  “That is for you to decide, Mother,” she said. “So far as I’m concerned, it makes no difference. I’ve decided I can’t go on here any longer.”

  She spoke abruptly, almost harshly, because it had been such an effort to get the words out, and Mrs. Farrington gave a little cry of distress.

  “But, Madge, darling, we’ve been into all this before. . . . I’m sorry, dear, but could you get me a glass of water? I’ll take one of my pills. I hate to worry you, but I find altercations so exhausting.”

  Madge leaned across and put a firm hand on her stepmother’s wrist, feeling the pulse. “It’s all right, Mother. Your pulse is quite good. I’ll get you a glass of water, but you have no need to feel nervous about your heart. It’s perfectly normal.”

  She went and fetched the glass of water, adding: “I will make your Ovaltine as soon as I’ve got this pie in the oven. You were saying we had been into all this before. That’s not quite accurate. You see, I have been offered a job, rather a good job. I am going to America as nurse and travelling companion to an elderly lady.”

  Mrs. Farrington set the glass down on the table and looked at Madge very directly.

  “I am sorry, Madge, darling. You should have consulted me about this before. You see, dear, it’s quite impossible.”

  “Is it?” asked Madge. “Why?”

  Mrs. Farrington sighed. “Darling, I know you’ve forgotten. It’s right and natural that you should forget, poor child. But when you had that breakdown, you were very ill. Not physical illness, but mental. It was an agonising time for me. I can hardly bear to think of it, and of course you made a marvellous recovery. But the doctors warned me, darling. You must lead a very quiet life, with no excitements or emotional disturbances. For you to go to America in charge of an invalid is quite out of the question. It couldn’t be allowed.”

  “You mean you would try to stop me going?” asked Madge. Her breath was coming quickly now, and a pulse was beating in her temple.

  “Darling, I shouldn’t try to stop you. I should stop you. It would be my duty to do so. I should have to see Dr. Baring about it. My dear little Madge, put all this out of your head.

  If you had only confided in me, I could have saved you so much distress. You see, dear, no doctor would sign the necessary papers for your entry permit to the States.”

  Madge lifted her pie carefully and put it in the oven. Then she came back to the kitchen table and began to shape the fragments of the dough into tiny tarts.

  “Let us get this quite clear,” she said. “Are you suggesting that I am insane because I had a nervous breakdown five years ago?”

  Mrs. Farrington gave a little wail of protest. “Darling, never say things like that. It hurts me too terribly. And it shows how easily you are upset, how you lose your normal judgment in moments of stress. It’s just that you’re not strong enough, darling.”

  Madge stood very still, leaning on the scrubbed table. “Mother, if you prevent me going to America, you will be very sorry. I’m not going to say any more now, and it would be better for you to say nothing else. Only unders
tand this. You are not going to stop me doing what I want to do this time. Now I will make your Ovaltine and I suggest you should go and have a rest.”

  As she spoke, the kitchen door opened and Colonel Farrington came in. “By Jove, Madge, you look a picture when you’re cooking—neat as a daisy. And the kitchen always looks so jolly. Sorry to bother you when you’re busy, my dear, but could you find me a drop of that cleaning fluid—always forget its name. I’m getting a grubby old man, dropping food down my waistcoat.”

  “Of course, Father. If you wait half a minute, I’ll do it for you,” replied Madge. “I just want to make Mother’s Ovaltine.”

  “I do not want any Ovaltine, dear. Eddie, I’m afraid you will have to help me up to my room. I’m sorry, dear, but I can’t manage the stairs alone.”

  “Muriel, my dear, whatever has upset you? You look exhausted. Let me get you some brandy,” exclaimed the Colonel in consternation.

  “No. Just your arm, dear. I am a little upset. It is foolish of me, of course, but we won’t talk about it. And you might phone old Dr. Baring. Now don’t fuss, Eddie. I shall be quite all right. Just your arm around me, dear—and very slowly, please.”

  2

  When Mrs. Farrington had been convoyed out of the kitchen by her husband. Madge slumped down on a kitchen chair and tried to control the shivering fit which took hold of her. Then the scullery door opened and Mrs. Pinks came in.

  “Well, miss, seeing I was in there, I couldn’t help hearing all that. Now don’t you take on. Your ma’s plain wicked. I’ve known it for a long time, and this last lot puts the lid on it. It was as much as I could do not to butt in and tell ’er off, you ’ipocritical old ’umbug, I thought. Now I’m going to make you a nice cup o’ tea and a drop of you-know-what in it. You needs it.”