Damsel in Distress

by Carola Dunn

  In any case, the way through the brush had probably been forced by someone genuinely walking a dog, she assured herself as Tuffet disappeared around a clump of gorse. Inhaling the coconutty fragrance of the yellow blooms, Daisy followed. Before her stood the witch’s hut.

  Beneath the branches of a towering sycamore, the cottage crouched like a cornered animal. Weeds sprouted from the sagging thatch roof. Whitewashed plaster had yellowed, peeled, and in places flaked away to show the wattle-and-daub walls beneath. The glass in the two small windows was broken. The door between was cracked and warped, its iron latch rusted.

  Nothing could have looked more desolate, derelict, deserted. Daisy heaved a sigh, half disappointment, half relief. So much for her triumphant return with news of Gloria’s whereabouts.

  The dog had paused to snuffle at something in the small garden, where pink-flowered convolvulus smothered overgrown currant and gooseberry bushes. Now she sat down for a brief scratch, before trotting off around the end of the cottage.

  “Tuffet!” Daisy called, in vain.

  They had come quite a distance from the village, and Daisy was afraid the dog might not find her way home. She followed. No sign of Tuffet. Around the next corner, a thatched lean-to slumped against the cottage’s back wall. Perhaps Tuffet had found a way into it.

  As she went to investigate, Daisy glanced up. Above, in the gable of the end wall, she saw the window of an upstairs room. At least, she assumed it was a window. It was boarded up.

  The boards should have been grey, weathered, splitting. Instead, they were the ochre of new-sawn wood. Bright nail-heads gleamed.

  Daisy’s heart began to thump. She backed away, turned, and hurried round the corner to the front, calling breathlessly for her camouflage. “Tuffet, come! Come here, you naughty dog. Time to go home.”

  The door swung open, smoothly, noiselessly, on well-oiled hinges. A large man in braces and a collarless shirt stood on the threshold, his baleful glare adorned with the fading remnant of a black eye.

  “Just walking the dog!” Daisy squeaked. “Have you seen her?”

  He blinked. “Nah.”

  “Get on wiv it,” snapped an impatient voice behind him.

  The big man stepped out, uncertainly. “I dunno, she …”

  “Too late, mate. She’s seen yer now. We gotta stop ’er.”

  By then Daisy was half-way to the gorse bush marking the path. Feet pounded after her.

  Tuffet appeared from nowhere, frisking about her ankles, barking joyfully. Daisy tripped, staggered a few steps trying to regain her balance, and fell headlong into a bed of nettles.

  Hands like iron bands gripped her arms.

  “Gotcha!”

  12

  “Miss Arbuckle, I presume?” said Daisy gloomily as the bar thudded into place on the outside of the door behind her.

  The grimy girl huddled on the lumpy mattress on the floor stared up at her wide-eyed. The room was too dark to make out the colour of her eyes, but her limp, unkempt hair was fair. No doubt gold and curly when shampooed, Daisy thought charitably.

  Feeling rather limp herself, she stepped forward, saying, “Do you mind if I join you?”

  “Gee, sure, please do.” Miss Arbuckle moved over. “Excuse me, I wasn’t expecting …” And she burst into tears.

  The straw-filled palliasse crackled as Daisy flopped down beside her and put an arm around her shaking shoulders. With the other hand she absently rubbed a particularly painful patch of nettle-rash on her leg.

  When the sobs showed signs of giving way to sniffs, she offered her handkerchief.

  “Here, take this. My name’s Daisy Dalrymple.”

  “I am Gloria Arbuckle. How did you know? Oh, I guess those guys downstairs told you.”

  “Actually,” Daisy said in a low voice, “I was looking for you, and there can’t be many girls locked up in tumbledown cottages in woods in this area. At least, I hope not!”

  “Looking for me?” Gloria said in wonder, following Daisy’s example in speaking softly. “You? Wait a minute, though! Dalrymple? You must be Phillip’s deceased friend’s sister. Have they … have they found his body?”

  As she started to dissolve in tears again, Daisy deduced that she was talking about Phillip’s body, not Gervaise’s. The last Gloria had seen of Phil, he was being dragged off to be murdered, Daisy recalled.

  “He was so b-brave, trying to escape, and the one he hit was raising Cain, shouting about k-killing him.”

  “He’s alive,” Daisy said hastily. “He’s perfectly all right.”

  The tears came anyway, but they were tears of relief. “And Poppa?” Gloria sniffled a few minutes later. “Phillip said they wouldn’t harm him.”

  “I met Mr. Arbuckle last night. He’s right as rain except for worrying about you, and being a bit tired from running round collecting ransom money. He’ll have it by tomorrow.”

  “So they’ll let me go soon, and you, too.” Gloria heaved a shuddering sigh. “It’s been horrible, but the worst was thinking Phillip was dead. Miss Dalrymple, I’m real sorry you’ve gotten mixed up in this.”

  “Daisy, please. Formality seems too, too idiotic in the circs. Phillip involved me in the first place, but it was my own fault I was caught. I’m never going to hear the last of it.”

  “Well, I can’t help being glad you’re here. You start imagining all sorts of dreadful things when you’re alone.”

  “They haven’t mistreated you?” Daisy asked. “I mean, apart from all this.” She waved her hand at the squalid room, noting a covered chamberpot in one corner; noting also that it was already darker than when she arrived. The sun wouldn’t set for hours yet, so the clouds must be growing thicker. “They haven’t beaten you, or starved you, or anything like that?”

  “No. They’ve even apologised for the food all being cold.” Gloria managed a shaky laugh. “They don’t dare light a fire because they’re afraid the smoke would attract attention. What brought you here? Why did Phillip involve you?”

  Already editing the story in her head to eliminate the upsetting parts, Daisy said, “I’ll explain later. Right now, while there’s still some light, I’m going to see what I can do about getting us out of here. I refuse to wait for them to let us go. A friend of mine’s coming down from town tomorrow.”

  Stiffly, she hauled herself to her feet. The door she ignored, and a brief inspection eliminated the window as a means of egress. Even with a hammer, no fear of making a noise, and all the time in the world, she doubted she could have knocked out the sturdy boards.

  That left the possible hole in the ceiling Phillip had mentioned. Unable to make use of it because of his tied hands, he had not examined it closely.

  She crossed to the corner where the stain ran down the wall—the worst stain, rather; none of the walls was exactly pristine.

  Actually, at that point the wall and the ceiling were interchangeable. The rear wall of the cottage ran up vertically for three or four feet. Then the incline of the roof forced an inward slope to a horizontal portion of ceiling running down the centre, which met the opposite roof slope at the front.

  On tiptoe, Daisy could touch the flat part. She did not need to. The crumbled plaster on the floor came from an indentation just level with the top of her head.

  She reached up to feel the hollow, and jumped back hurriedly in a cloud of dingy white powder as a large chunk came loose. Landing with a thump on the floor, it broke into little pieces. Daisy held her breath, swinging round towards Gloria with her finger to her lips.

  No outcry below, no footsteps rushing up: the men must be in the other downstairs room.

  “Gee!” said Gloria.

  Breathing again, shallowly because of the dust lingering in the air, Daisy looked up to see a small patch of green. Leaves! Beautiful green sycamore leaves and a bunch of winged seeds …

  “Oh blast!” said Daisy.

  “What’s the problem?”

  “Is anyone likely to come up in the next few hours?
”

  “I guess they’ll bring something to eat. Quite soon, because it’s going to get dark and they won’t let me—us—have a lamp. Why?”

  “They’ll see the hole.”

  “Can’t we stuff your handkerchief into it?”

  “We’ll try,” Daisy said dubiously, studying the ragged edges of the opening, “though I’m afraid it may be rather too large.”

  “We could use my stockings, too. I gave up wearing them days ago.”

  “All right, that might work. I’d have preferred to make the hole still larger while we have some light, but that would never do. We’ll just have to wait until dark.”

  They succeeded in fashioning a serviceable plug. It caught on the splintered spikes of broken, half-rotted laths and looked as if it would stay up for long enough.

  “What good will a hole in the roof do us?” Gloria asked hesitantly.

  “We’ll work that out once we have one big enough to climb through,” Daisy told her with an assumed confidence she was far from feeling.

  She could not sit here tamely, hoping for release, wondering whether the Yank would murder one or both of them. She had to try to escape. Resolutely she turned her mind from the possibility of a fall from the roof leading to a broken leg or a broken neck.

  As the Austin Chummy reached the end of the elm avenue and Alec saw the house before him, he let out a long, low whistle. Knowing Daisy’s father was a viscount had failed to prepare him for anything quite as impressive as Fairacres.

  The entrance portico boasted four Ionic columns, and behind it rose a cupola, white against the slate grey overcast. On either side stretched four tiers of windows: a semi-basement rustic below, attics above, and between them two rows with pilasters. The balustrade running along the top of the façade was interrupted at regular intervals by classical statues, with a smaller cupola at each end.

  Both in the course of his duties and as a student of history, taking tours on open days, Alec had visited grander mansions. Wentwater Court, where he first met Daisy, was considerably larger and more impressive, for instance. It was the fact of Daisy’s having grown up here that he found a bit intimidating.

  More than a bit, he acknowledged ruefully, drawing up before the portico. He must be mad to imagine she might consider marrying a middle-class, widowed copper with a child, a resident mother, and a semi-detached in St. John’s Wood.

  Yet she had invited him to meet her mother.

  Wearily stepping down from the car, he glanced up at the relief on the pediment above the pillars. Just distinguishable in the fast-fading evening light, a cornucopia poured forth fruits.

  Somewhat heartened by the implied welcome, Alec trod up the steps and faced the choice of a knocker in the form of a pineapple, an old-fashioned bell-pull, or an electric button. He opted for modern convenience.

  The youthful lackey who opened the door wore a maroon jacket with brass buttons. A footman, Alec diagnosed.

  “May I see Miss Dalrymple?” he requested, and then wondered whether Daisy’s cousin had daughters. “Miss Daisy Dalrymple,” he amplified. “The name’s Fletcher.”

  The youth regarded him with undisguised interest. “If you care to step in, sir, I’ll see if Miss Dalrymple’s in,” he said in the sort of voice which indicated he had to check for form’s sake though he knew the answer perfectly well. “Was miss expecting you?”

  “Not exactly. That is, tomorrow, not today.”

  “Ah,” remarked the footman profoundly. He glanced back as if to see if his superior, the butler, was creeping up on him across the polished marble floor. Reassured, he became confidential. “You’ll likely know what it’s all about, then, sir, this funny business?”

  “Part of it,” Alec said with caution, taking off his hat.

  “That’s all I knows meself,” the lad admitted, discouraged. “Though I did think when I obliged Mr. Petrie right at the start that he’d let me in on it. Lor, what a sight for sore eyes he were!”

  “Oh?”

  The monosyllable failed to draw a description. “Then along come the American gentleman, as hadn’t ate his breakfast yet, the which I asked him special. ‘Ernest,’ says Mr. Petrie, ‘you ask him has he ate.’ So I does, and I tips him the wink on the sly. Have you dined, sir?” he enquired solicitously.

  Utterly bewildered, Alec was for a moment under the impression that the question had been addressed at some past time to an unknown American gentleman. Realizing it was meant for him, he confessed that no, he hadn’t. “But I shouldn’t dream of presuming on Lady Dalrymple’s hospitality,” he added.

  “That’s all right, sir. Her ladyship’s dining out, and a good job, too. Miss Dalrymple’s guests kept putting dinner back, waiting for her to turn up, but …”

  “Waiting for her ladyship?” Alec asked with a sinking feeling.

  Ernest confirmed his suspicion. “For Miss Dalrymple. Her ladyship’s dining out,” he repeated patiently, “and so’s his lordship, of course.”

  “And Miss Dalrymple was late for dinner?”

  “Hasn’t come back yet.”

  “Great Scott!” Alec exclaimed, biting back several more forceful imprecations. What the deuce was Daisy up to now, that even her fellow-conspirators were unaware of? What were they all up to? “I must speak to Petrie,” he said determinedly.

  “If you’ll please to come this way, sir.”

  The footman ushered Alec into a formal dining room. On the white tablecloth six places were set, glasses sparkling, silver gleaming. Five soup-spoons halted between plate and mouth; five faces turned towards the door, premature relief giving way to disappointment, then worry.

  And, in Petrie’s case, to dismay. He started to rise.

  “Mr. Fletcher here’d like a word, Mr. Petrie, sir,” Ernest belatedly announced.

  Petrie pushed back his chair, but Lucy Fotheringay intervened. “I think Mr. Fletcher had better have a word with all of us,” she said with a crispness quite unlike her usual world-weary manner.

  “We’re all in this together,” agreed a young man unknown to Alec, standing up. “I’m Pearson, Tom Pearson, and this is my wife.”

  The pretty, pixyish blonde beside him gave Alec a strained smile. “You’re Daisy’s friend, aren’t you, Mr. Fletcher? We’re awfully worried about her. We expected her back by tea-time.”

  “Do sit down, Mr. Fletcher,” Miss Fotheringay invited, her drawl back in place. “Have you dined? You’d better take Daisy’s place.”

  Alec did not protest his unwillingness to intrude, nor his lack of evening dress. The footman set a plate of soup before him and reluctantly left the room.

  The moment the door closed behind the servant, Petrie said with a forced optimism, “Daisy may have stopped at her mother’s for the evening.”

  “There’s a telephone at the Dower House,” Miss Fotheringay pointed out, scarcely concealing her scorn. “You said yourself we mustn’t ring to see if she’s there in case she isn’t.”

  “If she was, she’d have phoned you,” Alec said. In a voice in which he tried to blend camaraderie with a certain official, nononsense tone, he went on, “All right, you’d better tell me what’s going on. Why the urgent messages calling you down here? Where did Daisy go, what for, and why alone?”

  He addressed the questions at large. The others deferred to Petrie.

  “We’re looking for some … something.” He sleeked back his already sleek fair hair with a nervous hand. “It was Daisy’s idea for some of us to go out alone, to cover more ground. She was the one who worked out where each of us would go, so none of us is too sure exactly where she was heading after her last telephone call.” He glanced around the table and received confirming nods.

  “I stayed here,” Mrs. Pearson explained, “and the rest reported in now and then.”

  “You were expecting trouble, then?” Alec tried not to explode with anger, remembering his own inability to stem the tide of Daisy’s determination.

  “Lord no!” said Pearson, “or we�
��d never have let her go off on her own. We ‘phoned in for news, don’t y’know. We were just making enquiries.”

  “In village shops,” Petrie elucidated.

  “Making enquiries in village shops? What the dickens are you looking for?” Alec recalled Petrie’s hastily covered pause. “Or should I say whom?”

  Petrie’s alarm told him he had struck gold. The young man pressed his lips together, aware too late that he was the last person capable of misleading an experienced detective.

  “Miss Fotheringay?”

  “We’re sworn to silence,” she said with uncharacteristic uncertainty. “But Phillip, with Daisy missing … .” Her voice trailed away.

  Alec turned a searching gaze on each in turn. Even Petrie’s face expressed indecision.

  “We can’t!” he said, agonized.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Pearson, I take it you know I’m a policeman?” They both nodded soberly. “So do the rest of you,” Alec continued with a sternness he had no need to feign. “Quite apart from my … feelings for Daisy, I’m obliged to tell you that I can’t simply overlook your determined efforts to keep from the authorities what is clearly a serious matter.”

  “I quite appreciate your position,” said Pearson. “As a matter of fact, I’m a solicitor. I assure you, before I let myself or Madge become involved I ascertained that no crime has been committed by any of us. Nor is our intention to shield any other person who has committed a crime.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Pearson, that clarifies matters.”

  Taking a spoonful of cooling soup, Alec thought rapidly. He had often noticed that lawyers, though in general the cagiest of men, once they let themselves go frequently gave away far more than they intended.

  That a crime had been committed seemed certain. The obvious deduction was that Phillip Petrie had called in Daisy to solve it, knowing her propensity for interfering in police matters. To be fair, Alec was forced to acknowledge that she had two or three times been almost as much a help as a hindrance.