So Bad a Death
Page 20
I crept along the passage to the Mulqueen apartments. The door to the sitting room was slightly open, but the room was in complete darkness.
“Mrs Mulqueen?” I said again, this time almost in a whisper. There was no sound, but I still had a sense of being watched. I put my hand around the door feeling for the light. The room was quiet and empty like the passage behind. I shrugged and prepared to go back to Yvonne. I had neglected my original purpose badly. Any more delay and Yvonne would probably start looking for me.
I put my head in Mrs Mulqueen’s door once again in order to switch out the light. My eyes fell on the frame which held the photograph of James Holland’s erring wife. It was like a blank enigmatic face. It neither beckoned nor repulsed my sudden overwhelming curiosity as I moved across the room.
I had learned something of the character of Olivia Holland from three different sources: sister-in-law Elizabeth, her own farewell letter to the Squire, and lastly from Mrs Potts-Power.
They all pointed to a direct similarity to Yvonne. I turned the frame around gently, holding it in both hands. The face I looked into was totally different from the confused mental picture I had composed. Yvonne could be considered pretty. This face was startlingly beautiful. But I felt a sort of anticlimax because it did not coincide with my own conception. I put my head on one side and regarded it in a puzzled way.
Somehow it was familiar to me. I studied it bit by bit. Usually I can recall people by the shape of their legs and their walks; similarly others can place a person by the hands. Unfortunately the only part of Olivia’s limbs open to the beholder was the tip of one foot, and that was clad in a dainty shoe. My eyes went over the portrait again. Unconsciously I memorized it, noting the shape of the ears revealed by the upswept hairstyle. Ears were my first emergency. I do not know why, but I was glad later when Olivia’s only picture was stolen from Mrs Mulqueen’s sitting-room. Still perplexed about the sense of familiarity Olivia’s face gave me, I turned the picture back to the wall.
Before I had time to turn around the door behind closed sharply. It may have swung to in a sudden draught from the outside passage. I was inclined to imagine a human hand had closed it. No matter under what influence the door closed, it gave me a nasty fright. I was becoming very tired of chasing people through dark houses.
I opened the door, somewhat relieved to find it unlocked. It would never have done for Elizabeth Mulqueen to return and find me in her sitting-room. With firm purposeful footsteps I retraced the way to the foot of the stairs. The pedestal light was still on. I cast one glance up and down the hall and mounted the stairs.
“Is that Mrs Matheson?” asked an uncertain voice from above. It was Yvonne.
“Yes. I’m just coming. Sorry to be so long. I thought I heard Mrs Mulqueen and came down to see her.”
Yvonne took me straight to the nursery, keeping one hand on my arm. After all, the invitation had been extended merely to see Jimmy. So far I had done nothing but wander around the Hall in the dark, looking for shadowy forms and listening for strange noises.
The child did not seem very bad to me. Like Tony, Jimmy looked heavy and pale. I asked Yvonne a few intimate questions which were answered satisfactorily.
“Let him sleep,” I advised. “If he is not better in the morning, ring Sister Heather at the Health Centre. It may be some new bug that’s around. Tony was a bit off-colour too.”
Yvonne said, knitting her brows in anxiety: “I don’t think it can be anything new. He’s been like this before.”
I looked at her quickly, frowning at this information. She did not observe my glance, as she was bending low over the child. I made certain Jimmy was getting plenty of fresh air and drew her outside. She lost the air of assurance she had adopted as she gave me the details of Jimmy’s sudden relapse.
I made no comment to her wail: “And he had started to do so well. I can’t think what could have happened. Do you think it is some sort of chill in the stomach?”
I soothed Yvonne’s worries as quickly as she would allow. They were mainly reiteration and I was anxious to be gone. As we passed Nurse Stone’s room, the unmistakable sound of alcoholic snoring issued forth.
The journey down the drive to the gates was as shadowy and fraught with horrid imaginings as the one through the wood. I kept my mind firmly fixed on John and the fire and the waiting game of solo. Despite these prosaic thoughts, I was glad to see a light from the Lodge shining through the trees. Only the road beyond spelled real security from Holland Hall and its evil influence. Outside the gates I could deal with matters in a practical manner freed from imagination.
Once I looked back towards the house, and regretted it as much as Lot’s wife must have done. The light in the tower was on. It flickered once or twice before it became dark. With my head turned slightly towards the Hall, I foolishly kept on walking. That was how I did not observe the piece of thin cord that was stretched across the drive.
My fall was heavy because it was unexpected. The torch was jerked from my hand and rolled several feet along the gravel driveway. I did not know the obstacle was intentional until I crawled after the torch and became entangled in the string. When I did realize the significance, I became paralysed with fright.
The thought came clearly to me: “What do I know? What clue do I hold?”
I considered it was important to work this out before my assassin struck. But no one moved out of the shadows to advance relentlessly on my prostrate figure. Presently I struggled to my feet and, daring myself out of my terror, shone the torch in a circle about me. It lighted up nothing but the poplar trees of the drive.
My hour was not then. I was being warned, that was all. That cord stretched across my path was like an unsigned letter ordering me to stop prying or it would be the worse for me.
I limped down the drive, mindful of my promise to John. As far as I could see, a trip through the wood would have been less fraught with danger than this one down the drive. I skulked close to the poplars, playing the light every inch of the way.
As I neared the Lodge, my heart thumped hard again. A man’s figure had slipped from the shadow of the tiny porch. I smothered the torch at once and pressed back against the poplars. The figure moved stealthily towards the gates. There the man paused and turned around.
I waited, shaken from the fall and sick with fear. He seemed to be facing the place where I stood.
A sudden light shone from an unshaded window of the Lodge. The man moved at once. But he was not quick enough. I had time in which to recognize him.
It was Cruikshank, the estate agent, who behaved so furtively. He turned down the road towards the village.
I waited for a few moments before I crept from my hiding place. I had no desire to draw Cruikshank’s attention. But like him I glanced back up the drive. The light in the tower had started to flicker again.
CHAPTER TEN
I
I deemed it politic to withhold from John the full facts concerning my fall in the Holland drive. If he should read the same significance into the string across my path as I did, our departure from Middleburn would be imminent. Apart from possession of the Dower House, there were too many interesting matters that I wanted to pursue. An evacuation was out of the question.
I passed off the incident as lightly as a shaken appearance could allow. The brandy bottle, hitherto hardly touched from one Christmas to another, came into play again. It was badly punished those days. I doubt if there will be enough left to make the sauce this year. I went to bed as carefully as the rollicking floor would permit.
After that first warning nothing happened for a day or two. I avoided the Hall and its household out of sheer necessity. Tony’s health had me more concerned than crime. He was not actually ill, but he wandered listlessly about the house, ignoring any persuasion on my part to play outside in his sandpit. I knew he was off-colour by the way he dogged my footsteps, and meals were periods of trial. He kept me busy concocting dishes to attract his wayward appetite.
I came into contact with one of the members of the Holland household in the most unexpected place. It seemed to set the ball rolling again, and I became as thickly immersed in affairs as before. As a matter of fact, it nearly meant my undoing. I doubt even now if that second affair was more of a warning than an actual attempt to end my interference.
After an excursion into gardening one weekend, John discovered that he was minus a certain pair of clippers which meant success or failure to the pruning. Hitherto I had congratulated myself on not mislaying anything during our move from the flat to the Dower House. But now it seemed I was wrong. Later that day John also discovered the shoe last was missing. I suddenly recalled an unobtrusive cupboard at the flat which I may have overlooked. There was a chance that both articles, along with others not yet missed, might still be there.
The idea of a return visit to the flat intrigued me. It would be interesting to compare the two dwellings, and to slap myself on the back yet again at having found the Dower. I would find it in me to pity and even to patronize, in a perfectly nice way, our old neighbours and the new occupants of the flat. There might be a shortage of houses, but it just showed what could be accomplished if one really tried.
I never dreamed that our successor would be Ursula Mulqueen. It didn’t occur to me even when she opened the front door to my ring. I thought that by some extraordinary coincidence she was visiting a friend there.
I said “Good Heavens!” in a faint voice when I saw her. It was Ursula all right. Even though she was barely recognizable. Apart from her clothes—she was wearing slacks and a battle jacket of chalk-striped grey flannel—her very expression had altered. Her face was made up in a tan shade and was offset by a high-piled coiffure. The habitual sweet smile had given place to a firm full mouth that tilted only at the corners when she wished to manifest amusement or pleasure as she did then.
I stared at Ursula with unconscious rudeness. She did not seem at all embarrassed at being discovered in her second personality. I had heard the rumour, of course. She probably considered it a matter of time before the whole of Middleburn verified that rumour. Perhaps she no longer cared now that James Holland was out of the way.
I followed up my first inadequate exclamation with a feeble: “Fancy meeting you here!” My astonishment sent a guarded look into her eyes, now deeply blue because of her mascaraed lashes. She imagined my remarkable deductive powers had led me to her lair.
“Why not?” she asked coolly. “The only way to get a place nowadays is to follow up other people’s movements.”
“You mean,” I said, unable to believe my own ears, “that this is your flat? You took it over when we left?”
“Why not?” she repeated.
I wanted to ask: “Where on earth do you get the money to run this double life? How do you fit it in with the Hall?”
Instead I bottled my curiosity temporarily and stated the object of my visit.
“Certainly,” Ursula said in her new clipped voice. “Is it that cupboard in the laundry? I found some odds and ends there. Come through.”
I followed her. Really, the slacks outfit made her figure appear very trim. One would never have guessed it under her shapeless Middleburn clothes.
Quite brazenly she mentioned the village. “Won’t those things be too heavy for you to carry? I’ll bring them out to the Hall with me.”
“What about you?”
“Oh, I’ll find a car from someone.”
I gaped at her. The whole layout had a nasty look about it. She dropped her eyes. “Would you care for some tea? I was just going to make it.”
“Thank you, I would,” I said promptly. Ursula wanted to talk. There was no mistaking the purpose of her invitation.
“What about your little boy? Orange juice? Milk?”
“A biscuit will do, thanks. It will keep him out of mischief. Please don’t go to any trouble.” She busied herself with a kettle and found cups and saucers. Presently she said casually: “I suppose you’ve realized by now where the money comes from.”
“I think I have an idea,” I replied.
She said fiercely: “You can’t blame me for what I have done. Who wouldn’t have taken the opportunity? You’ve seen what it is like at home!”
“Pretty grim,” I agreed. I made a sketchy wave with my teaspoon. “But did you have to be quite so drastic? This sort of life will lead you into a packet of trouble.”
Ursula gave me a slightly puzzled look before continuing a tirade at her upbringing and the life she was expected to lead. She broke off suddenly.
“Well! What’s going to happen now?” she demanded.
“I’m sure I don’t know,’” I replied, taken aback. “It is a trite phrase, but your life is your own to make.”
“You don’t know!” she repeated. “Hasn’t Inspector Matheson given you an idea what he will do?”
I opened my mouth to speak and then shut it like a trap. My eyes narrowed. The notion that Ursula and I had been at cross-purposes occurred to me. I was only just in time. Another wrong word from me and Ursula would have realized I did not know what she was talking about. I continued to survey her silently.
She set her cup down sharply in her saucer. “Well?” she said. “Speak up. Is he going to send me to prison?”
I sought vainly for a noncommittal answer. One that would lead Ursula on until I had unravelled this confusing conversation.
“Not yet,” I said, in a grave voice.
She gave a short laugh and got down from her perch on the kitchen table. The drawn-up trouser of her crooked leg fell back into its perfect crease.
“Why is he holding fire?” she asked over one shoulder. She took cigarettes from a drawer and lit one expertly. “Now that he knows about the money, why doesn’t he go ahead and arrest me?”
“Oh, yes!” I said, with care. “The money. Perhaps he does not consider it as important as you might think. After all, it is essentially your uncle’s death that he is investigating.”
Ursula turned round and tried to speak lightly. “You mean he’ll leave my embezzling games for that awful oaf Billings to deal with? I’m not sure I don’t feel insulted.”
“Why do you call it embezzling?” I asked brightly. “Isn’t there a softer term you can use?”
Her mouth drew down at the corners. “I suppose I could say I was claiming my just rights. After all, the allowance Uncle made was quite inadequate. What I got out of cooking his books was never missed. At least,” she added bitterly, “until your husband came snooping around.”
I passed over the rudeness to John. I was getting a grip on the situation at last and did not wish to become sidetracked. So it had been Ursula who had been juggling the household accounts. In order to lead this double life, to have an escape from the life of pretence in Middleburn, she had helped herself to the petty cash.
I felt I owed her an apology. “You are too ready to believe the worst of people,” I told myself severely. Embezzler was a sweeter name than the one I had been calling her for the past ten minutes.
If it was Ursula who had been stealing the money, it must have been Ursula who had crept into our house that night. I attacked from a tactical position.
“You know,” I remarked, helping myself to one of her cigarettes, “you gave me a hell of a fright that night.”
“Did I? I can’t say I’m sorry. You shouldn’t have been about at that hour. I thought I was safe until I broke that glass. After the row it made, I gave up my search for the ledger.”
It was my turn to be puzzled. “Why did you want the ledger?” I asked her. “You had already removed the evidence.”
A sudden change passed over Ursula’s face. I had made a wrong move. We stared at one another in silence, each trying to outwit the other.
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Ursula did not know about the pages torn from the ledger until I had foolishly let it fall. Someone else must have done it.
Ursula’s eyes had dropped away from mine. She was planning a way out of the situation she had precipitated. I do not think she was interested in who was responsible for her protection. It was enough that John had no evidence against her.
I got up to go. I had done enough damage. It was too late to change the state of affairs. Retreat was the only move left. Ursula was running the water over the tea things, her back towards me.
“I’d better get home,” I said awkwardly. “Will you still bring those tools out for me?”
A sniff and a nod answered me. I frowned. I remembered someone at the Middleburn Community Centre saying what a splendid actress Ursula was.
“Here!” I said feebly. “Don’t do that. Everything will be all right.”
She swung round, a handkerchief to her eyes. “Oh, Mrs Matheson,” she burst out. “Do you really think so? I can’t tell you what that means to me to hear you say so.”
This sounded like the Ursula I knew. I frowned all the deeper.
“Please don’t tell your husband,” she begged. “I was just being silly today. Forget all about the affair, won’t you? Promise me you will. I can’t bear to bring disgrace on my parents.”
“Well, he doesn’t know anyone broke in the other night,” I admitted unwisely. The scene was assuming such proportions that Tony became affected. His lip fell.
Ursula grabbed my hand. “You didn’t tell him? Just to protect me? Oh! How can I ever thank you.”
“I didn’t tell him for my own reasons,” I said. “To be quite frank I wasn’t sure whether it was you or not. As for telling my husband that you are to blame for the unusual mistakes in the Hall account book, he’ll probably find out for himself sooner or later. He has a nasty habit of getting to the bottom of things, big or little. And that I want you to interpret as a warning. The best bet is to be quite candid with the police.”