by Joan Aiken
“You forgot my stockings, dearie.” Aunt Fennel’s tone was faintly martyred when Lucy returned to her. She put out a foot, like a child, Lucy thought, making a bid for attention the instant it senses the adult’s interest has moved elsewhere.
“I’m so sorry, Aunt Fen. Look, here they are, nice and warm from the radiator.”
“Who were your letters from, dearie?”
“I haven’t read them yet,” Lucy said defensively.
“Don’t you want to look at them?”
It would be unkind to repulse this gentle persistence.
“I think one’s from Benovek, the man who’s going to teach me piano.”
Aunt Fennel remained silent. It was one of her expressive silences; she had made it plain that she did not think highly of Lucy’s choice of career. But perhaps this was just a rationalisation of an innocent possessiveness, a wish not to lose her newly acquired niece just yet?
“And the other one?”
“I don’t know. It’s from York. I might as well look, I suppose.” She pulled the envelope from her pocket, carefully reserving Benovek’s for future reading.
“It’s from someone staying at the Royal Turpin Hotel—good grief, it’s from Uncle Wilbie. Who ever would have thought he’d find time to come to England?”
Has he come to see why I haven’t secured any pictures yet? she wondered. Does he really set so much store by them? Or is he determined to establish Aunt Fennel’s status as an imposter once and for all? Whatever he’s come for, I bet he’s up to no good.
“Want to hear what he says?” She read aloud, her eye shooting ahead, editing and abridging. “All neatly typed, he must have hired a secretary—oh, I see, he says he has Russ along. ‘Dear Lucy, I got your letter . . .’ hm, hm . . . ‘I do not think Appleby Old Hall sounds in the least a good place in which to leave her, these private homes are often not at all well run and in any case it is impossible to tell how a place so recently opened may turn out—’ humph! ‘. . . Obliged to visit England on business . . . contacting firms in this part of the country . . . think it best if you bring your great-aunt over to York to see me . . . discuss what to do with her—’ As if you were a parcel!” said Lucy indignantly. “You’ll have to tell him where he gets off—interfering so-and-so! He’s not going to shift you out of here unless you want—you like this place, don’t you?”
She was amused to notice that her sympathies had switched round and were now strongly partisan in favour of Mrs. Marsham and her smoothly run establishment.
“‘Russ McLartney is with me . . . suggest you ring and fix a time to come . . .’ hm, hm . . .” Lucy suppressed the final paragraph, which was an angry inquiry as to why she had not made more progress in acquiring Aunt Fennel’s pictures, what she had done with the money given her for that purpose, why the matter of identity had not been cleared up, and in general, what the hell was going on? Signed, Uncle W. “Typical,” said Lucy. She was tempted to tear up the letter and throw it away, but he had better be phoned, at least. “Do you want to go and see him, Aunt Fennel? Feel like a trip to York? Maybe he’ll give us a champagne lunch.”
Aunt Fennel had been quite silent since Lucy opened the letter. It was as if her mind were preoccupied, very much elsewhere; and she hardly seemed to be attending. Now she said absently,
“See him? No, I don’t want to see him, dearie. I’m quite happy here. I think this is a very nice place.”
“You don’t feel like an outing to York? Bit of shopping?”
“No, thank you, dearie. I never did think much of the shops in York.”
“Okay. I’ll tell him to go take a long walk off a short pier. If he wants to see you, he can come here.”
“I don’t want to see him at all, dearie.”
“Who would?” Lucy agreed. “But one might as well be civil. I don’t suppose he’ll come.” Unless lust for the pictures fetches him over, she thought.
Aunt Fennel’s expression was still distant and withdrawn; she mumbled her lips together, and her eyes had the apprehensive look she had begun to lose since coming to Wildfell Hall.
“You can see him if he comes, dearie. I shan’t. But you won’t let him move me away from here, will you? Promise?”
Her thin fingers tightly gripped Lucy’s. Miserable little bastard, Lucy thought, putting the poor old dear in such a fright again. He shan’t upset her any more if I can help it.
“Don’t worry,” she said, “he needn’t see you if you don’t want. You can always retire to bed with a cold.”
“That’s a nobby idea; in fact I don’t feel too well now; hearing from him has upset me. I think I’ll have a little lie-down now.”
“Yes, you do that.”
Lucy helped the old lady into bed, crossly dislodging the repellent Baby Brother, who was asleep on the knitted patchwork. He yawned, stretched his gross body, and jumped out on to the portico.
“I do wonder if Taffypuss was really killed by a fox?” Aunt Fennel murmured, looking after him. “Didn’t you say you saw a cat when you went to High Beck?”
“Yes, but surely it couldn’t have been your Taffy. You said Colonel Linton buried him. This one was probably a stray.”
“Suppose Colonel Linton was mistaken?”
“That doesn’t seem likely. Now, don’t you worry your head about that—have a nice nap. I’ll call you in plenty of time for supper.”
Troubled by the old lady’s rambling tone and dreamy, vacant air, she ran down to help Fiona prepare carrots for the evening meal.
“What’s up? You look like Madame Defarge sharpening the guillotine.”
“Just thinking about my uncle. He’s arrived in England and making hell—wants to know why I haven’t got any pictures yet.”
“Just let him try getting them out of the good people of Appleby,” said Fiona cheerfully. “Then he’ll know. By the way, when I was exercising my powers of persuasion on Mrs. Thorpe, unsuccessfully, I’m afraid, I heard an interesting piece of gossip about Mrs. Marsham’s son.”
She glanced towards the door.
“Oh yes?” Lucy was inattentive, longing to get away and read her letter.
“He started training as a doctor, it seems, but got into trouble over some back-street abortion affair in Birmingham and had to give up. Now he has this osteopath’s practice which, according to Mrs. T., is a highly shady business; she knows someone who has a friend who has a cousin who has a neighbour who has a daughter who’s no better than she should be who went to him for you know what. All first-hand evidence as you can see.”
Lucy stopped peeling. “That’s a worry,” she said slowly. “I wonder if it’s on account of Harold that I’ve had this uneasy feeling about the place, that Adnan warned me off it? He’d know about a thing like that. Am I right to leave Aunt Fennel here?”
“Mrs. Thwaite did say that none of this had anything to do with Mrs. Marsham; she’s as honest and jannock and hard-working a body as you could hope to find.”
“Fiona,” said Lucy abruptly, “I suppose you wouldn’t consider looking after Aunt Fennel?”
“How do you mean, ducks? Look after her where?”
“Back at her own cottage—if she could be persuaded to go? It’s a dear little place—” A dear haunted little place, Lucy thought, but Fiona was supremely unimaginative; if she did encounter a manifestation of the supernatural she would probably kick its shins and deal it a brisk blow with a hockey stick—“you could have your baby with you there, it would be great!”
“Well, I must say, I wouldn’t mind,” Fiona said slowly. “Your Aunt Fennel’s a honey and a darling, I’d get along all right with her . . .”
“You see, it wouldn’t cost any more than keeping her here—less, probably. And if she moved back to High Beck old Colonel Linton could be persuaded to part with his pictures. The main difficulty may be persuading Aunt Fennel herself to agree
, but you’re a big tough girl and she likes you—if she felt she’d be safe with you—”
“I’ll think about it,” said Fiona. “Really, it’s not a bad notion. I don’t think darling Mrs. M. and I are going to hit it off much longer, now measles are past their prime.”
The carrots were done; there was only the fish to steam. Lucy escaped for five minutes and ran across to the stable-yard where little PHO was parked. Sitting in the driver’s seat, she pulled Benovek’s letter from her jeans pocket; there would just be light enough to read it.
The envelope was large, square, and white.
There should be a seal on the back, she thought, turning it over, with recollections of Villette. I ought to fetch my embroidery scissors and snip round it, carefully preserving it to put under my pillow. Pity people don’t use them now.
There was no seal, but there was something else which did catch her eye; a large ginger cat’s hair, sticking out from under the sealed flap. Odd; very odd, Lucy thought; it looks exactly like one of that revolting Baby Brother’s hairs; but how would it get under the flap?
She gave it a tweak; the hair stayed firmly in place.
There were always cat-hairs on Lucy’s jeans, because Baby Brother, whether welcome or unwelcome, rubbed vigorously against any human leg he encountered and shed fur in handfuls; Lucy found a hair on her trouser-leg and compared it with the one under the envelope flap. They seemed identical.
Has that goddam Mrs. Marsham been reading my mail?
The idea made her burn with fury, but it seemed the only explanation. She wished she still had Wilbie’s envelope, to recheck and see whether that, too, had been tampered with, but unfortunately she had tossed it into the kitchen stove.
At last, with a feeling as if greasy fingers were on her arm, jeering voices whispering behind her back, she opened the envelope, prising it up with a pencil so that the cat’s hair remained gummed to the flap.
Dear Lucy,
Julius Writtstein, who visited me last Wednesday, was immensely impressed by your aunt’s picture and says that if there are more, and if she is agreeable to the idea, he would be glad to handle them for her at his Mayfair gallery. I may say that Julius is not at all in the habit of making such a suggestion after seeing a single sample of an artist’s work, so this is an offer to be taken seriously, as I am sure you will appreciate. Can you let him know as soon as possible how your aunt feels on the matter (I will get my secretary to put the gallery’s address at the bottom) and, if she approves, send him all the pictures you can lay hands on. Julius did not commit himself to the question of prices at this stage but, quite honestly, if you or she can produce ten or twenty canvases like the one you sent me, I think that your mind may be relieved of financial anxiety about her from now on.
You are right, I love the picture! I look at it all day. And your letters give me inexpressible pleasure. But you should lose no more time in those northern parts—there has been too much delay already. Make haste back to my piano!
Max B.
With a start, Lucy glanced at her watch and realised that she had been sitting in the car reading and thinking about this short letter for twenty minutes. Guiltily, she tucked it back into its envelope, and was about to move when she saw somebody leave the little grotto-summer-house among the conifers and make for the Hall, not crossing the open tract of rough park grass, but skirting furtively round by the belt of evergreen shrubs. Dusk was thickening; a great owl coasted by on moon-coloured wings. Lucy could not distinguish the man very clearly; he was short, and carried something under his arm—golf club? Fishing-rod? Perhaps it was Harold Marsham come back? No, too short for Harold, too fast-moving for Clarkson, the gardener, who had a pronounced limp. In a moment he reached the door that led by a back stair to Mrs. Marsham’s flat, opened it, and disappeared.
Maybe she has a boy-friend, Lucy thought. Though it would be a bold fellow who’d take her on. Honestly, though, this place is beginning to spook me; I just hope Fiona and Aunt Fennel agree to my plan, I’m sure that would be the best arrangement.
She hurried back to the kitchen, where Mrs. Marsham was helping Fiona serve up steamed fish with mashed potato and carrot.
“My uncle’s staying in York,” she said abruptly before Mrs. Marsham could ask why she was late. “Will it be all right if I phone him after supper and go over to see him tomorrow afternoon?” I bet you know that already, you hag, I bet you read his letter.
“Of course you may have time off if you wish,” Mrs. Marsham said smoothly. “But why don’t you invite your uncle to come here? I’d expect he would like to inspect the place where Miss Culpepper is staying.”
“Well, I will; thanks; but he’s over on business and may not have time.”
Aunt Fennel ate very little supper, Lucy noticed. The old lady’s attention kept wandering; she would pause, with a spoon halfway to her mouth, and fall into a worried abstraction.
“Don’t let your rice pudding get cold, Aunt Fen dear!”
“I keep thinking about Taffypuss,” Aunt Fennel said apologetically. “I keep wondering if, after all, he’s still up there at High Beck, half starved, with no one to look after him. I do wish you’d slip along after supper, dearie—it wouldn’t take a minute, in your little car—and see if you can see him. If it is Taffy he’ll have a big black A mark in the middle of his forehead.”
This seemed such an unreasonable request that Lucy was quite dismayed. Had the news of Wilbie’s advent so upset Aunt Fennel that she was becoming slightly senile?
“It’ll be dark now, Aunt Fennel,” she said gently. “Supposing I take a look tomorrow?”
“Very well, dearie,” the old lady sighed. “I’ll be off to bed then, if you really can’t go this evening?” She gave Lucy a slightly reproachful look, and made her way slowly upstairs.
“He’s in York—if it is him.” Mrs. Marsham put down the tray. Goetz peered under the metal dish-covers.
“Steamed fish—for the Lord’s sake! Can’t you give us anything better than that?”
“Is he going to come here?”
“I don’t know. The girl’s going to call him—she wants to go and see him. I said ask him here.”
“Good. When’s she going to phone?”
“Any time now.”
Harbin took off the extension receiver and laid it down. They sat listening. Presently they heard a crackle, and a voice.
“Royal Turpin Hotel—can I speak to Mr. Wilberfoss Culpepper . . . Uncle Wilbie? Lucy speaking. I got your letter.”
“Hello. Princess. How’s our little highness?”
Mrs. Marsham drew a snapping breath.
“I’m okay, thanks. I gave Aunt Fennel your message, Uncle Wilbie, but she’s not keen to go to York, so I guess if you want to see her you’ll have to come here.”
“That’s not at all convenient, Princess.” As usual he sounded injured and put-upon. “In fact I don’t think it can be managed; Russ and I are up to the ears in conferences. This is ridiculous! It’s essential we should all meet and have a chat.”
“Sorry,” said Lucy. “I’m prepared to come over and see you tomorrow if you want. But Aunt Fennel won’t be budged. Says she’s happy where she is and no wish to move.”
“How do I even know she’s who she says she is?” he demanded angrily. “Can you bring a photo of her?”
“Oh really, Uncle Wilbie! What would that prove? When did you last see her? Anyway I’ve no camera. I’ll come over and see you tomorrow afternoon about five. Okay? See you then.”
“Hey, wait, Lucy, what about the pictures?”
“Tell you when I see you.”
“What’s this about pictures?” Harbin demanded when Lucy had rung off.
“Oh, some nonsense. When the old lady was living at home she used to do paintings all mixed with embroidery and patchwork and give them away to people—there are lots in Appl
eby—and it now seems the Culpeppers think they might be saleable, and want to get hold of them all. That sounds like Fred, doesn’t it; he always liked to grab anything that might turn out valuable.”
Harbin nodded slowly in agreement.
“Do you think that was Fred?”
“Well—American accent, of course. But then he would, after twenty years there. It could have been Fred. It was like his way of talking.”
Harbin nodded again.
“Pity he won’t come to this place. I wonder why? Could he know you were here, Linda?”
“He wouldn’t know I’d changed my name.”
“I’ll ring Crossley; ask him to get a snap of this guy.”
Goetz sniggered. “He wants a snap of his old auntie, you want one of him—it’s like those royal marriages. Everyone acting coy.”
“Harold could go and look at him,” Mrs. Marsham said. “He’ll be in York tomorrow.”
“Harold won’t—”
“Won’t what?”
“Won’t know him.”
“He could get a picture.”
“No need to worry Harold; I’ll get Crossley on to tailing him. And maybe we ought to get hold of some of these pictures?”
“Why?” said Mrs. Marsham. “What use are they?”
“Bait, maybe.”
Goetz laughed again. “It’s really just that he doesn’t want Fred to get them.”
“Who has them?”
“Oh, most people in the village. And Adnan, the doctor in Kirby. But it’s a trouble getting people to part, it seems.”
“I don’t mind going to some trouble for Fred.”
“Nor does Linda, do you Linda love? What’ll you do, give him a cold bath, like the old girl who wandered up here?”
“Fred’s my pigeon,” Harbin said. “Just you leave him to me.”
Mrs. Marsham shrugged and went out.
“That’s another angle,” Harbin looked after her thoughtfully. “I don’t want her interfering; Linda’s getting a bit dictatorial in her old age. Maybe she’d better have a day off; two birds with one stone.” He reached for the telephone again.