A Poisonous Journey

by Malia Zaidi

  Oh indeed, at the moment Jeffrey utters these words, Daniel walks through the door. We all freeze and observe a pained expression dance across his face.

  "Oh, Daniel. There I go putting my foot in my mouth, I only meant—" Jeffrey tries, making to get up. Daniel raises his hand.

  "No, please stay." Jeffrey hovers for a moment, then obeys and sits back down. Looking pale, Daniel sinks into the empty seat beside me. I am in the awkward position of wanting both to embrace him and to run away. Before I get the chance to do either and confuse the poor man even more, he resumes speaking. "Don’t look at me like that, Jeffrey. It’s all right. I know who Caspar was. I had my own difficulties with him on more than a few occasions, but—" he takes a deep breath, "he was my friend. Even if that friendship wasn’t what it once had been."

  "Of course." Jeffrey replies somberly, and Briony, desperate for her nervous hands to do something pours Daniel coffee, spilling a fair bit onto the saucer in the process.

  "I assume the police told you what happened?" Daniel asks, shooting a little smile at Briony who is loading his plate with slices of toast and thick rashers of bacon. She seems intent on making him physically ill too.

  "Yes, Inspector Dymas told us. I still cannot believe it was murder." Jeffrey utters the last, ugly word in a low voice, creases of concern lining his forehead. He appears older today. The crime committed in his garden has aged him, and Briony looks particularly young beside him, her face tired but unlined.

  "Can’t you?" Daniel’s voice is sharp. He hesitates, a pained expression crosses his even features. "I am sorry. I only meant, we need not paint a false picture of Caspar. He chose to live life a certain way, without regard, without care, there were times in our travels, well …" he allows his gaze to sweep to the far reaches of the garden behind us. I cringe inwardly as my mind’s eye brings forth the image of the body I found there only hours ago.

  "He was no saint. None of us are." Jeffrey’s voice brings Daniel back to us, and his eyes glint in the warm light streaming through the windows.

  "You’re right. None of us are."

  Briony and I follow the awkward exchange in silence. I clearly sense her deep unease. She thrives on being good in social situations, aways saying the right thing, the perfect hostess. It unsettles her, as I see in her wide-eyed stare, to be able to do nothing to make this moment any more pleasant. I feel the urge to get her away from this scene, and myself as well.

  "Briony," I start, my voice much too loud as I shatter the thickening silence, "would you help me, I cannot find my passport and travel papers. I must have mislaid them somewhere. Inspector Dymas wanted to see them when next we met."

  A look of relief comes over my cousin, and she all but jumps from her seat as though she had been sitting on hot coals. "Yes, of course. He might be back today. You’ll excuse us." She is talking quickly, and Daniel and Jeffrey look almost amused at my transparent attempt to extricate my cousin and myself, all the while giving them the privacy they probably desire.

  "Of course. Good luck with your search." I can hardly believe it, but I almost detect the hint of a smile on Daniel’s lips. Now I wish I wasn’t leaving and could follow the continuing discussion. I take some comfort in the assumption that Briony will wheedle it out of her husband and relay anything interesting to me.

  "Yes, in fact," Jeffrey adds as Briony and I are almost at the door, smelling sweet freedom, "Inspector Dymas said he would come by later with the—" he pauses, shooting a nervous glance at Daniel. "Well, to tell us whether the doctor has been able to find anything more. You see, since Caspar was a British tourist the authorities will be keen to solve this quickly. Any dragged out business may create scandals."

  "Oh!" Is all I manage, before noticing a tug at my sleeve and following Briony into the interior of the villa.

  I actually have to tell Briony that it was a ruse, my travel documents are safe and secure in my mother’s hatbox. I am either a good liar, or she is quite innocently gullible. In all probablility the latter is true.

  "Oh well," she says as we find ourselves climbing the stairs to my room, "we need to have a chat and some privacy anyway."

  I close the door after we enter my bedchamber, more out of habits formed at aunt Agnes’ house than for fear of being spied on. Briony sits down on the small chair in front of my vanity table, and I drop myself onto one of the closed trunks.

  "Oh, Evie, what a terrible mess!" In a frustrated gesture, she drops her hands into her lap and immediately begins fiddling with the hem of her skirt.

  "Daniel seems oddly calm about it all, don’t you think." My brow creases as I air my confusion. "How was Jeffrey last night?"

  "Oh, you know. Upset, of course, but to be honest," a guilty expression comes into her open face, and she lowers her voice, "Jeffrey never much liked Caspar. He knew Daniel’s family quite well, went to school with one of his older brothers, so inevitably he met Caspar too."

  "He knew Daniel’s brothers?" I cannot keep the curiosity out of my voice.

  "Well, he met them years ago, yes. They died, you know." Briony looks down at her hands. I suspected as much. Hearing her confirming such a tragedy still manages to strike at my heart.

  "How terrible." My voice comes out in a whisper.

  "It was. They had enlisted together. Daniel was too young at first and in school. His parents begged him, all three of them, not to go. Of course they would have had to join eventually when conscription began in ‘16." As she speaks, I see in my minds eye, the eager faces of young men, proudly showing off their khakis, not understanding what it all meant, not understanding their own mortality.

  "And Daniel?" I know he fought as well, but Briony needs to talk, and I want to hear whatever she knows.

  "It was a very bad business." She shakes her head sadly, hesitating a moment before finding her voice and continuing in a soft, melancholy tone. "While he was still at home, being the youngest, he got news of both his brothers, killed at the Somme. He was so infuriated that, in some misguided rebellion, he joined up as soon as he could. Three days after his eighteenth. Apparently, his parents pleaded with him not to. Told him they could get him away, he wouldn’t be drafted. This was before conscription, you see. But he wouldn’t listen. Stubborn bitter youth, I suppose. Couldn’t see his parent’s fear beyond his own anger."

  I swallow, but the hard lump in my throat won’t be moved. So much suffering. I want to tell her to stop now. I want to climb under those lovely soft blankets on my bed and hide away until I am old and all of this is so far in the past I can hardly remember it. That is impossible, of course.

  Memory must act as our restraint. It must hold the evil, the carelessness, the greed at bay. We call it the Great War, why I have wondered many times. It bestows upon it an ill-deserved aura of glory when it was only horror, and all that remains of it is pain.

  "His mother turned very fragile after they heard news of the of the tragedy that befell her eldest sons. She became ill, couldn’t eat or sleep, and passed away after only a few months. The father was desolate, inconsolable. He shot himself two days later. Daniel was already in France at the time and didn’t hear the news until weeks after it happened. I cannot imagine how he coped. Jeffrey said he might have found brotherhood in the army, people who looked out for him. I cannot really understand it. He was only a boy. He only went back to visit their graves. Since then he’s been traveling far away from home. No one really knows what he does, though he says he writes travel books. He has the funds, so nobody questions him."

  I listen in silence to Briony’s narrative, distraught at the thought of the immense burden of grief this man must carry with him every waking hour. I wonder how many mornings he has to do battle with himself to find the will to start a new day. Another orphan, does not the world have enough? I cannot help the strange sensation that we both belong to some deranged, melancholy club. I know the sort of grief that can be so overwhelming it is like a virus clawing its way into my body.

  Briony and I sig
h almost in unison. I have been gripping the edge of the trunk I am sitting on, and my knuckles have gone stiff and white from the tension. Releasing my hold, then not knowing what to do with my hands, I fold them in my lap.

  "And Caspar?" I finally manage to say.

  "They enlisted together. Caspar was part of the family. I don’t know how his parents reacted, surely much the same way any would. They were just boys." Briony’s eyes are gleaming, but she does not cry. The stories have been told a hundred times, we know them well.

  "Stubborn boys. Oh, Briony, how often can one wish the past undone." It is not a question, simply a statement every human being must arrive at at some point or another.

  "They were in France for a long time, almost until the end."

  "That might explain why he seems so closed off."

  "He has had more than his fair share of suffering." Briony pauses and gives me an odd glance.

  "What is it?"

  "I don’t know if I should say—"

  "Say what?" I hear the hint of irritation in my voice. This is one of Briony’s few bad habits, she loves a good baiting, even if she isn’t aware of doing so.

  "Well …" Another drawn out moment until I widen my eyes in exasperation. "Oh, fine. Daniel might be a bit more closed off with women as, even in that realm, fate spared him no heartbreak."

  "What happened?"

  "He was engaged."

  "Engaged!" I cannot hide my surprise. "He was?"

  Briony nods, and I get the sneaking impression she is taking a little pleasure in having such juicy gossip. By her manner, I can at least assume his wife-to-be has not died.

  "I only know this from Jeffrey, who swore me to silence." She wavers only a second before continuing, "I am quite certain he wouldn’t be angry if I told you. He likes you." Pleased as I am that Jeffrey likes me, I am keen to know more about Daniel’s romantic past.

  "Go on, then!" I find myself leaning forward. Feeling the hint of a blush creep up my neck, I lean back again.

  "Before he went off to France, he got himself engaged to local girl. I don’t know her name, they had been sweethearts awhile, and he wanted to marry her. Then he got shipped out before they could make it legal. Apparently, she wrote to him when he was away. You remember how the soldiers could receive mail and little packages to keep their spirits up? Well, he thought everything was fine, that they would truly get married once he arrived home, something to live for, I suppose. Then, 1918 rolled around and he was released from duty, only to find his fiancée got married a year earlier!"

  "No!"

  "Yes! In a way she did the decent thing in continuing to write to him as if everything was as he imagined, so he wouldn’t give himself up completely. In truth, she fell for some flat-footed boy at home and married him instead. It was a terrible blow. He was shocked and angry, and who could blame him?"

  "Indeed."

  "He went a bit wild, did some foolish things, that was when Jeffrey met him again." As Briony explains, my attention is immediately caught on foolish things. Before I can inquire as to their nature, she continues her narrative.

  "Jeffrey was injured so early in the war, he never really saw much battle. He and Daniel bonded over other matters and Jeffrey," her face takes on an expression of loving pride, "helped him recover again."

  "Jeffrey is a kind man. I am sure he was a good friend to Daniel then, and will be now." It seems such a silly thing to say, but I am all out of wisdom. I knew Daniel had tragedy in his past, but to this degree … No, I would never have imagined. It would not be wished on one’s worst enemy. It will be strange facing him in a little while, pretending not to know, yet desperate to make him realize he is not alone. A small flicker of shame runs through me. Perhaps Briony should not have told me this. I know it would disturb me to find others discussing my own past behind my back.

  "What are you thinking?" Briony is staring at me, the light shining through the open window setting her golden hair aglow, a halo around her face.

  "I don’t know," I wipe my eyes. "I suppose I just feel so helpless."

  "And hopeless?" I hear the fear in her voice and look up to meet her eye.

  "Do not be afraid for me." I get up and walk over to her perch on the edge of the chair. "I am out of the blackness. I carry memories everywhere I go and many are good. I have you and Jeffrey, Iris, and even Aunt Agnes. I know I am not alone and neither are you, and neither is Daniel."

  Briony gets up and gives me a quick hug. "I’d best get myself together if the Inspector is coming soon." She walks to the door. Opening it, she turns back, a small smile tugging at the corners of her mouth, then she is gone. The light tapping of her heels on the wooden floor echoes faintly in the silence.

  For another moment I stand frozen to the spot, allowing the impact of her words to settle. How I sometimes wish the past did not have such mighty power to hold us in its talons! But then I remember laughter and cheer and try to let those happier memories overwhelm the desparation that awakens when I realize I will never hear it again.

  CHAPTER 7

  Detective Inspector Adriano Dymas arrives less than an hour later. He has come alone, leaving his constable to work on other matters at the station in Miklos. Briony guides us into the sitting room, which I have thus far only seen in passing. It is a long room with high white ceilings and a comfortably elegant set of sofas and armchairs. Most importantly, there is enough space for all of us as even Niobe, Yannick, and the cook, (whose name I do not even know!) have been called to congregate here.

  I am seated beside Briony and the inspector on one of the long low-backed sofas, upholstered in a pale green fleur-de-lis pattern. Jeffrey sits beside his wife and Daniel on a chair next to him. The household staff has huddled together on the opposite setee.

  "I wanted all members of the household present when I gave you the news." Dymas looks around, just as I imagine a detective in one of my novels might do. He gives each of us a glance, though I catch only a moment of his searching black-brown eyes as we are seated close to each other and I am at the edge of his periphery.

  "What news? Has the doctor finished his report already?" Jeffrey is on the edge of his seat, and I notice the taut muscles and the throbbing of a vein in his neck.

  "Yes. It was as he suspected." Dymas pauses, presumably for dramatic effect, though I cannot imagine why. All of us have reached the apex of tension and curiosity by this stage. "It was strychnine, or as you may know it, rat poison. We found remnants in the glass we discovered near his body. He ingested the poison, likely through wine."

  "Good heavens!" Briony gasps, though this is no real surprise, but then she did not see the body. Exhaling slowly, I wish we were outside. I suddenly feel very closed in. So many people, and me squashed between them all. I fight the urge to dash out of the room, remembering with startling slowness that I am in the middle of a murder investigation. Suspicious behavior would be noticed. I push away my anxiety as best I can and sit up a little straighter.

  "Could it have been an accident?" Daniel asks, sounding neither hopeful nor convinced of such a possibility, and I wonder what motives for Caspar’s murder he might be aware of, or what enemies he might suspect for that matter.

  Dymas shakes his head. "I very much doubt it, Mr. Harper. The amount found in his stomach was not insignificant. He might have been saved if it had only been a small, accidental measure, though as I understand, no one but him was at the house for most of the day, is that not correct?"

  Everyone nods dumbly, and I wonder where Niobe and the cook were? Yannick drove us into town. He could easily have come back here in the four hours between the time he dropped us off and picked us up again, but I am sure the inspector will have asked him about that.

  "Yes, we were in town, Daniel and I at the museum, and my wife and her cousin were together at the market." Jeffrey answers as representative of this household. "Niobe was visiting her mother, and our cook had the day off and was in Klima to be with her daughter." Niobe and the cook, whose real n
ame I must discover at the nearest convenient time, nod their heads in unison, saying nothing.

  "Hm … yes, so you told me yesterday." Dymas doesn’t sound entirely convinced, and I wonder whether he already has suspicions. I cannot imagine anyone here … Someone in this room could be a murderer! No, no, we all have alibis. I shake my head and catch Briony giving me a strange look.

  "Did he suffer?" We turn to look at Daniel, whose calm face belies the fact that he must be aching with emotion.

  I catch the policeman glancing quickly at his large, brown hands lying folded in his lap before he meets the grieving man’s eyes.

  "I am sorry to say, it was not an easy death." He looks apologetically at the faces around him, and I can only sympathize with him. What a miserable task it must be to have to tell people such dreadful news; to watch the sadness and agony and anger written across their faces and be unable to offer any true comfort. I do not think I could do it.

  "Can you be any clearer?" Daniel is forcing the words from his mouth, and I feel the urge to get up and fetch him a glass of water, but find myself frozen in my seat, eagerness and dread mingling in my mind as I await the inspector’s answer.

  "This will not be easy to hear."

  I respect him for not saying it will upset the ladies, but shrink from what he will say all the more.

  "Go on."

  Dymas inhales and does as he is asked. "Strychine ingested causes spasms of the head and neck. These occur repeatedly and result in paralysis of the airways. The victim dies of asphyxiation two or three hours after ingestion."

  The silence between us lasts a few seconds as we take in the horrible fact. The tiny hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Without noticing I reach for my throat, but lower my hand quickly so no one else will notice either.

  "Do you know when it was taken?" Daniel’s questions are clear and logical. I cannot imagine how he can think sensibly enough to articulate them. Perhaps he wrote them down last night. I doubt he slept, if the rings beneath his eyes are anything to go by.