‘What is it, Augustus?’
Both the Miss Tremletts peered at the fine stretched canvas upon which there was depicted a dark grey cloud tinged with pink, a human eye surrounded by three sunflower heads, and a twining plant with scarlet berries. The eye had been completed, but only one of the sunflowers and part of the trailing plant. The cloud was in a fairly advanced state. As an example of the embroiderer’s art it stood high, a fact immediately pointed out by Miranda.
‘I told you he did the most exquisite needlework’—she addressed Thomasina—‘No, it wasn’t you, it was that Miss Silver. But he does, doesn’t he?’
‘What does it mean?’ repeated the Miss Tremletts, both speaking together.
Mr Remington appeared to wave the question away.
‘That surely is for you to say. I conceive the idea—I endeavour to give it form and substance. It is not for me to supply the perceptive intelligence as well. Beauty is given to the world—it is for the world to receive it.’ He flung himself into a chair as he spoke, put a couple of stitches into one of the sunflowers, and murmured in a languid voice, ‘The inspiration fails. After this morning I am not yet attuned.’
Thomasina had already heard so much about the morning that she could not imagine Miss Gwyneth and Miss Elaine having anything more to say about it. But in that she was wrong. Not only they but Miranda and Augustus appeared to have an endless store of speculation, supposition and comment to offer. And they all appeared to be very much taken up with Mr John Robinson.
‘Such a strange person.’
‘All those windows boarded up.’
‘No one knows anything at all about him.’
‘We have never ever spoken to him. He seems positively to avoid us’—that was the Miss Tremletts.
‘Distressingly secretive.’
Sometimes they all talked at once, sometimes Miranda’s deep ringing voice bore everyone down. Thomasina remembered the story of the Scapegoat. She thought it would be very convenient if the police could be induced to fix their attention upon Mr John Robinson, who though in the Colony was not really of it.
‘Of course,’ said Miss Gwyneth, ‘we are all quite sure that this horrid affair can have nothing to do with us.’
‘Peveril was wonderful!’ said Miss Elaine. ‘Such dignity—such composure. But that he should be subjected—that any of us should be subjected to being questioned by the police!’
Miranda looked over the tops of their heads and said,
‘He stands too high to be touched by it.’
Augustus Remington pushed away his tambour frame in rather a pettish manner.
‘Dear Miranda, how true! And so, I hope, do we all. Yet innocence should be vindicated. It has occurred to me that you might contribute to this end by your art. As you know, I am somewhat of a sceptic as to the—no, I will not say authenticity, since that would imply a doubt of your integrity which I would, of course, never for a moment entertain.’
Miranda lapsed into her blunter manner.
‘If you will say what you mean, Augustus, and stop wrapping it up!’
He closed his eyes for a moment.
‘I cannot be hurried—it disturbs the thought process. I was about to say that if I were not somewhat of a sceptic as to the practical uses of the crystal, I would suggest that you should employ it in order to clear this matter up.’
Miss Gwyneth brightened.
‘Miranda sees things in the crystal,’ she explained to Thomasina. ‘If she were to look into it she might see something about Mr Robinson or—or—anyone.’ She turned eagerly. ‘Miranda, have you tried?’
Miranda waved a noncommittal hand.
‘It has all been dark—’
‘But it mightn’t be today—with all of us here in sympathy!’ Miss Elaine’s voice was eager too.
Augustus made a slight negative gesture.
‘I am half a sceptic. You must not rely on me.’
Thomasina had been brought up to be polite to her elders, or she would have added, ‘Or on me.’
But it became apparent that opposition had merely roused Miranda’s spirit, and that with or without any further urging she proposed to accede to the Miss Tremletts’ request. The tea-table was cleared and a square of black velvet laid upon it, the crystal, a large round ball on an ebony stand, placed exactly in the centre, and all the lights turned out except for one which cast a single dazzling ray. It was all very odd, and something in Thomasina didn’t like it. She didn’t know why, and she didn’t care, because what she felt had nothing to do with reason. It harked right back to the child or the savage who is afraid of the dark. And what that child or that savage wanted to do was to hit right out at the crystal ball and to break it, and then run screaming from the room. Naturally the civilized person who was Thomasina hadn’t the slightest notion of doing any such thing.
She watched the ray of light which came slanting from a hooded lamp and made the crystal ball look like a bubble of light floating on dark, deep water. You couldn’t see the table, or the velvet, or the ebony stand—only the ball with the light swirling round in it. Because that was what it seemed to do. It swirled like water—no, like mist—like cloudy thoughts in a dream. And then they cleared, and as plainly as she had ever seen anything in all her life, she saw Anna Ball’s face looking at her out of the crystal. It was there for a moment, and then it was gone again. But she had seen it, and nothing and nobody was ever going to persuade her that she hadn’t. She drove her nails hard, hard against the palm of either hand.
Miranda gave a long, deep sigh, and leaned right back against the cushions of her chair. The ray and the bright crystal were between her and Thomasina. When she leaned back like that she went into the darkness. Her voice came out of it, very deep and low.
‘Anna, where are you?’
All the words were on the same deep muted note. Then the voice lifted. It became another voice, faint and far away.
‘Not—here—’
Then the deep voice again.
‘Where are you?’
‘A—long—way—off—’
‘Where?’
‘I—don’t—want—her—to—know. Tell her … happy … no good—to—cling—to the past. … Broken links—cannot—be replaced. … This is—final.’
There was another of those deep sighs. Miranda moved, put up a hand to her head, groaned distressfully, and sat up.
‘What happened?’ she said in her natural voice. She sounded bewildered. ‘Did anyone see anything? I didn’t. I went into the trance—or did I? I feel awful. Here, for pity’s sake put on the lights, Augustus, and switch off that ray—it’s blinding me!’
As the lights came on, Miranda could be seen to be pale. Between the dark red of her hair and the violet of her robe this pallor had a greenish tinge. But the room was consolingly ordinary again. The remnants of the tea, hastily bundled on to a side table, were reassuringly domestic. The crystal on its ebony stand was just a big glass ball. The black velvet square upon which it stood had a worn place on it, and the edges had begun to fray.
Miranda blinked and said,
‘I don’t remember a thing. What happened?’
Elaine was twittering with excitement.
‘You went into a trance!’
Miranda ran a hand through her hair.
‘But I was going to look into the crystal—’
‘Oh, but you didn’t! You just leaned back, and of course we knew it was the trance. And then you began to talk.’
‘What did I say?’
‘You said, “Anna, where are you?” Thomasina spoke in a voice which she only just kept from being an angry one. ‘Why did you do that?’
‘I haven’t the least idea. Did I say anything else?’
Augustus Remington gave his odd high laugh.
‘Oh, yes, my dear, you did indeed! First you said, “Anna, where are you—”’
‘And then your voice was quite different, and you said, “Not here—”’
‘And then�
�’
They tumbled over one another to tell her what she had said—breaking sentences, jumbling up the words, correcting one another. Only Thomasina took no part in it. She looked at Miranda and she held her tongue.
‘“Anna, where are you—” Well, I can’t make head or tail of it,’ said Miranda. ‘Can anyone?’
Miss Gwyneth was frowning.
‘That Miss Ball’s name was Anna, wasn’t it?’
Miss Elaine gave a little sniff.
‘I don’t know, I’m sure. She wasn’t at all friendly—no one called her by it. And she went away almost at once.’
‘And why should you get a message from her?’ said Gwyneth. ‘So—so irrelevant.’
Augustus Remington had picked up his tambour frame. He held the needle poised and took a delicate stitch.
‘How too, too true! The irrelevance of these communications intrigues me. Why wander in from the void to make perfectly banal remarks?’
‘But there was a message,’ said Miss Elaine.
‘Oh, a definite message,’ said Miss Gwyneth.
They spoke as if taking part in a duet.
‘“I don’t want her to know—”’
‘“Broken links cannot be replaced—”’
Then, both together,
‘But what does it mean? Who is the message for?’
Augustus took another stitch. His glance mocked them.
‘That, alas, we cannot tell.’
Miranda closed her eyes.
‘Well, all I can say is that it means nothing to me, except that it’s given me a headache. But then that’s often the way with messages like this—they don’t mean a thing to me. I am only the medium.’ She raised her hands above her head and stretched magnificently. ‘Well, that’s that, and I’m going to have another cup of tea.’
When your hostess has confessed to having a headache it is not in very good taste to linger upon the scene. Miss Elaine and Miss Gwyneth made their farewells. The embraces were on the languid side, and Thomasina got off with quite an ordinary handshake.
As they walked the short distance to the converted stables, Miss Elaine remarked with some acerbity that she thought Augustus should have had enough sense to come away when they did, instead of settling down on Miranda with his everlasting embroidery. Upon which the sisters started an argument as to whether Miranda would have preferred him to leave, and whether it was really true that he spent every evening there and did not go away until after midnight. Nothing but Thomasina’s youth and innocence prevented either or both of them from adding, ‘If then.’
TWENTY-NINE
THOMASINA WENT UP to her room and began to take off her things. When she had unfastened her coat she slipped a hand into the pocket, because she knew she had put a handkerchief there and she remembered about the sandwiches. She didn’t want it stained to the bone with Miranda’s horrid filling. Her hand went down, and came up again all clammy. The sandwiches were there, and the handkerchief wasn’t. She opened the window, threw them out, and wiped her hand, all rather vigorously.
And then she remembered having the handkerchief before she put the sandwiches in her pocket, because a drop of that horrid green tea had fallen on her dress, right in front where the coat opened, and from the way it tasted she thought it might leave one of those lingering stains, so she had got out her handkerchief and dabbed it. And then—what had she done with the handkerchief? There was no pocket in her dress, and it wasn’t in the coat. She must have just left it lying in her lap and forgotten it when they got up to go. She did up the buttons of her coat again and ran downstairs.
Neither of the Miss Tremletts was in the sitting-room. She would be able to run along the path to Miranda’s and get her handkerchief without having to explain how she had come to leave it there. Elaine and Gwyneth were pets, but they did love to talk anything to shreds, and the sandwiches made it all a bit delicate. She shut the door softly behind her and melted into the dark.
As soon as her eyes were accustomed to it she could see quite well. There was a light in Miranda’s sitting-room. The curtains didn’t quite meet, and a long bright streak showed between them. She came up to the door and found it ajar. That would be Miss Elaine, who never managed to latch a door. She held on to the handle too long, and Miss Gwyneth was always telling her about it.
In ordinary circumstances Thomasina would not have walked into anybody’s house without knocking. But they had only just left. Miranda was there, and the door was open. She came inside the little hall and was going to call out that she had come back for her handkerchief, when the sitting-room door moved. Someone was opening it. It moved a couple of inches and stopped, as if the person who was coming out had turned back for something.
It was Augustus Remington, and he had turned back to say, ‘You really did that very well, Miranda. You got it across all right.’
With a little more practice in eavesdropping Thomasina might have done better than she did—she might have heard what Miranda said in reply. She didn’t hear anything at all. The blood drummed in her ears, and she found that she was out of the house and running away as fast as her feet would take her. Some instinct kept her on the grass. There was a path, and there was a rough grass verge. She found that she was running on the grass. Even if someone came to the door and listened, they wouldn’t hear her now.
When she got back to the Miss Tremletts’ the sitting-room was still empty. She had only been a few minutes away, and no one would ever know that she had been away at all. She went up to her room, locked the door, and sat down on the edge of the bed. She had no doubt at all as to the meaning of what she had heard Augustus Remington say. The whole scene with the crystal was a fake. Miranda had done her part well, and Augustus Remington was commending her. The two of them had played a scene, and Miranda had ‘got it across all right.’ That the words could have any other meaning just never entered her head.
But she herself had seen Anna’s face in the crystal.
A bright ball with the light shining on it—that was one way of hypnotizing people. She had felt her thought slipping as she looked at the swirling light. It didn’t really swirl of course. She just saw it like that because she was slipping into a dream.
And then she saw Anna’s face.
She saw it because someone wanted her to see it. Someone was trying to hypnotize her, and to make her see Anna’s face in the crystal. A burning anger came up among her thoughts. She was to see Anna’s face, and then there was to be a fake message. ‘Anna, where are you? … A long way off. … I don’t want her to know. … No good to cling to the past—broken links cannot be replaced—this is final.’ The short sentences stood out black and clear against the anger. It burned steadily.
It showed her quite a lot of things. Someone wanted to get her away from here. Someone wanted to stop her looking for Anna. Why? The answer stood out too. She was to be got away because Anna was here, in this place. Or if not Anna herself, something that would give her a clue as to what had happened to Anna. Somebody was afraid, somebody wanted her to be gone. Somebody wanted her to think that Anna had made this break deliberately—that she didn’t want to have anything more to do with her. If Thomasina believed that, she would go away and not give any more trouble. And this meant that her being here was a trouble to somebody.
She threw up her head with a jerk.
What was the good of all this ‘somebody’? She knew perfectly well that it was Miranda who had just played a trick on her. And Augustus Remington had told her that she had done it very well and got it across all right. If she hadn’t gone back for her handkerchief and heard what he said, it might almost have been true. Almost, but not quite, because of one little thing. She had seen it, noticed it, and put it away to think about. She hadn’t had time to do that thinking, because of missing her handkerchief and having to go back. But now she had the time, she thought even that one little thing would have told her she had been tricked—even if she hadn’t heard what Augustus Remington said.
&nb
sp; It really was a very little thing. Just a smear of powder on the front of Miranda’s violet robe, high up towards the shoulder. A little smudge of powder showing up against the purple when the lights came on—just ordinary face-powder with a greenish tinge. Anyone might have a smudge of powder on their dress. But it hadn’t been there when Miranda held both her hands in that exuberant welcome. And it wasn’t there when she plied her with those sandwiches and the savoury cake at tea, or when she laid the black velvet square on the table after it had been cleared and set the ebony stand and the crystal ball upon it. Thomasina was prepared to swear to that, and to seeing Miranda put up her hand to her head when she was pretending to wake from that faked trance. She had looked so ghastly when the lights came on—quite green—and it had all added to the effect. And of course too easy to look green if you have a pad or some cotton wool in your hand with the right powder on it. She remembered exactly how Miranda had brought up her hand in a kind of sweeping movement right across her face, her eyes, her brow. And of course it looked absolutely natural, because it is just what you do when you are sleepy, or have a headache, or when you first wake up. But Miranda was getting that greenish powder on to her face, and a little of it had dropped and marked her dress.
Thomasina’s hot anger had burned down to a steady flame. When you are too angry you can’t think, and she needed to think.
After she had been thinking for some time she felt quite clear in her mind. They wanted her to go. They had taken the very words of her advertisement, ‘Anna, where are you?’ She had used only Anna’s Christian name, and she had signed only ‘Thomasina.’ Someone who read the advertisement had known that ‘Anna’ was Anna Ball, and that ‘Thomasina’ was Thomasina Elliot. It looked as if that someone must be Anna herself. By what means had they made Anna tell them what she knew? There were terrible ways of making people speak. Her own words, said on the spur of the moment when she was quarrelling with Peter, came back to her—‘Those old houses have cellars.’ Suppose Anna was there, locked up in one of those cellars. Anger sets a match to your thoughts. The words had just flashed into her mind because she was angry. Now they came up in quite a different way—a slow, cold, considering way which was much more frightening.
Death at the Deep End Page 18