“On Monday last, at 12:30 P.M., Henry Lambert fell from the steps outside your dwelling at 2, Britannia Mews, and was fatally injured. Can you tell the Court how it happened?”
“My husband was standing beside me at the top of the steps. He was going out. He turned and missed his footing. When I got down to him he—he was dead.”
The Coroner expressed perfunctory sympathy. With intense relief Adelaide realized that he was not in the least interested in her, but was favourably disposed because she made a good witness who would not waste his time. (The next was murder.) He turned and asked a question of the police officer beside her: How high were the steps from the ground, and were they steep enough to be dangerous? Nine foot, replied the officer, and not to say dangerous, but very steep. They would need care. The landlord wished to say that they had been passed by the proper authorities; but in his, the officer’s, opinion, they could be called very steep. The Coroner nodded, and turned back to Adelaide.
“Was your husband a temperate man?”
“Oh, yes, sir.”
“No sort of quarrel or disagreement? You weren’t arguing about anything?”
“Oh, no, sir. He was just going out … I said good-bye to him.”
There was another touch on her lips, this time of clean linen. Again instinctively, Adelaide had covered her face with her handkerchief. It was the right, the sympathy-arousing move; before she had time to realize that no more questions would be asked, that her personal ordeal was over, someone had taken her by the arm and led her from the box.
When she looked up again, Mrs. Mounsey was in her place.
“You are Mrs. Sarah Mounsey, of 9, Britannia Mews?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Will you tell the Court what you saw on the morning of Monday last?”
The Sow nodded gravely. In spite of her grotesque appearance she managed to give an impression of great judiciousness.
“I was standin’ in me winder, which is opposite Number 2 and on the same level. I see Mr. and Mrs. Lambert a-standin’ there as ’e was goin’ out. ‘Good-bye,’ she says to ’im; ’e turns, misses ’is footing and falls like a stone. I see ’er rush down after ’im, and then I comes down meself; only bein’ ’eavy I moves slow. An’ seein’ ’er too distracted to think fer ’erself, I says, ‘Fetch the perlice.’ So ’elp me God.”
There was a brief silence. Adelaide looked not at Mrs. Mounsey but at the Coroner: he had the appearance of a clever man; the Sow’s unctuousness was evidently unpleasant to him. He turned to another policeman, whose face Adelaide recognized, and asked sharply:—
“You were sent for as this witness says? Who fetched you?”
“A young lad, sir. He made off. But I found the body as stated, and not cold. There was no obstruction.”
“Is there any other witness?”
“A party known as Old Bert, also living in the Mews, was about at the time.”
“He must have another name than Old Bert,” said the Coroner impatiently. “Is he here?”
Adelaide clutched her handkerchief tightly as the Old ’Un wavered to his feet. In a high, thin voice, like the voice he used for the Hangman, he cried shrilly:—
“Albert Daneslaw, your honour, Albert Arthur Daneslaw!”
“In the box,” said the Coroner.
The Sow waddled out, angry, and, as Adelaide could see, disturbed. She sank down in Old Bert’s place, muttering under her breath as he took the oath, thrusting her bulk against Adelaide’s shoulder. Adelaide drew away.
“You wish to give evidence?” asked the Coroner.
Old Bert looked across at Adelaide and lifted his aged voice.
“I want to give evidence as I’ve known Mrs. Lambert ever since she come to the Mews … and ’er ’usband before that …”
“Yes?” prompted the Coroner. “If you have no direct knowledge of what occurred—”
“If you mean did I see it, I didn’t. What I want to say is this: ’e treated ’er something shocking.”
A stir of interest passed over the Court. One of the reporters turned and began to look for Adelaide among the witnesses. The Coroner frowned.
“Unless what you have to say is relevant—”
“’E treated ’er something shocking,” repeated Old Bert stubbornly. “She was too good for ’im. They’re covering it up now, but ’e drank like a fish. What she ’ad to put up wiv, oh dear, oh dear.”
The Coroner looked at him irritably. Old Bert wasn’t a good witness, indeed his blinking and rheumy eyes, his high senile voice, made him seem almost half-witted: whatever he said would not weigh with the jurors, but it might confuse them. It was only, the Coroner admitted to himself, out of sheer dislike for the witness before that he had called the old man at all. The woman’s evidence, and the widow’s, was perfectly clear and largely corroborated by the police. Catching the foreman’s eye, the Coroner read there sentiments exactly matching his own: they were wasting time, and the next was murder.
“Did you or did you not witness the deceased’s fall?”
“Nay,” admitted Old Bert. “Wot I want to say—”
“Then stand down,” said the Coroner.
His summing-up took less than a minute, and the jury’s consultation no longer. They returned without the least hesitation a verdict of accidental death.
2
There was still half an hour to wait, for the burial order. When Adelaide learned this she gave Mrs. Mounsey five shillings and Old Bert half a crown, and told them to go and get a drink. That the action was at all dubious, that it might be interpreted as a payment to witnesses, did not strike her; she only longed to be alone. Mrs. Mounsey accepted the bounty expressionlessly, Old Bert with a certain mild pride. “I done me best for you,” he asserted complacently. “I wor the one as stood up for you, worn’t I now?” “You were indeed,” said Adelaide. The Sow looked at them both with contempt, but did not speak. Outside, she took the old man’s money away from him.
Adelaide sat down in the sombre waiting-room and pushed the hair back from her forehead, and hooked her collar. She felt weak, as though after hard physical exercise; not her own minutes in the witness-box, but Old Bert’s, had drained her strength. Yet things had been made easy for her, unbelievably so: she had simply had to tell the truth … leaving a little out. Leaving out, naturally, the worse side of Henry’s character, for by convention one did not speak ill of the dead, and leaving out one slight action of her own. Indeed, Adelaide could so easily reconstruct the whole scene without it that it had begun to lose reality: might not Henry have fallen, was he not bound to fall, even without that thrust of her arm against his breast? In her distress and confusion, might she not have exaggerated its force? No more than the lightest contact would have sufficed to leave that mere physical memory of rough tweed under her wrist: in distress and confusion, one’s senses played tricks …
So Adelaide’s mind set about preparing itself for the return to Platt’s End; for there were certain memories, certain doubts and self-accusations, which would be out of place there, which therefore had to be eliminated; yet strangely enough, as she worked step by step towards an acceptable position, the one obvious, all-exonerating circumstance for a time escaped her; when she realized it she was astonished by its simple logic. She thought: If I had really pushed Henry down those steps, Mrs. Mounsey would have seen. She did not see, so I did not push him.
This was the first time it occurred to Adelaide that Mrs. Mounsey, in the witness-box, on oath, might have been speaking the truth.
The idea was as surprising as welcome. Yet why should it be? Why, after all, had she assumed that the Sow was lying? Why should the Sow lie? It was not to her interest. She was no well-wisher to perjure herself on Adelaide’s behalf. If she had thrust herself forward, taken control, it was because of a certain professionalism in regard to disaster and sudden death: an inquest was meat and drink to her. But there was no reason why she should have lied, and Adelaide, turning these new ideas over in her mind, almo
st laughed with relief. Not yet, not even in her reaction from fear, could she admit how afraid she had been: the bald summary of the facts, I thrust Henry to his death, I killed him, I was seen, was still too terrifying to face. But now it need never be faced. In her own eyes, as in the eyes of her Sovereign Lord the King, she stood acquitted. I have been distracted, thought Adelaide. I must forget all about it. I shall forget easily, when I am at home.
The door opened and a man came in: a clergyman with a kind and troubled face. He said:—
“Mrs. Lambert? I thought I would bring you this myself. I am Mr. James, the Court Missionary.”
She took the paper and looked at it: it was the Coroner’s order for burial.
“Thank you,” said Adelaide.
Mr. James was regarding her with interest, almost with curiosity, but holding that paper in her hand Adelaide felt safe. If he recognized her for a lady it no longer mattered; it might even be an advantage.
“If there is anything I can do to help—if there are relatives to be informed—”
“My husband had no relatives.”
“But your own, Mrs. Lambert? Surely your own people will not allow you to bear this burden alone?” He moved a step nearer, evidently disturbed by her extreme tranquillity. “Forgive me if I seem to pry, but if there has been any—estrangement, an outsider like myself, and in my position, can often be of help. I need not assure you of my willingness.”
Adelaide straightened her back. It was a relief to do so, and a relief also to speak to someone of her own class, in her own language.
“I don’t think you are prying, I think you are very kind.” She hesitated a moment, and added deliberately, “I should like to be frank. My family did not approve of my marriage; it led, as you say, to an estrangement. Now that it is ended, I shall of course go home.”
“May I say how glad I am to hear it?”
“Thank you. But I wish them to be spared as much as possible. They do not yet know of my husband’s death, and I hope they never will know the—the circumstances. Papa is an invalid. Do you think it will be reported in the papers?”
Mr. James, who at the mention of an invalid parent had prepared a fresh expression of sympathy, altered it to one of reassurance.
“I doubt it. I trust not. The next, you see—”
“Was murder,” said Adelaide. “And none of my people live in London. They take The Times.”
“It’s extremely unlikely that any report should be in The Times. I think you may set your mind at rest on that account.”
“Then I shall say my husband died suddenly, of the influenza. There’s a lot of it about. If I sound heartless, it is because I have so much to think of. The arrangements for the funeral—”
“That I can take off your hands.”
“I should like it to be as soon as possible. I can’t go home, you see, until it is all over; I’ve caused too much grief already. I know I sound heartless.”
“If I may say so, you sound as though you are bearing up most bravely under a great strain. I only hope it may not prove too much for you.”
She looked at him searchingly; but Mr. James returned her gaze with genuine admiration. He was a man of wide experience; he could reconstruct very easily the story of her married life; he guessed at once that her late husband had drunk like a fish, had probably been drunk when he died. A dreadful end … Mr. James had seen it before, he would doubtless see it again; the whole squalid story was thoroughly commonplace—save for the personality of the young woman before him. A fine character, thought Mr. James; been through too much for her years and never given in; desperately eager—and how naturally!—to put the whole tragedy behind her; eager like a child to go home. He only hoped she would find there the sympathy and understanding she deserved.
“Must you tell that untruth?” he asked abruptly.
“I think so. If Papa knows it is any sort of accident, he will know there has been an inquest. He’ll make enquiries. He will learn what sort of people gave evidence. I don’t want him to know what my life has been like.”
Mr. James sighed. There was reason in what she said, and the risk of discovery was very slight; it simply grieved him that she should be forced to take on the additional burden of a lie. He said very kindly:—
“Then give me back the order and I will make all arrangements. I will call and tell you of them. Quite simple, I suppose …?”
“But good,” said Adelaide.
With that, suddenly, her tears flowed. They were tears as much of fatigue as of grief, but they made a profound impression on Mr. James, who led her out, and put her into a cab, promising that so far as in him lay she should have no more trouble.
He was as good as his word; Adelaide did not even have to see the undertaker. Two days later Mr. James called for her in a closed carriage, and alone they followed the hearse to the Paddington cemetery. They stood side by side at the lip of the grave, in a downpour of rain that spared them the attentions of any bystander. No one followed from the Mews; and thankful as she was Adelaide subconsciously noted the fact as strange, almost disturbing. It was not like Britannia Mews to boycott death.
Before returning she left with Mr. James the inscription for her husband’s tombstone: HENRY LAMBERT, BELOVED HUSBAND OF ADELAIDE LAMBERT, the date, and REST IN PEACE. And because she was not heartless, she directed that the mason should carve as well an artist’s palette, crossed by a spray of laurel, at the head.
3
The intervening days had been spent by Adelaide cleaning and clearing the flat in Britannia Mews. The work was valuable to her, occupying her thoughts and tiring her body; it was also part of her plan for immediate flight. She had little to take away, only her own personal belongings, and little to destroy, since Henry seemed to have kept neither papers nor letters; his clothes, his books, his painting materials, she simply stacked in the coach-house below. They would not stay there long, the Mews would scavenge them up in a morning; Adelaide contemplated this dispersal of her husband’s property not only with detachment, but with a sense that it was somehow fitting. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust … Nor did she care what became of the furniture; if she left the rooms clean it was because the landlord would see them; but she did not bother to give him notice. The rent was paid to the end of the month. All her other dealings had been for cash. It was, in fact, extraordinarily easy to be rid of Britannia Mews.
To defray the unusual expenses of the funeral and her own mourning she sold a heavy gold necklet of her grandmother’s, and found herself with a sufficient balance to return to Farnham first-class.
The morning after the funeral, therefore, Adelaide had no more to do than pack her own clothes in the trunk she had brought from Kensington. It did not take long; by eleven o’clock she was standing in the clean bare room, drawing on her gloves, ready to go out and find a cab; first, as she now decided, to send a telegram. She had originally planned to arrive at Farnham unannounced; so obsessed with the idea of going home, so nearly romantic in her longing, she imagined herself walking into Platt’s End as simply and naturally as she might have walked into the house at Albion Place after a morning in Kensington Gardens. But as her mind returned to its old habits she perceived that from her mother’s point of view even a few hours’ notice would be valuable. There must inevitably be some little talk about the sudden appearance of a daughter; there would be less if Mrs. Culver had dropped a word in advance. “We are so happy, my daughter comes home this afternoon”; and then with a melancholy look, a lowering of the voice, “She has lost her husband.…” For Adelaide now saw that it would be wise to give this information too, and with a certain fullness. She took off her gloves and looked round for a scrap of paper on which to compose the message; there was none, she had cleaned too thoroughly; only by a blackened mass in the hearth lay a clean white rectangle, a single card of the hundred on which Mr. and Mrs. Henry Lambert had announced their intention of opening a school.
Adelaide picked it up, drew her pencil through the neat
copperplate, and turned it to the other side:—
Dearest mother and father, she wrote. I am coming home this afternoon. Henry passed away a week ago after a short illness, influenza. I long for you with all my heart. Your loving Addie.
Never since earliest girlhood had she so signed herself; never before with such sincerity. She felt the springs of youth begin to flow again, warm with a new affection. I have been hard and ungrateful, thought Adelaide; I have been too selfish. Please God, I’ll be a good daughter.
There was a sound behind her as someone pushed at the outer door. It moved slowly, clumsily; halfway it stuck, then grated on; for it had to open to its widest extent to admit the huge swaddled bulk of Mrs. Mounsey, the Sow.
She looked round the room, taking in the strapped trunk, the charred hearth; then she looked at Adelaide.
“You bin cleanin’ up.”
“Yes,” said Adelaide cheerfully. “I’m going home.”
The Sow waddled across the room and sat down in Henry’s chair.
CHAPTER VIII
1
For perhaps half a minute the two women looked at each other without speaking. The narrow room was perfectly still: a brief silence had fallen even on the Mews without. Mrs. Mounsey sat like an image: her smooth, dirty-greyish face might have been carved from soapstone, her eyes were mere opaque slits between the creases of fat above and below. She was a dirty and probably a diseased old woman: with loose discoloured teeth, bits of wool stuck in her ears, every squalid sign of decay; and she also looked immensely enduring, able to carry disease as a powerful creature carries lice, in sum formidable.
Adelaide moistened her lips and said pleasantly:—
“I wanted to see you, Mrs. Mounsey. You will find some things in the coach-house which may be of use; I should like you to have them.”
The Sow said nothing.
“Clothes, and books,” persisted Adelaide. Her voice sounded unnatural in her own ears: too high, too sweet, too fluent. “And if there is anything up here—china, or bedding—please take what you like. There’s a kettle and teapot, besides cups—”
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