Eltonsbrody

by Edgar Mittelholzer

  ‘Haven’t they been set free?’

  ‘No. I saw them chained near the kennel up to a few minutes ago.’

  I shrugged. ‘Perhaps the old lady will release them herself later.’

  We continued to stare out at the darkness. The wind droned round the house, unflagging in its perpetual onslaught on the framework of Eltonsbrody. I felt a draught groping tentatively round my ankle, sending a thin, cold finger up my leg.

  Walter barked again, and this time there seemed a note of anger and fear in the sound. We could hear the chain rattling. Then Patrick began to utter whining cries, and eventually howled mournfully.

  ‘Do you think something could be upsetting them?’ she asked me.

  ‘Don’t think so,’ I said. ‘They’re probably pining to be set free, that’s all.’

  We fell silent again. Glancing once at her face, I wondered if she, too, were listening to the unearthly whisper of the casuarinas outside. Out of the corner of my eye I could see her hand on the sill. It kept clenching slowly and unclench-ing.

  Light footsteps became evident again in the corridor, then on the stairs. Miss Linton glanced at me.

  ‘She seems to be going downstairs again.’

  I grinned and said: ‘I can see we’re both going to have at least one good creepy story to tell next Christmas Eve.’

  ‘You’re right,’ she laughed—but it was a jerky laugh.

  Presently, we heard the tinkle of a bell downstairs, and knew that Jackman was summoning us to dinner.

  A minute later when we were taking our places at the table we heard a footstep in the sitting-room and stiffened alertly, our glances moving towards the gloom beyond the four fluted columns. We saw Mrs. Scaife, a dim shape, crossing the spacious room. She walked slowly as though deep in thought and unaware of our presence in the dining-room here.

  Miss Linton smiled and murmured: ‘It looks as if I’m not the only one with nerves this evening.’

  I nodded. ‘I admit it. I do feel hellishly jumpy myself.’

  ‘I hope it’s a sign that we’ll have as quiet a night as last night. Last night we felt jumpy, too, but—’ She had been unfolding her napkin as she spoke. Now she was staring down at her lap, and I saw the colour leave her cheeks. She made a brushing motion on her lap and rose.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ I asked.

  In the sitting-room, Mrs. Scaife had paused at a window and was staring out at the night. Instead of turning my attention floorwards, I glanced towards the old lady, somehow connecting the girl’s actions with the presence of our hostess in the sitting-room.

  ‘I don’t think I want to eat anymore,’ Miss Linton murmured.

  ‘Why?’ I asked. ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘Look on the floor near my chair,’ she said.

  I looked down. Something whitish caught my eye. I stooped and picked it up. ‘What’s . . . ?’ I broke off, suddenly recognising what I was looking at. It was a bone—or, better, three bones linked together by fine thread. The phalanges of a human finger.

  ‘Where did this come from?’ I asked.

  ‘It fell out of my napkin.’

  ‘I see.’

  I glanced again into the sitting-room. The windows made a tremulous chattering as an unusually strong gust of wind attacked them. The flame of the lamp reached for the top of the glass shade, then subsided.

  At this point Jackman entered. She looked from me to Miss Linton with inquiring eyes. ‘Anyt’ing you need, sir? Miss?’

  ‘No, nothing, thank you, Jackman. If we need you we’ll ring.’

  She hesitated, then went out, though she paused at the pantry door to glance back curiously at us.

  I looked towards the sitting-room. ‘Mrs. Scaife!’

  The old lady turned at once and began to approach. She was smiling with a sweet, affectionate cordiality as she came past the columns into the full radiance of the lamp.

  ‘Did you call, my boy?’ Her voice was caressing, soft, motherly. It seemed absurd to think of her as the sinister figure I had seen silhouetted against the sky not an hour ago.

  ‘Yes, I did call,’ I said coldly. I pointed to the bones which I had put down on the edge of the table. ‘I’d be glad if you could explain this.’

  ‘Explain? What’s that?’ She seemed surprised. Then she looked at the table and said: ‘Oh.’ She took a pace forward and bent her gaze upon the grisly relic. ‘Good gracious! Why, it’s a little group of bones! The phalanges of a human finger, isn’t it?’

  Neither Miss Linton nor I made any comment.

  Mrs. Scaife uttered soft grunting sounds. She took up the bones and began to examine them with an air of mild, pleasurable interest. She might have been a collector of rare pottery and this was an item that had just been brought to her notice for comment.

  ‘Very nicely strung together, I must say. The work of an expert. Where did you find this, my boy?’

  ‘It was in Nurse Linton’s napkin.’

  Her brows went up. ‘Indeed! Well, well! How odd! And it’s the very thing I’ve been hunting for all day long.’

  ‘It illustrates that you have a very perverted sense of humour, Mrs. Scaife.’

  ‘Me? Me with a perverted sense of humour!’ She wagged her head. ‘I do wish it were only my sense of humour that was perverted, Mr. Woodsley. Why, I’m perverted through and through. I thought you knew that. I’m an awful person. I always used to warn Michael not to indulge in any under-statements when referring to my vices. Ah, but there! I’m forgetting my manners. Nurse, thank you for recovering this little thing for me. It’s a very dear keepsake of a job Borkum and I performed over eight years ago. On the night of the thirteenth of January, to be exact.’ She sighed again, this time rapturously. ‘Ah! Wasn’t that a delicious night! So dreadful—and so delicious!’ She nodded and looked at the bones in her hand. ‘Yes, I would have been grieved to lose this. Very grieved.’

  She began to move towards the stairs, and I glared after her, feeling strongly tempted to rush at her and strangle her.

  At the foot of the stairs she paused and wagged her finger at me. ‘I can feel you’re furious with me, Mr. Woodsley, but never mind! I hope it won’t upset your appetite.’ She held up the bones. ‘Remember we all have to come to this some day, my boy.’

  She chuckled and melted into the gloom up the stairway.

  The windows of the sitting-room rattled loudly in another strong gust of wind, and Miss Linton shifted her feet uneasily. I gripped her arm and said: ‘Look, don’t let this get you down, Miss Linton. Let’s sit down and eat.’

  ‘I don’t feel like anything.’

  ‘Nonsense! You’re going to let an old scarecrow like that prevent you from eating? Come on. Sit down!’

  After a little bullying I got her to take her place again and make an attempt at eating. ‘Anyway, this is my last meal in this house,’ she vowed. ‘As soon as I go upstairs I’m going to phone Doctor Dayton and ask him to bring another nurse tomorrow morning to relieve me. I’m going back to town by bus.’

  ‘I can hardly blame you. This is really the limit.’

  We were silent for a long interval. Then suddenly I noticed that Jackman was at the pantry door watching us. I smiled and beckoned to her, and she approached at once. ‘You look worried, Jackman,’ I said, trying to speak lightly. ‘What’s on your mind?’

  ‘Sir, Oi ain’ loike how matters happening, sir. Oi ’fraid. Dis house froighten me bad.’

  ‘It does, eh? Have the other servants gone home already?’

  ‘Yes, sir. Only Oi left behind, Mr. Woodsley.’

  ‘What really are you afraid of?’

  ‘Everyt’ing, sir. De way Miss Dahlia behaving particular. She never behave loike dis before, sir.’ She took a swift glance at the stairway, then bent in a confidential manner and said: ‘Sir, Oi can tell you private. Oi see Miss Dahlia when she put dat bone in de young lady’s serviette. Yes, sir. Oi stands jest by dat pantry door and Oi see her come to de table here and do it. She put de bone
in de young lady’s serviette, and she smile to herself and walk off into de sitting-room.’

  ‘You saw that, did you?’

  ‘Yes, sir. But, sir, dat ain’ all what froighten me. Few minutes a-whoile ago Oi was standing at de window in de kitchen washing a pot and Oi hear footsteps outside walking in de dark near de goat-pens. And Oi hear a noise loike ef somebody rest a heavy box on de ground.’

  ‘A heavy box?’

  ‘Yes, sir. Dat’s what it sound loike. A heavy box—or a trunk, or somet’ing jest loike dat. Near de goat-pens, sir.’

  ‘Certainly doesn’t sound too pleasant.’ I said, trying to make my tone as bantering as possible. ‘Anyway, don’t let it bother you too much, Jackman. When you’re ready to go home let me know and I’ll come with you to the gate.’

  ‘Many, many thanks, Mr. Woodsley. Oi’d be grateful, sir.’

  She was about to move off, but I stayed her. ‘Look, just a minute. There’s something I was to have asked you. You were here since Doctor Scaife’s time, weren’t you?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Do you remember if anything strange happened after the doctor died? Very shortly after he died, I mean?’

  ‘Anyt’ing strange loike what, sir?’

  ‘Anything at all you can think of. Think a bit and see.’

  She was silent a moment, grunting in a musing way, then said: ‘Well, sir, onlyest t’ing Oi can remember was dat Miss Dahlia give us a day holiday. Oi can remember dat.’

  ‘What about Borkum? Wasn’t he working here, too, then? Did he take a holiday, too?

  ‘Well, now you talk ’bout dat, sir, Oi remember somet’ing. Oi was talking to Tappin ’bout it dis morning early on de way to work. Oi got a cousin. She live near Horse Hill, and she used to work at de hotel—de Atlantis Hotel—and she had to pass here every day on her way to work. And Oi remember she tell me dat she pass here and see Borkum working in de grounds. She even ask me ef Borkum didn’t get a holiday wid de rest of us.’

  ‘I see. Borkum turned out to work as usual on the day you were all supposed to be off.’

  ‘Yes, sir. And somet’ing else Oi jest remember. Tappin been telling me ’bout de funny smell you and de young lady here been smelling upstairs. Well, sir, Oi can tell you private. Peters, de first housemaid who work here before Malverne, she tell me dat she smell a same funny smell upstairs in de passage-way de day when we turn out to work. Yes, sir. Peters say de smell was strongest outside de doctor’s room. For days after she smell it. It take nearly a week to die away.’

  ‘And I take it the doctor’s room was locked up?’

  ‘Oh, yes, sir! When we turn out dat day after de holiday both de rooms over dat side lock up. From dat day dose two rooms never open. Never not once! And de mistress tell Peters dat why she lock dem up is so as to give Peters less work in cleaning up.’

  ‘Why did Peters leave Eltonsbrody, by the way?’

  ‘She get a better job in Bridgetown, sir.’

  ‘You’re quite certain it was on the day after the holiday that Peters first began to smell this funny smell?’

  ‘Yes sir. Oi sure ’bout dat. Soon as we turn out to work.’

  ‘That would be two days after the doctor’s death?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Thank you, Jackman. Interesting to hear about these little things. Well, don’t forget. As soon as you’re ready to leave just come and call me. I’ll be in the sitting-room.’ A little later, after seeing Miss Linton upstairs and searching the room to make sure that nothing odd had been planted anywhere during our absence, I returned downstairs and settled down in the one comfortable chair in the sitting-room to smoke and wait for Jackman’s call.

  The draughts, as usual, did not leave me alone. They circled about my head, crawled up my trousers legs, shivered their way down my neck, and the windows kept up their spasmodic rattling as the wind pushed at them. My old enemy, the epergne on the centre table, kept slithering into my range of vision, tantalising, elegant and ghostly. Now and then it would become merged with a drifting puff of smoke from my cigarette, and in these moments it seemed to smile and nod at me behind the uncertain temporary veil.

  I was relieved when I heard Jackman’s footsteps in the dining-­room. She said she was ready to go, and I accompanied her out through the kitchen door. The back garden was dark, but my eyes soon grew accustomed to the darkness as we moved round the side of the house along the pathway that led to the front garden and the driveway. The dogs barked and whined in their kennels, and Jackman said that her mistress had told McTurk not to release them. I made no comment, and a minute later wished her good night and stood at the tall iron gate watching her go out of sight along the road. She lived about half a mile away, she had told me.

  It was good inhaling the fragrant night air. Now and then a leaf from the mahogany trees would brush past me in the wind and make a light lisp as it skimmed along the ground before coming to rest.

  Instead of returning into the house, I went round in the direction of the goat-pens. Flashing on the electric torch I had got from my room after dinner, I brought the beam to bear on the ground everywhere in the vicinity of the poultry-runs and the goat-pens.

  Walter and Patrick began to bark with renewed vigour, straining at their leashes. The kennels stood only a few yards from where I was.

  Ignoring them, I kept playing the beam of my torch here and there along the ground. But I could find nothing suspicious. The ground was hard and dry, and it was useless to look for impressions. I doubt whether ‘a heavy box’ made even out of lead or iron would have left any marks.

  Still not satisfied, I turned my attention to the track that led through the kitchen garden towards Tappin’s tool-shed. I glanced from side to side, flashing the light of the torch on at frequent intervals. Once I thought I heard a sound behind me and, glancing back, nearly walked on to a bed of lettuce. A sense of uneasiness crept over me as I went on. The star-light was bright, and I could make out the track without the aid of the torch, but it gave me more confidence to keep playing the beam about.

  An insect clicked and made a swift arc through the light, and it startled me so much I had to come to a halt. The inclination to turn back and make a dash for the house was almost overbearing.

  Suddenly Patrick began to howl, taking a high, mournful note that seemed to end on a human-like groan, and I found myself remembering that dogs were supposed to be psychic and could sense the presence of death. Was Patrick howling because he could divine what I could not?

  I was passing the cassava plants now. Their slim, knotted stalks looked like night-black skeletons on my right. Had they begun to hop and skip about in a silent dance of death I think I wouldn’t have been very surprised. Anything macabre seemed possible at any instant.

  I emerged into the clearing where Tappin’s tool-shed stood. The sight of it reassured me. Tappin’s goodnatured aura seemed to hang round it, dispelling evil influences. The mahogany tree, too, nearby inspired me with confidence. Its weathered trunk had a look of solidity and safety. It seemed contemptuous of everything sinister and phantasmal.

  I flashed the light round the clearing. Nothing terrifying to see. Yet my uneasiness began to return. Some sense warned me that I was being watched, warned me to be on the alert.

  Tingling all over, I moved round behind the tool-shed. My foot stumbled against something that gave out a dull, hollow thud. I looked down and saw what it was.

  On the leafy ground, pushed right up against the rear wall of the shed, was a rough wooden coffin.

  17

  Above me the foliage of the mahogany tree hissed in the wind as at any other time, but to my fancy at this moment the sound had a special significance. It was like the rasping breath of a ghoul perched on the limb right above me.

  Steeling myself, I reached forward and lifted the lid of the coffin.

  It was empty. There was no corpse in it as I had dreaded. But something else that caught my attention increased my uneasiness. On the ground nea
r the head of the coffin there was a Gladstone bag, old and very battered looking. It was half-open, and the beam of my torch revealed inside it a collection of surgical instruments. I stooped and opened the bag wide. Just inside, under the middle catch, on a worn silk lining, I read in faded gold letters the name Simeon Borkum.

  In the bag I recognised two scalpels, forceps of different sizes, a surgical saw, catheters, a dissector, a gouge.

  I did not wait to investigate further. I hurried back towards the house, deciding that I must see Mrs. Scaife at once about my find. My nerves were in a ragged state now or I might not have acted in this precipitate manner. I dashed up the stairs three at a time.

  Miss Linton was at the door of the patient’s room, apparently awaiting me. But I hardly gave her a glance. I flew past and charged up the corridor to the door of the room which Mrs. Scaife now occupied.

  I hammered on the panels, noting that a yellow streak of light showed under the door. The door opened at once. Mrs. Scaife was in her olive-green dressing-gown. She gave me a look of surprise. ‘What’s it, Mr. Woodsley? Where’s the fire?’

  ‘Look, I’ve found something, Mrs. Scaife,’ I said, panting from my exertions. ‘I was having a look behind the tool-shed.’

  She recoiled slightly. ‘Don’t tell me it’s a murdered corpse you’ve stumbled upon, Mr. Woodsley!’

  ‘This is no time for fooling,’ I snapped. ‘There is a coffin behind the tool-shed. And a Gladstone bag with surgical instruments near it.’

  She smiled in her old twinkling, affectionate manner and exclaimed: ‘What a young man you are for investigating! Good gracious! What next won’t you discover! A coffin, indeed! And surgical instruments! I congratulate you, my boy! Well done!’

  ‘I think I told you I’m serious!’

  ‘Surely you don’t expect me to take you seriously. A coffin behind the tool-shed! And a Gladstone bag of surgical instruments! No, please! This is too much for a poor old lady with bad nerves!’ She wagged her head and sighed. ‘Good heavens! What is Eltonsbrody coming to that coffins are going to appear within these grounds! And surgical instruments!’