The Property of Lies

by Marjorie Eccles

  ‘Any girl in particular?’

  ‘I’ve no idea.’

  A gift from one of the girls? Possibly. It wasn’t a piece of jewellery she was at all likely to have chosen herself, not in view of that expensive watch she’d been wearing. She might perhaps have worn it occasionally, to school, as kindness to the child who’d given it, but he wondered why she’d been wearing it on the night she died, when she was all dressed up. He also wondered if wearing her glad rags had been for a rendezvous with Deegan; though, if so, Maxstead would seem to have been a decidedly odd place to choose for it.

  ‘Where did you spend your time together?’ he asked, trying for the most delicate way of putting it. Deegan either didn’t notice the implication, or chose not to, but he still looked discomfited.

  ‘Here. I used to fetch her in my car, whenever she could get away.’ He interpreted the silence and gave a short laugh. ‘Not here in this room, of course. I’m living in the back.’

  ‘Is it likely she left anything behind?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’ He seemed uncertain and, after a long hesitation, he said there might possibly be one or two things. ‘She might have, I suppose. You’d better come and look.’

  They followed him along the passage, along the usual arrangement in houses of this type – two rooms, one behind the other, and the kitchen beyond – into a living room so spectacularly untidy and crammed with furniture it was hard to grasp at first glance how anyone could even find their way through it all, never mind a place to sit down. Possibly fairly clean, although a glimpse into the kitchen made Reardon glad they hadn’t been offered tea. It was impossible to tell whether there was dust or anything else under the welter of discarded clothing, old newspapers, several used items of crockery and sundry other miscellaneous objects. And Deegan obviously had a serious addiction to Cadbury’s Fruit and Nut, judging by the number of wrappers tossed around. A dusty three-piece tapestry suite formed a little island in the centre, chairs and sofa touching each other, and a bed settee, still observing its function as a bed, and unmade, was somewhere at the far end, its slept-in sheets scrunched up in a tangled mess. Chaos didn’t begin to describe it.

  Did Deegan even see what it looked like? Not normally, that was plain, but now, viewing it through someone else’s eyes, he looked around and spread his hands. ‘Camping out,’ he offered feebly.

  How was it possible it had got into this state in the short time Deegan had occupied the house? Only by moving in and dumping all his worldly possessions into this one room. In a way that made sense – having everything together, he could forget about taking care of the rest of the house. If this sort of disorder extended to his business life, he was in trouble.

  He did, however, appear to be one of those people who could and did compartmentalize their lives, ruthless enough to be able to shove aside what he thought was unimportant in order to concentrate on what was. Amid all the confusion, there was an open roll-front desk wedged into a corner, where papers were neatly stacked, pens and pencils sprouted from a jar and files were set in orderly fashion on its top.

  Deegan was looking helplessly round at the shambles of the rest of the room, understandably enough. Where even to begin searching? ‘Hold on, there’s a box somewhere she asked me to keep,’ he said suddenly, clapping a hand to his forehead as he remembered.

  He swept papers off a small chest and groped about in the top drawer, finally coming up with an old, flat chocolate box with a picture on the lid of a simpering Gibson Girl with Cupid’s bow lips and quantities of hair. Across the corner a large red ribbon bow which had been stuck on as a decoration still adhered, now faded to a tattered pink. He handed it over and, as Gilmour lifted the lid, a musky perfume arose. Inside was a small collection of jewellery: a seed pearl necklet, a string of corals, and a couple of rings with semi-precious stones, pretty but none of it looking very valuable. The source of the perfume was a small, attar-of-roses scent-card, meant for a handbag or a handkerchief drawer, priced at one penny, sold for the Queen Alexandra nursing charity. Resting on it was a well-thumbed miniature book of illustrated French fairy tales, the print so tiny it was scarcely decipherable.

  These were personal mementoes, childish treasures of the deceased woman, pathetic in a way that brought her to life more than even the snapshot had been able to convey. As Reardon flicked through the tiny book he found, folded and tucked inside but protruding slightly, a scrap of paper that seemed to be have been torn from the last sheet of a letter, almost covered with spiky French handwriting. He scanned it quickly.

  ‘What does it say?’ asked Gilmour.

  ‘It’s presumably from her aunt, since she signs herself “Tante Mathilde”. Basically, she’s refusing to give Isabelle some information she seems to have written for. She warns her that she’s playing a dangerous game, and tells her not to involve anyone else.’ The tone of the letter was sharp and reproving. It looked as though it had once been screwed up and then smoothed out.

  ‘And?’

  ‘That’s it. Not going to help much, is it?’ Except that it was proof of a sort that Isabelle’s purpose in coming to England had possibly not been entirely innocent.

  He turned the paper over. On the back were a few scribbles, the tentative beginnings of what might have been a reply. But if it was, it wasn’t one to the sender, since it was written in English and began, Dear Nol. Each attempt was scribbled out, as though it might have been a tricky letter to write, each beginning heavily scored through. I have heard from … I have to tell you … I have had no luck. And that was all.

  ‘Do you know anything about this letter, Mr Deegan?’ Reardon asked, showing it to him but keeping hold of it.

  But Deegan, having peered at it, looked as mystified as they were.

  ‘Ever heard her mention anyone called Nol?’

  ‘Funny name. Nol? No, never. I’d remember if I’d heard that, wouldn’t I.’

  ‘Maybe it’s a nickname,’ Reardon said. ‘Short for Oliver? Like Old Noll. That’s how Oliver Cromwell was known, wasn’t he?’

  Gilmour had long since ceased to be surprised at what Reardon could come out with. ‘Or even for Olivia,’ he tried himself, not to be outdone.

  ‘Well, I don’t recall her ever mentioning anyone called Oliver, or Olivia, either,’ Deegan said. He flopped down on the bed and sat looking miserable and defeated, as if the stuffing had been knocked out of him. Whatever else, the fact that Isabelle had been pregnant, and presumably with his child, had shattered him. Reardon hoped it was the only thing that he was feeling guilty about.

  ‘Why did she leave this box with you?’

  ‘Oh, she didn’t trust the maids at Maxstead,’ he said absently, wrapped in his own thoughts. ‘She said they poked about in her things and she didn’t want to lose these.’

  ‘We’d like to keep this, Mr Deegan,’ Reardon said, waving the letter.

  ‘Take the lot, I’ve no use for any of it.’ As he held the door open for them to leave, he said, ‘I would have married her, you know.’

  ‘I wonder if he would?’ Easy to say, isn’t? Gilmour remarked as they walked down the street.

  ‘I don’t know.’ The truth was, Reardon didn’t believe he had quite got the hang of Deegan. He was no fool, and he must realize he was a prime suspect. The pregnancy apart, he could be putting on quite an act. Reardon didn’t really see him as a murderer, though he’d seen enough of them to know he’d met more unlikely ones. ‘One thing that puzzles me,’ he said. ‘That letter, from this Tante Mathilde. It wasn’t particularly friendly, you’d have thought she’d have chucked it away. What was the point in keeping it?’

  He thought he would show it to Ellen. It had seemed perfectly clear, but his French wasn’t such that he might not have missed some nuance that she might pick up to indicate why it had been kept.

  EIGHT

  Ellen has taken the first available train home and arrived in Folbury at an early hour. A visit to the capital where she had once lived and worked has been
such a treat. She loves the bustle there, the crowds and the sense of life and things happening, but Folbury – or more correctly, anywhere where Reardon is – is now home, which means a great deal more. She has a lot to tell him and it’s disappointing to find he has already left for work, though he has set the table for her breakfast and propped a note against the teapot. She has only spoken to him on the telephone, to tell him she had arranged to stay over another night with Kate. The note is apologetic. Duty says he’s had to leave early to go over to Dudley and report to the new super before going on to Maxstead. Tolly has had his walk and is even now probably cadging a second breakfast with Horace Levett, their next door neighbour. He knows it’s one of her days at Maxstead, so he’ll look out for her there. With love and a few more remarks which bring a smile to her face.

  She goes to see Horace, who lives in the nearest semi, to have a word before she leaves, and finds the little old man already at work, perched on a stool like a busy elf in a fairy tale, performing magic at the table under his window. Before his retirement he had owned a small jeweller’s shop, with a sideline in watch repairing, and people still bring timepieces for him to mend, which he does with skill and for only a token payment, no matter how clapped-out the clocks might seem. He looks up from the glasses perched on the end of his nose and smiles the smile which transforms his ugly face into something memorable and heart-warming.

  With a volley of frenzied barks, Tolly launches himself fervently at Ellen, forgiving her for abandoning him by trying to knock her down and wash her face with his tongue.

  ‘All right, Tolly, I’m delighted to see you, but that’s enough for now,’ she says, giving him a hug and kissing the top of his head.

  The old man has been lonely since his wife of over fifty years died and was delighted when neighbours with a dog which needed occasional dog-minding moved into the old house at the end of the street. They had taken to each other from the first, he and the dog. Tolly is happy in both houses, Horace’s or his own, he can take it or leave it. He knows he’s on to a good thing; he’ll get his dinner either way and keeps his options open. His main priority is food, he’s a thief of the first order where it’s concerned, and neither is he averse to an extra walk, even though he’s just had one.

  He sits near the door where his lead hangs, staring fixedly at Ellen in silent reproach as she makes no move to take it down. ‘Are you happy to have Tolly again today, Horace?’ she asks, superfluously.

  ‘Happy any day, you know that m’duck.’ Horace has never lost his regional accent, or the habit of hospitality. ‘Cuppa tea?’

  ‘No thanks, I’ve just had breakfast. But I’ve brought you this.’ She hands him a box of Florentines from Kate’s favourite delicatessen, knowing what a sweet tooth he has. They chat for a while about her visit to the capital, while Tolly goes to sit on the staircase that leads from the living room, contemplating suicide as Ellen presently prepares to leave without him. She kisses the top of his head again and, as she starts up her car, sees he has leapt up on to the chair beside Horace’s window and is watching sorrowfully as she leaves.

  She drives over to Maxstead in an optimistic frame of mind and, as she steers into the parking spot by a rear entrance to which she’s been allocated, she feels how good it is to be back in her own work environment. She hadn’t admitted, even to herself, how much her real work is part of her, and it’s only to Kate so far that she’s confessed what the return to it has meant. Reardon himself knows without being told, without any need to have it pointed out.

  The police car has already arrived, so Gilmour at least is here. If her husband has gone over to Dudley as he intended, he must have ridden over on his motorbike again. It’s begun to worry her a little, that he’s still riding it, but it might be more than her life’s worth to even hint that maybe he’s not as young as he was, that he won’t see forty again. She leaves the Morris and makes her way into the school via the back entrance. Her previous stints here, taking separate Lower School classes, have gone down fairly well. She can’t rate it better than that, because while her pupils have all given her a gratifying attention, though not without a certain curiosity, it’s unusual to find girls of that age quite so obedient and industrious. She’s a new broom, of course, and they haven’t yet got the measure of her and how easy she might or might not be. On the other hand, considering what’s happened to their previous French teacher, their quietness is understandable. Such a tragedy is highly unlikely to have entered their young lives before. What had happened to Isabelle Blanchard is sufficient to sober even the liveliest of girls and, if what Marian Golding had said was true, Isabelle Blanchard had been quite a favourite with them – contrary to what the staff had thought of her. Maybe that was because she’d had a more laissez-faire approach than the girls are used to from teachers, or maybe it was just because she was different – foreign, sophisticated, pretty clothes. Scent. It’s by no means unusual for teachers like her to have this sort of effect on adolescent girls. ‘Pashes’ on teachers they admire and want to copy are a fact of life. Ellen fears they may find they have a poor substitute in her.

  Her first lesson is with 5a. As she is walking towards their form room, she almost collides with Miss Draper, distracted and even more all over the place than usual, if possible, as she clutches Ellen’s arm. ‘Oh, Mrs Reardon, there you are, thank goodness! Is your husband with you?’

  ‘No, but he’ll be here soon, I expect. Is there something wrong, Miss Draper?’ she asks, an obviously superfluous question.

  Miss Draper inelegantly blows a damp strand of hair from her hot face and yanks it back behind her ear. ‘One of the girls is missing!’ she declares dramatically.

  ‘Missing? Good Heavens! Which girl?’

  Josie Pemberton, it seems, one of the senior girls Ellen hasn’t yet met. Miss Hillyard has already questioned the girls she shares a room with, but so far all they’ve been able to say is that she hadn’t been there when they woke that morning. They are in trouble, because for some reason best known to themselves they hadn’t seen fit to mention that fact to anyone, and it was only at Assembly that Josie’s non-appearance had been made apparent.

  Miss Draper is almost in tears. ‘We’re all at sixes and sevens. I’ve set Daphne Cash and Miss Scholes to search the whole school, but there’s been no sign of her. ‘Let’s just hope she hasn’t had some sort of accident.’ Her face registers horror at what she’s just said, the fate of Mam’selle clearly uppermost in her mind.

  ‘Is it possible she’s run away?’ Ellen asks uncertainly, to steer her on to another track. Maxstead Court is no Dotheboys Hall, but she can think of all sorts of reasons why a child would hate boarding school. Being separated from her parents and family, missing some sort of treat she might have been having with them, or even pining for her pet dog, anything. Such things can – and do – run deep with children. On the other hand, Josie is no longer a child, in that sense. She’s nearly sixteen, and presumably long adjusted to the trials of life in a boarding school.

  ‘Is there any chance she might be hiding? As a joke?’ It’s a feeble suggestion, but she can’t prevent those other ‘incidents’ which haven’t yet been fully explained to her from crossing her mind.

  ‘Hiding? Why on earth should she? Oh, gosh, the attics!’ Miss Draper’s hand goes to her chest, as if to order her heart not to cause further trouble. ‘No, no, she wouldn’t, they’re strictly forbidden to the girls – and why would she go up there anyway, when they’re only used for storing trunks and so on?’ She blanches, as frightening possibilities occur to her. There are doors from the attics with access to the roof, opening on to the leads, acres of rooftops with dangerous gullies between, and the narrow parapet which overlooks the Quad below – where Mam’selle’s body had been found. The potential for accidents is endless.

  ‘A dare?’ Ellen suggests tentatively, then wishes she hadn’t when Miss Draper looks even more horrified, though she doesn’t dismiss the idea out of hand.

  ‘Oh, Lord,
perish the thought, but yes, you could be right! Josie has plenty of spirit. I believe she has an older brother at university, too, and you know what those graduates are with those rags of theirs, climbing to the top of monuments and leaving things and …’ Her voice trails off. Someone will have to venture out on to the roof, it’s clear. But who, among all these women, will have the pluck?

  At that moment, Sergeant Gilmour appears in the hall and Miss Draper falls upon him as though Mafeking has been relieved.

  ‘What’s happening?’ asked Reardon a few minutes later as Gilmour came into the cubbyhole/storeroom which everyone seemed to be calling the police room, though it was just a convenience, somewhere to park their papers, talk to people. At the present moment, the police presence was limited to himself and Gilmour, until the department’s two DCs joined them to begin another, more thorough search of the derelict east wing, even though it was unlikely to produce much further in the way of results.

  ‘A girl’s gone missing,’ Gilmour answered, his face as long as a wet weekend. It was also very red, and he was sweating. He had spent the last fifteen minutes on the roof, crawling all over it and trying not to look down, searching for a girl who definitely wasn’t there.

  ‘What?’

  ‘And Miss Hillyard wants to see you in her study. Me as well,’ he added, not happily. Miss Hillyard put the fear of God into him. Lowlifes twice his own size he could deal with, but clever women like her could reduce him to a pulp, though he’d be the last to own up to that.

  Along with Miss Hillyard and a flustered-looking Miss Draper, they found Ellen herself also in the study, which didn’t please Reardon. Not that it didn’t lift his heart to see her after what seemed like an absence of weeks, rather than three days, but she had already been caught up more than either of them liked in the tragedy which had happened here, and he could see she was looking slightly ruffled at being drawn into this new development. He badly wanted to put his arms round her and say hello in a manner hardly appropriate at this moment. They exchanged a slight smile, in his case apologetic, acknowledging that it was maybe his fault she’d been roped in, and hers reassuring and saying that it wasn’t. They settled themselves to listen as Miss Hillyard hurriedly launched into explanations.