A La Carte

by Jeffrey Archer

  But it did not work out quite like that.

  The children, in their different ways, were friendly enough. Tamsin was even quite talkative once her initial shyness wore off. She had a way of tossing her head so that the blonde pigtails shook, like a show pony shaking its mane. Tara was more silent and physically frailer. But she sprang into life whenever Tamsin felt the need to contradict her, as being her elder and better. Arguing with Tamsin made even Tara quite animated. You could imagine both settling down quite easily once the double shock of Zillah’s death and their real mother’s arrival had been assimilated.

  Nevertheless, something was odd. It was instinct not reason that guided her. Reason told her that Mrs Parr’s accusations were absurd. But then nagging instinct would not leave her in peace. She had interviewed too many subjects, she told herself, to be wrong now … Then reason reasserted itself once more, with the aid of the children’s perfectly straightforward account of their past. They referred quite naturally to their life in Sussex.

  ‘We went to a horrid school with nasty rough boys —’ began Tara.

  ‘It was a lovely school,’ interrupted Tamsin. ‘I played football with the boys in my break. Silly little girls like Tara couldn’t do that.’ All of this accorded with the facts given by the lawyer: how the girls had attended the local primary school which was fine for the tomboy Tamsin, not so good for the shrinking Tara. They would have gone to the reputedly excellent school in Kildrum when the Scottish term started had it not been for the death of Zillah.

  Nevertheless, something was odd, strange, not quite right.

  Was it perhaps the fact that the girls never seemed to talk amongst themselves which disconcerted her? After considerable pondering on the subject, Jemima decided that the silence of Tamsin and Tara when alone – no happy or unhappy sounds coming out of their playroom or bedroom – was the most upsetting thing about them. Even the sporadic quarrelling brought on by Tamsin’s bossiness ceased. Yet Jemima’s experience of children was that sporadic quarrels in front of grown-ups turned to outright war in private. But she was here as an investigator not as a child analyst (who might or might not have to follow later). Who was she to estimate the shock effect of Zillah’s death, in front of their own eyes? Perhaps their confidence had been so rocked by the boating accident that they literally could not speak when alone. It was, when all was said and done, a minor matter compared to the evident correlation of the girls’ stories with their proper background.

  And yet … There was after all the whole question of Zillah’s absent nieces. Now, was that satisfactorily dealt with or not? Torn between reason and instinct Jemima found it impossible to make up her mind. She naturally raised the subject, in what she hoped to be a discreet manner. For once it was Tara who answered first:

  ‘Oh, no, we never see them. You see they went to America for Christmas and they didn’t come back.’ She sounded quite blithe.

  ‘Canada, silly,’ said Tamsin.

  ‘Same thing.’

  ‘It’s not, silly.’

  ‘It is—’

  ‘Christmas?’ pressed Jemima.

  ‘They went for a Christmas holiday to America. Aunt Kitty took them and they never came back.’

  ‘They went forever’ interrupted Tamsin fiercely. They went to Canada and they went forever. That’s what Zillah said. Aunt Kitty doesn’t even send us Christmas cards.’ Were the answers, as corrected by Tamsin, a little too pat?

  A thought struck Jemima. Later that night she consulted Mrs Parr. If Zillah’s sister had been her next of kin, had not the lawyers tried to contact her on Zillah’s death? Slightly reluctantly Mrs Parr admitted that the lawyers had tried and so far failed to do so. ‘Oddly enough it seemed I was Zillah’s next of kin after Kitty,’ she added. But Kitty had emigrated to Canada (yes, Canada, Tamsin as usual was right) several years earlier and was at present address unknown. And she was supposed to have taken her two daughters with her.

  It was at this point Jemima decided to throw in her hand. In her opinion the investigation was over, the Parr children had emerged with flying colours, and as for their slight oddity, well, that was really only to be expected, wasn’t it? Under the circumstances. It was time to get back to Megalith Television and the autumn series. She communicated her decision to Mrs Pan, before nagging instinct could resurrect its tiresome head again.

  ‘You don’t feel it then, Jemima?’ Mrs Parr sounded for the first time neither vehement nor dreamy but dimly hopeful. ‘You don’t sense something about them? That they’re hiding something? Something strange, unnatural …’

  ‘No, I do not,’ answered Jemima Shore firmly.

  ‘And if I were you, Catharine’ – they had evolved a spurious but convenient intimacy during their days in the lonely lodge – ‘I would put all such thoughts behind you. See them as part of the ordeal you have suffered, a kind of long illness. Now you must convalesce and recover. And help your children, your own children, to recover too.’ It was Jemima Shore at her most bracing. She hoped passionately not so much that she was correct about the children – with every minute she was more convinced of the rightness of reason, the falseness of instinct – but that Mrs Parr would now feel able to welcome them to her somewhat neurotic bosom. She might even give up drink.

  Afterwards Jemima would always wonder whether these were the fatal words which turned the case of the Parr children from a mystery into a tragedy. Could she even then have realised or guessed the truth? The silence of the little girls together: did she gloss too easily over that? But by that time it was too late.

  As it was, immediately Jemima had spoken, Mrs Parr seemed to justify her decision in the most warming way. She positively glowed with delight. For a moment Jemima had a glimpse of the dashing young woman who had thrown up her comfortable home to go off with the raggle-taggle-gypsies seven years before. This ardent and presumably attractive creature had been singularly lacking in the Mrs Parr she knew. She referred to herself now as ‘lucky Catharine Parr’, no longer the wretched Queen who lost her head. Jemima was reminded for an instant of one of the few subjects who had bested her in argument on television, a mother opposing organised schooling, like Catharine Parr a Bohemian. There was the same air of elation. The quick change was rather worrying. Lucky Catharine Parr: Jemima only hoped that she would be third time lucky as the sleeping car attendant had suggested. It rather depended on what stability she could show as a mother.

  ‘I promise you,’ cried Mrs Parr, interrupting a new train of thought, ‘I give you my word. I’ll never ever think about the past again. I’ll look after them to my dying day. I’ll give them all the love in the world, all the love they’ve missed all these years. Miss Shore, Jemima, I told you I trusted you. You’ve done all I asked you to do. Thank you, thank you,’

  The next morning dawned horribly wet. It was an added reason for Jemima to be glad to be leaving Kildrum Lodge. A damp Scottish August did not commend itself to her. With nothing further to do, the dripping rhododendrons surrounding the lodge were beginning to depress her spirits. Rain sheeted down on the loch, making even a brisk walk seem impractical. With the children still silent in their playroom and Mrs Parr still lurking upstairs for the kind of late morning rise she favoured, Jemima decided to make her farewell to Elspeth Maxwell in the kitchen.

  She was quickly trapped in the flood of Elspeth’s reflections, compared to which the rain outside seemed suddenly mild in contrast. Television intrigued Elspeth Maxwell in general, and Jemima, its incarnation, intrigued her in particular. She was avid for every detail of Jemima’s appearances on the box, how many new clothes she needed, television make-up and so forth. On the subject of hair, she first admired the colour of Jemima’s corn-coloured locks, then asked how often she had to have a shampoo, and finally enquired with a touch of acerbity:

  ‘You’ll not be putting anything on, then? I’m meaning the colour, what a beautiful bright colour your hair is, Miss Shore. You’ll not be using one of those little bottles?’

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p; Jemima smilingly denied it. I’m lucky.’ She wasn’t sure whether Elspeth believed her. After a bit Elspeth continued: ‘Not like that poor lady.’ She seemed obsessed with the subject. Was she thinking of dyeing her own hair? The late Mrs Parr, I mean, when I cleared out her things, I found plenty of bottles, different colours, dark and fair, as though she’d been making a wee experiment. And she had lovely fair hair herself, or so they said, Johnnie and the men, when they took her out of the water. Just like the children. Look —’ Elspeth suddenly produced two bottles from out of the kitchen cupboard. One was called Goldilocks and the other Brown Leaf. Jemima thought her guess was right. Elspeth was contemplating her own wee experiment.

  Tm thinking you’ll not be needing this on your natural fair hair.’ There was a faint ironic emphasis in Elspeth’s tone. ‘And Tamsin and Tara, they’ll have lovely hair too when they grow up. They won’t need Goldilocks or such things. And who would want Brown Leaf anyway with lovely fair hair like theirs? And yours. Brown Leaf would only hide the colour.’ Elspeth put the bottles back in the cupboard as though that settled the matter.

  Irritated by her malice – there was nothing wrong with dyeing one’s hair but Jemima just did not happen to do it – Jemima abandoned Elspeth and the kitchen for the nursery. Nevertheless, Elspeth’s words continued to ring in her head. That and another remark she could not forget. Tamsin and Tara were both reading quietly, lying on their tummies on the door. Tamsin looked up and smiled.

  ‘When will the programme be, Miss Shore?’ she asked brightly. ‘When will you come back and film us? Oh, I’m so sad you’re going away.’

  Jemima was standing by the mantelpiece. It had a large mirror over it, which gave some light to the dark room. In the mirror she gazed back into the room, at the striking blonde heads of the two children lying on the floor. It was of course a mirror image, reversed. The sight was symbolical. It was as though for the first time she was seeing the case of the Parr children turned inside out, reversed, black white, dark fair … Lucky children with their mother restored to them. A mother who drank and smoked and was totally undomesticated. But was still their mother. Zillah had done none of these things – but she had done worse: she had tried to keep the children from the mother who bore them. Lucky. Third time lucky.

  Jemima stood absolutely still. Behind her back Tamsin smiled again that happy innocent smile. Tara was smiling too.

  ‘Oh yes, Miss Shore,’ she echoed, Tm so sad you’re going away.’ For once Tara was in total agreement with her sister. And in the mirror Jemima saw both girls dissolve into soundless giggles, hands over the mouth to stifle the noise. She continued to stare at the children’s blonde heads.

  With sudden horrible clarity, Jemima knew that she was wrong, had been wrong all along. She would have to tell the woman resting upstairs that the children were not after all her own. A remark that had long haunted her came to the front of her mind. Catharine Parr: ‘Just like the wretched Queen who lost her head, and I’m just as wretched.’ And now she knew why it had haunted her. Catharine Parr had not been executed by Henry VIII, but she had been childless by him. Now she would have to break it to Mrs Parr that she too was childless. Would be childless in the future.

  It had to be done. There was such a thing as truth. Truth – and justice. But first, however dreadfully, she had to confront the children with what they had done. She had to make them admit it.

  Wheeling round, she said as calmly as possible to the little girls: Tm just going to drive to the telephone box to arrange with my secretary about my return. This telephone is out of order with the storm last night.’ She thought she could trust Tamsin to accept that story. Then Jemima added:

  ‘And when I come back, we’ll go out in the boat. Will you tell your — ’ she paused in spite of herself — ‘Will you tell your Mummy that?’

  The children were not smiling now.

  ‘The boat!’ exclaimed Tamsin. ‘But our Mummy can’t swim. She told us.’ She sounded tearful. ‘She told us not to go in the boat, and anyway we don’t want to. She told us we’d never ever have to go in the boat again.’

  ‘Oh don’t make us go in the horrid boat, Miss Shore,’ Tara’s eyes were wide with apprehension. ‘Please don’t. We can’t swim. We never learnt yet.’

  ‘I can swim,’ replied Jemima, ‘I’m a strong swimmer. Will you give your Mummy my message?’

  When Jemima got back, Mrs Parr was standing with Tamsin and Tara by the door of the lodge, holding their hands (the first time Jemima had glimpsed any sign of physical affection in her). She was looking extremely distressed. She was wearing a filthy torn mackintosh in which she had first appeared at Jemima’s flat. Her appearance, which had improved slightly over the last few days, was as unkempt and desperate as it had been on that weird-occasion.

  ‘Miss Shore, you mustn’t do this,’ she cried, the moment Jemima was out of the car. We can’t go out in the boat. It’s terrible for the children after – after what happened. Besides, I can’t swim —’

  ‘I’m sorry, Catharine,’ was all Jemima said. She did not relish what she had to do.

  Perhaps because she was childless herself Jemima Shore believed passionately that young children were basically innocent whatever they did. After all, had the Parr children ever really had a chance in life since its disturbed beginnings? And now she, the alleged protector of the weak, the compassionate social campaigner, was going to administer the coup de grâce. She wished profoundly that she had not answered the bell to Mrs Parr that fatal Sunday morning.

  The rain had stopped. The weather was clearing above the mountains in the west although the sky over the loch remained sullen. In silence the little party entered the rowing boat and Jemima pushed off from the soft ground of the foreshore.

  ‘Come on, Tamsin, sit by me. Row like you did that afternoon with Zillah.’

  Mrs Parr gave one more cry:

  ‘Miss Shore! No.’ Then she relapsed with a sort of groan into the seat of the stern of the boat. Tara sat beside her, facing Jemima and Tamsin.

  After a while Jemima rested on her oar. They were near the middle of the loch. The lodge looked small and far away, the mountains behind less menacing. Following the rain the temperature had risen. Presently the sun came out. It was quite humid. Flies buzzed round Jemima’s head and the children. Soon the midges would come to torture them. The water had a forbidding look: she could see thick green weeds floating just beneath the surface. An occasional fish rose and broke the black surface. No one was visible amongst the reeds. They were, the silent boatload, alone on the loch.

  Or perhaps they were not alone. Perhaps Johnnie Maxwell the ghillie was somewhere amid the sedge, at his work. If so he would have seen yet another macabre sight on Loch Drum. He would have seen Jemima Shore, her red-gold hair illuminated by the sunlight, lean forward and grab Tara from her seat. He would have seen her hurl the little girl quite far into the lake, like some human Excalibur. He would have heard the loud splash, seen the spreading circles on the black water. Then he would surely, even at the edge of the loch – for the air was very still after the rain – have heard Tara’s cries. But even if Johnnie Maxwell had been watching, he would have been once again helpless to have saved the drowning person.

  Mrs Parr gave a single loud scream and stood up at the stern of the boat. Jemima Shore sat grimly still, like a figure of vengeance. Tamsin got to her feet, wielded her oar and tried in vain to reach out to the child, splashing hopelessly now on, now under the surface of the loch. Jemima Shore continued to sit still.

  When a child’s voice was heard, half choking with water:

  ‘Zillah, save me! Zillah!’

  It seemed as though the woman standing at the stern of the boat would never move. Suddenly, uncontrollably, she tore off her white mackintosh. And without further hesitation, she made a perfect racing dive onto the surface of the loch. Minutes later Tara, still sobbing and spluttering, but alive, was safely out of the water. Then for the first time since she had thrown Tara
into the loch, Jemima Shore made a move – to pull the woman who had called herself Mrs Catharine Parr back into the boat again.

  The police are coming, of course,’ said Jemima. They were back at the house;. You killed her, didn’t you?’

  Tamsin and Tara, in dry clothes, had been sent out to play among the rhododendrons which served for a garden. The sun was gaining intensity. The loch had moved from black to grey to slate blue. Tara was bewildered. Tamsin was angry.

  ‘Goodbye, Mummy’ she said fiercely to Zillah.

  ‘Don’t make her pretend any longer,’ Jemima too appealed to Zillah. And to Tamsin: ‘I know you see. I’ve known for some time.’

  Tamsin then turned to her sister: ‘Baby. You gave it away. You promised never to call her Zillah. Now they’ll come and take Zillah away. I won’t ever speak to you again.’ And Tamsin ran off into the dark shrubberies.

  Zillah Parr, wearing some of her own clothes fished out of Elspeth’s packages, was sitting with Jemima by the playroom fire. She looked neat and clean and reassuring, a child’s dream mother, as she must always have looked during the last seven years. Until she deliberately assumed the messy run-down identity of Mrs Parr that is. How this paragon must have hated to dirty her fingernails! Jemima noticed that she had seized the opportunity to scrub them vigorously while she was upstairs in the bathroom changing.

  Now the mirror reflected a perfectly composed woman, legs in nice shoes, neatly crossed, sipping the glass of whisky which Jemima had given her.

  ‘Why not?’ said Zillah coolly. ‘I never drink you know, normally. Unlike her. Nor do I smoke. I find both things quite disgusting. As for pretending to be drunk! I used to pour all those wine bottles down the sink. But I never found a good way of producing cigarette stubs without smoking. Ugh, the smell. I never got used to it. But I feel I may need the whisky this afternoon.’