Dandy Gilver and a Deadly Measure of Brimstone

by Catriona McPherson

  His words about the blunting of bad news had hit home in me and I meant it when I assured him that I would not go making trouble for nothing, not me. He smiled and spoke again, but what he said surprised me.

  ‘There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in your philosophy,’ were his words. Startling ones to hear issuing from a policeman’s lips. ‘Would you agree with that, Mrs Gilver?’

  ‘Up to a point,’ I replied. ‘What bearing does it have on this matter, though?’

  ‘Well put, madam,’ said the sergeant. ‘What a lovely way of speech you have.’ He took a deep breath. ‘She had a shock. She got a fright.’ I nodded; he had already said this much. Finally he got to the point: ‘She saw a ghost.’

  ‘A ghost.’ It was not a question. I am not at all sure what it was, beyond an echo.

  ‘Earlier in the day. And she went back at night to see it again. It was too much for a woman of her years, not to mention her size. Her heart gave out. She was fighting for life when they found her.’

  ‘A ghost,’ I said again.

  ‘They don’t know which one,’ said Simpson. ‘She never told them.’

  ‘Are there lots?’

  ‘A fair few.’

  I was at a loss for words, a deep and enduring loss which went on beyond all the bounds of normal conversational pauses, beyond silences and well into rudeness, and yet I had no expectation of it ending. Sergeant Simpson sat forward, both hands on his desk, and peered at me.

  ‘I don’t believe in ghosts, Mrs Gilver. I’m not saying any of it was true.’

  ‘Oh!’ The spell was broken and I could talk again.

  ‘Good heavens above!’ said Simpson. ‘I’m an elder of the kirk and my father was the session clerk. My wife runs the Sunday school, too. I’ve no time for nonsense, none at all. But Mrs Addie … She saw a shadow, or heard a sound, and she frightened herself out of her precious life. Now. You can see why we wouldn’t want to tell her family the poor lady was as daft as all that!’

  ‘When you put it that way, Sergeant,’ I said, ‘I do begin to.’

  And so it was that when I rang up Alec that evening I was able to steal his thunder in the most resounding style. I was in Grant’s clutches for a while first, to be sure, as I had expected to be.

  ‘Never,’ she had said. ‘Never in all my years. I mean, I’ve seen you in some states after a day’s shooting and I’ve been that busy with the invalids this last while, you’ve been more tousled than I’d like. But this! What have you been doing? Where have you been?’ She was helping me out of my coat and my shirt as she scolded me; clearly I was to have my head stuck under one of the sprays for an actual washing, no matter how recently I had had one and how long she had hoped it would last me.

  ‘I was—’ I began, but she was not finished.

  ‘And don’t blame the weather,’ she said, driving me down onto my knees beside the bath. ‘Madam. For Mrs Tilling and Mr Pallister and me have been out in the woods for a nice walk and there’s not a hint of drizzle about it. What did you do?’

  ‘I had a Turkish bath, Grant,’ I said, just as she bent me over the side. ‘And it was wonderful. Quite delightful. My skin feels like silk and my—’

  ‘Your skin is under your clothes,’ she said. ‘Your hair feels like wool, same as it looks. Wild wool. On a fence. In the rain.’ She rubbed the hair soap hard between her hands and set to work on me. My teeth were still chattering when I was sitting, head wrapped in a towel, waiting for her to heat her irons.

  ‘I’m glad to hear you had time for a walk, Grant,’ I said. ‘This is by way of helping Pallister and Mrs Tilling convalesce and you recover from your extra exertions, you know. Coming here, I mean. And if you decide to use the Hydro’s facilities, I’m sure we can come to some arrangement.’

  ‘That’s very generous of you, madam,’ Grant said. ‘I’ll tell the others. And thank you.’

  ‘I meant as to times, actually,’ I said. ‘One wouldn’t want—’ to meet one’s cook and maid stark naked in the plunge pool, was what I was thinking.

  ‘Oh, I’m sure,’ said Grant. ‘But this house runs itself, more or less, the size that it is and all electric with it.’ She had misunderstood me, which was probably best, and I let it be.

  Alec was most entertained by the notion when I mentioned the delicate matter later over the telephone.

  ‘You don’t mind total strangers, but close acquaintance is beyond the pale?’

  ‘Something like that,’ I agreed.

  ‘Mind you, Dorothea said she only goes at night when it’s empty.’

  ‘Dorothea?’ I asked. ‘Does her title stick in your throat a little, Alec? I never took you to be so old-fashioned as to baulk at a lady doctor.’

  ‘I’m not,’ he said. ‘I don’t. I just … Anyway, Miss Grant and Mrs Tilling would no more take off all their clothes and sit in a cloud of steam than they would—’

  ‘You’re probably right,’ I said. ‘I wonder about Pallister, though. If you meet him in the men’s Turkish, be a love and don’t tell me.’

  ‘I shan’t be in there either,’ Alec said. ‘I spent one rainy season in Nagpur as a child and the tummy bug I caught there is the stuff of legend amongst the Osborne clan. It put me off heat and humidity for life.’

  ‘Aren’t the germs in the drinking water?’ I said. ‘I don’t think they fly through the air.’

  ‘The power of association,’ said Alec. ‘I don’t suppose you’ve heard of Mr Pavlov and his salivating dogs.’

  ‘Don’t you?’ I retorted.

  ‘I was talking about that only this afternoon, in fact,’ said Alec. ‘And you’ll never guess to whom.’

  ‘Very likely not,’ I said. ‘Anyway, let me tell you about my chat with Sergeant Simpson.’

  ‘There’s more going on in this here Hydro than meets the eye,’ said Alec, talking over me. ‘I thought it was all mumbo-jumbo, I have to say, but the psychological angle is—’

  ‘I wonder if that’s what Hugh’s laughing up his sleeve over,’ I said. ‘Doesn’t seem all that likely.’

  ‘No, no, no,’ Alec said. ‘That’s quite another neck of the woods. Brother Laidlaw – can you believe they call him Tot? – has hit on a bit of a wheeze to keep the place afloat and lessen his boredom. No, I’m talking about Dr Laidlaw. She’s not that interested in hydropathy per se.’

  ‘I should say not.’ I laughed to remember it. ‘She seems to be in a world of her own.’

  ‘An ivory tower,’ Alec said. ‘She called me back for a second examination and we had a very interesting discussion instead. I don’t think she got as far as writing my name on the little card. So I’d be surprised if she’s even noticed what’s going on now.’

  ‘Tot’s latest wheeze?’ I said. ‘What is it?’

  ‘No, something else again,’ Alec said. ‘There are Dr Laidlaw Sr’s loyal patients who’ve been coming for years. Then there’s Tot’s crowd – rather a fast set, they are. But you will never guess who’s started arriving to make a third faction.’

  I thought of my eavesdropping in the steam room, and the strange bunch who had turned up in the foyer as I was leaving. I thought of Simpson’s revelation too.

  ‘What’s the bet?’ I asked.

  ‘First pick of the next juicy bit the case offers,’ said Alec.

  ‘Does that include shirking the next dull bit?’ I said.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘It’s a deal,’ I said. ‘I am spitting in my palm and holding it to the mouthpiece. I think the wave of new guests coming to the Hydro are … mediums.’ He was silent. ‘Spiritualists.’ Still nothing. ‘Ghost hunters, darling.’

  ‘Brava,’ said Alec, sounding about as pleased as someone who has just dropped his watch down a grating. ‘How did you know?’

  ‘And the next irksome task in this case,’ I said, ‘which I must say is beginning to get interesting, is to go back to Edinburgh to the Addies and delicately try to find out if their mother was the fanciful sort
who would see a shadow, call it a ghost and drop dead from the shock of it. A ticklish business to carry it off without offending or alerting them, I must say. I’m glad that it falls to you.’

  6

  Tuesday, 22nd October 1929

  Of course, I had to tell him how I knew, which rather diminished my glory.

  ‘Well, if you will send me off to interview policemen,’ I said, ‘you can’t complain if I turn up treasure.’

  ‘You really are being quite insufferable,’ Alec said. He recrossed his legs and took his pipe out of his pocket to stare at it in mourning. We were in the winter gardens, packed with the more solid sort of Hydro guests this morning as the rain fell steadily on the late summer gardens outside, and Alec had come a cropper on that very part of the Hydro’s organisation which had so pleased Hugh, namely that all the smoking rooms were gentlemen’s rooms and if one wanted to converse with ladies one had to lump it. He was particularly miffed because the ladies were allowed to smoke in the ladies’ drawing room, but not so the gentlemen who joined them there.

  ‘What’s the point of that?’ he said. ‘Hardly fair.’

  ‘I suppose if all the ladies were puffing away on briars and fat cigars, it would be a nonsense,’ I said, ‘but until they do, I for one think it’s perfectly just. Go and stink up the billiards room by all means and leave us be. Besides, no one’s allowed to smoke in here.’

  I was thankful of it. The winter gardens had soaring glass ceilings and were easily eighty feet from end to end, but even with the little air vents cranked open and the doors propped ajar they had a slightly Turkish feel about them on such a clammy morning. I supposed some of the guests installed in the basket-work armchairs which were dotted in groups around the walls must have braved the weather for some sort of airing before retreating in here, and so their outdoor clothes were gently steaming. Add to that the fact that there were orchids and palms and yet other exotics of unknown name arranged on staging at all the windows and planted in great clumps in the corners, the sort of plants that zealous gardeners will mist with water and even nicotine potions out of a pump spray every day if given their head, and it was hardly surprising that the air in the winter gardens felt like a warm drink, if not a square meal followed by a cigar, as one breathed it. It did not feel at all like the sort of place sickly people should pack into all together, especially after a soaking and the possibility of a chill.

  ‘Anyway,’ Alec said. His appetite for squabbling had been diminished by the prospect before him. ‘How would you go about asking if Mrs Addie believed in ghosts then?’

  ‘Very carefully,’ I replied. ‘I agree with the sergeant – no point in upsetting them. On the other hand, if she was fanciful perhaps they knew. Perhaps if they’re told that their mother thought she saw a ghost they’ll believe in the heart failure after all.’

  ‘Or perhaps they’re fanciful too,’ Alec said. ‘Perhaps they’ll think – or her daughter at least – that she did see one. We might have done all we need to already.’

  ‘We?’ I said. ‘What did you do? And why, pray, should the daughter be the one to swallow mumbo-jumbo and not the son?’ Alec tutted and since I had no wish to sound like a suffragette – all very worthy I am sure, but so dull at parties – I changed the subject back again. ‘You might start in by asking them what made her believe in hydropathy? That’s the dominant note of mumbo-jumbo around here. Or here’s a thought: ask their religion—’

  ‘Church of Scotland,’ Alec said. ‘You only had to look at them.’

  ‘—under cover of breaking the news that there was no clergyman with her when she died. No time to fetch one and all that. But tell them that another guest, “a very spiritual lady”, sat with her and you only hope that brought her comfort. Use the word “spiritual” and make it a woman and see what they say.’

  Alec was staring at me with his mouth hanging open.

  ‘Where do you get it, Dandy?’ he asked.

  ‘You wanted me to help you,’ I replied. ‘Don’t complain that I’ve managed it.’ Then I considered his question. ‘I honestly don’t know. I never used to be able to think up lies. When I was a child I couldn’t do it to save my life. Edward and Mavis concocted the most jaw-dropping tarradiddles and pointed at me and it was always me who got sent to my room with no dinner.’

  ‘Well, I’m glad that your moral standards have deserted you,’ Alec said. ‘That’s exactly the line I shall take. And having them think I went all the way to Edinburgh to broach such a delicate topic face-to-face can’t hurt our reputation.’

  ‘You can wheel out your head-undertaker routine again,’ I said. ‘They’ll adore you.’

  ‘What are you going to do in the meantime?’ Alec said, ignoring the jibe.

  ‘Attack it from this end,’ I said. ‘She saw a ghost? Surely she told someone. I shall try to find that someone.’

  ‘Sounds sensible enough,’ Alec said. If he meant it as praise he could have done better.

  ‘Not a guest,’ I said, musing. ‘It’s been too long. But I’m sure Dr Laidlaw knows more than she was happy to tell.’

  ‘Might only be that it wasn’t her idea to bowdlerise the tale for the Addie relations,’ Alec said. ‘I’d be surprised if it were, actually. She’s a very rational sort. I’d almost say tough-minded, if that didn’t sound nasty.’

  I noted that he seemed more concerned with tailoring compliments for the good doctor than for me, and not for the first time I considered the way that intimacy of the sort Alec and I shared, now that we had been flung together in perils too many to name, was all very well, but I still missed the courtesy that there used to be.

  ‘If not her,’ I said, ‘I think I’ll go and pester Regina again. She definitely knows something too and might break more easily than the doctor when leaned on.’

  I looked around the winter gardens, hoping that if I were very lucky I might see her little round personage bustling about, but there were only a couple of maid-cum-waitresses in black frocks and white caps taking orders, I thought, for coffee. Instead I saw, ambling along, feet dragging on the red clay tiles and making a noise which always grated upon me, Donald and Teddy. As I had suspected, Donald was already pulling at the soft collar of his shirt to loosen his tie, clearly feeling the muggy air too much for him. Again I felt one of my infrequent maternal pangs and was glad all over again to think that the secret of Mrs Addie’s death was most likely a white lie of sorts, not a black deed like murder at all. At least, I hoped so. If we uncovered anything much worse, I should really have to winkle my sons out of here and get them home. Perhaps it was even worth concocting a plausible tale I could keep up my sleeve and trot out if need be.

  ‘Mother, you’re squinting like a charmed snake,’ Donald said. ‘Good morning, Mr Osborne.’ As the three of them exchanged greetings, I retreated yet further into my own concerns.

  Donald and Teddy could not be packed off home. How could I have forgotten? I was supposed to have rung up the factor as soon as we arrived to check that the workmen were set fair to begin their campaign on the draughts and drips of Gilverton first thing this morning. Gilchrist was already greatly troubled by his own treachery, colluding with me unbeknownst to his liege lord, but I had dangled a glittering prospect in front of his eyes and – more to the point – in front of the eyes of his wife who had three daughters under the age of ten and twin baby boys and had been brought up with indoor servants of her own, before marrying and having to make do with a daily maid and part shares in the estate gardeners. In short, I had offered the Gilchrists the chance to put their tin bath out in the yard for horses to drink from, and to turn the old privy into a kennel for their aged and unlovely terrier, and bask instead in an enamelled bath with a basin and lavatory, all installed in the old boxroom a step across the landing from where they slept. I had even agreed to the colour Mrs Gilchrist fancied best, although it made me shudder. Primrose it was called in the catalogue, depicted in a fanciful watercolour complete with bathing nymph. Custard, I called
it, and powdered custard out of a tin at that.

  There was to be a little gas water-heater above the kitchen sink too, and a larger one above the double sinks of the wash house, so Mrs Gilchrist could throw a cotton cloth over the old wash copper and stand a jug of flowers there. And of course there were to be radiators, all fed by a tank of oil in the yard, and the only coal to be carried would be a decorous brass scuttleful to make a cheery note in the sitting room on those few evening when the family had leisure to sit there. It would make a marked change from the twenty-hour day which began with lighting the kitchen range in the morning and ended with carrying covered shovels into the bedrooms at night, the hours between being filled with stoking and banking like a double shift on a steam engine.

  Mrs Gilchrist’s eyes had shone as she leafed through the fanciful catalogue and even before she turned them beseechingly upon her husband, I knew she was mine. She was mine, he was hers and therefore he was mine too. He was not happy, but I had promised to draw all of Hugh’s inevitable wrath onto myself and had gone so far as to put it in writing that his job was safe. (If the worst came to the worst, he could hide at Benachally and help Donald for a month or two until matters settled again.)

  Still, I really should have made sure to ring him. He was not used to having to forge ahead without Hugh. They sometimes reminded me, poring over their maps and plans, of two old women searching for a dropped stitch in their knitting.

  Teddy was speaking. I shook all thoughts of Gilverton out of my head and attended to him.

  ‘—could have buttered me both sides and called me a bath bun,’ he said. This was a saying he had learned from a sweet nursery maid when he was very small. He took care to reserve it for use out of his father’s hearing, but it made me smile. ‘Donald too. You’ll never guess what the doctor is, Mummy.’

  ‘I shan’t take the bet, dear,’ I told him. ‘I knew.’

  ‘Did you tell Father?’ Donald said. He was smirking. ‘Because we didn’t. He’s in there now.’ Then the giggles got the better of both of them. I tried and failed not to join in.