A Dark and Stormy Night

by Jeanne M. Dams

  ‘By which I assume you mean heroics. No, love, I won’t. I’ll be with other people – more than one other person – the whole time. Now Pat and I will see you back to the room. I don’t like the idea of her being alone, either. Then she and I will go downstairs, tell the others, and organize search teams.’

  I didn’t learn until later that Alan had excluded the Bateses from the search, even though their knowledge of the house probably surpassed anyone else’s. His stated reason was that someone needed to be available in case, by a miracle, some outside help arrived. His real reason, I knew, was that they were not entirely above suspicion. Neither were Jim and Joyce, but Alan had to have someone who knew the house reasonably well. So Jim had gone with Allen, along with Lynn, and Joyce led Mike, Pat and Tom.

  Neither of the Moynihans knew as much about the hidden parts of the house as John Bates, but they knew what one might term the surface very well. Both groups searched the same areas at different times, in case someone spotted a trace – a tissue, a bit of cigarette ash, a thread – that the others had missed. They searched all the living areas, the cellars, the outbuildings. They ranged over the devastated gardens, peering under promising bushes and into the pits left by upturned shrubs and trees. They looked in and under everyone’s cars, including the trunks/boots and under the hoods/bonnets, and made sure that all the cars were where they should be.

  They found neither Julie nor any trace of her.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Alan knocked on the door. This time I was wide awake and recognized his code. I knew as soon as I saw his face that the news was not good.

  ‘You didn’t find her.’

  ‘No, but that’s not the worst of it.’ And he related to me the scene when the searchers returned and told Rose Bates that Julie had now to be counted as missing. ‘It seems Rose has been busy conducting a search of her own. She said that food was missing from the kitchen – portable food, cheese and biscuits and apples, that sort of thing – and that Mr Bates had reported that two bottles of whisky were gone. Well, Pat confessed that she had taken one of them, and put it back on the kitchen table. But Rose said bourbon wasn’t whisky, so there were still two bottles unaccounted for.’ Alan heaved a sigh. ‘Which would have been the end of it, except then Pat commented that it was apparent Julie was gone, and the only question remaining was whether she had gone of her own free will or been spirited away. And at that Rose flew into a kind of hysterics. Jim and Joyce are still trying to calm her down, so far as I know.’

  ‘But why should that have touched her off? It’s no more than we’ve all been thinking ever since we found her room empty.’

  ‘“Spirited”,’ said Alan with another sigh. ‘Pat meant nothing in particular by the word, but it seems there’s a streak of good old country superstition in the competent and efficient Mrs Bates. All the unfortunate things that have happened in recent days have worked on her fears, and the mention – as she thought – of spirits was the crowning touch. She has decided, from what little sense I could make of her ravings, that the house is cursed, or possessed, or something of the kind. God only knows what’s going to happen without her in the kitchen. She has been the glue that kept the household together, and now . . .’ He raised his hands in a helpless gesture and sat down heavily on the bed.

  ‘There’s no chance she’ll come to her senses?’

  ‘Oh, eventually, I suppose. I wish we could give her a sedative. When she does come out of it, she could be in a bad way. I’m no doctor, but I’ve seen full-blown hysteria before, and it’s not easy on anybody.’

  ‘Poor Joyce.’ I sat down beside him.

  ‘Why Joyce, more than any of the rest of us?’

  ‘Because she’s the hostess. She’ll feel it her job to try to keep things going, and it’s hopeless. I wish—’

  ‘No.’ Alan said it with a finality that cut me off in mid-sentence. ‘You will not attempt to cook for this crowd. You will not organize a rota for the household chores. You will stay in this room until help arrives.’

  ‘Her master’s voice,’ I said with a lightness I did not feel. His face didn’t change. I studied it for a moment and said, ‘You’re really worried, aren’t you?’

  He sighed. ‘I am. I didn’t mean to shout at you, Dorothy. But I have no idea what’s going on here, and until I do, I’m genuinely frightened. For everyone, not just you. Until someone responds to our calls for help . . .’

  ‘That could be a long time,’ I said meekly. ‘What are we going to do about food?’

  ‘I’m going back down in a moment. Tom and I will pack boxes of non-perishables for everyone. Fortunately there’s plenty of food, though the variety may leave something to be desired. We will distribute them to everyone, and then my recommendation is that everyone keep to his or her or their own room – with the door locked. I do not intend this to turn into that novel you keep citing, with all of us being picked off one by one.’

  ‘Your recommendation.’

  ‘Well, love, I can’t give orders to any of these people, much as I’d like to.’

  Only to me, I thought but didn’t say.

  ‘I can only advise them, strongly, that there is someone very dangerous among us, and we need to take sensible steps for self-protection.’

  Thus began our siege. I wondered what the single people in our party would do, and then decided not to wonder. Laurence Upshawe was still under the care – or guardianship – of the vicar, Paul Leatherbury. Jim and Joyce had each other, Tom and Lynn, the Bateses. And if Pat Heseltine and Ed Walinski decided that sharing a room was less lonely and frightening, good luck to them. I certainly didn’t intend to poke my nose into their activities. I had Alan, after all.

  Or I would have, when he returned from his commissary duties. I wished, the minute he had left, that I had remembered to ask him for some books. I can endure almost any period of enforced inactivity if I have enough to read. There were books in the room. Joyce was too good a hostess not to see to that. But the ones I hadn’t already read didn’t interest me. I thought about taking a nap, but I was too tense to sleep. I wanted to do something, find some way out of this nightmare.

  I started counting casualties. Two recent deaths, three if Julie had met the fate we all suspected. Two much older deaths, the skeleton and the mummy. (I shuddered at the thought of her and forced my mind to move on quickly.) Laurence injured. Mr Bates shocked into a faint.

  Seven. Seven human beings killed or injured in this house. By this house?

  No. That was too fanciful, too much like Rose Bates’s terrors. This wasn’t Hill House, with its evil, ghostly inhabitants. But there seemed to be an evil, malevolent presence here, all the same. Only it was human.

  Which one? Which of the inhabitants of this house had killed, and killed again, and again?

  I went to the lovely little writing desk in the corner and opened the top drawer. Sure enough, there was a small cache of stationery, paper, envelopes, even stamps. The paper was thick and lovely, meant for invitations, thank-yous, gracious correspondence. I had nothing else to use for a list. I pulled out several sheets and the pen, also thoughtfully provided, and headed the top one ‘Events’.

  The first listing there was obviously the skeleton. I was about to write it in when I had another thought. Really the first odd thing to happen was Dave Harrison’s conversation with Julie, that first night, and then his drunken outburst just before dinner.

  Julie had shut him up on that occasion. Why? What had he said, exactly, that she wanted to cut off?

  I headed a second sheet ‘Queries’ and wrote that one in, and then went back to the skeleton.

  There were plenty of questions about him. It seemed likely that the first question, his identity, had been answered. But assuming he was Harry Upshawe, who killed him? Why? When? And another one that just occurred to me: why had the pilot of that aircraft not tried to contact Harry when he didn’t show up for the planned trip?

  Maybe someone had called the pilot, someone pretendin
g to be Harry, saying he couldn’t make it after all. That could be important, a lead . . .

  And then I realized it was only another dead end. We couldn’t question the pilot; he had gone down somewhere near São Miguel.

  Nevertheless, I wrote the question down. There might be some way to check fifty-year-old flight plans. I doubted it, but Alan might know.

  Lots of questions. No answers. I went back to my Events page.

  The next things, in the order they had happened, not when I learned about them, were the complicated series of events involving Laurence, the vicar and the Harrisons. I began to note them down with some care.

  The first was Laurence’s conversation with the vicar. I wrote down the gist of it, as best I remembered. Alan, who had a policeman’s memory for detail, could correct me. Then Laurence had started on his walk.

  Meanwhile, Dave and Julie, in their irrational state, had decided to try to get away. They heard Laurence’s – confession was too strong a word – his narrative. Julie, somewhat surprisingly, was bright enough to realize the implications and warn Dave – who then went off after Laurence.

  And then what? Julie could have told us. Julie had disappeared. Laurence could have told us. Laurence had received a blow to the head that wiped out his memory.

  At this stage of my unproductive exercise, Alan rapped on the door, and I let him in. He carried not only a large crate of food, but – bless him – a canvas bag full of books.

  ‘Sorry I was so long, love. Tom and I delivered everyone else’s first.’

  ‘How are they all holding up?’

  ‘As one might expect. The Bateses are inclined to be a bit resentful; I am abrogating their responsibilities, after all. Mr Bates is testy; his wife is defensive but more inclined to cooperate.’ He took a box of cereal out of his crate, and a couple of cans of peaches.

  ‘I suspect Mr Bates is still feeling a bit poorly, after that faint. It was only yesterday, wasn’t it? Time is behaving very oddly.’

  ‘It does. Yes, it was yesterday, and Mr Bates is obviously feeling “poorly”, as you put it. The rest are bearing up, though Jim and Joyce are desperately worried, and feeling guilty.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous. Nothing they did caused any of the awfulness.’

  ‘They assembled the house party. And of course we’re just assuming that—’

  ‘Alan!’

  ‘I like them, too, but I think like a policeman, love. I can’t help it. Where were Jim and Joyce when Harrison met his death?’

  I tried to think back through the eternity that had passed since last Friday. ‘Napping! A bunch of people did that afternoon, remember? None of us had had much sleep.’

  ‘Exactly. And presumably they’ll vouch for each other. As evidence, it’s useless.’

  ‘Well, but what about . . .’ I paused to think about the other victims. Laurence’s story was allied with Dave’s. Julie had run off to hide, the first time and possibly this time, too. Mike, poor idiot, had gone his own ill-advised way. But . . .

  ‘The skeleton! And the mummy! Jim and Joyce couldn’t have had anything to do with them.’

  ‘Probably not. But we’re assuming that both old deaths took place longer than two years ago. Until we get a forensics expert in here, that’s not a proven fact.’

  ‘Harry Upshawe died fifty years ago!’

  ‘Probably, but we have not yet proven – proven, I said – that the skeleton belonged to Harry, nor indeed that Harry is dead, rather than living in happy senility in America somewhere. I have to put Jim and Joyce in the category of suspects. Unlikely, I agree, but not impossible.’

  ‘We’ve eaten their salt!’ I was beginning to be very angry indeed at my husband’s stubbornness.

  ‘Nevertheless.’

  Ever since I was a child, I’ve wept when I was furious. I hated it then; I appeared to be full of misery when I was in fact full of rage. And I hated it now. I felt the tears start and turned my head so Alan wouldn’t see. We almost never quarrelled, and maybe there was some misery involved with my tears, after all. I fumbled blindly for a book and took it to the farthest corner of the room.

  He knows me rather well. He said nothing, but continued unpacking the groceries and stowing them away as best he could.

  ‘Sandwich?’ he offered when he had put all the food away.

  ‘Thank you, no.’ I was starving, but unwilling to let go of my anger. I turned another page I hadn’t read. In sudden dismay, I glanced at the book to make sure I wasn’t holding it upside down. It was right side up, but it was a book of Victorian sermons. Probably Alan had brought it so we could laugh over it together.

  Another tear squeezed out and rolled down my cheek.

  It was Alan who patched it up. He must have heard my stomach growl; I was really very hungry. He came over to me, gently took my book away, and said, ‘I imagine your head and stomach would be happier with tea than a glass of wine, my dear. Darjeeling, perhaps? And a chocolate biscuit or two?’

  My stomach spoke again. I swallowed. ‘Yes, please.’ There were still tears in my voice.

  Alan sat down next to me. ‘Dorothy. I’m exceedingly sorry. You married a stubborn man, my dear.’

  ‘And you a stubborn woman.’

  ‘And we’re both still convinced we’re right, but we can’t . . . Dorothy, I never want anything that trivial to come between us again.’

  ‘Trivial? A question of murder?’

  ‘A difference of opinion. I fully concede that I’ve been wrong before, particularly when it came to my opinion about a suspect versus yours, and I may be wrong this time. Now, may I make you some tea?’

  I took his hand. ‘And several sandwiches. I was ready to eat those sermons.’

  TWENTY-TWO

  It had grown dark by the time we finished our tea/supper. Alan lit the lantern and a soft glow permeated the room. If I sat close to the light, I thought I might be able to read, for a while, at least.

  ‘I’ll trade you the sermons for something a little more frivolous,’ I said.

  ‘Agatha Christie?’

  I shuddered. ‘No. Too topical. There wouldn’t be any P.G. Wodehouse?’

  He rooted in the box and handed me a large volume of Jeeves stories.

  ‘Perfect. I can’t read more than one or two at a sitting – it’s like consuming too many desserts – but one will certainly lighten the gloom. Where are you going?’

  For Alan had put on his coat and hat.

  ‘To fetch some wood, for a start. The fire’s nearly dead, and it’s getting distinctly chilly now that the sun’s gone down. We’ll need more tea presently, and I don’t think I could boil water over those embers. Then I thought I’d get Jim to help, and try again.’

  ‘Flares?’

  He nodded. ‘Maybe three volleys, if the supply will hold up. Most of Jim’s stash is more spectacular stuff, not terribly suitable for the purpose, but we’ll try.’

  I could have made a remark about collaborating with a murder suspect. I didn’t. The sore spot was still tender. Leave it alone. I contented myself with a caution. ‘Be careful with those things. I’d simply hate to have you blinded, or worse. And come back soon, love. It’s . . . creepy in here without you.’

  And cold. When I had locked the door behind him, I put on my coat and hat, moved the lantern to a table near the dying fire, and settled back close to both, trying to pretend I was warm.

  I found I couldn’t concentrate on ‘Jeeves Takes Charge’ with much more success than I’d had with the Reverend Entwhistle’s sermons. I knew the Wodehouse text almost by heart; perhaps that had something to do with it. I did wish Alan would come back with the wood. Arthritic hands never turn pages easily. Cold arthritic hands have a really hard time. I dropped the book twice, the second time on my foot. Thirty-four stories in one book pack a punch. I gave it up, carried the lantern over to the bedside table, and climbed in, clothes and all, bringing my earlier lists with me.

  Studying them by the soft lantern-light, I saw that t
hey weren’t very useful. The questions had no answers, or none that I could find. The events made no sense, individually or collectively. I picked up a third sheet of expensive stationery and headed it ‘People’.

  Begin with Jim and Joyce. What did I know about them? Know – not surmise.

  I thought about ruling some columns and decided the paper wasn’t big enough for that, and anyway, my mind doesn’t work that neatly. I think in narrative.

  So I wrote down their ages: fifty or so, both of them, at a guess. Americans. Lived at Branston Abbey for about two-and-a-half years. Extremely wealthy. Jim was retired – no, I was assuming that, I didn’t know for sure. Tom and Lynn would know. They would also know where he had worked, or was still working, and where they had lived before coming here. Not in America for quite a while, I was guessing. Or . . . wait. Had Tom or Lynn said something about the Moynihans moving here to get away from the Harrisons? I couldn’t remember for sure.

  I needed to talk to them. Surely Alan would rule them out as suspects? Well, whether he did or not, I was going to invite them to come share our food and our fire, and pick their brains.

  What else did I know about Jim and Joyce? They loved England. They loved trees and beautiful gardens and old houses. They had excellent taste in furniture and food, and enjoyed tradition – witness the planned Guy Fawkes celebration. They were cordial and thoughtful hosts, trying to make the best of a well-nigh unbearable situation.

  They were childless. Did I know that, for sure? I wracked my brains, but couldn’t remember being told that. Maybe I only surmised it; I had seen no family photos. I added another query to the list I needed to ask Tom and Lynn and lay back, dissatisfied.

  So far there wasn’t a thing known about the Moynihans that could clearly exonerate them from any except the oldest deaths, and those did not, necessarily, have anything to do with the modern ones.

  ‘Bosh!’ I said out loud. My instincts were usually reliable about this sort of thing. The house and its troubled history was at the root of the whole conundrum. I was as sure of that as . . . well, I was sure.