‘What about Cara trying to sell them?’ said Alec. ‘If you’re right about this. Does it help that fit in?’
Another of the bubbles popped and I looked at him through the clear water, cold and certain.
‘Cara tried to sell them, my dear Alec, because she was a good girl who did as she was told.’
‘Who was telling?’
‘Lena, of course.’
‘And Cara obeyed? Why?’
‘I don’t know. I don’t understand the hold Lena had over her, any more than I understand the hold Lena has, or thinks she has over Silas and Daisy. Horrible woman, with all her little secrets.’
‘And why was Cara to be killed?’ said Alec.
‘Because she could not be trusted to keep it all to herself once she was an independent married woman. She was used to bring the theft to light and then, since she was expendable, she was expended.’
‘Evil woman,’ said Alec. ‘For jewels? For money?’
‘But, you know, in her favour I don’t think the sacrifice of Cara was part of the plan from the start. If one of those horribly discreet jewellers had done what they were supposed to do –’
‘Mummy,’ said Teddy’s voice, high with indignation and wonder. ‘Why aren’t you hiding? And what on earth are you talking about?’ I started and gobbled uselessly like some nervous item of poultry, but Donald and Teddy were clearly wearing out too and made little protest as we packed up the picnic things and bundled everything back into the cart for a hasty return. They were not too tired, however, to persist in trying to find out what we had been discussing. They kept on and on until Alec relented and told them it was a story we had not finished reading and were trying to guess the end of, and then went into enormous detail about such quelling matters as which of the two heroes the heroine really loved and what kind of stocks and bonds the old banker had embezzled, until Donald begged him to shut up.
‘And why weren’t you hiding?’ said Teddy.
‘Why weren’t you seeking?’ I countered.
‘We were using Indian tracking methods, Mother,’ said Donald.
‘Well then, I don’t think much of them,’ I said.
Both boys began to talk at once, Teddy’s voice, being the more piercing, winning through.
‘– just where you’re wrong. Because they are actually very skilful – better than blacksmiths and everything that we’ve got here – and not at all savage at all.’
‘Even scalping,’ Donald put in.
‘Scalping isn’t savage?’ I could hardly help laughing. Donald looked witheringly at me.
‘Yes, but it’s not just lunging at someone and ripping his hair off, Mother, there’s a lot to it and . . . Mother? Are you all right?’
‘Are you going to faint, Mummy?’
‘Are you going to be sick? Did you eat berries?’
‘Because you’re always telling us not to, and really after that huge lunch –’
‘Dandy?’
I could not answer.
‘Right, you two,’ said Alec, bundling them into the trap. ‘You set off now and we’ll give you three minutes and race you home.’
I sat numbly in the motor car while he started it, not quite believing where my thoughts were leading me.
‘What is it?’ he said, once we were under way, rolling along in the wake of the pony.
‘Simply this,’ I said. ‘When a person flies into a murderous rage and attacks someone, what one ends up with is a battered bloody corpse, not a girl lying in a bed who looks as though she has had an abortion. And if we hadn’t been so cowardly about making ourselves face it I should have seen that straight away.’
‘What made you think of it all of a sudden just now?’ said Alec.
‘Scalping,’ I said. ‘It’s brutal and nasty but not, as my charming children pointed out, just lunging at someone and ripping his hair off. And the same goes for what happened to Cara. There’s no way one thing could be mistaken for the other.’
‘But Dr Milne –’
‘Yes, but that’s what I’ve been thinking through. Dr Milne said precisely nothing. Simply that she had tried to miscarry in a very silly way that only an ignorant girl would think of. He supplied no details. I filled it all in, and in the most grisly way possible.’
‘And you told me no details and I did the same,’ said Alec. ‘You’re right. But Dr Milne did seem sure, Dandy.’
‘He also seemed sure that the girl was a servant, and we know she wasn’t. Besides, something about what he said has been bothering me all along in a way I can’t get a hold of. I almost got it at the memorial service, or I thought I did, but then I fell asleep. So maybe I was dreaming.’
‘Don’t drift, Dandy,’ said Alec. ‘Concentrate. What can have happened? You’re right, of course. Any . . . direct method would have nothing in common with a sudden angry outburst, but what else is there?’
‘Hot baths? No. Gin? Clearly not.’
‘What about jumping?’
‘That’s an old wives’ tale,’ I said. ‘Complete nonsense – But oh! That’s exactly what Dr Milne said, isn’t it? That only a silly ignorant girl would believe it would work and that anyone with any sense would see that she’d be as likely to die as to miscarry.’
‘And jumping, jumping off something and landing badly, would look almost identical to being shoved and landing badly.’
‘And a shove is exactly the kind of thing one would do if one flew into a rage, isn’t it? I’m sure this is right, Alec. It must be.’
We rattled up the drive to the house. The boys, unable to stop the pony, who had got the bit well and truly between its teeth, swept away around the side to the stables. I gestured for Alec to pull up on the gravel then hurried inside and straight to my sitting room to the telephone.
‘Who are you calling?’ he said, arriving just as I lifted the earpiece.
‘Hello?’ I said. ‘Yes, it’s a Dr Milne in Gatehouse of Fleet, please. Kirkcudbright 59.’ I put my hand over the mouthpiece. ‘Before I lose my nerve,’ I whispered to Alec.
‘Well, be careful,’ he whispered back and sank into a chair to listen.
Chapter Seventeen
It took the usual aeons for the call to be put through, clickings and whirrings and sudden hollow silences. While I was waiting, Alec whispered at me again.
‘What are you going to say?’
‘No idea. But don’t worry – it’s a favoured ploy of mine.’
The telephone was ringing at last.
‘Yes, hello, what is it?’ said a clipped voice at the other end. If this was Mrs Milne, then I pitied the doctor.
‘Might I speak to Dr Milne?’ I said. ‘Or leave a message?’
‘Can you not come to the surgery?’ said the voice, surely a housekeeper.
‘Oh, no,’ I trilled. ‘This is not a professional call. I’m a friend. Mrs Gilver. But I’ll happily ring back if Dr Milne is busy.’
‘Oh, Mrs Gilver,’ said the voice with deep interest. I supposed I was famous in Gatehouse by now. The doctor was in for Mrs Gilver, no doubt about it, and the housekeeper, for such she must be (a wife would hardly be so accommodating in handing over even her husband’s ear to such a female), bustled off to fetch him.
‘My dear Dr Milne,’ I began, greetings over, ‘if you send me a bill this time it will be no more than I deserve, but please let me trespass for a moment. I’d like you to back me up in my efforts to get my boys to maturity in one piece. You didn’t meet my little boys, did you? Well, they are monkeys. I use the term advisedly. They’ve been learning mountaineering at school this year and I cannot keep them off the roofs. The stable roofs have always been a draw, but now they’re up on the house roofs day in and day out and will not listen to me telling them they could kill themselves. Now, here’s how you can help me. I told them a heavily edited version of what happened to that poor little kitchen maid of the Duffys’.’
‘You did what?’ He almost shouted, and Alec too was looking at me as though I was gaga.
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‘What I mean is I told them that a girl I knew jumped from the tiniest height and ended up dead. She did jump, didn’t she? I’m almost sure you said she jumped, or that’s what I had understood you to mean.’
‘Oh yes,’ said Dr Milne. ‘She jumped.’ I wiggled my eyebrows at Alec.
‘And I’ve been telling them that jumping is safer than falling because you’ve planned for it and that this poor girl jumped off something miles lower than our roofs here – you remember the house, don’t you? Terrible Gothic additions, turrets everywhere – so then they said, What did she jump off, Mother? And I had to admit that I didn’t know. And now they think it was a cliff-top or something and they won’t heed my warnings the least bit. And to cut a long story short, we’ve got ourselves into a betting situation over it. There are scones at stake. Shocking when one thinks of the poor creature, I know, but there it is. Now, what did she jump off? Do you know?’
Alec’s face was caught midway between stunned admiration and disbelief, but I held out the earpiece towards him to let him hear Dr Milne laughing cosily at the other end and he mimed a salute to me. I smirked back, and put the earpiece to my ear again.
‘She jumped from the landing, my dear Mrs Gilver. Down the stairwell. Hit her head as she fell and snapped her neck when she landed.’ We both sighed.
‘Well, since there couldn’t have been more than a dozen steps in a cottage staircase, I should think that might sober my little demons no end. Thank you, Dr Milne.’
‘You’re very welcome, Mrs Gilver. But don’t dwell on it now, or you’ll give yourself nightmares again.’
‘You are very kind to think of that,’ I said. ‘Can I ask one more thing?’ I knew I was headed for thin ice now, but I could not help myself. ‘I suppose I’m right, saying to them that a fall is even worse than a jump? Even more dangerous, I mean.’
‘I would imagine so.’
‘And, I suppose, a shove is worst of all.’
There was silence at the other end.
‘But can one tell the difference?’
More silence. Alec was making furious gestures at me and I could feel a pulse quicken as it rose in my throat.
‘Because they do muck about up there, pretending to push one another and whatnot. It’s terrifying to watch. And if I could say I had it from a reputable doctor that a shove and a fall are both worse than a jump and that even a doctor can’t tell the difference . . . Well, the thought of one dead and the other in jail for fratricide might have some sway.’
‘I think I would rather you did not quote me on this topic,’ said Dr Milne, after a huge pause. ‘As you say, a reputable doctor has a great deal of sway and has to be very careful.’ My mouth dropped open in amazement.
‘What?’ Alec hissed, jumping to his feet. ‘What’s he saying?’
‘I suppose so,’ I said as calmly as I could. ‘Well, be assured that if I need to call upon a witness for corroboration, I shall leave you out of it.’ I gave my best attempt at a gay little laugh. ‘I shan’t see buttered scones for days to come, Dr Milne.’
‘My condolences,’ he intoned, not even trying to match my gaiety.
We rang off.
I tried to relay it word for word to Alec; at least I got the gist of the important bits.
‘A reputable doctor has a great deal of sway?’ Alec echoed. ‘Oh my God, Dandy, he’s going to sue you for defamation. You just wait. You’re not safe to be let out.’
‘I like that,’ I said. ‘What would you have done? Nothing, that’s what. And where would we be once you had? Nowhere.’
‘Well, where have you got us?’ he said.
‘I’ve shown Dr Milne up for what he is,’ I said. ‘I always knew he was. The way he spoke about the girl that very first time – you weren’t there, Alec, you don’t know. And now it’s quite sure. Just because she was a servant (he thought) and had got into trouble he didn’t even bother to wonder whether she had jumped or was pushed. Didn’t even think to question Lena’s version of things. A snob and a fool.’
‘A snob and a fool now thoroughly on his guard. I wish you had talked things over with me before launching into it, Dandy. That was a very silly thing to do.’
So, from self-taught philosopher to reckless idiot overnight. There was ages until the dressing bell, but I stamped off anyway, feeling under-appreciated and sick of the lot of them. (I was even cross with Donald and Teddy for the playing on the roof.)
Grant, evidently, was in one of her mellower moods and did not seem put out to be summoned early. She had taken delivery that afternoon of a collar and cuffs in mauve rabbit-fur edged with seed pearls, which she planned to attach to a lilac chiffon evening wrap of mine. I could not remember ever hearing of these monstrous articles, much less rubber-stamping their purchase, and when Grant opined that there was plenty of time to get them on in time for dinner that night I panicked.
‘Bit of a waste, isn’t it?’ I asked, cajolingly. ‘Only Mr Gilver and Mr Osborne to see them.’
Grant sighed.
‘Yes, I daresay, madam,’ she said, laying the collar back in its tissue paper nest. ‘When’s the next time anyone will be here?’ By anyone, I knew, Grant meant any ladies. We make no pretence about that.
‘As soon as I can arrange it,’ I said feelingly, stepping out of my dress and turning to let her unbutton my underbodice. ‘I am sick up to my teeth of men and boys, Grant. I’d join a convent for tuppence.’
‘Oh, madam, no,’ she said, genuinely shocked. ‘Grey serge and no lipstick. And all that praying must give them knees like leather. They must thank heavens habit hems never go high enough to show them.’
Grant’s take on the preoccupations of nuns, utterly serious and utterly typical, cheered me up no end.
‘Well, all right,’ I said. ‘Not a convent. Perhaps a harem.’ I suspect she is unshockable, but it does not stop me from trying. She smirked at this, though, and I saw that I had failed again.
‘What have “men” done anyway, madam?’ she asked presently through a mouthful of hairpins. I have offered many times to hold the pins and pass them to her, but I do not pass them quickly enough or hold them out at the right angle and she is best left to manage it herself.
‘Nothing out of the ordinary,’ I said. ‘Just been unwilling to face up to the plainer side of life and made everything more difficult as a result.’
‘Oh, that,’ said Grant. ‘As to that, madam, the kitchen cat brought in a mouse this morning and started to eat it right under the upper servants’ breakfast table, and guess who crawled under with a bit of newspaper and got it away from the little beast? Mrs Tilling. Mr Pallister was the colour of milk.’
‘Exactly,’ I said, lifting my chin while she untied my dressing cape. ‘What if the mouse had still been alive, though?’
‘Lord, I’d have run a mile!’ said Grant.
‘Me too,’ I said, and even the thought of it made me tuck my feet up off the carpet. ‘Men do have their uses,’ I concluded.
‘No doubt about it, madam,’ said Grant. ‘You said yourself you’d prefer a harem to a convent.’ (When it comes to shock statements, Grant outstrips me without trying.) ‘But birth, death and nappies, as my mother always used to say.’
I stared at her.
‘Birth, death . . .?’
‘And nappies, madam. Things men don’t do. Are you all right?’
I didn’t answer, but continued to stare.
‘Madam?’
‘I shan’t need you tonight, Grant,’ I said. ‘And tomorrow is your day off, isn’t it? Well then, let’s say I’ll do without you in the morning too.’ I stood and turned slowly, arms out, while she inspected me.
‘I hope I haven’t said anything to offend you, madam,’ said Grant. ‘I meant nothing by it.’
‘Absolutely not,’ I said. ‘You’ve been very helpful.’
I waited until she had cleared the end of the passageway and disappeared through the door to the servants’ stairs, then, shoes in hand, I crept alo
ng to the guest wing on tiptoe. Before I reached Alec’s door he emerged dressed for dinner but, seeing me, he backed into his room again and drew me after him.
‘Is your valet –?’
‘He’s long gone,’ said Alec. ‘What is it?’
‘I’m going to come upstairs straight after dinner,’ I said. ‘And then tomorrow the story is that . . . let’s say . . . Daisy Esslemont rang very early and I’ve gone off to see her at Croys. I shall think of some reason Hugh won’t question. Actually, I’m going to drive to Gatehouse tonight.’
‘You’re not tackling Dr Milne on your own,’ said Alec. ‘He’s backed into a corner, Dandy. There’s no telling what he might do.’
‘I’m not tackling Dr Milne,’ I said. ‘Alone or otherwise. I’m going to track down our witness and I need to leave tonight in case Dr Milne has the same idea.’
‘Our witness? What makes you so sure we have one?’
‘We do.’
‘And what makes you think it won’t be as bad an idea for you to tackle him on your own as –’
‘It’s not a him,’ I said. ‘It’s a her.’
‘Who?’ said Alec.
‘I don’t know her name or where she lives,’ I said. ‘But I know she exists. She’s the person who laid out Cara’s body before the undertakers took it away. And unless I’m very much mistaken, she is also the local midwife. She will know not only that the girl she laid out was not a servant, but also that she was still pregnant when she died, and perhaps – since she’s probably the nearest thing there is to a doctor for those who cannot afford Dr Milne – she might also know that Cara’s injuries came from being shoved over, not from jumping off any landing. I don’t know how they managed to hush her up, Alec – money probably – but I shall unhush her if it’s the last thing I do. Now go and entertain Hugh while I prepare a few things and . . .’ I hesitated and may even have blushed although the lamplight was too low for him to see me. ‘Could you possibly make sure that he has a great deal to drink tonight at dinner and after? I don’t think he’s likely to come to my room, but it’s best to be sure.’
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