Laurels are Poison (Mrs. Bradley)

by Gladys Mitchell

  She did go with him to Iffley in the morning, and by the following Monday night was in the vortex of the most idiotic, exasperating, wholly unsatisfactory love affair that could be imagined. At least, she found it satisfactory up to, but not including, the Monday night. It became serious then, and she no longer knew what to make of it, of herself, or of Jonathan.

  Miss Topas enjoyed herself hugely. She and the American professor spent most of their time in the house, seated at Mrs. Ditch’s enormous kitchen table, on which they spread maps and plans, sheets of cartridge paper purchased in Oxford, coloured pencils, rulers, dividers and books, books, and more books. Thus equipped, they spated forth volumes of learned argument which caused Our Walt, Mrs. Ditch’s son, to observe: “I say, young Our Mam, do ee thenk their brains, like, ull stand et? Tes like so much wetch craft to I.”

  His mother agreed, brooded darkly awhile, and then said: “They do be getten on very noice, though; very noice endeed. But I do wesh I could do sommat to gev t’ other uns a lettle bet of a shove up. Made for each other, they be. But the Mess Young-I-say, her hangs back. Shy, I reckon, poor maid. Mester Jonathan ded ought to make a bold bed there, and breng her to et violent. Tes the only way. Her’d gev en, easy enough, ef he act forceful.”

  When she had arranged for the students’ lunch, Mrs. Bradley walked across the grounds to speak to George, who had been given temporary quarters at the Chief Engineer’s house, where he found congenial company, lavish and well-cooked food, and a boy of twelve whose idol he had become during the first week of his stay.

  “George,” said Mrs. Bradley, “would you have any objection to taking parties of students out during the week-end?”

  “Certainly not, madam,” replied George respectfully.

  “Not on Sunday, or on Saturday afternoon, of course.”

  “I shall be pleased to take the young ladies out any day, madam. The car could do with a run. I haven’t driven her for weeks, except to bring up the young convalescent lady from the station.”

  “Ah, yes. Miss Vincent,” said Mrs. Bradley. This unfortunate student had been rushed to hospital on the fourth day of term to be operated on for appendicitis. She had been three weeks in hospital, a couple more in the college sanatorium, and, to release the nursing sister for a short break, she was to be shipped over to Athelstan for a long week-end. She was to be brought along the communal passage from one extreme end of the building almost to the other in the wheeled carriage, and then the nurse was to go off duty until Tuesday afternoon. This arrangement had been made possible, said the Principal, because Mrs. Bradley was a doctor, and had kindly offered to remain at Athelstan for the weekend.

  Mrs. Bradley herself had been more than a little perturbed when the Principal suggested this arrangement, but she saw no graceful way of objecting, and so had announced her pleasure at the prospect.

  Twenty-one students lunched in Athelstan, the twenty-first of them, the sufferer, being served in her room. Mrs. Bradley had given her a bed in the Guest Room, which was on the ground floor between the Servery and the Junior or North Common Room. The Sub-Warden’s sitting-room was directly opposite, and Mrs. Bradley felt that no objection would be lodged by Deborah if she herself used it as a bedroom whilst she had the convalescent student under her care. Miss Vincent could stand, and was allowed to walk a little, but even the one flight of stairs from the basement up to the room which had been prepared for her was quite as much as she seemed able to tackle. The Guest Room, too, was larger and more pleasant than a study-bedroom. The convalescent Miss Vincent seemed very pleased with it.

  The twenty students, who comprised First-Years, Second-Years, Third-Years, and One-Years, made themselves into groups to go out in the car. Sometimes they gave George the route, sometimes he worked out an interesting drive for them. Those who did not go out in the car spent Friday afternoon at the pictures or in walking over the moors. By about half-past six most of them were back in Hall, and some had taken their own gramophone records over to the Demonstration Room—for the college building was open to students until seven—and were dancing in the space cleared of desks.

  At seven came dinner. Mrs. Bradley, on this first evening, elected to dine in Hall, and had asked the Third-Year and One-Year students from Columba to sit at her table. Judging by the laughter which came from the group throughout the meal, the students enjoyed themselves, and there was slight consternation, followed by general approval, when, with the pudding, a very sweet white wine was brought in by the maids and served in what one excited student diagnosed as “real wine-glasses.”

  Lights-Out was translated broadly by the Warden-in-Charge during half-term week-ends, but by midnight the house seemed comparatively silent. One or two quiet Sittings from room to room were still going on, but noise had ceased and most of the guests were asleep.

  Mrs. Bradley stayed up until one, occupying herself with Hall accounts, and when she was ready for bed she had a last look at her patient. The girl, a fragile-looking child of nineteen with a long golden plait of very pretty hair, her eyes deeply shadowed, lay asleep, one hand out on the pink counterpane, the other beneath her cheek. The night was chilly, the room unheated except for one small radiator. Mrs. Bradley put out a yellow claw and gently placed the arm under the bed-coverings. Beneath that experienced touch the girl did not even stir.

  Mrs. Bradley went out quietly again, carrying the electric lamp she had brought in with her and crossed the passage into Deborah’s sitting-room. She left the door ajar when she went to bed. In about ten minutes she was asleep.

  She slept lightly but soundly until about seven o’clock. She always woke at approximately the same time each morning. She got up immediately, put on her dressing-gown, and went across to look at the convalescent student in the Guest Room. The girl had altered her position, and was now lying on her left instead of on her right side. Her arm was again flung outside the bedclothes. But Mrs. Bradley’s black eyes gazed with curious intentness upon the plait of golden hair; for this was no longer attached to the small and delicate head it had once adorned. It lay on the pillow, certainly, but it had been cut off close to the nape of the little white neck, and, somehow, had become thus more a thing of horror than of beauty.

  Mrs. Bradley stood for about three seconds looking upon this scene of devastation. Then she turned about very sharply, but still silently, and went upstairs to the study-bedroom of the head student.

  “Miss Mathers, dear child,” she said, waking her. Miss Mathers woke without either surprise or resentment.

  “Oh, good morning, Warden,” she said. In place of the genial cackle she anticipated, Mrs. Bradley said urgently:

  “Who, among these students, is particularly friendly with Miss Vincent, the student who had appendicitis?”

  “Oh—er—Miss Smith, from the same Hall, I think, Warden.”

  “Miss Smith’s number?”

  “Number Three.”

  “Go and rouse her. Tell her to put on her dressing-gown and report to me on the ground floor immediately. Reassure her. I don’t want her descending on me in a state of nerves or peevishness.”

  “I see, Warden.”

  “I’ll tell you all about it later on. Bless you, dear child. Be just as quick as ever you can.”

  “Is Miss Vincent worse, Warden?”

  “No, not worse. Just in need of an affectionate friend.”

  “I understand.”

  The admirable girl leapt out of bed, and, pulling her dressing-gown about her as she went, made her way to Miss Smith’s room and roused that somewhat lymphatic student from slumber.

  “Miss Vincent’s taken a funny fit. Nothing serious, the Warden says, but she’s got a bit nervy, or something. Will you tazz down to the ground floor? Quicker the better. It’s nothing much. Don’t worry.”

  Miss Smith, a good soul, thrust back counterpane, blankets, and sheet, abandoned, without a sigh, the laze in bed she had promised herself that morning (for another student had volunteered to bring up her breakfast) an
d went down to the ground floor, a trifle flummoxed by the sudden awakening and the summons, but anxious to do what she could.

  “Ah, Miss Smith, my dear,” said Mrs. Bradley, “you are fond of Miss Vincent?”

  “Oh, yes, we’re bosoms,” observed Miss Smith, eagerly extending her chest.

  “Right. Well, now, Miss Smith, I don’t need to tell you that people under the influence of a single, terrifying idea can sometimes contrive to do extraordinary things. Miss Vincent has had in her mind, poor girl, for some time now, the terrifying idea of an operation—cutting, cutting, cutting. The consequence is, that (quite unconsciously, of course) she has cut off, in her sleep (a kind of sleep-walking we should call it), all her beautiful hair. It is a perfectly natural reaction, but, as you can imagine, it will be a very considerable shock to her to find out what she has done. You are well-disposed enough to bear the brunt of that shock for the poor child. Go in to her, and when she wakes up, break the news to her, and comfort her, as I know you certainly can.”

  “Oh, Warden!” said the dismayed Miss Smith. “I shall make a mess of it!”

  “No, you won’t,” said Mrs. Bradley. “You’re fond of her, you see.”

  “Oh, I do wish I hadn’t left you!” said Deborah, on Tuesday evening, when she heard of it. “I knew I ought not to have gone.”

  “You look the better for the change,” said Mrs. Bradley, “and you couldn’t have done anything if you’d been here, I’m sure. And Miss Smith managed beautifully, bless her heart! They had a nice little cry together, and then, of all things, Miss Vincent admitted that she’d wanted to have her hair off for years, ever since she was nine, and her parents wouldn’t hear of it. So we sent straight away for a hairdresser, who trimmed up the hair, and later on she’s going to have it waved, and she’s perfectly happy about it, and has written home to break the news. So all has ended very nicely, except for me.”

  “How…for you?”

  “She didn’t cut her own hair, child.”

  “I should have thought it would have been quite a natural thing. I read of a case just like it. The girl had had a serious operation…”

  “Nonsense, child.”

  “No, really.”

  “I don’t think so. Do you mean the case of Miss E., as the psychologists so enthrallingly put it? Miss E. of Attleborough?”

  “I think it was.”

  “Well, she cut off her hair before the operation. She knew she’d got to have the operation, and it preyed on her mind.”

  “Oh, yes, you’re right. You mean that Miss Vincent would have got over all the horror…”

  “Yes. You see, in the case of acute appendicitis the whole thing is over and done with in a few hours. In goes the patient and out comes the appendix, and that’s all there is to it, except a certain amount of inconvenience afterwards.”

  “Then…?”

  “Yes, I’m afraid so. Somebody is determined to make my stay at Athelstan as uncomfortable as possible.”

  “Miss Murchan’s disappearance…?”

  “I imagine so. It should not be difficult to put one’s finger on the mischief-maker.”

  “You don’t mean that you know who is at the bottom of all this business?” asked Deborah.

  “Well, child, let us ask ourselves a few questions. Ah, here is Lulu with the coffee.”

  The Negro maid, her broad face beaming, put down the tray and began to pour.

  “Hullo, Lulu,” said Deborah. “Had a good holiday?”

  “Yes, Miss Cloud. Ah nebber work so hard in ma life! C’lectin’ up dem coconuts Ephraim knock down, until he was warned off three shies, and nobody else wouldn’t let him have no balls because dey’d had word from de udders dat he was a one ball one coconut man.”

  She went out, beaming proudly. Deborah turned to Mrs. Bradley for enlightenment. Mrs. Bradley grinned.

  “I have become Lulu’s confidante,” she observed. “She has a young man named Ephraim Duke, a mulatto. He can hit anything he throws at, up to a distance of thirty yards, twenty times out of twenty. I told Lulu I had a passion for coconuts.”

  “You haven’t!”

  “Actually, in the sense you mean, no. Well, she brought back two suitcases full. I told her to take a taxi to the station at the other end, and George went to meet her with my car at this end. Very good of Ephraim, wasn’t it?”

  Deborah looked at her suspiciously, but Mrs. Bradley’s face told her nothing at all.

  “I suppose it makes sense somewhere,” she admitted. “But what were you saying when Lulu came in? Do you mean you’ve decided which student it was who gave the wrong name when you collared her out of that circle of young men who were dancing round the bonfire on the first night of term?”

  “No, child. But I can find her when I want her. She’s in Columba, I should say, on present evidence.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I deduced it. You see, she can’t be on the Staff, unless she is Miss Topas. She can’t be Miss Topas—or can she?”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Has Miss Topas an alibi for the night of last Saturday, child?”

  “Well, she was talking to your nephew, his wife, and myself up to midnight. Does that give her an alibi?”

  “Yes, child. It must be quite two hundred miles, from my nephew’s pig-farm to this equally remote spot. Yes, I think we may say Pass, Miss Topas; all’s well.”

  “But you have never thought Miss Topas had anything to do with all these ridiculous goings-on, have you?”

  “No, child; but it is as well to eliminate our friends as soon as we can.”

  She grinned again.

  “Besides,” said Deborah hotly, “Miss Topas wouldn’t go about cutting off people’s hair.”

  “Miss Topas is very intelligent,” said Mrs. Bradley, “and if it was thought that there was someone sneaking about Athelstan at night cutting off people’s hair, there would be immediate panic. In fact, among girls of the age of these students I cannot think of anything more likely to cause disquiet, except…”

  “Yes?”

  “Have you ever seen a ghost?” asked Mrs. Bradley.

  “No, and I don’t believe in them.”

  “Lulu does.”

  “I suppose so, yes. Negroes always do, even if they don’t admit it.”

  “She does admit it. I asked her.”

  “Wasn’t that—you know best, of course, but I should hardly have thought—wouldn’t she immediately fancy she could sense a ghost in this Hall?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m sorry, but I don’t see the point.”

  “Perhaps there isn’t one, but I shouldn’t be surprised—and you mustn’t be, either, because I should need your help—if Athelstan produced a ghost before the end of the term. That is why Lulu is exchanging with my sister’s Cambridgeshire kitchen-maid next week. I shall miss her, but that can’t be helped. I don’t want a hysteria-patient on my hands when the spirits walk or—much more likely—talk. How did you like my nephew Jonathan?”

  “I—he—he’s rather clever, isn’t he?” stammered Deborah, who had been anticipating and dreading this question. “But, really, I hardly saw enough of him to know much about him.”

  “Would you call him clever? He’s inclined to be impulsive, rarely a sign of the highest mentality,” argued Mrs. Bradley, eyeing Deborah solemnly. Deborah got up.

  “I hope you’re wrong about the ghost,” she said, walking away. She did not reappear after dinner, but sat correcting a set of lecture notes and verifying references until about eleven. Then she went to bed without seeing Mrs. Bradley again; for on the Monday evening, finding her alone, Jonathan had proposed marriage again, and Deborah had refused him. The trouble was that she had so much wanted to accept the offer, but it seemed to her ridiculous to agree to marry a man she had known for exactly four days.

  She had told no one about it, not even Miss Topas. She thought that perhaps she might have confided in Mrs. Bradley, but the fact that Jonathan was M
rs. Bradley’s nephew made such a confidence, to Deborah’s way of thinking, impossible. However, college would soon fill her mind again, she concluded, particularly if Mrs. Bradley was right, and the Athelstan Horrors were merely in their infancy.

  She went over them mentally, whilst her pillow seemed to get more and more like something made out of wood. Taken separately, there was nothing very terrifying about them. Of course, things like the coat-slashing and the stabbing of the tins of disinfectant could have, as everyone had pointed out at the time, an unpleasant connotation, and if Mrs. Bradley should be right about the hair-cutting, there was, somewhere loose, a devilish agency which it was not very pretty to brood on.

  She continued to brood, however, and, when she slept, met Jonathan’s dark face in her dreams.

  CHAPTER 8

  SKIRLING AND GROANS

  THE term went on for a week or two without incident except for what could be accounted for by the normal course of events. Deborah, who was now enjoying her life at Cartaret, began to wonder whether, after all, everything which had occurred at Athelstan since the evening of her arrival at the college had not been magnified, or even falsified, into bearing an interpretation which it did not warrant or deserve.

  She argued that Mrs. Bradley’s views on some subjects probably were determined—“warped” was the word she first used—by her professional training as a psycho-analyst and by her past experiences as a criminologist.

  This point she put to Miss Topas. It was the Monday of the week before School Practice, and Miss Topas, having done nothing all day except give one lecture and a couple of Demonstration lessons in English history, had spent the afternoon in Columba with her shoes off, her feet up, chain-smoking, and debating within herself (she told Deborah, who had been bidden to afternoon tea) which of two invitations she should accept for Christmas.