Withering Heights

by Dorothy Cannell

  “Elizabeth…”

  “No one ever calls me that.”

  “Beautiful name… suits you.”

  “Thank you.” Would she begin to believe he’d fallen in love with her from beyond?

  “Right for Cragstone. The west wing… Elizabethan. Other tragedies over the years… papist priest met the same end as I.”

  I could almost hear Betty thinking, My darling, I think only of you! “Tell me how I can help you,” she urged tearily.

  “Know you care, felt it from the first. Tried to get through… sent indicators.”

  I heard Tom snort and agreed wholeheartedly. A funeral wreath and some dead birds as love tokens? I scoffed inwardly. But then men always say they never know what to send.

  “How can I bring your murderer to justice, Nigel?”

  “You will know when the moment comes… soon. Very soon. Don’t… tell anyone what you are about to do. Might try to stop you… Go alone. Promise me, Elizabeth.”

  “I do.”

  “Can’t stay… have to leave.”

  “Must you?”

  “Until… we meet… again.”

  A depleted sigh issued from Madam LaGrange’s lips. She had done such an admirable job of conjuring up Nigel Gallagher that I missed him deeply until I came to my senses. Nobody spoke for several minutes.

  “Did he come through?” she finally asked in her own voice.

  Betty’s was thick with emotion. “Oh, yes!”

  “I can never be sure. We need no longer hold hands.”

  “I don’t know how to thank you, Madam LaGrange.”

  “We can pay her the fee Ariel promised her.” Tom sounded understandably sullen. He’d been forced to witness his wife throwing herself at a ghost. Who better than I to appreciate his feeling, having watched Val do the same thing with Ben? Or hadn’t that been the other way round? I suddenly felt as worn out as Madam LaGrange was pretending to be. When Betty excused herself and rushed from the room, I was tempted to follow suit.

  “I never accept any payment in situations that involve murder. My gift is meant to help make the world a better and safer one,” Madam was telling Tom when we heard Betty talking to someone in the hall. She did not return. It was Miss Pierce who hobbled quickly into the study.

  “Where is he?” she quavered.

  “Who?” Ariel pranced toward her as Tom and Ben got to their feet and Madam LaGrange fiddled with the fringe on her sleeve.

  “My Mr. Nigel. I woke up to hear Val telling me he was home where he belongs, but when I sat up in bed she said I’d been dreaming and cried out in my sleep.”

  “That’s what happened.” Her great-niece was suddenly at her side. “Aunt, you shouldn’t have come up here.”

  “I’ve got a coat over my nightgown. I wouldn’t let Mr. Nigel see me not properly dressed.”

  “I know; you look entirely presentable. But he isn’t here and you’ve interrupted the Hopkinses’ evening with their guests.” Val looked apologetically at Tom, but was it the sight of Ben looking at her intently that brought the lovely flush to her cheeks?

  “Miss Pierce, Mr. Gallagher hasn’t come home,” Tom told the old lady, with a kindness that surprised me.

  “He did pay a fleeting visit”-Ariel began, then checked herself-“to Istanbul, Mrs. Cake told me.”

  “He never went there,” Nanny Pierce replied crossly. “He went to Constantinople, somewhere quite different. Oh, I am disappointed that I don’t get to make Mr. Nigel a welcome-home cup of cocoa.”

  “Someday soon.” Val put an arm around her, to have it shoved away.

  “No need to coddle me like I’m demented. I’m as sharp as I ever was. None of that forgetting names and faces for me.”

  Madam LaGrange pushed up her sleeve to look at her watch. “I’d better go out to wait for my taxi. I booked it with the man who brought me here, for ten minutes from now. But he’s going to be early.”

  “It must be marvelous to know things ahead of time.” Ben smiled at her. He had stopped looking at Val.

  “Yes, there is that.” Madam glided into the hall with Tom following like a bridesmaid. After they left, Nanny sat down in the nearest chair and began reminiscing about her Mr. Nigel. Val looked embarrassed. Ben didn’t look any way at all. And Ariel asked me if I’d enjoyed her surprise.

  “Betty did. I don’t know if that’s good or bad.” Suddenly I couldn’t stand the constraint between Ben and myself a moment longer. Without bothering to excuse myself as Betty had done, I hurried into the hall. Deciding that wasn’t far enough away, I opened the front door and headed down the stone steps in time to see Madam LaGrange get into her taxi. It was still quite light.

  “Who’s that?” Mrs. Malloy popped up at my side and pointed a finger at the departing guest.

  “Is your eyesight failing?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “That you should recognize Madam LaGrange.”

  “But that wasn’t her.”

  “Are you sure?” We stood staring at each other.

  “ ’Course I am. Madam LaGrange is a slip of a girl, not much taller than Ariel and no more than eighteen years old.”

  “Then who was that woman?”

  8

  When I related to Mrs. Malloy what had transpired at the séance, one thing became clear: someone, for whatever dubious reason, wanted to confirm Betty’s belief that Mr. Gallagher had been murdered. The real Madam LaGrange might not have produced Nigel at all, let alone have him play so effectively on Betty’s emotions; therefore the switch. We agreed not to say anything to the Hopkinses for the time being. Better, Mrs. Malloy and I decided, to let the devious plot unfold.

  Upon our return to the house, she immediately phoned the real Madam LaGrange and got her voice mail. Not thinking it wise to leave a message that might result in Madam’s phoning back and talking with one of the Hopkinses, Mrs. Malloy told me she would ring back the next morning.

  She and I also talked about Miss Pierce: my visit to the Dower House and her arrival at Cragstone following the séance. Was there anything to Mrs. Malloy’s suggestion that Val might have had mercenary reasons for keeping in touch with the old lady over the years and then had jumped at the chance to move in with her? A practical move, Mrs. M had pointed out, if the old lady’s gratitude was demonstrated by making Val her sole heir: ousting the brother who had bunked off to Ireland or possibly Scotland, made an unfortunate marriage, and forgotten all about the great-aunt. But was there an inheritance worth bothering about? The fact that Lady Fiona had not taken up residence at the Dower House merely suggested an unwillingness to turn out an elderly person who might have nowhere else to go. It was far too big a leap to assume that a grateful Mr. Gallagher had persuaded his wife to gift the Dower House to his devoted former nanny.

  I was proud of having introduced this caveat. It was good to know I had not succumbed to unkindness as a result of petty and completely unfounded jealousy toward the beautiful woman who had stood that afternoon with my husband in a tableau that excluded everyone else present, clinging to his hands, gazing deeply into his eyes. What else should be expected from two people who come unexpectedly upon each other after a long interval of time? Our vicar would be proud of me. His wife might go so far as to offer me the lead in her next play, The Merry Wives of Chitterton Fells.

  The rest of the evening was such that Ben and I were never alone until we came upstairs, at which time we were occupied with the necessary unpacking. I whisked into the bathroom, not to avoid conversation but because I like concentrated time with my teeth. It is a source of some pride to me that I have never had a cavity, something most women in their thirties cannot claim. Val must be about my age, I thought, as I hung up the dainty hand towel. Whether she looked younger might be in the eye of the one doing the beholding. The mirror informed me that I could shed a few years by unplaiting my hair and shaking it loose down my back. True, in the morning I’d look as though I had escaped from an attic, but so what? Then ag
ain, maybe what Ben needed at this time was a wife with whom he could converse without visible distraction. There had to be so much he was aching to tell me: what he had thought of the séance, how it felt to be reunited with Tom, his impression of Betty, and what he was planning for the tea tomorrow and the catering for Thursday.

  I left my hair in its plait and smoothed the demure collar of my nightgown before leaving the bathroom and making my way to the four-poster bed where Ben awaited me under the covers.

  “Sleepy, darling?” I asked, settling back against the comfy down pillows.

  “Yes, but not too tired to talk.” His hand reached for mine but instantly let it go, as he lay in a straight line on his back, arms at his side, eyes on the ceiling.

  I resisted the urge to rearrange him like a piece of furniture that needed to be set at an angle. Instead, I switched off my bedside lamp and watched him subside into shadow. Nice, I told myself: peaceful contentment at the end of a long day. No need to talk. Everything that had occurred since our arrival at Cragstone House could wait till morning to be discussed. Of course he must be tired, after the early start and the drive to Yorkshire.

  “How was Mrs. Malloy’s reunion with her sister?” he asked, across the great divide that can happen in beds designed for families of six.

  “Interesting.”

  “In what way?” Ben inquired of the ceiling.

  “We met Mr. Archibald Scrimshank. He looks like an Archibald. Melody had some pertinent things to say about him and his relationship with the Gallaghers.” I went on to explain, speaking faster as the feeling increased that he was only half listening. When I petered out, it was several moments before he answered. I wondered if he’d fallen asleep.

  “Do the sisters resemble each other?”

  So much for depicting Mr. Scrimshank as the pin-striped villain of the piece and exciting Ben’s interest in ways to prove him guilty of embezzlement and murder.

  “Looking at Melody was like catching Mrs. Malloy on the hop without any makeup or hair dye. I felt I ought to apologize and back out the door, promising not to breathe a word to anyone that I’d seen her naked.”

  Another silence, during which Ben compressed his arms even closer to his sides. I waited for one of us to start humming as the faux Madam LaGrange had done earlier. When that didn’t happen, I brought up the visit to the Dower House. Finally, in a giddy attempt at providing him with a clearer visual image of the scene, I mentioned Val’s arrival.

  “She’d brighten the dullest room, wouldn’t she?” I said.

  “You think?”

  “Oh, yes! I don’t know when I’ve met anyone so lovely.” Now I was the one making a confidant of the ceiling.

  “Ellie…”

  “You must have been stunned to see her walk into the hall this afternoon.” It was said at last. Now he would explain what she had or had not meant to him once upon a time. I would pose gentle questions and receive all the right answers. I would confess to having felt just the tiniest bit threatened until Mrs. Malloy had talked sense into me on the drive to see Melody. He would take me in his arms and tell me tenderly that I was the only woman he had ever loved, and the bed would shrink to its proper size with only room for the two of us.

  That was what should have happened. Instead, his response increased the distance between us.

  “She was someone I knew.”

  “And?”

  “It was a surprise to see her walk in.”

  “You didn’t know that she had a great-aunt living in this part of the world?”

  “Ellie.” He reached again for my hand and this time held on to it. “There’s a lot I didn’t know about Valeria Pierce. We crossed paths… Can we leave it at that for the time being?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “No probing questions? No digging up the past?”

  “You were ships passing in the night.” I squeezed his hand, to let him know I understood, before turning over and pressing my quivering lips against the pillow. So silly to react in such a way! But why was he reluctant to talk about the woman if meeting her again had not reawakened regrets for what might have been? I was convinced I wouldn’t be able to fall asleep with Ben lying beside me like a block of wood and unanswerable questions hammering away in my head. But misery provides its own stupor, and I found myself dragged down into a bog that suffocated thought.

  No unhappy dreams disturbed my slumber. I awoke to sunlight blasting through the windows, bouncing on and off the furniture and spray-painting the walls with gold. Mother Nature is not always the most sensitive of souls, and at first I recoiled. Let the birds chirp their little hearts out, let the sky be the color of bluebells, I would not be coerced into a more cheerful frame of mind. I would burrow deep into my Slough of Despond, put a pillow over my face, and refuse to set foot out of bed. But then pride had to go and rear its ugly head. Ben was already up. Did I really want the entire household, of which Val seemed to be an integral part, to know I was sulking? My mind said it didn’t matter. The rest of me collaborated in getting out from under the covers. Despicable, how we can turn against ourselves at crucial moments.

  But once up I felt marginally better. It was a relief that Ben had stolen a march on me and did not have to be faced immediately. A steaming hot shower further improved matters. Indeed, I found myself wondering if I hadn’t blown our bedtime chat out of all proportion. So he hadn’t wanted to talk about Val. What man would want to rehash a past relationship with his wife? Maybe she had dumped him in a way he found embarrassing to remember, or he was the one who had broken things off and he still felt somewhat guilty. By the time I had finished coiling my hair into its chignon, I was convinced I had upset myself over nothing. It also came to me that Val reminded me of Bridie O’Donnell, the girl in my class at school whose dark curls and blue eyes had made me feel so hopelessly inferior.

  I drifted downstairs renewed in spirit. On hearing voices emanating from the far end of the hall, I went through the open kitchen door to find a beehive of activity. Ben was making toast and Mrs. Malloy was handing around cups of coffee. Ariel was jabbering about not wanting to go to church. Betty, wearing a green polished cotton suit two sizes too big for her, was insisting that Ariel was going, like it or lump it. Tom, in yesterday’s country squire’s outfit, seemed to be working on being invisible. Nobody mentioned the séance.

  Smiles here and there wafted my way as I sat down at the large table in the center of the room. A coffee cup and plate of toast magically appeared in front of me, followed by a butter dish and marmalade pot.

  “How are you this morning?” Ben asked, his face a breath away from mine. The world righted itself completely.

  “Awake, which you know is amazing, since I’m not a morning person.” I hoped he’d read between the lines and realize I was telling him I now saw things more clearly. His hand touched my hair and Val’s specter drifted away to the funeral heap of what might have been but wasn’t.

  The kitchen, despite its being in need of refurbishing, was meant for cheerful occupancy. In time, I thought without a pang, the present-day Val would bring new life to its old-world charm with new cabinets, countertops, and appliances. The floor perhaps she would leave; I liked the honey-colored stone. It would be good to find a modern replica of the large country sink and 1920s cooker, but my opinion was not what counted. Chance had given the Hopkinses their decorator, a friend who only a few short months before had been a stranger to them both. A happy outcome among neighbors.

  Regrettably, Ariel was not happy. Her face was marred by the fiercest of scowls as she stood with her hands on her hips, squaring off at her stepmother. “If I have to go to church, why can’t it be to St. Cuthbert’s? Their service is shorter.”

  “Because it’s Church of England and we’re Catholic?” Betty looked ready to sling a slice of toast at anyone who moved.

  “Then why have their vicar for tea?”

  “You know the reason. Mr. Hardcastle has an old clergyman friend staying with him who
remembers Cragstone House fondly and wants to see it one more time before he kicks the bucket. Tom”-rounding on him-“say something to your daughter or I’ll run screaming from this house.”

  “Ariel-”

  “Oh, please!” Betty screeched. “Not in that wimpy voice!”

  “Aren’t we a lovely family?” The wretched child flung her arms wide and beamed a smile around the room. While I looked at Ben, hoping for inspiration as to what to say, Mrs. Malloy, disporting herself in emerald taffeta this morning and wearing more than her usual amount of rouge and incandescent eye shadow, announced that she had sometimes rather fancied becoming a Roman Catholic.

  “Trouble is, me doctor advised against it. Bad for the knees, he said, all that bobbing up and down in the pews. A shame, really, because I’ve always liked their views on Bingo. Protestants have never taken to it the same way. To be fair, there’s nothing in the Bible that says anything about it one way or another.” She returned to pouring coffee.

  “Ariel.” Tom made another attempt at being the heavy-handed father. “Go upstairs this minute and wash your hair. You can’t go to church looking like that.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s”-he struggled to come up with a word-“greasy. I don’t know why nothing is ever done about it.”

  “Meaning I’m supposed to introduce her to a bottle of shampoo, tell her what it does, and point the way to the nearest tap?” Betty grew a full inch with rage.

  “No.” Tom hastily retrieved the look he had darted at her. “But other girls her age don’t go around looking like she does.”

  “If I do wash my hair,” said Ariel smugly, “I’ll be too late for church.”

  “Suit yourself.” Betty marched toward the hall door with Tom following at a snail’s pace behind. “Anyone else want to come?” she asked belatedly and, receiving responses in the negative, she and Tom departed.

  “I think having afternoon tea with two vicars is enough spirituality for me on any given Sunday,” Ben confided, into the hush that followed.

  “We’ll go twice next week.” I buttered another slice of toast.