The Skeleton in the Closet

by M C Beaton

  ∨ The Skeleton in the Closet ∧

  Two

  THE funeral of Mrs. Doris Dolphin took place on a beautiful morning in late May. The sun shone down on the churchyard with its old leaning tombstones, on the laburnum tree heavy with yellow blossoms by the church gate and on the dandelions that starred the thick tussocky grass.

  The church of St. Peter’s was very old, a Norman church built on Saxon foundations. The stained-glass windows had survived Cromwell’s purges: splashes of jewelled colour lay across the pews and the stone-flagged aisle.

  Despite the glory of the day, Aunt Agnes was buttoned tightly into a tweed coat. The coffin lay before the altar with one wreath of flowers supplied by Fell on the top.

  Although the vicar had kept to Fell’s choice of hymns, they were played by a steel band. How his mother would have hated it, thought Fell.

  After the service, they drove in one large limousine – Barbara and her husband, Cousin Tom, Aunt Agnes, Fell and Maggie – behind the hearse to the town cemetery.

  Maggie in a severe black suit looked the only one of them dressed for the occasion. Fell was wearing his new blazer and trousers with a black tie; Cousin Tom had on a blue suit and red tie, Barbara a yellow trouser suit, and her husband, Fred, the same sort of blue suit as Cousin Tom had on.

  Fell tried to conjure up suitable feelings, but he felt numb and cold despite the increasing heat of the day. Must order a headstone, he thought.

  There had been no conversation among them, but when they got back to the house and Maggie put on an apron and went off to the kitchen to heat the savouries, Fell poured drinks all round, regretting having lavished so much money on such a large selection because Barbara, Fred, Tom and Aunt Agnes all asked for sweet sherry.

  “So that’s your fiancée,” began Aunt Agnes. “Not much of a looker, is she?”

  “I find her very attractive,” said Fell.

  “Oh, well, I’ve never been able to make out what folks see in each other.”

  Fell set himself first to discovering if his relatives were in straitened circumstances. As Maggie handed around plates of savouries, he unearthed that Fred owned an electrical-goods shop in Cardiff, and Tom had a building business in Bath. Aunt Agnes said that she hoped Fell would manage. Her late husband, she said, had left her comfortably off. She didn’t suppose Fell had been left much, she said, her little eyes bright with curiosity. Poor Doris had always complained they couldn’t even afford a holiday.

  Fell murmured that he would manage. He still insisted on sending the furniture to Aunt Agnes, but instead of saying this time that Maggie didn’t like it, he said instead that it all reminded him of his dead parents.

  Barbara and Fred looked bored and said they had better be getting back. “Oh, have another drink…just one,” begged Fell. “I want to ask you all something. I can’t find any family photographs. Have you got any of me when I was young, Aunt Agnes?”

  “Can’t say I have,” said Aunt Agnes. “When are you getting married?”

  “We’re in no hurry,” said Fell. “Wait here. I’ve something to show you.”

  He ran upstairs and got the photo album and returned with it. He opened it and took out the photo of the couple in front of the grand house. “Do you recognize them?”

  “No,” said Barbara. “What about you, Tom?”

  “Never seen them before.”

  “Aunt Agnes?”

  “Well, I’d better be going. Tom’s offered me a lift to back home.”

  “But do you recognize them?”

  “No. What do you want to bother about a lot of old photographs for, Fell?”

  “Because I find it odd that there aren’t any of me as a child.”

  “That was Doris for you. Never could abide getting her photo took. Now, Tom, if you’re ready…”

  ♦

  Maggie and Fell were alone. “That’s that,” said Fell, but he felt flat and disappointed. Ever a romantic, his busy imagination had begun to weave stories about that aristocratic couple in the photograph. Perhaps he had been adopted. Perhaps the elderly couple in the photograph were his real grandparents. Maybe their daughter had fallen pregnant to someone unsuitable. His father, he remembered, was always bragging about some ‘nob’ or other he had chatted to on the platform. What if old Lord Thingummy had paid him to adopt the daughter’s unwanted baby?

  “Penny for them,” said Maggie.

  Fell gave a reluctant laugh and told her about his fantasy.

  “I don’t know,” said Maggie slowly. “I often used to dream I was adopted. Unhappy children usually do.”

  “I suppose you’re right.” Fell looked downcast.

  “I tell you what we could do,” said Maggie quickly. “Once we’ve got this place fixed up, we could get a book on country houses and see if we can find one that looks like the one in the photograph.”

  Fell brightened. “We could do that. Then we’ll see about setting up some business or other.”

  “The bookshop?”

  “Or maybe a restaurant.”

  “Like I said, wouldn’t that be a bit like what we’ve always done – waiting table?”

  “We’ll think about it. I mean, the glorious thing, Maggie, is we don’t really need to work for a bit.”

  There was a ring at the door. “Now who can that be?” Fell rose and went to the door.

  A hard-faced, middle-aged blonde stood on the doorstep. “I’m Maggie’s mother,” she said harshly.

  “Come in.” All at once, as he stood aside and she walked past him, Fell realized he hadn’t changed at all. Nothing had changed. He felt weak and cowed.

  Mrs. Partlett sat down and crossed her legs. She was wearing a short tight skirt which rode up about her thighs. Her muscular legs ended in high-heeled sandals. A low-cut blouse plunged down to reveal the tops of two flabby breasts, pushed up by her brassiere. Her mouth was painted scarlet, and her discontented face was floury with white powder dusted over some sort of heavy foundation cream with which she had attempted to grout the wrinkles in her face.

  She lit a cigarette and blew smoke in Maggie’s direction. Another stereotype, thought Fell. The world is full of stereotypes. She’s like a stage tart.

  “So what are you up to, girl?” asked Mrs. Partlett.

  “I’ve moved in with Fell. We’re going to get married.”

  “Oh, yeah? Where’s the ring?”

  “We’re going to get one…soon.”

  Fell noticed that Maggie wasn’t wearing the emerald ring.

  “I met that wop from the hotel bar,” said Mrs. Partlett. “He told me you’d both jacked in your jobs. What are you going to live on?”

  “I’ve got a little money,” said Fell.

  “Won’t last long. You’ll need to provide for her.”

  “It’s got nothing to do with you,” said Maggie, turning blotchy red with anger. “You’ve never bothered about my welfare before.”

  “Don’t get snippy with me. No one going to offer me a drink?”

  “No,” said Maggie, getting to her feet. “We’re just going out.”

  Mrs. Partlett rose to her feet. She’ll wriggle her hips and smooth down her skirt, thought Fell. Mrs. Partlett did just that.

  She turned on Fell. “I’ll be keeping my eye on you, and do you know why? I think you’re a pervert.”

  “How dare you!” shouted Maggie.

  Her mother looked at her with scorn. “What man’s ever been interested in you before? Oh, don’t give me your lies about Tom, Dick or Harry who died or went abroad. I knew they were lies. I know just about everyone in this town.”

  “You should,” said Maggie evenly. “You’ve slept with most of them.”

  Mrs. Partlett shrugged her shoulders and walked to the door. “You never really grew up, Maggie. I’ll be watching you.”

  She went out and slammed the door behind her.

  Maggie collapsed into a chair and began to cry.

  Fell circled helplessly around her, saying, “Don’t c
ry. She’s gone.” He knelt down in front of her and took her hands in his. “I know, let’s get out of here. Take me for a drive.”

  “Where?”

  “Anywhere, and where’s your ring?”

  Maggie fished in her pocket and drew out the ring and put it on. “I took it off as soon as I knew it was her. If she saw it, she would smell money and we’d never be rid of her.”

  ♦

  When they were driving along the country lanes, Fell said, “Was she always like that?”

  “I suppose so,” said Maggie wearily. “My sisters are like her. I was the bookish one. I always felt like a stranger in my own home.”

  “Never mind. Listen to me, Maggie. The old part of our lives is over. We’ve never really had any fun.”

  “Maybe it’s too late for us.”

  “Don’t say that,” exclaimed Fell, suddenly furious with her because he feared what she said might be true.

  ♦

  But during the following weeks, thoughts of adoption and worries about where the money in the cash box might have come from were temporarily forgotten as Fell and Maggie, once they had cleared the house of all the old furniture, set to work. Fell decided his idea of turning the living room into a kitchen was too ambitious. He quickly ordered a modern three-piece suite for the living room, then he and Maggie concentrated on refurbishing the old kitchen. All the old units were taken out – the fridge, the ancient washing machine, and the inadequate cooker. They ripped off the old wallpaper and painted the walls sparkling white. They ordered the kitchen counter complete with stainless-steel sinks and cupboard from a D.I.Y. store. Fell assured Maggie that all they had to do was study the instructions and they could do it all themselves, although by the time they had bought a whole range of expensive electrical tools, Maggie privately thought it would have been cheaper to pay the shop extra to fit it for them. They ripped up the old green linoleum and found a stone-flagged floor underneath.

  “You’ll need to get some new clothes,” said Fell, watching Maggie scrubbing the flags.

  “Why?” demanded Maggie defensively.

  Fell laughed. “It’s all this exercise. You’ve lost a lot of weight.”

  It was not only the exercise. Maggie had always eaten comfort food – chocolate puddings, piles of pasta, anything to fill the empty spiritual hole inside. But Fell had become a gourmet, wanting to get as far away from his mother’s ‘good plain cooking’ as possible. The weather was becoming increasingly hot and they had been eating a lot of salads.

  “You could take a break, and we could go and get you something,” suggested Fell.

  “Do you want to come with me?”

  “Why not? I’ve never had the experience of watching a woman choose clothes. Let’s go to Cheltenham. They’ve got some really smart shops in the Parade.”

  ♦

  To Maggie, it was a delight to try on pretty dresses and find that they fitted. Before, she had always chosen skirts with elasticated waists and loose blouses or sweaters to hide her lumpy shape.

  Fell bought a charcoal grey suit, shirts and new underwear until, after several trips back to the car park, Maggie’s little car was laden.

  “Now, let’s get your hair done,” said Fell.

  “I don’t think much can be done with it.”

  “It’s shiny now. It didn’t use to be,” said Fell. “Let’s try.”

  Maggie had her dreams and fantasies as well. When she emerged from the hairdresser with her hair cut in a becoming wispy feathery cut which framed her heart-shaped face, she felt it was only a matter of time now before she and Fell became lovers. He was so delighted with her appearance.

  They decided to dress up in their new clothes that evening and go out to the French restaurant.

  Maggie put on a fine cotton dress, white with a pattern of roses which clung to her now shapely hips and was long enough to hide her legs. She pictured the scene in the restaurant. There would be candlelight in the evening and Fell would lean across the table and look into her eyes and take her hand, and then…and then…

  She thought Fell looked distinguished and handsome in his new suit and striped shirt. Well content with each other, they walked through the balmy summer evening to the restaurant. Swallows swooped around the walls of the old castle.

  “Dandelion summer,” said Fell. “It’s a dandelion summer.”

  Together they went into the restaurant. Bolder now, Maggie ordered her own food. The next step in her appearance was contact lenses.

  Fell smiled into her eyes.

  “What are you thinking?” asked Maggie huskily.

  Fell laughed. “I was thinking that I can’t wait to start on the living room tomorrow. We’ve been using that packing case as a table for long enough.”

  It’s too soon, Maggie chided herself, as the bubble of her dream burst. I mustn’t rush things.

  “That woman over there, the one who keeps smiling over at me,” said Fell. “I know her from somewhere.”

  Maggie followed his gaze. “That’s Mrs. Harley. Used to dine at the hotel with her husband. I heard he died last year.”

  “What did her husband do?”

  “He was manager of your bank.”

  Mrs. Harley rose and walked over to their table. She was the sort of woman, Fell thought, that he often dreamed about. She was wearing a short black chiffon dress which clung to her excellent figure and showed off her long, long legs. Fell saw a cloud of dark hair, a full pouting mouth and large dark eyes fringed with long lashes.

  “I know you, don’t I?” she said to Fell.

  All at once, Fell wished he were on his own. He knew he would never have told her he had been a waiter at the Palace.

  But there was Maggie, and Maggie was saying, “We both waited table at the Palace.”

  “Of course!” She smiled. “You look so…debonair…I didn’t recognize you.”

  “I’m Fellworth Dolphin, Fell, and this is Maggie Partlett. I was sorry to hear about your husband’s death,” said Fell.

  “Yes, too sad. I’m in business now. Let me give you my card. I run a health shop in the High Street.” She handed Fell a card. “Drop in and see me and we can have a chat.”

  She drifted off on a cloud of Chanel.

  Maggie’s dreams lay in ruins. Fell was looking excited, happy, elated, and his eyes kept drifting over to Mrs. Harley’s table.

  “I hope our Mrs. Harley is not a gold-digger,” said Maggie with a lightness she did not feel.

  “Why should she be that?”

  “This is a small town and gossip travels fast. It’s a good thing your relatives don’t live here. A lot of people probably know now that you’ve come into money.”

  Fell frowned. “She seems very prosperous.”

  Maggie dropped the subject and tried to chat about house improvements and ignore the heavy, indigestible misery that had settled somewhere in her gut.

  To her relief, Mrs. Harley left. Immediately Fell decided they should get home. Usually he liked to linger over his coffee.

  And once home, he didn’t want to sit up. He was tired, he said. And Maggie knew he wanted to be alone with dreams of Mrs. Harley.

  In his room, Fell took out that precious card. Her full name was Melissa Harley. He had fallen in love before with such as Melissa, but his circumstances had kept his love to fantasies and dreams. He dreamt like a very young teenager, for his repressive life had frozen his emotional development like an insect in amber.

  But he was blessed with a certain amount of stoic common sense, and in the clear light of another morning, all he looked forward to was more home improvements with Maggie.

  It was only after another busy morning of shopping and planning, when Maggie suddenly said she had left her television set, but might as well go and get it and then they would have one each, that he felt the compulsion to go out and stroll along the High Street in the direction of the health shop.

  The shop was called Whole Body and as he hesitated outside the window, Melissa Har
ley came out. “Why, if it isn’t Fellworth,” she said.

  “Fell,” he corrected quickly. “I don’t like my name much.” He blinked a little in the sunlight. Melissa seemed smaller and plumper than he remembered, but Fell was a romantic and he wanted to see a glamorous woman again, and so his imagination quickly told him that he did.

  “Why did your parents choose a name like that?”

  “They never told me. I suffered a lot because of it at school.”

  “Poor you. Got time for a coffee?”

  Of course he had. All the time in the world.

  They strolled into a tea shop of the olde English variety, beams and horse brasses, and cakes that most of the world had forgotten about – Eiffel towers, congress cake, fly cemeteries, empire biscuits.

  She fixed those dark eyes on his and said in her husky voice, “Tell me about yourself.”

  “There’s not much to tell,” said Fell. “I’ve had a rather dreary life.”

  “You’re not still waiting table?”

  “No, my parents have left me a bit of money, so I’ve packed it in.”

  “So what do you plan to do?”

  “I thought of starting up some sort of business, a restaurant or bookshop.”

  She smiled at him, a languorous smile. “Or you could invest in an existing business – like mine.”

  He stared at her. “Would you like to work with me, Fell? I run a prosperous little concern.”

  “That would be wonderful. But I’d need to ask Maggie.”

  “Ah, yes, your little friend. Well, let me know.” She was suddenly brisk. Fell longed to tell her that his engagement to Maggie was a sham, but an irritating loyalty to Maggie kept him quiet.

  She talked about the shop, about how she had dreamt up the idea after her husband died. Fell looked through the distorting prism of his imagination at what he saw as the beauty of her face and listened to the sound of her voice, mesmerized.

  When they parted, he braced himself to tell Maggie. Maggie would be disappointed because she was really keen on a bookshop, but it was his money and Maggie would just need to get used to the idea.

  Maggie was home when he arrived. To his relief, she did not protest, simply listened to him quietly with her hands folded. “It’s your inheritance,” said Maggie when he had finished. “You haven’t had much fun in your life. You have to do exactly what you want.”