by Carola Dunn
Again, that indefinable expression—dismay? distaste?—flitted across her face, as when Daisy had offered to take notes. Searching pockets and reading private letters—the unacceptable side of police work was intruding on her kindly efforts to treat Alec as the acceptable husband of her daughter’s school friend. She said nothing.
Alec could think of no way to soften what he had to tell her. “The letters appear to have been written by Mrs. Gooch. She claims to be Mr. Tyndall’s—Jack’s—natural mother.”
Lady Tyndall’s face went completely blank. Then, with an obvious effort, but gently, without anger, she said, “Why on earth should she do such a thing? The poor woman must have been delusional. Jack is my son.”
17
Chilly,” observed Wookleigh. “Bit of a breeze come up. Morning, Mrs. Yarborough. Don’t let us disturb you, ladies,” he continued apologetically. “It’s time I was getting along.”
“Won’t you stay for lunch, Sir Nigel?” asked Babs, her invitation extended with more propriety than enthusiasm.
“That’s kind of you, Miss Tyndall, but you won’t want an unexpected guest on a day like this. I just stopped in for a word with Fletcher, but he’s obviously up to his ears in his investigation. Mrs. Fletcher, please tell him to telephone if there’s anything I or my force can do to help. And not a word to your revered mama, eh? Miller, my dear chap, it’s been enlightening talking to you.” He shook hands with the engineer. “I might take you up on your offer one of these days. Good day to you all.”
He bowed, and Babs escorted him towards the door to the entrance hall. Daisy wondered whether she ought to suggest he leave by the French doors so as not to disturb Alec. Indecisive, she drifted after the pair. After exchanging a frigid “Good morning,” Adelaide and Miller followed.
At the door, Babs turned back. “I suppose you’d better lunch here, Addie,” she said.
Daisy continued into the hall behind the chief constable. As Babs, Adelaide, and Miller followed her, Alec glanced up, his dark brows lowering in annoyance at the interruption. Lady Tyndall summoned up a faint smile for Sir Nigel, who went to her to present his mingled apologies and condolences.
A voice from the stairs drew everyone’s attention. “He needs fulltime care, of course,” said the doctor to Gwen as they reached the bottom. “I’ll send day and night nurses.”
Lady Tyndall stood up, steadying herself with a hand on the back of a chair. “Yes, Dr. Prentice, please do,” she said firmly. “The best possible.”
He came over. “And you, Lady Tyndall, are not to sit up with him. Take care of yourself, or we’ll have you laid up, too.” He turned to Alec. “Chief Inspector? I must speak to you. You’ll want a report of my findings last night.”
“Yes—”
“I’m first,” Addie declared.
“Dr. Prentice must be anxious to return to his patients. Detective Sergeant Tring will take your statement, Mrs. Yarborough.”
“A sergeant!” Addie was outraged.
“Adelaide,” her mother said sharply, “you forget yourself. Kindly remember why Mr. Fletcher is here. You are to comply with his requirements without a fuss.”
“Bravo, Mother,” said Babs in an undertone.
A modest cough from the direction of the door to the passage turned every head that way. PC Blount blushed and saluted. “I come as soon as I could, sir,” he said to Alec.
Even more like Piccadilly Circus than the far end of the drive, thought Daisy. Who would turn up next?
Alec looked a fraction of a degree less harassed. “Thank you, Constable. Go upstairs and relieve DC Piper, please. He’ll explain.”
“I’ll show you the way, Blount,” Gwen offered. “I must have accommodations prepared for the nurses. Then I’ll sit with him until they arrive.”
“Who would that be, miss?” Blount enquired, mystified, as he tramped after her to the stairs. “Nurses?”
“I must get back to work,” said Babs, “if you can spare me, Mr. Fletcher.”
“For the moment, yes, as long as you’re not going to be too far from the house. Let me know, please, if you intend to go as far as the village, or farther.”
“Right-oh.” She went out with Sir Nigel.
“I should like a little fresh air before luncheon,” said Lady Tyndall. “Daisy, would you care to walk with me? We might see if there are any flowers to be cut for the table.”
Daisy had already set out for one morning walk that day, only for it to end in catastrophe. She reminded herself that she had actually walked only one way, though the trip back to the house in Struwwelpeter’s car had been anything but restful. Besides, her kind hostess ought to have someone with her, and all her daughters were otherwise occupied. If Lady Tyndall should happen to want to talk about Mrs. Gooch’s letter, so much the better.
“Do let’s,” she said. “It’s jolly cold outside, though. You’d better wrap up well.”
She was still wearing her outdoor clothes. Lady Tyndall went to the cloakroom and emerged bundled up in hat, gloves, scarf, and a long dark grey woollen cape trimmed with green.
“Gosh, that looks warm,” said Daisy.
“It is, and fairly waterproof, too, though it gets rather heavy when it’s wet. It’s Tyrolean. Lodenmantel, they call it. I’ve had it over twenty years, well before the Germans and Austrians became our enemies, but I didn’t wear it during the War.”
“It looks good for another twenty.”
They went out through the drawing room, leaving Miller looking rather lost, Adelaide sulking on a sofa, and Alec and the doctor in close confab at a discreet distance from both.
From the north end of the terrace, a stone-paved path led into a shrubbery of evergreens, ilex, yew, and laurustinus.
“Rather gloomy at this time of year.” Lady Tyndall apologized.
“The holly and yew berries brighten it up a bit, and it’s sheltered from the breeze.”
“It’s pleasantly shady in the summer. I love to walk here on hot days.” She continued to utter polite nothings, but her mind, unsurprisingly, seemed elsewhere. Why had she invited Daisy to go with her unless she really wanted to talk about the calamities afflicting her family? Perhaps she simply didn’t know how to begin.
Daisy, bursting with questions, tried in vain to think of a tactful way to broach the subject of Jack’s parentage.
A side path took them to a well-concealed potting shed, its weathered wooden walls and lichened slate roof blending into the bushes.
“I’ll just fetch a trug and secateurs.” Lady Tyndall lifted the latch and went in. Daisy stood in the doorway.
The shed contained the usual clutter of garden implements—clay pots, watering cans, bottles of turps and linseed oil, balls of twine, old sacks, a stepladder, bamboo plant stakes, a scythe hanging from a high hook, and a still higher shelf with rusty tins and dusty jars of poisons equally fatal to insects and humans.
“I simply can’t persuade Biddle to keep it tidy. Of course, the poor man has far too much to do these days with just a boy to help. But my flower things belong in this corner—yes, here they are.”
She tucked the secateurs into one of the Lodenmantel’s capacious pockets. Daisy took the shallow reed basket and followed Lady Tyndall past the shed. The shrubbery opened out into a sheltered vegetable garden with several beds dedicated to cutting flowers for the house. Not much was in bloom at this season, but they managed to fill the trug with Michaelmas daisies, calendulas, and greenery.
“That will do for now. The Chinese lanterns are ready to cut for drying, but they can wait.” She turned towards the path, saying in a detached tone, “Isn’t it odd. Everything is . . . falling apart, yet one carries on doing the little, everyday things, as if they still mattered. Did your husband tell you about the letter from that woman?”
“Gosh no, Alec wouldn’t tell me something like that. But I happened to be there when Jack opened it, and I know what she wrote.”
“It’s nonsense. Jack doesn’t believe it, doe
s he? He mustn’t! He’s my son, the best son any mother could ask for.”
“He said he absolutely couldn’t believe it.”
“Thank heaven! He must have been hurt and bewildered, though. I thought he seemed distressed when I came downstairs. I should have stayed with him.”
“He was very anxious that you should not be distressed. He hoped Alec wouldn’t have to tell you about the letter, but it’s part of the investigation. He couldn’t keep it from you.”
“Part of the investigation?” Lady Tyndall looked shocked. “Oh, surely not.”
Daisy decided it was inadvisable to point out that Mrs. Gooch’s claim must somehow explain her meeting with Sir Harold. “Well, let me put it this way: Alec has to treat it as if it’s part of the investigation. That’s his job.”
“I suppose so. But does he believe what it says? Your husband?”
“He wouldn’t tell me if he’d made up his mind, but I’d be surprised if he’s not keeping an open mind about it. That’s also part of his job.”
“Oh dear, just when one thinks things can’t possibly get any worse, some new horror raises its head. Is it true that my grandsons caused Mr. Gooch’s accident?”
“I’m afraid it seems very likely.”
Lady Tyndall fell silent. They entered the house by a back door and thence into a small whitewashed scullery with a stone sink. Daisy set the trug on the slate draining board. Lady Tyndall opened a cupboard and surveyed the several shelves of vases. She selected a tall one, green porcelain, for the Michaelmas daisies, and reached for a step stool.
“Let me help,” Daisy offered.
“That’s all right, dear, I always do the flowers myself.” She stepped up on the stool and took down a pair of smaller vases from a higher shelf. “I find it soothing, and I have a great deal to think about.”
Daisy accepted this gentle dismissal. “I’ll leave you in peace, then.”
At the door, she glanced back. The big vase was in the sink, filling with water, while Lady Tyndall stripped and snipped the stems of the Michaelmas daisies. Though she seemed completely intent on her task, the slump of her thin shoulders looked less like weariness than utter defeat.
What must it be like to have doubt cast on the legitimacy of one’s beloved son? Mrs. Gooch’s letter had made a strong impression on Daisy, but after due consideration, she couldn’t believe it was true.
Things had changed since the days of the Warming-Pan Plot, when people believed the Old Pretender, as a baby, had been smuggled into queen’s bed to provide James II with an heir. Even the king hadn’t been able to suppress the rumours.
Sir Harold couldn’t possibly have introduced his love child into Edge Manor with only his wife’s knowledge. The notion was preposterous. For a start, why would Lady Tyndall have agreed to the deception? But supposing he had persuaded her, too many people would have had to be in the secret: doctor, midwife, monthly nurse, vicar, registrar, lady’s maid, and other servants—and what the servants knew, the village knew.
If Sir Harold had actually pulled it off, though, the arrival of the Gooches had set off an explosion greater than anything Babs’s boys had so far accomplished. Like a Catherine wheel throwing off glittering sparks, Daisy’s brain whirled with multiplying motives.
At the luciferous centre, one fact stood out: Jack had by far the most to lose from a revelation of his illegitimacy.
But it couldn’t be true!
“Prognosis?” Alec asked.
“I believe he’ll live,” Dr. Prentice told him, “but severe head injuries are the very devil to predict. He may have permanent brain damage. He may not be able to speak.”
“Or write?”
“Or write. But he may recover fully, soon, or in time.”
“Poor chap! All right, what about your examination of the murder victims?”
Prentice’s brief oral report confirmed Tom’s, Alec’s, and the police surgeon’s conclusions. Tucking the written report into his pocket, Alec said, “Thank you, Doctor, that’s admirably clear. If you should ever want a position as police surgeon, I’d be happy to recommend you. You realize, I’m sure, this is as confidential as your relations with your patients.”
“Of course.”
“And what I have to ask you now is equally confidential. Am I right in assuming you were not in practice in this area twenty-one years ago?”
“Nor anywhere,” Prentice agreed with a touch of amusement. “I would guess we are much of an age, you and I.”
“I don’t suppose you can put me in touch with your predecessor?”
“Unless you believe in table turning, no. I bought the practice on Dr. Gunnicott’s death. But my attic is full of his records. Apparently he never discarded anything. I haven’t found time to go through any but the most recent of those applicable to patients I took over, and I hate to throw them out wholesale.”
“Good! I’ll send DC Piper to go through them.”
“Just a minute, Chief Inspector. It was you who brought up the subject of patient confidentiality.”
Alec grinned. “Oh well, it’s always worth a try, to save time. You live in Gloucestershire?”
“In Chipping Campden, just up the road.”
“Then Dryden-Jones will no doubt be delighted to make himself useful in obtaining a warrant.”
“Send your man with a warrant and he may ransack my attic to his heart’s content.”
They shook hands cordially, and Prentice went to the telephone cubby under the stairs to ring up a nursing agency.
While they were talking, Piper had come down from Gooch’s room. Alec quickly brought him up-to-date, then sent him after the doctor. As soon as the line was free, he was to go to the telephone in the butler’s pantry to start the process of applying for a search warrant, and then to get in touch with the county officers in charge of questioning all last night’s guests.
Adelaide Yarborough and Martin Miller were both still hanging about in the hall, not speaking to each other. She sat flipping through a copy of Vogue; he stood staring out of a window. When Piper left, they converged on Alec.
The engineer reached him first. “I don’t think I’m doing a lot of good staying—”
“Mr. Fletcher,” Mrs. Yarborough interrupted impatiently, “how much longer do you expect me to wait? I do have more important things to do with my time, you know.”
Miller stared at her with undisguised astonishment.
Alec raised his eyebrows. “Indeed? More important than helping us discover who killed your father?”
“I can’t honestly see that it matters who did it. That stupid Australian, I expect. The fact is, Father’s gone, so there’s no chance now of Reggie inheriting more than a paltry amount. I don’t see how Babs expects me to send them away to a good school when I’ve got hardly anything to live on as it is. Jack will have to pay the fees.”
Alec wondered who would be the residuary legatee if Jack were convicted of his father’s murder (and his mother’s?). He ought to have asked the solicitor. Whoever, he or she would undoubtedly have to deal with the young malefactors. If Prentice was mistaken and Gooch died, the police would be drawn into the matter, though Alec doubted there was a provable case against the boys.
Mrs. Yarborough started to fidget under Alec’s icy gaze. “How much longer?” she repeated.
“I’ll be with you in a moment, to escort you to Sergeant Tring.”
“There’s no one else here. I haven’t anything to tell you, but I don’t see why you can’t interview me yourself.”
“I have more important things to do with my time.” A police officer ought not to resort to frivolous sarcasm, however true, but Mrs. Yarborough didn’t seem to recognize the echo of her own words. She was cross but not offended. Turning to Miller, however, Alec surprised a quickly hidden grin. He ignored it, beckoning the engineer aside. “I think you’re wrong,” he said. “You may be at a loose end just now, but I think your presence will be a comfort and support to more than one of the family.�
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Miller gave him a probing look. “Does this mean I’m no longer under suspicion?”
“I wouldn’t go quite so far as that. But new information has come to light which changes the entire tenor of this enquiry. I can’t justify telling you about it, but if young Tyndall chooses to confide in you, I have no objection.”
“Does this mysterious information tend to implicate him?”
“Not exactly. I can only say that his position is precarious.”
“I shan’t advise him to confess,” Miller said bluntly.
Maybe not, though Alec suspected the engineer was a conventional, law-abiding soul. If Jack confided anything suggesting guilt, whatever advice Miller gave, the relationship between the two was bound to change. Alec might learn a lot simply by observing them.
“I shouldn’t dream of asking you to do so,” he said. “My hope is that your common sense will prevent his doing anything foolish. You’ll stay?”
“For the present.”
“Good. Mrs. Yarborough, come with me, please.”
In the passage, they found the ancient butler perched on a stool outside the door to his pantry.
“Young whippersnapper,” he muttered resentfully, “has to use my telephone, says he, in private, says he. What’s a man to do when a whippersnapper of a policeman can turf him unceremonious out of the place that’s his by right?”
“Oh, do stop fussing, Jennings,” snapped Mrs. Yarborough. “It’s not as if he’s going to pinch the silver. Nor as if you were doing anything useful in there, or have for a hundred years.”
Dignity injured, the butler drew himself up as straight as his bent back allowed. “I do my best, Miss Adelaide, and it’s not for you to criticize if others are satisfied.”
Alec forestalled Mrs. Yarborough’s retort. “Mr. Jennings, I’m Chief Inspector Fletcher. I’m sorry my man has disturbed you, but I’m afraid it’s unavoidable.” He kept his tone more incisive than apologetic. “I’d like a few words with you, in a couple of minutes.”
“I’ll be here,” Jennings said morosely.