by Brett, Simon
‘Right. See you in bed.’ Taking the whisky bottle by its neck, Laurence left the room. She heard his cough receding up the stairs.
‘Jude. It’s Sandy. Ring me as soon as you can, please.’
The voice of Austen’s Education Officer was tight with anxiety. Jude rang back straight away. There was the sound of a car’s engine in the background, though of where she was going, and who with, as ever Sandy Fairbarns made no mention.
She told the news as soon as Jude got through.
‘It’s Mervyn. He’s gone over the wall. He’s escaped.’
Chapter Twenty
There were small paragraphs in the national broadsheets the following morning about the body found at Bracketts, but no detail was given. The papers didn’t have enough information to voice suspicions or make insinuations.
The local press, however, were not so restrained, as Carole Seddon found out at about a quarter to ten. She had just come back from an extended sunny walk with Gulliver on Fethering Beach and was wiping the sand off his feet with an old towel, when the telephone rang.
‘Hello.’ She was so surprised by the brusqueness of his tone that she didn’t take in the name. ‘I’m from the Fethering Observer.’
‘Oh yes?’
‘That is Mrs Seddon?’
‘Yes.’
‘Mrs Carole Seddon?’
‘That’s right.’
‘And I believe you’re a Trustee of Bracketts . . .?’
‘I am.’
As the voice continued, it sounded increasingly boyish. Cub reporter on one of his first assignments, Carole reckoned. Seen too many movies about hardbitten journalists.
‘Could you give me a statement about the discovery of a body buried in the house’s kitchen garden.’
‘I’m not sure that I’m the right person to ask,’ said Carole, wishing she’d had a briefing on how much the press should be told, now the story was public property. ‘I would have thought it would make sense for you to ring the Administrative Office at Bracketts.’
‘Don’t think I haven’t tried,’ came the bitter reply. ‘All I get there is a recorded message, saying the house and gardens are closed until further notice.’
Carole noted the information. They hadn’t managed to keep Bracketts open right through to the end of the season. But they’d only fallen short by two days. Whatever Sheila Cartwright’s delaying tactics had been, they had worked pretty well.
‘I wish I could tell you something,’ said Carole, ‘but I’m afraid I don’t have any information.’
‘Oh, come on. I’ve asked everyone else,’ complained the boy, giving away his inexperience, ‘and none of the other Trustees’ll talk to me.’
She grabbed the lifeline. ‘Then I’m afraid I can’t talk to you either. I’m sure a press statement will be issued by the Board of Trustees at the appropriate time,’ she concluded primly.
‘For heaven’s sake! This is the appropriate time. The story’s only just broken. It could be really big.’
‘The Fethering Observer . . .’ said Carole, now fully in control of the situation, ‘is published on a Thursday. I really can’t believe that the deadline for your copy is today, nearly a week ahead.’
‘That’s not the point.’ The cub reporter’s callowness was revealed again. ‘The nationals’d be really interested in a story as juicy as this.’
I see the way his mind’s working, thought Carole. JUNIOR REPORTER ON FIRST ASSIGNMENT GETS SCOOP OF A LIFETIME!
She could have just rung off, but didn’t. ‘What makes you think it’s a juicy story?’
‘Because of the secrecy. The body was actually found over a week ago, and the news has only now been released.’
‘I would have thought it was up to the police when they informed the press about this kind of thing.’
‘No, it’s definitely a cover-up,’ the boy insisted. ‘And it’s often the case that the cover-up is worse than the original crime. Look at Watergate.’
Oh dear. One of the movies of which he watched too many had evidently been All The President’s Men.
‘You use the word “crime”,’ said Carole. ‘There’s no evidence that any crime has been committed.’
‘There was a bullet-hole in the back of the skull.’
She wondered where he’d got that from. If it was information released by the official investigators, then it was very significant, the first confirmation that the body in the kitchen garden had been the victim of a shooting. ‘Did you hear that from the police?’
The boy was evasive. ‘No. But I heard that there was a hole in the skull.’
‘And you made the deduction that it must have been made by a bullet?’
‘Yes,’ he replied, with a degree of pride in his detective skills. ‘What else is going to make a hole in a skull?’
‘Quite a lot of things,’ said Carole severely. ‘I go back to my point that there is no evidence of any crime having been committed.’
‘The woman who phoned the office talked about a “crime”. She even used the word “murder”. Well, actually, she said “moider”.’
The cub reporter’s attempt at an American accent gave her the information she needed, but Carole still asked, ‘Which woman was this?’
‘I’m sorry,’ the boy said staunchly, remembering another movie he’d seen. ‘I can’t reveal my sources.’
There was no sign of life from Woodside Cottage all day. Jude hadn’t phoned, and Carole was damned if she was going to be the one to make contact. Let Jude get on with her love affair, or whatever it was. She, Carole, was quite capable of conducting the investigation on her own.
The weather changed as she drove the Renault sedately towards Bracketts. The spine of the South Downs frequently broke the climatic pattern. The coastal plain down to Fethering and the sea could be bathed in sunshine, while north of the ridge was drowned in rain. The demarcation wasn’t quite so pronounced that afternoon, but the air did grow darker the further north the Renault went, and heavy leaden clouds hung truculently in the sky. Autumn was killing off the last stragglers of the retreating summer.
Carole looked at her watch as she stopped the Renault in the almost empty car park. Not even half past six. Her habit of being extraordinarily early for everything did annoy her. The only thing that would annoy her more was being late. She had always wished she could be one of those people who ambled up to appointments at just the right time. For Carole Seddon, any prospective encounter with another human being involved a certain amount of trepidation and realignment.
Still, she wouldn’t waste the time. She’d go and have a word with Gina before the Trustees’ Meeting started. In doing this she had double motives. For a start, she could find out what the official line should be for the Trustees when approached by the press. And she could also perhaps do something for the Director’s self-confidence, demonstrating that some of the Trustees still thought she was the one in charge at Bracketts.
As Carole approached the former stable block, however, she heard the voice of Gina’s rival, raised in anger. Carole stopped awkwardly. Out of sight round the corner, there was clearly a major row going on, and, in a very British way, she didn’t relish walking into the middle of that. She looked back towards the car, but what she heard stopped her from retracing her steps.
‘I can assure you,’ Sheila Cartwright was almost shouting, ‘that Bracketts is bigger than you are! Esmond Chadleigh is bigger than you are! And your attempts to sully his reputation will soon be shown up for the kind of gutter journalism they really are!’
‘We’ll see about that.’ The other voice was Marla Teischbaum’s, no less angry, but more controlled. ‘And I don’t take kindly to having my writing referred to as “gutter journalism”. I am a serious academic writer, and all I am seeking is the truth. I’m not setting out to find muck or filth or sleaze or whatever you want to call it in the life of Esmond Chadleigh. I am trying to find out the truth about that tortured man.’
‘He was not tortured!
He was a man of great personal happiness, who spread happiness to those around him!’ Sheila Cartwright sounded like a religious fundamentalist, the basis of whose belief was being challenged.
‘I have evidence to the contrary,’ said Marla Teischbaum coldly. ‘And I will write nothing that is not fully supported by evidence. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to pay a call on Graham Chadleigh-Bewes.’
‘I can save you the trouble, Professor. He’s out for the afternoon, with his aunt. And they’ll be back just in time for a meeting tonight at seven. So you won’t have an opportunity to talk to him today.’
‘Then I’ll have to find another day.’
‘He still won’t tell you anything.’
‘We’ll see about that.’ Professor Teischbaum’s voice took on a new intensity. ‘You can’t stand in the way of the truth, Mrs Cartwright. My biography is going to be completed. It’s going to be published. And nothing is going to prevent that from happening.’
‘Don’t you believe it!’ Sheila Cartwright now sounded dangerously out of control. ‘I’ll prevent it from happening!’
‘I think not.’ The words were spoken calmly, and the accompanying scuff of gravel suggested they had provided Professor Teischbaum with a satisfactory exit line.
Rather than being caught obviously hanging around listening, Carole moved forwards, making loud footsteps, as if she had just arrived from her car.
As she rounded the corner, she saw the two strong-minded women taking one last look at each other. Though almost exactly the same height, they couldn’t have been more different in style. Sheila Cartwright, her white hair sensibly short, looked what she was, an upper-middle-class Englishwoman in white blouse, navy suit and sensible black shoes. Marla Teischbaum, the copper-beech of her hair gleaming in the sunlight, was wearing a symphony of autumn tints in linen and Indian cotton.
Suddenly it started to rain. Big heavy drops thudded down on to the gravel. Marla Teischbaum lifted the briefcase she was carrying to hold it over the perfectly coiffed chestnut hair and, with a nod of acknowledgement to Carole, stalked off towards the car park.
Sheila Cartwright managed a curt ‘Good evening’, and then she too strode away towards the main house, no doubt to prepare for the Emergency Trustees’ Meeting she had summoned.
Carole Seddon went into the Administrative Office to speak to the person who should have called the Emergency Trustees’ Meeting.
But she couldn’t forget the scene she had just witnessed between Sheila Cartwright and Marla Teischbaum. Or the flame of intense hatred that had burned in the eyes of both women.
Chapter Twenty-One
It had been a bad day for Jude. She had been woken at half past four by Laurence’s coughing, which sounded worse than ever. It was. There was blood all over the sheets, and still dribbling from his mouth.
She had called an ambulance immediately. Though a great believer in the efficacy of alternative therapies, Jude knew when conventional medical intervention was required.
They had left Woodside Cottage before anyone else in the road was awake, and Jude had had a day of intense anxiety at the hospital, while Laurence was subjected to a series of X-rays and tests, building up to a late afternoon interview with the consultant. Even though she had no official relationship with him, Jude reckoned she would have been allowed to sit in on that meeting, but Laurence didn’t want her to, and she respected his wishes.
Even though the day, like most in hospitals, involved a lot of sitting around waiting, Jude was too preoccupied with Laurence’s health to think of anything else. She’d meant to ring Carole to discuss the previous night’s news bulletin about the Bracketts skeleton, and to tell her about Mervyn Hunter’s escape from Austen, but such intentions were swamped by worry about Laurence.
He was silent in the cab back from the hospital. Except for the occasional coughs, coughs which had taken on a new and ominous significance for Jude.
But as soon as he got back inside Woodside Cottage, he found his black leather jacket, took out a cigarette packet and lit one up. Jude said nothing as she watched him gratefully drink in the smoke.
‘Would you like a whisky?’ she asked.
‘God, would I like a whisky? I’ve spent this entire day only thinking how much I would like a cigarette and a whisky.’ His voice was dry and cracked after his ordeal. He looked paler and thinner than ever.
Jude waited till they both had drinks and were sitting in two of her shawl-draped armchairs. Then she said, ‘So?’
‘So . . . what?’ he echoed with a dusty giggle.
‘Presumably the consultant didn’t give you a clean bill of health?’
‘I think, Jude, that would have been too much to hope for.’
‘Cancer?’
‘He came up with a lot of longer words first, but then he made a concession to my ignorance and used that one. Always a problem for us academics. If it’s not our speciality, we just don’t know the jargon.’
‘And what treatment did he recommend?’
‘Oh, there was chemo-this and radio-that. It all sounded distinctly unpleasant.’
‘Don’t you think the alternative might be even more unpleasant?’
He shrugged languidly, tapped out the ash of his cigarette and returned it to his mouth. ‘It all seems rather a fag,’ he said, ambiguous as to whether the pun was deliberate.
‘Are you saying you’re not going to have any treatment?’
‘I’m saying that I’ve spent nearly sixty years of being me. That me is not a particularly admirable being. It certainly smokes and drinks too much. Its morals don’t accord to the prescribed norms. It has probably caused unnecessary hurt to people – mostly women – who didn’t deserve it. But that me has suited me surprisingly well. Having got this far through life, jogging along with myself amiably enough, I don’t want to have a personality transplant at this late stage.’
‘So you think treatment for the cancer would change your personality?’
‘I’m damned sure it’d change my lifestyle. There seems to be some rather tedious conventional wisdom in the medical world that chemotherapy and chainsmoking don’t mix.’
Jude couldn’t help smiling. Laurence Hawker had always been a poseur, a lot of what he said was purely for effect, but its mischievous knowingness still made her laugh.
‘So you’re saying you’re not going to have any treatment? You’ll let the cancer run its course?’
‘Yes.’
‘And did the consultant say how long that course might be?’
Laurence Hawker shook his head, exhaling dubiously through pursed lips. ‘An inexact science, the prediction of longevity. But I get the impression that I should think in terms of short stories rather than novels. Certainly O. Henry rather than Proust.’
There was a long, peaceful silence between them. Each took a substantial sip from their glass. Laurence reached across and affectionately took hold of Jude’s hand.
‘One of the things I like about you,’ he said, ‘is your lack of knee-jerk reactions. Very few of the human species, after what I’ve just told you, could have resisted saying, “But you must have the treatment, you must!” Whether they meant it or not. It’s just one of those things people say instinctively, like “Bless you” after a sneeze. Thank you, Jude, for not saying it.’
She shrugged. ‘Not my place to say it. Your life. You’re grown-up. You make your own decisions.’
‘Thank you.’
The peaceful silence descended again. When Laurence next spoke, it was with greater briskness. ‘I’ll be off tomorrow. This has been an extraordinarily pleasant interlude. I’m very grateful.’
‘Where are you going?’ He shrugged. ‘To another of your women?’
‘I don’t think that’d be very fair. No, I’ll find a base somewhere, and meet them on a daily basis, for nice, long, self-indulgent lunches.’
‘There is an alternative,’ said Jude.
‘Sorry. I’m not going to sweat in a tepee, or only eat p
ulses, or have ginseng enemas. All those sound at least as undignified as the chemotherapy.’
‘That is not what I meant, Laurence. And you know full well that is not what I meant.’ He smiled acknowledgement of her percipience. ‘I meant you don’t have to go. You can stay here.’
He was silent for a moment. ‘Jude, I know you never make offers you don’t mean, but I think that’s too much for you to take on.’
‘My decision, I’d have thought.’
Another silence. ‘It’s tempting.’
‘You’ve never had any qualms about giving in to temptation before. Why suddenly get picky now?’
‘Hm.’ An even longer silence. ‘One thing . . .’
‘Yes.’
‘If I do accept your very generous offer . . .’
‘Hm?’
‘You won’t tell anyone, will you?’
‘Won’t tell anyone you’re here? That’s going to be tricky. I’m afraid, amongst its many conveniences and amenities, Woodside Cottage doesn’t feature a Priest’s Hole.’
‘I meant don’t tell anyone why I’m here. Don’t tell anyone I’m ill.’
‘Oh,’ said Jude. ‘Not even Carole?’
‘Particularly not Carole.’
‘Why?’
‘Because, if ever I saw one of the “But you must have the treatment, you must!” brigade, Carole Seddon is it.’
Jude wasn’t sure that he was right about her neighbour, and foresaw problems ahead. She visualized a lot of misunderstandings, when she would have to spend time caring for Laurence, and Carole would regard her preoccupation as a personal slight. But it was his illness and his decision, so she just said, ‘All right. Any other terms and conditions?’
‘Just one other thing I’d like to clarify.’ A sardonic smile twitched his full lips. ‘If I am living here . . .’
‘Mm?’
‘ . . . will I still be able to go out and meet my other women for nice, long, self-indulgent lunches?’
‘Oh yes, Laurence. I wouldn’t dare try to change your personality. Don’t worry, I’m way beyond that kind of jealousy,’ Jude replied, with a grin.