The New Sonia Wayward

by Michael Innes

  ‘Not in the least. That is – yes, you must have done.’ Petticate found that he was far too bewildered to produce a coherent answer. ‘You weren’t like her. You couldn’t be, since you never saw her and know nothing about her. We’ve taken on the sheerly impossible. I see that now. I’ve been quite mad. And yet…and yet that Gotlop woman hadn’t a flicker of doubt.’

  ‘She hadn’t because I hadn’t.’ Susie threw back her head and laughed, so that the commissionaire handing them to their cab glanced at her in respectful surprise. ‘That’s psychology, dearie. If I’d flickered, she’d have flickered, and it would have been all up with us.’ Susie sat back with unassuming satisfaction against the dusty upholstery of the cab. ‘It’s not knowing about your Sonia that’s needed. It’s nerve. And I’ve got nerve.’

  Petticate drew a long breath.

  ‘So it seems,’ he said. ‘But you appear to have a certain amount of information too. How did you know that old woman was Lady Edward Lifton?’

  ‘Picture papers, silly. I’ve always had a fancy for turning over the society news. As for the nerve, don’t think I’ve had it always. If I had, things wouldn’t have got me down like how I was when we first met, dearie, or living like I’ve been doing in that nasty Eastmoor Road. No – it’s something that’s come back to me. And why? Because I like you, as I said.’ For a moment Susie was silent and thoughtful. ‘Queer, isn’t it? You’re not really very nice, I suppose. But I’ve taken to you all the same. Like some of the girls do to their ponces, I’d say. They’re chaps that aren’t very nice either.’

  It was scarcely to be expected that Petticate should produce any articulate reply to this. It was certain that, on every front, his three weeks with Susie were to be a nightmare.

  ‘By the way,’ Susie went on, ‘tell him to drop me at Oxford Circus.’

  ‘Drop you?’ Petticate was disconcerted. ‘We’re going to Paddington. We’ll be in excellent time for the six forty-five.’

  Susie shook her head – and so casually that he suddenly perceived that she was a woman of iron will.

  ‘Not for me tonight, dearie. I’ll get a morning train, and we’ll have a long quiet day getting up Sonia for all I’m worth. But it’s a holiday for Susie Smith till then.’ She sighed happily. ‘It’s been ages – it’s been ages and ages – since I’ve been in London with a little money in my bag.’

  So, once more, Petticate travelled down to Snigg’s Green alone. He was grateful, after all, for the break. At Paddington he bought an evening paper, simply to hide himself if any neighbours turned up. He noticed that it seemed to say something about San Giorgio. But he was so tired that he didn’t bother to find out what it was.

  5

  During the latter part of his journey – a thing unusual with him – Colonel Petticate slept. He had been through a fantastic day – and a day which had followed immediately upon a fantastic night. No wonder he had felt quite done up. But now, as he walked slowly home from the railway station through the darkness, he found his head clearer and better able to take stock of his situation.

  He had been worried about the tape-recorder, buried beneath the debris of the barn. But now it occurred to him that it lay entirely within his own discretion to say whether that debris should be cleared up or not. If he simply let it all slowly disappear beneath nettles and thistles, there would probably be nobody to protest or take the slightest interest in the matter. If, at some future date, the site was cleared and the smashed machine discovered, it would be no more than a matter of a few moments’ curiosity to the workmen involved. As to the rope, he must simply cut it off short where it disappeared among the masonry. Nobody pottering about in the ruins would then be remotely likely to come upon it.

  No, the barn was not a problem – always provided that the Hennwifes could be sent silent and disgraced away. And there seemed to be little doubt about that. He knew just what he would do when he got home tonight. He would say crisply to Hennwife that his mistress was returning to Snigg’s Green tomorrow morning. Beyond that, he would say nothing at all. The Hennwifes would be staggered by the mere statement, and the succeeding twelve hours of bewildered suspense would thoroughly unnerve them. It was very likely that at the mere sight of the false Sonia they would snatch up a few possessions and bolt. It was true they knew that he had tried to kill them. But they surely realized that they had richly deserved that fate – and only the more so since they must now believe that they had based their insolent and evil conduct upon a false assumption.

  Mopping up the Hennwifes, in fact, was going to be child’s play. And exceedingly agreeable child’s play at that. Petticate was chuckling at the prospect when, turning a corner of the road that led past his front gate, he became aware of a stationary motor van only a few yards in front of him.

  It was late for the tradesmen to be delivering anything – and moreover the van was somehow a more sombre affair than any enterprising tradesman was likely to go in for. Seized by an obscure foreboding, Petticate forced himself to take a few more paces forward. Twenty yards beyond the stationary van there was a stationary motor-car. Its parking lights were switched on. And just above its roof there was an inexplicable dull blue glow.

  The inexplicability lasted, of course, only for a moment. At a nearer view that dull blue glow would say ‘POLICE’. And the van was a police van too. In fact it was what, in his youth, had been vulgarly known as a Black Maria. Petticate felt a violent tremor seize and shake his frame. He wanted to turn round and run, but knew that something horrible would happen to his knees if he did. As it was, he stood transfixed, staring at his own front gate. And as he did so, he saw something stir beside it. Indeed, he saw something stir at either side of it. The gate-posts might have been unnaturally moving. Only he knew that these were not gateposts but the helmets of constables – of constables who were quietly waiting…

  And now Petticate did manage to turn round. It was to face a bright light that shone momentarily on his face, and to feel a firm grip that took him by the arm.

  ‘All right,’ he heard Sergeant Bradnack’s voice say. ‘A bit of a shock, no doubt. But just take it easy.’

  It was as a man in a dreadful dream that Petticate found himself led into his own hall. The Hennwifes were there, and a surprising number of policemen. Petticate stared at these policemen dully. He supposed that they must have come to turn over the rubble of the barn. The Hennwifes, it was clear, must have informed on him. They must have told of his plan to murder them, and of the fiendish manner in which they had outwitted him.

  Petticate stood quite still. He didn’t attempt to take off his overcoat. He supposed it was quite likely to be chilly, jolting along to jail in that black van. There was a moment’s strange silence, and then Sergeant Bradnack cleared his throat and spoke.

  ‘A very delicate matter this, Colonel. Very delicate, indeed. I have strict orders from the Superintendent to say as little as need be. But, since considerable inconvenience is going to accrue’ – Sergeant Bradnack paused in some admiration over this expression – ‘is going to accrue to you, sir, as the employer of the apprehended persons, a word of explanation seems in place.’

  Petticate found himself feeling rather blindly for a chair. For seconds his physical vision was actually clouded. When it cleared, it was upon a full view of the Hennwifes. There could be no doubt about it. He had never seen them looking remotely like that before. Whatever had happened, it was something that had told them they were cornered.

  ‘A charge of blackmail, sir, I am sorry to say. Always a very delicate matter, as you know, sir; always a very delicate matter indeed. The world being as it is, sir, the persons victimized don’t always care to be named in court. Not by no means. And, having come forward, they deserve the protection of the law. Which is the reason, you will understand, Colonel, why I can’t say much.’ Sergeant Bradnack paused upon this, all of which he had delivered himself of in a very loud voice. Now he suddenly leant forward and whispered loudly in Petticate’s ear. ‘Old ba
stard Sir Thomas Glyde, Colonel. Nasty habits. Very nasty habits, indeed. And your precious pair got on to him.’

  ‘I see.’ For the first time since the rays of Bradnack’s lantern had so paralysingly fallen on him, Petticate achieved articulate speech. ‘But I’d never have believed it – never.’ He looked straight at the Hennwifes. ‘I’d never have believed it of you,’ he said, sternly but sadly. ‘You must have been carried away, I suppose, by some sudden temptation. I am sorry – very sorry, indeed.’

  And now Hennwife spoke – first licking his dry lips. ‘Thank you, sir. I trust you will bear witness to character, sir. I think I may say we have always endeavoured to give satisfaction.’

  ‘Yes, yes – my good fellow. I have no complaint.’ Petticate stood up and gave a heavy discouraged sigh. ‘Let us hope, Sergeant, that nothing else of a similar sort comes to light. If they proved to be anything like professional blackmailers it would of course be very much worse for them. Anything up to fifteen years.’

  ‘Quite so, sir.’ Sergeant Bradnack seemed a little disappointed by this turn of things. ‘We have naturally been wondering if they’ve been giving any trouble elsewhere. To yourself, for instance.’ Bradnack paused, as if conscious, too late, that this had not been happily phrased. ‘Not in the way of attempted blackmail, of course. But perhaps the disappearance of valuables, or something of that sort.’

  Petticate shook his head. ‘No, no – they are both blameless, so far as I am concerned. But now you had better take them away, Sergeant. It’s a most painful situation.’ Again he looked straight at the Hennwifes. ‘I am glad,’ he said, ‘that this didn’t happen after Mrs Petticate’s return tomorrow morning. She would be deeply pained. Indeed, I shall hardly like to break it to her. Good night.’

  Mrs Hennwife said nothing. Hennwife offered his employer his customary expression of thanks upon withdrawing from his presence. He even managed – although somewhat hampered by the close contiguity of the police – to back out of the front door in his established professional manner.

  Petticate watched him go. He watched Bradnack and his mustered subordinates go. Then he staggered upstairs, tumbled on to his bed, drew the eiderdown over himself, and fell asleep.

  6

  For some hours Petticate enjoyed oblivion – if indeed oblivion can be enjoyed. And then he was assailed by dreams.

  He was on the yacht with Sonia – the real Sonia – and they quarrelled. It was not the sort of quarrel that he had ever actually known with her: a measurable irritation or bad temper, bred of boredom or competing selfishness. It was the sort of quarrel for which a man stores the fuel deep in his heart – and commonly obeys a prudent instinct to keep away from. But in this dream it was suddenly a flame all around him, so that nothing seemed more natural than that he should strike at her, and strike at her to kill. That he succeeded in killing her was evident from the fact that her body as it fell to the deck shrank to the size of a dog’s body – since this (Petticate knew in his dreams) always does instantly happen to dead bodies. So he picked up Sonia’s small dead body and threw it into the sea. Then, turning to the other side of the yacht, he saw Sonia instantly climb on board again – only this was not the true Sonia but the false Sonia, Susie Smith. Susie came out of the sea and over the gunnel and he noticed that her clothes were quite dry. He wasn’t surprised by her dry crisp clothes – because he remembered that they were only acting parts in a film, and that in films actresses who have been immersed are always for some mysterious reason quite dry again a few seconds later. But he knew that he must kill the false Sonia too, and he ran at her with the boat-hook. The boat-hook went clean through her, so that he had to shake her body off into the sea as one shakes a dead leaf off a walking-stick. He watched the false Sonia sink very slowly, as a dead leaf might sink, and then he thought how silent it was. But not entirely silent. For from somewhere behind him there came the rapid click-click of the keys of a typewriter. The sound came from the cabin. He ran towards it and looked in – and somehow it was entirely without surprise that he saw the true Sonia sitting at the machine and the keys jumping beneath her fingers. Sheets of typescript littered the cabin floor, and he thought what a pity it was that they should all be turning to pulp. They were turning to pulp because the true Sonia sat dripping wet at the typewriter, so that all the floor around her was becoming a pool and the papers were floating in it. Petticate knew that he must let out the water – for the true Sonia was now in a bath in which he had drowned her – and there was a plug to pull out which turned to a rope as he heaved, and he hoped against hope that beneath the ruins of the barn as it came tumbling down both Sonias were buried together.

  The barn made a great noise as it fell. And Petticate woke up and knew that somebody was hammering at the front door.

  Susie Smith had stepped back on the drive when she heard the window open almost above her head.

  ‘Hullo!’ she called. ‘So you’re there after all. I was beginning to think it must be all a hoax. Come down and let me in.’

  For a moment Petticate stared at the woman in stupefaction. He had been convinced, for one thing, as he stumbled across the room, that it must still be the middle of the night. But he was looking out on broad daylight, and he realized that he must have slept until nearly noon. It was an autumn day, but Susie stood in only a short pool of her own shadow. She was surrounded by trunks and suitcases and bandboxes. She must have had all the stuff unloaded from a taxi, and then dismissed it. Petticate reflected with dismay that there could be nothing in this whole outfit for which he had not himself paid in cash or pledged credit on the previous day.

  ‘Hullo,’ he said. It wasn’t a usual form of greeting with him. But he could, for the moment, think of none other to utter.

  ‘You don’t sound very pleased to see me.’ Susie spoke with no suggestion of being aggrieved; indeed, she appeared uncommonly cheerful. ‘But do come and open this door. It doesn’t look right, this Romeo and Juliet turn – not in an old married couple like you and me.’

  ‘I’ll be down in a minute.’ Petticate turned round and went hurriedly to his wash-basin. He had no need to dress, since he was still in the clothes – now sadly crumpled – in which he had tumbled upon his bed. But he couldn’t of course go downstairs unshaved – even if some intrusive neighbour, coming up the drive, were to judge it odd that Mrs Ffolliot Petticate should be cooling her heels outside her own front door.

  But rapid shaving didn’t prove easy. His troubled night had scarcely refreshed him, and his hand was trembling as he manipulated the razor. It was true that he hadn’t been very pleased to see his substitute wife. On rather, he had been even less pleased to see her than he had expected. He wasn’t, at the moment, at all clear why this should be. He just had an obscure sense that a certain anticlimax was involved in the occasion.

  The house – cold and still shuttered as he passed through it – affected him disagreeably, and he found himself fumbling with the lock that had closed automatically behind the police as they had retired with their prisoners the night before. When he did get the door open, it was to find that Susie was standing within inches of him. This was a bit of a shock.

  ‘I’ve done well, haven’t I?’ she asked. ‘I got the ten-five. And guess who I travelled with.’

  Petticate’s sense of discomfort grew. The care-free tone of Susie’s voice seemed entirely genuine; and he reflected that nothing in the world builds up a woman’s confidence like oceans of new clothes. At the same time she was looking at him sharply, rather as if making sure of some impression she had formed the day before.

  ‘Travelled with?’ he repeated stupidly. ‘No – I’ve no idea.’

  ‘Dear old Augusta.’

  ‘Augusta?’ He stared at her. ‘Who is Augusta?’

  ‘Augusta Gotlop, of course. By the way, did you know she had been a Gale-Warning?’

  Petticate took a long breath. Or rather he tried to do this, out of a dim notion that it might fortify the system. It was, of course, all to
the good that Susie was something of an artist. Only an artist’s instinct could have carried her through that sudden crisis in Fortnum’s the previous afternoon. And there were occasions in the immediate future upon which she would abundantly require this power. Nevertheless there was something alarming about it.

  ‘Well,’ he said, ‘you’d better come in. I’ll give a hand with your things.’

  ‘What about those servants?’ Susie looked into the empty hall behind Petticate, evidently surprised. ‘They might as well make themselves useful – until I give them the sack, that is.’

  ‘You won’t have to give them the sack. They’ve gone.’

  Petticate, as he said this, suddenly remembered why a sense of anticlimax was attending Susie Smith’s arrival. The scene to which he had really looked forward – the confounding of the fiendish Hennwifes by a Sonia returned as from the grave – would never now take place. It didn’t now need to take place. The Hennwife goose was otherwise cooked.

  ‘Gone, have they?’ Miss Smith took this quite casually. ‘Well we can easily get more. But I’d kept the taxi man waiting if I’d known. The trunks aren’t all that light. Haven’t you got a chauffeur?’

  ‘No, I always drive myself.’

  ‘I think it might be a good idea if you had a chauffeur. A chauffeur’s smart, if you ask me. And Augusta has one… You’d better fetch the gardener.’

  ‘There isn’t a gardener. That’s to say, he comes three times a week, and this isn’t one.’

  Petticate, feeling understandably exasperated and also inexplicably alarmed, began ferrying suitcases into the hall. There seemed to be no end to them. Miss Smith at least didn’t stand idly by. She joined in the work with gusto.

  ‘We’ll get somebody from the village to help with the trunks,’ she said decisively. ‘And of course somebody to come in and clean and wash up. I can cook for a bit; I’m really not bad at it. While you advertise.’ She paused, evidently remembering. ‘But what about that blackmail? You don’t mean they’ve gone because you risked giving them in charge?’