The Mysterious Affair at Castaway House

by Lam, Stephanie

  The courses came and went. Alec ate little and drank a lot. The silence in the room was as thick and loaded with menace as a gathering storm. I noticed him watching his wife through narrowed eyes, his face growing redder and redder. I attempted to engage him in conversation, but to my questions he gave only monotone answers. I tried to think of pleasant thoughts, such as the bloom in Lizzie Feathers’ cheeks and the smell of the brine from the sea.

  ‘So this is to be it, then, is it?’ he said after a half-hour in which I had given up attempting to leaven the atmosphere with small talk. ‘Honestly, Clara, I thought you might at least make an effort, seeing as we’ve a guest here.’

  Without looking up from her book, Mrs Bray said, ‘He’s no guest of mine, darling, as you well know.’

  Alec threw down his napkin, startling one of the maids clearing plates. ‘He’s my cousin, damn it!’

  ‘Mmm,’ she said, ‘guilty by association.’

  Alec was practically purple with rage.

  ‘Please,’ I said to him. ‘Don’t be concerned on my account.’

  He wasn’t listening. ‘Now then,’ he said, ‘say what you like about me, but Robert’s a decent chap and he doesn’t deserve any of this.’

  ‘Well, perhaps you shouldn’t have invited him to stay, then.’

  ‘I’d rather he stayed than you.’

  I sensed the servants shrinking back against the walls, eyeing each other, retreating rapidly from the room.

  ‘Now you’re upsetting the servants, dearest.’ She snapped her knife and fork together on her plate and got to her feet, drawing a cardigan around her shoulders. She turned to me and with a red-lipped, cold smile said, ‘Don’t worry, Mr Carver. You may have my husband all to yourself now.’

  And, with that, she swept out. We waited in silence as she rapped out an order to Scone in the hallway, and we heard the sharp creak of the stairs as she went up.

  We sat back in our seats, both breathing rapidly. I had the sense of emerging, scarred and weary, from a field of the dead. Alec wiped his forehead with his handkerchief. ‘How are you?’ he said eventually.

  I grimaced at the fruit salad which had materialized in front of me. ‘This wasn’t exactly how I’d planned to spend my summer.’

  ‘Do apologize for that, old chap.’ Alec ran a hand through his hair. ‘She’s been having meals in her room for weeks. Probably only emerged so she could goad me further.’

  I put a stoned cherry in my mouth. ‘She certainly doesn’t want me to stay.’

  He leaned across the table and put his hand on my arm. ‘Well, I do.’ He grinned at me. ‘I think she’s jealous.’

  ‘Of me?’

  Alec glanced towards the door, and then whispered in my ear, ‘She hates me because I’ve seen through her.’

  I turned to him. ‘What on earth do you mean?’

  ‘Shh.’ He looked at the open door, and then, loudly, ‘Let’s go out. I’ve something to show you.’

  ‘Show me?’ I asked, heavy with food and wine and not particularly willing to leave the house. ‘Is it important?’

  He squeezed my hand. ‘Life-threatening,’ he growled, and then sprang to his feet. ‘And what’s more, it’ll be fun. Carpe diem, veni, vidi, vici, et cetera, ad nauseum.’

  I laughed at the way Alec could switch his mood on a sixpence. He swung on the dining-room door, and I heard him tell Scone in the hallway that we would not be needing coffees or port tonight. I put my chin on my hand and sighed, wishing that Mrs Bray had decided to take a motoring tour of the Lakes for the duration of my visit.

  The air was warm and scented with violet-coloured four o’clocks unfurling in the front gardens as we descended the cliff. We crossed the road at the bottom and I followed Alec down the slippery steps that led to the beach. There were no street lights here, and I clung on to the handrail.

  ‘Isn’t this rather dangerous?’ I asked, but Alec was far ahead of me, marching across the boards alongside the brick wall of the promenade. I followed him gingerly, the fish-smoking houses spiking shadows upwards against the dusk. I heard the sea washing in and out at the end of the sand, and felt my feet dampening inside my inadequate shoes. Alec was a shadowy glint ahead of me; I hurried to catch up.

  Hammered out of the wall beside us were arched doorways, some open and empty, others doored and barred. The open doorways swallowed darkness and I hurried past, practically bumping into Alec as he turned to me, dangling a long iron key on a length of string.

  ‘Are you ready?’ he asked.

  We were outside a padlocked doorway with ‘231’ above its entrance.

  ‘You said this would be fun,’ I grumbled.

  ‘It will be. Just wait.’ He fitted the key into the padlock, turned it and pulled back the bolt. The door opened with a shudder, and Alec stepped over the raised threshold and into the black space beyond.

  I hovered in the entrance. The dusky beach now seemed fairly benign compared to the emptiness beyond. I remembered that Alec had always had a fondness for practical jokes; had told me about putting frogs in his teachers’ desks and pinning messages to his classmates’ backs.

  ‘What is this?’ I asked impatiently.

  ‘Come on,’ he said, his voice a little faded. He must have moved well within the interior of the arch. ‘I’ve a lamp here somewhere; just looking for it.’

  His matter-of-fact voice finally convinced me, and I stepped over the wooden ledge and into the arch. ‘I can’t see a damn thing …’ I began, when a gas lamp was switched on and a bearded man leaped at me.

  I yelled and lashed out. The man toppled backwards. I heard an oath and saw a dark shape as Alec crouched over the figure. ‘Well done, Robert,’ he said, his light ranging over the figure’s head. ‘You’ve just knocked over the King.’

  He heaved the man back to a standing position, from where he stared at me with glassy, imperial eyes. On his military chest were pinned several medals. His face was a smooth pink, except for two rosy cheeks. ‘Here,’ I heard, and the lamp was thrust into my hands. I held it up by the handle and looked about me at a hundred bodies peering back through the dark.

  ‘Oh my God,’ I whispered. ‘What is this?’

  ‘Hold that steady.’ I saw Alec flitting about the room. ‘I can’t … ah, here it is.’

  Another lamp flared on. My cousin picked it up and grinned at me. ‘What do you think?’

  We were in a tunnel that stretched far back under the road, and the various bodies were stacked along both walls. Beyond the King there was the Queen and a figure dressed in a Grenadier Guards’ uniform that I presumed was the heir apparent. To my right was a little man with a moustache and a bowler hat wielding a cane, and past him a girl with a cascade of ringlets and a dress made of rags.

  My heart still pounded, and my chest was constricted with the fright and the musty air of the tunnel. ‘Why didn’t you tell me you were taking me to a waxworks?’

  ‘Precisely that.’ He leaned on the shoulder of the little man with the bowler hat. ‘I wanted to see your reaction first. They’re good, aren’t they?’

  I looked at his companion. ‘I suppose that’s Charlie Chaplin,’ I said. ‘But I couldn’t tell you who this is. Lillian Gish?’

  ‘It’s Mary Pickford, you fool,’ he said somewhat impatiently. ‘Come through. I’ve tons more to show you.’

  His lamp slid off into the darkness and I followed, not wishing to be left behind with the present company. Alec called out names as we headed further into the tunnel. ‘Gloria Swanson, that’s Sarah Bernhardt over there – I expect we’ll have boys peeking under her skirt to see if she really has a wooden leg – Mr Baldwin here, the Kaiser, Mata Hari … d’you like the artfully placed sheet? Rudolph Valentino … the ladies will all want to pose next to him, no doubt.’

  The tunnel turned the corner and became another archway, heading back down towards the beach. At the rear of the tunnel was yet another empty doorway. ‘That’s going to be the Cellar of the Dead,’ he said, pointing.
‘But at the moment it smells of fish.’

  I put my hands in my pockets and circled round a bare-chested Douglas Fairbanks, curtain rings dangling from his ears. ‘Is all this … yours?’ I asked, rather faint from the whole experience.

  ‘Yes. Well, mine and Bump Mason’s. Bump’s an awfully good chap; whole thing was his idea, actually. But we’re in it together. Mason and Bray’s Hall of Fame, that’s what we’re going to call it, when it’s done.’

  ‘I see.’ I frowned at Fatty Arbuckle. ‘Rather reminds me of a famous waxworks on Baker Street.’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Alec. ‘That’s where Bump had the idea. Now, Robert, I want you to picture the scene. Imagine you’re a family man, working in some evil little job that keeps the wheels of industry going. You have your week’s holiday and you take the wife and the two brats to Helmstone, along with your savings. And what d’you know, one day it just pours with rain. Now what is there to do in a seaside town when it rains? Go to the pictures? Maybe. Go to a museum? Not if you’ve a brace of run-around kids.’

  ‘Or go to Mason and Bray’s Hall of Fame?’ I supplied.

  ‘Adults two bob, children sixpence.’ He grinned hugely and reminded me of a child himself, with a very expensive toy. ‘You’re in a small minority, Carver. Not many people have seen the show so far.’

  ‘Obviously.’ I squinted at the mannequins. ‘Although I have to say, if it wasn’t for the get-up I’d be hard-pressed to tell who any of them were.’

  ‘Oh, who cares about that?’ Alec jumped off the table and joined me in inspecting Fairbanks. ‘That’s what the clothes and the wigs are for. And the props. That’ll be half the fun, working out who they are. We’ll have plaques, anyhow.’

  ‘Mmm,’ I muttered, not entirely convinced. I had been to Madame Tussaud’s myself, once, as a child, and had gasped at the lifelike representations of the great and good. Here, in three arches under the seafront road, I was not quite sure that tourists would be so impressed by a marble-eyed figure in a headscarf. ‘You haven’t invested all your money, have you?’

  He sighed. ‘Now, Robert, you’re in fearful danger of sounding like Mother, and as much as I miss her, I’d rather not have her back in your body. That would be far too complicated.’

  ‘All right.’ I looked about. ‘It’s a marvellous idea. But listen. Are you really going to have all these models just standing about like this? Because it’s rather … higgledypiggledy, if you don’t mind my saying.’

  Alec folded his arms and put one hand to his chin. ‘Continue.’

  ‘Well …’ I looked about me. ‘It sort of seems as if they’re queuing for a bus, and I don’t think that’s the impression you want to be giving of Rudolph Valentino, do you?’

  I walked up to the figure and turned him a little. He was leaning forwards, his dark eyes heavily rimmed with black pencil. His sheikh’s robes brushed my hands as I moved him, and I jumped.

  ‘Don’t worry, that happens to me all the time,’ said Alec. ‘Easy to believe they’re touching one. Rather creepy, until you get used to it.’

  Now I moved Gloria Swanson so she was facing him. She had her head thrust back as if declaiming, and so the scene now looked as if she were resisting his attempts to ravish her. ‘There you go,’ I said. ‘A tableau. Gives one more of a complete picture, don’t you think?’

  Alec put his arm about Gloria’s waist and looked over her shoulder at me. ‘That,’ he said, ‘is utter genius.’

  ‘Good.’ I said. ‘Can we go now?’

  He moved behind Valentino and peeked over his headscarf. ‘You don’t fancy being our artistic advisor, do you, Robert? After all, neither Bump nor I have a clue about aesthetics.’

  ‘Artistic advisor?’ I looked about at the dank, smelly room, thinking that the first thing the place needed was a good airing.

  Alec came out from behind Valentino and leaned on a carpenter’s workbench stationed opposite. ‘I’ll be frank with you. I … well, with one thing and another I’ve incurred a few debts over the years.’

  I nodded. Of course. Cards, I supposed, and perhaps that was the least of it. ‘You’re in trouble?’

  ‘Not at all.’ He shook his head rather vigorously, and I realized he was still drunk. ‘But Mother’s inheritance has … frankly, it’s been used up, and this is the last of it. I’ve finally decided to be sensible, you see. Invest in my future, for once.’

  ‘With Mr Mason?’

  ‘Mason-Chambers actually, but that wouldn’t fit on the sign. No, Bump’s the ideas man, and I’m the hard cash. Clara was … that is, she was supposed to help us with the other side of things.’

  He folded his hands under his armpits.

  ‘Help you?’ I said.

  He waved his hand. ‘You know, tableaux and so on. Paint pigments. Artistic whatnots. That’s all gone down the pan now. I mean, actually, when I think about it, this whole thing’s been quite a help for me,’ he continued blithely. ‘Taking one’s mind off the domestic situation.’

  I went and sat next to him on the workbench. ‘I am sorry,’ I said softly. ‘About, you know …’

  He shrugged. ‘My own fault, Robert. Bump told me. You should meet Bump; he’s a wise old saw. By all means fuck them, he said, but for God’s sake don’t fall in love with them; they’ll eat you alive.’

  I goggled at him. ‘Sorry?’

  But Alec was in his own world. ‘It was through Bump I met her. Dragged me along to some third-rate musical one night because of the so-called Greek nudes. Lot of bunkum, anyway; a queue of silly girls wearing fig leaves. But the lead – Clara – well, I’ll give her this, she lit up the whole stage when she came on.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ I said carelessly. ‘I’d heard she was an actress.’

  He smiled. ‘I went to see her twelve times before I decided I was going to talk to her.’ He glanced at me. ‘You know going to bed with an actress is as easy as falling off a log, don’t you? If you’ve the cash for it. And by God, they want paying.’

  I thought of Clara Bray, in a grubby dressing room in a shabby theatre, waiting for a man to knock on her door, legs crossed at the knee, gown folded across her cleavage, and then dashed that thought away. ‘I see.’

  He looked at me. ‘No, you don’t. Clara wasn’t like that. At least, I thought she wasn’t. I was completely wrong, of course. Turns out she’s been to bed with half of London, but she made out she was this very simple, sweet, innocent girl, and I believed it. I mean, she really is a very good actress, I’ll give her that. Fell for her completely, married her in this sort of haze of love, everything’s peachy … I take her down to Castaway for weekends, show her the whole town, not a word said. She puts off meeting the parents – understandably, perhaps – but then one day we’re at Castaway and Mother gets a little better and decides to show up, with Father. We’re sitting round the pond with friends and cocktails when Mother’s wheeled up the path, looks at Clara and says, “My word, Clare Tutt, what on earth are you doing in my garden?” ’

  Alec turned to gauge my reaction.

  I attempted a show of surprise. ‘She’d grown up in Helmstone?’

  He frowned at me. ‘Wait a second. Who have you been … ? Oh, don’t tell me. The Feathers town crier. Didn’t take him long, did it?’

  I pulled a face. ‘He told me she used to lurk outside the house.’

  Alec nodded. ‘Mother insisted that none of the family should know. Well, you’re the first. I don’t remember her at all from those days – I was at school, you see – but apparently she wormed her way into Mother’s affections, playing the poor little orphan card, and Mother, being a soft touch, took pity on her, used to bring her in for tea and so on.’

  ‘I remember,’ I breathed. ‘When you took me to see the dinosaurs. You said something about another child taking your place.’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Alec bitterly. ‘Of course, I was a terrible disappointment all round and Clara – well, she fooled me and before that she’d already fooled Mother. She’d been on
the rob every time she’d been invited into the house. Stealing from Ma’s handbag when she wasn’t looking, that sort of thing. Father was the one who found out; gave her the old heave-ho. Clara used to tell Mother she’d love to have a house as beautiful as Castaway. She must have decided she’d get her hands on it one way or another, the spiteful little bitch.’

  I suddenly thought of Agnes sobbing on the pier. ‘The parlourmaid,’ I began, and Alec looked up sharply. ‘She was talking of evil in the house. I mean, I hadn’t a clue what she meant.’

  He sighed. ‘They all know who Clara really is,’ he said. ‘Of course they do. Not that she cares; she’s as hard as nails.’

  He put his hand on mine and entwined my fingers with his.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ I said.

  He squeezed my hand. ‘I fell in love with a chimera,’ he said softly. ‘Clara Bray doesn’t exist, and now I’ve seen through her she hates my guts. You’ve seen the locket she wears?’

  I nodded, remembering the elaborate engraving upon it. ‘A gift from you?’

  ‘It was my mother’s. After she … well, when she first became ill it hurt her to wear it, and she gave it to me to look after. Back when I was spoony over Clara, I presented it to her with a lock of my hair inside.’ He grimaced. ‘The day I realized she’d told me a pack of lies, we had the most enormous row. She tore the thing open and emptied out the contents. Didn’t hand back the locket, of course. Far too avaricious to let that go.’

  ‘I’m surprised you allow her to stay here,’ I said. ‘Considering all of that.’

  ‘Still trying to work out what to do for the best.’ He looked at me with his wide, open face. ‘It’s all rather new and raw, I’m afraid.’

  I felt suddenly thrust into the adult world, and with that came a welter of emotions I had little idea what to do with. I smiled with more confidence than I had and said, ‘I know what we should do.’