Mrs. Malory and Any Man's Death

by Hazel Holt

  “I wonder,” Judith said, gesturing towards Annie’s door, “if perhaps I’d better just go in to see if things are all right—no fires left on and so forth. And”—she lowered her voice—“see if there’s any clearing up to do, if you know what I mean. I wouldn’t like her to come back from hospital to anything like that.”

  “What a good idea,” Rachel said. “Shall I come and give you a hand?”

  “Oh, that would be marvelous,” Judith said gratefully, “if you don’t mind.”

  They went into the house and Jim Fletcher said, “Well, I suppose I’d better be getting along. Mary sent me up to the shop to get some bread—she’ll be wondering where I’ve got to.”

  “I suppose I might as well go and get a few things from the shop as well,” I said. “I really came to see Annie about the Book—some old letters. I don’t know what will happen about it now.”

  “Well, of course you’ll go on with it,” Captain Prosser said briskly. “Annie will want to know how it’s going when she gets back. I think I’ll come with you. Maurice won’t know what’s happening.”

  Indeed, the exciting presence of an ambulance in the village had drawn a few people into the shop, the usual center of news and information. I remained silent while Jim and Captain Prosser (antiphonally) told their story, embellished with their feelings and reactions and prognostications as to the outcome.

  “One of these superbugs, do you think?” Maurice asked. “There’s a lot of them about.”

  “Or food poisoning,” Jim suggested.

  “That’s not very likely,” Margaret said, quick to defend the purity of the food on sale in the shop. “Nobody else in the village has gone down with anything like that.”

  “But,” Jim persisted, “you know what Annie’s like. She uses up every scrap of everything—stuff she’s cooked days before. Mary went in there once and found her hotting up some meat left over from a joint that must have been a good week old! It’s a miracle to me something like this hasn’t happened before.”

  We all nodded wisely. Annie’s frugality (“I can’t abide waste. ‘Waste not, want not.’ That’s what my mother used to say.”) was a byword in the village as well as her contempt for those who ate ready meals or never used up leftovers.

  “She cooks in batches,” Jim went on. “She says it saves electricity—which it does, of course, but there are limits.”

  “And now,” Margaret said, “since she was given that microwave, she just hots things up all the time. That’s not healthy, surely!”

  “There’s nothing like good fresh home-cooked food,” Captain Prosser (who considered himself something of an expert cook) said firmly.

  We were all silent for a moment to consider the truth of this statement.

  “Oh well,” I said tritely, “she’s in the best place now.”

  Enid Stevens, who, with her husband, Norman, runs the hotel and who’s had some lively run-ins with Annie over the years, gave a little laugh. “Well, I wouldn’t want to be one of the nurses looking after her,” she said. “She’ll drive them mad, telling them how much better things were done in her day!”

  “She certainly won’t be an easy patient,” Margaret said. “That’s for sure.”

  As I came out of the shop, I saw Rachel.

  “How was everything?” I asked.

  “Things were in a bit of a mess, so we’ve sorted that and locked up properly. Judith has the keys. Oh, and she packed up some nightgowns and toilet things—Phyll and I will take them into the hospital tomorrow and see how she is.”

  “Has Annie got any relatives?” I asked. “She never spoke about anyone.”

  “Not that I know of. I believe there were no other members of the family, apart from Annie, at the funeral when her mother died.”

  “How sad.”

  “I suppose so,” Rachel said, “but I’ve never thought of Annie as sad exactly! She drives us all mad most of the time, but, really, she’s the heart of the village.”

  “That’s true,” I said. “Anyway, how was Grace? I can’t believe she’s ninety.”

  “Oh, full of beans. Still very active. She bought a new car the other day.”

  “No!”

  “Typical of Grace. It was a lovely party—a real mix of people from teenagers to other ninety-year-olds—a lunch party, because she likes to play bridge in the evenings. I suspect that’s why she was so keen for us to stay on for a few days, to make up numbers for her bridge.”

  “Good heavens, it makes me exhausted just to think of it.”

  “That generation is tough as old boots,” Rachel said. “Think of Rosemary’s mother!”

  I was just washing out some cat food tins to go into the salvage, watched intently by Foss, who hoped it might inspire me to open another one, when the phone rang.

  “I’m afraid Annie’s in a pretty bad way,” Rachel said. “She’s in intensive care. Phyll and I weren’t allowed to see her.”

  “Good heavens, what’s the matter with her?”

  “They wouldn’t give us details because we’re not relatives, but it does seem serious.”

  “How awful. Will she be all right?”

  “Again, they wouldn’t say, but I’d think it’s touch and go. I’m going to try and phone Lewis; he might be able to find out more about her.”

  “Good idea. Do give me a ring when you have any news.”

  All that morning I kept thinking about Annie and wondering how she was. As Rachel had said, she’s the heart of the village and it’s impossible to imagine Mere Barton without her.

  “Oh, she’ll recover,” Rosemary said when we had lunch together. “She’s a survivor, no question about that. Anyway, she’s one of those small, wiry people, full of energy, who go on forever.”

  “I certainly hope so,” I said. “From a purely selfish point of view I really need her help with this wretched book.”

  “How’s it coming on?” Rosemary asked.

  “Very slowly. In fact, I’ve barely started.”

  “I can’t think why you agreed to do it in the first place.”

  “Because I’m an idiot,” I said ruefully, “and because you know how difficult it is to say no to Annie—force of personality, I suppose. That’s how she manages to get things done. And that’s why I need her to bully people to produce material for the Book.”

  “What about those old letters of hers? Are they going to be useful?”

  “I’ve had them photocopied but I haven’t had a chance to read them yet. They’re from her grandfather, written from France in the First World War. I think he was a carpenter in the village, so they’ll certainly go in.”

  “Has she anything else you could use?”

  “I don’t know, but I got the impression that there were other things, but, being Annie, she was going to disclose them one by one.”

  “You’re going to need more than that,” Rosemary said.

  “I know; that’s why I need Annie to badger people, not that there are many proper village people still around. Annie’s going to write to some of them who’ve moved away—they might have stuff that would be useful. So you see why I need her back in the village!”

  “I wonder what’s wrong with her?” Rosemary said.

  “The general impression is that it’s some sort of food poisoning, but, of course, they wouldn’t tell Rachel anything because she isn’t a relative.”

  “That’s maddening, especially as Annie doesn’t seem to have any relatives.”

  It was quite late that evening when Rachel rang again. I’d fallen asleep in my chair in front of the television (something I’m increasingly prone to do) and was in that confused state that you are when jerked suddenly into consciousness by the telephone.

  “I’m afraid she’s gone,” Rachel said.

  “Gone?” I echoed stupidly. “Gone where?”

  “It’s Annie. She died this afternoon. Lewis has just called me.”

  “Good heavens!” I was wide-awake now. “How awful.”

  �
��I think it was pretty inevitable, from what Lewis said.”

  “What was it?”

  “An acute form of food poisoning. The effects lasted a few days and led to renal failure.”

  “Renal failure? That’s kidneys, isn’t it?”

  “That was the problem. In the normal course of events it need not necessarily have proved fatal, but unfortunately it appears that Annie only had one kidney, so . . . well . . . that was that.”

  There was a moment’s silence while I tried to take in what Rachel had been telling me.

  “What sort of food poisoning?” I asked.

  “We’ll know more after the postmortem.”

  “A postmortem—oh dear!”

  “Well,” Rachel said patiently, “they have to establish the exact cause of death and there’ll have to be an inquest, of course.”

  “Yes, I suppose so. It just sounds so horrible.”

  “It was a dreadful thing to have happened, but they do have to get to the bottom of it. Anyway, I thought you’d want to know as soon as possible, because of the Book and everything.”

  “Oh yes, of course—the Book. Well, thanks so much for letting me know . . .”

  “I’d better get on; I need to tell other people in the village and I must see if I can get in touch with Father William. Perhaps we could have lunch sometime soon. Ask Rosemary.”

  There was the click on the phone and she was gone.

  I thought of phoning Rosemary straightaway, but when I looked at the clock I saw it was quite late. So I took my confused and gloomy thoughts with me out into the kitchen and, while I was putting out the animals’ supper and laying my tray, I wondered what effect Annie’s death would have on the village and, indeed, what effect it would have on me.

  “Oh dear, how dreadful,” Rosemary said, “and what rotten luck about her only having one kidney. Did you know?”

  “No, I don’t think anyone did. You know how Annie never talked about herself. I mean, she talked all the time about what she’d done and what she thought about everything—especially that!—but never any really personal details. Like why she’d never married, or, indeed, if she had any relatives—things like that.”

  “Now you come to mention it, she didn’t, did she? We were all so occupied in seeing how involved she was in other people’s lives that we never noticed things like that about her.”

  “I mean, we know she was the local midwife for years,” I said, “but I haven’t the faintest idea where she trained or where, if anywhere, she worked before she came back here.”

  “So need you go on with the Book now that Annie’s not there to chivvy you?” Rosemary asked.

  “That was one of the first things that occurred to me,” I admitted. “Though I felt a bit guilty thinking it.”

  “I don’t see why. You didn’t want to do the thing in the first place and I don’t expect there’s anyone else in the village who cares about it either way.”

  “I don’t expect there is.”

  But apparently we were wrong. Just after I’d spoken to Rosemary, Father William telephoned.

  “Ah, Sheila, I gather Rachel has told you the sad news?” His voice, I noticed, was in clerical mode, soft and muted. “We are all very shocked and saddened by poor Annie’s passing.”

  “Yes, it’s dreadful, isn’t it. Is there any news about when the funeral is to be?”

  “No, alas, we have to wait for the postmortem and then, perhaps, for the inquest—it depends on what the findings will be—before any decision can be made.”

  “Oh dear.”

  “I have made myself responsible for the arrangements, since there do not seem to be any relations. And because of that, there will, of course, be a lot to do.” The tone was now brisker with just a slight undertone of importance. “But I have been thinking about what kind of service she would have wished for, so I am asking all her friends to get in touch with me if they have any suggestions.”

  “Well,” I said hesitantly, “I have no idea what Annie thought about such things. I really didn’t know her that well.”

  “But you have been working with her on that splendid book, which will, in some ways, be her memorial!”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t say that.”

  “Something she cared about so much!”

  “I don’t know if I can go on with it. There were a lot of things Annie was going to do.”

  “I’m sure you’ll find a way—you’re so resourceful—and it’s the last tribute the village can pay to her.”

  There was much more in a similar vein, and when he’d finally rung off I slammed around the kitchen in a temper.

  “It’s absolutely ridiculous and I don’t see why I should be lumbered with it!” I said to Tris, who looked at me with his head on one side, worried by my cross voice. “All that tiresome work—and I don’t even live in the wretched village!” I said to Foss, sitting impassively on top of the microwave. “Even when she’s dead, Annie Roberts is forcing me to do things I don’t want to do. It isn’t fair!”

  Foss gave me a contemptuous stare, jumped down and stalked off into the hall where I could hear him sharpening his claws on the stair carpet.

  Chapter Seven

  I got out the photocopies I’d made of Annie’s letters, because I still didn’t like to work from the originals, and began to look through them. I’ve read quite a few letters written home by soldiers (including those from my father when he was a chaplain in Italy during the last war) and I’m always struck by the fact that, almost always, even in the most horrible places and at times of great stress and danger, the language is so matter of fact. I suppose it’s an instinctive shying away from heroics.

  Frank Roberts’s letters were like that. Written from a position just outside Ypres, the commonplace words (designed to keep from his family any knowledge of the appalling conditions around him) were very touching. Now that we’ve all seen on television pictures of the unspeakable horror of mud and devastation, the words “a bit wet and miserable” and “not exactly a home from home” were immensely moving. As were the references to the children, about how much they’d have grown, so that he wouldn’t recognize them when he got back.

  Fortunately Frank Roberts did go back and took up his old job as village carpenter, just as if he’d never been away. And I believe he never referred to those years, except to make the odd joke with a fellow ex-soldier, down at the Legion, about lorries that should have brought ammunition being full of plum and apple jam, and to say, on occasion, that he didn’t think much of foreign parts. I would have liked to ask Annie what memories she had of her grandfather—he seems to have been a mild and kindly man who would have been fond of his grandchild—but now it was too late. I would just have to imagine it. Though it was hard, almost impossible, to imagine Annie as a child.

  On an impulse, I put the letters away, got out the car and went to Mere Barton. Having no plan in mind I went into the shop, the most likely place to glean what information there was about Annie. Maurice was behind the counter, deep in conversation with Judith. He looked up as I came in.

  “Sheila might be able to help,” he said. “Her son is—was—Annie’s solicitor.” He turned to me. “That’s right, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, he is,” I said, “but I don’t know . . .”

  “It’s so awkward,” Judith said. “I really don’t know what to do—it’s the keys, you see. Now that poor Annie’s gone, who should I give them to? I mean, I’m quite happy to hang on to them for the time being, but I wouldn’t want to do the wrong thing—legally, that is. What is the situation? I don’t know of any relatives, do you? And what’s to become of all her things? She had some very nice pieces—that dresser in the kitchen (it’s a really old Welsh dresser, you know, and they’re fetching a good price at auction. I saw one on television the other day) and that bookcase in the sitting room—lots of things. What’s to become of those?”

  “I’m afraid I don’t know,” I said. “I haven’t spoken to Michael since Annie died—h
e and the family are away for a few days—but I’m sure if you rang the practice, they’d advise you—”

  “It’s the responsibility,” Judith went on. “As I said, I’d be happy to hang on to the keys, but I would like to know . . . well, what’s going to happen.”

  “Do we know what the result of the postmortem is,” I asked, “and if there’s got to be an inquest? If there is, I suppose the police would have to be involved.”

  “No, we haven’t heard,” Maurice said. “We’re waiting for Lewis—I don’t suppose they’d tell us, would they?”

  “I’d be happy to give them to the police,” Judith said, “if that’s what they want. I had been going to go in there to water the plants, but now—well, I don’t think . . . I mean, she had some really nice potted plants, and it would be a shame just to let them die. But I don’t like to actually go in, not with Annie—you know . . .”

  “It is awkward,” I said. “I have those letters of hers—her grandfather’s, that is. She gave them to me for the Book, but now . . .”

  “Oh, you’ll go on with the Book,” Judith exclaimed. “It’s what she would have wanted. Don’t you think so, Maurice? Oh, you must go on!”

  “It’s really a question of who the letters belong to now,” I said, “and, if I do go on with it, Annie said there are other things she had that ought to go in as well. I really don’t know what to do about them.”

  “It seems to me,” Maurice said, “that there’s not much that we can do until we know what’s in the will—I suppose she did make a will?” He looked at me inquiringly.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I suppose she must have done, though often people don’t.”

  “There’s the cottage,” Maurice said thoughtfully. “That was Annie’s. I mean, it belonged to her mother and she left it to her. Her father was in the army, killed in the war, in North Africa I think it was, though Annie never talked about it. So there was a widow’s pension and her mother used to work at the hotel and, then, Annie was earning. I never knew the mother, of course; she died before we came here. Anyhow, as I was saying, there’s the cottage. That must be worth quite a bit—properties in the village are fetching ridiculous amounts. I was just saying to Margaret the other day, it’s lucky we bought this place when we did; we certainly couldn’t have afforded it now!”