Miss Garstone had always been there too. Jenny called her Garsty. She was energetic, kind and industrious, but quite unsentimental. It was very strange to see her lie all day and never stir at all. Jim Stokes who worked for Mr Carpenter had found her at twelve o’clock when he came whistling home to his dinner. She had done her shopping and started home, but she had not got farther than half way. There were the marks where the bicycle had run off the road. What had made it run? Nobody knew. If it was a car, it hadn’t stopped to pick her up – it hadn’t stopped at all. And Miss Garstone hadn’t moved after she had fallen. She had lain there amongst the dusty trails of blackberry at the side of the road with her broken bicycle in the ditch beyond her, and no one to say what had happened.
Jenny had got as far as this when Miss Garstone moved. Her eyelids quivered and then opened. Her eyes looked out, looked ail round the room, and then closed again. It was an unseeing look. Jenny’s heart beat faster. She said, ‘Garsty—’ in a hushed sort of way as if she was calling to someone who might hear her but who mustn’t be disturbed. The eyes opened again. This time they saw. She said in quite a strong voice,
‘Jenny—’
Jenny said, ‘Yes?’
‘I’ve been hurt.’
‘Yes, but you’ll be all right now, Garsty.’
‘I – don’t – think – so—’
Jenny stretched out her hand and took the pale hand nearest her. Miss Garstone had always been proud of her hands. They were her one beauty and she cherished it. They lay on the bed, the nails even and shining, the fingers a little curved, lying there quite empty. Jenny took the hand that was nearest to her. It felt slack and weak and empty. She said, ‘Oh, Garsty, Garsty!’
The eyes opened. Miss Garstone’s voice came again. She seemed to be continuing something that she had been saying in the dream in which she walked. She said,
‘So it all belongs to you. You know that, don’t you?’
‘Don’t worry about it now, Garsty.’
Miss Garstone shut her eyes, but she was not at peace. The hand that was under Jenny’s kept on moving. It was like something that was trying to wake up and couldn’t quite manage it. Jenny’s hand closed on it warmly.
‘Don’t. Don’t try, Garsty. It’s bad for you. You mustn’t. Another time when you’re better—’
The eyes opened again. For the first time the head moved. A very slight movement. It said, ‘No.’ She lay quiet, her eyes open, fixed on Jenny. Then she spoke in a thread of a voice.
‘Did I say it?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘It’s – so – difficult. I – must – tell – you. I oughtn’t – to – have – kept it – from you. I never meant – to go – without – telling you. It seemed – best – at the time. Your mother—’ She stopped. ‘She was Jennifer Hill. Your father – your father didn’t know – he didn’t know about you – that you were coming – I don’t think he knew – but Jennifer never said. He was Richard Forbes – Richard Alington Forbes. Alington belonged to him. But you know that – I didn’t keep that from you – everyone knows it.’ The cold hand under Jenny’s warm one twitched and turned.
Jenny said quickly,
‘Don’t worry yourself, Garsty! Oh, please don’t!’
‘I must.’ The two words came out quite clearly and strongly. They were weighted with a deep earnestness. After that she fell silent. It was like watching someone drift. Presently she spoke again.
‘I ought not to have done it. At first I wasn’t sure. And there you were, just a tiny baby, and your mother dead and she didn’t tell me anything. If she had told me – I wouldn’t have – let her down. Oh, I wouldn’t! Do you believe me – because it’s true—’
‘Of course I believe you. Oh, don’t trouble yourself.’
The pale lips said, ‘I must—’ on a failing breath. She was silent again. After what seemed like a long time she spoke in a faint voice. ‘I didn’t know there was anything more – not till you were seven and Mr and Mrs Forbes had been here all that time. I was talking to a friend of mine, and she said, “There’s a way you can be quite sure, you know. If there was a marriage, it will be at Somerset House.” Did I tell you about the letter?’
‘No. Never mind about it now.’
Miss Garstone took no notice. She went on in that whispery voice which was like the trees sounding in a little wind, or something that you heard in a dream. She said,
‘About the letter – it was in that little chest of drawers. It’s there still – I put it back – I didn’t want to read it. But you’re their daughter – you have the right. It was the only letter she had from him, because they were together. She was in the W.A.A.F.’s – you know that. He was killed before he could write again. His plane was lost. He went out on – what do they call them – a reconnaissance or something like that – and he didn’t come back. He didn’t come back—’ There was a pause. The eyelids fell. The room was very quiet. The minutes went by.
Then very suddenly the eyes were open again.
‘I only saw the one sentence – just the one – but it made me think. I couldn’t get it out of my head. You see, he called her “My wife – my precious wife” – there, at the end of the letter. I couldn’t help thinking if they were married, then the house was yours – it was all yours.’
It didn’t penetrate. It was just something that the pale lips were saying. Jenny couldn’t believe it. The hand which held Miss Garstone’s was steady. Her mind shut all its doors. She couldn’t believe it at all. She said,
‘If they were married, she would have said.’
‘I thought of that – I thought he felt that way about her. But it couldn’t be true – it couldn’t really be true—’
The thought came into Jenny’s mind, ‘Why couldn’t it?’ Before she knew what she was going to do she heard herself saying,
‘Why couldn’t it be true?’
Miss Garstone looked at her. She made an effort that moved her head a little, and she looked at Jenny.
‘I knew you would ask me that some day.’
All at once there seemed to be a tingling in the air between them.
‘I knew it. Now it’s come. I wasn’t brave enough – I couldn’t face it. I can’t die without telling you – I never went to Somerset House – I was afraid—’
‘Why were you afraid?’
‘I loved you so much.’
Jenny’s heart melted in her.
‘Oh, Garsty!’
‘I thought – it was all wrong – I can see now. I thought if I said – and if it was true – that they were married – I thought—’
‘Don’t trouble now, Garsty.’
‘I must – there’s so little time—’
‘Tomorrow—’
‘I haven’t got any tomorrow. I never went to Somerset House – they would have taken you away from me. I couldn’t bear it – it was because I loved you so much—’ The lids came down again. There was a long silence which gradually became peaceful. Then suddenly the hand under Jenny’s twitched and pulled. The eyes opened.
‘You were born – here in this room. She came back – Jennifer came back. She never spoke. They weren’t here then, you know – Mrs Forbes and the boys. The house was empty – because of course it belonged to him, and if she was his wife and he was dead, then it belonged to Jennifer and to her baby. Only she never said – she never said anything. She would sit all day by the window. What I told her to do she did. She wasn’t ill – not in body – but she was like a person in a dream. I had this cottage and we stayed here. The Forbes came – because he was the heir. Mrs Forbes came down and had a talk with me. She said it was stupid to stay on here – but I said, “Jennifer has no people and she has no money – but I’ve got this cottage – it’s my own – no one can turn me out.” She saw I meant it, and she didn’t say any more. Jennifer never roused at all. When her time came and you were born it was all easy. But she died that night—’
There was a long pause. When Miss Garst
one spoke again there was a difference in her. She did not speak to Jenny. The eyes that she opened did not see her. They were fixed on someone else. Jenny had the feeling that if she could turn her head she would see who that someone was. She could not see, but she knew what Garsty saw. There was a presence in the room. She didn’t know whether it was the presence of death or of life. She saw Garsty smile and say something, but she did not know what she had said. And then in a moment it was over and Garsty was gone.
TWO
MISS ADAMSON WAS away for an hour. She would not have been so long, but she met a number of people, and of course, they all wanted to know about the accident and about how Miss Garstone was, and what with telling them and their saying how dreadful it was, and how shocking to think that anyone would run a woman down and not see if they had killed her, the time just slipped away. Then she had to let herself into her cottage and feed her cat and get what she wanted for the night, and it all took time. She hurried all she could, and then she made haste back along the lonely stretch of road where the accident had happened, and round the corner past the gate into Mr Carpenter’s farm, and then on to where the light shone from the window of the room where Jenny was watching. On the other side of the road was the empty lodge of Alington House where the Forbes lived.
Miss Adamson felt a momentary twinge of resentment. She wouldn’t have said that she got on well with Mrs Forbes. She made it her business to get on well with everyone, but try as you will, if you’ve got a feeling you’ve got a feeling, and in her inmost heart Miss Adamson knew that she had a feeling about Mrs Forbes. She didn’t stop to think about it, but it was there as she put away her bicycle in the shed and walked up the dark garden path to go in by the kitchen door. Put into words, it would have been something of this kind – ‘She’s always here when she’s not wanted, and come the time when she might be some use she’s away. Not that I suppose she’d have put her hand to anything if she’d been here.’ The thought was in her mind, if words did not clothe it.
She opened the door into the kitchen. There was a lamp burning here. She went through. There was no light in the front passage or on the stairs. The house was very still – it was very still indeed. There ought to have been some sound. The thought went quickly through her head. A little shiver went over her. She called up the stairs, ‘Jenny, I’m back!’ and there was no answer.
Miss Adamson caught at herself. If anyone else had behaved like this, she would have known what to say about them. She couldn’t believe that it was she herself, Kate Adamson, who stood at the foot of the stairs and was afraid to go on. She knew very well what she would say if it were anyone else.
In the room above her Jenny still held the cold dead hand. It had very little warmth to lose. She couldn’t bear to let it go. She was glad to be alone. She was glad that there had been no one there except herself to see that look on Garsty’s face. It was the look of someone who sees into reality. She would never forget that she had seen it. When the voice called to her from below it seemed very far away. She began to come back, but slowly. Even when the door opened behind her she did not turn.
Miss Adamson came into the room and stopped. For a moment she had nothing to say. She saw Jenny sitting forward holding Miss Garstone’s dead hand in hers. She saw Jenny’s face in profile, quite calm. She had rather the look of someone waking from a dream – waking, but not quite awake yet. Miss Adamson’s eyes went to Miss Garstone’s face. It had changed very little since she had seen it last, but she knew at once that she was dead. She had changed hardly at all, but there was something there, something quite unmistakable, and Miss Adamson knew that Miss Garstone was dead.
There was a silent moment. No sound at all in the little room, and outside the wind that had been blowing gustily was still. As Miss Adamson stood there with the open door in her hand she heard the car. She could hear it quite plainly. It tooted twice at the entrance gate which was just across the road and turned in. Time was when the lodge was occupied and one of the children would run out and open the gates for the carriage to pass. But that was a long time ago. The carriage had given place to a car, the lodge stood dark and empty, and the gates were always open.
The sound of the car died away and was followed by a puff of wind. It shook the latched windows and made a rushing sound about the house.
Miss Adamson pulled herself together with a jerk and came into the room.
‘Oh, Jenny my dear—’ she said.
Jenny turned very slowly. There was only one thought in her mind. She said,
‘It isn’t true. It – it can’t be true – not Garsty—’
Mrs Forbes drove on to the house and beyond it. She put the car away, drew a long breath of the something accomplished done sort, gathered up her parcels, locked the garage, and made her way to the front door. It was open, and Carter stood there peering out.
‘Oh, ma’am,’ she said, ‘– oh ma’am. I’d have managed to keep it from them, because that was what I thought you’d want. But oh dear, what a dreadful thing!’
Mrs Forbes was not paying very much attention. Carter was an emotional creature – it didn’t do to take too much notice of her. She came into the lighted hall and began to undo her coat. The lamp in the ceiling shone down upon her and showed a very handsome woman. Not young – she owned being over fifty, but she was very well preserved. Her two boys had been born with only a year between them when she was twenty-eight, the two little girls not for fourteen years, during which time Major Forbes had been in the Army – though what use he could possibly be, she never pretended to understand. When he did return he was even more absent-minded than he had been before he went. He was Colonel Forbes now, that was all there was to it. He slipped easily enough into the life of the village, was on terms of politeness with his wife, of vague affection for his children and for Jenny. He had died unobtrusively two years before, and his eldest son Mac reigned in his stead.
Carter continued to obtrude her excitement.
‘Oh, ma’am,’ she said, ‘you could have knocked me down with a feather – you could indeed! I don’t know when I’ve had such a turn! Right at our door as you may say!’
‘What are you talking about, Carter? Not the children?’
Carter was at once shocked and impressed by the calmness of her voice.
‘Oh, no ma’am! Oh my goodness, no! I couldn’t have met you like this if there had been anything wrong with them.’
‘Well, what is it?’ Mrs Forbes was a carefully controlled woman, but the control was wearing thin. ‘For goodness sake, Carter – what’s the matter with you? If you’ve got anything to say, say it! Oh, I got that stuff for Meg and Joyce – it will make up very nicely, I think. I’ll go down and see Miss Garstone about it in the morning, or she can come up here. Yes, that’ll be best.’
‘Oh, ma’am, you don’t know – Miss Garstone won’t ever make no more dresses! Not a shred of hope – that’s what the doctor told Mrs Maggs when she asked him. She’ll go out tonight or in the early hours, he said. Miss Adamson—’
Mrs Forbes turned. She had reached the foot of the stairs, but she turned and came back.
‘What are you talking about?’
Carter had her handkerchief out. She sniffed and choked a sob.
‘It’s Miss Garstone,’ she said. ‘Went into the village this morning same as she has time out of mind and nobody thinking anything about it, and when Jim Croft come home at noon he found her—’
‘Found her?’
‘Yes, he did, poor boy, and it was a shock to him. He didn’t try and move her, but he biked back to the village – he’s a sensible boy – and they fetched Dr Williams and Miss Adamson and they brought her home. And Miss Adamson she stayed with Jenny.’
Mrs Forbes stood where she had turned. It was a shock. She stood there assembling all her forces to meet it. Then she said,
‘The children don’t know?’
Carter hesitated to avert if possible the cloud of anger which she could see sweeping up.
‘Oh, be quiet, Carter!’ Mrs Forbes struck in with a sense of resolute strength. ‘I gather that the children know. I must go down there at once. It’s a nuisance – I’ve just put the car away, but it’s not worth getting it out again. I may be bringing Jenny back with me – I’ll see. Get the bed made in the little room next the children’s. Put two hot water bottles in it. Oh, and be on the look out for the telephone, because I’ll ring up when I know what’s happening.’ As she spoke she came down the hall and picked up a flashlight from the table. As she finished speaking she was already at the front door. A moment later it fell to behind her with a resounding clang that echoed through the house.
Two little girls sprang from the top of the stairs and raced down them. They each put an arm round Carter and tugged her out of the hall and into the study.
‘She’s gone down there!’
‘She said she was going!’
The Fingerprint (The Miss Silver Mysteries Book 30) Page 28