Murder at Maddingley Grange, page 18
He picked up the torch that had rolled against a wall fitting almost flush to the last stair, and quickly discovered a handle, twin to the one he had left behind. He put his ear against the outline of the door but could hear nothing. Derek felt cheated. He had been hoping for voices. A gathering of the clans. Never mind. He would not let a shortage of spectators detract from his satisfaction. Even if he had not successfully apprehended the intruder he had still successfully traversed the unknown and was about to emerge victorious. Nothing could take that triumph away. He turned the handle and pushed.
Something was in the way. He pushed harder and whatever it was shifted slightly. He put his gun down on the bottom step and, gritting his teeth with fervid determination, almost threw himself at the door. It opened about a foot and immediately masses of shiny green fleshy leaves thrust themselves into the gap. He was outside. Something quite unexpected. Derek pushed a little harder and heard a dragging, bumping sound as of a heavy object being propelled over a hard surface. One more big heave should do it. And so it proved. The heave was followed by a tremendous crash. The door flew open with such force it nearly came off its hinges, and Derek stepped out into the conservatory.
It was very quiet, flooded with the most extraordinary light. The roof was sea green curved into ribs, and through this the sunshine poured, subdued and distorted by the thick glass, becoming soft, luminous and wavery. The air was very hot and damp. Hoses snaked about the floor and water trickled and hissed. Just behind his exit door an enormous terra-cotta jar lay on its side in several pieces. Its occupant, the plant with the shiny leaves, reclined in loose mounds of earth. The exposed roots were most unpleasant, hairy and with great rosy carbuncles that looked like lumps of raw flesh.
Derek closed his secret door, leaving a barely visible gap, and was just about to rush off and impart his thrilling news when he was halted by a sudden recollection. In the excitement of his discovery he had quite forgotten his arrangements with Sheila. He had certainly been successful at keeping out of everyone’s way. In fact, so engrossed had he become in his investigations that he was now left with—a quick glance at the half hunter—less than ten minutes to get himself murdered in.
Martin and Sheila met head on crossing a tiny conceit of a bridge in the shrubbery. Nothing more than six arched planks and handrails of peeling bark. A willow-pattern bridge, beneath which ran a trickle of crystalline water bobbing over spotted stones.
Martin said: “Sorry,” and stepped back. Sheila, without smiling or thanking him, crossed over. She appeared very cross.
“Have you seen Simon?”
“No,” replied Martin. “I haven’t seen anyone. I’ve only just got up. Have you seen Rosemary?”
“Rosemary?” Sheila looked at him sharply and Martin blushed.
“Just thought she might like a game of tennis.”
“I’m sure she will. If you can find her,” said Sheila tartly. “Games of all sorts seem to be her specialty.”
“Here, I say…” began Martin but Sheila had flounced off. Not an easy accomplishment in a severely tailored outfit with not a furbelow in sight, but flounce she did. Martin wondered what had upset her.
He went over the bridge to find that his path immediately diverged, both trails disappearing into a wild-looking tangle of small trees, flowering shrubs and brambles. Martin tossed a coin and turned left.
He passed an early purple buddleia, blossoms so pulsating with butterflies that the whole tree seemed about to take off, and a tangle of summer jasmine, a column of pale stars, twining around an old Blenheim Orange. Many of the shrubs had T-shaped iron markers giving their Latin names, and clematis clambered everywhere.
Tranced with delight at the scents and sounds Martin continued along the path. It was by a gigantic Kiftsgate, a landscape in its own right, that he heard, intermingling with the warbling of birds and the zizz and drone of insects, human voices. Rising and falling, one deep, the other much lighter. Then a girl laughed.
Martin looked around. Although the voices sounded very near he could see no one. He strolled on a bit, trying to follow the sound to its source, and came to a little arbor partially concealed by a swag of honeysuckle. He pushed the fragrant curtain aside. There was a stone statue of Cupid and Psyche in the bower and a love seat. On the seat, plainly determined not to let all this romantic ambience go to waste, were Simon and Rosemary. They jumped up when they saw Martin. Simon waved away his blurting apology and Rosemary patted her hair. Then Simon lifted his companion’s hand rather formally to his lips, saying, “I shall be in real trouble if I don’t help with lunch. See you both in half an hour?”
After he had gone there was a brief silence sticky with accusation. Martin looked severely at Rosemary, who twirled her Leghorn hat by the ribbons and stuck out her smeary lower lip. At last he said: “What on earth do you think you were doing?”
“Me? You’ve got a cheek. I might ask you the same question.”
“What have I done?” asked Martin, genuinely puzzled.
“I’m not blind. I saw you gazing into Laurel Hannaford’s eyes on the terrace yesterday. If I hadn’t come over and asked for another drink you’d still be standing there.”
“What absolute rubbish,” said Martin, aware, even as he spoke, that the conviction in his voice was muted. For it was true that he had felt strangely content as the recipient of that deep-blue gaze from the girl in the shimmering dress. But an easy friendliness was all it was. What Rosemary suggested was nonsense. As Martin recalled those few moments of closeness and listened to his fiancée cheapening them by the name of flirtation he became angry.
“At least whatever I was doing, I was doing it where you could see me. Not skulking in some mangy grotto.”
“How dare you! I’ve never skulked in my life. And anyway, after your ridiculous performance in the middle of the night, I didn’t think you’d care what I did.”
“It wasn’t my fault the butler threw me down the stairs.”
“I despise people who blame others for their incompetence.”
“Gave my head a terrible crack.” Silence. “Hurts like hell.” More of the same. “I wouldn’t be surprised if it needs stitches.”
“Oh, don’t be such a wimp.”
“I see. As I obviously failed on the field of battle, Rosemary, perhaps you would have preferred it if I’d been brought down to breakfast on my shield?”
“A little bump on the head.”
“Thank you very much. This is a wound honorably received, I’ll have you know. I was making my way back from your room when it happened.”
“Well, you can’t be very good at it. I didn’t even wake up.”
“There’s no need to be coarse.”
“And what on earth induced you to babble on to Mother at dinnertime about Sealyhams and the Chinese?”
“I misread your list—all right? Am I not allowed one single error?”
“Two actually.”
“Couldn’t you give me a dispensation? One and a half minutes’ kindness perhaps, instead of the regulation hearty breakfast?”
“How could anyone mistake the word Sealyham for the word Pekingese? They are not even remotely similar. SEE LEE HAM. PEEK ING EESE.”
“Oh, shut up!” Rosemary drew in her breath. A huge gasp of amazement. Her eyes bulged. “I’m sorry, darling…No, I’m not…Well, yes, I am but only for being rude. Things had to… have to be said.” Martin drew in his breath. “The fact is—”
“The fact is, Martin, that coming away on this weekend is the most sensible thing I ever did. It has enabled me to see you in your true colors. Mummy was quite right when she said you weren’t good enough for me. I’m only grateful that I found out in time. You must regard our engagement as at an end.”
“What—null and void?”
“Precisely.”
“Righto.”
“Is…is that all you’ve got to say?” Rosemary produced a wisp of apricot chiffon and dabbed daintly at the corner of a dry eye.
“Er…” Martin ruminated. “Your lipstick’s all smudged.”
“Beast!” Rosemary stamped her sandaled foot and flounced off, making a much better job of it than Sheila had, thanks to the wide trousers.
Martin sat down in the lovers’ bower and took a deep lungful of the perfect air. It wasn’t long till lunch and he wished to spend the time quietly sorting out his emotions. It was not easy to get comfortable on the hard bench. His shoulders still felt bruised and his knees and ankles a bit on the mangled side. His head too, although the stones seemed to have permanently rolled away, remained spongily tender. So why, Martin wondered, given this extreme discomfort, plus the fact that he was now unmistakably one fiancée short, was his heart as light as a feather?
Laurie was hiding in the vegetable garden. Ostensibly she had gone there to pick lettuces for lunch. Now, already wilting in the hot sun, they lay at her feet. She sat on an old zinc bucket, hugging her knees and drowning in a turmoil of emotion. She felt miserable, elated, panicky, nauseated and alarmed. There was a persistent lump in her throat no sooner swallowed than back again.
She had hoped that the orderliness of the enclosed garden, the neat vegetable parterres, low box hedging and formal herringbone paths would have a calming effect upon the disorderly tumult in her mind. Often during childhood visits, if her aunt or uncle had been grumpy, she would come out here, fill her small watering can from the rain butt and sprinkle the herbs radiating out like the spokes of a wheel from a sundial center. But today the garden had lost the power to heal.
Suddenly, unbearably irritated by sitting still, Laurie got up and started wandering about. Her arms and legs were heavy and she felt stupid and unnaturally detached as if she were in some sort of limbo; marking time waiting for she knew not what. She longed to go to sleep, a miraculous healing sleep where, when she woke, the mysterious disturbance would have flown away and she would be her old, undistressed self again.
She broke off a sprig of myrtle and was inhaling the sweet prickly scent when the old iron gate creaked and her brother came in.
“Bennet’s waiting for the lettuce. Lunch is in ten minutes.”
“Are these them?” Simon picked up four hot, dry, wilting plants.
“Yes. Webb’s Wonder.”
“They don’t look very wonderful to me. They look pathetic.”
“I picked them half an hour ago.”
“I think you should pick some more.”
“You pick some more,” flared Laurie. “You’ve done nothing all morning but swan around on the croquet lawn.”
“No need to snap.” Simon hitched up his cream Oxford bags and crouched down. “Got a knife?”
“They just pull.”
“So they do.” He tugged out four lettuces and stood up again. “Everything set for one o’clock?”
“How should I know?”
“Aren’t you in charge?”
“Oh, yes—it’s always me, isn’t it? Everything falls on me.”
“I know the help’s not ideal—”
“Help? A butler as drunk as a newt and a maid as blind as a bat? All we need is a frog and a brace of fenny snakes. We could open on Friday in Macbeth.”
“You are in a tizz, Lol—”
“Don’t call me that! You know I hate it.”
“I really am terribly grateful for everything you’ve done. Honestly. I can’t think of anyone else, given this bloody disaster, who could have resisted saying I told you so.”
“I told you so.”
“That’s not like you.”
“Yes, it is. It’s exactly like me. I’m fed up to the teeth.”
“I’ll make it up to you.”
“No, you won’t. You never do.”
Simon sat down on the edge of a cucumber frame, feeling the metal warm against his legs, and regarded his sister with genuine concern. “Spit it out, then.”
“Nothing to say. Anyway, I have to go and look after the salmon.”
“You’re too late.” Simon stamped his face with woe. “It’s dead.”
“That’s about as funny as Gilly’s ‘Girl from Idaho.’”
“Please!” Simon put his hands over his ears. “One more rendering will send me out of what is left of my mind. Three choruses after breakfast and he’s serenading the Gibbses in a punt on the lake now. I’m hoping they’ll jump over the side in despair and drown.” Simon reached for the bucket, pulled it close and patted it. “What’s up?”
“Don’t know.” Laurie regarded the scuffed, dusty toes of her sandals. “Actually…to tell you the truth…I feel really unhappy.”
“Well, we can’t all be happy at once. There’s just not enough to go round. It’ll be your turn tomorrow.”
“Mmm.” Laurie sounded most unsure. “Are they…all down now?”
“Think so. Would you believe Mrs. Saville and Gypsy Rose Gibbs are playing cards on the terrace?”
“That’s…everyone, is it?”
“Yes. Martin has finally showed his face. And I must say it’s looking rather the worse for wear.”
“Oh, him.” Laurie’s voice tightened. “He makes me sick.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. He seems quite pleasant.”
“No—I mean actually. Every time I look at him I feel sick. Or else I want to cry. And then I get dizzy.”
“I see. Anything else?”
“The flowers and trees seemed to vibrate and shine and become all…”
“Rose colored?”
“Bright and glittery and yes, since you mention it, a bit on the pinkish side. Then, when I gave him his drink, he smiled and said ‘Thank you.’”
“Knocks you sideways. That sort of repartee.”
Laurie’s eyes filled with tears. “I don’t know what’s the matter.”
“That’s easy. You’re in love.”
“In love?” Laurie stared. “Is that it then? Seeing him even when he’s not there, feeling sick when he is and the scenery jumping about?”
“More or less.”
“Why do people keep going in for it then if it’s so awful?”
“The first time’s the worst.” Simon rose, pulling her up with him. “And the best, of course. Don’t worry—he’ll be gone tomorrow and you’ll never have to see him again.”
“Ahhh…” Laurie swung out over a chasm on a rope of sand. “Simon!”
“Oh, dear, you have got it bad. What about Hugh?”
“Who?”
“Never mind.”
“I shall die.”
“No, you won’t. You’ll miss dinner and tomorrow’s cornflakes and be as right as a trivet by lunchtime. Come on”—he picked up the lettuce—“you take two and I’ll take two. They’ll be baying for their victuals any minute. I never knew such a ravenous bunch. I’m sure they’ve all consumed at least two hundred and fifty pounds’ worth of nosh already.”
They reached the gate, and as Simon held it open and Laurie walked through, she said: “Don’t you think Rosemary Saville’s absolutely awful?”
“Of course not,” replied Simon, fastening the latch. “The family’s in banking.”
Chapter Seventeen
On the terrace a long trestle had been set out with a brightly checked cloth and napkins and greenish chunky Italian tumblers with bubbles in the glass. Simon thought it looked just right. Informal and quite festive. He pictured everyone sitting around in the sunshine quaffing away, voices raised in laughter and friendly exchange. It would be just like one of those marvelous en famille lunches the French and Italians were so good at but without ghastly bambinos hurling the pasta about.
He had maneuvered Mother and Mrs. Saville to the far end of the terrace simply by picking up their table and walking off with it. They had followed as if attached by invisible reins before immediately sinking into the chairs he had repositioned and going on with their game.
Gaunt, having struck the gong at his third attempt, limped and hunch-hobbled over to his employer. Simon braced himself for a lengthy gripe about the winter of his minion’s discontent.
“Miss Laurel asks should she send the soup out, sir.”
“Give it five, Gaunt. Get the bibs tied on.”
“Very good, sir.”
Rosemary appeared, her lips freshly painted shiny geranium red, and the boating party made their way toward the house, brief midday shadows preceding them. They had enjoyed a pleasant morning once the musical accompaniment had ground to a halt. Gilly had wielded the punt pole with great élan while his companions reclined plumply, trailing their hands in the water. Violet admired the waving fronds of willow, the immense bronze dragon and the ducks and moorhens skimming about and Fred questioned their boatman as to his reasons, “your real reasons, mind,” for being present at the Grange. He then offered his own theory and Gilly argued in vain that he was neither hit man nor minder, simply a clerk for the Electricity Board seizing the chance to live and breathe thirties-style for a short spell.
He was still protesting as they crossed the drawbridge and Fred stopped, almost in midstride, and stared. Violet bumped into him and Gilly said: “What is it? What’s the matter?”
Fred turned and looked at his wife, his nostrils pinched with anger. “I thought you said she was clean.”
Violet followed his gaze. “She was. I looked through all her luggage, her clothes, everything.”
“She must have had them in that bloody bag. You could get the crown jewels in there. It’s the size of an elephant’s scrotum.”
“She didn’t. I checked.” Violet stumbled after Fred as his step quickened. Gilly, still in the dark but scenting drama, scuttled along behind.
On the terrace the ladies played on, Sheila standing behind Mrs. Saville’s chair. Mother, aware of her son’s approach, ignored it. Mrs. Saville, in the grip of the game, her eyes glued to the cards in her fist, did not hear Fred even when he spoke.
