The Seaside Corpse, page 21
“Everett came back last night,” she said.
“He survived his time in jail?” I asked. While I was eavesdropping, you said he looked terrible.
“Yes,” she said, “and something he said got me thinking.” We’d reached the far side of the open grassy area and continued around the perimeter. “I did nothing but think. All night.”
I met Helen’s worried eyes. Where was this leading?
“Everett commented that the sergeant had suspected everyone in turns. I joked that it would be my turn next because who else was there? My motive was stronger than anyone’s, to escape an unhappy marriage. But I know perfectly well that I did not kill him.” She glanced at us as if to check that we agreed. “So, who did?”
I dared not look at Helen.
“Who had he wronged so grievously as to provoke his own death?” Nina went on. “He’d argued with Everett, but that was not unusual. He’d upset Oscar’s father, but to the point of murder? And there was the ugly scene with Spud, which I heard about afterward. I began to wonder, How did that begin?” She stopped walking. I paused too, as did Helen, who gave a little shudder.
“Howard overstepped the line of decency, is that right, Helen? And your father was rightfully outraged. But Spud is a softie, really, isn’t he? He’d not harm anyone, would he, if it meant harming you as well?” Nina didn’t wait for an answer. “But what if you…well, it occurred to me…I might not be the only woman who felt bullied. Was someone else braver than I am? Someone who took command when she felt threatened?”
Helen abruptly turned away.
“Are you feeling awkward because I was his wife?” said Nina.
“You’ve got the wrong idea,” said Helen.
“Do I?” Nina did not wait for an answer. “Shall I first tell what happened to me? We’re not so different as you might think. And Aggie should hear, because she’s a girl about to be a lovely young woman. It is nice to be a lovely young woman, but it cannot be the only thing you are. Do you understand?”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said.
“Ma’am?” she said with a laugh.
I felt the flush in my cheeks as surely as I saw it in Helen’s.
“My father was delighted that I should wed an eminent scholar,” said Nina. “My mother felt I was too young. ‘You will not see the world so clearly if guided by his eyes,’ she said. But I married him the week after my graduation, and quickly learned another side of my new husband. He was content for me to continue my studies, but he would assume the right to present my work to the world. Suddenly his reputation became even more esteemed, thanks to my papers. A married woman has no standing in a court of law. He was a lazy opportunist. And still a flirt with every pretty student who crossed his path.”
Helen kicked a stone.
“A picnic with Miss Pringle,” said Nina. “A letter received from Miss McLean. A giggle from Daisy, who mended the linens. Oh, hell.” We’d made a turn that brought the camp back into view. Nina stopped walking. “Is that the insufferable sergeant again?”
Yes, it was. The familiar bicycle weaved to avoid the ruts halfway down the track. Constable Guff was a considerable way behind.
“And look!” I said. “The patient is outside.” Under the kitchen canopy, Hector lolled in a sling chair like those on the deck of an ocean liner. His injured leg was propped on one of the benches, next to where Everett was sitting.
“King Hector,” I said.
Everett did not look concerned at the sight of the approaching policemen, just irked. Nina exhaled abruptly and strode toward camp.
“She’s got the wrong idea entirely,” said Helen. “I’d rather eat grubs than flirt with the professor. But Missus thinks I killed him and now she’ll tell the sergeant!”
At that moment, the sergeant’s bicycle toppled over, landing his bottom on the dusty track.
“Guff!” he shouted. “I’ve got a ruddy puncture!” He kicked his bicycle as he stood. Helen and I were far enough away to laugh aloud as he vigorously slapped at the seat of his pants to remove any marks. Poor P.C. Guff rolled to a stop to hear his sergeant’s command. “Fix it!”
Spud appeared in the doorway of the cook tent.
“Dad’s looking for me,” said Helen. “I should be stirring porridge instead of listening to Missus suggest that I tossed her husband into the sea.”
“Oi! Helen!” Her father had caught sight of us loitering in the meadow.
“Coming!”
Helen hurried into the cook tent and I knelt by Hector’s chair. His pallor, in the brightness of day, made him ghostly and startling, especially next to Everett’s brown face and bright eyes.
“You look as if you might faint dead away,” I said, “like a damsel with consumption.” Like a rubber balloon with the air squeezed out. Like a vampire’s victim drained of blood.
“It is surprising that I do not expire,” said Hector, “after so many hours sharing a confined space with—” His gaze jumped to something behind me. “With them.”
Arthur and Oscar, back from their mysterious errand! They went straight past us and hurried to the tap beside the backhouse.
Everett laughed. “Boys are stinky,” he said. “I’d avoid their tent if I were you.”
I blushed, and did not allow him to catch my eye. Would Everett tell James where he’d found me last night? The boys came back, damp and cheerful.
“Where did you two go?” I said.
“Can’t say,” said Arthur, full of importance. Oscar, behind him, rolled his eyes and held up his hands. Under his fingernails, where usually a boy had grime—unless the boy was named Hector—was a telltale line of white plaster. I still was puzzled, until he patted the pocket where he’d been keeping his souvenir from Mary Anning’s grave. Ohh! Now I understood. He’d replaced the stolen piece and affixed it with plaster! I hadn’t even told Hector, but Oscar had confided in Arthur? Well, I supposed I’d been occupied with Helen, and Hector was down with an adder bite, so poor Oscar had been rather stuck with the one ally left over.
“We didn’t make porridge this morning,” Helen announced, “what with Mr. Jarvis and Mr. Volkov not being here.” And you not being on duty to make it, I thought. “But we made a nice pan of scrambly eggs and there’s bread and butter, of course.”
We served ourselves and sat to eat, with the policemen grumbling too nearby.
“Let’s pretend they’re not here,” said Nina. “It’s a beautiful Monday and our ichthyosaur is safe and sound on dry land, waiting to travel to its next destination, wherever that ends up being. Isn’t that all that matters? Whatever nonsense the officers are here to—”
P.C. Guff dutifully handed over his own bicycle so that the sergeant could arrive in a respectable manner. The constable picked up the useless bike and pushed it toward the shop yard. Helen abruptly retreated into the cook tent. It was not such a beautiful Monday the way she saw things, I imagined, expecting to be accused of murder.
The young woman’s fluffy yellow hair was now matted and bedraggled as she huddled in a corner of the cold cement cell. Her rosy cheeks were drawn, eyes smudged with fearful shadows, hands manacled to an iron ring on the damp wall, and her heartbeat hollow and forlorn. Protests voiced by father and friends had been ignored. The paleontologist’s claim was enough to satisfy the dim but comely officer.
“Your attention.” The sergeant’s voice banished my grim daydream, and prompted Helen to peek from the kitchen doorway. He wore his usual copper-buttoned uniformed and tall boots—as well as his usual smug expression. He held a collecting sack. Was it the collecting sack?
“Mrs. Blenningham-Crewe.” Sergeant Harley lifted the sack. “You will recognize this as belonging to your husband?”
“I recognize it as one of a dozen that we have in camp,” said Nina. “If it is the sack you snatched from my hands on Friday morning, discovered on Church Cliff by the children and holding Howard’s flask but not a suicide letter? Then yes, it may have been used by my husband. Beyond that—”
“No letter,” said the sergeant. “A flask with the victim’s monogram, and two drinking glasses. One is now broken.”
“Two glasses?” Nina said.
“Glasses?” said Helen.
“That’s what I said, ma’am.” The sergeant smirked. “What do you think of that, eh?”
Nina’s eyes were resting on Helen.
Helen had become as still as a statue: Girl with Tray and Teapot. She must be thinking of the mystery woman named Sweetheart. I was certainly wondering where the glasses came from, as I’d seen none in the camp.
“My theory is that you and your husband had a little celebration planned, eh?” The sergeant was pleased with his deduction. “He went to the pub to meet the big American millionaire, to sell the fossil and make your fortune. Mr. Ostrid explained how you pretended to be reluctant about the sale so that he would offer a higher price to clinch the deal with your husband—”
Nina shook her head in disbelief.
“He had his flask filled up,” said Sergeant Harley, “ready to raise a cup of good cheer.”
Helen put down the tray ever so carefully, her hands a-trembling.
“Mr. Tobie claims you were with him in camp on Wednesday evening,” continued the sergeant. “At first, we were fooled into thinking that he was using you to provide an alibi, while he dashed off to do the deed…but what if we look at the scene from the opposite direction?”
Nina was still shaking her head, as steadily as a human metronome. “If Howard had his flask and two cups in that sack,” she said, “it was certainly not to celebrate with me. He was meeting someone who might appreciate his whiskey. There are several whiskey-loving men who wished to meet with Howard that night to conduct secret business…or, yes, I suppose it could have been another woman…but we don’t need to be specific about such plans in front of children, do we, Sergeant?”
“We don’t have glassware here in the camp,” murmured Helen. “Breaks too easy.”
“I do not hold you responsible for anything that happened on Wednesday night, Helen,” said Nina. “You shall not hang.”
“Missus!” Helen protested. “Nothing happened! I’m not—”
Nina turned toward the sergeant. “I want it noted,” she said. “Going forward, I do not blame the girl. Howard could be overwhelming, I know that. I expect Helen felt crushed, as others have been. Including me. Mostly me. She may have done us all a favor.”
Chapter 30
An Unanticipated Truth
A gasp from every one of us. Nina was condemning Helen! Tossing her into a moat with a snapping crocodile. A rather dull-witted crocodile, but one fond of making accusations.
“You’ve got it all wrong!” cried Helen. Spud stepped out of the kitchen to watch his daughter in alarm. Sergeant Harley’s gaze fixed on her, and then flicked back to Nina.
“What makes you think—?” he said. “Do you have evidence to support this—?”
“It’s a guess,” Nina admitted. “It wouldn’t be the first time that he—”
Spud made a growling noise. “Are you suggesting, Missus, that my girl was overly friendly with the Mister? Is that your claim?”
“Never! Dad, I swear.”
“If you’re trying to sway the sergeant’s opinion,” Spud thundered at Nina, “using some kind of trick to excuse yourself—”
“No!” said Nina. “I was here in camp! Ask the children! I did not kill my husband!”
“I didn’t do it neither,” said Helen.
“Who was it, then?” said Sergeant Harley.
“Because if you did”—Spud turned to his daughter—“you’ve cracked my heart like an egg on the edge of a bowl. Tell me straight, were you there on Church Cliff or no?”
“Good question,” said the sergeant. “Yes? Or no?”
If Helen said yes, they’d all think the worst. If she said no, she’d be telling a lie.
“This is the time.” Hector was looking at Oscar, prompting him, as if they had arranged this moment.
“I was there.” Oscar’s voice filled the trembling silence. “I heard what happened.”
All heads turned to stare. He’d been so ashamed and nervous telling me, yet here he was making a declaration to anyone with ears.
“Speak up, lad,” said Sergeant Harley. “I am terribly confused.”
“You were where?” said Helen.
“When?” said Everett.
“You heard what?” Nina said.
Oscar waited for quiet. “I went to the churchyard,” he said. “On Wednesday, when my father went to the pub. I heard them talking.”
“You heard who talking?” said the sergeant.
“Mr. B-C,” said Oscar, “and a woman, but—” His palm flew up to stop the instant flutter of questions. “I didn’t see her. I know they were not there to meet each other. Mr. B-C was expecting someone else. He sounded drunk. There was shouting, but it was windy. I couldn’t really hear. And then the woman ran away.” He shifted his gaze from the buttons on Sergeant Harley’s chest to face the girl with hair the color of yellow daisies. “Didn’t you?”
A gulping sob from Helen, a groan from Spud and another chorus of gasps from everyone else.
“We were nowhere close to the edge,” Helen whispered.
“She’s right,” said Oscar. “He—”
“What did you argue about?” said Nina.
I raised my hand. “An argument does not mean a murder,” I said.
“What about the bruises on his chest?” said Nina. “Someone pushed him.”
“A push can just mean ‘go away,’ ” I said. “Isn’t that right, Helen? Tell what happened.”
Helen took a breath and did not look at her father. “I have a beau,” she said. “His name is Ned Cleff and he plays a trumpet in the circus band. There’s no cause for huffing, Dad. Let me tell it, now I’m begun. The whole reason Ned’s a secret is your huffing. But he’s a lovely boy and we’ve done nought wrong, I promise you that. So, I were meant to be meeting Ned on Wednesday evening, and when the Mister showed up it were a surprise for us both. He thought he had a tryst of his own. I’m sorry, Missus, but you were right about that. She didn’t come, and I doubt she ever meant to.”
“Wait!” I said, again plonking myself at the center of attention. All eyes suddenly turned my way. What had I meant to say?
“Excuse, please, the interruption.” Hector came to my rescue, speaking softly. “Does not The Crow’s Nest serve drinks in what you call half-pint glasses?” he said. “The professor’s flask is full. He thinks he has made a conquest. He puts into the sack two glasses—”
“Yvonne!” I said.
“Yvonne!” said Spud. Relief spread across his face like butter on a hot griddle. “He was dead wrong, waiting for Yvonne. She gets chatted up by drunken louts five times a week and ignores them all.”
Helen was nodding yes. “He had his hopes up, I suppose. But my Ned didn’t come neither, thanks to Oscar’s dad getting a shiner and needing help right then. The Mister didn’t like me seeing him there, not one bit. He said I were fired, and my dad too, even if we work harder than he does. Did. Mister were a bully and I were fed up with it.”
Helen looked straight at Nina. “To answer your question about the bruising? Those were my handprints on his chest. I gave him a shove, to get him away from scaring me. But I swear before the Savior that I never pushed him over the cliff.” She let herself meet her father’s eyes at last. “I swear,” she repeated.
“Oscar,” said Hector. “Do you hear the agonized cry of a falling man?”
“No,” said Oscar. “But I did hear him cursing like an old sailor! After Helen ran past me! There was grunting and bad words while he tried to stand up. I didn’t wait around to see where he went, but I know for certain that she didn’t push him off the cliff.”
Sergeant Harley cocked his head to look at Oscar more closely. “And what was your own reason for being in the churchyard in the dark of night?”
“It wasn’t all the way dark yet,” said Oscar. “The sun was down, but the sky was still—”
“Answer the question,” said the sergeant. “Why were you there?”
I saw a flash of panic as Oscar’s eyes swiveled my way.
“Coming back to camp from the hotel for the bonfire, didn’t you say?” I leapt in to help him, as he had done for Helen.
“I’d only ever gone by the cliff path,” he said, shrugging. He shot me a grateful smile. “It was dumb, maybe, the long way around, but I—”
“It is best always to follow the path that you know,” Hector said.
“It’d be scary going by road at night if you’d never done it,” Arthur added.
“Hold on there,” said Sergeant Harley. “I questioned the men, with no satisfaction. Mrs. Blenningham-Crewe says that she didn’t kill him. Helen Malone says it wasn’t her either, so what am I supposed to think? Who killed him? Someone must have done it! But who?”
But who?
“I have an idea of what might have happened,” I said. The skeleton of a story was taking shape in my mind. Could I really say it out loud? I tried not to think of the crowd of faces watching me. I looked straight at Hector, as if we were having a Detection Consultation.
“A man succeeds in making everyone around him angry or frightened—or just wishing his bluster would stop.” I heard the sergeant sigh, but I ignored him. Hector’s green eyes were bright and reassuring.
“Nina and Everett try to brighten the evening by having a bonfire with us, the children. Spud and his friends have a pint or two to wash away the earlier clash with our victim. Also at the pub are Mr. Osteda and Mr. Jones and Ned Cleff, the trumpet player. When trouble erupts at The Crow’s Nest, not one person wants any part of it. The quarrel makes the men less inclined to follow the professor, not more. They steer clear and leave him to fend for himself.”
