After a bit, the investigative instinct, that inveterate curiosity which would not be stilled, came to the fore. She found she was speculating all the time about Miss Izzy’s death. A robber? A robber who had also tried to kill Tina Archer? Or a robber who had merely been surprised by her presence in the house? What connection, if any, had all this with Miss Izzy’s will?
The will again. But that was one thing Jemima didn’t have to speculate about for very long. For Claudette, the manageress, also just happened to be married to the brother of Hazel, Miss Izzy’s cook. In this way, Jemima was apprised — along with the rest of Bow Island, no doubt — that Miss Izzy had indeed signed a new will down in Bowtown on the morning of her death, that Eddie Thompson, the solicitor, had begged her not to do it, that Miss Izzy had done it, that Miss Izzy had still looked after Hazel all right, as she had promised (and Henry who had worked for her even longer), and that some jewelry would go to a cousin in England, “seeing as Miss Izzy’s mother’s jewels were in an English bank anyway since long back.”
But for the rest, well, there would be no National Bo’lander Museum now, that was for sure. Everything else — that fine old Archer Plantation House, Miss Izzy’s fortune, reputedly enormous but who knew for sure? — would go to Tina Archer.
If she recovered, of course. But the latest cautious bulletin from Claudette via the niece-who-was-a-nurse, confirmed by a few other loquacious people on the island, was that Tina Archer was recovering.
The police had already been able to interview her. In a few days she would be able to leave the hospital. And she was determined to attend Miss Izzy’s funeral, which would be held, naturally enough, in that little English-looking church with its incongruous tropical vegetation overlooking the sunny grave. For Miss Izzy had long ago made clear her own determination to be buried in the Archer Tomb along with Governor Sir Valentine and “his only wife, Isabella.”
“As the last of the Archers. But she still had to get permission since it’s a national monument. And of course the government couldn’t do enough for her. So they gave it. Then. Ironic, isn’t it?”
The speaker making absolutely no attempt to conceal her disgust was Coralie Harrison. “And now we learn that she wasn’t the last of the Archers, not officially, and we shall have the so-called Miss Tina Archer as chief mourner. And while the Bo’lander government desperately looks for ways to get round the will and grab the house for their precious museum, nobody quite had the bad taste to go ahead and say no — no burial in the
Archer Tomb for naughty old Miss Izzy. Since she hasn’t, after all, left the people of Bow Island a penny.”
“It should be an interesting occasion,” Jemima murmured. She was sitting with Coralie Harrison under the conical thatched roof of the hotel’s beach bar. This was where she first danced, then sat out with Joseph Archer on the night of the new moon — the night Miss Izzy had been killed. Now the sea sparkled under the sun as though there were crystals scattered on its surface. Today there were no waves at all and the happy water-skiers crossed and recrossed the wide bay with its palm-fringed shore. Enormous brown pelicans perched on some stakes which indicated where rocks lay. Every now and then, one would take off like an unwieldy airplane and fly slowly and inquisitively over the heads of the swimmers. It was a tranquil, even an idyllic scene, but somewhere in the distant peninsula lay Archer Plantation House, not only shuttered but now, she imagined, also sealed by the police.
Coralie had sauntered up to the bar from the beach. She traversed the few yards with seeming casualness — all Bo’landers frequently exercised their right to promenade along the sands unchecked (as in most Caribbean islands, no one owned any portion of the beach in Bow Island, even outside the most stately mansion like Archer Plantation House, except the people). Jemima, however, was in no doubt that this was a planned visit. She had not forgotten that first meeting, and Coralie’s tentative approach to her, interrupted by Greg’s peremptory cry.
It was the day after the inquest on Miss Izzy’s death. Her body had been released by the police and the funeral would soon follow.
Jemima admitted to herself that she was interested enough in the whole Archer family, and its various branches, to want to attend it, quite apart from the tenderness she felt for the old lady herself, based on that brief meeting. To Megalith Television, in a telex from Bowtown, she had spoken merely of tying up a few loose ends resulting from the cancellation of her program.
There had been an open verdict at the inquest. Tina Archer’s evidence in a sworn statement had not really contributed much that wasn’t known or suspected already. She had been asleep upstairs in one of the many fairly derelict bedrooms kept ostensibly ready for guests. The bedroom chosen for her by Miss Izzy had not faced onto the sea. The chintz curtains in this back room, bearing some dated rosy pattern from a remote era, weren’t quite so bleached and tattered since they had been protected from the sun and salt.
Miss Izzy had gone to bed in good spirits, reassured by the fact that Tina Archer was going to spend the night. She had drunk several more rum punches and had offered to have Henry fetch some of her father’s celebrated champagne from the cellar. As a matter of fact, Miss Izzy often made this offer after a few draughts of punch, but Tina reminded her that Henry was away and the subject was dropped.
In her statement, Tina said she had no clue as to what might have awakened the old lady and induced her to descend the stairs — it was right out of character in her own opinion. Isabella Archer was a lady of independent mind but notoriously frightened of the dark, hence Tina’s presence at the house in the first place. As to her own recollection of the attack, Tina had so far managed to dredge very few of the details from her memory — the blow to the back of the head had temporarily or permanently expunged all the immediate circumstances from her consciousness. She had a vague idea that there had been a bright light, but even that was rather confused and might be part of the blow she had suffered. Basically, she could remember nothing between going to bed in the tattered, rose-patterned four-poster and waking up in hospital.
Coralie’s lip trembled. She bowed her head and sipped at her long drink through a straw — she and Jemima were drinking some exotic mixture of fruit juice, alcohol-free, invented by Matthew, the barman.
There was a wonderful soft breeze coming in from the sea and Coralie was dressed in a loose flowered cotton dress, but she looked hot and angry. “Tina schemed for everything all her life and now she’s got it. That’s what I wanted to warn you about that morning in the churchyard — don’t trust Tina Archer, I wanted to say. Now it’s too late, she’s got it all. When she was married to Greg, I tried to like her, Jemima, honestly I did. Little Tina, so cute and so clever, but always trouble—”
“Joseph Archer feels rather the same way about her, I gather,”
Jemima said. Was it her imagination or did Coralie’s face soften slightly at the sound of Joseph’s name?
“Does he? I’m glad. He fancied her, too, once upon a time. She is quite pretty.” Their eyes met. “Well, not all that pretty, but if you like the type—” Jemima and Coralie both laughed. The fact was that Coralie Harrison was quite appealing, if you liked her type, but Tina Archer was ravishing by any standards.
“Greg absolutely loathes her now, of course,” Coralie continued firmly, “especially since he heard the news about the will. When we met you that morning up at the church he’d just been told. Hence, well, I’m sorry, but he was very rude, wasn’t he?”
“More hostile than rude.” But Jemima had begun to work out the timing. “You mean your brother knew about the will before Miss Izzy was killed?” she exclaimed.