He shook his head. ‘N … no,’ he managed at last. ‘It was not thought possible. The sides of the pool slope so gently, you know. So, n … no, not an accident.’
‘Murder!’ Lucy reached for her lavender water and I was in fear of the hysterics. But, luckily, the delay caused by his stammering prevented it. She could not very well give way to hysterics while she must wait and coax him into an answer.
At last he managed to explain that the verdict was not murder but, ‘s … s … su … In short, it seems that Miss Fenn took her own life.’
‘Self-murder!’
There was a silence while Lucy considered this – and I began to hope that she might after all forgive poor Mr Wishart his shortcomings, since his opinion at least furnished her with a great deal to feed her imagination.
While she was lost in thought, I questioned Silas about the reasons for this verdict; and it seems that Mr Harris Paynter could prove that the young woman was much troubled with melancholy in the months before her death. Of course, this Mr Paynter is not more than one or two and twenty and so the death occurred before he was surgeon here. But his uncle, Mr Arthur Paynter, was Badleigh’s medical man before him: and, by Silas’s account, he (that is, the uncle) kept a journal of his patients. It was this journal which was presented as evidence in the court today.
‘Well,’ said Lucy at last, ‘one thing is quite certain. It was this dreadful discovery which the Grey Nun came to warn us of.’
And I was on the point of arguing against her … But I found that I must pause and think a little more carefully about the matter. For, though I certainly do not believe that there was a ghostly warning, yet …
Yet I must confess to being puzzled, Eliza. It does seem so very strange, does it not, that two such unusual events – first Penelope’s fall, and now this discovery in the pool – should occur within the course of only a few days? And within a few hundred yards of one another. It seems so very improbable that they should be random occurrences coming together only by chance. But I cannot come at any explanation which might join the two together.
Nor can I escape the feeling that there was something wrong – no, not wrong exactly, perhaps I should rather say strange – about the discovery of the bones. I keep remembering that moment when the captain and I first saw the commotion down beside the lake and I feel as if there was something decidedly odd …
A knocking on the house door stilled Dido’s pen. She waited, fervently hoping that the visitor would not be admitted to disturb her precious hour of solitude. Margaret was gone to pay calls in the village and she had been quite determined to finish this letter while she was alone.
But, after a minute or two, there were the usual sounds of approach, the parlour door was opened and the round red face of Rebecca, the vicarage’s upper maid, appeared.
‘It’s Mrs Harman-Foote, miss. I told her the mistress was gone out, but she says she most particularly wishes to speak with you.’
‘Then you had better show her in, Rebecca,’ said Dido with a sigh. And she put the letter away in her writing desk, wishing very much that she had some success to report concerning her enquiries after the ghost.
But, meanwhile, the maid was hesitating in the doorway and looking quickly about the room as if to be quite sure Margaret was absent before venturing upon an opinion. ‘She’s looking but poorly to my mind, miss,’ she said in a half-whisper before ushering in the lady – who was looking very ‘poorly’ indeed. Dido had never seen her so pale – nor so agitated.
She took a seat beside the hearth and clasped her hands together tightly in her lap. Rebecca hurried forward solicitously to mend the fire, hoping, no doubt to hear something of interest, but Dido waved her away with a frown. As soon as they were alone, the visitor raised her eyes.
‘You have heard the news, Miss Kent? I mean, the news of the inquest.’
Dido replied that she had.
‘It is all so very unpleasant,’ began Mrs Harman-Foote, then seemed unable to go on. She pressed her lips together, swallowed and fixed her eyes upon a spot just behind Dido’s head, as if she was suddenly very interested in an old silhouette of Mr Kent which hung there. She had, altogether, the appearance of a woman who was endeavouring to hold back tears.
Dido waited rather awkwardly for, though they had been acquainted for a little more than five years, there had never existed between them the kind of intimacy which could authorise her to notice her friend’s distress. ‘It is all very shocking,’ she said at last.
‘Yes.’ Mrs Harman-Foote struggled for her usual assurance. ‘But there can be no doubt – I mean as to her identity. I knew the ring for Miss Fenn’s immediately. It was always upon her finger. It is certainly her, Miss Kent, but …’ Again it was necessary for her to study the silhouette and, as she did so, Dido’s mind turned to some hasty calculations which she had not thought to make before.
The woman had died fifteen years ago. Fifteen years ago Anne Harman was a girl of (a pause while Dido counted, arithmetic did not come easily to her,) thirteen or fourteen years old. And, since she was the sole heiress of Madderstone, it was probable that she had been the only young person in the family at that time. Elinor Fenn had been her governess. And the struggling face, the gleaming eyes, proved the pupil had been very much attached to her teacher.
‘I am very sorry,’ Dido said quietly. ‘The lady who died in the pool was a good friend of yours, I think?’
‘She was the woman who brought me up. For many years – since I was six years old – Miss Fenn had supplied the place of the mother I never knew.’ The words were pronounced with quiet, feeling dignity – but a slight flicker of the eye as she spoke sent a single tear running down her cheek. She drew out a handkerchief and wiped it away briskly.
‘This discovery,’ said Dido gently, ‘and the publicity of the inquest must be very painful indeed for you.’
‘It is, of course, distasteful,’ she said, and tucked away her handkerchief as if resolved upon not needing it again. ‘But not because I have ever doubted …’ She stopped, drew in a long breath and straightened her back. ‘I have known for many years, almost from the time of her going, that my dear friend was dead. There could be no other explanation. She went out one evening, you see, and never returned. She was searched for, but never found.’
‘So,’ said Dido cautiously, with curiosity and propriety making their usual battle inside her, ‘this late discovery has not surprised … That is, I hope, it has not pained you so much as …’
‘It has, of course, shocked me. It has raised unhappy memories. But it has not recalled me to grief,’ came the firm, quiet answer. ‘That would not be right. It is a principle of mine never to waste time upon empty regrets. I have mourned my friend already and I have long ago committed her soul to the loving care of that greater power which I know has received her.’ As Mrs Harman-Foote spoke these comfortable phrases of Christian reassurance, her usual confidence seemed to be gaining ground. There was something positively defiant in her emphasis and in the setting of her jaw. ‘But,’ she continued resolutely, ‘I know that the verdict of the inquest is wrong. I know that Miss Fenn did not take her own life. Every principle which she possessed – every principle which she taught to me – would have cried out against such a wicked, irreligious act.’
‘I am sure it is very much to your friend’s credit that you should remember her so kindly,’ said Dido. And she sat for some time in very thoughtful contemplation of the woman before her. There is always a kind of fascination in seeing a familiar acquaintance act in an unfamiliar way; and tears in the eyes of Madderstone’s assured mistress were an odd sight indeed. But Dido’s interest in the present case went deeper. Doubts as to the coroner’s verdict must raise the possibility of a mystery …