Ingrid’s legs were numb too. She tried stretching them and failed. She tried wriggling her toes but couldn’t do that either. She had lost all feeling. Pinpricks sparkled faintly through her calves… She was bound and gagged. She was incarcerated. She was at her enemy’s mercy -
Her enemy. Who was her enemy? If only she could think more clearly
…
Minutes passed… Hours… Ingrid had no idea how many. She must have passed out and then come to. She made an effort to remember what exactly had happened. She tried to trace the exact sequence of events that had led her being placed inside this… coffin? Was she really in a coffin? Had she been buried alive? Apremature burial, like in Poe… Well, she remembered being dragged across the garden – someone pulling her by the shoulders… She also remembered the knife glistening in the sun… That had been earlier on.
Ingrid had got on a bus – then – then she had arrived at Ospreys. She had walked up the drive. There had been rooks again, circling above her head, shrieking. Yes. She remembered the rooks. She had known at once there was something wrong. The rooks were her friends and they had been trying to warn her. She had started running…
She had arrived late, not at the time she intended. And the reason? Something had distracted her. She had seen a little girl on the bus – for a moment she had thought this was her daughter, her little Claire, but of course that was impossible. If her daughter had lived, Ingrid reasoned, she would have been thirty now. Ingrid had stood gazing at the girl, listening to her prattle to her little brother. She had wanted to reach out and stroke her fair curls – pinch her cheek. She wanted to pick her up and give her a kiss – She had missed her stop, that was it! She’d had to walk back. That was why she had had to run… Yes… Across the garden… How the rooks had screeched and flapped their wings! Catching sight of the well, she made a wish. Please, Mighty God Rook, let me be the first to get to Ralph.
She had opened her bag and taken out the knife. She had wondered whether the priest would be there already. Her thoughts came back to her. I’ll be damned if I let him kill Ralph. With a soft pillow? An easy death? Oh no. That is not the death Ralph deserves. She had heard the priest talk about using a pillow into his mobile the day before – she had been concealed among the rose bushes in that overgrown garden.
The priest had been talking to Ralph’s nephew. What was the nephew’s name? Robin? Yes. Ralph didn’t trust Robin – well, with good reason! How funny that there should have been a second plot to kill Ralph – the kind of thing Antonia Darcy might have dreamt up. Assassins at Ospreys – some such ridiculous title.
So she had been right about the priest. She knew that he was a dodgy one the moment she laid eyes on him, though a less likely hired killer one could not possibly imagine. Who would get to Ralph first? She had liked the challenge. She’d relished the adrenalin rush. She had been convinced she’d beat the podgy padre to it, oh yes, she had no doubt.
As Ingrid came round the corner of the terrace, however, she heard the priest’s voice coming from inside Ralph’s room. Father Lillie-Lysander was speaking in conversational tones. Did you say your solicitor was coming at eleven? You are definitely leaving all your money to Miss Ardleigh? No change of heart? She realized at once the french windows of Ralph’s room were open. Exactly as she’d anticipated them to be on a warm day like that. The priest had beaten her to it! Well, no – not quite. Not yet. Ralph was still alive. There was time. She had halted and now she looked down at the knife in her hand. The blade caught the sun and for a moment she had been dazzled. She remembered her thoughts: Now I will have to kill the priest as well.
She had started walking across the terrace but the next moment had stopped short.
She had stood and stared.
She hadn’t been able to believe her eyes -
23
Lord of the Flies
‘Good afternoon,’ Beatrice said with her most winning smile, removing her dark glasses and revealing her bright green eyes. ‘I’d like to see Ralph – Mr Renshawe, that is. I’ve been to see him several times before. Would you tell him that it is Beatrice? My name is Beatrice Ardleigh. He knows me very well, yes.’
She was a born liar. Despite herself, Antonia found her-self admiring Beatrice’s chutzpah. What poise – what sangfroid – what confidence! Bee hadn’t batted an eyelid. Or was that unfair? Well, she was Beatrice Ardleigh – but she had never been to Ospreys before.
They had had to knock hard – the doorbell still didn’t work. The young man who had opened the door wore spotless white overalls. He was fair-haired and had a pleasant face. He was the gentle giant type and spoke with a South African accent. He had I Love Cape tattooed on his muscular right forearm. Antonia saw Beatrice shoot him an appreciative look. He was smiling broadly. A male nurse? Antonia had expected a woman. Ralph had mentioned a woman called Wilkes, Beatrice told them.
‘Sure, madam. Come in… Your friends too. That’s fine. I am new here, but I’m sure it’s all right for friends of Mr Renshawe to visit him. My name is Greg. Mr Renshawe hasn’t been too bad, to tell you the truth. His appetite seems to be returning. He actually asked me to make him creme caramel!’ Greg held open the door for Payne and Antonia. ‘That was what he used to love eating best when he was a boy
… He also asked me to bring him a feather fan that had belonged to a lady friend of his!’
They walked into a gloomy hall where it felt distinctly cooler than outside. Major Payne looked round. Empty, but for two Pugin chairs and a rusty armour that seemed to have been made to accommodate a colossus. William and Adelaide gothick wallpaper. Was it faux? No – it looked authentic. He ran his hand across the wall – felt authentic too. The great staircase was made of black wrought iron and had red mahogany balustrades. Glancing up he saw angel faces with sly heavy-lidded eyes and outspread wings that seemed to have sprouted from the back of their heads hanging suspended from the hammer-beam vault above. They brought to mind monstrous bats poised for flight – or attack more likely, by the look of it, which was not something one would have expected from angels – something jolly unsettling about them – he felt they couldn’t be trusted. Surely that was not the way angels were supposed to affect one?
‘I will try to get as much out of him as possible,’ Payne heard Beatrice whisper.
‘This way, madam.’ Greg pointed to a door. ‘Oh, you know it – you’ve been here before.’
They watched Beatrice trip across the hall – as though she had done it hundreds of times – as though the place belonged to her! As she opened the door, they heard a thin voice pipe up, ‘Bee, my dear – is that you? How lovely to see you!’
The situation was curious, to say the least – well, surreal. Would Ralph see it was not the same one? Antonia wondered. And would it make any difference to his decision to leave his money to her if he did?
‘Would you like a drink? There’s orange juice and iced tea.’
‘Good idea. Thank you.’ Payne said and they followed Greg down a long corridor into the kitchen.
The kitchen was a large cavernous room with a round oak table in the middle. All the windows were open. ‘You wouldn’t think it was November, would you? All these flies and bluebottles! They keep coming in.’ Greg waved his hand.
‘It’s hot. They’ve crept out of their hibernation pad.’ Major Payne produced his pipe. He started patting his pockets.
‘If you smoke, they’ll probably go,’ Greg said. He went up to the fridge and took out a jug full of orange juice. It was very fresh. He had squeezed it himself some quarter of an hour earlier. The old man – he meant Mr Renshawe – loved orange juice. Mr Renshawe ate next to nothing, but he loved his orange juice.