‘This is becoming addictive.’
‘Beatrice started telling me a story. Apparently not long before her father died, he had what Beatrice called a “second vision”. Her father woke up in the middle of the night and saw his dead wife – Beatrice’s mother – standing beside his bed, looking down at him as though in great disapproval. He told her to go away and stay away. He then went back to sleep. Ingrid said, “Wasn’t that rather unkind?” Bee’s eyes filled with tears and she said, what a horrid thing to say. Her father had been frightfully upset by the experience and he died only three days later. Ingrid pointed out he couldn’t have been frightfully upset – he wouldn’t have been able to go back to sleep if he had been “frightfully upset”. She mimicked Beatrice’s high voice, which only made matters worse.’
‘How fascinating.’ Payne produced his pipe and tobacco pouch. ‘Or do I mean, how ridiculous?’
‘Another curious thing happened earlier on. A woman with a child passed by – the little girl was crying. Ingrid reacted in a rather peculiar way. Her eyes opened wide. She looked startled – shocked. As though – I don’t know.’ ‘As though she felt certain the woman was abducting the child?’ Payne suggested.
‘Yes… But Ingrid also gave the distinct impression that she knew the child. Her eyes were on the little girl. That’s what made the whole thing so odd.’ Antonia paused. ‘She looked very tense. She seemed to want to follow them, but decided against it. Her face was the picture of misery and frustration.’
For a couple of moments Major Payne smoked in silence. Leaning back in his chair he watched the blue smoke rings as they chased each other up to the ceiling. ‘I think, my love,’ he remarked at last, ‘that of all the cases we have investigated, none is more fantastical than this. It presents us with an irresistible mixture of the absurd, the inexplicable and the menacing. The case is marked by a pervading sense of strangeness.’
‘There is no case as such, Hugh. Nothing’s actually happened.’
‘Nothing that we know of. A lot may have been happening behind the scenes. Well, I think we should avail ourselves of Mistress Ardleigh’s kind invitation and pay her a visit. Ring her up and make her happy.’
As Antonia dialled Beatrice Ardleigh’s phone number, she felt her heart beating fast. What if it was Ingrid who answered? I am afraid of Ingrid, she admitted to herself. I am scared to death by her – those black gloves! Eventually the receiver was lifted – but it was a man’s voice that answered.
‘Bee is having a rest. She’s just put her feet up. Would you like to call again later, or can I take a message?’ Antonia had the fleeting impression of somebody bluff, solid, genial and imperturbably placid. ‘Who? Antonia Darcy? Of course. I am so sorry. Bee was talking to you a moment ago. Yes? Yes? With your husband? But of course. Splendid! I’m terribly glad. It means so much to her. She’d be delighted. She is a great fan of yours. And of course she wants you to see the letter.’ He cleared his throat. ‘When can you come? Saturday? No, not this Saturday… Let me look at the diary… How about next week – Saturday 24th? Splendid. Say, half past three? We’ll give you tea. Splendid. I do look forward to meeting you.’
Putting down the receiver, Antonia turned round. ‘That was a man. He said they would be delighted to have us to tea. He didn’t introduce himself. So Beatrice does have a man in the house.’
‘Her butler?’ Payne suggested. ‘All my aunts have butlers but only one is happy with hers.’
‘The man sounded extremely familiar. He referred to her as “Bee” and kept saying “splendid” – would a butler say “splendid”?’
Payne said that that anything was possible in this egalitarian day and age. Butlers were not what they used to be. Butlers were no longer deferential. This one might even be having an affair with his mistress – that would explain why he was taking liberties with diminutives and was generally acting beyond his station.
‘The man sounded like a husband. Beatrice might have got married, don’t you think?’
‘She might have,’ Payne agreed. He puffed at his pipe. ‘Perhaps the man who spoke to you was none other than the incredible Ingrid en travesti – in her masculine role. Which means that Ingrid has now succeeded in luring us to a house where identities shift and melt and savage punishments are a daily affair -’
‘What have you done with the board?’ Antonia cried. ‘We never finished the game, did we? I realize I could have had “incarnadine”!’
‘We said no Shakespeare words. Blood on your mind already?’ Payne joked.
4
Malice Aforethought
The ground was frozen and crunched under her feet. The sky was a forbidding shade of grey. Rooks, stiff and black, croaked and circled low above the house. For a moment she had imagined they were ospreys – otherwise why call the house Ospreys? People did give country houses silly names. Clouds – Nunspardon – Charleston – Ham House – Owlpen Manor! She stopped, her hands thrust deep in the pockets of her mink coat, the cashmere scarf the colour of crushed raspberries covering her blonde head, and watched the rooks for a couple of moments. They had been perched on the turrets but had heard her coming. Creatures of ill omen, harbingers of doom, or so it had been said – could they really sense death, someone about to die?
Ralph had bought Ospreys from a Sir Marcus Laud, who had been eager to sell. It was easy to see why. A faint smell, as from a sick animal, emanated from the crumbling plaster. No one in their right mind would want to live in a place like that. The House of Usher, Ralph had called it. Something in that. She could well imagine children com-ing over on Hallowe’en with lighted pumpkins and marching round Ospreys, chanting spells that invoked evil spirits. One whole wall was covered in ivy. Creeping ivy hides the ruin it feeds upon. (Cowper?) There was smoke coming out of only one of the six chimneys. Most of the rooms were not in use, that was what the nurse had told her.
The walk from the bus stop had taken only five minutes. Thank God for that. It was another bleak, dark, dispiriting day. The air was raw and she felt chilled to the bone. Five minutes if she walked briskly. If she dawdled, ten, even fifteen. She had timed her journey carefully during her very first visit. She had also drawn a plan of Ralph’s part of the house – the french windows – the terrace – and, for good measure, she had added the wishing well too – it was in a direct line from the windows. She didn’t know precisely why she did that. She had been in an odd mood that day. She had made it look like one of those diagrams one found in old-fashioned detective stories.
X marks the spot. This is where the body was found. Antonia Darcy probably knew all about house plans. Modern detective stories weren’t likely to have house plans in them, but then Antonia Darcy didn’t exactly write ‘modern’ detective stories. Well, writers who did not trust their descriptive powers resorted to diagrams. As a matter of fact she had the sheet with the diagram in her pocket at that very moment. How funny. It wasn’t as though she would ever need it. Sometimes she did do things, she had to admit, which were not entirely rational…
Progress was slow today. So slippery – that damned ice! Her shoes needed new soles, or maybe she needed new shoes? It would have been much faster if she had been driving. Once upon a time, a million years ago, she had been able to drive – she’d had a cherry-red racer – she had enjoyed driving. No longer. The mere thought of getting into a car and sitting behind the steering wheel made her start shaking.
Again she passed the priest. She looked at her watch: four o’clock. Her coming and his going always seemed to coincide. Today Father Lillie-Lysander was wearing a tall astrakhan hat and was smoking a cigar. His dog collar was invisible under a scarf of some shimmering silver pattern and he wore grey gloves. He was carrying a small black leather bag. He looked prosperous – nothing like a priest – he brought to mind a banker or a rentier. He had a some-what furtive air about him and she wondered as to the reason. (Weren’t priests allowed to smoke cigars?) This time he acknowledged her with a distant nod; for a moment his eyes rested upon her speculatively.