Thankfully, Regina was the sort to face trouble head-on and get it over and she did not give me anything like fifteen minutes before she came to summon me for my rubbing. As a consequence I had not quite slipped into a stupor and I heard her clearly when she opened the door.
‘Mrs Gilver?’ she said.
‘Ssh, Regina,’ I replied. Through my groggy stupor, it seemed terribly important and absolutely real. ‘They’ll hear you. And close the door. You’re letting the steam out and they’ll see you too.’ There was a scraping noise as she pulled a heavy iron doorstop forward to prop the steam room open.
‘Come out, madam, do!’ she said. She came and shook me and then lifted my feet down onto the shelf below and tugged on my arms to sit me up. ‘How could you be so silly? How could you let yourself get in this state? I told you how to go the baths that first day and don’t say I didn’t. Don’t you dare get me into trouble now.’
We were out into the cool air, or what was left of it with all the steam pouring from the open door. I could see Mrs Molyneaux and the other mediums walking shoulder deep in the plunging pool, but in my mental fog I was sure they were wearing their cloaks and coats and that the hat with the raven feathers was perched on Mrs Molyneaux’s head in place of her turban.
Regina sat me down on one of the marble slabs and kicked away the doorstop, closing the steam room off again. She helped me out of my robe and pushed me down until I was lying supine, staring up at the rose of the spray above me.
‘Please don’t turn the cold water on,’ I whimpered.
‘I most certainly won’t,’ Regina said, twisting the lid off a jar of some unknown substance. ‘You need to cool down slowly.’
She rubbed her hands together in that powerful way of hers and then began slapping me all over, the rough salt from the jar causing the very last of my torpor to leave me.
‘Did Mrs Addie do something silly like that?’ I said. Regina’s face puckered and I was sure that I could see tears glinting in her eyes. She rubbed the back of one hand roughly across her face and then set it to work on me again.
‘I do wish to goodness you would stop about Mrs Addie,’ she said. ‘It was a very sad day for the Hydro. The first time a patient has ever died and even though it was her own- Well, I won’t speak ill of the dead.’
‘Her own fault?’ I echoed. ‘If she went out instead of sticking to her treatment? I suppose if she had stayed in the Hydro and had her heart attack here the doctor would have got to her sooner. But it’s rather a harsh judgement.’
‘I’d never say anything half so heartless about a dog in the street!’ Regina said. ‘That’s not what I meant at all.’
‘So… you mean if she had left the spirits alone she wouldn’t have been scared out of her wits?’ I asked. It was a guess, but a good one. Regina left off slapping me and sank down onto the marble at my side.
‘I just don’t know what’s happening here,’ she said. ‘First Mrs Addie saw a ghost and then you saw her ghost and there’s all these funny folk that came to see it too, talking about Old Abigail and Big Effie as if there’s spirits and spookies all over the place. I don’t like it, madam, and I can’t pretend I do.’
‘Nor do I, Regina,’ I said. ‘I wish I could convince you I was on your side. You can talk to me, you know.’ She shook her head, but she had already told me more than she knew. For one thing, Big Effie was a new name. As Regina resumed her ministrations with a fretful sigh, I determined to write it on my growing list as soon as I had my notebook near me. For another, it was interesting to know that the ghost Mrs Addie saw was the first and all the others, Big Effie included, came after. Perhaps Alec was right and Tot Laidlaw had made up the first ghost to cover the murder.
‘So the strange people-’ I said. I lowered my voice, conscious that four or five of them were wading about in the cold pool a few yards from where I lay. ‘-came to see the same ghost Mrs Addie saw? How did they know it was here?’ Regina shook her head. ‘Who knew that Mrs Addie had seen one?’ She shook her head again. ‘The word must have spread from someone.’
‘I never told a living soul,’ Regina said.
‘I believe you,’ I said. ‘Might I turn over, by the way? This is very refreshing but I’m beginning to feel rather flayed. I trust you, Regina, and I wish you would trust me.’ I gave her a piercing look and then turned over onto my front. The marble was unforgiving but the salt on my back felt wonderful.
Regina said nothing, but it was an inviting silence, I thought, instead of a repressing one. I answered the invitation.
‘That room over there,’ I said. ‘The locked one? What’s in there?’
‘Nothing,’ she replied loud enough for it to reverberate around the room.
‘What is it used for?’ I asked.
‘Nothing,’ she said. ‘It’s empty. There’s absolutely nothing in there.’
‘Since when?’ I asked her. She did not answer and her hands fell away from my back. I was aware of a nasty creeping feeling as the wet salt slid off down my sides and dripped onto the marble below me. I raised myself on one elbow and looked over my shoulder. Regina stood with her arms hanging at her sides and more of the salt rub dripping from the ends of her fingers. She was staring at the door and then she raised her hands and stared at them.
‘Since Mrs Addie died?’ I asked. Regina blinked and the colour which had drained from her came flooding back. ‘You’ve just realised what happened, haven’t you? Tell me!’ I was speaking in a fierce whisper, but nothing like as fierce as the one she fired back at me.
‘No,’ she said. ‘I’ll tell you nothing. It’s always been empty. There’s never been anything in there. It’s never been used for anything.’
‘I see,’ I said. ‘And why would that be?’
She shook her head and, wiping her hands on her apron, she ran away. She did not hurry or trot or bustle: she ran.
I was left cold, covered with salt and lying on a marble slab – all in all much more like an item of stock in a fishmonger’s than I ever thought to be – but more determined than ever to get into the locked room and see whatever Regina had just realised was in there. The door was partly glass and so I supposed I could wrap my hand in a scarf and break it, but that would put them all on their guard. I wasted a moment wishing I knew how to pick a lock and wondering where I could learn to do so. Finally, I returned to the more sensible question of who would have a key and how I could lay my hands on it. I had far too much respect for Mrs Cronin even to consider her; she popped up whenever one most needed her not to, even – apparently – taking notes from guests in the middle of her afternoon free. (I wished I knew why the sound of her outdoor shoes, every time I remembered it, bothered me so.) Neither did I much fancy trying to find Tot Laidlaw’s private rooms and let myself in there. That left Dr Laidlaw. I was in the changing cubicle by now, dressing and trying to ignore the uncomfortable scrape of salt against my skin, but the thought of searching for anything in that chaotic hovel of an office was enough to make me sink down on the velvet bench with shoulders drooping. Then my head snapped up. There would be no searching. I kicked myself for not thinking of it before. Dr Laidlaw’s keys were sitting out for all to see in a Staffordshire sweet dish on her chimneypiece. Now, all I had to do was think of a way to get her out of her room without pausing to lock it.
It would have to wait until evening, naturally, when the Turkish and Russian baths were empty; and so, long after dinner, I left the boys playing cribbage by the fire and Bunty already retired to the middle of my counterpane and drove my little motorcar back over the valley. I wondered how Alec had got on with the Addies and whether Hugh had begun his evening’s entertainments. Specifically I wished Alec were here in Moffat to help me and wondered if I could pretend to be joining Hugh if someone saw me – I had overdressed a little for dinner, to Grant’s satisfaction, and was just about swanky enough to walk into a casino without attracting attention. (Rather depressing when that is the highest aim of one’s toilette, but for this evening anyway I was thankful.)