In a field of stubble they sat down, and, after a period of silence during which they took in the view, Mrs Bradley remarked:
‘And now to business. I want you to tell me all you know.’
‘About what?’ Connie naturally enquired.
‘First, about your parents; secondly, about yourself; thirdly, about Mr Tidson; fourthly, about your aunt; fifthly, about the ghost; sixthly—’
‘Oh, dear!’ cried Connie, flushing and then becoming pale. ‘I can’t remember all those!’
‘Oh, yes, you can. They are named in a logical sequence which you ought to be the first to appreciate. You could even, if you wished, tell me what the sixth account is to be.’
‘Yes,’ said Connie, ‘I suppose so. You mean Ronald.’
‘Very well, then, I mean Ronald, although I should have thought that I meant the Preece-Harvards. Isn’t that the name I’ve heard mentioned?’
Connie, with a scared expression, agreed that it was, but muttered that she was going to live with Ronald, whatever anyone might say, and that her relatives (and, she inferred, Mrs Bradley) could mind their own business.
‘I see,’ said Mrs Bradley. ‘This young man is of independent means, I perceive.’
‘He’s an artist,’ said Connie defiantly. ‘I went to a show he had in Town.’
‘I’m sure it was most successful,’ said Mrs Bradley. ‘Well, yes,’ Connie doubtfully replied. ‘I suppose it was. It was held in Pimlico. Wasn’t there a Pimlico Mystery? I seem to remember hearing something about it, although—’ she attempted an unsuccessful giggle – ‘I’m afraid it only makes me think of sausages. Was there a Pimlico Mystery?’
‘Yes, a very atrocious murder,’ said Mrs Bradley. ‘Were you, by any chance, born in Pimlico, I wonder?’
‘Of course not!’ said Connie, surprised into sudden confession. ‘I thought you knew I was born down here, near Alresford.’
‘I had guessed as much. Go on.’
Chapter Fourteen
‘It happened one day, about noon, going towards my boat, I was exceedingly surprised with the print of a man’s naked foot on the shore . . .’
DANIEL DEFOE (Robinson Crusoe)
‘MY FATHER and mother died,’ said Connie, without betraying emotion, ‘when I was six years old, and until I was thirteen I lived with the Preece-Harvards. Of course, they are quite rich, but so was my father, until the smash in 1931. I was only four then. At the Preece-Harvards’ I had a governess, and my little cousin Arthur shared her with me until I had to come and live with Aunt Prissie and he was sent to his prep. school.’
‘He’s a good deal younger than you, then?’
‘Not so very much younger, really. Three years, that’s all. But, of course, he was rather spoilt, and that made him precocious, and even older than he was.’
‘An only child, I imagine?’
‘Oh, yes, and I was treated as his sister until Colonel Preece-Harvard died. It was then that Aunt Prissie gave me a home with her, for Mrs Preece-Harvard turned me out. She said that, after all, I was no relation of hers, and she did not feel that she could be responsible for me. It was a dreadful shock to me. I felt I should never get over it.’
‘You minded the change very much, then?’ said Mrs Bradley, noting with interest the featurelessness of the narrative.
‘I was heartbroken. You see, I missed Arthur so terribly. That was one thing. In fact, I think it was the worst.
I was fond of Arthur. We meant a great deal to one another.’
‘But he was going to be sent to school in any case, I thought you said.’
‘Oh, yes, but only because I was leaving to live with Aunt Prissie. I – you see—’ She began to flounder. Mrs Bradley was glad of the change to an unrehearsed effort.
‘But surely a boy of ten would have been sent to school whether you were staying with his mother or not?’ she enquired.
‘Oh, well, perhaps. If so, I didn’t know. I wasn’t told. The whole thing was a really dreadful shock. I was a sensitive child, I suppose,’ said Connie, returning to her first lifeless voice, and looking to see the effect.
‘No doubt. Lots of children are sensitive, particularly where their convenience is involved,’ said Mrs Bradley sharply and in very unsympathetic tones. There was a pause, for Connie, after giving her a surprised and resentful glance, gazed over the distant hills and preserved an offended silence.
‘And your aunt has had you with her for the past six years,’ said Mrs Bradley, changing her tone to one of casual interest. ‘You must feel that you owe her a good deal.’
Connie turned her head sharply as though to repudiate this theory, but she must have thought better of it, for she turned her face away again, pulled at a few stalks of the stubble, and said, in quiet tones:
‘I suppose I do. Poor Aunt Prissie! But it did mean a very great change.’
‘No doubt. But now that change has given place to another. You are about to live your life in your own way, I believe, during the time that must elapse before your marriage.’
‘Well, as soon as you let me go my own way,’ said Connie, with a certain amount of justifiable resentment. ‘I mean, I know you intend it for the best, and want me to be safe, and all that, but, after all, who would harm me, so long as I keep away from Uncle Edris? And even that doesn’t matter now.’
‘Mr Brown might harm you,’ said Mrs Bradley. Connie gave a gasp, almost as though she had been stabbed, and Mrs Bradley saw her stiffen as though to resist another blow.
‘So that’s what you think?’ she said. ‘I tell you you’re wrong! I know nothing of any Mr Brown!’
Facing her, and keeping her alert black eyes on the girl’s perspiring forehead, Mrs Bradley began a slow and rhythmic nodding.
‘But you can’t prove anything!’ said Connie, breaking away with difficulty from the hypnotic effect of this performance. Mrs Bradley stopped nodding, and gazed at her with mild interest.
‘No,’ she agreed, ‘I cannot prove anything, at present. Perhaps I never shall. But I suggest that you stay here as long as you can, and on no account write any letters. It is a pity you cannot bring yourself to tell me the truth, but I think I understand your point of view.’
‘You don’t agree with it, though,’ retorted Connie. ‘But I wouldn’t be safe for a day if I told you everything.’
‘Bless you, child, I know everything!’ said Mrs Bradley.
‘Are you going straight back to Winchester?’ asked Connie.
‘Or London,’ said Mrs Bradley. ‘I have not made up my mind.’
They walked down the rough turf path at the side of the rutted track towards Cliffe High Street and the shops and houses of Lewes.
‘Suppose,’ said Connie, ‘you could prove anything? What then? You see, it’s the absence of motive that makes the difficulty, isn’t it? You’d find it almost impossible to pin a murder on anybody if you couldn’t show a motive, wouldn’t you? That’s what I’ve always understood.’
‘Your understanding was well-founded,’ Mrs Bradley admitted. ‘But there is such a motive as that practice makes perfect, don’t you think? I believe that might hold good in law, although I’ve never had occasion to test it.’
Connie looked startled, and almost missed her footing. Mrs Bradley grasped her elbow as she stumbled. Her yellow fingers were steel on the girl’s plump arm, and she hitched her roughly sideways, for there was a drop of two hundred feet to the houses below.
‘A suicide complex,’ thought Mrs Bradley, with interest.
‘I see you’ve got something to go on,’ Connie said as they reached Cliffe High Street. ‘Do you think – does psychology tell you – whether anything more will happen?’