“Yes, but the other’s a better tune. Anyway, I can think that over later.”
The narrow road-bridge which carried Brayne high street over the canal was reached a short time later. They crossed the high street opposite a small public house called The Faudrey Arms and a walk of five minutes’ duration brought them to the private road they sought. It was bordered on one side by a house with a brick-walled garden and on the other side there was another and a higher brick wall. The road was not gated and was wide enough to take a large car. It was only about sixty yards long and did not lead directly to the ducal mansion, but to a kissing-gate which, in its turn, gave on to a public footpath leading down to the Thames.
“Well, that’s your lot,” said Julian Perse. “It’s no good asking me exactly where the body was found—the spot marked with a cross, I mean—because I don’t know.”
“It is immaterial,” said Dame Beatrice. “One may assume, I think, that the body was brought along the high street and not out from the ducal mansion. It would be helpful to know where the murder took place and where the head is hidden. However, as the police, with all their resources, have so-far failed to discover these things, it is in the highest degree unlikely that we shall succeed. Still, it is a pleasant evening and quite early, and our time is our own. I should wish to continue our walk. Where did you instruct George to meet us?”
A respectful note on a horn saved Mr Perse from answering this pertinent question. George was backing the car towards them along the narrow road. He pulled up alongside and got out.
“Ah, George,” said Dame Beatrice, “we are enjoying our walk and propose to extend it. Mr Perse will tell you where to wait for us.”
“Very good, madam.”
“Turn left at the top of this road, then left again at the traffic lights and keep straight on until you get to the river. Turn right and you’ll see a biggish pub called More Fish in the Sea. We shall call in there for a drink and then you can pick up the ladies and go home. All right?” said Mr Perse.
“Very good, sir.” The stocky, stolid, eminently respectable chauffeur climbed back into the driver’s seat and started up the car. Mr Perse held the kissing-gate open for the ladies and Dame Beatrice and Laura, followed by the young man, threaded their way through it and found themselves on a gravel path fenced on both sides by iron railings. There were trees, and some cows were grazing behind the railings. A little further on there was a large, shallow lake.
“Freezes over very readily in sharp weather,” said Julian. “People come from all over the place to get some free skating. Otherwise, the park, as you see, is kept inviolate. You can, however, on payment of half-a-crown, enter and view the mansion and use the woods behind it for picnics. It’s one of our nicest school outings and well worth while, in other ways, too,—history and so forth, I mean. Henry V founded a convent here and, when it was dissolved, all sorts of important people came along. At different times it housed Catherine Howard as a prisoner before her execution, and also Lady Jane Grey, who was living here at the time when she accepted the crown. Charles I visited his children here, when he was a prisoner at Hampton Court, and Queen Anne made it her home before she came to the throne. The interior is a magnificent job by Adam, and Capability Brown did the landscaping. Then there are fine portraits and period furniture…”
“And once,” said Laura, “the body of Henry VIII. The real one, I mean.”
“These murders are very odd,” said Julian, side-tracked, from his own point of view, but brought back on to the highroad, in Laura’s estimation. “I am very glad you have interested yourself in the matter, Dame Beatrice. I suppose you don’t want a working partner?”
“You’re already on the strength, showing us round like this,” said Laura. “Besides—”
“Yes?” said Julian hopefully. Laura scowled thoughtfully at a cow which, not satisfied with the lush riverside pastures which stretched for acres all around it, had put its head through the iron railings and was eating the drier, inferior grass which bordered the gravel path.
“It’s something you’ve said since we met you today,” she said. “There’s a bell ringing somewhere, but, so far, I haven’t been able to place it. It will come back, I suppose. I hope so, anyway, because it’s so loud and clear that it’s definitely shouting in my ear. Most frustrating and annoying.”
“Perhaps Dame Beatrice heard it, too.”
“She may have done, but, somehow, I have a kind of sort of feeling that she didn’t, and why she didn’t I can’t think, but there it is. I’d better put it right out of my mind and then it will come back of its own accord, I hope.”
The gravel path ended at a tall, wrought-iron gate and they found themselves on a bus-route. Another road, quiet and, apparently, little used by motor traffic, debouched from this and led gently downhill past some hospital buildings and, in ironic and grim juxtaposition, a cemetery. About half a mile further on was the river, and the quiet road, making a right-angle bend past an eighteenth-century church, led to the public house mentioned by Julian. George had the car drawn up outside it. They went inside for a drink and then Dame Beatrice insisted upon giving Julian a lift back to his rooms. She and Laura declined his invitation to go in, and soon they were on their way towards Dame Beatrice’s Kensington house, where they had planned to stay the night before going back to the New Forest and the Stone House at Wandles Parva.
Laura was remarkably silent during the drive. Dame Beatrice glanced at her once or twice, but said nothing and left her to her thoughts.
“It’s no good,” said Laura, at last. “I ought to let it rest and wait for it to come back of its own accord, but I just keep chewing it over in the way one can’t leave an aching tooth alone. All the same, try as I will, I’m getting nowhere, so I’ll change the subject. As Henri and Celestine are both at the Stone House, how and where are we going to eat? It’s getting late and I’m absolutely starving.”
“Our dear Mrs Trevelyan-Twigg has invited us to dine with her, and she will also feed George.”
Kitty was delighted to welcome them. They were given sherry and an excellent dinner, and then Kitty asked whether their outing had been satisfactory. Laura gave her an account of it and suddenly, in her own expression, the penny dropped as she was describing the walk along the canal.
“So then we came to this steep, high, narrow bridge, where the towing-path changed sides,” she said. “There was a much nicer path which ran past the Batty-Faudrey woods, but Julian said it didn’t lead anywhere. It’s called Squire’s Arm…” She broke off. “Good Lord!” she exclaimed. “That’s it! That must be it!”
CHAPTER TWELVE
Head Tucked Underneath His Arm
“From that stately mansion and the beautifully wooded and verdant surroundings…we will now pass once more to the extreme…boundary which we shall make the starting place for a ramble to some of the most interesting scenes in the old County town.”
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Dame Beatrice gazed at her secretary with mild interest, Kitty with deep concern.
“Do you feel all right, Dog?” she enquired.
“Very much all right,” replied her friend. “Something that’s been nagging at me for hours has suddenly fallen into place. Let’s forget it. It will keep. Stick some Bach on, and let Mrs Croc. enjoy herself. We’ve had a tiring although fascinating day.”
“Well,” said Dame Beatrice, when they reached the Stone House in mid-afternoon of the following day, “you have said nothing so far of your satisfying discovery. Am I to share in your raptures? I noticed that you did nothing to allay the obvious curiosity of Mrs Trevelyan-Twigg.”
“Old Kitty babbles. She probably doesn’t intend to, but what goes in at the shell-like ears is apt to come out through the ruby lips.”