“What was the occasion?”
“Mrs. Cushman called me and asked me to come over and see Rose and try and straighten her out.”
“Did you straighten her out?”
“No,” Frank said gravely. “I guess not.”
Greer didn’t look at the two women or give any indication that he realized they were still there watching him. “Rose was more than a patient of yours, wasn’t she?”
“I considered her a friend.”
“You knew her well? Very well?”
“I thought I did. As things turned out, I was wrong.”
“How have things turned out, Frank?”
“Say, what is this anyway?” Lora said. “If you two want to have a private conversation, have it some other place. I have to get Mrs. Goodfield home. She’s not well.” She took the older woman by the shoulder. “Are you?”
“No. I’m not well. I can’t remember anything.”
Greer didn’t even turn his head. With his eyes still fixed on Frank he repeated the question: “How have things turned out?”
“You know how. Why do you ask me?”
“It’s more fun to hear it from somebody else.”
“All right. Things have turned out, well, very oddly.”
“Let’s get back to Rose. After you left her that Sunday, you heard from her again?”
“Yes. She phoned me the next afternoon around three o’clock.”
“At the inquest there was considerable doubt about the time on the part of the Sheriff.”
“Not on my part. It was the middle of the afternoon. I couldn’t swear to that at the inquest because the evidence was all against it, but I can now.”
“You had still further news from Rose?”
“Yes. A postcard came the following morning, Tuesday. No message on it, just a rough pencil sketch of a rose.”
“What was the postmark time on the card?”
“Six o’clock. You saw it yourself.”
“According to the evidence, Rose was dead three hours before she telephoned you and several hours before she mailed that postcard. You heard Dr. Severn testify to that?”
“Yes.”
“Did you believe his testimony?”
“Yes.”
“Do you believe it now?”
“No.”
“Severn also testified that Rose was suffering from an incurable enlargement of the heart, and that the only reason she had not died before was because she managed to lose a great deal of weight by rigorous dieting. Does this fit in with what you know of Rose?”
“No. She never dieted. She boasted about being able to eat anything and not gain a pound. I didn’t recall this at the inquest but I checked my file on her this morning and then I went directly over to Dr. Severn’s office. He confirmed his own testimony. Within the past three years or so the dead woman had been extremely overweight.”
“You don’t think Severn is a liar, do you?”
“No.”
“Think he made a mistake?”
“No.”
“Some mistake was made. Who made it?”
“I’m afraid Rose did.” For the first time Frank looked directly across the room at the two women. “I don’t believe she realized the gravity of the situation. Her emotional responses were frequently very childish. I think she considered the whole thing as a game or as a play with herself in the leading role.”
“Who wrote the play?” Greer said.
“I don’t know.”
“Miss Dalloway, perhaps you know?”
“Of course I do.” Lora went over to the window and looked down at the street below, listlessly, as if what the people on this street were doing — or any other street — didn’t interest or concern her. “Mrs. Goodfield wrote it. Every line, every stage direction, she wrote.”
“Why?”
“Money. Some people will do anything for money, even after they’re dead.”
“Mrs. Goodfield is dead?”
“She’s dead, all right. I saw them carry her out the back door, the three of them, Willett and Ethel and Rose. They tried to put her in the Lincoln. They intended to drive her away and let her be found someplace else. But she was too stiff by that time; they couldn’t get her through the car door. God, it was funny. It wasn’t so funny at the time, but now when I think of it, it strikes me as hilarious. There were the three of them, Willett bawling and Ethel hysterical and Rose with a load on — there they were, trying to push that skinny little dead woman into the car. You don’t find it amusing, Captain?”
Instead of answering, Greer glanced at the other woman. She was clutching the black wool coat around her as if it were a tent to hide inside. “Did you find it amusing?”
“No.” She spoke in a whisper. “How can she talk like that? It was terrible. She was so stiff. I didn’t know people got so stiff.”
Lora started to laugh. She didn’t turn, she just stood looking down at the people on the streets, laughing softly to herself. Greer told her to stop and she stopped, immediately. It was as if her laughter meant nothing to her anyway, it was merely a way to pass the time, a sound to fill a vacuum.
Greer said, “You couldn’t get the dead woman into the car?”
“No,” Rose said. “Then Willett broke down completely and we had to send him back to the house. Ethel decided we couldn’t carry out the plan, that we’d have to leave her in the garden. So we put her in the chair by the lily pool. Or tried to. She wouldn’t stay in, she was so... so brittle. Like glass.”
“She died at noon?”
“Yes, at noon. In her bed. But we had to wait until dark to arrange — things.”
“You spoke of a plan. Whose plan?”
“Mrs. Goodfield’s. It was all her idea. Don’t blame the others.”
“The ‘others’ include you, Rose?”
“I didn’t mean any harm. I didn’t even want to do it; I wouldn’t listen to her at first. It was such a crazy scheme, and I couldn’t understand the reason for it. The next time I met Lora I told her about it. She was looking for a job anyway, so she decided to plant herself at the Goodfields’ and find out more about them and exactly what the set-up was.”
“And she did?”
“Yes, she kept me posted. The next time Willett phoned and asked me if I’d made up my mind, I told him yes, I’d do it. I couldn’t see anything really wrong about it, not at first.”
“And later?”
“Later, I began to get jittery, cooped up in that room all the time with Ethel and Willett watching every move I made, listening outside my door. They were jittery too, worse than me, I guess. With Mrs. Goodfield dead there was no one to, well, to pull us together. It was like carrying out a conspiracy with the chief conspirator missing and the reason behind it not very clear, not to me anyway. Then came the payoff, a double payoff. Dalloway started hanging around the house and Jack Goodfield was on his way. I realized I had to get out of there, fast. I was good enough to fool strangers like you, but I knew I couldn’t fool a man who was supposed to be my son. And Dalloway, I was afraid Dalloway would recognize me even after all these years. Ethel kept telling me that Jack could be taken in quite easily, because he hadn’t seen his mother for some time and her illness had previously caused great changes in her. But I didn’t believe her. I was scared. Lora hadn’t come back and I was all alone. I waited until Willett and Ethel went to bed and then I put on my coat and sneaked out. I left a note for Willett.”
“Why?”
“I didn’t want him searching for me right away. I had to have time to think, figure things out.”
“And have you figured things out?”
“I guess not. But I know I never meant to do anything wrong. It still doesn’t seem to me that what I did was exactly wrong. I didn’t harm anyone, cheat anyone. All I did was lie a little, pretend to be a woman I wasn’t because the woman died too soon.”