“There is something,” I said.
“Lucas, if you promise … promise you won’t do anything thatiJ ask you not to …”
He looked at me in puzzlement.
“Is it something that happened on the island?”
“Well, yes … in a way.”
“John Player?”
“Yes. But he isn’t John Player, Lucas.”
“That doesn’t surprise me. I knew there was some mystery.”
“Promise me, Lucas. I must have your promise before I tell you.”
“How can I promise when I don’t know what I’m promising?”
“How can I tell you if I don’t know you will?”
He smiled wryly.
“All right, I promise.”
I said, “He’s Simon Perrivale.”
“What?”
“Yes, he left England on the ship … taking the place of one of the deck hands.”
Lucas was staring at me.
“Lucas,” I said earnestly.
“I want to prove his innocence … so that he can come back.”
“This explains … everything.”
“I thought it would. And I was afraid that you might think it your duty to tell the authorities … or someone.”
“Don’t worry about that. I’ve promised, haven’t I? Tell me more. I suppose he confessed this to you on the island when I was lying there, unable to move.”
“Yes, it was like that. There is something else you must know. He was in the seraglio … or rather just outside it, working in the gardens.
I told you how I became friendly with Nicole and she was the friend of the Chief Eunuch. Well, he Simon managed to ingratiate himself with the Eunuch and I think because of it and because of Nicole . he helped us both. Simon escaped with me. “
Lucas was speechless with incredulity.
“We were taken away together and left close to the British Embassy. I
went in … and in time came home. Simon dared not be sent home. He left me there. He was going to try to get to Australia.”
“And you have heard nothing of him since?”
I shook my head.
“I understand now,” he said, ‘why you have this crazy idea of proving his innocence. “
“It’s not crazy. I know he’s innocent.”
“Because he told you?”
“It’s more than that. I got to know Simon very well…”
He paused for a few seconds before he said: “Wouldn’t it be better for him to come home and face things? If he is innocent…”
“He is innocent. But how could he prove it? They have all decided that he is guilty.”
“And you think you are going to make them change their minds?”
“Lucas, I know there is some way of doing this. There must be. I’m certain of it. If only I could find the answer.”
“This is the most important thing in the world to you, is it?”
“I want it more than anything.”
“I see. Well, what good is it playing governess to that child?”
“I’m here. I’m close to the people who were involved in it. It’s a way”
“Listen, Rosetta. You’re not being logical. You’re letting your emotions get in the way of your common sense. You’ve had some fantastic adventures; you were plunged into a world so different from the one you knew that you are not thinking clearly. What happened to you was melodramatic … beyond what you could have imagined before.
Miraculously, you came through. It was a chance in a thousand . but because it happened you expect life to go on like that. You were in that seraglio . a prisoner. everything was so different there. Wild things could happen. You’re in another sort of seraglio now. one of your own making. You’re a prisoner of your imagination. You think you are going to solve this murder, when it is clear what has happened. The innocent rarely run away. You should’re member that. He couldn’t have said, “I’m guilty” more clearly. You’re not being logical, Rosetta. You’re living in a world of dreams. “
“Nanny Crockett believes in him.”
“Nanny Crockett! What has she to do with it?”
“She was his nurse. She knew him better than anyone. She says he is incapable of such a thing. She knows.”
“That explains this friendship. I suppose she put you up to this governessing.”
“We worked it out together. We didn’t think of my being a governess until the possibility arose. Then we saw that it was a way of getting me into the house.”
I was looking at him appealingly.
“Do you want my opinion?” he said.
I nodded.
“Please, Lucas.”
“Drop it. Give up this farce. Come back to Trecorn. Marry me and make the best of a bad job.”
“What do you mean, a bad job … ?”
“Say goodbye to Simon Perrivale. Put him out of your thoughts. Look at it like this. He ran away when he was about to be arrested. That is too significant to be ignored. If he returned he’d be tried for murder and hanged. Let him lead a new life in Australia … or wherever he lands up. As you’re so certain of his innocence, give him a chance to start a new life.”
“I want to prove that he was wrongly accused.”
“You want him to come back.” He looked at me sadly.
“I understand absolutely,” he said. He shrugged his shoulders and looked grave, as though communing with himself. Then he said: “What discoveries have you made so far?”
“There was a drunken sailor.”
“Who?”
“His name was Thomas Parry. He fell over a cliff and was drowned.”
“Wait a minute. I remember something about that. There was quite a stir about it at the time. It was some while ago. Didn’t he come down here … from London, I think. Got drunk and fell over the cliff.
It’s coming back to me. “
“Yes,” I said.
“That’s the one. Well, he’s buried in the graveyard here. I discovered Kate putting flowers on his grave. When I asked her why she said he was her father.”
“What! Married to the glorious Mirabel?”
“One can’t be sure with Kate. She romances. She said that she saw him in the market in Upbridge and he was asking if anyone knew a woman named Parry with a little girl. She was frightened and hid herself behind the woman she was with … the mother of a little girl she had gone to play with. She was frightened of him. Apparently she remembered something of a father who was a brute.”
“And he was found at the bottom of the cliff.”
“You see, it seemed so fortuitous. If Mirabel was hoping to marry one of the Perrivales and a husband from the past who is supposed to be dead turns up, it could be awkward.”
“And as far as the glorious Mirabel was concerned, he was more useful at the bottom of the cliff than making trouble for her. It makes sense.”
“Not completely. You see, I have only Kate’s word for it. I asked her if she had told her mother she had seen him. She said no. But she had told Gramps. Gramps is her name for her grandfather. Major Durrell. He said she had made a mistake and she shouldn’t mention it because it would upset her mother and her father anyway was dead. He’d been drowned at sea.”
“Why should the child think it was her father?”
“She’s a strange child … given to fantasy. It occurred to me that she might miss a father and was inventing one.”
“She has Sir Tristan as a stepfather.”
“He doesn’t take much notice of her. She calls him Stepper in a rather contemptuous way … but then she is contemptuous of most of us. It occurred to me that she had seen people putting flowers on graves and thought she would like to do it and so invented a father. The sailor had no relations so she put flowers on his grave and adopted him.”
“It seems plausible … but how is all this going to solve Simon Perrivale’s troubles?”
“I don’t know. But just suppose someone now in the house did the murder … well, people who commit one might not hesitate at another. It might be part of the whole picture.”