I was tempted to say it was a pity Cynthia ever had to get off the horse. Instead I asked if I was right in assuming that Mr. Featherstone didn’t believe her to be the source of what was going on at Moultty Towers. He replied that he did not, and then brought up the subject of Laureen Phillips and his nephew.
“Laureen told me she had confessed to you and your partner about the stunt they hatched up between them. I very much regret and disapprove of Tom scaring you by showing up with that gun.”
“We should have realized it wasn’t real.”
“That doesn’t lessen the seriousness of his shocking behavior.”
“There was no harm done, in fact quite the reverse. It convinced Mrs. Malloy and me that there might be something in Lady Krumley’s story that needed investigating.”
“You’re very kind, and there is another bright side.” Mr. Featherstone’s eyes twinkled. “His performance convinced my nephew that acting wasn’t the career for him, and he has decided to go into the church. Laureen also seems to have discovered her true calling. She has found so much pleasure spending time with Mrs. Hasty and other elderly people in the village that she has decided to make working with them her chosen path.”
“That’s wonderful!” I really meant it and could not resist asking: “Any hope of wedding bells?”
“An engagement is imminent.”
What a special man he was, so freely rejoicing in the romantic happiness of others when his own hopes for a life with Lady Krumley had not been realized. But surely it wasn’t too late even at this stage in their lives. Maybe, once she was able to put all this business of Flossie Jones and Ernestine behind her, she’d come to the realization that the years she had left could be filled with renewed happiness. I thought of my grandmother who had recently and blissfully married the love of her life and I made a wish for Lady Krumley and Mr. Featherstone. I completely forgot that I’d harbored suspicions of her motives for searching out Ernestine, and they didn’t reoccur when I asked Mr. Featherstone if it was possible for me to see her ladyship.
“Or is she in bed?”
“She wouldn’t hear of it and threatened another health episode if anyone brought pressure to bear. You’ll find her in the drawing room with Sir Alfonse. Niles and Cynthia are upstairs in their rooms, but I believe Daisy Meeks is with them. No one in the family had met her prior to a few years ago, when she came on a visit to Moultty Towers and shortly afterward bought a house in the village.” Mr. Featherstone then led me across the hall and walked with me into the drawing room. As on the previous day my appalled gaze fixed on the array of game heads on the walls. All those furry faces with their antlers and reproachful glass eyes! They reduced everything else-including the people in the room-to a backdrop for a powerfully visual appeal for animal rights. I jumped when a voice spoke from a chair near the fireplace.
“Admiring the family portraits?” A man got to his feet. He was of a portly build and of medium height with a head of glossy black curls and a luxuriant moustache. His accent was faintly continental and his attire-a beige linen suit and a yellow and navy blue bow tie-also suggested that he wasn’t English or liked to project the image of a widely traveled man of the world. So this was Sir Alfonse Krumley, inheritor of the title, but not the heir to Moultty Towers.
With his emergence the rest of the room sprang to life. My eyes went to Lady Krumley who beckoned me forward with an imperative hand. Seated beside her on the sofa was Daisy Meeks. Her badly permed hair gave her every right to complain to her hairdresser, but her frumpish frock suggested she had little interest in her appearance. I stood in a whirl of introductions made by her ladyship in a voice charged with vigor and found myself seated in the chair vacated by Sir Alfonse, who remained standing. Mr. Featherstone left us, saying he needed to return to the vicarage and when the door closed behind him the room sank into a silence that had a muffled sort of quality to it. A small fire burned in the very large grate and it wasn’t until a log broke apart with a sharp crack that animation returned with Lady Krumley addressing me in her deep voice, while her black eyes snapped glances at Sir Alfonse and Daisy Meeks.
“So, Mrs. Haskell, how are you proceeding with the plans for the decorating?”
“We’ve come up with some ideas, but this may not be the best time to talk about it with you so upset about your relative’s death.” Would this clue her in that I would return at a more convenient time?
“Alas, poor Vincent! He came to Moultty Towers to meet his fate.” Her ladyship now looked at Sir Alfonse, who was to be congratulated on looking suavely anguished.
“I was fond of the old roue.” The foreign accent deepened, the moustache quivered and the rather protuberant dark eyes moistened to a shining gloss. “Many’s the night we sat in a Parisian nightclub, discoursing on the most eclectic of subjects-Russian art, the advent of Esperanto, the proper making of porridge. A man of many parts was Vincent. Do we remember him as a drunkard, a gambler or do we recall only what was in him sublime? His devotion to that little dog?”
As if summoned to contribute to this eulogy, Pipsie, if I remembered the name rightly, appeared out of nowhere to leap at a linen trouser leg and begin devouring what I guessed, from the forthcoming reaction, to be a cherished cuff. Far from smiling fondly down at Vincent Krumley’s dog, Sir Alfonse attempted to shake it off with a vengeance, and I thought I caught words, “revolting animal.” Meanwhile Daisy Meeks had entered the conversation in a small flat voice that strained the ears of her listeners.
“What’s comforting is that we were all together when Vincent passed away.”
“We weren’t all with him,” Lady Krumley contradicted. “And he didn’t pass away. He went down a well.”
“What I meant to say,” Daisy continued, shuffling her feet away from Pipsie who was trying to burrow under the sofa, “is we were all with him the night before he left this earth.”
“He hasn’t left it.” Lady Krumley was growing more provoked, which explained perhaps why she hadn’t thought to ask me to return at a more convenient time or suggested that the other two leave us to talk. “He’s still on a slab in the morgue. That’s what we’ve been sitting here talking about: how to get him buried.”
“Before he get’s too well settled in and refuses to move.” This quip from Sir Alfonse was in line with his initial remark to me about the family portraits. Clearly the man prized his sense of humor as much as his trousers. I was sure that there were women somewhere who would appreciate his well-practiced charm.
“We must decide on the hymns for the funeral,” barked Lady Krumley.
“It’s some consolation to remember how much he enjoyed the stew Mrs. Beetle made for dinner that night.” Daisy turned to me. “Do you make stew?”
“Yes.”
“The coffin must be selected,” her ladyship addressed Sir Alfonse.
“May I lift that burden from you, Aunt Maude? I believe I know just what Vincent would like.”
“That’s all very well but I don’t think we can put him in a brandy cask.” Lady Krumley’s hooded eyelids were beginning to droop.
“I always put turnips in my stew.”
“If you would also be so good, Alfonse, as to arrange for the flowers.”
“And a couple of bay leaves.”
“The service is set for noon, followed by internment in the family plot.” Her ladyship’s voice had grown gravelly with fatigue.
“We must make it an occasion. It’s what Vincent would have wanted.” Sir Alfonse turned away to hide his emotion.
“And a little garlic powder.”
Not having known Vincent Krumley I didn’t have a clue what he would have wanted for his funeral, but I was beginning to wonder if he really had been the doddering old duffer her ladyship had described to Mrs. Malloy and me at the hospital. She had talked about his being muddled in his perceptions. But had he been wrong about Cynthia having been a go-go dancer? And had he said Daisy Meeks had a twin as reported by her ladyship, or that he hoped she didn’t have a twin? Words get altered in the recounting. Or elaborated upon.