Ann Granger (20 page)

But the knife, I thought. Such an intruder would not be armed with the knife from the hall table.

Perhaps the knife was not the hall one? Or possibly Brennan had slipped it into his pocket earlier in a petty theft and, arguing with a trespasser in the garden, had pulled it out and threatened the unknown man with it. There had been a struggle, the trespasser had wrested the knife from Brennan and plunged it into his neck  …

‘Stop, stop, Lizzie!’ I’d muttered aloud.

I could have conjectured like this endlessly. I’d made an effort to clear my mind, settled on the pillows and eventually fallen into uneasy slumber.

*   *   *

On Wednesday, when Dr Lefebre had gone up to London to inform Charles Roche what had happened and visit Scotland Yard, Lucy had still not appeared at breakfast. The laudanum must have worn off by now. I went up and knocked at her door and enquired through the panels how she was.

‘Go away! I won’t open the door and I won’t come out!’ had been the fierce reply.

Two can play at that game. I tapped at the door again more sharply and in a raised voice called, ‘I shan’t go away. I shall sit here until you open the door and you’ll know I’m here. This is nonsense, Lucy, and a waste of your time and mine.’

There was a pause, a scuffle and rustle of skirts, and the key clicked as it was turned. It was left to me to push open the door and by the time I had entered the room, Lucy had scurried away to the far side to a window seat. She sat huddled on it with her arms wrapped round her body.

I’d been relieved to see she was fully dressed and her hair was brushed. It curled loosely on her shoulders, making her look even younger, and as if she really did belong in the schoolroom. There was a tea tray nearby brought, I suspected, by Williams earlier. She looked very pale and although her attitude was almost as if she had been frozen yet her eyes still held that wild look. It worried me.

She’d greeted me with, ‘I know they are bringing policemen from Scotland Yard to arrest me! I won’t let them in.’

‘They’re not coming to arrest you, Lucy. What nonsense. You…’ Here I paused to pick my words carefully. On the one hand Lucy appeared to believe any stranger arriving at Shore House had come to take her away, whether it be Lefebre or Ben Ross. On the other hand, she was sensitive about being disbelieved. This made it difficult to refute her charge.

‘I have previous acquaintance with Inspector Ross. I’ve seen him at work. He’s careful, very methodical, not given in any way to impulse. Also he’s intelligent. He won’t bully you. You’ll find him courteous and understanding.’

(I swear Ben blushed at this point of my narrative although he put up his hand as if to stifle a cough, in order to hide it.)

‘He may be all the things you say,’ returned Lucy vehemently, ‘but I still won’t see him. I won’t come downstairs and they shan’t come in here. I shall lock the door and if they try to break it down, I shall – I shall push the chest of drawers in front of it, there!’

‘Let’s not talk of it any more now,’ I soothed her. ‘They don’t arrive until tomorrow. Let us go out for a little walk. The fresh air—’

But I got no further. Lucy interrupted me with a repeat of her intention to stay in her room and that was that. An offer to sit with her, perhaps read to her, was equally rebuffed.

‘I don’t want to be watched!’ she shouted at me.

This was a sulky child and best left to work out her bad mood. I, at least, could go for a walk and breathe fresh air so I’d left her and gone to my room to collect a hat. When I stepped out again and turned towards the head of the stairs I received quite a shock.

The corridor in which my room was located, to the right at the top of the stairs, was always dark because there was no window. But the corridor to the left was lighter, due to a window at the far end. Both corridors had been empty when I went into my room, of that I was certain. I had only been moments picking up my hat. But I was no longer alone.

A female figure in a dark dress stood motionless at the head of the staircase, facing towards me. Because I was in gloom, and the waiting figure lit from behind by the window at that end of the house, I couldn’t make out anything at all, not one feature. It was a form as mysterious as that figure I had seen slip into the house from the garden on my first night here. The waiting woman had been so still and silent, I confess I felt a moment of panic and even had a foolish impulse to turn and run back into my room. But I told myself sternly it was only a trick of the lighting that gave the figure such a sinister aspect. I forced myself to walk briskly towards her (although I did half wonder if she would disappear before I reached her).

When I was closer I’d been able to see (with some relief) that it was Phoebe Roche. I had wondered if it would turn out to be the dowdy self-effacing woman who acted as lady’s maid to both sisters, although she would have no reason to wait for me as the figure clearly had been doing. I remembered that Miss Phoebe breakfasted in her room and didn’t come downstairs until mid-morning. She must just have emerged from her early seclusion. With the departure of the corpse from the premises, the sisters had promptly laid aside their mourning black. Today’s gown, as I could now see, was magenta in colour. I fully expected that when I saw Christina Roche, her dress would be the same. Did they agree this the night before, I wondered? ‘Good morning, Miss Phoebe,’ I said, my voice seeming to echo along the upper landing and reverberate away down the corridor behind her.

‘Good morning, Miss Martin.’ Phoebe peered up at me in a way that might have to do with the poor light or, it struck me, meant she was very short sighted. I hadn’t so far seen her wearing spectacles. But neither had I seen her reading despite her sister Christina’s claim that Phoebe ‘always had her nose in a book’. Perhaps she read in the privacy of her bedroom and that was why she came downstairs so late each morning. ‘I was about to knock at my niece’s door. Do you know, by any chance, if she’s in her room?’ she asked.

‘She is and I’ve spoken to her, but she’s still very upset. I wanted her to come out with me for a walk but she refuses. Perhaps you can persuade her?’

I waited to see if she’d take up the suggestion, but after only the very shortest of hesitations, Phoebe Roche shook her head. ‘My niece is obstinate. I do believe it’s her only failing. Even as a small child there was no moving her once her mind was made up. Add to that a natural youthful impetuosity…’ She sighed and shook her head resignedly. ‘My sister and I have done our very best for dear Lucy,’ she went on abruptly. ‘I know Charles, my brother, sent you because he felt Lucy might benefit from younger, more lively, company in whom she might confide. We all worry about her. I think Charles believes, that is, he feels we did not prevent—’

She broke off in some confusion. I guessed she had been about to refer to the hasty marriage between Lucy and James Craven.

‘I’m sure you have always done all you can, ma’am.’

It was not their fault they were completely unsuited to deal with Lucy’s troubles. As to whether they could have prevented the love affair, that was another matter. Young lovers sometimes seem to thrive on opposition and are ingenious in finding ways to meet. From what I had been told by Lefebre regarding James Craven, the sisters would have been hard put to it to prevent him outmanoeuvring them. An elopement might have been the result.

Again, I pruned the conversation of the following exchange that I saw no reason to repeat to Ben.

Miss Phoebe had now eyed me slowly up and down in a way not offensive but certainly disconcerting. ‘You carry yourself very well, Miss Martin, and although you are not a beauty, you are handsome. You have a certain presence; I think it would be called that.’

All this had been so innocently uttered I decided the speech was intended to be complimentary and took it as such. But I’d no idea what could have inspired it.

Miss Phoebe’s next words were, ‘My niece is very pretty, don’t you think?’

‘Indeed she is,’ I agreed.

‘When she’s quite well she’s beautiful, I’ve always thought. She’s not well now. She hasn’t been well since the baby died. Even before that, from the moment Mr Craven left for China, she fell into a decline. My sister upbraided her for moping. She told her a Roche should show more strength of character. I was very sorry about the baby.’ She sighed. ‘I, of course, was never a beauty, always a plain child and a plain young woman. Now I’m a plain old one.’

I thought Miss Phoebe no more than fifty or so. As a woman fast approaching thirty myself I didn’t view that as very old. I reflected with some annoyance that society considered a single gentleman of fifty still perfectly eligible. One of thirty was still a sprig of a lad! Why should women be so cruelly placed ‘on the shelf’? I waited in silence because I guessed there was something she wanted to say to me.

She leaned forward and lowered her voice as one about to impart a confidence. ‘I’ve often thought myself fortunate to be so plain. Not when I was younger, of course. Then I wanted to be pretty, as Lucy is. But now, when I consider my niece’s sad situation, I do believe it’s a blessing for a woman to be born without good looks. One is spared so much distress and sorrow.’

With that, Miss Phoebe smiled sweetly at me, and began to walk downstairs, apparently abandoning her plan to knock at Lucy’s door.

I was left perplexed and wondering if she had been trying to indicate something rather more than her words had expressed. Perhaps it was Phoebe who needed someone to confide in? In the end, I put the whole thing out of my mind, following her downstairs.

Ben was scowling down at the ground and appeared to be mulling over what I’d recounted so I broke off my tale for a while.

Chapter Thirteen

Elizabeth Martin

THERE WERE things I hadn’t yet told Ben, partly because a natural break in our conversation had arrived and partly because I was uneasily aware my loyalties were divided. Of course, Ben would say that in such a serious inquiry there was nothing that should be kept from the police. But I was well aware of Lucy’s fragile state of mind. She needed a friend and I’d promised her I’d be that friend.

I thought back to that curious meeting with Phoebe Roche. But was it so odd? She’d come to ask after her niece. Nothing could be more natural.

‘Will you go on?’ prompted Ben gently.

‘What? Oh, yes, of course. Where was I?’

‘Outside Mrs Craven’s door, talking to her Aunt Phoebe.’

I picked up my story. I’d followed Phoebe downstairs. By the time I’d reached the hall below, the drawing-room door was closing on her. I’d tied on my hat before the mirror to make sure it wasn’t crooked and set out.

My footsteps had turned automatically towards the church and I’d wondered whether today I might find it open. It had been a fine morning and I’d felt very sorry I hadn’t been able to persuade Lucy to come with me. It could hardly be good for her to be shut away in her room in the state she was in.

The church slumbered in the sunshine like a recumbent elderly giant. I tugged at the great metal ring in the oak door in vain and decided the sexton must be too lazy to come and open up when there was no service to be held. I began to stroll along the narrow paths between the plots in the churchyard, stopping from time to time to read an inscription. As is usual in country burial places, the same few names reappeared over and over again. Most tombstones were modest in nature but there were a few more ornate ones. One quite grand vault surrounded by wrought-iron railings belonged to the Beresford family. I saw they’d been at least a hundred years in the district. Another, curiously built in the shape of a pyramid, was a memorial to a Captain Meager R N who had taken part in the Battle of the Nile and survived that engagement to perish of the fever in the West Indies. These were the local families, the gentry and the farm labourers and servants who had worked for them. Here lay the squire, village blacksmith, grocer, baker, cobbler and midwife, all linked by kinship and old acquaintance or by employment. ‘A place for everything and everything in its place.’ Lucy had told me that was Miss Roche’s favourite saying. For ‘everything’ one might substitute ‘everyone’. Yet, in this little community, the Roche sisters had arrived as strangers and remained as such. I wondered again at their self-imposed isolation.

I’d turned aside and made my way back to simpler resting places until I again found myself standing before the little stone commemorating Lucy and James Craven’s infant child. I’d been prepared for it to inspire me with sadness but not to surprise me; yet it did. For the second time that morning something startled me.

Placed carefully upon the tiny mound was a small tribute of hedgerow grasses and flowers. I couldn’t imagine who might have done such a thing. Not Lucy, who denied her baby rested here. A village child, perhaps? There was something childishly naive about the simplicity of the tiny bouquet. It was tied together with a scrap of grubby red ribbon. Someone had taken great trouble; someone who had no access to garden flowers or a greenhouse.

A sudden idea had occurred to me and I’d whirled round, looking towards the spreading yew tree. But today nothing had moved in its dark shadows. I’d turned back and wondered what I should do about the offering. Should I remove it? If Lucy came here and saw it, it might distress her. But who was I to remove a gift surely made in respect and in love? I’d left it there and walked slowly back to Shore House deep in thought.

Ben had fallen silent and thoughtful again. He emerged from his reverie, gave his head a shake as if to clear it and asked, ‘Anything more?’

‘Very little,’ I told him. ‘But the spot where I found Lucy and – and the dead man is just over here.’

Despite my offer to help, I could show Ben where Brennan’s body had sprawled more easily than I could supply him with much new information likely to be of use. I could tell him how I’d heard people talking in the garden that first night. But I couldn’t guess who it might have been. I hadn’t mentioned seeing a white dog; in truth I didn’t know whether it had been Brennan’s terrier or Beresford’s and if the latter, anything I said might require an embarrassing explanation from Lucy. I decided that if it became necessary I’d tell Ben about the dog later.