Dorothy Eden (25 page)

Then she whirled round and left the room.

‘Blane,’ said Lady Malvina, after a long silence. Her voice had lost its resonance and was that of someone very old and frightened. ‘Blane, what does she mean?’

‘Mean?’ Blane jerked himself to attentiveness. ‘Oh, nothing, Mamma. That’s just Amalie in a tantrum. She enjoys theatricals.’

‘She wouldn’t take Titus away?’

‘You’re taking him away, Mamma. That’s what we arranged. Nothing has been altered.’ Then Blane’s expression changed from its harsh and moody reflectiveness to a curious tenderness. ‘Do you love the boy, Mamma?’

‘Oh, more than I can say.’

‘And he cares for you a little?’

‘A little, I think.’ Lady Malvina’s voice was humble.

‘Then why, may I ask, are you looking so unhappy? You can have him to yourself for a few weeks in London.’

The old lady began to brighten.

‘Can I really? But that would be tremendous fun. And the child needs a holiday. He’s worked hard at his lessons, and he’s been ill. But not for too long, Blane,’ she added. ‘I want him to love Mallow.’

‘He’s going to love Mallow. I don’t know why you think he wouldn’t.’

Sarah went upstairs and found Amalie in the nursery dressing Titus in his outdoor clothes, while Eliza stood nervously watching.

‘Where are you taking him?’ Sarah burst out.

Amalie looked up.

‘I am his mother, Miss Mildmay. Had you forgotten?’

Titus’s lip drooped. His acute sensitiveness had already told him that something was wrong. Sarah saw the appeal in his face. Long ago, for some reason, he must have lost trust in his mother. It had turned him into the timid little boy he had been. Sarah had hoped he had outgrown his timidity, but it was not far beneath the surface after all.

‘He’s been talking about a black swan on the lake,’ Amalie decided to explain. ‘We’re merely going down to look for it.’

‘No! You shan’t take Titus near the lake.’

‘Why, Miss Mildmay! I believe you think I pushed Mrs Stone in! Oh, dear, no! If she were pushed in—if she were—it would require someone with more than my frail strength.’

‘You said it was a black swan,’ whispered Titus. His eyes became dilated and his voice rose. ‘You told me a lie!’ He stood there, dwarfed by his tweed coat, a very small boy trying valiantly to cover his bewilderment with anger.

Amalie smiled soothingly.

‘There, my lamb. Perhaps Miss Mildmay really did think she saw a black swan. Perhaps we’ll see it, too. Now come.’

She took his hand, but Titus, suddenly reverting to being the child Sarah had first met, began to scream and tug away from her.

‘No, I don’t want to go! I won’t go!’

‘Darling! You’re only coming for a walk with Mamma. Don’t you love Mamma?’

‘No, I’m not coming. I don’t love you. I hate you!’

Red-faced and hysterical, Titus snatched his hand away and flew to Sarah. For the second time, at a crucial moment, he sought refuge in her arms. Bundled in his thick coat, she picked him up and faced Amalie.

‘So you’ve succeeded in spoiling him,’ Amalie said, with the quietness of extreme self-control. ‘I always said you would. And you’ve done it deliberately. You’re the most scheming woman I’ve ever met. You’ve stolen my husband and my son.’

Sarah’s mouth dropped open in sheer surprise.

‘Don’t bother to deny it, Miss Mildmay. And don’t think you’ve got away with it. I shall ruin you, I promise. And my husband as well. I can, you know. Much more easily than you think.’ She paused, then added significantly. ‘I only have to tell the police who Mrs Stone really was.’

‘Then you did know her!’

Amalie laughed. ‘I didn’t. But Blane did. She was his wife.’

A
LECHER AND A
drunkard. A bigamist also? And now a murderer? For Amalie’s words had had a deadly implication. Blane could not afford to have a woman like that turning up to wreck all his plans. He would have to be as ruthless about her as he had been about everything else.

And Amalie, suspecting what he had done, haunted by fear, had walked every afternoon at the lake to see if the body appeared…

Police sergeant Collins and the young constable were back that afternoon. They spent a long time down by the lake, walking up and down, testing the ground and the rickety piles of the jetty.

Sarah happened to pass the library door and saw Blane at the window staring out. He was watching the activities at the lakeside. There was the stillness of complete absorption in his figure. What did his face express? Anxiety? Fear?

But fear was one emotion she couldn’t imagine in Blane Mallow’s face. All the others had been there, anger, ridicule, pride and arrogance, merriment, even fleetingly tenderness. But not fear.

Sergeant Collins came in later and was shut in the library with Blane for a long time. Eliza reported this. The servants were all whispering and surmising. Sarah was trying to make up her mind whether, if the sergeant wanted to question her again, she would tell him of the brooch she had found. Not in the mud by the lakeside, where it might presumably have fallen off, but in the summer house. As if a struggle might have taken place there.

Under the pretence of an embrace…If Mrs Stone were really Blane’s wife she might have welcomed his embrace, not suspecting its treachery. After all, he was given to kissing women in secluded places. His mother said he always had been…

But the sergeant left without asking to see anyone else, and Sarah felt sick with relief. She knew she had not meant to say anything about the brooch. She also could not believe that Blane had ever kissed Mrs Stone’s sour and secretive face.

And Amalie had certainly been bluffing when she had made those extraordinary statements, for she made no attempt to see the police.

She waited until they had gone, then came down to tea, wearing a simple dark merino dress and a woollen shawl. She had a strange extinguished look, as if her moment of madness in the nursery had burnt out all her anger.

‘Well, that’s more sensible, my dear,’ said Lady Malvina. ‘You look as if you’ve put on an extra petticoat.’

‘I have. It’s freezing cold. This house is like a tomb.’

She kept her eyes down as if she wanted to hide what was in them, but her voice was normal enough with its familiar peevish quality.

‘Where’s Titus, Miss Mildmay?’

‘Eliza’s giving him his tea, Lady Mallow.’

‘Now it’s so cold perhaps it’s as well I didn’t take him out.’ That was as near to an apology as she would ever get. But at least she didn’t sustain her anger, vindictive as it was at the time.

‘We’ll have to wrap up well for our journey tomorrow,’ Lady Malvina said.

‘Titus has a fur-lined coat somewhere,’ said Amalie. ‘I’ll look it out presently. And Mamma, if you take him out walking in London do see he doesn’t get wet feet. He catches cold so easily.’

‘I’ll look after him like a cherished jewel,’ Lady Malvina said happily.

‘Thank you, Mamma. I do trust you with him. I was overwrought earlier today.’

Then Blane came in and without lifting her eyes Amalie said smoothly,

‘Tea, my love? I hope the police didn’t detain you too long. What did they want this time?’

‘Merely to verify suspicions.’

‘Suspicions?’

‘Such as whether the woman’s death was not suicide at all.’

Amalie’s eyelids flew up momentarily. Then dropped again as she said calmly, ‘They have to do their duty. Have they discovered anything more about the woman’s identity?’

‘Only that she arrived by train at Yarby. She asked the porter the way to Mallow. He remembered her very well. She told him she’d come a long way and wasn’t sure whether she could manage the ten-mile walk, but would have to since she had no money.’

‘And what did police sergeant Collins make of that?’ Amalie asked.

‘He would have been very mystified if it hadn’t been for Mrs Stone’s last remark.’

‘Yes?’

‘She said she’d had a lot of bad luck but hoped to catch some good from us.’

‘Inferring that we were lucky?’

‘I imagine so.’

Amalie gave a short laugh, then said with strange resignation,

‘Doesn’t she know you can’t buy luck? Well, she does now, I imagine.’

Blane took his teacup and turned to the fire.

‘The police have decided now that the woman probably fell in the lake accidentally. The path is very slippery and cut away in one place. If it was very dark and she was taking the short cut through the woods, she could easily have stumbled too near the water. That would account for her bag in the lake, too. And the ring on her finger. Apparently it’s a strange fact that when a woman takes her life she usually preserves her valuables.’

Lady Malvina leaned back in her chair, sighing with relief.

‘That’s the first sensible thing I’ve heard since this dreadful business began. The whole thing was an accident, of course. That will be the coroner’s verdict, Blane?’

‘I should think so, Mamma. The woman seems to have been a vagrant and a sneak thief. I fear there’ll be no sympathy wasted on her.’

Sarah could no longer keep silent.

‘And no one will identify her?’ she said in her clear voice.

Blane turned. He met her gaze levelly.

‘Unless someone turns up from her past.’

‘What about you, Lord Mallow?’

‘Me! But I’d never set eyes on her before.’

His eyes met hers unwaveringly, and with astonishment. His answer had been quite spontaneous. But he was a devilishly clever actor. Ambrose had said so all the time.

For he must be lying. There was the letter from Sammie to prove it, the letter out of his past.
Fancy, I thought you was dead
…

But it was Sammie—Samantha—who optimistically hoped her luck would change who lay dead. Sammie, who had lost her cheap jet brooch in the summer house…

Amalie was standing up, smiling. Her expression was unreadable.

‘Blane, let me congratulate you on finding Miss Mildmay. You recognised her talents when I was quite blind to them. She’s so clever, isn’t she? So observant. And so good for Titus. I think you ought to give her a present. What about the diamond ring Mrs Stone had. It’s a very fine diamond.’

‘Amalie!’ Lady Malvina’s voice was rough with shock. ‘What a peculiarly grisly thing to suggest! Anyway you said the ring was yours.’

‘Not mine. Blane’s. I believe it would fit Miss Mildmay. She has slim fingers, too. Perhaps you’ve noticed the similarity, Blane? And governesses don’t often have the opportunity to acquire valuable rings. Not if they’re honest people.’

She lifted her head high. For a moment, her face defiant and shrewish, she faced her husband. Then she said lightly, ‘I must look out Titus’s fur coat for the morning. Will you excuse me?’ and left the room.

‘Blane! Blane!’ Lady Malvina burst out pleadingly. ‘That ring wasn’t Mrs Stone’s? Surely you didn’t once give it to her!’

‘I told you, Mamma. I’d never seen the woman in my life.’

‘Then Amalie—’ Lady Malvina began uncertainly.

‘Go up to Titus, will you, Mamma. Stay with him until Miss Mildmay comes.’

Sarah moved towards the door.

‘I’ll go now.’

‘Stay here!’ The harsh command stopped her. ‘I want to talk to you.’

She turned reluctantly.

‘Lord Mallow, couldn’t I go to London tomorrow with Titus? If the police have decided Mrs Stone’s dead was an accident there’s no need for me to stay.’

‘What has my wife been saying to you?’

‘Why, that—that—’ She couldn’t say the monstrous thing.

‘Come, out with it!’

She should have flung the accusation in his face. He deserved it. But her heart failed.

‘She told me Mrs Stone was your wife.’ Now the words sounded only dreary and banal. ‘She said she intended to tell the police.’

‘And what did you think of this story?’

He didn’t deny it, she noticed, neither did he seem surprised. She began to shiver, and checked herself, pressing her hands together hard.

‘I thought perhaps for some reason she wanted to hurt you.’

‘So she does,’ he muttered. ‘I believe she would swear that wretched woman turned up inconveniently out of my past and that I pushed her in the lake. Clumsily, like that, leaving her body to float. My God!’

The unguarded horror in his face communicated itself to Sarah.

‘But, Lord Mallow, surely you don’t think—’ This new suspicion was also unspeakable.

‘Where did you pick up that brooch ?’

‘In the summer house. It hadn’t a very good fastening. It would—have fallen off…’ Sarah’s voice died away.

‘The diamond was on her finger. It was a bribe, of course. She hadn’t stolen it. I give her credit for that. But when and where was she bribed?’

‘And why?’ Sarah asked.

The ghost of a smile touched his lips.

‘Amalie’s right. You are observant, Miss Mildmay. Too observant. I think you’re going to find out more than you will enjoy. That’s what you’re going to do, isn’t it? Outdo the judge and jury and all by yourself prove I don’t belong here.’

Somehow Sarah contrived to speak steadily. ‘If you think that, why have you insisted on my staying? Why didn’t you dismiss me long ago?’

‘Because your little plot amused me. That was the first thing. The second was that you proved enormously good for Titus, as I knew you would. The third is simply that I’ve fallen in love with you.’

She couldn’t move. He didn’t heed to take her wrist in this hard grip to hold her there.

‘Why?’ she whispered.

‘Heavens knows. And a pretty mess you’ve made of all my plans.’

‘You’re being—preposterous, Lord Mallow.’

‘Am I?’

‘It’s true you fall in love with every new face, as your mother says.’

‘But that was Blane Mallow. You don’t believe I’m that person, do you?’

Sarah’s brain spun.

‘I don’t know what to think!’

‘You’ve been trying to trick me into some admission ever since you’ve been here. You’ve taken pleasure in discovering any evidence you could, such as that verse on the window pane, and testing me with it. Or making Titus do so. You’ve spied and schemed. Not nice activities for a well-brought-up young lady.’

‘Then why—’