Murder at the Castle (23 page)

‘No, don't hang up!' But it was too late. She was gone. And far from being reassured, I was more worried about her than ever. There had been a note of near-hysteria in her voice.

The splashing sounds next door had ceased, and two small naked bodies burst into their parents' bedroom, chasing and squealing. They stopped abruptly at the sight of a stranger instead of their mother.

‘Well, don't you two look lovely and clean!' I said warmly.

The little girl stuck a thumb in her mouth and stared at me. ‘Mummy?' she said doubtfully.

‘Your mummy is getting all nice and clean, too. Shall we go and find some clothes for you to put on?'

‘No,' said the boy firmly.

‘
There's
my naughty Tom kitten,' said his father, snatching him up under one arm. ‘And you, too, Thomasina.'

‘That's not my name, Daddy,' said the girl, giggling.

‘No? Well, we'll go in and get you dressed, and both of you can tell me what your names are.'

‘You
know
, Daddy,' said the boy. ‘I'm Jack and she's Jill.'

‘
Really
? Just like the rhyme? Can you sing it?'

Jack slithered to the floor and hand in hand the three of them skipped into the children's room singing the nursery rhyme. On pitch, I noticed.

I noticed, also, that I had tears in my eyes. I dashed them away.

‘You're slightly damp, my love,' I said, surveying Alan, who looked as if he'd fallen into the tub with the twins. ‘I don't suppose you had a chance to ask Sir John anything.'

‘He asked us to drop the Sir and Lady. They both find the titles slightly embarrassing except for formal occasions. And no, we couldn't talk in front of the children.'

‘You certainly did a lovely job with everyone's mood, anyway.'

‘That's all very well, but my mood will improve only when we make some headway with this mess!'

‘Mine, too. And I'm afraid I have some bad news on that front. Pat called, just a few minutes ago, but I couldn't make her tell me where she is. She said over and over again that she's all right, but . . .'

‘But?'

‘She was so emphatic about it that it almost sounded as if she was trying to convince herself.'

‘Mmm. Not good. Did you ask her about James?'

‘No. I thought it might scare her off. She did say she was with someone – “a friend to look after me” – but she didn't say who, and I didn't have time to ask. If James ran away because he killed Delia somehow . . . but she got spooked anyway. She definitely didn't want to tell me where she was, and when I tried to press her, she hung up. She sounded . . . I can't put a finger on it, but unsettled, at the very least. I'm sorry, Alan. I'm sure you would have handled it much better. I wish she'd called you instead.'

‘She might have done. Unfortunately I left my phone back at Tower. Don't worry, love. I'll phone her right now.'

‘She said she was going out.'

‘She'll still have her phone, presumably. Especially if you're right and she's uneasy about something.'

‘I wish there were a way to track cellphones. Mobiles, I mean.'

‘There is, but it's quite sophisticated, and not available to us poor civilians. Don't worry. We'll find her.'

‘We'd better do it soon!'

That remark didn't deserve a reply, so Alan made none, but opened the door into the hallway.

‘Where are you going?'

‘You sound almost as panicky as Cynthia. I'm going to find a landline, or to borrow someone's mobile. I don't want to call from yours; she'd know the number and might not answer.'

‘Use Sir John's. She won't know that number, and if his name shows up, that might not hurt anything, either.'

He considered that. ‘Do you think she has any idea about the connection between him and Delia?'

‘Why would she?'

‘Someone does. Witness the anonymous letter.'

‘Oh, Lord! Do you know, I'd positively forgotten the letter for the moment! I can't imagine how anyone found out, but maybe you're right. Better use the hotel phone. Oh, but before you go, did Sir John show you the letter?'

‘There wasn't time. I certainly want to see it.'

‘So do I. I'll ask him about it. Go make that phone call.'

The children were making a noisy game out of getting dressed. I tapped on the door, walked in, and approached their father.

‘Sir John,' I said quietly, under cover of the shouts of the twins, ‘do you have that letter? Alan and I would like to see it, if you don't mind.'

‘It's just John, please, and certainly you may see it.' He pulled it out of his breast pocket, holding it gingerly between thumb and forefinger. ‘It doesn't make pleasant reading.' He handed it over with a little shudder of distaste, and I grabbed a tissue before accepting it.

I suppose I had expected the usual plain envelope, printed in block capitals. This wasn't like that at all. The envelope was thick and expensive, and was addressed twice. The first address, somewhere in Kent, was typed, or probably printed from a computer. That one was crossed out, in pen, with the Soughton Hall address handwritten in a rather irregular scrawl beside it.

I looked up questioningly.

‘It was sent to our home and redirected here. We have a gardener who comes over occasionally, and a woman to help with the cleaning. One of them must have sent it on.'

I peered at the postmarks. The top one was yesterday's, but the one underneath it was smeared too badly to be legible. ‘I wonder,' I said, ‘how long this has taken to reach you.'

‘That's one of the things I mean to find out as soon as I can. I had to deal with poor Cynthia first. I can't thank you enough—'

I waved a hand. ‘There'll be time to sort all that out later. Right now we need to learn as much as we can about this letter. It must, of course, be turned over to the police. This is the first tangible evidence we have of criminal activity, and it's the kind of thing they're very good at tracing. You'll note I haven't touched it, nor do I intend to take out the enclosure until Alan is back. I imagine Cynthia has a pair of tweezers with her?'

‘I imagine so. Tom kitten, what
are
you doing with that shirt? It goes on the other way round, don't you think?'

‘Fraülein always does it for me. I want Fraülein!' His lip began to tremble.

‘I'm Fraülein for today,' I said, giving the envelope carefully back to Sir John. ‘Now let me zee,' I went on in what I fondly imagined to be a German accent. ‘Vass heff ve here?' I clumsily inserted Jack into the shirt. With neither children nor grandchildren of my own, my experience in dressing kids was limited.

Jack put up with my uncertain ministrations for a moment or two, but a tantrum was imminent when Cynthia walked into the room, bathed, dressed, and looking much more like the cool, soignée self I'd seen before.

‘What's this, then, kittens? Nearly all dressed? What grown-up kittens you're getting to be, aren't you, darlings? Mummy's very proud of you!'

‘Did it myself!' proclaimed Jack. ‘Nearly,' he added with a sidelong glance at me.

I winked back in a tacit promise not to give him away.

‘Splendid, both of you. Now I don't know about you, but Mummy's starving, so I'm going to take you down to breakfast while Daddy and Mrs Martin talk.'

‘Want Daddy, too.' Jack's lower lip became prominent once more.

That little boy knew what he wanted, and was certainly shaping to be the troublemaker of the two. But Cynthia knew how to deal with him. ‘Poor Daddy has to do some boring work while we have our lovely eggs. He'll be down in five minutes. Now let's creep downstairs like little mice, because other people are sleeping and we don't want to wake them up. Ssshh!' She put her finger to her lips and began to creep in stage-villain fashion, the children aping her.

T
he door closed behind them and Sir John sank into a chair, looking twenty years older than he had a moment before.

‘It's better to have something to do, isn't it?' I said. ‘Someone to look after. I knew that well when I was a teacher. I remember one day when there was a terrible storm. It was late spring and there were tornadoes all around us. The sky turned green and the classroom windows rattled and the children were terrified. So was I, but I couldn't show it. I knew we'd be told if a tornado was actually approaching, and meanwhile it was best to go on with what we were doing. But it was useless to try to make anyone concentrate on long division. So I decided on an art lesson, the messiest, most absorbing activity I could think of. We got out paper and crayons and paste and paint and modelling clay, and I told them to make pictures of the storm, using any medium they liked.'

‘Was the distraction effective?'

‘Oh, yes. Some of the efforts they produced were more expressions of their own emotions than literal representations of a storm, but that's probably closer to real art, anyway. It took their minds off their fears, and did the same for me. The storm had cleared before we were done, and they hadn't even noticed the sun was out.'

‘I wish our particular storm would clear.'

‘It will. We'll take this letter to the police and they'll track down the sender, and we'll be a long way toward solving the problem. And Alan left a little while ago to phone Pat Stevens. You remember, the fiancée of the singer who fell off the boat?'

‘Ah, yes. The young alto. How will she be able to help?'

‘We think her fiancé might have told her something that would confirm some of our theories. I'd rather not say more, because it's all in the realm of guesswork just now, but . . . and here's Alan back. Any news?'

‘Quite a lot, actually.' Alan looked moderately satisfied with himself. ‘But do you think we could discuss it over breakfast? I'm rather hungry, and the children are getting fractious. I think Cynthia would appreciate your help, John.'

The hotel people were cooperative about providing two extra breakfasts, and the twins were cooperative about eating theirs, now that they were once more securely surrounded by their family.

I was more interested in what Alan had to say than in bacon and eggs, so I drank my coffee while he, in between bites, told us what he had learned from Pat.

‘She's in Penzance, for a start. She's from those parts, and though her family are all gone now, she says she used to have friends and connections there. She's staying at a B & B for now, and looking for a place of her own. James is no longer with her.'

‘But he was?'

‘He was. They left together. Pat was a bit cagey about where they went first, and where he is now, but I got the impression they quarrelled. Not hard to do, I'd have thought, given James's temper.' He finished his bacon and picked up his coffee cup.

‘But did she tell you anything about . . .' I looked over at the twins, now absorbed in finishing their toast soldiers, and lowered my voice. ‘Anything about what we discussed earlier?'

‘I asked her if she and Dan had talked at all about the diva,' said Alan blandly, his eye also on the twins, ‘and she said they had, and he had told her some surprising things.'

We waited for him to continue.

‘And she'll be here in –' he looked at his watch – ‘about an hour to answer any questions we or the police want to put to her. That missive you received, John, may be the best thing that's happened in this case, because it puts the matter firmly in the hands of the authorities.'

‘But doesn't take it
out
of your hands, I hope,' said Cynthia, with enough anxiety in her voice to disturb the children. Their balance was still pretty fragile – as, I thought, was hers. They turned their heads toward her with worried looks on their small faces, and she immediately pulled herself together, ruffled their hair and pointed to their plates. ‘Have you finished, darlings? You've more crumbs on your plates and on your faces than in your tummies, I do believe. We'd best go and get you clean and tidy again.'

‘Daddy?' said Jack, predictably.

‘I'll be there soon, Tom-kitten,' he said. ‘Go with Mummy now and be a good boy.' There was a firmness to his tone that Jack had heard before, judging by his reaction. I could see the small boy decide it would be safest to do as he was told.

‘Now,' said Alan as soon as Cynthia and the children had left the room, ‘I'd like to see that letter. Ah, carefully wrapped, I see.'

‘Your wife did that,' said Sir John. ‘I'm afraid I'd handled it by that time; so had Cynthia and Frieda.'

‘No matter. It'll be easy to get all those fingerprints. At least, you said Frieda had gone?'

‘Not far, not yet. She said she was going back to the house in Appledore to get her things, and then she was going home. She was quite hysterical. Said she wanted nothing to do with such a family.'

‘You'll need to head her off. Can you phone the house?'

‘She might not answer, or she might not have arrived yet. Train connections aren't terribly good from here to Appledore, and it's still only – good Lord, not even eight o'clock. I'll ring Mrs Stokes, who does cleaning for us.'

While he did that, Alan studied the envelope carefully. ‘Redirected,' he commented.

‘Yes, Sir John – John, I keep forgetting – said the gardener or household helper probably sent it on. He was just going to phone when you came back upstairs.'

‘Good. We'll need, or rather the police will need to try to find out when it was originally sent. Now, let's have a look at the letter itself.'

He used a table knife to ease out the folded sheet and then to lay it flat.

It, too, was a neat computer printout. Times New Roman in a large, bold size, about twenty point if I was any judge.