Buffet for Unwelcome Guests (12 page)

A curtain descended between two distinct halves of her mind: the half that felt and the half that acted. All so easy, all so safe, so obvious. The note to the hospital authorities would be produced at the inquest; if morphia proved not to be missing from the hospital cupboard, it would be assumed that she had got it in some other way. The girl was hysterical, unbalanced, an exhibitionist; and in the family way. One more suicide by one more little psychopath; and no one, she had said, had been told the story about Richard Harrison being the father of the child….

Cool, decisive, without further reflection, she walked through to the surgery. ‘Ricky, I think you’d better take her through to the drawing room. We don’t want anyone to come in and find her here.’ She gave the two men no time to argue, hustled them, half dragging the girl, through to the other room. ‘Sit her down on the sofa. The coffee won’t be half a minute.’ She closed the drawing-room door behind her and, swiftly unlocking the cupboard in the surgery, took out the bottle of morphine tablets.

How many? She emptied half a dozen of the tiny pills into her hand, replaced the bottle, locked the cupboard and replaced the key. Back in the kitchen, she gave herself not a moment to reconsider: dropped the tablets into the cup, poured on the coffee, hot and strong, stirred in abundant sugar—walked through to the drawing room and thrust it under the girl’s nose. ‘Come on—drink this!’

The girl pushed it aside. ‘I don’t want it.’

‘
Drink
it!’ said Stella. The men looked up uneasily, half shocked by the vicious determination in her voice. The girl took the cup and drank, sipping it slowly, till all but a spoonful of dregs remained. Stella took the cup from her and went back with it into the kitchen; once there, she rinsed it out with scalding water, carefully preserving, however, the lipstick on the rim and the girl’s finger-prints and her own on the outside: stirred the coffee in the pot, poured into the cup just enough of the muddy deposit, left the cup on the draining-board of the sink and went back into the drawing-room. The whole thing had taken not half a minute. She said, taking care to preserve the irritable scorn of her manner, ‘I trust you’re now better?’ and could stand aside and wonder at her own grim determination; the subservience of her feeling self to the dictates of that remorseless, curtained-off other half of her mind.

They all stood looking down at the girl, Frederick impatient, Ricky on the hop because he ought long ago to have gone back to his case, Stella ice-cold and yet with a fluttering at her innermost heart. For now the other side of her mind had begun to work again, to admit the possibility of danger, the necessity to plan, to calculate. If the girl went back to the hospital now, they would soon enough see that she had indeed taken morphia and would deal with her accordingly. And to have her life saved now would make matters worse a hundredfold than they had been before, for the girl, conscious of no genuine attempt to administer poison to herself, would become aware that someone else had done it for her. And then—what a story would she not indeed have to relate?—confirmed by the fact that no morphia in fact would be found missing from the hospital. Or if she kept silent it would appear all a genuine attempt at suicide—since in view of her condition the dose would be diagnosed as a lethal one—and far more credence would be given to any story she chose to tell. No: the first step had been taken and from that there could be no going back. I am a murderess, thought Stella: a murderess—and from the very first step of my murder I am committed. I can’t turn back.

She took another sudden resolution: drew the two men away and into the dining-room end. ‘Do you think we’re wise, after all, to let her go straight back to the hospital? Would it be better to keep her here for the night? I could ring up and make it all right with Matron: tell her some tarradiddle. In the morning the girl will be more rational, we can talk sense to her. Don’t you think that for her to arrive back, late at night, in triumph, having made a lovely scene at Dr. Harrison’s house, would be a mistake? Yank her back in the cold, clear light of morning and let Matron have her on the carpet. Meanwhile, I’ll make up the bed in the spare room and we can let her sleep off the whole affair.’

‘I believe you may be right,’ said Frederick. ‘Only in that case it’s a pity we gave her the black coffee.’ He glanced over towards the sofa. ‘She seems to be considerably woken-up already.’ (These must be the first signs, the restless, voluble symptoms before the coma set in. Time was growing very short.)

Ricky glanced for the hundredth time at his watch. ‘I simply must go. Yes, I think this is best, Stella. Everything looks clearer by daylight and I’ll go to Matron myself and sort it out with her. She’s a good soul!’ He turned back to the lolling figure on the sofa. ‘Look here, my wife thinks you’d better stay here for the night and then we can talk things over in the morning, more calmly. It’s a pity you had the coffee but I’ll give you something to counteract that and you can have a good sleep; then you’ll feel better.’ He gave her no time to argue but went through to the surgery and returned with half a dozen small white pills. ‘Give her these, Stella, with a drop of warm milk.’ He rolled them out of his cupped hand on to the high mantelpiece.

‘Six?’ said Frederick, looking at them a bit doubtfully.

‘It’s only that Restuwell stuff; they’re quite mild and she’s had all that coffee. Now I must rush.’ He gave not a backward glance at the girl but hurried off out of the door. They heard the car engine purr into life outside.

‘They’ll think it very peculiar, won’t they?’ said the cool, sweet voice from the sofa ‘—you keeping me here for the night. I suppose they’ll think Mrs. Harrison didn’t want it to come out about my trying to commit suicide because I was having a baby by her husband: and they gave me antidotes and things and kept me here till I was all right again.’

‘An impression you would do nothing to correct, would you?’ said Frederick, savagely sardonic.

‘Of course not,’ said Ann Kelly: smiling her little smile.

Stella’s self-control fell away from her, suddenly, as though her clothes had ripped apart and fallen, leaving her naked. ‘You utter little bitch! You vile, filthy, lying, blackmailing utter little bitch!’ She stood over the girl, dreadfully shaking, one hand clenched as though she would hit out at her. Frederick caught her shoulder and pulled her away and she collapsed against him, lying convulsed with great, shuddering sobs, against his breast. ‘Oh, Frederick! Oh, God, Frederick, it’s all so vile, so terrifying, so horrible….’ Vile and terrifying and horrible to have this cool, smiling, taunting little face lifted to hers like an evil white flower; to know that soon it would smile its sneering little smile no more….To be unmoved by that knowledge; to know oneself suddenly not human any longer, not capable of ordinary human pity or remorse….

Frederick held her close, strong, reassuring, kind. ‘Hush, my dear, hush, don’t upset yourself, don’t let it get you down. You’ve been marvellous, love, you’ve handled the whole thing perfectly, and you’ll see, it’ll all be all right in the morning.’ He held her away from him, pulled out a handkerchief, dabbed at her livid, tear-stained face. ‘Come on, dry up those lovely blue eyes of yours; it isn’t as bad as all that.’

She leaned her head for a moment, just for a moment, against that firm, kind shoulder; revelling uncontrollably in her first physical contact with him, drowned for a moment in the first revelation of his tenderness. ‘Oh, Frederick—!’

‘Oh, Frederick….!’ mimicked the soft little, sneering voice.

They moved apart sharply, as though a sword had been cleft between them. Stella cast one venomous glance at the sofa and went out of the room. ‘I’ll ring Matron.’

Matron seemed only mildly surprised to learn that Nurse Kelly was at Dr. Harrison’s house. ‘Has there been any drama at the hospital, Matron? She says she left a note saying she’d taken some morphia—’

‘Yes, there was some rubbish of that sort,’ said Matron. ‘But the poisons are all accounted for and I’m getting a bit used to the young lady’s tricks—not to say fed up with them. Why did she come to you?’

‘Well, you know she’s supposed to have a crush on my poor husband?’ (Better to be casually frank….)

‘They all do this kind of thing,’ said Matron, comfortably. ‘It hasn’t prevented her going around with one of the housemen.’

‘You know she’s going to have a baby?’

‘Oh,’ said Matron rather flatly. She added: ‘Are you sure?’

‘When she really shows you—’

‘I suppose I ought to have spotted it,’ said Matron. ‘Well, tomorrow I shall send the young lady packing. Him too, if I had anything to do with it but I don’t.’

‘Him?’

‘Well, young Bates is obviously the father. They’ve been very thick, and there’s been nobody else.’

Obviously the father….! All for nothing—a murderess and all for nothing: the whole ugly threat dissipated into gossamer. In this new light, Stella saw that any suggestion against Ricky would have been brushed aside: Matron, sturdy and outspoken, would have stamped a scornful foot upon the first whisper of scandal, despatched the girl before she’d had time to make further trouble, probably extorted from the young man an admission of responsibility. All safe: all harmless and clear and unsensational. And now…

Too late. If she made any move now to save the girl, Ann Kelly would be abroad with the dangerous knowledge that in this house an attempt had been made upon her life. Very well; by her own folly and malice she had signed her death warrant and execution must be carried out. She had declared, and in writing, her intention of destroying herself by this means, and nurses must have opportunities of obtaining drugs and covering over the traces of their depredations. If she were not alive to deny it, the police would accept her as a suicide. With the threat of scandal gone, there was nothing to connect her death with anyone in the Harrison household.

Matron thought it a good idea if the girl could be kept for the night; in the morning she might be less hysterical and could be dealt with. They rang off in mutual trust and friendliness.

Once released, Stella flew to the poisons book in the surgery. A ball point pen was kept in the book, always handy. Not daring to put on a light, she picked it up and, turning back the pages at random, here and there altered a figure.

Ann Kelly was making a small play for handsome Dr. Graham, gazing up at him with increasingly bright eyes; her hands, thought Stella, looked like plump claws, waving as she chattered. Frederick was looking at her a little curiously. ‘She seems very over-excited,’ he said, aside, to Stella. ‘Better get her upstairs, I think.’ He took the six tablets from the mantelpiece. ‘Don’t forget these.’

‘I don’t want them,’ said the girl, looking at Stella like an obstinate child, the coy glance reserved for Frederick.

‘Mrs. Harrison will bring you a nice hot drink—’

‘I don’t want any more of Mrs. Harrison’s nice hot drinks. She’ll probably put arsenic in it, if she hasn’t already.’ But she saw the gathering frown, the coming together of the slanted black eyebrows. ‘Well, all right—for
you
, Dr. Graham,’ she said.

He dropped them into her hand and she swallowed them dry, one at a time, tossing back her head with each swallow. She looks like a hen, drinking, thought Stella, revolted.

Frederick took her up the stairs, a hand under her elbow, but she would have no further assistance. ‘I don’t want
her
fussing around me,’ she said, tossing her head towards Stella who was hurriedly making-up the bed. ‘If you’ll leave me alone, I’ll go to bed quietly, honestly I will. I’m—a bit exhausted.’ She clutched at a last moment of drama. ‘It’s been rather a strain.’

‘Well, the bathroom’s over there,’ said Stella. She fished a clean towel out of the linen cupboard and ushered the girl in. When she returned to the bedroom, Frederick was going hastily through the scruffy little handbag, dipping a hand into coat pockets. ‘We can’t take any chances.’ But there was nothing there; and when she returned from her very brief ablutions, they left her. The point of no return, thought Stella. But the point of return had been passed half an hour ago.

He took her down and she flopped wearily on to the disordered sofa and let him bring her a drink and sit there quietly with her, while the whisky did its reviving work. Once he went upstairs and poked his head into the darkened bedroom. ‘A bit restless, but sound asleep and rather unbeautifully snoring,’ he said, grinning, coming down again; and when Ricky returned he said the same thing to him. Asleep… Rather restless… Like a doomed ship, thought Stella, rolling, wallowing, settling down at last into the waters of death. ‘You don’t think we’d better….?’ But better—what? There was nothing now to be done.

The sound of the stertorous breathing reached them again and she and Ricky made their way up to bed. She sent him on ahead, and made a pretence of going into the room to see that all was well. ‘She’s quite quiet now; only snoring a bit,’ she said rejoining him. ‘I dare say she was pretty worn out, silly girl,’ he said. ‘She’ll be better in the morning.’ And he added, humbly and gratefully, ‘Thank you, darling. You were splendid,’ and kissed her. She turned away her head.

And in the morning, the girl was dead. Ann Kelly would smile her sweet, sneering, malicious little smile no more; and Stella Harrison was a murderer.

Suddenly the house was full of policemen, large, slow, kindly-spoken men, led by a small, quick, snapping little man called, apparently, Chief Inspector Cockrill. ‘Sorry about this, Mrs. Harrison. Very distressing for you. And you say the girl was hardly known to you, to you or Dr. Harrison either…?’

Up at the hospital Matron told her story: evidently they had all underestimated the lengths to which the girl would go in her neurotic desire for attention—or the girl herself had overestimated the dose which it would be safe to play with… At the house, they went through the anticipated routine. The coffee cup proved all that it had promised: the Chief Inspector dipped in a tentative little-finger tip and sucked it—‘No, nothing there—just black coffee,’—and gave instruction for a few drops to be poured off and the rest sent to the laboratories. ‘We’ll get a quick analysis done here, Sergeant: I dare say the doctor has some reagents about the place. We shan’t find anything but it’ll be nice to know for certain. Can’t be too careful, Mrs. Harrison, for your sake and the doctor’s. She might just possibly have smuggled something into it.’