Murder at Maddingley Grange (14 page)

Everyone turned and stared encouragingly at the scarlet wings but they did not respond.

“If there's one thing I cannot abide,” said Mrs. Saville, “it's sulking.”

“I am
not
sulking.” Stung into action, Derek bounded to his feet. “But I must say”—he faced them all and glared, especially at his host— “I think it's absolutely disgraceful that a murder weekend should be set up in such a way that one of the guests misses all the action.”

“I do think Derek has—” Laurie began but was interrupted by Mrs. Saville.

“You're only saying that because the choice has fallen on you. If it had been one of us you'd have been delighted to just carry on. And after all,” she continued, “once the body's been discovered you can join in and hunt the murderer with the rest of us.”

“Oh brilliant!” Derek's scorn was boundless. “There's real verisimilitude. The corpse springing up and cross-questioning the suspects. Of course, the fact that I'd know who the killer was might blunt the edge of the suspense a bit. What a farce!”

“Perhaps whoever it is could wear a mask?” said Mr. Gillette, and Laurie paled at this revelatory snippet of criminal know-how. Before he could expound further, or perhaps offer a choice from his selection, she crossed to Derek's side and laid a hand upon his arm. His face, darkened and hard done by, turned, but the words “I'd be very happy” had no sooner passed her lips than an alarming distraction occurred.

Sheila sprang to her feet, stretched out a rigid arm toward the window, now black with streaming rain, and let out a loud and terrified shriek.

“A
face…” Her shriek became a moan. “Out there pressed up against the glass. It was…horrible…”

She staggered and appeared to be on the point of collapse. Derek leaped to her side, motivated, it appeared to several of those present, more by investigative lust than husbandly concern.

Simon rushed over to the window and opened it. The curtains billowed into the room like great sails and the wind and rain beat at his skin. He leaned out, gazed intently into the dark for a long moment, then slammed the sash down. “Nothing there.”

“My wife, Hannaford,” said Derek, crisp as a nut, “is not a fanciful woman. If she says she saw a face at the window, then a face at the window is what she saw.”

Pausing only to hand his trembling spouse over to the nearest comfort station (Rosemary Saville), Derek ran across the library and flung open the window. The curtains billowed into the room like great sails and the wind and rain beat at his skin. He leaned out, gazing intently into the dark. “I think I saw him…” he shouted to the others over his shoulder. Then he slammed the window down. “Running…a dark shape. Around the side of the house.”

“Ohhh…” cried Sheila, quivering anew.

“That's nonsense,” Simon argued. “Why didn't
I
see him? I looked out first.”

“Elementary, my dear Hannaford. He was on his knees beneath the window waiting till the coast was clear.” Derek, only a moment ago moodily disenchanted, was now transformed. His eyes sparkled, his skin, buffeted by the elements and flushed by the thrilling knowledge that at last things were really on the move, glowed.

“All this talk of murder, I'm afraid,” soothed Simon. “Isn't this the moment in all those old B movies—guests relaxing after dinner—when someone sees a white staring face pressed up against the glass?”

“I
didn't
imagine it!” Sheila was almost shouting. “There was someone there. Oh, Derek…I'm frightened.”

“There, there.” Derek, torn between standing masterfully by his spouse and striding busily about, compromised by surging on the spot. “We have an intruder. No doubt about it.”

“How can we have an intruder,” said Mrs. Saville, who had remained phlegmatically unimpressed throughout the entire episode, “when he's outside? Surely intruders intrude. That is their function.”

“We are all present,” said Derek with solemn lack of necessity, “which leaves…the servants?” He crossed to a tapestry bell rope and raised his eyebrows at Simon. “May I?”

“By all means,” replied Simon. “But I'm afraid there's no bell on the other end.”

“Would you like me to call them?” Having received a reply in the affirmative, Laurie was just about to leave when the door opened, showing Gaunt, a silver tray under one arm, hanging on to the handle.

“Is it convenient to clear now, madam?” Laurie nodded and the butler started uncertainly stacking the cups and saucers.

Derek, in ostentatious preparation for the coming interview, filled his pipe. Fred intervened when a match was produced.

“I shouldn't strike that while he's about, Sherlock”— nodding at the tottering figure—“or we'll all go up in smoke.”

As Gaunt picked up Sheila's cup, Mother called to him, a harsh croaking imperative, and beckoned him to her side. She seized the cup, rejected the saucer and waved Gaunt away. The butler, getting over by the merest inclination of his head that while he realized it took all sorts to make a world, he had never expected to find himself actually waiting on any of them, proceeded hesitantly on his way only to find it blocked by Derek Gregory.

“Just a moment if you please.”

“Sir?” Gaunt put down his tray in readiness and drew himself up to his full height. This put rather a strain on his dickey, which snapped its moorings and rolled up with a clatter like a tiny blind. When it had been safely reanchored, Derek began to speak.

“Now I'm going to ask you a question.” He thrust his face forward. “If you answer me truthfully no harm will come to you. There is no need to be afraid.” Gaunt looked as if he wasn't at all sure about that and backed away a bit. “Were you or were you not looking into this room through that window,”—pointing histrionically—”approximately two minutes ago?”

“Out there?”

“Precisely.”

“Two minutes ago?”

“That is what I wish to know.” Derek unbent a little. “Take your time before answering. There is no hurry.”

Gaunt mulled it over for a brief spell, then said: “But it's pouring with rain.”

“What about your colleague?”

“She's washing up, sir. In the kitchen.”

“Very well, Gaunt. You may go—for now. But I may wish to interrogate you further. Hold yourself in readiness, please.”

The butler, having picked up his tray and balanced the last piece of crockery on top of an already teetering pile, made his way toward the door. He did not take the most direct route and at first seemed to be traveling in the opposite direction. He progressed by crossing his left foot directly over his right, then bringing the right alongside rather in the manner of the sidewinding snake. Coming up against the bookcase he frowned, turned and made the reverse journey in the same oblique manner, this time picking up a fair lick of speed.

Simon, nearest to the door, leaped to open it. The butler shot through and disappeared into the hall. Everyone crowded around in the doorway to watch his progress. He zoomed across the black and white tiles, listing more and more to the horizontal until he reached the heavy rose-velvet curtain which concealed the passage to the kitchen. Then, just as it seemed impossible that he would not hit the ground entangled in its folds, the curtain was whisked aside and he was gone. The observers waited a moment for the crash which never came, then returned to their seats with a definite sense of anticlimax.

“He's a lad.” Fred wagged his head in admiration. “Talk about on the sauce.”

“Does that white lapel,” asked Violet, “mean he's had specialized training?”

“He must be telling the truth though,” said Sheila, “about not being outside. His clothes and shoes were dry. He wouldn't have had time to change.” Although she had been one of the first excitedly in the doorway, Sheila now reverted to her previous expression of fearful dismay. “So that means we've definitely got a prowler.”

“
I know what it is!” Rosemary clapped her hands in a coy, patty-cake gesture. “Simon's hired someone.”

“What?”

“To lurk. In the shrubbery and…and places. To add to the atmosphere. I bet even now the servants are giving him a cup of tea and a plate of scraps in the kitchen.”

She beamed across at Simon, and Laurie watched in growing disbelief as her brother, far from denying his complete lack of involvement in any such domestic arrangement, allowed an expression of small-boy naughtiness to steal across his features. He shrugged disarmingly and held his hands palms upward, in a show of surrender.

There was a collective and audible release of tensions. Several “aahs” and “theres.” Fred said he'd guessed as much and Sheila was almost laughing in relief, although the sound had a slightly ragged edge. Only Derek, his detecting thwarted almost before it had begun, remained frustratedly aloof.

They had all forgotten Mother. Now, alerted by the fierce creak of her chair, Laurie stared at the old lady. She was rocking backward and forward, more and more energetically, her little buckled slippers flying higher and higher until the impetus was enough to push her onto her feet. She was still holding the coffee cup she had demanded from Gaunt and now, wheezing slightly from the force of her corybantics, shuffled over to the fire and emptied the dregs into the flames. Then she returned to her seat, cradling the cup in her palms for a moment before squinting into it with what appeared to be malign anticipation.

“What's she doing?” Laurie asked Violet.

“Reading the grounds, dear. We're honored—it's very rare. She only does it when she thinks there's something in the wind.”

“Really?” Laurie felt more alarmed than honored. Earlier on the terrace she had listened to the revelations of Mrs. Gibbs's Tzigane ancestry with considerable trepidation. The word
Romany
seemed to Laurie to smack of Ruritanian excess and one of Aunt Maude's glasses had gone already. “She doesn't…hurl the cup about, does she?”

“Oh, no,” Violet reassured her comfortably. “Only if it's bad news.”

Laurie watched the old lady withdraw her attention from the blue and yellow cup and wondered how there could be any news, good or bad, when most of the grounds were securely trapped in three large coffee pots back in the kitchen. Mother sucked her breath in with a bubbling hiss. Her haggish features showed no satisfaction, just a stern, almost sinister prognosis. Violet said, in a hushed voice: “She's got something.”

Mrs. Gibbs lifted her arm and pointed, straightening with difficulty an arthritic finger. Everyone followed the line, which ended at Sheila Gregory. She gave a gasp, clinging to her husband's arm. Mrs. Gibbs drew her lips back, revealing the tusky teeth, and spoke. One word on a long, implacable breath. “Beware…”

“What do you mean?” Trembling, Sheila gazed into her husband's face. “Darling…what does she mean?”

But for once Derek had no answer. He seemed as mesmerized as the rest as he stared into those glittering eyes. The old woman sat, a humped dark shape, as her ancestors must have sat in encampments and caves all over Europe, foretelling the future in the heart of a smoking fire.

“You
must
tell me,” cried Sheila. “You can't just…just point at someone out of the blue and say things like that. Tell me what you mean.”

As she spoke the final sentence, Sheila ran over to Mrs. Gibbs and made a grab at her hand, but too late. A blue and yellow blur flashed toward the fireplace and the cup splintered into the grate. Sheila stood rooted to the spot, apparently bereft of speech. The old woman indicated that she should draw closer and Sheila, in her beautiful cream velvet gown with the scarlet poppies, knelt down.

“Death…” The rasping voice was scarcely audible. “I speak of death…of murder…”

Sheila slowly rose to her feet, her face the color of her dress, and gazed blindly around. She swayed and Derek ran across the room toward her.

“Now look here,” he turned on Mrs. Gibbs, and although he tried to make his voice angry, all present noted an undertone of jubilation. The game, his shining countenance declared, was afoot and no mistake.
“
I suggest you be more careful—”

“It's me, Derek.” Sheila had started to cry. “Someone's going to murder me.”

“Not while I'm around.”

“I want to go home. Take me home,
Derek—please.”

“No one's going to murder anyone,” said Simon calmly, “except in fun.” He turned and smiled at Sheila. “I'm sorry. I rather expected, as it's so late, that we would all leave the assumption of our new characters and the start of the drama till the morning, but it seems one of us couldn't wait.” He turned to the old lady. “An absolutely splendid piece of acting, Mrs. Gibbs. If everyone does as well we're in for quite a thrilling time. I assume you did draw Mad Betty stroke Black Tom? Soothsayer and gossip in our fictional melange.”

Everyone looked at Mother, who remained silent and expressionless. Then the malignancy that had seemed to hover over her like a heavy cloud of dark insects dispersed. She ignored Simon's question, though. Lancelike, the beam of her attention swung away from Sheila and round the room, finally coming to rest in the area that held the drinks table. Then her face, which had been enclosed and secretive, opened out, showing a quite ferocious concentration. Her gnarled hands clenched and unclenched on the arms of her chair. The slow release of her breath made a little whistle. Laurie wondered if she was going to have a fit. Then Fred got up and crossed to his mother's side.

“Come on now—”

“You!”
She turned, distraught, yelling at him. “You cackhanded ferret! I were on the verge there…”

“You'll get on the verge.”

“I think it's time we climbed the wooden hill to Bedford.” Violet helped the old lady to her feet, encountering a fair bit of resistance. “Get up Mother. You've done enough damage for one night. Frightening folk half to death.” On their way to the door she stopped and spoke gently to Sheila. “You all right now, dear?”