Thrice the Brinded Cat Hath Mew'd (18 page)

BOOK: Thrice the Brinded Cat Hath Mew'd
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To begin with, Hilary and Cynthia were far too polite to each other. For another, they were both too red in the cheek.

My heart sank deeper and deeper, like a waterlogged canoe.

The vicar would be devastated when he found them out. He would fling himself from the top of the church tower and impale himself on the sharp iron spikes of the railings which surrounded the grave of
Arabella Darling, Spinster of this Parish, who “died praising the Lord on the twenty-ninth day of November, seventeen hundred and sixty-seven. Amen. Amen. Amen
.”

I was ashamed for Cynthia—more ashamed than I had ever been for myself, and my face must have shown it.

After a while the talk ground to a halt and I realized that both Cynthia and Hilary Inchbald were staring at me.

I squirmed in my chair. I didn't know what to do. My mental hands were tied. I had been flung into a part of life that was over my head and I was in danger of drowning in ignorance.

And then Cynthia laughed.

“Flavia, dear,” she said, “Hilary and I are old friends. We have known each other since we were in prams. We meet to share our sorrows.”

As if she had been reading my mind.

If I had been flustered before, I was now absolutely gaga. I would need to backpedal and pretend I hadn't been thinking what she thought I had been thinking.

I looked from one of them to the other, speechless.

“Tell her, Cynthia,” Hilary said. “Go ahead. I shan't mind.”

No…no…no…,
my brain was screaming.
I don't want to know. Keep your secrets to yourselves
.

I covered my ears with my hands, pleading with my eyes.

Cynthia reached across the table, offering her wrists and forearms as if she were in a lifeboat and I a drowning swimmer.

I took hold of them and hung on for dear life.

Where did this woman get her strength? I had once—a few years ago—thought Cynthia to be pathetic. What a fool I had been! What I had mistaken for jelly was a flexible fiber of the strongest steel. No wonder my mother, Harriet, had been so fond of her.

“Hilary has been very sadly bereaved,” Cynthia told me. “We thought you might have already worked that out.”

Hilary? Bereaved? What was she talking about? His father had been dead for years, and his mother…?

Well, that remained to be seen. If she were still alive she had been remarkably successful in keeping her name out of the newspapers.

Could I be losing my mind? Had I, without knowing it, tripped and fallen through a hole into another world in which turvy was topsy, and topsy turvy, and time ran backwards towards forever?

But for as long as I live, I shall never forget the pale, frail man who, at the same time, was also the boy, Crispian Crumpet, leaning towards me in the vicarage kitchen and saying in a voice that came to my ears like a memory of last summer's southern wind, “Roger Sambridge was Oliver Inchbald—my father.”

· FIFTEEN ·

I
'D GIVE ANYTHING TO
be able to say I had seen it coming—but I hadn't. I had failed miserably.

What a feather in my cap it would have been to be able to drop the bombshell at Inspector Hewitt's feet:

“Oh, by the way, Inspector, in case you haven't already worked it out, Roger Sambridge, the ecclesiastical wood-carver, was actually the world-famous author Oliver Inchbald.”

“What!”
he would have expostulated, and if he'd worn a monocle—which he didn't—it would have popped out of his eye like a cork.

I'd have smiled modestly and let him take all the credit, as I had so often done before.

But it was not to be. I had failed, and felt for the moment as if I had been doused with black paint.

And yet at the same time I was beginning to burn with excitement. If Roger Sambridge
was
Oliver Inchbald, so many otherwise inexplicable things began to make sense.

I thought he might be
, I wanted to say, in order to salvage what was left of my pride. But some strange new Power was telling me to keep quiet.

Except to say, “I'm awfully sorry to hear that, Mr. Inchbald. May I offer you my sympathy?”

I listened, appalled, as my words slipped out as slick and soft and insincere as black velvet at a funeral.

What was happening to me? What alien creature had seized control of my mouth? Had I been possessed by one of those slimes you see in the cinema that lurks in your lungs as it feeds on your brain?

“Thank you, Flavia,” Hilary said. “You're exceedingly kind. I understand from Cynthia that you, too, have lost a parent. Your condolences mean a great deal to me.”

I was thunderstruck.

Moses on horseback!
I thought. Was that how things worked? Had I spent all these years barking up the wrong tree?

I lowered my eyes demurely.

“It's not easy to be deprived of a parent, is it? I first lost my father when I was eight years old. And now I've lost him again.”

Those had been almost precisely my own thoughts when Harriet's body had been returned to Buckshaw—could it have been only last spring? So much had happened since that crushing day that it seemed an eternity away.

I did something that surprised me: I got to my feet, walked round the table, threw my arms around Hilary Inchbald, and hugged him.

And he hugged me back. Fiercely.

Neither of us seemed to want to be the first to let go, so that our grip on each other went on for quite some time.

Cynthia, her hand to her mouth, was unashamedly in tears.

None of us spoke, but when the long moment had passed, Hilary and I let go of each other and I returned to my chair and sat primly down, as we English do, as if some miracle hadn't happened.

Cynthia busied herself with the teapot.

“I was sent away to prep school when I was eight, you see. Far too young, but my father, being who he was, was able to pull certain strings. In order to justify my presence among the older boys, it was put about constantly that I was exceptionally intelligent—or at least clever.”

Hilary spoke softly and slowly and, in spite of my acute hearing, I had to strain at times to hear him.

“At first I thought my father had sent me away because I had done something wrong: something too horrible to be put into words. No one ever took the trouble to set me straight, and so I was utterly miserable for the first few years.

“But in time, I came to equate brains with imprisonment. It was my own intelligence that had caused me to be put away. I didn't pretend to understand the reasons why, but there I was in Cheadle House, so it must be true. I had done nothing wrong, and there could be no other explanation.

“If brains were the cause of my incarceration, then the solution was evident: I would become an ignoramus. It was that simple. I don't know why I hadn't thought of it before.

“Then, perhaps, when they realized what a mistake they had made, I would be set free.

“I can still remember the exact moment this enlightenment came upon me. I was listening to Hanson, the Latin master, droning on about the future perfect tense of the verb
spero,
‘I hope.'

“ ‘
Speravero,
my fine young gentlemen,' he was saying. ‘
I shall have hoped,
if indeed you are still alive in the future, and perchance there's any of that precious substance left.'

“I chose that moment to spill my ink. And before the end of the class, I had translated
bello,
‘war,' as ‘tummy' and
pudere
as something that comes forth from a cow.

“Old Hanson was livid, but my father was incandescent. I had shamed him. I had belittled him. I had brought great dishonor upon him. And he wasted no time in telling me so.

“When the holidays came round, I was packed up and sent to a house that was no longer home. My father showed me a ‘talking stick' he had been sent from Borneo by someone in his club. It was a wonderful thing, made from bamboo, I believe—about the length of a common ruler and covered with carvings. It was held, generally, by the headman of the tribe who made it, and only the person holding the stick was allowed to speak. The penalty for speaking without the stick was severe: banishment, my father claimed—although I didn't believe him—or even death.

“Whenever my father wished to address me, which was seldom, and usually to take me to task for some perceived misdeed, he would bring out the talking stick from the locked drawer of his desk where he kept it, and give me a tongue-lashing.

“Once, because I wished to defend myself, I held out my hand for the stick and my father reacted by slashing me across the palm with it, drawing blood. I did not ask again. Nor did I speak.

“I could not imagine what I had done to deserve such treatment. Where was the father who had sung silly songs to me with his trousers rolled up at the seaside? Where was the father who had carried me on his shoulders to see the stone dinosaurs at the Crystal Palace? What could possibly have gone wrong?

“All I knew was that I was no longer just living in my father's shadow; I
was
my father's shadow. We could never be one. I was all that he was not, and he was all that I was not—rather like the anti-matter which the physicists are now beginning to speculate about.

“In time, of course, I came to understand that my only sin had been that of growing up.”

Hilary's long fingers were spread out on the tabletop, white from pressing so tightly.

“His father beat him badly,” Cynthia said softly, touching his shoulder, and Hilary glanced up at her gratefully, as if she had spared him the pain of saying this himself.

Oliver Inchbald had beaten Crispian Crumpet? That golden-haired little boy of the storybooks?

My mind almost gagged at the idea as my brain cells drew back in horror.

Until that very moment, I had never really understood the meaning of the word
obscene,
but if anything was obscene, it was this.

—

“He used to make me box with him,” Hilary said. “He would bloody my nose, then rush out of the room and leave me to clean myself up.

“The moment I was old enough I changed my name, joined the Royal Air Force, and trained as a wireless operator air gunner. When my father found me out, he pulled strings, as he had always done, and I spent what remained of the war somewhere in Scotland, sending out coded top-secret wireless demands from the officers for tea from Harrods and hampers from Fortnum & Mason.

“I attempted at every turn to get myself posted to aircrew, where I would be in real bodily danger, but as always, my father contrived to have my every wish denied. He took away—no,
stole
from me—the single chance I ever had to commit suicide with great honor and dignity. And for that, I wanted to kill him.”

“Oh, surely not!” Cynthia gasped. “You've never told me that before.”

“It's true, nonetheless,” Hilary said softly.

“You mustn't say that,” Cynthia protested. “You simply mustn't.”

“You mean in light of him lying dead in—in whatever hell he's in?”

As interesting as it was, the conversation was veering from criminal acts into theology, a subject about which I knew little and cared less.

“Did someone kill him—your father, I mean?” I asked, perhaps a little bluntly.

“I don't know,” Hilary replied. “I certainly hope so.”

“Hilary, dear,” Cynthia said. “Take me for a little walk. I've been feeling iffish all day. A turn in the fresh air might do me good.”

Hilary Inchbald, whatever else he was, was also a gentleman. He got to his feet, pulled back Cynthia's chair for her, and went to fetch her coat.

While he was out of the room I caught Cynthia's eye, and saw nothing in it but my own reflection.

I followed the two of them out of the vicarage and watched as they walked across the churchyard towards the west.

Only when they were at a slight distance, and only when I saw him in an outdoor setting, did I remember where I had seen Hilary before he had unfolded himself from the sideboard at Lillian Trench's cottage.

I turned east towards the High Street and the Thirteen Drakes.

—

Howard Carter was holding up the front of the pub, his shoulders and the sole of a shoe pressed against the doorframe. Howard was something of a local character who did odd jobs around the village and kept the Thirteen Drakes afloat by spending his earnings. Since he possessed the same name as the discoverer of King Tut-ankh-Amon's tomb, Howard came in for more than his share of teasing, such as “Does your mummy know you're out, Howard?” and other village witticisms.

Howard didn't seem to mind: Fame is fame wherever you may find it.

“Could you ask Mr. Stoker to step outside, please? I'd like to have a word with him.”

Tully, I knew, would not be as lenient as Rosie when it came to enforcement of the Licensing Act.

Howard examined his fingernails. This was the sort of moment he lived for: a position of authority, even for a matter of seconds.

“Depends,” he said. “What's it about?”

I glanced at an imaginary wristwatch. “It's about one o'clock,” I said.

“Haw!” Howard said. “You're a rare one, aren't you, Flavia de Luce?”

“Selab Dusticafeenio,” I said, pleasantly, which is a complicated tactic—a spell, actually—which I sometimes use with those who take liberties. They never know quite what to make of it. And it worked. Howard looked at me as if I had suddenly sprouted an extra head and yellow spotted fur.

He launched himself into motion and vanished inside the pub. Moments later, Tully ambled out, wiping his hands on his apron. He acknowledged me with a hint of a nod.

“Good morning—or, rather, good afternoon, Mr. Stoker. I wonder if you can help me? I'm trying to get in touch with a Professor Karl Heinz Heidecker. He's a famous chemist—Nobel Prize, if I'm not mistaken—and I've been given to understand that he may be spending a holiday in the neighborhood. I thought if he's not actually staying at the Thirteen Drakes, he might have come into the pub in the past several days.”

This was unlikely, since I had invented Professor Heidecker on the spot.

Tully eyed me with suspicion, as he always did.

“I don't know Professor Heidecker by sight,” I said, “but I happened to see a distinguished-looking gentleman helping you repair a broken window, and—”

“That wasn't your professor,” Tully interrupted.

People are always so eager to point out to you that you're wrong that they can't wait for you to complete your sentence.

“It was Mr. Hilary and he's no chemist. I can't imagine him getting his hands dirty,” Tully said, staring at my hands which, as usual, were stained and discolored by the handful of experiments I had managed to do since coming home.

Mr. Hilary! Hilary Inchbald was staying at the Thirteen Drakes under an assumed name!

Or was it simply that Tully was on a first-name basis with him?

“Mr. Hilary?” I asked, as if I hadn't heard.

“Mr. Percival Hilary,” Tully said. “Of London, England.”

That clinched it! Who could forget Percival the Penguin who, in
Hobbyhorse House,
escaped from the London Zoo, got lost, and—having made his way on foot past Madame Tussaud's wax museum and Sherlock Holmes's headquarters at 221b Baker Street, and having stopped to dance the Penguin Pavane on the pavement in front of each of those locations—was finally located in Hyde Park, paddling with the children in the Serpentine?

“Mr. Hilary” was obviously Hilary Inchbald. There could be no doubt of that.

But if he was staying at the Thirteen Drakes, then why on earth had I found him huddled in a cupboard in Lillian Trench's cottage, which, I couldn't help noting, was directly across the road from Thornfield Chase, where his father, Oliver Inchbald, had been living under the name Roger Sambridge?

It was enough to puzzle the sharpest saint.

“Well, thank you, Mr. Stoker,” I said. “I'm sorry to bother you. Oh, by the way, please say hello to Mary for me. I haven't seen her since I've come home.”

Mary was Tully's daughter, who had been of great assistance to me at the time of the Horace Bonepenny affair.

Tully's face grew dark with blood. For a moment, I thought he was going to turn away and slam the door in my face.

“Thought you might have heard,” he said. “Everyone else in the kingdom has. She's gone.”

“Gone?”

“You heard me. And Cropper with her.”

There are times when I've been taken by surprise, but seldom as I was at this moment.

“Gone? Mary and Ned? When? Why?”

I was gasping for words.

“Couple of days ago. Same morning your Sambridge turned up dead. The lad had words with Mr. Hilary in the Saloon Bar and a window was broke. Police were called. In the morning the lad was gone, and her with him.”

BOOK: Thrice the Brinded Cat Hath Mew'd
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