Poppy Redfern and the Midnight Murders

by Tessa Arlen

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  MY GRANDMOTHER LOOKED around her drawing room at Reaches and nodded at the flying officers gathered in a respectful and attentive group as they were introduced by their commanding officer. After a roll call of names and a sea of alert faces, two corporals circulated with trays of cocktails. I took what I recognized as a martini glass and glanced around what had once been our drawing room and was now the officers’ mess for the base.

  Without the Aubusson rug, the gray damask curtains, and our family paintings and furniture, the room looked nothing like our drawing room. The dismal collection of Ministry of Works utility chairs and sofas scattered through the room looked shabby and third-rate against the Wedgwood blue of the walls.

  I took an experimental sip from my glass. Whatever it was, it tasted extraordinary, in a shuddery sort of way, like one of the vicar’s housekeeper’s herbal tonics. Lieutenant O’Neal appeared at my elbow holding a crystal bowl of nuts. “Good evening, Lieutenant,” I said as I took a bolder sip from my glass.

  Large, serious eyes sought mine. “Would it be too much to ask you to call me Griff?”

  “Griff, is that your full name?”

  He sighed. “In fact, it’s Griffith, but Griff is what I prefer.” He offered the bowl as I took another sip of my drink. “That’s gin you’re knocking back. Better take a handful of peanuts; otherwise you’ll be flat on your face by the time we eat. Our commanding officer is a two-cocktails-before-dinner man, just like your Winston Churchill.”

  The roasted nuts were salty and sheer heaven. I could have eaten the entire bowl. “If this is all you give us this evening, it will be more than enough,” I said, and he laughed.

  “It’s easy to forget what austere lives you have been leading here, when we have everything we need in the States. No shortage of anything,” he said, and I believed him.

  A tall man in dress uniform came in through the drawing room door and made his way over to us. Griff made introductions. “Miss Redfern, this is Lieutenant Colonel Franklin. I guess he is the American Army Air Force equivalent to a wing commander in your Royal Air Force. He spent quite a bit of time in your country before the war.”

  Franklin had a deep voice with an extraordinarily slow way of talking that seemed to breathe palm trees and soft trade winds. “I’m from Florida, Miss Redfern. We take life at a gentlemanly pace in the South, unlike these upstart Californians.” He winked at Griff. “My mother was a York: connected way back to one of your big aristocratic families over here.” I nodded, wondering if he meant the Plantagenet royal house of York. I wasn’t quite sure what I was supposed to say to this information, and since we Redferns don’t know any old aristocratic families, I simply smiled and nodded as he launched into his ancient ancestry. Mercifully, he was interrupted by Colonel Duchovny with my grandmother in tow. “I was just telling your grandmother, Miss Redfern, that I feel as if I know you all through this beautiful old house. I understand Reaches has been the family home of the Redferns for . . . I’m not exaggerating if I say centuries, am I?” he asked Granny.

  “Three centuries, Colonel, through both good times and bad. The colonel is fascinated by the history of the house, Poppy.”

  Granny is far better informed on the ancient lineages of families that died out centuries ago, and I was only too pleased to introduce her to the genealogist Franklin, and escape to say hullo to our vicar, Cedric Fothergill. He is also my boss, I suppose, since it is he who runs the ARP in our district.

  I think Mr. Fothergill is probably one of the most irreverent of reverends when you catch him in his private moments. He was having a moment now with a large glass of scotch and soda. Village rumor has it that our vicar was quite a tearaway in his youth. He had wanted to be an actor in Stratford-upon-Avon with the Royal Shakespeare Theatre and had even auditioned and been accepted as a junior member. But his father put his foot down: there were to be no actors in Sir Wendell Fothergill’s family, so Mr. Fothergill did what was expected of him: he read theology at Oxford and became a vicar, which is what the third sons of baronets are supposed to do. Before the war he was the director, producer, and wardrobe master of the Little Buffenden and Lower Netherton Players, whose notable hits, Lady Windermere’s Fan and Lord Arthur Savile’s Crime, were due to both his directing and his acting skills.

  I have never seen Mr. Fothergill without his clerical collar, but I can easily imagine him dressed in a black velvet doublet with a starched Elizabethan ruff at his neck and a black pearl earring in one ear, standing center stage as Duke Orsino, and he does a very credible Rosalind if you half close your eyes.

  “You look very festive, Poppy,” he said, lifting his beaky nose out of his scotch and soda. “That shade of blue suits you.”

  “It’s very old,” I said, which was crafty of me, since he is also a connoisseur of women’s fashion between the wars.

  “That is what makes it so beautiful. Prewar fashions are far more elegant than the skimpy little things I see women in today. The cut of that dress is superb—it’s perfect for you.” And almost immediately I felt myself become more graceful: a tall, willowy redhead elegantly dressed for dinner in London’s West End circa 1930 and not an overgrown schoolgirl whose nighttime wardrobe usually includes heavy boots and an ARP helmet. His thoughtfulness is why I am very fond of our eccentric vicar.

  More officers drifted over and formed a group around us. None of them, I noticed, as they referred to their few weeks on English soil, mentioned the murdered girls. They were far more interested in telling us about our beer.

  “Two things I fell for immediately were your beer and . . . fish and chips,” a pilot officer said, and his navigator chimed in, “And your movies. I am in love with Margaret Lockwood. I could listen to her all night.”

  “Not like James Mason.” The pilot looked like he was all of eighteen years old. “I can’t understand a word he says.”

  “That’s because you’re from Alabama.” Another officer joined us. “We can’t understand you either.” Uproarious laughter—they were all so relaxed with one another, in a rather competitive way.

  More cocktails were served, and the talk became louder and the laughter came a little more often, and just as I was beginning to really enjoy myself, I looked up and saw Fenella Bradley standing in the doorway of the drawing room.

  Fenella has a perfect porcelain-white complexion and almost blue-black hair. With a voluptuous bosom, tiny waist, and rounded hips, she generally creates a stir wherever she goes, which she thoroughly enjoys. She stood quite still in the open door as Colonel Duchovny put down his glass and started toward her, and when all heads had turned in her direction, she walked slowly into the room and stood in its center.

  “Colonel Duchovny.” She smiled. Her lipstick, a deep, dramatic red, emphasized the curve of her sensuous mouth. “So sweet of you to invite me to dinner. My sister, Betty, is still in London—duty calls.” She rolled her mascaraed blue eyes. She was in uniform and looked positively dashing. I noticed that Griff O’Neal’s eyes were nearly popping out of his head, but he managed to stop himself from leaping toward her—just about.

  Fenella saw me and inclined her head. “Poppee! Mummy told me that you are now Little Buffenden’s air-raid warden—what fun!” She laughed and shrugged her shoulders. She certainly didn’t make being an ARP warden sound like fun; she made it sound dull, which I suppose it really is.

  Her eyes went to Griff O’Neal, standing next to me, and I knew she would lure him away to be fascinated. “Lieutenant O’Neal, we met the other night in the Rose and Crown. Nice to see you again,” she murmured with a sideways glance through long lashes, as if they had enjoyed more than half a bitter. “How long have you known Poppy? We grew up together, always been great friends, haven’t we, Pops?” She didn’t make it sound like being my friend was much fun either.

  “Poppy and I met my first evening here,” Griff said. “It was da
rk, and it was late: we sort of bumped into each other.” He smiled at me as if our meeting had been the most fascinating experience of his arrival. “It was quite an introduction.” I was grateful that he stayed by my side and was not enticed away by Fenella’s compelling brand of sex appeal. After a thoughtful glance at me, she drifted off to talk to a tall captain, who blushed with delight that she had chosen him, and I decided that I rather liked Griff O’Neal.

  “Why didn’t you tell me the other night that your grandfather owned this house? I felt like such a fool when I found out that the Redfern family has lived here forever.”

  I smiled up at him. “As you said to Fenella, it was quite an introduction. There didn’t seem to be time to give you my entire family history.” I wanted to excuse my ungracious behavior, but dinner was announced, and we walked in an informal group across the hall to the dining room.

  “Beautiful staircase, Mrs. Redfern, is it Jacobean?” Duchovny asked, and Granny smiled with pleasure.

  “It certainly is, Colonel, and there is an interesting story attached to it. Ask Poppy to tell you all about the Gunpowder Plot of 1605 . . . She knows the history of this lovely old building, and our wicked ancestors, better than I do.” I could have laughed aloud; my granny had no doubt appreciated Fenella’s arrival onstage—only an Edwardian woman could applaud another’s sense of dramatic entrance. But she had obviously decided that Fenella had had enough of the limelight, and she knows how much I love the story, long enjoyed by the Redferns, about an ancestor who had been executed for treason. Several heads turned in my direction with the hope that a fascinating tale was about to be told.

  “Is it true that one of your ancestors was executed for treason?” Everyone leaned forward. I am often tongue-tied in mixed company, and small talk is not something I am good at, but the history of our unorthodox ancestors makes for a good story, and I had enjoyed two very ginny cocktails. I looked around the table—Fenella was at the far end in deep flirtation with her tall captain.

  “Yes, it is true. His name was Everard Digby. He was a young and very political Catholic. Everard and his wife, Mary, had converted to Catholicism, which in early-sixteen-hundreds England was a very chancy thing to do, since Henry VIII’s departure from the Church of Rome eighty years before. Like many Catholics of his time, Digby hoped the new monarch, King James VI of Scotland, who became our King James I of England, would be more sympathetic to English Catholics since his mother, Mary, Queen of Scots, was not only a devout Catholic but one who had plotted all her life to bring Scotland and England back to papal Rome.”

  “Isn’t she the one that was executed by Good Queen Bess for treason?”

  “The very one. Mary was rather a tempestuous character: she was always in the middle of some scheme or plot, all of which failed.

  “Unfortunately, the new king of England showed little tolerance for the Catholic nobility, and the persecution of Catholics continued. A group of young aristocrats led by Robert Catesby and including Everard Digby decided to assassinate the king and rid themselves of the strongly Protestant House of Lords at the same time. Their plan was that they would put King James’s nine-year-old daughter, Princess Elizabeth, on the throne as the new Catholic head of state and rule as her protectors. They put barrels of gunpowder in the cellars under the Houses of Parliament to blow up the king and the House of Lords when Parliament reopened. Unfortunately for them, gunpowder in those days was particularly unreliable. The plot failed, and Everard Digby and his coconspirators were all herded up and executed.”

  “Off with their heads!” Tall, even for an American, Captain Peterson was a giant of a man. He threw back his big blond head and laughed at his joke.

  “They were not quite so lenient in those days. I am afraid they were hanged, disemboweled, and then their bodies quartered and nailed up at the four gates to London as a warning—the penalty for high treason.”

  “You mean they really did that?” Disbelief and laughter echoed around the table.

  “Yes, they really did that.”

  “And is it still? The penalty for treason,” Griff asked, and I shook my head.

  “No, of course not. We are not quite that savage!”

  “I heard your grandmother say they took up the floorboards and the staircase to this house,” Peterson said, leaning forward to look across me as he winked at Griff. “Why was that?”

  “In those days if you were executed for treason, your family were also punished. Everything you owned was forfeit to the Crown. Apparently, Digby, at his trial, pled guilty and asked for forgiveness. ‘I request that all my property might be preserved for my wife and children . . . I also request that I be beheaded instead of hanged.’ Well, they were lenient with Mary Digby, but not with poor Everard.”

  “What happened to her, to Mary?”

  “The local Protestants in the area couldn’t bear to think that Mary would get off so easily. They took out the staircase and lifted the boards throughout the ground floor. It must have been awfully difficult to sleep on the joists, because they took all her furniture too—every stick of it. Years afterward a new staircase, the one you see today, was built.”

  “That’s a really good story—do you believe it?” Peterson asked.

  “Yes, of course I do. It is historical fact.”

  “That’s quite a cautionary tale,” Griff chimed in. “We must remember not to upset the locals—can you imagine eating dinner on just the joists?”

  The table was beautifully laid with good-quality china; silver and crystal shone in the candlelight, and the generous dinner that was put before us was delicious.

  “Must be difficult for your grandmother to see strangers living in her house.” Griff’s voice was pitched for only me to hear, and I was touched by his sensitivity.

  “My grandmother might not look it, but she is quite a tough old bird. But it’s her garden she misses the most.”

  In the center of the long, well-polished table were three arrangements of Granny’s favorite Old Blush roses. She had smiled at them when she came into the dining room, as if she had been greeted by old friends, and I heard Duchovny say, “You know, if you would like to come up to the house and enjoy your garden, Mrs. Redfern, we would be delighted to have you here.”

  Granny’s smile deepened. “How very kind of you, Colonel. I would love to. But I would have to bring the verger with me; it is as much his garden as mine.”

  “The verger?” It was quite clear that Colonel Duchovny had no idea what she meant.

  “Our sacristan,” explained Cedric Fothergill, who had been enjoying a perfect beef consommé as he listened to the talk around him. “The Anglican Church appoints a member of the parish who is responsible for the order and upkeep of the church buildings. Kind of like a butler but with gravedigging responsibilities!” There was a ripple of laughter around the table. “Our verger’s name is Leonard Smith and he’s also Mrs. Redfern’s right-hand man, or was her right-hand man, in her garden before . . . well, before you lot arrived.”

  “Your vicar is quite a character. He’s nothing like how I imagined a vicar in an English country parish would look.” Griff was thoroughly enjoying himself. He sipped his wine and gazed across the table at Mr. Fothergill.

  “How does a vicar in a country parish look?”

  “Short, balding, fat, and jovial was what I had in mind. Why isn’t his wife here—they can marry in the English church, can’t they?”

  “Yes, but Mr. Fothergill chose not to marry. His house is kept for him by Mrs. Martin. She is the parish’s pillar of strength: caring and kind, but with boundless energy and frighteningly efficient.”

  “So, why hasn’t he married her?”

  I laughed at the idea of Cedric Fothergill marrying the rotund and matronly Mrs. Martin. “She’s at least sixty. But there is a rumor.” I lowered my voice. “Apparently, Mr. Fothergill fell in love, about ten years ago, with a de
an’s daughter. She was young, pretty, and loved the theater (one of our vicar’s passions), but when Mrs. Martin said she did not think she could possibly share her vicarage with another woman, Mr. Fothergill hesitated for a little too long and the vicar’s daughter did rather better for herself and married a bishop. I have no idea if this is true or not.”

  “Jilted!”

  “I don’t know about that. He just chose not to lose Mrs. Martin.” I didn’t add that Cedric Fothergill possibly prefers a life of untroubled comfort over the ups and downs of passionate love.

  Talk around the table, led by my grandfather, had returned to the topic of our ancient Gothic church and its charming old Georgian vicarage.

  “Colonel Duchovny and I were wondering if we might arrange for some of his officers to come to Sunday service at Saint Bartholomew’s. Cedric, what do you think? It might go some way to mending the relationship between the village and our American friends.” My grandfather and Colonel Duchovny had had their heads together after Ivy and Doreen’s funeral, and I realized that this dinner had been cooked up as an opportunity to discuss how best to heal the rift in our Anglo-American alliance.

  “I think it is a splendid idea.” Mr. Fothergill spoke around a large mouthful of succulent beef. “We could do Sunday lunch afterward.”

  What on earth is he thinking? I asked myself. Who is going to cook this Sunday lunch and what on earth are we to eat? I couldn’t see how we could measure up to the kind of hospitality we were being offered this evening—except perhaps for the gin.

  Grandad put down his glass and looked at his wife for her support. “We could certainly ask two or three of you over for luncheon after Matins. My dear, do you think we might fit that many in our dining room, with the Rev of course, and perhaps”—he glanced at Fenella—“you and your parents might like to join us.”

  Fenella looked up from an intense conversation with the very southern Lieutenant Colonel Franklin. I didn’t think she looked too enthusiastic. Sunday lunches after morning service were hardly what she and her family were used to. The Bradleys have always kept their relationship with the village formal, preferring the sophisticated company of more elite families in the county. I suppressed a giggle at the thought of Fenella and her snobbish mother eating lunch with us—they might have graced us with a visit to Reaches, but they would hardly be enthralled with lunch at the lodge. But the idea was taken up with enthusiasm by Cedric Fothergill and my grandmother.