The China Governess

by Margery Allingham

  ‘Julia’s father? Oh! I’m sorry. He didn’t tell me. I thought he was being perfectly frank with me.’

  ‘I think he was.’ The man in the spectacles hastened to prevent any further damage. ‘He spoke to me about you quite a long time ago when you and Julia were first going around together. He and I have been friends since we were both up at Cambridge, so it’s quite natural for us to gossip about our various interests when we run into each other. He asked me if I’d heard a spiteful little tale which was going the rounds and I had not, but I was interested and so when I received an invitation to Angevin to see some ceramics I accepted. It was there I encountered Mrs. Broome.’

  ‘I see. I’m sorry. How did you know she was at the Well House now?’

  ‘Julia told me.’

  ‘Julia!’ His voice quivered. ‘Is she pulling strings too?’

  ‘You can hardly expect the poor girl not to be interested.’ Mr. Campion spoke with asperity. ‘Don’t be a fathead. She’s in love with you and she’s left at the starting post, so to speak. Naturally she’s desperate.’

  ‘Do you think I don’t know that? And do you think I’m not desperate myself?’ The violence of the young man’s protest was unexpected. There was a raw force about him which was completely hidden and unsuspected in the normal way. It startled Mr. Campion, since it seemed out of character in one whom he had assumed to be a typical young Oxford success-type.

  ‘The point your old college chum doesn’t seem to have confided to you,’ the boy continued bitterly, ‘is that he has extracted a promise from me not to see or speak to Julia until all this has been cleared up. Moreover he hasn’t explained that fact to her yet. Because he knows she wouldn’t wear it, I suppose!’

  ‘Why do you?’

  ‘Wear it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Timothy blinked.

  ‘Do you know, I don’t know,’ he said at last. ‘I’ve been wondering. It’s just that in my heart I believe the old buzzard is right, I imagine. I’ve never believed in heredity consciously before and I don’t know that I do now, but I certainly like to know what is behind me. Probably I’ve always been too much aware of everything I thought was there. Now that it’s – well, that it’s all been altered, I feel like an untethered balloon. I’m afraid that’s Mrs. Broome’s contribution.’

  ‘Ah.’ Mr. Campion perceived the position. ‘She need only just hand your bag in. If you don’t want to see her, Lugg can simply take it from her in the passage. There’s someone coming up now, I fancy. You hear everything in these old buildings.’

  ‘A fac’ which ‘as bin useful in its time,’ said Mr. Lugg as he lumbered out into the narrow hallway, closing the door behind him.

  As in many old London houses, the dividing walls were thin, and made of pine panelling, and as the outer door opened the murmur of protesting voices was very audible.

  Timothy stood up abruptly. ‘That’s Julia!’

  He pulled the door open and Mr. Lugg, for once completely put out, stepped back to admit two women.

  Julia appeared first, looking smartly casual as usual, in a loose grey woollen coat and a heavy multi-coloured silk headscarf. Mrs. Broome followed her, neat in tweeds and beret and tightly buttoned cape gloves. They came sweeping in, feminine and possessive and upset, and filled the whole apartment so that both Lugg and Campion were dispossessed in a matter of seconds and Timothy, his bath-robe wrapped round him like a toga, met the full force of the invasion.

  ‘Oh, what has happened to you?’ Julia would have flung her arms about his neck but he repulsed her gently. He was relaxed but very much aloof.

  ‘Nothing much. I’m all right. I had a dust up with a bigger boy. That’s all.’ He turned to Mrs. Broome. ‘Did you bring me some clothes?’ He gave her no name but added ‘Please’ as an afterthought.

  Mrs. Broome did not look at him. She was more than twice his age but her mood was unmistakable. They were in the midst of a serious quarrel.

  ‘They’re in the case,’ she said without raising her eyes, her lashes looking long against her weatherbeaten cheeks. ‘Everything you could possibly want lugged right across London at a moment’s notice by me and the sweetest, prettiest little princess of a girl who’s much too good for you and I don’t care who I say it in front of.’ She flashed a defiant stare at the nearest stranger, who happened to be Mr. Lugg. He was regarding her in pious horror and now stepped back involuntarily. The appealing glance he shot at his employer stirred Mr. Campion to action.

  ‘It is most kind of you, Mrs. Broome,’ he said firmly. ‘Could I ask you to unpack them in the bedroom?’

  ‘In a minute, sir.’ The tremendous authority of the nursery met him like physical resistance. ‘There’s just something I ought to say first. I’m responsible for bringing Miss Julia. In fact I made her come with me. Before you rang she came to the Well House looking for Mr. Timothy to tell him something. As soon as I heard what it was – I got it out of her, she didn’t want to tell me – I said at once that she’d better come up here with me. Some things are serious. Some tales are dangerous and must be stopped. “We’ll go and thresh it out once and for all”, I said. “And then perhaps he’ll stand up for himself and not go condoning every cock-and-bull story told about him. At least he’ll know this isn’t right”, I said. I was there and the only thing he did was to open the door and in she fell. . . .’

  The final words meant nothing to Mr. Campion and Lugg but their effect on Timothy Kinnit was considerable.

  His face grew with fury and he turned on her. ‘Nan! Go home at once. I’ll talk to you later. Hurry!’

  ‘I won’t, you know. Mr. Timmy, Mr. Timmy! It’s im . . . portant!’

  There was an ominous gulp on the final word and all three men saw to their dismay the dreadful signs of disintegration: the swimming eyes, the reddening nose, the mouth opening raggedly like a sodden paper bag. Mrs. Broome was about to cry.

  Mr. Campion and his henchman stood helpless but Timothy was experienced in such emergencies. He took a step towards the suitcase and inquired softly: ‘Did you bring my brown shoes?’

  She could only just hear him and the little effort which she had to make in order to catch the words distracted her attention. It was as if they saw the tears actually receding.

  ‘Brown shoes? You don’t want brown shoes. I brought your blue suit. Black shoes with blue cloth, you know that.’

  He did not argue but continued to look disappointed, consolidating the position.

  Mrs. Broome’s happy, self-assured little smile reappeared like sunshine. ‘Only b.o.u.n.d.e.r.s. wear brown shoes with a blue lounge suit, or that is what I was always told,’ she said gaily, one eye on the audience. ‘Perhaps I’m old-fashioned but it’s very nice to have some little rules.’ And having reduced one school of snobbery to absurdity she returned brightly to the task she had come to perform.

  ‘Well now,’ she said briskly before Timothy could stop her. ‘That Basil Toberman has privileges because he’s almost part of the family, but even so he musn’t be allowed to go about saying you helped to kill a poor little old lady.’

  If she was striving to capture his attention she succeeded. He stood staring at her, his bathrobe festooned about him, his expression blank with horror.

  ‘What the hell is all this?’ he demanded, turning to Julia.

  The girl had been sitting on the arm of a couch, her head bowed and her long silk legs stretched elegantly. Now she raised her face towards him, her cheeks flushing red and white.

  ‘Of course that’s only half true.’ she said frankly. ‘I really came round because I wanted any excuse to see you, I suppose, but the story is going about and I do think it ought to be stopped. Ralph Quy rang me this morning and told me that out at dinner in Knightsbridge last night he heard that you’d got in a temper with an old lady from South Africa and shaken her or frightened her or something so that she had a heart attack and died, and that Eustace Kinnit had hushed it all up “as usual”.’

  ‘“A
s usual”? What does that mean?’

  ‘I don’t know, Tim. Don’t be angry with me. I just thought it was a story which ought to be scotched pretty quickly.’ She struggled on with an explanation which she found distasteful but important. ‘It’s silly and untrue I know, but it’s being linked with the other business. The inference is that you’re reverting to type. You know, like a dog or a tiger or something, all right about the house until it becomes adult.’

  ‘When it has to be put in a zoo.’ Timothy sat down heavily and put his hands through his hair. ‘This is a little much, isn’t it? Did old Ralph convey that Basil was definitely responsible for this item?’

  ‘Well, yes he did. That was what he telephoned to tell me. He told me to warn you that we ought to get hold of Basil Toberman and stop him spreading dirt which wasn’t funny any more.’

  ‘As far as I’m concerned it never was.’ Timothy was irritated but not as angry as he might have been and Mr. Campion, who was listening to the exchange with tremendous interest, eyed him curiously. His next remark was unexpected. ‘Basil is a peculiar chap,’ he said. ‘He doesn’t mean these things he says. He just talks to reassure himself. He means us no harm.’

  It was a patron’s point of view and highly mistaken, as Mr. Campion knew for a fact. Suddenly he understood that it must be the Kinnit view of all the Tobermans, the grander family’s assessment of a ‘lesser breed’, and for a fleeting moment he caught a glimpse of Basil Toberman’s genuine grievance. Meanwhile Timothy was still talking in complete innocence and good faith.

  ‘I’ll tackle the old blighter,’ he said. ‘Don’t be too hard on him, Julia. It’s just one of those infuriating things. You can’t really blame him you see, because in a way it’s true.’

  ‘What is?’

  ‘The story. I don’t suppose poor old Miss Saxon would have died just then if it hadn’t been for me.’ He got up abruptly and smiled ruefully at Campion. ‘I’ll go and dress if you’ll forgive me,’ he said. ‘Nanny Broome will explain all this if you care to hear it. I see I’m not going to stop her.’

  Julie was looking at Mr. Campion. ‘You do agree that it matters, don’t you?’ she said earnestly. ‘You heard Basil Toberman talking about Tim down at Angevin. He wasn’t talking for talking’s sake. He meant it. Tim won’t believe that.’

  ‘And don’t try to make him, Miss.’ Mrs. Broome spoke placidly from the other side of the room. She was sitting on one of the few hard chairs the flat contained, in what was once called a “ladylike attitude”, both her feet close together and hard on the ground, her thickly gloved hands folded upon her good leather handbag.

  ‘It would break Mr. Tim’s heart if he found out that someone really close to him didn’t love him,’ she continued devastatingly. ‘“People who really know you always love you if you’re lovable”. I taught him to believe that when he was the tiniest little boy because I don’t like people who are always seeing snakes, do you, sir?’ She put the question directly to Campion with a bright smile conveying that she had no doubt of his answer.

  The thin man laughed. ‘I’m a little afraid of the people who never see them at all,’ he said gently.

  ‘Are you?’ She seemed astonished. ‘I was always taught that if you didn’t pull pussy’s tail she wouldn’t scratch you, and there’s a lot of truth in that whatever they say, but of course there are a few horrible boys like Basil and he really ought to be stopped before he does some real harm, which is why we’ve come, isn’t it Miss Julia? We’re not just bearing tales, I mean.’

  Julia opened her mouth, caught Mr. Campion’s eye and ceased to worry quite so much. She returned to Mrs. Broome.

  ‘Tell Mr. Campion exactly what happened when Miss – what was her name? – Miss Saxon fell. Tell him exactly what you told me.’

  ‘Did’e lay a ’and on ’er?’ The question, put with earnest interest by Mr. Lugg, who had been forgotten, startled everybody and Mrs. Broome turned to him, scandalized.

  ‘Of course not! That’s another thing I’ve ground into Mr. Tim. Never never never hit a lady!’

  ‘Well then, the tale’s all cock,’ said Lugg, dismissing it. ‘Don’t worry and don’t repeat it. ’E didn’t touch ’er and that’s the end. Wot did ’appen to ’er? For the sake of the record.’

  Mrs. Broome hesitated and he stood watching her, his head on one side, his little eyes very intelligent.

  ‘Start wiv ’oo she was,’ he suggested.

  Mrs. Broome’s radiant smile reappeared. ‘Well that was very difficult to find out, although I tried hard enough,’ she said frankly. ‘She didn’t want to be called a lady’s maid, you see, and she wasn’t a governess because the child was too ill for one. When I was a girl she’d have been a mother’s help and liked it, except that she’d have been sixteen and not sixty. “I wonder Mrs. Telpher didn’t feel it was too much of a responsibility bringing you with her,” I said. “I mean you’re quite as likely to get ill on the journey as the kiddie, aren’t you?” She didn’t like that but I was right, wasn’t I?’

  Lugg began to laugh in the high teetering way which only escaped him when he was genuinely amused.

  ‘An’ she was the one ’oo got ’erself killed!’ he said. ‘There’s justice for you. That’s life that is. She’d come from Souf Africa ’ad she?’

  ‘So she said, and you needn’t think we didn’t get on. She used to talk to me by the hour. She told me all about the diamonds and everything.’

  ‘Diamonds! Now we’re coming to something. Where do they come in?’

  ‘They don’t. I never saw them.’ She sounded regretful and the childlike streak in her character had never been more apparent. Her face actually saddened. ‘But they’re there in the safe deposit.’ she added, cheering visibly. ‘Mrs. Telpher put them there because, as she told Miss Saxon, it wasn’t fair to Mr. Eustace to keep them in the house. They’re wonderful. Enormous. If you hadn’t known how rich she is you’d never credit they were real. Miss Saxon told me that she couldn’t think of them without her mouth watering.’

  Julia leaned forward.

  ‘Tell them about the kitchen door,’ she suggested.

  ‘Yes, well, that is what killed the little lady, dyed black hair, painted face and all.’ Mrs. Broome permitted herself to be kept to the point. ‘Mr. Tim and I were in the kitchen having silly words about something which after all did happen over twenty years ago, when he suddenly stopped shouting at me and said, “Nan, there’s someone listening outside that blasted door.” It’s an old stone kitchen. We live in an antique up here all right. I wonder Miss Alison gets any help at all. . . . Anyhow, he leapt across the matting and wrenched open the heavy old door and there she was leaning against the other side. So down she came, poor silly old thing, right down the two steps on to the stones. Mr. Tim and I picked her up at once but we certainly didn’t shake her. She only said that afterwards to Mrs. Telpher, to take everybody’s mind off her listening at the door.’

  ‘She did not die at once, then?’ Mr. Campion appeared fascinated by the story.

  ‘Oh no, thank goodness! That would have frightened Mr. Timmy and me! She waited until she got into bed, poor little dear, and then she had a heart attack and died and wasn’t found until the morning. The doctor said the fall was quite enough to bring it on with a heart like hers. She ought not to have taken the job,’ she added earnestly, ‘not when there was a child to be considered. She might have dropped it or frightened it, you never know.’

  ‘When did she tell Mrs. Telpher about the shaking?’

  ‘The night before. She went to bed early, with me fussing round. Mrs. Telpher was worried, because of course they were in someone else’s house and illness and accidents are a trouble however polite the people are. In the morning it was dreadful when we knew she was dead. Mr. Tim felt so guilty about pulling the door open and he was worried to death anyhow about the silly evacuee story of Mr. Basil’s, which really is the stupidest thing I ever heard, that he went off as soon as he knew from the doctor that he
wasn’t to blame and he has hardly been home since. He’s a very sensitive boy.’

  Lugg raised a heavy hand as if to put it on her shoulder, thought better of it and lowered it hastily.

  ‘Wot is stoopid about the evac story?’ he demanded. ‘Why shouldn’t the young feller try to find aht abaht ’is family?’

  ‘Because he’s got a perfectly nice family of people he’s very fond of and knows all about and takes after by this time!’ Mrs. Broome blazed at him in sudden annoyance. ‘Why Miss Julia’s father wants to upset all that I do not know. Besides, suppose Tim did find a family he seemed to have been born into – I don’t think he can, mind you, but suppose he did – then what could that do but mystify him completely, poor boy?’

  ‘Mystify ’im?’ Lugg was puzzled.

  ‘Of course. You don’t know anything about people by seeing them! I remember a lady coming to inspect St. Mary’s Home where I was brought up and seeing us all in our lovely Elizabethan uniforms we were so proud of, and bursting into tears all over us because “it was wicked to dress us like charity children”. We nearly crowned her we were so offended. She saw us but she didn’t know us, did she?’

  Lugg stepped back from her and permitted himself his little high-pitched laugh again.

  ‘You’ve got it all sorted out, ’aven’t yer?’ he said admiringly. ‘“Mum knows best”, that’s gointer be my name for you! Your young lordship ought’er be dressed by now. You’ll all go ’ome together I expeck.’ He shuffled out of the room and Julia got up hastily and looked at Campion.

  ‘I don’t want to leave it like this,’ she began. ‘Basil Toberman is doing Tim active harm. He’s got to be stopped. If I thought —’

  She was silenced in mid-sentence by the reappearance of Mr. Lugg whose face was blank with surprise.

  ‘Gorn.’ He announced. ‘He went down the fire escape so as not to disturb us. Winder’s wide open. Wot’s the young feller up to, eh?’