Broken Music

by Marjorie Eccles

  ‘I’ve brought you a book, I hope it isn’t one you’ve read.’ He glanced briefly at Diary of a Nobody, shook his head and murmured his thanks.

  ‘It’s very light. I think you’ll find it amusing. Have you replied to your dear Emily’s letter yet, Jack?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘That’s not really fair, is it? She must be waiting for an answer.’

  ‘Then she’ll have a long wait. I won’t have anybody marrying me out of sympathy.’

  ‘Why don’t you try to have a little sympathy for her? Hasn’t it ever occurred to you that she might love you? It’s wrong, you know, and not like you, I’m sure, not to face up to things, to make two people unhappy. Wouldn’t it be tremendous, if you went back home and got your old job back…?’

  His face twisted. ‘Are you pulling my leg?’

  ‘Don’t make bitter jokes like that, Jack, please.’

  ‘How do you suggest I should manage such a thing, then? Peg legs, I suppose you mean.’

  ‘You can do it, if anyone can. You’re a hero; they’ve given you the Military Cross for what you did, and I know how you got it – going out into no-man’s-land to bring a wounded comrade who was caught on the wire, under enemy fire—’

  ‘Yes, and he died after all, and I lost my legs. Who’s told you all this rubbish?’

  ‘Sergeant Major Broadbent, and it’s not rubbish. You’re a hero to him, too.’

  ‘How did I come to be in the same hospital with that fool? He talks too damn much.’

  It was a familiar conversation, and never got much further than this, but Eunice kept faith with herself that it would, one day. She rose and laid a hand on his. ‘Think about what I’ve said, Jack. And do try to have some thought for your poor Emily. Courage, mon ami.’

  He hesitated. ‘I’m sorry I was rude, I’ll try to do better next time. Goodbye, Miss Eunice, and thank you for the book.’

  She hurried away before he should see the tears filling her eyes.

  After his impromptu lunch on the Hill, Reardon, leaving his motorbike where it was behind the hedge, had wandered down the village street until he came to the humpback bridge, the oldest of the three bridges which spanned the shallow, winding river. Two further wooden bridges also crossed it, for there were houses and cottages clustering either side, but from here he had a good view of the police house on the main street, so that he could observe the comings and goings, while remaining discreetly stationed out of sight.

  He leant against the stone parapet. After the winter, the water had risen to the level of the banks either side, though nowhere was it a deep river. Flooding, he had been told, was no unusual event: it regularly rose and spread out across the water meadows, along the street and into the cottage gardens, but in its retreat leaving behind a rich silt, wonderful for cabbages and dahlias, roses, beans and rhubarb. Bracey’s garden certainly testified to this. From here Reardon had a good view of its flourishing vegetable patch, garden hut, chicken run and a pigsty beyond.

  It was very quiet, the occasional sounds of the village were muted: the clop of a horse towards the smithy and the subsequent ring of the anvil, a woman shouting a greeting across a garden to another. The two shops were closed, until after the funeral. The children were still in school, the men at work. The clock on the squat tower of the church struck the half-hour.

  The church and the tall-chimneyed rectory and the Greville Arms were the only large buildings in the village, with the bulk of Oaklands Park in the distance. Looking across the river towards the big house, you could see the small lake belonging to Oaklands, curving around the base of the Hill. They called it a lake, but it was in fact a backwater of the river, fed also by a spring that rose in the woods surrounding it. He watched a long-legged heron fishing in the shallows. Along the banks willows grew, their arching branches dipping to the water. The grass was starred with some little, shining gold flowers he thought were celandines. Emerging from winter, the bright day looked new and hopeful, the village peaceful and uneventful, and for a moment, part of him understood why Ted Bracey had dug himself in here. He was nearing retirement now, a man originally from a Devon village, Reardon remembered, used to an easy, undemanding countryman’s existence. One that would never suit Herbert Reardon.

  Yet somewhere in this new world, he too must find a place. Alone, of course, he would always be alone, what else could he expect?

  He looked up and at that moment saw his patience was to be rewarded. Ted Bracey came out of the house, helmeted, steering his bicycle with one hand, the other still buttoning up the neck of his tunic. He mounted and began to make his slow, stately way towards the centre of the village. Reardon easily caught up with him. ‘Morning, Constable.’

  Bracey slowed even more, and became official. ‘Morning, sir,’ he said, touching his helmet.

  ‘You won’t remember me, but we’ve met before, Constable. The name’s Reardon. That case here, just before the war, that young woman who drowned, Marianne Wentworth?’

  After a moment’s slow inspection of him, Bracey replied in his slow West Country burr. ‘I do remember you. Sergeant Reardon. What brings you here again, then?’ he asked, dismounting and wheeling his bicycle. Reardon did not disabuse him regarding his status, but walked by his side.

  ‘I needed a holiday and remembered this as good walking country. Maybe you could recommend some good walks?’

  ‘Don’t do much walking meself.’ Reardon could believe it. Bracey fitted into his tight uniform like a sausage into its skin. ‘You want to ask the rector about that. He’s the one who does the walking round here.’

  Reardon had been wanting to steer the conversation around to the Wentworths and now it was Bracey himself who had done it. He wondered if it had been done on purpose, but he decided that was perhaps overestimating the constable’s powers of perception, though he was obviously wondering what Reardon wanted. ‘Would that be the Reverend Wentworth? Father of the same young woman we’ve just mentioned? Odd case, that. Never got to the bottom of it, did we? You can’t get many like that around here.’

  ‘And thank the good Lord for it.’

  ‘Amen to that. All the same, I don’t suppose it’s been forgotten.’

  ‘Nine days’ wonder. Nobody wants to remember it, now, poor young lady.’

  ‘But in your capacity, you must recall it. I mean to say, that sort of thing was out of the usual run for you, wasn’t it? Pub keeping open too long, unlicensed guns, abrogation of fishing rights by strangers from the towns, that’s about it around these parts, isn’t it? You’re very pleasantly situated here, very comfortable life, I reckon.’

  ‘Mustn’t grumble.’

  Reardon saw what Henry Paskin had meant about Bracey: a leisurely life in Broughton Underhill inducing in Bracey a certain disinclination to bestir himself, or to disturb the status quo. The constable stopped and leant his bicycle against the garden wall of a cottage, propping himself up beside it. He gave Reardon a look that could only be called old-fashioned. ‘Don’t mind me asking, but are you here, official like?’

  ‘Not at all. Holiday, as I said.’

  ‘So why all these questions?’

  Reardon had prepared for this. He hesitated, then asked, ‘Remember Gifford, the superintendent in charge of the case?’

  Bracey nodded. His chins wobbled. He loosed the tight collar of his tunic. ‘Retired now, hasn’t he?’

  ‘He’s writing his memoirs. And this was one case that was puzzling.’ Both statements were true, but he hoped Gifford would never hear that he seemed to have acquired a self-appointed amanuensis.

  ‘That so? Well, what is it he don’t remember? It’ll all be down in the records somewhere, in black and white,’ Bracey said, preparing to set out again. He was sharper than he looked, if no more inclined to put himself out.

  ‘The facts, yes. It’s what’s behind the facts that matters, though, isn’t it? What did you know of the Wentworth girl?’

  ‘I knew who she was, of course, but I don’t thin
k more than half a dozen words ever passed between us. Time of day and so on. Nothing more.’

  ‘Nobody seemed to want to talk to us at the time. In fact, it was all a bit hushed up, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Just as well. They wouldn’t have liked it else, up at the Big House.’

  ‘Oaklands Park? What had it to do with them?’

  ‘Happened on their land, didn’t it? And that jetty wasn’t safe, everybody knew it, should have been taken down or repaired years before, not left to rot all of its own. They didn’t want no blame.’

  ‘Well, you see, that’s the problem. If Marianne Wentworth knew it wasn’t safe, why did she run out on to it? What was she doing down there at all, in fact?’

  Bracey produced a pipe, looked at it for a moment, then put it back in his pocket. ‘You married? Children?’

  ‘No,’ Reardon said shortly.

  ‘Then you won’t know about young women, growing up. I’ve two daughters of my own, both married with their own families now, and I tell you, there’s no knowing what they’ll do at that age. It wasn’t the first time. I’ve seen her more than once going down there when she thought nobody was about.’

  ‘Who did she meet down there?’

  The constable shrugged his massive shoulders. ‘Now, how should I know she did meet anybody? None of my business.’

  ‘Well. I should think, as the village policeman, it was very much your business.’

  ‘Look here, Sergeant Reardon, I’m here to keep the peace, not to go shoving my nose into other folks’ concerns. I’ve already said more’n I should, and I hope it won’t go down in Superintendent Gifford’s memoirs.’

  ‘I can certainly promise you that, Constable,’ Reardon said, as Bracey nodded, mounted his bicycle and proceeded in a stately manner down the street.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Young Master Noakes had scarcely yet made his appearance into this troublous world, but his mother was already up and about again. Mattie, young and strong, couldn’t abide the idea of lying idly in bed when there were things to be done. A whole month, the conventional lying-in time, wasn’t even to be thought of. Her mother had never had that luxury and she’d been none the worse after seven children. As a concession, she had promised the midwife she would rest as much as she could, and for the sake of her Sam and Baby Sammy, she was keeping to her word – cooking bacon and eggs for their guest could hardly be classed as hard work.

  Herbert Reardon was enjoying a breakfast such as he hadn’t seen before the war.

  He had made the right decision to seek accommodation here at the village pub, rather than use his motorcycle to travel back and forth to Dudley every day, he thought as he munched the last pieces of crisp bacon and black pudding, mopped up egg yolk with his fried bread and prepared to embark on the toast and…real butter, by God, if he wasn’t mistaken! No bread and scrape for the village of Broughton Underhill, or at least not for the Greville Arms. He poured himself a last cup of tea. Unfortunately, there was barely a scant teaspoonful of sugar in the bottom of the basin, but sugar was still scarce as gold dust and you couldn’t expect everything.

  It had, of course, occurred to him that he was being given special treatment, although he did wonder why, because he knew he must have been recognised by now, despite his face, marked down for who he was. A stranger, who was asking the sort of questions he was asking, it wouldn’t have taken long for two and two to be put together.

  They’d given him breakfast in a small parlour off the main bar, a shining-clean room (as was the rest of the public house), and lit a good fire. He sat back with his tea and was just about to put his feet up on the fender when the young landlady came in. ‘Everything all right, sir?’

  ‘Best breakfast I’ve had in years. You do yourselves well in Broughton Underhill.’

  ‘Not to say that – but we like to give our guests the best of what we have.’

  She was a well-spoken young woman with a kind of Irish beauty – pale skin and dark hair, very blue eyes. He liked the way both she and her husband met his gaze fairly and squarely, though he was getting used to people avoiding it, and didn’t blame them. It was some time before he had been able to meet his own reflection himself.

  ‘Can you spare me a moment or two, Mrs Noakes?’ he asked as she began to clear away his breakfast things with movements that were quick and efficient.

  Unfortunately, he seemed to have timed his request badly. At that instant what sounded like the cries of a very young baby began somewhere in the back regions, but she answered, smiling, ‘I can if you can give me about ten minutes. My baby needs seeing to first.’

  She picked up the tray, balancing it on her forearm while she opened the door with her other hand, practised movements that were too quickly done for him to get up and help her. In almost exactly ten minutes, she was back, smoothing her apron and standing in front of him. He motioned to her to sit down. ‘I dare say I’d better explain who I am.’

  She sat down neatly and crossed her ankles, her hands, large and capable, work roughened, clasped together on her lap. ‘I know who you are, Sergeant Reardon, and I can guess why you’re here.’

  News had got around as quickly as he’d expected. No doubt he’d been the subject of interested speculation in the bar last night. He’d given the idea of a drink there a miss and gone to bed early. ‘It’s not Sergeant anymore, Mrs Noakes. I’m not yet back in the police force.’ (Factually true, if deliberately misleading.) ‘Which might make you think I’ve no right to be stirring matters up again, poking my nose in.’

  ‘Why should I think that? It’s about Miss Marianne, isn’t it? It was a mystery how she died, and if it’s cleared up…well, I can’t see it matters what way. I know how it looked, but I never did think it was right, the way everything was so rushed. The police couldn’t get out fast enough. Crying shame, it was.’

  ‘There was a war just started. Things were in a turmoil.’ He trotted out the explanation, though he was gratified, if surprised, that someone at least had shared his doubts. ‘So you knew Marianne Wentworth?’

  ‘Oh, yes. I’ve lived in Broughton all my life, and I worked up at Oaklands before I married and came here – went as nursery maid when I was fourteen. Miss Eunice was already seven or eight but her nanny was too hoity-toity to manage the nursery without help. I was used to a houseful of brothers and sisters so a job like that – only one little girl, and a brother that was only home for the holidays – seemed a bit like heaven to me. Besides, she was a lovely little girl, Eunice. She looked like a picture book fairy and was no trouble, though I’m not saying she didn’t have a mind of her own…’ She smiled. ‘I’m sorry, all that’s not what you want to hear, but anyhow, that’s how I knew the Wentworth girls. They used to come up for their lessons with Miss Eunice.’

  ‘What can you remember about Marianne’s accident?’

  She looked down at her hands for a moment, then raised her eyes. ‘As you said, it was a very confusing time, but I remember it like it was yesterday. How could I forget it, with everything that was going on that time? My Sam and his mates going off together – in the Terriers they all were, and couldn’t wait to get in the fighting, you know? Silly beggars, men are, if you’ll excuse me. Women don’t see it like that, most of us, at any rate. If only they’d known! But there was that much excitement being whipped up…Well, anyway, some of us went up to Kidderminster first thing to see them off on the train – me and Phyllis Hobbs, and one or two more. Lady Sybil gave me time off, which was very good of her, considering.’

  ‘Considering what, Mrs Noakes?’

  ‘There was a party that same evening, one her ladyship had arranged for Mrs Villiers’s seventieth birthday. Any excuse for a celebration, that was always Lady Sybil! It had been planned for some time, and she refused to cancel it just on account of all the war news. There was a deal of work to be done, so it was nice of her to give me most of the day off, but she was always considerate. Mind you, I had to make up for it when I got back to the house
, straight into my cap and apron and get stuck in.’

  He had thought her quiet and reserved, but once started, she seemed glad to let come out what had evidently been on her mind for some time. He wished all witnesses were the same. ‘Family affair, was it, this party? Lot of guests?’

  ‘Twenty-eight at table there were. Family, a few special friends, and all the Wentworths. And the other two boys, of course.’

  ‘Which two would that be?’

  ‘The Rafferty boy, Steven, from the pottery, and that German…Austrian, I should say, that was staying at the rectory. They’d been together all summer, all the young folk, Mr Greville home from his music studies in Paris, and William Wentworth down from Oxford. There was always a lot of coming and going between Oaklands and the rectory. Well, of course, they were such close friends, more like family…and it was a lovely summer, that one before the war, if you remember. There was tennis and picnics and swimming in the lake, all that sort of thing, sometimes larking about in that dangerous old punt, till Mr Foley had it taken away. I bet he wished he’d had that rotten old jetty taken down, too, afterwards. The young ladies didn’t swim, of course. If they had, Miss Marianne might have saved herself…’ For a moment, her eyes clouded, then she said, ‘There was no harm in it, you know. At least…’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I suppose there was a bit of feeling between Mr Greville and the foreigner.’ Her mouth set in a disapproving line.