The Andre Norton Megapack

by Andre Norton

  “I don’t know, I’m sure. About then, I expect.” Mrs. Hartwell’s voice sounded querulous. Fredericka, who had had several occasions during the week to observe Margie’s “Mom,” thought how much she looked the part. Even now, though obviously agitated, she was also quite unable to disguise her pleasurable excitement. This was, indeed, more than a titbit, for the Village Gossip. Her fat hands moved nervously in her lap and, as she spoke, she thrust her lips forward hungrily.

  It was at this point that the doctor’s car drew up outside, and, a moment later, he entered the room quietly. He was a middle-aged man, running to fat, and with an untidy family-doctor look about him.

  “Evening, folks.” He nodded round a little absently as he entered. Then he turned to Thane. “You called me. Where—?”

  “Outside,” Thane said, and then: “Come—and you, Mohun, if you don’t mind.”

  James Brewster turned once more from his study of the darkness outside the window. “Shouldn’t some member of the family go, too?” he asked abruptly.

  “No, I think there’s no need,” Dr. Scott said in his soft reassuring doctor’s voice. “Stay here and we’ll come back presently.”

  After the men had left, Fredericka couldn’t think of anything to say to Mrs. Sutton or Mrs. Hartwell, and they sat without speaking. Mrs. Sutton seemed unaware of the presence of the others. Mrs. Hartwell fidgeted nervously and Fredericka felt that the doctor’s “presently” had stretched to a very long time when the back screen door banged and the three finally reappeared.

  Dr. Scott cleared his throat. Then he looked quickly at Mrs. Sutton and said: “We’ve had to decide on an autopsy, Margaret. I am sorry—terribly, my dear—but, well, there are certain symptoms that make me unable to determine the exact cause of death.”

  Mrs. Sutton’s hands were clenched tightly in her lap but she said in a low voice: “Of course, Ted, if that’s what seems necessary; I’m sure you wouldn’t do it otherwise.”

  And then one of Thane’s policemen arrived and moved unobtrusively into the garden. The others stood up to go as if by signal and Mrs. Hartwell said unexpectedly: “Shall I stay with you, Fredericka? I’m sure Margaret can spare me and you won’t want to be alone. I’d be glad to.”

  “It’s most kind of you, Mrs. Hartwell,” Fredericka said quickly, “but really I’d rather be alone. The policeman’s just outside and, well—”

  “I quite understand.” The usual note of petulance and hurt had returned to Mrs. Hartwell’s voice. It would have made a very good story for the next meeting of the Women’s Guild—a night of terror. It was obvious to everyone that Mrs. Hartwell did not understand, but Fredericka was too exhausted to care.

  Fredericka walked to the door and, as she stood for a moment on the walk outside, she saw that the sky was lightening along the horizon with the first hint of dawn. A bird had wakened to make his announcement to the sleeping world, and Fredericka was grateful to him for his note of cheerfulness. Peter dropped behind the others.

  “Sure you’re all right?” he asked.

  “Quite sure. I’m more than ready for bed.”

  “Good.” He put a firm hand on her shoulder for a moment and then hurried after the others.

  But when Fredericka returned to the empty house and the soiled coffee cups, a weight of depression fell on her. And when, with determination, she turned her back on the untidiness and went upstairs to bed, she could not sleep. She turned the pillow and moved from one side of the bed to the other, but she could not forget the cold body of Catherine Clay lying below in the garden and the wretched policeman keeping his silent vigil. Why hadn’t they taken her away at once?

  Finally, Fredericka switched on the light and got up to put on her bath robe. It was much better, she decided to give up the struggle. She went downstairs, collected the dirty cups and made a fresh pot of coffee. When she called the policeman, he came in and took the coffee gratefully but refused to sit down. He went back to his job, taking his steaming cup with him and Fredericka took hers to the office. Then she opened the middle desk drawer, drew out the notes for her projected book and, with her head in her hands, in a proper attitude of concentration, she began to study them intently. The lives of her three industrious “scribbling women” began to shape themselves in her mind and she reached for a block of paper with eagerness born of her sudden creative impulse and the blessed relief it gave her. It was a long time later that she looked at her watch and saw that it was half past five. Outside, the sky was streaked with crimson and the tentative bird song had now become a mighty chorus. She stood up and stretched. Then, after a moment of indecision, she tiptoed to the kitchen and, with the fascination of horror, stared out at the hammock and the dead body of Catherine Clay. Behind it the figure of the policeman paced slowly up and down like a symbol of grief.

  Fredericka had worked away her morbid fears and now, having looked at the body, she felt relieved of the weight of mystery. She could sleep at last and the whole day lay ahead. Sunday. Blessed thought. Unless, of course, the police came to perform their macabre duties and go on with their endless questioning. Surely not that, again. She lifted one weary leg after the other and went up the stairs to bed.

  In a few hours dawn brightened into day and the sun streamed in across the carpet, but Fredericka slept on.

  Chapter 5

  On a desert island somewhere in the blue Pacific, Fredericka was just reaching up to pick a large grapefruit for her breakfast when she was startled by the sound of tom-toms in the distance. She stood still and listened, tense with fear. The noise increased until it became rolling thunder and then, near at hand, she could hear the clamor of human voices, calling out again and again, as if in distress.

  At this moment she woke up. The tom-toms became loud knocks at the front door of Miss Hartwell’s bookshop. The voices became one voice, calling, “Miss Wing,” and then, more urgently, “Miss Wing, are you there?”

  With the sound, she returned from the dream to the nightmare of reality—the death of Catherine Clay and the long night. It was Thane Carey who was calling because the police had come as she had feared they must. She looked at her watch—only nine o’clock—and she had planned to sleep the whole day, dreaming away on golden sands under azure skies. But there was no escape.

  The thumping became more urgent. She went out onto the landing and called down the stairs, making no effort to keep the fury from her voice.

  “Very well, I hear you. For goodness sake can’t you even give me time to put on my bathrobe?”

  The knocking stopped and Fredericka went back to her room. She took her time but it did not soothe her ruffled spirits. Some moments later she went down the stairs and unlocked the front door.

  Thane Carey and a policeman stood outside. “Well,” she said rudely.

  “Good morning.” Thane took off his hat and looked at her intently. “You locked the door again.”

  This unwise remark was the spark to set off her smouldering anger. “Yes, and wouldn’t you yourself do the same after all that’s happened here. And didn’t I tell you last night that I have city habits, perfectly good ones that I hang on to, even in the backwoods of Massachusetts,” she exploded.

  “I’m sorry, Miss Wing, if I’ve disturbed you.” Was there a hint of a smile on his face? Really this was unbearable. “I’m afraid it’s all in the line of duty. May we come in?”

  “If you must, you must.” Fredericka stepped aside for them to enter, and then turned to go back upstairs.

  “I’d like to have a few words with you, Miss Wing, if it’s possible,” the chief of police announced to her retreating back.

  She looked down from the landing. “Very well, but, if you don’t have any objection, I would like to dress first.”

  “By all means. There’s no rush. I’m going to put my two men onto a thorough examination of the grounds. And I will do the house myself, if you don’t mind.”

  Fredericka said nothing in reply. What was there to say to this officious intrus
ion? She went into her bedroom, shut the door and started to dress slowly. The routine movements had a quieting effect on her and she began reluctantly to regret her unreasonable anger, and to remember that Thane Carey even if he was the chief of police of South Sutton, was also Peter Mohun’s friend.

  She finished dressing quickly and hurried down the stairs to find Thane busily reading her sheets of manuscript on the desk. At this sight, her anger boiled up again, but she managed to keep it in check, and she made no mention of this unpardonable act of prying. Instead she said, slowly: “I’m afraid I was rude to you. You see, you woke me up to all this mess and I’ve had more than enough of it already.”

  “You don’t like death in the country as much as you thought you would, then?”

  “I guess I’d rather keep it inside covers,” she admitted. Was he implying that this was not a natural death? What did he mean? She had been talking yesterday about murder, and this—“Will you have some breakfast with me?” she said quickly. “I think, if you don’t mind, I’ll have some anyway. I—I need it!”

  “Of course, and I’ll join you with pleasure, but just for coffee. I’ve eaten already.”

  Fredericka retreated to the kitchen and tried not to look out the window. But the impulse was too strong for her and then she saw with relief that, not only the body, but the hammock as well, had disappeared. In the near distance a policeman was beating his way slowly and systematically through the shrubbery like a bloodhound on the scent. She turned away from the window and busied herself with breakfast.

  Twenty minutes later she sat opposite Thane Carey at the small kitchen table. Sun streamed in through the open window that looked out on the back yard. The sound of bees already busy in the petunias bordering the path outside, emphasized the heavy silence between them. At last Thane spoke, but he looked down at the black coffee in his cup and stirred it unnecessarily.

  “I’m sorry about this, Miss Wing,” he said quietly. “Yesterday at the bazaar you and Mohun and my wife and I were friends theorizing about murder. Today, mur—” he coughed, “today death has made a sudden change in our relationship. You must forgive me for my intrusion on your privacy. When these things happen we policemen are forced to forget everything but our duty. All the same, I see no reason why we can’t both make the best of it and continue to be friends.”

  “Of course, and I am sorry. I’m not my best in the early morning. Coffee helps, though.” They smiled at each other across the table and then, before Thane could speak, Fredericka continued quickly: “You—you don’t think it really is murder, do you? Mrs. Sutton said she sometimes took dope. Couldn’t it be just an overdose by accident as she suggested—or—or at best, suicide—?”

  Something in her tone made Carey look up and study her face. “I don’t know a thing, and I haven’t meant to imply anything, either. We must wait for an autopsy. May I ask why you think it to be murder? You don’t honestly believe it to be either accident or suicide, do you?”

  “I—why? Oh dear, you’re too clever for me. I suppose I have felt it to be so from the start. Perhaps it’s just because I had too much to say yesterday. But, well, something in that awful look on her face—and, you’ll not forgive me for this—something in the atmosphere—has made me imagine things.”

  “I see. Well, now, my policeman reports that you kept the light on all night. If you wanted company why didn’t you let Mrs. Hartwell stay?”

  “Oh, I couldn’t sleep; so I got up, made coffee, and worked on my book. In this way I succeeded in wearing myself out and finally went to bed.”

  “I saw your manuscript. Is it to be a novel?”

  “No—about some Victorian women novelists, though.”

  He looked at her with more interest. “I try to write myself but, strange as it may seem in this quiet town, I don’t have much spare time. At the moment I’m struggling with crime in its wider aspects, but some day I’m going to take a busman’s holiday and write a really good detective story.”

  Fredericka laughed a little shamefacedly. “Yes,” she said quickly. “I gathered as much from what you said at the bazaar yesterday. Perhaps—after this—we can collaborate.”

  Fredericka saw at once that she had blundered. A mask suddenly hid the pleasant face opposite her and the chief of police said: “Perhaps. Well, I must get on with my work.” He stood up and walked toward the door, then he turned to say casually: “You didn’t miss anything from the house when you got back last night, did you?”

  “I hardly had time to. But I haven’t noticed anything wrong this morning. I’ll look around if you like.”

  “Good. I’ll be pottering about myself inside and outside, but please don’t take any notice of me or of my men. We’ll try to disturb you as little as possible, and we should finish and be off within the hour.”

  Fredericka nodded and then, when he had turned to go, a sudden thought occurred to her. “Oh, heavens—there’s that old well at the back of the house. Its cover has rotted away and one of your men may stumble into it. I—I never thought. Chris told me about it and I’ve been meaning to write to Miss Hartwell but I haven’t had time to do anything.”

  “Thanks for telling me. As a matter of fact, one of my men discovered it without falling in, I’m happy to say, and I think he’s put something over it, but it does want looking after.”

  “Thanks. I’m terribly sorry and I’ll get Chris to see what he can do.”

  Again the chief of police’s face became Thane Carey’s, the two smiled at each other, and Fredericka got up to wash the dishes with a somewhat lighter heart. By the time she had finished, Thane had completed his round of the downstairs rooms and she could hear him walking about overhead. She decided to go back to her writing and escape all her police visitors until she was free of them.

  Some time later, Thane appeared in the doorway, and when she looked up, he said quietly: “We find nothing out of the way in the house and only a few oddments in the grounds and outhouses that can probably be explained away in ten minutes. We haven’t touched anything except to take a few fingerprints and I don’t intend to bother you with any more questions until I get the doctor’s report on the autopsy. Until then, please consider yourself a free woman and”—he looked at her directly—“and, again, my apologies and thanks.”

  When he had gone, Fredericka tried to get back to her writing but the interruption had broken the spell, and though she struggled with one sentence for some moments she was forced in the end to give up and throw down her pencil. It was then that she realized how hot the day had become. Even as she sat quietly at her desk she felt sticky and breathless. She lit a cigarette and felt better. Then she got up to go into the kitchen and see if her watch could possibly be right. To her surprise she found that the loudly ticking alarm clock agreed that it was almost one. She made herself a salad and iced coffee and took her lunch on a tray out to a shady corner of the back porch. Then she went back to get a book. Trollope’s autobiography ought to give her comfort of a very solid kind.

  But in spite of having all the ingredients to spell peace and contentment, Fredericka could not sit still for long. The house and the grounds were too quiet in the heavy summer heat.

  Why hadn’t Peter come to see how she was? Why did everyone keep away? Surely she had had enough evidence of small town curiosity to know that this lack of it was strange. Perhaps the police had put a cordon outside to protect her. At this thought she laughed outright. A “cordon”—a good word for South Sutton, boasting a chief and two overgrown country boys who were his “force.”

  She thought over the questions Thane had asked her and the last remarks he had made before leaving. It was all very well for him to accuse her of thinking up things when it was quite evident that he himself suspected that Catherine Clay’s death was ‘unnatural’. Otherwise why did he suddenly become formal and ask her questions? Why was he so stiff and so obviously relieved when he left her, and was able to say that he had found nothing whatever out of the way in the house? But wh
at had he said about the grounds? “Only a few oddments”—Whatever could he mean by that?

  On a sudden impulse, Fredericka got up, walked down the steps on to the path and began, systematically, to explore the shrubbery and outbuildings as Thane’s policemen must have done.

  It was high time that she had a look around anyway. It had been a very busy morning that Chris had inconveniently chosen to show her the well with its rotting cover and her other visits to the outbuildings had been mainly to the old stable where, as Chris had explained, Miss Lucy stored her “extry books.”

  Skirting the spot where the hammock had hung, she went from the patch of lawn at that side of the house on through the tangle of bushes and weeds until she came to a tall wire fence that must mark the end of Miss Hartwell’s land. She then followed this boundary until she came to the stable storehouse which faced an alley that ran parallel to Beech Street and marked the end of Miss Hartwell’s land at the back. The alley must originally have been the carriage entrance to the stable. Fredericka took the key from its nail by the door, unlocked it and went inside. But she did not stay long. A quick look sufficed to show her that all was in order—at least more or less in order. Her survey told her that the stock needed attention, but the empty packing cases were in the old horse stalls and the books that had been unpacked were in orderly piles on shelves in the large central room. Well, she couldn’t bother with the stock now. She was glad to escape from the heat inside the stuffy building.

  Fredericka next followed the fence as it continued along the alley and was broken by the gate which was the entrance for the back path to the house. About twenty yards beyond the gate she came to an unexpected gap in the fence where the wires had been pressed back and an entrance forced. At this point the shrubbery was especially dense so that the spot was quite hidden. But who would want to force an entrance here when the gate was always open? She looked at the gap carefully and saw that the bent wires were rusted. It was not a recent break then. Some child’s prank perhaps.

  As she pushed her way on through the shrubbery she came suddenly on another building which she had never seen before. It was evidently an old greenhouse with large leaded panes of broken glass over half the roof and one side. She approached the battered door and was aware of a sudden feeling of apprehension. But when she summoned courage to push it open there was nothing much inside. The room was whitewashed but moss had grown over the stones at the base of the walls and the dirt floor looked damp. The place had, in fact, a thoroughly disused look, except for three or four very odd and surprising things. On the wall facing her at the end of the narrow room hung a mirror. Below it was a small shelf and a chair. Fredericka walked across to examine the objects on the shelf and to her further amazement found them to be a complete makeup kit and various and sundry odd bottles containing pinkish and bluish liquids, and on the shelf nearby a pile of old magazines and comics.