The Vanishing of Dr Winter: A Posie Parker Mystery (The Posie Parker Mystery Series Book 4)

by L. B. Hathaway

  So Dulcie Deane had somehow found this out and was thinking of reporting Dr Winter to the authorities as a fraud and a bigamist. Both of which would carry a weighty jail sentence.

  The school buildings came into sight and Posie breathed a huge sigh of real relief.

  ‘So what will you do now, Parker?’ asked Dr Winter, coming to a stop.

  Get away from you and your gun, she thought quickly.

  ‘I’ll stop the blackmailer,’ said Posie measuredly. ‘As I promised. And I keep my promises. I’ll send you a card to let you know when it’s done, but I’ll keep it as anodyne as possible, so your ‘wife’ Valerie doesn’t think anything is amiss. I won’t mention to anyone that I’ve seen you or know who you are. And I’ll hush everything up where Felicity is concerned, too.’

  ‘Tell her some sort of version of the truth, if you must, Parker. But not where I am. Got it?’

  Posie nodded. ‘And your side of the bargain is that you won’t harm me, sir. You won’t come looking for me with that gun of yours. Swear it? Please?’

  Dr Winter nodded, his mouth a grim line. ‘If I receive a postcard from you with news of a positive result by Christmas then you have my word I will never look for you again. Certainly. Otherwise, you leave me no choice. You’ve told me where you work, so don’t think I won’t find you. I have too much at stake.’

  Posie gulped but nodded briskly. ‘One last thing, sir.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Get in touch with your father. He’s a lonely old man and he misses you more than you know.’

  ‘My father? What on earth has he got to do with all this?’

  ‘I saw him yesterday.’

  Posie was gratified to see Dr Winter turn even more ashen than usual beneath his normal pallor. Up ahead one of the boys had fallen down on the gravel and was screaming his head off. Dr Winter looked over anxiously in that direction.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘How else do you think I found you, sir? He told me about Perdita. The whole thing is almost unbelievable! That was the key to finding you, of course: your infatuation with a beautiful actress who had gone missing and your obsession with The Winter’s Tale. I found you because of the copy of the play you kept in your tent: the inscription inside it. And it looks like leopards don’t change their spots: you still choose women who look like that first actress. So now you have another Perdita, and, if you don’t mind my saying so, sir, she seems to have you very firmly under her capable thumb, sir. You seem to be dancing to her tune. I hope you are happy, sir, happier than if you had stayed with Felicity. Let’s hope for all your sakes, including your sons’, that you didn’t make a mistake when you “married” your current wife. I don’t know how you’d run away from this. I wish you a good day, and a very Happy Christmas, sir.’

  Posie turned on her heel before Dr Winter could reply and walked as fast as her feet would carry her in the direction of the big wrought-iron school gates. She looked back as she left and saw Dr Winter still standing there. Watching her.

  I hope to goodness I never have the misfortune of meeting you ever again, she thought to herself numbly, almost running up the lane which led away from the school.

  She felt slightly sick, and it wasn’t anything to do with being hungry. Unusually.

  ****

  Twelve

  Evangeline Greenwood was waiting outside the gates to King’s College, a burst of bright red against the dark wet pavement. She was craning her neck up and down the street, checking for her visitor.

  The college clock was just chiming a quarter-past two. Posie spied Evangeline from far off, and was grateful the woman had waited for her. She was late, which was a trait she detested in others, but after her horrible run-in with Dr Winter she had had to walk to the station as there were no cabs about, and she had missed her connecting train at Bishop’s Stortford, having to wait for the next one.

  On reaching Cambridge she had then discovered that there were no motor taxis at the station either and instead she had hailed a hansom cab and urged the driver to drive his horse as fast as he could into the centre of town. But it was an old nag, with no fondness for the wet slippery cobblestones, and even that short ride had seemed to Posie to stretch on forever. She had tried to push the experience with Dr Winter to the very far recesses of her mind, but she was still nervy and twitchier than she’d have liked to have been.

  She dismounted with a tide of apologies and explanations, but Evangeline shook her head, smiling, and steered Posie through the college gates and in the direction of the lovely old Chapel.

  ‘Please, don’t worry about it,’ Evangeline soothed, walking smartly along. A crowd was gathered up ahead around the entrance to the Chapel. ‘It is I who should be apologising after my awful behaviour on Tuesday. I do hope that you can forgive me. And thank you for coming. It was important to me.’

  She turned her lovely purple eyes, so at odds with the exotic darkness of her long braided hair and dusky skin, on Posie, and it was as if the day had been transformed from a wet, wintry December day to a day in summertime with all the roses out and the birds singing. When she smiled it lit up her whole face and Posie saw for the first time that Simpkins the Porter had been right; Evangeline was a real beauty. Her bruise was either fading or covered very well with make-up, as it didn’t seem so visible today. She was very dressed up, as if for evening, in a long golden velvet dress underneath the vivid red coat, and Posie noticed that large red rubies glittered at her ears, dancing with fire, even in the horrible darkness of the December day.

  ‘What’s this all about?’ asked Posie, confused. ‘I have to admit that I’m intrigued, but anxious too. Does it have a bearing on something to do with my brother, Richard? Did you know him? I don’t even know that…’

  Evangeline had stopped at the grand entrance to the Chapel and was purchasing a programme for each of them. She passed one to Posie with a smile but said nothing. Posie continued, slightly annoyed now:

  ‘I showed you that letter which had been sent to me last year and you denied all knowledge of it on Tuesday, despite the fact that the letter specifically mentioned I should get in touch with the Secretary of Richard’s Department, which turns out to be you. And who on earth is Harry Eden? I could swear you know something about all of this. Please, please, tell me. And what are we doing here anyway? This isn’t Trinity College, where your husband and Richard were based. Why have you brought me here?’

  They were suddenly inside the Chapel, and although it was only lunchtime, the interior was fully candle-lit. The glorious fan-like gothic glass interior of the walls and ceiling was lit up in a strange shadowy relief, both cosy and magnificent at the same time. The pews were filling up with bustling crowds now, tourists in raincoats and office workers taking a late lunch-hour. As Posie and Evangeline sat down on a bench very near the front, Posie finally read the programme clasped in her hands.

  CHRISTMAS CAROL SERVICE

  ‘But I don’t understand,’ hissed Posie, indicating the programme.

  She was beginning to feel like she had been dragged out here on a wild goose chase, or even perhaps that Evangeline was not quite in her right mind; perhaps a bit dotty. Was that why the insufferable Dr Greenwood liked to keep her near him at all times? Posie noticed now that Evangeline had settled her red-gloved hands in her lap in a prim fashion and was checking her wristwatch and cocking her head a little to the back of the Chapel, as if waiting for someone else. A missing guest, perhaps?

  She turned her lovely gaze on Posie again and half-sighed, half-smiled. She nodded quickly:

  ‘You were right. It was I who sent you that note last year. I’d been thinking about trying to contact you for years. Since Richard died, in fact…’

  ‘So you did know my brother, then?’

  ‘Oh, yes. I knew him. I knew him very well, as it happens.’

  Evangeline looked to the back of the Chapel again, the way they had come in. There was much rustling of programmes and people were quieting down,
expectantly.

  Posie was willing Evangeline to continue, but she seemed to work to her own sweet rhythms, and wouldn’t be rushed. Was this woman a former girlfriend of Richard’s perhaps, or simply a work or research partner?

  ‘I saw a story about you in the newspaper. That’s how I knew how to contact you. I saw that you had become a Private Detective. I almost laughed aloud, as that was Richard’s nickname for you, nosy parker! He would have been so proud of your success. He often spoke about you, and always with so much affection. I was so pleased you tracked me down, although I couldn’t say so at the time. As it was, your visit cost me dear.’

  She indicated her face. The bruise.

  Posie gulped.

  ‘Why did you deny you had sent that letter to me, then, on Tuesday?’

  Evangeline exhaled slowly.

  ‘Oh dearest Posie,’ she said, avoiding Posie’s gaze, ‘when you are married to a first-class brute of a man like I am, you learn to lie about pretty much everything, as long as it makes your life easier. I couldn’t admit that I’d sent the letter, could I? Even though it was obviously from me, and even though you had shown him the letter in all good faith the evening before. I had to brazen it out. It was more than my life was worth.’

  She continued: ‘I sent it to you last year, and when I got your reply I was mad with excitement. But my husband found your reply to me last year; he goes through nearly all my things and like a fool I hadn’t burnt it. He went crazy, asking me what it was all about, but I played dumb, biding my time. I couldn’t reply to you last year, and I was waiting for a good moment. It hadn’t come yet. And then of course there was the subject matter of the letter. That was the biggest problem of all.’

  ‘You mean whatever it was that my brother Richard supposedly left behind here?’

  Evangeline nodded. Organ music started up. It was the first chords to ‘Oh Little Town of Bethlehem’.

  What was it Evangeline was talking about? Richard’s research?

  ‘I wanted to show you in person. In the flesh. I couldn’t just write, or tell you. It’s difficult…’

  Posie suddenly remembered an expression used by the helpful porter, Simpkins. He had said, when talking about the Greenwoods, that ‘it’s all a bit tricky’.

  So he had been right.

  Simpkins had led her to these people somehow, and now here she was. Sitting on a Friday afternoon, bemused, next to a woman she didn’t know, about to listen to an entire Carol Concert which for some obscure reason still unbeknownst to her was important.

  ‘I’ve been lying to my husband pretty much continually for more than eight years now, Posie. About what it was that Richard left behind.’

  Posie stared at Evangeline stupidly. Was she talking in riddles?

  A procession of choirboys in their smart red and white ruffed surplices suddenly processed past them, carrying candles and hymn-books and filling the huge high-ceilinged Chapel with unbearably sweet singing. They filed into their places in the choir stalls and finished the hymn.

  Posie crossed her arms, and frowned. The opening bars of ‘Once in Royal David’s City’ started up. Posie gave herself up to enjoy the music, trying to convince herself that her trip had been worthwhile.

  And then she sat up stock-still in her seat, her back ramrod straight.

  A schoolboy of about eight or nine had started to sing the first verse of the carol as a solo, and his voice carried out across the pews, clear as a bell and beautiful as an angel’s.

  But none of this was important, for when Posie looked into his face, she saw her brother’s eyes, and her brother’s lips moving to the old, old words. She was watching a miniature version of Richard, darker for sure, with pitch-black hair and a peachier-than- English complexion, but otherwise he was Richard; Richard as she remembered him when she was just a very little girl. Her heart was beating madly.

  There was no miraculous piece of research after all; no breakthrough knowledge which Richard had discovered. It was even better. It was Richard’s son. It had to be. The ‘something’ he had left behind.

  So Posie had a nephew.

  ****

  His name was Harry. Harry Greenwood. Posie read it in the programme, which she scanned through as quickly as she could.

  She had one thousand questions to ask Evangeline. But there was little time. Evangeline explained in a hushed whisper during the service that she was taking Harry for tea with his father at a smart hotel in town immediately afterwards. Dr Greenwood had been unable to attend the Carol Service, much to Evangeline’s relief, and, luckily for Posie it had enabled her to see Harry in an open, legitimate environment, with no sneaking about or pretending. And it had been the perfect setting for Evangeline to show off her beautiful, talented son, with a voice which could move even the stoniest of hearts.

  ‘You must be very proud of him,’ Posie said sincerely as the two women walked out of the Chapel together after the service.

  Evangeline nodded and smiled. ‘Yes, I am. He’s a good boy. He’s talented and he has a good heart. Harry does very well at school in town, and he’s a boarder there, which I’m pleased about it, as Harold treats him harshly at home. But I miss him when he’s away. And I visit him whenever I can, which is every weekend, and for all his performances, like today. Now Richard is gone, Harry is my whole life.’

  They stood on the wet paving slabs, some way away from the Chapel, waiting for Harry to come out of the vestry where he had been changing out of his robes. An icy chill wind was getting up, replacing the rain, blowing round the corners of the Chapel building.

  Posie swallowed hard:

  ‘Forgive me, but does your husband know that Harry is Richard’s son?’ There! She had said it.

  Evangeline laughed, but it was a laugh without any joy in it.

  ‘Yes, of course he does. How could he not? Harry is the spitting image of Richard, isn’t he? It’s an open secret. The whole college and the Department of Botany knows it, too, but no one, fortunately, has ever spoken of it. Especially not my husband, Harold. Who likes to admit to having been a cuckold? Better to save face and pretend. But he saves his anger up and it comes out in other ways.’

  Posie nodded, remembering the bruise, and sadness flooded through her.

  ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Oh, don’t be. It’s not just Harry. Everything I represent causes problems for my husband now. I came from a very wealthy family before I married him: my father was British but my mother was an Indian princess, and it was she who had the money, a great deal of money in the Raj. It was she who encouraged me to learn and to study; she who encouraged me to come to Cambridge and study botany here. I met my husband Harold here and fell in love. I didn’t know he was a brute then, did I? Would you believe that he made me laugh? And he was so handsome. Still is, I suppose.’

  Evangeline stared into the distance, but really Posie knew that she was staring into the past.

  ‘My father agreed to our marriage and my Indian family settled a small income on Harold. But I was given a fortune, for myself and any children I might have. Thank goodness! It was put into a Trust Fund, so it’s money which fortunately is now just for myself and for Harry. Harold can’t touch it, which I suppose must be difficult. Living on the salary of a University Lecturer is hard and he doesn’t like to ask me for financial handouts. So he punishes me in other ways.’

  Posie nodded but she was speechless. All of this was so new, so daunting. And she had a nephew!

  ‘And then there was my exoticism, I suppose. Harold loved it at first. It was a novelty. He was excited to walk beside a woman in the street who looked so different, so unusual, whom everyone stopped to look at. But it’s been a blessing and a curse. The novelty soon wore off. He got tired of men staring, and of the attention I received. But I play up to it, to annoy him, I suppose. I always wear bright, bright colours. I have my clothes made in London in the most shocking, most jewel-like colours I can get hold of. I want to show him he can’t daunt me, can’t suppress
me totally. Like he has done with my work.’

  ‘Your work?’

  Posie thought back to the way Evangeline had hidden away the blue folder when her husband had entered the office on Tuesday.

  ‘Yes.’ She nodded. ‘I was a proper researcher at one point in my life. But after Harry was born, Harold forbade me to work. Some years later the position of Secretary in the Department came up, and I volunteered to do it for free. Harold let me; he thought he could keep an eye on me constantly, which is why he agreed to it; but I do it so I can continue my research. It’s a smokescreen. I snatch moments here and there. Actually, it was our research to begin with; mine and your brother’s. That’s how I came to know him.’

  She waved as a group of boys came out of the Chapel, loitering near the grand portico. Harry Greenwood was excitedly swopping what looked like cricket cards with some of the other choirboys, his surplice thrown carelessly over his arm in a ruffled knot which some poor devil would have to iron out later. Harry was tall, and the way he leant down now to the other boys, as if to take up less space and deflect attention from his height, made Posie gasp at the inheritance of her brother’s self-same gesture.

  ‘When I came to Cambridge I was working on plants used in medicines. I had studied that in Delhi, and I wanted to continue here. Of course, I knew I could never get a degree here, that women were not yet permitted to receive degrees in Cambridge, but I was thrilled to come anyway; to get the opportunity to study with other like-minded people. People like your brother Richard, who was interested in this same area. I became his unofficial assistant when he got his doctorate in 1913. I had been married a little over a year then to Harold.’

  ‘Goodness,’ said Posie, genuinely surprised at Harold Greenwood’s recklessness at letting his lovely wife slip through his fingers – Richard Parker had been a very attractive man for sure, but much more importantly, he had had a brilliant sense of humour and an easy laugh –surely he would have posed some sort of threat?

  ‘What did your husband think of you working with Richard?’