Clouds among the Stars

by Clayton, Victoria

  ‘We-e-ll. Somehow not so bad.’

  Max was weaving about rather gracefully, actually, with enough self-parody to stop him looking ridiculous. Emilio had joined the others on the improvised dance floor and was rolling his hips and wagging his head in front of Cordelia. He accidentally trod on Dirk’s tail where it lay limp and unattended while its owner slept before the fire. Dirk woke and, taking exception to Emilio’s attentions to Cordelia, whom he counted as one of his own, snapped at Emilio’s ankle.

  ‘Do you know,’ said Mrs Mordaker to me, when the ankle had been examined and found free from so much as a tooth mark, ‘I’m not at all sure that young man,’ she cast her eyes in the direction of Emilio, who had resumed dancing, ‘is quite all there. First of all he accused me of disturbing his sleep. I’ve no idea what he meant. And then he said something about – well, you know his accent’s very odd – my calves. I thought he said that they were two pillars of pleasure.’ We both looked down at her stout legs encased in gingery stockings. ‘What could he have meant?’

  ‘Harriet.’ Jonno was upright now and plucking at my sleeve. ‘What shay we cut the rug?’ He swayed forward on his feet and had to be pulled upright by Vere.

  ‘Harriet’s going to dance with me.’ Max had materialised unexpectedly beside us. Archie was playing something more euphonious now and crooning along to it in a pleasant baritone.

  ‘Shod it! I arshed first.’ Jonno was indignant. ‘Anyway, washo fucking great about a poxy actor, I’d like to know, that all you gerlsh have got the hotsh frim?’

  ‘Young man!’ Mrs Mordaker reeled back, either from the brandy fumes or the swearing. ‘If you don’t moderate your language I shall complain to your father.’

  ‘Oh, shut up, you silly old moo! You oughta be arreshted, that’sh what!’ He waved a weaving finger under Mrs Mordaker’s affronted eyes. ‘Arreshted for making people feel shick whenever they shee your ugly old mush!’

  ‘How dare you!’ Mrs Mordaker strode away on her twin pillars of pleasure.

  Jonno broke into mocking laughter that quickly became tears. ‘I’m sho shad, Harriet. Sho fucking shad! No one lovesh me.’

  Vere took Jonno’s arm. ‘You’ve had a skin-full, that’s all. I’ll take you up to your room and find you some aspirin.’

  ‘You’re a fucking good bloke,’ Jonno sobbed into Vere’s lapel. ‘You’re the only pershon here that givesh a tosh what happensh to me. Harriet only wantsh to fornitake – forni – cake with that fanshy nanshy actor –’

  Vere led him firmly away.

  Max took my hand. ‘That boy’s a pest. He ought to be sent away somewhere to be dried out.’

  Rupert was standing in the doorway of the drawing room. I watched as his glance went very deliberately about the room, resting first on Archie, who was singing ‘Smoke Gets in your Eyes’. On Cordelia and Emilio dancing together, cheek to cheek. On Sir Oswald, who was watching Cordelia, a fatuous smile on his lips. On Miss Tipple, head back, knees apart, sleeping in her chair. On Annabel, who was kneeling down, tying together the laces of Miss Tipple’s black brogues. On Georgia, who was leaning against the piano, smoking a cigarette and staring angrily at me. Then his gaze fell on Max’s hand holding mine, where it remained.

  I took away my hand. ‘I must do something about Emilio and Cordelia. He’s going to set her alight in a minute, if he goes on rubbing her bottom like that. He can’t realise she’s only twelve.’

  ‘Don’t be a spoilsport.’ I thought I detected impatience in Max’s voice. ‘You can see she’s enjoying it.’

  Whatever justification I might have found for interfering with my little sister’s pleasure was made superfluous by the arrival of Maggie, white-faced. She grasped Rupert’s sleeve.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ Rupert put his arm around her broad shoulders. ‘You’re trembling. What is it?’

  ‘I’m that put about, I don’t know whether I’m coming or going.’ Her voice broke. ‘Oh dear, oh dear!’

  Rupert pushed her into the nearest chair and bent over her. ‘Now, Maggie. Hysterics won’t help.’

  Maggie looked up into his face, her eyes distraught, the corners of her mouth turned down like a child’s. ‘Old Gally’s arm. It’s gone!’

  TWENTY-FIVE

  The confusion that followed the discovery of the disappearance of Old Gally’s arm meant that none of us was able to get to bed before midnight. First Maggie had to be calmed.

  ‘Get her a brandy, someone,’ commanded Rupert, as she was still clinging to his arm.

  Max went over to the decanter. The rest of us turned our eyes as though mesmerised to act in concert, to Old Gally’s chair. It looked its usual unattractive, inhospitable self.

  ‘Do you mean that dirty old thing from the Long Gallery, that’s supposed to bring bad luck?’ Georgia shivered. ‘I think I’ll have a brandy too.’ When Max put a glass into her hand she pressed a naked shoulder against him. I would have put her down as thoroughly hard-boiled but the knowledge that the arm was missing seemed to have triggered a need for masculine support. ‘Silly of me, I know, but a girl feels vulnerable when there are crazy people around. Who on earth would have taken it?’

  No one could, or would, answer this.

  ‘I wish I knew what the fuss was about,’ said Mrs Mordaker in a forthright voice. ‘Maggie, what is this nonsense? What’s missing and why has it upset you like this?’

  Maggie made a gulping sound and shook her head, pressing her apron to her mouth. It was distressing to see her shaken from her usual calm competence. The growing tension drove Dirk to his loudest barks. Mrs Mordaker attempted to silence him with her patent method which, she had assured me several times, had never been known to fail. It consisted of hissing at maximum volume while touching his nose with an admonishing forefinger. I had tried it when alone in our bedroom with disastrous results. Dirk had been inflamed by the rain of saliva and the pressure of my finger to howl like a she-wolf separated from her young. Mrs Mordaker was equally unsuccessful on this occasion and we begged her to desist. She vented her temper on Maggie, saying she believed Maggie had overindulged in wine at dinner and her imagination had run riot in consequence.

  ‘No, Rhoda, I never touched a drop and it weren’t imagination. I do assure you of that.’ Maggie spoke with certainty though she was still ashen-faced. ‘I’ve had the key on my belt all day. Look.’ She took hold of the chatelaine at her waist and sorted through the keys. ‘Here it is, see? But, unless I’ve gone out of my wits – and I don’t think I have – the padlock’s been opened and the case is empty. And the Lord alone knows how. I’m ever so sorry to frighten you all but I dursn’t say owt but the truth for fear that …’ her voice trembled but she carried gamely on, ‘harm may come to someone.’

  ‘Maggie, be sensible’ said Rupert. ‘What possible harm could a bit of rusty old iron do? It’s been locked up so long it couldn’t even give you tetanus.’

  ‘Oh, I beg you not to speak disrespectful of it!’ cried Maggie. ‘He’s got ever such a nasty temper,’ she added in a whisper.

  Now I was sure that Maggie knew far more about the ghost of Galahad that she had been willing to admit.

  ‘I agree with Maggie,’ said Archie. ‘Don’t let’s provoke it. Is there anything particular to fear?’

  Maggie pressed her hands to her cheeks. ‘It always turns up again. Always. It sort of hovers, though you can’t see no one behind it. And it – points.’

  There was something unpleasant in this idea.

  ‘It’s obviously a very badly brought up arm.’ Archie sounded seriously rattled but one never knew whether he was teasing. ‘Imagine if it were a codpiece. Now, that would be alarming.’

  Mrs Mordaker frowned as she turned this idea over in her mind. I had an almost uncontrollable desire to giggle.

  ‘The person it points to,’ whispered Maggie, ‘has terrible bad things happen to them. Divorce, disgrace, bankruptcy, illness – and then, in the end – worse.’

  Everyone looked rather so
lemn. Everyone except Emilio, that is, who probably had not understood what Maggie was saying. He was trying to see down the neck of Cordelia’s dress.

  ‘Annabel, what do you know about this?’ Rupert looked at her sternly. ‘Have you been trying to frighten us?’

  ‘I swear I haven’t touched it!’ Annabel appeared to be excited and alarmed. ‘Hadn’t we better go and look for it?’

  ‘Do let’s,’ said Cordelia, not to be outdone in bravery.

  ‘For heaven’s sake,’ cried Maggie, ‘don’t let the blessed lambs go off on their own with that – thing …’ She faltered and looked up at Rupert with pleading eyes. ‘Where’s Freddie? And Jonno? Oh, if something should happen …’ She had recourse to her apron once more.

  ‘I’ll go and look for them,’ said Rupert. ‘Not that I believe for one moment that there’s any danger – just to reassure everyone that they’re not going to be strangled in their beds.’

  Maggie gave a gasp of dismay and Georgia shrieked. Even Mrs Mordaker put her hand nervously to her throat.

  Rupert looked annoyed. ‘There’s nothing to scream about. I shall do a tour of the house and check on everyone not here and then there must be an end to this fuss.’

  Maggie clutched at him. ‘Whatever you do, don’t go alone!’

  Rupert looked down at her tired, frightened face and a softer note crept into his voice. ‘All right, if it will reassure you. Who’s coming with me?’

  ‘I will,’ said Max.

  Archie said he feared it might bring on a laryngospasm if he was forced to leave the safety of the drawing room. Sir Oswald asserted with an air of gallantry that it was his duty to remain with those members of the fair sex who were most in need of his protection. His hand shook as he poured himself a generous measure of spirits. I did not blame him for this. No doubt he had heard tales of Old Gally’s doings at his mother’s knee. More reprehensibly Emilio claimed to have been crippled by Dirk. His big brown eyes with their strange canary-tinged whites were almost weeping with regret as he hobbled round in a circle to demonstrate.

  Annabel and Cordelia begged to be allowed to join the search party but Rupert said they would be an appalling nuisance and forbade them to stir from the spot. Miss Tipple told anyone who would listen that the legend of Old Gally’s arm was a paradigm of man’s brutality, perfidy and stupidity.

  ‘I entirely agree with you, Miss Tipple,’ said Rupert. ‘I’m absolutely certain that the theft of the arm is a joke – in questionable taste.’

  ‘I’m coming with you,’ I said.

  ‘I think you ought to stay here,’ said Max. ‘Of course Rupert’s right. It’s a stupid prank. But you never know.’

  ‘You’re forgetting I’m the author of a celebrated weekly spine-chiller. What would my faithful readers think if it came to be known that the author of “Spook Hall” had skulked in the drawing room instead of risking life and sanity in pursuit of a vengeful limb?’

  ‘Come on, then.’ Rupert gave me a glance of approval.

  ‘If Harriet’s allowed to go I don’t see why I shouldn’t,’ grumbled Cordelia.

  ‘For one thing, I don’t trust you not to have had a hand in this,’ said Rupert sternly. ‘It has all the hallmarks of the juvenile mind. For another, you’re supposed to be convalescent. Come to think of it, it’s after eleven and you ought to be in bed.’

  Cordelia cast him a glance of pure despite but wisely said no more.

  ‘Actually, neither Cordelia nor Annabel could have taken it,’ I said as the three of us went into the hall. ‘I passed it on my way downstairs from looking at Freddie’s painting. The children were in the drawing room from the moment of my return until Maggie came in. So it couldn’t possibly have been them.’

  ‘What time was that?’

  ‘About twenty minutes ago.’

  ‘And you definitely saw the arm?’

  ‘I didn’t make a point of looking at it but I’d have noticed if it hadn’t been there.’

  ‘Damn!’

  ‘Is that specially annoying?’ asked Max.

  ‘Don’t you see? If it was one of the children who took it, it’s just tomfoolery. If it was an adult the motivation becomes more complex. Let’s have a look at the case.’

  The lid was open and the coiled chain and open padlock lay beside it. The two-foot-long depression where the arm usually lay was a much darker red where the velvet had been protected from the light.

  Rupert examined the padlock. ‘No sign of it having been forced. No scratches round the lock. Someone had the key.’

  ‘Anyone could have borrowed it,’ said Max. ‘Maggie presumably doesn’t wear the keys in bed or in the bath. The most likely person is that ass Jonno. Typical adolescent attention-seeking.’

  ‘He’s my age,’ I said, with dignity. ‘Hardly adolescent.’

  ‘Everyone knows that girls grow up faster than boys.’ He ran his finger lightly down the hollow in the nape of my neck, which made me jump.

  ‘Might we suspend the paddling of palms and pinching of fingers for the time being?’ Rupert said coldly.

  ‘Othello.’ It was out before could stop myself. Being educated men, they both looked at me in pained surprise.

  But Vere, whom we discovered unlacing a snoring Jonno’s shoes in the latter’s bedroom, ruled out the possibility that Jonno had taken it. He, Vere, had not noticed whether the arm had been in its case on the landing when he had passed it ten minutes ago. His attention had been fully engaged. Jonno’s legs had refused to take him up the stairs and Vere had been obliged to give him a fireman’s lift.

  ‘He was asleep behind the sofa when I came downstairs,’ I pointed out ‘and didn’t leave the drawing room until he went off with Vere. So it couldn’t have been Jonno.’

  Freddie was in her studio. She had been concentrating on Sir Oswald’s chin and had heard nothing unusual. ‘Actually you could have blown up the house and I wouldn’t have noticed.’ She put down her palette and began to wash the brushes. ‘If not the children, then who? It would be funny if it weren’t for Maggie being upset.’

  ‘I know who it wasn’t,’ I counted on my fingers. ‘Archie, Georgia, Emilio, Mrs Mordaker, and Miss Tipple were in the drawing room all the time. We can discount you and Vere, of course,’ I added politely.

  ‘There’s Mrs Whale,’ said Rupert.

  ‘It couldn’t possibly be her.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘She’s much too devout. She’d never have the spirit. When Jonno swore the other day I saw her discreetly crossing herself. Honestly, she’s practically a nun.’

  ‘That only leaves Colonel Mordaker,’ said Max. ‘But he doesn’t seem the kind of man to play a practical joke. I can’t imagine him finding anything funny.’

  ‘There’s me, of course,’ said Rupert. ‘After the men left the dining room I went outside for a walk, alone. I’ve no alibi.’

  ‘You’re not taking this seriously,’ I said accusingly.

  ‘If you mean do I believe that the vindictive spirit of a long-dead Pye has returned to wreck the peace of his descendants, no, I most certainly do not. Someone very much alive has taken the arm, in order to put the fox among the hens and set up a cackling. It could have been me. I happened to know it wasn’t but that’s more than you do. Or your readers.’

  ‘I’m supposed to be writing a ghost story, not detective fiction.’

  ‘Suppose it was a stranger, someone from outside?’ suggested Max. ‘Are the doors kept bolted?’

  ‘I went out through the front door,’ said Rupert, ‘and came in through one of the side doors. It was snowing just before I went out, which was helpful of it. If someone came in while I was in the garden there’ll be footprints.’

  We went down to see. As far as we could tell by the light of Rupert’s torch and what gleams escaped the shutters, a single line of prints described one and a quarter circles round the house from the front door to the side door, just as Rupert had said.

  ‘All right,’ said Rupert. �
�It’s an inside job.’

  ‘Must you talk like Fabian of the Yard?’

  Rupert ignored me. ‘Thanks to the snow we can also be certain that the arm is somewhere in the house.’

  I was not particularly grateful for this information. Though I was determined to maintain a spirit of sceptical inquiry I had to fight an inclination to spin round from time to time just to make sure there was nothing behind me.

  In the kitchen Mrs Whale was standing at the sink, working her way through giant heaps of washing-up. Everything in the kitchen, including her face, was perspiring from contact with steam. When Rupert asked her if she knew anything about the missing arm her eyes registered alarm. She made the sign of the cross over her aproned chest with a hand encased in a soapy red rubber glove. ‘Dark deeds can never be hid.’ Her voice, usually low and flat, trembled with fervour. ‘As the Good Book says, “Woe unto them that draw iniquity with cords of vanity, and sin as it were with a cart rope”!’

  ‘Woe, indeed,’ said Max pleasantly.

  ‘I take it that means you can tell us nothing?’ said Rupert.

  Mrs Whale indicated the piles of plates and knives and forks already washed, dried and stacked on the table. ‘Satan finds mischief for idle hands.’ She turned her back to us and plunged a bundle of spoons into the foaming sink. I felt guilty, as I always did in her presence because my life was so much nicer than hers.

  ‘You see, she couldn’t have done it,’ I said when we were in the hall. ‘She’s a paragon of godliness and moral rectitude.’

  ‘The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose,’ said Max. ‘And that, you sinfully ignorant girl, is The Merchant of Venice. But it’ll be a pleasure to take your education in hand. And other things besides.’ He gave me a smile that, had I been less preoccupied, I would have found pretty devastating.

  Rupert closed his eyes briefly. ‘We’d better find Colonel Mordaker.’

  ‘It’s waste of time,’ I said. ‘The man hasn’t an ounce of imagination. I know he didn’t take it. I’m beginning to think I’ve got a scoop. For once, a manifestation of the supernatural that can’t be explained by hot-water pipes or hysteria. Can’t you sense something in the atmosphere? I can.’ I was definitely beginning to see things out of the corner of my eye that vanished as soon as I looked directly at them. ‘A paranormal force is at work here, some ancient mystery beyond our understanding. I’ve got a feeling that the doubting Thomases among us are in for something of a shock. Isn’t it exciting?’