Styx and Stones

by Carola Dunn

  “From your own stream, Lady John?” The vicar’s wife took one and delicately nibbled a corner. “Delicious. I always say it’s impossible to buy watercress as good as what is grown at Oakhurst.”

  “I’ll have a bunch sent down to the Vicarage,” Violet promised.

  “Too kind! To get back to the fete, I was hoping for a word with you on that subject. You won’t mind, Miss Dalrymple, if Lady John and I talk a little parish business?”

  “Not at all,” said Daisy. “Are you opening the fete again this year, Vi?”

  “Yes indeed, Lady John is quite indispensable.”

  “I’m nowhere near as indispensable as you, Mrs. Osborne.”

  Mrs. Osborne preened herself. “If the church is not to collapse in ruins, someone must organize these affairs,” she said, assuming an air of modesty, “and it usually falls to the lot of the vicar’s wife. Nothing would get done if one did not tell people what to do and see that they do it, however helpful they intend to be. However, some people one might wish were a trifle less eager to play a part,” she added with an ominous frown, “which is what I want to consult you about, Lady John.”

  “Yes?” Violet asked, looking a trifle dismayed.

  “It’s Mrs. LeBeau.” Her tone was grim. Daisy pricked up her ears, while trying to appear more interested in a scrumptious Banbury tart. Mrs. Osborne went on, “She heard that our usual fortune-teller can’t make it this year, and she’s offered to take her place.”

  “I think Mrs. LeBeau would make an admirable fortune-teller,” said Vi. “I don’t think you’ve met her, Daisy? She’s dark and terrifically magnetic. With a bright scarf over her head, she’ll look just like a gypsy.”

  “You can’t have considered, Lady John! To leave her alone in a darkened tent, with the men going in one by one—it’s inviting trouble.”

  “What do you imagine might happen?” Violet was quite angry, considering her usually equable temperament. “What could happen, with a queue waiting outside? The fortune-teller’s is always one of the most popular booths. What is more, it’s women, children, and courting couples who consult her. Men don’t seem to find it amusing.”

  “They will when it’s That Woman,” muttered Mrs. Osborne not quite under her breath. “I don’t think it’s wise,” she said obstinately, aloud. “If you were to have a word with her …”

  “I’ll do nothing of the kind. It’s most generous of Mrs. LeBeau to offer her services in aid of re-leading the church roof. I dare say I shall consult her myself. What else can we anticipate? Tombola, and a white elephant stall, and a bran tub for the children seem to be staple favourites. Lord John is looking forward to presenting the prizes for the races. I expect you’d like me to judge the jams and jellies as usual?”

  “Speaking of jam,” said Daisy, “may I cut you a slice of this Victoria sandwich? Violet’s cook does have a particularly light hand with a cake, doesn’t she? Do you have a home-made cake stall at the fete?”

  Mrs. Osborne’s feathers were skillfully smoothed. Daisy and Violet had a great deal of practice, as the slightest breath of adversity, real or imagined, was enough to ruffle their mother’s plumage.

  After enumerating the prospective delights of the fete, Mrs. Osborne asked, “May we hope you’ll be staying on for our little country jollification, Miss Dalrymple?”

  “I’m not sure.” By that time, Daisy thought, she might have been sent to Coventry by half the population of Rotherden. “It depends partly on how much I can get done while I’m down here. This is a working holiday for me.”

  “Working!” Mrs. Osborne looked shocked, and avidly curious. A viscount’s daughter working? her expression said.

  “Daisy is a writer,” Violet explained. Dear Vi—so conventional herself, she had always supported Daisy’s desire to be independent. “She does jolly good articles for Town and Country, and for an American magazine.”

  “Oh, Town and Country. For a moment … but I couldn’t credit, my dear Miss Dalrymple, that you would have anything to do with the sort of rubbishy modern novels written by that most undesirable young man who has taken Brigadier Lomax’s cottage. Piers Catterick he calls himself.”

  “I know the name,” said Daisy. “He’s quite popular.”

  “Disgraceful! I don’t imagine you have met him, Lady John, but he was shockingly rude when Osbert called to welcome him to the parish. And when I delivered the parish magazine, he tore it up before my eyes!”

  “Oh dear,” said Violet serenely.

  “Naturally I haven’t read any of his books, but I believe they are full of … You Know What. I spoke to Brigadier Lomax about it—he is a churchwarden, after all, and ought to set an example—but he said the cottage is let on a long lease and there is nothing he can do. I must say, he was quite disagreeable.”

  “Oh dear,” Violet repeated with unimpaired calm. “Another cup of tea?”

  “Thank you, so kind, but I really must be going. It’s Cook’s afternoon off, and Doris is quite hopeless without constant supervision. I dare say she has forgotten to serve tea. Osbert won’t mind, very likely won’t even notice, but Osmund will crack one of his dreadful jokes and that I cannot bear!”

  With this final outburst, Mrs. Osborne made her farewells and departed. As soon as she was out of hearing, Daisy succumbed to the laughter she had managed to hold in check.

  “What’s so funny?” Violet asked resignedly, adding hot water to the pot and pouring them each another cup of tea.

  “Oh, Osbert and Osmund Osborne for a start! Poor things, what can their parents have been thinking of?”

  “Even worse than Violet and Daisy,” Vi conceded, her mouth twitching. “I believe there’s a third brother called Oswald.”

  “Too, too frightful!” said Daisy, awed. “I suppose, once they had two, it wouldn’t be fair to change for the third and give him a decent name. I’ve always thought Gervaise was jolly lucky not to have been christened Narcissus, or Chrysanthemum, or something. But actually, the Osbornes’ names were the icing on the cake. What set me off was a vision of Mrs. Osborne tackling the brigadier on the dread subject of S-E-X.”

  “You Know What,” Violet corrected with a chuckle.

  “Y-K-W? Ghastly woman. Does she really run the village?”

  “She does her best. She’s told me her privileged position as vicar’s wife makes organizing people a duty, though I think she regards it rather as a pleasure.”

  “Undoubtedly. She seems well entrenched. Have they been in Rotherden long?”

  “Since well before the War, before I came here. He was an Army chaplain during the War, but her uncle was a clergyman and he came out of retirement to take care of the parish, so she stayed on.”

  Sipping her tea, Daisy wondered whether Mrs. Osborne had seen Johnnie enter Mrs. LeBeau’s house that day six years ago. If so, fond as she was of reviling people, she would surely not have kept such a tidbit to herself. Half the population of Rotherden, if not the whole, might be aware of Lord John’s misdeed.

  “She’s a fearful gossip,” Daisy observed, reaching for a last Bakewell tart. “Three reputations destroyed at one sitting—Mrs. LeBeau, Brigadier Lomax, and Piers Catterick—besides slanging her maid and her brother-in-law!”

  “She certainly knows all the gossip,” Vi said doubtfully, “but I’m not sure that she passes it on indiscriminately. She once said she felt it was her duty to keep me apprised of what was going on in the village, as though Johnnie or I could do anything about it! She has a rather feudal view of the aristocracy, I’m afraid.”

  “Not to mention an absolutely Victorian view of You Know What. What was all that about the dissipated Mrs. LeBeau? She lives in the house by your gates, doesn’t she? Who is she?”

  “Our local Scarlet Woman. She’s a widow, and she has a lot of visitors, gentlemen as well as ladies. That’s enough to damn her. If there’s any more concrete evidence, it has not been passed on to me, thank heaven. I like her. As long as she’s discreet, her private life is non
e of my business. Oh, here come the children. Don’t let Derek bully you into playing cricket if you don’t want to!”

  Derek approached at full speed, his normal mode of progression. Behind him, Belinda had Peter by the hand. Her braids bobbed as she tried to teach him to skip along. From her Clark’s sandals, skinny, newly scratched legs rose to grubby knees, and the hem of her white cotton frock was smeared with mud.

  Every footstep a squelch, Derek bounced up to the terrace. “I hit the ball into the stream,” he announced cheerfully. Retrieving the cart and horse from under Vi’s chair, he stood on one foot, the other dripping, and precariously balanced Peter’s toy on his head. “It was a smashing hit, would’ve been a six easily. But we couldn’t find the ball.”

  “Po-sit-ively hu-mil-iating,” said Belinda, and they both started laughing.

  The cart and horse wobbled. “You’ll break it,” wailed Peter.

  “No, I shan’t. Here, take it. Daddy got fed up and went to write some boring letters or something, so will you come and play with us, Aunt Daisy? We can use an old tennis ball. It really flies!”

  “No,” said Daisy. “I’m much too full to run after boundary hits. I thought I’d stroll down to the village and buy some postcards. You can come too, if you like.”

  “Oh yes!” cried Derek. “I’ve got tuppence. Do you like humbugs, Bel?”

  “Not to be eaten before your supper,” said Vi. “Go and change your shoes first, and next time do try to remember to take them off before you wade. Take Peter up with you. It’s time he went back to Nanny.”

  “I’d like to go with you,” Belinda whispered in Daisy’s ear, “but I got my frock awfully dirty.” She bit her lip.

  “You’d better change too, darling, but don’t worry, the mud will brush off when it dries, I expect. I’ll tell you what, we’ll see if we can find some cheap shorts and Aertex shirts in the village. Then you won’t have to bother about staying clean.”

  “I’ve only got two shillings. And Granny doesn’t approve of shorts for girls.”

  “Granny isn’t here,” Daisy pointed out, thankfully, “and your daddy gave me some money for your expenses. Off you go.”

  After the vicar’s wife, she reflected, the village shopkeeper was usually the person most conversant with local gossip. Her chief aim, however, was to spy out the land, to see which houses besides the Vicarage overlooked Mrs. LeBeau’s front door.

  Then she’d have to find out who lived in them, how long they had lived there, and whether they had been away during the War. Which would be just a basis for investigation, she thought rather despairingly. How long would it take to get to know her suspects well enough to guess who might have written those foul letters? And what if Mrs. Osborne was indeed the source of the story, so that absolutely anyone might know Johnnie’s secret?

  Perhaps he had set Daisy an impossible task. How much easier it would be to assume the author was Mrs. LeBeau herself, and just look for proof.

  3

  Ten minutes later Daisy and her troops set off down the carriage drive, an avenue of ancient oaks winding down the hill with parkland on either side. The verge was bright with pink and white convolvulus and the blue stars of chicory. Derek, Belinda, and Tinker raced ahead, of course. The children stopped now and then, while Derek showed Belinda the best tree to climb, the place where a visitor’s motor-car ran into the ditch, and such landmarks. The dog found her own landmarks to investigate.

  Daisy walked briskly, wanting to reach the village shop before it closed. As she approached the gates, a high hedge on her left took the place of the oaks. It must be Mrs. LeBeau’s. Neatly clipped on top, and presumably on the garden side, it was left to grow wild on the park side.

  Derek and Belinda, both already grubby again, had jumped the ditch and found some early blackberries—sour, by the looks on their faces. Daisy caught up with them as Derek handed Bel a green hazelnut.

  “Here, try this.” He cracked another between his teeth. “They’re not ripe yet but they’re sort of crunchy.”

  Belinda turned to Daisy for permission. If she was their mother, Daisy reckoned, no doubt she would worry about tummy-aches, but she wasn’t, and she remembered eating the crisp white nutmeats as a child without ill effect.

  “Try it,” she said, “but come along, or the shop will close.”

  What time of year had it been when Johnnie came home on medical leave? Could some villager picking berries or nuts have seen him through a sparsely-leaved hedge? The Third Battle of Ypres had gone on for months and months, but Daisy rather thought it was autumn when Johnnie came to Fairacres.

  Then there was the lodge. Had it been tenanted during the War? It was a tiny dwelling, but two-storied. From the first floor Mrs. LeBeau’s front door might be visible.

  At present, the resident was an aged bachelor uncle of Johnnie’s, the younger brother of the uncle who had owned Oakhurst. Mr. Paramount bitterly resented the estate being left to his nephew. Refusing to stay at the manor with the family, he had grudgingly moved into the lodge—before the War or after? He seldom set foot outside the little house, where he was looked after by his manservant and a daily woman from the village. Violet’s invitations to join the Frobishers for Sunday lunch or a holiday meal were always churlishly rejected.

  Daisy had no desire to request permission to look out of the hostile old hermit’s upper windows. She hoped it wouldn’t come to that, but she must add Mr. Paramount and his servant to her list of suspects.

  She smiled, remembering how reluctant Alec always was to cross anyone off his lists.

  Directly across from the end of the drive was a tile-roofed lych-gate in a brick and flint wall. Beyond, the ancient stone church rose in the middle of its graveyard, where Daisy noted in passing a figure apparently lost in rapt contemplation of a large stone angel. The square, stubby, seventeenth-century tower gave a fine view of the surrounding area, she knew, including the entire length of Rotherden’s main street. Who had access to the tower, and business there on a rainy autumn afternoon?

  To the left of the church was the Vicarage. A frill of tall pink hollyhocks made a brave effort to disguise the singularly ugly Victorian building. Grey-stuccoed, it was of a size to accommodate a vast Victorian family. From it, Mrs. Osborne could easily have seen Johnnie enter Mrs. LeBeau’s house on the opposite side of the lane. What was more, she would be quite likely to keep a look-out to see how long he stayed.

  Daisy passed between the high gates of Oakhurst, now permanently open, bound in place by the bindweed whose white trumpets nodded from the ornate wrought-ironwork. As she turned towards the village, a tall woman came down Mrs. LeBeau’s front path.

  She wore a tailored linen dress, beige, trimmed with pillar-box red buttons and a matching sash around her slim hips. Unlike Daisy, who was bare-legged, she had on stockings, in the fashionable flesh-coloured tint regarded as immodest by old-fashioned people accustomed to uncompromising black or white. Her broad-brimmed cloche hat was natural straw with a red cockade.

  Somehow the Scarlet Woman succeeded in looking both frightfully smart and not overdressed for a village street.

  Opening her garden gate, she smiled and nodded to Daisy, who responded, “Good evening.” Impulsively she added, “Mrs. LeBeau?”

  “Yes, I’m Wanda LeBeau.” Her voice was low-pitched, slightly husky. “May I make a guess too? You must be Lady John’s sister, Miss Dalrymple. Our village grapevine is efficient, you see.”

  Daisy laughed. “What village grapevine isn’t?”

  Close to, the femme fatale was obviously older than she looked from a little distance. Perhaps forty, she had a hint of smile-lines around her full mouth and the beginnings of crow’s-feet at her dark eyes. She was not the sort to entirely eschew make-up, as Daisy did on a fine country afternoon, but it consisted of a mere dusting of powder on her nose and a lightly tinted lip salve. Her hair, just visible beneath the hat, was also dark, unbobbed. Though she was not classically beautiful, Daisy thought her very at
tractive.

  “I’m hurrying to the shop,” said Mrs. LeBeau. “Are you going that way? Shall we walk together?”

  “I’d like to, but you can’t want to walk with two grubby children and a large—Oh, blast, where have they got to?” Daisy swung round.

  “I rather like children, as a matter of fact,” said Mrs. LeBeau with a throaty chuckle, “but if you don’t mind I’d better get on to the shop before it closes. I hope you find them in one piece! Do drop in for morning coffee tomorrow if you’re free. Eleven o’clock.”

  “Thank you, I’d love to,” Daisy said sincerely. What luck, her prime suspect inviting her for elevenses!

  But where were the children?

  Just as Daisy started back along the lane, Belinda dashed around the end of the tall hedge, Tinker loping at her heels, barking. “Miss Dalrymple! Aunt Daisy! Come quick! Derek climbed the gate and he’s stuck. He was showing off.”

  Daisy groaned. She reached the end of the carriage drive, and there was her nephew, hanging onto the top rail of the tall gate. His fierce expression suggested he was trying desperately not to cry.

  “What’s up?” Daisy asked with assumed calm, eyeing the ironwork with a devout hope that she was not going to have to climb it.

  “M-my foot slipped and went through the g-gap and I can’t pull it out, and I can’t reach to untie my shoe-laces to take off my shoe.”

  The dog whined. Belinda hugged her and said with confidence, “It’s all right, Tinker Bell, Aunt Daisy will rescue him.”

  Daisy had just decided she would have to kilt up her skirts like Leezie Lindsay in the old Scots ballad, when a diffident voice came from behind her.

  “May I perhaps be of some assistance, madam?”

  A short, portly man was dismounting from an aged bicycle. He wore clerical black, with trouser-clips, and a dog collar. Politely raising an old-fashioned Panama hat circled with a faded tartan ribbon, he revealed thinning black hair, a few strands carefully combed across his involuntary tonsure.