Diamonds of Death

by Vivian Conroy

  The door of the police car fell to a close, and the engine growled.

  Then it was silent again in the solemn space before the gate into the cemetery. Only Anne’s sobbing disturbed the tranquillity.

  Helena said, ‘We should be getting home.’

  Anne looked up at her. ‘You ugly serpent. You wanted this all along. You enticed George and seduced him, whispering evil into his ear. I bet you put him up to it. You told him to hire the thief and steal the stones so he could find favour with Father. Only you could think up such a devious plan. You have always tried to tear our family apart, from the moment you first visited us in India. It is you. It has been you all along. I wish you were dead. I wish you were buried there in Father’s stead.’

  Helena did not even blink. She said to her husband, ‘I am afraid your sister is having a nervous breakdown. She should drink a sedative as soon as we are home. If this persists, we have to call the psychiatrist who saw her before. He might know what can help her now.’

  ‘No psychiatrist saw me before,’ Anne screamed. ‘You made me talk to him at a party not even knowing who he was. It was simple conversation about dreams and travelling, but you made it all look like I am crazy. But I am not.’

  Helena surveyed her with cold eyes. ‘Your mother was mad, and so are you. It is simply a matter of bloodline. Albert has known it for a long time. He has tried to deny it but he can deny it no longer. You will have to be locked up. For your own sake.’

  She walked away, her back straight. Albert stared after her, his face a mask. It seemed he was undecided whether he should go after her or linger with Anne and say something to make up for his wife’s harsh words.

  With a shrill scream Anne bent forward and picked up a large rock from the ground. She threw it at her sister-in-law, hitting her full between the shoulder blades. The woman pitched forwards, falling onto her knees. She cried out, and her husband rushed to her side. ‘Elena! Are you all right?’

  Albert continued in a stream of foreign words, probably soothing for his wife, but disconcerting to Alkmene as she could not understand what Albert was saying. Was he just comforting her after her scare or was he telling her to behave herself as the situation was getting completely out of hand?

  Turning back to Anne and Alkmene, Albert cried, ‘You will pay for having done this. Now I can’t deny it any longer. Protect you for the sake of our family bond. I will have to remove you from my home. You will have to be locked up like you should have been long ago. You are insane just like Mother.’

  ‘Mother was not insane,’ Anne cried, her eyes wild. ‘And she did not die of fever either like you have all told me for so long. Somebody killed her. Strangled her from behind. She never saw the face of her killer. But she must have known who it was. It was Father or it was you. I do not care. But when my mother died, she knew she was dying at the hands of someone she had loved and trusted. She had never done you or Father any harm. She did not deserve to die that way. George believed it was Father who did it and now he is in jail for that. He is paying for something that is all your fault. I could just kill you. Both of you. You and that viper who poisoned our lives. Then nobody will have this fine house of yours and the precious stones, nobody.’

  The precious stones, Alkmene thought, the elusive stones everybody was talking about but nobody had been able to produce.

  ‘It is clear she is stark raving mad,’ Helena said in a level tone, leaning on her husband’s arm. ‘She must be taken into special care as soon as possible. She is a danger to others and to herself.’

  ‘I will make a call to a specialist right away,’ her husband said through gritted teeth. ‘They can come and get her in the morning.’

  Anne clung to Alkmene. ‘You will not let them put me in an asylum, will you?’ she asked in a high, childlike voice. ‘I have done nothing wrong.’

  Alkmene put her hand over Anne’s hand, registering how cold it was. She wasn’t entirely sure about the girl’s mental condition, but she doubted she was insane. She had just suffered from the constant tension between these people who had all been watching each other after the death in India. None of them sure which one of the others was to blame. It had to be emotionally draining to always be so angry and so afraid at the same time.

  ‘You should not have thrown that rock at your sister-in-law,’ Alkmene said softly, watching the angry pair walk off to the car left a few yards away. ‘She is not one to forget an insult done to her.’

  Although she shivered at the scene she had just witnessed, she wasn’t about to let go of this girl by her side. Anne had to be in shock after her brother’s sudden arrest, the prospect he would be condemned and executed for murder. She had not known what she was doing when she threw the rock at her sister-in-law. That one act could not determine her entire future.

  Anne said, ‘It is so hypocritical of Albert. He beats Helena and then it is fine and I throw a bit of rock at her, not even really hurting her, and I should go see a specialist. I will not see him. Do you hear me?’

  Anne pulled away from Alkmene, her gestures wild. ‘If you will not help me, I will go to someone who will. I have to make sure George is released from prison. He did nothing wrong.’

  ‘It is not that easy, Anne,’ Alkmene said seriously. ‘George did accuse your father and threaten him in front of witnesses mere hours before your father died. He did come back to the house and he was not drunk either, at least not much. Your sister-in-law saw him and can testify to it.’

  ‘And what was she doing out of bed, walking about in the dead of night? She always takes medicine to sleep; she should have been in bed.’

  ‘I know. That is kind of strange.’ Helena had also said there had been light coming from underneath the door. But Mac had said that upon his arrival the room had been dark. Did that mean Helena had entered the room before, when Lord Winters had still been alive? Had she killed him? But what could have been her motive?

  Alkmene patted Anne’s back to calm her down.

  The car was leaving without them. She had to find a way back to the mansion. Was it even safe to go there, safe for Anne and for herself?

  But Jake was still there, playing ‘Parker’, and she did need to inform him of these latest developments.

  She could never solve this case unless she made up her mind whom she could trust. She had to make a decision based on her gut feeling, her assessment of their characters as she had experienced them in the past few days. Then she had to act on that assessment and hope she was right.

  If she was wrong, her life would be in grave danger.

  She made eye contact with Anne and said, ‘Listen. I came here to look into things. Not just your father’s death, but your mother’s as well. After all she was my aunt and I want to know if she was murdered and if so, by whom. I want to help you; I want to help George as well. I want to clear his name, but you have to help me. We have to stand together and not be distracted by all these emotions. Most of all, we have to stick together and be careful, for if somebody else killed your father and he or she is still on the loose, we could be targets as well.’

  Anne stared at her with huge eyes. ‘You are looking into my mother’s death? That is why you are here? They told me for years it had been fever. I was ill myself so I never noticed the commotion when her body was taken away. I believed she had fallen ill and died. I did feel tricked out of a proper goodbye, but…illnesses could kill people very quickly there in the heat and all. I would never have known Mother was murdered until Helena told me.’

  ‘She told you?’ Alkmene asked perplexed.

  ‘Yes. I suppose my brothers would have hidden it from me for ever. She told me after we had come back here to England. She made me swear I would never tell a soul I heard it from her. She was so afraid of Albert. It is weird how she is afraid of him and still sticks with him all the time. She is a bitch to George, but never to Albert. Look what she did just now, turning against George. While he was trying to help her because he believes Albert beats her.’r />
  ‘Doesn’t Albert?’

  Anne bit her lip. ‘He has a temper, so I can imagine that he does. But Helena is in charge. She is in charge of the household, the servants, where we go, whom we see. She always manages to manipulate things to have her way.’

  Alkmene took a deep breath. That was the perfect word for Helena. Manipulate. Twist the kaleidoscope so the picture changes.

  Be kind, be distant.

  Be open, be aloof.

  Keep things back, reveal things.

  The letters written to Alkmene’s mother, just happening to be in the room where Helena had put Alkmene.

  Helena having told Anne her mother had been murdered. Then being so concerned that the girl was showing signs of nervous strain…

  Alkmene said, ‘It is almost like Helena was turning all of you against each other. Yes, Albert beats her and there is no excuse for that. Yes, Helena is afraid of him, because of the beating. But she also uses her position as oppressed wife to make George feel sorry for her and do her bidding. I bet she put the idea about the stones in his head, convincing him he could for once be his father’s favourite son. She also told me certain things about her past, no doubt to win my sympathy and colour my perception of what happened in India. I wonder if she chose to reveal those particular elements on purpose while holding others back. She gave me this whole story, you know, about her childhood and being a poor girl with a mother who kept her on a short leash – a mother alone, I gathered, and then having to fend for herself. Now at the funeral a woman told me Helena is actually from a rich family who owned land in Africa. She must have made that up when she came here, ashamed of her lowly origins.’

  ‘Maybe not.’ Anne looked up at her. ‘I know it is wrong to snoop, but I did go through her things once and I saw her name. I mean her real name.’

  ‘Elena,’ Alkmene said.

  Anne nodded. ‘She was always called Helena Perkins back before she married Albert. But her real name is Elena Maria Pereiro.’ She made a face as she pronounced it with an exaggerated accent. ‘I think it is Spanish or something. Maybe she is related to conquerors who once sailed the seven seas.’

  ‘Must be Portuguese,’ Alkmene corrected automatically, thinking of what she had been told before the funeral. Then perking up, she exclaimed, ‘Pereiro? You are sure about that? Her real last name is Pereiro, not something just like it?’

  Anne nodded. ‘I know for sure. I saw it spelled out on her birth certificate. It is hidden in that hideous tiger figurine on her dressing table. It has a rubber stop in the bottom. You can pull it out and then look in. It held the birth certificate and a lot of money. I thought she was saving to get away from us some day. After all, Albert does treat her in a beastly way at times, and I can imagine she can only take so much. She did always want to be Lady Winters, but does the title make up for all the bad things Albert does and says to her? It would not for me.’

  Alkmene stared ahead.

  Anne touched her arm. ‘What are you thinking?’

  Alkmene focused on the girl and smiled. ‘I am wondering what might help make up for all that Helena has been through at the hands of this family. Not just Albert’s abuse now, but your father’s behaviour before, fawning over her, and your mother hating her for that reason. George wanting her as well. Helena put up with all of that, back in India, then here again, and what for? All those years of manipulation, of careful preparation. There must have been a very good reason for it. A magnificent reward. And maybe, just maybe, I now know what it is. Maybe I have put all the pieces in place at last.’

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Alkmene sat on the couch in the room with the large piano. After George’s arrest at the cemetery and the scene with the family, she had taken Anne to dinner in another town. Partly for distraction, partly to prepare herself for what she had to do once she was back at the house. If she was right, her adversary was extremely clever and ruthless. Someone who would not hesitate to remove a risk, whatever it took.

  And to succeed here Alkmene had to offer herself up as the greatest risk there was.

  They had only arrived back here a few minutes ago. She had met Jake on the landing and he had whispered to her, asking where on earth she had been. She had told him to make sure he kept an eye on her one way or the other, because things were about to come to a head. He had vowed he would be there for her the moment it went wrong. He had grabbed her shoulders a moment, insisting she should be careful.

  She had not had time to explain it all, so she could only hope Jake understood how wrong this could go. One person in this room with her was a double murderer, and once that person knew the game was up, Alkmene’s life would be in direct danger.

  Helena was running her fingers over the piano keys, too slow to produce any coherent tune.

  Her husband looked up from his newspaper and snapped, ‘Stop that, woman. You are driving me crazy with that pling-plonging.’

  Helena straightened her back. ‘I play better than any of you do. And I taught myself.’

  Albert sighed. ‘Yes, yes, we have heard all about that for years now. Just do something else. Something quiet, if you please.’

  Helena rose and paced the room. ‘I wonder how George is doing in prison. Perhaps we should have gone to deliver some clothes to him or other things he may need?’

  Albert snapped, ‘Don’t be silly. If he did what they are accusing him of, he will be in there for the rest of his life and then he will walk to the gallows. He does not need clothes, let alone a treat from the kitchens like he is a little boy.’

  ‘He does need justice,’ Alkmene said quietly.

  Albert looked up at her, his eyes cold. ‘I trust, cousin – ’ his voice was deceptively calm ‘ – that you have stayed long enough now. The funeral is over. You may pack your bags and leave in the morning, as soon as you have had some breakfast. I am sure Cook will prepare some for you before any of us gets down. You need not even say goodbye. We have had quite a shock with the arrest and want to be left in peace.’

  ‘Oh, I will leave as soon as it’s light,’ Alkmene said sweetly. ‘I have so many things to do in town, you know.’

  She stretched her arms up over her head. ‘You should know that Father left me with little funds when he set out on his latest botanical quest. He is terribly frugal and he expects the same of me. Unfortunately, my spending habits are not quite suited to the budget he allotted to me. I always see little somethings I like. A hat with ostrich feathers. I think it would just look perfect on me.’

  Helena made a strangled sound as if she was suppressing laughter, but Alkmene ignored her and pushed on, in a dreamy tone, ‘I do need some ready cash. And this little stay here has handed the perfect chance to me. Those stones your father collected do have a special history. The Cygnus diamonds they are called, right? Object of a long-running feud between two old and influential families.’

  Albert shook his head. ‘I would not know about that. My father bought them at an auction. We are not related to any of those so-called feuding families.’

  Alkmene pushed on as if she had not heard him. ‘And the public just loves a story about precious gems. I will call a few papers and asks who wants to offer most for the story. As George is in jail already, accused of being involved in both the burglary and the murder, it will be all the juicier.’

  Albert stared at her. His big bony hands clutched his paper. ‘You would not dare do that.’

  Alkmene rose. ‘Who is to stop me, Lord Winters?’ She put a derogatory stress on the word Lord. ‘You have certainly not made me feel welcome here. Just the other day you threatened to lash out at me with a whip.’

  ‘I have not done anything of the kind.’

  ‘My driver was present.’ Alkmene held his gaze a moment. ‘But I will not press that point. I am happy to leave and take Anne with me. Happy also to drag your good name through the mud as much as I like. Or should I rather say: as much as it will pay me? With a violent death attached, I am sure it will be quite a hands
ome sum. Goodnight.’

  She went to the door and opened it. She didn’t hear him jump up behind her, not just yet. Her heart was pounding like crazy for she knew full well how violent Albert Winters could be when provoked.

  He might just come after her and grab her ankle as she was walking up the stairs, dragging her down the steps to break a few bones.

  But nothing happened. She only heard subdued voices like the lord and lady were arguing among themselves.

  That was odd. She had expected more of the revelation she had dropped in their midst.

  Could she be wrong?

  Would nothing happen? Would she have to leave in the morning, none the wiser?

  Unable to save George from ending up with his neck in the noose? Anne would be so disappointed in her then. She would be disappointed in herself. That she had misinterpreted the clues gathered, putting them together in the wrong way. It would be a victory for the real killer. A defeat for justice and her partnership with Jake.

  She ran up and rushed into the blue room. Anne was sitting on the bed, eyeing her expectantly. ‘And?’

  Alkmene exhaled. ‘I said all the right things I guess. Now we wait. You hide behind that screen. I will get ready for bed. They should act soon.’

  Anne’s gaze wandered through the room, restlessly. ‘You really think they will do something? But what? If they tried and killed you, your driver would tell the police, the press. There is no end to this. Anybody with a lick of sense would realize that right away.’

  ‘But cornered killers don’t argue that way. They panic and they act. Just wait and see.’

  Alkmene dived into bed fully dressed and pulled the blanket up to her chin. She turned the lights off and waited. It felt like for ever until the doorknob turned.

  Alkmene reached out and switched on the light.

  Helena stood in the doorway with a bottle in one hand, a glass of water in the other. ‘I trust you want to sleep well tonight before you travel back to London in the morning. I have some sleeping drops here you might find useful. I always take them myself.’