Winking at the Brim (Mrs. Bradley)

by Gladys Mitchell

  (3)

  Dame Beatrice, meanwhile, was meeting the other members of the expedition. She was kindly, even enthusiastically, received by all, including the usually curmudgeonly major, for Sally had elected to take her grandmother first to the farthest point. They found the major, his wife, and the two Benson sisters still at breakfast, although at the later stages of the meal.

  “Glad to see you again, Dame Beatrice,” said the major. “Had your breakfast at the pub, I suppose, eh? You early birds put the rest of us to shame, what? Come to take young Sally home, I suppose. No point in staying up here any longer, I take it. Eh, Sally? Bad luck, this funny business of that Barton woman. Odd sort of type. Never thought she’d do for herself, though. Selfish as the devil, these middle-aged spinsters. No possible thought for others. Might have known it would put paid to poor old Calshott’s plans (dotty though everybody knows they are), and to the rest of our holiday, too.”

  “You are still doubtful about the existence of the monster, then?” said Dame Beatrice. “I remember that you expressed yourself freely on the subject when we were fellow-guests in Hampshire. You have not seen fit to alter your opinion?”

  “God bless my soul, no! A lot of poppycock!”

  “I wonder you consented to take part in the expedition, feeling as you do.”

  “Took the chance of a cheap holiday, that’s all,” said the major, with engaging frankness. “Nothing to pay for except our flight. Even a car laid on from Glasgow. Food, drink, and shelter all provided free, and nothing to do all day but eat and sleep and keep an occasional eye on the water as a token payment, don’t you know. Getting browned off with it now, though. Shan’t be sorry to get home. Uncomfortable sort of atmosphere up here now. Police and all that.”

  “Oh, you’ve had a visit from the police, have you?”

  “Just a routine check, they said. Couldn’t help them, of course. Hardly knew the damn’—the poor woman. No clue to her private life at all, except the rumour that she was setting her cap at the vicar. Still, they only bothered us once. Anxious to know how she could have got hold of the poison. As though we should have any clue to a thing like that! Asked them what poison it was, but they weren’t letting on, although I suppose they know.”

  “Well, she could not have got it here,” said Catherine Tamworth, “unless she bought it in Glasgow on the way up.”

  “Don’t talk rubbish, my dear,” said the major. “She would have been with Humphrey and Mildred all the time. What chance would she have had to go careering off to buy poison?”

  “Then she must have brought it with her,” said Winfrith Benson.

  “Don’t the shepherds put poison in sheep-dip?” asked Godiva. “She might have got hold of some on one of her walks.”

  “She might, at that, by Jove!” said the major. “First sensible suggestion I’ve heard. You ought to have mentioned that to the police, Miss Godiva. Maybe it hasn’t occurred to them. Remember the case of a chap who died dipping sheep? Had a cut on his arm and the stuff got into his bloodstream and did for him. His wife was nearly topped for murder, I believe, until somebody had second thoughts. Must have had a damn’ clever lawyer, that woman.”

  Sally had been tempted to make an observation before the major had concluded this speech, but met the hypnotic eye of her grandmother and kept back the words. Godiva said, “The idea had only just occurred to me. Oh, well, Winfrith, if you’ve finished breakfast, I suppose we had better man the boat and get over on to the other side.”

  “Shouldn’t think there’s the slightest need,” said the major. “I take it the expedition is all washed up and finished. I think, after lunch, we’d all better converge on Calshott and suggest we make for home. He’ll be in touch with the police and will know whether it’s all right for us to leave, but I should think, myself, that there’d be no point in keeping us here any longer.”

  “We must ask about the funeral, dear, and see what arrangements can be made about flowers,” said his wife.

  “Winfrith and I will not be sending flowers,” said Godiva. “It is against our beliefs to take part in pagan customs. And now, Major, we rely on your help in pushing the boat out.”

  At this double-edged phrase the major first stared and then roared with laughter. He finished by saying decidedly, “Not me, my dear girl. Not in either sense. Nobody will expect us to go on duty today. You begin packing up your things and later on I’ll go over to young Parris and arrange for his estate car to take our gear over to Calshott’s caravan ready for the long trek home.”

  “I could take a message, if you like,” said Sally. “It will be on our way, and will save you a walk in this heat, Major.”

  “Very civil of you, my dear. Catherine, you’d better begin packing up. The sooner we can all get away, the better.”

  “Come along, Winfrith,” said Godiva. “If others shirk their duties and ignore their commitments, the Bensons do not. To the boat, and we will keep faith with Sir Humphrey.”

  “Before you go,” said Dame Beatrice, “I should tell you that this is more than a merely friendly visit, delighted though I am to see you all again. In short, I am here to pump you.” She glanced with birdlike, cruel brightness from one apprehensive countenance to another. The only face which did not appear to have changed was that of Catherine Tamworth, who merely looked mildly interested.

  “Pump us, dear lady?” said the major, looking aghast. “What the devil!”

  “I am sorry to have been so abrupt. As a psychiatrist, I am interested in the mentality of suicides. Why is it, I ask myself, that circumstances which lead A to trust to good fortune and hope that matters will right themselves, can lead B to take his own life?”

  “God-damn cowardice,” said the major.

  “I don’t think it can be that, dear,” said his wife. “It must take tremendous resolution.”

  “From what I am told,” said Dame Beatrice, “Miss Barton appears to have made three attempts, the third of which was successful. What state of mind was she in when you last saw her, which was, I believe, on the morning of her death?”

  “Just as usual,” said the major. “Came here with Sally. Nothing wrong with her, so far as I could see. A bit surprised, I expect, to find I’d swapped caravans with young Parris and his lot, but so was Sally a bit surprised, come to that.”

  “I didn’t see Angela,” said Catherine Tamworth, “but I heard her voice. She sounded quite normal, I thought, didn’t you, dear?”

  “Thought I’d said so,” said the major.

  “We also heard her, but didn’t see her,” said Godiva, “but perhaps she hadn’t read the letter then. I heard her ask the major to ferry her across the loch when he took us over to the watching-site below the hunting-lodge.”

  “Oh, yes, so Sally told me. And did you ferry her across, Major?”

  “No, he did not. He went fishing,” said Godiva.

  “Do you know where she went after she left you? Somebody seems to have taken her over the water.”

  “Oh, as to that,” said Winfrith, “I think she walked to the head of the loch and then followed the river and waded across it where she could. You could reach the other side of the loch that way.”

  “What makes you think that that is what she did?”

  “She suggested it herself,” said Godiva. “I heard her.”

  “And stalked off in that direction,” said the major.

  CHAPTER 14

  The Hunting-Lodge and the Island

  “The virtues were but seven, and three the greatest be;

  The Cæsars they were twelve, and the fatal Sisters three;

  And three merry girls, and three merry girls are we.”

  Anonymous (17th Century).

  The hunting-lodge, Laura concluded, as she explored the ground floor rooms and then climbed the stairs, had died of neglect. It was impossible, merely by looking at it, to decide how long it had been uninhabited. Four of the windows overlooked the loch, but, of thes
e, only from two, both of them upstairs, could a comprehensive view of even part of the loch be obtained. That this had been taken into consideration by Sir Humphrey’s watchers was shown by the presence of two folding chairs, canvas-backed and canvas-seated and in almost new condition, which were opposite the bedroom window which gave the widest view.

  Laura took one of them, unslung the binoculars she was carrying, and made a survey. Far to her left she could see the solitary island which commanded the head of the loch. She noticed the ruins which Sally, at first sight, had taken for those of a castle, and she saw that, to the right, the main part of the loch was cut off from her view by the mountain behind which she had driven to get to the cottage.

  The water, to which she was now much nearer than when she had obtained her first sight of it from the road, did not appear as unruffled as she had thought. She swept its surface with the glasses and then picked out a boat which was being rowed across the loch in her direction.

  “Oh, Lord! Two of the watchers,” thought Laura. “I don’t want company.” She vacated her chair and descended the stairway. “I’ll just take a last look round before I go. This house isn’t all that far from the cottage, and you never know your luck.” She had noticed a closed inner door in the kitchen and deduced that, since the house was built on rising ground, it must be the door to the cellar.

  It appeared to be secured by a large, old-fashioned type of padlock, but Laura, who believed in testing apparent obstacles in order to find out how valid and insurmountable they were, pulled at the smooth, rounded arm at the top of the lock and discovered that it had been pushed into place but not fastened.

  She pulled the door open, fished in a pocket of her anorak, and produced matches. She struck one, perceived that the flight of steps in front of her was a short one, stamped on the match, and cautiously felt her way down.

  “Spiders,” she thought, “but hardly rats, with nothing to eat in the place.”

  At the bottom of the flight—she felt for firm ground with an exploring shoe—she struck another match. The cellar, at first sight, was disappointing. All that it contained was a number of empty casks. Laura blew out the match and rolled one of the casks to the foot of the cellar steps where there was an infiltration of light from the room above. As she did so, she was aware of something rolling and bouncing away inside the cask.

  It proved to be an empty bottle and as she groped for it she thought there was a smell of spirits in the cellar.

  “Surely the previous inhabitants didn’t buy their whisky by the cask?” she said aloud. Having fished out the bottle, she rolled the cask away from the foot of the steps and bore her prize aloft. It proved to have contained (if its label was to be trusted) sparkling burgundy. Laura had been informed by Sally of Sir Humphrey’s generosity in providing this elixir for his party. “That’s a bit odd,” she thought, “to find it here. You’d think they’d drink it at lunch or dinner in the caravan, not bring it across the loch as a private tipple for two. Wonder which two it was?”

  She closed the cellar door, went out by the back way, tossed the bottle into the bushes and, coming to the front of the house, again had recourse to her binoculars. The boat was much nearer now, and she could see that it was manned by two women, both of them pulling strongly at the oars.

  “The morning watch, as I supposed,” muttered Laura. “Not too early on the job, either. Wonder whether they’re coming up here?”

  This, it was soon apparent, was the intention of the newcomers. They beached the boat on a strip of greyish shingle which was just within Laura’s view and then she lost sight, but not sound, of them as they began to climb towards her.

  “Come to get themselves chairs,” she thought. A childish sense of not wanting to be discovered caused her to retreat up the slope towards the cottage. Here she did go inside, but there was nothing of interest, so she went back to the car and continued her drive along the narrow, switch-back road towards what she hoped would be the head of the loch.

  As the car made progress, Laura realised that her route was taking her further and further north, which meant that the loch was getting further and further away, so when, at last, her lane joined a wider road, she turned in her tracks and went back by the way she had come. She was due at the inn for lunch at one o’clock, but when she reached the end of the overgrown track which led to the cottage she found herself still with time in hand, so she left the car on the verge, returned to the cottage, passed it, and climbed down to the hunting-lodge once more. This time she felt differently about encountering the watchers for, during her drive, she had made up her mind to attempt to trace the route which Angela Barton had traversed on her last and fatal walk, and she thought that the two women, who must be the Benson sisters, might be able to suggest a starting-point for her quest.

  There was no sign of them up at the house, but the two folding chairs had gone, so she guessed that these were now lower down the slope, possibly on the edge of the water. She found an easy, winding descent, but, although the chairs were there at the loch-side, the two women were not, and Laura, training her binoculars on to the opposite side of the loch, spotted the boat drawn up below the little pine-wood and realised that the Bensons had decided upon a return to the major’s caravan for an early lunch.

  She was about to turn and make the ascent back to where she had left the car, when she was aware of a disturbance in the loch. Great circles appeared, as though made by some gigantic fish and, as Laura watched, three dark-grey humps appeared. As nearly as she could judge, they were about thirty yards off shore and each appeared to be about five feet long. They remained motionless for several minutes; so did Laura. She fancied afterwards that she had held her breath all the time, although commonsense told her that this was unlikely.

  Whatever breeze had rippled the surface of the water earlier on had died away and a mirror-like calmness was on the face of the loch. The ripples widened in huge, concentric circles, then, as though Laura’s presence had been detected, the dark humps were simultaneously submerged and Laura, coming to, began to wonder (as Sally, earlier, had wondered) whether she had seen what she thought she had seen. She picked up a grey, slimy pebble and shied it into the loch, but the water retained its tantalising secret and, apart from the disturbance caused by the submergence of the fabulous humps and the lesser ripples caused by her pebble, nothing moved. She sat on a convenient boulder and waited for half an hour. Then hunger, and a glance at her watch, put an end to her vigil. Regretfully she climbed the winding path to the house, passed it, and made her way back to the cottage and then to the car.

  “I wasn’t ‘seeing things’ then?” said Sally, who was taking a late lunch with her grandmother and Laura at the inn. “I’m so thankful. But you didn’t see the head, you say?”

  “Well, you didn’t see the humps,” retorted Laura.

  “And several of us saw the wake the thing made, earlier on, as it travelled down the loch,” Sally went on. “Oh, I do wish—poor Angela, though,” she added.

  “You do wish nothing had happened to break up the party,” said Dame Beatrice. “Well, there is nothing to be done about that, I fear, but there is no reason, if this place can accommodate you both, why you and Laura should not stay on for a bit. Laura needs a holiday and now that you have both been favoured with a sight of something which, for the sake of convenience, we may call the monster, it would be a thousand pities if you came away too soon.”

  “What about you?” asked Sally.

  “Like the devil (according to St. Peter) I shall be walking about, seeking whom I may devour.”

  “Funny thing, but that’s what Nigel said about Angela. Up here, or at home?”

  “Both, I hope. I shall remain here until all our companions have departed and probably stay a few days after that. Then Laura will drive me to Abbotsinch, whence I shall fly to London.”

  “Oh, you can’t leave us here to cope,” said Laura, who distrusted aeroplanes. “Please don’t go. Stay up here with us and let’s all
go home together. We’ve got to take the car and Sally’s bus back, anyway, and an extra day or two en route won’t make any difference to your plans, will it? We need not take the train. We’ll go all the way by road.”

  “I notice in you,” said Dame Beatrice, “an increasing tendency to make yourself responsible for my conduct and well-being. I suppose you don’t want me to fly.”

  “Bossy is the word for Laura,” said Sally, “but this time I agree with her. It would be much more fun if we all went home together. She doesn’t want a holiday up here and neither do I. It’s ten to one against our seeing any more of the monster, anyway. I do wish one of us had been able to take a photograph, though. It won’t be the least use to report my head and neck and Laura’s humps without having a picture. Nobody is going to believe us except the experts, and I’m sure they’ve got similar evidence, lots of it, already.”

  “What do you propose to do with yourselves this afternoon?” asked Dame Beatrice.

  “I must get my van serviced,” said Sally. “It’s a long trek back for me and the van has done some rough work up here. I suppose you won’t go by road as well, Grandmamma, as Laura suggested?”

  “I see no reason against it. I was in haste to reach you, so we came by train, but a leisurely drive home, with overnight stops, would be most agreeable. This afternoon I want to talk to Mrs. Parris. They will be leaving soon, and I would like to catch her before they go.”

  “Good,” said Laura. “That leaves me a free afternoon. I shall borrow the expedition’s boat and row over to the island with the ruins unless there is anything useful I can do for you.”

  “No, there is nothing. Go off and enjoy yourself.”

  Laura, who liked her own company, was in love with islands and relished nothing more than (as she expressed it) poking her nose into things which did not directly concern her, set off on foot as soon as she had dropped Dame Beatrice at Nigel’s caravan. She found the boat pulled up on the oozy shore. As it was clear from this that no watch was to be kept that afternoon from the opposite side of the loch, she exerted her considerable strength and, being far more powerfully built than Sally, found no difficulty in launching the bulky craft and getting afloat.