by Anne Perry
“Aunt Vespasia!” Charlotte said distinctly. The room was darker than Emily’s, having heavier curtains, and in the gloom they could see the big bed and Vespasia’s head on the pillow, her pale silver hair in a coil over her shoulder. She looked very frail, very old.
“Aunt Vespasia,” Charlotte said again.
Vespasia opened her eyes.
Charlotte moved forward into the shrouded light from the window.
“Charlotte?” Vespasia sat up a little. “What is it? Is that Emily with you?” A note of alarm sharpened her voice. “What has happened?”
“Emily remembered something she saw, an expression on Sybilla’s face the other night at dinner,” Charlotte began. “She thought if she understood it, it might explain things. She went to ask Sybilla.”
“At dawn?” Now Vespasia was sitting upright. “And did it—explain things? Have you learned something? What did Sybilla say?”
Charlotte shut her eyes and clenched her hands hard. “Nothing. She’s dead. She was strangled with her own hair round the bedpost. I don’t know whether she could have done it herself or not. We’ll have to call Thomas.”
Vespasia was silent for so long Charlotte began to be afraid; then at last she reached up and pulled the bellpull three times. “Pass me my shawl, will you?” she asked. When Charlotte did so, she climbed stiffly out of bed, leaning on Charlotte’s outstretched arm for support. “We had better lock the door. We don’t want anyone else going in. And I suppose we must tell Eustace.” She took a long, deep breath. “And William. I imagine at this time in the morning Thomas will be at home? Good. Then you had better write him a note and send a footman to bring him and his constable.”
There was a sharp rap on the door, startling them, and before anyone answered it it opened and Digby came in looking disheveled and frightened. As soon as she saw Vespasia herself was all right the fear vanished and was replaced by concern. She pushed the straggling hair out of her eyes and prepared to be cross.
“Yes, m’lady?” she said cautiously.
“Tea, please, Digby.” Vespasia replied, struggling to maintain dignity. “I would like a dish of tea. Bring enough here for all of us—you had better have some yourself. And as soon as you have put the kettle on, waken one of the footmen and tell him to get up.”
Digby stared at her, round-eyed, grim-faced.
Vespasia gave her the explanation she was waiting for. “Young Mrs. March is dead. Perhaps you’d better get two footmen—one for the doctor.”
“We can telephone the doctor, m’lady,” Digby answered.
“Oh, yes, I forgot. I am not yet used to who has these contraptions and who has not. I presume Treves has one.”
“Yes, m’lady.”
“Then get one footman to send for Mr. Pitt. I’m sure he hasn’t got a telephone. And bring the tea.”
The next few hours moved like a feverish dream, a mixture of the grotesque and the almost offensively commonplace. How could the breakfast room look precisely the same, the sideboard laden with food, the windows thrown open? Pitt was upstairs with Treves, bending over Sybilla’s corpse locked in her own hair, trying to decide whether she killed herself or someone else had crept in and tied those lethal knots. Charlotte could not keep it from her mind to wonder if that was why Jack Radley had gone in the night before, not by any amorous design—only she had wakened too soon, and raised the alarm. She knew it must have occurred to Vespasia too.
It was late when they sat down, well after ten, and everyone was at the table. Even William, ashen, hands shaking, eyes haggard, apparently preferred the noise and occupation of company to the loneliness of his room next door to Sybilla.
Emily sat rigid, her stomach knotted so hard she could not bear to eat. It would make her ill. She sipped a little hot tea and felt it burn her tongue and slide painfully down her closed throat. The sounds of crockery and talk alternately outraged and frightened her, swirling round her like so much empty rattle. It could have been the sound of carriage wheels over gravel, or geese in a yard.
Charlotte was eating because she knew she would need the strength it would give her, but the carefully coddled eggs and thin sliced toast might as well have been cold porridge in her mouth. The sunlight glittered on silver and glass and the clink of cutlery grew louder as Eustace fought his way through fish and potato, but even he found little joy in it. The linen was so white it reminded her of snowfields, glaring and cold with the dead earth underneath.
This was ridiculous. Fear was paralyzing her, solidifying like ice. She must force herself to listen to them all, to think, to make her brain respond and understand. It was all here, if only she could tear the fog from her mind and recognize it. It ought to be familiar to her now—she had seen enough murder before, the pain and the fear that led to violence. How could she be so close, and still not know it?
She looked round the table at them one by one. Old Mrs. March was tight-lipped and her fist was clenched beside her plate. Perhaps anger against the injustice of fate was the only way she could keep from being overwhelmed by the tragedy which was engulfing the family in which she had invested her whole life.
Vespasia was silent. She had shrunk; she seemed smaller than Charlotte had thought her, her wrists bonier, her skin more papery.
Tassie and Jack Radley were talking about something totally immaterial, and she knew even without listening that they were doing it to help, so that the silence would not creep in and drown them all. It did not matter what was said; anything, the weather would do. Everyone, each imprisoned in a private little island of horror, was trying to grasp back something of last week, only a tiny span of days ago, when the world had been so ordinary, so safe. They would gladly have brought back the anxieties that seemed pressing then, and so infinitely trivial now.
Charlotte had seen Pitt briefly. He had called her into Sybilla’s bedroom. At first she had drawn back, but he had told her the body was laid out quietly, the hair undone, a sheet over the terrible face.
“Please!” he had said fiercely. “I need you to come in!”
Reluctantly, shivering, she had obeyed, and he had almost pushed her through the door, arms round her. “Sit on the bed,” he had ordered. “No—where Sybilla was.”
She had stood rooted to the spot, pulling against him. “Why?” It was unreasonable, grotesque. “Why?”
“I need you to,” he had said again. “Charlotte, please. I have to know if she could have done it herself.”
“Of course she did!” She had not moved, pulling hard against his strength, and they remained frozen like that, locked in a tug-of-war in the middle of the carpet in the sun.
Pitt was getting cross, because he was helpless.
“Of course she could!” Charlotte had been shaking. “She had it round her throat; then round the bedpost. It’s just like tying a scarf behind your neck, or doing up the back of a dress. She used the bedpost to make it tight enough—the carving on it tightened it again when she slipped down a bit. She must have meant to, or she wouldn’t have stayed there. She’d have moved while she still had the strength. I don’t suppose you black out straightaway. Let go of me, Thomas! I’m not going to sit there!”
“Don’t be silly!” He had begun to lose control, because he understood what he was asking of her and he knew of no other way. “Do you want me to have to get one of the maids? I’m not asking Emily!”
She had stared at him in horror; then, seeing the desperation in his eyes, hearing the edge of it mounting in his voice, she had taken a step towards the bed, still refusing to look at the exact spot where she had seen Sybilla.
“Take the other one.” He had yielded, pointing to the bedpost at the opposite side. “Sit there and reach behind your neck, round the post.”
Slowly, stiffly, she had done as he ordered, stretching her arms up behind her head, reaching the post, feeling her fingers round it, pretending to tie something.
“Lower down,” he had commanded.
She bent them a little lower.
>
“Now pull,” he had said. “Make it tighter.” He had taken her hands and pulled them down and away.
“I can’t!” Her arms had hurt, her muscles strained. “It’s too low down—I can’t pull that low. Thomas, you’re hurting me!”
He had let go. “That’s what I thought,” he had said huskily. “No woman could have pulled at it that low down behind her own neck.” He had knelt on the bed beside her, put his arms round her, and buried his face in her hair, kissing her slowly, holding her tighter and tighter. There had been no need for either of them to say it. They stayed there close in the silent certainty: Sybilla had been murdered.
Charlotte’s mind returned to the present, to the breakfast table and its painful charade of normality. She wanted to be gentle, comforting, but there was no time. She swallowed the last of her tea and looked round at each of them.
“We have our senses, and some intelligence,” she said distinctly. “One of us murdered George, and now Sybilla. I think we had better find out who, before it gets any worse.”
Mrs. March shut her eyes and grasped for Tassie’s arm, her thin fingers like claws, surprisingly brown, spotted with old age. “I think I am going to faint!”
“Put your head between your knees,” Vespasia said wearily.
The old woman’s eyes snapped open. “Don’t be ridiculous!” she snarled. “You may choose to sit at the breakfast table with your legs around your ears—it would be like you. But I do not!”
“Not very practical.” Emily looked up for the first time. “I don’t suppose she could.”
Vespasia did not bother to lift her eyes from her plate. “I have some sal volatile, if you want it.”
Eustace ignored her, staring at Charlotte. “Do you think that is wise, Mrs. Pitt?” he said without blinking. “The truth may be of a highly distressing nature, especially for you.”
Charlotte knew precisely what he meant, both as to the nature of the truth he believed and how he intended it should be presented to the police.
“Oh, yes.” Her voice was shaking, and she was furious with herself, but she found she could not prevent it. “I am less afraid of what might be discovered than I am of allowing it to remain hidden where it may strike again—and kill someone else.”
William froze. Vespasia put her hand up to her eyes and leaned forward over the table.
“Bad blood,” Mrs. March said with harsh intensity, gripping her spoon so hard it scattered sugar over the cloth. “It always tells in the end. No matter how fine the face, how pretty the manners, blood counts. George was a fool! An irresponsible, disloyal fool. Careless marriages are the cause of half the misery in the world.”
“Fear,” Charlotte contradicted deliberately. “I would have said it was fear that caused the most misery, fear of pain, fear of looking ridiculous, of being inadequate. And most of all, fear of loneliness—the dread that no one will love you.”
“You speak for yourself, girl!” Mrs. March spat at her, turning, white-faced, her eyes blazing. “The Marches have nothing to be afraid of!”
“Don’t be idiotic, Lavinia.” Vespasia sat up, pushing her fallen hair off her brow. “The only people who don’t know fear are the saints of God, whose vision of heaven is stronger than the flesh, and those simpletons who have not enough imagination to conceive of pain. We at this table are all terrified.”
“Perhaps Mrs. March is one of the saints of God?” Jack Radley said sarcastically.
“Hold your tongue!” Mrs. March shouted. “The sooner that incompetent policeman takes you away the better. If you didn’t murder poor George, then you certainly inspired Emily to do it. Either way, you are guilty and should be hanged!”
The blood fled his face, but he did not look away. There was a vacuum of silence. Somewhere across the hall a footman’s steps sounded loudly till they died away beyond the baize door. Even Eustace was motionless.
Vespasia rose to her feet stiffly, as if her back hurt her. Eyes glazed, William rose also and pulled out her chair, steadying her arm.
“I assume Mr. Beamish will send Mr. Hare to console us again,” she said quietly, and with only the slightest tremor, “which is as well; he will be infinitely more use. If he calls I shall be in my room. I would like to see him.”
“Would you like us to send for the doctor, Grandmama?” William found his voice with difficulty. He looked as if he were walking in a nightmare through which he had struggled all night, only to wake and find it still with him, stretching into endless, unalterable reality.
“No, thank you, my dear.” Vespasia patted his hand, and then walked slowly from the room, keeping her balance with care.
“Excuse me.” Charlotte set her napkin by her plate and followed Vespasia out, catching up with her in the hallway and taking her elbow all the way up the long, wide stairs. For once Vespasia did not resist her.
“Would you like me to stay with you?” she asked at the door of the bedroom.
Vespasia looked at her steadily, her face weary and frightened. “Do you know anything, Charlotte?”
“No,” Charlotte said honestly. “But if Emily is right Sybilla hated Eustace, whether for herself or for William or for Tassie, I don’t know.”
Vespasia’s lips tightened and her eyes looked even more wretched. “For William, I should imagine,” she said in barely more than a whisper. “Eustace has never known when to hold his tongue. He is not a sensitive man.”
Charlotte hesitated, on the brink of asking if there was anything else, but drew back from probing any more. She gave the shadow of a smile, and left her.
The idea was hardening in her, and as soon as she was sure the landing was clear, Charlotte went to Sybilla’s door and tried it. The servants had naturally been told what happened, and no maid would venture in here. Pitt had moved Sybilla to the long seat by the window before, for his experiment on the bed, but perhaps he had lifted her back now, to rest in some attitude of peace, providing one did not see the face.
The door was not locked. Maybe there was no need; who would return, except in grief, and in humanity that must be allowed? Both Pitt and Treves must already have seen everything they could, and presumably gone down to the butler’s pantry to consult.
She glanced round the landing once more, then turned the handle and went in. The room faced south and was full of light. There was a shape on the bed, under a sheet. She kept her eyes from it, although she knew perfectly well precisely what she would see if she were to take it off. She must control her imagination and a surprisingly sharp sense of pity, which tugged at her like a bruise of the mind. Sybilla had caused Emily dreadful pain, and yet perversely she could not loathe her as she wished, even when she was alive. She was aware of some hard knot of hurt in Sybilla also, something growing and becoming worse, more acute. She could only hate the comfortable, the unmarked, because she felt alien from them. The moment she saw the wound and believed the pain, her anger slipped away like sand through a sieve. So it had been with Sybilla, and now she intended to search for some sign of what had been the cause.
She stared round. Where to begin? Where did she keep her own private things, things that would reveal to another woman her frailties? Not the wardrobe—that would hold only clothes, and one did not leave private things in a pocket. The bedside table had a small drawer, but maids might tidy that; there was no lock on it. Still she pulled it open in case, and found only handkerchiefs, a lavender bag smelling sweet and dry, a twist of paper that had contained a headache powder, and a bottle of smelling salts. Nothing.
Next she tried the dressing table and found all the things she would have expected: brushes and combs, silk scarves for polishing hair, pins, perfumes and cosmetics. She would like one day to learn how to use them as skillfully as Sybilla had. The thought of the murdered woman’s beauty was peculiarly painful, seeing these small artifices spread out so uselessly now. It was ridiculous to identify with her so much, and yet the knowledge did not dispel the feeling.
There was underwear, as she
would have expected, infinitely prettier and newer than her own—probably much the same as Emily’s. But there was nothing about it in which she could see any deeper meaning, no paper or article hidden underneath. She tried the jewel case, and lingered in a moment’s envy for a rope of pearls and an emerald clasp. But again the bare objects told her nothing, gave her no clue as to whether they were more than the ornaments any wealthy and loved woman might have.
She stood in the center of the floor, staring round at the pictures, the curtains, the enormous four-poster. Surely there must be something.
Under the bed! She knelt down quickly and threw up the long counterpane to see. There was a trunk for clothes, and beside it, in the shadow, a small vanity case. Instantly she hauled it out, and still kneeling, tried the lid. It was locked.
“Damn!” she swore fiercely. “Damn, damn, damn!” She thought for a moment, peering at it. It was a very ordinary lock, small and light. There was a little tongue of metal holding the catch. If she could just move that! Where was the key? Sybilla must have had one ...
Where did she keep her own keys? In the jewel case, of course, in the space underneath the tray for earrings. That was where she kept her own suitcase keys, not that she traveled very often these days. She scrambled to her feet, tripping over her skirt, and landed half on top of the dressing-table stool. It was there, a little brass key about an inch long, in with the gold chains.
It opened the vanity case on the floor, and with fingers fumbling with excitement Charlotte pushed back the lid and saw the pile of letters and two little white kid-bound books. One had ADDRESSES written on the front. She looked at the letters first. They were love letters from William, and after the first one she checked only the names. They were passionate, tender, written with a delicacy of wording that brought back to her mind the painting on the easel in the conservatory, full of so much more than merely wind in spring trees. There was in it all the subtlety of the turning year, of blossom and ice, and the knowledge of change.
She hated herself for doing it. They were all from William; there was nothing else, nothing from George—but then George was not a man who wrote love letters, and any other man’s would surely be clumsy and inarticulate beside these.
