The Poison Cupboard

by John Burke

  *

  Three days later Charlotte said that she had had a letter from Peter and that he wanted to see her after all. She would make the journey to the North.

  At the end of a week she had still not returned.

  Chapter Eight

  Charlotte had escaped. And though Laura hated the sight of her, that had not been the idea at all.

  ‘The poor child must be feeling upset,’ said Mrs. Swanton. ‘I expect seeing her husband upset her, and she needs a day or two on her own to get over it.’ She said ‘her husband’ with impersonal sympathy, as though she had forgotten that the man in question was her own son Peter. ‘She’s probably staying up there a night or two —’

  ‘I don’t believe she ever went there,’ said Laura.

  ‘What? Oh, really, Laura. I don’t know what’s got into you.’

  ‘I’m sure there wasn’t any letter for her that day. Did you see one?’

  ‘Well —’

  ‘Did you see her reading one?’

  ‘I don’t see why she should make up a fib like that. She just wants to stay there — or perhaps in London, on the way back . . . that’s it, she’s staying with friends in London.’

  ‘I can imagine what sort of friends,’ said Laura.

  ‘We mustn’t worry. We must just leave her to work things out in her own way. It’s her life.’

  ‘And Peter’s,’ said Laura.

  ‘I don’t see what harm she can do Peter,’ said Mrs. Swanton. ‘I mean,’ she added vaguely, ‘Peter’s safe enough where he is.’

  Laura left her, and went into the consulting-room. She put in a trunk call to the Governor of the prison, and drew symmetrical patterns on the blotter while she waited — a rectangle with bars down it, and a vertical figure that might have been made up of two gallows trees touching, the ropes dangling.

  When the call came through she was told that the Governor was busy and could not speak to her. By making several brusque, unspecific remarks about her status as a doctor, and hinting at urgent medical reasons, she at last got in touch with him. He was not anxious to answer her questions. But in the end she had established the fact that Peter had not been visited by his wife. They knew nothing about his wife.

  Laura reported this with cold triumph to her mother.

  ‘It’s none of our business,’ said Mrs. Swanton defensively. It was clear that if Laura had not been so persistent, Mrs. Swanton herself would have been the first to worry and make frightened guesses at what had happened. As it was, she felt herself bound to speak up for Charlotte. ‘She’ll be back in a day or two.’

  The day or two passed, became three days, and Charlotte did not return to Brookchurch.

  Laura telephoned Doctor Whiting in Jury. With his usual infuriating affability he agreed to take any urgent calls for her next day. Laura worked until eleven o’clock that night, making routine visits for the next two days, leaving as little as possible for Doctor Whiting. The following morning she went up to town on the early train. It was her first trip to London since she had gone up to Peter’s trial — that day on which she had first met Charlotte.

  Charlotte would be in London. She was one of those people who belonged in London; and, Laura was convinced, she was also one of those who would move in a limited area, within a certain circle of friends and places.

  She had to be brought back. Laura was clear and decisive now. Her original uncertainties had been dispelled.

  From now on she was consciously, deliberately the hunter. When the moment came to strike, she would recognise it — and act. There must be no trace; she must not, in striking, expose herself to danger. For Peter’s sake as much as her own, there must be no scandal.

  Perhaps she would find it possible to set a trap, or perhaps the opportunity would present itself unexpectedly. She must be ready.

  ‘I can’t think what you’re hoping to do,’ Mrs. Swanton said. ‘You oughtn’t to pester the poor child. She’ll come and see us again when she’s ready.’

  Laura ignored her. She set off in the haze of the summer morning and sat quite still in the compartment as the fields rose to the tunnelled ridges and gave way at last to groves of chimneys and the deeper haze of the city. She did not read, and was not consciously making any plans.

  She went first to the house in which she had met Charlotte.

  Charlotte had not been there. There had not been any word from her since she had sent money and instructions for the removal of her personal belongings — and a fine nuisance that had been, you’d have thought the least she could do was come and sort it out herself; still, she was always a pleasant girl and no doubt there were good reasons . . .

  Decisions must have been shaping themselves for Laura as she travelled up. She went straight from the flat to the nearest telephone box and took up the last volume of the telephone directory.

  The echoes were remarkably clear. Trivial things came back to her when she needed them. She could hear Charlotte in one of her reminiscent moods, giggling over some disjointed story. ‘As Harry Watford used to say . . . I’ll never forget Janie and Bossy Merriman . . . that time we were out with the Watfords . . .’ The name of Watford had come back over and over again, reverberating with remembered amusement. Those, for Charlotte, had been the days. ‘Harry Watford, he really was the limit, you’ve no idea . . .’

  Laura found four Watfords, Henry, in the directory, and one Watford, H. W., two of them in the W.2 district. She lifted the receiver.

  Then she paused.

  If the wife — the Watfords, she recalled, were often referred to in the plural — were at home, and knew anything about Charlotte, would she be prepared to answer questions over the phone? A voice in a receiver could be very uncommunicative: Laura would learn nothing that the speaker did not wish to pass on. Diagnosis from a series of vibrations in a metal diaphragm was difficult.

  She put the receiver back in its cradle, noted the two addresses, and left the telephone box.

  She went to the nearer address. The morning was racing by: she realised that she had very little time and that her quest could so easily be a hopeless one.

  London was said to be the finest place in the world for anyone who wished to lose himself, or herself.

  Nevertheless she was still sure that Charlotte would not plunge into a completely unknown part of the city. She would not have the courage to cut herself away from the places she had known. Desperation might have driven her back to London, but it would not drive her into an utterly new existence.

  Desperation . . . Why was she desperate?

  Laura had several theories. She would find out, in all probability, which was the right one. If she had time, that was, before . . . before the end.

  The house to which she came now was a small one with a flat roof, incongruously sandwiched between two taller ones. It had almost certainly not been painted since before the war.

  The woman who opened the door was about Laura’s own age, but there was little resemblance between them. Her features were slack and puffy, but it could be seen that she had once been very attractive. If her caller this morning had been a man, she would, Laura sensed, have produced a smile that was still charming — the easy, responsive, still achingly youthful smile of a woman used to the company and jokes and advances of men.

  As it was, the face was impassive. The woman waited for Laura to identify herself.

  Laura said: ‘Mrs. Watford?’

  ‘Yes.’ There was a trace of reluctance in the reply.

  ‘I’m Doctor Swanton.’

  ‘I haven’t sent for a doctor. Don’t need one. At least’ — she squeaked with unexpectedly skittish laughter — ‘I don’t think I do.’

  ‘I believe you knew my brother, Peter Swanton.’

  ‘Peter?’ Mrs. Watford stared. Then she smiled. ‘Oh, him. Charlie’s husband.’

  ‘I’m looking for Charlotte,’ said Laura quickly.

  ‘You won’t find her here, my pet.’

  ‘I rather hoped you would be
able to help me.’ Laura was furious that she should be kept standing on the step like this, but she tried not to show it. ‘I’m worried about her.’

  ‘She’ll be all right.’

  ‘You know where she is, then?’

  ‘Me? Why should I know, my dear?’

  Laura said with terrible patience: ‘She has been staying with us, and now she’s disappeared. We’re afraid she may — may not be well. I’ve come up to town to try and find her. She ought not to be wandering about on her own.’

  Mrs. Watford scratched her head. She looked uncertain: her character was as blowsy and unkempt as her appearance. Laura tensed. Here was a woman who could be easily swayed. It was a matter of approach, of applying the right pressure, carefully, at the right moment.

  Mrs. Watford said: ‘You mean she’s . . . there’s anything the matter with her?’

  ‘Of course not,’ said Laura brightly. ‘That would be a most misleading way of putting it.’

  The door was opened wider. Laura went in, and followed Mrs. Watford down a narrow passage. A Hogarth print hung askew on one wall. A low bookshelf jutted out at the end, as they went into the room beyond.

  There were two low tables in the middle of the room — the sort of tables that required one to sprawl languidly, half on the floor, if one proposed to make use of them. Several empty glasses with red stains in the bottom were clustering on each table and also on the top of a radio in one corner. A smell of smoke and drink was trapped in the gaudy chequered curtains. Over the fireplace was a long picture in a yellow frame; the picture was composed of squares and blobs. It reminded Laura of something virulent seen under a microscope.

  Mrs. Watford nodded her towards a chair. Laura sank down into it. The chair was just too low for one to be able to get up again without an effort.

  ‘Of course,’ said Mrs. Watford, ‘that business of Peter shook her up. You could tell that.’ She blinked at a group of glasses near her elbow. ‘Care for a drink?’

  ‘Thank you, no.’

  ‘No.’ Mrs. Watford looked momentarily sad. ‘I suppose it is a bit too early.’

  Laura said: ‘Have you seen Charlotte recently?’

  ‘Last night,’ said Mrs. Watford, snapping the words out quickly before she could change her mind.

  ‘Where?’

  ‘At a friend’s.’

  There was something in her tone that convinced Laura she was already beginning to hedge again.

  Laura said: ‘Do I know the friend? If you could give me the address . . .’

  ‘Oh, hell,’ said Mrs. Watford. ‘Actually it was a pub. The one we always go to. The one Charlie’s always been to.’

  ‘And after you’d been to the pub — what then?’

  ‘We came home earlyish,’ said Mrs. Watford plaintively, slumping back in resentment from this cross-examination. ‘We had a party fixed up here.’

  ‘Charlotte came with you?’

  ‘She said she wasn’t in the mood. I thought then that she looked a bit queer. Not concentrating at all, if you know what I mean.’

  ‘I know exactly what you mean,’ said Laura quickly, with sinister emphasis.

  ‘Oh, dear,’ said Mrs. Watford. ‘Poor kid.’

  ‘It would be better,’ said Laura, ‘if I could find her in time. It’s not advisable for her to be alone.’

  ‘She wasn’t alone. She was with a man.’

  With a man. Laura felt a tremor of disgust.

  ‘Not that I’m saying anything,’ Mrs. Watford rushed on. ‘She never was one of those . . . I mean, she didn’t look as though she was enjoying herself.’ She wriggled uncomfortably, not sure what she was talking about.

  Laura said: ‘Where can I find her?’

  ‘You might look’ — Mrs. Watford was looking away at a thick unsymmetrical vase, as though to dissociate herself from the information she was allowing to come out — ‘in the Malt Shovel, in Beckonbridge Grove. That’s where we saw her yesterday. She and Peter always used to drift in and out of there. Not that she would ever go in on her own. We used to laugh at her for being shy about going into a pub. She’s a queer little thing.’

  Mrs. Watford looked around the room again and showed signs of wanting to wipe her eyes. It was impossible to tell whether the sight of so many empty glasses had affected her, or whether she was melancholy over the thought of queer little Charlotte.

  ‘Thank you,’ said Laura.

  The woman got up thankfully, eager to be rid of her. A suspicion struck Laura. She said:

  ‘That’s the only lead you can give? You can’t be more definite — you’ve no idea where she’s staying?’

  ‘’Fraid not. I’d no notion she was . . . that people were looking for her. Harry said afterwards that she looked a bit odd, but then it was ages since we’d seen her. And it was none of our business.’

  Laura left the house. She thought that she might well have been staved off with half-truths, but at least the woman had seemed honest in her information about the public house. It was only to be hoped that Charlotte did not see the Watfords or telephone them before Laura could get to her.

  She found the Malt Shovel and waited for a long time in the saloon bar, perched on a stool near the counter so that she could look through a doorway behind the bar into the public bar as well.

  Charlotte did not come.

  Little groups of young men with beards and warm-smelling corduroys gathered behind her, and drew in a number of young women with shrill voices. An elderly man clutching a violin case held court in what was evidently his accustomed corner.

  Laura could clearly visualise Charlotte among such people. She so obviously belonged here that one expected the door to open any second and admit her. But it did not.

  Laura had a makeshift lunch at the bar, indifferently selecting a slab of meat pie, potato salad, pickled walnuts and cold spaghetti. When she had finished, Charlotte had not arrived, and it was almost closing time.

  Laura asked the barman whether Mrs. Swanton was expected. The name meant nothing to him, but as she spoke she detected a tension in one of the groups further down the room. Their loud argument became suddenly softer, and she had the impression that they were listening without turning their heads towards her. She glanced hopefully at them. Their faces were averted. Clustering together, they looked blank and unyielding.

  At closing time they all shuffled or sauntered out into the afternoon streets. The sun shone. A dark cloud over a nearby church threatened rain.

  The end of Beckonbridge Grove tilted down into a grey road lined with grey houses and a few shops. A tattered cinema poster made the only splash of colour, and that colour was rapidly fading.

  Laura had an overwhelming sensation of vast, empty spaces — emptier than the marshes she knew so well. She could walk for miles and not find the one person she sought. And if she did find her, what then? To kill her now, here, in London, was impracticable. She had spoken to too many people about Charlotte now. If Charlotte died, Laura Swanton would be the first person they would look for.

  Unless, of course, she could find Charlotte on her own, and then continue the search, expressing horror when the news of Charlotte’s death reached her.

  How was it to be done?

  In the first place, how to find Charlotte?

  The remaining hours of the afternoon blurred into one another. Laura went purposelessly back to the square in which Charlotte’s home had been, then wandered on through streets that led from nowhere to nowhere. Hatred dazed her faculties. She turned right at a corner, and right again. Somewhere in the neighbourhood, somewhere within this erratic path she was tracing, Charlotte would almost certainly be. She might walk out of a house at any moment. She might be buying bread at that confectioner’s on the other side of the road; might be ready to get off that bus that was thrusting its red bulk in to the curb through the traffic; might be lying on a bed in one of those gaunt houses, staring at the ceiling.

  What was she doing about money? Laura had doled out a weekly allow
ance to her while she was in Brookchurch, but Charlotte was not the sort to save. She would hardly have put it away regularly, accumulating enough to escape. Why come to Brookchurch in the first place, if she had wanted to be in London; or why, having got there and found it not to her liking, not simply make sensible, adult arrangements to leave? To get a job somewhere, to shake hands and say goodbye . . .

  Laura swayed on the edge of a pavement. Traffic swished in close to her, accelerated, and went off at a tangent. She closed her eyes, felt that she would fall forward, and opened them again.

  Now she understood how murderers came to make mistakes. She realised how clouded the judgment could become by the intensity of one’s hatred. Minor details became exasperating. The incessant wrangling in the head began to scream into incoherence, until there was nothing but a babel of loathing, viciousness, and the longing to put an end to it — the longing that could only be fulfilled by action, silencing the clamour at last. One would rush blindly on, yearning only for the peace that would come with accomplishment; and that was when the mistakes would be made.

  She felt purposeful but unfocussed. Inside her was a frightening concentration of energy that could not be released until the right time. The pressure was intolerable.

  Yet until she found Charlotte it all meant nothing. She was venomous yet harmless, at this moment. The longing in her mind was like a deadly poison stowed away in a cupboard — harmless until it found a substance to attack.

  At the end of the afternoon she turned back towards the Malt Shovel, simply because there was nowhere else she could look.

  She had forgotten Peter. She wanted only Charlotte. When Charlotte was out of the way, she would be able to think again of Peter and the way she would look after him when he was free. He would come home. This time she would make sure that he did not want to leave again. She would make up to Peter for all that he had suffered: for all his mistakes and his misery.

  The last possible train home would leave at eight o’clock. She looked at the clock over the bar every two or three minutes, and turned towards the door each time it opened.