“Even if she had lived, things would never have been the same between us. There’s a saying: Broken friendship is like broken china, you can put it together again, but it will always show the crack.”
“Maureen, your husband loves you very much. He’ll forgive you.” I then went downstairs to tell Sir Robert his wife wanted to see him. When I asked if I might use the phone, he pointed one out to me in an alcove off the hall. As I dialed my own number and spoke to Freddy, I heard the baronet’s footsteps dwindle into a sad echo.
All I wanted at that moment was to get home, but I had explained to my cousin that I was going to make a stop first and that if I wasn’t home within half an hour to come and rescue me—words lightly spoken because I didn’t foresee any problems. I wasn’t silly enough to walk into the lion’s den when the lions were there. But it’s true I wasn’t thinking entirely clearly. A numbness had settled on me upon leaving Maureen Pomeroy’s bedroom.
As I drove up The Cliff Road, the only thing I was sure of was that she hadn’t killed Mrs. Large. I told myself that the reason for making a stop before going home was an attempt at putting the ghosts of my suspicions to rest. To face once and for all the fact that Mrs. Large’s death had been an accident. It was raining hard as I got out of the car and walked towards the house. Tall Chimneys stared back at me with dark, unseeing eyes. The Miller sisters were away at their dog show. But I did not need them to let me in. I remembered Vienna had spoken about a spare key to the back door hidden under a flowerpot.
The house closed in on me as I entered the kitchen, and it wasn’t until I blundered into the hall that I found a light switch. But even in the sudden brightness there remained something furtive about that hall and the way the stairs hugged tight against the wall. I didn’t like the way the entire house pretended to echo my footsteps so that no one would guess what it was really saying.
Although, to be fair, who could blame it? I was not much better than a burglar. As much a criminal as Maureen Pomeroy. I took off my raincoat because its cold dampness weighed me down, and hung it on the hall tree. Stepping out of my wet shoes, I jumped when a raincoat belonging to either Vienna or Madrid slid off the tree, to be followed by a felt hat.
Heart hammering, I replaced them. There was no denying that Mrs. Large made one ghost too many at Tall Chimneys. I braced myself to go into the study to relive the moment of finding her lying on the floor beside the toppled ladder, the dustpan and pile of ashes bearing silent witness to her recent activity. But I couldn’t do it. Instead I moved towards the sitting-room door, which stood open. Its furniture looked as though it would tell on me if I shifted one foot off the hall floor. So I stood in the doorway, restaging those who had gathered there for the Hearthside Guild meeting. Our hostesses, Sir Robert and Maureen Pomeroy, Brigadier Lester-Smith, Tom Tingle, and Clarice Whitcombe. All assumed their places. Their faces and forms fleshed out; their voices grew in resonance as memory came flooding back. My spine prickled and my hand felt cold and sticky.
What was this room trying to tell me? Was a phantom Mrs. Large attempting to give me a mental nudge? Or was I unnerved by the portrait of Jessica—with the lilac bows between her ears and the ruby on her paw? She looked so alive, as if she might start barking if I moved a muscle. Suddenly I was in the drawing room at Merlin’s Court, Bunty across from me sipping her sherry, and I was putting my glass on the mantelpiece, knocking over Mrs. Malloy’s china poodle. In a flash of belated illumination, I knew why I had stood with my eyes glued to the floor. Looking at those broken piece had prodded a memory. And it was that half-formed realization that had brought me back to this house. Now the other pieces of the jigsaw puzzle fitted into place. It was rather like one of those times when you’re talking and can’t find the right word and all the poking around in your mind won’t dig it up. So you tell yourself that if you leave it alone it will come to you later. And it does, popping into your head when you are thinking about something else entirely.
I leaped at the blast of noise, but it wasn’t Madrid’s beloved Norfolk terrier. It was the telephone. The shrill sound went on and on. Probably Freddy, I thought. The silly ass! There was no recovering my nerve when the phone finally stopped. Grabbing my raincoat off the hall tree and snatching up my shoes—to be put on when I got outside—I barely remembered to switch off the light before making a dive for the door.
I was still feeling sick as I backed the car into a skid and bounced out onto the lane. My shoes were on my feet, but I had tossed the raincoat on the passenger seat. Even with the windscreen wipers going full speed, I had trouble seeing through the fogged glass as I turned onto The Cliff Road. Cutting the corner too sharply, I stalled the engine, got it going again, and was breathing a little easier when the car slid into a ditch to settle with a soft bump—rather like a dog landing in its basket. Some five minutes later, having only dug myself in deeper, I faced up to walking home.
It was as I reached for my raincoat that I had my worst moment. The tip of a scarf protruded from the pocket. A scarf that wasn’t mine. Meaning neither was the coat. As my loving husband had said, it was easily done. So many of them look the same. But this was not the time to regret that I hadn’t gone for flaming red or royal purple. I was already half running, half slithering back around the corner and down the lane to Tall Chimneys.
I have to admit cowardice has its charms. Reentering that house was something I would not have wished upon anyone, not even the murderer of Trina McKinnley and Winifred Smalley. I was in such a daze of fright that it didn’t strike me that the hall light was back on as I came through the kitchen. I had eyes only for that hall tree, which is why I didn’t hear Vienna Miller come down the stairs.
“Well, Ellie, this is a nice surprise.” She was standing two feet in front of me. If I still had a mouth, I couldn’t find it. All I could do was stare at her. "I had to come back for Madrid’s medicine,” she continued. “My poor sister suffers terribly from springtime allergies.”
It was only long afterwards that I was able to think of excuses that I might have made, such as I hadn’t been able to find my handbag since coming here to clean and hadn’t thought she and Madrid would mind if I came round to look for it while they were gone. Vienna might even have believed me, until in my stricken state I fiddled with the scarf dangling from my pocket, and as it slipped to the floor found myself holding something that must have been caught in its folds. A smallish black bow. And like a complete idiot I allowed realization to show in my eyes as they met hers. “What was in the dustpan, Vienna?” I heard myself saying. “Is that what Trina discovered?”
“So now you know, dear.” It was the endearment that chilled me more than anything. Never had Vienna looked more sensibly tweedy. More kindly capable. More thoroughly resourceful. “I had to get rid of that unpleasant Trina McKinnley,” she said calmly. She might have been talking about the increase in the price of coffee.
“Then it was you! Not your sister!” The bow was sticking to my hand.
“What, Madrid? She doesn’t have it in her to murder anyone.” Vienna smiled indulgently. “I’ve always had to take on the world for both of us. So when Madrid told me Trina was blackmailing her because she had knocked Mrs. Large off that ladder, it was big sister to the rescue as usual. Not that I intended to kill Trina when I went to see her in Madrid’s stead that evening. I really thought I could reason with her—get her to see that what had happened to Mrs. Large was an accident. Madrid hadn’t meant to kill her. Certainly she lost her temper and gave that stepladder a shove. It was an impulse and completely understandable under the circumstances, in the light of Mrs. Large’s gross insensitivity to Madrid’s grief and outrage. But there was no getting through to Trina. She was angry that her friend Mrs. Smalley was going to portion out her inheritance from Mrs. Large—which, when you think about it, she would not have received but for Madrid. Trina wanted money, lots of money. And of course she would have been back for more. So when she turned her back I did the only practical thing.”
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“That’s one way of putting it.”
“I was waiting to make sure the coast was clear before leaving the house on Herring Street, when who should walk in but Mrs. Smalley.” Vienna’s voice became if possible even more bland. “I got her outside, and she had the sense to behave until I spotted the old convertible a couple of doors down, with the keys in the ignition.”
“It was mine.”
“I know, dear. And I’m sure you’ve learned a valuable lesson. It was as I was getting us settled in the car that Mrs. Smalley screamed.”
“So that’s why I was sure the sound came from out in the road. You were directly beneath Brigadier Lester-Smith’s bathroom.” Talking helped. It made me feel a little less powerless. “The surprising thing is that you were able to drive away from Herring Street without being spotted. It was full of people standing about when the brigadier and I got outside.”
“Several other cars were passing when I got the engine going, and I just tucked in between them.”
Rage seized me—at that wretched car. All the times it had stalled for me, but oh, no! Not for a murderess making her getaway with an elderly waif in the passenger seat.
“Don’t tell me how you killed Mrs. Smalley!” Tears stung my eyes. “I don’t need the details. Let’s get back to why Madrid pushed Mrs. Large off the stepladder.”
“You still haven’t figured that out, after all your snooping?” For the first time Vienna looked at me with dislike, and my spine stiffened. Looks couldn’t kill and there wasn’t room in the pockets of her tweed jacket for a weapon. In a hand-to-hand struggle, I would give as good as I got. There are advantages to not being a size 3.
“Mrs. Large broke something connected with Jessica that day, didn’t she?” I took a deep breath and resisted clutching at the hall tree as Vienna’s eyes narrowed. “My guess is a plaster or marble bust. Madrid told me that the man who painted Jessica’s mainly did sculptures.”
“Plaster.” Vienna bent and picked up the silk scarf from the floor. “It was my sister’s most treasured possession, even more important to her than the portrait, because she said it captured Jessica’s soul. And when that oaf of a woman broke it, all she could say was that she was glad it wasn’t valuable—couldn’t be because the artist was still alive.”
“Mrs. Large said something similar when she broke a mirror at my house,” I said. “But even Jonas, to whom it belonged, wouldn’t have pushed her off a ladder. He might have been tempted, but he would have restrained himself.”
“Don’t criticize my sister!” Vienna yanked the scarf tight between powerful hands. “You can’t understand her. No one ever could but me. I didn’t even contemplate the thought of letting her confess what she had done. She couldn’t have dealt with the aftermath and I wasn’t about to let her pay the price.” Vienna took a couple of steps towards me. “It happened minutes—seconds—before the Hearthside Guild meeting was due to begin. Someone rang the bell as Madrid was explaining to me what had happened. I picked up the larger pieces of the bust and told Madrid to put them in the dustbin. I scattered the smaller pieces with fireplace ash and left the dustpan alongside, to look as though it had been disturbed in the fall. Then I answered the door.”
“Unflappable you! I should have realized at once that Mrs. Large would not leave a full dustpan on the floor before starting to dust the bookshelves. I’m sure the rules of the C.F.C.W.A. instruct that one job must always be completed before starting another. But I suppose you couldn’t risk going back into the study after people arrived in case someone saw you.”
“That wasn’t it!” Vienna studied me with mounting contempt. “I didn’t have a moment to spare. Every minute was taken up trying to calm Madrid down so she didn’t give the game away. My poor darling.”
“I think she did remarkably well.” I was trying not to look at the hall tree, because I was counting on giving it a shove when—if—I could catch Vienna off guard. “She had her wits sufficiently about her to tell me she was upset because it was the day Jessica had died. And being the fool you take me for”—attempting a smile—”I didn’t realize her story couldn’t have been true when you told me on my subsequent visit that Jessica had died on her third birthday. And the ruby she is wearing on her paw is the December birthstone.”
“A little too late to think yourself clever, isn’t it, Ellie?” Vienna’s smile was much better than mine.
“Speak for yourself!” I placed my hand--unobtrusively, I hoped—on the hall tree. “Oh, I’ll admit that you played your part very well, taking me into the study to make sure Mrs. Large’s body was found while the Hearthside Guild members were still in the house. Luckily for you and your sister, every one of the members except me had left the sitting room at one time or another for various reasons. Although I’m not so sure it really mattered. The police had no reason to think Mrs. Large was murdered.” I had forgotten I was still holding the black bow. The small token of mourning had become part of my hand.
“I tore that bow out of Trina’s hair when we were struggling and must have picked it up along with my scarf, which had slid off.” Vienna spoke in a conversational voice. “I didn’t do a perfect job. Just the best I knew how to save my sister. When Trina came in to clean after the funeral—her first time back since her holiday—she noticed that the bust was gone from the bookshelf in the study. Nothing got past Trina McKinnley. So I told her I had put it away because I was beginning to think that looking at it was not helping Madrid’s despondency. Unfortunately she realized I was lying when she found a piece of a paw that must have slid under the bookcase.”
I stood looking at Vienna, suddenly wondering if things might have worked out differently if Mrs. Nettle had been paying attention when Trina phoned her and had asked what Trina meant in saying, “It never rains but it pours pennies from heaven.” But there was no bringing Trina or her two C.F.C.W.A. colleagues back. I had to save myself, something I might not have needed to do if Freddy had followed instructions and come looking for me as we’d agreed. He was as feckless as he’d ever been. I was just working myself into a froth when Vienna caught me off guard by flinging the silk scarf over my head and, capitalizing on my few seconds of blindness, slammed me into the staircase wall.
I heard my head breaking into fragments just like Jessica’s bust and Mrs. Malloy’s china poodle before darkness dropped down over me like a blanket over a birdcage. “Stupid, stupid me!” I murmured before drifting away on a vast tide of nothingness. Although perhaps there was something: a vile and suffocating smell. What was it? Deciding that it mattered took a huge effort. My head throbbed and my eyes burned and I was curled up in a cramped heap on the floor. But it wasn’t the floor in the hall. I was in the pantry at Tall Chimneys. Or was I dreaming about the time I got trapped in there? I told myself that if I blinked a few times, I would wake up fully to find myself in my own bed at Merlin’s Court with Ben hovering over me, begging me to taste a mouthful of chicken soup.
Alas for happy endings, the noxious fumes told me this was all too real. Struggling to my feet, I cupped my hands around my mouth and after trying, and failing, to open the pantry door, endeavored to take in my surroundings. I could see the marble shelf by the light filtering through the high window. But the ones stacked with tins and boxes were blurred. I was just able to make out a bucket on a shelf a good five feet above my head. It was from that bucket that the overpowering smell was coming. I knew exactly what was in that bucket. A mixture of bleach and ammonia. Abigail’s book of household hints had contained a warning about working with such a combination—especially in a closed area. The fumes were toxic. Deadly.
My mind, if not my head, cleared as if by magic. It’s amazing what self-preservation can do. I was even able to get a grip on my terror. Force myself to think. There had to be a way out. If Vienna had left the key in the lock on the other side, I might be able to nudge it out with a splinter of wood torn off one of the shelves and pull it inside on a piece of paper slid under the door. After winding
the raincoat belt around my nose and mouth I knelt down and peered into the keyhole. It was empty. Vienna had outfoxed me. There had to be another way. I told myself that I had the advantage of having been locked in here before. Nothing is ever as bad the second time around.
I remembered suddenly that Vienna had said—after she had rescued me the first time—that she had been meaning to do something about the pantry door’s sticking. Might I not reasonably assume that the problem had existed before she and Madrid moved into Tall Chimneys? In which case the woman who had lived here before might have had the same problem. The Lady in Black had been eccentric, but eccentricity is not the same as stupidity. If she’d ever found herself trapped in the pantry wasn’t it likely she would have kept a spare key in here? Indeed, my grandmother had kept a spare key above every door in her house.
Hands shaking, feeling more foggy by the moment, I reached above the door. It was there! While I was giving silent thanks to the Lady in Black, my shaky hand fitted the old iron key into the keyhole. At last I heard the grate of turning metal. Would the door stick this time? I shoved with all my considerable weight against it and finally it gave way with a disheartened groan.
I sat on the kitchen floor until I could breathe again. I was about to stagger to my feet and flee through the back door when Vienna appeared, no doubt to unlock the pantry door, so that my passing could be regretfully described as another ghastly accident.
Mustering all my strength, I got to my feet. “You don’t love your sister,” I said. “You don’t know the meaning of the word. You’re one of those people who need so desperately to be needed that you suck the life out of those closest to you. Clarice Whitcombe’s parents may have been selfish, they may have used her, but at least they allowed her to develop the capacity to function in the world. And my cousin Vanessa loved her baby enough to let her go when she wasn’t sure she was cut out to be a mother. But you are a monster. I’m sure you encourage Madrid to stay trapped in her grief—it’s your hold on her.”
The Spring Cleaning Murders Page 25
