When Last I Died

by Gladys Mitchell

  March 17

  Muriel was much calmer this afternoon. She asked me whether I would be prepared to lend her a little money until she can find some work, as Tom is determined to return to the haunted house, and she has refused to live there. Tom cannot afford to pay her bills at the inn if I leave them and go to Cornwall. I said I would gladly help her, and that, if she cared to do it, I would be pleased to take her on as my paid companion. She asked whether she might have time to think it over, not that she wasn't grateful, but she had thought of something more in the secretarial line, or teaching music.

  March 18

  There is no doubt the police think Tom was pushed out of the window. That means that he must have said so, and is returning to the house to solve the mystery. The police have interviewed a good many people—tradespeople and others—and have again questioned Muriel and myself. How I wish I had never gone near the house that night! That's what's done it. They think I pushed him out, I do believe! I wonder what he has against me !

  March 19

  Muriel told me that they have been asking her whether he had anything on his mind. That would make it attempted suicide. She replied that he was in good spirits with every prospect of making some extra money out of his writings on the haunted house, that he was not financially embarrassed, and that, in any case, he was receiving an allowance. That brought them back to me, and they demanded to know what had made me think of giving Tom an allowance. I explained about Aunt, as briefly as I could, and the inspector rather nastily said: "Oh, yes, the old lady who was choked with the grated carrot. I remember."

  In spite of my income and my freedom, I am beginning to wish that that particular carrot was still growing in the garden.

  The diary ended somewhat abruptly, and Mrs. Bradley could not help wondering what had caused so assiduous a diarist— supposing the diary to be genuine, a supposition which, on the internal evidence, she was disposed to reject—to fall short of reporting the course of events at least up to the death of Cousin Tom.

  She enquired, later, on what date Cousin Tom had died, and learned that it was on the morning of the twenty-second of March that his body had been found on a gravel path outside the haunted house. The ghosts believed in repeating their effects, it seemed.

  Chapter Two

  REACTIONS OF AN ELDERLY SERVANT

  "And whereas none rejoice more in revenge Than women use to do: yet you well know, That wrong is better checked by being contemned Than being pursued...."

  DANIEL.

  AT half-past two in the afternoon, Mrs. Bradley drove into the village. The weather had improved. It was no longer raining, although there was no sunshine either. In the distance the sea boomed, a sullen sound in keeping with the lowering sky.

  Derek accompanied his grandmother. They were to meet his father and mother at the station and drive them back to the house for an early tea.

  The little boy had spent three hours upon his scrap-book, and the result, a little uneven, and marred here and there by the application of too much paste, was creditable enough, considering his age. Mrs. Bradley, in fact, was surprised at the dimensions and variety of his holiday collection when she assisted him in checking, classifying and naming it.

  "We're allowed to have any help we can get," he announced. "Miss Winter says that no man is sufficient unto himself when he goes out into the world, and so she sees no reason why we should be sufficient unto ourselves at school. She lets us cheat our mathematics and everything else, if we want to. She says it's too fatiguing to fight against Nature in the raw. I don't know what it means, but she's awfully nice."

  Mrs. Bradley inwardly commended Miss Winter for being, if not 'awfully nice,' at any rate the most sensible person she had heard of for some time. She then urged George to drive a little faster, as she thought the train was almost due. George replied with an inspired burst of speed which brought a flush of joy to the clear cheeks of the child, and caused Mrs. Bradley to quote Aristophanes in a dignified but heartfelt manner.

  "Be valiant, daring and subtle, and never mind taking a risk,"* said she in Greek, as the car drew up at the station.

  * The Frogs, Act 3. Trans. by D. W. Lucas and F. J. A. Gruso. 1936.

  It was Ferdinand's habit to travel by train whenever it was possible to do so. Caroline, who detested trains, said that he liked working out the connections from Bradshaw and deciding how much time could have been saved if they had made three more changes. Ferdinand denied this, and said that driving made him sleepy.

  At any rate, the train had not arrived when George pulled up, but they could hear a distant whistle.

  Ferdinand and Caroline both looked well and were pleased to see their child again. Caroline questioned Mrs. Bradley, Derek supplied vociferous footnotes, and the scrap-book, solemnly brought from the house to the station in brown paper, had to be displayed.

  It was agreed that the parents should remain at the house for the night, and should leave with Derek soon after breakfast next morning. Caroline, who was tired, was grateful; Derek was delighted, and, with his father's assistance, put in a valuable couple of hours after tea on the scrap-book. At eight he went to bed, sleepy, but, as an artist, satisfied.

  "Staying on here all alone, Mother?" asked Ferdinand. "What on earth for?"

  "Well, I'm still hoping that the authorities may let me have my boys. Besides, I've stumbled upon something interesting," replied Mrs. Bradley. She showed him the diary. "I was doing some work at Shafton, the reconstructed institution for delinquent boys, when I came on the story first. It appears that there was a housekeeper there named Bella Foxley. She resigned about six years ago, when she came into some money at the death of her aunt, an old lady who lived in this house, and died in it under, apparently, peculiar circumstances."

  "Do you mean that she murdered the aunt?" asked Caroline.

  "Oh, no, she didn't murder the aunt. At least, there was no suggestion of that. But certainly she murdered her cousin," said Ferdinand, before his mother could reply. "I remember the case quite well. She was acquitted, but, all the same, she did it. You were in America, Mother, at the time. I was asked to defend her, but I wouldn't undertake it. However, they got her off. Lack of motive. But the motive was there, all right."

  "You mean she did murder the aunt, and the cousin knew it?" said Mrs. Bradley. "I can see all sorts of objections to that theory, and yet there is a great deal to be said in favour of it. The diary gives some very curious sidelights. Poltergeist phenomena——"

  "Oh, lord, yes! The haunted house," said Ferdinand. "The prosecution didn't care for the poltergeist at all, I remember, but the defence produced some pretty good stuff on the subject. Their theory was suicide whilst the balance of the mind was affected. They tried to prove that the haunted house had got on Cousin Tom's nerves, and he'd chucked himself out of the window in a fit of panic. You know, Mother, you ought to meet Pratt, if you're interested in the case. He covered it for one of the evening papers. Of course, he's given up reporting ever since he brought off that record-breaking play, but I daresay he could give you a pretty good idea of how the trial went. Conscientious bloke, too. Wouldn't invent anything or distort anything—knowingly!"

  "How was Cousin Tom supposed to have died?" asked Caroline. "Just by falling out of the window?"

  "Well, that was the contention of the defence, but the prosecution got hold of medical witnesses who declared that a blow on the head was struck before he ever reached the ground. It became a battle of the experts in the end. I think that's why the jury let her off. The average person is suspicious and upset when expert witnesses can't agree, you know."

  "I'm going to stay on for a bit and pump Eliza Hodge, my landlady," said Mrs. Bradley. "She used to be a servant here before the old lady died."

  "But I still don't understand what your object is, Mother, in going back over all this," said Ferdinand. "What has struck you about it?"

  "While I was at the Institution I helped to trace two boys who had broken out," replied Mrs. Br
adley. "When Bella Foxley left the Institution two other boys had disappeared, and were never traced. That seems to me a most extraordinary thing."

  "Why? Do you think she helped them to run away?" enquired Caroline.

  "There is little to lead one to such a conclusion, but she mentions the boys several times in her diary, and the present Warden thinks that some member of the staff connived at the escape. If he is right, one wonders what could have been the motive. These boys were anti-social and degenerate. One of them had committed murder. It seems odd that any responsible person should think it desirable to have them at large. Especially-—although this is not mentioned in the diary—as Cousin Tom did die."

  She spoke with her usual mildness, and Ferdinand looked at her sharply.

  "What are you getting at, Mother?" he demanded. "You don't think one of those boys did the murder, do you?"

  "Oh, no. I am prepared to believe that Bella Foxley did the murder. I think, too, that she murdered her aunt. And I think she contrived the escape of the boys. All of that is implicit in her diary, as I read it. Do you read it, child, before you go to bed. You will find it more than interesting."

  It was to Miss Hodge that she took herself straightway when the guests had driven off in the morning. She had made up her mind that she would approach the subject bluntly, and she did.

  "I was interested in the diary, Miss Hodge," she said. "I wonder ...." She looked into the eyes of the old servant.

  "Yes, madam?" said Miss Hodge; and her eyes flickered nervously, Mrs. Bradley noticed.

  "An impertinence on my part, perhaps, but—were you very much attached to Miss Bella and Miss Tessa? I suppose, by the way, that you are the Eliza of the diary?"

  "Yes, madam, of course I am. As to Miss Bella and Miss Tessa—well, I was very fond indeed of Miss Tessa, and terrible grieved when she was so unfortunate."

  "Unfortunate? You mean ...?"

  "Yes, that's it, madam. Her husband turned out badly, I'm afraid. In fact, it proved he wasn't her husband. Such a nice fellow he was, too. But I suppose these bigamists often are, and that's where they lead themselves astray. I don't really think he meant Miss Tessa any harm, and fortunately— most fortunately as it turned out—nothing came of the marriage——"

  "No children, you mean?"

  "That's right. So it wasn't as bad as it might have been; and when it all came out he went away to South America before he got himself arrested, and there, it seems, he died of being attacked by a crocodile or a snake or something of them kind of horrible things."

  "Is it certain that he's dead?"

  "Oh, yes, madam. No manner of doubt, and really, for poor Miss Tessa, the best way out. But she always kept up her married name, I believe, although she never came back here no more. I did just write to her once, getting the address— although I suppose it was not my place—out of the bureau drawer where I knew the mistress kept it, for all she had said she would never see Miss Tessa again...."

  "But surely it wasn't the girl's fault?"

  "Well, she wasn't so much of a girl, if you take me, madam. She would have been all of thirty-five when she married him, and the mistress never liked the marriage anyhow, and when it came out what he was, she said she had always known something would happen, and Miss Tessa was old enough to have had more sense about men."

  "Yes, I see. So she cut Miss Tessa out of her will, and left all the money to Miss Bella."

  "Well, she did and she didn't. She left the money to Miss Bella, but Miss Tessa was to have it after her, unless Miss Bella should have got married, which there wasn't much chance she would. But, much to everybody's surprise, madam, Miss Bella gave Miss Tessa to understand that she was to have half the interest on the capital straight away. Of course, after the death of poor Mr. Tom, we heard no more about it, but I dare say she did it, all the same. Mr. Tom's death, and then Miss Bella being put in prison and tried for her life, took all our thoughts, as you can fancy, and ..."

  "The sisters got on well together, then?"

  "Well, I can't hardly say, madam. They didn't quarrel, that I know of, and I suppose Miss Bella must have been fond of Miss Tessa to share the interest with her like that; although, as she said to me herself, ' Why shouldn't a thousand do me as well as two thousand, Eliza? After all, I've never had more than two hundred up to now.' As, of course, madam, no more she hadn't, and a job that ate all the heart out of her, too, and all, even to get that much. But I was sorry to think Mr. Tom never came in for his share."

  "You were very fond of both of them, then?"

  Eliza hesitated for an instant, and then seemed to make up her mind.

  "I'm not ever one to speak ill of the dead, madam."

  "I am glad to hear you say that," said Mrs. Bradley. That this was a cryptic utterance was lost upon Eliza. She replied :

  "No, that's not my way, madam. What's buried should bury our spite with it. That's what I always say. All the same, I was very, very glad when they let Miss Bella off. It would have been a most terrible thing, that would."

  Mrs. Bradley agreed, and then said, changing the subject, it seemed :

  "I wonder whether you'd care to come to tea with me at your house this afternoon? I shall be quite alone now that my grandson has gone back with his parents."

  "That would be ever so nice, madam," said Eliza immediately. "Mrs. Bell is going over to Hariford, so I shall be all on my own, too."

  "Good," said Mrs. Bradley. "I shall expect you early, then."

  Eliza arrived at half-past three and found her hostess in the garden. Together they walked up the path and talked about the plants and flowers. The rockery particularly attracted attention. It had been one of Aunt Flora's hobbies, and Mrs. Bradley encouraged a subject of conversation of which she had some knowledge in order to keep the memory of Aunt Flora well in the foreground of her companion's mind.

  These artless tactics were successful, and by the end of her visit she had a clear picture of the household just before the old lady's death. Eliza was not garrulous, nor did she make too many tiresome repetitions. She seemed to welcome questions, and was obviously so much interested herself in what she was talking about that Mrs. Bradley's curiosity did not strike her as excessive. It seemed perfectly natural to her that other people should be fascinated by stories about the tragic household in which she had had a place.

  They had tea in the garden. It was brought out by the young maidservant who had come down with Mrs. Bradley because it was thought that a fortnight by the sea might do her good. It was doing her good, Mrs. Bradley had been glad to notice. She had taken Derek for some of his walks while Mrs. Bradley, who enjoyed what she called 'pottering about the house,' had done the dusting and had cooked most of the meals.

  During tea Eliza's anecdotes were chiefly based upon the small and harmless eccentricities of her late mistress, but, later (for the evenings were not very warm), when they went into the house to a small but cheerful fire, the trickle of reminiscence gradually rose to flood height, and by the time the visitor left at half-past eight Mrs. Bradley's curiosity was satisfied to the extreme limit of whatever satisfaction Eliza was able to provide. In fact, Mrs. Bradley felt that if there was anything she had not been told, it was because it was something which the old servant herself did not know.

  The fire had been lighted in the drawing-room, a room which had been furnished too heavily for its size. Heavy mahogany chairs, a sideboard (in the same kind of wood) which occupied almost the whole of a wall so that there was scarcely enough room to open the door, a dark red carpet with a thick pile, a mahogany bureau, an overladen mantelpiece and dark red velvet curtains which hung from the ceiling to the ground, created an impression of stifling and strangely hellish gloom which was not discounted, but, on the contrary, enhanced, by portraits of a gentleman with side whiskers and a lady wearing a bustle; by a couple of large fish labelled respectively Uncle Percy and Uncle George; and, finally, by a repellent arrangement of Wedgwood dinner plates affixed to the walls by wire brackets.