by Sarah Rayne
‘Yes,’ said Ella slowly. ‘Yes, I do see it that it had better be done.’
‘We wouldn’t go in unprepared. We’d work out what to say beforehand; stress that we were very young and frightened that morning – that the man threatened us.’
‘He did threaten us, didn’t he?’
‘God, yes.’ Clem shuddered and swigged down more of the sherry.
‘I suppose,’ said Ella, ‘it ought to be all three of us telling the story.’
‘You mean Veronica, too?’ Clem had not thought about this. ‘Would she agree?’
‘I think I could talk her into it,’ said Ella. ‘You’d better leave her to me, though. I’ve got to phone her this evening, as a matter of fact, so I’ll ask.’
Clem was very happy to leave Veronica to Ella on this occasion. Veronica, once she got going on the phone, was apt to talk for anything up to an hour, and although Clem enjoyed a gossipy conversation as much as anyone, tonight he wanted to concentrate on his menu.
After Ella had gone, he returned to stirring his fish. He added salt, spooned out a bay leaf that had floated to the surface, and thought how unlike Ella it was to turn up unannounced. It was even more unlike her to change her mind. People were odd; you thought you knew them and then they did something that surprised you.
He had expected a real tussle over telling the police what had happened, but Ella had capitulated without any fuss. Or had she? The more Clem thought about it, the more he remembered all the times he had discovered that Ella had her own agenda, even over the smallest things. He would not put it past her to have some plan to turn this situation to her own advantage, although he could not think how. Still, he was not going to be fooled by Ella Haywood’s little plottings, not he! He smiled to himself. Over the years Ella often thought she had fooled him, but she never had.
Ella had often fooled Clem Poulter over the years, and she knew she had done so tonight. She smiled to herself as she drove home.
She had gone to his house prepared to give him a second chance, but as soon as she went into his kitchen, she had known that the time for second chances was past. He was playing that music, the music Ella had heard so many years ago in the over-scented room of Cadence Manor with Serena Cadence, dead-eyed and terrible, seated bolt upright in her chair. And he was doing so deliberately and maliciously. When Ella rang the doorbell she had seen him peep through the hall window, then dart back into the house before letting her in. He had seen who was on his doorstep and seized the chance to administer one of his vindictive little jabs, switching on the stereo so the music would greet her when she walked in. In some way he knew what the music meant to her. Ella could not think how, but clearly she had been right to suspect him of giving Amy the CD. It was sad because it meant the plan Ella had worked out – the plan she had hoped would not be needed – was now imperative.
It was a quarter to nine when she reached her own house. As she got out of the car she waved a friendly greeting to some neighbours across the street, out walking their dog. If asked, they would be able to confirm the time she had arrived home.
She went into the house, satisfied that the plan was already under way. She dialled Veronica’s number. It was slightly irritating of Veronica to take so long about answering, and even more irritating that the silly creature was breathless and giggly when she did answer.
‘I spent the evening with my new friend,’ she began coyly. ‘And he’s only just left, actually, so when the phone rang I was—’
‘I won’t keep you a minute,’ said Ella, quickly. ‘But I’ve just got back from Clem’s house, and he’s in one of his flaps about the pudding for Friday evening.’
‘Pudding?’ Veronica sounded bewildered. Ella supposed if she had been cavorting around the bedroom with her current man it would be difficult for her to switch her mind onto puddings.
She said, ‘Clem wanted my advice about what to serve. We’ve been looking through his cookbooks, but we haven’t found anything. Then I remembered that lovely meringue dish you did once and I told Clem I’d get the recipe from you. He thought it would be just the thing.’
‘Meringue,’ said Veronica blankly. Then, ‘Oh, meringue. Yes, he can have the recipe with pleasure. Will tomorrow do? I can drop it into the library. Because at the moment the bedroom’s like a battlefield and—’
‘Tomorrow will be plenty of time,’ said Ella. ‘I’ve got to go out to his house first thing because I promised to lend him my crystal dessert set – the one—’
‘—that Derek bought when you were in Portugal,’ said Veronica. ‘I know. Can you call for the recipe on your way to his house?’
This was exactly what Ella wanted. She said, ‘Is nine o’clock too early?’ and braced herself for another of Veronica’s suggestive remarks, but Veronica said, in a perfectly ordinary voice, that nine o’clock would be quite all right.
Ella replaced the phone and sat very still, reviewing all the details of the plan. It had been right not to hide the fact that she had called at Clem’s house tonight. She might easily have been seen by one of his neighbours – she had been seen by a couple of her own. And Clem might even have made a phone call to someone – anyone – after Ella left, although that was not very likely. He was a bit of a Scrooge at times, old Clem; he made as many phone calls as he could from the library rather than his own phone.
And there were the sherry glasses. Clem might not have washed them up; he might just have put them in the sink for later. Ella’s fingerprints would certainly be on them, along with DNA from her lipstick. But she thought her story about a recipe was completely credible and she would have Veronica’s backup over that.
The only person who could contradict the story was Clem himself, of course. But by about half-past nine tonight Clem would not be able to contradict any story at all.
It was nine o’clock when Clem finally ladled out the fish in its rich sauce. It looked very good indeed, the consistency just right, the smell appetizing. Another of his triumphs. He sighed happily, fished out the other two bay leaves, dropped them into the bin, then buttered a wedge of crusty bread. He set the plate on the kitchen table; he would eat here, and this time he would listen properly to The Deserted Village.
The first mouthful of the fish was excellent, creamy and sharp, and the cadences of the music rose and fell as he ate. It was evocative music. The village and its people were pretty much doomed, that was the burden of the song. As he listened, he could almost imagine himself back in that long-ago morning when they had walked through the deserted village street, hearing the church clock chime, listening for the plane bringing the Geranos. It was odd how it had become known that Geranos was harmful; Clem had never actually heard of anyone being damaged by it. Still, governments and councils had been cagey in those days, and they had been able to be cagey. Not like now, when so much information had to be available to everybody.
He forked up a second mouthful of the fish. On further tasting it was actually a bit salty. Or was it? Clem’s recent head cold had blunted his sense of smell and also his sense of taste. He frowned, trying to decide. It was salty. In fact it tasted almost bitter. Had he put in too much seasoning after all? Clem got up to pour a glass of the chilled wine from the fridge and sipped it, hoping to sharpen his palate. No, it made no difference. He would be very annoyed if, after all his care, his beautiful dish had not worked and something else had to be quickly fudged up for Friday. He carried on eating, trying to think what he could cook in its place. He could not serve this to his guests, that was for sure. The bitterness was becoming more strongly pronounced, in fact it was almost acrid. His whole mouth was starting to feel hot and his throat was prickling.
He got up to get a glass of water and the entire room tilted and spun all around him. Clem gasped, and clung to the edge of the sink. Something was wrong with the food – something was very wrong indeed. Sickness welled up and he retched violently, leaning over the sink, spluttering and shuddering helplessly. Dreadful. He managed to run the tap to wash
the disgusting mess away and felt slightly better. A bad bit of fish, most likely. In that case, it was just as well he had been sick and got rid of it. In a minute he would tip the whole panful of food down the outside drain and flush it away with disinfectant and bleach. He would most likely throw the casserole dish away as well. He never wanted to eat fish again in his life.
He tottered back to the kitchen table but a dreadful cramplike pain twisted his stomach before he got there. He doubled over, sweat pouring from him, and as he did so felt the inside of his throat tightening and swelling. Dear God, this was more than a bit of food poisoning – he was really ill. He would have to get to the phone to summon help – a doctor – ambulance . . .
He was sick again, shamefully and messily, the wetness spattering all over the floor. Clem shuddered, but the pain tore through his guts again and he was beyond caring about the mess. If he could just get to the phone—
But he could no longer stand up and the phone on its cradle by the hall door seemed a thousand miles away. He felt dreadfully dizzy, but he managed to crawl a couple of feet towards the phone. Almost there, almost . . .
The pain slammed into him again and he curled over it, clutching his stomach and moaning. His throat and mouth seemed to fill up with thick suffocating flannel and he clawed at the air, gasping. The kitchen shivered and blurred, and there was a dull roaring in his ears. As he fell to the floor, the music wound its way to its eerie conclusion and faded into silence. But Clem could no longer hear it.
Ella was friendly and ordinary when Derek came home, with Amy shortly after him. She listened to all they had to say and, when asked about her own evening, said she had gone round to Clem Poulter’s house. He had wanted her help with a recipe, would you credit it? All that boasting he did about planning his menus and here he was, two days before a dinner party, rushing round like a demented hen to find a pudding.
‘Make him one of your apple pies, why don’t you?’ said Derek, who had switched on the television news and was only half listening to what Ella was saying. Ella did not bother to say apple pie was hardly the kind of thing Clem would want to serve. She did not, of course, say that there would not be any party anyway. She merely said she had promised to collect a recipe from Veronica and take it round in the morning.
‘I’ll do that if you like,’ said Amy, who was curled up on the hearthrug, drinking a mug of the tea Ella had made for them all. ‘Then I can take it into the library when I go in after lunch and save you the bother, Gran.’
Ella had a sensation like skidding uncontrollably over a patch of ice in a car. They said there was always one small item you overlooked. Was this it? Then she heard her voice saying, ‘I think he wants the recipe first thing, Amy. He’s going to collect the ingredients on his way in to the library. And I said I’d lend him my crystal dessert set as well, so I’ll need to pack that up and drive round with it.’
‘Oh, OK.’
The moment passed and Ella felt safe again. Derek had started his usual running commentary about the news: the state of the country and what the government ought to be doing, and he and Amy entered into a lively argument about some policy the Home Secretary had just announced.
Ella relaxed, but she was shaken. It just went to show you could not plan for absolutely everything. To reassure herself, she went back over what she had done that day. It had been so easy to pluck several leaves from her own garden that afternoon – not bay, which gave such a good flavour to cooking and which Clem swore by, but leaves from another bush entirely . . .
When they bought this house Ella had been very taken with the fact that it had a conservatory. Very nice, she had said. They would spruce it up and make it into an orangery with rare Mediterranean plants. Derek had said however much sprucing up you did and whatever names you gave them, conservatories were apt to become dusty and filled with dead flies, never mind being drearily unused during winter. But Ella had had it freshly painted and added ruched blinds and cane furniture ordered by catalogue from Heal’s. She tried her hand at growing a few of the rarer, more tropical plants in there, and one of her real successes was an oleander bush. Several members of the Exotic Plants Society had admired the oleander very much; one of the ladies actually had the very same variety of oleander in her garden, she said – Petite Red, a dwarf variety. It was nowhere near as luxuriant as Ella’s, however, although having this greenhouse – beg pardon, orangery – probably made it easier. Hers had to be taken into the house in a big pot during the winter, which was a bit of a nuisance, particularly when you had to be so careful with oleanders. They were regarded as one of the most poisonous plants in the world. Ella did know that, did she?
Ella had not known it, but she was not going to admit it to the Exotic Plants crowd.
Earlier, casting around for a means to deal with Clem, her eye had fallen on the bright splash of colour in the orangery. Oleander, one of the most poisonous plants in the world . . . A tiny pulse of excitement began to beat. In a cluttered kitchen, with a complicated recipe to follow, the oleander leaves might just about pass for bay. As Ella considered this, another fragment of memory swam into her mind, something the Exotic Plants woman had also said about her garden.
‘We inherited a lovely bay tree from the previous owners of our house,’ she had said, ‘but I do wish it wasn’t so near the road. D’you know, people actually reach over the hedge to steal the leaves? Can you believe that? In fact, the other week you wouldn’t believe who I saw taking some— No, I mustn’t say.’
She broke off hopefully, and at least half the assembled company urged her please to say, just in confidence, just among friends.
‘Mr Poulter from the library,’ said the woman. ‘He looked round to make sure no one was watching, then he leaned over the hedge and broke off a handful of bay leaves.’
Remembering that conversation, Ella thought it just went to show that you never knew what seemingly innocent part of your own life might one day come in useful.
Even so, before putting her plan into action she made very sure of the facts, looking up oleander in Derek’s Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Its full name was Nerium oleander. It was a Moroccan and Mediterranean plant, described as an evergreen shrub in the dogbane family, Apocynaceae. Ella already knew this because she had looked it up in preparation for the Exotic Plants afternoon. What she had not known was the strength of what the encyclopaedia called its toxicity. There was a list of the substances oleander plants contained. Ella did not recognize any of them and she could certainly not have pronounced them, but the burden of the song was that if you ate enough you would almost certainly die, and very quickly too. Ella read it all carefully, paying particular attention to the quantities believed to be fatal. As well as the leaves, the bark, it seemed, contained a substance called rosagenin, which was apparently known for its strychnine-like effects.
Before going to Clem’s house, she went into the orangery and, wearing her kitchen gloves, plucked a number of the leaves. Then, with extreme care, she scraped off some of the bark, and sealed everything in a small freezer bag, which she tucked in her handbag. It should be easy enough to stir the contents into Clem’s casserole. He had made enough fuss about telling everyone how he was cooking it this evening, and Ella thought she would be able to make some excuse to go into the kitchen or to find a reason to get him out of the room.
In the end, it was easy. He offered her a glass of sherry and went bumbling out of the kitchen to find the bottle and the glasses. While he was gone Ella tipped all the leaves into the casserole, along with the bark scrapings taken from the stems. There was even time to stir it all round before Clem came back with the sherry.
Lying in bed that night, Ella found it difficult to sleep. She was not specially troubled by what she had done because Clem, stupid poultering old hen, had signed his own death warrant.
What was bothering her was the unpleasant task that now lay ahead, because she would have to drive out to his house, conspicuously bearing Veronica’s re
cipe and the dessert dishes, and discover his body. And then find those stupid diaries and get rid of them before anyone saw them.
Would it actually be a body she found, though? Supposing he had recovered? Supposing he had managed to summon a doctor or an ambulance?
She finally managed to get to sleep, but her dreams were troubled and the eerie music of The Deserted Village ran in and out of her consciousness like quicksilver.
Chapter 23
Next morning, Derek left for the office at half-past eight, as usual. In his own words, he liked to be at his desk on the tick of nine. You had to set an example in these things.
Amy was in the bathroom when Derek left, washing her hair. To Ella’s mind Amy washed her hair far too often. Her mother, said Ella, would have considered Amy was washing all the nature out of it.
Amy said, ‘Yes, but this morning my hair smells a bit of the Red Lion’s seafood platter,’ and Ella found she had to grip the banister because her heart had done its breathless little skip. It was going to be a nuisance if this business with Clem resulted in her heart performing gymnastics every time anyone mentioned eating fish.
She left Amy to her shampooing, saying she would nip round to Veronica’s house for the promised recipe, then go on to Clem’s.
‘It sounded good, that pudding of Veronica’s,’ said Amy, coming downstairs with her hair wrapped in a towel. ‘Have I got to dress up for this bash at Clem’s?’
‘No, but I hope you won’t turn up in jeans,’ said Ella, wrapping up the dishes she was supposed to be lending Clem. It was a nuisance to have to do this, but it was important to act innocently.
Veronica had the meringue recipe ready. She was a bit puffy-eyed this morning, but she invited Ella in, saying there was surely time for a cup of coffee.
‘Actually, there isn’t,’ said Ella. ‘Can we make it another day? I promised to get this stuff round to Clem before he leaves for the library.’
