by M C Beaton
“No,” said Rose slowly. “I could do it. I wish there was some way of making me up to look like Mary Gore-Desmond.”
“There’s a big hamper of theatrical stuff downstairs that they use for charades. But all you really need is a sort of sandy wig. They’ve got a box of grease-paint as well. I could make up your face. I was in the theatre, remember. Here’s what we’ll do…”
♦
Freddy and Tristram, staggering a little with all they had drunk, emerged from their rooms. Each was wearing a sheet over his head with eyeholes cuts in it.
They started to mount the steps to the tower where Rose’s room was located.
They had nearly reached the first landing when a figure, lit dramatically by a shaft of moonlight shining through an arrow slit, confronted them.
They stopped and clutched each other. All they could see was sandy hair over a thin chalk-white face contorted into an awful sneer. Then one white hand materialized and pointed at them.
“Murderers,” wailed an unearthly voice. “You murdered me.”
And then it disappeared.
It did not dawn on the frightened pair that the unearthly apparition had simply stepped back into the unlit blackness of the landing.
“Help!” called Freddy, his voice weak and thin as in a nightmare. “Help!” shouted Tristram, finding his voice.
Their terror had made them forget that they were still draped in sheets. Frederica Sutherland, the first to come running, saw the sheeted figures and fell down in a faint.
Others came crowding the bottom of the staircase. “Take off those sheets,” roared Lord Hedley. “Blithering idiots.”
They pulled off the sheets. “It was just a joke,” said Freddy. “But we saw this ghost of Mary Gore-Desmond.”
“She called us murderers,” said Tristram.
“Someone’s playing a joke on you. You are both drunk.”
“But we saw her,” wailed Tristram. He suddenly vomited all over the stairs.
“Get to bed, all of you,” ordered the marquess. “I’ll deal with you two in the morning.”
♦
Rose rolled around her bed with a handkerchief stuffed in her mouth to muffle her laughter. “Oh, Daisy,” she finally gasped. “How wonderful it was. And when the fuss has died down, they may start to wonder whether there really might be a ghost after all.”
Daisy laughed as well. She was relieved the haunting had gone well, and also relieved that her mistress was behaving more like a young girl and less like some sort of chilly mannequin with a head stuffed with facts.
Rose fell happily asleep that night, looking forward to telling Harry about the success of their exploit.
♦
He was furious. “Don’t you know what danger you have put yourself in?” he shouted as he drove away from the castle. Rose clutched her hat and demanded, “What do you mean?”
“I mean that they will get it out of Freddy and Tristram that they planned to haunt you. Who else would decide to give them a scare but you? And why are you screeching murder? If it was murder, then someone may want to silence you.”
“Piffle,” said Rose. “You are only angry because you did not think of it yourself.”
It took them three hours to reach the Gore-Desmonds’ country mansion. None of them had breakfasted, and all were feeling cold and angry.
“I am famished,” complained Rose as the car moved up the drive.
“Then you should have said so and we could have stopped somewhere,” snapped Harry. “Let’s get this over with.”
The house was still and quiet, with all the blinds drawn down and the curtains closed.
“How are we going to get a chance to talk to Quinn?” hissed Rose.
“I’ll think of something,” said Harry.
A butler opened the door before he had a chance to ring the bell. Harry handed him his card and asked if Mr. and Mrs. Gore-Desmond could spare them a little time.
“I am afraid the master and mistress have gone into town to supervise the last of the funeral arrangements.”
“And when will they be back?”
“I do not know, sir. Perhaps later today.”
“We have come quite a distance. Perhaps we might have a word with Quinn? – unless she has accompanied her mistress?”
The butler turned away and they followed him into one of those side rooms in country houses which are used for receiving farm tenants and the other hoi polloi.
Daisy and Becket found their way to the servants’ quarters in the hope of food.
The room was lit by a single oil lamp. It was full of overstuffed furniture, a large battered oak desk, and paraphernalia of fishing tackle, game bags, walking-sticks and rubber boots.
Quinn entered, dressed from head to toe in black.
“You did not accompany your mistress today?” asked Rose.
“No, my lady. My mistress has seen fit to engage another lady’s maid instead of employing me as she promised. I hope to shortly have employ with a respectable family who might have a better idea of how family servants should be treated.”
“Please sit down,” said Harry, helping her into an armchair. “We have heard that you were not pleased with Miss Gore-Desmond’s behaviour.”
Quinn suddenly rose to her feet, went to the door and jerked it open. The butler was standing there. “Go away and stop listening at doors,” shouted Quinn. She returned and sat down.
“I was not pleased with Miss Gore-Desmond’s behaviour, no. A lady’s maid is judged by the behaviour and dress of her mistress.”
“What precisely did you consider wrong in Miss Gore-Desmond’s behaviour?”
“It is not my place to say, sir.”
“But you haven’t got a place now,” Rose pointed out. “Surely this family is not deserving of your loyalty.”
“That’s as may be, my lady. But there are some things that should not be spoken of.”
Rose felt like shaking her. But Harry, who was sitting close to her, took Quinn’s hand and said gently, “I trust you not to repeat this, but we fear Miss Gore-Desmond’s death was murder.”
Quinn sat there, unmoving, her harsh face registering neither shock nor surprise.
“We have reason to believe she was romantically involved with someone.”
Harry released her hand, drew out his wallet and opened it. He took out one five-pound note and then another.
Quinn still sat unmoving.
When Harry was holding twenty pounds in his hand, Quinn said, “I’ll tell you what I know.”
Her hand snaked out and took the twenty pounds.
At last, thought Rose, an end to this mystery. She would not admit to herself that Harry’s earlier words, that she had put herself in danger, had frightened her.
“Miss Gore-Desmond was having an affair,” said Quinn.
“With whom?”
“I don’t know and that’s the truth.”
“Then how do you know she was having an affair?”
“Marks on the sheets. You know.”
Harry did, but Rose did not, and looked bewildered.
“Then there would be a smell of cigar smoke in the room in the morning.”
“Was she by any chance pregnant?” asked Harry.
“How could Quinn know…” began Rose, then blushed furiously. Of course a lady’s maid would know whether her mistress had had her monthly menstruation. The soiled towels would need to be collected for the laundry.
“Not to my knowledge, sir.”
“Had this ever happened here? Did any man visit and did you then find the same evidence?”
“No, my lord. Miss Gore-Desmond had her first season this year in London and had the opportunity to meet plenty of gentlemen. I do not know if she favoured anyone in particular, and certainly no one favoured her enough to propose.”
“At the castle, did you ever challenge her about the state of the bed linen?”
“Certainly not, sir. It was not my place to do so.”
�
�Well, that’s that,” said Harry as they drove off.
“Don’t you think it was Quinn’s duty to inform Mary’s parents about her affair?”
“All Mary had to do was deny it and Quinn would have been fired. Back to square one.”
∨ Snobbery with Violence ∧
Eight
A woman feels so tremendously at a disadvantage if her hair is untidy. She cannot even argue until it is neat again!
– MRS. C.E. HUMPHRY, MANNERS FOR WOMEN
Rose felt a surge of dislike for her host as the car drove through the poor village and up to the folly of a castle. The architect had not put much imagination into his plan, she thought. It was nothing more than a giant square box with towers at each corner. She was sure the moat kept it unhealthily damp.
As they cruised over the drawbridge and into the courtyard, Rose felt depressed and frightened and very young. Why not leave, go home to her parents and the comfortable surroundings of her family home?
But somehow the very awfulness of the castle inside with its fake armour in the hall and its overstuffed and over-draped furniture in the rooms reassured her.
By the time she went down to dinner, she had persuaded herself that it did not matter whether Mary had been having an affair with someone or not. She had either committed suicide or accidentally taken an overdose of arsenic.
She chatted about trivia to her dinner companions and listened politely to their tales of shooting and fishing.
In the drawing-room, the Peterson girls, Deborah and Harriet, were anxious to know where she had been that day. Rose said she had gone for a drive with Captain Harry, who wanted to show off his new car. She refused an invitation to try the ouija board again.
She retired to her room with relief and sat down at the dressing-table. Daisy began to remove the pins from her hair.
“Any more news?” asked Daisy.
“Nothing,” said Rose. “You know, Daisy, I’m suddenly weary of the whole business. Let Captain Cathcart deal with it.”
“That’s not like you!” exclaimed Daisy.
“Yes, it’s very much like me,” said Rose wearily. “I have come to the conclusion that I’m a coward. Yellow as custard. I was all for supporting women’s rights, but when the scandal of my photograph in the Daily Mail blew up, I caved in and never had anything to do with any of them again.”
“Surely there was not really so much you could have done,” said Daisy, “what with your parents planning your season and being so against women’s rights, like everyone else in society. If you’d gone on, they might have had you locked up.”
“I’ll finish undressing myself, Daisy. You may go. I’m tired. I was so sure Quinn would answer all questions and the mystery would be resolved.”
“Maybe things’ll look more hopeful in the morning,” said Daisy soothingly.
Daisy left and Rose wearily finished undressing and went to bed. There was a note pinned on her pillow.
She slid out the pin and opened it.
It read:
If you wish to know why Mary Gore-Desmond died, meet me on the roof of the castle tomorrow at 1 P.M. Do not tell anyone, even your maid. A friend.
The message was printed in block capitals.
Rose held the little note with trembling fingers. She should tell the captain. But if someone else joined her on the roof, the author of the note might just fail to appear.
She stayed awake for hours, tossing and turning, and then at last fell asleep with the note clutched in her hand.
When she awoke, she found she had slept until ten in the morning. The memory of the note flooded into her frightened brain. Perhaps it was just that wretched pair, Tristram and Freddy, planning to play another joke on her. And yet, most guests would be at lunch at one o’clock. It would be broad daylight.
She dressed in a plain divided skirt and shirt blouse and serviceable boots. She looked out of the window. It was a cold, blustery day, with great ragged clouds streaming across the sky.
“I will go. I am not a child anymore,” she admonished herself out loud.
“What’s that?” asked Daisy, who had quietly entered the room.
“Oh, I was thinking about letting the suffragette movement down,” said Rose hurriedly. “Do my hair and then leave me, Daisy. I won’t be needing you for the rest of the day.”
♦
Rose had not wanted to ask for instructions as to how to get to the roof of the castle, but assumed if she kept on walking upwards, she would come to some sort of a door.
She walked up the main staircase and kept on walking up, ignoring the corridors which branched off to the towers. The stairs became narrower and uncarpeted. She found herself in the servants’ quarters, which stretched out on either side of her at the top landing.
A footman appeared from one of the rooms and stared at her in surprise. “May I help you, my lady?”
“I wanted to get up on the roof to look at the view,” said Rose. She had been told not to tell anyone, but surely that meant any of the guests, or Daisy.
“You go along to the right, my lady,” said the footman, “and you’ll find a door at the end. If you open it, there is a stone staircase which will take you up. Would you like me to escort you?”
“No, no, that will not be necessary. I’ll go on my own.”
Rose made her way along the corridor to the right. She came to the door the footman had mentioned and opened it. There was the staircase leading to the roof. There was still time to go back down to luncheon and tell Harry.
On the other hand, there would be the pleasure of solving the mystery and telling him she had done it all by herself.
Squaring her shoulders and wrapping the thick shawl she had brought tightly around her, she walked up. Another door. There was a large key in it and the lock looked as if it had been recently oiled. She unlocked the door and swung it open. A blast of cold air hit her face.
Rose stepped out onto the roof and shut the door behind her.
She looked around. No one in the immediate vicinity. The roof was flat, with four banks of chimneys sending out snakes of smoke which whirled about the roof.
Perhaps someone was on the other side of the banks of chimneys. She walked around them, peering through the sudden downdraft of smoke from the whirling cowls of the chimneys. She gasped and choked. Wiping her streaming eyes, she walked to the edge of the roof and took in a gulp of fresh air.
A low crenellated wall surrounded the edge of the roof. She was at the back of the castle, where the walls plunged down, sheer into the black waters of the moat.
Rose turned and looked around. The smoke from the many fires seemed to be performing some mad snake-like dance, first bending this way and that, then running along the top of the roof, sent down by the chimney-cowls.
He would have to have modern chimneys, thought Rose. If he had put in tall, fake Tudor chimneys, the smoke would be carried away from the roof and into the air.
She turned back. There was a view of the village huddled near the castle like some poverty-stricken peasant seeking warmth.
Beyond the village, near the woods, she could see the puffs of smoke from the shotguns of the men after pheasant and hear the cracks of shot. So the men would not have been present at lunch anyway. Then through the village came Harry in his car, the car looking like a toy.
On impulse, she stood at the edge and shouted and waved.
An almighty shove in her back sent her hurtling over the edge. Rose screamed and screamed as she hurtled down past the sheer walls of the castle and straight down into the moat.
♦
Becket was seated beside his master in the open car as they drove along the winding road which approached the back of the castle. He was gazing gloomily at the castle when he saw to his amazement a tiny figure up on the roof, waving and shouting.
“Sir,” said Becket, raising his voice to be heard over the noise of the engine, “there is someone on the castle roof. Oh, my God, they’ve fallen.”
�
��Where, what?”
“Back of the castle, sir.”
Harry drove as hard as he could, over the drawbridge, under the portcullis, through the courtyard and sped along the tradesman’s route which ended at the side of the castle.
He switched off the engine, jumped out, and started to run to the back. There was a figure struggling in the moat.
“It’s Lady Rose,” gasped Becket.
Harry stripped off his long overcoat, his jacket, hat and motoring goggles, tore off his shoes, and dived in.
When he surfaced it was to find that Rose had gone down again under the icy waters.
He dived and groped around until his hands grasped clothing. He pulled the body to the surface and found himself staring at the bloated features of an unrecognizable dead female.
There came a faint, “Help!” as Rose surfaced again. He abandoned the horror he had found, and swam to Rose and put his arms around her.
“Relax,” he ordered. “And let me tow you in.”
He swam with Rose to the bank and Becket pulled her clear. “Get Lady Rose back to the castle, and then come back here with some help. There’s a dead body down there.”
Rose was shivering and spluttering. Then she turned away and vomited. “That’ll get some of that filthy water out of you,” said Becket. He tenderly wrapped her in his master’s coat and assisted her to the car.
He drove quickly round to the front of the castle. The butler appeared on the doorstep.
“Get Lady Rose’s maid,” said Becket, “and send for the doctor.”
The butler went back into the hall and shouted orders. The marquess appeared. “What’s going on?”
“You must get the police immediately, my lord,” said Becket.
♦
“Oh, Daisy, help your mistress to her room. She fell in the moat from the roof.”
“Why should I get the police?” demanded the marquess testily. “There is no need to get the police because one of my guests was playing on the roof and fell over.”
“My lord, Captain Cathcart dived in to rescue Lady Rose and found a dead body in the moat.”
“Where? What?”
“At the back of the castle.”
The marquess strode out of the castle followed by his butler, two footmen, and the hall-boy.
