Mingled With Venom (Mrs. Bradley)

by Gladys Mitchell

“Of course I did not. Fortunately I fell into a dip which arrested my descent, but of course I am neither of the age, the build or the physical power to be able to climb to the top again. Fortunately the cliff-path is a favourite haunt of the holiday walkers, so I thought that if I called out and continued to do so, in the end some passer-by was certain to hear me and either render assistance or go in search of it.”

  “And somebody came.”

  “After what seemed a considerable interval, yes. Of all people it turned out to be Garnet. He said he was out for his morning constitutional. I took this to mean that he was on his way to see Diana, but when, after he had climbed down and assisted me to the top, I told him that I myself was on my way to Campions, he must have thought it better to change his mind. He accompanied me through the woods as far as the Campions garden fence and then left me.”

  “You have had a lucky escape.”

  “Lucky do you call it?”

  “Miraculous, then. But surely it could not have been intended as an attack on you? It must have been either a sheer accident or dangerous, thoughtless horseplay.”

  “I have my ill-wishers, Parsifal. You reached Campions before I did, it seems. You were paying a return visit when we met.”

  “But, look!” said Parsifal in an incredulous tone. “You’re not accusing me of pushing you over the edge of the cliff, are you? I came by the inland route, over the hill, as I told you. I was never on the cliff-top at all.”

  “If I thought you were my assailant, should I have asked for your escort on my homeward way? I wondered whether you had seen anybody in the woods, that is all. But, of course, you entered them from the other side, did you not?”

  “Yes, I saw nobody.”

  “You are very late back,” said Bluebell. “Gamaliel, poor boy, says he is starving. Did Diana keep you talking too long? She is lonely and tends to become loquacious, as lonely people usually do when they get a sympathetic listener.”

  “Let us have our lunch. I will tell you all about it later. It is not for Gamaliel’s ears. I do not want to upset him so near to his examinations. Where is Garnet? He will be hungry too.”

  “He will not be in for lunch. He went out soon after you had left and said he would have a bread and cheese lunch at a public house.”

  “Oh? Did he say where he was going?”

  “Out for a walk, and that he would call at Headlands on his way and ask how our grandmother felt after the party.”

  “I suppose he really went to see Diana. He slept with her last night while Rupert was at Headlands, I expect. At any rate, he did not sleep here.”

  “Oh, well, I suppose they must make the most of their opportunities, as I expect Rupert and Fiona did,” said Bluebell tolerantly. “How oddly things arrange themselves! If only Garnet had desired Fiona instead of Diana, how beautifully simple everything would be.”

  “Not for us and Gamaliel. We should have had to find other lodging and how that could have been afforded I hardly know. From our point of view, things are much better left as they are.”

  When the picnic lunch, at which he was in high spirits, was over, Gamaliel went off to resume his studies. Parsifal and Bluebell cleared the table and washed the dishes and then settled in deckchairs on the balcony above that where they had lunched.

  “One gets a wider prospect from up here,” said Parsifal.

  “Yes. You are going to tell me about your visit to Diana.”

  “About that there is nothing to tell. I was with her a very short time and did not stay long at the house. It was Mrs. Leyden who delayed me.”

  “You have not been to Headlands?”

  “No, I met her at Diana’s gate. I think they were having an altercation.”

  “That means she knew Diana slept with Garnet last night.”

  “That was the lesser of her complaints. She claims that she was attacked on her walk along the cliff-top and might have been killed.”

  “Attacked? But people don’t do that sort of thing around here.”

  “Our own people, no, but one cannot go bail for holiday-makers and there are already plenty of them around here.”

  “What does she say actually happened?”

  Parsifal, who had a good verbal memory, quoted Romula’s words.

  “Oh, it must have been an accident,” declared Bluebell. “All the same, surely the person who did it could have stayed to find out whether she was hurt.”

  “Perhaps not, if he thought he might have killed her. I would put him down as a sort of pedestrian hit-and-run.”

  “Oh, well, yes, perhaps.”

  “She claims, moreover, that she was not on the path when she was pushed. That means the way was clear. There was no need for any pushing.”

  “She is getting on in years. Do you think she made the whole thing up? She may have a persecution complex. Elderly women sometimes get some very peculiar notions in their heads.”

  “I had not thought of that. All the same, perhaps she ought not to take these lonely walks while so many strangers are about. One does hear of muggings and kidnap and suchlike unpleasant things, and I don’t suppose her wealth is any secret.”

  “I believe I am what is called unworldly, but I wish I thought that some of it would come our way.”

  “I wonder whether it would be a good idea if I walked over to the village Post Office and telephoned Headlands to ask whether she got back safely and how she feels after her experience?”

  “It could do no harm, I suppose, and it might please her. All the same, I do not care that she should have any excuse to class us as sycophants.”

  “There is no question of that where I am concerned, Blue,” said Parsifal, suppressing the fact that he often begged from Romula. “She knows that I have no expectations under her will.”

  “She might think I sent you. Oh, that will! If only she had made her intentions known at the dinner party we should all be relieved from the burden of uncertainty.”

  “I do wish your mother and Fiona were not coming here.”

  “I know what you mean. It affects Garnet, too. Grandmother may think he ought to forbid them in the house. After all, he is the master here. Oh, well, go and do your telephoning if you think fit.”

  “And if she does ask me to call?”

  “I will expect you when I see you.”

  “I think it might be a few pence well spent.”

  “It is better not to think so, but off you go.”

  Outside the little Post Office he met an acquaintance. “Why, good afternoon, Miss Pabbay,” he said. “So you are not yet back in London? How is Mrs. Leyden after her accident?”

  “You had better come back with me and find out.”

  “I was about to telephone.”

  “Oh, I have Lunn and the car just up the road. Excuse me while I buy some stamps. We’ve run out and I think she wants to write to her lawyers.”

  “That sounds interesting.”

  “Or ominous, depending upon how you look at it.”

  Romula received Parsifal with unusual cordiality. “It is kind of you to call and enquire after me,” she said, “but I am fully recovered.”

  “Perhaps you should inform the police of your dangerous experience.”

  “I have already done so by telephone, but, of course, I could give them little information. I do not even know whether my assailant was a man or a woman.”

  “Surely no woman would behave in such a manner?”

  “If you knew the way some women behave nowadays, you would not ask such a stupid question. Is my grandson giving house room to my daughter and Fiona?”

  “Well, really, that is nothing to do with Blue and me,” protested Parsifal, looking alarmed.

  “I am aware of that. Pensioners seldom hold the whip-hand.”

  “We pay our way, thanks to some help from you.”

  “Barely. You live rent-free, I suppose, and are largely dependent upon the allowance which comes to Bluebell out of my purse.”

  “I am sorry you gr
udge it to her.”

  “Who said I grudged it? I think it is a pity you do not earn enough to keep her in the style she deserves, but that cannot be helped. No doubt you do your best, such as it is, if only as a beggar when the big bills come in.”

  “Yes, I do my best. It is not easy to follow one’s star. I still hope to make something of myself as a poet.”

  “As a poet, yes, perhaps. As a business man—well, that is beyond your grasp, although, as I say, you know how to beg. You had better put pressure on Rupert to pay for Fiona’s keep. I shall do nothing to help if she leaves me. But I won’t threaten you. You were of service to me this morning. How is my Black Prince?”

  “Gamaliel? Oh, he flourishes. I am sure he would have wished to be remembered to you had he known I was coming here this afternoon.”

  “Cupboard love!”

  “Oh, no! You do him an injustice.”

  “Yes,” said Romula, after a pause during which Parsifal found himself surprised by his own bold comment. “Yes, I believe I do. Of course, your adopting him confirms me in my original estimate of you that you are neither prudent nor far-seeing, but he is an amusing and pleasant person. I may remember him later on.”

  “Well, I’m thankful you’re not prudent,” said Bluebell, when she heard the story after tea on the terrace was over and Gamaliel had taken his books into Garnet’s room in order to con them while Garnet banged away on his ancient typewriter. “If being prudent means blackmailing her into getting Rupert to pay for Fiona’s keep, I hope you never will be prudent. Think no more of her unkind remarks and do not build your hopes for Gamaliel too high.”

  “You haven’t had any extra news while I was paying my visit to her?”

  “The only extra news would be the actual arrival of mother and Fiona and they have not come. Of course the quarrel with grandmother may have been made up by now.”

  “You sound as though you would regret that.”

  “Well, I should not be averse to the company of other women in a house which contains myself and three men.”

  “So it was not the money side of it which concerned you? It is a good thing you leave the financial side to me. I don’t know where we should be if you did not place the allowance your grandmother makes you in my hands.”

  “Yes, you are clever with money, Parsifal.”

  “So you don’t mind having Fiona here?” said Parsifal, finding it unnecessary to disclose Romula’s views of him as a businessman.

  “Since you ask me, no. It is pleasant for a woman to have the company of other women. There are things they have in common which a man would not understand.”

  “I see. I have always thought, until now, that Gamaliel and I sufficed you.”

  “So you do. I said it would be pleasant to have some female society for a change. I did not say it was a necessity and I am far from thinking so. Would you mind taking on the washing-up? It is only three small plates and the cups and saucers, not anything greasy or unpleasant. The light is just right for a picture I want to paint. There are some new visitors at the hotel, you say, so it may be profitable to get a few pictures done while they are here, especially as, if mother and Fiona do come, I shall have less time to myself than I have at present.”

  “One of his new visitors, so Trev Poltrethy informed me this morning, is a very wealthy and important woman who is staying for a whole month. She has her own chauffeur who has been accommodated at the pub further up the hill. He is to report for duty each day.”

  “An important woman? Have we heard of her?”

  “Dame Beatrice Adela Lestrange Bradley. Her secretary, a Mrs. Gavin, and two friends, travelled down with her, but Poltrethy gathers that the holiday marks a reunion of the three younger women, who have now gone off together. Dame Beatrice belongs to a much older generation than the others, and wishes them to enjoy a more adventurous time than the hotel can provide.”

  “Perhaps each of the others will buy a picture later on. When one member of an adult party shows interest, the others often feel inclined to follow suit. They are sure to return and pick her up, so I will have pictures ready.”

  “Then away with you, my dear, and put brush to canvas. Of course I will wash up the dishes.”

  Bluebell collected her materials and, so burdened, did not attempt the route by way of the garden, the stepping stones and the smugglers’ track, but went through to the front of the house and took the steep but made-up slope which led to the village street and so down to the hotel and its small grey beach.

  “Somebody pushed my great grandmother over the edge of the cliff?” said Gamaliel to Garnet on the following morning. “But who would do a thing like that to an old lady?”

  “How do you know anything about it, Greg?”

  “Oh,” said Gamaliel, with a gesture which showed the pinkish palm of his hand, “I heard my mother and father talking about it. They also said you had done yourself a bit of no good by having Fiona here. Does that mean she will not give you her money when she dies?”

  “No, of course it doesn’t. In any case, she isn’t going to die for years and years yet.”

  “It must have frightened her very much, that fall. Old ladies are easily scared.”

  “Not this one. She was mad at herself, not scared.”

  “But how could she be mad at herself? She ought to have been mad with the man who pushed her.”

  “I’ll tell you something, Greg. There wasn’t any man. Nobody pushed her. She said there was because they are—I mean my mother and Fiona and even Mattie Lunn—they are always warning her that she ought not to be taking these cliff walks alone at her age. Her sight isn’t good, you see, and also, if she takes a fancy to a plant or a flower, she is apt to scramble after it. The cliff-path is perfectly safe for ordinary walkers, but not for a half-blind old lady who seems to think she’s a goat.”

  “So you think she slipped and was not pushed?”

  “Yes. She confesses she was digging up a plant. She shouldn’t have been doing that, anyway. Conservation, you know, and all that.”

  “So Allah, the conserver and the judge, pushed her over the cliff to teach her a lesson, but because He is all-merciful, all-compassionate, and because Mohammed is His prophet she was not hurt.”

  “Eh?” said Garnet, taken aback by this evidence of discipleship. “What’s all this about conservers and judges?”

  “My conception of my faith. I am a Mohammedan with Hindoo thoughts. When my boxing career is over I shall found a new religion. My people are good at religion. Swing low, sweet chariot. Jewish, Old Testament. Virgin Mary have a baby boy. Christian, New Testament. The bird of Time has but a little way to fly. Persian, Omar Khayyam. If the red slayer think he slays. Buddha, by understanding English poet of enlightened kind. Leave this chanting and singing and telling of beads. Hindoo poem of Rabindranath Tagore. Do what thou wilt is the whole of the law. Aleister Crowley, a bad man, perhaps, but with his ideas I have sympathy, as I have with witchcraft watched over by the Great Mother and the Horned God. All religions are good in their own way, and my religion will be a mixture of them all. Meanwhile, I am thinking like Muhammad Ali, the Muslim way.”

  “I don’t know why you say you won’t pass your O levels,” said Garnet.

  “I think too much, that is why. O levels do not require thought, only a good memory to produce what my teachers have said.”

  “Well, to get back to the subject of my grandmother’s fall down the cliff—”

  “You say it was only a fall, not a push.”

  “If she’d really been pushed, she would have landed on the rocks below. No, no. She lost her footing and fell just a dozen feet or so. She bellowed for help because she couldn’t scramble back to the path again, although you or I or an active girl or woman could have done it easily.”

  “And you helped her up to the top.”

  “Yes, that’s about it. She’s a proud and obstinate old lady and she would never admit that other people had been right and that she ought not to t
ake these walks and scrambles alone.”

  On the following day, however, Garnet was compelled to alter his opinion about Romula’s mishap on the cliff path. He set out early in the morning from Seawards and took the rough, hilly route which Parsifal had followed to reach Campions and concealed himself in the woods there until he saw Rupert come out by the wicket gate. He waited until the sound of Rupert’s car could no longer be heard and then announced himself to Diana, who had come to the wicket gate to let her dogs out for a run in the woods”

  “Hullo,” he said. “Will you give me some breakfast?”

  Diana was in shorts and a bolero which showed her midriff. Garnet thought she was beginning to show her age, too. For the first time he saw her as a pathetic figure, a woman trying to protect herself against the onset of middle age. She let the dogs loose and held the gate open for him.

  “Sometimes you are in the right place at the right time; sometimes you’re not,” she said.

  “You mean there’s no breakfast for me?

  “Of course I don’t mean that.” He followed her in to the house. “Will eggs and bacon do?”

  “Yes, and I’ll cook them if you’ll allow me. I know how I like them done.”

  “All right. Do some for me, too. I never eat breakfast with Rupert. He’s always in such a hurry.”

  “Gone to Truro, has he?”

  “No, botanising for this new book of his. Sometimes I wish he’d fall into a quarry and break his neck.”

  “Or over the cliffs like my grandmother,” said Garnet, dealing with his cookery in an expert manner. He began to laugh. “The old fraud,” he concluded.

  “What do you mean by that?” asked Diana.

  “What I said to Gamaliel yesterday. She was no more pushed over the cliff than I was. She lost her footing and tumbled down, that’s all, but she made up that story to forestall criticism. My mother and Fiona are always warning her against taking these cliff walks on her own.”

  “But Garnet, I think she was pushed.”

  “Oh, well, all right, if you think so.”

  “Garnet, I don’t just think. I know.”

  “Don’t tell me you got behind her and did the pushing, because I shan’t believe you.”