[Mrs Bradley 50] - Late, Late in the Evening

by Gladys Mitchell

  'I can't think why they did not realise it much earlier,' I said. 'They knew, I suppose, that she had left the house.'

  'I understand that, after the charades, most people went on to the terrace to cool off,' said young Doctor Tassall.

  'That's right,' said another young man. 'Amabel wouldn't let us take off the lendings because of the photographer. Most of us went outside for a breath of air, so she wouldn't have been missed for a bit. Then people sort of drifted in again and hung about because, I mean, you couldn't dance in those fancy outfits, and after that I'm afraid there was a bit of hunting in couples and people sneaked away upstairs and took the costumes off, don't you know, and so forth. You couldn't really say, at any given time, where anybody was, and that's the strength of it, so she wouldn't really have been missed at all, you see.'

  'I cannot understand what Harlow and Esmé were thinking about, to walk away from the party the way they did, and go off without a thought for their responsibilities. After all, Amabel is their daughter,' I said angrily.

  'Well, darling,' said Nigel, with an unpalatable degree of truth, 'isn't that a case of the pot calling the kettle black? It's your house, after all, and you walked out and left the revellers to it, just as they did. It's a great pity that Tassall and I both had to be out of the house at the same time. As for that damned photographer, I could wish him at Jericho and Tassall's expectant mother, too! Anyway, we're going to search the grounds. The wretched girl can't be all that far away!'

  Chapter 9

  Letters

  Mrs Kempson's Letter Continued

  * * *

  From this point onwards, my dear Mrs Bradley, my letter may appear somewhat incoherent, but I will be as lucid as I can. Some of the remaining men claimed that they must escort their sisters or female friends home and would therefore be unavailable as members of a search-party. This seemed to me reasonable enough at that hour of the morning, so, in the end, the searchers were reduced to three: my son-in-law Harlow Conyers, my beloved Nigel and Amabel's friend, young Doctor Tassall, who immediately and rightly stated that, if the girl had suffered an injury, he would be of more use than anybody else.

  They were about to leave the house with the only two electric torches we could muster, when Lionel came down in his pyjamas and dressing-gown and wanted to know what was happening. He demanded to be allowed to join the search-party, but, of course, this was out of the question. He then stated that he possessed a powerful torch and was sent upstairs to fetch it and be prepared to lend it to Doctor Tassall. This he did and, as a reward, was told by his father that he might stay up for a while, which he elected to do. As soon as they had gone, he put on the fearsome fancy dress which he had commandeered when the costumes arrived. It was that of an iguanadon, or so he informed me.

  He then settled down and gave me a lecture on prehistoric animals, which passed the time until we received further news. I was glad of the child's company, for I had a premonition that something very serious had happened. At last my son-in-law presented himself and looked taken aback at the sight of his young son. He sent him straight back to bed and seemed angry with him. I could see that something else was the matter, and I looked anxiously at Harlow, who, after all, had given permission for Lionel to stay up.

  'Has she hurt herself?' I asked, when the child had gone.

  'Yes, badly, I'm afraid. I came on ahead to tell you. The doctor and Nigel are bringing her in.'

  'How bad is it?' I asked.

  'Worse than bad,' said Harlow. 'We're in for trouble, mater. The poor girl has copped it.'

  'Do you mean-you don't mean-rape?' I asked, my thoughts flying in horror to the gypsy encampment on Lye Hill, although previously I had dismissed such an idea.

  'That remains to be discovered,' said Harlow grimly. 'Take hold on yourself, mater. The primary fact we have to face is that the poor kid is dead.'

  'Dead?' I said, in stupid repetition of the unbelievable word.

  He nodded. 'I'd better go back and help them along with her,' he said. 'I thought you ought to know, though, before they bring her into the house. Will you ring the police?'

  'The police?' I echoed, stupidly again.

  'Yes, of course. We mustn't delay. Ring them at once.'

  'But what shall I tell them?'

  'That we have to report the finding of a girl's body near the sheepwash at the foot of Lye Hill. Just tell them that. All further information can wait until they arrive.' He went off and I did as he suggested. The police asked on the telephone whether we knew the girl's identity. I replied that we did, and was told that they would be along immediately and that nothing was to be touched. I indicated that this was nonsense and that the body, as the girl was a guest of mine, would be brought to the house, but the policeman at the other end, having given his orders, had rung off.

  I sat and waited. At the end of about an hour Harlow returned. I told him what the police had said. He nodded.

  'Just as well we had young Tassall with us,' he said. 'Told us the very same thing. He and Nigel are standing by.'

  'But, surely, in a case of accidental death...'

  'Accidental nothing, mater.'

  'What on earth do you mean?' I felt myself beginning to tremble and my head to swim.

  'Tassall thinks she's been attacked.'

  'Not-oh, no! No!' I cried.

  'Steady on, mater. We've got to face facts.'

  'But if she's been attacked-and is dead-'

  'That's it,' he said. 'Murder. Not very nice for us, is it? What on earth possessed her to leave the drive and go right down Lovers' Lane at such an hour? We shall never know, I suppose, but there it is. Sit down, mater. I'll get you a drop of brandy.'

  Well, Mrs Bradley, the poor child's body was never brought to the house. The police, when they had made their preliminary investigation, had it taken to the mortuary in the town and as I had the girl's home address and telephone number (since it was I, as hostess, who had issued the invitations to the birthday party, although the original invitation had been sent to the girl's brother) I was able to get in touch with the relatives.

  I do not think I closed my eyes that night or, rather, early morning, and later in the morning, of course, the police came again. They wanted the names and addresses of everybody who had been present at the party. They were very polite, but very inquisitive.

  What kind of party? List of guests? Drinks? Drugs? Quarrels? Rivalries? Jealousies?

  Really, Mrs Bradley, you cannot imagine!

  It was not that kind of party, I assured them. The young people had been dancing and playing at charades and the girl in question, Merle Patterson, had said she was going out for a breath of air. Others did the same, but nobody else went further than the terrace.

  Was I sure of that?

  No, not to be able to swear to it, but so I had been informed.

  Had the girl come with a male escort?

  No. She had been one of a party of four, all old girls of my grand-daughter's previous school.

  And so on and so forth. Everybody in the house was questioned, and this included the servants. Just as the inspector had released me from his mesmerism-for, indeed, I was quite bemused by this lengthy interrogation-my butler informed me that Mrs Landgrave from the village was asking to speak to me.

  'Oh, send her away,' I said. 'She must come at some more convenient time. I can't see her now. Ask her to leave a message if it's anything to do with Mr Ward.'

  Well, it was! Ward had not returned to his lodgings for the past two nights and Mrs Landgrave thought I ought to be told.

  One dreadful detail has been brought to our notice. The police believe they have found the weapon the murderer used. A heavy spade had been thrown into the deepest part of the sheepwash and the nature of the poor girl's injuries-but, no! I cannot go on! We are living in a nightmare. I do hope you have not altered your plans in order to come here, but you will understand that for you to visit us at present would be a waste of your time.

  Doctor Tass
all's Letter

  * * *

  By this time you will have heard our bad news. It never occurred to me, dear godfather, that when you encouraged me to study medicine I should be called as a witness at the inquest on a case of murder, but so it has proved. Mrs Kempson, into whose well-ordered, not to say snobbish and sheltered, existence some rain has now fallen for the first time, I fancy, since the death of her husband, let your name drop at some time during that ill-fated birthday party, but I did not let on that I knew you, as I feared she would not believe me. As I am hoping to become her grandson-in-law, I did not want to antagonise her more than I could help and I thought that for me to claim acquaintanceship, not to say godsonship, with so eminent a personage as yourself might cause her to think me even more of a mountebank than she does at present. Besides, she would be bound to find out (unless you will reinstate me in your good graces) that you have banned me from your house since I told you I had broken with my little blackbird, Merle, and wanted to marry Amabel Kempson-Conyers.

  First I ought to explain about Amabel, and this is where I throw myself, dear godfather, on your mercy. She is a beautiful young hussy whom I encountered under romantic circumstances a year ago in Paris, where I was celebrating the lucky fluke which enabled me, at the end of my course, to put the magic letters M.B. after my name.

  She and another rash child were playing hooky from their finishing school one evening when they were accosted by a couple of amorous French youths of undesirable type. I contrived to break up the little party by claiming to be Amabel's brother and suggesting that I should whistle for the gendarmes if the boys did not abandon their obvious intentions. One of them pulled a knife, so I laid him out, took the girls back to their home from home, expressed the hope that both would receive a sound spanking from the dragon-in-charge and handed them over to the concierge with a large bribe to persuade her not to give them away.

  That, I supposed, would be the end of it, but this was not to be. No, I'll be honest, godfather. I hoped it wouldn't be the end of it, so, having extracted from the young delinquents on the way home the information that they were in the first weeks of their year at finishing-school, I began to haunt the Sights of Paris in the hope of catching up with Amabel again.

  It came off in the Louvre. Half-a-dozen young beazels, all demureness and devilment, were being towed around the galleries by a couple of grim, black-clad females of official aspect and, directly she spotted me, Amabel gave a slight squeal, grabbed one of the females, chattered away in French, broke ranks and, seizing my hands, kissed me fervently on both cheeks, rushed me up to the rest of the gang and introduced me as her brother(!).

  After that, it was all gas and gaiters-nothing to it. I wrote her a prim, brotherly letter in case their mail was censored, received a reply, and that was the beginning of the end; at least, I hope so, for I intend to marry her. She needs a firm hand and I am the man to supply it. Unfortunately, if I make known (at this stage) my intentions, honourable though they are, there is the chance that old Mrs Kempson will persuade the parents to make Amabel a ward of court and rob me, no doubt, of access to her, unless I fancy a spell in chokey which, quite frankly, dear godfather, I most emphatically do not.

  Well, to our muttons. As you know, I returned from Paris to take up a post as assistant and general dogsbody to old Doctor Faustus (I call him that, because you never saw anything like his dispensary except in bad dreams) but, naturally, I kept in touch with Amabel and she with me. I knew, therefore, the date of her return to England and that she proposed to make a lengthy stay at Hill House, so, to disclose a truth which you will not need to be told, I only took the Faustus job to be near her in the village where her ancestral hall dominates the hilltop.

  We managed to meet two or three times in London after she first got back, and then I received an invitation to the birthday party. It was from old Mrs Kempson herself, and I don't know how Amabel wangled it. However, I put on a clean shirt and showed up.

  On the morning of the party there was a charity rag led by some of the University Medical School fellows. Apparently they called at the Big House and then nothing would satisfy Amabel but to borrow or buy the prehistoric-animal costumes in which they appeared. She got a message to me at the surgery by way of one of her grandmother's servants, so as soon as I was free I engaged the lads on the blower and arranged for a wagonette of obsolete vintage to deliver the costumes to the manor. From what I heard later, young Lionel, Amabel's kid brother, watched the costumes being unloaded and immediately claimed one for himself. More about that later.

  Meanwhile, I suppose you wouldn't care to come along and hear me give my evidence, such as it is, to the coroner? I feel I shall do you credit in the witness box, although the thunder, I suspect, will be stolen by the police doctor, who will be in the enviable position of one to whom the city mortuary is his washpot, not to mention that over the police-station hath he cast out his shoe.

  Incidentally, although she's probably too stiff-necked to say so, I believe Mrs Kempson could do with a bit of support from you. She isn't very young and the knowledge that a guest at her party has been slugged and killed in the immediate neighbourhood of her ancestral home has given her more than somewhat of a jolt. Apart from that, your presence (especially if you would be willing to drop a word in my favour) would give me enormous pleasure.

  Amabel Kempson-Conyers' Letter

  * * *

  Oh, Maisy, how I wish it had never occurred to me to buy those wretched lizard-costume things from the boys at the medical school! And how lucky you are that Anthony insisted on taking you home so early. I suppose you went to his flat in his car and whooped it up a bit. Not that I'm jealous, darling. Your Amabel has her own bit of cake stashed away and is perfectly content with it.

  Still, never mind that. No doubt our troubles will be a nine days' wonder in the papers, but I'd like to give you my version because, maybe, to write it down will clear my head in case I'm called upon to give evidence at the inquest, as I think I'm bound to be. I'm sure the whole thing is connected with those prehistoric things. Do you think there's a curse on them or something?

  Anyway, this is what has happened. You remember how we shared out the costumes, I expect? They-that's to say, the rag students-were limited in their ideas because each of them had to have an outfit which only involved two legs, unless anybody was willing either to have a partner, like a pantomime horse, or else go about on all fours which, for dashing about the town and village collecting for charity, simply was not feasible.

  So, as I say, the restrictions. Not everybody got a costume, because the students could only supply fourteen costumes altogether. Each one was labelled as to what it was supposed to be. Well, owing to the limitations of only needing the two-legged types of pre-historic monsters, each costume was duplicated and there were only the fourteen altogether, of which my wretched little brother Lionel bagged one as soon as they were unpacked and refused to give it back. He bore it off, cavorted about in it until, mercifully, he was sent to bed, and we did not see it downstairs again until after two o'clock in the morning, after you and Anthony had sneaked off without saying goodbye.

  My first idea had been to pair off people as male and female of the same species, but when I looked at the costumes I saw that this was impossible because some of the things were too heavy and too bulky for us poor females to manage, so, in the event, as you may or may not recollect, we had two men as Tyrannosaurus, two, rather similar, as Tarbosaurus and two as Corythosaurus, a terribly silly-looking creature with a huge duckbill and a sort of helmet on its head. We gave those to Chris and Billy, if you remember, so that they could clown a bit, which I knew they would do, anyway. It makes them a bit tiresome at times, but, being so beetle-brained, I suppose they have to give some scope to their ego, although they can be fatiguing. I specially think so after my rather sophisticated year in Paris, meeting French boys, who are ardent without being silly and have beautiful manners so long as you don't give them too much encouragement, b
ut, on the whole, I would rather trust Chris and Billy, in spite of their lunatic antics. Of course we didn't get much chance of encouraging the French boys, as we were very well chaperoned-talk about Spanish duennas!-but there's always a way.

  Oh, well, that's not what I'm writing about. First of all I offered Merle (the gate-crasher!) a prehistoric bird-thing called Dimorphodon-did I tell you I only know the names because they were on the costumes? It's a pterosaur. One thing this business has done is improve my education, but that's the best anyone can say about it, as you'll know when you read the papers.

  Anyway, Dimorphodon has great, leather-looking wings and Merle said the costume would make her look like a bat out of hell, for it has the most repulsive head half as long as its body and hideous, overlapping teeth. She made such a fuss that I gave it-the two of them, rather-to Pippa and Jennifer, who were quite pleased, actually. It was like Merle's cheek to beef about what she was offered, anyway.

  You and I had Saltoposuchas, which I thought, with all that iridescent blue and green colouring and the splashes of red-brown, was quite the prettiest costume of the lot, and Polly and Sophie had Diatryma, which reminded me of the sort of ostrich you could only see in a nightmare. Polly said it was indecent because they had to straddle their legs so much that they were reduced (I must admit) to a rather obscene waddling when they had to move about.

  Anyway, as my little brother had seized one of the two iguanodon costumes, I thought Merle could have the other. She wasn't very gracious about that, either, and did not join in the charades. It seemed she had a chip on her shoulder all evening, I thought, knowing that it was her brother I'd invited, but the wretch sent her instead. I'd have had the charades before the dancing, so that people could take the costumes off and have a long, cool drink (I didn't think much of my grandmother's claret-cup, did you?) before beginning the dancing, but there was a reason for the reversal. The consequence was that when people had danced and then were told to dress up, I don't think the majority were any too keen. The costumes were hot and some of them were heavy and the charades we could do in them were so very limited that I think we were all glad when both sides had done one little sketch and we could all opt out of doing another.