Wildfire at Midnight

by Mary Stewart

‘May-Day?’

  ‘May the thirteenth is May-Day, according to the old calendar. Ancient lore again, you see. Oh, everything fitted, even though it did so in a queer mad way; so, of course, I showed the book to Inspector Mackenzie.’

  ‘You did what?’ I exclaimed. ‘When was this?’

  ‘Last week.’

  ‘Then he knew the book was yours!’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Then why—?’ A memory flashed back at me, of the Inspector’s kind, compassionate gaze. ‘Did he never suspect you, Nicholas?’

  ‘He may have done, to begin with, and of course, even after I turned up the evidence of The Golden Bough he may have kept me under suspicion, along with Hubert Hay, since we two, as well as Grant, have made some sort of study of local folklore. But Hay had an alibi – with you – for Marion’s murder, while I, if you discount the intolerable possibilities of bluff and double-bluff, had indicated my innocence by giving evidence to the police. Which left Grant.’

  ‘Then why,’ I said again, ‘was the Inspector so – so kind, and so sorry for me, this morning? He talked about loyalties, and—’

  ‘And you thought he was warning you that I was guilty? Why should you assume that your loyalty should be directed towards me, Gianetta?’

  Abruptly, between one wing-beat and the next, the lark’s song ceased. He shut his wings and dropped like a flake of shadow into the heather. I said, stupidly: ‘D’you mean he thought it was Roderick I saw by the bonfire?’

  ‘Of course. He thought you were falling for Roderick Grant. That was my fault, I’m afraid; I’d told him so – on very little evidence except that Grant, in his own way, was quite patently interested in you.’

  I was stupefied. ‘You told the Inspector that I was in love with Roderick Grant?’

  ‘I did, more or less. Sorry, Gianetta. Sheer dog-in-the-manger-stuff. Jealousy exaggerates, you know.’

  I let that one pass. After a moment he went on: ‘The Inspector could only take my word for it, and when you seemed to be protecting Grant he thought you suspected him yourself, but hesitated to give him away.’

  ‘But that’s absurd! Of course I was never in love with him! I liked him, yes. I thought he was very charming – but in love!’ I spoke hotly, indignantly. ‘It’s fantastic nonsense!’

  ‘Why?’ The question was bland as cream.

  ‘Why? Because—’ I stopped short, and bit my lip. I felt the colour flooding my cheeks, and shot a quick glance at him. His eyes, narrowed against the smoke from his cigarette, were fixed dreamily, almost inattentively, on the long glimmering verge of the mist where it lay along the far sea’s edge. But there was a smile touching the corner of his mouth. I said hurriedly: ‘But when did the Inspector finally fix on Roderick? Surely the others at the hotel were suspect too?’

  ‘Of course. Any of the other men – Braine, Corrigan, Persimmon, Beagle, could have had an unconfessed interest in folklore, but Marion’s murder, remember, narrowed the field down sharply, since it demanded that the murderer also be an efficient climber. And soon afterwards the only climber of the group – poor Beagle – was murdered too.’

  ‘Which leaves us with Roderick again.’

  ‘As you say. When the Inspector came over yesterday morning he found Roderick, so to speak, leading the field and hardly anyone else running, but still without a thing that could be pinned on him. Then you found Roberta, and he might have got his proof, but he didn’t dare wait much longer for her to open her mouth. He put another hurried call through to London for any information about Grant that they could rake up. He was going to risk pulling him in on suspicion if he got anything from them that could justify him. But nothing came through till this morning.’

  ‘The fact that his grandmother had died insane? Was that enough?’

  ‘It wasn’t all,’ said Nicholas soberly. ‘His father died in a mental home two years ago.’

  ‘Oh God,’ I said.

  ‘Quite enough,’ said Nicholas grimly, ‘to warrant his being detained – got somehow out of circulation till Roberta could talk. But it was too late. That damned fog came down like a curtain, and Grant gave Neill the slip, and went out looking for you.’ His arm, somehow, was round my shoulders. ‘Bloody little fool,’ he said angrily, his mouth against my hair.

  ‘I’d have been all right with Dougal if the mist hadn’t come down,’ I said defensively. ‘Nicholas, tell me something.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Dougal – he had a knife. I saw it. Did he – down there when you caught Roderick – he didn’t – hurt him?’

  His arm tightened, as if in protection. ‘No,’ he said soberly. ‘He came up spitting fire and brimstone and revenge, poor devil, but he shut up as soon as he saw Grant.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Grant collapsed. When I caught him first, he fought like a wildcat, but when Dougal got there as well, and he saw it was hopeless, he just seemed to deflate. To break. He went suddenly quite helpless and gentle, and – I can’t describe it, quite. It was rather beastly. He seemed to change character all in an instant.’

  ‘He did it with me.’

  ‘Did he? Then you’ll know just how unspeakable it was. I’d just hit him on the jaw, and then there he was smiling at me like a nice child, and wiping the blood away.’

  ‘Don’t think about it, Nicholas. He wouldn’t remember you’d just hit him.’

  ‘I suppose not. He just smiled at all of us. That was when Dougal put his knife away and took him by the arm and said ‘Come on, laddie. Ye’d best be getting back oot of the fog . . .’ He went quite happily with the three of them.’ He dragged at his cigarette. ‘After they’d gone a little way off, into the fog, I heard him singing.’

  ‘Singing?’ I stared at him.

  ‘Well, crooning a tune, half to himself.’ His eyes met mine. ‘“I to the hills will lift mine eyes, From whence doth come mine aid . . .”’ He looked away. ‘Poor devil. Poor crazy devil. . . .’

  I said swiftly: ‘They’ll never hang him, Nicholas.’

  ‘No.’

  He ground out his cigarette on a stone, and pitched it away as if with it he could extinguish and discard the memory of that nasty little scene. Then he turned his head again, and his voice changed abruptly.

  ‘You saw me with Marcia Maling, didn’t you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I heard you go past us when she – when we were kissing outside her room.’

  ‘You heard me? But I hardly made a sound.’

  He smiled crookedly. ‘My dear girl, my instincts work overtime where you’re concerned. Even in the dark, and when I’m kissing another woman.’

  ‘Perhaps even more when you’re kissing another woman,’ I said drily, and got a wry look from him.

  ‘I suppose I deserve that one. But this time, I promise you, I was more kissed against than kissing.’

  ‘All night?’ I said.

  His brows shot up. ‘What the devil d’you mean?’

  I told him how I had heard a man’s voice in her room later that night. ‘So of course I assumed it was you. And when I asked you next morning—’

  ‘I – see. I thought you were just referring to the kiss you’d seen. No, Gianetta, I did not spend the night with her. I merely got – how shall I put it? – momentarily way-laid, through no intention of my own.’

  ‘I’m sure you struggled madly.’

  He grinned, and said nothing.

  ‘I suppose the man in her room was Hartley Corrigan? Oh yes, I see! That was why he came home early from fishing that night, and yet Alma Corrigan said he didn’t get to bed till three!’

  ‘I think so. And when she realized what had happened she took her lipstick and murdered Marcia’s doll with it.’

  ‘Poor Alma.’

  ‘Yes. Well, it’s over for her, too. I rather think they’ve both had a fright, and they realize that they do matter to each other after all . . .’ He paused for a moment, looking down at me under lowered brows. ‘And now,’ he said, in a to
tally different voice, ‘shall we talk about us?’

  I did not reply. My heart was beating lightly and rapidly somewhere up in my throat, and I could not trust my voice. I could feel his eyes on me again, and when he spoke, he did so slowly and deliberately, as if with some difficulty.

  He said: ‘I’m not going to begin with apologies and self-abasement, though God knows you have plenty to forgive me for, and God knows, too, why you have apparently forgiven me. I’ll say all that to you later on. No, don’t speak. Let me finish . . . What I want to say to you now is quite simple, and it’s all that matters in the world to me. I want you back, Gianetta. I do most damnably want you back. I suppose I knew I’d been a fool – a criminal, brutal fool – about two days after you’d gone, and then my pride stepped in and stopped me coming after you.’

  I remembered how I had told Alma Corrigan that there was no room for pride in marriage. His next words were almost an echo; almost.

  He said: ‘But pride and love won’t go together, Gianetta. I discovered that. And I do love you, my darling; I don’t think I ever stopped.’ He took me gently by the shoulders, and turned me so that I had to face him. ‘Will you have me back, Gianetta? Please?’

  ‘I never did have any pride where you were concerned, Nicholas,’ I said, and kissed him.

  Later – a long time later – he said, rather shakily: ‘Are you sure? Are you sure, my darling?’

  ‘Quite sure.’ The words were decided enough, but my voice was as uncertain as his. I added, foolishly: ‘Darling Nicholas.’

  ‘Gianetta mia . . .’

  Later – a rather longer time later – he held me away from him, and laughed.

  ‘At least, this time, there’s no doubting the solid worth of my affections!’

  ‘Why not?’

  He looked down at me with the old, mocking look. ‘If you could see yourself, my Lady Greensleeves, you wouldn’t ask me that! And if Hugo were here—’

  ‘Which God forbid—’

  ‘Amen . . . No, don’t try and tidy yourself up: it couldn’t be done, and in any case I like you dirty, wet, and semi-ragged. I want to concentrate on your beautiful soul.’

  ‘So I noticed.’

  He grinned, and his arm tightened round my shoulders.

  ‘It wasn’t just coincidence that I met you here, you know.’

  ‘Wasn’t it? But how—?’

  ‘Your father,’ he said succinctly.

  ‘D’you mean to tell me—?’

  He nodded, still grinning. ‘I got into touch with your people again some time ago. As you know, the divorce upset them very much, and they were only too anxious to help me put things straight.’ He smiled down at me. ‘Poor Gianetta, you didn’t stand much chance. Your father told me flatly that you’d never be happy without me, and your mother – well, I don’t think she ever has quite grasped the fact that we were divorced, has she?’

  ‘No. For Mother, divorce just doesn’t exist.’

  ‘That’s what I understood. Well, I was here at the beginning of May, and I happened to write to your father from this address, to ask him about The Golden Bough. A little later I rang him up – I was at Armadale then – and he told me you were due for a holiday, and that he’d contrived—’

  ‘Contrived!’ I said dazedly. I began to laugh. ‘The – the old Macchiavelli! And Mother said it must have been “meant”!’

  ‘It was meant all right,’ said Nicholas grimly. ‘I thought that all I needed was a chance really to talk to you . . .’ He smiled ruefully. ‘And then you ran away from me and I thought that perhaps your father was wrong and it really was all finished. I’d been so sure . . . I deserved a set-down, by God I did. And I got it. You came – and I couldn’t get near you . . .’

  He gave a bitter little laugh. ‘So of course I behaved just about as badly as I could. I said some pretty filthy things to you, didn’t I? I’ve no excuse, except that I thought I’d go crazy, being so near you, and having no – no claim. Somehow the biggest shock to my egoism was when I found you’d even discarded my name, and my ring.’

  ‘I only dropped them when I saw your name in the register. Look.’ I held out my left hand. The white circle on the third finger stood out sharp and clear against the tan. Nicholas looked at it for a moment, while a muscle twitched at the corner of his mouth, then he turned again and pulled me into his arms. His voice was rough against my hair. ‘So you’re going to let me walk straight back into your life? After what I did? After—’

  ‘You said we’d not talk about that.’

  ‘No, I like things made easy, don’t I? It would serve me right if you turned on me now, and told me to get back where I belonged, and stop making a mess of your life.’

  ‘No,’ I said.

  The lark had left his nest again, and was bubbling up through the clear air. I touched Nicholas’ hand softly. ‘Just don’t – don’t ever leave me again, Nicholas. I don’t think I could bear it.’

  His arms tightened. He said, almost with ferocity. ‘No, Gianetta, never again.’

  The lark rocked, feather-light, snowflake-light, on the crystal bubbles of his song. The great hills drowsed, drifting head under wing in the luminous haze.

  I stirred in his arms and drew a little breath of pure happiness.

  ‘What d’you bet,’ I said, ‘that when we arrive at Tench Abbas, Mother’ll meet us just as if nothing had ever happened, and serenely show us both into the spare room?’

  ‘Then we’d better be married again before we get there,’ said Nicholas, ‘or I won’t answer for the consequences.’

  And so we were.

  Also by Mary Stewart

  Madam, Will You Talk?

  Thunder on the Right

  Nine Coaches Waiting

  My Brother Michael

  The Ivy Tree

  The Moonspinners

  This Rough Magic

  Airs Above the Ground

  The Gabriel Hounds

  Touch Not the Cat

  Thornyhold

  Stormy Petrel

  Rose Cottage

  THE ARTHURIAN NOVELS

  The Crystal Cave

  The Hollow Hills

  The Last Enchantment

  The Wicked Day

  The Prince and the Pilgrim

  POEMS

  Frost on the Window

  FOR CHILDREN

  The Little Broomstick

  Ludo and the Star Horse

  A Walk in Wolf Wood

  Mary Stewart, one of the most popular novelists, was born in Sunderland, County Durham and lives in the West Highlands. Her first novel, Madam, Will You Talk?, was published in 1955 and marked the beginning of a long and acclaimed writing career. All her novels have been bestsellers on both sides of the Atlantic. She was made a Doctor of Literature by Durham University in 2009.