So Bad a Death Page 7

  Old man Ames and Robin both bowed with a strange courtesy, but Mrs Ames did not look up until I was out of the Lodge. I saw her watching me as I passed under the windows, the sun striking full onto her ravaged face.

  IV

  Yvonne caught up with me when I was about half-way to the village. She had her baby propped up with pillows. His face in repose still had a thin, pinched look about it, but he seemed more contented than on the previous day. I pointed this out to her.

  “Nurse Stone was terribly cross about the dummy,” she announced. “She immediately rang through to the Lodge and told Mrs Ames to put one down on the shopping list.”

  In spite of my protestation to Yvonne, locating the Middleburn Health Centre was a simple task. It was merely a matter of following the prams.

  It was a sunny brick building with a verandah built on two sides. Yvonne squeezed her pram into the last available place and lifted up the child carefully. Holding Tony by one hand, I waited for her as she collected oddments of clothing without which one never travels with a baby.

  She preceded me into the L-shaped room. It was bright with gay curtains and posters illustrating the importance of the foundation foods. Already several mothers were waiting their turn for the scales.

  A small room led from the main one. There the sister-in-charge sat interviewing each mother after her child was weighed.

  “What is her name?” I asked Yvonne, watching her undress Jimmy across her knee. She found it awkward.

  “Sister Heather. She’s been here a long time. I believe she would have resigned long ago but for the shortage of fully trained staff. She loves the babies.”

  She arose and moved over to the weighing table. Jimmy let out a cry as the cold basket met his naked behind. Yvonne flushed up at once and cast an apologetic look around the room. She made some attempts to soothe the child by snapping her fingers while the nurse arranged the weights. The child’s crying infected other members of the community, so much so that by the time I got up to go into Sister Heather’s office the whole room was a roar. It was really rather funny, although Yvonne was a little distressed.

  I pushed Tony into the room, turning back to close the door against the din.

  “Talk about feeding time at the Zoo,” I began. I stopped abruptly. Sister Heather had raised her head. The fountain-pen with which she had been writing slipped from her fingers. We stared at each other for a long moment in silence. A moment in which our eyes were held, puzzlement changing to recognition and on her part a startled look. Tony pulled up a chair for himself and clambered into it noisily.

  Sister Heather was the first to recover her composure. She held out her hand, smiling. “How do you do? You’re a newcomer, aren’t you? Please sit down while I make out a form for you.”

  I murmured something inaudible and idiotic, pushing Tony off his chair and sitting down with him on my knee.

  Sister Heather’s gentle voice flowed on, asking particulars as to Tony’s age, weight and diet. When I gave my address her hand hesitated in writing for a moment. The pause was barely noticeable and might only have been imagination on my part. It was incredible that this serene-looking woman was the one I had overheard talking of murder. For some reason the short strained sentences Sister Heather had uttered in the middle of High Street were something between us that was going to be ignored; on her side at any rate.

  “We have only just moved into the Dower House,” I said, watching her closely. She was drawing up a graph illustrating Tony’s progress.

  “So I heard,” she replied smoothly. “You were lucky to find such a place. You must be in high favour with Mr Holland.”

  Somehow I didn’t like the way Sister Heather said that. There was a faint hostility in her voice. I attacked again.

  “By the way, Mr Holland’s grandson was instrumental in bringing me here.” I paused a moment. She did not look up.

  “Indeed?”

  “Mrs Holland offered me her escort. She doesn’t come here often, I believe.”

  “I will be glad to see her baby again,” Sister Heather said in the same non-committal manner. She drew out a tape measure and started to take Tony’s head and chest measurements.

  “I don’t think that baby is well,” I said bluntly. “You must do something.” She looked at me over Tony’s head. Her eyes were quite blank.

  “Mr Holland exercises a considerable influence in this district,” she informed me in an even tone. “If you wish to stand well in his favour you would be wise not to interfere with the members of his family.”

  I did not give up. “Not even if it is a matter of life and death, Sister?”

  Her eyes flickered. She moved back to her side of the desk.

  “I am afraid I don’t understand you, Mrs Matheson.” There was a note of finality in her voice. I sighed and got up.

  “All right,” I agreed. “Have it your own way. I’m to mind my own business, am I? But I do hope you will give that baby a good examination and some strong advice to his mother. Thanks very much for looking at Tony. I will be along again.” I turned back from the door. “By the way, Sister, can you recommend the local doctor? I am anxious to have one close at hand.”

  My simple request had an amazing effect on Sister Heather. She looked confused and stammered slightly, losing the polite detachment with which she had greeted my attempt to force an open discussion on the Holland baby. After some hesitation she told me Dr Trefont was the local man’s name. He held good degrees and had a postgraduate obstetrical record. He was well liked in confinement cases. Very good with children’s diseases.

  I took myself off to await Yvonne outside. She did not take long in Sister Heather’s office, a fact that rather disturbed me.

  “Well?” I said, as she put Jimmy back in the pram. “How did he go? What did Sister Heather say about him?”

  “He’s all right,” she replied with a curtness wholly unlike her.

  “How is his weight?” I persisted.

  “He has lost a bit, but considering he’s teething I’m not worrying.”

  The latter part of her statement was without doubt a lie. She was more than worried, she was scared.

  “What’s the matter?” I asked gently. “You look upset. Is it your baby?”

  We walked along in silence for a moment. I waited patiently. Yvonne seemed undecided whether to speak.

  “Oh, Mrs Matheson,” she burst out presently. “She wants me to take Jimmy to that man.”

  “What man?”

  “Doctor Trefont. I couldn’t. Why should Jimmy want a doctor? He’s well enough. But for his teeth he’s—”

  “Listen to me, my child,” I broke in. “Don’t put too much blame on teething. That’s a very old one. Do as Sister Heather tells you. Go along to the medicine man.”

  She shook her head stubbornly. “I couldn’t,” she repeated. “Not to him. Mr Holland wouldn’t hear of it.”

  “What’s wrong with Trefont? I’m going to him myself.”

  Yvonne stopped her pram and gazed at me earnestly. “Don’t, Mrs Matheson. Don’t go to Dr Trefont.” She spoke in dead seriousness.

  I replied lightly: “You talk as though the man is an abortionist or something.”

  She flushed at my words, and changed the subject.

  Yvonne’s earnest request could not but affect me. I had marked too the note of hesitation even as the Health Centre sister had given the recommendation.

  That night I rang my old doctor to ask him what he thought. He grunted, “Good idea,” in reply to my careful explanation.

  “Glad to get rid of you. Much too busy. Trefont? Nothing against him that I know of. Anyone who has gone through the university here must be all right. I’ll fossick around and see if I can dig up any dirt. How’s your brat? You needn’t tell me. I’d forgotten you’re no longer a patient of mine. Not interested now.”

  I rang off, grinning. Doctor Johnson was a dear old chap. If there was anything at all shady about Trefont, he would soon let me know.


  On impulse I took up the phone again. It was connected in John’s study and I leant against the edge of his desk as I dialled.

  John heaved an ostentatious sigh. “Last one, darling. I won’t be long. Hullo, is that you, Connie? Maggie speaking. How are you?”

  I certainly gave the right cue. Connie held forth for some time on her various symptoms and ailments. I listened patiently for a time before I cut in.

  “Quite so. I rang to find out the name of your doctor. Is he by any chance Trefont? He is? How do you like him? I’m thinking of going to him myself.”

  Connie liked him fairly well, but was not enthusiastic. He had been well recommended. “But he lacked polish if you know what I mean, Maggie. Of course—”

  “No bedside manner. Is that it?”

  It was, precisely. But a good doctor. Most of the girls around Middleburn went to him.

  “Sounds as though he’ll do. Thanks, Connie. By the way, what about you and—er—Harold dining with us one night?”

  We arranged the date, and I rang off satisfied with my calling for the time being.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  I

  The day of the dinner-party at the Hall dawned much the same as any other day. A feeling of pleasant anticipation was mine that morning. There were no grim forebodings or terrible premonitions. “Nobody knows what night will bring,” or similar gloomy phrases, never entered my head.

  Half-way through the morning Ames rang with the suggestion that I should squeeze in a game of golf before the Squire returned. Mrs Ames would come to the Dower in the afternoon. Mindful of Ernest Mulqueen’s advice, I jumped at the offer.

  Mrs Ames arrived a few minutes before the appointed hour. She wore the usual tweed coat with its big collar almost covering her face, and carried an attaché case. Robin was with her, one hand grasping a bunch of geraniums. Under his arm were a number of brightly coloured books. The flowers, it appeared, were for me, while the books were to form an overture to Tony.

  I gave Mrs Ames a few instructions and slipped out unobtrusively.

  The links were almost deserted. There was no one in the tiny office to take a green fee, so I moved off without delay. Greenkeepers have the habit of popping up at the eighteenth hole, just as you are congratulating yourself on getting a free game. I had a very brief run for my lack of payment that time. I approached the first green with stiff shots through lack of practice, and there was Ames seated on a diesel-driven mower on the other side of the pin. He dismissed my offer of payment with a word that Mr Holland would not like it, and cut off his engine to watch me drive off the second tee. It was not a very marvellous drive, but straight and true. I went down the slope, anxious to be away from his gaze. I knew he was as perfect a golfer as he was in his many other crafts.

  About the fifth hole, when my muscles were starting to relax and the sound of a lark in the cloudless sky above was heightening my enjoyment, I stroked through another solitary female player. I was thoroughly delighting in one long unkind shot when I was hailed by name from a thicket where she had retired for safety.

  As I approached I recognized a woman I had met at the Middleburn Community Centre—the one who adored children. She clapped her hands after my next stroke in earnest applause. I eyed her with a sinking feeling. My happy solitary game was going to be a thing of the past.

  “Hello, Mrs Matheson. I’m so glad to see you. You do play well.”

  It was the only shot she had seen me make and that was a fluke.

  “Miss—” I began gropingly.

  “Potts-Power. But please call me Daisy. Everyone does. I’m quite a figure in Middleburn. A gay spinster amongst all you young-marrieds. Tell me, how is my little Anthony?”

  I winced throughout this speech. “He is Mrs Ames’ little Tony at the moment,” I said, glancing backward in the vain hope that someone might be wanting to drive off.

  “Isn’t she a funny person? So hard to make friends with her. I suppose her poor face makes her shy. I do like to be friendly with everyone, don’t you?”

  I began to edge away.

  “Wait until I play this ball,” Miss Potts-Power begged. “We can go along together and have a nice chat. Unless you want to go ahead. I’m afraid I’m a bit slow.”

  “Not at all,” I replied, feeling hemmed in.

  “It’s so much nicer playing twosome, don’t you think?” asked Miss Potts-Power. I could not bring myself to even think of her as Daisy yet.

  She bent down low and hacked at her ball. Incredibly it trickled onto the green.

  “That just shows what the influence of a good player can do,” she remarked fulsomely. I made no comment as I moved after my ball and took up a stance.

  Miss Potts-Power chatted on in an unconcerned fashion behind me. Ames was giving her lessons. Didn’t I think he was a frightfully nice man? So handsome and well-spoken. So utterly devoted to his wife and son, and to his poor old father, and, of course, the Hollands too. Indeed he was marvellous to everybody, even poor little her.

  I made a swipe at my ball, hoping for the best.

  “I don’t often get the opportunity to play golf, you know. But Mother was having a nap and I just felt I had to get out. She always has a nap when we are going out at night. I’m sure you can’t guess where we’re going. I’ll give you three chances.”

  I glowered at the distance separating my ball from the pin.

  “The Zoo!” I suggested.

  “‘The Zoo’,” she repeated blankly. “Oh, you’re teasing me. All right, if you won’t play—”

  “I’m trying to,” I muttered fiercely, following through the putt.

  “—I’ll tell you. It is such a coincidence, really. It’s all over the village about Mr Holland’s party. You can’t keep anything secret in Middleburn. It is just as well Mrs Ames could mind Tony, because I was going to offer if she couldn’t, you know, and I never break a promise, even though it means doing without some outing more pleasant.”

  I sank my ball at last and held the pin as Miss Potts-Power holed out in five or six putts. The last one ended on the tip of the hole. I gave it a surreptitious nudge with my toe to help it on its way.

  “Mother and I have been invited to dinner at Holland Hall. There now, aren’t you surprised?”

  “Very!” I said, knowing my cue. “But why should I be?”

  “How silly of me! Of course you haven’t been here long enough to know. And actually it was Ames who issued the invitation, so it mightn’t count for anything.”

  “You are holding me in suspense,” I said, speculating on the best way to cross the creek half-way down the sixth fairway. A discreet stroke to land just this side or a bold bid in the hope it might come off?

  “You always lose a ball here,” Miss Potts-Power said happily. “Ames must find dozens in that creek.”

  “He won’t find any of mine,” I said, playing the careful game. “You were saying about tonight?”

  “Tonight? Oh, yes. So odd of Mr Holland. You see, he and mother haven’t spoken to each other for years.” She paused for effect.

  I made some fitting sound of incredulity.

  “What do you make of it, Mrs Matheson? You are a bit of a detective, I believe.”

  I slammed my wood into the bag with unnecessary force.

  Blast Connie and her prattling!

  “On the face of it I should say the quarrel, if such it was, was going to be forgotten at last.”

  “As a matter of fact,” Miss Potts-Power confessed, “I don’t know if there was any actual quarrel. You see, mother has never spoken of it.”

  “In that case,” I suggested, “it would be better not to waste our time with idle speculation. I wonder if you’d think me terribly rude if I went on. I’m anxious to get back to Tony.”

  “Of course not,” she said, looking hurt. “Anyway, I’ll see you tonight. Maybe we can have a nice long chat then.”

  I finished the fifteenth hole and paused to add up my card. The result was not too startling; in fac
t, low enough to make the playing of another three holes interesting. A mist hung low over the creek again. I glanced up at the sky. It had become overcast with a thin layer of cloud.

  I gave an undecided look at my watch, shrugged and climbed on to the next tee. I played the next two holes well and felt fully justified in stealing time. This self-satisfaction vanished when I lost a ball second stroke off the last fairway. The mist was creeping up steadily. Combined with the fading daylight, I was forced to abandon the search in disgust.

  I took a mental photograph of the approximate position of the ball, determined to try the search again the following day. Golf balls were too hard to come by to go losing them through sheer stupidity.

  II

  It was after six when I turned into the gateway of the Dower. Tony was having tea in the kitchen with his new friend. Some lively and completely unintelligible conversation was going on between them. Mrs Ames sat between them, her head bent over some intricate fancywork. She looked up as I burst in, anxious to see Tony after what now seemed a long separation.

  “I hope you had a pleasant game,” she remarked, bending her head again swiftly.

  “Very pleasant, thank you. Tony, my lamb, not all that much in your mouth.”

  Robin had finished his tea. He slipped from his chair, wiping a perfectly clean face on an equally spotless feeder. Mrs Ames came up behind him to untie it, while I poured more milk for Tony.

  “Now remember, Robin,” I heard her say in a low tone. “Go home by the road and be very careful.”

  “Are you sending Robin home by himself?” I asked, swinging round in surprise. It was nearly pitch-dark outside with that nasty mist coming up. Although the child seemed highly intelligent, he was not much more than a baby.

  “Let him play with Tony while I get changed,” I suggested. “I’ll take him on my way to the Hall.”

  She accepted my offer without hesitation. I caught the merest hint of a smile on her averted face and felt warmed by it. You would hate to think that a woman who had been looking after your child as competently as she seemed to have looked after Tony and to whom you felt indebted was incapable of any response.