Say It With Flowers (Mrs. Bradley) Page 7

  “ ‘Lay not up for yourself treasure on earth,’ ” said Dickon, to the departing car, thus proving that his ability for apt quotation extended further even than he had given evidence of it.

  The headmaster drove back to school, placed the mask and the jar on his desk and took out a magnifying glass. The things probably were faked, he decided. The Italians were clever about such replicas. He had a rather nice little copy of a bronze lamp and his wife had a beautiful piece of wood inlaid with copies of the more polite frescoes at Pompeii. The fact that the mask and the jar were copies need not detract from their educational value, he decided. He rang for his secretary and ordered her to place them in a suitable position in the case devoted to objets d’art and to request the art master to letter a suitable description of them.

  Dame Beatrice, meanwhile, had returned to the Stone House and was on the long-distance telephone to her secretary.

  “Means an inquest and no end of fun and games for the police, I suppose,” said Laura. “Do you require my presence?”

  “No, no, child. I thought you would like to be abreast of the local news, that is all.”

  “Don’t ring off. I want to call Gavin. He’s sure to want to talk to you about it.”

  Dame Beatrice confided to the operator that she wished to purchase another three minutes of post-office time and was pleased to hear the confident Scottish tones of Detective Chief-Inspector Robert Gavin.

  “We’ll come back at once,” he said. “I love a busman’s holiday, and Laura would never get over it if I kept her out of the swim.”

  He was as good as his word and motored himself, his wife, and his small son to Edinburgh, where they stayed the night, and then to York, where they stayed a second night, and so to London. In London he applied formally for an extension of leave and told the Assistant Commissioner, informally, of his reason for demanding it.

  “Oh, that Hampshire case. The inquest was held yesterday. The County Police are calling us in. It’s pretty clear that they don’t want a long, tiresome job that, maybe, isn’t their pigeon, anyway. I should think the skeleton was planted on them, you know. May have come from anywhere. There’s no telling from where, at present. Look here, you can have the job, if you like. You’re looking pale and tired!”

  Gavin, who had spent almost all his time in Scotland in the open air, grinned cheerfully and said that perhaps a year or two in the New Forest would set him up again.

  “A year or two—and then I doubt whether you’ll be much further forward,” said the Assistant Commissioner, frowning. “I don’t like skeletons. Nothing but expert witnesses and doubtful timings. Be off with you. I’m busy.”

  Gavin thereupon took his wife and son out to lunch and then down to the Stone House at Wandles Parva. From the Stone House he drove alone to introduce himself to the Superintendent with whom he would be working on the case.

  “Where are we?” he asked. The Superintendent grunted.

  “Your guess is as good as mine,” he said. “The medical evidence is all over the show. There’s not much doubt but that the body is fairly recent; all the same, it could be anything up to twelve years old. It means tracing all the missing persons for the past ten or twelve years.”

  “Not much future in it, you think?”

  “Well, I don’t know, and that’s a fact. You see, somebody planted that skeleton, that’s clear enough. You don’t tell me that those boys and the young convent ladies and the two little devils who skipped school didn’t find that skeleton if it was there to be found.”

  “So there should be something to go on,” said Gavin. “Who planted it and why, for instance.”

  “It had got too hot in the other place where it was laid. Yes, we’ve got that to go on, I suppose. I can’t see it helps much.”

  “What about the verdict at the inquest?”

  Laura Gavin was asking much the same question of Dame Beatrice at the Stone House.

  “Where on earth will the police start?” she enquired. “With Dickon, I suppose, as the thing was found on his land.”

  “The police,” said Dame Beatrice, “have left Dickon both angry and alarmed. I have been to see him several times and there is no doubt that he believes they suspect that he knows a good deal more about the skeleton than he has told them.”

  “I shouldn’t think he does. What do you think?”

  “I am convinced that he knows nothing at all. His wife is extremely worried on his behalf and has begged me to do what I can to save him from persecution.”

  “I suppose having police about the place does seem like persecution. Poor old Dickon! What a shame! What about the vicar and those people who actually unearthed the thing?”

  “I met the Reverend Mr. Pierce the other day. The Carmichaels are lodging at the vicarage as paying guests, you know. He said that they had given the police their account of the matter and that he did not think they were likely to be questioned further, so I expect they will soon return home.”

  “I expect the case will have to be written off as one of those unsolved mysteries. I mean . . . it isn’t even as if you can identify a skeleton, is it?—and one that’s been ten to twelve years dead!”

  “It has not been dead for nearly as long as that. I had ample opportunity for examining it at Mr. Brooker’s school and it is my opinion that the body had been exposed to the air since the murder except for its very brief interment in Dickon’s soil.”

  “Oh, really? What difference does that make?”

  “It means that the murder may have been committed less than two years ago. A body exposed to the air becomes a skeleton in from a year and a quarter to a year and a half. In water the time taken varies between two and a half and three years. It is only if the body is buried in ordinary soil that it takes as long as ten to twelve years to lose all flesh and sinew.”

  “Did the doctors who gave evidence at the inquest agree with you, do you think?”

  “Oh, yes, certainly, but, of course, they were cautious.”

  “Do you think they’ll ever find out what happened?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Are we going into this in a big way, at all?”

  “I confess to a certain amount of interest in the cadaver, and, it follows, I think, in the people who discovered it, particularly Mr. and Mrs. Carmichael.”

  “So the wind sits in that quarter?”

  “Dear me! You must not jump to conclusions of that sort!”

  “Maybe not,” said the unabashed Laura, “but a nod’s as good as a wink!”

  “Only to a blind horse, remember!”

  She left Laura to digest this trenchant rejoinder and went to call upon the vicar. As it happened, Mr. Pierce was not at home, but this did not upset Dame Beatrice’s plans. Mrs. Pierce, in some respects, might be a more willing collaborator than her husband. What Dame Beatrice wanted was all the information she could gather about the Carmichaels.

  Mrs. Pierce proved to be co-operative.

  “They’re out again with Gascony, tracing his Roman road. They won’t be back for hours. We can have a lovely long gossip,” she said.

  “Where do they come from?” asked Dame Beatrice.

  “They live on a house-boat moored somewhere between Oxford and Reading. The address is Reading, anyhow—Pollarded Reach, Reading.”

  “They are a united couple?”

  “They say so, and there seems no reason to disbelieve them. They seem to like the same things—dilettante kind of things, if you know what I mean. One year it’s one thing and the next year something else. Nothing they do seems to have any roots to it. As soon as one of their interests looks like needing real research and a bit of scholarship, they drop it and take up something new.”

  “What do they do for a living?”

  “Oh, nothing. They have money of their own. A pity, I think. I should like to see Phlox made to buckle to and make a do of something. By this time, though, I really doubt whether he is capable of tackling an honest job of work.”
<
br />   “You are not favourably impressed by the characters of the couple, I gather.”

  “It’s envy that sways me, I daresay. I feel a certain amount of resentment when I compare my lot with theirs. I struggle against my feelings, but it’s not much good. Of course, we can do with the money they pay when they come here, but I’d much rather have the sort of people who come here because it’s quiet and they really need a holiday. I don’t mind working myself to the bone for them, but I do grudge looking after Phlox and Marigold and seeing to their meals and shopping for them and helping Marlene make their beds.”

  “I can understand that, of course. How long have you known them?”

  “This is the fourth time they’ve been here. I don’t really know why they like it. They could afford to go to good hotels and they are not a bit mean about money, I’ll say that for them. I charge them well above my usual prices, and they know that, and still they come, roughly once in six months.”

  “What is your opinion of them?”

  “I really don’t know. They’re polite and pleasant and, I must say, remarkably easily pleased. Never any complaints, and tons of compliments when they say good-bye. I couldn’t possibly tell you why I dislike them so much—well, it isn’t them, it’s him.”

  “Does Mr. Pierce know how you feel?”

  “No. If I told him he wouldn’t have them here anymore and, as I’ve told you, they do pay well and we certainly can do with the money.”

  “Did they give any reason for wanting to dig on Dickon’s smallholding?”

  “Not to me. Actually, I believe it was Gascony’s idea. He thought that there might be something more to find—his villa near his Roman road, most probably. I think his theories are pretty reasonable.”

  “Yes, so do I. Were the Carmichaels present when the girls from the convent school did the digging?”

  “Oh, I’m sure they were. Why?”

  “It seems that the skeleton must have been planted after the girls had left, and after those two little boys did some extra digging.”

  “There’s no other conclusion to be arrived at, I would say. You mean that the Carmichaels planted the skeleton and then deliberately ‘found’ it? But that doesn’t make sense. I can imagine that a guilty person or a guilty pair might plant it, but I can’t imagine why they should dig it up again in front of witnesses. It could have remained in the ground for years. Ground that had already been dug over for Roman remains would remain undisturbed, wouldn’t it?—oh, perhaps not on a smallholding, though.”

  “Well, there, you see, nobody can tell. I understand from Laura that the very first digging was done by Dickon himself and that the object of it was to dislodge a badger. The Roman finds were fortuitous.”

  “Yes, that’s true. You think there might have been more badgers?”

  “No. I begin to think that the police are right to question Dickon very closely. As I say, I am convinced that the skeleton was buried on his smallholding after the boys, and then the girls, had dug in that particular place.”

  “And that it might have been bad luck on Dickon that my husband and the Carmichaels decided to dig on almost the same spot?”

  “Yes, but then again, Dickon could have refused them permission to dig if there was something he did not want discovered.”

  “Oh, dear! It is a muddle!”

  “Of course, there is always ‘person unknown,’ is there not?”

  “But we must know whoever it is! It isn’t feasible that a perfect stranger used Dickon’s smallholding, and that part of it which had already been well dug over. It seems as though the Carmichaels can be washed right out of it, anyhow. They can hardly have brought a skeleton down here with them.”

  “What are you going to do next?” asked Laura, when Dame Beatrice returned to the Stone House.

  “I shall approach Mr. and Mrs. Carmichael and ask for a first-hand description of the unearthing of the skeleton.”

  “How will that help? They’ll just say they dug it out, and that will be that.”

  “One never knows. Something may come up which will be useful.”

  “I wouldn’t like to bet on it. Do you want me to come with you to take notes?”

  Dame Beatrice cackled.

  “As you know, I have a prejudice in favour of making my own notes,” she said. As it turned out, she did not need to go to see Phlox and Marigold: they came to see her, not in connection with the skeleton but in quest of psychiatric treatment for Phlox.

  “The fact is,” he said, “I’m suffering from hallucinations.”

  “Hallucinations? Of what kind?” asked Dame Beatrice, wondering whether archæology had palled and he was in quest of some new experience.

  “I see things.”

  “Yes? Please sit down, Mr. Carmichael. Mrs. Carmichael, I wonder whether you would be kind enough to go with Mrs. Gavin into the adjoining room whilst we have our consultation?”

  “I should wish to be present, Dame Beatrice. I understand Phlox and he likes my support.”

  “In that case, I fear . . .”

  “No, no!” said Phlox, pettishly. “Do as you are asked, Marigold, please. I can manage quite well alone.”

  Marigold looked reproachfully at him.

  “Just as you wish, dear,” she said. “I thought I ought to be at hand in case Dame Beatrice needed any corroboration of what you say.”

  “No, I shall not need that,” said Dame Beatrice briskly.

  “Do you not settle your patients on a couch?” asked Phlox, when his wife had gone and the door had closed behind her and Laura.

  “Sometimes; but not at the first consultation. Now, begin at the beginning, omitting nothing.”

  She seated herself at a table so that he presented his left profile to her.

  “That’s nice,” said Phlox. “I thought you might gaze fixedly at me and attempt to bore into my brain.”

  “Oh, no. I would really prefer to turn my back on you so that you could talk merely as though you were soliloquising, but as I sometimes have patients who are potentially dangerous, I do just keep an eye on their movements. It saves both of us from the final embarrassment of my having to ward off an attack.”

  “I assure you that I should never hurt a fly.”

  “Quite so. Now, take your time, Mr. Carmichael. When did these hallucinations begin, and under what circumstances?”

  “They began after my wife and I returned from walking the Roman Wall.”

  “Hadrian’s Wall?”

  “Exactly. Hadrian’s Wall. So why should I see the ghost of Calpurnia? Can you tell me that?”

  “How do you know it is Calpurnia?”

  “That’s what she calls herself.”

  “Oh, she speaks to you, then?”

  “Only to moan, and tell me her name, and then she concludes by telling me, ‘Help, ho! They murder Caesar!’ It’s not at all pleasant, I assure you.”

  Dame Beatrice scribbled busily, aware that Phlox was watching her with a closeness and an intensity which suggested mental derangement. Suddenly he got up, came swiftly to the table, and stood looking over her shoulder.

  “You won’t be able to decipher what I write,” she said equably, in an almost apologetic tone. “I have my own system of hieroglyphics.”

  “Ah!” He sighed, shook his head and sat down again. “I feared as much. The last psychiatrist I visited wrote in Polish, a language also beyond my grasp.”

  “You have attended a psychiatrist before, then?”

  “Yes. The bombing during the war. My nerves, you know.”

  “I see. How were your nerves affected?”

  “I kept seeing angels.”

  “Angels?”

  “Yes, but they all had the swastika on their wings.”

  “Most interesting. May we now return to Hadrian’s Wall?”

  “Certainly. We had a charming time there, and came back—this applies particularly to my wife—full of things Roman-British.”

  “Colchester oysters, do you mean? Sure
ly not from Hadrian’s Wall!”

  Phlox leapt up.

  “Really, Dame Beatrice, if you’re going to joke about it,” he said, “I think I am wasting my time!”

  “I entirely agree,” said Dame Beatrice amiably. “So let us have done with farce and come to the dramatic realities. What have you come to say to me?”

  “Really, I don’t think I follow you.”

  “In that case, there is nothing more to be said, unless we return to our sheep, which would seem to be these hallucinations of yours.”

  “Yes, my angels.”

  “With swastikas on their wings.”

  “What do you make of them?”

  “They almost make you seem like an enemy alien, do they not?”

  “Yes,” Phlox soberly agreed. “I had thought of that. But it isn’t—wasn’t—true, you know. I was—I am—patriotic to the backbone. I just cannot account for the angels.”

  “They are unaccountable beings, no doubt. Now, to the skeleton.”

  “You force the issue!”

  “And with reason. Now that you know the skeleton to be that of a woman killed within the past few years, do you not also know that you and your wife are high on the list of suspects?” This question was a mere gambit to test his reactions, and it had a surprising and (she thought) a suspicious sequel.

  “That is what I have come about,” said Phlox. “I realise that the police suspect us of knowing more about the skeleton than we have said, and that’s where we want your help. Will you give it to us?”

  “A question which astounds me.” This was true.

  “Why so? It is a simple enough proposition. I want you to be on our side in any subsequent enquiry. Do you promise?”

  Dame Beatrice regarded him benignly.

  “Let us return to your Nazi angels,” she said. “What about some word associations? Relax, please, and, when I say a word, I want you to tell me the second word which comes into your mind.”

  “I am familiar with this technique. The second word which comes into my mind. Very well.”

  “Trainer.”

  “Cub.”

  “Cubist.”

  “Mathematics.”

  “Attica.”