Buffet for Unwelcome Guests (14 page)

‘I did go into her room for a moment,’ said Stella, ‘on our way up to bed.’ She let it hover in the air a moment. ‘But of course Mr. Graham had seen the first symptoms before that—hadn’t he?’

It had caught him on the hop: he gave her his bright, appraising glance. ‘Of course,’ said Stella, ‘she might have smuggled something up to bed with her; and that’s why she wouldn’t let me stay.’

‘But as you’ve just said—Mr. Graham had already seen the symptoms. And it still doesn’t account for the book.’

The last hope gone; and she was glad. With Ricky out of the way….She said: ‘Inspector—frankly: do you suspect someone?’

He gave her a wouldn’t-you-like-to-know smile, turning back the pages of his notebook, narrowing his eyes, underlining half a dozen words. What they were, she could not see; but might not one hazard a guess? ‘He placed six tablets on the mantelpiece…’? Frederick had said: ‘Rather a large dose?’ and Ricky had accounted for it, glibly. ‘These Restuwell things are very mild.’ But if they had
not
been Restuwell….

The two men came in from the surgery, their hands moist and pink from washing, after their ministrations to the child. Inspector Cockrill rose. ‘Doctor, a word with you, if you wouldn’t mind?’ Ricky acquiesced, unsuspiciously, and they went off together to the surgery. Stella was left alone with Frederick. He said compassionately: ‘You look all in.’

But she was all right again now: only still sick and dizzy with relief, after the traps and tensions of the past horrible half hour. She went up close to him, collapsed against him, butting her forehead into his shoulder: leaning there. He put one arm around her and gave her a little shake. ‘Bear up, love! Nothing more to worry about now. He just wants to check the book with Ricky, I suppose; and then they’ll all clear off and everything will be as-was.’

She did not move. She said, faintly, (and could not damp down the little, stabbing thought, half grim, half humorous, that she was behaving not at all unlike the departed Miss Kelly, after all)—‘After last night, Frederick, nothing can ever again be quite “as-was”.’

He released himself, taking her by the shoulders, holding her away from him, looking down, smiling, into her eyes. ‘My dear, don’t take it so desperately! The poor girl’s dead but there’s nothing we can do about it. It—’

She interrupted him. ‘I mean—you and me.’

‘You and me, Stella?’

And she knew: already, at the very sound of his voice as he said it, puzzled, ‘You and me, Stella?’—she knew: it was all or nothing, he did not love her, it was madness to go on. But she went on, she was driven on, she could not help herself. ‘Now that we’ve—found each other, Frederick, don’t let’s go on keeping up this terrible pretence. After all I’ve gone through, honestly I couldn’t bear any more.’ She felt the withdrawal, the repudiation, the shock: but she could not accept it, she could not let the dream go. ‘When you held me in your arms last night, when you said I was marvellous—’

‘So you were marvellous,’ he said, trying to wrench the whole thing back to normality before it was too late, trying to save her from her own shame. ‘You behaved like an angel—’

She thrust herself against him, clinging to his arm. ‘Don’t hold me off, Frederick, don’t let’s pretend any more….’ And her nervous volubility got the better of her, she began to gabble again, pouring out with bitter spite her apologia, the ugly defamation of Ricky, Ricky supposed to be so honourable and upright and all the time betraying her with a dirty little strumpet like that… Her gorge rose as she saw the girl before her, lolling in the chair, the author of all the terror and trouble of the past horrible hours and she poured out her loathing, sicking up from the depths of her soul all the loves and hates and passions and eroticisms of the long, unloving, unlovely years. ‘Why should he stand in our way, what do we owe to him any longer—deceiving me, betraying me, messing about with a trollop like that, getting her into the family way and then when she promises trouble—murdering her, murdering her, honestly I wouldn’t put it past him, to shut her mouth….’ As he tore himself free from her grip, she clutched at him again, yearning up into his face, blind to all but the knowledge that this scene must continue, must go on, go on and never end; because when it was ended, there would be nothing left of hope. ‘Oh, Frederick! At least you and I are free of it all, we do belong to each other….’ She was beyond control, shaking, shuddering, her hands clawing at his arms.

He gave one mighty heave, thrusting her away from him and lifted his hand and hit her across her ashen face; and slammed out of the room.

She fell back on to the sofa, where only last night that hateful, smiling, evil little creature had lolled and taunted and brought the ruin into all their lives. Now indeed she was defeated. She had murdered—and all for nothing. She had betrayed an innocent man, her husband, kindest and best of men, as well in her heart she knew. If last night she had dreaded poverty, with him—what would it be like now, without him, without him, the bread-winner; what would it be like with a husband in prison ‘for life’ for a sordid murder… Divorce? But of what use was a divorce when the dream was gone?—that dream which she now recognised with instant, bitter disillusion as nothing but the figment of her own sick, greedy imagination. She put her hand to her cheek and rising stood staring into the looking-glass over the mantelpiece….

Six little tablets had lain there: six white tablets upon whose innocence she herself had cast the first shadow of doubt—the shadow which now stretched out so dark and dangerous over the life of the only person in the world who cared for her. ‘Oh, God—Ricky!’ she whispered to that white face staring back at her from the mirror. ‘What have I done to him?’

But… She began to see that all might not yet be lost: that she might at one swoop save Ricky and repay that blow across the face. She heard the slam of the door as Frederick burst out of the house, the angry altercation with the policeman stationed outside. She began frantically to tidy her disordered hair, straighten her dress, steady her shaking hands. She went out into the hall. ‘Inspector—could I see you one minute, in here?’

Ricky was standing in the hall. He gave her a look that frightened and puzzled her: a look of incredulous, heart-broken, bitter reproach. Well—she must explain it all away later; she could always manage Ricky. Meanwhile…‘Sit down, Inspector. I’ve got to—tell you something.’ She perched herself, knees nervously locked together, on the edge of the sofa. ‘This is horrible for me, absolutely horrible. May I ask you first—am I right in thinking that you suspect my husband? I mean—the book being altered—’

He was eyeing her curiously. ‘As to that, it’s fair to tell you that your husband says he simply can’t understand it. He has no other answer.’

‘And then those tablets. Six little tablets that were supposed to be Restuwell—but could have been morphine—’

He continued to watch her, silent.

She was calm again now; but she said on a rising note: ‘—and which my husband never administered to that girl.’

He jerked up his head. ‘Didn’t give them to the girl?’

‘Don’t you remember the evidence, Inspector? He put them on the mantelpiece and—then he left the house. I went into another room, to telephone Matron. When I came back there were still six tablets in their little row on the mantelpiece. It was Mr. Graham who actually handed them to the girl and made her swallow them.’ She sat up very straight. ‘Inspector, my husband is in danger; and he’s my husband. Who is to say that those tablets were the same ones he handed to Mr. Graham?’

Inspector Cockrill sat for a moment very still. When he spoke it was equably. ‘You mean that Mr. Graham might have slipped across to the surgery when you were on the telephone, helped himself to morphia tablets, picked up the pen and altered the book—and exchanged the tablets without the girl realising what was happening?’ It was beautifully neat. ‘You’d already worked out the possibility?’

‘One has to think of all sides,’ said the Inspector, tolerantly.

‘Nothing was said as to whether he left the room while I was ’phoning.’

‘But what could be his motive in doing such a thing?’

‘The girl could have destroyed the practice, you know, with all this vicious scandal.’ She saw his deprecatory glance. ‘But of course, Inspector, that was not the motive.’ And she straightened her shoulders, again, clasping her hands on her knee till the knuckles were gleaming knobs of ivory against the dull white flesh. She said again: ‘This is horrible for me: but I must protect my husband. You see, Inspector—Mr. Graham was in love with me.’

That brought him up, startled. ‘In love with you?’

‘I think it had been going on for years,’ she said. ‘He never said anything. I never knew and God knows, Ricky never knew. But last night—well, it started with his just being kind and comforting and then—he just lost his head, I suppose; he put his arms round me, he called me wonderful and marvellous, he raved about my blue eyes, all that sort of thing, you know. I—was utterly taken aback. What my husband would say if he knew…!’

The Inspector was silent again. He said at last: ‘Hardly account for the murder of the girl though, would it?’

Stella grew excited. ‘Do you understand
any
thing about that girl, Inspector? She was vicious; vicious and hysterical and a mischief-maker. She hated me because she fancied herself in love with my husband—she’d have done anything to blacken my name. And she—saw all this, you see. I suppose he thought she was half dopey, anyway, as I say he simply lost his head, he didn’t care whether she was there or not. But then….She could have destroyed us, Inspector; she could have destroyed us all. Bad enough running round saying that she was having a baby by my husband; but if she could add to it that his wife was having an affair with his partner! And all so easy!—people knew about the other thing, but nobody in the world knew about this, he was the very last person to be suspected. And she was so utterly worthless; and after all she wanted to die, she was telling everybody that she wanted to die….’ It was strange how clear her mind was, taking into consideration every point, every twist and turn; and yet how limited—for somewhere in her consciousness she knew that this was not all. Yet what could one do but meet each blow as it came; and before it came….‘This morning when I—I realised you suspected my husband—well, Inspector, there are only three people involved and I knew that my husband was no more guilty than I was. I—well, engineered him out of the room, I knew you’d ask him to show you the poisons book. You see I—well, I wanted to make a test. I spoke to Dr. Graham, I went up close to him, I let him think that what he’d said last night had been—well, not unwelcome to me. He responded at once. He put his arms round me, he called me his angel; and I played up, I said things against my husband, I pretended to believe that he’d deceived me with that girl. I said—I drew back from him and looked into his face, Inspector, and I said that if my husband were convicted of her murder—then he and I would be free. He knew at once; he knew by the look on my face when I said that, that I’d realised the truth—that that was what he had been thinking, that he’d killed the girl himself, knowing Ricky would get the blame. And once again, he lost his head; he pushed me violently aside, knocking his hand against my face—you can see the mark, here—and rushed out of the house. God knows where! To think up his version, I suppose—no doubt
I
made up to
him
, no doubt it was
I
who wanted my husband accused! But you’ll be ready for that now, Inspector. You’ll be ready for anything that comes.’

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I’m ready for anything that comes.’

She was exhausted; her mind twisting through the terrible underground warren of her doubts and fears; but she forced herself to a sort of outward calmness, sitting down quietly, hiding her shaking hands in her lap; very pale, head bent, eyes cast down. ‘It’s—not a pretty story,’ she said.

He sat down beside her and a little to her astonishment, leaned over and put his fingers to her wrist. He said: ‘Now, do you know, Mrs. Harrison, I think that’s rather where you and I disagree. I do think it’s a pretty story; as pretty a story as ever I listened to—even prettier than the one you told me before.’

Terror rose in her, a wild, upward surge. ‘What do you mean? What story?’

‘The story about your husband,’ he said. He left his thin, hard hand across her wrist, like the hand of a mother, absently quietening her child while her mind is elsewhere. ‘You’ve been very clever, Mrs. Harrison. You’ve stuck so closely to the truth and that’s what most people fail to do. The conversation with Dr. Graham just now—I daresay my sergeant, outside in the hall, will confirm almost every word that passed between you; just a matter of the interpretation. Which of course it might be; everything may be, when one comes to look closely at it. Don’t you agree?’ And he dropped his note of sardonic banter and said sharply: ‘For instance—that coffee?’

‘The coffee?’ she faltered. But surely—surely she was safe enough there. Surely she had made no mistake; the lipstick on the rim, the finger-prints; hers as well as the girl’s, just as they would have been, no silly nonsense about wiping away all the prints—she’d been rather proud of that. ‘I gave her some coffee, yes. My husband told me to.’

‘That’s right. He told you to. You left the two men in the surgery with the girl, and went through to the kitchen. That gave you a little time to think, I suppose. Suddenly you came back and packed them all off to the drawing-room. That’s true, isn’t it? It’s in your own statement.’

‘Yes, it’s true. Why not? I thought it would be more comfortable for them in the drawing-room. There’s only one decent chair in the surgery.’

‘You said earlier that the reason was that you might be interrupted by an emergency patient.’

‘That too. All sorts of little considerations.’

‘One little consideration would be that it left the surgery free?’

‘I suppose you mean for me to go through and get the morphia tablets—?’

‘Thank you,’ he said, and again he had that glitter in his eye. ‘Morphia tablets—stirred into the coffee: hot, strong black coffee with lots of sugar in it so that she would not taste anything else. You came back into the drawing-room and handed the cup to her—’