Drop of the Dice (40 page)

‘You were a long time passing,’ I said. ‘How did you manage to see so much!’

‘Well, I stopped a little while.’

‘And spied on her.’

‘I
am
a sort of spy. That’s my job. I discover things. But you wait and see what I’ve found. I waited until she had gone out and then I went to her room. I saw where she had put this thing she was looking at. You know the secret drawer? You have to take out one drawer and there’s another drawer behind it. That is where she had put it… in the secret drawer, so it must have been a secret. So I went in and found… guess.’

‘You tell me.’

She put her hand in her pocket and when she withdrew it she was holding something in the palm of her hand. It was the bezoar ring.

I was so startled to see it that I gasped. She watched me with satisfaction.

‘He gave it to
her.
He gave her
your
ring.’

‘No… he lost it at the tables.’

‘That was what he told you.’ Sabrina spoke scornfully. ‘She wanted it. She said, “Get me the bezoar ring and I’ll be yours.” So he just gave it to her.’

I shook my head, but of course I half believed what she was telling.

I sat staring at the ring. I was wretchedly unhappy, for I felt in that moment that there was more than a pinch of reality in Sabrina’s wild imaginings.

She was watching me intently. ‘They took it away,’ she said darkly, ‘because it was taking the poison out of the tisane

I laughed a little unconvincingly. I didn’t want her to know that I was worried. I think that at times Sabrina herself did not believe in these accusations. It was a game to her, like charades and I Spy. She had always loved treasure hunts and games of detection.

‘You won’t need a taster now,’ she said. ‘You have the ring.’

I said thoughtfully: ‘I think the best thing you can do is take it back and put it where you found it.’

She was astounded and I went on slowly, playing her game: ‘It is best for them not to know that we know where it is.’

She nodded darkly.

I sat still, watching her speed across the grass to the house.

Was it possible? I asked myself. Was he in love with my sister? It was feasible enough. She was attractive and she shared that all-consuming passion. They were together a great deal. She was often invited to accompany him to gambling parties. I was left out because people knew I did not care to play. How often had I heard them laughing together or growing excited as they discussed the manner of some past play.

Was it so absurd? Was I wilfully blind to what was happening about me? Did I need the awareness and the possessive love of a child to make the picture clear to me?

After that I seemed to become conscious of a certain menace all about me. At times I thought it must be due to my condition. Women had strange fancies at such times. Sabrina had planted suspicion in my mind and it grew.

There was Lance. What did I know of Lance? He was in a way a secret person and this was all the more alarming because he showed no signs of secrecy. He appeared to be light-hearted in all ways, reckless, even careless, but always kind… avoiding trouble or any form of unpleasantness. How could he be capable of intrigue, of plots to be rid of me—for that was what it amounted to. I looked for motive. He had been both passionate and tender, a lover and a friend; but I had always known that his real passion was for gambling, and it had made a barrier between us. I had made it clear that I thought his gambling foolish; and there was Aimée, pretty enough and very elegant, with a love of gambling which almost equalled his own. They were together a great deal. There was one other dark thought. I guessed that there were debts and they might be enormous ones. He was constantly staving off his creditors. If I died, my fortune would be his… except the Hessenfield inheritance which had so rapidly increased at the time of the South Sea Bubble. But Aimée would have that because my money was to go to her and hers to me in the event of either one of us dying.

So there was a motive.

I wondered about the extent of Lance’s debts, but he would never tell me. He would always shrug the matter aside if I raised it, as though debt were a natural sequence in the life of a gentleman. Then it occurred to me that he might be in dire financial straits in which case my death would be a necessity to him for it would give him escape from his creditors and, at the same time, Aimée, if it were true he was in love with her. How could I be sure? He was charming to her, but he was charming to everyone and it was his nature to pretend that people were of the greatest importance to him. My death might even have meant to him escape from a debtors’ prison… and marriage with Aimée.

No, I could not believe it. There were times when my doubts seemed to have grown out of wildest imaginings and to be quite absurd.

Oh Sabrina, I thought, I am as bad as you are!

I found a certain pleasure in escaping to the woods which I loved. I found them enchanting, and different every day. I liked to watch the leaves change and to listen to the birds’ song. There was peace there and when I was among the trees everything seemed natural and normal, and my doubts faded away.

Of course, I would say to myself, it must have been Eddy who gave the bezoar ring to Aimée. She had been intrigued by it from the time she had first seen it and knowing how I felt about it she did not want me to know that it was in her possession. She probably felt she ought to hand it back to me and I could understand that she wanted it for herself. As for the suggestion that she and Lance were lovers, it was too ridiculous to stand up to credulity. He was my devoted husband; and I did not believe that he had ever been unfaithful to me either in thought or deed.

So I went to the woods in the late afternoon of each day; that was when Sabrina was having her riding lesson, and it was something she would not willingly give up. She was learning to jump now and was very excited about it.

I had returned from the woods that afternoon and was resting, as was my custom, when I heard Madame Legrand in the corridor outside my room talking excitedly to Aimée.

I rose and looked out.

‘Has something happened?’ I asked.

‘Oh dear,’ said Madame Legrand raising her hands and looking extremely annoyed with herself. ‘Now I have awakened you, which is
méchante
of me. Oh, but the ’eart it go pit-pat, pit-pat. I think it burst from the bosom.’

‘Maman had a shock near the common,’ Aimée explained. ‘There were gipsies there a day or so ago. One of them was lurking in the bushes. He called out to her as she passed… something about telling her fortune.’

‘He look… evil,’ said Madame Legrand. ‘I begin to run…’

‘And he ran after her, or so she thought,’ went on Aimée. ‘Poor Maman, rest a while and I will bring you one of your tisanes.’

‘And now we have return and disturb poor Clarissa. See to her, Aimée. I will go to my room. Clarissa, you must forgive.’

‘Oh it was nothing,’ I assured her. ‘I wasn’t asleep. I’m so sorry you’ve had a fright.’

‘Maman is nervous by nature,’ whispered Aimée, ‘but she will be recovered in half an hour.’

I went back to bed and shortly afterwards Sabrina came in to tell me how high her horse had jumped and how Job, the groom who was teaching her, had said he had never had as good a pupil as she was.

She was so proud of her achievements that she could think of nothing else and was not even very interested when I told her how Madame Legrand had been frightened by a gipsy.

It was a few days later when I took my usual walk in the woods. My favourite spot was a little clearing among the trees. There was an old oak there under which I liked to sit. From there I could just glimpse the dene hole between the trees. I would sit there and wonder about it and imagine for what it had been used in prehistoric days. I would dream too of my baby, who had now become alive to me. I could feel its movement -and I longed above everything to hold it in my arms.

I knew that to have a child of my own would be the greatest happiness I could hope for.

There was something strange about that afternoon. Was it a premonition? I wondered afterwards; but from the moment I had entered the woods I had been aware of something… I was not sure what. It was a certain uneasiness. I had felt it before… in Enderby particularly… as though I were being watched, that I was menaced in some way. The servants had said it was the ghost in Enderby, but were there ghosts in the woods?

Little sounds made me start; a crackle in the undergrowth, the displacement of a stone, a sudden rustling. It was probably a squirrel getting his hoard ready for the winter; perhaps a rabbit or a weasel or a stoat scuttling through the foliage; the breeze making moaning sounds as it moved among the branches of the trees. They were the natural sounds of the wood which, but for the unusual nature of my mood, would have gone unnoticed.

When I came to the clearing the strangeness passed and peace descended upon me. I sat there under the oak, thinking of my baby. This time next year you’ll be here, my little one, I thought. And how I longed for the waiting to be over.

And then… there it was again. I was not alone. I knew it.

I turned my head sharply. I thought I saw a dark shadow darting among the trees… scarcely a human being… a shape.

I sat very still peering into the wood. I could see nothing.

I had imagined it, of course. I turned away. And then… there it was again… the sound of a footfall, the eerie certainty that something was menacing me… something evil.

I must get back to the house. To do so I had to go through the woods and suddenly I was afraid of what might be lurking there. There was no other way, though. It was absurd to be afraid of those familiar trees which I loved.

I had let my imagination run on. Sabrina, I thought, you are responsible for this!

I was getting a little cumbersome and not able to get nimbly to my feet, and as I attempted to do so there was a movement from behind. I turned. Something struck me on the back of my head. I had fallen to the ground. I was not sure what happened then. I think I must have lost consciousness for a moment or so, before a terrible realization came sweeping over me that Sabrina had been right. Someone wanted me out of the way and here I was in the woods, alone and helpless.

It could only have been for a few seconds that I had lost consciousness. I was aware now that I was being dragged across the grass. I could smell the scent of earth; the grass brushed my hands; I had returned, from blankness to horror and a fearful understanding of what was happening to me.

I was being dragged towards the dene hole.

I could not see who my assailant was. It appeared to be a dark, cloaked figure… man or woman, I was not sure. I was lying face downwards on the ground and I could not see who was looming over me. I could feel my head beginning to throb and I knew that death was staring me in the face.

Sabrina… oh, Sabrina… I was thinking. You were right after all.

I had stepped into a nightmare. I was going to be taken to the dark pit and then… I should disappear.

Suddenly I heard a voice; ‘Clarissa! Clarissa!’

Everything seemed to stand still. Time itself. But the voice I heard was that of Sabrina. I thought I must be dreaming. It was the last moments of consciousness before death took me; and it was significant that it should be Sabrina of whom I was thinking.

Sudden silence. What had happened? I knew I was still above the earth; vaguely I could see the light; I could smell and feel the grass beneath me.

I tried to rise. I heard Sabrina’s voice again. ‘Stop. Stop. What are you doing to Clarissa?’

Then she was close to me, kneeling over me. I could see her face hazily through the mists which seemed to be settling over my eyes.

‘Clarissa… oh dear, dear Clarissa. Are you all right? You’re not dead, are you?’

‘Sabrina.’

‘Yes, I came. Buttermilk was in a bad mood today. He wouldn’t jump. Job said leave him. He’s touchy today. So I did and I came here to find you… and talk. Then I heard you call out and I saw… I saw…’

‘What did you see?’ I was fighting the desire to slip back into unconsciousness. ‘Sabrina… Sabrina… what did you see?’

‘Someone… was pulling you across the grass.’

‘Who was it? Who?’

I was waiting for her to tell me. It seemed like a very long pause. I was praying, I think. Oh God, let it not have been Lance.

‘I didn’t know. It was the disguise. A long cloak and a hood over its face. It could have been anyone.’

‘Oh, Sabrina, whoever it was was going to kill me. I felt the strangeness as I came into the woods today… something evil… lurking there.’

‘Yes,’ said Sabrina, ‘yes. I ought to get you back to the house. Can you walk?’

‘I think so.’

‘We ought to get someone to carry you. I can’t go away and leave you, though.
It
might come back.’

I was sitting up leaning against her and she had her arm protectively round me.

‘Oh Sabrina,’ I said, ‘it was… horrible.’

‘It was attempted murder,’ she answered. ‘If I hadn’t been here they would have killed you.’

‘You saved my life. I am sure of it. I know what it was going to do—take me to the dene hole.’ Sabrina was shivering.

‘I knew I had to save you,’ she said. ‘I knew it.’

We clung together for a moment. Then I said: ‘We must get back. If whatever it is comes back…’

‘I’d kill it,’ said Sabrina.

‘Help me up.’

She did. My head was swimming and I could feel a large bump coming up. I felt I was going to faint.

Then I thought with alarm of my baby. I felt it move within me and for a moment I felt exultant. I had greatly feared it might have suffered from the assault.

Sabrina put her arm round me and although she was only a girl of ten I felt safe and secure with her beside me.

I took a few tottering steps towards the trees.

‘It’s not really far,’ said Sabrina. ‘Can you do it, dear Clarissa?’

I said I could and I would.

As we came within sight of the house I saw Lance. He was on his way to the stables. When he saw us he stopped and stared.