The Gladstone Bag (12 page)

That roused her enough to raise her head a little. She stared at the door as though she couldn’t remember where she was. “Oh, Mrs. Kelling.” Her voice was somewhat between a drawl and a croak, nothing like last night’s brisk, cheerful prattle. “I don’t know. I just don’t feel right. Wait a minute.”

Mrs. Fath fumbled the blanket away from her body, revealing a great deal of peach-colored tricot. Her nightgown had got hiked up around her hips, and she spent quite a time tugging it down while Emma gazed steadfastly out to sea. At last the seeress got herself decently covered in a garish Japanese kimono, the slimpsy kind made of a cheap synthetic Emma had only seen before hanging in touristy souvenir shops. She stuck her bare feet into straw scuffs and slipslopped over to the door.

“Sorry to keep you waiting, Mrs. Kelling. I left the screen door hooked. Afraid the skunks would come in and get me, I guess, though I can’t think what they’d want me for. It was too stuffy with the door shut. I couldn’t get my breath.”

“Oh dear, didn’t you sleep well?”

“I don’t know. Seems to me I’d drop off and then wake up feeling smothered, don’t ask me why. I’m usually a great sleeper. I can’t think what’s the matter with me. I just don’t feel right.”

“In what way don’t you feel right, Mrs. Fath? Is it your stomach?”

“Not specially. It’s—well, there’s this funny feeling in my head, and I’m kind of woozy standing up. I’m not sick exactly; I just don’t feel right.”

She didn’t look right, either, though Emma couldn’t quite figure out why. “I do hope you’re not coming down with something, Mrs. Fath. You don’t suppose it could simply be that you got too much sun yesterday on the boat?” Emma couldn’t imagine how a person might get a delayed reaction from sunstroke, but it was the least contagious thing she could think of. “It couldn’t have been dinner; everybody else feels fine. They’re finishing breakfast now; I came to see if you wanted any. We stop serving in about fifteen minutes.”

Mrs. Fath didn’t say anything.

“I could send one of the girls over with some tea and toast.”

This was stretching the rules, but surely Adelaide wouldn’t mind Emma’s making an exception for somebody who didn’t feel right. Mrs. Fath finally managed a pathetic attempt at pretending to be grateful.

“That’s nice of you, Mrs. Kelling, but I—I don’t know. It seems like such an effort.”

“Maybe you’re simply tired out. Have you been working awfully hard lately? You haven’t had any—er—psychic intimations that you ought to take a good rest?”

“I never get messages for myself, just about other people. And when I’m not feeling right, I can’t get anything at all. Ev’s going to be awful mad if it turns out he’s paid my fare up here for nothing.”

T
HE SEERESS DIDN’T SOUND
unduly worried at the prospect. Emma began to have a psychic intimation of her own. Could this be how Mrs. Fath intended to wangle herself a pleasant vacation with all expenses paid while getting around the problem of not being able to locate Pocapuk’s imaginary treasure? Emma knew she ought to be affronted, but she found herself rather amused and wholly sympathetic.

“You’d better get back to bed, then. I’ll have somebody look in on you after a while. Here, let me help you.”

For a second there, she’d thought the woman was going to faint. Maybe it was part of the act, but Emma didn’t dare take any chances. She steered Mrs. Fath over to the bed, helped her out of her kimono, and got her safely tucked in. Her pulse was a trifle slow—Emma had done enough home nursing on her own family to know—but lots of people had slow pulses for no special reason. Her skin felt chilly and clammy, but why shouldn’t it if she’d been there for some time with the sea breeze blowing in through that open door? Emma decided the sensible thing would be to let the woman rest a while longer and see what happened.

She went back to the house, spoke to Bubbles about taking Mrs. Fath a light snack in a little while, and got to work on the inventory.

Rather than go down the entire list, which would take the rest of the summer from the look of it, she decided to check out the more obvious possibilities, starting with the one thing that wasn’t listed.

The necklace was exactly as she’d left it in the wall safe. It really was an impossibly gorgeous thing, she had to admit. Could she be wrong about the diamonds being genuine? Emma picked up the tumbler that went with Adelaide’s bedside carafe and tried an experimental scratch or two. Sharp and clear, no doubt whatsoever. She got a bit carried away and began doodling little ducks and fishes on the glass with various stones, realized what she was doing, and put the necklace back in the safe.

She oughtn’t to have handled it so freely; there might have been fingerprints. Could fingerprints be got off diamond necklaces? One wouldn’t think so, but police laboratories did manage incredible technical feats these days. She’d better switch this glass with the one in her bedroom and accidentally drop it on the bathroom floor. Too bad to break up the set, but those clear glass carafes were nothing that couldn’t be replaced, assuming there’d be any point in doing so. She went on to Adelaide’s dresser.

Silver filigree perfume bottles, silver-backed brushes, combs, buttonhooks, silver pin tray, silver picture frames, silver thisses, silver thats, all present and accounted for. Wedding presents, birthday presents, silver anniversary presents, Emma supposed. Guests would have noticed the plethora of silver gewgaws, decided the Sabines must be collecting them, and sent some more. That was a penalty of being rich; one kept on accumulating stuff that had to be taken care of. These knickknacks were rather badly in need of polish; she’d turn Sandy and Bernice loose on them some rainy afternoon.

Not that they’d ever be at a loss for chores; there was a great deal of work here for two young girls. Vincent might have been better advised to get somebody more grown up, but perhaps an older girl wouldn’t have wanted to be stuck out on an island all summer. Or perhaps Vincent had shied away from starting something that might lead to a sticky finish. That fellow Ted had what Emma’s mother would have called an eye; Mama wouldn’t have trusted any housemaid of hers within a mile of him.

Enough of this. Nothing was missing up here that Emma could see. The dining room must have been put to rights by now, she’d better go count the silver there. She was exploring the buffet for some triple-plated serving pieces when Vincent burst through from the kitchen, soaking wet, dripping on the carpet and not even noticing.

“Vincent, what is it?” she exclaimed. “Can’t you see what—”

“I got to get to the phone.”

When a man spoke in that tone, a woman knew better than to ask him why. Emma stood aside and let him pass. The proper thing then would have been to stay here and keep on counting silver. Emma followed him into the living room.

Vincent didn’t pay any attention to her. He got the phone out of its box and dialed a number he didn’t have to look up.

“Lowell there? Hell! Then get ahold of him fast as you can an’ tell ’im the bugger’s found. Over the cliff in five feet o’ water, dead as a mackerel with ’is head stove in. Hit the rocks runnin’, looks like. Tell Lowell I said he better get out here quick as the Lord’ll let ’im
.

He slammed down the receiver without waiting for an answer and turned to Emma, taking it for granted she’d been listening.

“We got ’im up on George’s Rock.”

“Where is that, Vincent?”

“High end o’ the island, over beyond the pine grove. Drops off pretty steep there. He must o’ went over in the dark an’ got caught down among the rocks an’ mud with the tide makin’. Good thing it was comin’ in ’stead o’ goin’ out or we might never o’ known what become of ’im. Ted spied that ol’ black bag o’ yours floatin’ upside down, is how we happened to look there. Must o’ got air trapped inside when it fell. So we clambered down an’ fished around some an’ there he was.”

“What a shock it must have been for you!”

“It was a worse one for him, I reckon. Must o’ lost ’is bearin’s an’ thought he was headin’ for the dock. Or somewheres. Anyways, that’s where he got to.” Vincent was being garrulous, for him. Shock took some people that way.

“Ted’s blowing up the rubber boat we keep for emergencies. We wasn’t goin’ to let on we got one for fear that loudmouth who thinks he’s going to find Pocapuk’s treasure’d get ’is paws on it an’ tear it to pieces on the rocks. Didn’t seem sensible to haul the poor bugger up over the cliff on a rope an’ have to carry ’im out o’ the woods on a stretcher, though. We figure to load ’im aboard off the rock an’ float ’im around to the dock so’s Lowell can pick ’im up easy in the patrol boat.”

“Much the best plan,” said Emma. Not that she knew, but what did it matter? “Vincent, hadn’t you better get yourself a tot of brandy and put on some dry clothes?”

“Mug o’ coffee’ll do me. No sense changin’ now when I’m just goin’ to get wet again. We picked up a few o’ your pieces, The bag must o’ come open when he fell. Neil’s still huntin’ for the rest of ’em.

“Yes, the clasp was broken. Please tell Neil not to bother. I’m ashamed to think a man lost his life over so paltry a theft.”

It hadn’t been something paltry, it had been the diamond necklace he’d thought he was stealing. And that probably meant he had an accomplice who’d not only let him out of the storeroom but also told him where to look. She ought to tell Vincent right now. But Vincent was in no mood to listen.

“I got to get back. You goin’ to tell the rest of ’em?”

“We’ll have to, shouldn’t you think, if we’re going to have a corpse laid out on the dock till the boat shows up? In any event, this should make an exciting addition to Dr. Wont’s book,” Emma added dryly.

Vincent grunted. “One man’s foul weather’s another one’s fair. You wasn’t plannin’ to put it off too long?”

“No, I’ll do it right now. I don’t suppose there’s much point in going on with this inventory now that we know he didn’t take anything except my bag.”

“We don’t know,” Vincent contradicted. “Might be somethin’ we haven’t found yet.”

“Then it will turn up when the tide goes out, won’t it? Are the rocks bare then?”

“Just about, but that ain’t sayin’ the stuff mightn’t get washed out on the ebb tide. She’s just about on the turn now. Don’t leave us much time to look.”

“I’ll hurry,” Emma promised. “Where are the cottagers, do you know?”

“Last I seen of ’em, they was over lookin’ out at Shag Rock an’ wishin’ pretty loud for somebody to build ’em a raft. You take that path from the side door over there an’ keep on it till you come to either them or the ocean, dependin’.”

Vincent squelched off to the kitchen. Emma put Adelaide’s sun hat back on and went out the side door. Actually she wasn’t going to need the hat, she realized. The sun, which had been so bright when she’d gone to check on Mrs. Fath, was now all but obscured by great clouds. So much for the forecast. Well, she wasn’t going to bother taking the hat back, not now.

She hurried on. Once down from the knoll, she could hear a distant yapping that sounded like a dog but was more probably Everard Wont laying down the law about something or other. She couldn’t make out any words, but that didn’t bother her.

Sounds must carry remarkably well on the island, Emma decided after she’d been walking for a while. She still didn’t seem to be near the end of the path; she hadn’t caught so much as a glimpse of the ocean. She didn’t mind; she wasn’t looking forward to telling the cottagers about the dead man, and she was enjoying the exercise in spite of her conscience. Wont had stopped orating, thank goodness; she was able to pick out the birds’ various tweets, chirps, honks, and quacks over the less obtrusive voices of his companions.

Emma herself must have been making no noise at all; Count Radunov was even more startled than she when she rounded a particularly large boulder and ran smack into him.

“Oh, sorry,” she gasped. “I was hurrying.”

The count must keep his aplomb within easy reach at all times. He replied suavely, “And why should one hurry on so glorious a day? Dear madame, can I not persuade you to linger with me in this enchanted spot?”

This was no glorious day, the wind was picking up and those clouds were growing blacker and thicker by the second. Nor was there anything particularly enchanting about the spot that Emma could see. Furthermore, that was surely poison ivy growing up the rock he’d been lounging against.

Or had he been lounging? Radunov was giving the impression of having lounged, but Emma had used the same bit of business once when she was playing Buttercup in
Pinafore.
And carried it off, she thought, a good deal more convincingly.

“I haven’t time to linger,” she all but snarled back, “and you’d better get away from that poison ivy or you’ll be sorry you didn’t.”

That fetched him, and he fell into step with her. They walked the rest of the path together without saying much of anything. In fact, the end was just over a short rise. As Vincent had told her, Everard Wont, Groot, Sendick, and Lisbet Quainley were clustered on the shore, staring out at some rocks shaggy with bladderwort, scaly with mussels, black with the splashing of the increasingly high waves. One rock was taller than the rest, shaped like a stela, and capped with white. Miss Quainley’s phallic symbol, no doubt. Emma suppressed a wholly unsuitable giggle. Radunov was trying not to look too amused; she preferred not to speculate on what he might be thinking.

Black John’s sweatshirt lay on the beach, if such the narrow strip of rocks and dried seaweed could be called. His trunks were wet and his skin looked a trifle blue; he must have been braving the cold water again. Groot had a camera slung around his neck but wasn’t taking any pictures. Lisbet Quainley was making a few absent-minded squiggles with a stick of charcoal on a drawing pad she held in the crook of her left arm. None of them seemed to mind being interrupted in whatever conclave they might have been holding, though Wont’s greeting was less than cordial.

“Oh, it’s you. Where’s Alding?”

“In bed,” Emma told him. “She’s not feeling well.”

Of course he took her answer as a personal affront. “What do you mean, she’s not feeling well? What’s wrong with her?”