The Irish Manor House Murder (2 page)

Fingering the check from the Language Institute, she’d thought at once of the old groundsman’s cottage in Ballynagh. It would be a cheap rental. There was blood in its recent history, she knew that well enough. She’d been in Ballynagh four months ago, when she’d worked at the conference in Dublin. The Ballynagh villagers still shuddered and steered clear of the cottage in the woods, in spite of a low rent. So, cheap. Hopeful, she made a long-distance call to the owner, Winifred Moore of Castle Moore, and pinned down a six-month lease of the cottage. Already she’d been here two months.

Still shivering, she picked up her jeans from the chair beside the bed. They were muddied and grass-stained at the knees from when she’d knelt in the meadow beside the body of Dr. Ashenden.

Still holding the jeans, she had a sudden, flashing vision of Rowena Keegan astride the stallion, the upraised hooves, Rowena’s enraged face.

Torrey gazed down at the jeans. She saw herself yesterday afternoon standing in the great hall at Ashenden Manor with Sergeant Bryson in his blue uniform and cap. She heard her own smoothly lying voice, protecting Rowena. Then, footsteps: chubby, balding Dr. Collins, Dr. Ashenden’s old friend, coming down the staircase in his familiar olive-green tweed jacket, bringing the reassuring news that Dr. Ashenden’s main injury was a sprained shoulder. Dr. Collins’s kindly voice and his honest blue eyes made her feel ashamed of her lying.

Stay out of it.

But of course she wouldn’t. She never could. Besides, having lied to the police, she was already in it. And Inspector O’Hare was not one to let sleeping dogs lie. He’d kick them awake. Or more likely lure them awake with a biscuit held under their noses. Better not underestimate the paunchy, comfortable-looking Inspector O’Hare.

But above all, Rowena! There had to be an explanation for that horrifying scene in the meadow, that scene of madness.

What could have happened to turn Rowena so murderous? Rowena was not that person on the galloping, plunging horse. The Rowena Torrey knew was a warmhearted, loving young woman who was studying to be a veterinarian. Rowena had a gentle hand with horses, dogs, cats, and any living thing. A week ago, she’d crawled on her stomach through a rotting, maggot-ridden log to rescue a frightened kitten.

Torrey felt a stab of hunger. Breakfast was in order; it was already past eight o’clock. Sun flickered through the trees and shone through the small bedroom windows. Torrey went into the fireplace kitchen with its pine chairs, and table, and shabby couch. She’d have coffee and buttered day-old brown bread.

Passing the table, she switched on the little radio that she kept tuned to RTE, Ireland’s national radio and television network. Slicing the bread, she heard the weather report. There was a break-in at Brewley’s on Grafton Street, thieves making off with two sides of bacon and a turkey. A fracas near Trinity College over a soccer match.

Then the commentator’s voice said: “Dr. Gerald Ashen-den, Ireland’s justly famous thoracic surgeon, late yesterday afternoon suffered a riding accident at the Ashenden estate in Ballynagh. An expert horseman, Dr. Ashenden faults a broken stirrup that resulted in the fall that sprained his left shoulder. A speedy recovery to you, Dr. Ashenden!”

Torrey, holding the coffeepot, said softly, “Well, bless me for a bloody lie!”

“Yes,” Rowena said, from the open doorway.

*   *   *

Rowena was standing just outside, on the sill. The sun flickered on her red hair, which was short and curly. She came in. She wore a parka and jeans and well-scuffed brogues. A thick brown muffler hung from around her neck. Her tanned face was pale. Her eyelids were heavy and tinged with pink.

“Coffee?” Torrey said, with a great sigh of relief. “I’ve only one egg, but I can make us French toast.” She turned off the radio.

Rowena shook her head. “Nothing, thanks. I had breakfast at the jail. Sergeant Bryson sent over to Finney’s. He said breakfast’ll be covered by the Ballynagh taxes we pay. Can you imagine? It made me laugh.” She walked aimlessly across to the sink and back to the table. Her unzipped parka hung open, her hands were thrust into the pockets. “I came to thank you. I saw Sergeant Bryson’s report, what you said. You lied, didn’t you? You
saw.
”

“Actually, I didn’t see what happened,” Torrey said, lying again. There was something so strange and troublesome about Rowena standing there, so unlike the Rowena who was always whistling, laughing, speaking Gaelic slang to Torrey for kicks, or showing her how to feed a baby guinea pig. “Except it was a horrible accident.”

Rowena gave a skeptical, under-her-breath sort of laugh, “Oh, come on, Torrey! I wish you
hadn’t
seen what happened. You’re my friend. But there’s something I can’t tell even you. But thanks for sticking by me. Lack of evidence freed me, what with my grandfather raising hell with Inspector O’Hare: ‘An outrage, arresting my granddaughter … the damned stallion out of control, my granddaughter shouting at me, “I can’t stop him! Get out of the way!” Altogether, an accident…’ And now, as you just heard on the radio, my grandfather’s revised official version.”

Torrey nodded. And waited.

“Anyway, this morning after I had breakfast at the police station, I sneaked home. I went up a back staircase and changed my clothes. Then I came here. I can’t stay at Ashenden Manor. Can you imagine me having dinner across the table from my grandfather, with his sprained shoulder in a sling? Both of us pretending that in the meadow I didn’t try to kill him! Pretending to my brother Scott and my mother and her new husband that it was all a mistake, an accident that Sergeant Jimmy Bryson misconstrued!”

Torrey was thinking,
Why, Rowena, why?

“And Inspector O’Hare keeping me overnight in the Ballynagh jail.”

“Poor Rowena.”
Rowena’s wild, contorted face, the rearing stallion.

“So for now,” Rowena went on, “I’m moving into the old horse trainers’ quarters above the stables at Castle Moore. Later I’ll find a place in Dublin. I exercise the two horses at the castle, and I know it’ll be all right with Winifred Moore. She’s not in residence, anyway. I’ll phone my mother this morning to pack some clothes and have Jennie bring them to Castle Moore. Thank God my mother wasn’t home yesterday afternoon! By now she must think the world’s gone upside down.”

“I shouldn’t wonder. And your brother, Scott.” The boy with the deformed leg.

Rowena went still, then she shrugged and turned out her hands in a helpless gesture. “Yes. Scott.”

“There’s nothing you can tell them? Your mother and Scott?”
And me?
But Rowena’s green-eyed gaze slid away, her lids lowering. She rubbed the bridge of her nose, a characteristic habit when she was upset.

Torrey said, “Rowena? If there’s anything, I’m here, at my hot little computer. Keep it in mind.”

At that, Rowena hesitated, then abruptly she flicked her fingers good-bye. She smiled, but her green eyes were strained. “I’d better get on. Bye, Torrey.”

Troubled, Torrey watched Rowena walk toward the open door. Rowena’s walk was … what? Different, somehow, heavier these last weeks, and something else. What? A bloom, a blossoming. Something. Torrey rubbed her forehead. What? What? And as though seen in retrospect minutes ago, yes, the unfamiliar tightness of Rowena’s favorite plaid shirt straining across her breasts. Torrey, guessing wildly, called out, “You’re pregnant, aren’t you, Rowena?”

4

At Torrey’s words, Rowena stood still. Her figure, half turned away, seemed to shimmer in the sunlight reflected up from the lintel.

Stunned at her own discovery, Torrey said, “None of my business. I’m sorry. If you’d’ve wanted me to know, you’d’ve told me.”

Rowena turned fully around. Her face was pale. “I wish you hadn’t guessed. Nobody else knows.” She slid her hands deep into her pockets, thrust out her chin, and looked squarely at Torrey. She said carefully, distinctly, “I’m going to abort it.”

In the small silence that followed, they stood looking at each other, then Torrey said “Oh?” as though Rowena had merely said
It’s a nice day.
She had an odd feeling that Rowena would otherwise shatter into pieces. Then, “Sit down. You can’t just tell me you’re going to abort your baby and then walk out the door.”

Rowena’s look softened. She came back and sank down at the table. Torrey pulled out the chair opposite and sat down. And waited. Then without looking up, Rowena said, “I don’t want to kill my baby. But I’m going to. If I could tell anybody why, it would be you.” Now she did look up at Torrey. “But I can’t. So that’s it. That’s the whole tale. The end.
Finis.
”

Torrey said, reasonably, “Just tell me this, Rowena, just tell me, so I won’t feel so obtuse: Exactly what are you talking about? You’re pregnant. You don’t want to abort your child but you must. Well, as a friend, is there anything I can do?”

Rowena slanted a green-eyed glance at her and managed a half smile. “You
are
a caution, Torrey. Thanks for wanting to help me. But you can’t. The subject isn’t up for discussion either.” She got up. Against her plaid shirt her slender neck looked white and vulnerable. “I have to do it.”

“
Have
to? Oh, please!” Suddenly impatient, Torrey too stood up. She leaned across to Rowena, both hands on the table. “Come
on,
Rowena! You have a choice. I under
stand
that you’re dying to get your degree. You’ve put in four years — five years? — of backbreaking work. And you’re
not
married, but —” She stopped. Something about the way Rowena was standing there told Torrey that she wasn’t hearing. She was in some other place, some far-off dimension from which she now said, so low that Torrey barely heard, “It would be a crime to let this baby be born.”

Torrey felt a chill. She looked at Rowena, who now lifted her gaze. Her green eyes stared at Torrey from that other place, wherever it was. “Forget it, Torrey. Don’t try to help me.”

“But — the baby’s father! What about
him?
Doesn’t
he
have any say?”

“The father.” Rowena stared at her. “The father? No. No say at all. Torrey, please! Have done with it! I’m going.”

“Rowena, wait! Let me help.”

“
Stop
it!” Rowena said fiercely.
“Don’t!”
And more quietly, “Do me a favor. Forget all this.”

But it was too late to forget. It had been too late from the moment Torrey had guessed so wildly and accurately as Rowena had walked toward the open door of the cottage.

“All right,” Torrey said, “not another word. I promise. It’s not my business. But … just one quick question?” She didn’t wait. “How many months pregnant are you?”

Rowena gave an exasperated laugh, “You
are
a bulldog, aren’t you, Torrey? You never give up. Is it too late for an abortion? Still not the second trimester. I have about three weeks left before it’ll be too risky.”

“I see. I was just asking.” Risky. A better word was
dangerous.
And in any case, not legal in Ireland. Rowena would have to go to England or elsewhere.

“So I have to hurry.”

“Yes,” Torrey said. “Before it’s too late.”

5

At ten minutes past eight that Saturday morning, Inspector O’Hare abruptly jerked his hand holding the coffee mug. Coffee spilled across his desktop. “Turn it off! Turn the damned thing off!” he said, and Sergeant Jimmy Bryson turned off the radio on top of the Coke machine. The news commentator’s last words still hung in the air. “A speedy recovery to you, Dr. Ashenden.”

Inspector O’Hare, jaw tense, blotted up coffee with a paper napkin. “The Ashenden family’s making us look like fools, Sergeant.” He looked at the wall clock. “I give it ten minutes.”

They waited. Sergeant Bryson meantime put vinegar on a bit of a rag and wiped the front windows of the police station. Inspector O’Hare drew triangles. Nelson lay just inside the front door, nose between his paws. The morning sun shone on the still-empty street.

Twelve minutes. The phone rang. O’Hare picked it up. “Inspector O’Hare here.”

“Good morning, Inspector. Hold for Chief Superintendent O’Reilly, please,” Chief O’Reilly of the Murder Squad at Dublin Castle. The Dublin Metropolitan Area comprised Dublin city and the greater part of the country and portions of County Kildare and Wicklow.

“Good morning, Egan,” came the cultivated voice of Chief O’Reilly, “This about your report. Attack on Dr. Ashenden by his granddaughter? And your detaining of the young woman? What’s going on, Egan?” The chief superintendent’s ordinarily pleasant voice was somewhat less than pleasant.

Five minutes later, Inspector O’Hare hung up, a taste in his mouth bitter as an unripe orange. He looked over at Sergeant Bryson. “Dr. Ashenden is not happy at Inspector O’Hare’s action in imprisoning his granddaughter on suspicion of attempted murder.”

“Isn’t he, now!” Sergeant Bryson said. “He’s not happy? Doesn’t like what’s going on here? What went on
there
was attempted murder! And them all buttoned up about it, Including
her.
That’s the crux, Inspector. Ms. Torrey Tunet! Collusion! Snake in the grass! Lying for her friend, Rowena, swearing she saw nothing!”

“Collusion,” O’Hare repeated; he was making more triangles.

“She and Rowena Keegan! From the time Ms. Tunet found that dog the gypsies left and brought it to Rowena Keegan, you’d’ve thought they exchanged blood.”

Inspector O’Hare made another triangle.

“Not that they’re lesbians, mind you,” Jimmy Bryson said. “I’m not saying they’re gay. Leastways, Ms. Tunet’s got that fellow from Cork. Since last month, anyway. Fixed a leak in her roof’s the story. Him on a bicycle trip’s the story, Dún Laoghaire to Clifden. He as good as lives with her.”

“Collusion.” O’Hare gazed out through the plate-glass window at Butler Street, so empty. “Right, Ms. Tunet had to’ve seen it. That stallion’s as big as a mountain.”

“Bakes bread, I’ve heard,” Sergeant Bryson said, “Cock-a-leekie soup. Beans with a bit of smoked pork. Fancy stuff, too. Good as a chef. From Cork. Just turned up at the cottage, time she had the flu, right? Jasper O’Mara, from Cork. Looking for a bed-and-breakfast. Stumbled on the cottage.”