The Shivering Sands (33 page)

“Be careful. You know how impulsive you always were.”

She had said something like that to me on many occasions and I could distinctly hear her voice in my mind.

I had a friend now, an ally. Wouldn’t it be wise to enlist the help of Godfrey Wilmot before trying to discover the reason for this strange phenomenon?

One of the candles suddenly went out; and it was immediately followed by the other; the room was almost in darkness.

Alice said shrilly: “It’s a sign, Mrs. Verlaine. It’s a warning, the two candles going out like that when there was no draft.”

“You blew them out.”

“I didn’t, Mrs. Verlaine.”

I turned to Allegra. “She didn’t either,” declared Alice. “They went out of their own accord. Strange things happen in this house, you know. It’s on account of all that happened all those years ago. It was a warning. We mustn’t go to the ruin. Something awful would happen if we did.”

As she lighted the candles I saw her hands were trembling.

“Alice,” I said, “you are letting your imagination run riot again.”

She nodded gloomily. “I can’t help it, Mrs. Verlaine. Ideas come to me. I wish they wouldn’t…and then I think what could be and sometimes it’s frightening.”

“You ought to live in some little house where nothing has ever happened,” said Allegra.

“No, no. I want to live here. I don’t mind being frightened now and then as long as I can live here.”

She turned to the window and stood looking out. I went to stand beside her.

We were both watching the copse; but the light did not appear again.

The candles burned steadily and Alice turned to look at them with satisfaction.

“You see they’re all right now. It was a warning. Oh, Mrs. Verlaine, don’t ever go to the ruin alone in the dark.”

I said: “I should like to get to the bottom of the silly affair.”

I was relieved however that it was not Allegra; and it occurred to me then that it might be one of the menservants signaling to one of the women.

I had met Godfrey in the cottage near the site. Because of his interest in archaeology he was frequently there and we had made the cottage a rendezvous.

I sat on the stairs and he perched himself on the table while we talked about Roma. I told him of her delight in this place because it was so close to the remains and how, when I had stayed here, I had tried to instill a little domestic comfort.

“Not,” I said, “that one could cook much, but there was an oil stove which she kept in the little outhouse. It smelled abominably—but perhaps that was mainly the drum of paraffin oil she kept there. Oh, what a relief it is to talk of Roma!”

“What could have happened?” he asked. “Let’s think of all the possibilities. Let’s explore them—one by one.”

“That’s what I’ve been doing ever since I heard. I explore and reject. What was that?” I was sure the room had darkened suddenly. I had my back to the tiny window and so had Godfrey. It was so small that the cottage was always dark but in that moment it had become a degree darker.

“Someone was at the window,” I whispered.

In a second or two we were at the door, but there was no one in sight.

“Why,” said Godfrey, “you’re really scared.”

“It’s the thought of being overlooked…when I’m not aware of it.”

“Well, whoever it is can’t be far away.”

We hurried round the cottage, but found no trace of anyone.

“It must have been a cloud passing across the face of the sun,” said Godfrey.

I looked up at the sky. There was scarcely a cloud.

“No one could have got away in time,” he went on. “Roma’s disappearance has unnerved you naturally. It’s made you jumpy.”

I was prepared to concede this. “I shan’t have a moment’s real peace until I know where she is,” I said.

He nodded. “Let’s get out of this place. Let’s have a walk round outside. We can talk as easily there.”

So we went outside and we talked; and after a while I said: “We didn’t look in the outhouse. Someone could have hidden there.”

“If we had we should probably only have found your old oil stove.”

“But I have a strange feeling…”

I didn’t finish. I could see that he was thinking I had imagined the shadow at the window.

It was a few days later when the startling news was revealed. I had met Godfrey at the cottage, talked there for a while and then taken a walk round the site.

Godfrey was growing more and more certain that the answer to Roma’s disappearance at any rate was to be found here. He enjoyed examining minutely the baths and the pavements, looking, he said, for clues. But I knew he delighted in studying them. I mentioned the light to him and told him that the idea had occurred to me that Roma might have gone there to investigate.

But Roma had disappeared during the afternoon. The light could not have been in evidence then. But had she? What if she had gone out in the afternoon, perhaps for a walk—and returned at dusk, saw the light, investigated.

“It was possible,” agreed Godfrey. “We must go to the ruin one evening and wait for the kindler of the light to appear.”

I thought that might be a little compromising in view of the remarks the girls had made; and I believed that Mrs. Rendall was eying me with attention and suspecting me of what she would call “setting my cap” at the curate.

However I did not comment on this and when I said goodbye to Godfrey we were no nearer solving the mystery of Roma’s death than we had ever been.

I came back to Lovat Stacy and as I entered the hall I heard footsteps behind me. I swung round and came face to face with Napier. He looked very tired and strained.

“I have just come back from London,” he said. “There is news.”

“Of Edith?” I said.

“She is not with Jeremy Brown.”

“Not…” I stared at him.

“Jeremy Brown arrived in East Africa—alone.”

“But—”

“We have been quite wrong,” he said, “to suspect that Edith went off with a lover. She did no such thing.”

“Then what?”

He looked at me blankly. “Who can say?” he whispered.

But there were those who had much to say. The secret was soon out, and the village was gossiping about it. The vicar received a letter from Jeremy Brown to say that he had arrived safely and was becoming absorbed in his work. So this was further confirmation that he was alone. Edith had not gone with him. Then where was Edith?

Eyes were turned once more on Lovat Stacy. That house, that unlucky house which many said was cursed.

And why was it cursed? Because a man had killed his brother. They called it the curse of Cain. And because he had killed his brother his mother had died, and now his wife had disappeared. Where could she have gone? Who could say? But perhaps there was one who could.

When a wife met some misadventure, the first person open to suspicion was her husband.

I was aware of the mounting feeling against Napier, and it disturbed me deeply—more so, it appeared, than it disturbed him.

There was wild speculation everywhere. I noticed the way in which everyone was avoiding Napier. Mrs. Lincroft’s expression changed when she spoke of him; her lips tightened. I knew she was thinking of what Edith’s disappearance had done to Sir William and was blaming him for it.

The girls were constantly discussing the affair together, although they did not talk to me very much about it. I wondered what construction they put on it.

Allegra did say on one occasion: “If Sir William died and it was through the shock of Edith’s going…that would be like history’s repeating itself. You know, Beau died and then his mother…”

I retorted sharply: “Who said Edith was dead?”

“No,” cried Alice vehemently. “She’ll come back.”

“I hope so,” I said fervently; and how I hoped it! I wanted Edith to come back more than I had wanted anything since Pietro had died. I tried to work out all sorts of reasons for her disappearance. Amnesia? Why not? She was wandering somewhere because she had lost her memory. What a joy that would be! I did not want Napier to be a murderer. And if Edith had been murdered…

I just would not accept that. But what of Roma?

The strangeness of this—the awful coincidence—struck me afresh. Two young women disappeared in exactly the same manner. They both walked out, saying nothing, taking nothing with them.

It was horribly, frighteningly sinister.

I was deeply concerned. One of those women was my sister; the other the wife of Napier.

I must know. If anything my determination was doubled; and at the same time I thought of them both—no two women could have been more unlike: poor Edith with her ineffectuality, poor frightened Edith; and Roma, the determined, the fearless, the woman who knew exactly where she was going…except perhaps on one occasion.

I don’t care where it leads me, I told myself, I am going to find out.

“Have a care, Caro.” It was Roma’s voice cautioning me. “This could be murder.”

But I would not accept that it was murder even if others did. I could sense the wall of suspicion growing as fast as a jungle bamboo.

I wished that I had not heard that quarrel between Sir William and Napier. I had gone up to play for Sir William again because Mrs. Lincroft had decided that my music soothed him. I did not go through Sir William’s room but straight to the piano in the next, for Mrs. Lincroft had said that he might be dozing and that he liked to wake and hear the music I was playing.

On this occasion as I entered the room I heard the sound of angry voices: Sir William’s and Napier’s.

“I wish to God,” Sir William was saying, “that you’d stayed out there.”

“And I can assure you,” retorted Napier, “that I have no intention of going back.”

“You’ll go if I say, and let me tell you this, there’ll be nothing for you.”

“You’re wrong. I have a right to be here.”

“Listen to me. Where is she, eh? What’s happened to her? Run off with a curate. I knew she’d never do that. Where is she? You tell me, eh?”

I should have slipped away. But I could not. I felt too involved. I had to stand there. I had to listen.

“Why should you think I know?”

“Because you didn’t want her. You married her because there was no other way of coming back. The poor child!”