The Trouble with Harriet (11 page)

“Mrs. Ambleforth appears to have drawn rather largely from life in writing this play.”

“All great art is partly autobiographical,” Mrs. Malloy pronounced with the authority of a six-former who has just received an acceptance from Cambridge.

I turned the conversation back to my father. “Just now I said that Daddy was involved with someone,” I began, “but what I didn’t tell you is that he has brought her to Merlin’s Court.”

“Well”—Mrs. Malloy bristled as she got to her feet— “I hope she won’t go putting on airs and expecting to be waited on.”

“She’s not that sort of woman.”

“That’s what they all say.”

“This one’s not saying anything.”

“Lost her voice?” Mrs. Malloy tried not to sound interested. “Or is she in a snit?”

“Neither. She’s dead.”

“And she’s here in this house? Well!” With a deep intake of breath, she pronounced, “If there’s one thing you should know by now, Mrs. H., it’s that I don’t work with bodies cluttering up the place. For starters it’s not allowed by the C.F.C.W.A. In case you’ve forgotten, that’s the Chitterton Fells Charwomen’s Association.”

“Harriet isn’t laid out on Daddy’s bed. Her ashes are in an urn that looks like quite an ordinary clay pot, and although I don’t think he’ll let it out of his sight for long, I thought you ought to be forewarned.”

“In case I thought it was a jar of freeze-dried coffee”?” Mrs. Malloy could be quick on the uptake.

“There is that,” I said, “along with the problem of Aunt Lulu.”

“Freddy’s mother?”

“That’s right. She’s arriving today to stay with him at the cottage for a while. And, of course, she will be in and out of this house. You knew about her being a recovering kleptomaniac; it just wouldn’t do at all if she were to make off with Harriet. For one thing, Daddy would be beside himself. Plus, Harriet’s relations are coming sometime today to collect the urn.”

“So you want me to keep an eye on old feather fingers?”

“I’d be most awfully grateful, Mrs. Malloy.”

“Story of my life, that is. One of these days you’ll notice that I don’t have a Dior frock to me name. But in the meantime tell me more about this Harriet,” she urged, patting my shoulder invitingly. “Where did your dad meet her?”

“In Germany.”

“And what’s her last name?”

“Brown.” I thought this over. “About as common a name as you can get other than Smith. I’m sure he’ll be more than willing to tell you the whole story. I think he needs to continue to work it out of his system. Something happened last night that was really quite disturbing. Daddy came downstairs when Reverend Ambleforth and his wife were here. He was sleepwalking and looked quite scary, especially when he started babbling at Mrs. Vicar, thinking she was Harriet. I don’t suppose they will be inclined to say anything. I certainly hope not. You
will
keep mum on this, Mrs. Malloy?”

The woman I had long regarded as my right hand eyed me severely from under neon lids. “I trust that was a joke, Mrs. H., because as well you know, it’s against the ethics of me profession to breathe a word to a living soul about what goes on here at Merlin’s Court. Except,” she amended, “to immediate friends and the occasional person in the bus queue.”

“I just don’t want it going round that my father is batty.” I had been prowling around the room as I spoke and ended up in front of the window in time to see a taxi halt in the driveway and deposit three passengers.

“That’ll be Harriet’s relatives,” I informed Mrs. Malloy over my shoulder as I hurried from the room. If she replied, I didn’t hear her because on winged feet I was through the hall and down the outside steps. Perhaps I had been letting my imagination run wild last night. Perhaps there was nothing more to the Harriet situation than a sad little love affair. But I was enormously relieved that the end was in sight. I would invite these people in for a cup of coffee, Ben and I would offer condolences, Daddy would emote, and they and the urn would go away, never to be seen again. This may sound hard, but I wasn’t only thinking of how glad I would be to have the funeral pall lifted from the house. I really believed my father’s emotional recovery depended on making an immediate break.

Unfortunately, the best-laid plans of daughters often run amuck. When I reached the three people standing alongside the taxi, Ben had already joined them. It took a moment for me to sort them out into a man and two women, for they looked oddly like those egg-shaped Russian dolls that fit one inside the other. Short and round with shiny black hair and eyes. Also a bit wobbly. That could have been because they were bundled up in jackets better suited to a Siberian winter. Or because they were upset.

Ben gathered me forward. “Ellie, these are the Hoppers, Harriet’s cousins, and I’ve just been telling them that your father isn’t here.”

“What do you mean?” My face suddenly felt as if it, too, had been produced in a doll factory. “I heard him come downstairs a few moments ago when I was talking to Mrs. Malloy.”

“And I just saw him go whizzing off on the back of Freddy’s motorbike.”

“Did they say where they were going?”

“No, but your father shouted back that he had the urn with him.”

“Oh, my goodness! What if they have a spill?” It was an unfortunate suggestion to make in front of the Hoppers. All three mouths rounded into O’s of alarm.

“I’m sure Freddy will be careful to avoid any big bumps in the road. But it is too bad they went off without letting us know when they’ll be back.” Ben was doing a better job of keeping a grip on his temper than I was of holding down my hair, which the wind was trying to rip off my head.

“We’re so sorry about this,” I said. “Why don’t you come into the house and wait at least a little while.”

“Yes, do,” Ben urged them. “If you haven’t eaten yet, I can make us all a big breakfast to take the chill out of our bones. And with luck my father-in-law will be back before we’re finished with the toast and marmalade.”

The response was a threefold stare; then the Hoppers went into a huddle, their heads so close together that they seemed to merge into a black bowling ball. Whispers drifted our way, punctuated by miniature snuffles and snorts. It seemed to take ages, but at last they separated back into their clonelike entities.

“We’ll come back later,” said the man.

“This afternoon,” added a female voice.

“At about three,” piped up another.

“It wouldn’t do to keep the taxi waiting indefinitely.” The man flexed the fingers of his red mittens. A signal, perhaps, to his companions. And before Ben and I could get out more than a few words in reply, they had all bundled aboard and were being driven away at a lumbering pace.

“It really is too bad of Daddy.” I stood shivering in my cardigan, which wasn’t made for Siberia. “He bunked off on purpose.”

“I didn’t think he got on Freddy’s bike by accident.” Ben wrapped an arm around me as we made our way back to the house.

“I meant that he wanted to put off handing over the urn for as long as possible.”

“To be fair to him, Ellie, the Hoppers could have been more precise about when he was to expect them. They could have set a time last night or rung again this morning. But they are understandably upset and not thinking clearly. This has to be an unhappy experience for them. And somehow I don’t think they’re too bright, do you?”

“I don’t want to think about them at all,” I said. “I know it sounds horribly selfish, but I’d like to forget about Harriet and go off to France as we planned. But of course I can’t blithely abandon Daddy.”

“Not today or even tomorrow. But in a couple of days he may perk up and begin to feel at home here.” We were standing on the little bridge that spanned the ornamental moat, and Ben swung me around to face him. “And we wouldn’t be abandoning him, sweetheart. Freddy would be around to help keep his spirits up.”

“Freddy will have enough on his plate with Aunt Lulu and the play.”

“That’s true, but—” Before Ben could cajole me further, we heard a mighty roar and turned to see a motorbike slithering and sliding down the drive. A couple of birds shot up in the air, squawking for dear life. Moments later, as the vibrations faded into the wind, my father staggered to the ground and blundered toward us. As he brushed up against me, in passing I saw that his eyes were squeezed shut. I was afraid to say anything to him in case he was sleepwalking again. Isn’t it supposed to be dangerous to rouse someone when they are in that state? Ben may have been thinking along those lines, or he may have noticed that Daddy’s face was avocado green. Anyway, he let him go into the house without a word.

“Back safe and sound,” Freddy shouted from the drive with inappropriate cheer. “Although I suspect Uncle Morley’s life flashed before him when we were taking the worst of the hairpin bends going up and down the cliff road. But that’s not all bad, because I think he was hoping at the start to have me drive him around for hours so he could be gone when Harriet’s relatives showed up.”

“They came and left. Empty-handed. Where’s the urn?” Ben called down from the moat bridge.

“Still up in Uncle Morley’s bedroom. He only said he had taken it so you or Ellie wouldn’t go looking for it and hand it over while his back was turned.”

“You’re a disloyal toad, Freddy, and I hope your mother stays with you for months and robs you of every dish in the sink.” I would have said more, but Mrs. Malloy came out the front door to announce that Lady Grizwolde was on the phone and wanted to talk to me.

“It’ll be about the decorating,” I told Ben.

“You would go thinking that. You and your career!” Mrs. Malloy followed me back into the house. “And there’s me all in a state that she’s rung to say she broke her leg and would you please break it to me gently that I’ll have to take over as Malicia Stillwaters and risk seeing me name up in lights when Hollywood comes calling.”

Mrs. Malloy would probably have continued to hover beside me, listening in on my attempts at conversation with Lady Grizwolde, if my father had not come downstairs. His complexion was back to normal, and he was carrying the urn with all the pomp and circumstance of the archbishop of Canterbury preparing to anoint his monarch at the coronation. Mrs. Malloy came as close to genuflecting as I had ever seen her, in or out of church.

“If I had known you had a dad like that, Mrs. H.,” she whispered in a voice that carried to the rafters, “I would have worked for you free of charge. Of course, it’s too late now because you chose to be sneaky. But I won’t hold the sins of the daughter against the father.” Upon which parting thrust she proceeded reverently across the flagstones to the kitchen door, which she opened as if she were one of St. Peter’s underlings manning the Pearly Gates. Stepping aside, black and white head bent, she allowed my father to pass through.

I spoke into the receiver. “I’m sorry, Lady Grizwolde. I didn’t catch what you said.”

“I’ve been wondering when you are setting off for France?” Her voice was that of a woman who knows she is beautiful. It was easy to picture her standing in the vast hall of the Old Abbey with the light from the stained-glass windows illuminating her perfect features to a medieval perfection beloved of kings and struggling artists alike. I immediately wished I were wearing something smarter than my old skirt, striped blouse, and camel-colored cardigan.

“We were supposed to leave today, but my father arrived unexpectedly. So the trip is off.” I stood peering into the mirror above the trestle table, fiddling with my hair, and in the process almost knocked over the bronze vase filled with chrysanthemums and autumn leaves. “Ben and I will just have to go to France another time.”

“I’m sure it’s lovely having your father with you.” Lady Grizwolde’s voice had grown faint, and I hastily adjusted the receiver to my ear.

“Oh, yes! Daddy’s quite a character.”

“You’ll have to bring him over here. Perhaps even this morning, if you can spare the time, because I’m eager for you to come out and look over some of the magazines I was telling you about; the
House Beautiful
ones, with those rooms I liked. Remember I couldn’t find them when you came last time? Timothia—you’ll remember my husband’s cousin—had put them away in an old chest. She’s a bit vague at the best of times, and it seems to have gone over her head that I’ve been looking for those magazines for days.”

“It’s so annoying to lose things,” I agreed. “What time would you like me to come?”

“How about eleven-thirty? And then you can stay for lunch. Cook always rustles up something more exciting when we have visitors. And do bring your father, if he would like to come.”

“Thank you, Lady Grizwolde. I’m sure he’ll appreciate the invitation even if he decides that he’s best to stay put for today.”

“Try and persuade him; I’ll tell Cook to prepare for one more, just in case.”

“That is kind of you.”

“And if he doesn’t come, we can have his share.” Lady Grizwolde’s mellow laugh had the faint ring of one that had been perfected during hours of rehearsals. I hung up with mixed feelings. I wasn’t really keen on working from pictures. I much preferred to get the feel of the house I was to work on and integrate that with the owner’s taste.

Idly, I wondered if my relationship with Lady Grizwolde would open up into something approaching friendship. Would the day come when she’d ask me to call her Phyllis? Somehow I doubted it, although not because I suspected her of snobbism. It was more the feeling that she was a woman who, for all her graciousness of manner, didn’t choose to get close to people. Maybe she was shy. I knew all about putting up defenses. Unfortunately, I’d discovered that the shields used to protect ourselves tend to be made out of glass. Doomed to shatter at a thrust from an unexpected quarter.

Mrs. Malloy was a woman who knew how to parry life’s slings and arrows. She wore the armor of her taffeta cocktail frocks and heavy makeup with the indomitable courage of Henry V preparing to trounce on French heads at Agincourt. When I entered the kitchen, she was seated at the table across from my father. Ben stood at the Aga frying bacon and eggs as if playing a bit part in
Murder Most Fowl.