“Well, I must say I think it’s very hard on Rachel, coming all the way down here from Scotland to be with her sister and then having her go off like this.”
“They’ll still be in the village,” I said. “They’re having Annie’s cottage done up—Phyll is full of it!”
“I wouldn’t care to live right in the village like that, and it’s a dismal sort of place. No,” she said dismissively, “I wouldn’t care for that at all.”
However, Anthea’s seemed to be the lone disapproving voice.
“Splendid news,” Captain Prosser said, embarking on his third vol-au-vent. “Couldn’t happen to a nicer couple.”
“Such an amazing coincidence,” Mary Fletcher said. “Meeting again after all those years—quite romantic!”
“And having the cottage,” Jim put in, “they’ve got a ready-made home. Though there must be a lot to do to it.”
“I believe it needs complete modernizing,” I said.
“Well, Annie never spent a penny on it,” Jim said. “Allowed it to get into a very bad state.” It was interesting to see how criticism of Annie was now deemed to be allowable. “It’s going to cost a packet.” He looked around to see if he could be overheard by the happy couple. “I don’t know how well-off Martin is; though, of course, he’ll be selling his house—or is it a flat—in London and, even these days, London prices are pretty high.”
“And I imagine,” Captain Prosser said, lowering his voice, “there’s no shortage of money on
her
side.”
“I believe Dr. Gregory had private means,” Jim said confidentially, “and so did his wife.”
They all looked at me as someone who had known the family for years.
“They always seemed comfortably off,” I said vaguely. I started to move away. “Do excuse me; I must have a word with Father William.”
He was standing at the far end of the room by the table with the food. “Now,” he said earnestly, “shall I have just one more of these delicious anchovy tartlets, or shall I go straight on to that irresistible chocolate cake?”
“Decisions, decisions!” I said, smiling. “Go for the cake, and then you could fit in a piece of the cherry cheesecake, which is Rachel’s specialty, as well.”
“Of course! Local knowledge, always so useful.”
“So what do you think?” I asked. “Is it going to work?”
“I don’t see why not. They are both of mature years and seem well suited.”
“I suppose so. It’s just that we don’t know much about him.”
“What do we really know about anyone?” He looked at me quizzically. “No doubt he has secrets like the rest of us. If Phyllis is prepared to take him on trust, perhaps we should too.”
“Possibly,” I said doubtfully, “but she’s . . . well, prejudiced in his favor.”
“The eye of love? You may be right, but that may not always be a bad thing. That particular gaze may very well penetrate into places where the casual glance cannot reach. Don’t you agree?”
I laughed. “Metaphysics, even spurious ones, can win any argument. Anyway, when’s the wedding to be? Have they set an actual date?”
“I have to rearrange a few things, but before Christmas, certainly. I gather Phyllis has always wanted to spend Christmas in Vienna, so that is where they will spend their honeymoon.”
“Dear Phyll,” I said affectionately, “a genuine romantic!”
“That is, naturally, top secret information and I’ve only told you now because I know that your implacable curiosity would have wheedled it out of me sooner or later.”
“Of course, not a word! And I’ll feign total surprise when I’m finally told.”
I looked round the room. “Is it my imagination or is the atmosphere quite different now than it was at other gatherings—the Harvest Supper, for example—when Annie was alive? Everyone seems much more relaxed.”
“I think we both know the answer to that.” He cut a thick slice of chocolate cake and placed it carefully on a plate. “Have you made any progress? In general terms, that is.”
“In general terms. I’ve found, as we agreed, that everyone has some sort of secret they would prefer to keep hidden. Mostly minor ones, though there are a couple that might cause more anxiety. I really don’t know. It was such a calculated thing to do.” I paused. “As I say, I don’t know.”
“Come and see me sometime if you think it would help. Come anyway and have a glass of delicious sherry . . .” He picked up a fork and began to eat. “Absolutely
divine.
I can’t imagine how you could resist it.”
Like Max Beerbohm, I love the seaside out of season when the visitors and day-trippers have gone, the amusement arcades are shuttered, the cheap clothing shops are closed and the beach is empty except for the occasional dog walker. Then the town reverts to its old self, what it was like in my parents’ time. I like it best when there is a brisk wind and there are curling white horses on the sea and the clouds part to let through an occasional gleam of sunshine. The next day was just such a day, so I called Tris, held him still while I fastened his coat (he’s quite an elderly dog now and feels the cold), and got down his lead. Foss, who’d investigated the weather earlier in the day and rejected it, gave us a contemptuous look and took himself upstairs to sleep under the duvet.
I didn’t go down to the harbor, but farther along the seafront, to where the receding tide had left the sort of firm sand that suits Tris’s short legs. I let him off the lead and he ran away, barking at seagulls and investigating the clumps of seaweed, as if the briskness of the day had somehow renewed his youth. I followed more slowly, pausing to look for shells and bits of drift-wood, but beachcombing here usually offers nothing more than empty plastic bottles and other, even less agreeable detritus. As I walked, thinking of William’s offer, I tried to sort out in my mind what exactly I had discovered, trying to fit together some sort of coherent picture from the diverse pieces of information I’d gleaned.
As I’d told William, most of the secrets were of a fairly minor nature. Their revelation might have caused a certain embarrassment to the people involved, but there was nothing that wouldn’t have been a nine days’ wonder in the village. Ellen’s boys might (or might not) have felt uncomfortable if the truth had come out, but—as we’d agreed—in this day and age there was no reason why they should. And, actually, I had no way of knowing if my theory about the Fletchers’ son was true and I had only a vague feeling about the Sanderses’ daughter. Nor did I know if Maurice was in the pay of the developers and had wanted to displace Annie on the committee of the village trust.
The only two people I really did know about who might have been harmed by Annie’s threats were Naomi and Toby. Well, Naomi couldn’t be actually harmed, because the medical scandal she was involved in would surely be known to her present employers. But it would be a real blow to her pride to have it all dragged out into the open.
Which left Toby. Thinking back to our conversation I realized I’d been rather carried away by the feeling of nostalgia from the photos. Toby admitted that there had been dealings with Max Holtby, and, even if there’d been nothing actually illegal, Annie knew enough to make things very difficult for him. He certainly had the most to lose and that, of course, explained his particular dislike of Annie and his unease in her presence. It must have been like living with a time bomb. And Diana must have been involved. She really hated Annie and, in spite of the danger to Toby, let it show. Toby was weak, but, somehow, I felt that Diana might well have had the resolution to get rid of Annie. Certainly she’d been quite different since Annie had died.
A loud barking made me look for Tris and I saw he was confronting a young golden retriever. As I went towards him a familiar voice behind me called out, “Flora, come here. Come here at once!” I turned round and saw that it was Diana.
“It’s all right, Sheila. She’s quite harmless—only wants to play.”
Tris, having recovered from his surprise, decided that he too would like to play and they raced up and down the beach together, scattering sand in all directions.
“Sorry about that,” Diana said. “She’s a bit excitable.”
We both looked at Flora, who, having totally ignored Diana’s command, at that moment decided to splash about in a rock pool, and emerged dripping. I laughed, then said, “Dogs! But it would be awful to be without one.”
“When Tessa, my old retriever, died, I was so upset that I made a vow I’d never have another one. That lasted a week.”
“I know.”
We stood for a moment watching the dogs. I’d never seen Diana in this mood before. It was almost as if the stiff breeze had blown away her usual supercilious manner.
“Toby told me about your visit,” Diana said.
“Oh yes, the photos.”
“Not just the photos. About that bloody woman.”
“She had some sort of hold over a lot of people,” I said, “if that’s any sort of consolation.”
“But not like the one she had over Toby. She could have ruined him.”
“Well, yes, I suppose so.”
“And didn’t she just love that!” Diana said viciously. “Her mother used to do the washing for his family when times were hard before the war. So she really enjoyed having that sort of power over him. People in the village have long memories.”
“Especially for slights, real or fancied.”
“She liked to play games—you know, hints, double meanings, never quite saying anything, just keeping us on edge all the time.”
I remembered her jibes to him about politicians’ memoirs. “I bet she did,” I said.
“When we were first married and I came here to live, she was all over us; nothing was too much trouble. And when I was laid up with a bad leg that had to have the dressings changed every day, she was in and out the whole time. But, of course, we didn’t know then . . .”
“That was how she gathered her information?” I said.
“It was worse for me, of course, because I was down here most of the time—I’m useless at constituency things, though I did my best—so I was the main target. She really enjoyed that.”
I could just imagine Annie’s delight in taking Diana down a peg. “Yes,” I said, “she’d like that.”
Diana was silent for a moment, apparently concentrating on taking deep breaths of sea air.
Then she said, “I’m so glad she’s dead.”
“A horrible way to die.”
“It was typical—she always had to know best. Well, that time she didn’t and it killed her.” Her voice was hard. “In fact,” she went on, “if she hadn’t died when she did, I do believe I would have killed her myself.”
“You don’t mean that,” I said.
She’d been staring out to sea, but now she turned and looked at me. “What? I don’t know—perhaps, if she’d gone on . . .”
“Toby said he’s giving up at the next general election.”
“He’s been living on the edge for too long. I hated to see him like that. It was never really his thing, you know; he was pushed into it. I’d have done anything . . . Still, it’s all right now.”
The dogs came rushing up; Tris was panting a little and I bent down and put his lead back on. The retriever shook herself briskly, covering us both with sandy water. Diana grabbed her collar.
“Sorry, Sheila,” she said, her words seeming to cover both the wetting and our conversation.
“That’s fine,” I said. “I think I’d better get this one home—he’s not used to such energetic exercise.”
She bent and patted Tris. “He’s a splendid little chap.” Flora, meanwhile, had wrenched herself free and was racing off towards the sea. “I’d better go after her,” she said, “before she tries to swim to Wales! Anyway, I can do with a good walk; it clears the head somehow.” She gave me one of her rare smiles and set off along the beach.
As I was trying to get most of the sand off Tris’s paws before I put him in the car, I looked up and saw that she was racing along, the dog leaping beside her, like a young girl—like her mythical namesake.
“It was a really odd feeling,” I said to Rosemary when I saw her next day, “seeing her like that—natural and not being sarcastic all the time or scoring points.”
“Doesn’t sound like the Diana we know.”
“Though she was really bitter and savage about Annie. I did think—”
“That she might have poisoned her?”
“It would have been easy for her to go across the field (her field) and get in the back way.”
“You think she’s bright enough to have planned something like that?”
“Oh, Diana’s bright enough. But . . . well . . . I’m not so sure now.”
“You don’t think she could have killed anyone because she loves dogs?” Rosemary looked at me quizzically.
“And horses too.” I laughed. “No, there was something about the way she talked about wanting to kill her.”
“That could have been to put you off the scent.”
“It could. As I said, she’s bright enough. No, it was just the way she spoke. Oh, I don’t know. Toby certainly had enough motive to want Annie out of the way and, since he wasn’t around when she died, then it would have to be Diana . . .”
Rosemary looked at me with a slight smile. “Has it ever occurred to you that no one killed Annie Roberts, that it really was an accident?”
“You mean that I’m making a mystery out of nothing?”
“Something like that.”
“But all those people—they all loathed her.”
“Just because a lot of people loathed her, it doesn’t mean that someone killed her.”
“But we know for a fact that she found out their secrets and used them to manipulate people.”
“But you have no proof that anybody actually got rid of her.”
“Well, no . . .”
“Exactly. So let it be.”
“You’re right,” I said reluctantly. “As usual. I’m making too much of things.”
“Well, put it out of your mind and come into Taunton with me to find Mother a new bedspread. There’s nothing in Taviscombe and she won’t consider catalogues, even the really fancy ones, and when we offered to order her one online she nearly had a fit!”