Nothing Like Blood (6 page)

“I suppose it might,” I said politely, as though this had only now occurred to me.

“It is all very unpleasant. We have never had any experience of this kind before. We find it morbid. Yet we cannot help feeling a certain disquiet.”

“We have found it a great relief to discuss the whole matter with you, Mrs Gort. We said today, that you would obviously have a level-headed view of it all. That is why we invited you to share our confidence.”

“And your Armagnac,” I said brightly. “I'm most grateful to you.”

But when I reached my room I thought that both their Armagnac and their confidence had been shared sparingly.

I
T
is three days since that conversation with the Natterleys and I know today that whatever ‘it' is that they all discuss, I am now involved.

It's my own fault, really. I realized, as I made a certain remark, that I was throwing out a challenge, not to any individual but to fate. I had not really taken ‘it' seriously. Good, gossiping Mrs Jerrison and those ridiculous Natterleys had failed to convince me that there was anything more in the house than a mild attack of mass hysteria. So during lunch, which gathers most of us together, I dropped my bombshell.

“I
always
keep a diary,” I said.

Phiz exploded.

“Sheer sentimentality, diary-keeping,” was her snorted comment. “Or exhibitionism.”

“Not at all. My diary has very little in it about me.”

“What is it about, then?”

“The people I meet, chiefly. Their affairs interest me far more than my own.”

“Worse,” said Phiz. “Mean to say after you leave us at night you go up to your room and write about us?”

“When there's anything to write about.”

“Perhaps you would tell us,” said the bishop rather haughtily, “whether you have found the trivialities of our life in this house worth a place in your diary?”

“Not the trivialities,” I said, “except where they are significant. The realities. And, perhaps, the speculations.”

The bishop grunted. I hoped it would recall to him a diary kept in Kenya or Kassala, Khartoum or Kafa Kumba, because I felt I had said more than was wise. But
no. He seemed to take the matter too seriously for anecdotes.

I also mentioned, as I see now foolishly, that I should not be in to dinner on the following evening. I told this to Mrs Derosse, but of course it was audible to everyone. I might have guessed what these two statements of mine would produce, but, as I say, I did not yet take the situation very seriously.

“Going up to town, Mrs Gort?” asked Esmée.

“No. Only to Northmere. I have some friends there.”

“Going by car? “It was Steve Lawson who asked this.

“Yes. I've hired Woodhams.”

I thought no more about these commonplace exchanges at the time and set out during the afternoon to visit Paul and Valerie, a young couple I have known for some years. Paul is an artist, Valerie very much a mother, and when I reached their place at tea-time I found that they were having one of their rare but devastating quarrels. I needn't go into that—it concerned the children; Paul's work; Valerie's being
tied
to the house like a
slave;
Paul not having a moment's peace in which to think; Valerie's friends being
insulted
when they came to see her; Paul being unable to suffer fools; Valerie thanking God that she could or she would have left long ago; Paul remembering someone called Michael and Valerie wanting to know what about a certain Gloria. It was quite evident that they would enjoy this better if left to themselves and that it would be protracted by the presence of a third person. If I left them to reach a climax of bitterness and recrimination at about ten o'clock that evening, they would be in bed, in tears, and in one another's arms by eleven. But, if I stayed, it would go on till they were too tired for reconciliation. So I made an excuse and by half-past six was approaching Cat's Cradle.

I stopped the chauffeur in the road beyond the drive
and walked up to the front door, which is kept open. I met no one and thought with some amusement that the evening's ‘changing' had begun.

I had been thinking, on my way back from Northmere, about the Natterleys' ‘strike again' theory, which had seemed to me at the time merely melodramatic. Yet, I remembered, there is nothing quite as dangerous as a creature cornered and afraid. If it was true that there had been a murder here, it was also true, as I had admitted, that it was almost certainly by someone in the house. To carry the hypothesis farther, if someone else was the only person with information—consciously or not—which would incriminate the culprit, then it was quite logical to expect him or her, given the opportunity, to eliminate the one who knew too much. But there were several conditions attached to this. The murderer wouldn't do it unless the proof was clear and definite and had not already been passed on. To hasten the death of a woman who could not in any case live long might be the act of someone cowardly and desperate, but not by nature homicidal. To plan and carry out the death of someone who happened to have incriminating knowledge was a different and perhaps more inhuman crime.

I could at a pinch believe that any one of the guests at Cat's Cradle was capable, with sufficient motive, of the first. But I could not imagine any of them guilty of the second. All the same I felt a certain relief, I will admit, that I had not been here at the time of Mrs Mallister's death and could not be in possession of any fatal piece of evidence.

Then I opened the door of my room. My sensations during the next few moments were curious, a mixture of choking fear and resolution to remain calm. I knew at once that someone was there. Just as people who are unfortunate enough to be allergic to cats instantly sense the
presence of one in a room, wherever it may be hidden, so I knew immediately that someone concealed was watching me. There was no light as I opened the door and I switched it on at once. How did I know someone was there? There was no extraneous scent, either of tobacco or perfume. Nothing was out of place.

It seemed to me that my life depended on my remaining quite cool. If I discovered the identity of my visitor, it would put me in extreme danger, not perhaps immediately but thereafter. This was nonsense, of course, because, if I immediately roused the house, everyone would know who was in my room and I should not possess secret and dangerous knowledge. But one does not think like that. I felt only that I must not, on any account, know who was there, and the important thing was not to reveal that I had the smallest awareness of any presence but my own. Yet I longed more than I can say to walk straight out to the landing and scream at the top of my voice.

This is perhaps what I should have done, for then the whole household would have come. But though I kept my head pretty well I was not capable of acting except in the way I had determined. I took off my hat and gloves, smoothed my hair, and slowly, as casually as I could, crossed to the door and, switching off the light, went out. I should have liked to wash, but the bathroom door was ajar and this was one of the places in which someone could quickly have hidden on my approach.

I did not hesitate on the landing, but went straight downstairs to find myself alone in the lounge. I was feeling distinctly jittery and rang the bell. Before Jerrison appeared, however, I managed to pick up a newspaper and appeared quite calm as I asked for a large whisky-and-soda.

Slowly the sheer funk I had felt began to give way to
curiosity. I realized that, if I knew who was in my bedroom, I should almost certainly know the answer to everything that was perplexing me in this house. There could only be one reason for the visit—my diary. Someone was anxious to find out whether anything that a newcomer to the house might have realized or been told was dangerous. Someone was sufficiently anxious to take the risk of being seen entering or leaving my room. I suppose I am an excessively inquisitive person. I was almost inquisitive enough to wish that I had boldly looked into the two or three possible hiding-places. But not quite. For there could be no doubt now that there was danger here. ‘Mortal dangerI said to myself, not liking the words.

Just then the bishop entered. I at once had an idea. He would not make the same mistake as I had. Mine had been failure to realize in time that, if I made a big scene and everyone knew at once who was in my room, I should be no more in danger than anyone else. If the bishop found someone there, he would reveal it and it would not implicate him, for the whole house would know. As for any immediate danger, he could certainly take care of himself. He had not coped with cannibals and crocodiles for nothing.

“I wonder if I know you well enough to ask you a small favour? “I said as sweetly as I could.

He did not look pleased, but said: “Of course, Mrs Gort.”

“I am absolutely dead beat,” I said. “I have been over to Northmere and back and for some reason it has tired me out. I went up to my room when I came in and left my glasses there. May I impose on your kindness?”

He looked positively relieved. Perhaps he had thought I wanted to borrow money.

“I should be delighted,” he said.

“I don't know where they are. The bathroom perhaps. I put them down in the oddest places. I'm so sorry to trouble you.”

He looked at me fixedly for a moment and I felt uncomfortable. Did he know I was lying? Or was he remembering someone who had lost his binoculars in Nairobi or Nigeria? At all events he went.

I realized that it was unlikely that my visitor would have remained there, but there was just a chance that, thinking I would not return before dinner, whoever it was had stayed to read my diary, which was lying on the writing-table. In any case, I wanted to be sure that the room was now clear of that hidden presence.

The other guests had begun to gather before the bishop returned, full of apologies because, although he had looked
everywhere,
he said, he had failed to find my glasses. This was scarcely to be wondered at, since they were safely in my bag.

Jerrison was in the lounge while the bishop made his report and I remembered guiltily that he had seen me wearing my glasses to read the paper when he had brought me my whisky-and-soda. He said nothing, however, and, after thanking the bishop profusely, I said I should have to go and look for myself, because I cannot see to eat without them. As I left the room, I heard Phiz Grissell say something sharp about women who were always losing things.

This time I carefully locked the door on the inside and took my time in getting ready. I was pleased to find that the incident had not left any unpleasant traces in the room or its atmosphere. I had liked the room since I first saw it and I liked it still, but I resolved to keep the door locked in future. I rejoined the others in the lounge. They turned as I came in and I thought there was expectancy or perhaps anxiety among them. Since presumably someone
in the room had been my visitor, I realized the necessity of lying convincingly.

“Where
do you think they were? “I said, showing my glasses to the astonished bishop. “I really must be getting rather dotty! I had put them under my pillow as I always do before getting into bed. No wonder you could not find them!”

I beamed round on everybody but, if I expected to see any signs of disquiet, I was mistaken. The Gee-Gees nodded politely but most of the others looked bored, as well they might be.

There was a quarter of an hour to pass before the second gong and I took a seat in the farthest corner of the lounge and looked, I hoped, a benevolent old lady pleased and amused by the antics of her juniors.

Nobody seemed quite natural. Nobody seemed, for that matter, to be what he was supposed to be. Steve Lawson was not, I thought as I looked at his hard mouth and troubled eyes, a carefree playboy with a large income. James Mallister was by no means a heartbroken widower, and Esmée beside him looked far too clever and expensively dressed and altogether sophisticated to be the manageress of a local shop. Miss Godwin and Miss Grey were certainly spinsterish in appearance and one could well believe they had spent much of their lives teaching in school, but weren't they rather too much in character to be natural? Or was it merely their presence in this house which made me think this? And the Natterleys—afraid to stay, they said, because they scented danger, and afraid to leave because it might look as though they had something to conceal. Even the bishop seemed curiously unepiscopal as he swallowed a third sherry. I supposed he must be what he said he was and Phiz could scarcely be anything else, but I thought as I watched them that there was something very odd about the pair.

The only person who was almost blatantly herself was Sonia Reid. Attractive, sensual, intelligent, she could only be, as I divined on my first evening, the
femme fatale
of the whole menage.

As I watched them all, so unnatural, so determined to make light conversation while their thoughts were anything but light, I decided that I had been quite wrong this evening in my analysis. I had thought then that, whereas any of these people might have hastened the death of Lydia Mallister, none of them, so far as I could imagine, was capable of a cold-blooded murder to conceal his crime. I had missed a very important thing—the change in the atmosphere of the house. When Lydia Mallister died they were, I believed, a reasonably contented ordinary collection of people. Indeed, my friends the Bellews, who had stayed here only a few months ago, described it as a happy place. Murder in such a household would be a calculated, resolute crime by someone born to such an act. Murder in this seething atmosphere of suspicion and intrigue might almost be an act of despair.

“You came home earlier than you intended then, Mrs Gort?”

It was Esmée Weiton who had taken a seat beside me.

“Yes. I found my friends in the middle of a big conjugal row and left them to it.”

Esmée smiled. “So you preferred the intrigues of Cat's Cradle to their open warfare?”