Daisy pounced. “In the general way of things?”
“There's been a regular rash of them these past few months.” Straightening, she glanced back at the desk where she postmarked the mail, as if some might be lurking there. She looked harried, seeming to regret having spoken, but not knowing what to do other than to rush on to elaborate: “All in bunches, and all written by the same person by the looks of them.”
“Do you have trouble deciphering them? It's not so difficult, I suppose, if they're all to people in the village, to addresses you know.”
“Well, as a matter of fact, they are,” the postmistress admitted, tight-lipped.
“How odd!” Daisy remarked. “Wouldn't you think whoever it is would go to see people instead of wasting the money on postage? You haven't noticed someone suddenly buying a lot of stamps?”
“No, miss.” Mrs. Burden spoke quite sharply. “It's not my business to be paying attention to who buys what, nor I shouldn't be gossiping about Post Office business.”
“It's my fault,” Daisy said with a smile. “I'm a writer, you see, and I'm always interested in the ins and outs of people's jobs. Here's sixpence for my stamps. Thank you.”
Winifred Burden had emerged from the telephone exchange a few minutes earlier to serve the children, so they were ready to leave. Daisy was dismayed to see the vast quantity of sweets they had bought for a shilling.
“Don't you dare be sick, you two,” she said as they left the shop, “or I shall be in disgrace. Save some for later.”
“D'you want a sherbet dab, Aunt Daisy? I bought three.”
“No, thanks!”
“Look!” cried Belinda, who had gone straight to Tinker Bell and given her a great hug. “Tinker's chewed through the string, but she just sat there pretending! Isn't she good and clever?”
“I told you she didn't need a lead,” said Derek smugly. “Here, Tink, here's an aniseed ball.”
Tinker crunched the aniseed ball and followed them up the street with her nose glued to Derek's paper bag.
Daisy felt moderately pleased with herself. Getting names
had been too much to hope for, but at least she could be pretty certain Johnnie was not the only victim of the Poison Pen. That cut out Mr. Paramount as a suspect, she thought with relief as they approached the Oakhurst gates. His resentment was aimed specifically at his usurping nephew, so she wouldn't have to beard him in his den.
Of course, Alec would not cross a suspect off his list so easily. The old man never left the lodge and she had never heard that he had any visitors, but his daily woman might provide all the village gossip. General misanthropy could be motive enough for the other letters, or perhaps they were just an attempt to disguise the provenance of Johnnie's.
Alec was rightâonce someone was on the list, it was difficult to be quite sure one could take them off.
They reached the end of the drive. Daisy glanced at the church clock: ten to eleven. She gave Belinda the shorts. “Here, go and put a pair on right away,” she said, “before you dirty that frock. Derek, please tell Nanny I'll be very grateful if she will kindly lend a couple of your shirts to Bel. Straight home, now. I'm going to elevenses with Mrs. LeBeau.”
The door was opened by a neat, white-capped maid, not young. Daisy knew as soon as she spoke that she was not local.
“Please to come through, miss. Madam is in the arbour.”
What Daisy saw of the house as she passed through left a pleasant impression of light and air. The back garden, rather than sloping up, was terraced on three levels. The lowest was paved. The second was a rose garden, with a shady, rose-grown bower of the kind described by Dickens as a shelter erected by man for the benefit of spiders. Daisy presumed it had been swept clear of eight-legged marauders before its elegant mistress ensconced herself there.
Mrs. LeBeau came to the top of the steps to greet Daisy.
Her dark hair, loosely looped up into a chignon, gleamed in the sun. “You won't object to taking coffee outside, I hope?” she said. “We can easily move indoors if ⦔
“No, no, it's beautiful out here.”
“I'm rather fond of roses, as you may have guessed! I spent some years in the grimmer parts of South Africa. Roses grow marvellously in the Cape, but where we were those that survived were generally covered in dust. I used to dream of English rose gardens.”
“I have a friend who lived in southern Italy and dreamt of daffodils,” said Daisy, sitting down on one of the white-painted wrought-iron chairs, well cushioned, in the arbour. “What took you to Africa?”
“I married a big-game hunter,” Mrs. LeBeau said drily, “frightfully handsome and dashing, but without a penny to his name. It was a runaway match and my family cut me off without the proverbial shilling. Shooting lions and buffalo was all Perry knew how to do, so he became a guide, going off into the veldt for weeks while I was left behind in dusty little dorps full of dusty little Dutchmen. With neither shillings nor pennies to our name, we hadn't much choice.”
“I suppose not.” Daisy regarded with some doubt the expertly cultivated garden and the charming Queen Anne house, in excellent repair.
Mrs. LeBeau laughed. “You're wondering how I managed all this. Sheer luck! A party of prospectors on holiday hired Perry. After the shooting, he went up with them into the Wit watersrand, and they practically fell over a vein of gold. I suspect it was in a drunken celebration they signed over a share to Perry. At any rate, the result was that when a buffalo took revenge on him for all the slaughter, and I came home, I found myself with a comfortable income.”
“What luck!” said Daisy, not without a touch of envy. But
then, if she had not had to work for her living, she would never have met Alec. “Oh dear, I didn't mean what luck losing your husband. I'm sorry!”
“Oh, as to that, poor old Perry had his points, but as a life's companion ⦠Well, let's say my parents weren't far off the mark. I've certainly no desire for a second venture into matrimony. Ah, here's our coffee. Thank you, Alice.”
The maid transferred a Wedgewood coffee set and a plate of shortbread from her tray to the wrought-iron table. Mrs. LeBeau dispensed coffee and biscuits.
“Marvellous shortbread,” said Daisy after her first bite.
“My cook-housekeeper is Scottish.”
“And your maid is from London, isn't she? Not local, anyway.”
“I have a flat in London and I spend a good deal of time there. And I don't care for gossiping servants,” Mrs. LeBeau admitted with a wry smile. “There is enough talk without a maid who goes home twice a week to report my every move to her family. You live in London, don't you? Lady John mentioned Chelsea, I think.”
Daisy accepted the change of subject, for the moment at least. They talked about London and Daisy's work. Mrs. LeBeau kept the conversation steered firmly away from her own concerns, until at last Daisy could not decently prolong her visit.
A fearful waste after such a promising start, she thought as they descended the steps together and went into the house. The police had a great advantage in being able to pose direct questions instead of having to feel around in the dark.
On the way to the front door, Mrs. LeBeau picked up a small pile of letters from the hall table. She opened the door and bade Daisy goodbye. Daisy was half way down the path when she heard an exasperated exclamation behind her.
“Oh no, not another of the wretched things!”
Mrs. LeBeau was leaning against the doorpost, staring at one of the envelopes in her hand with mingled annoyance and apprehension. Perking up, Daisy hurried back to her.
“Is something wrong? Can I help?”
“No, no, it's just ⦔ Mrs. LeBeau's voice faded, and she looked searchingly at Daisy, who did her best to appear guilelessly sympathetic. “Actually, it would be a relief to tell someone about it, but I'd hate to shock you.”
“I don't think I'm frightfully shockable. Living in Bohemian Chelsea, you know, and then I've helped the police with one or two criminal investigations ⦔
“I wouldn't want the police involved in this,” said the Scarlet Woman in alarm.
“Of course not. May I guess? It's an anonymous letter, isn't it? I happen to know you're not the only one to get them.”
“No?” Mrs. LeBeau's expression lightened. “Perhaps it's silly, but that does make me feel better. Come back in, won't you?”
She led the way into a drawing room decorated in light blues and greys, with touches of peach, and vases of roses everywhere. A modern, comfortable sofa and easy chairs continued the colour scheme. The rest of the furniture had the simple, elegant lines of traditional Sheraton and Hepplewhite designs, whether antique or reproduction Daisy was not competent to judge. There were two well-filled bookcases, as well as a gramophone with a pile of records, and an expensive wireless set.
“What a lovely room!” A painting hanging over the mantel caught her eye and she went across to study it. A twisted thorn tree to one side framed the foreground of sun-bleached grasses and a range of dark, rocky hills which stood out against a deep blue sky. “And what an interesting picture.”
“The Witwatersrand, âwhence cometh my help,' if you'll pardon the blasphemy.”
“I'm not very religious. You painted this?” Daisy asked, noticing the initials “W. L.” in the corner.
“Yes, I had to keep myself occupied somehow. My friends forgive its deficiencies, and my enemies are not invited into my house. I have enemies, you know, in the village.” She took a paperknife from a small writing-table in one corner. Sinking into a chair by the open French windows, she slit the envelope and took out the paper inside. “I thought these letters came from one of them, but if other people are getting them it sounds more like general malice.”
Daisy took the other chair. “I know of at least two other recipients,” she said, exaggerating a bit since she couldn't be certain of the brigadier. “I'm pretty sure there are more. May I see the envelope?”
The writing was exactly like that of Johnnie's letters. The postmark was earlier that very day. When Mrs. Burden glanced at her desk, this and any similar envelopes must just have left it in the postman's bag.
“I shan't ask who else is being victimized,” said Mrs. LeBeau, the unfolded letter in her hand, “though your presence and knowledge lead to certain conjectures. I hope you don't expect to read this.”
“No,” Daisy said reluctantly. “You've read all of them?”
“Yes. They all say much the same in different variants of foulness. I shall destroy this at once, as I did the rest.”
“Forgive me, but may I ask why you go on reading such frightful stuff when you know pretty much what each new one will say?”
“Because, my dear Miss Dalrymple, I'm afraid that sooner or later there will be a demand for money in exchange for
silence, and that if I fail to respond ⦠Well, my reputation may be already tarnished in Rotherden, but I'm still received in decent houses. It would be painful to lose that. I'd hate to have to move. More important, if word spread beyond this little community, there's someone else who could be badly damaged.”
“You mean ⦠?” Daisy ventured.
“My lover,” the Merry Widow said flatly. “Despite any conclusion you may have drawn from what you've been told, I'm not wildly promiscuous. I have a satisfactory arrangement with a gentleman of whom I'm very fond. His wife, on the other hand, flits from man to man. Incidentally, she knows about us, and is mildly amused by our faithfulness to each other. His position is such that divorce would ruin him even more surely than exposure of an ⦠irregular liaison.”
“I see. Does he know about the letters?”
“No. Nor have I any intention of worrying him with them.”
Daisy nodded. “Thank you for being so frank. I'll be frank in return. I've been asked to try to find out privately who's writing these beastly things. I don't know if I've any chance of success, but obviously the more information I have the better.”
“Rather you than the police,” Mrs. LeBeau said irresolutely. “But if you succeed, what next?”
“Frankly, I haven't thought that far ahead. I suppose it would be up to Jâto the person who asked me to investigate. He's no keener for publicity than you are. Nor can I see that I need tell him you're another victim.”
“Doubtless he suspects. Unless he suspects me of being the writer?”
“No, he told me he couldn't believe you're the Poison Pen.”
“Poison Pen!” Mrs. LeBeau shuddered. “What a dreadful term, but horridly apt. A pen dipped in venom. Let's hope it doesn't lead to worse.”
“You mean, that he or she doesn't go on to blackmail?” Daisy asked.
“There's that. But what I was thinking of was that one of the victims may discover the writer before you do, and take violent steps to silence the Poison Pen.”