Winterwood Page 25

  “There’s no question of its being touched. Anyway, that would require permission from the Home Secretary. Ignore this communication, Mr. Clayton, I beg you. This deplorable matter will be cleared up within a few days. Thank you for calling. A glass of Madeira before you leave?”

  Lavinia remembered her exploration of the dust-sheeted rooms of the old palazzo on the Grand Canal. Had someone been hiding in them, and living ever since in the silent shut up house? Waiting patiently to perpetrate this morbid joke that was more than a joke? One would have known it would distress Charlotte, with her highly nervous temperament, but the unexpected thing was that it distressed the Contessa’s nephew, too. Although Lavinia had imagined Jonathon to have nerves of iron, there was no doubt he was shaken by the mysterious letters. So shaken that luncheon went by without a glance from him, or one word about his promised threat to expose her. Neither had he sought her out to demand her answer to his proposal. She had a reprieve. She had to be grateful to the unknown hoaxer for that.

  Daniel dispatched the letter to Mr. Mallinson asking him to make urgent inquiries as to who had access to the palazzo in Venice, and whether anything of an irregular or puzzling nature had happened. He contemplated making a personal visit to London, then decided to wait for Mallinson’s answer.

  “It may mean I go to Venice instead,” he said.

  Charlotte sank back in her chair.

  “Then you are taking this seriously?”

  “The more I think of it, the less I like it.”

  “Why?” Charlotte’s voice was almost inaudible.

  “Blackmail is an ugly word.”

  “Blackmail!” Jonathon exclaimed. “Explain yourself, Meryon.”

  Ignoring him, Daniel continued speaking to Charlotte.

  “Had your aunt any relatives besides yourself and your cousin?”

  “You mean—someone who would have designs on her fortune?” Charlotte said faintly.

  “Exactly that. After all, you were scarcely close to her. I understand you were to be her heir simply because you undertook to bring her back to England and care for her until she died, and then bury her with her son. Might there be another claimant who resented this?”

  “Such as me?” Jonathon said crudely. “Only I’m right here so I couldn’t have posted the letters.”

  “Another claimant such as your cousin here,” Daniel went on, still addressing himself to Charlotte. “After all, you only made Jonathon’s acquaintance in Venice. I believe you didn’t know of one another’s existence previously. Couldn’t there be some other person similarly placed? You ought to know more about this than my wife, Peate.”

  It could never have been said that Daniel and Jonathon were on congenial terms, but now a cold formality seemed to have sprung up between them. It was as if it were no longer necessary to pretend a friendship they did not feel. But why? Blackmail was a word that could easily have fitted Jonathon Peate, Lavinia admitted, but it scarcely fitted now, for he was as badly shaken as Charlotte. She had never thought to see fear in that bold face.

  “The old lady had no other relations,” he said quite definitely. “Willie Peate had only one brother, my father. Charlotte knows the other side.”

  “There was my mother, and another sister who died young,” Charlotte said.” Aunt Tameson was the eldest. There can’t be any other relative, Daniel. Really there can’t.”

  “Then a close friend whom perhaps she had promised to remember in her will?” Daniel persisted.

  “She didn’t seem to have any around her when we went to Venice. She seemed completely alone. That was after her companion had died.” Charlotte shivered suddenly and violently, and said that she was thinking of that bizarre funeral they had gone to. The black-draped gondolas on the gay blue water. So incongruous. And all that sunshine and the blazing white monuments in the cemetery. No wonder Aunt Tameson had wanted to die in England.

  “Perhaps,” said Daniel thoughtfully. “Well, we must wait for Mallinson’s answer. Miss Hurst, where are the children?”

  “Mr. Bush has them in the schoolroom.”

  “It’s time Flora had her rest. She must be particularly careful not to overdo things. Stay with her, Miss Hurst.”

  With that curt order he left the room. Lavinia gathered up her writing materials and prepared to follow him. In her haste she dropped her pen, and turning to pick it up she caught a strange conspiratorial look between Charlotte and Jonathon. A look of apprehension and fear and knowledge.

  She was not an eavesdropper, and abhorred such a tendency. But under the present circumstances it was justifiable.

  She deliberately refrained from completely closing the door, and paused to listen.

  Charlotte spoke in so low a voice that her words were disappointingly inaudible. What she said, however, had a shattering impact on Jonathon, for he forgot all caution as he exclaimed, “You mean to tell me you didn’t see it! You utter fool!”

  Joseph was crossing the hall; Lavinia could not linger. What was she to do with this new cryptic information? Tell Daniel? See what he made of it? Or say nothing and wait for Mr. Mallinson’s letter.

  Say nothing, she thought wearily. She had already run to him with too many alarms. He must know there was some understanding between Charlotte and Jonathon. He was not blind.

  It was a misty damp afternoon, not suitable for being outdoors. Nevertheless Charlotte ordered the brougham and drove off, telling no one where she was going. When she returned she did not come indoors immediately, but walked up and down the terrace in her long gray cloak and befurred bonnet. Mary had looked out of a window and seen her and said that the mistress was in one of her moods where she couldn’t be still.

  “Sometimes she walks up and down half the night, Bertha says. It’s her nerves all ajar. They won’t let her rest. That traveling abroad didn’t agree with her. She’s been in her queer moods off and on ever since.”

  As if something invisible were pursuing her, Lavinia thought, looking down at the tense, lonely figure. Then, suddenly, Charlotte looked up sharply as if she knew she were being watched. Lavinia drew back from the intense stare of the white face. But a moment later she knew that it was not this window but the next one at which Charlotte gazed. Poor Lady Tameson’s window. As if she expected to see a ghost.

  When she came in to tea she was shivering. She said she had been to put some flowers on her aunt’s grave.

  “It’s a mistake to go to churchyards in the winter. They’re so cold.” She shivered and held out her visibly trembling hands to the fire. “So cold.”

  She asked Lavinia to pour the tea so she could drink some and compose herself before the men came in.

  “Do you really believe those letters are a hoax, Miss Hurst?”

  “I think they’re a mistake. They must be.”

  “Whoever wrote them knew I had admired the jade cupid. How could anyone know that, except my aunt herself?”

  “You mean—they’ve been written after you were in Venice?”

  “Yes, didn’t you realize that? I’d never seen the cupid until I was there. I don’t think even my husband has seen the significance of that.”

  “So it must be someone playing a trick,” Lavinia said in complete bewilderment. “Unless—”

  “Unless what, Miss Hurst?”

  “Unless it wasn’t your aunt you brought to Winterwood.”

  There was a crash and the delicate Meissen cup and saucer lay in fragments on the hearth. There was spilled tea everywhere.

  Charlotte sprang up, wringing her hands.

  “Ring the bell. Get someone to clean this up. So clumsy of me. My hands were stiff with cold. Where’s Daniel? Where’s Jonathon? Where’s Jonathon?”

  It almost seemed as if she had expected Jonathon to mysteriously disappear. But he was very much with them still. He came in presently, and appeared to have recovered his familiar aplomb.

  “I’m late,” he said. “I apologize.” He took the proffered cup of tea from Lavinia. “I’m neglecti
ng you, Miss Hurst.” His eyes gave her their specific message. “But that, I assure you, is only temporarily.” A faint odor of whiskey hung about him. There had been no tributes on graves for him. He had been down to the village inn to bolster up his courage in another way. It was necessary for him, too, to blot out the thought of the mysterious woman in Venice—if there were a woman who wrote letters in the handwriting of someone already deceased.

  Daniel didn’t come in until tea was over. He was in riding clothes, and he, too, apologized for being late. He said he had ridden to Dover to put the letter to Mr. Mallinson on the train himself. He had contemplated going to London personally, but was afraid that, being Christmas, the old man might be away. In any case—his eyes went around the room—he preferred not to be away from home himself at this time of the year.

  “Where’s Flora, Miss Hurst?”

  “She’s resting, Mr. Meryon. She’s tempted to be on her feet too much. She doesn’t believe the miracle unless she constantly proves it. Mary’s giving her her tea in her room.”

  “Daniel, why do you go on worrying about Flora?” Charlotte said irritably. “The time for that is over.”

  “I hope so,” he said cryptically, giving her a long look.

  If she had had a cup in her hand, Lavinia believed she would have dropped it again. Something had passed between her and Daniel. Was it acknowledged suspicion? Had Daniel, all the time, believed that fiction of the laudanum in Flora’s chocolate?

  “Charlotte’s right,” said Jonathon suddenly. “I can think of people more deserving of anxiety than your very pampered daughter.” Then he dropped his bombshell. “Since this little matter in Venice seems to be on Charlotte’s mind—and on mine, too, I grant you—I’ve decided to go and do a little personal investigation.”

  Charlotte was on her feet.

  “Go to Venice! Then you do think it—more than a hoax?” Her voice trailed away.

  “Let’s just say I don’t like being hoaxed.”

  Chapter 22

  HE REALLY DID MEAN TO GO. He had a servant pack his bags that night in readiness for his departure in the morning. The evening was passed in desultory conversation about the discomforts of traveling across Europe in midwinter. Sir Timothy had a lot to say about that, but no one paid much attention. Charlotte looked tired enough to drop. But when Daniel, who scarcely took his eyes off her, suggested that she retire, she denied vehemently that she was tired. She sat on over the dying fire, afraid to go upstairs.

  Finally Jonathon said that if he were to travel the next day he thought he would get some sleep. The barest perceptible nod from Daniel indicated to Lavinia that she must go to her post beside Flora. Mary, who had been sitting up with her, would be nodding or perhaps sound asleep by the fire.

  Jonathon must have guessed that she would follow him, for he was lingering in the passage. He had pulled back the curtain from one of the long windows and was looking out on the dark night.

  “It’s beginning to rain,” he said. “If this wind gets up I’ll have a damned unpleasant crossing.”

  “Are you a bad sailor? Is that all that worries you?”

  “Was that a taunt, my pretty Lavinia? No, it’s not all. Another thing that worries me is losing you. But we’ll have to postpone that little affair until I return. In not less than ten days. Can you wait that long? I think you can. I think you will.” The threat was plain enough in his voice, but it was overlaid by this other anxiety. It seemed that the mysterious trouble in Venice could be more important than she. Why wouldn’t he say what it was? Why wouldn’t Charlotte speak? Or did they truly not know?

  It was not only Charlotte who dreaded the night.

  Flora was sitting upright in bed, wide-awake, her eyes much too bright and apprehensive.

  “Miss Hurst, at last you’ve remembered my existence. Why do you leave me alone with that good-for-nothing who just falls asleep?” For Mary, looking the child she was, her cap tilted sideways, her little work-roughened hands clasped on her apron, was sound asleep by the fire.

  “Why aren’t you asleep, too?” Lavinia asked Flora.

  “Because my legs ache.”

  “You used them too much today. Didn’t Doctor Munro warn you not to? The muscles are still too weak. You must be patient.”

  “Miss Hurst, don’t scold! I dislike you very much when you behave like a governess.”

  “Then I shall behave like a nurse. Would you like some hot milk?”

  “No.”

  “Then shall I rub your legs to ease them?” Lavinia began to shake Mary awake. But before the sleepy girl had stirred, Flora was saying, “Miss Hurst, what did they say downstairs tonight? Is it true Great-aunt Tameson is coming back?”

  “Flora, of course not! She’s dead.”

  “Edward thinks she is coming. You wouldn’t believe how quiet he’s become. He thinks she wants to punish him for playing tricks on her. Phoebe had to promise to sleep in his room. Would you believe it, a big boy like that!”

  Flora was silent a moment, trying to retain her scorn. But it left her, and her voice was small. “I was not allowed to see her lying dead. Is it because—she wasn’t?”

  “I saw her,” Lavinia said quietly. “She looked very peaceful and contented. Does that please you?”

  “It would please me more if she were still here. I don’t really want her money or her jewels. I’d gladly give them back. I don’t need them now that I can walk.”

  “No, you don’t,” Lavinia agreed. “They’re a—”

  “They’re what?” Flora asked, as she paused.

  She had been going to say they were a curse. And that was true. For everything had happened since the old lady had changed her will. Everything sprang from that, even this strange haunting.

  “There are many things more important than wealth,” she said primly. “Now will you please lie down and go to sleep.”

  “If I can have Sylvie on my bed. Then I will feel safe. She barks if anyone strange comes in.”

  “Now whoever do you imagine is going to come in?”

  Flora’s overstrained eyes looked up from the pillow.

  “Sylvie would regard Great-aunt Tameson as a stranger, I expect.”

  “Flora darling!”

  To conceal her own agitation Lavinia briskly awoke Mary and sent her stumbling off to bed, then allowed the little dog, trembling with pleasure, to curl up beside Flora. Charlotte, she thought, would have appreciated Sylvie’s company that night. But Charlotte had given her treasured pet to her daughter to prove how much she loved her—even though previously it had been quite obvious to everyone that she had a passionate unbalanced affection for Edward, and no one else, especially not her crippled, plain and difficult daughter. One could not change one’s affections overnight simply because the daughter one had despised was suddenly immensely wealthy. But it might be politic for the world to think one could.

  Lavinia didn’t know why her quite unproven suspicions about Charlotte came back so vividly.

  But yes, she did. For today it was as if a mask had slipped from Charlotte’s face, and the haunted woman beneath it showed all too clearly.

  There had always been a plot between her and Jonathon Peate. If she had received Lady Tameson’s money, he had been going to share it for some private reason. But the plan had gone badly awry and had somehow to be retrieved.

  So Charlotte lavished affection on Flora, and talked to Edward of going to live in London with only him, her best-loved child, and pretended to seek the company of the man who frightened her out of her wits. All contradictory behavior.

  And now, most contradictory of all, the plotters themselves were frightened. Badly frightened.

  The tap on the door an hour later scared her badly. Flora had at last fallen asleep, and she herself, from sheer exhaustion, was drowsing.

  But in a moment she was sitting up, and Sylvie was growling softly.

  Was it Jonathon again? This was more than she could stand.

  It was Daniel.
<
br />   He apologized for disturbing her. He only wanted to know if everything was well.

  “With Flora? She’s asleep.”

  “Good. Lavinia, I want you to take her away tomorrow. I will arrange lodgings for you. Somewhere quiet. Bournemouth, perhaps. Will you do that?”

  “Has something happened?”

  He gave a bleak smile. He looked very tired.

  “Hasn’t enough happened? No, nothing more. My wife will say nothing. Nothing at all. She merely assures me that I know as much as she does. When I point out that I am not collapsing from some secret fear, as she appears to be, she says that is merely her nervous condition. She has always been highly nervous, and a letter from the grave does nothing to improve her health.”

  “There is some reason for Mr. Peate to be going to Venice. Some urgent reason. Your wife must know what that is.”

  “Perhaps. Personally, any reason, no matter what it is, to get him out of my house pleases me. I should have made him leave long ago, and not listened to Charlotte’s wishes.”

  “You think everything will be all right when he has gone? But you don’t, or you would not want me to take Flora away.”

  “It will be good for Flora’s health.”

  Lavinia put out her hand impulsively.

  “Will you join us in Bournemouth?”

  “Later. When we have finally ascertained who is buried in young Tom Peate’s grave.”

  He had called her Lavinia again. That was the only glimmer of comfort she could get from the curiously shocking conversation.

  She slept, to dream of Lady Tameson wearing all her jewels standing over her bed and demanding, in her hoarse autocratic voice, to be taken out of the cold English mud and returned to her grandeur in Venice. Then Jonathon Peate stood behind her giving his loud laugh and saying that he would take her if the weather were not too stormy, and the poor old lady screamed, awaking Lavinia to a chilly dark morning, and Flora shouting in her ear.

  “Miss Hurst! You slept so soundly. I had to scream. Look, I got out of bed without help.”