The Trouble with Harriet (17 page)

I can’t say anything about Daddy’s reaction to standing in on this conversation or describe Ned’s demeanor, for I had kept them out of my line of vision, but I was certainly feeling off-kilter, even before Sir Casper wobbled up against me.

“Perhaps you are right, Jarrow,” he bleated from my arms. “I must endeavor to be patient. It will make the rewards all the sweeter, my Phyllis.”

He went suddenly, horribly limp. My knees sagged as I backed up against the desk. Help was slow in coming. My father, Ned, Lady Grizwolde, and Mr. Jarrow all stood fixed in place, as if wondering what was the proper etiquette in a situation such as this. Who was the appropriate person to step forward? Did it depend on whether Sir Casper was living or dead? I was getting ready to drop him when he let out a snore that shook him awake, and finally Mr. Jarrow took custody of him.

In the ensuing reshuffling of our positions I found myself on the other side of the desk staring blankly at a daily calendar. It was the notebook kind with the date and the day of the week on the top of the two pages spread open. There were a number of entries recorded in neat black handwriting, but nothing as my eyes skimmed the lines on any of the black lines about an appointment for this evening between Sir Casper and the caller. And yet when speaking on the phone, Mr. Jarrow had looked down at the calendar and spoken as if he saw one noted there. I looked more closely and spotted a tiny jotting on the topmost outer corner of the page. I had to squint to make it out: R. to be D. 9. Or it could have been a 7.

I was jostled several paces to the right by Ned, who was struggling to help Mr. Jarrow. Sir Casper had come to like a drowning man hell-bent on dragging his rescuer and possibly a couple of passing liners underwater. My father had very sensibly stepped out of the way. Now he caught my eye, and I would have had to be a dolt not to have realized that he was desperate to get out of there and recover the urn. Luckily, Lady Grizwolde was every bit as eager to be rid of us. She reached into a drawer and withdrew several key rings. Selecting the one she wanted, she dropped it into my hand.

“Take my car—not the Rolls, the other one. And don’t worry about getting it back to us today. I know you are expecting visitors. Tomorrow will do just fine. No, I wouldn’t dream of letting you wait for a taxi,” she insisted, cutting off my protest. “Just go off and enjoy the rest of the day. And now if you will excuse me,” she added, having guided Daddy and me firmly out the door, “I really must help Ned and Mr. Jarrow with Casper.”

“Of course.” I had trouble putting the brakes on my feet after being given such an emotional, if not physical, shove out the door.

“And I hope you didn’t pay too much attention to his nonsense.” Her ladyship fiddled with the narrow gold belt encircling the waist of her black sweater and then let her hands fall limp at her sides. “It was the dementia talking. Sometimes it’s worse than others, and today has been one of his bad times. If he were anyone else, living in an ordinary house, he would have had to go into a home months ago. But luckily we have the facilities to keep him here.”

“It must be very difficult,” I murmured.

“Extremely sad,” Daddy agreed with only a tinge of impatience in his voice.

After which neither of us spoke a word until I was backing the Honda Prelude out of the garage. We hadn’t even made eye contact as we walked across the red-carpeted area into the narrow corridor leading outdoors. The rain had stopped, and the sky showed patches of blue among the clouds.

Turning the car around in the courtyard took several moments of intense concentration, for I had no wish to go back inside and report that I wrecked it before even reaching the drive. Somehow I didn’t think Lady Grizwolde was quite as keen on me as she had been before I witnessed her husband’s pathetic antics. And the world is filled with qualified interior designers, although possibly not in Chitterton Fells, where people tend to consider switching a picture from one side of the room to another a major renovation.

I drove at a snail’s pace toward the open gates and even when out on the cliff road proceeded with caution until I was well past the spot where we had almost come to grief earlier. Actually that was beginning to seem ages ago. My mind filled with images of Ben, who would have gone on with his life after an interlude of suitable sorrow. I would walk into the house and discover that he had married the lawyer who had helped him have me declared legally dead. She wouldn’t be wearing my clothes; they would be too big for her and not sufficiently chic. But she would have taken over every other aspect of my life, including the children, who would have returned from staying with Grandpa and Grandma. They would have been gently informed that Mummy had gone away, but that if they didn’t whine for new toys and went to bed when they were told, they would get to see her again one day.

“Woe betide that vicar when I catch up with him, Giselle.” Daddy stuck his plummy voice right into the middle of my pathetic daydream. “If I were a less civilized man, I would spin him around by his dog collar and punch his miserable nose into the nearest wall. As it is, I shall give him a tongue-lashing he will never forget. Let him have harmed a blessed inch of that urn and I will ... will ...” Words failed him.

“I’m sure you will get Harriet back safe and sound.” I steered the car around a bend, avoiding the bristling hedgerows that jutted out in places like bearded-faced Peeping Toms, hoping I sounded more convinced than I felt. A man who was as absent-minded as Mr. Ambleforth might well not even notice the canvas bag on the front seat of the car he had mistaken for his bicycle. And, unsecured, it could fall on the floor, the lid could come off, and the contents spill all over the rubber mat.

“My dear Giselle.” Daddy spoke with what he undoubtedly considered rigid self-control. “It is my profound hope that you will drive to the vicarage at several miles above this paltry speed before going home. That way we can trap the fellow before he takes off for parts unknown, beard him in his den, and threaten him with a stern letter to be written to his bishop if he does not immediately produce the urn safe and sound.”

“But we just telephoned and no one was home,” I reasoned, “and we really do need to get back in case Harriet’s relatives have arrived early.”

“And how, pray tell, am I to explain to them that she is missing?” Daddy’s glower burned most of the skin off the side of my face.”

To get him off the subject if only for a moment, I said, “It is awkward, but, let’s talk about Mr. Jarrow. Do you still think you’ve seen him before?”

“Alas,” he cried, his eyes lifting to the roof of the car, “I have not been in any mood to dwell on the matter,”

“Well, I have ... at least thought about it. I remember your mentioning, when talking about one of your outings with Harriet, that there was a man at another table reading a newspaper or a book with a mustache too big for his face. Couldn’t that have been Mr. Jarrow?”

“My feeling was that I noticed him at the airport.”

“Which one? In Germany or this end?”

“Both. I recall seeing people in flashes, their faces seeming to zoom into close-up range, because in the midst of my agony I marveled that others were going about the business of travel as if God was still in his heaven and all was right with the world.”

“Ned said Mr. Jarrow had been in Colchester looking after his old mother,” I reminded him.

“Giselle, I am in no mood to rack my brains on the subject of Mr. Jarrow. Until Harriet is restored to me, I shall remain in the depths of despair. I implore you to take me to the vicarage.”

“You’re right,” I said contritely. “It is what we should do. And if no one’s there, we can try the church hall and hopefully find Kathleen Ambleforth holding a rehearsal. It’s just a day or two until opening night, so she’s probably working her cast around the clock.”

I was, of course, really praying we would find my car conspicuously parked in front of St. Anselm’s with the keys still in the ignition. That way we could steal it back without having to snitch on the vicar to his wife, who must too often find herself at the end of her rope where he was concerned. No such luck! And I was about to find out that there are women in this world with incredible blind spots when it comes to their men. After knocking to no avail on the vicarage door, Daddy and I tracked enough textbook-perfect footprints across the gleaming church-hall floor to have delighted Scotland Yard. As on my last visit, Kathleen didn’t appear to notice a presence looming to her rear. Again her eyes were riveted to the stage. This time her niece Ruth, a tall, gangly young woman, was in the process of strangling Freddy.

“Absolutely splendid,” Kathleen heralded them. “We’re finally seeing the tender passion that binds Clarabelle and Reginald together despite Malicia’s cold-blooded attempts to tear them apart. Now let’s take the kiss again very slowly. And this time, Freddy, don’t pull away until Inspector Allbright taps you on the shoulder and says, ‘If it’s all right with you, sir, I’ll take a closer look to see why there’s an arm hanging out of that chest under the window.’ “

By now my cousin’s face was purple, but Daddy saved him from lapsing into unconsciousness with
a
loud “Ahem!” which swung Kathleen around to face us.

“Oh, how nice!” Kathleen didn’t look or sound tremendously enthusiastic. But then, we were interrupting her directorial flow. Besides which, Daddy’s spouting off at her in a wildly lovelorn state last night was probably still fresh in her mind. Still, she made an effort. “Every little bit of audience prepares the actors for looking out and seeing every seat in the house filled on opening night. Helps them shake off the collywobbles. Do sit wherever you like,” she said, waving her script at the rows of folding chairs.

“We’d love to stay and watch,” I fibbed, “but that’s not the reason we’re here.”

“Something most appalling has occurred ... ,” Daddy began.

“Oh, dear!” Her eyes had shifted back to the stage. “Clarabelle, perhaps you should hug Reg around the shoulders instead of his throat. But remember, Freddy, I want you to keep that dreamy-eyed expression.”

“The thing is,” I plowed on, “Mr. Ambleforth went off in my car.”

“And he’s taken Harriet.” Daddy’s furious vibrations sent autumn leaves eddying across the floor.

“That isn’t right!” Kathleen had finally given us her full attention, or so I thought until I realized she was addressing the gnome-like man with a large magnifying glass hovering on tiptoe behind the footlights as if afraid of inadvertently stomping on Freddy, who had finally collapsed, gasping on the floor.

“Inspector Allbright, you aren’t skipping through a meadow with a butterfly net. You have come on official business, devastated by your suspicions that your old friend Major Wagewar has met an untimely death in this house but deeply conflicted because Reg and Clarabelle have always been generous contributors to the Policemen’s Widows and Orphans Benefit. One wrong step in this investigation and you may find yourself sitting up at night knitting blankets and hot-water-bottle covers for the annual fund-raiser. Now, let me see the furrowed brow, the intently clenched jaw, the intelligent yet deferential gaze; there’s a dear man.”

Poor thing! He looked as though he wouldn’t mind abandoning his acting career to empty ashtrays and mop up beer spills down at the Dark Horse pub. I knew Tom Tingle from the Hearthside Guild and other local activities, and his diminutive stature and big ears tended to bring out my protective instincts. At any other time I would probably have rushed up onstage, tucked him under my arm, and spirited him off to his house, where he could have got into bed with a hot-water bottle. But Daddy was breathing down my neck like a cyclone. So I tracked after Kathleen and as kindly as possible explained about the Old Abbey, Ned, and the car and hinted that I would rather like to have it back. Sooner, if possible, rather than later.

“Immediately!” stormed Daddy.

“Yes, of course you would! It really is too shockingly bad of Dunstan. And I wish I could assure you that he’s an expert driver. But the truth of the matter is that when he’s all caught up in St. Ethelwort, he’s an absolute menace on the road.” Kathleen shook her head. “Still, let’s look on the bright side. Maybe he’ll run out of petrol. That sometimes brings him round. Especially if it’s close to teatime. The poor lamb is so desperately fond of my cheese scones.”

“There’s only one place for the perpetrator of such a horrible crime, and that’s at the end of a rope.” I thought it was Daddy speaking, but it was Tom in his role as the inspector. “You’re not leaving the scene of the crime,” he admonished Reg, otherwise known as Freddy, who plaintively responded that he’d really like to go home to his mum.

“When was she written into the script?” Clarabelle wanted to know.

“I’m talking about my real-life mother.” Freddy got up off the floor and dusted himself off. “She’s coming to visit, and I need to be home when she arrives.”

“Can’t you stay just another fifteen minutes?” Kathleen urged him. “It’s already next to impossible having a rehearsal without Lady Grizwolde. Such a pity she couldn’t come today. Although this could have been the chance for Roxie Malloy to understudy. Had I been able to get hold of her.” Heaving sigh. “And then there’s always the problem of having to work around the maid’s scenes until Dawn gets off school. Temperamental actors!” She rolled up the script and thumped it against a chair.

Afraid I might be the next buffeting block, I tiptoed over to her, asked her to phone as soon as she heard from Mr. Ambleforth, and on receipt of her nod marched Daddy, resisting, all the way out of the church hall. A voice from the rear implored us not to go. Actually, it was Clarabelle in a last-ditch scene with Reg begging him not to abandon their marriage vows to scamper off into Malicia Stillwaters’s lethal embrace.

“We’ve done everything humanly possible,” I told Daddy as we climbed into the Honda Prelude. To which he responded with stony silence. In fact, he didn’t say a word for the remainder of the short drive. We were within a few yards of Merlin’s Court when I saw another car turning in through the gates ahead of us. It was a vehicle I didn’t recognize, and I assumed that here again were Harriet’s relatives. But suddenly a frothy blond head popped out of the window, and I was looking at Freddy’s mother. Aunt Lulu. Far from looking crestfallen at having been dispatched to us by an irate husband fed up with her kleptomania, she had the sunny smile of a schoolgirl intent on causing as much mischief as possible.