After Clare (7 page)

But Clare had gone too far one day, even for Emily, when she had tried to use its powers to bring a curse down on Miss Jennett . . .

It is a day of heavy, enervating heat, when your fringe sticks to your damp forehead and you feel too hot for anything, when even white broderie-anglaise dresses and straw hats feel too heavy. She and Clare have been quarrelsome with each other all day, and as it becomes even hotter they have made their way to the tree house for coolness, only to find it stifling inside. In the clearing below, Clare throws off her hat, flings herself down under the tree and removes her kid boots and knee socks. The dress and petticoats come next and presently she's stripped down to her drawers. ‘Oh, come on, Emily, take your things off. It's much cooler.'

Emily is tempted. ‘If Miss Jennett comes, there'll be trouble.'

‘I don't care. She won't come anyway. Not if we put a spell on her.' Clare has donned the magic blue beads and holds a handful of stiff grass she has twisted and tied up into a roughly human figure.

‘Clare! You wouldn't dare!'

‘Oh, yes, I would. We can swear on the tree.'

‘Not me.'

‘Don't be a baby. Swear on it! If you put both your hands on the trunk and say what I tell you, something awful is bound to happen to Jennett.'

‘That's wicked. And you don't mean it.'

‘Oh, yes, I do. Well, anyway, something to magic her away, to send her off in a puff of evil smoke. Come here and say it with me. Like this.' Clare stretches out her own arms as far round the rough, scaly trunk as they will go and leans her cheek against it. She begins to chant. ‘I swear by—' There is an ominous rumble of thunder.

‘I don't want to.'

‘Then I'll do it myself. I swear by—'

But Emily has had enough. ‘No!' she shouts, into the sudden heavy silence that has descended over everything. Even the birds have stopped singing. ‘I won't! I hate this old Hecate! There's nothing magic about it – it's just a silly old tree!'

And at that moment lightning splits the sky and the first heavy drops begin to fall. Emily flees, pursued by terror and pelting rain, into the house.

But when Miss Jennett fell down the stairs and twisted her knee, which didn't get better for ages and made her cry a lot, and in the end caused her to leave, she never again questioned Clare's belief in the power of the Hecate tree.

‘Last for ever, that will,' Gifford had said of the tree house. Well, it hadn't lasted forever, any more than Gifford himself had. Fifty years later, the yew was still there, but the little house was no longer lodged in its branches. It was now just a heap of timber, collapsed or blown down by the wind, nothing left of it but rotting, piled-up planks that had been dragged onto the rough ground beyond the spread of the tree's swooping branches and its carpet of dried needles, and tossed into a heap along with the fallen masonry.

Rosie, heaving bricks to one side, tearing out nettles, brambles and tenacious trails of ground ivy, was by now breathless, hot and perspiring with her exertions. She stood back, looking at the wood beneath. ‘We're going to need some paraffin, or petrol. This isn't going to catch light easily. It's damp and rotten underneath the top layer. Ugh.' She threw a few more stray bricks aside and tugged at a stubborn plank. The wood seemed originally to have been laid in a rough pyramid, as if intended for just such a fire, but the weight of the bricks and other debris tossed on top of the wood had flattened it. The plank finally came loose and Rosie staggered back. Then stood, staring, the blood draining from her face.

‘Don't look. Don't look, Lady Fitz—'

But it was too late. A glance had been enough. There was no mistaking what Rosie was staring at. A human skull was a human skull, even when it was stained and yellow and a dandelion thrust itself obscenely out of one eye socket.

Rosie was trying to believe what she had been taught – that snap decisions about people were unreliable, that you shouldn't allow pre-conceived ideas to enter into it – however, she was honest enough to admit her instant antipathy to the detective from London probably had a lot to do with men who had deep-set eyes and black hair that grew in a widow's peak, simply because they reminded her too much of the terrifying illustration of an evil demon in a book she'd had as a child. It was hardly fair to blame him for something he couldn't help.

All the same, she found her hackles rising at the judgmental looks she felt this man, Detective Inspector Novak, was casting around the dear, untidy old Leysmorton library, missing nothing of its shabbiness, and not seeing how unchanging, how
reassuring
that always made it. Even more annoying was his frankly incredulous attitude towards their activities in the clearing, before that gruesome discovery. What had she and Lady Fitzallan actually been doing there? Why had
two ladies
found it necessary to disturb that pile of stones and timber? To clear the ground ready for planting? No? Then what was the purpose, what was the clearing to be used for?

The ‘purpose', Emily replied, fixing him with a look, very Lady Fitzallan, was for nothing more than to get rid of the unsightly rubbish that had accumulated there. She, too, was having problems with Novak's appearance, though for different reasons. He had brought a reminder of the past: Yerevan, and Stepan Saroyan, the young and handsome Armenian whose life Paddy had saved, and who had thereafter seen it as his mission to educate Paddy into the injustices of Armenian politics, bringing untold trouble and also passing on the tuberculosis which had eventually caused Paddy's death.

Unintimidated, Novak left the subject hanging in the air, almost as if he still thought she was hiding some ulterior motive, some knowledge about that macabre . . .
thing
they had unearthed!

Rosie, who was having dreams about that skull, tried to pull herself together. Stop it! Don't imagine aggressive attitudes where none exist. Detective inspectors from Scotland Yard would naturally have a different approach to Sergeant Chinnery from Kingsworth, who was sitting there beside him, his thick neck red above his uniform collar, trying to appear as reassuringly kind as always. He looked as hot and uncomfortable and out of place as he undoubtedly felt – nasty, this, these sorts of things just didn't happen around here, in the peaceful Netherley community, least of all at Leysmorton House! He couldn't conceal that he was manifestly relieved to have outside support, though he still looked as if he wished himself elsewhere.

That went for Rosie, too. There was nothing new to tell – she'd been through it all before. Several times, in fact. Everyone at Leysmorton and Steadings had been agog for details when the grisly discovery had been made – and then she'd had to repeat it all again to successively higher authorities after Grandfather, who had taken charge of the situation as he always did, had reported it. Firstly, she'd had to tell it to Constable Pickles, Netherley's only representative of the police force, then to his superior, Sergeant Chinnery at Kingsworth, who had bicycled over to question them himself, and now to this detective inspector from Scotland Yard. When really there was nothing more than the simple facts of how she'd begun to clear the heap of debris until . . .

She swallowed as the image of the grinning skull swam before her eyes yet again, despising herself for feeling so squeamish about it. It was horrible, and macabre, but she was mortified to find she couldn't take it in her stride. ‘It's a joke, isn't it?' she'd whispered when the thing had come to light, though an icy trickle was running down her spine. ‘Someone put it there as a joke.' Skulls were objects of grisly comedy, and some person with a perverted sense of humour must have decided to give whoever found it a shock – always presuming they had known that disgusting pile of rotting timbers was likely to be dug up in the foreseeable future.

‘I shouldn't think it's any form of joke, Rosie, dear.' Lady Fitzallan, her voice not quite as steady as usual, had put a supportive arm around her and said they must leave things as they had been found, and not attempt to cover up the grinning obscenity. And of course the skull was no joke, no theatrical prop, either; it was real, and what was more, it was attached to a body – or the skeleton of one. The police had to be informed, and very soon they were swarming all over the place. The situation had evidently been serious enough to warrant the chief constable, a long-standing friend of Hugh's, making a request for the investigation to be taken over by Scotland Yard, although from her grandfather's rather wry comments, Rosie conjectured that their presence might have more to do with the status of Leysmorton House and its owner than any shortage of local resources, as the chief constable had claimed.

Whether that was true or not, this un-English-looking detective inspector – he had given his name as Adam Novak, though he had a London accent – was now in charge and had asked to see them all; those who lived at Steadings as well as those here at Leysmorton. The only one missing was her father, who had already left for Clerkenwell before Novak arrived. So here they were, her mother and her grandfather, as well as herself and Lady Fitzallan, and of course Dirk and Marta – Dirk wearing those bottle-bottomed specs he was supposed to wear all the time, but didn't. Because of course, looking like a goggle-eyed insect wouldn't suit the handsome, romantic Dirk Stronglove image.

He might have been forced to wear them today because he had one of his bad headaches. Marta, sitting on the edge of her seat as though she couldn't wait to get back to her potions and jams, kept throwing anxious glances at him. She did this all the time nowadays, which Rosie thought must be very irritating. But then, most people found poor, well-meaning Marta Heeren irritating. Like now, when she had on a bilious green cardigan that she hugged around herself as though she was cold, on a day so hot even the breeze coming through the open French windows hardly made a stir of difference to the room's stuffiness.

‘Thank you for agreeing to come here all together,' Novak had begun. ‘It will save time initially, though I may want to see you individually afterwards. I won't keep you long.'

And indeed, his questions were brisk and to the point. Perhaps he wanted to get it over with as much as they did. Firstly, Leysmorton House and its occupancy over the last few years. ‘I understand there have been quite a few changes, one way and another. You are the house's owner, Lady Fitzallan?'

‘Yes, although I've lived abroad for many years.'

‘But as I understand it, the house hasn't been left empty – it was always occupied during that time?'

‘More or less.'

‘We shall need details of anyone who has lived here.'

‘Which means me and my sister – for most of that time,' Dirk put in impatiently. ‘We were brought up here, and my cousin – Lady Fitzallan – allowed us to stay on until we moved to London.'

‘It was then leased to a Mr and Mrs Beresford for a short time,' Emily said, ‘while they looked around for a permanent home of their own, or so I believe. I can't tell you anything more about them, I'm afraid.'

‘I got to know them a little while they lived here,' Hugh offered. ‘Mrs Beresford had been recommended country air because she'd been very ill, with lung trouble. They weren't here long, six months or so. Rupert – her husband – was a captain in the volunteer reserve and was called up. Tried to get exemption, because of his wife's illness, but it didn't wash. He was one of the first casualties, poor fellow. His wife gave up the lease immediately afterwards and left, and I'm afraid she too died shortly after.'

‘You didn't decide to come back here to live when they left, Mr Heeren?'

‘Since I'd moved to London in the first place for convenience, there would have been no reason to return,' Stronglove answered shortly. ‘In any case, by then I was in the army, too, and my sister was driving an ambulance.' The spectacles he constantly fiddled with went on again. A nervous tic, or when the conversation became difficult? ‘By the way, I prefer to be known by the name I gave you, my professional name, Stronglove.'

‘As you wish – Mr Stronglove,' Novak replied, after a slight pause. His own mixed Middle European and French ancestry, though by now far back enough to have been almost forgotten, made him well aware of this sensitivity about foreign names. It was not one he had much patience with. ‘So – after the departure of Mrs – er –' He consulted his notes. ‘– of Mrs Beresford, the house was left unoccupied?'

‘No. It became a convalescent home. The number of casualties was making the need for hospital accommodation urgent and the army moved in immediately,' Emily said. ‘I suppose I could find the exact dates, if you need them.'

Novak waved a hand. ‘No need to trouble yourself. There'll be official records.' He paused. ‘Before we go any further, I think you should know the results of the initial examination the experts have carried out on the body. He appears to have been there for some time – we can't be certain yet how long, but for the moment we're going along with the probability of eight years or less.'

‘He?' repeated Hugh.

‘Yes, Mr Markham. It was the body of a man.' He turned to look at Lady Fitzallan as a small, almost imperceptible sound escaped her.

Emily closed her eyes for a moment as the room swam.
Well,
said Clare's voice mockingly in her head,
you didn't really think that skeleton was mine, did you?

No, of course she hadn't thought it was Clare. Or rather, she hadn't allowed herself to think at all since that moment when Rosie had unearthed the skull. Her mind had been blank with shock and dread. Otherwise, she might indeed have had to admit the unthinkable . . . that the skeleton lying there might be Clare's. And if so, that she had not suffered a natural death. Because what other reason could there have been for concealing a body under a pile of debris, and weighting it with bricks from the wall?