Dandy Gilver and a Deadly Measure of Brimstone (15 page)

Besides, no one would die of fright from this haunting. The librarian had told me the whole story and there was not enough in it to cause a decent shriek never mind a heart attack. The statue – an impressive bronze of a large full-coated and fully horned ram, standing proudly on a soaring stone base (which might have looked like a mountain crag if the mortar between the stones had not been picked for contrast) – had been commissioned by one William Colvin, a prosperous local farmer, in honour of the town where he had prospered. All was well until, after his death, the statue had been moved from the spot he had so carefully chosen to this one and, displeased, he took up residence inside it and manifested his presence by ‘ghostly tapping’. I lifted one side of my hat brim – current fashions worked hard against efficient eavesdropping – edged around one of the four basins set about it and laid my head against the base.

There was silence within. Without, there was laughing. I straightened up and turned to see a pair of housewives, their shawls crossed over their breasts and their full baskets hefted high, giggling at me.

‘Colvin’s ghaist only comes oot at nicht,’ said one.

‘Aye, so does mice,’ said the other. And I nodded, for I agreed. Tapping noises from inside a hollow stone plinth and the hollow bronze sheep above it would always suggest nesting rodents and not unquiet spirits to me.

I looked once again at the pencilled map the librarian had sketched for me. The Devil’s Beef Tub was a fair walk out of town. The well where Yellow Mary lay under the new wee housie was a shorter walk but a stiffer climb, up past the Hydro and around the back of Gallow Hill. Gallow Hill itself I could see looming up to the east and I quite simply was not shod for it. I let my eyes come down the slope to where the Hydro sat, flags flying, windows twinkling, and I was aware of a shift of unease inside me. A house near a church is favoured by villagers, whether for the respectability conferred by such neighbours or for the sanctuary near at hand, should the devil ride, but I always wonder at those cottagers whose gardens abut the graveyard walls, as they often do. Does it ever occur to them as they look with pride at their soaring beans and swelling roots that the rich earth which feeds their crops is fed in its turn? Similarly now, I had to question the placing of a hydro, supposed to offer complete relaxation, in the lee of a gallow hill. Would not exactly those who thought a sulphurous drench would cure their arthritis also believe that the shadow of such a place would disturb their rest? If it came to that, I wondered how many knew that the sulphurous waters themselves came from a well where a Yellow Mary once was found. If she were yellow from the sulphur it suggested she had fallen in and drowned there. If she were yellow from fever then, even if she only lived nearby, it was hardly a testimonial. Or was I getting confused between yellow fever and Typhoid Mary and making more than I should out of nothing? I turned away and surveyed the High Street instead. I was admirably shod for a stroll to a tea shop. Perhaps there was a better way to discover which ghost Mrs Addie had met in the night. Perhaps Regina, who thought it was to the hills and woods that Mrs Addie had gone, would know a little more and could tell me at least which hill or which wood was most likely.

I stopped in my tracks. Of course she knew more, my little round pummelling friend. She must have heard Dr Laidlaw or Dr Ramsay or someone say ‘Gallow Hill’ or ‘the Beef Tub’ or something when they brought the invalid back again. How else could she have a view on the matter at all? I abandoned my plans for tea, thinking that there was bound to be a substantial offering at the Hydro very soon, and retraced my steps up the hill.

I should have to find another way of communing with Regina very soon, I thought as I shrugged out of my clothes again. I wondered if I could discover her afternoon free, if Grant could be made to invite her to tea, and if I could gatecrash their party and grill her.

In the meantime, I settled down on the little velvet-covered bench in the changing cubicle with my robe about me, to listen for the squeak of her rubber-soled shoes on the polished boards. I wanted to speak to her but not enough to brave the heat again. I tucked my feet up and made myself very comfortable, except for a faint rumbling in my middle.

The next thing I knew, I started awake at the sound of a cubicle door banging next to me. My neck, its fictitious crick well cured by Regina only that morning, was actually cricked now and made a horrid clicking sound as I stretched it. I was just about to stand and unknot my back and legs too when I became aware of a whispered conversation drifting over the top of the cubicle wall.

‘Two women, a mother and daughter, Peggy and Lizzie. That’s what she said to me. And that’s what brought me.’

‘They’re common enough names,’ came the reply.

‘And then what I heard myself, you will not believe when I tell you.’

‘Heard from where?’

‘Someone who rang up the offices looking for guidance. Rang up after I’d come down here and they passed it along. He didn’t know what he was saying at all. Hadn’t a clue.’

‘And what was it?’

‘An old woman and a blind child.’ There was a gasp and then a long silence.

‘Truly? A blind child?’

‘A wee boy. And his grandmother.’ This brought another gasp. ‘Both very troubled, a lot of turbulence, a lot of excitement.’

‘Peggy and Lizzie and an old woman and a blind child.’ Her voice had a tone of awe about it now. ‘And how many more?’

‘Ah,’ said the voice. ‘That’s the question. How many more? Eleven or thirteen? Who’s to say?’

‘But what I meant was how many more have been contacted.’

‘Three more so far.’

‘Someone needs to take charge. Someone needs to draw up a list and make sure. We need …’

‘We most certainly do.’ There was a dramatic pause. ‘And he is on his way. He is coming from London today and arrives tonight.’

At that thrilling moment – and it was thrilling even to me who did not have the first clue what the thrill might be – a door opened and the unmistakable sound of Regina advancing could be heard all along the cubicle corridor. The two women in the next cubicle opened the door and began to walk away. I opened my own a crack and put my eye to it, watching them.

Of course, it is hard to tell much when everyone is wearing white towelling robes and has her hair twisted up in a turban. One was short and thin and could, I reckoned, be the slip of a girl with the gooseberry eyes I had met at luncheon – she was Mrs Molyneaux’s friend after all – and the other was taller and broader, older too by the look of her gait. She might have been one of those I had seen arriving, but from what this pair had just said there were ghost hunters descending upon the Hydro from all around. From London!

I watched them until they disappeared through the velvet curtains and then I opened the door wide. When I did, it was to see Regina, standing with a bundle of wet towels in her arms, regarding me with a look composed of three parts politeness and two parts amusement upon her face.

‘Mrs Gilver,’ she said. ‘Back
again
?’

‘Not for more rubbing,’ I said. ‘And not for more heat.’

‘That’s all we do in the Russian and Turkish,’ she said. Perhaps I imagined that her eyes flared with alarm but I did not think so.

‘I simply want to talk to you, my dear,’ I said. She looked down at the bundle of towels in her arms and took a step backwards.

‘I’ve to get these to the laundry,’ she said.

‘I don’t want to make any trouble,’ I assured her. ‘Not for you or for anyone.’

‘It’s about Mrs Addie, isn’t it?’

‘I just want to know where she was,’ I said. ‘Where she went exactly.’

‘Why?’ said Regina. ‘How will that help you?’

‘Witnesses,’ I replied. ‘If someone saw her then there’s proof she was there.’ She started again to back away. Those two words – ‘proof’ and ‘witnesses’ – spoken together had startled her. I left the cubicle and walked beside her, following her right through the staff door and into a bare, distempered corridor.

‘You’re not supposed to be in here,’ she said, miserably.

‘Regina, my dear,’ I said, relentless (I am not proud of myself sometimes), ‘I am sure that Mrs Addie died of a heart attack. I think it was misguided of the Laidlaws to try to spare her relatives’ feelings. They should have told them everything. I’d like to tell them everything and then their minds will be at rest. That’s all. Nothing to worry you. Now, where exactly did she go when she went out?’

‘I don’t know,’ Regina said. ‘I don’t even know when it was – except I know it was that Monday – and I don’t know how she got there.’

‘Walked, I suppose,’ I said, and did not miss the glance she gave me. ‘Very well, let me try another tack. What made you think she’d been in the country and not in the town?’

‘Because of how she was dirty, madam,’ she said. ‘She was like a bairn that’s been playing out.’

‘You saw her?’ I said. I wished that we were sitting at a tea table where I could ply Regina with buns, instead of standing in this draughty dark corridor with a load of damp towels doing their best to make things dreary. If Regina had witnessed the dying Mrs Addie’s return she might well have more to tell me.

‘I suppose you could say that,’ she said. ‘I … saw … her after the doctor was gone. I laid her out. The undertaker would have done it, but Dr Laidlaw wanted us to take care of her. Nicer that way. And Mrs Cronin was out, with it being Monday, and so it fell to me.’

I was working hard not to let my jaw drop open. This girl had actually washed and clothed the body! If there was a mark of violence upon her, Regina would know.

‘And when you laid her out, she was dirty,’ I said.

‘She was. I remember saying to myself, well to Mrs Addie really, the poor lady. I said, “Where have you been then? What have you been up to?” She looked like she’d been out scrambling up and down hills. Dirt under her nails. Dirty knees. She’d had a bit of a wash, like, off the doctor it must have been, when she got home, but she was still grubby. I made her nice as nice, anyway, when she fell to me. I was always fond of Mrs Addie. I was sorry to see her go.’ She broke off at the sound of someone moving in the distance, the squeal of brisk steps in those rubber-soled shoes. I laid a hand on her arm.

‘Regina, if you had to guess: where would someone scramble and slip? The Beef Tub, the well or the Gallow Hill? If you’ve been walking there?’

‘Why would she go to one of those places?’ she said. She was pulling away from me as the footsteps came closer. I glanced towards the turn in the passageway. I only had a minute.

‘To see Yellow Mary or the Reivers or the spirits of the hanged,’ I said. To be fair, I must have seemed like a madwoman suddenly to spout these words, gripping her plump little arm like the ancient mariner, hissing at her in the dark that way. She snatched herself free.

‘Mrs Addie?’ she said. ‘Is that what they’re saying? That she was one of
them
? She was none of the kind! Is that why they’ve come then? She was never!’ And she turned on her heel and sped off as fast as she could, barrelling along the passageway as though Yellow Mary and the Reivers and the spirits of all the hanged were after her. I hurried back to the staff door, opened it and slipped through, with the merest glance behind me as the footsteps grew closer still. Idiot! If I had kept my back turned I would have been just another figure in a white robe and turbanned towel. As it was, Mrs Cronin got a good look at me.

One thing that can be said for scares and alarums is that they take one’s mind off missed meals wonderfully. I had not eaten a bite since my poached egg at breakfast and yet when I climbed back into my clothes again for the third time that day, I did not go straight to the drawing room to wait for tea. I carried on past the doorway, noting that most of the other guests had begun to assemble, and made straight for the telephone in the front hall. It was in a comfortable little kiosk just opposite the door and commanded a moderate amount of privacy. I did not lift the earpiece right away. I needed a moment to marshal my thoughts.

Was
Mrs Addie hunting for ghosts? Regina thought not and Alec would soon be able to add her family’s views on the matter. Very well then, was she out and about on some other errand and happened simply to see one? Why did she return at night? And where did she return to? Did she bring anything back with her? How did Dr Laidlaw happen to follow her there? Only one of these questions had I the least chance of answering.

‘Mrs Bowie,’ I said, when the call had been put through and the servant had summoned her. ‘I am so pleased to be able to have a word with you, but it is actually Mr Osborne I’m hoping to catch.’

‘Oh Mrs Gilver, you missed him!’ said Mrs Bowie. There was no outrage in her voice, no disapproval. I guessed that Alec had managed to ascertain Mrs Addie’s views on the spirit world without offending her daughter to the point of sulking. ‘He was here a good couple of hours but he’s away to catch his train now. He’ll be back with you before much longer.’ I heard her voice grow strained as she twisted her neck, I guessed, to see a clock in the room where she was speaking.

‘Oh, dash it,’ I said. ‘I so much wanted to ask him to raise a few more questions with you than he went away armed with. Our investigation goes on apace, Mrs Bowie, and I have made some pertinent discoveries today.’

‘Can you not just ask me yourself?’ she said, falling neatly into my plan.

‘Well, how very accommodating of you,’ I said. ‘I should not for the world have asked you to hang on a telephone and be interviewed but if you are sure …’

‘For my dear mother’s rest, anything,’ said Mrs Bowie. She would bend over backwards head to heels now that this telephone interview was her own idea. My devious tricks shock me sometimes.

‘We are trying to piece together your mother’s last day,’ I said. ‘And I wondered—’

‘Oh, but dear Mr Osborne thought of that,’ said Mrs Bowie. I noted the adjective with interest. Not only had he not offended the woman; he had made a conquest of her. ‘He said it occurred to him coming up on the train.’