Flavia de Luce 1 - The Sweetness At The Bottom Of The Pie (22 page)

"'Explain yourself, Bonepenny,' he demanded.

"'I—I can't, sir. It must have burned up. It was supposed to be switched, you see, but I must have. I don't. I can't.'

"And he burst into tears.

"'Go to bed, boy!' Dr. Kissing shouted. 'Leave this house and go to bed!'

"It was the first time any of us had ever heard him raise his voice above the level of pleasant conversation, and it shook us to the core.

"I glanced over at Bob Stanley and noticed that he was rocking back and forth on his toes, staring at the floor as unconcernedly as if he were waiting for a tram.

"Bony stood up and walked slowly across the room towards me. His eyes were rimmed with red as he reached out and took my hand. He gave it a flaccid shake, but it was a gesture I found myself unable to return.

"'I'm sorry, Jacko,' he said, as if I, and not Bob Stanley, were his confederate.

"I could not look him in the eye. I turned my head away until I knew that he was no longer near me.

"When Bony had slunk from the room, looking back over his shoulder, his face bloodless, Mr. Twining tried to apologize to the headmaster, but that seemed only to make matters worse.

"'Perhaps I should ring up his parents, sir,' he said.

"'Parents? No, Mr. Twining. I think it is not the parents who should be brought in.'

"Mr. Twining stood in the middle of the room wringing his hands. God knows what thoughts were racing through the poor man's mind. I can't even remember my own.

"The next morning was Monday. I was crossing the quad, tacking into the stiff breeze with Simpkins, who was prattling on about the Ulster Avenger. The word had spread like wildfire and everywhere one looked knots of boys stood with their heads together, hands waving excitedly as they swapped the latest—and almost entirely false—rumors.

"When we were about fifty yards from Anson House, someone shouted, 'Look! Up there! On the tower! It's Mr. Twining!'

"I looked up to see the poor soul on the roof of the bell tower. He was clinging to the parapet like a tattered bat, his gown snapping in the wind. A beam of sunlight broke through between the flying clouds like a theatrical spotlight, illuminating him from behind. His whole body seemed to be aglow, and the hair sticking out from beneath his cap resembled a disk of beaten copper in the rising sun like the halo of a saint in an illuminated manuscript.

"'Careful, sir,' Simpkins shouted. 'The tiles are in shocking shape!'

"Mr. Twining looked down at his feet, as if awakening from a dream, as if bemused to find himself suddenly transported eighty feet into the air. He glanced down at the tiles and for a moment was perfectly still.

"And then he drew himself up to his full stature, holding on only with his fingertips. He raised his right arm in the Roman salute, his gown fluttering about him like the toga of some ancient Caesar on the ramparts.

"'Vale!' he shouted. Farewell.

"For a moment, I thought he had stepped back from the parapet. Perhaps he had changed his mind; perhaps the sun behind him dazzled my eyes. But then he was in the air, tumbling. One of the boys later told a newspaper reporter that he looked like an angel falling from Heaven, but he did not. He plummeted straight down to the ground like a stone in a sock. There is no more pleasant way of describing it.”

Father paused for a long while, as if words failed him. I held my breath.

“The sound his body made when it hit the cobbles,” he said at last, "has haunted my dreams from that day to this. I've seen and heard things in the war, but nothing like this. Nothing like this at all.

“He was a dear man and we murdered him. Horace Bonepenny and I murdered him as surely as if we had flung him from the tower with our own hands.”

“No!” I said, reaching out and touching Father's hand. “It was nothing to do with you!”

“Ah, but it was, Flavia.”

“No!” I repeated, although I was a little taken aback by my own boldness. Was I actually talking to Father like this? “It was nothing to do with you. Horace Bonepenny destroyed the Ulster Avenger!”

Father smiled a sad smile. “No, he didn't, my dear. You see, when I got back to my study that Sunday night and removed my jacket, I found an oddly sticky spot on my shirt cuff. I knew instantly what it was: While joining hands to form his distracting prayer circle, Bony had pushed his forefinger inside the sleeve of my jacket and stuck the Ulster Avenger to my cuff. But why me? Why not Bob Stanley? For a very good reason: If they had searched us all, the stamp would have been found in my sleeve and Bony'd have cried innocence. No wonder they couldn't find it when they turned him inside out!

"Of course, he retrieved the stamp as he shook my hand before leaving. Bony was a master of prestidigitation, remember, and because I had once been his accomplice, it stood to reason that I should have been so again. Who would ever have believed otherwise?”

“No!” I said.

“Yes.” Father smiled. "And now there's little more to tell.

"Although nothing was ever proved against him, Bony did not return to Greyminster after that term. Someone told me he had gone abroad to escape some later unpleasantness, and I can't say I was surprised. Nor was I surprised to hear, years later, that Bob Stanley, after being ejected from medical school, had ended up in America where he had set up a philatelic shop: one of those mail-order companies that place advertisements in the comic papers and sell packets of stamps on approval to adolescent boys. The whole business, though, seems to have been little more than a front for his more sinister dealings with wealthy collectors.

"As for Bony, I didn't see him again for thirty years. And then, just last month, I went up to London to attend an international exhibition of stamps put on by the Royal Philatelic Society. You might remember the occasion. One of the highlights of the show was the public display of a few choice items from our present Majesty the King's collection, including the rare Ulster Avenger: AA—the twin of Dr. Kissing's stamp.

"I gave it little more than a glance; the memories it brought back were not pleasant ones. There were other exhibits I wished to see, and consequently the King's Ulster Avenger occupied no more than a few seconds of my time.

"Just before the exhibit was to close for the day, I was at the far side of the exhibition hall examining a mint sheet to which I thought I might treat myself, when I happened to glance across and catch a glimpse of shocking red hair, hair that could belong to only one person.

"It was Bony, of course. He was holding forth for the benefit of a small crowd of collectors who had gathered in front of the King's stamp. Even as I looked on, the debate became more heated, and it seemed that something Bony had said was agitating one of the curators, who shook his head vehemently as their voices rose.

"I didn't think that Bony had seen me—nor did I want him to.

“It was fortuitous that an old army friend, Jumbo Higginson, happened along at that very moment and dragged me off for a late dinner and a drink. Good old Jumbo. it's not the first instance where he's turned up just in the nick of time.”

Something came over Father's eyes, and I saw that he had vanished down one of those personal rabbit holes which so often engulfed him. I sometimes wondered if I would ever learn to live with his sudden silences. But then, like a jammed clockwork toy that jerks abruptly back to life when it's flicked with a finger, he went on with his story as if there had been no interruption.

"When I opened the newspaper on the train home that night, and read that the King's Ulster Avenger had been switched for a counterfeit—this apparently done in full view of the general public, several irreproachable philatelists, and a pair of security guards—I knew not only who had carried off the theft, but also, at least in general terms, how the thing had been accomplished.

"Then, last Friday, when the jack snipe turned up dead on our doorstep, I knew at once that Bony had been there. ‘Jack Snipe’ was my nickname at Greyminster, ‘Jacko’ for short. The letters at the corner of the Penny Black spelled out his name. It's very complicated.”

“B One Penny H,” I said. “Bonepenny, Horace. At Greyminster, he was called Bony and you were Jacko, for short. Yes, I figured that out quite some time ago.”

Father looked at me as if I were an asp which he was torn between pressing to his breast and flinging out the window. He rubbed his upper lip with his forefinger several times, as if to form an airtight seal, but then went on.

"Even knowing that he was somewhere nearby did not prepare me for the dreadful shock of seeing that white cadaverous face which appeared suddenly from out of the darkness at the window of my study. It was after midnight. I should have refused to speak with him, of course, but he made certain threats.

"He demanded I buy both of the Ulster Avengers from him: the one he had stolen recently and the one he had made to vanish years ago from Dr. Kissing's collection.

"He had it in his head, you see, that I was a wealthy man. 'It's the investment opportunity of a lifetime,' he told me.

"When I replied that I had no money, he threatened to tell the authorities that I had planned the theft of the first Ulster Avenger and commissioned the second. And Bob Stanley would back up his claim. After all, it was I who was the stamp collector, not he.

"And hadn't I been present when both of the stamps were stolen? The devil even hinted that he may have already—may have, mind!—planted the Ulster Avengers somewhere in my collections.

"After our quarrel, I was too upset to go to bed. When Bony had gone, I paced up and down in my study for hours, agonizing, going over and over the situation in my mind. I had always felt responsible in part for Mr. Twining's death. It's a terrible thing to admit, but it's true. It was my silence that led directly to that dear old man's suicide. If only I'd had the intestinal fortitude, as a schoolboy, to voice my suspicions, Bonepenny and Stanley should never have gotten away with it and Mr. Twining would not have been driven to take his own life. You see, Flavia, silence is sometimes the most costly of commodities.

“After a very long time and a great deal of thought, I decided—against everything I believe in—to give in to his blackmail. I would sell my collections, everything I owned, to buy his silence, and I must tell you, Flavia, that I am more ashamed of that decision than anything I have ever done in my life. Anything.”

I wish I had known the right thing to say, but for once my tongue failed me, and I sat there like a mop, not able, even, to look my father in the face.

"Sometime in the small hours—it must have been four o'clock, perhaps, since it was already becoming light outside—I turned out the lamp, with the full intention of walking into the village, rousing Bonepenny from his room at the inn, and agreeing to his demands.

“But something stopped me. I can't explain it, but it's true. I stepped out onto the terrace, but rather than going round to the front of the house to the drive as I had determined to do, I found myself being drawn like a magnet to the coach house.”

So! I thought. It wasn't Father who had gone out through the kitchen door. He had walked from the terrace outside his study, along the outside of the garden wall to the coach house. He had not set foot in the garden. He had not walked past the dying Horace Bonepenny.

“I needed to think,” Father went on, “but I couldn't seem to bring my mind into proper focus.”

“And you got into Harriet's Rolls,” I blurted. Some times I could shoot myself.

Father stared at me with the sad kind of look the worm must give the early bird the instant before its beak snaps shut.

“Yes,” he said softly. "I was tired. The last thing I remember thinking was that once Bony and Bob Stanley found I was a bankrupt, they'd give up the game for someone more promising. Not that I would ever wish this predicament on another.

“And then I must have fallen asleep. I don't know. It doesn't really matter. I was still there when the police found me.”

“A bankrupt?” I said, astonished. I couldn't help myself. “But, Father, you have Buckshaw.”

Father looked at me, his eyes moist: eyes that I had never before seen looking out of his face.

“Buckshaw belonged to Harriet, you see, and when she died, she died intestate. She didn't leave a will. The death duties—well, the death duties shall most likely consume us.”

“But Buckshaw is yours!” I said. “It's been in the family for centuries.”

“No,” Father said sadly. "It is not mine, not mine at all. You see, Harriet was a de Luce before I married her. She was my third cousin. Buckshaw was hers. I have nothing left to invest in the place, not a sou. I am, as I have said, a virtual bankrupt.”

There was a metallic tapping at the door and Inspector Hewitt stepped into the room.

“I'm sorry, Colonel de Luce,” he said. “The Chief Constable, as you are undoubtedly aware, is most particular that the very shadow of the law be observed. I've allowed you as much time as I can and still escape with my skin.”

Father nodded sadly.

“Come along, Flavia,” the Inspector said to me. “I'll take you home.”

“I can't go home yet,” I said. “Someone's pinched my bicycle. I'd like to file a complaint.”

“Your bicycle is in the backseat of my car.”

“You've found it already?” I asked. Hallelujah! Gladys was safe and sound!

“It was never missing,” he said. “I saw you park it out front and had Constable Glossop put it away for safe keeping.”

“So that I couldn't escape?”

Father lifted an eyebrow at this impertinence, but said nothing.

“In part, yes,” Inspector Hewitt said, “but largely because it's still raining buckets outside and it's a long old pedal uphill to Buckshaw.”

I gave Father a silent hug to which, although he remained rigid as an oak, he did not seem to object.

“Try to be a good girl, Flavia,” he said.

Try to be a good girl? Was that all he could think of? It was evident that our submarine had surfaced, its occupants hauled up from the vasty deeps and all the magic left below.

“I'll do my best,” I said, turning away. “I'll do my very best.”