The Irish Manor House Murder (17 page)

But the hand. He was left-handed, guiding the car negligently. His hand, then the wrist, and between the hand and the sleeve of his gray-green sweater, on his wrist, the watch. The watch he’d lost in the woods that fatal afternoon of the knitting needle death of Dr. Ashenden.

Torrey stirred and lifted her head from his shoulder. Her neck was stiff. She rubbed it. “I see you found your watch.”

“Awake, are you? My watch? I never lost it.”

“But, remember —”

“A lie. I couldn’t trust you then. I couldn’t trust anybody. I said I’d lost my watch, an excuse so I could secretly meet Rowena in the gully. The gully where she lost the notebook the Gardai found that next day.”

“
You?
Meet with
Rowena?
” She turned to stare at him. Her head began to ache.

Jasper said, “I couldn’t tell you before. It goes like this: I’ve a good friend, Flann. He’s gotten involved in a political — a bit of trouble. In certain confidential quarters it’s known that he’s also involved with Rowena. He —”

“With
Rowena?
Rowena
Keegan?
”

“They’re lovers. Planning to marry. After this political … uh, situation is over. Once he gets clear and can safely return.”

It was too stunning to take in. Rowena’s lover. Rowena had a lover. Flann. Flann something.

“What’s he like, this Flann?”

“Trinity College. With ideals, but not a firebrand. His heaven is more a small manor house, a loving wife who was formerly Rowena Keegan, a pack of kids, and running a local liberal paper. Plus a horse or two.”

“Sounds … a gem.” Did this gem, Flann, know that Rowena was pregnant? And planning an abortion?

Moreover, if he was a gem, why was he in hiding from the law? And what did Jasper mean by “can safely return”?

“So, this Flann, return from where? How are
you
involved?”

“We keep in touch, Flann and I. When he learned I was going through Ballynagh, he asked me to let Rowena know he was still safe, and where, and when he’d return. But we’re known in those same certain quarters to be friends, Flann and I. A phone conversation wasn’t safe; it could be bugged. So we met in the gully.”

Ahead, to the left, the lights of the Duggans’ farmhouse, it was seven-thirty and full dark. In a few minutes they’d reach the break in the hedge; the groundsman’s cottage was only a few yards the other side of the hedge. “Leek and garlic soup,” Jasper said. “Mashed sweet potatoes, mint peas, and sausages. All on the stove, only needing heating. I’ll park the Jag in Ballynagh. Back in twenty minutes.”

“About Flann, return from where?” She felt obstinate.

“The price of petrol is going up,” Jasper said, “and wasn’t that ever the way of the world?” He kissed her on the nose and reached across her and unlatched the door. “Out. Out.”

48

Torrey wormed the Danish ring from the tight front pocket of her jeans. “Here. And thanks so much, Caroline.”

Caroline took the ring and looked up at Torrey who hadn’t even sat down but stood beside the breakfast table at Ashenden Manor looking so … well, so in
tense.
Her black-fringed gray eyes were strained, as though she hadn’t slept. For another thing, Torrey’s rust-colored sweater was on inside out, all the seams showing, as though she’d dressed inattentively, her mind elsewhere. And on her dark hair she wore, like a headband, a kerchief, orange and turquoise, with a design of blue peacocks. A Chinese-looking thing. Incongruous. But then, there were quite a few things that Ms. Torrey Tunet didn’t care a fig about.

Caroline pensively turned the Danish ring over and over. Lovely, intricate design. “What did he think of it? The craftsmanship.”

“What? Who?”

“Jasper. Your friend, Jasper O’Mara. You thought he’d be interested in the Danish craftsmanship.” She waited.

“Jasper. Oh, yes. Admirable, he thought, remarkably … Caroline, I want to ask you something.” And now Torrey did sit down.

Caroline said, “Do. And have some tea. You look a bit chilled.” She poured a cup of tea. “And the toast’s still warm.”

“Thanks. Think back, will you, Caroline?” Torrey’s face was serious. “The night before Rowena ran down —
accidentally
ran down — her grandfather in the meadow, were they friendly?”

“Of course! As always. And of course it was an accident. It couldn’t have been otherwise.”

“Yes, certainly. I just —”

“The night before, they had a whiskey nightcap before bed, in the library. They always did that. Just the two of them, Rowena and my father. Scott didn’t get on with his grandfather; neither did Mark. I went to bed after dinner, as usual, to read for a couple of hours or knit and watch television. Why? Does that answer your —”

“And the next morning? Rowena and her grandfather? Still … friends?”

“Torrey, really! Of course! Why ever not?”

“I
mean,
what I’m trying to get at, Caroline — were they still friends right up to the time your father left for Dublin that morning? That’s what I’m asking.”

Caroline sighed. How was this helping Rowena? Impossible. She gazed at Torrey in the inside-out sweater. “Yes, friends. Right up to the time he left for Dublin. I was going out to the kitchen garden behind the stable, and I heard them talking horses. Chatting, laughing. On my way back, I saw Rowena kiss him good-bye. As always.” She waited, then said triumphantly, “So you see! No enmity at all!”

But Torrey persisted. “That would’ve been about what time?”

“About…” Caroline thought. “It was a Friday. My father’s short day, end of the week. Not medical. Business. Accounts and such. Lunch at the Shelbourne or Merrion. He left here about ten that morning as usual. He was always back by three.” She waited, looking at Torrey, feeling helpless. She seemed to see not Torrey Tunet but her Rowena growing smaller and smaller in the distance, a dwindling, lost figure.

Torrey stood up. To Caroline’s surprise, she now looked remarkably wide awake. Her eyes were bright, and there was a flush of color on her cheeks.

“I’m off.” She gave Caroline something that was rather like a military salute, and was out the door.

49

Jennie O’Shea was deadheading the geraniums in the big concrete pot beside the stable door. The pot of geraniums had been Ms. Rowena’s idea, to dress up the stables. End of October, cold weather, this would be the last of the geraniums. Jennie liked deadheading: bend and snap, bend and snap, breaking off right at that knobby part, no twisting or tearing, and not having to bring scissors or a knife from the kitchen. Only thing, that bastard stallion, Thor, always lunging off to the side and taking a bite out of the geraniums. But no more. Dead as a doornail, knitting needle in his behind. Now there was only Sweet William, the bay, Ms. Rowena’s three-year-old. His coat was like brown satin — she wouldn’t mind having hair like that, gleaming like brown satin, not like her own black dull hair, though at least curly, curlier than Rose’s over at Castle Moore.

Jennie straightened, holding the plastic dish with the withered geraniums to be got rid of, and said “Oh!” for there was Ms. Tunet not five feet away, and Jennie hadn’t heard a thing.

“Sorry, Jennie, did I startle you?” Ms. Tunet said. She was wearing some fancy-looking scarf tied around her head, pretty colors, mostly turquoise.

“Oh, that’s all right, I was just —” Jennie shook the plastic dish.

“I was looking for you,” Ms. Tunet said. “I wanted to ask you. You know Ms. Rowena and I are friends, so I’m sort of trying to, well,
figure
out some things. Maybe in some minor way, to help her. So there won’t be any, uh, miscarriage of justice. You see?”

“Oh, yes! I do!” She liked Ms. Rowena so much. It was all so scary. She and Rose were on the telephone every morning with each bit of news; it looked worse and worse for Ms. Rowena.

“I was wondering, Jennie,” Ms. Tunet said. “That Friday. The Friday that Ms. Rowena rode the stallion into the meadow? And accidentally might’ve killed Dr. Ashenden? That morning. Were you here, Jennie?”

“Oh, yes.
Tuesday’s
my day off, Ms. Tunet.”

“Well, let’s see.” Ms. Tunet smiled at her. “That Friday morning. Have I got it straight, that Dr. Ashenden left about ten o’clock that morning for Dublin?”

Jennie could smell the sharp, acrid aroma of dead geraniums in the plastic bowl. “Yes, he always did, Fridays.” A waste of petrol, spending such a short day in Dublin, but Dr. Ashenden was rich; he could spend his money any old way he liked.

“Uh-huh,” Ms. Tunet said, “What happened then?”

Jennie was puzzled. “Nothing
happened,
that I can exactly — well, Ms. Rowena went up to her bedroom to study. I made them soup and sandwiches for lunch. They eat dinner at night.”

“Them?” Ms. Tunet said. She looked very intense, her eyes almost squinting.

“I mean Ms. Rowena and her brother Scott and her mother. Of course Dr. Temple was at his office in Dublin, it being a weekday. After lunch, Ms. Temple went to lie down; her neck or back was out. Sometimes she doesn’t come down until maybe three o’clock. Even later. Reading and such. Napping.”

“So … let’s see,” Ms. Tunet said. “So after lunch, well, what I’m asking is, just before Ms. Rowena left the house and went down to O’Malley’s and got drunk, and then
supposedly
tried to ride down her grandfather in the meadow … well, what I’m saying is, did anything happen to upset Ms. Rowena? that you know of?”

Jennie started to get that creepy-crawly feeling she’d had when she’d told Rose on the telephone about it. But it wasn’t exactly related, so she’d thought better not get involved, what with her holiday coming up and all.

“Anything particular?” Ms. Tunet asked.

“Particular? Not particular, I wouldn’t say particular.” She felt funny, because now that she was thinking of it again, it began to swell up, seemed to get bigger and bigger. It was like she was beginning to see it through a magnifying glass. “Not particular.” In her hands the bowl trembled.

“What?” Ms. Tunet said. Then again, louder, “
What,
Jennie?”

“Oh, Ms. Tunet! Nothing much.” But maybe it wasn’t nothing much. Uneasy guilt rode her shoulder. “Just … it was after lunch, maybe half past one o’clock.” Now that she’d started, it wasn’t so bad. “I’d cleared the dishes and all. I heard Jimmy Hogan — he’s the postman — ring his bicycle bell, and I went out through the hall and got the post. I came back in and I was walking past the library. It was all so peaceful. I could hear Ms. Rowena and Scott talking in the library, having a chat, I guess. Then all of a sudden, I heard Ms. Rowena give an awful … like a scream. Then she came out of the library. She was walking like a sleepwalker, her eyes staring like they were painted on her face. She went right past me, out the front door.

“Scott went hitching after her. He almost fell down the front steps, calling after her. But she paid no attention.” Jennie stopped. She felt breathless.

“And?” Ms. Tunet said.

“And? They said later she went down to the village to O’Malley’s and got drunk.”

“Did he follow her? Scott?” Ms. Tunet asked.

“No, he just sat down on the bottom step. It must’ve been cold, those granite stones. He sat there rubbing his face. But after a minute he got up and he almost fell over on account of his leg. His little car was in front. He got in and went off. I could see down past the main gate. He went left, toward Dublin.”

Well, now she’d told it, she was relieved. Not that it amounted to anything. And the rest didn’t count. She was getting cold; it was nippy and she had only her cardigan. She could do with a hot cup of tea. She hesitated. She looked off, like checking on the sheep up there on the mountainside. She knew her face was getting red and that Ms. Tunet was seeing her face get red. She had a feeling that Ms. Tunet, having seen it, was going to keep her here until Doomsday until she knew top to bottom about that Friday. Though for her part, she couldn’t see how the rest was related to anything, but separate.

“So then, there you were, standing in the hall, holding the mail,” Ms. Tunet said, like giving her a hard little shove.

“Yes, holding the post, the mail. And I turned around and Dr. Collins was coming from the library. I said ‘Oooff!’ I was a bit startled. Dr. Collins has the run of the house, though. He likes to drop in and maybe spend a few minutes in the sitting room with Mrs. Temple, such a sunny room. She likes to knit in there. Or he goes to sit in the library before the fire in that big wing chair and snoozes, so cozy, so hidden. You’d never know he was there!

“Anyway, there he was, he looked like, well, his
face.
It was all blotchy, and then he just stood, like a store dummy, so still, I got frightened, you hear about heart attacks and strokes and such. I said, ‘Are you all right, Dr. Collins?’ But he just looked at me for a whole minute, like in a trance. Then he said, ‘A little flutter of the heart, Jennie. But I’m fine. I’ll just sit here for a bit.’ And he sat down on a side chair, and I went into the dining room to sort out the letters. That’s all, Ms. Tunet.”

Jennie felt funny, then, the way Ms. Tunet was staring at her as though she’d been struck by a blow. Been hit by something. But all she said was, “Thank you, Jennie. I’m going back inside with you. I want to use the phone.” They went together back to the house, Jennie not saying anything more, except, “You’ve got your sweater on inside out, Ms. Tunet,” and Ms. Tunet looked down at her sweater, surprised.

Sorting the mail in the dining room, Jennie could hear Ms. Tunet on the hall telephone. It was the strangest thing, Ms. Tunet calling Collins Court and saying to Helen Lavery, Dr. Collins’s housekeeper — Helen always took the calls at Collins Court — that there was an emergency, a boy in a tractor accident at the McGinnis farm, and was Dr. Collins there? And then telling Helen Lavery, well, tell Dr. Collins to please come immediately, the boy had crushed his leg. Then there was silence in the hall, and Jennie knew that Ms. Tunet had gone.

50

Helen Lavery was frightened, shaking, crying in her sleep and awakening bewildered, her gray hair long enough to be damp with tears, the way she rolled her head around in bed, must have done, and the bedclothes all tangled up. For days now.