The Lie Tree (33 page)

Even as she said this, a clop and crunch of horse hoofs was audible from outside.

Myrtle let out her breath. ‘At last!’ she said.

As it turned out, it was not Dr Jacklers. It was Dr Jacklers’s apology in paper form. He had been detained attending to Miss Hunter.

It appeared that in the dead of night Miss Hunter had noticed a gaggle of men loitering not far from her home. Although she lived with only an elderly maid for company, Miss Hunter had not felt
under threat, since it was not unusual to see little ragtag groups weaving home slowly after a ratting, or sitting and drinking on the cliff-tops.

After she retired, however, she was awakened by a smash, and a cry of ‘Fire!’ She woke her maid and led her downstairs, where they discovered a haze of brownish smoke drifting from
the rear of the house. Miss Hunter sent her maid to the parsonage to seek help from Clay, while she began moving valuables out of her house and out of the post office next door, starting with the
precious post in her care.

Unexpectedly, she found herself helped by a group of men, who had just been passing and who ran in to move out her furniture and valuables, cloths wrapped around their faces to protect against
the smoke. It was only when she saw them loading some of her trunks and furniture on to barrows, or hoisting them on to their own backs, that it became clear that these were not Good Samaritans.
She had shouted at them, and finally tried to wrest her jewellery case out of the hands of one of her ‘rescuers’. He had shoved her brutally, knocking her backwards. Her head had struck
the corner of the wall, hard enough to render her insensible.

‘We are trying to ascertain whether there is a fracture, or bleeding within the skull,’ read Dr Jacklers’s letter. There was none of his usual enthusiasm for skulls, or
contempt for those of womankind.

Faith thought of the hints she had dropped on the cliff-top. They had seemed so tiny and air-frail. But the two boys must have run straight back to the ratting hut, spreading her rumour among a
gang of men already rowdy and in their cups, and not a mile from Miss Hunter’s house. Faith’s other lies had lit a slow fuse. This lie had thrown a spark straight on to a heap of ready
powder.

The last part of the doctor’s letter Myrtle did not read out aloud. Instead she stood there, quivering in her beautifully tailored dress, a flush stealing its way up past her velvet
choker.

Faith watched her with dread, wondering if her own name was mentioned in it.
It is believed that the attack took place because of scurrilous rumours spread by your daughter while she was
cavorting in a den of blood sports . . .

However, when Myrtle raised her gaze she looked through Faith, not at her, her face clouded and abstracted.

‘The doctor thanks us for helping him with his investigations,’ she said abruptly, ‘and apologizes for troubling us during this painful time. He will try to avoid trespassing
upon our patience any further.’

‘What does that mean?’ asked Faith.

‘It means that we shall not be seeing Dr Jacklers again,’ Myrtle answered, her voice flippant, but heavy with bitterness. ‘He is hauling Miss Hunter from the jaws of death, and
doubtless he believes that this will improve his prospects with her. If she is returned to the world an imbecile, he may even be correct.’

Faith sensed that there was something in the letter that she had not been told. It sounded as if the doctor’s unseemly courtship had come to a sudden end, and she wanted to feel relieved
about that. However, something about her mother’s expression filled her with dread. Myrtle was not belligerent or vociferous, as she might have been if her vanity had been punctured. Instead
her face was stony and deeply tired, and for once she almost looked her age.

Howard was almost crazed with boredom, so Faith took him out into the garden with the family’s old croquet set and pushed hoops into the stubborn earth. The grass was too
long, and the balls bounced wherever they chose. Howard laughed when Faith forgot the score, and when the balls hid in tussocks or burrowed into hollows. After a couple of hours Mrs Vellet brought
out supper for them to eat on the grass, like a picnic.

As they played, Faith walked beside Howard like a sleepwalker, picturing fractures in the skull beneath Miss Hunter’s neat black hair. She imagined the postmistress tossing in delirium, or
reduced to a drooling simpleton.

This is what you wanted,
said a voice in her mind. It was her own thoughts, but she could almost hear it, speaking with her own voice.
You wanted revenge on her, and now you have
it.
And yet this brought Faith no happiness.

‘She might be a murderess,’ Faith said under her breath.

She pressed her hands against the side of her head and forced herself to think. If she had understood her vision rightly, there were two murderers. Miss Hunter was rumoured to be having an
affair with Lambent. Miss Hunter rode out at all times of the day and night. Lambent claimed he had trouble sleeping, which gave him a good excuse to go out at strange hours. They could be meeting
in secret. They might be involved in an ‘intrigue’.

Faith did not know why they might want to kill her father, but Lambent had written to Uncle Miles inviting the Reverend to the Vane, and Miss Hunter had been the family’s enemy from the
start.

You must be ruthless
, said the voice in her head.
You have come too far to turn back.

‘Can we play again?’ asked Howard for the twentieth time, appearing at her side.

‘You must be tired of it by now!’ exclaimed Faith, though she could see from his face that he was not. She envied him. Had she ever been able to play and play the same game without
losing joy in it, or worrying about anything else? Perhaps this knack was something she had lost, or something she had never had.

She looked around her, noticing the dulling of the sky and the fading peach halo in the west. The battered wooden hoops were becoming harder to see against the grass.

‘It is starting to get dark,’ she said aloud. She had not even noticed. ‘This must be the last game, How. I mean it this time.’

‘Are
you
tired?’ asked Howard, then put his head on one side. ‘What’s wrong? Are you bilious?’ His nursemaid Miss Caudle was often bilious, and Howard had
adopted the word.

‘No,’ Faith managed to smile, ‘but . . . I have a headache.’

‘Is the ghost making you ill?’ There was a worried light in Howard’s eye, and Faith wondered how many conversations about Jeanne he had overheard.

‘No, of course not!’ Faith forced herself to smile. ‘You keep the ghost away, remember? By being a good boy and copying out your scripture.’

Howard dropped his gaze, and his hands curled nervously. ‘I couldn’t make it go,’ he whispered. ‘It came back.’

‘No, How—’

‘I
saw
it. Last night.’

Faith halted, and looked down into Howard’s round, earnest eyes. She was gripped by a powerful fancy that, if she looked round suddenly, she would see her father silently watching her. The
thought should have comforted her. Instead she felt a creeping dread. Try as she might, in her mind’s eye she could not make his expression kind or understanding.

‘Where? Where did you see it, How?’

Howard turned and pointed at the glasshouse.

‘It made a light,’ he whispered. ‘I saw it from my window.’

Taking Howard’s hand, Faith slowly approached the glasshouse. It had rained overnight, and the grass was still wet enough to dampen the hems of her skirts. The glasshouse panes were
clouded with moisture. She raised the latch and entered.

Several of the plant pots had been moved slightly. Tiny clods of fresh black earth were scattered here and there. In the centre of the floor, Faith found a small, gluey blob of yellow candle
wax.

Faith’s superstitious fear ebbed, only to be replaced by a far more pragmatic dread. Ghosts were not the only things that walked.

‘What did it look like, How?’ she asked gently. ‘What did you see?’

‘It looked like a man. In a big black coat.’

‘Did you see its face?’

Howard shook his head, and looked a little mulish. ‘It was looking all everywhere. I think it was looking for me, but it didn’t know I was up in the window. And then it went around
the house.’

Faith walked Howard out of the glasshouse and in the direction he had pointed. It led her past a flower bed to the foot of the steps that ran up to her roof garden.

There was a large, earth-laden footprint on one of the steps.

‘Stay there, How.’ Faith walked up the steps. In the garden she found two more faint prints on the stone flags. Here too the pots had been shifted slightly, and the stone children
faced in new directions as if startled into conference. Somebody had been here, in her secret haven. Perhaps their stealthy tread had been pressing the flags while she was asleep mere yards away.
Somebody had been searching, and their search had brought them to her very door.

But they weren’t looking for me.

The realization struck her as she slowly descended the steps. The ‘ghost’ had searched the glasshouse, the flower beds and her roof garden. They were looking for a plant.

At last she understood why a plant was missing from the glasshouse. Somebody had carried away the wrong plant in haste and darkness. Uncle Miles’s determination to gain possession of her
father’s papers and specimens also took on a deeper significance.

Somebody knew about the Tree. Somebody wanted the Tree. Her father had been right to hide it, right to fear that somebody would come for it. Somebody had tried to steal it, had asked Uncle Miles
to acquire it, would stop at nothing to get it.

A Tree that could give you secrets nobody else possessed, and unpeel the mysteries of the world. A Tree that could show governments their enemies’ plans, scientists the secrets of the
ages, journalists the vices of the powerful. It was not just scientifically fascinating. It was valuable. Powerful. Priceless.

Someone might kill for a plant like that.

Faith’s face tingled as she took up the threads of her mystery once more, looking at everything in a new way. The invitation to Vane had brought the Reverend to the island, but it had also
brought the Lie Tree. He could not entrust it to anybody else, and perhaps the murderers had counted on that. All this while, Faith had been poring over her father’s life, trying to work out
who might have been envious, angry, jealous or vengeful enough to kill him. But perhaps he had simply died because he owned a plant that somebody else wanted.

And now . . . it was in
her
possession.

Faith halted at the bottom of the steps. Another thought had struck her, causing her to glance hastily around.

If the murderers were looking for the Tree, then they probably knew of its falsehood-based diet. They might even be looking for strange lies that spread like wildfire. Ghost stories, for
example, or rumours of curiously elusive treasure. And if they tried to trace back the latest gossip about Miss Hunter, sooner or later they might find themselves talking to somebody who remembered
two boys mentioning a conversation with one Faith Sunderly . . .

She remembered her vision, recalled flattening herself to the ground in terror. She was not an all-powerful puppeteer. She was nothing but a paper girl, and could be torn apart if she was
discovered.

‘The ghost
might
be dead,’ said Howard hopefully, curling one hand around hers. ‘I shot it with my gun.’

‘Oh.’ Faith thought of his little wooden gun and tried to sound reassured. ‘Did you?’

‘Yes!’ Howard swung her arm to and fro. ‘
Bang!
Except . . . it didn’t say bang. It said click. But the ghost went away so I think it was shot.’

Click.

Howard’s wooden gun never made any noise.

‘Howard,’ Faith said slowly, ‘which gun did you use to shoot the ghost?’

‘The ghost-killing gun,’ Howard said promptly. ‘The one we found in the woods.’

‘The one we . . .’ Faith lowered her face into her hands. They had searched the dell together, looking for ghost-shooting guns, but she had been too busy staring at wheel ruts to pay
attention to Howard.

Faith, look! Look at this!
He had found something and shouted to her, but she had not looked.

‘Is the gun this big?’ she asked, scarcely daring to breathe. ‘Made of metal, with a yellowish-white handle?’ When Howard nodded, Faith crouched down until their eyes
were level. ‘Howard, listen. That is a
real
gun. A dangerous gun. You need to give it to me!’

‘No!’ Howard released her hand and recoiled a few steps. ‘I need it! I need it for the ghost!’

Faith made a grab for his hand, but Howard turned and fled back to the house. She followed him, but could not find him in the nursery.

‘Is Master Howard ready for his milk?’ asked Mrs Vellet as she passed Faith on the stair.

‘Nearly ready – we are just having a game of hide-and-seek before bed,’ Faith said hastily. If she explained the full story, there would be a full-scale search for Howard, but
the pistol would be found and confiscated. Now more than ever she needed it.

‘Well, it will do him good to wear himself out a little,’ said Mrs Vellet. The housekeeper looked particularly tired and careworn herself.

Faith had already mapped out the house for hiding places, but Howard was small and could fold up into any number of corners. Furthermore, it was getting dark, and there were more shadows to hide
a diminutive, stubborn form.

‘Howard,’ she hissed as she searched, ‘please come out!’

At long last, as Faith was passing through the hall, she heard a muffled sound of movement from the library. She crept over and put her eye to the keyhole.

She could see nothing unusual at first, only a narrow view of the bookcase, illuminated by gentle candlelight. However, she could hear the stealthy grating of drawers being pulled out, a faint
sound like rending cloth, and now and then a low, grinding creak.

Then footsteps approached and a shadow crept up the bookcase. A man came into view. He pulled books out of the case one by one, shaking them as if looking for loose papers, and dropping each as
it disappointed.