The Skeleton in the Grass (22 page)

“Bloody silly subject for an article. Bloody silly magazine.”

“What right have you to slander my livelihood?” protested Chloe.

“Well,
some
right,” said Sarah. “You won't remember, but years ago, when you were very small, I was your governess for a time.”

An hour later they were in the nearest pub, drinking pink gins, and Chloe was gurgling with pleasure at the encounter.

“You're quite right. It is a bloody silly magazine,” she said. “You should hear what my parents say about it.”

“I can imagine,” Sarah said.

That was the beginning of their renewed friendship.

Now, in 1936, that sunny, irrepressible nature fought against the gloom and tensions of the house, and the feeling of all its inhabitants that they were under siege.

“It's Chan!” she announced, as the visitors got out of the car. “And another boy I don't know. Can I go and let them in!”

“No, Chloe. You know Pinner likes to do that.”

And he did. He felt it was for the credit of the house. Sarah had to admit that much of the hard routine work that the Hallams' servants went in for was entirely their own choice. Chloe sat on the window-seat expectantly, and Sarah stood in the doorway into the hall, watching Bounce at the front entrance.
Flick
went the tail to one side. Then
flick
it went to the other side. Something that could only be described as a half bark. A friend, Bounce thought, but not a very close one. When the family arrived home, or Pinner or Mrs. Munday, the tail went nineteen to the dozen, and he barked continuously with delight.

Chan made an exuberant re-entrance into the house. He was wonderfully more confident with the Hallams now. Dennis came out from the study, and Helen came down from her sitting-room. Helen always looked quite stunning coming down stairs, and Chan kissed her hand (“Goodness, how nice. I don't know when the last time was that I had my hand kissed”). Chan introduced his friend, who was called Geoffrey. Geoffrey was rather overawed by the famous Hallams. He owned the car, but he clearly owned no such prestigious acquaintances. Chan displayed an innocent delight which verged on proprietorship.

“We are doing this little tour of the Oxfordshire villages, and I am saying: ‘Let us call on the Hallams. Just for half
an hour, not to disturb the intellectual activity.' Did you ever see so many books? Did you ever see so fine a specimen of Tudor domestic architecture?”

Geoffrey murmured that he never had.

Mrs. Munday brought in coffee and little sponge cakes newly baked, Elizabeth returned from a ride around the country lanes, and everyone was very jolly. It was like a return to times less fraught. Chan clearly knew nothing, or next to nothing, about the murder. The newspapers had lost interest after a day or two. It was decades before the popular press would seize with Australian whoops of joy on any whiff of scandal connected with someone suspected of being a do-gooder. The
Express
and
Mail
of the day were really not very interested in someone who enjoyed the sort of
éclat
that Dennis Hallam had in intellectual circles. It might have been different if he had had a title.

So Chan talked about anything but the murder.

“And you know your name was coming up two nights ago. Oh—what is happening to my verbs? This is because I am happy. Your name
came
up two nights ago. The students from overseas were invited to the Master's lodge for sherry—very English—and I was boasting to the Master of my friendship with the great and good Hallam family, as I do very often. And the Master, of course, was very impressed, as I meant him to be, and he was saying—he
said
—‘What a pity that Dennis Hallam is a country gentleman. We'd offer him a Fellowship like a shot, but of course he wouldn't take it!' ”

“You're making this up, Chan,” said Dennis, though his face was blushing slightly with pleasure. “I'm no scholar, and the Master of Balliol knows it.”

“You no scholar? You are joking, Mr. Hallam. You are a scholar in every field. A poly—”

“A polly?” queried Helen.

“A polymath. That is the word.”

“I'm afraid jacks of all trades don't get Balliol fellowships,” said Dennis.

“But you are wrong. The Master said there was nothing he would like better. Distinguished alumnus. Fine teacher, he was sure—he has heard you speak many times. Very good influence in the College. But I am saying ‘Why would Mr. Hallam come from his lovely mansion, with his beautiful family, and leave his peace and seclusion and his fine lawns and gardens with tea and cucumber sandwiches with his neighbours for smoky old Oxford with its factories and rowdy young men?' And the Master he was shaking—he
shook
—his head and said he was sure I was right.”

“There are times when Oxford seems a very pleasant memory—” began Dennis, but he was interrupted by a ring at the doorbell. “Oh dear. I think this will be Minchip. He said he'd be coming to see me some time this morning. I've got a very good idea of what he's going to tell me.”

As Dennis slipped out, some of the bloom went out of the party, but if Chan noticed he gave no sign, and he rattled on so happily that his half-hour's visit stretched out to an hour and a half.

 • • • 

“There's never an
end
to an investigation of an unsolved crime,” said Minchip. He was being a little pedantic and policemanly, as if the study induced in him feelings of inferiority. “We don't even talk about it being
shelved
. If any piece of information comes up, say from Sergeant South or from any of the people involved, then the case will be reopened straight away. But I'm afraid I'm being taken off active investigation of it.”

“So the thing hangs round our necks like an albatross for the rest of our lives,” said Dennis bitterly.

“I can see you must feel that,” said Minchip. “It's a blow for me, too.”

Dennis was immediately sympathetic.

“Yes, of course. A blow to your professional pride—I can understand that. I must say when you arrived first, I quite expected you to clear the thing up easily.”

“I don't know that I did, sir. Villages are clannish places, as I'm sure you've found, sir.” Dennis nodded a heartfelt assent. “And the Major is a cunning individual, with long experience of brushes with the police. Not that I'm saying the village is shielding anyone, or that the Major is shielding anyone. I just don't know.”

“The fact that Keene was the one with the gun hasn't helped, I suppose?”

“No, it hasn't, sir. If when I finally got hold of it we had found a fingerprint on it of someone whose print shouldn't have been there, that might have been another matter. But the lads, the Major, the Wadhams—all their prints could have got there in the normal course of events.”

“You mean, you might have felt you were on to something if you'd found one of
our
prints,” said Dennis acutely.

“Maybe, sir. But even then, I don't know how much forrarder I'd have been. You are neighbours of the Wadhams, after all. No, if I felt I was getting somewhere, was within an inch, or even a foot, of coming up with something, I'd plead for more time. But I don't. I've been in every direction: the lads—whether in horseplay, or someone with a grudge against Keene; the Major; the Wadhams, especially that young Simon; yourselves, obviously, sir . . .”

“Yes. I suppose we do have the best motive.”

“You have the best motive
that I know of,
sir. And of course your accounts of what you were doing at the relevant times are not satisfactory as far as providing an alibi is concerned. One can even slip away from games like Sardines and Murder. I was interested for a time in the fact that your daughter went to the party as Orlofsky.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Prince Orlofsky from
Fledermaus,
sir. I'm rather partial to a bit of operetta. A male part, played by a woman. And the Major was convinced that the form which attacked Chris Keene was wearing trousers . . . but in any case, every avenue I've gone up has led to a blank wall. I can't in all conscience tell my Super that I'm getting anywhere. And now apparently there's been a message from Scotland Yard to see whether we can send some men to London to be on standby. Apparently they're expecting large-scale trouble, though heaven knows what kind. I've heard no talk of a strike or anything.”

“Probably ‘The King's Matter,' ” said Dennis.

“The King's matter?” Minchip had pricked up his ears at once.

“The King wants to marry an American woman.”

“American!” Minchip sat back in his chair as if winded, but he soon thought over his reaction. “But there wouldn't be any objection to that, would there, sir? No constitutional objection?”

“Oh no. But the lady happens to have been twice divorced.”

Minchip whistled.

“That puts the lid on it.”

“Yes. Considering the founder of our national church divorced two ladies, and got rid of two more in very nasty circumstances, our Church leaders are surprisingly sniffy on the subject of divorce. I've no doubt if Edward does decide to put the woman before the throne, the present Archbishop will find something sanctimonious to say on the matter.”

“Put the woman . . . You mean he might
resign,
sir? Abdicate?”

“I gather there's a distinct possibility. He wants to get the whole thing over well before the Coronation.”

“Good Lord! Well, you have dumbfounded me! And do I gather, sir, you've known this for some time?”

“Oh yes. Everyone's been talking about it since early summer. My cousin Mostyn Hallam is always burbling on about it behind his hand. I must say I don't see it as the sort of cataclysmic event he apparently envisages. With Spain going up in flames, with a son fighting in the International Brigade, I can only see this as a very minor event.”

Minchip felt reproved for his interest, but he kept his end up.

“Yes. I can see that you would feel like that, sir. I must say to me it seems like the end of an era. And the old King not dead a year.” He got up. “I'll say goodbye, sir. I think I'll go back to headquarters and say I'm willing to be drafted to London. It's not often you get a chance to be in on a piece of history like this.”

Dennis reflected wryly that the end of the investigation was at least bringing joy to somebody.

 • • • 

“Did Chan get off all right?” Dennis asked, as they sat around after lunch, drinking coffee again.

“Oh yes. They were going on to Deddington and Chipping Norton. The other boy seemed nice too.”

“Interesting what Chan said,” Dennis remarked casually. “About what the Master said to him. He was probably just exaggerating casual chit-chat. Pity in a way. It could be that a term or so at Oxford, teaching and writing, might be just what I need at the moment.”

Helen pitched her reply equally casually.

“Why don't you give the Master a ring?”

“I might a bit later on.”

When he left to go to his study they all knew what he was going to do. But he just said:

“Ah well, back to Lawrence of Arabia. Do you know, I'm receiving a strong impression that that young man was untruthful! But I suppose all hell would break loose if I said so.”

He did not go back to Lawrence of Arabia. He came back into the sitting-room a quarter of an hour later, and he had a gleam in his eye for the first time in weeks.

“A great piece of luck. One of the History dons is having to take next term off—he's having an operation in the New Year. The Master has asked me to take his place.”

“Oh, marvellous!” said Helen. “Just what you need.”

“It should be no problem to rent a house.”

“And did he say anything about a Fellowship?”

“Oh, he
did.
” Dennis shuffled from foot to foot, uneasily. “But of course it's out of the question.”

Helen put out her hands to him, and once more drew him down on to the sofa.

“
Why
, Dennis? Why is it impossible? It's what you want, isn't it?”

Dennis nodded.

“When Chan mentioned it, it seemed like . . . like a door opening.”

“Then why not accept, if they make the offer? You'd find the work congenial. We'd both find the people congenial.”

“Dowdy,” said Dennis. “Oxford women are frightfully dowdy.”

“All the better, my darling,” said Helen with a laugh. “A new lease of life for me! And it
is
the ideal place for our peace work, a place in the centre of things, instead of a backwater. It's a place where we'd feel at home, with kindred spirits.”

“Awfully easy to get to London,” put in Elizabeth. “If I'm going to do the Season—”

“
Are
you, darling?” asked Helen, turning to her.

“Yes, I am. Don't frown, Mummy. Coronation Year—it'll be frightfully exciting. I've asked Winifred to take me under her wing.”

“Winifred . . . ?”

“Yes, Mummy. She's terribly kind and not too bright. An ideal combination. And not at all good-looking. I'd hate to have you as my chaperone, Mummy. All the young men would go after you.”

“Well, if you've settled it . . . So you see, darling, there's every reason to go after the Fellowship, if there really
is
a possibility.”

“I don't know,” said Dennis, clearly attracted. “It seems like running away.”

“Running away? What nonsense. We've never much liked being the Squire and his lady, have we? And I dare say we haven't been frightfully good at it. If people want to believe us murderers, staying here and being miserable isn't going to prove them wrong. Oliver can take over Hallam when he's finished with his Finals. It will suit him so well—he's always been good with the locals. And it will be a home for Will when . . . when he comes back. You really must think more positively, Dennis. It's the ideal solution.”