Crooked House, стр. 26

There was a murmur of voices from the big drawing room. I hesitated but did not go in. I wandered on down the passage and led by some impulse, I pushed open a baize door. The passage beyond was dark but suddenly a door opened showing a big lighted kitchen. In the doorway stood an old woman - a rather bulky old woman.

She had a very clean white apron tied round her ample waist and the moment I saw her I knew that everything was all right. It is the feeling that a good Nannie can always give you. I am thirty-five, but I felt just like a reassured little boy of four.

As far as I knew, Nannie had never seen me, but she said at once:

"It's Mr. Charles, isn't it? Come into the kitchen and let me give you a cup of tea."

It was a big happy feeling kitchen. I sat down by the centre table and Nannie brought me a cup of tea and two sweet biscuits on a plate. I felt more than ever that I was in the nursery again. Everything was all right - and the terrors of the dark room and the unknown were no more with me.

"Miss Sophia will be glad you've come," said Nannie. "She's been getting rather overexcited." She added disapprovingly:

"They're all overexcited."

I looked over my shoulder.

"Where's Josephine? She came in with me."

Nannie made a disapproving clacking noise with her tongue.

"Listening at doors and writing down things in that silly little book she carries about with her," she said. "She ought to have gone to school and had children of her own age to play with. I've said so to Miss Edith and she agrees - but the master would have it that she was best here in her home."

"I suppose he's very fond of her," I said. r "He was, sir. He was fond of them all."

I looked slightly astonished, wondering why Philip's affection for his offspring was put so definitely in the past. Nannie saw my expression and flushing slightly, she ccnrl • "When I said the master, it was old Mr.

Leonides I meant."

Before I could respond to that, the door opened with a rush and Sophia came in.

"Oh Charles," she said, and then quickly:

"Oh Nannie, I'm so glad he's come."

"I know you are, love."

Nannie gathered up a lot of pots and pans and went off into a scullery with them.

She shut the door behind her.

I got up from the table and went over to Sophia. I put my arms round her and held her to me.

"Dearest," I said. "You're trembling.

What is it?"

Sophia said:

"I'm frightened, Charles. I'm frightened."

"I love you," I said. "If I could take you away -"

She drew apart and shook her head.

"No, that's impossible. We've got to see this through. But you know, Charles, I don't like it. I don't like the feeling that someone - someone in this house -someone I see and speak to every day is a cold blooded calculating poisoner…"

And I didn't know how to answer that.

To someone like Sophia one can give no easy meaningless reassurances.

She said: "If only one knew -"

"That must be the worst of it," I agreed.

"You know what really frightens me?" she whispered. "It's that we may never know…"

I could visualise easily what a nightmare that would be… And it seemed to me highly probable that it never might be known who had killed old Leonides.

But it also reminded me of a question I had meant to put to Sophia on a point that had interested me.

"Tell me, Sophia," I said. "How many people in this house knew about the eserine eyedrops - I mean (a) that your grandfather had them, and (b) that they were poisonous and what would be a fatal dose?"

"I see what you're getting at, Charles.

But it won't work. You see, we all knew."

"Well, yes, vaguely, I suppose, but specifically -"

"We knew specifically. We were all up with grandfather one day for coffee after lunch. He liked all the family round him, you know. And his eyes had been giving him a lot of trouble. And Brenda got the eserine to put a drop in each eye and ToseDhine who always asks questions about everything, said 'Why does it say: "Eyedrops - not to be taken" on the bottle? What would happen if you drank all the bottle?5 And grandfather smiled and said: 'IfBrenda were to make a mistake and inject eyedrops into me one day instead of insulin - I suspect I should give a big gasp 5 and go rather blue in the face and then die, because, you see, my heart isn't very strong.' And Josephine said: 'Oo,' and grandfather went on 'So we must be careful that Brenda does not give me an injection of eserine instead of insulin, mustn't we?5 " Sophia paused and then said: "We were all there listening.

You see? We all heard!"

I did see. I had had some faint idea in my mind that just a little specialized knowledge would have been needed. But now it was borne in upon me that old Leonides had actually supplied the blue print for his own murder. The murderer had not had to think out a scheme, or to plan or devise anything. A simple easy method of causing death had been supplied by the victim himself.

I drew a deep breath. Sophia, catching my thought, said: "Yes, it's rather horrible, isn't it?"

"You know, Sophia," I said slowly.

"There's just one thing does strike me."

"Yes?" "That you're right, and that it couldn't have been Brenda. She couldn't do it exactly that way - when you'd all listened - when you'd all remember."

"I don't know about that. She is rather dumb in some ways, you know."

"Not as dumb as all that," I said. "No, it couldn't have been Brenda."

Sophia moved away from me.

"You don't want it to be Brenda, do you?" she asked.

And what could I say? I couldn't - no, I couldn't - say flatly: "Yes, I hope it is Brenda."

Why couldn't I? Just the feeling that Brenda was all alone on one side, and the concentrated animosity of the powerful Leonides family was arrayed against her on the other side? Chivalry? A feeling for the weaker? For the defenceless? I remembered her sitting on the sofa in her expensive rich mourning, the hopelessness in her voice -the fear in her eyes.

Nannie came back rather opportunely from the scullery. I don't know whether she sensed a certain strain between myself and Sophia.

She said disapprovingly:

"Talking murders and such like. Forget about it, that's what I say. Leave it to the police. It's their nasty business, not yours."

"Oh Nannie - don't you realize that someone in this house is a murderer."

"Nonsense, Miss Sophia, I've no patience with you. Isn't the front door open all the time - all the doors open, nothing locked - asking for thieves and burglars."

"But it couldn't have been a burglar, nothing was stolen. Besides why should a burglar come in and poison somebody?"

"I didn't say it was a burglar. Miss Sophia. I only said all the doors were open.

Anyone could have got in. If you ask me it was the Communists."

Nannie nodded her head in a satisfied way.

"Why on earth should Communists want to murder poor grandfather?"

"Well, everyone says that they're at the bottom of everything that goes on. But if it wasn't the Communists, mark my word, it was the Catholics. The Scarlet Woman of Babylon, that's what they are."

With the air of one saying the last word, Nannie disappeared again into the scullery.

Sophia and I laughed.

"A good old Black Protestant," I said.

"Yes, isn't she? Come on, Charles, come into the drawing room. There's a kind of family conclave going on. It was scheduled for this evening - but it's started prematurely."

"I'd better not butt in, Sophia."

"If you're ever going to marry into the family, you'd better see just what it's like when it has the gloves off."

"What's it all about?"

"Roger's affairs. You seem to have been mixed up in them already. But you're crazy to think that Roger would ever have killed grandfather. Why, Roger adored him."

"I didn't really think Roger had. I thought Clemency might have."

"Only because I put it into your head.

But you're wrong there too. I don't think Clemency will mind a bit if Roger loses all his money. I think she'll actually be rather pleased. She's got a queer kind of passion for not having things. Come on."

When Sophia and I entered the drawing room, the voices that were speaking stopped abruptly. Everybody looked at us.

They were all there. Philip sitting in a big crimson brocaded armchair between the -;_^^,,^ \^\y hpantifnl face set in a cold stern mask. He looked like a judge about to pronounce sentence. Roger was astride a big pouf by the fireplace. He had ruffled up his hair between his fingers until it stood up all over his head. His left trouser leg was rucked up and his tie was askew. He looked flushed and argumentative. Clemency sat beyond him, her slight form seemed too slender for the big stuffed chair. She was looking away from the others and seemed to be studying the wall panels with a dispassionate gaze. Edith sat in a grandfather chair, bolt upright. She was knitting with incredible energy, her lips pressed tightly together. The most beautiful thing in the room to look at was Magda and Eustace. They looked like a portrait by Gainsborough. They sat together on the sofa - the dark handsome boy with a sullen expression on his face, and beside him, one arm thrust out along the back of the sofa, sat Magda, the Duchess of Three Gables in a picture gown of taffeta with one small foot in a brocaded slipper thrust out in front of her. \ Philip frowned. V \ "Sophia," he said, "I'm sorry, but we are discussing family matters which are of a private nature."

Miss de Haviland's needles clicked. I prepared to apologise and retreat. Sophia forestalled me. Her voice was clear and determined.

"Charles and I," she said, "hope to get married. I want Charles to be here.55 "And why on earth not?55 cried Roger, springing up from his pouf with explosive energy. "I keep telling you, Philip, there5 s nothing private about this! The whole world is going to know tomorrow or the day after.

Anyway, my dear boy,55 he came and put a friendly hand on my shoulder, "you know all about it. You were there this morning.5' "Do tell me,55 cried Magda, leaning forward. "What is it like at Scotland Yard.