Death in High Heels (16 page)

Gregory had been in favour of hiring several large cars, one for Bevan, one for Cecil and herself, and one for the girls, but, “No, thanks,” said Bevan, grimly. “I should only need a fat cigar to look like a theatrical manager arriving with the season’s bunch of sweeties, fresh from their triumphs at Monte Carlo. Let them all come along in ones and twos in the best-looking taxis they can find, and I’ll pay their fares; and tell them not to send individual wreaths and things. We don’t want the papers printing the inscriptions and heading them, ‘Farewell Message of a Murderer?’”

“They couldn’t,” said Gregory, literally. “It would be libel.”

“Libel or no libel, I don’t want the girls sending flowers privately, do you hear? I shall order a large wreath from myself and one from them all collectively. Cecil had better send something, too.”

“Won’t that look rather mean—only three wreaths?”

“Will it?
I
don’t know. What a hell of a business this all is. Well, let the workroom send one, and perhaps we could divide up the showroom and send one from the mannequins and one from the salesgirls and yourself. You arrange it somehow—I can’t think any more about it. Do your best for me, like a good girl; if I don’t stop going over and over the thing, I shall be off my head. Damn this bloody publicity—whatever we do will be wrong.”

Mrs. ’Arris was sitting on a chair in Mrs. Carol’s elegant hall when Rachel arrived to call for Judy. “Ow, Miss Rachel, you are late. We thought you was never coming.”

“There’s plenty of time,” said Rachel, coldly. “I’ve got my taxi waiting, Judy.”

They sat down side by side in the cab and Mrs. ’Arris perched herself on one of the small front seats. “Here’s a pair of Mummy’s gloves,” said Judy, handing them over. “She says not to return them—they’re quite old ones.”

Their taxi joined the line of cars waiting at the appointed spot, and then started on the long, slow drive through the London streets. In front of them went Toria and the Dazzler in their small and shabby car; behind them Macaroni sobbed and snivelled and Aileen regarded her with dispassionate disgust. Mrs. ’Arris applied a large black-bordered handkerchief to such tears as she could squeeze out, and Rachel leant back in her corner and closed her eyes. After half an hour, when they had very little further to go, she said suddenly in a low, but perfectly audible voice, “Mrs. ’Arris.”

Mrs. ’Arris continued to stare out of the window with her handkerchief to her nose. She knew that tone of voice very well. There’s none so deaf as them that wants to ’ear what won’t be said in front of them if they
ain’t
deaf, thought Mrs. ’Arris, and many a tit-bit had she learnt at the shop through this purely imaginary failing of hers. “Mrs. ’Arris,” the young ladies would say softly. “Can you ’ear what we’re saying?” was what they meant; she would go on quietly with her work and out would come their secrets—oh, she’d picked up a lot that way, and now what was coming? She gave a tremendous sniff and gazed blankly upon the passing scene.

Rachel looked at her sharply. “I’ve got something to say to you, Judy, and I don’t want another soul to hear it—it’s perfect hell her being here at all, but I can’t wait, so thank goodness she’s deaf.”

“How mysterious you are, Rachel! Do you mean to say that all this business about the gloves was just an excuse?”

“Yes, of course. I’ve got a perfectly good pair at home, but I suddenly realized something this morning while I was dressing and I had to get hold of you at once before you made any—mistakes.”

“What on earth about?”

“About Doon’s death. Judy—you know who killed her, don’t you?”

“Yes,” said Judy, suddenly very still.

“How do you know?”

“I saw you picking up the poison, Rachel, off the floor.”

“I thought you did,” said Rachel, indifferently. “I remember now, looking up and seeing you standing at the door of your room. Now, Judy, what I want to say to you is this. Mr. Charlesworth told the Dazzler something yesterday that was very much to the point: he said that everybody at Christophe’s was safe
until they knew too much
. And you do know too much. So I wanted to warn you, Judy—just as long as there’s a chance of your telling what you know, your own life is in danger. You haven’t got proof, you know, and
I
haven’t admitted anything, have I? Mr. Charlesworth would have to find out a lot more than you can tell him, before he acted—and in the meantime anything could happen to you, couldn’t it, Judy? You hated Doon—I believe sometimes you’d have killed her yourself, if you could. Why should you bother about who actually did? If it’s going to be found out, Charlesworth will find it without any help from you—meanwhile, you do nothing—and I’ll do nothing. Will you promise?”

“I can’t promise,” said Judy, white and shaking. “I wasn’t going to say anything, anyway, but I can’t promise. I’ll think it over.”

“You must promise, Judy. You must swear to do nothing and you must promise never to breathe a word to anyone about what I’ve said to you to-day. Otherwise—you don’t want to die, do you, Judy? As it happens, neither do I. Look, we’re coming to the gates—promise me, swear to me, that you’ll keep quiet; promise me!”

Mrs. ’Arris sniffed and gazed and listened with all her might. Judy promised.

2

It was a dismal day for August, cold and sunless and inclined to rain, but a crowd of sightseers had gathered in the cemetery and the girls had to push their way past them and into the tiny chapel. Charlesworth, from a quiet corner, watched them coming slowly up the path towards him. Rachel and Judy walked stiffly beside each other, in troubled silence; Mrs. ’Arris waddled after them, her best black winter coat belted about her for the occasion, a velvet toque, cast out from Christophe’s, perched back-to-front on her head. Toria looked pale and sad, but her hair was like candlelight under her big black hat. Cecil swept back his forelock with a shaking hand, and minced along with a look of self-conscious grief on his pallid face; Bevan was nervous and ill-at-ease, Macaroni bathed in tears. Only Aileen walked nonchalantly up the path, and might have been a debutante at a garden party, obliged to wear grey on the death of her cousin, the Duke. She caught sight of Charlesworth in his corner and bestowed upon him a gracious, fleeting smile.

The coffin was borne slowly in and placed on its trestles before the marble altar. A clergyman embarked upon a series of singularly inappropriate prayers. The girls stood together in a little group, their lovely heads bent, tears in their eyes; Bevan looked cross, Cecil sniffed and fidgeted, Gregory stared at something she did not see. “She looks pretty grim,” thought Charlesworth, watching her haggard face and the bitter line of her mouth. “What a strange woman she is: I never saw anyone who so obviously took trouble with her clothes, and then looked so damned awful when she had them on.” His attention was caught by a movement at the door of the chapel: “Hallo, who have we here? Pals of Doon’s, I suppose. Snappy-looking piece with the henna and the silver fox; where have I seen her before? What frightful-looking bounders the chaps are; they must be Doon’s old flames. I wish this fellow would stop gassing and let us get out of here.”

“Doon would have laughed like hell if she could have seen all this,” whispered the Dazzler to Victoria, as they filed out to the graveside. “She must be enjoying it like anything, wherever she is. She had a great sense of the ridiculous, hadn’t she? and I’m sure she’d be tickled to death (not a very happy metaphor, my dear!) to see all these chaps making faces at each other across the pews and Cissie’s eye-black running with his emotion.”

“Oh, darling, I’m so glad you suggested that! I’ve been so depressed thinking it was all ghastly and not a bit like Doon; but, of course, you’re quite right—she would simply have loved it! If only it wouldn’t rain; and how muddy and dreadful it is. Rachel looks awful—she was so fond of Doon and I think she’s more upset than she lets on. Talk to me some more, Bobby, I’m sure I shall howl very soon.”

“Don’t do that, for goodness’ sake. That’s just what Charlesworth’s waiting for. One tear and he’ll clap you into prison, without further argument. He’s gazing at Bevan as if he expects him to yell out a confession at any moment.”

“Oh, darling, you don’t really think that’s why he’s here?”

“Of course, why else? He wouldn’t sweat all this way out and risk getting his feet wet and catching pneumonia just out of respect for the dear departed. No, my dear, he’s waiting for someone to get the heebie-jeebies and give themselves away, and by the look on some of these faces I should think he may be lucky.”

A cordon of police kept the crowd at a respectful distance. They threaded their dismal way between marble angels and granite slabs, sad little wooden crosses and fresh mounds of earth, and came to a halt at a yawning square hole, surrounded by wooden boards. The solemn words were spoken and a handful of earth scattered into the grave after the coffin was lowered slowly into the ground. Charlesworth anxiously scanned the faces around him; Victoria, Rachel, and Judy stood together, quiet and still; Gregory was between Bevan and Cecil, all with white faces and downcast eyes; Macaroni and Mrs. ’Arris sobbed in unison. But none of them moved. Only Aileen, standing elegantly aloof at the foot of the grave, grew suddenly pale and sinking to her knees, toppled slowly, gracefully, languid as ever, on to the very edge of the pit, and lay there motionless, with her lovely hair in the mud.

Eight

I
T
certainly was uncompromisingly dull, being companion to old Mrs. Prout. Holly thought she never could have stuck it, if it hadn’t been for the Society people who sometimes came down with Mr. Cecil on Saturday or Sunday afternoons. It was true that they only raved a bit about the garden and made foolish noises at the budgerigars, and went away again, and it always meant a lot more work and fuss; still, it did make a change and one saw all sorts of people—“ladies” and duchesses and sometimes even an actress. Holly went all goofy at the thought of the actress who had once actually laid a hand on her arm and called her Pretty Poppet. The actress called her dog Pretty Poppet and her maid Pretty Poppet, and even her husband Pretty Poppet, on the rare occasions when she spoke to him, but Holly was not to know that, and it had quite altered her ideas about giving notice to Mrs. Prout the very moment the guests had gone. She had flown on the wings of joy to fetch the actress’s handbag—which was what the actress had asked her Pretty Poppet to fetch; and now here was Saturday again, and Mr. Cecil would be down this afternoon and would tell them all about the murder. At least he would tell his mother, Mrs. Prout, about the murder, but it came to very much the same thing since Holly had found out that, by applying her ear to the floor of her bedroom, she could catch every word that was spoken in the sitting-room below. She had made this discovery on the first terrible afternoon when she had heard Mr. Cecil weeping and it had become so absolutely imperative to know what he was weeping about. It was nothing at all really, and she had since realized that Mr. Cecil was always weeping. He wept when a dress went wrong, or when a client was displeased, or when one of his friends let him down; and every time he wept his mother petted him and comforted him and praised him into happiness again. More like a girl, Mr. Cecil; it was his mother’s fault, really, thought Holly, who had never heard of the Oedipus complex and was ignorant of the name of Freud. His father had died during Cecil’s childhood, having, during the eight years of their married life, been such a husband as Mrs. Prout despaired of replacing; and she had settled down in the country to find solace in the constant company of her only child. Mr. Cecil—his name was Mr. Prout, of course, but one could see that that would never have done—lived in a flat in London, so as to be near his work; but he had recently established his mother in the prettiest little eighteenth century cottage imaginable, and he spent his week-ends with her there. Sometimes one of the boy friends came down with him and there would be skippings about in the garden and discussions about the flowers and re-namings of the budgerigars. When he was devoid of other employment, Mr. Cecil always rechristened the budgerigars, and during the short time that Holly had been at Trianon they had already been called “Sweet and Lovely,” “Louis and ’Toinette,” and, best of all to Cecil’s mind, “Sacred and Profane.” “Let me introduce the love-birds—Sacred and Profane Love,” he would say, and the duchesses and the actresses and the “ladies” thought it delicious. “Petit Trianon” was the name of the eighteenth-century cottage; and if the villagers called it, oafishly, the “little ’ouse,” even more simply, “Prout’s,” Cecil was above such petty considerations as the preferences of the local bourgeoisie.

Holly had, of course, read all about the murder in the papers. It only showed how right she had been to stay with Mrs. Prout, where there was the chance of inside information as to such terrific goings-on. She spent a happy afternoon with her ear glued to the bedroom carpet, and nothing but the fact that it was Myrna Loy at the local cinema could have dragged her away from the house. At six o’clock, however, she rose stiffly to her feet and, going down to the kitchen, begged for a surreptitious cup of tea.

“Coo, Miss Holly, I thought you was ’aving your afternoon out!”

“Yes, I am; well, I mean, you know what I mean. Mrs. Prout thinks I am.”

“Yes, she does, and a rare old time her and Mr. Cissel is ’aving in the droring-room. Talking and ’owling and arguing—you ought to ’ave ’eard it.”

“I did,” thought Holly, smiling to herself.

“I couldn’t get ’old of a word, though I don’t mind admitting that I listened for a bit outside the door; I wanted to find out about this ’ere murder, but they didn’t seem to be saying nothink about that—a lot of nonsense about that Mr. Elliot; seems ’e’s gorn orf or some think. I wish I could ’ave ’eard it.”

“You shouldn’t listen at doors, Gladys, it’s very wrong indeed,” said Holly piously, and trotted off down the drive.

A young man of astonishing good looks was bending over a car just outside the gate. He raised his hat as Holly appeared and, straightening himself, said, with a pleasant smile, “Good evening, miss. Would you mind me asking you if you live in that house?”