Edwardian Candlelight Omnibus (31 page)

“Is anyone
really
that good?” asked Cynthia. She waved her arm and knocked a cream bun on the floor. “Now look what I’ve done,” she said indifferently. “Mucked up the old frump’s carpet. Oh, well… where were we…?”

“You were asking me whether he was any good?” scoffed Cuthbert. “The man’s a genius. Why, Bertie Stuart-Graham hired him for a house party up in Scotland because he wanted revenge on some girl who wouldn’t marry him. This magician chappie drove this girl to a complete nervous breakdown. Lord! How we all laughed when they carted her off.”

Cynthia narrowed her eyes. “If I agree to help you, how can I be sure you won’t tell anyone of my part in it?.”

“You can’t,” said Cuthbert, with a great shrug of his massive shoulders. “But what would it matter anyway? No one blamed Bertie for the girl’s nervous breakdown. Everyone thought it the best joke in years.”

A sudden vision of a quivering, terrified Molly rose before Cynthia’s eyes. She gave Cuthbert a bewitching smile.” And what can I do?” she asked.

“Buy the girls a set of ghost stories. Real creepy ones like Sheridan Le Fanu and things like that. Talk a lot about ghosts. Tune up their minds, so to speak.”

“I’ll do it,” said Cynthia. “And now let’s ring the bell and get out of this gnome-ridden parlor.”

Cuthbert rang the bell. The owner of the tea shop, a thin, faded lady, inappropriately called Mrs. Jolly, answered the summons.

She let out a mouselike squeak of dismay at the sight of the cream bun lying on the smart blue carpet that she had just bought at great expense. While Cuthbert searched for coins to pay the bill, Cynthia held Mrs. Jolly’s eyes with her own. Then she looked down at the cream bun, taking Mrs. Jolly’s gaze with her. Very slowly and deliberately, she raised her little French heel and ground the bun into the carpet.

Mrs. Jolly raised her hands to her face in dismay. The couple went out laughing heartily, and the sound of their laughter still rang in her ears as she bent over her precious rug and began slowly and painfully to remove the mess.

Cuthbert’s home, called Hadding Court, seemed to be filled to overflowing with noisy young guests. Lord Toby Holden escaped into the gardens as often as he could, relishing in the tangled wilderness and having long enjoyable talks with the Postlethwaite’s gardener, who seemed to have turned avoidance of work into a positive art.

As Cuthbert had expected, Lady Fanny had accepted his invitation with delight.

The Maguire sisters gloomily surveyed their new quarters and wondered over Lady Fanny’s raptures.

The furniture in their suite was old and heavy and massive. Ivy blocked most of the view from the windows and a chill smell of damp and dry rot pervaded the whole house.

“It’s like one of those places in those books Cynthia’s been giving us to read,” said Mary in an awed whisper.

“Don’t talk in such a low voice. There’s nothing to be afraid of,” replied Molly in a bracing voice. “I told you not to read those books. You’ve had nothing but nightmare after nightmare. Any minute now you
will
start seeing ghosts. Why don’t you go to your room and lie down before dinner?”

Mary would rather have stayed with her braver sister but did not want to say so. She trailed off reluctantly into her bedroom and without undressing climbed into a massive four-poster and lay staring up at the worn canopy with wide, frightened eyes.

She suddenly became aware that someone or something was watching her. She turned her head and stared across the bedroom and then put a hand to her mouth and made little choking noises of pure fright.

Standing, leaning against the wall, was a thin, cadaverous figure dressed from head to foot in black. He wore a black skullcap on his straggling gray hair and his eyes gleamed like wet stones in the dim light of the room.

Then he spoke. And that was worse than anything. His voice seemed to come from a long, long, way away: “Go back to where you came from. You are not wanted in England.”

Mary found her voice and screamed and screamed and screamed. But when Molly, and practically everyone else in the castle, came rushing in, there was absolutely nothing to be seen. Molly began to wonder if the blow to Mary’s head when she fell off the bicycle had addled her wits. After the others had left, shaking their heads and muttering their disbelief, Molly sat holding her sister’s hand and worrying. Mary had been so definite and her voice was still trembling with fear. At last the shock and the sedative drink that Molly had given her began to take effect and Mary fell asleep.

Long shadows were falling across the unkempt lawns outside. Molly eased her hand free from Mary’s and went softly to her room and sank into an easy chair by the window. Could someone be playing a terrible practical joke? But Molly found that she too had been influenced by the ghost stories she had recently read. She began to feel increasingly nervous. Far away, she could hear the sound of the dressing gong. Time to start the long preparations for dinner. She rose and crossed to the massive dressing table and sat down in front of it. Looking at herself in the mirror, she reached out her hand for her hairbrush, wondering why her maid, Goodge, had not appeared. The hairbrush was not in its usual place and, twisting around, Molly saw it lying on the floor. It must have fallen there when she had dashed to Mary’s aid.

She picked up the brush and turned back to the mirror.

A horrible white graveyard face looked back at her from under a mop of black curls that seemed to be a parody of Molly’s own. The thin white lips opened and a dreadful voice whispered, “Go away. Go back to America or your sister will die.”

Molly fell backward in her fright and landed on the floor. Shaking in every limb, she picked herself up and bravely faced the mirror—and her own white face stared back at her.

With trembling hands she searched the face of the mirror and the back of the mirror and then sat down heavily, feeling all the hopelessness of complete despair and shock. Miss Molly Maguire was very, very frightened indeed.

Earlier that day Mrs. Pomfret put up the heavy shutters on the post office windows. The postmistress had planned to spend her half day resting in bed. She had felt very tired ever since the pageant and was suffering from a nagging pain in the small of her back. But her old friend, Mrs. Jolly, had written to invite her for tea. It would mean a long walk along the country roads in the heat but Meg Jolly’s teas were worth a bit of effort and Meg Jolly’s gossip was always worth listening to.

Mrs. Pomfret climbed upstairs to her small bedroom above the shop and took down her best straw hat. The sunlight shone into the room, highlighting the broken straw. Mrs. Pomfret gave a tired little sigh and wound her best scarf carefully around the crown in such a way as to hide as many of the holes as possible.

Outside the front door of the shop the heat struck her like a wave. People were saying the unnatural weather was all the fault of the government, but Mrs. Pomfret preferred to believe it was some kind of divine punishment for England’s wrongs. Stories of the ill-treatment of the South African prisoners were only now beginning to appear in the newspapers, and what more fitting punishment than that England should be cursed with Africa’s weather? She turned to lock the door and then noticed a round box sitting on the step. It was tied up with broad satin ribbons and had her name on it.

Her thrifty mind already registering that the ribbons would do to refurbish her Sunday dress, Mrs. Pomfret carried the box inside and carefully opened it. There, nestling on a bed of rose-colored tissue paper, lay a hat. And such a hat! It was of biscuit-colored straw, with a smart wide brim. The crown was decorated with artificial flowers, so beautifully made that they looked as if they had just been picked. With trembling hands, Mrs. Pomfret lifted the hat up and looked at the label. Paris!

There was a small note at the bottom of the box. It said, “A very happy Wednesday to Mrs. Pomfret, from Molly and Mary.”

“God bless them,” whispered Mrs. Pomfret, walking over to the mirror. She tossed her well-worn straw into the corner and, with reverent hands, placed the new hat on her head. Mrs. Pomfret no longer saw the lines on her face or the gray in her hair. She felt like a young girl again. The pain in her back seemed to have miraculously disappeared.

With her head held very high and feeling like Queen Alexandra, Mrs. Pomfret took the long road to Mrs. Jolly’s, impervious to the heat or the miles. She seemed to float there under the shadow of that splendid hat.

There was a full half hour’s discussion and wonder about the hat with Mrs. Jolly before both ladies gained enough breath to talk about other things.

“Do you see that faint mark on the carpet?” asked Mrs. Jolly as she refilled the teapot.

Mrs. Pomfret looked down and then exclaimed in dismay, “Oh, your new rug, Meg. Customers are
so
careless!” Mrs. Pomfret was the only customer that day, as it was also Mrs. Jolly’s half day and the
CLOSED
sign swung gently against the door.

“That,” said Mrs. Jolly with dramatic relish, “was done
deliberate
.”

“
No!
”

“Fact. It was that Lady Cynthia who’s staying with Lord and Lady Holden. She was in here with Mr. Postlethwaite and she dropped one of my best cream buns on the floor.” Mrs. Jolly’s voice trembled and her eyes filled with tears. “She—she called me—a—a
frump
.”

“Well, you’re not,” said Mrs. Pomfret gently. “Lady Cynthia always tells lies like that to be unkind. Why, you should hear what she says about my Miss Molly, and Miss Molly is much more beautiful, to my way of thinking, than Lady Cynthia. Do go on. What happened next?”

Mrs. Jolly leaned forward. “She stood up to leave and, while Mr. Postlethwaite was paying the bill, she
ground
the cream bun into my new carpet.”

“Fancy!” cried the postmistress, shocked to the core.

“But that’s not all,” said Mrs. Jolly, beginning to cheer up in front of such an excellent audience. “I’ll tell you what they were planning to do…” And dropping her voice to a whisper, she told Mrs. Pomfret all about the haunting of the Misses Maguire.

“Oh, dear,” said Mrs. Pomfret, her eyes round with horror. “The girls are already at Hadding Court and goodness knows what may be happening to them.” She got resolutely to her feet. “I must go and warn them immediately.”

Lord David eyed Miss Molly Maguire across the dinner table. She was looking unusually white and nervous and her sister, Mary, seemed on the point of collapse. As the long meal went on he began to feel increasingly anxious. The girls usually exuded an atmosphere of excellent health and high spirits. Now Molly’s face was so white it was practically translucent and she started at every sound.

He had been tempted to try out his Regency buck act with Molly and had already drooped his eyelids at her and tried out his mocking laugh, but Molly had only rather testily asked him if he had indigestion.

Cynthia was talking away in his ear, her high affected drawl grating on his nerves. Women used to have nice voices, thought Lord David, remembering his mother. Now all the girls seem to copy their fathers’ accents. And the latest baby talk was the end. “Is Davy cwoss wif ickle Cynthia?” remarked his beloved’s voice. He was about to reply when his eye was caught by a movement outside the window. In the greenish twilight there seemed to be a window box moving up and down.

He looked again. The “window box” resolved itself into a smart hat with the faded and anxious face of the postmistress, Mrs. Pomfret, underneath.

Mrs. Pomfret seemed to be trying to catch Molly’s attention but Molly was staring at the untouched food on her plate. Cynthia was still lisping away, demanding to know whether he were angry with her. “Of course not,” he lied, getting to his feet.

“Where oo going?” asked Cynthia in surprise.

Lord David looked down at her, wondering for the hundredth time what he had ever seen in her. He said, “I am going to that small room—you know, the place that young ladies are not supposed to know about.”

He moved hurriedly from the dining room and made his way through the hall and out into the garden. Mrs. Pomfret nearly jumped out of her skin when she turned and saw David standing behind her. She began to babble.

“Oh, dear, Lord David. I was just trying to catch Miss Maguire’s eye.”

“It must be something very important,” said Lord David.

Mrs. Pomfret looked awkwardly at the ground. “Miss Molly asked me to find her a special kind of silk for her embroidery,” she finally gasped.

“Come now,” said Lord David soothingly, taking her by the arm and leading her away from the dining-room windows. “A lady like you, Mrs. Pomfret, does not come all this way to talk about silks. You must tell me the truth. Something has frightened Miss Molly badly.”

Mrs. Pomfret let out a squeak of distress. “I must tell you then,” she cried. “It has obviously started already.”

Lord David steered her into a summerhouse in the gardens, out of the sight of the windows of the Court.

Straightening her hat with careful fingers, Mrs. Pomfret sat primly down on the edge of a cane chair while Lord David drew up another chair and sat opposite. And Mrs. Pomfret told him everything from the incident of the cream bun to the proposed haunting of Molly.

The windows of the drawing room opened and couples began to move about the terrace, chattering and laughing. “Dinner must be over,” Lord David said. “I must go and tell Miss Molly before she decides to retire to her rooms. Don’t worry, Mrs. Pomfret, everything will be all right.” He gave a sudden infectious grin. “I say, what a stunning hat!” Mrs. Pomfret blushed like a girl and thanked him.

Then she got up to leave. “I am going to be cowardly, my lord, and slip away. I do not wish to make an enemy of Lady Cynthia. She could do me quite a lot of damage in the town. I am sorry to have to speak so about your fiancée, but my loyalties lie with Miss Maguire and her sister.”

Lord David bit his lip in vexation. He longed to say that Cynthia no longer meant anything to him, but the evening had already been complicated enough.