The Murder Room (47 page)

Tally had reached home at last after a tube journey in which there had been no hope of a seat and in which only the crush of bodies had kept her upright. It had been to find Ryan in the sitting-room with his rucksack packed and ready to leave. A note written in capital letters on the back of an envelope lay on the table.

Tally sank into the nearest chair. “No, I don't think you ought to stay, Ryan. I'm sorry it hasn't been comfortable for you. The cottage is so small.”

“That's it!” he said eagerly. “It's everything being so small. But I'll be back. I mean, I'll be coming to work as usual on Monday. I'm staying with the Major.”

Relief was clouded with anxiety. Where, she wondered, was he really going? She said, “And the Major is happy to have you?”

He didn't look at her. He said, “He says it's OK. I mean, it's not for long. I've got plans, y'know.”

“Yes, I'm sure you have, Ryan, but it's winter now. The nights can be terribly cold. You need to have shelter.”

“I've got shelter all right, know what I mean? Don't you worry, Mrs. Tally, I'm OK.” He lugged the heavy pack on to his shoulders and turned to the door.

Tally said, “How will you get home, Ryan? Perhaps, if she's still here, Miss Godby will give you a lift to the tube.”

“I've got my new bike, haven't I? The one the Major bought.” He paused, then said, “Well, I'll be off then. Goodbye, Mrs. Tally. Thanks for having me.”

And then he was gone. Tally was trying to summon enough energy to move when there was a ring at the front door. It was Muriel. She was wearing her coat and was obviously ready to go home. She said, “I've seen to the locking-up; I couldn't wait any longer for you to get back. I saw Ryan cycling down the drive. He'd got his rucksack with him. Is he leaving?”

“Yes, Muriel. He's going back to the Major. It's all right, Muriel. I'm used to being alone. I'm never nervous here.” She repeated, “It's perfectly all right.”

“Miss Caroline won't think so. You ought to phone her and see what she advises. She might want you to stay with her, Tally. Or you could come to me if you're really frightened.”

The offer could not have been less gracious. Tally thought,
She feels she has to make it but she doesn't want me. She could offer to come and stay here, but she won't, not after what happened yesterday.
She thought she could read fear in Muriel's eyes and the realization gave her a small spurt of pleasure; Muriel was more frightened than she.

She said, “It's very good of you, Muriel, but I'm perfectly all right. This is where I live. I've got the window bolts, a double lock on the door, and the phone. I don't feel I'm at risk. Why would anyone want to murder me?”

“Why did they want to murder Dr. Neville or that girl? Whoever it is must be mad. You'd be much better to ring Miss Caroline and ask her to come for you. She could find a bed somewhere in Swathling's.”

Tally thought,
If you're so concerned, why not just insist I pack and go home with you?
But she didn't blame Muriel. Muriel would have thought it all out very carefully. Once Tally moved in with her it could be for weeks, perhaps even for months. There would be no reason for her to go back to the cottage until the murders were solved, and there was no knowing how long that would take. Perhaps they never would be solved. She had a conviction, which she knew was hardly rational but which was too strong to be ignored, that if she left the cottage now she would never return. She could see herself desperately searching for a bed-sitting-room or being given house-room by one of the Dupaynes or by Muriel, a perpetual source of anxiety and irritation to them all. This was her place and she wouldn't allow a murderer to drive her out of it.

Muriel said, “Well, it's your responsibility. I've made the suggestion. I came to give you your keys to the museum. We got them back by two o'clock and I told Sergeant Benton-Smith that I'd hand them over. And I'd better take the cottage keys that you lent to Ryan. They're the only spare set and they belong in the office.”

Tally said, “Oh dear, I'm afraid Ryan forgot to give them back and I didn't think to ask him. But he'll be back on Monday.”

Muriel voiced her usual reprimand, but somehow as if her heart wasn't in it. She had certainly changed since the second murder. She said, “You should never have let him have the keys. He could perfectly well have kept normal hours and relied on you to let him in. If you see him on Monday before I do, make sure you get them from him.”

And then at last she had gone. Tally locked and bolted the door behind her and then moved to a chair before the fire. She felt sick with tiredness. The trauma of discovering Lord Martlesham, her visit to New Scotland Yard, worry about Ryan and now the brief skirmish with Muriel had increased her exhaustion. Perhaps she would have been sensible to have accepted Commander Dalgliesh's offer of a lift home. But gradually the tiredness became almost pleasurable and the peace at the end of the day, which she always felt when sitting alone, returned and calmed her. She indulged in this mood for a moment and then, refreshed, got up and began putting the cottage to rights.

Upstairs Ryan hadn't bothered to strip his bed and the air was fusty. She took the key to the window from the small hook on which it hung and opened the double panes. Sweet autumnal air came in. She stood for a moment savouring it and looking out over the dark void of the Heath before closing and locking the window again. Then she stripped the bed, shoving the sheets and pillowcases into the linen basket. She would wash them tomorrow; tonight she felt she couldn't tolerate the noise of the washing machine. Next she removed Ryan's wet towels from the floor of the bathroom, cleaned the basin and flushed the lavatory. She had a half-guilty feeling that she was washing him away with the mess he had left. Where would he sleep tonight? she wondered. She was tempted to ring the Major and ask whether Ryan was really expected, but Ryan hadn't given her the number, only the Maida Vale address. She could look up the number in the directory, but to telephone would surely be seen as an unforgivable intrusion. Ryan was nearly eighteen, she was neither his grandmother nor his keeper. But the small weight of guilt and responsibility couldn't be lifted. Somehow she had failed the boy, and it had been a failure of tolerance and kindness. The cottage was her sanctuary and her beloved home, but perhaps her solitary life was making her selfish. She remembered how she had felt at Basingstoke. Was that how she had made Ryan feel?

She began to give thought to her supper, but although she hadn't eaten since her picnic lunch she was beyond hunger and was tempted by none of the pre-packed meals stacked in the refrigerator. Instead she made herself a mug of tea, pouring boiling water on to a single teabag, opened a packet of chocolate digestive biscuits and settled at the kitchen table. The sweetness revived her. Afterwards, and almost without conscious thought, she put on her coat and, unlocking the door, walked out into the darkness. This, after all, was how she always ended the day. This evening was no different. She needed that short walk on the Heath, the shimmering vista of London spread beneath her, the cool air on her cheeks, the smell of earth and greenness, a moment of loneliness which was never complete loneliness, of mystery which was without fear or regrets.

Somewhere in that stretch of silence and darkness lonely people might be walking, some in search of sex, companionship, perhaps of love. A hundred and fifty years ago a maidservant in the house had crept down the same path, passed through the same gate, to meet her lover and her appalling death. That mystery had never been solved, and the victim, like the victims of those murderers whose faces looked down from the walls of the Murder Room, had become one of the great army of the amorphous dead. Tally could think of her with transitory pity but her shade had no power to disturb the peace of the night, and it could not make her afraid. She armoured herself with the blessed assurance that she wasn't in thrall to terror, that the horror of the two murders couldn't keep her captive in her cottage or spoil this solitary excursion under the night sky.

It was when she had left the Heath and had closed the gate behind her that, looking up at the black mass of the museum, she saw the light. It shone from the south window of the Murder Room, not brightly as if all the wall lights had been left on, but with a faint diffused glow. She stood for a few seconds regarding it steadfastly, wondering whether it could be some reflection from the lights in the cottage. But that, of course, was impossible. She had left on lights only in her sitting-room and hall and they shone out now through the narrow slits between the drawn curtains. They could have no power to light up any part of the museum. It looked as if only a single light had been left on in the Murder Room, probably one of the reading lamps by the armchairs in front of the fireplace. Perhaps one of the Dupaynes or Mr. Calder-Hale had been in the Murder Room to study some of the documents and had neglected to turn off the reading lamp. Even so, it was surprising that Muriel, on her final checking of the rooms, hadn't noticed that one light.

Tally told herself firmly that there was no need to be afraid and that she should act sensibly. It would be ridiculous to phone Muriel, who must be home by now, or either of the Dupaynes, without checking that there had been a simple mistake. To phone the police would be even more ridiculous. The sensible thing would be to check that the front door was locked and the alarm on. If so, she could be confident that no one was in the museum and that it would be safe to enter. If the door were not locked, she would return to the cottage at once, lock herself in and phone the police.

She went out again, torch in hand, and made her way as silently as possible past the black spars of the burnt saplings to the front of the house. And now no lights were visible; that pale glow could be seen only from the southern and eastern windows. The front door was locked. Making her way in, she switched on the light to the right of the door and moved quickly to silence the bleep of the alarm. After the darkness outside, the hall seemed to blaze with light. She stood for a moment thinking how strange and unfamiliar it suddenly seemed. Like all spaces that are usually filled with human figures, human sounds, human activity, it seemed mysteriously to be waiting. She felt reluctant to move forward, as if to break the silence would release something alien which was not benign. Then that sturdy common sense which had seen her through the last few days reasserted itself. There was nothing here to fear, nothing that was strange or unnatural. She had come for a simple purpose, to switch off a single light. To return to the cottage without moving another step, to go to sleep knowing that the light still burned, would be to give way to fear, to lose—perhaps for ever—the confidence and peace which this place and the cottage had given her for the last eight years.

She moved resolutely across the hall hearing the echo of her feet on the marble and mounted the staircase. The door to the Murder Room was shut but not sealed. The police must have completed their search sooner than they had expected. Perhaps Muriel, still traumatized by the horror of finding Celia's body, hadn't even dared to open the door. It was unlike her, but then Muriel had been unlike herself since that awful discovery in the trunk. She might not admit to being afraid but Tally had seen fear darken Muriel's eyes. It was possible that she had dreaded that final checking of the building, particularly as she had been alone, and had done it less conscientiously than usual.

She pushed open the door and saw at once that she had been right. The reading lamp by the right-hand chair had been left on and there were two closed volumes and what looked like a notebook on the table. Someone had been reading. Moving to the table she saw that it had been Mr. Calder-Hale. The notebook was his; the small almost unreadable writing was in his well-known hand. He must have come to the museum to collect his keys as soon as the police were ready to return them. How had he been able to sit there so calmly working after what had happened?

It was the first time she had been in the Murder Room since the finding of Celia's body, and she knew at once that something was different, something odd, then realized that it was the missing trunk. It must still be in police custody, or perhaps at the forensic science laboratory. It had been such a dominant feature of the room, at once so ordinary and so portentous, that its absence was more ominous than its presence.

She didn't immediately go across to turn out the light, but stood for a full half-minute in the doorway. Photographs were not frightening to her, but then they never had been. Eight years of daily dusting, of locking and unlocking the cabinets, of polishing the glass above the exhibits, had robbed them almost of interest. But now the soft half-light of the room produced a new and unwelcome sensation. She told herself that it wasn't fear, merely unease. She would have to get used to being in the Murder Room; she may as well begin now.

She walked over to an eastern window and looked out into the night. Was this where Celia had stood on that fateful Friday? Was that why she had to die, because she had looked down at the blazing trees and seen a murderer bending down at the tap washing his gloved hands? What had he felt as he'd looked up and seen her there, white face and long yellow hair, the eyes wide with horror? She must have known the implication of what she had seen. So why had she waited for those strong hurrying steps to reach her, those gloved hands to clutch her by the neck? Or had she tried to escape, fumbling ineffectually at the closed door to the flat or rushing downstairs only to fall into her killer's waiting arms? Was that how it happened? She had been told little by Dalgliesh or by his subordinates. She knew that, since the first murder, they had been constantly at the museum, questioning, examining, searching, discussing, but no one knew what was in their minds. Surely it was impossible that two murderers should choose to kill on the same day, at the same time, in the same place. They had to be related. And if they were related, surely Celia had died because of what she had seen.