‘Oh, drat it. Drat it. Stuck again, you brute, you.’
Finally, success met these inward industries, and the door, making a creaky and rather doubtful noise, was slowly pulled open. A very old woman with a wrinkled face, humped shoulders and a general arthritic appearance, looked at her visitor. Her face was unwelcoming. It held no sign of fear, merely of distaste for those who came and knocked at the home of an Englishwoman’s castle. She might have been seventy or eighty, but she was still a valiant defender of her home.
‘I dunno what you’ve come about and I –’ she stopped. ‘Why,’ she said, ‘it’s Miss Ariadne. Well I never now! It’s Miss Ariadne.’
‘I think you’re wonderful to know me,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘How are you, Mrs Matcham?’
‘Miss Ariadne! Just think of that now.’
It was, Mrs Ariadne Oliver thought, a long time ago since she had been addressed as Miss Ariadne, but the intonation of the voice, cracked with age though it was, rang a familiar note.
‘Come in, m’dear,’ said the old dame, ‘come in now. You’re lookin’ well, you are. I dunno how many years it is since I’ve seen you. Fifteen at least.’
It was a good deal more than fifteen but Mrs Oliver made no corrections. She came in. Mrs Matcham was shaking hands, her hands were rather unwilling to obey their owner’s orders. She managed to shut the door and, shuffling her feet and limping, entered a small room which was obviously one that was kept for the reception of any likely or unlikely visitors whom Mrs Matcham was prepared to admit to her home. There were large numbers of photographs, some of babies, some of adults. Some in nice leather frames which were slowly drooping but had not quite fallen to pieces yet. One in a silver frame by now rather tarnished, representing a young woman in presentation Court Dress with feathers rising up on her head. Two naval officers, two military gentlemen, some photographs of naked babies sprawling on rugs. There was a sofa and two chairs. As bidden, Mrs Oliver sat in a chair. Mrs Matcham pressed herself down on the sofa and pulled a cushion into the hollow of her back with some difficulty.
‘Well, my dear, fancy seeing you. And you’re still writing your pretty stories, are you?’
‘Yes,’ said Mrs Oliver, assenting to this though with a slight doubt as to how far detective stories and stories of crime and general criminal behaviour could be called ‘pretty stories’. But that, she thought, was very much a habit of Mrs Matcham’s.
‘I’m all alone now,’ said Mrs Matcham. ‘You remember Gracie, my sister? She died last autumn, she did. Cancer it was. They operated but it was too late.’
‘Oh dear, I’m so sorry,’ said Mrs Oliver.
Conversation proceeded for the next ten minutes on the subject of the demise, one by one, of Mrs Matcham’s last remaining relatives.
‘And you’re all right, are you? Doing all right? Got a husband now? Oh now, I remember, he’s dead years ago, isn’t he? And what brings you here, to Little Saltern Minor?’
‘I just happened to be in the neighbourhood,’ said Mrs Oliver, ‘and as I’ve got your address in my little address book with me, I thought I’d just drop in and – well, see how you were and everything.’
‘Ah! And talk about old times, perhaps. Always nice when you can do that, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, indeed,’ said Mrs Oliver, feeling some relief that this particular line had been indicated to her since it was more or less what she had come for. ‘What a lot of photographs you’ve got,’ she said.
‘Ah, I have, an’ that. D’you know, when I was in that Home – silly name it had. Sunset House of Happiness for the Aged, something like that it was called, a year and a quarter I lived there till I couldn’t stand it no more, a nasty lot they were, saying you couldn’t have any of your own things with you. You know, everything had to belong to the Home. I don’t say as it wasn’t comfortable, but you know, I like me own things around me. My photos and my furniture. And then there was ever so nice a lady, came from a Council she did, some society or other, and she told me there was another place where they had homes of their own or something and you could take what you liked with you. And there’s ever such a nice helper as comes in every day to see if you’re all right. Ah, very comfortable I am here. Very comfortable indeed. I’ve got all my own things.’
‘Something from everywhere,’ said Mrs Oliver, looking round.
‘Yes, that table – the brass one – that’s Captain Wilson, he sent me that from Singapore or something like that. And that Benares brass too. That’s nice, isn’t it? That’s a funny thing on the ashtray. That’s Egyptian, that is. It’s a scarabee, or some name like that. You know. Sounds like some kind of scratching disease but it isn’t. No, it’s a sort of beetle and it’s made out of some stone. They call it a precious stone. Bright blue. A lazy – a lavis – a lazy lapin or something like that.’
‘Lapis lazuli,’ said Mrs Oliver.
‘That’s right. That’s what it is. Very nice, that is. That was my archaeological boy what went digging. He sent me that.’
‘All your lovely past,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘Yes, all my boys and girls. Some of them as babies, some of them I had from the month, and the older ones. Some of them when I went to India and that other time when I was in Siam. Yes. That’s Miss Moya in her Court dress. Ah, she was a pretty thing. Divorced two husbands, she has. Yes. Trouble with his lordship, the first one, and then she married one of those pop singers and of course that couldn’t take very well. And then she married someone in California. They had a yacht and went places, I think. Died two or three years ago and only sixty-two. Pity dying so young, you know.’
‘You’ve been to a lot of different parts of the world yourself, haven’t you?’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘India, Hong Kong, then Egypt, and South America, wasn’t it?’
‘Ah yes, I’ve been about a good deal.’
‘I remember,’ said Mrs Oliver, ‘when I was in Malaya, you were with a service family then, weren’t you? A General somebody. Was it – now wait a minute, I can’t remember the name – it wasn’t General and Lady Ravenscroft, was it?’
‘No, no, you’ve got the name wrong. You’re thinking of when I was with the Barnabys. That’s right. You came to stay with them. Remember? You were doing a tour, you were, and you came and stayed with the Barnabys. You were an old friend of hers. He was a Judge.’
‘Ah yes,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘It’s difficult a bit. One gets names mixed up.’
‘Two nice children they had,’ said Mrs Matcham. ‘Of course they went to school in England. The boy went to Harrow and the girl went to Roedean, I think it was, and so I moved on to another family after that. Ah, things have changed nowadays. Not so many amahs, even, as there used to be. Mind you, the amahs used to be a bit of a trouble now and then. I got on with our one very well when I was with the Barnabys, I mean. Who was it you spoke of ? The Ravenscrofts? Well, I remember them. Yes – I forget the name of the place where they lived now. Not far from us. The families were acquainted, you know. Oh yes, it’s a long time ago, but I remember it all. I was still out there with the Barnabys, you know. I stayed on when the children went to school to look after Mrs Barnaby. Look after her things, you know, and mend them and all that. Oh yes, I was there when that awful thing happened. I don’t mean the Barnabys, I mean to the Ravenscrofts. Yes, I shall never forget that. Hearing about it, I mean. Naturally I wasn’t mixed up in it myself, but it was a terrible thing to happen, wasn’t it?’
‘I should think it must have been,’ said Mrs Oliver.
‘It was after you’d gone back to England, a good long time after that, I think. A nice couple they were. Very nice couple and it was a shock to them.’
‘I don’t really remember now,’ said Mrs Oliver.
‘I know. One forgets things. I don’t myself. But they said she’d always been queer, you know. Ever since the time she was a child. Some early story there was. She took a baby out of the pram and threw it in the river. Jealousy, they said. Other people said she wanted the baby to go to heaven and not
wait.’
‘Is it – is it Lady Ravenscroft, you mean?’
‘No, of course I don’t. Ah, you don’t remember as well as I do. It was the sister.’
‘Her sister?’
‘I’m not sure now whether it was her sister or his sister. They said she’d been in a kind of mental place for a long time, you know. Ever since she was about eleven or twelve years old. They kept her there and then they said she was all right again and she came out. And she married someone in the Army. And then there was trouble. And the next thing they heard, I believe, was that she’d been put back again in one of them loony-bin places. They treat you very well, you know. They have a suite, nice rooms and all that. And they used to go and see her, I believe. I mean the General did or his wife. The children were brought up by someone else, I think, because they were afraid-like. However, they said she was all right in the end. So she came back to live with her husband, and then he died or something. Blood pressure I think it was, or heart. Anyway, she was very upset and she came out to stay with her brother or her sister – whichever it was – she seemed quite happy there and everything, and ever so fond of children, she was. It wasn’t the little boy, I think, he was at school. It was the little girl, and another little girl who’d come to play with her that afternoon. Ah well, I can’t remember the details now. It’s so long ago. There was a lot of talk about it. There was some as said, you know, as it wasn’t her at all. They thought it was the amah that had done it, but the amah loved them and she was very, very upset. She wanted to take them away from the house. She said they weren’t safe there, and all sorts of things like that. But of course the others didn’t believe in it and then this came about and I gather they think it must have been whatever her name was – I can’t remember it now. Anyway, there it was.’
‘And what happened to this sister, either of General or Lady Ravenscroft?’
‘Well, I think, you know, as she was taken away by a doctor and put in some place and went back to England, I believe, in the end. I dunno if she went to the same place as before, but she was well looked after somewhere. There was plenty of money, I think, you know. Plenty of money in the husband’s family. Maybe she got all right again. But well, I haven’t thought of it for years. Not till you came here asking me stories about General and Lady Ravenscroft. I wonder where they are now. They must have retired before now, long ago.’
‘Well, it was rather sad,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘Perhaps you read about it in the papers.’
‘Read what?’
‘Well, they bought a house in England and then –’
‘Ah now, it’s coming back to me. I remember reading something about that in the paper. Yes, and thinking then that I knew the name Ravenscroft, but I couldn’t quite remember when and how. They fell over a cliff, didn’t they? Something of that kind.’
‘Yes,’ said Mrs Oliver, ‘something of that kind.’
‘Now look here, dearie, it’s so nice to see you, it is. You must let me give you a cup of tea.’
‘Really,’ said Mrs Oliver, ‘I don’t need any tea. Really, I don’t want it.’
‘Of course you want some tea. If you don’t mind now, come into the kitchen, will you? I mean, I spend most of my time there now. It’s easier to get about there. But I take visitors always into this room because I’m proud of my things , you know. Proud of my thingsand proud of all the children and the others.’
‘I think,’ said Mrs Oliver, ‘that people like you must have had a wonderful life with all the children you’ve looked after.’
‘Yes. I remember when you were a little girl, you liked to listen to the stories I told you. There was one about a tiger, I remember, and one about monkeys – monkeys in a tree.’
‘Yes,’ said Mrs Oliver, ‘I remember those. It was a very long time ago.’
Her mind swept back to herself, a child of six or seven, walking in button boots that were rather too tight on a road in England, and listening to a story of India and Egypt from an attendant Nanny. And this was Nanny. Mrs Matcham was Nanny. She looked round the room as she followed her hostess out. At the pictures of girls, of schoolboys, of children and various middle-aged people, all mainly photographed in their best clothes and sent in nice frames or other things because they hadn’t forgotten Nanny. Because of them, probably, Nanny was having a reasonably comfortable old age with money supplied. Mrs Oliver felt a sudden desire to burst out crying. This was so unlike her that she was able to stop herself by an effort of will. She followed Mrs Matcham to the kitchen. There she produced the offering she had brought.
‘Well, I never! A tin of Tophole Thathams tea. Always my favourite. Fancy you remembering. I can hardly ever get it nowadays. And that’s my favourite tea biscuits. Well, you are a one for never forgetting. What was it they used to call you – those two little boys who came to play – one would call you Lady Elephant and the other one called you Lady Swan. The one who called you Lady Elephant used to sit on your back and you went about the floor on all fours and pretended to have a trunk you picked things up with.’
‘You don’t forget many things, do you, Nanny?’ said Mrs Oliver.
‘Ah,’ said Mrs Matcham. ‘Elephants don’t forget. That’s the old saying.’
Chapter 8
Mrs Oliver at Work
Mrs Oliver entered the premises of Williams & Barnet, a well-appointed chemist’s shop also dealing with various cosmetics. She paused by a kind of dumb waiter containing various types of corn remedies, hesitated by a mountain of rubber sponges, wandered vaguely towards the prescription desk and then came down past the well-displayed aids to beauty as imagined by Elizabeth Arden, Helena Rubinstein, Max Factor and other benefit providers for women’s lives.
She stopped finally near a rather plump girl and enquired for certain lipsticks, then uttered a short cry of surprise.
‘Why, Marlene – it is Marlene isn’t it?’
‘Well, I never. It’s Mrs Oliver. I am pleased to see you. It’s wonderful, isn’t it? All the girls will be very excited when I tell them that you’ve been in to buy things here.’
‘No need to tell them,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘Oh, now I’m sure they’ll be bringing out their autograph books!’
‘I’d rather they didn’t,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘And how are you, Marlene?’
‘Oh, getting along, getting along,’ said Marlene.
‘I didn’t know whether you’d be working here still.’
‘Well, it’s as good as any other place, I think, and they treat you very well here, you know. I had a rise in salary last year and I’m more or less in charge of this cosmetic counter now.’
‘And your mother? Is she well?’
‘Oh yes. Mum will be pleased to hear I’ve met you.’
‘Is she still living in her same house down the – the road past the hospital?’
‘Oh yes, we’re still there. Dad’s not been so well. He’s been in hospital for a while, but Mum keeps along very well indeed. Oh, she will be pleased to hear I’ve seen you. Are you staying here by any chance?’
‘Not really,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘I’m just passing through, as a matter of fact. I’ve been to see an old friend and I wonder now –’ she looked at her wrist-watch. ‘Would your mother be at home now, Marlene? I could just call in and see her. Have a few words before I have to get on.’
‘Oh, do do that,’ said Marlene. ‘She’d be ever so pleased. I’m sorry I can’t leave here and come with you, but I don’t think – well, it wouldn’t be viewed very well. You know I can’t get off for another hour and a half.’
‘Oh well, some other time,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘Anyway, I can’t quite remember – was it number 17 or has it got a name?’
‘It’s called Laurel Cottage.’
‘Oh yes, of course. How stupid of me. Well, nice to have seen you.’
She hurried out plus one unwanted lipstick in her bag, and drove her car down the main street of Chipping Bartram and turned, after passing a garage and a hospital building, down a ra
ther narrow road which had quite pleasant small houses on either side of it.
She left the car outside Laurel Cottage and went in. A thin, energetic woman with grey hair, of about fifty years of age, opened the door and displayed instant signs of recognition.
‘Why, so it’s you, Mrs Oliver. Ah well, now. Not seen you for years and years, I haven’t.’
‘Oh, it’s a very long time.’
‘Well, come in then, come in. Can I make you a nice cup of tea?’
‘I’m afraid not,’ said Mrs Oliver, ‘because I’ve had tea already with a friend, and I’ve got to get back to London. As it happened, I went into the chemist for something I wanted and I saw Marlene there.’
‘Yes, she’s got a very good job there. They think a lot of her in that place. They say she’s got a lot of enterprise.’
‘Well, that’s very nice. And how are you, Mrs Buckle? You look very well. Hardly older than when I saw you last.’
‘Oh, I wouldn’t like to say that. Grey hairs, and I’ve lost a lot of weight.’
‘This seems to be a day when I meet a lot of friends I knew formerly,’ said Mrs Oliver, going into the house and being led into a small, rather over-cluttered sitting-room. ‘I don’t know if you remember Mrs Carstairs – Mrs Julia Carstairs.’
‘Oh, of course I do. Yes, rather. She must be getting on.’
‘Oh yes, she is, really. But we talked over a few old days, you know. In fact, we went as far as talking about that tragedy that occurred. I was in America at the time so I didn’t know much about it. People called Ravenscroft.’
‘Oh, I remember that well.’
‘You worked for them, didn’t you, at one time, Mrs Buckle?’
‘Yes. I used to go in three mornings a week. Very nice people they were. You know, real military lady and gentleman, as you might say. The old school.’