Saturday afternoon
Bea said, ‘No, I don’t understand. The girl seems catatonic. I wondered if she’d taken something—’
‘Yes, of course. I made her take double the usual dose, which will keep her quiet. Please see that she continues to take the pills. It’s most important. For now, let her sleep it off and then give her carbohydrates, plenty of them. If all is well, we should be able to collect her tomorrow morning.’
There was no question of ‘would you’ or ‘could you’ – Mrs Trescott expected to be obeyed.
Bea said, ‘May I ask why—’
‘I must go. There’s so much to be done. Oh, by the way’ – an even sharper note in the cut-glass voice – ‘my chauffeur says there was a man at your house when he delivered Evelina. Who is he? I didn’t know you had a man living with you.’
‘No, I don’t. A friend flew in yesterday, dossed down here overnight, but—’
‘He’s not interested in young girls, then?’
‘No, of course not. Look, I don’t understand why—’
The line went dead. Bea said, ‘I could scream! What’s going on? She says one of her brothers has died of an overdose and another brother said he’d heard him arguing with someone. So now the police are involved and Mrs T thinks it best to get Evelina out of the way. Why? Is it because she might have a fit if she were questioned by the police? Or was she involved in her uncle taking an overdose of whatever it was? Are we harbouring a criminal?’
Bernice stood in the doorway with a mug of hot tea. ‘She’s in trouble with the police?’
Bea flung her arms out. ‘I don’t know! How dare that woman dump her niece on us! Piers, are you with me on this? Ought we to phone the police and say we’ve got Evelina here if they would like to interview her. Only … no, that won’t do. I think she ought to be in hospital.’
Piers rubbed his chin. He hadn’t shaved that morning. He had very designer, very attractive stubble. ‘I haven’t the foggiest.’
Bernice said, ‘Leave it to me.’ She went to sit beside Evelina. She placed the tea in Evelina’s flaccid hands, folding them around the mug. She made her voice soft. ‘Look, you’re quite safe here. Drink up. It’ll make you feel better. Have you eaten today? I can see you got dressed in a hurry. Did you have any breakfast this morning? Perhaps I can get you something to eat when you’ve drunk your tea?’
Evelina’s eyes focused on Bernice, and then went back to staring at nothing.
Bernice gently raised the mug and held it against the girl’s lips. Evelina’s eyelids fluttered, and she gave a little sob. She opened her mouth and drank a few sips. Then she took hold of the mug and drank the lot.
Bea and Piers froze.
Evelina’s eyes focused on Bernice with what that young lady had previously described as dum-dum’s ‘puppy dog’ look.
In the same gentle voice Bernice said, ‘That’s better. Want some more? And perhaps some egg and toast soldiers? You must be hungry.’
Evelina’s mouth twitched into an attempt at a smile. She nodded.
‘Good girl,’ said Bernice, sounding much older than her years. ‘Now, would you like to lie down here while I rustle up some food, or come with me into the kitchen?’
Evelina’s eyes skittered to Bea and Piers, and then went back to Bernice. The puppy dog look was firmly pinned to her face. She pushed back the rug Piers had put around her and got to her feet by inches, pulling herself up by the arm of the settee. Keeping her eyes averted from Piers and Bea, she took Bernice’s outstretched hand and was led out to the kitchen.
Piers and Bea looked at one another.
Piers said, ‘The brat’s growing up.’
Bea pushed her fingers back through her hair. ‘I don’t like this. Ought we to tell the police that we’ve got the girl?’
‘If the death was due to natural causes or an accidental overdose, then we don’t need to do anything, and the Awful Aunt did the right thing in whisking the child away from the scene.’
‘But surely, however fragile she is, if the girl discovered the death then she ought to tell her story to the police? They would make allowances for her, wouldn’t they? And, as she’s underage, she would have an adult present to safeguard her interests.’
‘You’re right. But she’s a poor little sausage, isn’t she? I suppose they fear that even being asked gently what she knows about her uncle’s death might cause her to have a fit.’
Bea was restless. ‘I see that, but I can’t help thinking that we’ve been put in a difficult position. Madam may well have been acting in the child’s best interests by removing her from the scene of the crime, but … I don’t know … was it the right thing to do? The assumption is that we’d hide the child from the police and I don’t understand why it’s necessary to do so. Am I overreacting? What do you think?’
Piers cracked his fingers. Nodded. ‘Agreed. It stinks. You can say the family are protecting the child and yes, they have a point. But the police ought to know where she is in case they need to interview her.’
Bea tried to rationalize her position. ‘We took her in out of common humanity because she was in trouble and we will look after as best we can. I agree she is not in any state to be interviewed in formal circumstances at the moment, but the authorities need to know that she is currently staying with us.’ She hesitated. ‘Perhaps I should warn the Awful Aunt that this is what we think should happen?’
She picked up her phone again. She thought Piers would probably tell her not to warn Mrs Trescott. She rather hoped he would. But he didn’t. Instead, he shut the door so that the girls in the kitchen wouldn’t hear.
Bea tried to get through to Mrs Trescott, but was diverted to voicemail. Pushing herself to feel brave, Bea left a message to say that she did not feel comfortable about the position she was in. She said Evelina seemed to be in deep shock, but if the police wished to interview her, then they should be told where she was to be found.
She clicked off, feeling limp. ‘Maybe the police don’t need to contact the girl. They’re so stretched that a death by natural causes or by accident must be low on their list of priorities.’
‘You did the right thing. You always do.’
Perhaps they both thought about a time when he had done the wrong thing several times over, and it had ended their marriage. She knew he regretted it now. But if he were to have his time again, he’d probably act the same way. Wouldn’t he?
Bernice led Evelina by the hand into the room, and guided her to sit on the settee once more. Bernice said, ‘She’s eaten two scrambled eggs and had half a pint of milk. I said that if she were up to it we’d like to know what happened, and she’s agreed to tell you. Come on, girl! Piers and Bea will look after you, but you must tell them what happened for your own sake.’
Evelina lifted her eyes as far as Bea’s hands, and dropped them again. She shook her head, wordless.
Bernice actually patted the girl’s shoulder. ‘Be brave. You’ll feel better, after. Get it off your chest.’
Evelina nodded. She held Bernice’s hand fast in hers, and spoke to that. ‘I found him. Lying in bed.’ She lifted frightened eyes to Bernice, seeking reassurance, and then dropped them again.
Bernice encouraged her. ‘You can do it. You know you can. You’re a lot stronger than you think. So what did you do?’
‘I screamed. They came. They shouted at me. They sent me to bed.’ She began to rock to and fro.
Bernice said, ‘Did he have a bad heart?’
‘I suppose he must have.’ A dull tone of voice.
‘Did he take too many sleeping pills by accident?’
‘I suppose.’ The girl’s eyes went out of focus, and she was silent.
Bea glanced at Piers. Evelina had agreed that her uncle might have had a bad heart, or taken an overdose, but she’d not done so in a way that convinced.
So was either of Bernice’s suggestions the truth?
Bernice seemed to have caught up with this line of thought, too. She frowned, and frowning, tried to pull her hand away from Evelina’s. The girl let Bernice’s hand go. Her eyes stared into the past. She was helpless. Defeated. Resigned to whatever happened to her. Or … doped out of her mind?
Bea said in a brisk, no-nonsense voice, ‘Now, you’ve had a perfectly dreadful day and hardly anything to eat. Suppose I show you to our guest room and you can unpack, have a shower and a lie-down till supper time.’
Piers made a sharp movement, and Bea remembered that he’d slept in the guest bedroom on the first floor the previous night, and might well expect to sleep there tonight as well. She looked him a question. Where was he sleeping tonight?
He said, ‘I can’t get back into the mews cottage till after the weekend. No problem. I’ll move out to a hotel.’
Bernice gave a resigned sigh. ‘No, it’s quite all right. She can have the spare room in my quarters at the top of the house. After all, I’ve been dossing down with her for weeks at school. Her snoring doesn’t really bother me. Come along, Evie. Let’s get you upstairs and settled in. You’ll like it up at the top. It’s nice and quiet, and I know you like it quiet. You can hear the birds singing in the garden below. Don’t worry, I’ll carry your case up for you.’
She eased the girl out of the room, and up the stairs. As they went Bea heard Bernice say, ‘What have you got in your case? Bricks?’
Piers went to the door and shut it behind them. He said, ‘Bernice asked a couple of leading questions there. The girl ran with Bernice’s suggestions, but I’m not sure she told us what really happened. Agreed?’
Bea put her hand to her head. ‘Half of me thinks the girl is off her trolley and not responsible for her actions, whatever they might have been. Evelina doesn’t seem to know what happened last night. But one thing is clear: she’s out of her mind on the medication she’s taking and she is in no condition to be interviewed by the police.’
Piers started to pace the room. ‘I think we can trust what she did say of her own accord. She said they shouted at her. Not at each other. Not for help. They shouted at her. Why? Were they afraid she’d somehow caused the uncle’s death?’
‘The other uncle apparently said he’d heard someone arguing with Constant. Auntie says he was dreaming. What if it was Evelina who was arguing with her uncle?’
‘Is she capable of arguing with anyone? I don’t think so.’
Piers stared out of the window at the back, then started to pace the floor again. ‘Say it was an accidental overdose. The Trescotts were right to get the girl out of the way, weren’t they?’
‘I’m biased because I’ve taken against the Awful Aunt. I wish I could be sure she was acting for the best of all possible motives.’
Piers rubbed his eyes. ‘Do you really think there’s something sinister in it?’
Bea hesitated. ‘How can we possibly tell?’
Piers went to stand by the window at the back, looking out on to the garden. He fiddled with the cord of the blind. Thinking. Eventually he said, ‘On balance I think that it’s up to the police to make enquiries in the case of an unexpected death, and presumably that’s what they’re doing. We know nothing ourselves about the manner of the death. Only what we’ve been told. We’ve informed Mrs Trescott we think that the police must be told where the girl can be found if they wish to interview her, and that’s all we need to do. We will look after the girl while she’s in our care, but we don’t need to do anything else. We don’t need to be involved.’
Bea wasn’t so sure. ‘We could take the girl to a specialist to see if she’s on the right medication.’
‘We can’t do that. We have no legal right. And if we did, wouldn’t it take time to evaluate the girl’s condition? She’d have to be placed as an in-patient in hospital, wouldn’t she, in order to undergo tests and psychiatric assessment and so on? It might take weeks, not days, to get an answer.’
He was right. Of course he was. The voice of reason.
Bea felt restless. ‘And yet, and yet … I feel that something is horribly, nastily, nightmare-of-the-worst-kind of wrong.’
Piers set the cord rattling against the window. And didn’t contradict her.
Bernice came into the room, treading lightly, but with a heavy frown on her face. ‘I put her to bed with my old teddy bear and she went out like a light. Honestly! Her clothes! It’s all very well at school to go around in sagging underwear but the family’s supposed to have money, so why don’t they get her a bra that fits, and some suitable everyday wear? Everything she’s got looks expensive but as if it were bought for an old woman who walks with a stick. No one our age wears clothes in those colours and made in that horrible, slippery fabric. The only other clothes they’ve sent for her are a navy-blue woolly jumper and skirt. Both are the wrong length and for someone much larger. She hasn’t a single pair of jeans or a T-shirt or an outdoor jacket. And no shoes. None. She’s got a pair of pyjamas with cartoon animals on, packets of medication and a half-empty box of biscuits. A toilet bag but no Tampax. We need to take her shopping.’
Bea and Piers both looked at their watches. The shops were still open, but …
Piers exclaimed, ‘Ouch! I quite forgot! The theatre tickets we’ve got for tonight! Bea, do you want to take Evelina in my place?’
Bernice folded her arms at him. ‘Don’t be stupid. She’s not going anywhere. She’s asleep and I’m not having her woken up. Someone has to stay with her. I’ll stay if you like. You go with Bea, and see if you can get a refund for my ticket.’
Bea put her hands on her ward’s shoulders – they were almost of a height now – and said, ‘You came good there, Bernice, but I wouldn’t dream of leaving you here by yourself to look after Evelina.’
Piers said, ‘Ditto. I’ll contact the theatre and see if we can get the tickets exchanged for another date.’
‘Sure,’ said Bernice, impatient as ever. ‘Book them for some time after we’ve been slobbing it out in the French chateau, right?’
Bea was about to say they must ask the Awful Aunt what to do about the girl’s clothes when the landline phone rang, and yes, it was the dreaded madam herself. Bea switched it to speaker mode as the woman began. There were no preliminaries.
‘I got your message. There is absolutely no need for you to inform the police where Evelina is staying. I get your point that you are in loco parentis, so to speak, but if you were aware of the facts you’d agree that the girl, with all her fanciful ideas, might make the situation even worse than it is if she were questioned before she’s calmed down. There is no need to complicate matters by suggesting she was involved in any way. We have to bear in mind that stress might tip her into another episode. In a couple of days’ time, maybe—’
‘A couple of days?’ Bea echoed. ‘You want to leave her here that long? Look, I understand she’s very fragile, and I agree she’s in no condition to speak to the police at the moment. But if she’s going to be here for that long, I do think the police should know where she can be found.’
A pause. Then: ‘Very well. I’ll see that they are informed and hope they won’t need to act on the information. Now, is that all?’
‘There’s one other matter which I wanted to ask you about.’
‘What?’ Sharp and to the point.
‘May we take her shopping for toiletries, undies and such? And she’ll need some shoes. There weren’t any in her overnight bag.’
‘Didn’t the housekeeper put them in? She’s absolutely hopeless. Well, I suppose there wasn’t all that much time to … well, never mind. I’ll ask the boys to bring some things over for her tomorrow. Now, if there’s anything she needs, please get it for her, keep the bills, and I’ll reimburse you later.’
‘The boys? Who are they?’
‘Her cousins. They want to see that she’s all right, so they’ll drop in to see her tomorrow morning. I’ll send her party dress over as well because it might need letting out for Friday. Also, she needs some evening shoes. We were going to buy them on Monday but as things are … if you could see to that for me, I’d be obliged.’ It was an order, not a request.
Bea grimaced. ‘Are you sure she needs to be hidden away like this?’
‘Hidden away? What on earth are you talking about. A couple of nights away, spent with a friend from school … what could be wrong with that?’
‘If the police come asking for her, what am I to say? Do I just refer them to you? If I knew what happened, it would help.’
A deep sigh. ‘Well, I suppose you do need to know. Evelina behaved very badly at supper. Constant was justifiably annoyed that she’d made us late and told her off for it. That reduced her to tears. As usual. But then – I can’t think what got into her – she started kicking the table and shouting it wasn’t fair. As if life were ever fair. I can only suppose she hadn’t taken her pills that day. And yes, things were said in the heat of the moment and yes, my brother did say it was all too much for him to cope with. No one thought he was that depressed, but he must have been, mustn’t he?’
Bea glanced at Piers and Bernice, to find they were also wide-eyed with amazement. What exactly had been going on? A family quarrel?
Madam continued, ‘Then this morning neither he nor she came down to breakfast and we couldn’t understand why until we heard Evelina screaming and found my brother dead in his bed. Can you imagine! The shock! He’d been drinking heavily, of course, but we didn’t realize he was so confused he’d double up on his medication.’
Bea couldn’t take it in. ‘How did he …?’
‘Sleeping pills. A bottle of whisky. But no note. The autopsy will prove it was an accidental overdose, of course. The thing is it was nothing to do with Evelina. It’s true that my brother said her school report was atrocious and he did go off the deep end with her about it. It also true that she did scream at him to let her alone, but honestly, that was just a teenager’s normal response to being criticized, wasn’t it? She didn’t mean it when she said she wished he were dead. Only, when she did find him dead this morning it must have tipped her over into having another of her little episodes. She hasn’t had one for months, and we did think she’d grown out of it. I’m sure she had nothing whatever to do with his death. We called the doctor and he said he had to report the death to the police, and that’s when we decided to get Evelina out of the way. Now do you understand? We have to protect Evelina at all costs. Nothing must jeopardize the big event on Friday.’
Bea said, ‘Poor girl. I have to think about this.’
‘What is there to think about? Your course of action is clear. Keep the child safe until we can bring her back here for the party next weekend.’ She rang off.
Bea looked at the others. ‘Did you get all that? She’s saying that Evelina’s uncle was confused after a family quarrel and took an accidental overdose plus a bottle of whisky. At least, I think that’s what she was saying. Accidental overdose. In one breath Madam says Evelina had nothing to do with her uncle’s death, and in the next she says that they had to get the child out of the house because … Because why? Because they think she might have helped him take an overdose and then forgotten about it or because she had a fit? Am I imagining it, or is the family hoping the police will agree the death was an accident, but that if they don’t, they are prepared to lay the blame for it at Evelina’s door?’
Bernice shrugged. ‘It’s not our problem. Her clothes are. So, can we take her shopping tomorrow? Look, I get a decent allowance and if you won’t stump up for some decent clothes for her, then I will. I don’t care if I don’t get paid back.’ She struggled with tears, brushing them off her cheeks with angry movements. ‘Oh, she’s such a victim! It makes me so cross! And yes, I know it’s her own fault, and if she’d been brought up differently she wouldn’t let them push her around, but it just makes me so mad!’
Bea put her arm around the girl’s shoulders, and drew her close.
Piers did the same thing. They held the girl between them till her tears were under control.
Piers said, ‘You’re right, Brat.’ And now the word was definitely a term of endearment. ‘I’ll tell you what, if your stern guardian here won’t stump up for some better clothes for Evelina, then I’ll go halves with you.’
Bernice sniffed. ‘You don’t want to paint her, do you?’
‘What?’ A long moment of consideration. Piers took all such questions seriously. And then: ‘Heavens, no! There’s nothing there to paint.’
‘That’s all right, then.’
Piers went off to see if he could exchange the theatre tickets and Bea tried to work out what they’d have for supper. They’d planned to eat out but now they had to babysit and she had to rethink. Bea was sorry for Evelina. Of course she was. But she wished she’d never seen her.