Chapter 32

 

“I feel tired as hell,” Edith said, “but at the same time I feel as though I’ll never sleep again. My mind is racing far too much.”

“You’ll sleep as soon as your head hits the pillow, especially if you have another glass of this.”

He held up the wine bottle and Edith nodded. They were alone in the house now. Mrs. Braithwaite was staying in a visitors’ room in the hospital and John was tucked up in the Sowerby’s spare bedroom. The presence of a child in the house and the feeling of doing something useful seemed to energise the pair and pull them out of whatever trough they had sunk into.

“He may as well stay,” said Marjorie, when Edith had walked across.

“If you’re sure,” Edith said, taking in Marjorie’s eager nod. “I’ll just have a quick word with him, if that’s all right. Then I’ll leave you to it—I see that he’s in safe hands.”

Marjorie led her into the kitchen where John was sat at the table in front of a jigsaw, a plate of biscuits by his side and Prudence asking him if he wanted another cup of cocoa.

His expression changed when he saw her. His appearance of enjoying the two women playing mother hen was only superficial. His thoughts were with his mother and sister.

“Cathy is in the hospital. Hopefully, in the end, she got help in time. But, she’s very poorly, John. So, your mam is staying overnight. I told her I would make sure you are all right, and I can see that you are.”

John nodded. “They are being very kind to me. I’ll be fine here, but Cathy—I want her to get better. Please tell me that she’ll get better.”

Edith had seen the look exchanged between the sisters when John said how well he was being looked after. He was in the best possible hands, here. She wished she could take the frightened look away from him and was tempted to make the possible recovery sound like a definite. But, she couldn’t—not quite.

“The bleeding has stopped and she is holding her own, John. The hospital people know what they’re doing. They are replacing the fluids she has lost and she is young and fit. We must pray and hope for the next twenty-four hours.”

John nodded vigorously, his face screwing up as if his concentration alone would make his sister better.

“Damn near exsanguination,” Archie said as he’d taken his coat off. “I’ll tell you something, Edie. That was one of the nearest things I’ve ever seen and I include the field of battle in that. I couldn’t find a pulse straight away and her breathing must have been so shallow—the whole system shutting down, you see. That’s the worry now. The next hours are crucial…to see that the major organs function all right…”

“But, you’re hopeful?” Edith wanted to put words in his mouth.”

He nodded. “I hope I’m not wrong, but they seemed on top of their game there and she has youth and I hope, good health, on her side. But, your arm. Come down to the surgery with me, and I’ll see whether it would benefit from a few stitches.”

At the end of a day like this, having four stitches in her arm was neither here nor there, though it was not something she’d experienced before. After the first wince, she steeled herself and told herself it would be soon over. “The poor girl must have been so terrified,” she said to Archie, thinking of Cathy as he put a crepe bandage over the dressing.

“Let’s hope she lives and gets well enough to tell the tale,” Archie said, soberly.

Archie put another shovel of coal on the fire and stoked it up into another spurt of life and heat. Edith looked deep into the orange, violet, and purple flame, allowing it to mesmerise her, calm her. Eventually she lifted her eyes and looked at Archie.

He’d gone to see Inspector Greene after stitching her arm. Greene had said Caroline Butler was calm, was talking a lot, apparently rationally, there were no signs of madness, no signs of hysteria. Her brother had been informed and was genuinely shocked.

“I understand why Esther Kirk wrote the letters, why she tipped back into some form of disturbed behaviour. I can well imagine the unwholesome duo she formed with Joshua Braithwaite. Like you say, there is even a sort of symmetry about the way she died. I see too that Braithwaite is an immoral chancer who is motivated by money, but Caroline Butler? Why on earth? Why kill her stepmother? Surely, it wasn’t all just about money?”

“Greene said there was a discrepancy about her visits to her stepmother. She came on another visit, apparently, on her own, without her brother. Saw her opportunity. Her luck ran out when Braithwaite wheedled this out of Esther Kirk. Money, pure and simple. Her passport into the world of moving pictures.

 

Archie leaned forward in his chair and held his wine glass to the light.

“At least half the ill doing in the world is for money or ownership of land—it all amounts to the same thing. I have no doubt the psychiatrists would say she had some form of megalomania. Whatever label you might put on it, she wanted money. Whether it was the truth or not, apparently she saw that as the only way she was going to achieve her dream.

In the firelight, Edith could see him grin.

“Maybe, she was just a bit more of an egomaniac than some of the others pursuing that particular dream.”

“Oh, Archie, don’t exaggerate. She’s paid, or will pay a heavy price for it. You don’t think she’ll hang do you?”

“No, she may be coming across as sane for now. But, I think she’ll only be able to keep that up for so long. Broadmoor for life would be my guess. Who knows? Maybe she will actually be all right there. Plenty of scope for her dramatic talents.”

That didn’t sound so likely to Edith, but she was too tired to argue. “Maybe we should just have a toast?” she said.

Archie raised his glass and looked at her.

“To Brigid,” she said,

“And Alastair,” Archie said. One more,” said Edith, “just one more. To the future.”