I heard the cheerful whistle of the newspaper boy as I came downstairs the next morning. His bicycle slithered to a racing stop on the gravel. The folded copy of the Times appeared through the letterbox and fell to the floor with a thud.
For a few moments I stood staring at it, as if it was something contaminated. Then I bent and picked it up, scanning through it quickly.
Madeleine’s death was reported with brief details. The paragraph went on to say that Dr. Alexis Karel had not been seen or heard of since having a short interview with his niece, Miss Gail Fleming, at a hotel in Geneva a few days before. That was all.
I left the paper on the console table in the hall and went to the kitchen to get myself some coffee. A big cupful, hot and milky, slowly brought me back to life. I even found the appetite to eat a buttered crispbread. To my relief, Mrs. Cramp hadn’t turned up yet.
I heard Brett calling my name and went out to the hall to meet him. He smiled at me, his eyes searching my face.
“You look tired, darling. Did you sleep?”
“A bit too heavily. I’m not used to taking pills.”
“Let’s hope you never will be. Have you seen the Times yet?”
“Yes, just now. It doesn’t say much.”
“I know, but some of the popular papers have really gone to town—as you’d expect. Look, Gail, I can’t stop. I just came through to tell you that I’m off to London.”
“To London?”
“Yes, I must go today. You see, things have rather piled up while we were away.”
I felt a sudden chill. I’d completely overlooked the fact that Brett had a job to do. Foolishly, I had pictured him being here with me at Deer’s Leap, working together to find the answer to Alexis’s disappearance.
I said dispiritedly, “When will I see you again?”
“Oh, sometime later today. I want to restart work on the film right away.”
I felt better at once. Brett wasn’t forsaking me.
“Caterina asked me to say she hopes you’ll join them for lunch, Gail. You will, won’t you?”
“Yes, of course. It’s kind of her to ask me ... in the circumstances.”
“Gail, you mustn’t think that. My father is very upset—naturally. But not with you.”
“All the same, I’m part of it all. A continual reminder.”
Brett stood hesitating for a moment, as if he felt torn. Then he said quickly, “I really must get going. There’s a planning meeting at ten-thirty, and I’ve barely time to make it.” He bent and kissed me swiftly on my cheek. “I won’t be gone all that long. I reckon that Elspeth and I should arrive about teatime.”
Elspeth. I had completely overlooked her, too.
Since Brett’s return last night when we had talked, I had believed that he and I were together once more after these long months of separation. In my newfound feeling of warm security I had shut my eyes to the part Elspeth Vane played in his life. Elspeth directed nearly every one of the films Brett made, and often they traveled together, both in England and abroad. When they were actually filming, Brett saw Elspeth every day. And at night, too? Was the former relationship between them still continuing?
After Brett had gone, I went in search of Rudi and found him in the Oak Room. He was sorting through some papers in a halfhearted fashion.
“Hello, Gail. There isn’t really anything for me to do, but somehow I can’t just do nothing. So I’m collating Alexis’s notes. One day, perhaps, someone will be interested in them.”
It was the same as Brett had said about the film.
I thought how ill Rudi looked. I wished I could say or do something that would ease his feelings of guilt.
I walked over to the window and stood staring out through the leaded panes. This morning the sun was shining again, mocking us with its cheerful golden brilliance. Against the pale-blue sky, the tips of the conifer trees stood up like an edging of black lace. I was thankful that the Oak Room looked out to the rock gardens and not to the terrace where Madeleine had fallen.
“Rudi, I’ve been thinking—there’s no reason for Freda Aiken to stay any longer. We could pay her off and suggest she leave right away.”
Rudi said heavily, “Is that a hint, Gail? Do you mean that you’d like me to leave Deer’s Leap, too?”
I spun around to face him. “No, of course I didn’t mean anything of the kind. Later ... well, I don’t know what will happen. Obviously I shan’t be staying on here myself indefinitely. But please don’t think of leaving, not for the time being. I need you here. With Freda Aiken, though, it’s altogether different. There’s really nothing more for her to do. Perhaps I’m being unjust to her, but every time I see the woman I can’t help wondering if ...”
“Wondering what?”
“Well, it could so easily have been Freda who left the newspaper for Madeleine to see. I wouldn’t put a thing like that past her—there’s a sort of spiteful streak in her that would think it amusing. Obviously though, she’d never have expected such a terrible consequence. If it was Freda, then that would explain why she’s so dreadfully upset.”
Rudi was staring down at his hands, gripped tightly together on the desk. “If you feel like that, Gail, I suppose it’s best to get rid of her at once. I don’t much care for Freda myself, I admit, and I wouldn’t be sorry to see the back of her.” He hesitated, looking uneasy. “All the same, I’d hate having to tell her to her face that she’s got to get out.”
“I wasn’t expecting you to, Rudi,” I said quickly. “That’s my job. I’ll go and tell her right away.”
Freda Aiken was in her bedroom and opened the door to my knock.
“Oh ... it’s you, Miss Fleming. I was just...”
Though it was nearly ten o’clock, she was still in her dressing gown. She looked so dejected that I couldn’t help feeling sorry for her. But believing what I did, remembering that she’d shown no human kindness toward Madeleine in the short time she’d been my aunt’s nurse, I hardened my heart.
“I just wanted a word with you, Miss Aiken. You’ll understand that there’s really no point in you staying on at Deer’s Leap any longer, so I thought ...” I saw her eyes widen in alarm. She started to make some protest, and I added hastily, “Naturally your salary will be honored—whatever the arrangement was. But there’s nothing for you to do here now, and you could be working somewhere else, or having a holiday.”
Her face seemed to crumble up, and she looked as if she was going to burst into tears.
“Oh, Miss Fleming, please don’t send me away. I... I’ve got to stay nearby, to give evidence at the inquest, and I... well, I’d hate to have to lodge with strangers.”
It seemed extraordinary to hear Freda Aiken speaking as if we at Deer’s Leap were her friends. But it was true that I had forgotten about her being needed for the inquest.
“Oh well,” I said awkwardly, “in that case I suppose—”
“Then I can stay?” Her face brightened at once. “Oh, you are kind. I’m so grateful. I’ve had a dreadful night, Miss Fleming. I couldn’t sleep at all for thinking. I mean, your poor aunt was supposed to be my responsibility. She was put in my charge.”
Amazingly, I found myself defending her, trying to bring reassurance to this woman I disliked so much.
“You mustn’t torture yourself, Miss Aiken. You couldn’t be expected to spend every single moment with her.”
After I had left Freda, I decided on an impulse to have a look in the bedroom Belle Forsyth had used. Just possibly I might find some clue there.
It was, as always, immaculately tidy. I stood in the middle of the blue carpet, staring about me, reluctant to touch anything that Belle had handled. But I forced the feeling down.
I was opening the top drawer of the tallboy when it struck me that I must be careful not to disturb anything. One day there might be a full-scale criminal investigation.
The contents of the drawer were entirely impersonal. They might have belonged to anyone. Odds and ends of lipstick, face cream, and powder, a bottle of skin lotion, some French Fern bath cubes—all well-known makes that could be bought at any pharmacy.
The unexotic, everyday beauty items that fitted the image of Belle Forsyth—nurse and companion. And a small pile of handkerchiefs, all plain white hemstitched, unmarked in any way.
I closed the drawer and passed to the next one down. It contained chain-store underwear, neatly folded. Several pairs of tights. In the bottom drawer there were blouses and sweaters, all like a million other women possessed.
What exactly was I looking for? I didn’t know. Just something, anything, that would point to Belle’s true character—give a lead, perhaps, about where she had come from. Just a tiny shred of solid evidence.
On the bedside table was a paperback, a collection of modern verse. I flicked through the pages, expecting nothing, finding nothing. I went across and opened the heavy oak wardrobe. There were a couple of wool dresses on hangers, a red jersey suit, a gabardine raincoat, two or three skirts. A black umbrella, neatly rolled, was looped over a hook. I examined every item without hope. Manufacturers’ labels told me nothing. The pockets of the suit and raincoat were empty.
Clean white paper lined the bottom of the wardrobe. But in one corner, at the back, it wasn’t lying quite flat. As I automatically bent and smoothed it down with my hand, I felt a ridge of something like a piece of thick cardboard.
Suddenly excited, I drew the lining paper back. I saw a large buff envelope, torn open along one edge. The name and address were typewritten—Miss Belle Forsyth, Deer’s Leap ... It contained photographs. I shook them out, spreading them on the carpet.
There were five altogether, postcard size, all of them similar—but none exactly the same—as the picture of Belle I’d seen in the newspaper. The changed Belle, with her hair cascading down. In one photograph the tip of her tongue showed teasingly between her lips. In another her shoulders were drawn back to reveal the outline of her breasts through the thin silk of her dress.
A series of six, obviously, and one photograph had been carefully chosen and passed into the hands of a newspaper. The photograph that best portrayed Belle Forsyth in the way it was wanted to portray her—as a cheaply provocative woman for whom the distinguished Alexis Karel had abandoned his invalid wife.
I picked up the pictures, one by one, examined them, and turned them over. There was no identification, nothing to show where they had come from. I looked again at the envelope, but it was empty.
The postmark was my only clue. It was smudgy, and at first glance I couldn’t make it out. I went over to the window, tilting the envelope to catch the sunlight. Against the blue postage stamp I could hardly decipher anything, except, at the bottom, the word Sussex. So it had been mailed locally.
The date was completely unreadable, but concentrating on one letter at a time, I decided that the name of the town began with S and ended ... ven. I felt triumphant. There was only one place in Sussex that could possibly fit. Seahaven. Someone in Seahaven— the photographer presumably—had sent Belle these prints.
With a sudden rush of excitement I slipped the photos back in the envelope and ran along the corridor to my bedroom. I didn’t want to waste time changing. I pulled on a belted raincoat over my slacks and hastily checked my face in the mirror.
Downstairs there was no one around. I collected the spare car keys from the hook by the door and went straight through to the Warrenders’ side of the house. Since I didn’t know what I hoped to discover in Seahaven, I was glad not to have to explain things to Rudi for the moment.
Caterina happened to be in the staircase hall, arranging early daffodils in a bowl that stood upon the antique marble table.
“Gail, my dear, how are you this morning? You managed to get some rest, I hope?”
“Yes, thank you, Caterina. I—”
“Good morning, Gail.”
Sir Ralph’s voice came from behind me. Turning, I saw him standing in the open doorway of the library.
“I gather from my son that he’s planning to finish that film of his about Alexis. The Lord knows why. It seems to me the quicker it’s all forgotten, the better for everyone. Do you understand what’s in Brett’s mind, Gail?”
He spoke with a kind of suppressed anger, and I guessed there had been sharp disagreement between Brett and his father. I determined to ask Brett, the first moment I could, whether it wasn’t time for Sir Ralph and Caterina to be told the truth as we believed it. With the evidence I’d just found of the photographs, and what I hoped to get from the man who had taken them, there was surely enough to convince them we were right.
Perhaps, I thought with wildly flaring hope, it was already enough to convince other people, too.
I restrained my mood of optimism and said quietly, “We don’t know the whole story about Alexis yet, Sir Ralph. Brett wants to be ready when the time comes.”
“Ready for what?” he asked brusquely. “I’m sorry, my dear—the last thing I want is to upset you, but when I think of Alexis driving your poor aunt to such desperation that she took her own life.”
“The person who left the newspaper in her room is responsible for that,” I said.
“Madeleine would have found out sooner or later. It was only a question of time. And it goes to prove what I’ve maintained all along—that she ought to have been told the truth at the start.”
Caterina put out her hand and touched my arm. It was an eloquent gesture, begging me to forbear with her husband.
I bit my lip, swallowing back my anger. “I came to ask you to excuse me from joining you for lunch. It was kind of you to suggest it, but something has cropped up.”
Sir Ralph moved forward quickly, his hand groping for me. He found my shoulder and gripped it hard.
“Gail, my dear girl, you must forgive me. I speak my mind too plainly. Please don’t take offense. Caterina and I will be delighted to have you lunch with us.”
“But it’s not that, Sir Ralph. I have to go out— really! I have to go to Seahaven.”
Caterina, serving as his eyes, said, “Yes, it is true, Ralph. She’s dressed ready to go out. Gail, may I drive you? You shouldn’t be on your own today.”
I shook my head. “Thanks, Caterina, but I’ll be okay. Honestly.”
I was actually halfway to Seahaven when the realization struck home with a sickening jolt that the car I was driving, Alexis’s ten-year-old Rover, was the one used by Belle and my uncle’s double to take them to the airport. And in the car had they also taken Alexis —his body—to wherever it was they had disposed of it?
My heart thudding, I pulled to the side of the road and stopped. For a moment I just sat there, breathing quickly. Perhaps by using the car today I might be destroying vital evidence—if not something obvious, then traces that forensic experts could detect. But I was not the first person to have driven the car since that night. A garageman had brought it back to Deer’s Leap from London Airport.
Careful to touch nothing I didn’t need to touch, I started to examine the interior—the floor, under the seats, the glove compartment. I found only the untidy paraphernalia Alexis kept—dog-eared maps, a tire pressure gauge, an odd leather glove—nothing with any special significance. I had to force myself to get out and look in the trunk, but it was empty. There were no suspicious looking marks.
Fingerprints? Belle’s, of course, would be on the car anyway, because she had been allowed to use it when she wanted to. But her accomplice’s prints would be a clue. To preserve any that might still be left, I handled the controls gingerly for the rest of the journey.
The familiar road, almost empty of other traffic, twisted its way to the crest of the downs, then dipped again on the gentler southern slope toward the coast.