In my bedroom, the room that had been mine since I was a girl of thirteen, I wandered around touching things, trying to find comfort in fingering my childish treasures. There was the collection of china dogs that Alexis and I had added to whenever we came across one with a suitably appealing face; the little mother-of pearl jewel box that had been a birthday present from Madeleine; a serpent-shaped piece of driftwood brought back from an outing to the sea on one of Madeleine’s good days.
Brett, at this moment, was on his way to London.
When we returned from the lake, Brett had sent Jenny to fetch his father from the dining room. Sir Ralph came at once, his table napkin still in his hand.
“We’d better go to the library,” he said. “Gail, are you here too?”
“Yes, Sir Ralph.”
Long familiar with every room at Deer’s Leap, he walked with unhesitating steps across to the fireplace, where a bright coal fire burned. He turned and faced us.
“Jenny said it was something very important.”
Brett told his father everything, as briefly as such a story could be told. I had to admire Sir Ralph’s self-control. His blind face registered his emotions—astonishment, horror, grief—but he allowed Brett to finish without interruption. I pitied him. Years seemed to have been added to his age in the space of a few minutes.
“Why didn’t you tell me about this before, Brett?” he said at last in a quiet voice.
“Because we couldn’t be certain until we had some sort of proof. It wouldn’t have been fair to worry you.”
There was an uneasy pause. Then Sir Ralph muttered, “You mean you were afraid I might not believe you? Perhaps you were right, Brett. It’s an incredible story.”
“The question is, Father, what do we do now? Ought we to contact the Intelligence people rather than the police? It’s possible they might want to keep quiet about the discovery of Alexis’s body and give themselves a better chance to track down some of the people involved.”
Sir Ralph nodded. “I think you may be right. I have contacts, of course. Do you want me to call someone now to put things in motion?”
“It might be risky to use the phone. When you remember how thorough the Communists are, there’s quite a possibility the lines here are being tapped. It would explain how they got on so quickly to the fact that Gail was going to Majorca. She rang the airport to book her flight.”
So in the end it was decided that Brett should drive at once to London to see a man Sir Ralph had known for many years.
Brett came and put his hands on my shoulders. “I may be very late getting back, Gail, so try and get some rest. I promise to come and wake you at once.” To his father he said, “How much will you tell Caterina?”
Sir Ralph hesitated. “Nothing, I think—for the moment. Tomorrow I suppose I shall have to.”
For a while after the sound of Brett’s Lancia had faded into the night, his father and I remained in the library. We were silent, both of us deep in our thoughts. At length Sir Ralph lifted his head, clearing his throat huskily.
“I cannot tell you how deeply I regret the harsh things I have said and thought about your uncle in these past days. He was my friend, and I should have had more faith. Unfortunately, unforgivably, I allowed myself to be deceived by appearances.” He turned his head away for a moment, then faced me again. “Gail, my dear, you know, don’t you, that Alexis would not have cared about death so long as the ideals he stood for survived? And now, when the world learns the truth, his books will be read, his teachings remembered. With ten times the force.” He gave a deep sigh. “Poor Madeleine—at least her sufferings are over now. Without Alexis, life would have had no meaning for her.”
I wanted to answer him, but I could not find my voice. He reached out a hand to me, and I put mine into it, feeling his fingers tighten. I knew that in his blindness Sir Ralph too was in need of this physical expression of sympathy.
After a long silence, he suggested that perhaps we ought to join Caterina and Elspeth. But I didn’t feel up to facing them this evening. Particularly Elspeth. So I said I was rather tired and would prefer to return to the west wing.
I intended telling Rudi at once about our discovery in the lake. But he was nowhere around, not in the Oak Room or anywhere else downstairs. Either he was up in his bedroom, or he’d gone out to get some air. Perhaps it was just as well, I thought with relief. I felt utterly drained, emotionally exhausted. I went up to my room and closed the door, thankful to be alone for a little while.
I kept my ears tuned to the stillness and silence of the house. When, presently, I heard the door of the Oak Room beneath me being opened, I braced myself to go down. I dreaded the task of breaking the news to Rudi, but I could not shirk it.
At the turn of the stairs I paused, hearing a voice. Not Rudi’s but Freda Aiken’s. A few steps nearer, and I realized that she was talking on the phone. The study door was slightly ajar, and though her voice was low, I caught the words distinctly.
“I tell you that they know.”
I froze at the foot of the staircase. More than what she said, it was the tone of her voice that arrested me. There was panic in it, a sort of desperation.
She was listening now to someone who spoke at length. I crept a few paces closer, standing behind the door.
Freda said in a cracked whisper, “But it was nothing I did. The girl realized it wasn’t her uncle she saw in Geneva. I heard her telling Rudi Bruckner. And then tonight she and Warrender were out on the lake in a boat. He had diving equipment and went down. They must have found the body,”
She paused again, and above the furious thudding of my own heartbeat, I fancied I could hear the voice at the other end—a man’s voice, charged with anger.
“You can’t blame me,” exclaimed Freda suddenly. “It was nothing I did.” Another pause, then hurriedly, “Yes, Bruckner’s outside somewhere. I saw him go. And she’s next door with the Warrenders at the moment. That’s why I took the chance to phone you. But I mustn’t be long.... Yes ... yes, I understand. I’ll leave at once—right away.”
I heard her replace the telephone, and I quickly slipped through the open door of the Winter Parlor, out of sight. I heard the study light switched off, the door closed. Swiftly, Freda crossed to the stairs and went up, making for her bedroom.
I was too shocked and stunned to move. It hadn’t occurred to me that anyone else in the house could be involved now that Belle Forsyth was gone. Her unspeakable job had been completed, and Alexis was dead and discredited. What possible reason could the Communists have for placing another agent at Deer’s Leap? What had remained still to be done?
Madeleine.
My entire body went ice-cold. I began to shake, powerless to control the wild trembling of my legs, the sickness in my stomach, the crawling of my skin.
My aunt’s death had been the final condemnation of Alexis Karel. If anybody still doubted that he had behaved despicably, this act of desperation on the part of his heartbroken, invalid wife would have convinced them. Everyone the world over must be thinking now that he had as good as killed his wife with his own two hands.
Had such a convenient and superbly timed piece of propaganda really been pure chance? Or had the Communists contrived that, too?
I thought about the tragedy I had witnessed from the garden. Could it be that Madeleine had been fighting desperately with Freda in order to save her life and not to end it?
I closed my eyes, seeing it all again, reliving those horrifying moments. The flutter of white inside the room, then Madeleine at the window, calling, calling Alexis’s name. And Freda Aiken coming up behind her, holding her, pulling her back. Or pushing her? With so frail an opponent as Madeleine, it would be easy to make the one look like the other.
If Freda had told her that Alexis was out there in the grounds, it would have been enough to send Madeleine rushing impetuously to the window, calling his name. And afterward, the discovery of the newspaper in her room would account for her “suicide.”
If only Brett were here, I thought frantically. But he was halfway to London by now. Sir Ralph, being blind, could do little to help. Caterina and Elspeth hadn’t the least idea what was going on, and it would take too long to explain.
I had to find Rudi.
I’d heard Freda Aiken say on the phone that he was outside somewhere. I opened the French windows and slipped out to the terrace. Swiftly, I circled the house, then ran across to the stable. But there was no sign of him anywhere.
I dared not call out for fear of alerting Freda. I sped down the path to the lake, stumbling in the darkness, whispering Rudi’s name. But no answer came. In desperation, I turned and ran back toward the house. The light in Freda Aiken’s room, her shadow moving behind the curtain, seemed to draw me, making me hurry faster. I’ll leave right away, she had said. She must be stopped.
I went back in through the French windows and ran straight upstairs to Freda’s room. I burst open the door.
She was standing at the wardrobe, taking down hangers. A suitcase lay open on the bed, already half filled. The drawers of the dressing table were open, too.
She spun around and her face went pale.
“Oh, Miss Fleming—you did startle me. I didn’t know you were in this side of the house.” Already she was recovering, getting back to the pose of pathetic gratitude she had adopted since Madeleine’s death. “Actually ... well, to tell you the truth, I was thinking about your kindness in letting me stay on, but it doesn’t really seem fair to have asked you. I was going to move out in the morning, find a room somewhere.”
“You ... you killed Madeleine,” I said chokily.
Her eyes narrowed, going wary. The dress she was holding slipped through her fingers to the floor.
“Whatever are you saying, Miss Fleming? It’s dreadful to talk like that. I admit I feel to blame for not watching your aunt more carefully, but that doesn’t give you the right to accuse me of—”
“You killed her,” I repeated. “You killed her because that’s what you were sent here to do. I heard what you said on the phone just now.”
“You heard?” she gasped. “Oh dear, I thought you were safely next door with the Warrenders.”
Casually she started edging toward me. I stood my ground, defying her. But then, before I realized what she meant to do, she lunged forward and swiftly turned the key in the lock. Slipping it into the pocket of her cardigan, she stood and smiled at me maliciously. “There now, we can have a cozy chat while I finish my packing.”
I boiled with anger—at letting myself be duped by her, at being so impotent.
“I don’t know what you hope to achieve,” I said icily. “I’m not frail like my aunt, so you’re not going to push me out of the window.”
She bent and picked up the dress she had dropped and started to fold it, slowly and deliberately.
“There will be no need for such drastic measures, Miss Fleming. I’ve got some very effective knock-out shots that will put you out cold for a couple of hours or so and no more than a nasty headache when you wake up again. By then I shall be well away from here.”
“You don’t think I’m going to let you give me an injection of dope.”
“I was trained in a very tough school,” she said scornfully. “There are precious few men who could get the better of me.”
I believed her. I could sense a sort of brute strength in that short, squat figure. I put on an act of false confidence because there was nothing else I could do.
“You seem to forget there are other people in the house. Rudi is just downstairs.”
“Is he? And have you told him about what you heard me saying on the phone?”
“Naturally. If I’m not down again in a minute or two, he’ll be coming up.”
That didn’t have the effect I’d hoped for. Freda merely shrugged carelessly. “I’ll deal with Rudi Bruckner later, after I’ve seen to you!”
She went to a drawer of the dressing table, and I watched her take out a tiny syringe. Rapidly, I scanned the room for something small and heavy and spotted a pair of Freda’s stout walking shoes beside the bed. In a sudden swift movement I dived for one of them and ran with it to the window. Dragging aside the curtain I smashed the heel into the casement, once and then again. The lead bent and buckled, and a dozen diamond panes shattered and fell tinkling to the paved terrace below. Surely that would attract attention. If Rudi was somewhere outside, he must have heard it.
Before I could start shouting for help, I saw Freda coming at me. I dodged aside, so that she fell against the window. Flinging up a hand to save her balance, she cut her wrist on a jagged edge of glass. Blood oozed and she gripped the wound, cursing.
Her momentary distraction was my opportunity. Grasping the full-length chintz curtains, I tugged at them so that the fittings gave way and the whole lot came crashing down. The heavy brass rod caught the side of Freda’s head, and she must have been slightly stunned. I grasped up an armful of the fabric and flung it over her, enveloping her in clinging folds.
In an instant I had snatched the door key from her cardigan pocket and was running across the room. The lock clicked back smoothly, and as I opened the door I plucked the key out again, intending to lock Freda inside. But I wasn’t spared time enough for that. Even as I pulled the door closed after me, Freda was already there, dragging it open. I felt her tremendous strength, the strength of a man.
I let go and ran for the stairs. But, fatally, I turned right as though from my own room, instead of turning left. Ahead of me, through a curtained archway, were the stairs to the attics. I raced up them in the dark with no clear idea in my mind except to get away from Freda. I recalled from my childhood explorations that at the end of the attic corridor there was a little cubbyhole under the eaves. I sped along to it and crawled inside.
I could hear Freda blundering up the unfamiliar stairs. At the top she paused, and then after a moment she found the light switch. But my hiding place was shadowed by a heavy beam of the roof.
Slowly, Freda came along the corridor, flinging open the door of each room as she reached it, peering inside, satisfying herself it was empty before moving on. All the time she was getting nearer.
There was a cold draft blowing down the nape of my neck, and that brought back a memory. I was about fourteen the first time I had found this place, found the sloping skylight that led out onto the jumbled rooftops of Deer’s Leap. I’d been out there a few times, unknown to Alexis, who would probably have had a fit if he’d found out about it.
Carefully, I felt for the remembered catch. I turned it, and silently, inch by inch, I eased up the heavy glazed door. But when I’d got it wide open, it suddenly slipped from my nervous fingers and fell backward onto the roof with a crash of splintering glass and tiles.
I froze and heard Freda Aiken’s exclamation, her footsteps running along the corridor. In a quick movement I heaved myself through the opening and out onto the roof.
What now? Useless to try and close the door—it couldn’t be fastened from the outside. I slithered the couple of feet down the steep-angled roof to the lead gully I knew was there, hearing the loosened tiles sliding with me. I followed the gully to where it disgorged into a water spout at the front of the house. Between the crenellated parapet wall and the pitch of the roof there was a narrow channel. I began to edge my way along, with the idea that when I reached the point above the great porch, a drop of about ten feet would take me to another skylight that might with luck be unlocked, or that I could smash.
I knew that Freda Aiken had climbed out through the skylight after me, and she must have taken some other route across the hodgepodge of roofs. She suddenly appeared ahead of me, outlined against the sky. In the faint starlight we crouched and stared at each other.
“Why not be sensible?” she said in a conversational tone. “I’m not going to hurt you—just give you a little injection. I’ve got the stuff right here. It will put you out for long enough for me to get well clear.”
“You’ll never get away,” I said. “Rudi will—”
“You can forget about Rudi Bruckner. He’ll do exactly what he’s told—just as he’s done in the past,”
Rudi? A terrible wave of darkness swept over me, a sense of utter hopelessness.
“It was lucky for us, having Bruckner so well dug in with your uncle. It enabled us to get Belle Forsyth fixed up with a job here without any trouble. And then me.”
“But Rudi would never do anything to harm Alexis,” I said huskily. “I’m sure he wouldn’t.”
“I think you’re right,” she acknowledged. “But he’s a very credulous young man. He actually believed that Alexis Karel had run off with Belle, because she had encouraged him to think they were having an affair. If he had known the truth—that we had killed Alexis Karel that night, and substituted a double in his place —he might have been more difficult to handle. But it’s too late for him to do anything about it. You see, he has a sister living in Czechoslovakia. Need I say more?”
I tried to blot out my misery, concentrating only on the need to get away from Freda, to raise the alarm, to prevent her escaping. In a daze I began to edge back the way I had come, thinking I might reach the skylight before she caught up with me. Stumbling against the parapet, I felt it tremble, and suddenly it gave way. Just in time I flung myself flat against the tiles of the steep-pitched roof, clinging there spread-eagled. Thirty feet below me I heard the heavy stonework crash onto the gravel.
Even Freda Aiken was startled for a moment. Then she laughed. “You are in a tricky situation now, aren’t you? Pity you didn’t go down with that chunk of parapet. Still, we can soon fix that. Just a little push ...”
She started inching her way toward me. I tried to shift my position slightly and immediately felt myself sliding down to the very edge of the roof. My foot dislodged more of the crumbling stonework and sent it plunging.
There was another noise from above us, someone frantically scrambling over the tiles. A dark figure appeared on the ridge above my head.
“Gail, are you all right?” It was Rudi’s voice, hoarse with fear. “You’re not hurt?”
Before I could answer, Freda called up to him. “You arrived just in the nick of time. Go and get the car out for me. If you behave yourself, I’ll take you with me. Otherwise, you’ll have a hell of a lot of explaining to do.”
Rudi ignored her. “Gail, you are all right, aren’t you? Tell me.”
“Yes, but I’m stuck. I dare not move an inch.”
“Then keep still! Stay just where you are, and I’ll come.”
Freda warned him in a dangerous voice, “Don’t bother about her, just do as I tell you.”
“I’ve finished taking orders from you. I wish I’d had the courage to stand up to you long ago.”
“Really?” she said mockingly. “I thought you were devoted to the big sister who brought you up. If you don’t do what you’re told, Rudi Bruckner, it’s going to be too bad for her.”
Again Rudi ignored Freda and spoke to me, his voice imploring. “Gail, please try to understand. I didn’t want to help them, but I had to. They kept threatening what they’d do to Bozena and her family if I didn’t carry out their instructions. But even so, if I’d realized what they were planning ... I just thought they wanted to plant Belle here as a sort of spy, and I didn’t see how there could be much harm in that. And then ... then I really believed that Alexis had let her seduce him. I ought to have known him better.”
From across the rooftops I heard my name called. It was Sir Ralph’s voice.
“Gail, what’s going on up here? I heard breaking glass, and then a lot of masonry falling.”
“Get help, Sir Ralph,” I called back frantically. “It’s Freda Aiken. She’s trying to kill me.”
To my horror, I realized that Sir Ralph, too, had climbed out through the skylight and was fumbling his way along. A blind man.
“No, Sir Ralph, go back. Go and get help.”
But he still came on. Fearfully, I twisted my head and saw his shadowy figure appear where the gully ended.
“Where are you, Gail?”
He edged toward me, his hand on the parapet, using it as a guide and support. A step or two farther and he would reach the point where the parapet wall was broken away. There would be nothing to stop him falling.
I screamed out, “Stay where you are, Sir Ralph. Don’t move, for God’s sake.”
This time my urgency got through to him. He stood quite still. No one spoke a word.
Four people, all of us frozen like figures in stone. I was stretched out on the steeply sloping tiles, clinging for my life. Rudi straddled the ridge ten feet above me, too far away to help. Freda Aiken, still with the solid parapet to support her, could edge along and send me crashing to the gravel court below. And—if she wanted—the sightless, bewildered Sir Ralph, too.
In the taut silence a sound penetrated through my fear. Faint, far off, the familiar throaty boom of an exhaust. Brett’s Lancia. But it wasn’t possible. Brett was on his way to London, miles and miles away from here.
Nearby, I heard the scrape of a shifting tile and realized it was Freda, starting to move along to me.
“If you’d had any sense, Gail Fleming,” she said, “you’d have been lying peacefully unconscious on my bed at this moment, while I made a quiet getaway. As it is, I’ll have to deal with you another way.”
Imperatively, Rudi called, “You stay where you are. Leave Gail alone.”
But she still came on, one step at a time.
“Whatever is happening?” cried Sir Ralph. “If only I could see.”
Freda was scarcely a yard from me, near enough for her outstretched hand to reach me, to give me a push. I braced myself to fight her off, knowing I hardly stood a chance because the least movement would send me sliding, slithering helplessly off the roof.
In those final split seconds I heard the car again, being driven hard. This time I knew for sure that it was Brett.
And then there was another sound, a sudden wild cry, weird and scarcely human. Then a clattering, splintering noise of roof tiles breaking and slipping, almost as if the whole house was collapsing under us. Rudi’s dark form hurtled past me down the steep-angled pitch of the roof. With another yell, he smashed into Freda Aiken, carrying her and himself and more of the stone parapet over the edge and out into space.
I closed my eyes as I heard the terrible screams and thuds of bodies and masonry plunging down and crashing to the gravel far below.
And when that dreadful sound was over, I heard the Lancia racing up the drive.
* * * *
Caterina had a bedroom made ready for me, for I could not have returned to the west wing that night. But it was almost dawn before any of us got to bed.
The police were at Deer’s Leap again, all over the house. And other men who were not police, grim-faced men who asked a different set of questions, issued curt instructions, kept the press at bay.
I told them my story, over and over, until at last Brett protested, “For heaven’s sake, can’t you let Miss Fleming rest? She’s had enough.”
“I don’t mind, Brett—if it helps.”
And so once again, right from the beginning to the end. To the final moment when Brett, after guiding his father back to a secure position, had come climbing over the rooftops to me, ripping out tiles to give him footholds on the timber framework beneath.
He held me for a moment, murmuring reassurances. Then slowly we made our way back along the gully and through the skylight into the house.
“Brett, what was it made you turn back home?” I asked him breathlessly. “However did you guess?”
“Leave it now, Gail. I’ll explain later.”
Freda Aiken and Rudi were both dead. Killed instantly, just as Madeleine had been.
“Rudi did it to save my life, Brett,” I said with an aching sadness. “He didn’t have to—if he’d let Freda kill me, nobody would have known for sure how it happened. Your father couldn’t see.”
“Perhaps,” said Brett quietly, “the poor devil knew he’d reached the end of the road and was trying to square the account. Besides, Rudi was in love with you. I’ve always known that.”
Again I asked Brett what had made him turn around and come back to Deer’s Leap.
“Something was niggling at the back of my mind—all the time I was driving. I knew there was some inconsistency somewhere. And then it suddenly hit me. Do you remember Rudi telling us that when Belle first came to work here, back in April, he was bogged down with the indexing of Alexis’s book?”
“Yes, but what ... ?”
“He was lying, Gail. He was trying to cover up for not being able to give us the details about Belle, and in doing so he said too much. I suddenly remembered a conversation I’d had with Alexis one time. He was talking about Rudi, praising him to the skies, and he mentioned how Rudi had even given up his holiday in order to do the indexing. His holiday in August. That was enough for me. I knew then that Rudi was deliberately concealing something, that somehow or other he was involved in all this. At once I turned the car around and headed back to Deer’s Leap. Even so, I’d still not have been in time if Rudi hadn’t ...”
* * * *
In the morning Alexis’s body was raised by divers from the bottom of the lake. Brett and I stood watching silently from the bank. When we returned to the house, Elspeth had left, which was a great relief to me. Brett explained that she had gone back to do some work on the film, and that he wanted to drive me to London next afternoon to see a run-through.
“Of course, there will have to be some final editing and polishing,” he said, “but I’ve decided, after all, to show it in an unfinished state—without any additional material except the commentary. Everyone will understand just why the film was never finished—because Alexis Karel was murdered in a Communist plot to discredit his name.”
In the private projection suite at the TV studios a small group was gathered. Elspeth was there with the rest of Brett’s team, and a few other people I hadn’t met before.
It was a deeply moving experience to see my uncle on the screen against the familiar background of Deer’s Leap, to hear again his vibrant, living voice. Madeleine appeared, too, looking frailly beautiful, and their devotion to one another came across unmistakably. The final sequence of the film showed Alexis at his desk in the Oak Room, reminiscing about his homeland. There was no bitterness in his words, and his last message was one of optimism and hope.
When it was over, I felt in no mood to stay around and chat. Brett understood. We left the studio at once, and he took me up in the lift to the roof of the building, where we stood leaning against the balustrade, staring out across the hazy expanse of London on a winter afternoon.
“It was a wonderful film,” I said at length, my voice still tight with emotion. “A wonderful tribute to Alexis. Thank you, Brett.”
He nodded. “I’m glad you liked it.” There was silence again, then Brett went on, “Gail, I ... I want to explain about Elspeth and me.”
“I know about Elspeth and you,” I said bleakly.
“But you don’t, darling. You never have understood. That night, the night you phoned me at the hotel in Manchester and she answered—it wasn’t what you thought. Elspeth was in my room for no other reason than to discuss the film we were working on.”
“Was she?” I heard myself saying. “I wonder if Elspeth would agree with that.”
Brett caught his breath impatiently. “Gail, I know this isn’t the moment to be rough with you, but will you please accept once and for all that it’s you I care about. Just you. And now, for God’s sake, let’s forget about Elspeth.”
“I’ll try, Brett,” I murmured. And suddenly it struck me that it wasn’t going to take all that much effort to forget her. I hadn’t anything to fear now from Elspeth Vane. Perhaps I never had.
Copyright © 1973 by Nancy Buckingham
Originally published by Dell
Electronically published in 2013 by Belgrave House
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
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This is a work of fiction. All names in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to any person living or dead is coincidental.