The Watersplash

CHAPTER XIX

Susan spent a dusty morning finishing up the Victorian novelists. There seemed to be an incredible number of them. An entire set of Mrs. Henry Wood, including no less than three copies of the famous East Lynne. A notorious tear-jerker- but three copies! There were also sets of Charlotte M. Yonge, an author beloved by Susan’s Aunt Lucy, and whose descriptions of vast Victorian families she herself had always found enthralling. There they were, in their original editions, and obviously well read. She remembered to have heard that strong men in the Crimea with death and disease running riot all about them had wept when the ill-fated Heir of Redclyffe died upon his honeymoon.

There was something tranquilizing about the ebb and flow of these family histories, even when they dealt with such tragedies as this. The people who died in them would all have been dead anyhow today. The people who lived in them were really still very much alive. Susan found herself dipping here and there, relieved to get away from the thought of Clarice Dean drowned only last night in the watersplash. She hadn’t known her very well, and she hadn’t liked her very much. No, she hadn’t really liked her at all. But she was a girl, here in Greenings, and if she hadn’t drowned herself, then somebody had drowned her. It gave you a horrid cold feeling. And then for it to be Edward who found the body-

She went on dipping, and trying to forget about Clarice Dean.

Edward was out all day. Susan and Emmeline had lunch together. They discussed the now urgent problem of finding homes for Amina’s kittens.

“And of course I would love to keep them, but if Arnold is really going to turn us out-”

“Darling, you can’t possibly keep them! You have eleven cats already!”

Emmeline looked at her wistfully.

“Is it really eleven? I find them so difficult to count.”

“It is. And there will be floods of more kittens before you can turn round. I think they would take one up at the Hall, and Mrs. Alexander says her sister-in-law in Embank would have one if it is really pretty.”

“They are all pretty,” said Emmeline fondly. “Amina’s kittens always are. I don’t think I can bear to part with them. Arnold hasn’t said anything more about my going, so I think perhaps he didn’t really mean it. Jonathan always did say that he was like that-doing things in a hurry, you know, just to bolster himself up and make himself believe he had one of those strong, ruthless characters. But he isn’t really like that at all. My dear Jonathan was a very good judge of character, and of course Arnold being his own brother, he did know him very well. So I think perhaps that was just a bit of make-believe-telling me I must go. I think he was put out about the garden being untidy -and the cats-and Edward coming here. Especially about Edward. You know, Susan, I quite thought there was something he was afraid of about Edward. Of course people have been saying that he ought at least to give him a share of what James left, and it might have been that. But he went away very quickly when I asked him why he was afraid of Edward coming back.”

Susan was looking surprised. She said,

“Afraid-”

“Oh, yes, I think so. And perhaps my saying it showed him that it wouldn’t do. People would blame him a good deal if he turned me out, and I expect he will have thought of that by now. So I really think I might keep the kittens. Don’t you?”

Neither of them mentioned Clarice Dean.

At two o’clock Susan went back to the Hall, where she encountered a really horrifying book about a man who was transported to Australia in the old Botany Bay days. It was called For the Term of His Natural Life, and dipping into it felt exactly like opening the door upon a hurricane in which all the forces of evil were let loose. It was some time before she could get the door shut again.

That finished the Victorians as a body, though she was to discover stray volumes here and there all over the place. She now mounted a ladder, began to investigate the upper shelves, and found herself in the eighteenth century. Volumes of the Spectator and the Rambler. Gulliver’s Travels, original and unexpurgated. Johnson’s Dictionary, and the first edition of Rasselas. These would be valuable-but she wasn’t sure of the values. She could write to a crony of the Professor’s who had that kind of bookshop and find out, if Arnold Random liked.

She went on discovering treasures and making a list of them.

Round about four o’clock she got down from the ladder and proceeded in search of Arnold. She found him behind a newspaper in one of the big study chairs. In his stiff way he seemed quite pleased to see her-said he had no idea of selling the books, but if any of them were valuable, it would be just as well to know. The probate people had accepted the insurance figures, but he didn’t suppose there had ever been any real valuation by an expert.

Susan was saying, “Well, I’m not an expert, but I can make a list and send it on to someone who is, if that is what you would like me to do,” when the study door was thrown open and Doris Deacon announced,

“Miss Blake-”

She had managed to get to the door before her this time, but she had almost had to run to do it.

“Walking past anyone as if they wasn’t there!” she told her mother that evening. “And with no more than a ‘you needn’t trouble-I know the way, Doris ’! Well, I know my manners, if she doesn’t know hers, and I got there first and showed her in. Mr. Arnold didn’t look any too pleased to see her neither. And who would! He’d got Miss Susan there, talking about those old books she’s sorting, and they didn’t either of them look any too pleased.”

“Miss Mildred wouldn’t bother herself about that,” said Mrs. Deacon with conviction.

Arnold Random was facing the door. He saw it open with a horrid sense of foreboding. Mildred! And what did she want this time? A blackness came up in his mind. He could neither see past it nor through it.

She came into the room with her head poking a little forward, her nose jutting from the long sallow face, her eyes set upon him in a bright unwinking stare. A vulture-that was what she looked like-a creature who would tear the very flesh from your bones. He remembered that he had come near to marrying her a long time ago, and it made him feel physically sick.

She had her black collecting-book in her hand, and she said,

“Perhaps I could just have a word with you, Arnold.”

Susan’s presence was being dispensed with. A light nod of the head intimated as much. She had always thought that Miss Mildred was probably the rudest woman in the world, and she was sorry for Arnold Random, but she did not see her way to remaining. She said, “Well, another time, Mr. Random,” and withdrew.

Miss Mildred seated herself. Arnold remained standing. He said,

“What do you want, Mildred?”

Her smile horrified him.

“Can you not guess?”

“I certainly cannot.”

She laid the collecting-book on her knee.

“You should be feeling very well pleased, I think.”

It was true. But he was not prepared to hear it said. He had felt a relief of which he could not but be ashamed. He felt it no longer. A sense of dreadful strain began to impose itself. Mildred Blake’s regard did nothing to avert it. He said in his coldest manner,

“I really have no idea what you mean.”

“Have you not?” She tapped the black collecting-book with a gloved finger. The tear had been mended, but it showed, thick and ugly like some flat crawling insect. “Well, my dear Arnold, let me enlighten you. Miss Dean’s death though extremely inconvenient to me-Ora is really quite intolerable when we are without a nurse-must have been a considerable relief to you.”

“To me?”

“Naturally. Since there is always the possibility that your brother James might have told her he had made another will. As a matter of fact, from something I heard her say on the telephone to Edward, she stated plainly that she had something of importance to tell him, and that it concerned his uncle.”

Arnold Random groped for his handkerchief and passed it across a sweating brow.

“What did she say?”

Mildred Blake fixed a look of malicious amusement upon him.

“Do you really need to ask me that? I have an idea that you must have been listening too. A party line is so very convenient when you want to know what is going on. But if you wish to pretend with me, of course you can. She didn’t tell him anything, as I think you very well know. And she won’t tell anyone anything now, will she? Of course I can’t help feeling that you have been rather imprudent. I quite see that you couldn’t afford to give her the time to overcome Edward’s reluctance to be confided in. The idea was, of course, to restore the rightful heir and then marry him, and Edward was so much taken up with avoiding being married out of hand that he hadn’t any attention to spare for her hints about James’ will. But she was being very persistent, and I suppose you couldn’t really afford to wait. Only I do think it was a pity to make it a Friday-” She paused, and added, “again.”

He was staring at her, the handkerchief crumpled in his hand.

“I don’t know what you mean.”

She went on being amused.

“Everyone knows that you practise in the church from nine to ten on Friday nights. William Jackson drowns in the splash on one Friday night, and Clarice on the next. By the way, you must have known her quite well. Or didn’t you? Did you ever make love to her?”

He flushed with anger.

“Of course not! I didn’t even like her!”

She tapped the black collecting-book.

“Well, I don’t think I should say too much about that if I were you. You know, Arnold, I am warning you seriously that the whole thing doesn’t look too well. First you were going away for the week-end, and I was to play the organ. But that meant you would have no excuse for going up to the church to practise on Friday night, so as late as Friday morning you dropped a note in at our letter-box to say that you would not be going away after all. And that meant you had the excuse you needed if you were to meet Clarice Dean down by the splash.”

“You’re mad! What are you saying?”

“I am not mad at all-I am very sensible. And pray don’t waste my time and your own by protesting that you had nothing to do with Miss Dean’s death. I shouldn’t believe you, and you might annoy me so much that I shouldn’t bother about helping you any more.”

He took a step towards her and said in a voice that shook with rage,

“I never saw her! I never touched her! I never thought of touching her!”

She gave a short staccato laugh.

“See if you can find anyone to believe it! William Jackson was the only surviving witness of a will which you suppressed. He drowned in the splash. Clarice Dean knew about the will- she was trying to tell Edward about it. She drowned in the splash. And both these drownings are on a Friday night-one last week, and one this week. And you up at the church hardly a stone’s throw away.”

His face was grey. There were patches of livid pallor about his mouth. He could find no more to say than what had come to him with the first impulse of fear and shock.

“You are mad!”

She shook her head, and went on shaking it. The deliberate motion turned him giddy-her head in the battered hat-the predatory nose, like the beak of a carrion bird-the glitter of the eyes. Moving from side to side. Swinging like a pendulum… Mist invaded the picture.

When it cleared he was leaning forward with both hands on the writing-table, and she was still again. Waiting. Looking at him and waiting. He remembered that in the old days of the torture chamber a man who swooned upon the rack was given a space to recover in order that he might be tortured again.

When he had straightened himself he put out a hand behind him, groped for a chair, and sank back upon it. He hadn’t anything to say. If she had, let her say it.

She broke the silence complacently.

“Now really, Arnold, there is no need for you to put yourself in such a state. I am sure that it must be very bad for you. You ought to know by now that I am willing to do anything I can to help you. After all, we are very old friends. It was naturally a shock to you to realize how strong the evidence against you might be if-” She paused, and repeated the word with a good deal of stress upon it. “I say if it were placed before the police. But you have to remember that this evidence doesn’t make sense unless the facts with regard to James’ second will are taken into consideration. Now both the witnesses are dead, and Clarice Dean is dead. Neither she nor William Jackson can supply the police with information about the will which you destroyed, or with the only credible motive for their deaths. I am the only one who can do either of these things. I heard William Jackson accuse you of suppressing the will, and I can bear witness to the fact that you did not deny it. And there is the danger point! Once you are suspected of destroying the will, all the rest follows-a motive for the drowning of William Jackson-a motive for the drowning of Clarice Dean. You are in my hands. I can destroy you, or I can save you. That sounds a little melodramatic, but it happens to be the bare truth. If I tell the police what I know about the will, I really do not see that they can do anything but conclude that you murdered William Jackson and Clarice Dean. If I hold my tongue, nobody will be in a position to tell them anything at all, and they will never know that your brother made a will which cut you out. I hope that is all quite clear. I shall be taking a certain risk, and I shall expect compensation. You can’t expect me to do it for nothing, you know. Now can you?”

He looked at her, and felt himself without power. If she went to the police, it would be all over. He had the desperate mental picture of a rock balanced on the brow of a hill. It did not move yet, but at a touch it would move, and once it moved there would be no stopping it. He could see how it would stir, and start, and gather speed, until it went bounding down the slope and out of sight.

Looking at Mildred Blake and hating her with the strength of misery, he said,

“I think you are a devil!”