Death at Dawn - Caro Peacock [107]
‘It’s all right,’ I said. ‘I’m not going to hurt you.’
I let go of the shawl. She rocked backwards and let her arm fall, blinking up at me. Her face was yellowish and deeply lined, her grey eyes bewildered. She seemed to be in her late forties. A light came into her eyes as if she thought she knew me, but I was certain I’d never seen her before in my life.
‘Are you employed here?’ I asked.
In a great household like Mandeville Hall it was possible there might be some servant I hadn’t met. She laughed.
‘Employed here? On the roof to scare the crows? Oh yes.’
The words were mad, but the voice wasn’t. It was hoarse but fairly cultivated, like an upper servant’s, though she wasn’t dressed as one. She was looking at me as if trying to place me.
‘It’s my shawl,’ I said. ‘You can keep it if you like, but did you take it from my room?’
‘Your room, was it?’
‘What’s your name?’
I’d intended to say it quite kindly, as far as I could control my voice when my heart was racing from the shock of finding her. But it must have sounded harsh because she braced her boots more firmly against the roof and pulled the ends of the shawl tightly around her.
‘No more questions. I’ve had enough of questions.’
‘Well, you can’t stay up here all day.’
‘I’ve been up here all night, so I don’t see why I can’t stay up here all day.’
‘All night? When did you …?’
She pulled the shawl up right over her head.
‘Aren’t you – I mean, you must be hungry and thirsty.’
‘Thirsty, yes.’ It came muffled through the shawl.
‘You’ll be like a hotcake on a griddle, up here all day. If you’ll come down with me, I’ll fetch you some water.’
She seemed to consider it, then: ‘Did the old lady send you?’
‘Yes.’
It was true, after a fashion. My tongue was twitching with questions I wanted to ask her, but the first thing was to persuade her down from the roof. She poked her head out from the shawl and began to straighten up painfully, pushing against the chimney stack. I helped her along the roof trough and went first through the trapdoor so that I could guide her down the ladder. Her legs smelled sweaty and unwashed, though there was something about her that suggested she had once been a fastidious person.
The moment the door of my room shut behind us she collapsed on the chair and eyed the cold, soapy water in the wash-bowl so thirstily I thought she might lap it like a dog. I told her to wait, ran down the stairs to the nursery kitchen and came back with a jug of water and a glass. She drank two glassfuls of water straight off, closed her eyes and gave a shudder. It seemed to bring her back to herself because she made an attempt at tidying her hair, scooping up the fallen tendrils and re-pinning them with shaking hands.
‘I look a sight, don’t I? I’m sorry I used your good soap.’
‘So it was you in my room yesterday?’
She nodded. At least she’d answered a question.
‘What were you doing here.’
‘The old lady said I was to stay here until she called me.’
‘What old lady?’
‘It’s no good asking me her name. I don’t know.’
‘An old lady in black?’
A reluctant nod.
‘What were you doing on the roof?’
‘It’s no use keeping on at me. Where else could I go?’
She gulped more water. I waited.
‘So are you going to take me to her?’ she said.
‘Do you want me to?’
I decided not to tell her at once about Mrs Beedle’s death. For all I knew she might have had a hand in it.
‘It’s not a question of what I want or don’t want, is it? I’ve been passed like a parcel, hand to hand, over the sea and back until I don’t know where I am or what I’m doing.’
‘Over the sea and back?’
‘Over by trickery and back by force. I told the old lady about it. She said she’d look after me, once it was all over. Will she keep her promise, do you think?’
‘Why shouldn’t she?’
‘There was a gentleman promised