isn’t what it was. I lost touch with your father after he left Dillmouth. I think he wrote to me once from the Sanatorium and, as I say, I have an impression it was on the east coast-but I couldn’t really be sure even of that. And I’ve no idea at all of where he is buried.’
‘How very odd,’ said Giles.
‘Not really. The link between us, you see, was Helen. I was always very fond of Helen. She’s my half-sister and very many years younger than I am, but I tried to bring her up as well as I could. The right schools and all that. But there’s no gainsaying that Helen-well, that she never had a stable character. There was trouble when she was quite young with a very undesirable young man. I got her out of that safely. Then she elected to go out to India and marry Walter Fane. Well, that was all right, nice lad, son of Dillmouth’s leading solicitor, but frankly, dull as ditchwater. He’d always adored her, but she never looked at him. Still, she changed her mind and went out to India to marry him. When she saw him again, it was all off. She wired to me for money for her passage home. I sent it. On the way back, she met Kelvin. They were married before I knew about it. I’ve felt, shall we say, apologetic for that sister of mine. It explains why Kelvin and I didn’t keep up the relationship after she went away.’ He added suddenly: ‘Where’s Helen now? Can you tell me? I’d like to get in touch with her.’
‘But we don’t know,’ said Gwenda. ‘We don’t know at all.’
‘Oh! I thought from your advertisement-’ He looked at them with sudden curiosity. ‘Tell me, why did you advertise?’
Gwenda said: ‘We wanted to get in touch-’ and stopped.
‘With someone you can hardly remember?’ Dr Kennedy looked puzzled.
Gwenda said quickly: ‘I thought-if I could get in touch with her-she’d tell me-about my father.’
‘Yes-yes-I see. Sorry I can’t be of much use. Memory not what it was. And it’s a long time ago.’
‘At least,’ said Giles, ‘you know what kind of a Sanatorium it was? Tubercular?’
Dr Kennedy’s face again looked suddenly wooden: ‘Yes-yes, I rather believe it was.’
‘Then we ought to be able to trace that quite easily,’ said Giles. ‘Thank you very much, sir, for all you’ve told us.’
He got up and Gwenda followed suit.
‘Thank you very much,’ she said. ‘And do come and see us at Hillside.’
They went out of the room and Gwenda, glancing back over her shoulder, had a final view of Dr Kennedy standing by the mantelpiece, pulling his grizzled moustache and looking troubled.
‘He knows something he won’t tell us,’ said Gwenda, as they got into the car. ‘There’s something-'
'Oh, Giles! I wish-I wish now that we’d never started…’
They looked at each other, and in each mind, unacknowledged to the other, the same fear sprang.
‘Miss Marple was right,’ said Gwenda. ‘We should have left the past alone.’
‘We needn’t go any further,’ said Giles uncertainly. ‘I think perhaps, Gwenda darling, we’d better not.’
Gwenda shook her head.
‘No, Giles, we can’t stop now. We should always be wondering and imagining. No, we’ve got to go on…Dr Kennedy wouldn’t tell us because he wanted to be kind-but that sort of business is no good. We’ll have to go on and find out what really happened. Even if-even if-it was my father who…’ But she couldn’t go on.
Chapter 8. Kelvin Halliday’s Delusion
They were in the garden on the following morning when Mrs Cocker came out and said: ‘Excuse me, sir. There’s a Doctor Kennedy on the telephone.’
Leaving Gwenda in consultation with old Foster, Giles went into the house and picked up the telephone receiver.
‘Giles Reed here.’
‘This is Dr Kennedy. I’ve been thinking over our conversation yesterday, Mr Reed. There are certain facts which I think perhaps you and your wife ought to know. Will you be at home if I come over this afternoon?’
‘Certainly we shall. What time?’
‘Three o’clock?’
‘Suits us.’
In the garden old Foster said to Gwenda, ‘Is that Dr Kennedy as used to live over at West Cliff?’
‘I expect so. Did you know him?’
‘E was allus reckoned to be the best doctor here-not but what Dr Lazenby wasn’t more popular. Always had a word and a laugh to jolly you along, Dr Lazenby did. Dr Kennedy was always short and a bit dry, like-but he knew his job.’
‘When did he give up his practice?’
‘Long time ago now. Must be fifteen years or so. His health broke down, so they say.’
Giles came out of the window and answered Gwenda’s unspoken question.
‘He’s coming over this afternoon.’
‘Oh.’ She turned once more to Foster. ‘Did you know Dr Kennedy’s sister at all?’
‘Sister? Not as I remember. She was only a bit of a lass. Went away to school, and then abroad, though I heard she come back here for a bit after she married. But I believe she run off with some chap-always wild she was, they said. Don’t know as I ever laid eyes on her myself. I was in a job over to Plymouth for a while, you know.’
Gwenda said to Giles as they walked to the end of the terrace, ‘Why is he coming?’
‘We’ll know at three o’clock.’
Dr Kennedy arrived punctually. Looking round the drawing-room he said: ‘Seems odd to be here again.’
Then he came to the point without preamble.
‘I take it that you two are quite determined to track down the Sanatorium where Kelvin Halliday died and learn all the details you can about his illness and death?’
‘Definitely,’ said Gwenda.
‘Well, you can manage that quite easily, of course. So I’ve come to the conclusion that it will be less shock to you to hear the facts from me. I’m sorry to have to tell you, for it won’t do you or anybody else a bit of good, and it will probably causeyou, Gwennie, a good deal of pain. But there it is. Your father wasn’t suffering from tuberculosis and the Sanatorium in question was a mental home.’
‘A mental home? Was he out of his mind, then?’
Gwenda’s face had gone very white.
‘He was never certified. And in my opinion he was not insane in the general meaning of the term. He had had a very severe nervous breakdown and suffered from certain delusional obsessions. He went into the nursing home of his own will and volition and could, of course, have left it at any time he wanted to. His condition did not improve, however, and he died there.’
‘Delusional obsessions?’ Giles repeated the words questioningly. ‘What kind of delusions?’
Dr Kennedy said drily, ‘He was under the impression that he had strangled his wife.’
Gwenda gave a stifled cry. Giles stretched out a hand quickly and took her cold hand in his.
Giles said, ‘And-and had he?’
‘Eh?’ Dr Kennedy stared at him. ‘No, of course he hadn’t. No question of such a thing.’
‘But-but how do you know?’ Gwenda’s voice came uncertainly.
‘My dear child! There was never any question of such a thing. Helen left him for another man. He’d been in a very unbalanced condition for some time; nervous dreams, sick fancies. The final shock sent him over the edge. I’m not a psychiatrist myself. They have their explanations for such matters. If a man would rather his wife was dead than unfaithful, he can manage to make himself believe that she is dead-even that he has killed her.’
