When she did get away the car crawled slowly along the coast road and discovered three-quarters of a mile of promenade, untidy at the ends, and a cafe or two, closed at that season, for Easter was some weeks off and there was scarcely a visitor in the town. Mrs. Bradley did not care for Hiversand Bay, and directed George to drive on. They inspected Kelsorrow, a respectable market-town about a dozen miles farther east, and then Mrs. Bradley announced her intention of turning about and presenting herself at the convent.
Six miles on the road George stopped the car in the middle of open moorland because Mrs. Bradley thought that they would be too early, and sat on a boulder and smoked whilst his employer strolled off to take the air and admire the rolling scenery. Whilst both were thus occupied, a small car, driven fast, shot by, two wheels on the road and two on the heather, and suddenly pulled up. The driver, a stocky young woman of medium height dressed in a tweed three-piece suit and a little suede hat, got out, slammed the door, and came briskly up to George, who rose and saluted.
“In trouble?” the young woman asked, in a deepish, self-confident voice.
“No, thank you, miss.” He looked at her with respectful interest, and continued, “Just killing time, because my employer thought she might be a bit too early at the convent.”
“The convent? Oh, they’ve finished lunch, if that’s what you’re thinking of. I’ve just had mine there, so I know. I believe they’re full up, though, at the guest-house; or has your employer booked her room?”
“I couldn’t say, miss. We’re lodging, just at present, in the village.”
Mrs. Bradley came up to them.
“I hope you’ve booked your room,” said the young woman, extending a hand. “Friends of the nuns are friends of mine. I think they’re simply splendid at that convent. Marvellous people! So simple and sweet, I think. Of course, I happen to get on rather well with them, working, as I do, for half-pay.” She laughed loudly, stridently and unconvincingly.
“Interesting,” said Mrs. Bradley. “A strange life, don’t you think, though, that of a nun?”
“Shouldn’t care for it myself. But there’s no doubt some are called to it.”
“I met a man yesterday who thought the life iniquitous.”
“Men will think anything. Thank goodness I’ve no use for them.”
“Still, a man,” said Mrs. Bradley reasonably, “would have seen that a geyser was properly installed.”
“Geyser? What do you mean? Of course it was properly installed! They had the Gas Company down to look at it the very same day, as soon as they had got the child out of the bath.”
“No flue, then, I imagine.”
“But there
“No, no. The case was in the papers and I cannot accept the suicide theory, that’s all. I suppose you were at the convent when it happened?”
“Well, I ought not to have been, but I was. Look here, I don’t in the least know who you are, but I suppose, if you’re not a reporter, it’s all right, and you’re bound to hear gossip if you’re staying in the village. We—I mean the convent—have had a lot of trouble. There are some perfectly bloody people living round about here. After all, a child who intends to commit suicide will do it wherever she is. The fact that this little idiot, poor wretch, was at a convent, makes no earthly difference.”
“So you were actually on the premises when it happened?”
“Kelsorrow School, where I do the P.T., had a day’s holiday. I hadn’t enough money to do anything decent, so I thought I might as well put in the time at the convent. That’s how it was, and a jolly good thing it was so, too, in a way.”
“What do you mean, I wonder?”
“Artificial respiration. No stone unturned. Worked over the child until the sweat streamed off me. Nobody could have done a better job. No go. Child quite finished. Been dead, the doctor said, at least three quarters of an hour— probably more—before we found her. That was accidental, too. I’d been playing netball with the orphans, and felt pretty sticky and grubby, so I asked Mother Jude for a bath. The kid was in it, of course, and a good old smell of gas. No window open. I flung open the window and we picked up the kid and took her into the nearest bedroom and there I got to work on her at once, but it wasn’t a bit of good. Nice child, too, in her way—which wasn’t mine.”
“Not good at her lessons?”
“Lord knows. Probably. No good at games or swimming. Timid as a rabbit. Just the type for suicide, of course. These quiet, mousy kids are always the ones. You never know what they’re thinking, then off they go and do it, and most people feel surprised. Not me, though. I’ve seen so much of it. Germany, now. Kids commit suicide there if they can’t get through their exams. I knew two boys—most brilliant kids—hanged themselves when the results came out. Too terrible.”
She produced a packet of cigarettes which looked as though it had been sat on, put Mrs. Bradley aside and got into Mrs. Bradley’s car, where she spread herself over the seat—“too windy to smoke in the open,” she explained— lit the cigarette by striking a match on her knee, waved the match carelessly to and fro and tossed it, still burning, on to the heather. George walked over and stamped on it. The young woman said, as an afterthought, speaking with the cigarette in her mouth:
“Hope you don’t mind my getting into your car?”
“It is a pleasure to have you,” Mrs. Bradley replied, getting in beside her and causing her to move up. “Tell me a little more exactly what you made of Ursula Doyle.”
“Oh, I don’t know. Do you know any Catholic kids? Always pick ’em out in any school. This one was Irish, though. The what-is-it kind of Irish, too. Not the devil type, but the—”
“But the—what, George?” enquired Mrs. Bradley, sticking out her head and addressing the chauffeur much as a witch might suddenly address her familiar.
“The Celtic twilight type, madam, perhaps?”
“That’s it! Deirdre!” said the cigarette-smoker, dropping ash on the cushions. “Pale and interesting.
