Spotted Hemlock

‘That’s nonsense,’ said Laura sharply. ‘All I want you to do is to give me the name of the school at which your stepdaughter taught.’

‘Teaches.’

‘All right—teaches.’

‘You are not on the level. Are you from the police?’

‘No, of course not. Do you refuse, then, to give me the address I ask for?’

‘No, no. I think you are phony, but it is none of my business. Carrie is not a nice woman, so I expect her to have some not nice friends. The school is called How Red the Rose House. It is in the village of Seethe, in Suffolk. Now tell me why you want to know.’

‘Thank you very much.’ It was a triumphant Laura who returned to the car and ordered George to drive home. ‘So I go to this How Red the Rose place tomorrow,’ she said, when she got back to the Stone House.

‘Do you really think it is a good idea?’ Dame Beatrice enquired. ‘All this rushing about must be extremely fatiguing for you.’

The Amazonian Laura laughed.

‘It’s fun,’ she said. ‘And, even if I’m not doing much good, at least I’m doing no harm. Besides, I’ve definitely established one thing.’

‘Yes?’

‘This Biancini certainly has no idea that it may be Carrie and not Norah who is dead.’

‘You mean he had no idea,’ said Dame Beatrice. Laura stared at her.

‘Could be,’ she said. ‘Oh, Lord! Talk about “the hounds of spring upon winter’s traces!” ’

‘Talk, rather, of “fills the shadows and windy places with lisp of leaves and rustle of rain.” That is what you may have contrived to do.’

‘It can’t be as bad as that!’

‘Why not?’

‘This Biancini isn’t capable of it, you know.’

‘Your meaning, obscure though it may seem, is not without interest.’

‘Well, honestly, now I’ve seen him I’m inclined to think it’s a case of Pass, Biancini, and all’s well.’

‘We are agreed.’

‘Really?’

‘I think so, child. I never did suspect poor Biancini of being anything but what he is.’

‘The child of God,’ said Laura, inconsequently, ‘and an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven. I suppose,’ she added, ‘that the address of that school is the right one?’

‘You can but go and find out.’

Laura studied her employer.

‘I thought you thought I shouldn’t interfere any more.’

‘Heaven forbid that I should stand between you and your desires.’

‘Hunches, not desires.’

‘Have you ever heard of Don Quixote?’

‘Ad nauseam. He tilted at windmills.’

‘That is what I mean. You will do no good by enquiring for Miss Palliser at that dreadful little school, but any harm you may do has probably been done already. What you propose cannot help us, but it will satisfy your curiosity without further prejudice to the enquiry.’

‘I don’t like you in this mood,’ said Laura. Next day she went to London and stayed the night in Dame Beatrice’s Kensington house. On the following morning she caught the fast train to Ipswich, had lunch and then hired a car and set out for the school. As she had expected, it was indeed a small one, but it was housed in a beautiful Georgian mansion with a fine, simply-designed doorway and the broad windows of the period. Laura studied the house appreciatively and then rang the bell. A girl in a dark-blue overall answered it.

‘Miss Palliser?’ she said. ‘I don’t think there’s anybody here of that name. Would you care to step inside?’

Laura stepped into a squarish hall from which rooms opened on either side. She was not kept waiting long. A tall, thin woman swam towards her.

‘You have a child?’ she asked.

‘Actually, yes,’ Laura replied. ‘But he is of masculine gender and tender years.’

‘But of course! We have special teachers for the nursery age.’

‘It was about a former member of staff that I came to enquire—a Miss Palliser.’

‘Palliser?’

‘Carrie—I’m sorry that I don’t know the full name— Carrie Palliser.’