Chapter 14 #2
For heaven’s sake, she admonished herself, you’ve seen it done often enough.
That was the hand brake, and that stick was the gear lever, between her seat and the driver’s seat.
Those three pedals were the clutch, the foot brake, and the accelerator.
Surely one could discover by trial and error which was which?
The big dial on the dashboard showed how fast one was going.
Did it work in reverse? Still, she had no intention of going faster than a snail’s pace.
Oil pressure she could safely ignore for the few yards she needed to drive. At least she hoped so.
There remained the question of starting the machine. Peering at the floor by the pedals, she saw no self-starter button. Blast, she’d have to crank it.
The baby within, whose antics she had been ignoring, turned a somersault.
Reprieve! No one could expect a six-months-pregnant mother-to-be to crank an engine.
Which, now she came to think of it, was just as well, as she wasn’t at all sure how to find reverse gear, and wasn’t there something called double declutching?
She hadn’t the foggiest what that involved.
As if reading her mind, Dr. Prentice stood up and called, “Mrs. Fletcher, can you drive?”
“No!”
“All right, come here then. Please.”
The “please” was definitely a perfunctory afterthought. Daisy reminded herself that he was a doctor dealing with an emergency. As she went to him, one of the van’s crew came to move the little car.
Daisy tried not to look at Gooch, but she noted from the corner of her eye that his head was bandaged and one arm splinted. “What luck that you came along!” she said warmly.
“I want a word with the police, and I thought I’d better look in on Lady Tyndall. Have you any nursing experience?”
“I’m afraid not.” Daisy felt more useless by the minute. She was definitely going to learn to drive, if not to become a nurse. “Is he going to be all right?”
“It’s touch-and-go. I’ll have to go with him in the van, and you’ll have to stay with the corpses. We can’t leave them unattended. The van will return to pick them up as soon as the men have carried this poor fellow into the house. How many months along are you?”
“Six.”
“You can walk up and down, then, so as not to get chilled. But I’ll give you a rug from my car anyway.”
“Thank you,” Daisy said meekly.
As they spoke, Prentice’s car had backed after the Lanchester into the lane, and the van followed, going forward.
Then the van backed up the lane and returned, facing towards the house now.
It stopped and the driver jumped out. The doctor’s car reappeared and the second man came to help lift Gooch into the rear of the van.
With considerable annoyance, Daisy saw the Lanchester’s long bonnet nosing after the runabout. She debated asking Dryden-Jones to watch over the remains of Sir Harold and Mrs. Gooch.
The van departed. The van man came to get the doctor’s car. Handing Daisy a tartan rug from behind the seat, he said, “Sure you’ll be all right, ma’am?”
“Hurry back,” she begged.
He drove off. The Lanchester pulled up beside her.
“What’s this, what’s this?” demanded the orangutan, alias Struwwelpeter, alias Dryden-Jones. “What were those fellows thinking, to leave you behind, Mrs. Fletcher! Allow me to offer you a lift.”
“The men are needed at the house, and someone has to watch over the bodies.” Daisy indicated the two sheet-covered stretchers at the side of the drive. “They couldn’t fit everyone into the van.”
Dryden-Jones paled. “Oh . . . er . . . yes . . . well.” Obviously he was not going to offer to take her place.
Instead, he addressed his chauffeur, who, like a well-trained servant, had been pretending not to listen to their exchange: “Hotchkiss, take Mrs. Fletcher’s place. I shall drive her to the house.”
Hochkiss’s training was not proof against this. He turned an alarmed face to his employer. “Sir, do you think that’s a good idea?”
“I know how to drive!” He started to get out. “Nothing to it. Hop in, Mrs. Fletcher. I’ll take you to the Manor.”
As Daisy’s path crossed Hotchkiss’s, the chauffeur muttered to her, “Better hang on tight, madam.”
She hung on. She needed to. With Dryden-Jones behind the steering wheel, the Lanchester started off like a startled rabbit and proceeded by leaps and bounds that would have done credit to a kangaroo. The big car shuddered and moaned.
Daisy was very glad she had not tried to drive, and more determined than ever to learn how. Properly.
Glancing back, she saw Wookleigh following at a cautious distance, his Bentley rolling smoothly along under his own control. She closed her eyes and tried to concentrate on what Gooch’s being injured might mean to the investigation.
They reached the forecourt at last and came to a halt with a final convulsion. Daisy opened her eyes. They were stopped right across the bows of the van, which had been backed up to the front door.
“You can’t stay there, old chap!” Wookleigh parked neatly beside the doctor’s car. As the lawyer’s small car pulled up beyond him, he strode over to the Lanchester and opened the rear door for Daisy. “My dear lady, are you all right?”
“I think so.”
“Take my arm, do. Dryden-Jones, you’ll have to move. The van can’t get out.”
Dryden-Jones still hung on to the wheel with a rigid grip. Turning his head cautiously, as if afraid it might fall off, he said with the merest trace of his usual asperity, “I shall go in only for a minute, just to make sure my county is providing the Chief Inspector with every facility.”
Wookleigh opened his mouth, but Daisy squeezed his arm and whispered, “If it means he’ll go quickly, leave it. The van driver can always move it if necessary.”
He looked down at her with approval and patted her hand. “Quite right, my dear. He may have to in any case.”
Daisy was too well brought up to omit thanking Dryden-Jones for the lift. She just hoped he didn’t think she was being sarcastic. He avoided meeting her eyes but climbed out of the car on wobbly legs. They all went into the house together.
They found Dr. Prentice and his patient in the entrance hall. The doctor was once again kneeling beside the stretcher, looking very worried. Before Daisy could ask him if Gooch’s condition had deteriorated, Babs came through from the passage. Behind her, a goggle-eyed maid peeked around the door.
Babs was breathing faster than normal, so she could only have arrived a few minutes earlier. After a glance of dismay at the gentlemen with Daisy, she disregarded them. “Dr. Prentice, I was ringing you up when I was told you’d just arrived, with Mr. Gooch.”
“I was on my way here when I came across the accident. I need to get him to bed immediately so that I can make a proper examination.”
“Gwen’s making up the cot in Father’s dressing room for him. I hope that will do. Dilys, show them the way.”
The maid scurried to obey. As the stretcher men picked up their burden once again, Prentice said, “I’ll need hot water bottles, plenty of hot water, bandages, and something suitable for splints.” Without waiting for a response, he followed his patient up the stairs.
“Daisy . . .”
“You go along, Babs,” said Daisy. “I’ll deal with things here. Sir Nigel, Mr. Dryden-Jones, Mr. . . . er-hm won’t you sit down?”
“Lewin,” said the lawyer. “Lewin, Lewin, Pent and Lewin. I really must insist—”
“All in good time, my dear fellow,” said Sir Nigel. “Can’t you see the household is all at sixes and sevens? Mrs. Fletcher, you come and take a seat. You must be in need of rest after your . . . adventures.” He gave the Lord Lieutenant a scathing look.
“Just want a quick word with the Chief Inspector,” said Dryden-Jones feebly.
Daisy would have liked nothing better than to sit down, preferably with her legs up, but she said, “I ought to see if I can find Jack Tyndall.”
“I’ll do that,” the Chief Constable offered, “if you’ll point me in the right direction.”
“The last I saw of him, he was on the lowest terrace, dismantling the fireworks apparatus.”
“Not to worry, if he’s there, I’ll fetch him in a trice. I’ll go out through the French doors, that will be quickest.”
As Sir Nigel’s tall, narrow figure disappeared into the drawing room, Alec emerged from the passage, followed by Tom and Piper.
Dryden-Jones darted towards him with a cry, “Chief Inspector, just the man I wanted to see.”
Not to be pipped at the post, the lawyer scurried after him. “Chief Inspector? You are in charge of the case? I am as yet unaware of . . . er . . . precisely what has occurred, but—”
Dryden-Jones raised his voice. “Since Gloucestershire is my county, I—”
“I consider it my duty, much as it goes against the grain—”
“I want to assure you—”
“I feel obliged to inform you,” Lewin persisted, rivalry provoking him into abandoning the discretion demanded of a lawyer, “that Sir Harold disclosed to me last night that he intended to change his Last Will and Testament to disinherit his son.”