Chapter 18 #2
What luck, she thought, hurrying after the others. With Lady Tyndall practically begging her to talk to Gwen and Babs about the letter, Alec could hardly cavil when she did so. Well, he could and doubtless would object, but at least she had a defence, for once.
Her quarry was just going out of the front door.
“Babs!” she called. “I’ll walk a little way with you, if you don’t mind waiting a moment while I fetch my coat. It’s down here.”
“Shouldn’t you put your feet up for a while? You had quite an energetic morning.”
“It’s no good lying down right after a meal, believe me. In fact, quite the wrong thing to do. The pressure—”
“Spare me the details, please! I can cope with cows and sheep, but if you’d heard how Addie carried on . . . !”
Daisy laughed. “Right-oh. I’ll just come a little way, so I won’t hold you up.”
She fetched her coat and hat from the cloakroom and they set out.
“I’ll spare you the details,” Daisy said, “but really on the whole I’m very well. I gather your mother had a hard time with her pregnancies.”
“Yes. At the time, we didn’t know why she was sometimes such an invalid, of course.”
“You must have been ten when Jack was born, though. It’s hard to keep anything from a child that age. Didn’t you find out what was going on?”
“I dare say I might have if she’d been here. Father took her to a sanatarium abroad. Switzerland, I think. Don’t the Swiss rather go in for that sort of thing? Rest cures and such?”
“I believe so,” said Daisy, trying to hide her shock. What better cover for a secret adoption? How on earth was she going to tell Babs about the letter?
Babs gave her an odd look, but she was distracted at that moment, as Adelaide sailed by in her chauffeur-driven Humber, giving Babs and Daisy a regal nod as she passed. Babs uttered a wordless growl.
“I would hate,” she muttered, “to have gone through a difficult pregnancy and have nothing to show for it but Adelaide.”
“You should sympathize with Addie, even if her pregnancies were easy, for having gone through two with nothing to show for them but Reggie and Adrian.”
“They’re still young. Jack and I and a decent school will soon straighten them out. As long as Gooch doesn’t die!”
“It’d be almost worse if his brain is permanently damaged.”
“They won’t be able to try him for murder if he can’t defend himself, will they?”
“I shouldn’t think so. Even if they were pretty sure he did it, which they’re not.” Daisy ordered herself to stop procrastinating. “He had a letter in his pocket. Your mother asked me to tell you about it.”
“What?” Babs stopped and turned to face Daisy. “Why on earth . . . ?”
“It’s rather upsetting, and I don’t think she felt up to talking about it.”
“A letter in Gooch’s pocket that Mother doesn’t want to talk to me about?”
“Or Gwen. Jack already knows. It was addressed to him. Actually, there were two letters. I’m explaining this very badly.”
“Start again at the beginning. Pretend you’re writing an article and your readers expect to understand what you’ve written,” Babs suggested sardonically. “Gooch had a letter—two letters—in his pocket?”
“An envelope, sealed, with your father’s name on it.” Under Babs’s somewhat fierce regard, Daisy’s busy morning caught up with her and she began to feel rather weak at the knees. “Oh dear, is there somewhere we could sit down while I tell you?”
“There’s a stile a few yards farther on. You’re not going to faint, are you?”
“Heavens no!”
They reached the stile, flat stones projecting out of the banked wall on the uphill side of the drive. Daisy perched precariously on one of the steps.
Babs stood in front of her and resumed in gentler tones, “Gooch had two letters in his pocket in an envelope addressed to Father?”
“Yes. In the circumstances, Alec opened it and read the note to Sir Harold.”
“In the circumstances, I can see that he had to.”
“I ought not to have read it over his shoulder, though,” Daisy admitted guiltily. “I’m afraid curiosity is my besetting sin.”
“ ‘’Satiable curtiosity,’ like the Elephant’s Child?”
“Exactly!”
“Well, your nose seems to have survived intact. What did it say?”
“That she—it was written by Mrs. Gooch—she felt she ought to warn your father first but, whether he approved or not, she was going to tell Jack the facts.”
“For pity’s sake, Daisy, what facts?”
“That came later.” Daisy explained about the inner envelope, how Alec had given it to Jack and he, after reading it, had handed it back.
“So of course he read it. Oh Babs, it was heartbreaking! Mrs. Gooch said she’d come all the way from Australia to see him.
She wasn’t going to upset his life, but she wanted to make sure he was happy, and when he was so friendly to her at the pub she simply had to tell him the truth.
She said she and Sir Harold had an affair and she’s Jack’s mother. ”
“Good Lord,” said Babs blankly, “can it possibly be true? Or was it some sort of attempt at blackmail?”
“It could have been.”
“But it would fit, wouldn’t it, with Father dragging Mother off abroad and coming back months later with baby Jack? Father was so desperate for a son! And I’ll tell you what, it would explain why Gooch shot both of them. It must have been just plain old jealousy!”