Chapter Twenty-Six
TWENTY-SIX
Daisy couldn’t sleep. Or perhaps she did, she wasn’t sure. Much of the night she was in that half-waking, half-sleeping state where thoughts and dreams are so interwoven one can’t tell which is which.
The centre round which her musings meandered was the War.
People swirled past her inner eye: Tesler, the conscientious objector, crippled by the meaningless task set to punish him for refusing to kill people; Pencote, crippled by the War Tesler had refused to fight, no longer believing he had suffered for a just cause.
How could either not be bitter? How could either not resent Harriman’s brutal teasing, Tesler damned as a coward and Pencote a hero who saw himself as a victim?
Pencote, though, considered Tesler a hero for standing up for his principles to the point of going to prison.
Miss Bascombe, her hand on Tesler’s arm.…
Michael came to Daisy, his face as clear as the day she heard of his death, blown up driving a Friends’ Ambulance at the front. Awake, she could no longer picture her “conchie” fiancé with such clarity, and she had destroyed her photos of him out of loyalty to Alec.
“Blessed are the peacemakers.” The vicar had spoken the phrase at Evensong that very afternoon. Yet most of the officers going like patriotic sheep to war must have been Anglicans. On the whole, one simply was.
Alec’s Colonel Pelham, for instance—she would be extremely surprised to hear he hadn’t considered himself a member of the Church of England, however rarely he attended services.
It was the colonel who had first made Daisy’s thoughts turned to war.
She had said as much to Alec hadn’t she?
He was looking for connections, and she had wondered. …
Connections. Three bodies connected by burial close to one another in Epping Forest, connected by the manner of their death, connected by the paper targets pinned to their chests. Where had Daisy heard of such a thing before?
Gervaise, she thought. Her brother, patriotic, Anglican, an officer, and dead, hadn’t he told her, on his one and only leave from France, that they pinned targets over the hearts of deserters when they were shot?
Or had it been one of the officers in the military hospital where she had worked in the office?
Too cowardly to be a VAD nurse tending their gruesome wounds, she had talked to them when they were safely bandaged. Those capable of speech.
Someone had told her only the rank and file were shot when they ran away. Patriotic Anglican officers were sent to special hospitals, whence, once deemed cured of cowardice, they were returned to the front.
Pencote—she didn’t know whether he had been an officer, but if once he had been patriotic, he was no more, not as Gervaise would have understood it.
Perhaps if he had been a coward, he’d have been sent to a hospital instead of having his legs blown off.
Pencote, striking out in vain at his tormentor with his crutch.
… Miss Bascombe with her hand on Tesler’s arm. …
Tesler, attaining serenity in Meeting.… Miss Bascombe scared to death of something.…
Who the coward, who the hero, who the villain, who the fool?
Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall … Shall what? Trying to remember, Daisy drifted off to sleep at last.
In the morning, when a chambermaid came in with early-morning tea, Daisy awoke with jumbled, fading memories of last night’s ideas, fancies, or dreams floating through her head.
Just one image was still clear in her mind: Pencote flailing at Harriman with his crutch.
Could Harriman, after long hours supervising sports day, have failed to move fast enough to get out of range?
She had to talk to Sakari. What time was it? She reached for her wrist-watch—nearly eight o’clock already. The hotel stopped serving breakfast at nine on weekdays, so they had agreed to meet in the dining room at half-past eight.
Daisy got up and washed, wishing she had brought more clothes.
She was supposed to be at home by now. She had washed out her knickers and stockings last night, and they were dry enough to wear.
It wasn’t raining, thank goodness. Sun and cloud alternated, so her summer-weight costume would do, and the flowery blouse she had worn on Saturday evening was still presentable.
She knocked on Sakari’s door.
“Daisy? I’ll be with you in five minutes.”
“All right. I’m going down.”
Hardly anyone was about. The parents who had come for the weekend had apparently escaped Inspector Gant’s clutches, presumably leaving their names and addresses behind them.
The commercial travellers who made up most of the Rose and Crown’s usual clientèle wouldn’t arrive for a few hours.
The dining room was empty but for a couple of professional-looking men sitting alone, who had an indefinable air of being bachelors who always breakfasted here, and a lounging waiter.
Daisy sat at a table by a window and ordered coffee and breakfast for two, knowing it wouldn’t come for at least five minutes. Sakari arrived first.
“Good morning, Daisy. I hope you slept well?”
“Actually, no. I hardly slept a wink. Did you?”
“Oh yes. You suffered from indigestion—”
“I never get indigestion!”
“—from a surfeit of religion, perhaps, not to mention murder. I leave the worrying about murder to you.”
“I am worried. You don’t mind talking about it?”
“Not in the least. I am all agog to hear your latest theory.”
“I don’t like it.”
They dropped the subject momentarily as breakfast arrived. The waiter poured coffee and removed the silver-plate dish covers. Milk and sugar; salt and pepper; toast, butter, and marmalade were passed.
Hungry as she was, Daisy scarcely noticed what was on her plate. As soon as the waiter was out of earshot, she said, “Sakari, I have an awful feeling that Mr. Pencote might have killed Harriman.”
“Nonsense, Daisy, he is a cripple. Inspector Gant has already considered him and decided it would be impossible.”
“That in itself is almost a good enough reason for thinking it’s possible!”
Sakari chuckled. “This is true. But only almost a good enough reason. The man has no legs.”
“I still think he could have done it. I saw him take a swipe at Harriman with one of his crutches. Harriman was already moving onwards so the crutch missed by a mile. I doubt whether he even noticed. But supposing he stopped to talk and was his usual offensive self. Like everyone else, he’d think of Pencote as harmless, defenceless.
He wouldn’t be watching out for an attack.
And Pencote, having missed before, might have hit out again with no expectation of landing a blow. ”
“You do not believe he intended to kill Harriman?”
“Oh no, I’m sure he didn’t mean to.”
“Surely he cannot be strong enough to hit hard enough to kill!”
“Think about it, Sakari. Imagine how much effort it must take to hang your whole weight from your arms, not just for a second or two, but for a long time.”
“I could not do it for a second or two.”
“I don’t suppose I could, either. Pencote does. And on top of that, he has to move the crutches with his weight hanging from them, controlling them with his muscles so that he doesn’t lose his balance. I’m sure his arms and shoulders must be very strong.”
“I do not like this, Daisy.”
“I told you, nor do I.”
“Fortunately, even if he has the strength to kill Harriman, you cannot persuade me that he could then move the body to the Garden and hide it in the maze.”
“No, I can’t work out how he could do it. But I like the answer even less. Tesler and Miss Bascombe must have done that part. Pencote and Tesler are close friends, and Miss Bascombe is in love with Tesler. Knowing it was an accident, they would have helped him.”
“Why are you so certain Mr. Pencote was involved? Is it not possible that the other two were responsible for everything? After all, Harriman’s insult to Tesler was much more unpleasant than that he offered Pencote, which, indeed, he himself may not have intended as an insult.
There are few men who would be angry at being called a hero. ”
“True, and of course it’s physically possible. But psychologically—you’re the one who goes to lectures on psychology. Can you imagine Mahatma Gandhi attacking someone who called him a coward?”
“No. He has been subject to worse insults.”
“Tesler also suffered for his abhorrence of violence. What makes it still more improbable: If it was Tesler, it would have had to be a deliberate attack, not an unthinking striking out.”
“This I like still less! I am exceedingly glad that we are merely speculating. You do not feel obliged to explain your theory to the inspector, I trust?”
“To Ghastly Gant? Certainly not! I doubt I’d even tell Alec, if it were his case. As you say, it’s pure speculation.” But if nothing of the sort had happened, why was Miss Bascombe so upset?
“If you intend to do nothing about it, you had best stop worrying about it,” said Sakari practically. “What are your plans for today?”
“I thought I’d walk up to the San to see how the girls are doing. Will you come?”
“Walk!”
Daisy shook her head with a smile. “You take a taxi, if you prefer. I could do with the exercise. It’ll clear my head, and it’s a nice day, not too hot and not raining.”
“Yet. I want to read the newspaper, and I have some letters I ought to write. I shall get on with those. Tell Deva I shall come and see her this afternoon. I dare say Sister will be happier if her Sanatorium is not overflowing with anxious mothers.”
“All right. I’ll be back by lunchtime.”