Виктория Холт - The Captive

“Someone must have killed Cosmo and perhaps someone in the house knows who did.”

“Someone somewhere knows the truth, that’s for sure.”

“Tell me about the house.”

“Well, there was Sir Edward, wasn’t there?”

“He’s dead now.”

“Yes. Died about the time of the murder, didn’t he? He was very ill before it happened … not expected to live.”

“And old Lady Perrivale?”

“She was a bit of a tartar. One of them Northerners … different from us. She’d been used to having her own way and Sir Edward … he let her … except when it was something like bringing the boy into the house. She didn’t want that… natural like, but he said it was to be and be it was. Well, there she was, never forgetting that it was her money that saved Perrivale. Mrs. Ford said the woodworm and death watch beetle would have done for the place and pretty quick if she hadn’t come into the family in time. And she had her boys Cosmo and Tristan. She was proud of them. And then Simon comes. It might have been better for the poor little mite if there’d been open ructions, I used to think sometimes, rather than all that snide picking on him. It wasn’t only her ladyship. There were the servants and others. I wouldn’t have had that in my nursery … but I’ve told you all this before.”

“I like to hear it and a bit more comes out every time.”

“Well, as I was saying, up at Perrivale it wasn’t a very happy house.

Things wasn’t quite right between Sir Edward and her ladyship. You can always tell. Mind you, he was always very proper . always treated her like the lady of the house . but you could tell. Her ladyship was one of those women who’d have had her own way with any other man. But Sir Edward, he was a funny one. He was the master but it was her money that had saved the place. She didn’t want anyone to forget that. And Sir Edward, he was that strict. If the girls got up to a bit of malarkey with the men, it would be wedding bells for them before there was the first sign of a bundle of trouble.

It was prayers in the hall every morning and everybody in the house had to attend. “

We were silent for a while. She sat there, smiling into the distance, seeing the past, I knew.

“Then came the day when the boys went away to school and they didn’t want Nanny Crockett any more. But I got this job in Upbridge … a stone’s throw away, you might say, so I didn’t feel quite cut off. A nice little thing, Grace was. Her parents were the Burrows … highly respected in Upbridge. Dr. Burrows was her father. She was the only one. I was with her right till the time they sent her to school.

She used to say to me: “You’ll be nanny to my babies, won’t you. Nanny Crockett … when I get some.” And I used to tell her that nannies get old like everyone else and there comes a time when they have to give a little thought to their own comfort, as they once did to that of their little ones. It’s sad, saying goodbye to them. You get attached. They’re your children while you’ve got them. That’s how it is. “

“Yes, I know. The wrench is very sad.”

“I’ve been lucky with mine. Simon used to come over to see me, and now and then I’d walk over and have a cup of tea with Mrs. Ford.”

“And after Grace Burrows, you came here?”

She nodded.

“It was in my last year at the Burrows’ that it happened.”

“So,” I said, hearing the note of excitement in my own voice as I spoke, ‘you were close when it happened? “

“I saw her once or twice.”

“Saw whom?”

“The widow.”

“What did you think of her?”

She was silent. Then she said: “With a woman like that around, things happen. There’s something dangerous about them. Some said she was a witch. They go in for that sort of thing round here. They like to think of people riding out on broomsticks and cooking up mischief. Well, there was mischief at Perrivale after she appeared on the scene.”

“So you think she was involved in it?”

“Most seem to think so. We hadn’t seen many of her sort down here. She looked different even. All that red hair and them green eyes that didn’t go with the hair somehow. All of a sudden there was this widow among us with a child … and she was almost as strange as her mother. Now her father, he was different. Oh, everybody liked the Major. He was jolly with everybody. Always passed the time of day. A very nice gentleman. Quite different from her.”

“Tell me about the child. You know a great deal about children. What did you think of her?”

“It’s my own I know … all their little ways and habits … I can read them like a book. But that one … well, I never had much to do with her nor should I want to. I reckon she’ll be another like her mother. Kate, her name is, I think. A nice, ordinary sort of name.

Different from her mother’s. Mirabel. What sort of name is that? “

“Hers apparently. And mine is Rosetta. You probably think that’s odd.”

“Oh no. That’s pretty. It’s Rose really and what’s nicer than a nice rose?”

“Tell me what you found out about Mirabel and Kate?”

“Only that they were a peculiar pair. They came with her father and took Seashell Cottage and it was clear that the widow woman was looking for a nice rich husband. So she settled on the Perrivales. They said she could have had any of them and she settled on Cosmo. He was the eldest. He’d get the estates and the title … so it had to be Cosmo.”

“Did the family approve of this woman coming from nowhere? I should have thought Sir Edward, with his conventional tastes, might have objected.”

“Oh, Sir Edward was too far gone. As for Lady Perrivale, she was as taken with Mirabel as any of them. Story was that the Major was an old friend of hers. He’d married her old schoolfriend and Mirabel was the result of that marriage. She had wanted them to come and settle in Cornwall in the first place. I don’t know how true that is but that’s how the story goes. The Major was always up at Perrivale. Oh, she was very taken with him. He’s the sort who’d get on with anyone. Oh yes.

Lady Perrivale was all for the marriage. “

“And then … it happened.”

“They all thought Simon, like the others, was smitten by her. That was where the motive came in.”

“He didn’t do it. Nanny,” I said earnestly.

“Why should he have done?

I don’t believe h& was in love with that woman. “

“No,” she said.

“He’d have too much sense. Besides, it didn’t mean that because Cosmo was dead she would turn to him. No … that was not the answer. How I wish I knew what was.”

“You believe in Simon’s innocence, don’t you. Nanny? I mean, you believe absolutely?”

“I do. And I know that boy better than any.”

“Do any of us really know other people?”

“I know my children,” she said staunchly.

“If you could help him, would you. Nanny?”

“With all my heart.”

And then I told her. I went through the whole story, beginning with our encounter on deck, to the time when we parted company outside the Embassy in Constantinople.

She was astounded.

“And you’ve been here all this time and not told me before?”

“I couldn’t be entirely sure of you. I had to protect Simon. You understand?”

She nodded slowly. Then she turned to me and gripped my hand.

“Nanny,” I said solemnly.

“More than anything, I want to solve this. I want to find the truth.”

“That’s what I want,” she said.

“You know a great deal about them. You have access to the house.”

She nodded.

I said with a sudden upward surging of hope: “Nanny, you and I will work together. We’re going to prove Simon’s innocence.”