Peter Dickinson - Death of a Unicorn

She continued to demonstrate her competence in coping with age. She needed to support her wrist with her left hand in order to pour from the teapot, but did so without splash or spill. The trolley was neatly laid with china all from one set, a variety of biscuits in a pattern on their plate, a fruit cake. The teaspoons and silver milk jug had been recently polished. The tea was hot.

The simplest course seemed to be to plunge straight in.

‘I have been talking to Ronnie Smith . . .’ I began.

‘Who, my dear?’

I mouthed the name.

‘Oh, Ronald Smith. He came to see me about his history of Night and Day. I must confess I was very doubtful about telling him anything. If I had known in the old days what we have since learned I would have done my best to see that he was locked up. Of course he claims to have had a change of heart, but you cannot ever tell with these people.’

‘I think it’s genuine,’ I said. ‘I saw him this morning. He’s in rather a poor way, I’m sorry to say, but I’m going to try and get him looked after. And he’s had trouble with his publisher about the history, which means it may not get written after all.’

‘An excellent project, though I must confess I would have preferred to see it in other hands. I could have told him a great deal about my dear husband’s doings, but he seemed to me much more interested in that dreadful man Brierley. My dear, I need not tell you how often I have given thanks that the scales fell from your eyes in time.’

‘If they did, but don’t let’s worry about that. There’s something I particularly want to ask you, Mrs Clarke. It’s why I came. I’m afraid it’s still about Amos Brierley. I know at one time you were trying to find out all you could about him. I wonder if you know where he got most of his money from.’

‘From the Communists, of course.’

‘I see. But you didn’t tell anyone?’

‘I did not realise in time. My late husband’s friends had told me that there was something peculiar. Money doesn’t come from nowhere, you know, and people in the City are very clever about that sort of thing. I did know of course about that business in Barbados of which I told you, but that had not then produced any funds. No, it was only after they had him shot . . .’

‘Who had him shot?’

‘The Communists, my dear.’

‘Why on earth?’

‘Because he was trying to cheat them. They gave him money to turn my magazine into a weapon on their side, and he pretended to be doing that, but all he wanted was to make money, and when he appointed Mr Naylor . . . I do not care for Mr Naylor, but he is certainly not a friend of the Communists. You see, he gave himself away. They shot him, of course. They do not know the meaning of pity or forgiveness.’

I was not as disappointed as one might think. The theory might be absurd, but the fact that she had remembered a brief and trivial conversation with me showed that her grasp of the past was remarkably precise. I wouldn’t have known what she was referring to if I had not recently read my old manuscript.

‘So you didn’t tell my mother about the Communists because you didn’t know then?’ I said.

‘I beg your pardon.’

Perhaps, because she had been seeming to follow the conversation with such ease, I had allowed myself to speed up too much. I repeated the question slowly and clearly.

‘I never told your mother anything, Lady Margaret,’ she said.

‘Oh, I’m sorry. I thought you told my mother about Amos Brierley trying to work a currency swindle in Barbados.’

‘No, my dear. I told you. I didn’t tell anyone else.’

‘Yes, I know you did. Well, you hinted at it.’

‘I told you very explicitly.’

‘All right. Perhaps my memory’s not as good as yours. But my mother certainly seems to think you told her.’

‘I never met Lady Millett except the once, at that party when your little book was published. Of course, as you know, she was kind enough to sign my photograph for me.’

‘She didn’t!’

I don’t know why I should have reacted with such vehement astonishment to this trivial bit of news. Not only astonishment, but also the amusement always aroused when somebody well known does something totally out of character. There was a long silence. Mrs Clarke, I remembered, was used to studying faces for information.

‘If I may say so, Lady Margaret,’ she said, ‘this is all very extraordinary. I am beginning to wonder why you have troubled to pay me this visit.’

As she spoke I heard vague sounds of struggle in the blackness beside the glare. Craning sideways and shading my eyes I saw that she had heaved herself to her feet and was looking around in a frustrated way as though not sure what to do next. I rose too and, now able to see her properly, realised that she wanted to move, but her walking-frame was in the kitchen and the trolley encumbered with tea things no longer stacked for safe transport.

‘Can I help ?’ I said.

She didn’t hear, so I moved and took her arm.

‘Oh, if you would be so good,’ she said. ‘It must be a misunderstanding. Perhaps I didn’t hear you aright. Oh dear, how strange.’

I steadied her across the room. Her movements were less purposeful than I had expected, nothing like as doubtful as my mother’s but tinged with the same kind of uncertainty. We stopped at the inner wall by a shelf covered with yet more of the collection. Below it was a closed cupboard.

‘In there,’ she said.

I opened the doors and found a double shelf of albums. I ran my finger along the backs until Mrs Clarke stopped me.

‘That one, I think,’ she said.

I heaved it out, then helped her over to the escritoire where I laid it down. She opened it and leafed steadily through the pages. Faces flipped by. Long dresses and short. Tiaras, toques, pill-boxes. Organdie, cotton, furs, silk. And there we were.

The picture was in fact dominated not by any of us but by a flower-urn from which erupted a structure of white lilies and roses and gypsophila, with white delphiniums rocketing up above. Before it stood the Milletts, my mother severe and slim in the middle and on either side of her two girls, distinguishable only by their dresses and the fact that one was wearing a showy necklace. Something about the lighting had brought out the Millett look more strongly than usual. The pig princesses. My mother’s emphatic scrawl spread across the bottom.

‘There,’ said Mrs Clarke. ‘I knew it was there. I knew I wasn’t dreaming. Sometimes when you get old you aren’t quite sure. You brought it to me. You said you realised you had been wrong about Mr Brierley. You said it was because of a picture you had found in a book. A picture of a little statue. You said it showed that he was a terrible man, and you asked me to explain what I had been trying to tell you before. I don’t normally repeat secrets, but I have had a very soft spot for you almost since the day we met. I told you all I had heard about Mr Brierley cheating his mother, as well as our own government, over a plantation in Barbados. What was its name, now?’

‘Halper’s Corner,’ I said.

She didn’t hear. I left the album where it was and helped her back to her chair. She was extremely shaky now. I held her hand and knelt in the glare of the light. I took a deep breath.

‘I’m terribly sorry,’ I said. ‘I’d quite forgotten about the photograph. Of course I remember now. It’s just that my mother gets very muddled, and the other day she was perfectly convinced she’d met you and you’d told her all sorts of things you hadn’t told me. I usually pay no attention because she gets so confused, but she did seem very on the spot that morning, and I really wanted to get it cleared up. Of course you’re right. You haven’t forgotten anything. It’s all my stupid fault.’