Elizabeth Speller - The Return of Captain John Emmett

'George,' the doctor said. 'This is Captain Bartram.'

Laurence shook hands with George Chilvers. Even-featured and of average build, he was as handsome as had been reported and in a way Laurence suspected would be attractive to women. His reddish-gold hair was slicked to a sheen and his trim figure was enhanced by expensive tailoring.

'Perhaps you could show Captain Bartram around?' the older man suggested. 'After that, we might meet to discuss any further questions he might have.'

They moved into the hal. A slight man in his twenties was crossing it from one room to another. His trousers were so loose, Laurence noticed instantly, that they had been gathered in deep folds and were held up by an old tie used as a belt. The man stopped when he saw them and started to go back into the room he had just left. Doctor Chilvers moved towards him and placed a reassuring hand on his arm, nodding towards his son and Laurence. Laurence observed Chilvers' firm but comforting demeanour: while he talked, he kept his hand gently where it had lain and looked the man in the eye. Eventualy the younger man smiled slightly and glanced at Laurence.

'How do you do?' he said softly and then hurried into the next doorway.

Chapter Fifteen

Laurence was surprised how exhausted he felt when he got back to the Bul. If he had been able to admit his real interest to Chilvers, he felt the doctor could undoubtedly have helped him. Except that if he had mentioned John, Chilvers would probably have disappeared behind a screen of professional reticence. Seeing the place had been helpful and fairly reassuring, but Chilvers' own perceptions had both disturbed and moved him.

A couple of hours later, he and Charles were exchanging information: his incomplete impressions for Charles's more substantial progress.

'Wel, apart from the fact that our disgruntled one-armed friend and his chum could drink both of us under the table, it's been a useful exchange, ale for il-wil. I was glad when the landlord caled time, though,' Charles said. 'But to start with: there's something his sister either didn't know or didn't tel you. Emmett was front man on a firing squad. Dr Chilvers told the coroner that his patient had been very troubled by the execution.'

'Neither Mary nor her mother attended the inquest,' Laurence said. He was certain Mary had no idea. 'But, God, poor man.' He'd known one young officer who was ashamed that he'd faked ilness to get out of presiding over a firing squad but, as the subaltern said, he would have felt ashamed either way.

'And another odd thing,' Charles remembered. 'This was probably just a straightforward bit of trouble-making but the sacked employee commented in passing that given that one of Emmett's main symptoms was paralysis of the right arm, it was strange that he'd managed to shoot himself with it.'

Laurence sat forward. 'Are you sure?' Although the symptom tied in with what he already knew.

'Sure he said it, sure Emmett had it or sure that he was naturaly right-handed? Al three. I can remember him on the cricket pitch. Good bowler. Chilvers'

evidence stated that Emmett's right arm was useless. Police surgeon was equaly certain that he couldn't have done it with his left. Perhaps because it would have been the wrong angle? Anyway, my man had been involved in the treatment, which at the subtler end was a matter of trying to trick John into forgetting his arm didn't work: handing him a book, or whatever came to mind. They tried tying his other hand behind his back for days at a time, and, at the more dramatic end, giving him electric shocks to stimulate the muscles.'

Laurence grimaced.

Charles said ghoulishly, 'Regular Dr Frankenstein. Are you sure you didn't see wires?' But he didn't wait for an answer. 'Strangely, he'd shot himself through the heart, not the head.'

'Less messy. Definitely no letter?'

'Nothing much at al, I think. I did ask. A few bits and pieces and our joly old school scarf near by. Faithful til death and al that. Neatly folded. Coroner saw the deliberation as evidence of intent. Removed it to be sure of his shot. Much what you'd expect except for no note. Damn hard on the family, not having a letter. I suppose they got the scarf. Not much consolation.'

'It wasn't Marlborough colours actualy—Mary showed it to me—and hardly his sort of thing anyway, I'd have said. But where was he between-times?'

Charles shrugged. 'There were any number of barns and outhouses he could have holed up in until the hue and cry had died down, they say. They reckoned if John could have got hold of some food, he could have survived a week or two before he emerged and sauntered off to get a train. Perhaps not from Fairford, where they'd probably circulated his picture, but from a neighbouring vilage perhaps.'

'Do you know exactly where they found him?'

'The Foly. On the hil. We passed it yesterday. I pointed it out—at Faringdon. Wel, obviously we al knew it from school.'

The location came as a shock. Foly Wood had been such a strange place, always in shadow. But it made it much more likely that John had gone there of his own volition. Why was it more painful to think of him seeking out somewhere familiar to end it al, Laurence wondered? He thought of the young Holmwood patient who had died in his mother's bed. Was that a last frenzied act of rage or a final refuge in the safest place he knew?

'Frankly, when I realised both the degree of disaffection even in the man currently employed there, and the fact that we are never likely to be coming back, since I for one would certainly choose an alternative therapeutic establishment if I were to suddenly believe that I was Napoleon Bonaparte,' Charles said, 'I came clean, or cleanish. That's when I learned some interesting facts about Emmett's time there. Most interesting of al, he had visitors. An army friend and two members of the family.'

'"Army friend" could be anybody,' Laurence said, although he recaled that Mary had given the impression he had few left. And Mary visited, but I thought that his mother stayed away.'

Charles lowered his voice, although the room was empty. 'Yes, Mary did visit. In fact, two sisters did. More than once.' He paused. 'One was dark-haired and cross, though a bit of a looker, as the man who stil works there tels it: presumably your Miss Emmett; and the other was red-haired and crosser.'

'Eleanor Bolitho?' said Laurence, astonished, simultaneously realising that there could be any number of redheads in John's life.

'That's my guess,' said Charles. 'Do you think it's true that redheads always have tempers?'

'Charles,' Laurence butted in, 'when did these so-caled sisters come, did you ask him that?'

'It was Eleanor,' said Charles, 'because one time she brought her boy with her. Moreover, in addition to my deductive guesswork, and though both girls gave their name as Emmett, our man overheard John saying his fond farewels and he caled her Ely. He remembered thinking it was a rather sweet, feminine name quite at odds with her personality.'

Laurence laughed. 'What had she done?'

'Wel, the only thing she approved of was the food, I gather. Demanded that arrangements should be made for John to be accompanied on daily walks, if they weren't prepared to let him out on his own. She took him out once but they wouldn't alow it the other time she visited. Dr Chilvers was away and they needed his permission, they said. She was impressively furious and al else folowed. She inspected the library and declared it inadequate. Was incensed that al the patients wel enough were made to go on church parade. Harangued Chilvers Junior about John's room; he had been moved to one of the barred ones. She said he was hardly likely to jump out, although my man pointed out, with a certain degree of satisfaction, that jumping out, in a manner of speaking, was exactly what he did when he got the chance. But she was angriest of al to hear that John had been put in close confinement simply for leaving the building without permission. Close to tears in her fury, apparently.'