Here Lies Gloria Mundy

‘It’s that bitch,’ he said. ‘There’s always trouble when she shows up anywhere. I nearly killed my closest friend once because of her. If you’re really going into the town, you had better go at once. I’ll give Celia a bit of time to cool off, and then I’ll go and make my peace with her. It was rotten of me to joke about Aunt Eglantine. I’m very fond of the old nuisance-value, as a matter of fact.’

‘It’s a pity she’s got this thing about witchcraft, isn’t it? Makes her seem — well — ’ I said delicately.

‘Yes. She was telling me that Gloria is a black witch and Dame Beatrice a white one. She is convinced that Gloria conjured up last night’s storm and got Roland and Kay bogged down because they laughed when Aunt Eglantine lobbed the lump of dough into Gloria’s soup. She’s sure that, if she attends the clinic, Dame Beatrice will preserve her from Gloria’s vengeance. Personally, if I had been Gloria I would have poured what remained of the soup all over the old pest’s topknot.’

‘Better not say so in public. Oh, well, I’ll be off, then.’

But I was not to go quite so soon as I expected. In fact, that morning I was not to go into the town at all. Coberley, who, with the lovely Marigold, was still at the school, rang up to say that he and his wife would not be coming over for lunch, as Marigold had slipped on the front steps of the school house (which meant the headmaster’s private domicile) and had hit her head. He had sent for the doctor, as he thought she had slight concussion and had badly bruised the side of her face.

This news would not have kept me from going to look for Aunt Eglantine and, in any case, I did not receive it until after my return to the house. I went to get my car, but as I walked past the old house I heard cries for help. The front door was closed, but I knew of the broken window at the back, so I shouted, ‘I’m coming,’ and went round there. The whole sash-window pane was out, so I climbed in and went along the passage.

Aunt Eglantine was lying amid the débris of the staircase. It was obvious what had happened. The old fathead, who must have weighed every bit of fourteen stone, had attempted to climb the stairs which Coberley had told me were totally unsafe. They had collapsed when she was halfway up and she had come down with a bang and had broken her left leg.

‘Don’t move,’ I said. ‘I’ll get an ambulance.’

‘Good Lord, whatever next!’ shouted Anthony, when I had blurted out the news. The ambulance removed Aunt Eglantine to hospital and then I heard about Marigold’s accident. Celia had been over to see her after she had returned from accompanying her aunt to the hospital.

‘Marigold does have slight concussion,’ she said, ‘and is to be kept quiet.’

‘Is her face much damaged?’ I asked. It was monstrous that such beauty should be flawed, even temporarily.

‘Well, it does look a bit of a mess,’ Celia admitted. ‘She seems to have scraped it on some rough stonework. It looks to me like a case for plastic surgery. Cranford Coberley is nearly out of his mind. He has threatened to flog every boy in the school if the culprit doesn’t own up.’

‘Own up to what?’ I asked. ‘Surely no boy is suspected of having pushed Mrs Coberley down the front steps? I expect they were simply slippery after all that rain.’

‘It wasn’t that. There’s a covered way up to the front door. Somebody had spread butter on the top two steps, that’s what.’

‘But it’s not all that easy for a boy to get hold of enough butter to spread it over two steps,’ I pointed out.

‘They are allowed to go into the town on Saturday mornings after early prep, and all the little devils have pocket money, I suppose,’ said Anthony. ‘I’m surprised, though, that any of them should have played such a stupid and dangerous trick on the Coberleys. I don’t know what the boys think of him, but I’ve always had the impression that Marigold was very popular with them.’

‘You had better go over there and try to make him see reason. He can’t flog the whole school,’ said Celia. ‘It’s the height of barbarism to flog anybody, in my opinion, and certainly the innocent should not be punished.’

‘How did you leave Aunt Eglantine?’ asked Anthony.

‘As comfortable as can be expected. I’m sorry for the nurses, that’s all.’

‘Did you travel with her in the ambulance?’

‘No, I followed it in my mini. By the way, be sure to keep the garage locked up. I saw two police cars turning into the road which leads to the old convent, so on my way back I drove up there to find out what was happening. A policeman stopped me and said the way was blocked by a burnt-out car.

‘ “Nobody hurt, and no number plates,” he told me. They think it was a stolen car which the thieves had abandoned. I suppose they had removed the number plates to baffle the police.’

‘It would hardly do that. Somebody is sure to report a stolen car, but why burn it?’ I said.

‘Just bloody-mindedness,’ said Anthony.

6

Arson

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