Here Lies Gloria Mundy

‘You first,’ she said; so I described the two Cornish hotels and added a couple of stories straight out of Rabelais concerning my doings in each. She laughed and laughed.

‘I must tell the nurses,’ she said. ‘It will keep them happy for weeks.’

‘I expect they’ve heard better ones from the young doctors,’ I said. ‘Now it’s your turn.’

‘Why haven’t you married, personable young man?’

‘No money to get married on at the time, and now I’ve let the chance go by.’

‘Nonsense. I prophesy that you will meet her again before long. Are you any good at picking up stitches?’

‘No, nor threads. Come on, play fair.’

‘Oh, yes, you want to know what I heard. First, that girl did not turn up out of the blue.’

‘She didn’t?’

‘No. Anthony Wotton asked her to come.’

‘You’ve got the story wrong.’

‘I never get stories wrong.’ I thought of Rubens and the portrait in the old house and said nothing. Encouraged or else irritated by my silence, she went on, ‘She came to blackmail him on the strength of the baby.’

I said sternly, ‘You really must not tell these awful whoppers, Madame Eglantine.’

‘Chaucer spelt it with an “e” and a “y”, whereas my misguided parents preferred Shakespeare’s rendering. What kind of flower is eglantine? Did your teachers tell you that?’

‘Eglantine is the old word for the sweetbrier. That’s why Oberon connected it with musk roses, I suppose,’ I told her.

‘I must remember to spell it Shakespeare’s way in my will. I shall leave you a competence. I am a very wealthy woman. Write both spellings down for me. Underline the one and run a light stroke neatly through the other.’

I took up the writing-pad which was on her bedside locker and printed in my best capitals EGLENTYNE and EGLANTINE.

‘Which is to be underlined and which is to have a line drawn through it?’ I asked.

‘Don’t ask stupid questions!’ she snapped at me. I drew a faint line through the first name and underlined more thickly the other. I deduced that she was getting tired, so I rose to go. She was having none of that, and ordered me to sit down again. She drew the writing-pad towards her and smiled.

‘I shall never get out of here alive, you know,’ she said. ‘They are witches and they meet at Hetty Pegler’s Tump.’

‘I’ve been there,’ I said, anxious to avoid the discussion of the Malleus Maleficarum which seemed imminent, ‘but I didn’t crawl inside.’

‘The Neoliths must have lacked stature,’ said Aunt Eglantine. ‘Did you ever visit Grime’s Graves?’

This subject lasted us for the remainder of my visit. A warning bell sounded and a nurse came in and told me that visiting hours were up. I bent over and kissed Aunt Eglantine.

‘You must come again,’ she said, ‘before they finish me off.’

I left the hospital and crossed the road to where Anthony had parked the car. He lowered the book he was reading and then tossed it on to the back seat.

‘Well,’ he said, ‘you stayed a lot longer than I thought you would.’

‘I did make one attempt to leave because I thought I was tiring her, but she wouldn’t have it. I suppose she gets bloody bored in there.’

‘Did she mention Gloria?’

‘Yes. She told me two things about her, both of them sheer invention, I feel sure.’

‘Did she get on to the Malleus?’

‘No. Hetty Pegler intervened and we also talked about Grime’s Graves.’

He started the engine. I stared out through the windscreen and hoped he would not ask what Aunt Eglantine had said about Gloria’s hair and her child, not that I believed either story. When the remark came, it was not a question but a simple assertion.

‘She has a bee in her bonnet about my having given Gloria a child,’ he said. ‘Sooner or later she tells everybody so. I suppose you got it, too.’

‘Yes, she did rather throw the information at me. I took it for what it was worth — sheer balderdash.’

To my astonishment he said he would tell me the truth, as he might need the help of a true friend later on. I realised, not for the first time, that he was desperately afraid of what Detective-Inspector Rouse might ferret out concerning his former relationship with Gloria and I realised, too, that he was far more concerned with the effect which possible revelations would have on his marriage than fears for his own personal safety.

The last thing on earth that I wanted was to become any more deeply involved in his affairs than I already was, but noblesse oblige, as, in its blackmailing way, it usually does, so I said something trite about doing anything I could. There was a long silence until I remarked that surely we were going rather a long way round to get back to Beeches Lawn.

‘Oh, Celia won’t be expecting us just yet,’ he said. ‘I told her you would probably need a pick-me-up in a pub after spending an hour solo with Aunt Eglantine. Anyway, I was going to tell you about the baby.’

‘Good Lord! So the story was true! I thought she was making it up because she dislikes you,’ I said.