Nursery Crimes Part 12

She couldn't remember why. She remembered the air-raid, though, and the bookshop. "Just to see they weren't homesick, I suppose."

"They were little more than babies then. They're grown up now - nearly. If we lived a long way off we could drop in - on our way somewhere else. You can't drop in when you're just a few miles away. Not unless you have something of importance to say."

(Such as: Zanny, did you or did you not murder Miss Bridget O'Hare?) They both asked the question in their minds.

"There's always the piano," Clare said.

"What?" He wondered if anxiety were driving her mental.

She was brightening up. "You know when I sold the old one I vowed I wouldn't have another - that it took up too much room. Zanny never touched it, but even so, she made a fuss. Well - we could have a new one."

He didn't follow her. What had all this to do with Zanny now?

"It's a good reason to see her," Clare explained. "We'll go to the convent and ask her if she'd like a new piano for her fifteenth birthday next month. We've had an offer of one, we'll say. Second-hand, but expensive. We don't want to buy it unless she'll practise on it."

"A piano? Couldn't we make it a violin - a flute - a mouth-organ ... by G.o.d! A piano!"

"It has to be expensive enough to give the visit some point. Surely you see that? If you can think of a better reason for going - then tell me."

Mother Benedicta, heavily weighted by present events, received the Moncriefs politely. It was something about a piano and about Zanny being musical. When children tended to be weak academically parents sometimes compensated in other directions. It wasn't a bad thing. She hoped Zanny would say yes to the piano. An expensive outlay, certainly, even though second-hand. Was the Moncrief money perhaps a little tight? She hoped not - for Dolly's sake. She was pleased they wanted to see Dolly, too. She had never been able to understand why they hadn't taken to her more lovingly. That tale about jealousy long ago was really quite irrelevant now. They weren't bosom friends by any means, but there had never been any overt hostility. Dolly should spend her holidays with Zanny in the Moncrief home. Other families received her at holiday time with much pleasure. She was a pleasant, intelligent girl. As nice as Zanny.

Oh to G.o.d that Bridget O'Hare had been as intelligent.

"We were so sorry," Graham said, perhaps with more feeling than was necessary, "to hear about the young teacher."

"The will of G.o.d," Mother Benedicta said, not wholly believing it, but it was a good phrase that revealed nothing. The best way to deal with death. She didn't to talk about it.

"A terrible accident," Clare probed fearfully.

"I'll see that the two girls are sent to you," Mother Benedicta said, "and some tea and cakes will be brought in at four. You will excuse me if I can't stay and enjoy your company, but I have some rather pressing duties."

The O'Hare parents needed some hand-holding. They were over in the visitors' annexe and were behaving as any normal parents would behave in these shocking circ.u.mstances.

"What a nice problem," she said, departing, "the purchase -- or otherwise -- of a piano."

Snide, Clare thought. Definitely sarcastic. A threat of greater problems to come, perhaps.

Zanny, like Mother Benedicta, was mildly astonished by the reason for her parents' presence. She kissed her mother and hugged and kissed her father. Dolly cautiously shook hands with both and raised her face to be kissed. She didn't kiss back. When Graham squeezed her hand she let it stay limp.

She was living now in a carefully guarded little cell of self-preservation. At times the situation amused her. At times it appalled her. On the whole, though, she thought she could handle it. She had no doubt at all about the real reason for the Moncriefs' visit. The local papers were left in the hall for the staff to collect, it was always possible to have a quick dekko before they did.

They were sitting in the parlour: it was like a scene from a Jane Austen novel. Conversation was being politely bounced about. "You're looking a little pale, Zanny dear, are you sure you're taking your extra orange juice every morning?" "Oh, Mummy, I'm fine." "You're taking it, of course, Dolly? You really are looking very well, dear. I'm sure you've grown nearly an inch since I saw you last."

And Mr. Moncrief (Graham as she thought of him), chipping in with pleasant, fatuous remarks about the treat the local boys would have when the two lovely ladies eventually left school.

In a minute, Dolly thought, we will drink tea. The tray will be placed on the table after Sister Bernadette has removed the fern. We will eat sandwiches of chicken paste and the cake will be a slab cake with cherries and currants.

She was right in every respect.

And now, she thought, after she delicately removed a crumb from her lip, the Moncriefs will get down to business. She couldn't help feeling rather sorry for them. They really were rather nice. Especially Graham.

"Well," Clare said, rather desperately, "the piano is settled, then. You definitely want it?"

"I don't much mind," said Zanny. She wondered if Murphy were -musical. The Irish were good on the violin, weren't they? They called it the fiddle. They played jigs. Murphy had a sense of humour - he let his dignity slip a little now and then - he might, just for fun, play a few reels. But most of the time he'd play something slow and sad like "The Londonderry Air". "Oh, Danny Boy" - the pipes - the pipes are calling. He'd sing it in that lovely baritone of his and the tears would come to her eyes ... as they were coming now.

Mummy was looking very worried. "Zanny, you're all right, aren't you?"

"Of course I am." (Why did she have to interrupt her dream just then? The only place where you could have a decent day-dream here without interruption was in bed - and then you tended to fade off into sleep.) "She wasn't all right after the picnic," Dolly said, "she got sick in the bus."

A simple remark. A small crackle like distant thunder. A harmless striking of the dust in the region of Zanny's feet - a bullet carefully aimed. A warning. No blood. Yet.

Zanny looked at Dolly and then she looked at her parents. "Picnic food here," she said coolly, "is not as good as your picnic food, Mummy. I think the chicken paste was off."

"Is that why you went off - a little while after Miss O'Hare went off-- because you weren't feeling well?"

Dolly's sabre, now unsheathed, gleamed in the afternoon sunlight. She pa.s.sed the plate of cakes to Clare. Clare, frozen into silence, shook her head mutely.

Graham, who already had a piece, took another. He didn't know what kind of jungle maze he was walking through, but this was, indeed, jungle.

Zanny answered Dolly's question, her eyes a little narrowed. The sleeper was no longer asleep, then? How long had she been awake? How much had she seen?

"I went off," she said, "to pick flowers. I wasn't sick until we were all in the bus and ready for the drive back."

"Oh, yes," Dolly said cheerfully, "I remember. Murphy was in a towering rage about not finding Bridget O'Hare, wasn't he? He said she could walk back. And then you got sick."

"He said he had seen her," Zanny pointed out. "Don't forget that."

Dolly took a polite sip of tea. "Well, of course," she said. "Why wouldn't he have seen her? What was so surprising that he should have seen her? I mean - why mention that now?"

Zanny, casting around for an answer, couldn't find one. Everyone except Dolly stopped eating. Dolly, gloriously hungry, wonderfully elated, saw her own future mapped out in clear and perfect detail. An academic life could be dull, but it could also scintillate. She saw her chance. Now was the time to construct the foundation, brick by careful brick.

"It was a very unfortunate picnic," she told Graham and Clare. "Bridget O'Hare got killed. Murphy - he's the gardener here, but he drove the bus - was so angry when she didn't return that he drove back like a lunatic. Zanny looked awful. Of course we didn't know that Bridget had been killed until the following day. Murphy said he'd seen her, but he must have seen someone else. Well, we'll know the facts one day, I suppose. Do you know, this cake isn't at all bad, the cherries are quite juicy."

Graham put his plate on the table. If Clare's stomach felt anything like his, it would appreciate a stiff whisky. He didn't dare look at her, neither did he look at Zanny. He had been in court once, accused of a minor motoring offence. There had been no barrister - no judge -just a collection of local JPs. He was beginning now - in Dolly's presence - to appreciate what the atmosphere of a criminal court could be like. He met her eyes briefly. Where along the line had she shrugged off her familiar rather jokey ident.i.ty? What was she now, for G.o.d's sake? What did she want from them?

"Mother Benedicta," Dolly said, picking it up telepathically, "is rather keen that I should learn Greek. It's not on the curriculum. Latin is, of course, and I'm supposed to be good at it."

"You mean," Graham limped along after her, "that Greek lessons could be arranged for you -- as an extra?"

Dolly smiled at him. "I'd hate to impose."

"No imposition - of course you may learn Greek."

"You're awfully kind to me. There's just a chance I might get to university."

"Why, that would be splendid, Dolly . .. wouldn't it, Clare?"

Clare nodded mutely. So Zanny had killed again. Why couldn't the young be dropped from the nest at the fledgling stage? Why couldn't responsibility be for ever shed? Turn her in. Cut off the blood money to Dolly. (Machiavellian Dolly - why didn't we know you had Machiavellian tendencies, Dolly?) Why do Graham and I have to be so caring - so good - so burdened? Why do we have to keep on pretending?