Sad Cypress by Agatha Christie
Elinor said:
“Though it was difficult for my aunt to speak coherently, she was able to make her meaning understood that last evening. She definitely wanted to make some provision for your future.”
Mary said quietly:
“That was very good of her.”
Elinor said brusquely:
“As soon as probate is granted, I am arranging that two thousand pounds should be made over to you—that sum to be yours to do with absolutely as you please.”
Mary’s colour rose.
“Two thousand pounds? Oh, Miss Elinor, that is good of you! I don’t know what to say.”
Elinor said sharply:
“It isn’t particularly good of me, and please don’t say anything.”
Mary flushed.
“You don’t know what a difference it will make to me,” she murmured.
Elinor said:
“I’m glad.”
She hesitated. She looked away from Mary to the other side of the room. She said with a slight effort:
“I wonder—have you any plans?”
Mary said quickly:
“Oh, yes. I shall train for something. Massage, perhaps. That’s what Nurse Hopkins advises.”
Elinor said:
“That sounds a very good idea. I will try and arrange with Mr. Seddon that some money shall be advanced to you as soon as possible—at once, if that is feasible.”
“You’re very, very good, Miss Elinor,” said Mary gratefully.
Elinor said curtly:
“It was Aunt Laura’s wish.” She hesitated, then said, “Well, that’s all, I think.”
This time the definite dismissal in the words pierced Mary’s sensitive skin. She got up, said quietly, “Thank you very much, Miss Elinor,” and left the room.
Elinor sat quite still, staring ahead of her. Her face was quite impassive. There was no clue in it as to what was going on in her mind. But she sat there, motionless, for a long time….
III
Elinor went at last in search of Roddy. She found him in the morning room. He was standing staring out of the window. He turned sharply as Elinor came in.
She said:
“I’ve got through it all! Five hundred for Mrs. Bishop—she’s been here such years. A hundred for the cook and fifty each for Milly and Olive. Five pounds each to the others. Twenty-five for Stephens, the head gardener; and there’s old Gerrard, of course, at the Lodge. I haven’t done anything about him yet. It’s awkward. He’ll have to be pensioned off, I suppose?”
She paused and then went on rather hurriedly:
“I’m settling two thousand on Mary Gerrard. Do you think that’s what Aunt Laura would have wished? It seemed to me about the right sum.”
Roddy said without looking at her:
“Yes, exactly right. You’ve always got excellent judgement, Elinor.”
He turned to look out of the window again.
Elinor held her breath for a minute, then she began to speak with nervous haste, the words tumbling out incoherently:
“There’s something more: I want to—it’s only right—I mean, you’ve got to have your proper share, Roddy.”
As he wheeled round, anger on his face, she hurried on:
“No, listen, Roddy. This is just bare justice! The money that was your uncle’s—that he left to his wife—naturally he always assumed it would come to you. Aunt Laura meant it to, too. I know she did, from lots of things she said. If I have her money, you should have the amount that was his—it’s only right. I—I can’t bear to feel I’ve robbed you—just because Aunt Laura funked making a will. You must—you must see sense about this!”
Roderick’s long, sensitive face had gone dead white.
He said:
“My God, Elinor, do you want to make me feel an utter cad? Do you think for one moment I could—could take this money from you?”
“I’m not giving it to you. It’s just—fair.”
Roddy cried out:
“I don’t want your money!”
“It isn’t mine!”
“It’s yours by law—and that’s all that matters! For God’s sake, don’t let’s be anything but strictly businesslike! I won’t take a penny from you. You’re not going to do the Lady Bountiful to me!”
Elinor cried out:
“Roddy!”
He made a quick gesture.
“Oh, my dear, I’m sorry. I don’t know what I’m saying. I feel so bewildered—so utterly lost….”
Elinor said gently:
“Poor Roddy….”
He had turned away again and was playing with the blind tassel of the window. He said in a different tone, a detached one:
“Do you know what—Mary Gerrard proposes doing?”
“She’s going to train as a masseuse, so she says.”
He said, “I see.”
There was a silence. Elinor drew herself up; she flung back her head. Her voice when she spoke was suddenly compelling.
She said:
“Roddy, I want you to listen to me carefully!”
He turned to her, slightly surprised.
“Of course, Elinor.”
“I want you, if you will, to follow my advice.”
“And what is your advice?”
Elinor said calmly:
“You are not particularly tied? You can always get a holiday, can’t you?”
“Oh, yes.”
“Then do—just that. Go abroad somewhere for—say, three months. Go by yourself. Make new friends and see new places. Let’s speak quite frankly. At this moment you think you’re in love with Mary Gerrard. Perhaps you are. But it isn’t a moment for approaching her—you know that only too well. Our engagement is definitely broken off. Go abroad, then, as a free man, and at the end of the three months, as a free man, make up your mind. You’ll know then whether you—really love Mary or whether it was only a temporary infatuation. And if you are quite sure you do love her—well, then, come back and go to her and tell her so, and that you’re quite sure about it, and perhaps then she’ll listen.”
Roddy came to her. He caught her hand in his.
“Elinor, you’re wonderful! So clearheaded! So marvellously impersonal! There’s no trace of pettiness or meanness about you. I admire you more than I can ever say. I’ll do exactly what you suggest. Go away, cut free from everything—and find out whether I’ve got the genuine disease or if I’ve just been making the most ghastly fool of myself. Oh, Elinor, my dear, you don’t know how truly fond I am of you. I do realize you were always a thousand times too good for me. Bless you, dear, for all your goodness.”
Quickly, impulsively, he kissed her cheek and went out of the room.
It was as well, perhaps, that he did not look back and see her face.
IV
It was a couple of days later that Mary acquainted Nurse Hopkins with her improved prospects.
That practical woman was warmly congratulatory.
“That’s a great piece of luck for you, Mary,” she said. “The old lady may have meant well by you, but unless a thing’s down in black and white, intentions don’t go for much! You might easily have got nothing at all.”
“Miss Elinor said that the night Mrs. Welman died she told her to do something for me.”
Nurse Hopkins snorted.
“Maybe she did. But there’s many would have forgotten conveniently afterwards. Relations are like that. I’ve seen a few things, I can tell you! People dying and saying they know they can leave it to their dear son or their dear daughter to carry out their wishes. Nine times out of ten, dear son and dear daughter find some very good reason to do nothing of the kind. Human nature’s human nature, and nobody likes parting with money if they’re not legally compelled to! I tell you, Mary, my girl, you’ve been lucky. Miss Carlisle’s straighter than most.”
Mary said slowly:
“And yet—somehow—I feel she doesn’t like me.”
“With good reason, I should say,” said Nurse Hopkins bl
Mary went red.
Nurse Hopkins went on:
“He’s got it badly, in my opinion. Fell for you all of a sudden. What about you, my girl? Got any feelings for him?”
Mary said hesitatingly:
“I—I don’t know. I don’t think so. But of course, he’s very nice.”
“H’m,” said Nurse Hopkins. “He wouldn’t be my fancy! One of those men who are finicky and a bundle of nerves. Fussy about their food, too, as likely as not. Men aren’t much at the best of times. Don’t be in too much of a hurry, Mary, my dear. With your looks you can afford to pick and choose. Nurse O’Brien passed the remark to me the other day that you ought to go on the films. They like blondes, I’ve always heard.”
Mary said, with a slight frown creasing her forehead:
“Nurse, what do you think I ought to do about Father? He thinks I ought to give some of this money to him.”
“Don’t you do anything of the kind,” said Nurse Hopkins wrathfully. “Mrs. Welman never meant that money for him. It’s my opinion he’d have lost his job years ago if it hadn’t been for you. A lazier man never stepped!”
Mary said:
“It seems funny when she’d all that money that she never made a will to say how it was to go.”
Nurse Hopkins shook her head.
“People are like that. You’d be surprised. Always putting it off.”
Mary said:
“It seems downright silly to me.”
Nurse Hopkins said with a faint twinkle:
“Made a will yourself, Mary?”
Mary stared at her.
“Oh, no.”
“And yet you’re over twenty-one.”
“But I—I haven’t got anything to leave—at least I suppose I have now.”
Nurse Hopkins said sharply:
“Of course you have. And a nice tidy little sum, too.”
Mary said:
“Oh, well, there’s no hurry….”
“There you go,” said Nurse Hopkins drily. “Just like everyone else. Because you’re a healthy young girl isn’t a reason why you shouldn’t be smashed up in a charabanc or a bus, or run over in the street any minute.”
Mary laughed. She said:
“I don’t even know how to make a will.”
“Easy enough. You can get a form at the post office. Let’s go and get one right away.”
In Nurse Hopkins’ cottage, the form was spread out and the important matter discussed. Nurse Hopkins was enjoying herself thoroughly. A will, as she said, was next best to a death, in her opinion.
Mary said:
“Who’d get the money if I didn’t make a will?”
Nurse Hopkins said rather doubtfully:
“Your father, I suppose.”
Mary said sharply:
“He shan’t have it. I’d rather leave it to my auntie in New Zealand.”
Nurse Hopkins said cheerfully:
“It wouldn’t be much use leaving it to your father, anyway—he’s not long for this world, I should say.”
Mary had heard Nurse Hopkins make this kind of pronouncement too often to be impressed by it.
“I can’t remember my auntie’s address. We’ve not heard from her for years.”
“I don’t suppose that matters,” said Nurse Hopkins. “You know her Christian name?”
“Mary. Mary Riley.”
“That’s all right. Put down you leave everything to Mary Riley, sister of the late Eliza Gerrard of Hunterbury, Maidensford.”
Mary bent over the form, writing. As she came to the end she shivered suddenly. A shadow had come between her and the sun. She looked up to see Elinor Carlisle standing outside the window looking in. Elinor said:
“What are you doing so busily?”
Nurse Hopkins said with a laugh:
“She’s making her will, that’s what she’s doing.”
“Making her will?” Suddenly Elinor laughed—a strange laugh—almost hysterical.
She said:
“So you’re making your will, Mary. That’s funny. That’s very funny….”
Still laughing, she turned away and walked rapidly along the street.
Nurse Hopkins stared.
“Did you ever? What’s come to her?”
V
Elinor had not taken more than half a dozen steps—she was still laughing—when a hand fell on her arm from behind. She stopped abruptly and turned.
Dr. Lord looked straight at her, his brow creased into a frown.
He said peremptorily:
“What were you laughing at?”
Elinor said:
“Really—I don’t know.”
Peter Lord said:
“That’s rather a silly answer!”
Elinor flushed. She said:
“I think I must be nervous—or something. I looked in at the District Nurse’s cottage and—and Mary Gerrard was writing out her will. It made me laugh; I don’t know why!”
Lord said abruptly:
“Don’t you?”
Elinor said:
“It was silly of me—I tell you—I’m nervous.”
Peter Lord said:
“I’ll write you out a tonic.”
Elinor said incisively:
“How useful!”
He grinned disarmingly.
“Quite useless, I agree. But it’s the only thing one can do when people won’t tell one what is the matter with them!”
Elinor said:
“There’s nothing the matter with me.”
Peter Lord said calmly:
“There’s quite a lot the matter with you.”
Elinor said:
“I’ve had a certain amount of nervous strain, I suppose….”
He said:
“I expect you’ve had quite a lot. But that’s not what I’m talking about.” He paused. “Are you—are you staying down here much longer?”
“I’m leaving tomorrow.”
“You won’t—live down here?”
Elinor shook her head.
“No—never. I think—I think—I shall sell the place if I can get a good offer.”
Dr. Lord said rather flatly:
“I see….”
Elinor said:
“I must be getting home now.”
She held out her hand firmly. Peter Lord took it. He held it. He said very earnestly:
“Miss Carlisle, will you please tell me what was in your mind when you laughed just now?”
She wrenched her hand away quickly.
“What should there be in my mind?”
“That’s what I’d like to know.”
His face was grave and a little unhappy.
Elinor said impatiently:
“It just struck me as funny, that was all!”
“That Mary Gerrard was making a will? Why? Making a will is a perfectly sensible procedure. Saves a lot of trouble. Sometimes, of course, it makes trouble!”
Elinor said impatiently:
“Of course—everyone should make a will. I didn’t mean that.”
Dr. Lord said:
“Mrs. Welman ought to have made a will.”
Elinor said with feeling:
“Yes, indeed.”
The colour rose in her face.
Dr. Lord said unexpectedly:
“What about you?”
“Me?”
“Yes, you said just now everyone should make a will! Have you?”
Elinor stared at him for a minute, then she laughed.
“How extraordinary!” she said. “No, I haven’t. I hadn’t thought of it! I’m just like Aunt Laura. Do you know, Dr. Lord, I shall go home and write to Mr. Seddon about it at once.”
Peter Lord said:
“Very sensible.”
VI
In the library Elinor had just finished a letter:
Dear Mr. Seddon,—Will you draft a will f
Yours sincerely,
Elinor Carlisle
She glanced at the clock. The post would be going in a few minutes.
She opened the drawer of the desk, then remembered she had used the last stamp that morning.
There were some in her bedroom, though, she was almost sure.
She went upstairs. When she reentered the library with the stamp in her hand, Roddy was standing by the window.
He said:
“So we leave here tomorrow. Good old Hunterbury. We’ve had some good times here.”
Elinor said:
“Do you mind its being sold?”
“Oh, no, no! I quite see it’s the best thing to be done.”
There was a silence. Elinor picked up her letter, glanced through it to see if it was all right. Then she sealed and stamped it.
Six
Letter from Nurse O’Brien to Nurse Hopkins, July 14th:
Laborough Court
Dear Hopkins,—Have been meaning to write to you for some days now. This is a lovely house and the pictures, I believe, quite famous. But I can’t say it’s as comfortable as Hunterbury was, if you know what I mean. Being in the dead country it’s difficult to get maids, and the girls they have got are a raw lot, and some of them not too obliging, and though I’m sure I’m never one to give trouble, meals sent up on a tray should at least be hot, and no facilities for boiling a kettle, and the tea not always made with boiling water! Still, all that’s neither here nor there. The patient’s a nice quiet gentleman—double pneumonia, but the crisis is past and doctor says going on well.
What I’ve got to tell you that will really interest you is the very queerest coincidence you ever knew. In the drawing room, on the grand piano, there’s a photograph in a big silver frame; and would you believe it, it’s the same photograph that I told you about—the one signed Lewis that old Mrs. Welman asked for. Well, of course, I was intrigued—and who wouldn’t be? And I asked the butler who it was, which he answered at once saying it was Lady Rattery’s brother—Sir Lewis Rycroft. He lived, it seems, not far from here and he was killed in the War. Very sad, wasn’t it? I asked casual like was he married, and the butler said yes, but that Lady Rycroft went into a lunatic asylum, poor thing, soon after the marriage. She was still alive, he said. Now, isn’t that interesting? And we were quite wrong, you see, in all our ideas. They must have been very fond of each other, he and Mrs. W., and unable to marry because of the wife being in an asylum. Just like the pictures, isn’t it? And her remembering all those years and looking at his photograph just before she died. He was killed in 1917, the butler said. Quite a romance, that’s what I feel.