Page 83 of The Secrets of Dragonfly Lodge
‘Of course I am. Terribly worried, but how can I go on with my work when it’s clear that the substance I’m investigating is dangerous and shouldn’t be used in its current form? And what if they don’t know, further up, and it’s just Dr Staunton who’s blocking it. I can’t square it with my conscience, James.’
‘I do see that, yes.’ He paused to think. ‘Why don’t you let the matter lie for a while? Things change,’ he said, flapping his hand vaguely. ‘The way might become clearer.’
‘Perhaps I ought to confront Dr Staunton again and have the whole thing out.’
‘Do you really think that would help?’
She remembered the previous interview. The man’s coldness, the way he dodged her questions. ‘I don’t know,’ she said.
The day passed slowly, and the atmosphere in her lab was charged. The others hardly spoke to Nancy and everyone worked quietly. She was glad. A break from Jim’s banter was welcome and she could lose herself in routine tasks. At lunchtime, the lab emptied and she used the moment’s privacy to go through her books and papers again, knowing it was hopeless, but she felt better doing something. At least by the evening she’d have the typed-up report from Miss Bateman. She’d ring ahead to check that it was ready, then leave early to collect it.
Knowing that James had left for a few days in London and Edmund was away, she took her homemade sandwich to the staff common room, but found it, too, was empty. Many were on holiday and, it being a glorious day, those remaining were sunning themselves outside. She made herself a cup of tea and sat down, feeling suddenly terribly fearful and alone.
Forty-Nine
It was after six when Nancy reached home with the precious typed report and its handwritten original safely sealed in an envelope. She closed the door and stood in the hall a moment listening to the ticking clock. The sense of a vacuum was horrid. She left the envelope on the kitchen table and set about grilling the chop she’d bought for her solitary supper. After she’d eaten, she sat in the garden for a while listening to the birds and the rhythmic purr of the neighbour’s lawn mower, then, when it became chilly, went inside to telephone her mother, promising to go home to see them the following weekend. After the call ended, she wandered back to the kitchen, her mind full of the family news. Roger and Sally’s wedding was fast approaching, Helen was struggling with her little Terry’s sleeplessness. At moments like this, she missed them all.
She glanced at the envelope on the kitchen table, then sat down and with trepidation opened it and drew out its contents. Flicking through, she saw with relief that the reportwas accurately typed and all was in order, though annoyingly there was no carbon copy. The question was what to do with it now. She couldn’t decide.
The telephone rang, startling her from her reverie. She rose and went to answer it. ‘5173? Hello?’ She was rewarded by a click, then a crackling sound like bacon frying in a pan. ‘Hello?’ she said again, but the crackling continued. Finally, she replaced the receiver. It might have been Frank or Eleanor ringing from the Continent, she supposed, and hoped there was nothing wrong. She stared at the telephone but it didn’t ring again, so she returned to the kitchen.
This time when she sat in a reverie, a shadow darkened the window. She glanced up with a sense of disquiet, but saw only a cloud crossing the purpling sky. There was little point, she thought, her attention returning to the envelope, in keeping the report and the handwritten notebook together. The house was secure, she was sure it was, but just suppose… oh, that was silly, she should pull herself together. Still, best to be on the safe side. She took the notebook and hid it under the mattress in her bedroom, then drew the curtains in the sitting room and stowed the envelope with the typed report under the carpet by the bureau. Feeling more confident, she tried ringing James at his parents’ house but there was no answer, so she settled down for an early night.
It was dark when she was awakened by the telephone. Three o’clock. She scampered down in bare feet to answer it. Again, there was a click, then the fizzing noise. ‘Hello?’ she said, ‘Frank? Eleanor?’ The fizzing stopped and the line went dead.She went back to bed, but lay there, sleepless, waiting for the telephone to ring again. It didn’t, but other more routine sounds bothered her. A scraping noise above the window must be a bird – they had martins nesting under the eaves. The dripping of a bathroom tap, the normal creaks and groans of the old house settling. But what was that? The rattle of the letterbox. Was someone trying the front door? Footsteps along the side of the house, the creak of the side gate, or was it her imagination? She threw back the blankets, went to the window and lifted the curtain. The small back garden lay silent, bathed in moonlight. The window squeaked as she opened it. She looked down and drew a sharp breath. She was sure she’d seen a movement. Had that been a figure retreating down the side of the house? She hurried into Frank and Eleanor’s bedroom, where the curtains stood open, but could see no one from the window. Whoever the figure might have been, he had either concealed himself or had gone – or had she imagined him?
Unable to stand it any more, she stumbled downstairs, picked up the receiver and when the operator answered requested to speak to the police.
‘I don’t think they believed me,’ she said to James when she finally tracked him down at his parents’ home the following evening. ‘They imagined I was being hysterical. Oh, James, where have you been, darling? I rang your mother earlier, but she didn’t know.’
‘I stayed with Malcolm Gifford last night. Old schoolfriend. I told you about him. We had a bit of a late night.’ He sounded defensive. ‘What did they say, the police?’
‘They waved their torches about, waking all the neighbours, told me to buy a padlock for the side gate and that was it.’
‘Would you like me to come over now? It’s late, but I suppose there might be a train.’
She heard him sigh and her pride got in the way. She wasn’t the helpless type. ‘No, that’s ridiculous. All this stupid business, it’s given me the jitters.’
‘If you’ll just let it go, Nancy, things will settle down.’
It was her turn to sigh. ‘I can’t, you know that.’
‘We’ll talk about it on Friday. I’ll be back at Brandingfield first thing.’
After he rang off, she replaced the receiver and sat with her face in her hands. Things were not right between her and James. The warmth had gone. He should be supporting her, but instead she felt increasingly abandoned by him. Her mind roved over the events of the past week and now she saw with clarity how the clues stacked up. The many ways that he had discouraged her from following her conscience. His conversation with Dr Staunton, which he’d brushed away with a weak excuse when she’d challenged him. Miss Bateman’s description of the ‘gentleman’ who’d collected the copies of the typed report, who sounded astonishingly like James. Individually all these things could be argued away, but putting them together now the evidence against him was strong. Suddenly, she felt sick. She roused herself, went to the kitchen for a glass of water and stood slowly sipping it until she felt better. She must be wrong about him, she thought. What, after all, could his motive be? He had no obviousconnection with ICP, had nothing to gain by placating them. And if he loved her, why would he plot against her and make her suffer in this way? These truths briefly sustained her. Of course he loved her and had nothing to do with this.
That night, as the light failed, she prowled the house, locking the doors and tightening the window catches. She’d bought a padlock for the side gate, but it didn’t fit. In Frank and Eleanor’s room, she paused to look out. She could just see the ghostly glow of Brandingfield in the distance above the rooftops. She shivered. Even here she couldn’t escape its threat.
She left the landing light on when she went to bed, but the sound of the wind kept her awake and, when she slept finally, dark ghoulish shapes haunted her dreams.
The following day, she was so exhausted that she had to drag herself through the hours in the lab. She hardly cared whether the eyes of her colleagues were upon her. All she knew was that she couldn’t go on like this. It was driving her mad. She had to make a decision. ICP’s headquarters were at Watford nearby, but she could hardly just turn up there.
She could send the Chief Scientific Officer the report in the post. Then at least she’d have done her duty. But if she made that choice, what would happen next? Either she’d be thanked and applauded or, at worst, lose her job. Be disgraced. And if that happened, who would want to employ her?
As Nancy walked home that evening, a light rain began to fall on the dusty pavements, so she quickened her pace. Later, she watched it grow heavy as she sat in the kitchen eatingpoached eggs on toast. Far away, thunder growled and flashes of lightning made strange silhouettes of the trees. Normally she loved a good storm, but tonight it made her feel cut off from the world and lonelier than ever. After her supper, she went round the house locking up, listened to the wireless and finished sewing a summer dress for her holiday, then, in a bid for much-needed sleep, she had a hot bath and made a comforting mug of cocoa. All to no avail.
For hours she lay sleepless as rain battered the window and rattled down the pipes, while the wind howled through the trees and the house rang like a glass. This weather, she thought grimly, was like a stage set for the nightmare her life had become.
Eventually, she must have dozed, for a noise snatched her to sudden wakefulness. She lay quiet, her skin clammy, the room alive with shadows. The rain had dwindled to a gentle patter, but this had been a different sound, something strange and wrong. There it was again, a clink of metal, somewhere outside, but close enough to worry her, very close. Then came a scraping noise, as of a spade across stone, followed by a silence. Someone was in the garden, she was sure of it. She dared not move but knew she had to. To reach the telephone. She threw back the covers, then paused. What was the point of summoning the police? She remembered two nights before, the weariness in the sergeant’s voice as he’d tried to reassure her: ‘There’s nobody here, Miss.’ She wouldn’t trouble them again, not until she’d investigated for herself.
