The Death of Mrs. Westaway(42)
Hal cocked her head, listening to the vacuum cleaner going back and forth, back and forth, and then climbed up the steps to retrieve the book, trying to set her feet as closely as possible within the other person’s prints.
It was a photograph album—she could tell that as soon as she took it down. As she opened it the thick pages creaked gently, the plastic film that covered the pictures unsticking with reluctance.
The first page held a black-and-white snapshot of a fat blond baby in an old-fashioned stroller and a miniature Aran sweater, staring blurrily out to the camera. There was a lawn behind him, falling away to the sea, and Hal recognized the view as the top terrace at Trepassen, just outside the drawing room. Harding, 1965 was written in neat pencil across one corner.
Hal turned the pages, feeling like a time traveler tiptoeing through the past. There was a little boy aged about two on the beach below the house, and another of him sat on the lap of a stiff, formal-looking man with a bristly mustache. The boy was presumably Harding, but who was the man? Mr. Westaway?
More photographs, a color snap of the same little boy, a little older this time, on a blue tricycle. H, June 1969, read the caption. Next came Harding in a school uniform, knock-kneed in his gray shorts, and then another baby appeared, red-faced and newborn. Maud? For a second Hal felt her heart leap as she looked to the penciled caption beneath for a date. But no—it read Abel Leonard born 13th March 1972. On the facing page was a black-and-white picture of the same baby lying on a hearthrug, kicking his little legs. A.L. 3 months, said the caption.
But before she could turn the page, a noise made her freeze. There were voices filtering in through the hallway—not Mrs. Warren, by the sound of it, but members of the family. And they were coming closer.
She must not be found in here, poking through the family papers.
Hastily, Hal shoved the book back into place and scrambled down the ladder, less careful this time about where she put her feet, and then stood at the bottom, holding her breath as she tried to work out where the voices were coming from. At first her heart was thudding too much to make it out. Then she heard, “Mrs. Warren! How might one obtain some coffee?” and realized they were coming from the breakfast room.
Quickly Hal slipped out of the study, closing the door behind her, and hurried through the little hallway. She was just in time—no sooner had she entered the conservatory than the door to the breakfast room opened and Harding’s head stuck out.
“Mrs.—” He broke off. “Oh, Harriet.”
“Yes,” Hal said, slightly breathlessly. There was dust on her fingers, she saw, from the study, and she wiped them surreptitiously on the back of her jeans. “I was just passing the time in here until eight—Mrs. Warren said breakfast would be served then.”
“Well, you’d better come through,” Harding said. There was something awkward in his manner, and he coughed and picked an imaginary speck of dust off his blue golfing pullover before adding, “About last night, Harriet, naturally the news was a shock, but I hope you didn’t—”
“Please,” Hal managed. She felt a betraying flush rise up her cheeks. “There’s no need—”
But Harding was going to say his piece, no matter what, and Hal had no choice but to stand and endure a rather pompous little speech that basically amounted to an apology for his remarks last night.
“That’s not to say,” he finished up, “that I don’t still have some concerns about Mother’s state of mind. But I was wrong—very wrong—to suggest that that was any reflection on you, Harriet. If you have any involvement in this at all, it’s as an innocent bystander. Well, there we go.” He coughed and brushed at his sweater again. “Passing on to more pleasant things, I hope you’re feeling better?”
“Oh—oh yes,” Hal said, though her cheeks were still flushed. “Thank you. I feel completely fine. I’ll be able to travel today.”
“Travel today?” Harding raised his eyebrows. “There’s no question of that, my dear. Mr. Treswick needs to see all the beneficiaries in his office in Penzance, and in any case, there’s a great deal we need to sort out here.”
At the mention of the appointment with the lawyer, Hal felt her stomach lurch, as sickeningly as if the ground had dropped away beneath her feet. Of course she had known that there would be hoops and formalities, but somehow in her fantasies about how this would pan out, she had always imagined herself sending in her documents by post from a safe remove. That was before, though—when she had been imagining a legacy of a few thousand at most.
Now, with the entire estate hinging on her identity . . .
The prospect of having to go in person and actually stand there, heart thumping, while her papers were looked over, was not comforting. There would probably be questions too—specific ones that Harding, Abel, and Ezra had been too polite to put to her at their mother’s wake, and she would have no time to figure out plausible answers or pick her wording. What if Mr. Treswick realized his mistake while she was actually in his office? Would he call the police?
She opened her mouth to reply, but before she could find the right words, the door behind them slammed open, and Mrs. Warren appeared, stick in hand.
“Oh, Mrs. Warren,” Harding said, with an ingratiating smile. “We were just discussing breakfast. How kind of you to put out the toaster and so on—where can one obtain tea and coffee?”