Agatha smiled. It pleased Chilton no end that she might like the sound of that: Mrs Chilton.
‘Yes,’ Agatha said. ‘He claimed this was a trip for work but to me it sounded like a holiday. So I thought I’d join in.’
Chilton said to Miss Armstrong, ‘I thought you’d gone off these hot waters.’
‘Oh, not at all, Mr Chilton. One must keep trying new things, and soldier through. And when I thought how my mother would object to this particular bath I couldn’t resist. Men and women bathing together. Quite scandalous.’ Miss Armstrong spoke the last as if it were the most delightful word in the English language. ‘I’m determined to enjoy myself despite the bad business with the Marstons.’ She turned back to Agatha. ‘Has your husband told you? About all that’s been going on at our little hotel?’
‘Yes,’ said Agatha. ‘How awfully sad.’
‘You’ve no idea. That is, I’m sure a man wouldn’t tell it right. Their love story was something special. All those years of longing to be together. And then when they finally were, when the moment they’d longed for arrived, all the years ahead of them were taken away. Just like that. There’s a lesson in that, don’t you think, Mrs Chilton? A person can’t waste time being unhappy.’
‘Quite right,’ Agatha said. ‘I far prefer to waste my time being happy.’
Chilton thought, if I can talk her into boarding a train, first thing in the morning, we could waste the rest of our lives being happy.
For the moment what seemed to make Cornelia Armstrong happy was waxing sorrowful about the Marstons’ untimely end. She moved over to sit directly beside Agatha. Chilton felt thankful none of the hotel guests were privy to the information about the poison that had been discovered in both Marstons.
‘Do you know,’ Miss Armstrong said to Agatha, ‘that before marrying Mr Marston, Mrs Marston had been a nun?’
‘You don’t say?’ Agatha looked to Mr Chilton, interest changing from polite to sincere.
‘She told me so herself. She asked me not to tell anyone. But I suppose that doesn’t matter now.’
‘I suppose not.’ Chilton poised himself, the way he did when someone was about to reveal something important, hoping the acceleration of his heartbeat wasn’t detectible.
‘She had been a nun,’ Miss Armstrong said, her voice giddy with the romance of it. ‘And Mr Marston, he had been a priest. Oh, it sounds like a novel, doesn’t it? The two of them torn and in love, all those years working side by side until they couldn’t bear it a moment longer. They’d only just renounced their vows and run off, so they could be together.’ She lowered her voice to a whisper. ‘You know, I’m not sure they’d even married yet, really. But that could just be me wanting more scandal.’ She laughed, a gentle twitter that might have been delightful, this show of happiness from the lovely young woman, if only it didn’t spell possible doom for another.
‘Do you happen to know,’ Chilton said carefully, ‘what sort of order they’d come from?’
‘An orphanage.’ Miss Armstrong spoke warmly, as if this were the most philanthropic venture she could imagine. ‘She was such a loving person, Mrs Marston, you could see it plain as day. I’m sure she took wonderful care of all those children.’
‘I’m sure she did,’ said Mr Chilton. ‘Did she say where this orphanage was located?’
‘County Cork, in Ireland. And I remember the name of the town. So poetic.’
Before Miss Armstrong could speak the words, Sunday’s Corner, Chilton looked over at Agatha. He could see from her face that in her mind as well as in his, everything had just come clear.
Perhaps you surmised in that moment, along with Chilton and Agatha: Mrs Marston and Sister Mary Clare were one and the same. Or perhaps you figured it out pages and pages ago. I wasn’t finished, that day in Sunday’s Corner, when my fingers circled around Sister Mary Clare’s throat.
In the baths, the world dripped with warm moisture. The ceiling was good and high, no need for claustrophobia as Chilton made the connection he’d felt certain was there, between his two cases and the element that connected them both. Me.
‘Funny,’ Agatha murmured. ‘My mother-in-law comes not far from Sunday’s Corner.’
‘Oh,’ Miss Armstrong said, turning to Chilton. ‘Is your mother Irish?’ At his vague nod she said to Agatha, ‘Mrs Marston was such a jolly person. Wasn’t she, Mr Chilton?’
He nodded again, just as dishonestly. Mrs Marston had the precise sort of jolliness he’d never believed in. The sort that masked something, or else the lack of something. He wished there were a way to convey this to young Miss Armstrong. It seemed an important lesson for a young person. It wasn’t only the angry people that should make one wary. The jolly ones could be even more dangerous.
‘And where do you return to, Miss Armstrong,’ Agatha asked, ‘when you go home?’
‘Mundesley.’
‘Lovely,’ said Agatha. ‘How I prefer the sea, Miss Armstrong, to this countryside. Even in the winter. I don’t care what sort of natural springs a place has to offer, or how they try to lure me. This is all well and good but there’s no place so refreshing as the sea. Do you know, my mother believed salt water cured everything, from spots to heart disease?’
‘My father says the same,’ said Miss Armstrong.
‘Give me a plunge in the cold brine.’ Agatha actually looked cosy, even refreshed, by the hot water. She sank low so that it covered her ears for a moment, as if someone might contradict her and she didn’t want to hear it.
From outside a cold wind blew, strong enough for a little chill to creep in, the glass ceiling rattling as if flimsier than promised. Agatha’s love song to the seaside was a welcome sound to Chilton. Very welcome indeed.
Chilton and Agatha bundled back into their clothes and headed outside with their hair still damp. Strands froze; Agatha scrunched a handful to hear them crackle.
‘You know what I like to imagine?’ she said, as they walked towards the road.
Neither had discussed what they’d learned, not yet, only come to a silent agreement. That’s love, thought Chilton, when your mind works in concert.
Agatha seemed to know better than him, at the moment there were more important things to think of than their romance. She said, ‘I like to imagine it wasn’t just Nan. That every single woman staying at the Bellefort had a hand in it. When you think of all the girls who passed through that place, and others like it. Seems a pity for just one to have revenge when so many deserve it.’
This was the last thing Chilton expected. He said, ‘I suppose I’ll have to get a confession out of Nan.’
‘You’ll do no such thing.’
‘But Agatha. This is murder we’re talking about, not a game.’