found himself in the presence of Natalie Arno’s Aunt Gladys, Mrs Rupert Mountnessing, the sister of Kathleen Camargue.
His first impression was of someone cruelly encaged and literally gasping for breath. It was a fleeting image. Mrs Mountnessing was just a fat woman in a too-tight corset which compressed her body from thighs to chest into the shape of a sausage and thrust a shelf of bosom up to buttress her double chin. This constrained flesh was sheathed in biscuit-coloured wool and upon the shelf rested three strands of pearls. Her face had become a cluster of pouches rather than a nest of wrinkles. It was thickly painted and surmounted by an intricate white-gold coiffure that was as smooth and stiff as a wig. The only area of Mrs Mountnessing which kept some hint of youth was her legs. And these were still excellent: slender, smooth, not varicosed, the ankles slim, the tapering feet shod in classic court shoes of beige glacé kid. They reminded him of Natalie’s legs, they were exactly like. Did that mean anything? Very little. There are only a few types of leg, after all. One never said ‘She has her aunt’s legs’ as one might say a woman had her father’s nose or her grandmother’s eyes.
The room was as beige and gold as its owner. On a low table was a coffee cup, coffee pot, sugar basin and cream jug in ivory china with a Greek key design on it in gold. Mrs Mountnessing rose when he came in and held out a hand much be-ringed, the old woman’s claw-like nails filed to points and painted dark red.
‘Bring another cup, will you, Miranda?’
It was the voice of an elderly child, petulant, permanently aggrieved. Wexford thought that the voice and the puckered face told of a lifetime of hurts, real or imagined. Rupert Mountnessing was presumably dead and gone long ago, and Dinah Sternhold had told him there had been no children. Would Natalie, real or false, hope for an inheritance here? Almost the first words uttered by Mrs Mountnessing told him that, if so, she hoped in vain.
‘You said on the phone you wanted to talk tome about my niece. But I know nothing about my niece in recent years and I don’t – I don’t want to. I should have explained that to you, I realize that now. I shouldn’t have let you come all this way when I’ve nothing at all to tell you.’ Her eyes blinked more often or more obviously than most people’s. The effect was to give the impression she fought off tears. ‘Thank you, Miranda.’ She took the coffee cup and listened, subsiding back into her chair as he told her the reason for his visit.
‘Anastasia,’ she said.
The Tichborne Claimant had been recalled, now the Tsar’s youngest daughter. Wexford did not relish the reminder, for wasn’t it a fact that Anastasia’s grandmother, the one person who could positively have identified her, had refused ever to see the claimant, and that as a result of that refusal no positive identification had ever been made?
‘We hope it won’t come to that,’ he said. ‘You seem to be her nearest relative, Mrs Mountnessing. Will you agree to see her in my presence and tell me if she is who she says she is?’
Her reaction, the look on her face, reminded him of certain people he had in the past asked to come and identify, not a living person, but a corpse in the mortuary. She put a hand up to each cheek. ‘Oh no, I couldn’t do that. I’m sorry, but it’s impossible. I couldn’t ever see Natalie again.’
He accepted it. She had forewarned him with her mention of Anastasia. If he insisted on her going with him the chances were she would make a positive identification simply to get the whole thing over as soon as possible. Briefly he wondered what it could have been that her niece, while still a young girl, had done to her, and then he joined her at the other end of the room where she stood contemplating a table that was used entirely as a stand for photographs in silver frames.
‘That’s my sister.’
A dark woman with
His first impression was of someone cruelly encaged and literally gasping for breath. It was a fleeting image. Mrs Mountnessing was just a fat woman in a too-tight corset which compressed her body from thighs to chest into the shape of a sausage and thrust a shelf of bosom up to buttress her double chin. This constrained flesh was sheathed in biscuit-coloured wool and upon the shelf rested three strands of pearls. Her face had become a cluster of pouches rather than a nest of wrinkles. It was thickly painted and surmounted by an intricate white-gold coiffure that was as smooth and stiff as a wig. The only area of Mrs Mountnessing which kept some hint of youth was her legs. And these were still excellent: slender, smooth, not varicosed, the ankles slim, the tapering feet shod in classic court shoes of beige glacé kid. They reminded him of Natalie’s legs, they were exactly like. Did that mean anything? Very little. There are only a few types of leg, after all. One never said ‘She has her aunt’s legs’ as one might say a woman had her father’s nose or her grandmother’s eyes.
The room was as beige and gold as its owner. On a low table was a coffee cup, coffee pot, sugar basin and cream jug in ivory china with a Greek key design on it in gold. Mrs Mountnessing rose when he came in and held out a hand much be-ringed, the old woman’s claw-like nails filed to points and painted dark red.
‘Bring another cup, will you, Miranda?’
It was the voice of an elderly child, petulant, permanently aggrieved. Wexford thought that the voice and the puckered face told of a lifetime of hurts, real or imagined. Rupert Mountnessing was presumably dead and gone long ago, and Dinah Sternhold had told him there had been no children. Would Natalie, real or false, hope for an inheritance here? Almost the first words uttered by Mrs Mountnessing told him that, if so, she hoped in vain.
‘You said on the phone you wanted to talk tome about my niece. But I know nothing about my niece in recent years and I don’t – I don’t want to. I should have explained that to you, I realize that now. I shouldn’t have let you come all this way when I’ve nothing at all to tell you.’ Her eyes blinked more often or more obviously than most people’s. The effect was to give the impression she fought off tears. ‘Thank you, Miranda.’ She took the coffee cup and listened, subsiding back into her chair as he told her the reason for his visit.
‘Anastasia,’ she said.
The Tichborne Claimant had been recalled, now the Tsar’s youngest daughter. Wexford did not relish the reminder, for wasn’t it a fact that Anastasia’s grandmother, the one person who could positively have identified her, had refused ever to see the claimant, and that as a result of that refusal no positive identification had ever been made?
‘We hope it won’t come to that,’ he said. ‘You seem to be her nearest relative, Mrs Mountnessing. Will you agree to see her in my presence and tell me if she is who she says she is?’
Her reaction, the look on her face, reminded him of certain people he had in the past asked to come and identify, not a living person, but a corpse in the mortuary. She put a hand up to each cheek. ‘Oh no, I couldn’t do that. I’m sorry, but it’s impossible. I couldn’t ever see Natalie again.’
He accepted it. She had forewarned him with her mention of Anastasia. If he insisted on her going with him the chances were she would make a positive identification simply to get the whole thing over as soon as possible. Briefly he wondered what it could have been that her niece, while still a young girl, had done to her, and then he joined her at the other end of the room where she stood contemplating a table that was used entirely as a stand for photographs in silver frames.
‘That’s my sister.’
A dark woman with
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