Tied Up In Tinsel

Winter entered the room with the tree and laid its hand on their faces. Cressida cried out against it. The men shut the french windows and went away. A step-ladder and an enormous box of decorations had been left beside the tree.

From the central chandelier in the drawing-room someone – Nigel, perhaps – had hung the traditional kissing-bough, a bell-shaped structure made from mistletoe and holly with scarlet apples depending from it by tinsel cords. It was stuck about with scarlet candles. The room was filled with the heady smell of resinous greenery.

Troy was almost as keen on Christmas trees as Colonel Forrester himself and thought the evening might well be saved by their joint activities. Mrs Forrester eyed the tree with judicious approval and said there was nothing the matter with it.

‘There’s a Crib,’ she said. ‘I attend to that. I bought it in Oberammergau when Hilary was a pagan child of seven. He’s still a pagan of course, but he brings it out to oblige me. Though how he reconciles it with Fred in his heathen beard and that brazen affair on the chandelier is best known to himself. Still, there is the service. Half past ten in the chapel. Did he tell you?’

‘No,’ Troy said. ‘I didn’t even know there was a chapel.’

‘In the west wing. The parson from the prison takes it. High church, which Hilary likes. Do you consider him handsome?’

‘No,’ Troy said. ‘But he’s paintable.’

‘Ho,’ said Mrs Forrester.

Mervyn came in with the coffee and liqueurs. When he reached Troy he gave her a look of animal subservience that she found extremely disagreeable.

Cressida’s onset of hostess-like responsibility seemed to have been left behind in the dining-room. She stood in front of the fire jiggling her golden slipper on her toe and leaning a superb arm along the chimney-piece. She waited restively until Mervyn had gone and then said: ‘That man gives me the horrors.’

‘Indeed,’ said Mrs Forrester.

‘He’s such a creep. They all are, if it comes to that. Oh yes, I know all about Hilly’s ideas and I grant you it’s one way out of the servant problem. I mean if we’re to keep Halberds up and all that, this lot is one way of doing it. Personally, I’d rather have Greeks or something. You know.’

‘You don’t see it, as Hilary says he does, from the murderer’s point-of-view?’ Mrs Forrester observed.

‘Oh, I know he’s on about all that,’ Cressida said, jiggling her slipper, ‘but, let’s face it, gracious living is what really turns him on. Me, too. You know?’

Mrs Forrester stared at her for several seconds and then, with an emphatic movement of her torso, directed herself at Troy. ‘How do you manage?’ she asked.

‘As best we can. My husband’s a policeman and his hours are enough to turn any self-respecting domestic into a psychotic wreck.’

‘A policeman?’ Cressida exclaimed and added, ‘Oh, yes, I forgot. Hilly told me. But he’s madly high-powered and famous, isn’t he?’

As there seemed to be no answer to this Troy did not attempt to make one.

‘Shouldn’t we be doing something about the tree?’ she asked Mrs Forrester.

‘Hilary likes to supervise. You should know that by now.’

‘Not exactly a jet-set scene, is it?’ Cressida said. ‘You know. Gaol-boss. Gaol-doctor. Warders. Chaplain. To say nothing of the gaol-kids. Oh, I forgot. A groovy shower of neighbours all very county and not one under the age of seventy. Hilarious. Let the bells chime.’

‘I am seventy years of age and my husband is seventy-three.’

‘There I go,’ Cressida said. ‘You know? The bottom.’ She burst out laughing and suddenly knelt at Mrs Forrester’s feet. She swung back the glossy burden of her hair and put her hands together. ‘I’m not as lethally awful as I make out,’ she said. ‘You’ve both been fantastic to me. Always. I’m grateful. Hilly will have to beat me like a gong. You know? Bang-bang. Then I’ll behave beautifully: Sweetie-pie, Aunt B, forgive me.’

Troy thought: Aunt Bed would have to be a Medusa to freeze her, and sure enough a smile twitched at the corners of Mrs Forrester’s mouth. ‘I suppose you’re no worse than the rest of your generation,’ she conceded. ‘You’re clean and neat: I’ll say that for you.’

‘As clean as a whistle and as neat as a new pin, aren’t I? Do you think I’ll adorn Hilly’s house, Aunt B?’

‘Oh, you’ll look nice,’ said Mrs Forrester. ‘You may depend upon that. See you behave yourself.’

‘Behave myself,’ Cressida repeated. There was a pause. The fire crackled. A draught from somewhere up near the ceiling caused the kissing-bough to turn a little on its cord. In the dining-room, made distant by heavy walls and doors, Hilary’s laugh sounded. With a change of manner so marked as to be startling Cressida said: ‘Would you call me a sinful lady, Aunt Bedelia?’

‘What on earth are you talking about, child? What’s the matter with you?’

‘Quite a lot, it appears. Look.’

She opened her golden bag and took out a folded piece of paper. ‘I found it under my door when I went up to dress. I was saving it for Hilary,’ she said, ‘but you two may as well see it. Go on, please. Open it up. Read it. Both of you.’

Mrs Forrester stared at her for a moment, frowned and unfolded the paper. She held it away from her so that Troy could see what was printed on it in enormous capitals.

SINFUL LADY BEWARE

AN UNCHASTE WOMAN IS AN ABOMINATION.

HE SHALL NOT SUFFER THEE TO DWELL IN

HIS HOUSE.

‘What balderdash is this? Where did you get it?’

‘I told you. Under my door.’

Mrs Forrester made an abrupt movement as if to crush the paper but Cressida’s hand was laid over hers. ‘No, don’t,’ Cressida said, ‘I’m going to show it to Hilary. And I must say I hope it’ll change his mind about his ghastly Nigel.’

IV

When Hilary was shown the paper, which was as soon as the men came into the drawing-room, he turned very quiet. For what seemed a long time he stood with it in his hands, frowning at it and saying nothing. Mr Smith walked over to him, glanced at the paper and gave out a soft, protracted whistle. Colonel Forrester looked inquiringly from Hilary to his wife who shook her head at him. He then turned away to admire the tree and the kissing-bough.

‘Well, boy,’ said Mrs Forrester. ‘What do you make of that?’

‘I don’t know. Not, I think, what I am expected to make of it. Aunt Bed.’

‘Whatever anybody makes of it,’ Cressida pointed out, ‘it’s not the nicest kind of thing to find in one’s bedroom.’

Hilary broke into a strange apologia: tender, oblique, guarded. It was a horrid, silly thing to have happened, he told Cressida and she mustn’t let it trouble her. It wasn’t worth a second thought. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘up the chimney with it, vulgar little beast,’ and threw it on the fire. It blackened, its preposterous legend turned white and started out in momentary prominence, it was reduced to a wraith of itself and flew out of sight. ‘Gone! Gone! Gone!’ chanted Hilary rather wildly and spread his arms.

‘I don’t think you ought to have done that,’ Cressida said, ‘I think we ought to have kept it.’

‘That’s right,’ Mr Smith chimed in. ‘For dabs,’ he added.

This familiar departmental word startled Troy. Mr Smith grinned at her. ‘That’s correct,’ he said. ‘Innit? What your good man calls routine, that is. Dabs. You oughter kep’ it, ’Illy.’

‘I think, Uncle Bert, I must be allowed to manage this ridiculous little incident in my own way.’

‘Hullo-ullo-ullo!’

‘I’m quite sure, Cressida darling, it’s merely an idiot-joke on somebody’s part. How I detest practical jokes!’ Hilary hurried on with an unconvincing return to his usual manner. He turned to Troy. ‘Don’t you?’