Sometimes cocoa. Anyone who knew about me.’ She moved slowly across the room and opened a cupboard in a corner of the room.
‘Mrs Moody -‘ said Tuppence, ‘was she one?’ ‘Oh, you know about her – she wasn’t a mother – she’d been a dresser at the theatre. She recognized me so she had to go.’ Turning suddenly she came towards Tuppence holding a glass of milk and smiling persuasively.
‘Drink it up,’ she said. ‘Just drink it up.’ Tuppence sat silent for a moment, then she leapt to her feet and rushed to the window. Catching up a chair, she crashed the glass. She leaned her head out and screamed: ‘Help! Help?
Mrs Lancaster laughed. She put the glass of milk down on a table and leant back in her chair and laughed.
‘How stupid you are. Who do you think will come? Who do you’ think can come? They’d have to break down doors, they’d have to get through that wall and by that time – there are other things, you know. It needn’t be milk. Milk is the easy way.
Milk and cocoa and even tea. For little Mrs Moody I put it in cocoa – she loved cocoa.’ ‘The morphia? How did you get it?’ ‘Oh, that was easy. A man I lived with years ago – he had cancer – the doctor gave me supplies for him – to keep in my charge – other drugs too – I said later that they’d all been thrown away – but I kept them, and other drugs and sedatives too – I thought they might come in useful some day – and they did – I’ve still got a supply – I never take anything of the kind myself – I don’t believe in it.’ She pushed the glass of milk towards Tuppence – ‘Drink it up, it’s much the easiest way.
The other way – the trouble is, I can’t be sure just where I put
She got up from her chair and began walking round the room.
‘Where did I put? Where did I? I forget everything now I’m getting old.’ Tuppence yelled again. ‘Help? but the canal bank was empty still. Mrs Lancaster was still wandering round the room.
‘I thought – I certainly thought – oh, of course, in my knitting bag.’ Tuppence turned from the window. Mrs Lancaster was coming towards her.
‘what a silly.woman you are,’ said Mrs Lancaster, ‘to want it this way.’ Her left arm shot out and she caught Tuppence’s shoulder.
Her right hand came from behind her back. In it was a long thin stiletto blade. Tuppence struggled. She thought, ‘I can stop her easily. Easily. She’s an old woman. Feeble. She can’t ‘ Suddenly in a cold ride of fear she thought, ‘But I’m an old woman too. I’m not as strong as I think myself. I’m not as strong as she is. Her hands, her grasp, her fingers. I suppose because she’s mad and mad people, I’ve always heard, are strong.’ The gleaming blade was approaching near her. Tuppence screamed. Down below she heard shouts and blows. Blows now on the doors as though someone were trying to force the doors or windows. ‘But they’ll never get through,’ thought Tuppence. ‘They’ll never get through this trick doorway here.
Not unless they know the mechanism.’ She struggled fiercely. She was still managing to hold Mrs Lancaster away from her. But the other was the bigger woman.
A big strong woman. Her face was still smiling but it no longer had the benignant look. It had the look now of someone enjoying herself.
‘Killer Kate,’ said Tuppence.
‘You know my nickname? Yes, but I’ve sublimated that.
I’ve become a killer of the Lord. It’s the Lord’s will that I should kill you. So that makes it all right. You do see that, don’t you? You see, it makes it all right.’ Tuppence was pressed now against the side of a big chair.
With one arm Mrs Lancaster held her against the chair, and the pressure increased – no further recoil was possible. In Mrs Lancaster’s right hand the sharp steel of the stiletto approached.
Tuppence thought, ‘I mustn’t panic – I mustn’t panic -‘ But following that came with sharp insistence, ‘But what can I do?’ To struggle was unavailing.