Prospero's Daughter. Elizabeth Nunez
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kept the old ways in Boston.” Gardner spoke in clipped tones.
“American?”
“From New England. You’ve heard of New England, haven’t you, Inspector? It is as it says. New England.”
“And your daughter, sir, is with this American from New England?” Mumsford’s pen moved rapidly across his notebook.
“Not by herself, as you seem to want to imply, Inspector. She’s well chaperoned. By Mrs. Burton.”
“Mrs. Burton?” Mumsford raised his head.
“An Englishwoman. And the young man is not here alone. He is with his father.”
“With his mother, too, I take it, sir?”
“No. Not with his mother, Inspector. His mother is dead.”
Mumsford pursed his lips.
“The young man is quite respectable,” Gardner said.
Mumsford scratched the side of his head.
“Quite respectable. Father and son are staying in a hotel and my daughter is staying with Mrs. Burton.”
“Indeed, sir.”
“They would all be here if that devil had not attacked her.” Gardner threw back his head and drained his glass.
Attacked was a specific word. Mumsford prided himself on being thorough. He had been properly trained. Attacked indicated action. Violence to a person.
“Attacked, sir?” he asked.
“Attempted, Inspector.” Dr. Gardner corrected himself and put the empty glass on the table. “As I said to you before, that beast Carlos attempted to put a stain on my daughter’s honor.”
After Daughter in hotel with boyfriend, Mumsford wrote in his notebook No violence with the colored boy.
“Still writing, Inspector?” Gardner stretched his neck in Mumsford’s direction.
“Just notes, sir.”
“The inspector on duty,” Gardner said drily. He glanced once more at Mumsford’s notebook and then closed his eyes briefly. When he opened them again, he was still fixed on the point of establishing the propriety of his daughter’s trip to Trinidad. “The young man would be here,” he said, “if it had not been for the present situation. You understand? The attempt.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And he and my daughter will be here as soon as you remove that savage from my premises. Don’t you think I know about fire i’ th’ blood?” His eyes bored into Mumsford’s.
“Fire in the blood, sir?”
“Sexual passion. Carnal lust. You understand passion and lust, don’t you, Inspector?”
And in truth Inspector Mumsford did not understand, not in the way he felt Dr. Gardner implied. He had read books about carnal lust, dirty books he still stuffed under his mattress, for he lived with his mother, though it was the other way around now that she had followed him to Trinidad. But he had no experience with carnal lust. He had never been to a brothel.
“I have given the young man strict instructions,” Gardner said, when Mumsford did not answer him. “He is never to ask her to his room. They can go for walks, meet in the hotel lobby, that sort of thing. Public places only. Oh, he swore to me that he would respect her. That he would not touch her before they were married. But you know, Inspector,” he lowered his voice, “the strongest oaths are straw to fire i’ th’ blood. I told him so.” He examined his fingernails. “One must avoid all situations where the temptation may be too great or it is good night your vow,” he said.
Did he imagine it, Mumsford wondered, or had he not detected a trace of sadness in Gardner’s voice? “Yes,” Mumsford said, “it is always best to avoid temptation.”
“It’s her greatest treasure, you know.” Gardner raised his eyes to him again.
“Her treasure, sir?”
“I speak of her virginity, Inspector. It is the jewel in her dower.”
Mumsford’s neck felt hot. It throbbed with the rush of blood that rose from his chest.
“Yes, yes, no need for double-talk, Inspector. I will be plain. It is her jewel. I said so to Alfred. That is the young man who wants to marry her. Break her virgin knot, and it is all over. Nothing can follow but disdain after that. I told her that, too. A man may promise you the stars, but if you surrender to him, that which made you so special will be tarnished. Light winning makes the prize light. You understand? We are hunters, Inspector.” He leaned forward conspiratorially, the nuggets he had for eyes hard and shining.
Every instinct in Mumsford urged him to recoil—the man was making him uneasy—but he held his ground. He was here on police business. He was a professional. He would remember that.
“I would agree with you,” he said to Gardner. “Anthropologically speaking, sir.”
Gardner slapped his thighs and let out a loud guffaw. “ ‘Anthropologically speaking, sir?’ ” he mimicked him. “ ‘Anthropologically speaking, sir?’ ”
How had he allowed himself to feel pity for this man? Why did he think he seemed sad minutes ago when he talked of oaths and temptation? “Are you making fun of me, sir?” Mumsford asked.
“Did they teach you to speak like that in police school?”
“Am I amusing you, sir?”
“No, no, Inspector. It was a good word. Anthropologically speaking. Those are good words. Precise.” Gardner wiped his eyes on the shoulder of his shirt. “And anthropologically speaking, Mumsford, as you know as well as I do, there is no sport after the kill.” Gardner was no longer smiling. The hardness had returned in his eyes. “Yes, it is her jewel. They will both hate each other if it loses its sheen. Discord will come between them when they marry. Barren hate. He would know it was spoilt meat he got when he married her, and she would hate him for spoiling her before she had taken her vows.”
Mumsford felt he could not take much more of this talk of virgin knot, sexual passion, jumping hormones, carnal lust, spoilt meat. It was talk better for the pub among like-minded companions, or in a sleazy motel, perhaps with a prostitute. He was her father, for God’s sake. Dr. Gardner had called him stuffy, and perhaps he was. He was not a city man. He did not have city ways. He was raised in the country, in England, where it was improper for a father to speak this way about his daughter. His stomach felt queasy. They were inappropriate, Dr. Gardner’s intimate references to his daughter’s sexuality, not normal for a decent father.
“So you see, Inspector, that born devil would have destroyed all that if he had succeeded,” Gardner was saying, and in a flash Mumsford saw his mistake. Good detective as he thought he was, he had missed the point of Gardner’s tirade: first, to establish that there had been no assault, but, rather, an attempt to assault, thus leaving no doubt of his daughter’s purity. Then (his real purpose) to lay the foundation that would seal his argument that that very attempt had threatened her future, the plans he had in place for her.
“A good boy from New England would not marry a slut,” Gardner concluded.
Yes. Yes, it was clear now. He should have known.
“A woman who had been broken into. Used. You understand me, Mumsford?”
He understood him now. He turned to a clean page in his notebook. “I would need to know the beginning,” he said.
“The beginning?” Gardner’s eyes drifted across to the record player.
“Can we start from the beginning, sir?” Mumsford asked quietly.
“The adagio.” Gardner was not listening to him. “Mozart’s clarinet concerto in A.” He was conducting