'That's what hits you, isn't it — the sheer scale of the place? It must be, what, eighty feet long?'
'And twenty high.'
They entered wonderingly, two Gullivers in Brobdingnag.
'It's almost as dusty as the attic,' said Felix, running a finger over a polished oak table. 'All a bit run-down and neglected. Sir Neville was right.'
Double doors and a vestibule led to the ballroom. A great many gilt and velvet chairs were pushed together in one corner but otherwise it was empty. Gazing around, Felix peopled it in his imagination: the gay chatter and laughter, servants passing between the candle-lit tables, a whirl of dancers, and among them, the cynosure of all eyes, the happy couple. 'I wonder if they tangoed?' he said. 'It was all the rage then. In fact, we were dancing at Murray's the night war was declared.'
'I was raiding a pub in Billingsgate. Wouldn't it have depended on the Duchess? There was a lot of disapproval, as I recall.'
'There always is, isn't there? Any new dance. I remember getting a lecture from my Grandmamma. Depraved, she called it. I wonder what she'd have made of the Charleston?'
'Talking of which,' said Rattigan pointing at the ceiling. 'What do you reckon they're doing?'
'Not sure, but they'd pinch you for it in Soho.'
Passing again through the green baize door they descended to the ground floor. A meandering passage, redolent of cooking and carbolic, extended to left and right, but after wandering for a while in Godwinstowe's dark underworld they eventually found the servants' hall. Compared with the grand spaces of the piano nobile, it was a relatively low-ceilinged room of no great size, but pleasant enough and brightly illuminated by a row of stone-mullioned windows. A fireplace of mediaeval proportions dominated one wall, and Felix gained the impression they were in the oldest part of the house. The traditional row of servant bells was now augmented, he noticed, with a telephone receiver, but in other respects it could still have been nineteen-fourteen. At the usual long table sat Nash and Yardley, together with a plump, well-dressed woman of perhaps forty who proved to be Mrs Pardey, the Housekeeper. Introductions were effected and tea summoned for the newcomers.
'Well my goodness,' said Mrs Pardey, 'you ought to be able to find out what happened between the four of you. I'm going to leave you to it, if you don't mind. If there's anything else you want, just ask.'
'She's been all right with us, but the maids seem a bit frightened of her,' said Yardley, as she bustled away. 'Those we've seen are mostly quite young and some of them seem a bit simple. I suppose it's hard to get anyone decent nowadays. She couldn't tell us much because she only arrived after the war, but she let us see the staff register and I've made a few notes. We can have it again if we want, but I think we've got everything we need for now. It appears that the servant numbers have reduced by well over half since nineteen-fourteen, and I'm sorry to say that almost everyone who was here then has gone. Some of the girls got married, some died of the flu, which apparently hit them hard here, and some moved on to other things. About a dozen of the men died in the war, and most of the rest either never came back or didn't stay long if they did. One of the few returnees is His Grace's butler, Pearson. We've exchanged a few words and he seems all right; very formal and correct, as I suppose you'd expect. He's not all that old; I'd say mid thirties. There are also a couple of older maids: Gladys Fripp and Hannah Yates. Yates is the Duchess's lady's maid. Oh yes, and there's the Duke's valet, Merriman, whom we've yet to see. That's about it.'
'We've met the valet,' said Felix. 'He's knocking on a bit — late sixties, probably.'
'I can't say we've got very far on the gossip front,' said Nash, except we've discovered that the household is more or less split into three. Most of the staff come back here to eat, but a few don't. We got the impression there's a bit of tension there — within the family, I mean.'
'Happens in the best of them,' growled Rattigan, with the slightest hint of schadenfreude. 'Reading between the lines, I'd say His Lordship doesn't get on too well with his mother and his mother doesn't get on with her old man.'
'What's Lord George like, sir?' asked Yardley. 'We've never actually seen him.'
'Farmer Giles,' said Felix. 'Friendly, cooperative, no noticeable side to him. He was a bit offhand to start with but he's redeemed himself. I'd say this discovery has knocked him sideways but he's shy about showing it. As for the Duke, he seems a nice old boy but pretty thoroughly muddled. I doubt if he's going to be much use to us. And then, of course, there's the Duchess, whom we've yet to encounter.'
'And who I'll lay you a pound to a penny is the real boss round here,' said Rattigan.
'They usually are,' sighed Yardley, who was a married man.
'Tea, sir?'
Felix looked up to see the little maid who'd taken his coat. He wondered how much she'd overheard. 'That's very welcome, young lady. Thank you.'
'And some of Cook's ginger biscuits,' she added, setting them down.
'Which I can heartily recommend,' said Yardley.
'This is Alice,' said Nash, 'who's already stolen my heart.'
'And you're the cheeky one,' admonished Alice. 'Are you Inspector Felix, sir? I'm Alice Strong. Dick Maidment is my young man. You talked to him this morning.'
Felix smiled up at her. She's like a peg-doll, he though. 'Yes, I did. And when you're free, Miss Strong, I'd like to talk to you too.'
Chapter 4
They sat at a corner of Lord George's office table. The weather had become steadily brighter during the morning but the east-facing room had yet to benefit from the change and Rattigan banked up the fire before settling to his notebook.
'Now then, Miss Strong,' said Felix. 'Would you mind terribly if I were to call you Alice?'
'Oh no, sir,' said Alice, distinctly colouring. 'Not as it's you.'
'Good. How old are you, Alice?'
'Nineteen, sir.'
'And how long have you been working here?'
'Five years.'
'What sort of work do you do?'
'I'm supposed to be a parlourmaid, sir. Except we do all sorts of things, as there's so few of us.'
'I should think that makes it more interesting, doesn't it?'
'Yes, sir, it does, though I'm looking forward to leaving.'
'Ah, yes, to marry your young man. Are you engaged?'
'Not yet, sir, because we're saving up, but we've an understanding.'
'Well, that's topping. I hope you'll be very happy. So there you were, chatting together in the attic. Monday lunchtime, was it? Tell me what happened.'
Set at her ease, Alice launched into her tale with enthusiasm. 'Well, sir, I knew they were up there because their lorry was parked outside, so I asked if I could take them a pot of tea. Mrs Pardey said I could, so long as I didn't take too long about it. A lot of my work is early in the morning, of course, so I'm usually a bit free later on.'
'And when you walked in with your tray of tea things, what did you find?'
'That they'd already took off the roof and cut away the rotten timber. They're very quick workers, sir. They were only supposed to mend the chimney flashing but Dick said you could push a chisel through the wall plate and purlin ends, so Dad told Mr Pearson – Dad's what Joe said I was to call him, sir, as he soon will be – and Mr Pearson told His Lordship and His Lordship said to fix what was needed, which was a bit of luck for us because it's been terrible quiet lately, what with the strike coming and everything. Anyway, they'd done all that and I poured the tea and Dad said he was just going down to get his nammet and while he was gone Dick asked me what was in the chest and I said I didn't know and probably no-one did as no-one ever come up there no more, so he said let's open it, it might be treasure, so I said all right and he did!'
'Phew! And it was definitely unlocked?'
'Oh yes, sir. There wasn't nothing to lock. No padlock, like.'
'But the hasp was down?'
'Yes, sir. But it didn't take much shifting. Dick just flicked it up.'
&nbs
p; 'And in your opinion, had the trunk been opened before? Recently, I mean.'
'I don't know, sir; I shouldn't think so. It had a nasty smell and we had to take an old chair off it and one or two other things and they were all dusty and cobwebby. It was really horrible, sir, seeing the poor lady dead like that in her lovely dress.'
'And then what did you do?'
'I'm sorry to say I screamed, sir, I was that shocked. Dad said it sounded like a steam-whistle going off and he'd never climbed a ladder so fast in his life.'
'Well, I can understand that. And who raised the alarm?'
'We all did, sir. We went and told Mrs Pardey and Mrs Pardey told Mr Pearson and Mr Pearson told the Duchess, or maybe Lord George.'
'And who told the newspapers? Do you know?'
Alice looked troubled. 'No, sir, I don't. But it wasn't me! And it wasn't Dick or Dad neither. It'd be more than their jobs are worth, or mine. As it was, Mr Pearson was cross with me, and said I ought to have come straight to him and not tell the whole hall, though I didn't, except Mrs Pardey and Cook. Oh and Davis and Miller and Watts, but only because they were there.'
'Well I'm sure you didn't mean it to go any further,' smiled Felix. He stood up. 'I think that will be all for now, Alice. Thank you so much for helping us.'
Halfway to the door, she paused. 'Sir.'
'Yes?'
'I just wondered. In the newspaper, they're calling her "The bride in the trunk," and there's a drawing, except it's not much like the real thing, and it says it's like the story about a princess that hid in an old chest playing hide and seek and got trapped and died and they didn't find her for years and years, and they give the story, like a poem. It's ever so similar, isn't it, sir? Everyone says so. And the hasp being over the staple she might have got stuck in there, mightn't she? Only if she did, why didn't she scream? If Dad could hear me in the yard, you'd think someone would have heard her, especially as they were all looking for her. I keep thinking about it, sir, being stuck in that trunk and no-one coming to help and dying all alone. It'd be horrid.'
'Well you mustn't let it upset you, Alice. We don't know exactly how it happened yet. And, you know, it was all a long time ago now. It was a nasty thing for you to find, but you must put it out of your head and think of something more pleasant.'
'I'll try to, sir. But if it wasn't an accident, how did she die? Some say she must have been murdered. My gran does for one, and she was here at the time.'
Felix glanced at Rattigan. 'That's interesting. What was her job?'
'She was Head Cook, sir, for twenty years, before Mrs Figgins.'
'So she must be quite an elderly lady now?'
'Yes sir, she's sixty-nine. But she's still sharp, mostly. She's a marvel.'
'In that case, Alice, I should very much like to talk to your grandmamma. Do you think she would consent to that? What is her name?'
'It's Strong, sir, same as me. Elsie Strong. Would you like me to ask her?'
'What was that about a poem?' asked Rattigan, closing the door.
Felix smiled wryly. 'A nice example of Wilde's dictum. Have you encountered The Mistletoe Bough? It's a ballad, by Bayley.'
'Not that I recall.'
'Really? You surprise me. It was the first thing I thought of when I saw her. I suspect Carrington did too, judging by his comments. Hang on a minute.' He disappeared from the room, returning moments later with a newspaper. 'It's Sam's. I thought he'd probably have one. It seems we've made the nationals — the Mirror, anyway.'
'Pretty well inevitable, I'd have thought,' said Rattigan. He replaced his spectacles, and having perused with close attention the offending page began sonorously to recite:
'"And a skeleton form lay mouldering there,"
In the bridal wreath of that lady fair!
O, sad was her fate! — in sportive jest
She hid from her lord in the old oak chest.
It closed with a spring! — and, dreadful doom,
The bride lay clasped in her living tomb!"'
'Sergeant, I'm impressed,' chuckled Felix. 'Sir Henry to the life!'
'The resemblance has often been remarked, sir. And rather a clever piece of journalism when you think about it, making that connection. I'm surprised we haven't half of Fleet Street at the gate.'
'We may have by now. We'll be doing well to keep them out of the house.'
Ought we to issue a statement — tell 'em it's bunk?'
'I'm not so sure. It might add fuel to the fire. And, you know, it could actually work to our advantage.'
'It might, I suppose. But what else has she been telling them? You can tell she's a little chatterbox, just to listen to her.'
Felix shook his head. 'Don't be too hard on her, Teddy. She's only young, and it's probably the most exciting thing that's ever happened to her. Or ever will, come to that. Let's have Pearson in, if he's free.
Mr Pearson proved to be a lean, dark-haired man, formally attired, and with, as Yardley had intimated, the quiet dignity of his calling.
'Thank you so much for coming to see us, Mr Pearson,' said Felix, rising to greet him. 'Do sit down. Smoke?'
The butler shook his head. 'Thank you no, Inspector. I don't allow it in the house and must set an example. How may I help you?'
'Well first, I'd just like to check a few facts. You name is Stanley Peter Pearson, you're thirty-six and you joined the staff in nineteen hundred and five. You began as a hall boy, later becoming a valet and footman. Since then you have gone on to greater things, I find.'
'Yes, sir. I was promoted to under-butler in nineteen-nineteen and head butler in nineteen twenty-two; although in point of fact I'm the only butler, there being no under-butler now.'
'Quite a responsibility then. Enjoy it?'
Mr Pearson cracked a thin-lipped smile. 'It's all I know, Inspector. I might as well say I enjoy breathing. I was born and brought up on the estate, as was my father before me. I'm very content in my present position.
'Married?'
'No, sir.'
'And what exactly are your duties?'
'I have overall responsibility for the house, particularly provisioning and cellarage, and for the indoor male staff. Anything appertaining to the female staff devolves to Mrs Pardey. The grounds, the stables and what remains of the estate are the province of Mr Partridge, the Duke's agent.
'Thank you. So at the time of Lady Genny's wedding what were you, a footman or a valet?'
'Both, sir. I valeted for Major Mortimer when he was staying here, and for any other gentleman guests, as required. Principally, however, I was a footman, although there were five of us then and not two as at present. I was the senior of them, at the time.'
'Major Mortimer is His Grace's brother, I believe?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Does he stay here often?'
'Not often, sir; he only lives five miles away, at Godwinstowe Manor.'
'I understand he identified Lady Genny's remains?'
'Yes, he went up to the attic on Monday afternoon, soon after I reported the discovery.'
'Was he here at the time?'
'Yes he was.'
'To see His Grace?'
'Yes, and the Duchess. He was with the Duchess when I reported to her.'
'Thank you, Mr Pearson. Now what we are trying to do, of course, is reconstruct the day of the wedding, hoping to get an idea of what might have happened. As you'll have guessed, I have before me the nineteen-fourteen police report, to which I shall occasionally refer. I shan't be trying to catch you out, please don't think that, but it's possible you may be able to supply fresh insights or recall things that seemed irrelevant at the time. It'll also help us to flesh out the usual rather dull official account. I realise memories can become hazy after twelve eventful years, but please do your best. Incidentally, were you away during the war?'
'Yes, sir. I volunteered at the outbreak of hostilities, convalesced here from a wound during the latter part of nineteen-seventeen, returned to the front in ninete
en-eighteen and was demobilised in that year.'
'See much action?'
'I was wounded at Passchendaele, sir.'
'Then you did. How is the leg now?'
The butler smiled again. 'You noticed the limp? It doesn't give me much trouble nowadays.'
'Good. Now, Sergeant Rattigan here is going to make notes on your statement, and when it's typed up, we'll ask you to confirm that it's a fair account by signing it. If you're not sure about something, please say so and it'll be duly noted. May I take you through your day? How did it begin?'
'I remember it very well, sir. We were all up very early, as you might imagine. The Major didn't need attending to as he'd spent the night at home and had his own man there, so I helped out generally until it was time to go to the church.'
'At what time was that?'
'The ceremony was to begin at eleven o'clock, sir. I then accompanied His Grace's chauffeur, Fooks, in the Rolls-Royce so as to open the car door for Lady Genevieve. Fooks attended the Duke.'
'Who else was in attendance on Lady Genny?'
'Miss Yates, sir, in the carriage behind. And also, of course, the bridesmaids.'
'Who were the bridesmaids?'
The Honourable Letitia Cuthbert and Lady Persephone Creek-Barrington, sir. There were no little ones.'
'What were their ages?'
'I don't recall, sir. I should imagine they were in their early twenties.'
'Miss Yates still works here, I believe?'
'Yes, sir. She's Her Grace's personal maid.'
'She was standing in for Lady Genny's maid, I believe?'
'Yes, sir. Lady Genevieve's own maid was not available that day.'
'That was Miss Virginia Brown?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Why was she not available?'
'Miss Brown had given notice, sir.'
'When did she do that?'
'I believe that morning, sir.'
'That's a little surprising, isn't it? Do you know the reason?'
'No, sir.'
'To whom would she have given notice?'
'Normally the housekeeper. However, on that occasion I believe it was to the Duchess.'
Death of a Lady (The Inspector Felix Mysteries Book 1) Page 4
