Death at the Wychbourne Follies

by Amy Myers

  ‘My dear Constance,’ her husband said instantly, ‘you have missed the point. We would be required here as a shield. Remember that Gerald was an avid visitor to the Gaiety.’

  Katie was appalled. Even for Hubert this was going too far. She glanced at her husband and realized what was coming. Charles was always one for putting cards on the table.

  ‘And so was I,’ Charles said levelly. ‘All in all, it’s a pity indeed that Gertrude should have mentioned Mary Ann. Nevertheless, I shall tell the chief inspector about her. He might consider it relevant to his investigation.’

  At last. Trust Chief Inspector Melbray to ask for her company, just as she was about to put the finishing touches to the stuffed leg of mutton for Sunday evening dinner. Thankfully it was a day in which Mrs Squires would be working late.

  Nell strode through the Great Hall to the morning room where Mr Peters was serving coffee to the inspector and to Sergeant Caring. This meant business then. The ‘Alex’ she’d known seemed to have vanished for good, and one look at his face made it clear that he didn’t want any mention of their earlier encounter today. She was glad she had taken time to change into her red jumper suit. If you looked better, you felt better, and she certainly needed to do that.

  As always, though, Chief Inspector Melbray surprised her. ‘I apologize for any discourtesy this morning, Miss Drury. A journey beginning at three in the morning, in the snow and by train, motor car and foot, does not improve one’s outlook on life – or on death.’

  ‘At least I had more sleep last night than you,’ she replied inanely, relaxing slightly.

  ‘Thank you. Now to return to—’

  ‘The footprints?’ She had relaxed too soon.

  ‘No. Would you take me first through the events during and after the play?’

  ‘The Follies,’ she muttered.

  He let that pass, wrong-footing her again. ‘Did you see Mr Rocke after the Follies ended?’

  ‘Only in passing, when I went to help clear up after the performance. He had changed out of his Pierrot costume and was about to leave.’

  ‘Did you speak to him? Do you have any idea as to why he might have remained there and not returned to Wychbourne Court straightaway?’

  ‘None. I didn’t see him when I went back to the Court, or on the way. Perhaps he went somewhere else.’ She was making a real Eton mess of this, she thought savagely. All the fruit and meringue of the facts mashed into creamy nothingness.

  ‘Take me through your own movements,’ he asked again.

  She did so, then seized the bull by the horns. ‘I know he must have died because of that stone, but was he stabbed in the back too?’

  He shot a look at her. ‘Yes. He didn’t die prettily, Miss Drury. He was, we believe, first stabbed in the back and then killed by the stone. I remember your mention of blood splashes and quite a bit of it was found by the porch. That suggests he made a run for it and was pursued to the green. We have not, however, found any weapon, only the stone. Now would you kindly tell me about Jethro James? Would he, in your opinion, have any reason to kill him, if theft is ruled out?’

  ‘None that I can see. He wouldn’t even have known him. If Mr Rocke caught – no, I won’t make guesses.’ If he’d caught Jethro red-handed and threatened to summon Lord Ansley or the police … No, that just didn’t seem likely.

  ‘Don’t worry, Miss Drury. Motives don’t provide evidence against a killer, but they can give signposts, as in this case.’

  ‘You mean Mary Ann Darling,’ she said without thinking and instantly regretted it.

  He looked at her thoughtfully. ‘A name that has been mentioned to me. If you have any evidence or even any indications of her being relevant, then I should be grateful to know of them.’

  SIX

  There are some days when there seems to be a perpetual skin over the custard of life’s trifle, and today’s looked ominous. Nell laughed at herself. Moping macaroons, look on the bright side. Tonight’s dinner would only be for the family and Lord and Lady Kencroft, who would be rattling around like two peas in the very large pod of the west wing. Even Mr Beringer had returned to London. Only Lord Kencroft’s valet would still be in the east wing. Much of the snow had now melted and so she presumed had the police’s requirement for the guests to remain must have done likewise. There were still rumblings about the police’s ‘request’ to search their luggage early yesterday afternoon, but the halibut à la Welsh ‘rabbit’ (another thank-you to Mrs Leyel’s recipes) had wooed good or moderately good humour back.

  If only all life’s troubles would follow suit and tiptoe quietly away. But there was no doubt that the shadow that had fallen over Wychbourne Court was to remain here for a while. Tobias Rocke had been a well-known comic actor and so not only would there be an inquest, but newspaper reporters would once more be present in force. A fact of which Lord Ansley was no doubt fully aware.

  As an unwelcome hors d’oeuvres to Nell’s Monday morning, Mrs Squires had not yet arrived, an unexpected problem. She lived in Burnt Ash Lane, near enough for the remains of the snow not to trouble her. Something must be amiss, Nell realized. If she was ill, the butcher or milkman would have brought a message. But there had been nothing, which meant the servants’ lunch would have to be covered by Kitty, Michel and Nell herself. Miss Maxwell (and her formidable dresser Doris Paget, thankfully) would be leaving this morning, as would the Jarretts, and after luncheon Mrs Reynolds and Mr Heydock would be motoring off together – to everyone’s amazement) – in his Lagonda with the gentleman’s gentleman, Mr Winter, presumably tucked in behind them with the luggage. The indefatigable Mr Trotter would not be leaving, but was staying in the Coach and Horses, courtesy of Lady Clarice, so Arthur had told her (with some relief that he had not been asked to host Mr Trotter’s stay).

  Meanwhile, the family luncheon was catered for, but how about the servants’ hall? Nell made a whirlwind tour of the larders to see what Mrs Squires had planned and found the already prepared mutton pies. By eleven o’clock the crisis was abating – in the kitchens at any rate. Her morning visit to Lady Ansley had hardly convinced her that the atmosphere in the main house was brightening up. The cloud there remained firmly in place and would do so, Nell suspected, as long as Chief Inspector Melbray remained at the Coach and Horses with an unsolved murder case.

  That was puzzling. Wasn’t it strange that Mr Rocke’s fellow guests were being allowed to return home so promptly? If that meant they were cleared of involvement in the crime, then that must look ominous for Jethro, who had come across the body on such a wintry night. That was by chance, he’d maintained, which was odd. He hadn’t been in the Follies’ audience, nor had Frank Hardcastle served him in the bar and he wouldn’t go poaching in the snow. So what was he doing out? Nevertheless, Nell found it hard to think of Jethro as a killer – save of other people’s game, of course.

  She made a determined effort to study the organization of the dinner menu laid out before her in the Cooking Pot – or cook’s room, as Mrs Fielding scathingly called it. A knock on the door and a breathless Kitty announced, ‘Mrs Squires is just coming. She’s putting on her apron in the hall.’

  ‘Any sign of what’s wrong?’ Nell asked, following Kitty quickly to the kitchen.

  ‘No, but she doesn’t look happy,’ Kitty hissed.

  Mrs Squires was already at her post. She looked more than just unhappy, Nell thought in alarm, but Mrs Fielding bore down on Mrs Squires in full housekeeping mode before Nell could prevent her.

  ‘And just where have you been, Mrs Squires? It’s gone eleven o’clock.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Fielding. It’s my friend, Mrs Palmer,’ Mrs Squires replied.

  ‘Ethel?’ Nell intervened. ‘What’s wrong? She seemed well enough at the Follies.’

  ‘She’s very upset, Miss Drury.’ Mrs Squires turned to her with relief.

  ‘We’re all upset,’ Mrs Fielding snorted. ‘Miss Drury has been put to inconvenience.’

  ‘Thank you, Mrs
Fielding,’ Nell said quickly, her eyebrows mentally shooting up at such apparent concern for her welfare. ‘Upset about what, Mrs Squires? Is her husband ill?’

  ‘No. He’s been arrested. For the murder of Mr Rocke,’ Mrs Squires burst out crying and Kitty flew to comfort her.

  Gentle John? Arrested? ‘Why?’ Nell asked, completely at sea. This was incomprehensible. Not Jethro, but John? That huge giant of a man couldn’t kill an aphid on a tree let alone a human being. And what possible reason would he have for killing Tobias Rocke? ‘Can I help?’ she added impulsively.

  ‘Would you go and see Ethel, Miss Drury? She’s in a right lather. You could find out who really killed that man, couldn’t you?’

  ‘But I didn’t—’ Nell broke off helplessly in the face of Mrs Squire’s trusting expression. ‘I’ll visit her and then ask the inspector what’s going on.’ The thought of that appalled her, though.

  There was still an expectant silence and Nell braced herself.

  ‘I’ll do what I can, Mrs Squires.’

  Nell ploughed through what remained of the snow on her way to the village. It was turning into patches of ice and mud, rather like her mission, she thought wryly. With straight snowfall, one knew how to deal with the situation, but ice and mud had to be taken with care. She’d lost her footing badly over the murder of Mr Rocke. She hadn’t known that John Palmer – Gentle John’s formal name – was a suspect, let alone that he must presumably have had some motive for murder. What could it be? As far as Nell knew, he was one of Lord Ansley’s handymen, able to fell trees on the estate or paint a cottage or whatever was needed. She’d seen him at the Follies with his wife but not afterwards, but what the spluttering sausages could have happened then?

  Miss Smith, who seemed to have acquired her own means of obtaining information, probably through Lord Richard, had informed the upper servants that the guests had been delighted to hear after breakfast that Mr Rocke’s murderer had been arrested.

  ‘And perhaps relieved?’ Nell had suggested.

  ‘No signs of that,’ Miss Smith had retorted with glee. ‘Mr Jarrett insisted on an apology from the inspector, who refused to give one, even though Mr Jarrett said he wasn’t feeling well and his performance this evening would undoubtedly suffer from his ordeal this weekend. His lordship and her ladyship were very grumpy to hear about that terrible man who murdered Mr Rocke, because he does work for them, and everyone else was complaining about the clumsy and stupid way Scotland Yard had behaved over the luggage being searched.’

  Mr Peters had stepped in at that point with the full majesty of his position as butler. ‘What takes place with the family is not for discussion here,’ he said reprovingly.

  Miss Smith had not felt reproved. ‘A pity,’ she had observed cheerfully. ‘Takes all the fun away.’

  Fun was not how Nell would have described a murder. Once upon a time, the butler’s word would have been law, even for the upper servants. Not now, it seemed. Mrs Fielding had been shocked and even Nell thought it was out of order. Much as she liked Miss Smith’s bounciness in most circumstances, this was not one of them. Miss Smith, Nell thought, might not be long for Wychbourne Court, whether Lord Richard wished it so or not. His singling her out to drive her to the Follies had been noted with disapproval in the servants’ hall.

  Nell doubted whether grumpy accurately described Lord and Lady Ansley’s mood this morning, although no doubt Mr Jarrett had been as querulous as Miss Smith stated. If only Mr Trotter would disappear off the scene together with the Gaiety guests. He might be staying at the Coach and Horses but he seemed constantly to be at Wychbourne Court. She was beginning to see him in her dreams popping up everywhere, saying, ‘I don’t wish to be of any trouble …’ That reminded her of the Mary Ann photograph and whether Mary Ann’s spirit had chosen to appear exactly as she’d been photographed in her lifetime or whether the very human Mr Trotter had played a part in it.

  What part had Mr Rocke played in the story? she wondered. Had he been curious about the authenticity of Mr Trotter’s work in view of the recent doubts over the work of spiritualist William Hope and prowled around the darkroom for proof? Could that have led to his death? Suppose Mr Rocke saw himself as another Harry Price and was set on exposing Mr Trotter as a fake? No, from what she’d heard, Tobias Rocke was a placid, likeable man, who went out of his way to calm difficult situations down, not stir them up.

  Reaching the end of the drive, she decided to brave taking the footpath from the Wychbourne Court gates past the church porch where Mr Rocke had probably been attacked. There was nothing to show what had happened now, save for a pile of dirt-trodden snow on one side. No sign of the bloodstains though, and for that she was glad. Even in what was left of the daylight, the churchyard was a gloomy place in winter. The thick bushes along both sides of the fencing and the gravestones weathered by age made her feel trapped, and it didn’t help that on a weekday afternoon the churchyard was deserted. She quickened her steps to the lychgate to Mill Lane and made her way up the lane to Birch Cottage where Ethel and John Palmer lived. Their daughter had worked as a chambermaid at the Court before she left to get married, so Mrs Squires had said. That had been before Nell arrived a year ago, so she had not met her or Ethel, but Gentle John was known to her as a familiar estate worker.

  Am I here as comforter or investigator? Nell wondered, as she knocked on the cottage door. Both, she decided, as she followed Ethel into their parlour. This was clearly seldom used, as a fire had obviously been hastily lit, and the antimacassars on the armchairs looked immaculate. Ethel must be about fifty-five, Nell thought, though the worry and grief that had etched themselves into her face made her look older. She was tiny compared with Nell’s five foot six, and in the displayed photographs a six-foot Gentle John towered over his wife. No wedding photographs that Nell could see, but plenty with their three children, none of whom now lived in Wychbourne, so Mrs Squires had said. The ornaments suggested a happy life of work and excursions, judging by the ‘Present from Margate’ shepherdess china figure and the photographs of the couple and their children at fairs and circuses.

  ‘It isn’t right, Miss Drury,’ Ethel wailed, even before Nell had sat down.

  ‘Then your husband will be released when the facts are known,’ Nell said more confidently than she felt. ‘It’s some misunderstanding. Why would your husband have wanted to kill Mr Rocke? It seems very unlikely.’

  ‘He’d no reason,’ Ethel shot back at her as though this were an accusation. ‘We come home that night from the Follies and didn’t go out again. Police say he was out murdering Mr Rocke. But he wouldn’t, he couldn’t.’

  Nell disentangled this. ‘So why do the police believe he was out?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘They must have witnesses,’ Nell tried to explain patiently. Could they have got John confused with Jethro the poacher? she wondered. Very unlikely, and that still wouldn’t fit Ethel’s story since Jethro was out at about midnight. Could Ethel be lying? She seemed too genuinely distraught for that.

  ‘Did you come straight home from the Follies?’ she asked.

  Ethel hesitated. ‘Yes.’

  Nell noted the hesitation. ‘Did you stop to talk to anyone?’

  Ethel seemed to clutch at this. ‘Well, I had to, me remembering everyone from the Gaiety. But only for a minute or two and then we come straight home.’

  The Gaiety again. Of course. Ethel had worked there. Surely, oh surely, this murder couldn’t be connected to Mr Rocke’s role as the keeper of secrets there? ‘You were there at the same time as Lady Ansley?’

  ‘No, I never knew her. I knew his lordship – a real stage-door johnnie he was. Lord Kencroft too. That’s how I came to be here. His lordship told me I could have one of his cottages. I knew the others too. Recognized them right away. Miss Katie, Miss Lynette, Miss Constance, and Mr Neville of course. And that Mr Jarrett.’

  ‘Mr Rocke too?’

  Another hesitation, or was she imagining it? Nel
l wondered.

  ‘Him too. I was her dresser, see.’

  Of course! Nell remembered now that not only had Ethel been at the Gaiety but that she had been Mary Ann Darling’s dresser. Tread carefully, she warned herself. ‘Were you there the night Miss Darling disappeared?’

  ‘Course I was. That was my last night, almost, that is. I went in next day, found out she was missing, stayed on a couple of days and then I couldn’t take no more. I was so fond of her, that Miss Mary Ann.’

  Everything always came back to Mary Ann, Nell thought. And now Mr Rocke had been murdered.

  ‘It’s been said that Mr Rocke knew everybody’s secrets at the Gaiety. Do you think he knew what happened to her?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know,’ Ethel said woodenly. ‘Didn’t have much to do with him. Sweet on Miss Darling, he was, though. And a waste of time, that was.’

  ‘Why was that?’

  Ethel shrugged. ‘All the men had a yen for her. And she wouldn’t have nothing to do with any of them. Not her. Anyway,’ she said pitifully, ‘that ain’t got anything to do with this murder. And nor has my John. How could it? I left the old Gaiety when Miss Darling went and didn’t meet John for another three years.’

  That was a load of gammon at times, Nell thought as she left. Ethel Palmer might be right or wrong about her and John’s movements last night, but she certainly wasn’t telling the whole story about the Gaiety and Mary Ann. Nell walked back along the churchyard footpath, uncomfortably aware that Tobias Rocke’s murderer could well have taken this route.

  As she reached the Wychbourne Court gates, she hesitated. Presumably Gentle John had been taken to Sevenoaks Police Station for questioning, and only one motor car remained outside the Coach and Horses. Could the inspector still be there? And if so, should she take the opportunity to tackle him now on the question of Gentle John? She’d probably get a flea in the ear as a result, but she’d risk that. What had she got to lose – apart from her temper?

  There was no sign of him in the bar, and Frank Hardcastle directed her to the snug which he said Chief Inspector Melbray had taken over as his operations room. The snug was slightly more comfortable than the other bars, as it was the domain of those few ladies who dared to enter this male preserve with their husbands.