Edwardian Murder Mystery 04; Our Lady of Pain emm-4

by M C Beaton

  The door opened and Lady Polly came in, followed by a footman carrying a large basket of fruit.

  She eyed Bernie. “Who is this person?”

  “Not a person, my lady. Mr King works for Captain Cathcart and he has brought me some books.”

  “I’ll be off,” said Bernie hurriedly. Daisy sadly watched him go.

  “Now,” said Lady Polly, “I have had my servants move all your belongings from Chelsea to your new home. My maids have cleaned your flat and everything is ready for you.”

  “Thank you, my lady.”

  “What is this trash you are reading?” asked Lady Polly, picking up Lady Jane’s Dilemma.

  “Just some romances. I didn’t feel like reading anything heavy.”

  Lady Polly flicked the book open to the first page. “How is Lady Rose?” asked Daisy, but Lady Polly had become absorbed in the romance and did not hear her.

  ♦

  Rose sat silently beside Harry as he drove her to Scotland Yard. It was raining so she was wearing an oilskin coat, hat and goggles and shielding her head with a large umbrella. There was no danger of the umbrella being whipped away because the traffic was so bad; the motor seemed only able to inch along.

  She remembered the sunny day with Roger at Richmond. It seemed very far away now.

  At Scotland Yard, Rose took off her wet outer clothes with relief and followed Harry to Kerridge’s office.

  “Come in, Lady Rose,” said Kerridge. “Are you recovered from your ordeal?”

  “I hope so,” said Rose. “I gather you want a detailed statement.”

  “My officer there will take it down. Just begin at the beginning.”

  Harry watched Rose anxiously as she began to speak. She described the events of the evening but without describing Roger’s cowardice.

  When she had finished, Kerridge said in a fatherly voice, “Thank you. I’ll let the captain take you home now. You will need more rest.”

  “Actually, I think I will go and see Daisy.”

  “I’ll take you there,” said Harry quickly.

  Rose gave him a small bleak smile. “I would rather see Daisy alone, if you don’t mind.”

  “Then I shall drive you to the hospital. I suggest when you are ready to leave that you telephone Matthew Jarvis and get him to send a carriage for you.”

  ♦

  Another silent journey while Harry tried to think of things to say while Rose sat beside him, her back ramrod-straight and her face shielded by the large umbrella.

  At the hospital, Harry made to accompany her into the building, but Rose said, as if speaking to a stranger, “No, leave me. I shall do very well.”

  And Harry sadly watched her go.

  ♦

  Daisy smiled as Rose walked in. “Your mother has just left. Lady Polly has been so kind.”

  Rose divested herself of her rain clothes and sat down wearily. “Tell me all about it,” said Daisy.

  “I am tired of talking about it,” said Rose, but once more she described what had happened.

  When she had finished, Daisy asked, “But did Roger, Mr Sinclair, not try to rescue you?”

  “It was awful, Daisy. When we first went out on the terrace and he got down on one knee, I knew he was going to propose. And I would have accepted! But then he became so frightened he begged Thomson to let him go. He was prepared to run away and leave me to my fate. I thought he was so strong and adventurous and yet he just crumbled.”

  “Not like the captain?”

  “No, not like him.”

  “Your parents must be very grateful to the captain. Before she left, Lady Polly said, ‘I’ll need to let them marry now’.”

  “I don’t think I want to marry Harry.”

  “Go on!”

  “You know, Daisy, I am tired of being society’s rebel. When I was with Roger, things seemed so gay and easy. I began to see how happy I would be with someone cheery and undemanding. I do not want any more adventures. But don’t look at me like that. You have your Becket, and all’s well that ends well.”

  “I don’t want to be married,” said Daisy in a small voice. “I want to go back to the way things were.”

  “You are depressed because of the loss of your baby.”

  “I’m not. Not now. I feel unnatural. I feel the whole pregnancy was a dream and my marriage as well. I sometimes wake up and think I’m back in Belgrave Square with you. Then I realize I’m not and I cry.”

  “I’m sure we are both suffering from shock.”

  “Maybe. I had another visitor this morning. Bernie King. He works for the captain. He brought me some nice trashy books to read.” Daisy giggled. “Lady Polly took one away with her.”

  “And what is this Bernie King like?”

  “Ever so amusing. He comes from Whitechapel, same as me. Oh, Rose, what am I to do? I want a divorce.”

  Rose looked alarmed. “Daisy, once you are out of here and established, you will feel better. Besides, we are moving to the country soon and Mama has already said that you and Becket can come with us so that you may have some fresh air. So we will be together like the old times.”

  “Well, that’s at least something,” sighed Daisy. “But the old times will never come back now.”

  ♦

  Harry and Kerridge had been told that Thomson was now conscious and they went to the prison hospital, where she was chained to the bed.

  Her eyes glittered with fury as she looked at them. “How could you behave so wickedly?” asked Kerridge.

  “What would you know about it?” she spat out. “You, the bourgeois and you, the slumming aristocrat, playing at being a detective. Do you know what it’s like to be brought up in poverty? Then have to work one’s way up through the ranks of servants to become a lady’s maid? Always having to smile and crawl and watch people stuffing themselves with mountains of food while there are people starving in this country? Pah. Jeffrey was an easy tool. He kept calling for money and she would only give him a little at a time. He grew discontented. Then this Dolores said she did not want him coming around any more. She was getting threatening letters and she did not want anyone to know of her previous existence down the East End.

  “Then Jeffrey told me that she had left a will leaving everything to him. I worked on him. I persuaded him that if I could get his sister out of the way, then he would inherit everything and he could pay me half for my trouble.

  “He hummed and hawed until the last day, when he tried to talk to her and she screamed she never wanted to see him again. I gave him some of her jewels and told him to leave it to me.

  “I thought Lady Rose would be accused and we would be free from suspicion, but of course I should have known an aristocrat is never under suspicion. It’s one law for the rich and one for the poor.”

  “It’s the same law for all,” said Kerridge. “You will be hanged by the neck until you are dead, and good riddance.”

  ♦

  When they left the hospital, Harry asked Kerridge, “Did Jones write those letters?”

  “Yes, he’s admitted to it.”

  “I haven’t been pestered by the press,” said Harry.

  “We’re keeping it quiet until the trial. Amazingly, none of the guests at the ball seems to have known what really went on. So what are your plans now?”

  “More detective work,” said Harry. “Lost dogs, scandals to be covered up, that sort of thing.”

  “What about Lady Rose?”

  “I don’t understand you.”

  “Are you getting married?”

  “You’ll be the first to know.”

  But Harry could not bear the idea of a rejection. He had a feeling that if Rose refused him, it would be final.

  ♦

  Rose longed for the departure for the country. Her brief popularity had gone. It was put about that she had turned the catch of the season down. The Duchess of Warnford told everybody who would listen that she had discovered in Paris that Rose was seriously unconventional and would prob
ably remain a spinster until the end of her days.

  Daisy, too, longed for the day of departure. She was borne to her new home in Bloomsbury. Becket then had to go off immediately to chauffeur Harry.

  The flat faced north. It was furnished in the heavy, oppressive furniture of the last century. The windows were shrouded in blinds, net curtains and heavy damask curtains and the rooms were dark.

  The flat consisted of a long corridor with the rooms leading off it. Daisy removed her hat and sat down in the parlour and stared bleakly around. She remembered how she had longed for a home of her own and wondered what had happened to her.

  Harry had installed a telephone. Daisy eyed it. Then she picked up the receiver and asked to be connected to Harry’s office number. The secretary answered and Daisy, trying to disguise her voice, asked for Mr Bernie King. “Who is calling, please?”

  “His sister,” said Daisy, hoping Bernie had one.

  His cheery voice came on the phone. “Bernie, it’s me, Daisy,” she said. “I’m going mad with boredom. Is there any chance you could meet me for a cup of tea?”

  She waited anxiously. “There’s a Lyon’s tea shop at Victoria, near the station. Know it?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ll meet you there in an hour.”

  “Who was that?” asked Becket, who was sitting in a chair in the outer office.

  “Just my sister,” said Bernie.

  ♦

  “I wonder what your husband would make of this,” said Bernie, as he and Daisy sat over muffins and tea in Lyon’s tea shop.

  “I’m not doing anything wrong,” said Daisy. She wondered if Bernie had noticed her hat, a straw cartwheel embellished with fat pink and yellow pansies. “My husband is working all day and I felt I had to get out.”

  “When do you leave for the country?”

  “Next week.”

  “Are you looking forward to it?”

  “I’m a city girl. Stacey Court is very quiet.”

  “How long will you be away?”

  “Just a couple of weeks. It was Lady Polly’s idea. She thinks fresh air would be good for me.”

  “Two weeks isn’t a long time. It’ll go quickly.”

  “May I see you from time to time when I get back?”

  “I don’t know, Daisy. I like you lots, but it doesn’t seem right.”

  “I’m allowed friends,” exclaimed Daisy.

  “Of course, friends.” Bernie gave Daisy’s hand a little squeeze. “What else?”

  ♦

  Daisy prepared lamb chops for Becket’s supper. She looked around the large high-ceilinged kitchen and reflected that soon she would at least be occupied in cleaning the flat. Her husband had said nothing about hiring help, and anyway, Daisy was sure they could not afford it.

  When Becket came home, she served supper in their dining room. Becket looked about him with pride. “I say, Daisy, isn’t this marvellous? Our new home at last.”

  “You know,” said Daisy cautiously, “I am trained to type and take shorthand. It will be very dull for me, being here on my own all day. I could find a job and hire someone to clean.”

  “Nonsense. You’re my wife and a lady, and ladies don’t work.”

  “I ain’t no lady.”

  Becket gave an indulgent laugh. “If Lady Rose could hear you now! You’re slipping back into your old speech.”

  “I mean it. Why can’t I work?”

  “Because,” said Becket severely, “you’ll be too busy being a wife and mother.”

  “Mother,” echoed Daisy faintly.

  “As soon as I get round to it, I’m going to fix up one of the spare bedrooms as a nursery.”

  A scream rose up inside Daisy, but she fought it down and said, “I’ll need to go to bed. I’m still not feeling well.”

  “You go ahead. I’ll clean up here.”

  I’m trapped, thought Daisy miserably as she crawled into bed, and I don’t know what to do about it.

  ♦

  The exodus to Stacey Court took place the following week. Masters and servants and mountains of luggage made their stately procession out of London. It was one of those grey weeping British days with a fine drizzle falling from the sky.

  Daisy would have liked to travel with Rose, but in her new diminished status, she and Becket had to travel with the upper servants.

  Stacey Court was a Tudor building, its rose-red walls covered in creepers and with many mullioned windows. In Tudor times, the more windows, the higher the status of the owner.

  It was dark and damp inside. The earl ordered fires to be lit in all the rooms although it was warm outside. He had a fear of rheumatism and blamed his secretary for not having had the foresight to air and warm the place before they arrived, unaware that Matthew had suggested it to Lady Polly and had been told that as it was summer, such preparations were not necessary.

  Daisy and Becket were given a room on a half landing below the servants’ quarters in the attics.

  Another dark place, thought Daisy miserably as she unpacked. In the servants’ hall that evening, she and Becket received a warm welcome from the other servants. Brum smiled and suggested that after dinner, perhaps Mr and Mrs Becket could entertain them as they had done before, Becket playing his concertina and Daisy singing music-hall songs.

  Daisy was about to agree but Becket said severely, “I do not like my wife performing in public.”

  “It’s not public,” protested Daisy. “We’re with friends.”

  Becket shook his head and said firmly, “I’m sorry. It would not be suitable.”

  A vision of the chirpy, cheery Bernie rose in Daisy’s mind and again she felt that suffocating feeling of being trapped.

  ♦

  Upstairs, at the dinner table, the earl said to his daughter, “Captain Cathcart will be arriving tomorrow. He wanted to come and I could hardly refuse.”

  Rose felt a jolt of fear. She knew Harry was probably going to propose marriage. This is what she had wanted. Why did she not want it now?

  After dinner, she sent a footman with a note asking Daisy to join her.

  When Daisy entered, Rose hugged her. “I miss you.”

  “Me, too.”

  “Captain Cathcart is calling tomorrow. I think he means to ask for my hand in marriage.”

  “There you are,” said Daisy bracingly. “We’ll both be married ladies.”

  “I don’t think I want to get married,” said Rose.

  “Go on with you! The pair of you are so well suited.”

  “I’m sick of danger, Daisy. I’m sick of being frightened. If I marry Harry, I will be drawn into his life.”

  “You don’t need to be,” said Daisy.

  “Then what if, after we get married, another Dolores comes along?”

  “Or another Roger,” Daisy pointed out.

  “Oh, that was such a mistake. But I would never have known how weak he was if that terrible woman hadn’t threatened to kill us.”

  “How do you mean, ‘weak’?”

  “He wanted to leave me with her to get shot as long as he could escape.”

  “Well, they’re not all like the captain.”

  “True. Or your Becket.”

  Daisy leaned forward and poked the fire. A wind had risen and was howling in the chimney. “I’m in trouble, Rose, and I don’t know what to do.”

  “Why? What is the matter?”

  “I don’t love him any more. I’ll have to spend the rest of my days in the gloomy flat in Bloomsbury, having one baby after another, and that’s if I can have babies. Who knows? It might be one miscarriage after another. I’ll be an old woman before my time.”

  “Daisy, dear Daisy. You’ve had a very bad shock. After a bit of rest and quiet, you’ll feel differently.”

  “No, I won’t. I know I won’t. I’m frightened of beginning to hate him. Divorce isn’t for the likes of us. Unless he dies, I’m stuck with him.”

  “You can hardly kill him,” said Rose.

  “
Can’t I?” howled Daisy. “Just you wait and see. And there’s worse.”

  “Than wanting to kill your husband?”

  “I’ve met someone else. It’s Bernie King who works for the captain.”

  “His new servant?”

  “No, his new detective. Oh, Rose, he’s light and easy and cockney like myself. He’s fun. He makes me laugh.”

  “Daisy, listen to me. It is all a reaction to what you have gone through.”

  “Do you think you could ask the captain to suggest to Becket that I go out to work? I’m sure that would make all the difference.”

  “Yes, of course I shall. Now, your husband will be wondering where you are.”

  ♦

  Rose waited anxiously the next day for Harry’s arrival. What should she say to him? If she refused his proposal now that he appeared to have her parents’ permission, he would never ask her again and she would probably never see him again.

  The weather had cleared up and pale sunlight streamed in through all the windows.

  She paced up and down the gardens, hoping to tire herself out so that she would feel calmer.

  “Look at her!” said Lady Polly as she and her husband watched from the window as Rose paced up and down. “She’s got permission to marry the wretched man and she looks miserable. If we mention India to her again, she’ll accept him just to get out of it.”

  “I’m weary of the whole business,” said the earl. “Rose has been such a disappointment. She’ll have her own money by the time she’s twenty-one. Perhaps we should accept the fact that she’s going to be an old maid.”

  “But what a waste of all that beauty,” sighed Lady Polly.

  “I hear that motor of his,” said the earl.

  Rose had obviously heard the sound as well because she looked alarmed and then fled into the house.

  “Better go and welcome him,” said the earl.

  ♦

  Harry took tea with the earl and countess, wondering all the time where Rose had got to. The murders were not referred to. Now that the case was over, the earl and countess considered talk of murder in their drawing room very bad form.

  Putting his teacup down in the saucer with an impatient little click and wondering if Lady Polly meant to talk all day about the weather, Harry said, “May I see Lady Rose? You know why I have come.”