by Amy Myers
“Just as if you had known you would need mourning,” Louisa could not resist pointing out.
“Indeed yes,” Eleonore agreed. “It is always so wise to be prepared for all contingencies at these events. One never knows what attire one may need for day or night.”
Louisa’s eyes narrowed. She was resigned to being supplanted by Mrs Keppel in His Majesty’s affections but an upstart French countess was quite another matter. “So tragic,” she murmured, “for poor Arthur to die on his wedding night. I must offer my condolences to His Majesty, who must be greatly upset at the death of his friend. He was not at luncheon; an old friend such as myself understands his grief. We can mourn together. Have you spoken to His Majesty today?” She could hardly keep her eagerness to know out of her voice.
“Not since — that is to say, no.” Eleonore felt she could hardly be specific about the time His Majesty had left her company much earlier today.
Louisa went straight to the royal apartments, convinced of the purity of her motives. As she turned into the corridor that led to them, however, she almost collided with a strange gentleman in a homburg hat whom she could not recollect seeing before. He must, she deduced, be something to do with the police, and promptly donned her most gracious expression.
“May I help you, my man? This is the royal corridor, you realise.”
“I’m well aware of it, madam.” Egbert was on his way to keep his appointment with His Majesty, but saw no need to inform everyone of the fact. They arrived at the main door to his apartments together and in silence, and she stood impatiently aside as he rapped on the royal knocker, presumably installed for the visit, since it was an interior door. His summons was answered instantly by an equerry in court dress.
“The Duchess of Wessex to see His Majesty.”
“And Scotland Yard. Same errand. By appointment.” Egbert had seen Gold Stick before luncheon, and had almost been run over by the trolleys of food whisking by him to feed the royal palate.
“I regret His Majesty is resting. Might I ask you both to return later?”
The inspector from Scotland Yard and the Duchess of Wessex retraced their steps in the same silence in which they had arrived. The duchess was feverishly wondering whether Eleonore could possibly have beaten her to the royal presence. The inspector was annoyed at having to postpone the evil moment when he must face his monarch.
*
Gerald lay in wait for Jeanne Planchet, until she should appear from her mistress’s room on some errand that would take her in the direction of the servants’ quarters. He had a great deal on his mind, and in his anxiety he had almost forgotten he was now Lord Montfoy. When he did remember, the fact gave him little pleasure as he recalled that titles were all very well, but money was better.
He had spent the morning consoling Belinda who actually seemed upset that old Arthur was no more. He had done his best to grieve with her, but it surprised him that she should be so forgiving towards a rotter like Arthur, who had made her a pauper and then had stolen her necklace to give to Gertrude into the bargain.
At last Jeanne appeared. Again to his surprise she seemed in a good mood, and only too willing to allow him his droits de seigneur as he laughingly put it. He then listened patiently, and with some interest, to Jeanne’s dramatic rendering of her breaking the news of Arthur’s death to her mistress, his bride, early that morning. Jeanne had been most surprised to receive instructions from Gertrude to remove her possessions from the bridal chamber, and had performed these duties somewhat earlier than instructed. After all, it seemed from the gossip she had overheard there might be interesting events taking place at the time Gertrude had stipulated. She had been right.
A hand was now clasped to her naked bosom as she retold the tale. “‘Thank the good Seigneur you are safe, madame,’ I cried.”
“From what?” Gertrude had asked.
“From the assassin of your husband, madame.” Jeanne had burst into dramatically timely tears, and Gertrude had spent some time wiping them up and comforting her.
“Didn’t she cry?” Gerald asked curiously.
Jeanne shrugged. “She is an English lady now. She has a stiff upper lip. It is we French who feel things deeply.”
Gerald decided enough time had been spent soothing French emotions. The problem of his own safety must now be solved. He had told himself it was highly unlikely that the story of his discovery of Arthur’s bankruptcy would reach the police’s ears, but he had then discovered that the crazy French chef was some kind of chum of the Scotland Yard man, and would undoubtedly relate all he had heard in the conservatory yesterday.
“Chérie,” he whispered, “last night — shall we say we were together?”
“Why?”
“Both of us would have an alibi,” he pointed out. “And however innocent we both are, that is no bad thing.”
“How much will you pay me?”
Gerald was hurt. Surely the privilege of sleeping with the new Lord Montfoy was payment enough. Apparently it was not.
“Six sovereigns,” he said reluctantly.
*
Gertrude sat in her room, quite still, and tried to make sense of her emotions. She was appalled to find she had none. The events of the last two days had rendered her completely numb. Now at last her brain began to work. I must have been crazy, she told herself slowly. Quite crazy. First there was Arthur’s death to consider, then her own future. Should she pretend to be a grief-stricken widow? It would be expected. Was she a grief-stricken widow? No. Even that appalling fact failed to touch her. She looked up as her father came in. He looked tired, and still faintly unbelieving of the dire results of the wedding to which he had so much looked forward.
“The police are here, honey. Do you feel like seeing them?”
“I have to, Pa.”
“How are you?”
She made a gesture. “I get married, I’m told I’m a pauper’s wife, and that I have to sleep alone — and now I’m a pauper’s widow.”
“They’re going to say I — we — had a motive, honey. And we did.”
She shook her head. “If he’d been found with a bullet in him, perhaps. But he wasn’t. He had cuckold’s horns on his head — ”
“Gertrude honey! They were old Herne’s horns. A cuckold’s would mean you didn’t love him the way you ought.”
“And did I, Pa? Answer me that. Because I surely can’t.”
She was painfully aware that while her mind struggled to cope with Arthur, her heart was facing the same problem with Richard.
*
For once in his diplomatic life Richard was unable to think clearly. The Foreign Office, after all, was rarely called upon to deal with fairies, ghosts and murder, and he felt out of his depth. There was too much going on here that he could not understand. Auguste Didier, he’d heard from the king’s detective, was under the impression their host was a Russian agent. The Dizzy Duchess was dashing around even more dizzily than usual, and to cap it all, Gertrude’s bridegroom had been murdered. Arthur’s death was part of a dark blur in his mind, where reason did not seem to be coming to his aid. The one thought that kept surfacing, quickly to be repressed, was that Gertrude was now a widow.
Much the same thought was running through Harvey’s mind. He longed for the clean open spaces of America — or even its busy throbbing cities — where the convoluted ways of England would be far behind him. He felt lost in a land where the past, as represented by huge Elizabethan mansions, aristocracy and royalty, not to mention superstition, was so carefully cherished that there was hardly breathing space for a present, let alone a future. Harvey Bolland decided he’d had enough. The quicker he could get back to Denver and take Gertrude with him, the better. Gertrude’s plans for writing books on folklore and standing for the English parliament would be doomed, he told himself, if only on grounds of taste, now that Arthur had died in such a way.
It occurred to him that he hadn’t seen anything of Bluebell since the news broke. She was a smart kid,
and he hoped she hadn’t had a hand in this.
*
No longer was Farthing Court a Tir Nan Og: now uncertainties lurked round every corner, if not something more sinister. Nevertheless, as Auguste made his way back towards the kitchens, from another talk with Egbert in his hastily arranged office in the morning room, he felt on firmer ground. Food must go on, regardless of life and death, and so some semblance of normality must remain there. It had been evident as soon as he had entered the kitchen this morning that the news had spread long since. Work for dinner was now progressing, but a cloud was obviously lying over paradise. Signs of luncheon remained; His Majesty’s dishes, all emptied, were still on their trolleys. Obviously His Majesty’s appetite remained unimpaired, which was a good sign from Auguste’s experience. Ethelred was quiet, however, and the happy hum to which Auguste had become accustomed was stilled.
There was a silence as Auguste whisked round in the hope that by focussing his mind on dinner, it might also be disciplined into order about the death of Lord Montfoy. He was horrified to find that the scorned lobster salad of yesterday was being reconstituted into lobster à la cardinale. If His Majesty’s palate detected that, he, Auguste Didier, could expect no quarter. He promptly ordered it to be removed from the menu and allotted to the servants’ dinner — an arrangement which caused no problems at all. Ethelred’s excuse was that neither Auguste nor Mr Pennyfather had been available that morning to consult, and Mr Entwhistle could not be found either. Murder, Auguste almost said, was no excuse, and then realised it was. Even food must be put in proportion to the enormity of the tragedy that had hit Farthing Court. Nevertheless, His Majesty was present — it had to be thought of.
Ethelred retreated in dishonour, and then Jenny burst out sobbing.
“My grannie said there’d be trouble, and now there has been,” she informed them. “It don’t do to mock the fairies.”
“In what way have they been mocked?” Auguste asked quietly.
There was a slight pause. “They didn’t get their food the other night,” Jenny muttered in an anti-climax.
“And may in the house,” Mrs Honey added angrily, emerging from her stillroom. “It’s bad luck. I said so, and I’ll say it again.”
“But that was brought in by your grandmother, Jenny,” Auguste pointed out, puzzled. “Surely however much she disliked the Montfoys, she didn’t want such a terrible crime to happen?”
“No,” Jenny agreed, somewhat reluctantly he felt.
“Is His Majesty much offended?” Ethelred asked gravely, regaining his composure after Auguste’s rebuke.
“I haven’t seen him,” Auguste replied. He could hardly say that he had been dreading a summons. “I spent much of the morning with Inspector Rose, with whom I’m acquainted.” It seemed to him the whole of the kitchen was suddenly interested. “I have had the honour of assisting him on a few occasions,” he added in explanation.
“But he’s from Scotland Yard.” Ethelred’s eyes grew round and the floodgate of babble was opened.
“Will they want our fingerprints?” Jenny asked in awe.
“Did you know Kate Webster, Mr Didier?” Mrs Honey enquired, as though famous murderesses automatically sought him out.
“What about Jack the Ripper?” was Ethelred’s choice.
“Charlie Peace?” Stuart Tudor suddenly found the kitchen of more interest than his pantry.
“None. I met the Inspector at Stockbery Towers. The butler was murdered.”
Now his credentials were established, Auguste immediately found himself an authority on Fenians, forensic evidence, photography, Scotland Yard procedures and the Old Bailey. It was time to remember that Egbert would rely on him for help where the staff were concerned, and he should make that clear.
“Any information you may have about Lord Montfoy, or his family, or who may have wished him dead, would be much welcomed by the Chief Inspector.”
They looked at each other.
“We hardly knew Lord Montfoy,” Ethelred explained. “We upper servants were employed by Mr Entwhistle, for Lord Montfoy naturally wished to take his own staff with him. Many of the lower servants — Jenny, for instance — were here in his time, but you will know how infrequently they come into contact with their employer.”
Auguste did know. The kitchen staff might never see their employer in the whole of their service, and the housemaids very seldom, and then it was a case of ‘Watch the wall, my darling, while the gentlemen go by’. So there was little point in asking Jenny or other kitchen workers about the Montfoys — or even about Entwhistle. Jeanne Planchet, on the other hand, had been only too eager to chat about her mistress at servants’ dinner time. Egbert had taken lunch in the morning room with Naseby and Lyme, while Auguste had donned his chef’s hat in Pug’s Parlour. With the visiting servants still with them, it had been an awkward meal; the Farthing Court servants were trying to maintain the shreds of honour for their house by refraining from comment on the murder, and the visiting servants were only too eager to glean all the gossip they could.
“Mademoiselle, how is your mistress?” Auguste had asked Jeanne.
“Composed, monsieur. She is a brave lady.”
She must be indeed. Most ladies of Auguste’s acquaintance would be prostrated in bed with tansy tea and smelling salts at losing their husband on their wedding night. But then yesterday had been no ordinary wedding day.
Jeanne stole a look at him, clasping his arm, as he escorted her to dinner, more firmly. “Poor Lord Montfoy. Do you think it was Lady Belinda killed him?”
“His sister? Why should his sister wish to murder him?”
“He stole her necklace to give to his bride.”
He stared at her. “Have you seen it in your mistress’s room?”
“No. But I saw Lord Montfoy coming from Lady Belinda’s room,” she informed him, gazing up at him with innocent large eyes. “Naturally I told no one. It is not my concern, after all. Now the poor gentleman is dead, and — ”
“You must tell the police,” Auguste interrupted firmly.
Jeanne had thought this over. Part of her said she had nothing to lose now; the other part said she might gain a little more.
*
Egbert looked up as Auguste entered the morning room. To Auguste’s relief there was no sign of Naseby or Lyme. Egbert interpreted his look correctly. “They’re off interviewing guests. Half of them are declaring diplomatic immunity and saying they must leave immediately. I told them they can’t.”
“The King is still here, and they couldn’t leave before him.” Auguste paused. “How is His Majesty?” He tried to sound casual.
“I almost wish I knew. But I don’t. He’s put off my appointment until late this afternoon.”
“He ate a good lunch.”
“I’m not surprised. Good cook they have here. He turns out a nice chicken pie.”
“His name is Ethelred Perkins.”
“Anglo-Saxon, eh? Better cook than King Alfred, anyway.”
“Pardon?” Auguste tried to recall a chef of this name.
“Great English king, whose chief claim to fame is that he burnt the cakes.”
“The English delight in bad cookery,” Auguste observed. “Such wonderful food, such bad chefs.” He decided he could wait no longer in such irrelevancies. He had to know. “Have you met Thomas Entwhistle yet?”
Egbert leaned back in his chair. “I have. A very polite gentleman.”
“I trust he will be polite when he murders me.”
Egbert sighed. “I grant you he’s Gregorin’s build, Auguste, and looks — from what I remember and from his photographs — somewhat similar. But I have to go by what Chesnais tells me. Or do you think the Sûreté is in this conspiracy too?”
“Perhaps Gregorin has a double.”
“A very elaborate conspiracy if so. Entwhistle’s servants all swear he’s in England and Gregorin’s that he’s in Paris, a fact confirmed by Gregorin himself.”
“But a murder has
taken place here."
“We’ve been through this. I suppose you didn’t decide to save His Majesty’s honour, as you supposed, by bumping Gregorin off?”
“If I had,” Auguste, taken aback, managed to reply with some dignity, “I should have made a good job of it, and not killed Lord Montfoy in his place.”
Although well used by now to such sparring with Egbert, he felt uncomfortable. Even Egbert could not deny there was unfinished business between him and Gregorin and that Gregorin was persistent. Auguste remained convinced he was living under Gregorin’s roof, and was fully aware that with a murder having taken place there was little chance of escaping from it.
“Right,” Egbert declared. “Let’s assume that the murderer got the right victim, shall we, that he and perhaps others tied Montfoy up and then shot him — why put a deer’s head on him?”
“Like a blindfold — ” Auguste made an effort to be objective — “before an execution.” As Gregorin would do.
“Perhaps there were two separate stages; Montfoy was tied up with the head on him, and someone came along and took advantage of the fact.”
“Why,” asked Egbert practically, “tie up a bridegroom on his wedding night? To prevent him reaching his bride?”
“Or just to ridicule him.”
“Now you’re beginning to think, Auguste.” Egbert was approving. “A jilted suitor. Why horns then? Because the jilted lover intended to step into his place?”
“Perhaps. Bluebell said she was going to tell everyone the rhyme about Herne and how the lord of the manor must seek Herne’s permission for the consummation of the wedding to take place.”
“What did the bride think of that?”
Auguste hesitated. “She is very enthusiastic about these traditions, as I told you. But yesterday might have changed everything.”
“In what way?” Egbert asked sharply.
“The Pennyfathers discovered about the true state of Arthur’s finances, not to mention the true ownership of Farthing Court. Unfortunately they discovered it after the wedding. Also, Jeanne Planchet was telling me that Arthur Montfoy stole his sister’s necklace to give to Gertrude. Has she mentioned it to you yet?”
