“Then we may opine,” said Mr. Whipsnade in a loud, ill-bred voice, “that you’ve pulled off the Beaird-Wynnington Dirigible Airship deal?”
“Since the newsboys are already braying out the tidings,” Lord Ditherby-Stoat replied, “I believe I may not scruple to admit that such is the case.”
“And Britain owes it all to you!” Mrs. Swiveltree’s peacock feathers quivered with ill-suppressed emotion.
“I do not understand,” said Mme. Vigée-Lenoir. “What ees thees airsheep?”
“Suffice it to say, Madame,” A. Lysander Hellespont took it upon himself to explain, “that it is a lighter-than-air machine in which persons will be conveyed from one place to another.”
“Ah oui, comme les frères Montgolfier.”
“That’s it. Precisely like a Montgolfier hot air balloon, but with certain differences.”
“Vive la difference! Ah, je vois, you weel weesh les couleurs britanniques. It weel be you who get to choose zem, Lord Dizzerby-Stoat?”
“That, my dear lady, is a closely guarded state secret, I fear,” he replied whimsically, taking her dimpled arm in a manner that caused Mrs. Swiveltree’s lips to tighten, a fact that did not escape the vigilant Ermentine.
Nor did it elude her notice that the despicable Mr. Whipsnade had edged himself yet closer to her father and his seductive companion, as if to catch any unguarded word that might fall from the statesman’s lips under the influence of Mme. Vigée-Lenoir’s too-visible allurements. Ermentine was about to thrust herself and her Galahad into the breach, assuming one could be found, when another diversion presented itself. Figgleton announced, “Count Bratvuschenko,” and a dancing bear cavorted into the drawing room.
Such, at least, was the Honourable Ermentine’s impression. The Russian diplomat, for diplomat he must be, else her father would hardly have offered him the hospitality of Haverings, appeared ill-fitted and certainly ill-barbered for his role. At least he was already arrayed in evening dress, far from impeccable but lavishly bedizened with a wide red sash across his corpulent shirt front, far too many gems on his fingers, and a galaxy of foreign orders pinned to his coat. He bowed so low over Lady Ditherby-Stoat’s hand that that the decorations clanked together like the clashing of arms on a distant battlefield, saluted the other ladies in like manner, shook hands among the gentleman with a vigor that left them wincing, then stood glaring about him like a wild animal expecting to be fed.
As if divining the Muscovite’s requirement, Figgleton reappeared, bearing a huge silver wine cooler filled with iced champagne. Following him were footmen bearing trays of crystal goblets and quantities of caviar heaped like tiny jewels in jasperware bowls from the kilns of Josiah Wedgwood, for Lord Ditherby-Stoat conceived it his patriotic duty to Buy British whenever possible.
“A toast!” cried Hellespont when all were served. “To Lord Ditherby-Stoat and the Beaird-Wynnington Dirigible Airship.”
His eye were upon Mrs. Swiveltree as he spoke, since it was well-known that the elderly and irascible shipping magnate to whom she was so inappositely espoused was vehemently opposed to the mere concept of airborne vehicles in any form, and even forbade the feeding of pigeons in his park. Nevertheless, Mrs. Swiveltree drank with the rest, and held out her empty glass for more.
Not so the Russian. Having drained the bubbly to the dregs, he hurled the empty goblet straight at the fireplace. Fortunately, the omniscient Figgleton had prudently stationed there one of the footmen, a shining light of the local cricket crease in his off-duty hours. John dexterously fielded the fragile bit of crystal without cracking either the glass or Lady Ditherby-Stoat’s composure.
“Right smart operator, that butler,” Mr. Whipsnade remarked audibly to Mrs. Swiveltree. “Poor relation, I opine? Favors His Lordship a lot, don’t he?”
Even the uncouth Whipsnade could hardly have uttered a more ill-chosen remark. The resemblance between the great statesman and his major domo was indeed obvious, and the reason not far to seek. Among the buxom lasses of the countryside, the gallantries of His Lordship’s late grandfather—and indeed of a certain more recent member of his family—had been notorious. The bond between master and servant was indubitably strengthened by ties of blood.
And was that cause for opprobrium on either side? As butler in so stately a home as Haverings, Figgleton had risen to the same eminence in his sphere of life as had Lord Ditherby-Stoat in the loftier halls of Parliament. Why should any find it remarkable that a well-deserved mutual regard might exist between two men of such stature? Still, it was an embarrassing moment. A hasty babble ensued as everybody strove at once to change the subject. Under its cover, Lady Ditherby-Stoat made her way to her husband’s side.
“Edmund,” she murmured, “you have brought the plans for the Beaird-Wynnington Dirigible Airship to Haverings, have you not?”
He inclined his leonine head gravely. “How you divined the ruse, my dear, I do not know, but the fact remains that I have.”
“Are you totally mad?” she all but hissed. “Could you not have left them under lock and key at the War Office?”
“Quite frankly,” he replied, “I durst not. Even before negotiations had been fairly completed, bombs had been planted by the Anarchists, the Nihilists, the Separatists, the Prohibitionists, and the Folklore Society. I had an uneasy premonition that mischief might be afoot. Fear not, my dear. The plans are perfectly safe. Only we and Figgleton know where they now repose.”
At that moment, the unspeakable Whipsnade, who had sneaked close during their private conversation, was so unfortunate as to sneeze, thus calling attention to his unprincipled tactics. It was at once apparent to all that Lord and Lady Ditherby-Stoat had been discussing the whereabouts of the invaluable documents for which Lord Ditherby-Stoat had labored so adroitly and successfully. Lady Ditherby-Stoat immediately recovered her customary composure, but it was too late. Everyone present had caught the slight crisping of her gloved fingers, the slight tightening of her lips.
She masked it well. “Figgleton,” she said imperiously to the butler, who was assiduously engaged in refilling Count Bratvuschenko’s glass for the fourteenth time or thereabout, “the Dowager Lady Ditherby-Stoat is not yet down. Go and ascertain whether she requires assistance.”
As Figgleton passed out of the room, Lord Ditherby took occasion to intercept him and add in a tone too low for even Whipsnade’s ears, “And make certain our confidential matter is securely disposed of.”
Too discreet to reply by word or sign, the butler went about his mission. It could not but be observed that Lord and Lady Ditherby-Stoat hovered thenceforth close to the massive oaken doors, ostensibly to greet the dowager when she made her entrance, but in fact to make sure the butler was not trailed by the regrettable Whipsnade. Or so, at least, it was surmised by the Honourable Ermentine and her young knight-at-arms!
Needless to say, all were agog for Figgleton’s reappearance. It was, therefore, an anticlimax when the drawing room was next entered not by that august figure but by a mousy wisp of a middle-aged woman in a limp garment of some unappealing gray fabric. She approached Lady Ditherby-Stoat with humble steps and half-whispered, “My lady, I am sent to inform you that Her Dowager Ladyship will not be coming down.”
“Nonsense, Twiddle,” said the mistress of the great house crisply. “Return at once and remind her that we go in to dinner in precisely three minutes’ time.”
“I fear the summons will be of no avail, my lady. Saturn has gone retrograde.”
“How bothersome of Saturn,” drawled Mrs. Swiveltree. “Couldn’t it have waited until after dinner? Now your table won’t balance, Honoria.”
“Her Dowager Ladyship will not emerge from her rooms again until Mars enters the house of Leo,” Miss Twiddle explained with that meek stubbornness which the rich and powerful find so exasperating in the genteel poor.
“Then you must take her place, Twiddle,” said Lady Ditherby-Stoat. “I cannot allow Saturn to upset my seating arrangements. Mr. Whips
nade, you will take in Miss Twiddle.”
“And serve him right,” whispered the incorrigible Ermentine.
Whatever retort Gerald Potherton might have made was lost in the stir that greeted the butler’s return. Abandoning all pretense at detachment, Lord Ditherby-Stoat hastened to meet him at the drawing-room door. Almost at once, it became apparent to the entire company that the majestic, the impassive Figgleton was in a state of near-collapse. “My lord,” he gasped to the eminent statesman now so anxiously confronting him, “the plans for the Beaird-Wynnington Dirigible Airship are—”
Even as the word gone formed on his lips, the faithful retainer collapsed and expired at his master’s feet.
“’E ’as—’ow you say—faint!” cried Mme. Vigée-Lenoir.
“I fear not,” responded A. Lysander Hellespont, whose dilettante manner masked keen powers of observation. “That trickle of gore on his shirtfront and the knifelike object protruding from the region of the heart would rather indicate that Figgleton has been stabbed.”
“You are right,” confirmed Lord Ditherby-Stoat. “With a chastely ornamented gold-handled dagger such as might with propriety be carried by any lady or gentleman in full evening dress. My dear, I confess myself at a loss as to the handling of this untoward occurrence.”
“There is only one thing to do,” said Lady-Ditherby-Stoat. Touching the bell, she summoned a footman. “James, remove Figgleton’s corpse to the butler’s pantry and tell Frederick to pour the hock. Mr. Hellespont, will you give me your arm?”
Picking up her cue, Lord Ditherby-Stoat offered his arm to the succulent Mme. Vigée-Lenoir, leaving Mrs. Swiveltree, much to her dismay, to be escorted by the bearlike Russian count. Ermentine and Gerald, needless to say, were not to be parted. Nervous but ever-dutiful, the mouselike Miss Twiddle brought up the rear with Mr. Whipsnade.
One could hardly have expected gaiety to prevail among a company that had just witnessed the dreadful consequences of a murder, for murder it must have been. Even Lady Ditherby-Stoat appeared a trifle distraite as she discussed the novels of Lord Beaconsfield with Mr. Hellespont. It was Mme. Vigée-Lenoir who managed to choke off Mr. Whipsnade’s dismal rehashing of the horrendous event and save the occasion from degenerating into a mourning party. With flashing smile and vivacious wit, she managed to lift all spirits save those of Miss Twiddle, to whom gaiety would have been inappropriate, and Count Bratvuschenko, who continued to deplore the barbarous English custom of not allowing glassware to be smashed while he gourmandized freely among the many dainties proffered by the assiduous footmen who were valiantly upholding the hospitable tradition of Haverings even as their mentor Mr. Figgleton lay stiffening behind the baize doors with his pantry book laid upon his dagger-pierced bosom as a final token of respect.
Nor did Whipsnade enter into the spirit of stiff-upper-lip and play-the-game. His countenance grew steadily more dour as he responded in curt monosyllables to Miss Twiddle’s feeble attempts to make proper dinner-table conversation.
“He’s worried about which fork to use,” Ermentine murmured wickedly to Gerald.
But Whipsnade’s perturbation pierced far deeper than any fish slice. At last, to the astonishment and dismay of the company, he rose to his feet, overturning a glass of claret in his agitation. Heedless of the spreading crimson stain, he croaked in a tone more raucous than the cawing of the rooks on the battlements, “Enough of this heedless frivolity. A dastardly crime has been committed here tonight and I, Silas Whipsnade, can no longer stifle the stern voice of conscience that cries aloud for redress. The name of the evildoer is—”
He got not farther. With a wild cry of “Arrgh!” Silas Whipsnade clutched at his throat and fell forward into a serving of riz à l’emperatrice.
Count Bratvuschenko glanced up from his own plate. “One of zoze untraceable Asiatic poizonz. It happen all ze time at zese diplomatic dinnerz.” He went on eating his dinner. Lady Ditherby-Stoat rang for another footman. Ermentine addressed her father.
“Papa, we shall have to call the police, shall we not?”
“My dear, how can that be?” her father answered. “Have you no apprehension of the dread consequences that would ensue should it become generally known that the plans of the Beaird-Wynnington Dirigible Airship have been stolen? But lest you deem me to have been culpably negligent, I must reveal to you that the late Silas Whipsnade was in fact the noted detective Augustus Fox, whom I myself engaged to guard the plans. The gallant fellow appears to have been on the verge of unmasking the malefactor when he was so foully done to death by some as yet undiscovered agency. Let us only remember that, however uncouth his methods of procedure, the alleged Silas Whipsnade gave his life in the service of his country. Take him away, Frederick, and fetch the port.”
Lady Ditherby-Stoat gathered the eyes of the female members of the party and led them away from the dining room, leaving the men to find what solace they might within the depths of the cut-glass decanters. Circumstances being as they were, it was perhaps not surprising that they did not sit long over their port. Hardly an hour later, Lord Ditherby-Stoat, A. Lysander Hellespont, and young Gerald Potherton entered the drawing room.
“But where eez ze Count Bratvuschenko?” demanded Mme. Vigée-Lenoir.
“M’yes,” said Lord Ditherby-Stoat thoughtfully. “That is a penetrating observation of yours, Mme. Vigée-Lenoir. It seems to me Count Bratvuschenko has been absent from our gathering for sometime. Hellespont, have you noticed him lately?”
“Not I,” disclaimed of the suave man-about-town. “Potherton?”
The junior member of the group answered only by a shake of the head and a barely suppressed hiccough.
“But zees ees terreeble,” exclaimed the Frenchwoman. “All ze men deesappear.”
“It is a pity,” Mrs. Swiveltree agreed with an ironic glance at Mme. Vigée-Lenoir’s exuberant décolletage. “Why should it not have been one of the women?”
Lady Ditherby-Stoat touched the bell for a footman. “James, go and see whether Count Bratvuschenko has retired. He may have become indisposed, being unused to British cooking.”
“Considering how much of it he ate,” Ermentine observed sotto voce, “I shouldn’t be surprised.”
Gerald responded by another hiccough and a shake of the head. “He was in fine fettle over the port. Dearest, I fear there may have been yet more foul play. Might you not drop a hint to your father about calling in another private detective?”
“Better still,” cried Ermentine, “let us turn detectives ourselves. Come, a-sleuthing we shall go!”
Potherton held out a restraining hand. “Wait a moment, the footman is returning. Perhaps he has news of the count.”
Much the same thought must have crossed Lord Ditherby-Stoat’s mind, for he inquired, “Well, James, do you bring news of the count?”
“Yes and no, my lord, in a manner of speaking,” the servant replied in a tone of utter befuddlement. “What I mean to say, my lord, is that some of him’s there and the rest of him isn’t.”
“How very unusual. My dear, if you will excuse me, I believe I ought to go and view this astonishing development myself.”
“Oh, let’s all go,” cried Mrs. Swiveltree, sensing that Mme. Vigée-Lenoir was about to say the same thing.
Nobody, however, said what was in everybody’s mind; namely that since all the servants were faithful old retainers except the drab and mousy Miss Twiddle, whom none could dream capable of a stabbing, a poisoning, or indeed of any action calling for boldness and cunning; then the vicious murderer who was so adroitly decimating their numbers must, ipso facto, be a member of the house party.
Was it Hellespont, that enigma of the clubs and fashionable salons, whose source of income was cause for conjecture and whose predilection for such diversions as slow horses and fast women was well-known? Was it Mme. Vigée-Lenoir, whose reason for crossing the Channel might in truth have been something far, far removed from baby care? Mrs. Swiveltree had already intimated pretty st
rongly that she herself considered the voluptuous gauloise little more than a foreign adventuress.
And what of Mrs. Swiveltree herself? Was old Cadwallader’s absence from this gathering prompted by gout or by guile? Could his known antipathy to the Beaird-Wynnington Dirigible Airship have driven him to send his wife here tonight ostensibly in defiance of his wishes but in fact to obtain and destroy the plans that could threaten his shipping interests? Mrs. Swiveltree might have her reservations about old Cadwallader as a preux chevalier, but of his generosity in the matter of jewels, frocks, millinery, country houses, carriages, and the other small amenities of his life she had no cause for complaint and no desire to disoblige her source of supply.
Gerald Potherton was a younger son, with his way to make in the world. His attachment to the Honourable Ermentine might exclude him from suspicion, but how could he know His Lordship’s daughter might not suddenly transfer her affections elsewhere, and who was to say that madcap miss hadn’t put him up to it?
As for Count Bratvuschenko—well, they would just have to see.
And see they did! The door to the room that was to have been occupied by the foreign nobleman had been left open by the footman in his agitation. Through the orifice, all could see a heterogeneous group of objects dropped carelessly on the bed. There was a furry something that proved on closer inspection to be Bratvuschenko’s bushy brown beard, as well as his luxuriant head of hair. There was his eyeglass. There were his medals, his sash, his tail coat, and even his embonpoint.
“A padded waistcoat, by George!” exclaimed Hellespont. “The blighter was heavily disguised.”
“But why would any man weesh to make heemself fat and ugly?” demanded Mme. Vigée-Lenoir.
“That, madame, is a question we must all ask ourselves,” replied Hellespont, “though I deem it more pertinent to consider where the former inhabitant of these trappings may be at this moment.”
Well might he consider. Little did Hellespont know that even as he spoke, a figure far removed from the guzzling buffoon he had last seen at the dinner table was searching assiduously through Hellespont’s own personal effects. Nor were the discoveries thus made of a particularly edifying nature. What was an intimate of Lord Ditherby-Stoat doing with a pack of marked cards in his possession, not to mention a threatening letter from his bookmaker and several photographs of the sort of young women who are only facetiously referred to as ladies? And why should a cabinet-size portrait of the Honourable Ermentine be found in such less than dubious company? Lastly, what was contained within this box of a mysterious powder, that had a picture of a horse crudely limned on the cover?
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