by Myers, Amy
‘Did he know your son was killed at Isandhlwana, sir?’
‘I have no idea, Inspector,’ the General continued evenly. ‘I had no idea about Worthington myself till a few days ago.’ He paused. ‘Perhaps I should tell you, Inspector, that I had every intention of confronting Colonel Worthington. Indeed, in the heat of the moment I had even contemplated – um – extreme measures.’ His glance went to the Parisian Novelty incongruously placed upon the eighteenth-century writing desk. Rose followed his gaze and Fredericks smiled. ‘I did say extreme, Inspector. I agree with you that a gun is far more efficient. Though noisier, of course.’
‘But you didn’t confront the Colonel after all.’
‘No, Inspector,’ he said evenly, ‘it appears that someone else confronted him first. I had intended to approach him in the smoking room after I had finished my brandy. I should explain that by this time my impulse towards violence had long since passed.’
‘And you were with your wife in the dining rooms, when the gunshot was heard?’
‘I was.’
‘Anyone else?’
‘There were of course a great many people present. Whether they would recall our presence at that moment is open to doubt, however.’ His eyes held Rose’s steadily, and Rose began to feel doubly glad he’d not been an army man. And he’d thought discipline strong in the Factory. He’d sooner have McNaughten’s gimlet eye upon him.
‘Thank you, sir.’ He gave no sign of the dissatisfaction he felt with the reply. ‘May I ask, General, who informed you about Colonel Worthington being the officer in charge of the supplies?’
‘You may, Inspector. There is no reason for not telling you. It was Salt, Peregrine Salt. He had recently dined with Lord Chelmsford, who was in overall command of the British forces in Zululand, you might recall.’
Gertie Briton was pouting. At the other end of the long table, her husband was glaring.
‘I saw you talking to that Erskine fellow last night, Gertie. You promised not to.’
‘I had to reply when he spoke to me.’ she hurled at him, bringing her pretty fist down on the table with the result that the petit pois à l’ancienne jumped out of Beechcroft’s spoon as he was serving them on to the mistress’s plate.
‘You didn’t have to follow him round the room, did you, like a fox after a rabbit?’ All this much to Beechcroft’s interest.
‘I didn’t follow him round,’ she said indignantly, more about the fox slur than that on her honour.
‘I saw you – you seemed to be pretty annoyed with the fellow, too. I say, Gertrude’ – his tone changed suddenly as he remembered the talk in the club about the bicorne – ‘you didn’t do anything stupid, did you?’ Then he noticed Beechcroft. Only a servant of course, but nevertheless, he’d better not say any more.
‘Daphne!’ The roar seemed louder than usual, so Lady Bulstrode decided to answer the summons.
‘Daphne,’ her husband trumpeted, storming through the hall, ‘you didn’t have a pot-shot at Erskine, did you?’ The footman tried to remain impassive. Not that Bulstrode would have noticed.
‘A pot-shot, dear?’
‘Try to shoot the fellow. You’re short-sighted, you know.’
Lady Bulstrode frowned. ‘It was Colonel Worthington who was shot, dear.’
‘Dammit, I know that. Fellow talking in the club said it might have been in mistake for Erskine. And I know how you feel about that fellow.’
‘Horace, in case you have forgotten, I was with you in the drawing room when Colonel Worthington was shot. Do you not remember?’
Bulstrode frowned. ‘Might have dozed off now and then. You’re not all that exciting company, Daphne.’
Daphne Bulstrode did not retort that Horace, Lord Bulstrode, would himself hardly qualify in the high-class entertainment stakes. Instead she replied, ‘Horace, I realise that I was once somewhat overwrought over that poor Martin girl and I recall brandishing your Purdey. However, I assure you I did not do so last night, and I did not shoot Colonel Worthington in error.’
But Lord Bulstrode’s frown remained.
In a crowded, smelly, gas-fumed dressing room at the Theatre of Varieties, Watford, an artiste was attending to his greasepaint. The face that looked back at him out of the mirror was ever hopeful. After all, if Erskine did it, so can you, he reminded himself. Gaylord Erskine. He had followed his illustrious career every step of the way. From his early days with his wife to his Musketeer, to Petruchio, and now Hamlet, the very pinnacle of an actor’s dreams. What talent. What variety. One day maybe he would achieve the same. He had tried before, and had not succeeded. That unhappy memory clouded his thoughts for a moment. Then he smiled. But he could change everything, Meanwhile it was back to the Watford stage for the last night of his disappearing canary act. He clapped his hat on to his head, preparatory to stepping forth. Tomorrow to fresh woods and pastures new. Or perhaps he’d go back to the Sheridan again.
‘I tell you, Mr Didier,’ said Egbert Rose forcefully, ‘I don’t know which way we’re turning. Plenty of motives to kill Worthington on his own, plenty to kill Erskine. But no evidence. That struck you? Never known such a case. You’d think with all those people around someone would have seen something definite. We can’t even rule anyone out – no one can be precise about who they were with at the time of the shot. Everyone thinks they know until you suggest that that might have been when Worthington’s cry disturbed them. They can only remember for sure if it was their wife with them. Says something for marriage that, doesn’t it?’ he added, diverted for a moment. ‘So far as I can see, anyone could have grabbed the gun off the wall; it could have gone much earlier in the evening, no one would have noticed – except Worthington perhaps – and by the time the procession started the lights were too low everywhere for a mere gun to be missed. So here I am with two hundred or more suspects. If your temporary staff hadn’t left by then, we could say nearly three hundred. It’s like one of your mazes. Like that one at Stockbery Towers. Remember?’
Auguste did. He had happy memories of that maze.
‘Just when I was getting somewhere on Worthington,’ ruminated Rose, ‘I get something more on Erskine. Some actor he did out of a job or the man thought he did. Nasty business. Could well bear a grudge against him. Swore he’d get even with him. That’s all Erskine will admit to. No one else. But there are people with grudges against Erskine all over the place. Mostly husbands.’
‘Or their wives,’ pointed out Auguste. ‘It was a woman shouting from the Folly.’
‘Ah yes, and that is the puzzle. Where did she disappear to? According to Worthington, there was no one there when he got there.’
‘He could have been lying. She could have left altogether by the garden gate. Or she could have come back into the house by the garden door.’
‘Risky. The door leads into the billiard room. It would look odd for a woman to emerge from there—’
‘Then she must have gone into the garden.’
‘It seems to me there were a lot of people in that garden,’ said Rose with some asperity. ‘There was your extra waiter who might have disappeared into the garden, joined by the other forty-four when they came off duty. Then our anonymous lady friend joins them.’
‘Unless they were the same?’ said Auguste with an inspired guess.
‘Pardon?’
‘Unless it was a woman in man’s clothing. She was the waiter.’
Rose roared with laughter. ‘Now we’re getting fanciful again, Mr Auguste. Can you see Mrs Salt in man’s evening dress. Sort of Vesta Tilley, eh? “I’m Burlington Bertie. . .”’
‘I only say it is possible,’ retorted Auguste with dignity. ‘Look at Hanna Snell.’
‘Was she present?’ Rose scanned his list.
‘In the eighteenth century, Inspector, she passed as a soldier undetected for many years until her death, fighting, living and sleeping beside her male colleagues.’
‘It ain’t practical, though. Not today. Not in Plum’s.’
‘You sound like Mr Nollins.’
Rose sighed. ‘Very well. What woman though? There is Gertie Briton, slim enough I grant you. Mrs Salt, need a pretty big pair of trousers. Mrs Erskine, now if she took a fancy to murder her husband – but she was in the dining room, according to Preston. Mrs and Miss Preston? We only have Preston’s word for it that they were with him. Or Lady Fredericks. But I don’t see these ladies ripping off their petticoats and combinations and jumping into trousers.’
‘They could wear them underneath,’ said Auguste defiantly.
‘Now, Mr Auguste, as I said before, let’s make things simple. Who wanted to kill Colonel Worthington?’
Chapter Eight
‘Thank you, Watkins.’
Gaylord Erskine took his morning post from the proffered silver salver. One day perhaps not too far hence a letter would bear the royal crest; the summons would have come at last. But today brought an envelope with an all too familiar appearance. He glanced at Amelia, engrossed in her kidneys and eggs. Dear faithful Amelia, partner in so many trials during their life together, sitting there so demure and neat in her brown figured silk. Other women were, of course, necessary, but Amelia had not been concerned by them. Except, of course, for Gertie Briton. Unfortunately that hadn’t worked out as planned.
He opened the envelope. Inside was a piece of paper adorned by letters cut out from newspapers. He read it, carefully. Then read it again. Amelia’s eyes were on him now. Silently he handed it over. She swallowed. ‘Oh Gaylord – and we thought it finished.’
‘I fear not, my dear. But we shall face this together, shall we not?’
‘How can you doubt it, Gaylord?’ She was almost indignant.
‘Undaunted mettle,’ he said softly, ‘sweetest chuck.’
Amelia’s hand went to her breast as she cried, ‘Gaylord, no. Don’t quote that play.’
‘You think I tempt fate,’ he replied, smiling.
But her response was grave. ‘It will bring disaster on this house.’
A hansom cab brought him to Scotland Yard in time to greet Inspector Egbert Rose on his return from his meeting with the Chief Constable, to whom he had explained exactly why he considered Colonel Worthington the due recipient of the murderer’s intention. It was, therefore, without any enthusiasm that he saw the familiar letter being waved histrionically in Erskine’s hand, a letter that cordially invited him to prepare to meet his doom.
Half an hour later Rose stepped down from the hansom cab to find the doors of the Sheridan Theatre firmly shut. He made his way round to the stage door and with some difficulty exerted his authority over the ex-sergeant-major doorkeeper.
He stood in the enormous wings and watched the chaos backstage that miraculously turned itself into an orderly performance. He’d seen it all before at the Galaxy. Carpenters, gasmen, electricians, the myriad ants that supported the cast. Even before he asked the question he knew what the answer would be.
‘No one gets in here, sir, without I know who they are and why they’re here,’ said the doorkeeper firmly. Rose knew it to be otherwise. Delivery men, sandwich boys, costumiers, bootboys, wig-makers – all apparently with an official purpose, but who checked? No one.
‘Constable Roberts will be here with you checking folk in and out for a while.’
The sergeant-major regarded him with extreme distaste.
Oliver Noilins was even less enthusiastic at Rose’s ultimatum. ‘Members are still complaining about not being able to use the smoking room,’ he said weakly. ‘You already have a constable there. Surely—’
‘After the inquest, sir,’ said Rose patiently. ‘Meanwhile, it’s a constable on the door. Inside or outside.’
‘Inside,’ compromised Nollins, capitulating, already formulating his defence for the tirade of abuse that would be hurled at him, and wondering whether the constable might be persuaded to remove his helmet in order to resemble a relief porter.
‘Ah, Inspector,’ said Auguste happily, looking up from the pickling of the salmon. ‘I have been giving thought to our discussion yesterday. Eh bien, it seems to me the General might well be a good candidate for our murderer, save that he would need a woman accomplice. It is difficult to see Lady Fredericks in the role of temptress or clothing herself in gentleman’s garb. And always money is a powerful motive, greater than love, greater than revenge even. The good Colonel had no women in his life, so money must be the obvious motive. So, mon cher Inspecteur—’
The expression on Rose’s face stopped him in mid-wave of a large kitchen spoon.
‘It’s no good, Mr Didier. We have to think again. Seems we’ve got to think more complicated after all. Mr Erskine’s had another of those letters. Death threat.’
‘Ah,’ said Auguste, staring down at the calf’s-foot jelly. Like this case it obstinately refused to solidify. ‘Perhaps,’ he continued hopefully, ‘the two matters are unrelated. Or it is to throw us off the scent.’
Rose did not bother to answer. What he did say was entirely unexpected. ‘Now I was wondering, Mr Didier, if you could leave the premises here, whether you would care to partake of supper with Mrs Rose and myself at Highbury. It seems to me time we chewed things over, if you get my meaning.’
Auguste noticed the way Rose was staring at him, and indeed was fully conscious of the privilege this invitation bestowed, and that it was an atonement for words spoken that could not be unspoken. Both knew that Mrs Rose’s cooking was not of the standard of Plum’s cuisine; both knew that that fact would never be mentioned between them. It was a milestone. He felt the pricking of a tear behind his eyes, as he replied simply, ‘I should be most honoured.’
‘Splendid,’ said Rose with forced heartiness. ‘Tonight then, I’ll have a word with Nollins. Make sure he doesn’t throw you out for dereliction of duty.’
‘Indeed no, Inspector, the goose a la dauphinoise is all prepared, the fillet of rabbits a la financière may safely be left to John and do not trouble yourself about the scallops of hare. Of course there remain the desserts, but perhaps a simple iced pudding a la Prince Albert – or a crème à la romaine’ – but he was talking to himself. Egbert Rose, as was his wont, once a matter had been resolved, had gone.
‘What do you mean, you can’t dine with me tonight?’ Emma’s feathers were as ruffled as Disraeli’s, except for the one in her hat which merely quivered. ‘I’ve invited you.’ Her tone was of a royal command.
‘Dearest, I cannot. I dine with Inspector Rose at Highbury.’
‘Where?’ retorted Emma rudely.
‘Highbury,’ he repeated. ‘His home.’
The honour that this bestowed was lost on Emma. ‘What in ’Ell and Tommy for? Poor Auguste. You’ll dine on boiled cabbage and mutton instead of Sweetbreads Emma. What a pity,’ though the daggers in her eyes did not suggest sympathy, ‘and I’d prepared some perdreaux braisés à la soubise and a particularly fine darne d’esturgeon.’
His mouth watered. ‘Alas, I cannot attend.’
‘No matter,’ she said crossly. ‘Charlie Briton is free all evening – and later.’
Auguste reddened, and for the first time it occurred to him that Emma’s sensitivity for other persons was not of such high quality as her sweetbreads.
Rosie Scampton spared a passing thought for the late Colonel Worthington. If she had it in her to be sad about the death of anyone it would be him. He’d been interested in her, she liked her feeling of power over him, she could make him laugh when she went round to her auntie’s, who was his housekeeper. He hadn’t laughed when she told him about Sir Jones though. And now Auntie said he’d been murdered.
There hadn’t been much room in Rosie Scampton’s life to care about others; she was too busy trying to stay alive in the slums of Bethnal Green. Thank goodness she didn’t need no job now at the lucifer match factory. Not now she was a model. She fingered her new dress. Sir Jones liked her to look a swell, and gave her the money for dresses at first. Then when he realised she wouldn’t know how to u
se it, he ordered things himself. She couldn’t wear them in Bethnal Green – the street would want to know what was happening, but she liked to go up to St John’s Wood and change into velvet or silk – or nothing, as Sir Jones dictated. She hadn’t meant to tell the old Colonel all about that, but it had slipped out – that modelling, and more besides. He’d been ever so angry. Said he was going to do something about it. She’d been alarmed then; she wanted it to go on. It didn’t matter what the old Sir Jones did to her provided he went on giving her money. Her sharp little eyes gleamed. Then that actor man had been interested, so her cousin who worked for him said. She wished she’d never told Cissie now, but she had to share it with someone, and Cissie went and told her master. Rosie sighed, and tried to think of more pleasant things. Perhaps the old Colonel would have left her something in his will.
The carriage with that crest rattled along from the station into the drive of Windsor Castle. Inside Sir Rafael Jones smiled with quiet satisfaction at the fulfilment of his plans. Her Majesty had asked to see him in order that she might discuss her collection at Windsor. It would, it was true, be a bore to have constantly to admire those Orchardsons, the Gainsboroughs, the Rubens, but for royal patronage, why not?
Moreover his audience would include luncheon, a rare honour bestowed by the Widow of Windsor. Next year she would have her Diamond Jubilee, in which he might well play a part. A further honour perhaps. His eye went to the Chapel. The Garter itself? Erskine would not be a problem much longer. Yes, life was going well for Rafael Jones, baronet.
The hansom cab deposited the Inspector outside the Highbury home, and Auguste climbed down after him, immaculately dressed in evening attire. White steps proclaimed unusual zealousness on behalf of ‘the girl’, leading to the small, neat front garden.
The girl bobbed as they entered, her eyes popping as they took in this prepossessing man with dark twinkling eyes and neat black moustache. Nothing at all like the usual visitors the master and mistress had. He looked at her as though she was a person, almost as though she were a woman. Of course he was one of them foreigners, so the mistress said, but even so she began to look forward to serving the supper. Hitherto this had been a task of frightening magnitude, the culmination of a day of ‘Don’t do this’, ‘Don’t do that’. The mistress had been in a rare taking, almost as though royalty were coming.
