The Good Wife

by Jane A. Adams

  ‘Oh yes, sharp as a tack,’ Emory assured him. ‘Though she’s got to be ninety. Has a live-in housekeeper that’s not much younger.’

  ‘So, Martha Mason seems to have had something on her mind – no surprise considering the child she carried. I have to wonder how she planned to get out of this. Emory, if this Mr Benson happens to be the father of her child, in your opinion, would he be likely to have stood by her?’

  Emory paused before answering. He looked suddenly anxious, Mickey thought, and then, as though suddenly making up his mind, he shook his head. ‘There are rumours about the man,’ he said. ‘That this would not be the first time he got some girl in the family way. I suppose this is why he prefers to involve himself with married women; less consequences should the worst happen. At least they have husbands to take the blame for their condition.’

  ‘So he could not have known about Mrs Mason’s predicament,’ Henry mused.

  Again, Emory seemed hesitant but then he agreed. ‘If the rumour mill is in any way correct, he’s the sort of man who would take advantage of such knowledge,’ he said.

  ‘You mean blackmail?’

  ‘I can’t say for certain and I don’t reckon to listen too close to gossip, but––’

  ‘Gossip is the meat and drink of the detective,’ Mickey told him comfortably. ‘Speaking of which, may I bag that last sausage?’

  He didn’t, Henry noted, give time for an objection before it was speared and sliced. ‘So … blackmail? That would be a risk for any woman coming into his clutches.’

  ‘I never said he was a pleasant man, only a rich and, to his own class, a charming one. The woman who keeps house for him is a widow. A no-nonsense type of woman, and I doubt very much he’s tried his luck there. He employed a young maidservant who disappeared rather unexpected, like. Came back to town some months after but never settled. Too many gossiping tongues. And another who went away for good. He now has the housekeeper and daily woman who comes and helps but I heard tell the housekeeper threatened to pack her bags if he should try and employ another young’un. So like as not he only plays away now. It was after that the wagging tongues have it that he moved on to those that were married and there’s talk about three or four – not Mrs Mason, though. There’s also talk about him having the connections to solve such situations, should they occur again.’

  ‘You mean he procures an abortion,’ Mickey asked, low-voiced.

  ‘It’s just talk,’ Emory said carefully. ‘There’s a woman on Church Street in Newark, used to be a midwife. We’ve raided her place a time or two but can prove nothing. Then there’s a doctor out at Burton Joyce rumoured to be willing to assist in such situations but he’s a man of influence and it’s also rumoured that he’s done the deed for some very high-born types and so considers himself well protected. We’re fortunate, I suppose,’ Emory continued wryly, ‘that both of these alleged procurers of abortion have some degree of skill and knowledge. I pounded the beat in Nottingham for close on nine years and saw the results of such butchery as I’m sure so have you gentlemen.’

  ‘Indeed,’ Mickey agreed.

  ‘About Dr Mason,’ Emory began, a little hesitantly, Mickey thought. ‘What you know about him––’

  ‘Need go no further. The man no doubt lives in fear of discovery. I don’t regard him as a suspect in his wife’s murder, not at present, anyway. He is well alibied and if he falsified his grief when I spoke to him – well, I should be looking for another profession. If the evidence does turn his way, then I will consider again, but for now, even though I could arrest him for his proclivities alone, I’ve no evidence that he’s acted upon them and don’t have the time to spare to discover it, should the evidence exist.’

  Emory nodded wisely. He looked, Mickey thought, somewhat reassured.

  ‘So, Chief Inspector, if you should give me my list of names, I’ll get on with my work,’ he said.

  The next five minutes had been spent in dividing the list. Henry was content to make use of Emory’s local knowledge for this task and, saving only that Benson and the elderly Miss Georgia Styles be kept as their own task, allowed Emory to guide the division of labour.

  Once he had gone, Mickey and Henry readied themselves for the work of the day. Benson would be visited just after lunch when, Emory suggested, he was most likely to be at home and Miss Styles would be left until later in the afternoon because ‘she visits in the morning, likes to take a little nap in the early afternoon but always takes afternoon tea at four’.

  Mickey, in the meantime, would take car and driver and visit those houses and businesses in Newark and outlying villages and Henry would concentrate his efforts on Southwell – the town being small enough to walk around without effort.

  Henry and Mickey Hitchens reconvened just after one and made their way to the house of Mr Harry Benson, the man they suspected had been the father of Martha’s child. Somewhat surprisingly he opened the door to them himself, accompanied by two dizzy, enthusiastic spaniels who sniffed their shoes eagerly.

  ‘Gentlemen, it must be the police. Yes, I’ve been expecting you, come on inside. Coll, Spence, away with the pair of you.’ He pointed a finger at the dogs who obediently scurried off down the corridor. ‘They need their exercise,’ Benson said. ‘As do I, gentlemen, so I hope this won’t take too long.’

  He led them into a well-furnished room at the front of the house. A deep bay window was occupied by a window seat and this is where Benson sat. There were books around the walls, but they looked old and a little dusty and Henry doubted that Benson read any of them. A gun cabinet filled the wall next to the fireplace and photographs of Harry Benson posing alongside the corpses of various kills adorned the walls. He saw Henry looking and came over, jabbing one of the photographs with a stiff forefinger. ‘Bangalore,’ he said, ‘and this—’

  Henry cut him off. ‘How well did you know Mrs Mason? We understand that your relationship with her was more than casual.’

  Benson looked momentarily taken aback then he gathered himself and said bluntly, ‘Of course it was, my dear chap, served on committees together, didn’t we? I’m one of the hospital trustees. She was an excellent fundraiser and will be much missed for that.’

  ‘Just for that?’

  ‘No, of course not. Thoroughly decent woman. I like that husband of hers as well. Thoroughly decent chap, undertakes a great deal too much charity work if you ask me. I know it’s good for the soul and all that, but not so good for the pocketbook.’ He leaned in confidentially towards Henry. ‘Money always a bit tight for them, if you know what I mean. Not that it’s good form to discuss things like that, of course.’

  ‘Were you having an affair with Mrs Mason?’

  Harry Benson’s mouth opened and closed several times as he stared at Henry. ‘I say, I say, not the sort of thing to ask a chap at all. I understand you’re a policeman, but common decency, you know.’

  ‘A woman is dead, Mr Benson. The niceties tend to be dispensed with during the murder investigation. The only thing that matters is to get to the truth of who the killer is and how we might best catch them. So uncomfortable questions have to be asked and so I ask you again: were you having an affair with Mrs Mason?’

  Benson sat down beside a small table on which was set a decanter and several glasses. He poured himself a stiff drink and swallowed it. He seemed to be giving himself some thinking time. Mickey paced the room, examining the bookcases and the photographs and even the gun cabinet. Henry stood very still, waiting for Benson to respond.

  ‘We were friends, certainly. I would not wish to impugn a lady’s honour.’

  ‘The lady is dead. I doubt she cares. And I care only to find who caused her death. You need not worry for your reputation, Mr Benson, it is already well established that you are a womanizer and it is rumoured that you have fathered children. Your relationship with Mrs Mason will be kept quiet if at all possible, but only to protect her husband and her friends. Those worthy of our protection. But I ask you again, were
you having an affair with Martha Mason?’

  Henry could see that Mickey was quietly examining the contents of an open roll-top desk that stood on the other side of the room. He shifted position, sitting down without invitation in the winged armchair opposite Harry Benson. Steadily, he held the man’s gaze and it was Benson who looked away quickly and his face flushed with embarrassment and anger. ‘It was a brief thing,’ he said. ‘A very attractive young woman, and I didn’t think her husband was paying sufficient attention to her. She seemed lonely and we were much thrown together when organizing a charity ball last year, or some such thing … Truthfully, I hardly remember.’

  ‘I think your affair lasted longer than that,’ Henry said quietly. ‘Did she wish to break it off, and you did not? Was she blackmailing you perhaps?’

  Benson was on his feet now, the glass falling from his hand and crashing to the floor. It was quality crystal, heavy and solid, Henry noted, and it did not break on the thick hearth rug but merely bounced and rolled away.

  ‘I say, that’s a dreadful thing, a dreadful thing to—’

  ‘You knew that she was pregnant.’

  ‘I heard rumours that she was pregnant, certainly, and so, and so …’

  ‘But she is unlikely to have been blackmailing you about that,’ Henry said. ‘She is the last person to have wanted that to be revealed, that the child might be yours and not her husband’s. But I suspect she was in some way threatening your equanimity.’

  ‘All right, our affair did continue intermittently. Until just a few weeks ago when she decided she wanted to break it off, and I agreed. I was getting bored anyway. And then she told me it was because of the child, and that she must attend to her husband’s needs, and that of their new family. I told her I understood. I gave her a little money, a trifle, not blackmailing you understand but just to help … I know this must’ve been a difficult time, an expensive time for anyone who is expecting a child. A gift, no more.’

  ‘Where were you on the day she died? You were not at the races, I understand.’

  Harry Benson laughed. ‘Everyone who was anyone was at the races along with quite a few who weren’t anyone,’ he said. ‘Of course I was there, in company for most of the day. I had a flutter or two, and broke even in the end, so a good day, a good day.’

  ‘You told the constable that you were home alone.’

  ‘No, he must have been mistaken. I was at the racecourse, with a number of friends. I told you, we had a fine old time.’

  ‘Not so fine for the woman you had been intimate with. Where were you between three and five in the afternoon?’

  Benson was incandescent now. His face red, his arms flailing. He reminded Henry of the actor described in Dr Mason’s letter.

  ‘Please sit down, Mr Benson,’ Henry said sternly, and to his surprise Benson obeyed.

  Mickey had moved away from the desk now and was studying a large display case fixed to the wall. Henry glanced briefly at it but did not want to draw Harry Benson’s attention away. It seemed to contain various weaponry including one that Henry briefly noted was an assegai.

  ‘So, do you have an alibi for that time?’

  ‘Of course I do. Not that I should need one. Absurd to think.’

  ‘So who were you with?’

  ‘Hardly remember. But ask among my friends and cronies, someone will know. We were all a little cut by then. My chauffeur got me into my car and brought me home somewhere around six, I would think. There had been brief mention of meeting for dinner somewhere, but the truth is I fell asleep in my chair and that was it. When I woke up it was past midnight and I took myself off to bed. I didn’t hear about this dreadful business until the following day.’

  ‘So in essence, you have no one to vouch for you during that time.’

  ‘I need no one to vouch for me. You come here asking these questions. It was someone who sought to steal from her, that was all. Tragic and all that, but a random act. To suspect someone like me—’

  ‘A fine collection of weaponry,’ Mickey said from across the room. ‘Something would appear to be missing though.’

  ‘Missing? What on earth do you mean?’

  Henry looked curiously at his sergeant, surprised at the interruption to the interrogation. He followed Benson, who was now scurrying across the room to see what Mickey had meant. The case was large, floor-to-ceiling of the kind found in museums with a green baize backing and small handwritten labels affixed against each exhibit. It was quickly evident there were two or three gaps where something had been removed. Harry Benson blinked several times and then took off towards the door of this study, planted himself in the hall and yelled for his housekeeper.

  ‘The sun has faded the green,’ Mickey pointed out. ‘There would appear to be three things missing. A curved weapon that looks something like a sickle. From the shadow I would say there was a Katar, an Indian push dagger, and that last looks to me like a medieval halberd.’

  Henry nodded thoughtfully. It did indeed. An axehead pointing in the one direction with a tapering spike on the other, the spike at right angles to the axe.

  A woman came bustling into the hall, the spaniels now twining around her legs. ‘Whatever is the matter, sir?’

  Benson marched back into the study and the woman followed. ‘The meaning of this, Mrs Richardson?’ He pointed theatrically at the display case and at the missing items.

  Mrs Richardson looked completely puzzled. ‘The meaning of what, sir?’

  ‘Someone has been in here and removed items from this case. Someone has stolen from me.’

  Mrs Richardson, a tall, stout, robust-looking lady turned on her employer. ‘And how might I notice that, sir,’ she said with some asperity. ‘Since I’m not allowed even to come in here to dust.’

  Mrs Richardson turned on her heel and marched out, much to Mickey’s amusement.

  Benson, thoroughly embarrassed, began to bluster. ‘Been with me since … She was my nanny, if you must know. Seems to think she still is.’

  ‘Mickey …’ Henry indicated for his sergeant to follow the redoubtable Mrs Richardson. For a moment Benson looked as though he might object but then he thought better of it and sat down. He was not the most intelligent of men but he was bright enough to realize that this did not look good for him and said so to Henry.

  ‘When did you last check this case? And is anything else missing? It looks to my eye as though there are three items gone, would you agree? And where is the key?’

  ‘The key is generally in the lock. I have a tendency to lose these things, so I just turned it and left it there. As to how long ago these items went missing, I have no idea. I come in here of an evening to take a drink and to smoke a cigar. As you can see the gun cabinet is kept locked and no I did not leave the key in that lock. Those keys are in Mrs Richardson’s care,’ he admitted shamefacedly. ‘She locks up at night also. Occasionally I have a little too much … too much to drink of an evening.’

  ‘And so anyone could have got into this room, got into that cabinet, extracted your exhibits and made use of one of them to kill Martha Mason.’

  He watched as Harry Benson’s face changed from crimson to blue white and back again as the implications suddenly dawned. ‘You think she was killed with something from my room.’

  ‘The profile of the weapon used would fit something like the halberd that you had on display.’

  ‘Halberd. Yes, I had one of those. Yes, that is missing. But I never … I never even handled the damn thing. This was my father’s collection. Give me a gun and I’m a happy man, but as for the other stuff, well …’

  ‘How many people knew about your collection?’

  ‘Anyone could have known who has visited this house. I consider it my private space, even Mrs Richardson is not allowed into dust and clean, she moves and tidies and while I don’t mind her doing that in the rest of the house, in here I consider it my sacred space. But the door is not locked. Anyone could have come in here.’

  ‘But there is
a key to the door?’ Henry asked.

  ‘Of course, I expect Mrs Richardson has that too, in the key cabinet in the old butler’s pantry. There’s no woman of the house, so we don’t entertain very much, and Mrs Richardson tends to most of my needs. Then I have the chauffeur. I share him with Bertie Adams, over at the Lodge – it doesn’t make any sense for us both to have a chauffeur when one will do. It is rare we both need the car at the same time and if we do, well, we come to an accommodation.’

  ‘And was this Bertie Adams with you at the racecourse that day?’

  ‘Some of the day, certainly.’ He rubbed his eyes and said, ‘To be truthful, Chief Inspector, the day is something of a blur.’

  ‘Convenient,’ Henry returned. ‘Now, you will go to Mrs Richardson and you will ask her for the key and any other keys she might have to this room. This room is to be locked and the key given to my sergeant who will return later and will examine the room for fingerprints and any other evidence. I hope for your sake, Mr Benson, that he finds other prints here.’

  ‘Are you going to arrest me? I will inform my lawyer, nothing will stick.’

  ‘The key, Mr Benson.’ Henry’s tone was chill.

  They left shortly thereafter. Mickey had spoken briefly to the housekeeper and the room was now being secured.

  ‘You think he did it?’ Mickey asked.

  ‘Do you? No – had the woman been shot then he would have been an immediate suspect. I think our man likes to view his prey from the distance that a bullet will fly. I’m not certain that I see him clubbing a woman to death with a medieval weapon. That seems theatrical, unnecessarily so. As you said before a butcher’s poleaxe would make a kind of sense, but this? And what also troubles me is that two other weapons were taken. This is a rural area, shotguns would be easy to obtain. If he wished someone dead then opportunity surely would arise to shoot them and have done with it. But no, Martha Mason was lured away from her friend and killed with a most unusual weapon – that is if our assumptions are correct and the halberd was the weapon used. It could be just more misdirection. But if it was, then something troubles me even more. The other two weapons that were taken, were they a mere distraction or are there two more intended victims?’