Royal Spy 01 - Her Royal Spyness

by Rhys Bowen

  “That is correct.”

  “And a little hard to believe, wouldn’t you say?”

  “I agree, it seems completely impossible, Inspector,” I said, “but it’s the truth. I can only conclude that there is some kind of sick-minded madman running around London.”

  “You simply can’t stay in this house alone any longer, Georgie,” Belinda interrupted. “Pack some things and you can sleep on my sofa.”

  The inspector now turned his attention to her, which was, perhaps, what she wanted.

  “Miss Warburton-Stoke, did you say?”

  “That’s right.” She flashed him a dazzling smile.

  “And your address is . . . ?”

  “I live in a dinky little mews cottage. Three Seville Mews. Just a stone’s throw away in Knightsbridge, actually.”

  “And you were with your chum when she discovered the body?”

  “I was with Lady Georgiana, yes,” she said. “At least, she went upstairs to change while I waited downstairs. I came when I heard her scream.”

  “Have you seen the body, miss?”

  “I certainly have. Horrid-looking man, I’d say. He didn’t even look as if he’d shaved today.”

  “And you’d never seen him before?”

  “Absolutely not. Never seen him in my life. And believe me, Inspector, I’d remember a nasty face like that.”

  The inspector got to his feet. “Very well, then. I suppose that’s all for now. But I shall need to speak to your brother, the duke, you know. How can I reach him in Scotland?”

  I didn’t want the police talking to Binky before I had a chance for my own little chat with him. “As I said, I’m not quite sure where he is at present. You could always try his club, in case he hasn’t left London.”

  “I thought you just said he was in Scotland.”

  “I said I wasn’t sure of his whereabouts and assumed he’d gone home. If you like, I’ll try friends and family in Scotland for you, although the telephone is not in the widest use up there. It is rather remote.”

  “Don’t worry, miss. We’ll find him, all right.”

  Belinda took my arm. “Inspector, we really should let Lady Georgiana have a cup of tea. She’s obviously in shock. I mean, who wouldn’t be if they found a dead man in their house?”

  He nodded. “I suppose you’ve both had a bit of a shock. Off you go and have a cup of tea and a lie-down then. I know where to find you if I need you. And in the meantime if that brother of yours turns up, tell him we need to speak to him right away. Is that clear?”

  “Oh, absolutely, Inspector,” I said.

  “Off you go, then. I’ll have men working at the house for some time, I expect.” He tried to chivvy us to the front door.

  “It will be well supervised, I hope,” I said. “There are many valuable objects in this house. I wouldn’t want to risk their getting stolen or damaged.”

  “Don’t worry, miss. Your house will be in good hands. There will be a constable on guard outside until this little matter is cleared up. Now off you go.”

  “Her ladyship needs to collect some belongings before she goes. She can’t leave without so much as a toothbrush.”

  “Very well,” he said. “Rogers, go with the young lady and keep an eye on her. We don’t want her mucking about with valuable evidence.”

  I stomped up the stairs, fuming with indignation, threw various illogical articles into a bag, and then realized something. “My toothbrush, soap, and flannel are in that bathroom,” I said.

  “I don’t think you can touch anything in there,” the constable said, looking worried.

  “I don’t think I’d want to use any of them again after this,” I replied.

  “Darling, I’m sure we can go to my chemist and buy you a new toothbrush,” Belinda soothed. “Let’s just go. This place is beginning to depress me.”

  “Got what you need, then?” The inspector halfheartedly raised his hat as we left.

  “What a horrid man,” Belinda said as soon as the door closed. “I wouldn’t mind seeing him floating in a bathtub.”

  Chapter 15

  Belinda Warburton-Stoke’s mews cottage

  3 Seville Mews

  Knightsbridge

  London

  Still Friday

  As soon as we reached Belinda’s mews cottage, I asked to use her telephone and called Castle Rannoch. The call was answered, as usual, by Hamilton, the butler.

  “Hello? Castle Rannoch here. His Grace’s butler speaking.” Our elderly butler has never learned to be comfortable with telephones.

  “Hello, Hamilton, this is Lady Georgiana,” I shouted, because the line was particularly bad and Hamilton has been growing increasingly deaf.

  “I’m afraid her ladyship is not in residence at the moment,” came the soft Scottish voice.

  “Hamilton, this is Lady Georgiana. I am telephoning from London,” I positively shouted into the phone. “I wish to leave a message for His Grace.”

  “I believe His Grace is somewhere out on the estate at the moment,” he replied in his calm Scottish voice.

  “Don’t be ridiculous, Hamilton. You know perfectly well that he’s not on the estate. He could not possibly be in Scotland yet unless he has developed wings. Please tell him to telephone me the moment he gets home. It is vitally important and he will be in serious trouble if he doesn’t do so. Now let me give you the number at which I can be reached.”

  It took a good deal of yelling and spelling before he had successfully noted the number. I put down the phone in annoyance. “He’s already persuaded our butler to lie for him.”

  “My dear, I think you should consider the fact that your brother may well be guilty,” Belinda said. “Come and have a cup of tea. You’ll feel better.”

  When I took the teacup I found, to my horror, that my hand was shaking. This had been a most vexing day.

  A troubled night on Belinda’s sofa followed. Belinda herself disappeared to yet another party. She generously invited me to come with her but I was in no mood for parties and had nothing to wear. Also I was waiting for Binky’s phone call. The maid went home for the night and I tried to sleep. The sofa was modern, streamlined, and devilishly uncomfortable. So I lay awake, staring into the darkness, feeling scared and empty. I couldn’t believe that Binky was guilty, but I also couldn’t imagine how a stranger could end up in our bathtub dead unless Binky had had a hand in it. I couldn’t wait to speak to him, to know he was all right and not guilty. If only he could have left me some kind of note before he disappeared. If only . . .

  I sat up, now horribly wide awake. A note. I had left a note for Binky on his bed, a note in which I had mentioned the corpse in the bath and told him not to telephone the police. I could hardly have left anything more incriminating and the police must have found it by now. I wondered if the constable was stationed outside Rannoch House all night, or if I had any hope of sneaking in to retrieve it, on the unlikely chance that it hadn’t yet been discovered. I realized that it would possibly make the police even more suspicious of me if I was caught breaking into my house at night, but it was a risk I had to take. There was just a chance they hadn’t done a thorough search yet and the note was still there. I got up and put on my dress and coat over my pajamas, then I stuck some paper into the latch to make sure it would open again (one of the few useful pieces of education I had acquired at Les Oiseaux) and crept out into the night.

  The city streets were deserted, apart from a constable on his beat, who eyed me suspiciously.

  “Are you all right, miss?” he asked.

  “Oh, yes, thank you,” I replied. “Just going home from a party.”

  “You shouldn’t be out this late alone,” he said.

  “I only live around the corner,” I lied. He let me go on my way, but I could tell he wasn’t happy about it. The farther I went, the more I agreed with him. I heard the sound of Big Ben striking midnight, borne across the city on the breeze. It was cold and I wrapped my coat around me. Belgrave S
quare slumbered in darkness; so did Rannoch House. No sign of a constable. I went up the steps and put my key in the lock. The front door swung open. I stepped inside, fumbling for the light switch. The hall light threw long shadows up the staircase and I considered, for the first time, that the body might still be lying in the bathtub. I usually pride myself on my sangfroid: when I was three my brother and some friends home for the school holidays had lowered me into the disused well in the courtyard at Castle Rannoch in an attempt to discover whether it was bottomless, as reputed. Fortunately for me, it was not. And once I had sat on the battlements all night in the hope of seeing my grandfather’s ghost playing the bagpipes. But the thought of de Mauxville rising from the bathtub to exact revenge was so overwhelmingly disgusting that I could hardly make my feet go up the stairs.

  I reached the first landing, then turned on the light and started up the second flight. I let out a little squeak and almost lost my footing as an ominous shadow reared over me, arm raised. It took my heart a couple of minutes to start beating again, before I realized that it was only the statue of an avenging angel that had been banished to the second-floor landing after Binky had chipped its nose with a cricket bat. I felt very foolish and chided myself as I continued up the stairs. Someone had cleaned the water from the floor. The bathroom door was shut. I tiptoed across the landing to Binky’s bedroom at the front of the house. The note was no longer on the bed. I hoped that it might have fallen onto the floor and knelt down to look under the bed. I recoiled in horror as my knee touched a wet patch, and stood up again, my heart beating wildly. I made myself kneel and examine the patch and decided that it was nothing more than water. That could be easily enough explained—Binky had come into his room dripping wet from his bath and left a wet towel on the floor. I went carefully around the room, looking for clues, but found nothing.

  I was just about to leave when I was sure I heard a heavy tread on the stairs. I couldn’t help remembering that someone had committed a murder in this house earlier today. If Binky had indeed had nothing to do with the crime, then a perfect stranger had found a way into our house and lured de Mauxville to his death. Maybe he had returned. I looked around the room, wondering if I should try to hide in a wardrobe. Then I decided that nothing would be worse than waiting to be discovered and helplessly trapped. At least this way I had an element of surprise and might be able to push past him down the stairs. I went out onto the landing, then gave a gasp of horror as a tall figure loomed ahead of me.

  The tall figure gave a similar gasp and almost fell back down the stairs. As he did so, I noticed the blue uniform.

  “Are you all right, Constable?” I ran to assist him.

  “Lawks, miss, you didn’t half give me a turn,” he said, recovering himself enough to put his hand to his heart. “I didn’t think no one was in the place. What on earth are you doing here?”

  “I live here, Constable. It’s my home,” I said.

  “But there’s been a crime committed. There didn’t ought to be nobody in the house.”

  “I realize that. I’m spending the night with friends but I remembered that I had left my headache powders at home, and I can’t sleep when I have one of my headaches.” I was rather pleased with the brilliance of this spur-of-the-moment explanation.

  “And so you come back on your own at night?” he asked incredulously. “Didn’t your host have no aspirins in the house?”

  “My doctor makes me up very special headache powders,” I said. “They are the only thing that will work, I’m afraid, and I simply couldn’t face a sleepless night after what I’d been through today.”

  He nodded. “So have you found them?”

  I realized the light in Binky’s room was shining out across the landing. “I thought I must have lent them to my brother when he was here last,” I said, “but they don’t seem to be in his room.”

  “They might have been removed as evidence,” he said knowingly.

  “Evidence? The man was drowned.”

  “Ah, but what’s to say he wasn’t rendered unconscious with a drug first and then put in the bathtub?” He looked rather smug, I thought.

  “I can assure you that my mild headache powders wouldn’t kill a mouse. Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going back to bed. It will have to be aspirin after all. I presume you will be staying here and keeping an eye on things? I was quite surprised to find the house unattended when I arrived.”

  I had obviously hit a nerve. He flushed. “Sorry, miss. Just had to pop to the nearest police station to relieve the call of nature.”

  I almost said, “Well, don’t let it happen again.” My look implied it as I made a majestic descent, worthy of my great-grandmother, down the staircase.

  I hurried back to Belinda’s, let myself in, and tried to sleep. I wasn’t any more successful than I had been before. The police had the note I had left for Binky. They had presumably felt the wet patch on his floor and might well have decided that he had soaked his clothing in trying to drown the victim. And another thought crept into my mind: the murderer hadn’t just wanted to kill de Mauxville. He had wanted to punish us as well.

  At last I suppose I must have drifted off to sleep because I shot awake at the sound of a door closing. Belinda was making a poor attempt to tiptoe quietly across the parquet floor. She looked across at me and noticed my eyes were open.

  “Oh, you’re awake,” she said. “Sorry. There’s no way to close that door quietly.” She came across and perched on the sofa beside me. “God, what a night. I swear every new cocktail is more lethal than the one before. They were making something called Black Stallions—I don’t know what was in them but, God, did they pack a punch. I’m going to have a frightful hangover in the morning.”

  “Do you want me to help you make some black coffee now?” I asked, having no clue how one made black coffee.

  “No, thank you. Bed is what I need. Bed alone, I mean. I was offered plenty of the accompanied kind, but turned them all down. I didn’t want you to wake up all alone.”

  “That’s very kind of you,” I said. “Almost beyond the call of duty.”

  “To be honest, they weren’t that desirable,” she admitted with a grin. “I could tell they were going to be the ‘fancy a spot of the old rumpy-pumpy?’ kind. You know, a quick poke and over in five seconds. Honestly, public schools are doing Englishmen a great disservice by not providing elementary lessons in lovemaking. If I were in charge, I’d have employed a school prostitute, preferably French, to teach the boys how to do it properly.”

  “Belinda, you are terrible.” I couldn’t help laughing. “And what about a male equivalent for the girls’ schools?”

  “We had it, darling. Those delicious ski instructors we used to meet at the inn.”

  “They didn’t, did they? All I got was a quick kiss behind the woodshed. Not even so much as a grope.”

  “Primrose Asquey d’Asquey reputedly used to have it on a regular basis with Stefan. Remember the big blond one?”

  “The same Primrose who was wearing white for her wedding the other day?”

  Belinda laughed. “Darling, if only true virgins were allowed a white wedding, church organists would die of starvation. I must see if I can line up a suitable foreigner for you. A Frenchman would be ideal. I gather they can keep one in ecstacy for hours.”

  “At the moment I don’t think I’d be anxious to meet any more Frenchmen,” I said. “The dead one in my bathtub is bad enough.”

  “Oh, and speaking of the dead one, I asked a few discreet questions on your behalf. And several people had come across your horrid de Mauxville in Monte Carlo. Nobody had anything good to say about him. Apparently he’s one of those fringe dwellers, one gathers—seemed to have connections, but nobody was sure to whom. Always playing at the high-stakes tables—oh, and one person suggested that he was not above a spot of blackmail.”

  “Blackmail?”

  She nodded.

  I sat up now. “If that were true, and somebody had had enough
of being blackmailed, then killing him would be the answer.”

  “Exactly what I thought.”

  “But why in our bathtub?”

  “Two reasons: one, because it would not make the murderer the obvious suspect; and two, because somebody had a grudge against you or your brother.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” I said. “Nobody knows me, and who could have a grudge against Binky? He’s the most inoffensive chap in the world. Not a mean bone in his body.”

  “Against your family, then? A feud of long standing? Even someone who was antiroyal and thinks that by striking at you they are somehow harming the royal family?”

  “That’s also ridiculous,” I said. “We are so far removed from the line of succession that nobody would care if we were all wiped out in a Scottish avalanche.”