‘Here she is now,’ said Mrs Chanter. ‘Should I make you some tea?’
‘Later, perhaps,’ said Peter. ‘But for the moment maybe you would like to stay in case there is anything you can add to what Rose has to tell us.’
Mrs Chanter sat down, as Rose came into the room.
Harriet had been amusing herself watching Peter’s smooth manner as a detective. Now she turned her attention to Rose. The girl was pretty in that baby-faced way that often fades with youth, and well turned out. She was looking very apprehensive, and Harriet waited to see how Peter would deal with that.
‘Rose, we think you may be able to help us find Mrs Harwell’s murderer,’ he began. ‘We understand from what your mother told Mr Bunter that you were acting as Mrs Harwell’s maid and housekeeper in the short time before she died.’
‘She came down on the Wednesday,’ said Rose, ‘and she phoned and asked if I would open up the place for her before she got here.’
‘What did you have to do, exactly?’ said Harriet, wanting to claim a place in the conversation in case she had something more important to ask later.
‘I drew the curtains, and brought in coal, and lit all the fires,’ the girl said. ‘And give the place a lick over with a duster, and took the dust covers off the sitting-room suite, and brought up some milk and bread from the village shop, and put a bunch of flowers in a vase, and filled some hot-water bottles to air the bed. Well, and of course I had to make up the bed first. Couple of hours’ work.’
‘And when did Mrs Harwell arrive?’
‘About four o’clock, sir. She come up from the station in a taxi. She sent me down to the village to do some shopping right away. When I got back I had the supper to cook, and then I unpacked her suitcase, and hung up her clothes – she had the most lovely clothes, sir, you wouldn’t believe – and then she said I could go, and come back the next morning.’
‘And you did that?’
‘Yes, I did.’
‘So what did she ask you to do for her on the second day?’
‘Just the usual things, sir. Just what I always did when I did for her: clean the grates, set the fires, make her breakfast, neaten the bed—’
‘Woman’s work, as is never done,’ interjected Mrs Chanter.
‘Was there anything else?’ asked Peter, quietly. ‘Did she give you a letter to post? Anything like that?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Are you sure, Rose? We think there must have been a letter.’
‘She wouldn’t have needed to give it to me, sir, because she took the dog for a walk before lunch, and she could easily have posted a letter herself.’
‘I see,’ said Peter. ‘I see that you are a sharp sort of girl, Rose. You would have noticed anything unusual.’
‘Well, there wasn’t anything unusual to notice, sir.’
‘And was Mrs Harwell quite her usual self? She didn’t seem worried about anything?’
‘She was a nervy sort of a person, sir. Very offhand with servants. She never chatted, like, or told you what was happening. Not a bit like Mrs Sugden in this house. Mum always knows just who is expected, and all the family news and that.’
‘But Mrs Harwell was stand-offish?’
‘Very. Yes, she was.’
‘And so she didn’t tell you that she expected guests for supper that night?’
‘Well, yes, she did. She sent me off home as soon as I cleared her lunch things, which wasn’t much because she only had a boiled egg and a rack of toast. And she asked me to come back at five to help with dinner. She said she was going to invite someone “when she could get through”. I was a bit concerned, sir, in case she wanted me to cook. I thought it might be a bit much for me, and I said to her if only we had known, Mum would have been glad to cook something nice for her—’
‘As I would have been ready to help out, naturally, given a bit of warning,’ said Mrs Chanter.
‘She said she had only just thought of it, sir, and it was a nice surprise for someone, and not to worry because she had ordered a hamper.’
‘When had she done that?’ asked Peter.
‘It must have been on her walk before lunch, I suppose,’ said Rose.
‘And you have no idea at all who was expected?’ Peter’s voice was very neutral, almost gentle, Harriet noticed. Calculated to give no unnecessary signals. What was it that welcomed little fishes in with gently smiling jaws?
‘And when you came back at five, what were you asked to do?’
‘Just set the table, sir.’
‘Just the table? What about food?’
‘The hamper had come. It only needed unpacking.’
‘And for how many was the table to be set?’
‘I can’t exactly remember, sir. I think it was for two.’
‘You can’t be sure?’ asked Peter. Rose shot a glance at her mother.
Then: ‘It was for two,’ she said.
‘What did you think of the food you had to unpack?’ asked Peter.
The girl looked very uneasy. ‘It wasn’t my place to think about it,’ she said.
‘You didn’t think it was rather extravagant? Rather luxurious?’
‘It wasn’t what I would spend my money on, if I had her sort of money, if that’s what you mean,’ she said.
‘There wasn’t anything in it that you would have liked to eat yourself?’
‘Not that I can remember,’ said Rose. She wasn’t looking directly at Peter. She was fiddling with her watch strap as she spoke.
‘Well,’ said Peter, briskly, taking a pencil and a notebook from his pocket. ‘Let’s have a list of what you can remember, shall we?’
Rose was silent. ‘Come on, girl,’ said Mrs Chanter.
‘I just got it out of the basket and put it on the table,’ Rose said, angrily. ‘It was all wrapped up. I didn’t take no notice of it.’
‘Don’t worry, then, Rose,’ said Peter, putting his notebook away. ‘Just tell us what happened next.’
‘She said to wait till her guest arrived,’ said Rose, ‘so I sat and waited in the kitchen. And he never came. So there wasn’t anything to do, and when it got late she sent me home.’
‘She didn’t name anyone? She just said “my guest”?’
‘Yes.’
‘And did she seem worried or upset when he or she didn’t come?’
‘Not particularly. She just said as I was to go now, and come back in the morning. So I went.’
‘Did you notice what time it was when you left?’
‘Somewhere about ten o’clock,’ said Rose promptly.
‘You didn’t get in till after eleven, Rose,’ said Mrs Chanter.
‘I went for a bit of a walk down the lane,’ said Rose, desperately. ‘I didn’t come straight back in. Any objections?’
‘Yes, there is objections!’ exclaimed Mrs Chanter. ‘I’ve told you over and over again I won’t have you walking around by yourself after dark! Don’t you realise, my girl, as how there was a murderer lurking about somewhere?’
‘I wasn’t to know that,’ said Rose, hanging her head.
‘When you walked down the lane,’ said Peter, ‘did you happen to see anyone? Or did you see a car come or go?’
‘There was a car passed,’ said Rose, suddenly perking up.
‘Was it coming, or going?’
‘Coming up the lane, towards us here,’ said Rose. ‘I’m afraid I didn’t notice its number plate or anything. Just that I had to step on to the verge to get out of the way.’
‘All right,’ said Peter. ‘Look, Rose, is there anything else you can think of which might help us? I suppose you realise that you were the last person to see Mrs Harwell alive?’
‘That’s a horrible thought,’ wailed Rose. ‘You don’t know that, sir. Anybody might of come in.’
‘But you were sitting in the kitchen all evening. Wouldn’t you have heard if someone came?’
‘Yes. No, I might have nodded off,’ the girl said. She was staring at Peter, and then
at Harriet with wide blank eyes.
She’s very frightened, thought Harriet. Now why should she be?
‘It’s mortifying to a sleuth,’ Peter told Harriet, ‘when people keep telling one fibs. Just about everybody in this case has slipped in a fib or two, about some trivial matter having nothing in particular to do with the case.’
‘Are you thinking of Rose?’
‘And Amery. And Harwell. But Rose is a case in point. Can you imagine unpacking a hamper and not noticing anything that was in it?’
‘Perhaps one wouldn’t take much notice if one knew that not a bite of it was for oneself,’ said Harriet.
‘I don’t believe she unpacked the thing at all,’ said Peter. ‘But I don’t think we can get any more out of her, do you? And I very much doubt if Charles and his merry men would do better. I’ve been racking my brain over it. Bunter is already known to be part of our baggage train; Mrs Chanter would confide in him while plying him with steak and kidney and spotted dick, but Rose would be in awe of him, don’t you think?’
‘Yes, I do. Bunter is a considerably more awful phenomenon than his master.’
‘Thank you.’
‘What about Miss Climpson’s people?’
‘None in their earliest youth, I’m afraid. And imperceptibly of a station in life slightly higher on the ladder than Rose.’
‘Surrounded,’ said Harriet, ‘by that faint and fusty glamour that comes from being able to type? Peter, I know who you want. You want Mango.’
‘Harriet, that’s a stroke of genius! Can you spare her for a few days?’
‘I think I might be able to remember how to dress myself,’ said Harriet dryly.
‘And do you think the girl would be willing?’
‘I think she’d adore it, Peter. She worships you like a film star; and I’m sure she would find it thrilling to be involved in investigating murder.’
Peter hesitated, with his hand hovering over the bell. ‘You know, this might not be a case of murder, Harriet,’ he said. ‘Contrary to popular belief, a dead body doesn’t always mean capital murder. But even if what was done wasn’t murder, we still have to find who wasn’t a murderer.’
14
Through all the drama, whether damned or not
Love gilds the scene, and women guide the plot.
RICHARD BRINSLEY SHERIDAN
Report from Miss Juliet Mango to Lord Peter Wimsey:
Monday 16th March
Immediately on receiving your instructions proceeded to Hampton, and took rooms at the White Hart Inn. Gave myself out as a theatrical costumier, working on a film that had been projected to be shot this month. Succeeded in telling everyone in the hotel bar that the costumes for the film had all been destroyed in the studio fire at Elstree last month. Claimed that I was working in Hampton to be near the wardrobe mistress for the film, and that I needed a young woman the same measurements as Miss Kay Francis to model the dresses I was making. Aroused a good deal of interest with this story and several local girls are to come to see me tomorrow, Rose Chanter one of them. Have ordered three bolts of satin and some trimmings from Lady Peter’s account at Harrods, trusting that your lordship’s words about no expense spared would cover.
Please tell Lady Peter that her amethyst serge dress would be very appropriate for her engagement to speak at the Hampstead literary luncheon party, since full mourning not appropriate in circles such as that, and it would be best to wear pearls with it rather than one of those collars. The dress is all ready pressed and hanging in the wardrobe for her.
I will report again tomorrow.
Yours faithfully,
J.L. Mango
Having read this missive, Peter passed it to Harriet. Harriet, deeply absorbed in reading the newspaper, took several seconds before she picked up the letter.
‘What has attracted your attention?’ asked Peter. ‘Not the results of the Gas Light and Coke Company, I’ll hazard.’
‘No, not that. It’s this case.’ Harriet pointed at a headline which said: Wife Killed by Husband. Three years penal servitude.
‘What is worrying you about it, Harriet? I have no need of the death penalty to deter me from murdering my wife. Nothing would induce me to harm a hair of her head. Never was wife safer . . .’
‘It just seems to sort rather oddly with the judgement in the Buxton case,’ said Harriet.
‘Ah. Now that gentleman does seem to have been guilty of murdering his wife.’
‘And in the summing-up reported yesterday the judge said it was not for the Crown to prove motive,’ said Harriet.
‘My dear, is it just the corrupting proximity of a criminologist spouse, or have you always read the law reports?’
‘Always. Essential reading for the practice of my trade,’ said Harriet.
‘What is confusing here is the difference between motive and intent,’ said Peter. ‘You could probably base a novel upon it. Novelists like motive of course, as, Charles keeps telling me, do juries. Intent is much narrower, and easier to get a grasp on.’
‘It seems a very slippery distinction to me,’ said Harriet.
‘I think it’s clearer in practice than it is in theory,’ said Peter. ‘You might have a strong motive for wishing for the death of your aunt – if she is going to leave you a fortune, shall we say? But an intent to kill her is not the same thing. Most people with motives for murder never form the slightest shadow of an intent to kill. But now, supposing you have in fact killed your aunt, and it turns out you are her heiress. You might have more difficulty in rebutting the allegation that you had malign intent.’
‘In this case the husband seems to have seized his wife by the throat in a paroxysm of rage,’ said Harriet.
‘Humm,’ said Peter. ‘Well, he’s lucky to escape a conviction for murder then, isn’t he? Because an intent does not have to go so far as being an intent to kill, to support a murder charge. An intent to inflict bodily harm is enough.’
‘Otherwise, you mean, someone could stab someone else with a kitchen knife, and then say he had intended to wound, but not to kill the victim?’
‘Precisely. It would become impossible to convict for murder. The assailant would always say that something short of death had been his intention. There’s a further wrinkle to this. One is not allowed not to intend the obvious consequences of one’s actions. Supposing, for example, that you belonged to a society for the destruction of ugly buildings. You drew up a hit list, and you went around blowing the abominations up.’
‘Peter! What a wonderful idea; we should start such a society immediately, before London gets out of hand.’
‘And then supposing that you were to argue that you had not foreseen that anyone would be injured in the process. The jury would probably think that you jolly well should have foreseen it. Another example: if the man on the Clapham omnibus would expect death to result from a stab wound through the heart, then it is not open to the assailant to argue that he did not in fact intend such a result. Unless he pleads insanity, of course.’
‘I see. Well, in this case the man appears to have fallen over on top of the woman while holding her by the throat.’
‘Then I imagine the jury thought the fall was accidental, and that without it he would simply have let go, and she would have been left with nothing worse than a bruised neck. Can I see the report?’
Harriet handed the newspaper to Peter.
‘Yes; you see they had had brawls before, which had not seriously injured either of them. To get a conviction for murder you would have to show that he had, or ought reasonably to have had, a belief that this time the assault would result in death, or at least in grievous bodily harm.’
‘Three years isn’t much, though, in the presence of a dead body, is it?’ asked Harriet.
‘He must have been most convincingly penitent,’ said Peter. ‘Is this maze of distinctions of any special importance to you, Harriet?’
‘Yes, it is. I’m afraid my body in the reservoir may be the result of mans
laughter, or unlawful killing or something, not of murder.’
‘Does it matter? It’s still a body.’
‘Oh, it matters terribly. Murder is the only crime for a detective story. It has true glamour. Anything less is liable to strike the reader as perry to champagne.’
‘What a ghoulish crowd the reading public must be,’ said Peter. ‘Couldn’t you scrape home with a spot of conspiring to cause explosions? Embezzlement? Kidnapping? Counterfeiting coin of the realm? No, Harriet? Nothing but murder will meet the need? Then you must give your villain both motive and intent. As well as opportunity, of course.’
‘I realise, if there has been murder, then someone pays for it with a life,’ said Harriet, musing. ‘Perhaps if the death penalty is ever abolished, a wider tariff of crimes will be available to detective story writers. Meanwhile, has Mango found anything?’
‘See for yourself. So far, so good, I would say.’
Report from Miss Juliet Mango to Lord Peter Wimsey:
Wednesday 18th March
Interviewed several local young women in my room at the White Hart today and selected Rose Chanter to model dresses for me, purporting to find her measurements the closest to what was required. She was delighted, and the conversation easily turned to Mrs Harwell, when she told me that the money for the modelling sessions would be particularly welcome as she had no more expectation of occasional earnings from the Harwells. I began to make a calico maquette for a dress for her, but have not yet cut the satin itself, as am hopeful that she will confide in me before I have touched the bolt, which would enable me to return the fabric for a refund.
Found Miss Chanter very talkative. She believes that she knows a good deal about film stars, and is eager to learn about stage costumes. Elicited a good deal of detail about Mrs Harwell’s wardrobe, and whole history of relations between Harwells and the neighbourhood. Have also been told about Rose’s young man, Ronald Datchett, who is employed in the local boat yard, where skiffs and launches are made for sale and hire. Rose regards this as a good secure job as hire is not as seasonal as one might think. She would like to become engaged to Ronald, but her family are not keen on the idea. Mrs Chanter, I gather, is very strict with Rose, who has considerable difficulty finding a way of being alone with Ronald. They are restricted to one evening out each week, and must always say where they are going, and be back by eleven o’clock. I understand that Ronald walks Rose home after each excursion, but that cuddling in the bushes alongside the lane is cold and uncomfortable in winter weather. The girl made several envious remarks about the room in the White Hart with a nice fire burning, but I do not see why I should put her in the way of getting herself into trouble at Your Lordship’s expense. Have formed the impression that Mrs Chanter’s attitude is perfectly justified. Rose told me that the empty bungalow when the Harwells were absent was a sore temptation to her and Ron, but that he had been unable to find a way to break in without leaving signs of forced entry. Mrs Chanter keeps a key to the place, but it is on her ring of keys for Mon Repos and is never out of her pocket.
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