‘I would never have put you down as a brawler,’ I marvelled.
The woman butted the wall and sat down heavily on her bundle.
‘Had enough?’ Perkins chortled and dragged her back into the interview room.
Hesketh held open the door at the end of the corridor. I had never seen it closed before. ‘Got into a scrap with an ironmonger once – can’t even remember what it was about now – but I got arrested for that.’ Hesketh paused, eyeing his mistress warily.
‘Do not stop on my account,’ Cherry urged.
‘I went before the beak,’ he continued, ‘and for some reason he took against the ironmonger and a shine to me. I should give you three months for what you did to this upstanding citizen, he told me, but the way he said upstanding showed how he really felt. I’m going to give you one day to teach you a lesson. But, if I ever see you in this court again, it’s a year’s hard labour for you, young man, on top of whatever else you’ve done. The ironmonger made such a fuss he got three weeks for contempt.’
‘I was speculating when you would mention your criminal record,’ Mr G said as we reached the hall.
‘But how did you know that?’ I asked.
‘He knows everything,’ Cherry whispered.
‘I know how to search rooms.’ Sidney Grice put on his hat. ‘And the release paper is still in Hesketh’s shirt drawer.’
‘I kept it to remind me.’ Hesketh turned to his mistress. ‘I am sorry, miss. I never told the Garstangs – they would not have forgiven me. But I told your father soon after he took over the house – I did not want it hanging over me – and I was going to tell you.’
‘Oh, Hesketh.’ Cherry sighed. ‘What will people think?’ She cracked into a grin. ‘Gypsy James Mace, eh? I am so proud of you.’
Hesketh hesitated. ‘I hope you will not think me too out of turn, Miss Middleton, but I should like to shake your hand for what you did tonight.’
My hand, which my guardian often told me was of similar proportions to a shovel, was lost inside that valet’s gentle fist.
‘Lower your head, Hesketh,’ I enjoined him. ‘A bit more.’
I stood on tiptoe and pecked his cheek.
‘For heaven’s sake,’ Mr G expostulated. ‘Osculating in a public place with pugilistic servants. Whatever next?’
‘I dread to think,’ I murmured. ‘I hope I did not hurt your cheek, Hesketh.’
Hesketh put his fingertips to the site. ‘Not at all, miss.’ And I would have sworn there was a tear in his eye.
‘Did your father keep a diary, Miss Mortlock?’ Mr G enquired as he commandeered the first cab.
‘I do not think so.’
‘Endeavour to find out. He kept financial records?’
‘Obsessively. He liked to account for every penny.’ Cherry waved to another hansom.
‘Very well. We shall arrive tomorrow promptly at ten twenty, when I shall scrutinize Mr Nathan Mortlock’s fiscal chronicles, his last will and testament and any details you have of the terms of the Trust fund,’ Sidney Grice announced. ‘Have them in order. Goodbye.’
64
✥
The Outrage and Arthritis
THE FOG LINGERED thinly the next morning, like the steam from a hot bath in a cold room, dripping down every surface and pooling on the ground. An ancient beggar stood across the road from number 2.
‘Penny for a cuppa cha, gov?’
Much to my surprise, Sidney Grice went over to him and, even more to my surprise, instead of haranguing him about getting a job or going to the workhouse, reached into his pocket and gave him a coin. Perhaps, I thought, it was the fact that the man wore an eye patch that touched my godfather’s heart. I was not even convinced he had much of one up until then.
‘Gawd bless yer and yer loverly laydee,’ the man croaked out.
‘Get a job or go to the workhouse,’ Mr G harangued him, ‘and stop cluttering the streets pestering people.’
Sidney Grice rejoined me.
‘You gave him money,’ I accused, for he took some pride in his meanness.
‘How razor-sharp your powers of observation have become,’ he remarked.
I recoiled at my godfather’s reference to razors, but he was busy yanking the bell pull.
‘Good morning, sir and miss,’ Easterly greeted us. ‘Hi trust you are well.’
‘It is not for you to investigate our medical conditions,’ Mr G said severely, ‘especially that of so poorly constructed a creature as Miss Middleton.’ He flung his Ulster over the footman’s arm. ‘You have a lot to learn if you are not to betray the trust placed in you by your murdered master and your delightful not-yet-murdered mistress even further.’
‘Hi am sorry, sir.’ Easterly hung up Sidney Grice’s overcoat and took my cloak. ‘Miss Mortlock is awaiting you hin the drawing room.’
Cherry stood up to greet us.
‘I tried to make Hesketh see a doctor,’ she said, ‘or at least stay in bed, but he would not hear of it.’
‘Quite right.’ Mr G sat down uninvited. ‘There is too much shillyshallying with servants these days. Tell me about your father’s estate whilst we are awaiting tea.’
Cherry kissed me. ‘I have not ordered any yet.’
‘Shall Hi tell Veronique to bring it now, miss?’ Easterly enquired as he was about to shut the door.
‘This is an outrage,’ Sidney Grice fumed. ‘Listening in to a private conversation.’
Easterly blushed. ‘Hi am sorry, sir. Hi could not help but overhear.’
‘You hear a lot of things,’ I explained, ‘but you are supposed to pretend not to until you are spoken to.’
‘Hoh.’ Easterly blinked.
‘We will have coffee,’ Cherry said.
My guardian clucked and her valet hopped from foot to foot.
‘Was that a private remark or haddressed to me, miss?’
‘To you,’ she assured him and he hurried away. ‘Perhaps you could let me reprimand my own servants in future, Mr Grice.’
‘I would be delighted if you would.’ He looked at his watch. ‘Your father’s estate.’
Cherry settled me in a low-backed chair and the three of us faced each other across a round table with a lovely Ottoman vase in the centre, a flattened sphere swirling with flowers in vivid reds, blues and greens, with a high collar. My guardian tutted, took hold of the twin swan-neck handles and deposited it on the floor.
‘Have a care,’ Cherry protested. ‘That is irreplaceable.’
‘I have so many cares,’ he told her, ‘but we would be here for nine years and three months were I to recount them all accurately to you, by which time I would doubtless have acquired many more cares and so the recital might only end with one or both of our deaths.’
‘Do you normally rearrange other people’s ornaments?’ she demanded.
‘I am thinking of making it a habit,’ he admitted, ‘for they are often sources of irritation to me. This fine and doubtless expensive piece of Iznik ceramic craftsmanship was obstructing my pleasant view of your hands and, whilst people may lie with their voices, eyes and mouth, they rarely manage to do so with their fingers at the same time. But I weary apace when I am obliged to ask the same question in triplicate.’ He leaned towards her. ‘Kindly bestow upon me some information about your father’s estate.’
Cherry watched anxiously as he rotated the vase by the side of his chair.
‘He was a wealthy man,’ she said, ‘but the only person who stood to gain by that was me.’
‘No generous bequests to servants or churches exempli gratia?’ He patted the side of the vase loudly. ‘Nothing for his estranged wife, your mother, that he had not troubled to cancel?’
‘It is very simple,’ she said. ‘I get everything. Most of the Garstangs’ assets were put into a Trust fund. The Garstangs were wary of leaving it all in one piece to my father, given his profligate past. And so he had an annual income and the use of Gethsemane on condition that he always lived here. Mr Burton had b
een very keen to demolish it and complete his crescent, but they were even more determined to preserve the house. They did not think to forbid dividing the house, though.’
Sidney Grice was rocking the vase and she stopped to glare at him.
‘Did the Garstangs’ will not provide for your mother?’ I asked.
Cherry splayed her fingers. ‘I suppose they assumed my father would do so himself, but he cut my mother out of his will within a few days of her leaving.’
‘Did she know that?’ I asked.
‘You think she came back to kill him?’ Cherry greeted my question incredulously. ‘My mother is the most gentle soul you could hope to meet… but yes. He wrote and told her immediately, and she replied that she wanted nothing from him except to be left alone.’
‘Not to see you?’ I asked softly.
Cherry closed her eyes and inhaled. ‘I reminded her of my father.’ And when she opened those eyes they were somehow dulled.
‘How much was he worth?’ Sidney Grice reached into the vase.
‘I do not have the exact figures but not a huge sum in capital assets, though the income is somewhere in the region of ten thousand pounds and the use of this house is worth a great deal.’
‘I understand that your father closed off most of the house for security, but why did he never have the roof of the north wing repaired?’ I listened uneasily as my godfather rapped on the inside of the vase.
‘I think it was just to spite the Garstangs for trapping him here.’ Cherry craned her neck. ‘I shall not be happy if you break that,’ she warned.
‘Will you be a happy person if I do not?’ Sidney Grice went in deeper.
‘No, but—’
‘Then it makes little difference whether I do or not,’ my godfather reasoned, paddling his arm about like a child with a lucky dip. ‘But fear not. I shall treat it as I would any vase.’
‘You have a considerable inheritance,’ I remarked. ‘Forgive me for asking, but does your friend Fabian Le Bon know about it?’
‘Neither of us did until the will was read.’ Cherry did not appear to take offence this time. ‘My father led me to believe that I had been cut off without a penny and his fortune left to the Jews’ Deaf and Dumb Home in the Crescent.’
‘Why?’ My guardian pulled his arm out so suddenly that the vase rocked and it seemed that Cherry’s fears would be realized.
Cherry half-rose, prepared to leap out and save it, but the vase came to a standstill.
‘I suppose he wanted to bring me to heel,’ she conjectured.
Mr G flung out his arm, his sleeve catching the lip and setting the vase wobbling again.
‘I am not interested in your suppositions,’ he cried excitedly. ‘I care nothing for your guesses or flights of feminine fancy.’ He rested his hand on the vase.
‘I cannot bear this,’ Cherry muttered and, getting up, lifted his hand away, depositing it into his lap, picked up the vase and carried it to the octagonal table we had occupied when we first came what felt like a long time ago.
‘Mind that you do not trip over the hem of your remarkably fine Anatolian Beylik carpet,’ Mr G advised with his back to her.
Cherry placed her vase carefully and mimed strangling him.
‘You do not have arthritic fingers, I trust.’ He waved his stick towards the mantel mirror where he had a good view of her. ‘My penultimate enquiry concerned your slaughtered father’s choice of the institution which might benefit from his bequest.’
‘You do not like Jews?’ She came back to her chair.
Mr G patted where the vase was no longer, like a man in the dark searching for Lucifers. ‘I dislike ninety-eight per centum of Semites,’ he informed her. ‘I also dislike ninety-eight per cent of Gentiles. Please answer my question, lovely Miss Charity Clair Caroline Mortlock.’
‘Does he call all his female clients lovely?’ Cherry’s cheeks coloured.
‘I have never known him to,’ I admitted.
‘That was not because none of the others merited such a description.’ Sidney Grice clearly thought this was sufficient explanation of his behaviour.
Veronique entered with pink gold-rimmed cups, dominated by a splendid silver coffee pot.
‘Have you recovered from your visit to the police station?’ I asked.
‘Better zan Mr ’Esketh, I am thinking,’ she replied and departed.
‘I think Mr Grice wants to know if there was any particular reason that your father chose that charity?’ I asked.
‘I think so too,’ he agreed.
‘My father was always concerned about deaf children after what happened to Lionel.’
‘What did happen to Lionel?’ I enquired.
Cherry picked up the pot, using a linen napkin against the heat. ‘When Lionel was twelve he had a brain fever. The doctors thought he would die.’ She poured three cups with steaming burnt-umber liquid. ‘Perhaps it would have been kinder if he had. He recovered but, when he did, he was stone deaf. It affected his speech too. He spoke too loudly and he jumbled his words. The Garstangs thought he was a simpleton and put him in an institution. They believed it was for his own good, but he was miserable until my father persuaded them to bring him back into the world. He taught Lionel to play chess and tried to help him to lipread, but Lionel’s sight was badly affected also. He was devoted to my father. If he had had a tail he would have wagged it off whenever they met. Lionel was so timid, but my father told him that he need never be afraid because his name meant young lion and everybody started to call him that.’ Cherry smiled at the memory. ‘Easterly was very fond of Lionel too. They would hiss and snarl playfully at each other whenever they met. He used to take Young Lion all over the house so that he could find his way around. After dusk Lionel could hardly see a thing.’
Sidney Grice sniffed his drink suspiciously. ‘Coffee is number four in my list of comestibles that smell better than they taste. This has a pleasant aroma and I live in joyous expectation that it will not be too unpleasant to ingest.’ He took a sip and put the cup down without passing judgement. ‘Miss Mortlock, I regret imperilling the excellent relationship which we have thus far enjoyed, but I discover myself revolted by the manner in which you have hidden vital evidence from me.’
Cherry received this attack with almost as much astonishment as I did.
‘I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.’ She scattered some sugar on its way to her coffee.
‘Why did you withhold the information that Master Lionel Engra was impervious to sonic stimulation?’ he demanded.
‘I did not think it important,’ she stammered.
Sidney Grice did not react to that last statement for so long that I was just about to ask if he had heard it when he said, ‘I shall provisionally accept your explanation for the time being.’
‘Thank you so much,’ she said sarcastically.
‘But, oh, Miss Mortlock, client and provider of acceptable beverages, if only you had thought in your feminine mind to grant me that knowledge from the outset, who knows what direction my investigations would have taken?’
‘But what difference would it have made?’ I poured my milk.
‘Were you not listening?’ Mr G watched himself in the back of his teaspoon. ‘You do not suffer from Master Lionel’s affliction. Who knows? Possibly none whatsoever.’ He took another tentative sample of his coffee. ‘I wish to see Mr Nathan Roptine Mortlock’s accounts, if not now, then within the next three minutes.’
65
✥
Double Entry and Blocked Drains
CHERRY MORTLOCK ADJUSTED her veil, which had fallen over her eyes.
‘Hesketh had been helping me to sort through them,’ she said distractedly.
‘Why not your solicitor or accountant?’ I asked.
‘I neither trust nor like the members of either profession.’ Suddenly Cherry sounded like my guardian.
‘How wise beyond your years,’ he mused fondly. ‘I wish I could say the same about Miss
Middleton.’
‘I think we have put everything you need in the study.’ She frowned sympathetically in my direction.
‘Indeed?’ Sidney Grice arose, leaning heavily on his cane. ‘Then we must proceed there without undue delay.’ He paused. ‘That coffee – in case you are anxiously awaiting my verdict – was of a superior quality and pleasingly hot but, when all is said and done, it was coffee.’
‘Your powers of observation knock mine into a cocked hat,’ I quoted – with some satisfaction but to Cherry’s puzzlement – and followed my godfather into the hallway.
Easterly rose but, at a signal from Sidney Grice, resumed his high seat. Hesketh was in the study, arranging stacks of documents. His left eye was almost closed now and his upper lip crusted in dried blood.
‘You really should let a doctor examine you,’ I advised, but the valet gestured in polite dismissal.
‘Is there a cure now for cuts and bruises, miss?’
‘There is not,’ I admitted.
Hesketh gathered a few documents and patted them into a neat pile.
‘Then my place is here, Miss Middleton. My mistress tells me that Mr Grice believes that Mr Nathan’s accounts might help him to track the murderer.’
‘Miss Mortlock told you nothing but the truth in that respect,’ Mr G confirmed, ‘though whether she has been mendacious in other respects I am unable to ascertain at present.’
‘If I could have one wish,’ Hesketh closed a drawer of the desk, ‘it is, when you do find the son of a—’ He choked back the word, though, of the three of us, only my guardian might have been shocked by it. ‘That I might have ten minutes alone with him.’
‘You may have as many wishes as you like, Austin Anthony Hesketh,’ Sidney Grice assured him, ‘but I cannot promise to grant them.’ He flicked through a thin cardboard file, folded it up again and dropped it on the darkly varnished floor. ‘I shall see what I can do.’
Hesketh’s right hand twitched. ‘Thank you, sir.’
The Secrets of Gaslight Lane Page 29
