The Calico Cat (A Jules Poiret Mystery Book 8)

by Frank Howell Evans

  His mind went back to his time as a consulting detective in London. The case involved a young lieutenant, who had worked for Poiret at his detective bureau. He later joined the War Department. Poiret knew he had done the right thing. Afterwards, after the news broke. For a while he was actually contemplating leaving England. That was until his good friend Sir Herbert talked to him about the machinations behind the scenes. He told Poiret that reactionary forces had banded together to bring down the government. He was just a pawn at their disposal. They wished to bring down a democratically elected government to be more precisely. When Sir Herbert explained what was happening in those terms, Poiret understood what was actually happening. It had nothing to do with him. It was about democracy. That was when he decided to fight back no matter what. If he had left England, the coup would’ve succeeded. He couldn’t tell this to anybody at the time. The country was divided. The citizens wouldn’t understand. It was a coup attempt, no matter what the newspapers said at the time.

  As a detective, Poiret understood all about covert operations. For months his adversaries had thrown everything they could at him. The covert operations did not just involve smearing the adversary in the newspapers. What the operations did was confuse, change and detract from the other person’s message. The adversaries were masters at this. Every time Poiret came up with a new theory, their newspapers would clutter the air with paranoid stories about his supposed past and allegiance. So instead of talking about his investigation he was forced to defend himself and talk about what he knew to be nonsense.

  The local newspapers showed images of Lady Gloria Haslemere’s funeral on their front pages. The men and women in the pictures were identified as Reginald Haslemere and his fiancée, Lady Gloria’s sister, Saundra and the dour housekeeper. Poiret recognized policeman Dennis Ritchie standing in between several people he didn’t know. One of the newspapers reported that the fiancée had been released from jail and that all charges against her had been withdrawn. Reginald Haslemere was able to tell the police that it was he, who had given her the rings and that he had received the jewelry from his mother as a wedding present. Another newspaper reported the fiancée as telling the police that she and Reginald had broken up on the night of the murder, but that they had since made up and that the wedding was back on again. The police found a telephone operator, who had overheard her telling Reginald on the morning after the burglary that she was leaving him. Reginald told them that they had spent the whole night together on the beach looking at the stars.

  The more newspaper stories Poiret read, the more confusing the case became. He decided to go back to the scene of the crime as that would be the best way to come up with the most accurate theory about how the burglary happened.

  Poiret asked Sarah to drive him to the Haslemere mansion. He disliked driving himself and with his recent fall, he did not wish to get caught in a fainting spell while he was driving. When they arrived at the mansion, the housekeeper let them in. Poiret asked her how she was doing. “Fine, sir,” she answered unemotionally. She was her dour old self it seemed. Poiret asked her about her plans. She told him curtly that Reginald first offered to retire her, but that she had persuaded him to let her stay. She led them to Lady Gloria’s bedroom. Poiret asked her to describe what she had seen on the morning she found Lady Haslemere.

  She hesitated for a moment as a sligh smile almost invisible to the untrained eye found a home on the corners of her mouth. She told him that Lady Gloria was lying on the floor on her stomach and that the door of the cabinet was open. Poiret asked her about the window and she seemed to be looking for words for a moment. Finally she told him that the window had been open. She quickly followed this up by saying that she had a lot of work to do. She left the bedroom quickly.

  Sarah looked at Poiret with a frown on her face. Poiret however was already walking to the window. He opened it. There were no signs of use force anywhere. Poiret moved to the cabinet and opened the door and studied it for a while. It still had the same damage as he had seen before. He walked to the canopy bed. Poiret saw Tommy, the calico cat sitting on the bed. He was following Poiret’s movements with his eyes. As Poiret approached the bed he sprang on the floor and slowly walked to the curtain. After every few steps he looked up at Poiret as if to make sure he was still looking at him. Sarah looked at the cat and said in a voice that showed both amazement and excitement, “Mister Poiret, it is as if he wants to show you something.” Tommy went to the left side of the bed and rubbed his body against it. The canopy curtain moved slightly. Behind the curtain Poiret saw several buttons. “Qu’est-ce que c’est?” he asked, putting his gold rimmed glasses on. He examined the buttons closely. He pushed on one of them and the lights in the bedroom turned on automatically. He pushed another button. It turned on the fan on the ceiling. As it moved it blew cold air into the room. Poiret pushed another button, but nothing happened. Poiret pushed it several times, but still nothing happened. “It must be broken,” said Sarah. Then, as if to put lie to her words the housekeeper entered the bedroom and asked Poiret whether he needed something. Tommy immediately ran out of the room. Poiret replied, “Non, Madame.” She said that she heard the bell ring. She looked at the fan on the ceiling and shivered. She glanced at the buttons. She asked Poiret if she could turn off the fan. Poiret asked her why it was blowing such cold air into the room. “I’d be the last one to know anything about these modern appliances,” she said, looking from the buttons to the door and back. She added, “Lady Gloria always kept her room warm, because she didn’t want to get cold, her gout and the arthritis, sir. The cold air could’ve been the end of her.” She looked at Poiret intently. Poiret thanked her for her hospitality and taking Sarah’s arm he left the mansion. He was more confused about how the crime had been committed that dark night than he was when he arrived.

  He asked Sarah to telephone the local newspaper when they arrived home. He wished to find out what the weather had been like during that night. After holding for ten minutes, Sarah received the answer to her question from the weather desk. It had been a nice moderately warm night.

  A week later Poiret received a letter from Lady Gloria’s sister. She invited him and Mrs. Diss to her nephew’s wedding. Poiret looked at the image, which was included in the invitation. On it were Reginald Haslemere, smiling, his aunt, also looking happy and the fiancée, looking sad, as if she had no desire to be there. The scene was quite revealing. It put all the puzzle pieces into place. Poiret grinned.

  Sarah, who had handed him the letter as he was trimming the rose bushes in the garden, asked him whether he would go to the wedding as she needed to make sure his suit was clean and presentable. Poiret looked up at her and smiled, “There will be no wedding, ma chere Sarah,” he said. Sarah looked confused. Poiret handed her the image. “Please to take a look, Sarah,” said Poiret invitingly. Sarah looked at the image. “I don’t see anything out of the ordinary, Mister Poiret,” she told him. Poiret put his garden gloves on. After picking up his garden scissors he continued cutting the dead leaves from the rose bushes. He said, “The fiancée, Sarah, she stole the rings and the son murdered his mother.” Sarah’s mouth opened in a sign, which could only be interpreted as of sheer amazement. “That cannot be correct!” She closed her mouth quickly and put her hand on it. She seemed shocked at her own words. Poiret raised his head and said, “Qu’est-ce que tu dit?” He did not believe his ears. “What did you say?” he repeated as he moved closer to her, still holding the garden scissors in his hand. Sarah winced. “I said,” lied Sarah, “that I had never thought of that.” Poiret nodded, still looking at her suspiciously. She decided to use what she knew worked best on him. “How did you find out, Mister Poiret,” she asked. Poiret’s face instantly changed colors. He nodded contently.

  “The fiancée, she has always only been interested in Reginald for the money,” he commenced his explanation, taking his garden gloves off and pouring himself a glass of lemonade, which Sarah had put on a table in the shade. “On the even
ing of her death, Lady Haslemere, she loans to the fiancée some of her jewelry, so that she can wear them during the dinner party. Lady Gloria, she is adamant that the fiancée, she makes a good impression on the guests. After the party Lady Haslemere, she goes back to her bedroom. She is exhausted and she goes to bed. She has given to the fiancée the key to the cabinet and she asks her to put the jewels back inside, when she is ready after the party. The fiancée, she sees all the jewels inside the cabinet and cannot stop herself from stealing some of them.”

  Sarah looked at Poiret with bated breath. Poiret took a sip from his glass. He avoided Sarah’s eyes. They demanded more, but Poiret wished to take his time. Poiret had learned as a detective in London something Lady Haslemere as the wife of a rich businessman never had. Young women didn’t become dancers, the sort the fiancée was, because they were in need of money, because if it was money they were after they could just as easily find employment in a grocery shop. No these women were after something psychological.

  As a celebrated detective, Poiret had been approached many times by philanthropists asking him to donate to the homeless. Poiret would invariably donate money. One Christmas Poiret let himself be talked into going onto the streets of London to feed the homeless in person. He soon found out that the homeless weren’t people, who were in need of a job. Most of them were schizophrenics, who had maladies, which required their immediate institutionalization in an insane asylum on one of the moors. Poiret refused to feed the homeless again except by writing out a check.

  Poiret had a lot to learn, when he became a policeman. It was one of the most exciting times in his life. He had never forgotten that. He had a world class brain and he was full of ideas how to change the work policemen did. He walked too far ahead of the rank and file, though. He made one big mistake. He never took the time to educate them on why policing had to change or at least couldn’t stay the same. This was a mistake a lot of change agents made. They assumed everyone understood that the changes they desired were for the good of the population and when the majority of the population didn’t want their changes, they became angry and frustrated with them. Poiret had no other choice at the time than to leave the police force and become an independent private detective.

  Poiret continued explaining how the drama unfolded. After she had stolen the jewels the fiancée had left the house and telephoned Reginald after he arrived home that morning to tell him she was breaking off their engagement. He went to his mother’s bedroom to find out if anything had happened between her and his fiancée.

  He found his mother anxiously looking for her missing jewels. She must have accused the fiancée of stealing the jewels and told Reginald she would call the police and have her arrested. Reginald must’ve snapped and hit her on the back of her head with a blunt instrument as she was walking to the telephone. She fell to the floor. She was moaning and asking for help as the blow to her head was not lethal. Instead of telephoning for help, Reginald decided to murder her.

  Sarah shook her head in anger, disbelief and disgust. Poiret did not let up. He continued, “Poiret does not think even he could be so heartless as to murder his own mother with his own hands, so he decides to turn on the ceiling fan and makes sure the air coming in is as cold as possible. His mother, she has the health problems and it does not take long for hypothermia to set in. She was after all only dressed in the nightgown.”

  Reginald stayed with his mother until she stopped breathing. He then turned off the fan and damaged the door of the cabinet to make it look like a burglary. It was only then that he called the housekeeper and asked her to telephone for help. He remembered the window and as soon as the housekeeper was out of the room he opened the window to make it look like the cold air outside had murdered his mother. Above all though, he wished to explain the route the burglar had taken into and out of the house. The mind of a scientist was at work here. Every question needed an answer.

  When Sarah asked him why he had to murder his mother Poiret shrugged. It was impossible to know why. “He did the unthinkable deed to protect his fiancée,” he said. Saundra Wilmer had already told him that the boy was not like other boys. No matter how much his mother wished he was healed, his ailments were still there, invisible to the eye. Poiret took another sip of his lemonade. He then proceeded to carefully wipe his mouth and then his forehead with his handkerchief. Sarah waited impatiently for her employer to talk again. He did. “What is for certain is that he lied to the police to hide the fact that his fiancée, she stole the rings. He may have even told to his fiancée that she was to blame for his mother’s death. What is also certain is that he blackmailed her into coming back to him and marrying him.” Sarah shook her head slowly, when he concluded his explanation. She threw her hands in the air and said, “This is just so incredible. So he murdered his mother to blackmail his fiancée into coming back to him?” Poiret carefully put his garden gloves on. He picked up the garden scissors and walked slowly to the rose bushes. “Poiret, he does not know, Sarah,” he said. “Poiret knows that he did it and how he did it. It is the work of the psychoanalysts in the insane asylums to find out why he did it. Poiret, he can only guess and even that he does not wish to do.” Poiret waved his hand in the air as if trying to clear the air of the odious thought of murdering one’s own mother.

  In the afternoon, after leaving poor Sarah sitting on hot coals for hours to punish her for questioning him, Poiret raised his head from amongst the rose bushes. He smiled at seeing Sarah coming his way for the so-manieth time, hesitating and then walking away. He decided to end her torture by asking her to telephone Constable Ritchie. She smiled broadly. Her eyes showed relief and gratitude. Poiret had no problem convincing the talkative, but above all very ambitious policeman that his suspicions were worthy of further investigation. He telephoned back after five hours to inform Poiret that the police had arrested Reginald Haslemere and his fiancée. They had found blood on one of Reginald’s telescopes.

  It was many months later. It was autumn. Reginald Haslemere had been sentenced to life in a mental institution. His fiancée received one year imprisonment for theft. Her sentence was reduced on appeal, because she had helped the police. She had cajoled Reginald into confessing that he had murdered his meddlesome mother, because he didn’t want to lose her. Constable Ritchie had been promoted to sergeant.

  Poiret was sitting in front of the window in his salon gazing at the garden. The leaves had fallen off the trees, the rose bushes were bare and it was raining. Poiret regretted not going through with his plan to build a gazebo in the garden. He did talk to Mrs. Diss about building one, but she said, “Why? You already have your room.” Poiret looked at Bellevue and Albert. He said, “Poiret has to talk to Mrs. Diss again about this matter.” They twittered happily in response. He smiled. Looking back at the garden he noticed something. He stood up from his chair and went closer to the window. “Qu’est-ce que est?” he asked. He put his glasses on. There were pears in the pear tree.

  The End

  The Jules Poiret Mystery Series

  Jules Poiret in The Murder of Lady Malvern

  Jules Poiret in Lord Hammershield dies

  Jules Poiret in Sir Alexander dies

  Jules Poiret and The Brighton Bounder

  Jules Poiret in The Murder in Torquay

  Silent Rivers Bleed

  The House of Cards Came Tumbling Down

  Jules Poiret in Secrets

  Peril

  The Calico Cat