Death Descends On Saturn Villa (The Gower Street Detective Series)

by M. R. C. Kasasian

  ‘I was horrified,’ he read out. ‘Why did Nettles write that?’

  ‘I expect he was,’ I suggested. ‘We all were.’

  ‘Yes.’ He turned the page. ‘But why is it relevant? I detest this modern mania for expressing feelings. It is vile enough that people have feelings in the first place without parading them about like prize Norfolk geese.’

  ‘They are men, not machines,’ Pound muttered, ever sensitive about any insult to his force.

  ‘More is the pity.’ Mr G skipped two pages. ‘We are given to believe that he was also shocked but,’ he raised his hand as if we were interrupting him, ‘it gives an honest account of his findings.’ He scrutinized the second document and sniffed it. ‘It appears that Mr Brough smokes whisky-flake pipe tobacco. The document must be in his own hand for it has none of the stilted style of an official document and he gives free reign to his emotions. He would have us believe that not only was he, too, horrified, but he was also shocked.’ He ran his finger under a sentence. ‘His cornucopia of passions then overflowed with his being appalled, shocked again and – I am sorry to relate – flabbergasted.’ He turned over. ‘Apparently Miss Middleton was wild-haired and frothing at the mouth.’

  ‘I dare say my coiffure was not at its tidiest,’ I protested, ‘but I was certainly not frothing.’

  ‘And you rolled your eyes,’ he informed me, ‘like the mad woman of Killarney with whom, I am loath to confess, I have yet to make acquaintance.’

  He blew on his black tea.

  ‘Can we go back to the first time you met your uncle?’ Pound brought out his smoking tin and unclipped the lid. ‘I am still not clear what happened there.’ He took a pinch of honey-coloured tobacco and rolled it between his fingers.

  ‘What happened is childishly obvious.’ Mr G replaced the papers. ‘Why it happened is more complicated.’

  ‘So tell me the childishly simple part,’ I invited.

  ‘Which bit do you not understand?’ He retied the string, taking great care to make the ends and the loops of equal size.

  ‘From the moment I felt ill to the moment I ran out of the house,’ I said. ‘I know I was poisoned by cacti.’

  ‘Were you?’ My guardian greeted my statement with fascination. ‘I must make a note of that.’ He reached for his notebook. ‘I wonder why Molly did not react when I gave her a sample.’

  ‘You will kill your maid one day,’ Pound prophesied.

  ‘I tried to test it on Spirit,’ Mr G defended himself, ‘but she would not take any.’ He picked up her ball of wool and tossed it from hand to hand.

  ‘She has more sense,’ I said. ‘I hope that is how you got the scratches on your wrist.’

  ‘It might be.’ He tugged at the end of the yarn.

  ‘Outwitted by a cat,’ Pound mocked gently.

  ‘Out-clawed,’ Sidney Grice conceded, separating the wool into filaments. ‘I do not know what poisoned you, and it is perhaps something that will remain occult and trouble me until the day I die. But five things struck me particularly in my inspection of that bedroom, the hall and the stairs.’ Sidney Grice took up his teacup and viewed me over the rim. ‘First, that there was not the slightest trace of blood, nor any evidence that it had been cleaned away.’

  ‘You commented that there was no dust under the bed,’ I recalled and he nodded.

  ‘Second…’ He sniffed the faintly rising steam. ‘There was wax on the window sill.’

  Just to prove he was not the only one who could play with threads, I tied a stray strand of cotton round a button on my dress. ‘Colwyn said they had no candles.’

  ‘And third?’ Inspector Pound watched him intently.

  My guardian tested the tea and wrinkled his lips. ‘The slight scuffs on the ceiling in a room with solid walls and a locked window were highly suspicious.’ He threw his head back to drain the cup, when even with milk I found mine too hot.

  ‘Suspicious of what?’ I asked, but he continued as if I had not spoken.

  ‘And the presence of dust – which Miss Middleton so accurately identified – on the hand of that obscene and inaccurate representation of a pagan libertine was almost conclusive.’

  ‘So what did you see in that room?’ I was feeling nauseous now and hoped all my symptoms were not about to recur.

  Sidney Grice sprang to his feet, though with less agility than usual, brushed past the inspector and fetched a clean white card to lay on the table. ‘What do you make of that?’ He had two test tubes in his waistcoat pocket and uncorked one to deposit a small brown object on to the card.

  Pound squinted. ‘A woodlouse but it’s seen better days.’

  ‘Oniscus Asellus, to give the creature its scientific name,’ Mr G confirmed. ‘And what is the most important thing about this particular woodlouse?’

  ‘It is dead,’ I guessed, but was ignored.

  ‘What about the legs?’ my guardian urged.

  ‘There are three more on one side,’ the inspector noted.

  ‘Or, to put it another way, three less on the starboard side, and here…’ Mr G tapped out another tube. ‘…are two of them.’

  ‘But you found the woodlouse on the attic stairs,’ I realized, ‘and the legs on the undersurface of the bed.’

  ‘So the bed was taken up and/or down the stairs,’ Inspector Pound deduced.

  ‘But there was thick dust on the steps,’ I objected, ‘and no footprints.’

  ‘Could they have laid something over the stairs and then removed it without disturbing the dust?’ the inspector pondered.

  ‘I suppose so,’ I said uncertainly, ‘though I don’t understand how they could have left no trace at all.’

  ‘Let us take a look.’ Mr G poured his sample on to the card where it formed a little grey hillock. ‘What did you notice as I deposited it?’

  ‘It did not puff up,’ I said.

  ‘And I could actually hear it,’ Pound added.

  ‘Take a pinch,’ my guardian urged and we both dipped our fingers in.

  ‘It is very gritty,’ I remarked.

  ‘And what were the walls and ceiling of that staircase made of?’ Mr G clicked his fingers at me.

  I thought back. ‘They were whitewashed plasterwork.’

  ‘So where did the grit come from?’ the inspector wondered.

  ‘Where indeed?’ Mr G prodded around the pile with the blunt end of his pencil. ‘See those red specks? They are brick dust.’

  ‘It is more like the deposit you might find in an outhouse or a cellar,’ I conjectured.

  ‘Quite so,’ Mr G agreed. ‘Also dust tends to deposit more at the sides than the middle, whereas this lay very evenly on the treads and, though the goat moth must have been dead for many months, since they fly in the early summer – and I have never known one to survive beyond the beginning of September – this particular example lay on and not in the dust.’

  ‘So you think the stairs were sprinkled with dirt more recently and the moth put on top.’

  ‘Clever finishing touches like that are often what give the game away.’ Mr G blew his pencil clean. ‘Nature is not so extravagant as people are with clues.’

  ‘What about the woodlouse?’ I asked.

  ‘That was partially covered, though it had died more recently than the moth,’ he told me.

  ‘So it dropped from the bed as the frame was carried down and before the stairs were sprinkled,’ Pound surmised.

  ‘But why were the walls not covered in blood?’ I asked. ‘It was everywhere.’

  ‘Let me answer that with two questions,’ Mr G countered. ‘First, why was the pipe to the gas lamp so long and, second, why could Travers Smyth not reach the window sill from the position which he so obligingly re-created for you?’

  ‘Is it possible,’ Pound sniffed his tobacco longingly, ‘that the room was somehow made smaller?’ He shed a few strands on to his trousers. ‘What about…’ He hesitated to share his thought. ‘This may sound fantastical, but what about if the walls were
fake?’

  ‘And the floor,’ I suggested. ‘That is why I tripped. It was raised. So when Uncle Tolly leaned against the false wall he could reach the window sill easily, and the gas pipe needed to be long for the mantle to be in the room.’

  ‘A room within a room,’ Pound cried out. ‘Then they removed the inner room and burnt it.’

  ‘Which is how sawdust got on the statue – they were carrying the scenery up and down – and of course…’ I continued. ‘Oh.’

  My guardian tilted his head. ‘I know that oh.’

  ‘Uncle Tolly told me he worked in a theatre once.’

  ‘How skilled you have become at withholding salient information.’

  ‘I do not suppose Miss Middleton realized—’

  ‘Indeed she did not.’ Sidney Grice’s voice was vinegar.

  I tried to retrieve a little honour. ‘So the scenery was burned in the furnace, which is why there were flecks of paint nearby and screws in the ashes… and Annie had a stiff back from helping to move it.’

  Pound shut the tin lid. ‘What about the wax?’

  ‘He had a false skull,’ I conjectured. ‘That was why I thought his head seemed a bit flat when you knocked his smoking cap off.’ I realized what I had said and added, ‘No, I did not think that was important either at the time.’

  ‘Let us put it down to your small intellect,’ Mr G said benevolently. ‘I knocked Travers Smyth’s cap off to examine the mark on his forehead – it was a burn.’

  ‘From hot wax.’ Pound tapped the box with his fingertips. ‘So presumably the smashed face and severed hand were wax too.’

  It was as if a photograph flashed into my mind.

  ‘The hand.’ I clicked my fingers. ‘It was not stained by ink.’

  ‘You have a rare gift of remembering things when they are no longer pertinent.’ Mr G toyed with the jackal-headed ring on his watch chain.

  ‘But why did he spill it?’ I asked.

  ‘To destroy his family tree?’ Pound suggested.

  My guardian looked at the ring sadly. ‘That would only have raised doubts as to its reliability.’ He pushed his little finger into it. ‘And it could easily have been redrawn. Most likely an accident.’ He dropped the ring as if it were molten. ‘It would seem that March is not the only member of her family to be physically uncoordinated.’

  ‘But I checked for a pulse on his right wrist.’ I forced myself to ignore his gibes. ‘And there was none.’

  ‘A tourniquet.’ Sidney Grice grasped his own arm. ‘His free left hand was under his nightgown, probably behind his back. He could tighten it at will.’

  ‘It takes a lot of pressure to cut off the pulse completely,’ I pointed out. ‘That is why his arm was sore when you met him.’ I refilled our cups. ‘But where did all the blood come from?’ I asked.

  ‘An abattoir,’ Pound suggested.

  ‘Or the man who became a skeleton in the boiler.’ I cradled my face at the thought.

  ‘I do not know that yet,’ Mr G told Pound, ‘though Miss Middleton’s idea is less likely than yours.’

  ‘I am glad you do not think they were that cruel.’ I yanked the thread and my button spun off. Luckily, it was purely ornamental. I watched it roll across the floor and under the desk, and Spirit darted out to play with it.

  ‘Oh, I suspect they were much crueller than that,’ my guardian said.

  ‘They?’ Pound queried and Mr G nodded.

  ‘One man could not have done all that. It would seem that feigning murder is a team game.’ He scratched at the fabric to attract my cat and she bounded over and sniffed his open hand. ‘Who on earth is that at the door?’

  ‘I did not hear the bell,’ I said.

  ‘Nor I, and my hearing is quite good,’ Pound added.

  ‘It would have to be truly exceptional to hear something which has not yet happened.’ Mr G dusted his chair with the hand towel and the bell sounded. ‘I saw their reflections in the window cast into and reflected off the mantle mirror, though not clearly enough to know who they are.’ He dabbed his forehead.

  Molly clattered up the hallway and we heard a man’s voice, muffled through the door, and Molly reply and some bumping, and Molly rushed in, her apron askew and her hair even more untamed than ever.

  ‘Why on earth are you dressed like that?’ Mr G scolded.

  Molly wriggled her nose. ‘But this is my uniform, sir.’

  Droplets were breaking out on his face again. ‘But why do you look like you have been engaged in pugilistic demonstrations?’

  ‘Is that good or bad?’ Molly whispered.

  ‘Not good,’ I told her and her hopes of praise visibly collapsed.

  ‘Why are you so dishevelled?’

  ‘Untidy,’ Pound translated for her.

  ‘I’ve been fighting,’ she announced, bunching up her arms as if challenging any or all of us to slug it out.

  ‘We will talk about that later, Molly,’ I assured her. ‘Who is at the door?’

  ‘There is a pair of two gentlemen come, sir.’

  ‘Who?’ Mr G snapped. ‘Where are their cards?’

  ‘They didn’t not say nor not give me none, sir.’ She adopted a pugilistic pose.

  ‘Then what is their business?’

  ‘I asked them that,’ Molly unclenched her fists, ‘and they told me to mind my own.’

  ‘Then why in heaven’s name did you admit them?’ He gripped the air in frustration.

  ‘I didn’t not,’ Molly retorted. ‘They pushed past me.’

  ‘And you just let them?’ His voice rose angrily. ‘You should defend the access of my house to the death, you great clumping useless slovenly sluggard. It is in the unwritten code of servitude.’

  ‘I ain’t not read that,’ Molly confessed miserably. ‘Shall I go out and defend your axes to the death now, sir?’

  ‘No. Tidy all these up.’ Her master kicked one of the blankets towards her. ‘I cannot bear them lying around the floor like that.’ He swept back his hair. ‘I shall deal with this myself.’

  If truth be told, I was not sure he was capable of dealing with anything. His face was drained of colour and trickling sweat.

  ‘Oh, and one of them is all dressed up like a peeler,’ she remembered as he flung open the door.

  ‘We’ll see about that.’ Inspector Pound marched after my guardian. ‘You,’ I heard him say in surprise.

  I hurried out to join them and found Inspector Quigley standing with a tall, muscular young constable behind him.

  ‘How dare you burst into my house in that revolting neck tie?’ Sidney Grice confronted him.

  ‘My wife gave it me for my birthday.’ Quigley tightened it indignantly.

  ‘Then she must loathe you almost as much as I do,’ Mr G snapped. ‘Explain yourself.’

  Quigley held up a twice-folded sheet of headed notepaper. ‘I have here a warrant for the arrest of one March Middleton.’

  Pound stepped in front of me. ‘I don’t know what you are playing at, Inspector, but as you are well aware, Miss Middleton has been given bail by the court.’

  ‘For the murder of Mrs Prendergast,’ Quigley agreed, ‘though I have every confidence she will be convicted of that in due course of time.’ He tapped Pound on the chest with the document. ‘If you will step aside, Inspector, I have a job to do. This warrant is for the wilful murder of Mrs Prendergast’s maid, Miss Gloria Shell.’

  72

  Flat-footed Peter and Her Majesty’s Mail

  INSPECTOR POUND WAS the first to break the shocked silence. ‘Is this some sort of a joke?’ He laid an arm protectively over his wound.

  An odd smirk crept across his colleague’s flecked lips. ‘Miss Middleton is usually the comic turn, but I don’t suppose she will have too much to laugh about from now on.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ I stepped out to face Quigley. ‘You interviewed that girl yourself a few hours ago. You told me how pretty she was.’

  The smirk tightened tartly. ‘
Well, she isn’t very pretty now.’

  ‘When did this occur?’ Sidney Grice had one hand on the hall table for support.

  ‘About an hour ago.’

  Pound snorted contemptuously. ‘Miss Middleton has been in police custody or with me or in this house since yesterday afternoon.’

  ‘So you say,’ Quigley jibbed.

  Pound stiffened. ‘Are you accusing a fellow officer of lying?’

  Quigley made a calming gesture calculated to have the opposite effect. ‘Of course not, Inspector. It‘s just that you were not with the accused while you were at the station.’

  ‘As Inspector Pound has just explained, I was here,’ I said.

  ‘And can Mr Grice vouch for that?’ Quigley cross-examined me.

  Sidney Grice was breathing heavily. ‘I was asleep some of the time,’ he conceded.

  ‘You were in a state of disarray when I saw you last,’ Quigley remarked to me.

  ‘What has that got to do with anything?’ Pound paced to and fro.

  ‘A great deal.’ Quigley slipped the document into his pocket. ‘The suspect has obviously bathed and changed, which means she was by herself for some time.’

  ‘No, she weren’t not,’ Molly piped up. ‘I was with her the whole time.’

  ‘Molly—’ I began.

  ‘Shut your mouth.’ Quigley snapped his fingers at me.

  ‘How dare you speak to Miss Middleton like that?’ Pound rounded on him.

  ‘I am questioning a murder suspect,’ Quigley replied coldly, ‘not taking afternoon tea with a duchess.’ He stuck a finger in Molly’s arm and she bristled as if ready for the second round. ‘So did you wash your mistress’s back?’

  ‘’Course I did,’ Molly said defiantly.

  Quigley kept his pale eyes fixed on me to make sure I did not coach her.

  ‘And was her back still bleeding from those three scratches?’

  Molly wrinkled her nose. ‘A bit, p’raps, maybe, p’raps,’ she decided.

  Quigley’s arm fell. ‘Shall I get a police surgeon to ascertain whether or not you have any scratches on your back?’