Hijinks & Murder

by Beth Byers

  “Shall I go for Indian food?” he asked.

  She waited. He’d come to her, which meant there was something in the letter he would rather she not know, but he knew she wasn’t going to stand for him wrapping her in wool as he clearly wanted. It took only a look for that understanding to pass between them.

  He closed his eyes. “It was a claim of murder.”

  Vi paused, shocked. “And? They want us to investigate? Rather than the professionals?”

  “You, actually,” Jack corrected. “Not me. If some nameless fellow thinks they’re going to haul you into a murder investigation alone, they just might incite a second murder.”

  Violet laughed. “Are you offended they asked for me?” She was relieved that they hadn’t requested Jack.

  He shook his head with a frown.

  “Who was murdered?” she asked.

  “A man named Olly Rees.”

  “What?” Violet gasped. “Rees?”

  “Yes, I noted the coincidence, too. The same day you meet an old friend who has married into the Rees family you also receive a letter about the possible murder of a man bearing the same name.”

  “It wasn’t signed, was it?” Violet asked, holding out her hand and Jack handed the letter over.

  Dear Lady Violet,

  I turn to you with great horror and hope that the tales of your kindness have not been exaggerated. It has become clearer and clearer to me over the last days that a terrible crime has occurred. Olly Rees died recently. He was quite old, however, he was also quite mobile and strong. His sudden death was attributed to age by all involved, but I cannot believe the same.

  It is my opinion that Olly was murdered. I have heard tales of your cleverness and ability to sleuth out the truth. Won’t you help us? Help him? He was a good fellow who deserved better than he received. Won’t you prevent a murderer from getting away with their crime and set this family to rights?

  Signed,

  A Concerned Family Member

  Jack sat down next to her, taking the letter and reading it over again.

  “You don’t believe this is a coincidence,” she said to him, her stomach sinking, “and I don’t either. Mrs. Stevens did say she was going to invite me to a house party. It was a rather sudden declaration. Maybe this is why.”

  Jack shook his head. “I’d hate to put my foot down, darling—”

  Violet choked on the waterfall of sarcasm that wanted to pour from her mouth. He was the one who’d been shot. Though, she had to admit she’d been in a few near-misses herself. Instead, she looked at him, remembered how very much she loved him and said, “You won’t have to, of course.”

  The relaxing of his stiffness was just what she wanted to see. She placed her hand over his and then waited until he turned to her.

  “Why would we go?” he asked. “An imagined crime and a waste of our time.”

  Violet considered. “Thinking back, I suspect that Mrs. Stevens might also believe that this Olly was murdered. She said she’d asked Miss Allen about us. Why would any woman who didn’t know us do so?”

  “Odd that you ran into them at the tea shop,” Jack agreed. “Odd that the old woman knew who you were and had already inquired after you.”

  “Odd, yes. But what if we were going to get this letter regardless? What if she was pursuing information about us—” She grinned and amended it to, “me—regardless?”

  “Or,” Jack guessed, “what if there is more than one person who suspected murder? What if your friend was thinking it and then saw you at the tea shop and jumped at the opportunity to speak with you? At the same time, Mrs. Stevens was suspecting foul play and asked her friend, Miss Allen, about who might be able to help her?”

  “I think the question is whether we also believe that the man was murdered.”

  Jack laid back, pulling her down beside him so they were both facing the ceiling. “I don’t know about that and I don’t know about whether we should allow ourselves to be pulled in.”

  Playing the devil’s advocate, Violet asked. “If we refuse the invitation and there was a murder, will we be haunted by not doing something?”

  They both knew they would be though neither of them admitted it.

  “But can we allow ourselves to be pulled into any random claim of murder when someone doesn’t want to believe their relative shouldn’t be dead?”

  Violet didn’t disagree and she didn’t have any real fondness for her school chum, Phoebe, and no connection to the rest of the family. But she did think she might end up being haunted if there were reason to believe that he was murdered and the chance to discover what happened had passed.

  Vi turned onto her side and snuggled closer to Jack. “I think we should find out what we can about Olly Rees and then decide.”

  Jack considered this and Violet could see the need in his gaze to avoid being trapped again, but he nodded. “You have too bright of an imagination, darling. I can see you imagining the old man being killed and the family laughing in the background.”

  Violet laughed, but he was right. “The young heroine wishing to help, yet unable to discover how and why and so denied the chance to proceed. Haunted for the rest of her life.”

  “Her life?”

  Violet rolled her eyes at him.

  He snorted. “Fine then, her life. They asked only for you. You saw them at the tea. One of the women there must have been the one who asked for your help.”

  Violet pressed a kiss on his chin and suggested that an omelet, bread, coffee and cheese were worth staying in on a such a rainy day. “Since a man would never ask a woman for help.”

  “I suppose we can look into it,” Jack said kindly.

  Violet suppressed a triumphant grin.

  “And then tomorrow we hunt down your father.”

  Vi scrunched her nose.

  “If this Mrs. Stevens knew your mother and grandmother, she knows your father. He may well know more about Olly Rees or know someone who knew him.”

  “Fine,” Violet said, huffing and then followed him to the kitchens. The house was mostly empty with it being the servants’ half-day. There was a daily maid to answer the door and make coffee, but the rest of the live-in servants were out. Violet and Jack made themselves a meal by grabbing what looked good from the kitchens and taking it up to their bedroom for a picnic by the fire.

  Chapter 4

  Vi had to admit she struggled with her feelings for her father. She both loved him and found him disappointing. As a father, he’d been distant to non-existent in her life. But he’d also handed her and Victor to their aunt. Aunt Agatha was able to cut through their grief for their mother and help them be children again. It was an act of ineffable love, but it also hurt to realize that he’d let go after that. Regardless, he was her father and she knew he cared.

  “Father,” Violet said, leaning down to kiss his cheek and then sitting in the chair that Jack pulled out for her. “How are you?”

  She listened as he discussed her brother, Geoffrey, her stepmother, and his cronies. When the waiter appeared, she ordered a Bee’s Knees, feeling like a little honey might make the sourness of discussing potential murder a little easier.

  Once the waiter left, her fathered huffed. “What’s wrong?”

  Violet paused, realizing her heart was warmed by his question. He was ready to help. “Jack and I have been drawn into an oddness and we were wondering if you could give us some insight.”

  “Oddness?” Father asked.

  “Violet was drawn in,” Jack told her father with a laugh. “She was asked to help with a recent death that someone thinks may have been murder.”

  “Someone or some she? Of course it must be a woman, but Vi does have a reputation for cleverness.” Her father smiled and then he grew serious before he asked, “Was it for Olly Rees?”

  Violet and Jack both turned to him, mouths dropped as they stared. “How did you know?”

  “I don’t care if that man was in his eighties,” Father said without answering.
“He was as strong as a horse and his father lived to a hundred. The last time I saw him, we were hunting, and I couldn’t keep up with the codger. He was sprightly, completely mentally aware, and as savvy as he was in his twenties, if I had to guess.”

  “Was he really?” Violet asked. “Why was it determined to not be murder then?”

  “Any reasonable police officer,” Jack said, “would have looked at the death of a man in his eighties and assumed it was age if there were no overt signs of murder. Why wouldn’t it be? I assume he wasn’t stabbed or shot.”

  “No, of course not,” the earl replied. He sighed deeply, the most emotion he’d shown about the death of this supposed friend. “Perhaps it was necessary to know him and see him moving about. I’d bet my last pound he was murdered or something else untoward happened. A terrible accident, perhaps, but why would anyone cover that up?”

  When the waiter returned, they discussed the weather until the drinks were set before them, so their conversation would remain private, but Violet was turning over the new information in her mind. Having more than simply a name, getting pieces that put together Olly Rees as a living person made the possibility of his murder so much worse.

  She could so easily imagine some older gent out-walking her father while hunting partridges or whatever her father hunted. It wasn’t a sport that Violet had any desire to delve into.

  “Why would anyone kill your friend?” Violet asked after the waiter left. She took a healthy sip of her drink, which had been mixed perfectly, but honey still wasn’t enough to sooth the bitter taste that came from speaking of murder—especially with her father who left her on edge and a bit sour anyway.

  “I don’t know,” the earl replied. “He was well enough off, but I don’t imagine the money—even before death duties—it was not enough to murder over. His two sons are the likely inheritors, possibly with a small amount for each of his grandchildren.”

  “Are they in need, do you think?” Jack asked. “The money will always be the first motive for a rich fellow like this man.”

  “I believe they are both quite fine financially. Unless there was some secret, desperate need, he was a good man and a good father. I can’t imagine either of his sons hurting him for a small increase.” He let the thought trail off.

  Violet bit down on her bottom lip. “Meredith killed Aunt Agatha for less reason than that.”

  Her father reached out and took her hand. “Meredith wasn’t normal, Vi.”

  She stared at her cocktail, hiding her rush of fury. “No one who is normal kills another person. Meredith knew she wasn’t going to inherit a fortune and she killed for barely anything.”

  The earl sighed. “Meredith killed to escape her untenable life and stole something from you that can’t be replaced. Vi—”

  Violet frowned, withdrawing her hand from his, not wanting to hear what he would say. The platitudes never helped.

  He was bothered by the way she yanked her hand back. She could see it in him. The little crumbs of affection he sent her way were never enough to satisfy her need for a father, so they just hurt more.

  “There isn’t an apology for Aunt Agatha being killed. Nothing makes it better. I don’t understand. It doesn’t matter how many people I see murdered by those in their lives who are supposed to love them—I don’t understand it. I would never, ever kill anyone for money or for any other reason. What possible reason could someone have to kill your friend? Because I don’t understand. No matter how many times I see it, I can’t understand. Especially some kindly old man.”

  The earl looked to Jack as if he could translate why Violet was so upset and then carefully asked her, “Why are you so upset? You didn’t know him, Vi.”

  Violet stared. “Does it not matter because I couldn’t see the effect this has on people who knew and loved him? I might not have known him, but it doesn’t have to be only the death of a friend to affect me. It ruins whatever joy I can scrape together to think of someone grieving a loss, especially one that needn’t have happened. You are here, you’re alive. Olly isn’t. Someone took that from him and they stole from those who loved him all the time that they might have had together.”

  Violet rose and walked away from the table, knowing that she had lost control of her emotions. She heard Jack say, “Some old woman asked Violet callously about Agatha yesterday. Vi is still—” Jack trailed off and her father’s reply was too low to hear. Violet kept walking. It was like an unholy rage was rushing through her, prickling her veins from inside of her body, and she was furious all over again about losing Aunt Agatha let alone every death that had come thereafter.

  The truth was—if she were being selfish and unkind—how this man’s death brought up the murder of the woman who raised Violet. There just wasn’t an easy way to get over that. You didn’t forget that the woman who you adored and looked up to over the course of your life was stabbed in her office by someone she loved.

  Violet headed towards the ladies’ room to cool down. She approached the mirror, turned on the cold water and let it run over her wrists. The prickling behind her skin wasn’t lessening and Violet closed her eyes, breathing in slowly and letting it out even slower. Slow breaths, counting, cold water, and too long of a time and Violet was almost afraid she wouldn’t be able to cool down.

  She stared at herself in the mirror, ignoring the attendant. Someone had murdered Olly Rees just as Meredith had murdered Violet’s aunt. Possibly. Had that person possibly poisoned his after-dinner drink? Put arsenic in his sweets? Held a pillow over his face? When she imagined the amorphous old man the vision of him faded into a version of her aunt. The limbs twitching under the pillow were Aunt Agatha’s and even though Agatha was already dead, Violet was nauseated at the image. She shuddered and closed her eyes again. She didn’t want to think these things. She wished she could be one of those bright young things who only thought about clothes, lovers, and parties.

  Finally, the rage started to flee. She deliberately considered the dress she had bought earlier. It wasn’t anything to keep in her mind, but whatever it took to refocus her mind. It took too long to cool down and by the time she left the ladies’ room, her father was waiting in the hall.

  “I was worried.”

  “I’m fine,” she lied blatantly. His gaze didn’t sharpen at all, and she realized he had no idea what was going through her mind.

  “It’s not fine, Vi. Neither what happened to Agatha nor perhaps what happened to Olly.”

  Violet shook her head. She had just calmed down. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Olly wasn’t incredibly wealthy,” her father said, taking on a business tone, “but he did have a nice little country house with an excellent wood nearby, some money in savings, and a few collectibles that would have been worth killing over.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean he’s from an old enough family that it’s possible they’re passing around priceless heirlooms. To so many of our kind, people are handing down art that was bought by the grandmother and painted by a Renaissance master.”

  Violet’s brows lifted and she considered. It felt possible. After all, she’d inherited art and jewelry. When she saw some of the art, she didn’t think of the painter even if it was one of the ancient masters. Vi thought of looking at it in Aunt Agatha’s bedroom and the memory of days with her aunt. She never measured the value of the painting. Not ever.

  Violet followed her father back to the table and found Jack sipping her Bee’s Knees. His gaze was worried as it moved from Violet to her father and then back to Vi. She smiled slightly at him and then at her father. Only her father believed her expression was not a lie.

  Violet returned to her seat. “What can you tell us about Mr. Rees’ family?” she asked calmly though her insides were still jittery.

  “There’s the sister. The Stevens woman you apparently met. Jack told me,” he added. “There are several sons. I think they’re all married. Perhaps a daughter. There is a new generation of g
randchildren. I believe that he lost his wife a few years ago. I suppose that any of them might be expecting to receive something.”

  Violet’s stomach was too sour for the cocktail, and she rubbed her brow before sipping from her water. “Must it only be family?”

  “He died in his home around the holidays,” her father replied. “I would suspect that several good friends could have been visiting as well.”

  Her father glanced at her meaningfully as Vi’s own house was full of friends during Christmas.

  “Perhaps,” Violet agreed.

  “Olly was a friend of mine and his friends are mine as well. I’ll track his closest down at my club to see what we can find out about who might have been there.”

  Violet sighed. All that would do was give them a list of who could have killed the old man. Her father, though, was not shying away from involving himself in the matter, even agreeing quickly that it had to be murder, which told Violet that she hadn’t been foolish to pursue this.

  “Where did he die?”

  “He was found dead in his bed.” The earl shuddered. “The indignity of killing a man in his bed. It’s not to be born.”

  Violet’s dark look had him shuffling a bit.

  “It is cruel to kill a man in his bed. One wants to be shot down—some sort of warrior’s death—or die peacefully surrounded by your children.” Jack’s comment was an attempt to smooth things between father and daughter but it was unsuccessful.

  Both of them were too stubborn for that. The tension between them hadn’t faded in months and Violet supposed that it would eventually die a long, lingering death. Violet tried a smile, but even the earl could see it was a false attempt.

  Finally, she said, “I haven’t been myself since we got back to London.”

  “Are you well?” he asked her with a concern that she was catty enough to enjoy. She hated that she needed these little signs that he cared about her, but she did. Her sister, Isolde, never worried in the least about proof of their father’s love. Nor did Gerald, her oldest brother. It was the burden of Violet, her twin Victor, and their youngest brother, Geoffrey.