Edwardian Murder Mystery 02; Hasty Death emm-2

by M C Beaton

  The teacup rattled nervously on the baker’s knee. “You don’t mean…”

  “No, silly. I mean I’ve a good mind to phone the Daily Mail and expose her. That way she’d be socially ruined and the captain wouldn’t even look at her.”

  Mr Jones was a round-shouldered greying man with small black eyes almost hidden in creases of fat. The delicate chair he was sitting on creaked alarmingly under his weight as he leaned forward. “I don’t think that would be a good idea,” he said, his sing-song voice betraying his Welsh origins.

  “Why?”

  “Because this captain ain’t in top society. I mean, he’s put himself in trade. As it stands, Lady Rose’s parents would never give their blessing. But if she was socially ruined, why then, she would be on a par with him.”

  “I never thought of that. It’s so good to have a man around to advise me. I do worry about Dora. I would like to see her married before I get married again myself.” She glanced roguishly at the baker.

  “As to that,” said Mr Jones, turning red, “I have a proposition to make.”

  Mrs Jubbles put one thin old hand up to her bosom. “Oh, Mr Jones!”

  “Yes. See, I’ve a mind to ask Dora myself.”

  “Dora!” screeched Mrs Jubbles. “My Dora! Her what’s meant for the captain. Get out of here and don’t come back.”

  Mr Jones stood up and laid his teacup down on a side table which had just been beyond his reach.

  “I was only trying to help,” he said huffily.

  Mrs Jubbles raised her trembling black-lace-mittened hands and shouted, “Out! Out! Out!”

  And so Mr Jones left, bewildered, not knowing that Mrs Jubbles had believed his visits were because he was enamoured of her.

  Madly, she blamed this Lady Rose. Things had been going so well before she appeared on the scene.

  ♦

  Harry decided to call on Lord Alfred Curtis to start his investigations. Lord Alfred lived in a house in Eaton Terrace. His manservant answered the door and took Harry’s card. He studied it and then ushered Harry into one of those ante-rooms off the front hall reserved for tradesmen and other hoi polloi.

  Harry reflected ruefully that even society’s servants knew he had sunk to trade.

  He waited and waited. At last the door opened and Lord Alfred swanned in, wrapped in a brightly coloured oriental dressing-gown. “You woke me,” he said by way of greeting, but Harry noticed that the young man had shaved and that his thick brown hair was smarmed down with Macassar oil. Lord Alfred yawned and said, “What’s this about?”

  “It’s about the death of Freddy Pomfret.”

  Alfred composed his thin face and heavy-lidded eyes into what he obviously considered was the correct mask of mourning. “Poor fellow. Commit suicide, did he?”

  “No, he was shot.”

  “Terribly, frightfully, awfully sad. So what’s it got to do with me?”

  “You paid him ten thousand pounds.”

  “So? I must sit down. I’m getting a sore neck with you looming over me. Let’s go into the morning-room.”

  Harry followed him up the stairs and into a room off the first landing. It was decorated in gold: gold-embossed paper on the wall, gold silk furniture, gold carpet.

  There was a fire crackling in the grate. “Sit down,” ordered Alfred with a wave of one long white hand.

  They both sat down opposite each other.

  “I was asking you why you gave Freddy ten thousand pounds. I’m acting on behalf of his family,” lied Harry.

  “Let me think.” Alfred placed the tip of one finger against his brow, rather in the manner of the Dodo in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. “Ah, yes, he was on his uppers. Begged a loan to pay off his gambling debts.”

  “Do you have an IOU?”

  “Of course not. Gentleman’s agreement. You wouldn’t understand.” His voice held the hint of a sneer.

  “No, I don’t,” said Harry bluntly. “It’s the first time I’ve ever heard of anyone in society lending that amount of money without first securing a note.”

  “Really? I have heard you don’t get about so much in the world these days.” The ‘world’ to Alfred meant the world of society. After all, for him, no other world existed.

  “He wasn’t blackmailing you, was he?”

  Lord Alfred rang the bell beside the fireplace and stood up. “You are leaving now. Don’t ever come here again with your nasty remarks. Ah, Gerhardt, show this person out.”

  The manservant, a powerfully built man, advanced on Harry.

  “I’m leaving,” said Harry, “but you will be hearing from me again.”

  Alfred sank back in his chair. “Go away,” he said. “Never come near me again.”

  ♦

  Rose lay in a scented bath and wondered what to do about Daisy. Because they had been equals when they were working, the fact that Daisy was once more her servant made Rose feel uncomfortable. She had put herself down to Daisy’s level. Perhaps there would be some way to bring Daisy up nearer her own.

  After the maids had dried her, Rose dismissed them. She decided to dress herself, but realized that she would need help with her stays and rang the bell.

  “Sorry, my lady,” said Daisy, looking flustered. “I should have been with you earlier.”

  “Help me with my stays, Daisy. The problem is that I can no longer look on you as a servant.”

  “Do you want to get rid of me?” asked Daisy in a small voice.

  “After all we have been through together! Of course not. What am I to wear?”

  Daisy glanced at the clock. “The tea-gown with the lace panels, I think. It’s still quite cold, so you’d better take your Paisley shawl.”

  When she was dressed and her hair had been put up, Rose said, “There is no need for you to be on duty in the drawing-room. I wish to speak to my parents in private.”

  ♦

  Harry rang the doorbell of Mrs Jerry Trumpington’s home. He hoped he would have more success with her than he had had with Lord Alfred. He handed his card, and after a few moments was ushered into Mrs Jerry’s sitting-room. She was a vast toad-like woman who carried little bits of food about her dress as a testimony to her gluttony. She had eaten quail for luncheon, Harry noticed, identifying a small bone in the black lace on Mrs Jerry’s bosom, followed by, possibly, Dover sole – there were fish bones, also – and, he guessed, in a mornay sauce, the sauce having caused a thin yellow edge on the lace.

  “Why, my very dear Captain,” she said, her thick lips opening in a smile. “How goes the world?”

  “Very baffling,” said Harry, sitting down opposite her.

  “I was about to take tea. Will you join me?”

  “Too kind.”

  Mrs Jerry rang the bell and ordered tea for two.

  “The reason I am here,” said Harry, “is because of the death of Freddy Pomfret.”

  “Poor chap.”

  “Indeed. Why did you pay Freddy ten thousand pounds?”

  She sat very still, her slightly bulbous eyes fixed on his face. Then she said, “Did I?”

  “Yes.”

  “Oh, I remember. He was short of the ready, that’s all. I’m a generous soul.”

  “Ten thousand pounds would be considered a fortune to most people in this country.”

  “But I am not most people. How did you find out?”

  “I heard something at Scotland Yard. No doubt the police have been in touch with his bank.” Harry could imagine Mrs Jerry’s fury if she knew the real source of the information.

  Two footmen came in carrying the tea-things. Mrs Jerry waited until they had both been served and then waved the servants away. When the door had closed behind them, she said, “What’s it got to do with you, anyway?”

  “I am working for his family,” said Harry, feeling that he really must contact Freddy’s family as soon as possible before he was caught out in his lies.

  “I really think the – er – trade you are in is most distasteful.” Mrs
Jerry ignored the thin bread and butter and the mounds of sandwiches and fruitcakes and selected a meringue filled with cream.

  “Was Freddy blackmailing you?” asked Harry.

  She bit down on the meringue so violently that a shower of meringue crumbs, meringue powder, and a dollop of cream joined the detritus of food on her bosom.

  “Geffout!” she roared when she could.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  She seized a napkin and wiped her mouth. She lumbered to her feet, panting with rage.

  “Out!” she shouted. “And never darken my doorstep again.”

  “I didn’t know anyone actually said that apart from the stage,” said Harry equably. “If Freddy was not blackmailing you, why are you so furious?”

  Mrs Freddy rang the bell. “Because of your impertinence. Because I am a respectable woman without a stain on my character.”

  “Unlike your dress, madam? You are covered in food. You are a walking menu.”

  The footmen entered. “Throw him out!” howled Mrs Jerry, collapsing back in her chair.

  “It’s all right, I’m going,” said Harry.

  As he walked outside, he wondered if he had been too blunt. He reflected ruefully that he would not be able to contact Rose because he had nothing to tell her, and in the same moment wondered why that should matter so much.

  ♦

  “So pleasant to see you looking your old self again,” sighed Lady Polly. “We have decided to launch you back into society by gentle degrees.”

  To her mother’s surprise, Rose did not object but merely lowered her long eyelashes and said meekly, “Yes, indeed.”

  “There are various cards here. We will go through them and decide which ones to accept.”

  Rose’s sharp eyes caught sight of a name – Mrs Angela Stockton. She picked up the card. Mrs Angela Stockton was requesting the pleasure of the earl and countess and their daughter at a lecture she was giving on Rudolf Steiner.

  “This looks interesting.”

  The countess raised her lorgnette and studied the card. “It’s for tomorrow afternoon. Too late to accept now. Besides, who is Rudolf Steiner?”

  “It would be interesting to find out.”

  “I have no intention of going, even although the woman is perfectly respectable.”

  “I would like to go – with Daisy.”

  “As to Daisy,” said Lady Polly, “I fear you may have become over-familiar with her.”

  “I agree. So I am going to make her my companion and hire a lady’s maid.”

  “Out of the question.”

  “It was Daisy who persuaded me to leave my working life. You are always worried that I will do something disgraceful. Daisy takes care of me. Why, she was even shocked that I should threaten to tell society how you arranged for the road and railway station at Stacey Court to be blown up so that the king would not visit us.”

  “Quite right. I hope you have dropped that silly nonsense.”

  “I’ll need to think about it. Of course, were Daisy elevated to my companion, I wouldn’t dream of mentioning it.”

  “We spoilt you,” said Lady Polly bitterly. “Most young gels who behaved the way you have behaved would have been locked up in the asylum by now. Wake up!” she suddenly shouted at her husband.

  “Hey, what!” The little earl blinked like an owl.

  “Tea is served and your daughter wants to make that maid of hers a companion.”

  “And what does Cathcart have to say about that?”

  “Cathcart! He has nothing to say in what our daughter does or does not do.”

  “You must admit he saved her bacon on more than one occasion.” The earl rang the bell and when the butler answered it, he said, “Brum, fetch the telephone.”

  “My lord, that instrument does not detach from the study. It is necessary for one to go to the machine.”

  “Well, go to it and phone that Cathcart fellow and tell him to come here.”

  “It would be better to send a carriage for him,” said Rose quickly, fearing that Miss Jubbles would take the call and not pass it on. “His office is in the Buckingham Palace Road. Number Twenty-five-A.”

  “Very well, jump to it,” said the earl. “By Jove, do I see Madeira cake?”

  ♦

  Looking down from the window, Miss Jubbles saw the carriage with the crest on the panels drawing up outside and a liveried footman jumping down from the backstrap.

  She heard footsteps on the stairs. The footman entered. “I am here to take Captain Cathcart to visit the Earl of Hadshire.”

  Miss Jubbles’s heart beat hard. That girl again!

  “I am afraid,” she announced in tones of stultifying gentility, “that Captain Cathcart is not here. He has gone abroad.”

  “And when is he expected back?”

  “He did not say.”

  “When he returns, tell him to contact his lordship immediately.”

  “Certainly.”

  And then Miss Jubbles heard that familiar tread on the stairs. Harry had suffered a shrapnel wound during the Boer War, and on the bad days, walked with a pronounced limp, and this was one of the bad days.

  He entered the office and paused in the doorway. He had recognized the earl’s carriage outside.

  “Captain Cathcart,” cried the footman, who recognized Harry from his visits to the earl’s home. “Your secretary said you had gone abroad.”

  Miss Jubbles’s face was red with mortification. “I am sorry, sir,” she said. “When I said abroad, I meant abroad in London.”

  “That’s all right,” said Harry. “But the earl is a client and an important one. You knew I was due back here late afternoon because I told you.”

  “I am so sorry. I forgot.” And with that, Miss Jubbles burst into tears.

  “Don’t take on so,” said Harry. “I have to pick up some papers from my desk. There’s nothing else for you to do this afternoon.”

  He went through to his office. On his desk was a small vase of freesias, imported from the Channel Islands. He scowled down at them. They were expensive. He took some papers off his desk and walked out.

  “Miss Jubbles,” he said gently, “I appreciate the flowers but they are much too expensive a gift. Please extract the amount from petty cash.”

  “Oh, sir, they were only a little present.”

  “Please do as you are told,” ordered Harry, “and enter the amount in the petty-cash book.”

  Tears rolled down Miss Jubbles’s cheeks. “Here,” said Harry, handing her a large handkerchief. “Now, I must go.”

  He was beginning to suspect that his secretary’s feelings for him might be a trifle too warm, but never for a moment did Harry guess at the depth of the obsession that would cause her to sleep with the handkerchief against her cheek that night.

  Harry turned in the doorway. “And do not accept any more cases. I am going to be tied up with one important one for the foreseeable future.”

  ♦

  “Come in, Cathcart,” cried the earl. “Tea?”

  “No, thank you. Do you have a problem?”

  Rose had been sent to her room.

  “It’s Rose again. She wants to make that Cockney maid of hers a companion. She does give Daisy the credit, I gather, for having persuaded her to get back in society.”

  “I think it might be a very good idea,” said Harry. “Daisy’s demeanour is suitable, and with the right clothes she would not occasion comment.”

  “But companions have background!”

  “Then give her one. Any respectable recluse you know of in Hadshire who died recently?”

  “Well, let me see. There was Sir Percy Anstruther.”

  “Married?”

  “Married a girl half his age, who ran off and left him.”

  “Any surviving family?”

  “None as far as I know. I think the estate went to the Crown.”

  “Good. Daisy is his long-lost daughter. She fell on hard times. Her mother had reverted to her maiden
name of Levine. You rescued her. All respectable. You discovered her true identity after she had been working as your daughter’s maid and promptly elevated her to companion in respect for your old friend, Sir Percy. She is a strong, moral girl and will keep a guard of Lady Rose.”

  “I sometimes think,” put in Lady Polly, “that it might be an idea to give Rose just a taste of the asylum to discipline her.”

  “But think of the scandal,” said Harry. “She would be lost to you and damned as mad for the rest of her life.”

  “Oh, very well,” said Lady Polly. “But I will hire a lady’s maid for her and one that will keep a strict eye on her as well. Rose has some very odd ideas about going into society again. She insists on going to some boring lecture given by Mrs Angela Stockton.”

  “Mrs Stockton,” said Harry, consulting the papers he had taken from his office, “is fabulously wealthy and of good family.”

  “But a lecture…!”

  “And has a son of Rose’s age.”

  Both the earl and countess looked at Harry. “Now that’s different,” said the earl. “Nothing up with money in the family, hey.”

  ∨ Hasty Death ∧

  Five

  I am silent in the Club,

  I am silent in the pub,

  I am silent on a bally peak in Darien;

  For I stuff away for life

  Shoving peas in with a knife,

  Because I am at heart a Vegetarian.

  No more the milk of cows

  Shall pollute my private house

  Than the milk of the wild mares of the Barbarian:

  I will stick to port and sherry,

  For they are so very, very,

  So very, very, very Vegetarian

  G.K. Chesterton

  The fact that the earl and countess agreed to their daughter’s attending Angela Stockton’s lecture accompanied only by her new companion was prompted by parental weariness. Where had they gone wrong? They had supplied her with the best governess – or so they had believed – and the fact that they saw very little of her until she became of an age to be a débutante could not surely have created any problem, for she had been brought up as a lady of her class.