Murder at Bray Manor: a historical cosy mystery

by Strauss, Lee

  Ginger’s eyes burned with embarrassment and she wanted to kick the captain for his arrogance and his familiarity—calling her by her Christian name as if he were close to her.

  “Now that your stupid curiosity has been satisfied,” she spat, “you can leave.”

  “Actually, Lady Gold,” Basil said. “I’d like to ask the captain a few questions.”

  Smithwick chuckled, tapped ash into the ashtray, and held the cigarette in the air between two nicotine-stained fingers. “Fire away.”

  “What makes you say that Miss Webb is a liar?”

  “I’ve had the opportunity to spend time with her friend, Miss Gold.” He grinned coyly at Ginger and she swallowed back the fury she felt.

  “Miss Webb is the ugly sister of the three.”

  “Dear Lord, Captain Smithwick!” Ginger said.

  “I don’t mean to be a cad, but it’s true. Muriel Webb has barely concealed her jealousy. Angela was the prettiest, and Felicia the wealthiest. Miss Webb despised them both.” Smithwick inhaled and released a puff of smoke from the corner of his mouth. “Really, Lady Gold, I thought you more discerning.”

  “Captain Smithwick,” Basil said, drawing the man’s attention back to himself. “Are you in possession of a rifle fitted with a bayonet?”

  Smithwick chortled. “As you well know, all firearms and weapons used on the battlefield belong to the British Army.”

  “Answer the question, please.”

  “Why, yes, I am, and I did hear Lady Gold give away my confidences.” He clucked at her and shook his head. Nursing his cigarette, he continued, “King and country are under the impression the rifle was lost in France. I had to pay for it of course.” He snickered. “Believe me, I wasn’t the only one to have ‘lost’ something in France. What does this have to do with anything?”

  “Miss Ashton was stabbed to death.”

  “Ah, I see. Have you enquired of Mr. Croft?” The captain butted his cigarette out in the tray. “He also has a goodly collection of ‘lost’ war items? Don’t be fooled by that mask of his. He’s an opportunist, even without a face.”

  Ginger snorted. “He was going to marry a woman who would bring nothing to the marriage. How is that opportunistic?”

  Smithwick laughed as he stood to leave. “He doesn’t have to marry her now, does he?”

  Basil called after him. “You won’t mind if I view your ‘lost’ war items, Captain Smithwick?”

  Smithwick tipped his hat. “Knock yourself out, old chap.”

  Ginger held a glass of water against her flaming cheeks.

  Basil regarded her curiously. “That man has really got under your skin.”

  “I can’t stand that he’s involved with Felicia. It literally makes me sick.”

  “Do you think he killed Miss Ashton?”

  “He’s certainly a suspect. After all, the man has killed before.”

  “I do hope you mean on the battlefield.”

  Not exactly, but Ginger didn’t want to get into that. “He can’t be trusted.”

  Basil leaned back and considered her. “You two obviously have history. Can you tell me what happened?”

  Ginger sighed. “Maybe someday, Inspector.”

  Basil paid the bill as they left. He opened the passenger door of the Austin for Ginger and she climbed in.

  “What do you want to do now?” she asked

  His eyes flashed with compassion. “I think it’s time we spoke to Miss Gold.”

  Dear, dear Felicia. Ginger had hoped to keep her out of things but relented. “I know you’re right. Just be gentle with her. She’s been through a lot.”

  Ginger unpinned her hat and tossed it onto the bench in the entrance hall of Bray Manor. Wilson, hearing Ginger and Basil enter, offered his assistance.

  “Where might I find Miss Gold?” Ginger asked.

  The butler answered without emotion. “Miss Gold left about ten minutes ago.”

  “Did she say where she was going?”

  “No, madam. Only that she’d be out for the rest of the day.”

  Ginger had noticed the garage doors were closed and assumed the Humber was tucked away safely inside. Besides, it had yet to see a mechanic.

  “With whom did she go?” Ginger had a sinking feeling she knew the answer.

  “A Captain Smithwick called for her, madam.”

  “Thank you, Wilson,” Ginger said in dismissal.

  Ginger led Basil to the sitting room where they took either end of the settee. “What a beast!” Ginger said. “The moment he left us he hurried over here to whisk Felicia away. I don’t know what kind of game he’s playing, but I could throttle the man.”

  “Perhaps Felicia knows something he doesn’t want her to tell us?”

  “Undoubtedly.”

  “Do you want to go after them?”

  Boss hopped onto Ginger’s lap, and she stroked his little black head. “Felicia would disown me if we did that.”

  “But, do you think she’s in danger? I could call the locals to look out for them.”

  “I don’t think she’s in danger,” Ginger said. Though if Smithwick killed Angela Ashton, then she very well could be. “But, yes, call the police as a caution.”

  Boss at her heels, Ginger showed Basil the telephone room—a study-like space with a leather couch and matching chair. On a circular end table stood a candlestick phone. Ginger was pretty sure that Felicia was the only member of the house to actually take advantage of the modern convenience. She was glad Daniel had insisted on it being installed.

  Restless, Ginger meandered to the window. Ambrosia was in the flower gardens overseeing Clement. He busied himself with a pair of secateurs, what Haley would call garden clippers, preparing the beds for winter. The weather was moody and evocative. Low-lying clouds and a rolling mist floated along the lake, but no rain. She remembered the rowing boats in the boathouse.

  When Basil ended his call, she turned to him. “Would you like to go out on the lake?”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Like the skin of a drum on a winter’s day, Ginger’s chest tightened. She felt trapped in Bray Manor, senselessly claustrophobic. The waves called to her, lapping through the grass, slapping against the jetty. Perhaps, out there, she could breathe.

  Basil stared at her, his hazel eyes registering surprise at her suggestion to venture out. “Isn’t it raining?”

  “Just a drizzle,” Ginger said. “Besides, it’s calming. It might clear our heads so we can get to the bottom of this awful business.”

  “Let’s go, then.” Basil disappeared into the entrance hall to gather their coats and scarves and returned waving two umbrellas. “I pulled these from the brolly rack, just in case.”

  Ginger gathered the wool blanket that hung over the back of the settee, and called to Boss. “Hey, lazybones,” she said. “We’re going outside!” The pup scampered to his feet and followed Ginger and Basil out of the French windows into the garden. A pair of rubber boots had been left on the patio, and Ginger took a moment to slip them on. Much more suitable than the strappy shoes she’d been wearing.

  Together Ginger and Basil pulled the rowing boat out of the boathouse. Basil guided it by the rope towards the jetty as Ginger collected the oars.

  The fog swirled above their heads. With a deep breath, Ginger inhaled the fresh air—a mix of old earth, damp trees and lake mildew. The tension in her chest gave way little by little. “I know everyone gets so excited when the sun shines,” she said, “but I’m rather fond of the moody atmosphere. It’s brooding and mysterious.”

  “It’s mysterious all right,” Basil said as he helped her into the small boat. “One can barely see beyond one’s nose.”

  Boss jumped in and onto Ginger’s lap. Basil sat at the back of the boat and pushed off the jetty with one oar. They slipped quietly through the water. Ginger found the sounds of nature soothing to the disquieted churning within. Geese skimmed along the lake surface squawking out their disapproval at this interruption. Boss l
et out a string of short barks, encouraging the fowl onward. Smaller birds sang, their high-pitched trilling echoing along the lake’s surface.

  “The reed bunting nests here.” Ginger pointed to a cluster of reeds poking out of the water, and the small grey bird singing with a loud, beautiful voice.

  Basil watched the bunting in its habitat with appreciation. “Lake Livingston is more of a large pond, isn’t it?”

  Ginger grinned. “Don’t let Ambrosia hear you say that.”

  Basil paddled with slow, intense strokes, and Ginger relaxed into the sound of the wooden blades lapping through the water. The vice-like anxiety squeezing her ribs was nearly gone.

  Ginger knew it wasn’t the case that was troubling her, though she did have grave concerns about Felicia’s life choices. It was the little graveyard on the other side of the lake, the marble crosses visible from their position.

  Basil followed her gaze and stated plainly, “You miss him.”

  “I do,” Ginger admitted. “It’s been five years since the war took him, but at times it feels like yesterday.”

  “It must be hard for you to be here, at his family home.”

  Ginger was tempted to make light of the matter, but the look on Basil’s face was . . . vulnerable. Instead, she answered honestly. “Yes. In Boston, I could pretend that Daniel was simply ‘away.’ I talked to him, to his photograph, as if we were on the telephone.” Ginger didn’t know why she was being so candid about her private life, but it felt good to confess. “I rather liked my delusion. Coming to London and especially here, to Bray Manor . . . is hard.”

  Basil said nothing, only paddled, long strokes of the blades cutting smoothly through the water’s surface. His hands were red from the cold. His gold wedding ring stood out in sharp contrast.

  A window of transparency had opened between them, almost as the fog seemed to close in and Ginger stepped through it, daring to tread on very personal ground. “What about you? Do you miss your wife?”

  Basil’s hazel eyes flashed with remorse. “Yes. Every day.”

  He paused in his paddling and the boat bobbed with the waves. They sat there in silence and Ginger wasn’t sure what she should say to that or if she should say anything at all. Basil eventually spoke. “I’ve decided to give Emilia what she wants. I’m going to divorce her.”

  Ginger allowed herself to wonder, just for the slightest moment, if Basil’s decision had anything to do with his having met her.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  Divorce was only granted on grounds of adultery. Often it was the husband who claimed ownership of the indiscretion to preserve the wife’s reputation, even if she was in fact the guilty party. Ginger didn’t doubt for a moment that Basil would take the blame for the collapse of his marriage.

  Basil pulled back on the oars again. “I am, too.”

  The mist settled in around them, like a cocoon, thick and close, fortifying the sense of intimacy from which they couldn’t easily escape. Nor, Ginger realized with some consternation, did she want to. The surrealism caused them both to speak aloud on things they’d never dream of in normal circumstances.

  Basil rested the paddles and let the gentle wind carry the boat along where it may. He rubbed his chin where a shadow of late-day bristles formed, then cleared his throat.

  “What I don’t understand,” he said, “is how Angela Ashton died without anyone seeing her, or missing her.”

  Back to the case. To impersonal matters. Ginger felt as if she and Basil Reed were in a constant dance—moving closer, then farther apart—all at the whim of some invisible band. Hands on shoulder and hip. Hands off.

  “The doors to the veranda were opened,” she said. “But the weather was cool, so not many people ventured out. The few of us who did go outside didn’t stay long.”

  Basil paddled, one, two, three strokes, then rested. “So it’s late, people are leaving and, I assume, the band was packing up. The staff are collecting dirty glasses and teacups and delivering them to the kitchen. Miss Gold assumed Miss Ashton had left with Miss Webb. Miss Webb supposed Miss Ashton had left with Mr. Croft, and Mr. Croft believed his fiancée was spending the night at Bray Manor.”

  “The question is,” Ginger said, “why did Miss Ashton lie about staying the night. Felicia hadn’t extended that invitation to anyone, though now I wonder why not.”

  “Perhaps Felicia had plans with Captain Smithwick for after the dance?”

  That thought made Ginger’s blood chill. “If she did, he stood her up.”

  “Ah. Perhaps he’d scheduled himself twice. Promised both Miss Gold and Miss Ashton that he’d meet up with them.”

  “That could be why the captain and Miss Ashton argued,” Ginger said.

  “Smithwick, having lost control of Miss Ashton, searches for her later, and finds her alone outside and kills her.”

  Ginger’s heart tripped. “Oh mercy! Now I’m rather worried for Felicia.” Had she let her sister-in-law spend the day with a murderer? Her mind went to the worst places: Smithwick’s bayonet, the grizzly stab wound on Angela Ashton’s body.

  “I think we should go in,” she said, a small tremor in her voice giving away her rising panic.

  The boat had drifted into the reeds and Basil worked to paddle them out. Boss barked, his paws up against the edge of the boat.

  “What is it, Bossy?” Ginger spotted an empty bird’s nest in the reeds, Boss having frightened the occupant off. Then her eyes caught sight of something shimmering on the surface of the water, like an entangled floating pearl.

  Reaching over the side of the boat, she plucked out a long smooth wooden stick.

  She gasped. “It’s Felicia’s missing knitting needle!” She held the object outstretched. “See the nail polish on the end?”

  “Let me have a look at that.” Basil wrapped a handkerchief over his palm for Ginger to place the item on. The tip had been chiselled into a sharp point. Basil frowned. “I think you just found our murder weapon.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Having just been convinced that Felicia was walking out with a murderer, and now being slapped with this new evidence, Ginger reeled from the incongruity. If Angela Ashton was stabbed with a knitting needle, how did Smithwick get his hands on it? And if the murder was premeditated, why on earth use a knitting needle?

  It didn’t make sense.

  Unless the poltergeist was the killer?

  Basil paddled swiftly towards the jetty. “Our focus was all wrong,” he said.

  “We were looking at Miss Ashton’s friends,” Ginger said, “when we should be looking at the knitting association members.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Unless the killer and the poltergeist are acquainted. It could’ve been chance that the last ‘trick’ also provided a good weapon.”

  Basil assisted Ginger out of the boat, and the moment her boots hit the jetty, her urgency to find Felicia kicked in and she hurried to the house. Boss chased after her with equal intensity. She called over her shoulder to Basil. “Just tie the boat to the piling. I’ll get someone to return it to the boathouse later.”

  Phyllis was dusting the sitting room when Ginger blew in. “Phyllis, have you seen Miss Gold? Has she returned?”

  Phyllis shook her head. “I wouldn’t know, madam.”

  Ginger released a grunt of frustration. Basil soon caught up and was at her side. “We could drive around Chesterton. Maybe we’ll spot them.”

  “It’s getting dark. By the time we get to town, it will be black out.” Chesterton still depended on gas light and they were sparse.

  “Is there someone to call?” Basil asked. “Do you know where Smithwick lives?”

  “He resides in St. Albans. He must be staying at the Chesterton Inn. It’s the only inn in town.”

  Ginger caught sight of herself in the entrance hall mirror and stopped abruptly. If it weren’t for the urgency of the situation, she wouldn’t be caught dead going out in public looking as windblown and pale-faced as
she did. She sorely wished she could at least tidy up a bit for Inspector Reed’s sake. The poor man forced to look at her when she was not at all well put together.

  “Is something the matter, madam?”

  “Oh, Wilson.” Ginger hoped the butler could help. “Have you seen Miss Gold? Has she returned?”

  “I’m afraid not.”

  Basil reached for the door and just as he was about to grasp the handle, the door jerked open, as if the wind had caught it and Felicia breezed inside.

  Ginger and Basil stared at the wayward girl, and she stared back, her expression reflecting confusion.

  “What’s going on?” Her gaze lingered on Ginger. “Are you feeling all right, Ginger. You look flustered.”

  “I’m fine. We’re fine. Frankly, we were about to come and look for you.”

  “What on earth for? I’m a big girl. Quite able to take care of myself.”

  Ginger patted at her flyaway hair. “Of course, you are.”

  Felicia rolled her eyes and lumbered up the staircase. Ginger watched her go, relief drenching her like a sudden downpour. The fear that had gripped her sifted away, along with the strength in her bones.

  What she needed now was a stiff drink. She forced a smile. “Inspector, care to join me for some early evening refreshment?”

  “I’d be delighted.”

  “Wilson, perhaps you could see to some food?”

  “Certainly, madam.”

  “Basil, do excuse me for a moment. I’d like to get changed.”

  Phyllis had unpacked for Ginger when she’d arrived. Was it only three days ago? It felt much longer. She removed her damp clothes and put on an orange silk printed blouse with long, flowy sleeves, a white pleated skirt, and donned clean stockings—snapping them expertly to her garter. She brushed her hair, trained the tips to curl at her cheeks with her fingers, and finished with a fresh coat of mascara and lipstick. Not too much. She didn’t want to look like she was trying too hard.