Prime Crime Holiday Bundle

by Cleo Coyle; Emily Brightwell; Kenneth Blanchard

She looked away. “I’ve seen her once.”

  “Yet when I asked you that before, you insisted you’d had nothing to do with the woman since she left your employment?” He let the question hang in the air to avoid calling her a liar.

  “For God’s sake, Inspector, she’d just been murdered only a few feet from my front door.” She looked at him contemptuously. “What sane person wouldn’t have done the same? Of course I lied and said I’d not seen her.”

  “When, exactly, did you see her?” He kept his tone calm and deliberate. Arabella Evans was irritating, but not any more than many women of her class.

  “A few days ago, I received a note from her.”

  “How did the note arrive? By post or by hand?”

  “It came in the second morning post,” she replied. “I read it and sent a reply by the afternoon post.”

  “The one o’clock or the three o’clock post?” Witherspoon did some quick calculating in his head. If she replied by the earlier one o’clock post, Agatha Moran would have received the note by that same afternoon.

  “The one o’clock.”

  “What did the note say?” he asked.

  “She wanted to see me, Inspector. I should have thought that was obvious.” Her tone was clipped.

  “Did you invite her here?”

  Arabella waved her hand in a negative gesture. “Of course not, I told her to meet me in town. I had an appointment with my dressmaker the following day. I instructed her to meet me at Lyon’s Tea Shop on Oxford Street.”

  “You met her there? Is that correct?”

  Arabella smiled wryly. “Of course, Inspector. There was no reason not to meet with her, but I didn’t have a lot of time to spare that day. We had a quick cup of tea together. It was a very amicable meeting.”

  “What did she want to see you about?” Witherspoon asked.

  “She said she’d heard Rosemary was to marry and she had some family silver she wanted to give to her as a wedding gift.”

  “She wanted to give your daughter her family heirlooms?” the inspector repeated, his expression skeptical.

  “They were hardly heirlooms,” Arabella explained. “When we employed her, she had a few trinkets that she kept in her room. Rosemary used to love playing with them. Miss Moran thought Rosemary would enjoy them as a gift. They hardly have any real monetary value.”

  “So the gifts were sentimental in nature,” he clarified.

  “That’s correct. I told her to send them along to the house, and then I excused myself and went to the dressmaker.”

  “What time did you and Miss Moran meet at the tearoom?” He shifted on his feet as his bad leg began to tire and made a mental note to send a constable to the tearoom. Hopefully one of the staff would recall serving the two women. He wanted to verify Arabella Evans’ account of the meeting; she had already misled him once and he was determined she’d not do it again. She was a rather irritating woman.

  “I instructed her to meet me at ten forty-five,” she informed him. “Miss Moran was prompt. But then, I’d expect nothing less of her. She was always very good at keeping a schedule. She instilled a number of very good habits in Rosemary.”

  “And afterwards you went right to the dressmaker’s?” He moved his weight again as his knee began to throb.

  “I’ve just told you that.” She sighed impatiently. “Now look, I really must attend to my household—”

  He interrupted, “I’ll need the name and address of your dressmaker. Did you walk there or did you take a hansom?”

  She glared at him. “As it was just around the corner, I walked. The dressmaker’s name is Madame Corbier and her shop is on—”

  “I know the establishment,” he said, cutting her off again.

  He wasn’t generally so rude, but he was in a great deal of pain and could feel his knee starting to swell. He’d not seen Lady Cannonberry in over a week now, and he was nervous about Betsy’s wedding. He was walking her down the aisle, and it was his duty to insure her nuptials went off perfectly. He had a horrible feeling that uncooperative and untruthful witnesses like Arabella Evans weren’t going to help him get this case solved before Betsy’s big day.

  Downstairs, Constable Barnes wasn’t having an easy time of it, either. “Let’s try this again, ma’am.” He sighed. “What time did the guests start arriving for the tea party?”

  Mrs. Grayston, the housekeeper, stared at him as if he were a half-wit. “And I’ve already told you, I was in the kitchen so I’ve no idea when the first one got here. But it was probably close to four thirty.”

  Barnes decided that would have to do. He really wasn’t interested in any of the guests; the reports from the constables indicated that to date, none of them were acquainted with the victim. He’d hoped to use the timeline of the arrival of the first guest to get some idea of where each of the individual family members might have been between the start of the tea party and the murder. He tried another tactic. “Who greeted the guests when they arrived?”

  “I suppose Mrs. Evans and Miss Evans greeted their guests.”

  “But you don’t know that for a fact,” he pressed.

  “I’ve just told you, I was in the kitchen checking on the petit fours. Cook has had some trouble lately with her baking and I wanted to make sure they were acceptable. By the time I got back upstairs, Stevens was at the front door and guests were arriving. I’ve no idea who got here first.”

  “Was Mrs. or Miss Evans in the drawing room when you came upstairs?” he asked.

  “Where else would they be . . .” Her voice trailed off. “Oh dear, I’ve made a mistake. Come to think of it, Mrs. Evans wasn’t there. But some of the guests had already arrived. I remember now, because I overheard Miss Evans telling Lady Warburton that her mother would be right back and to please make herself comfortable.”

  “Do you know where Mrs. Evans had gone?”

  “I’ve no idea. But I saw her coming back into the drawing room a bit later.”

  “You saw her coming down the stairs,” he probed. Ye gods, getting information out of this woman was harder than pulling hens’ teeth.

  “I didn’t say that, did I. I saw her coming in from the conservatory.” She jerked her thumb up. As they were downstairs in the butler’s pantry, the constable assumed she was pointing at the conservatory.

  “The conservatory?” he repeated.

  “That’s right.” Some of her bluster had faded. “I assume she’d gone there to check on something. We’ve had workmen in for the past month and the wretched room still isn’t finished. Mrs. Evans wanted it done by this week. She’d planned to host a champagne breakfast there the day before the wedding.”

  He raised his bushy eyebrows in disbelief. “So she left a social occasion to go and check on how the work was progressing.”

  “Don’t be daft.” The housekeeper snorted derisively. “Mrs. Evans wouldn’t do such a silly thing. She probably went to make sure the workmen had put up oilcloths to keep the wet out. There’s some very expensive furniture in there now, and I imagine she wanted to be certain her new Spanish table wasn’t going to be ruined by the rain coming in on it.”

  Barnes winced. He’d only done a cursory search of the premises and felt foolish now. He should have gone into the conservatory instead of just glancing at the front from the street.

  “Like I said,” the housekeeper continued, “the wretched place still isn’t finished, so Mrs. Evans will not likely be hosting anything there till well after the New Year. The builders have mucked up the job and there isn’t even glass in half the frames. Add to it, Mr. Evans wasn’t home like he was supposed to be, so he couldn’t take care of the problem. I imagine she went to make sure they’d done what she told them. It was very cold and she did have guests coming.”

  Barnes suddenly went still. He couldn’t believe he’d been so derelict in his duty. Blast, why had he relied on the lads to search the house? None of their reports had mentioned oilcloths or open windows. “Were the empty frames at ground lev
el?”

  She shrugged. “How should I know? I don’t go in there. The workmen are rude. Now, if you’re finished, I’ve a lot of work to do.”

  He wasn’t finished at all, but he wasn’t going to waste any more time on questioning her. There had to be other servants who would be more helpful. He looked down at the list of names the butler had given him and selected the next one. “Could you send the downstairs maid to see me, please.”

  She gave him a curt nod. “Mind you don’t keep her long. We’ve a lot to do before the guests get here today.”

  CHAPTER 6

  “Are you sure you’ll not have another cup of tea?” Mrs. Goodge smiled at the young lady sitting across from her at the kitchen table. Phyllis Thomlinson was eighteen, plump as a Christmas goose, and currently unemployed. She wore a navy blue wool hat, high-necked blouse and jacket, both also navy blue, and a fitted gray skirt. The clothes had seen better days, but they were clean, and the rip in the jacket lapel had been neatly mended. Her hair was dark blonde and tucked back in a roll at the nape of her neck; her eyes were brown, her skin a perfect porcelain, and her face as round as a pie tin.

  “No thank you, ma’am, I’m fine.” Phyllis bobbed her head politely. “I hope you don’t mind my coming ’round. But Mrs. Dubay said it would be alright and that you might have a position available now that your housemaid is getting married.”

  Mrs. Goodge had been surprised when the girl had shown up at the back door with a note from Mollie Dubay, a woman she’d worked with years ago. Out of courtesy to her old colleague, she’d invited the girl inside and offered her a cup of tea. Mollie’s note hadn’t said much, merely that Phyllis was out of work and might be useful to the Witherspoon household. “Our maid isn’t leavin’ us,” she explained gently. “She’s gettin’ married but she intends to stay on here.”

  “Mrs. Dubay told me that’d probably be the way of it, but she suggested I come around anyway,” Phyllis said quickly. “She thought your household might need an extra pair of hands because of the wedding and it being Christmas and all.”

  Mrs. Goodge stared at her, her expression speculative. That actually wasn’t a bad idea. All of them were doing their very best, but with the various demands on their time, everyone was falling behind. Mrs. Jeffries hadn’t hired the extra staff for the wedding luncheon, Smythe’s tailor had sent notes twice reminding him he had to do a final fitting, Wiggins hadn’t had a spare moment to polish the big silver trays, and she’d even skimped on the baking for her sources. Perhaps a bit of help would be useful. But it wasn’t her place to promise the girl anything. “I’m not the person in charge of hirin’,” she said kindly. “That would be our housekeeper, Mrs. Jeffries, and I’m afraid she’s out at the moment.”

  “But you could put in a good word for me,” Phyllis pleaded. “I’m a fully trained housemaid and I’ve got references. I worked for Sir Madison Lowery but he had to let me go—”

  “Sir Madison Lowery,” the cook interrupted. “You worked for him?” Bless you, Mollie Dubay, Mrs. Goodge thought. Not long ago, she’d done her friend a good turn, and Mollie was returning the favor. She must have heard that Inspector Witherspoon had caught the Moran case and, gossip being what it was, must have learned about the connection between Lowery, the Evans family, and the dead woman.

  “He had to let me go,” Phyllis explained. “He’s getting married as well. He said his new wife would be bringing her own staff with her.”

  “Nonsense. A new wife might bring along her own personal maid, but she’d not bring an entire new staff,” Mrs. Goodge declared. “Are you certain that’s why he let you go? Was there, perhaps, another reason?”

  “I wasn’t sacked because I was lazy or there was anything wrong with my work,” Phyllis said defensively. “I worked hard.”

  “But you were let go, and frankly, I’ve never heard of a housemaid gettin’ dismissed because—”

  “He let me go because he couldn’t afford to pay my wages,” she blurted. “Oh dear, I’m sorry I interrupted, and I shouldn’t have said that, should I? We’re supposed to be discreet about—” She broke off and turned away, but not before Mrs. Goodge saw the tears in her eyes.

  “Don’t cry now, it’s alright.” She reached over and awkwardly patted the girl’s arm. “I wasn’t implyin’ there was anythin’ wrong with your work. But before I speak to our housekeeper on your behalf, I need to know as much as possible about you.”

  Phyllis pulled a clean but tatty handkerchief out of the sleeve of her blouse and dabbed at her eyes. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to start blubbering; it’s just that I so desperately need a bit of work. I live close by and I’d be willing to do anything, anything at all.” She teared up again.

  “We’ll see if there’s somethin’ for you here,” Mrs. Goodge said quickly. “But I’m not makin’ any promises. Staff decisions are up to our housekeeper.”

  Phyllis gazed at her with a hopeful expression. “Really? You’ll speak to her on my behalf?”

  “I said I would, didn’t I? Now why don’t you start by tellin’ me about your time at Sir Madison’s home?” She felt a twinge of guilt. Mrs. Jeffries might be dead set against hiring the girl, so she had to find out as much as she could about Madison Lowery while she had the chance. The housekeeper might very well think that a stranger in the household could cause a number of problems with their inquiries into Agatha Moran’s murder. But I didn’t make Phyllis any promises, she told herself.

  “What do you want to know?” she asked eagerly.

  “How long were you there?”

  “Four years. I was hired as a housemaid.”

  “And what were your duties?” Mrs. Goodge knew good and well what a housemaid did, but she wanted the girl talking freely about her former employer.

  “As I said, I was hired on as a maid, but I did a bit of everything except for the cooking.” She smiled shyly. “You know, cleaning the floors, dusting and polishing the furniture, beating the rugs properly every week. Making the beds, tidying up and airing the rooms regular like.”

  “You weren’t interested in learnin’ to cook?” Mrs. Goodge asked, more to satisfy her own curiosity than to find out anything about Lowery. She was always a bit mystified about why others were so uninterested in baking a perfect apple tart or making a tasty lamb stew.

  “I’d love to have learned,” Phyllis answered. “But he was real particular about his food, and he only let Mrs. Perkins, the cook, make his meals. But I did help with the serving, and I did the clearing up from the dining room.”

  “What sort of household was it? Formal?”

  “Oh yes, very formal. We didn’t speak to him unless he spoke to us first,” she replied.

  “How big a staff was there?” Mrs. Goodge reached for the pot and helped herself to more tea.

  “There were four of us. I did the housecleaning, Mrs. Clark is the housekeeper, Mrs. Perkins the cook, and Janie Dempsey the scullery. Mind you, I don’t think Janie’s there anymore. I ran into her cousin just the other day and she said Janie had been let go as well.”

  “So he’s only got a cook and a housekeeper now?” Mrs. Goodge frowned. “And you say it’s a big house?”

  “It seemed big when I was doing the cleaning.” She smiled. “But it’s not as big as this one.”

  “I imagine workin’ for a single man was very uncomfortable,” Mrs. Goodge said chattily.

  “Sir Madison Lowery wasn’t single when I first went there. He had a wife. Lady Lowery was very nice to us, and we were all sad when she passed away.”

  “How did she die?” Mrs. Goodge asked.

  “Food poisoning,” Phyllis said. “It was awful. They’d been out to the theatre and had asked Mrs. Perkins to have a cold supper waiting for them when they got home. They both got sick that night. Poor Lady Lowery was ill for days before she finally passed away.”

  “What caused the food poisonin’?”

  Phyllis frowned slightly. “Well, Sir Madison claimed it must have been the roast
chicken. But I think it must have been the oysters they’d had for lunch that day.”

  “Wasn’t the doctor able to determine what had caused it?”

  Phyllis snorted. “The doctor didn’t get there until the poor woman was almost dead, and by then, there wasn’t a bit of anything left in poor Lady Lowery. She’d been sick so many times; she couldn’t even keep water down.”

  “What about Sir Madison? Was he ill as well?”

  “Yes, but he wasn’t near as bad as she was,” Phyllis explained. “He vomited a time or two and that was it. But she was in terrible straits. That’s why I’m sure it was those oysters and not the chicken. She adored oysters. Sir Madison brought them home that day as a special treat for her. She ate quite a few at lunch. I remember because he kept teasing her and telling her to leave some for him. But I’m sure it wasn’t the chicken. She didn’t like cold roast chicken.”

  Constable Barnes put the guest list from the Evans tea party on top of the stack of statements he’d taken from the Evans servants. “They more or less all said the same things they did the first time, sir. The only discrepancy we’ve got thus far is between Mrs. Evans’ first and second statements, and she readily admitted she lied the first time around.”

  “I know, but I was so hoping someone would recall some little detail they’d not mentioned earlier,” Witherspoon said. “Pity no one did. What about the guest list? Anything useful there?”

  “We’ve checked them all, sir, and not one of them will admit to knowing Agatha Moran. I went over the statements myself and the constables did a thorough job of questioning everyone.”

  “I’m sure they did.” Witherspoon closed his eyes and leaned back in his chair. “I went over the statements as well, and you’re correct, there’s no evidence any of them knew the victim.”

  “According to both of the butler’s statements, most of the guests were already in the house when the murder happened,” Barnes added. “So I think we can cross that lot off. We’ve also not had any luck with the neighbors. The lads have been up and down that street speaking to everyone who might be a possible witness, but no one saw or heard anything.”