Dressed for Death

by Julianna Deering

“If you don’t mind, dear. Thank you.” She gave the others an apologetic smile. “I’ve had the fire going in my bedroom all day, but I know the rest of you are probably too warm for that down here.”

  Laurent’s eyes lit. “Nonsense. A fire would be just the thing. Come, you must have one if you are suffering the cold.”

  He rang for a footman, and soon there was a small but cheery fire in the grate. Mrs. Cummins sat huddled by it for a while, listening to the others’ quiet conversation, but soon she was nodding off and finally retired for the night. Laurent paced about the room after that, clearly bored.

  “It seems a good night for each of us to retire early,” he said, looking at everyone pointedly, and then when no one seemed inclined to agree, he made a slight bow. “I will take my own advice, at any rate. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.”

  Tal glared after him once he was gone. “The slimy toad, fawning over my mother that way. It makes me ill.”

  “At least we can talk now,” Drew said, and he told them about his visit to Lymington. “I’m certain Broadhurst had been waiting for someone, but nobody went into the tea room after I left, and he came out just a few minutes later.”

  “‘It will, I believe, be everywhere found,’” Nick quoted, “‘that as the clergy are, or are not what they ought to be, so are the rest of the nation.’”

  “And I wager that what our Miss Austen meant by that,” Drew said, “was that they’re no better or worse than anyone else, though they tend to lead their flocks into being like them. For good or ill.”

  “You don’t suppose whoever it was the vicar was waiting for was already in the shop, do you?” Madeline asked.

  “I don’t think so, darling. He kept looking over my shoulder, and I could almost swear he warned someone off. It was fairly subtle, but I don’t think I’m mistaken about that.”

  “I know the padre.” Tal leaned against the mantel, staring into the still-crackling flames. “If he was waiting for someone, it was perfectly innocent. Probably some middle-aged lady who thinks her husband doesn’t love her anymore or some such rot. Parsons have to deal with that sort of thing all the time, don’t they? I mean, if it was a woman like that, she couldn’t talk to him at the church or even at his home without someone noticing and mentioning it to someone else, and before long there would be all sorts of wild speculation about why she could possibly need to speak to the vicar in private. You know how small villages are.”

  Nick nodded. “And heaven help her if one of her neighbors was to ask her what she and the vicar talked about and she refused to say.”

  “Nasty gossips,” Tal muttered. “We’ve already had half a dozen old crows come by just to poke their noses in to see what they can find out at the murder house.”

  Carrie looked down at her hands lying folded in her lap, and Nick, sitting close to her on the floral sofa, glanced at Drew, clearly wanting him to steer them away from the subject of murder.

  “I’m sure it was nothing,” Drew said. “Maybe I just imagined something that wasn’t really there.”

  Carrie looked up at him again, blue eyes anxious. “But he did say he would do Billy’s service. He doesn’t mind?”

  “Not in the least,” said Drew. “He said he’d be honored. He’s got an engagement in the morning, but he said if one o’clock would be all right, he will do it then.”

  “That would be fine. If Daddy is going to be here on Sunday, tomorrow should be just right.” She gave him a pitifully thin smile. “Thank you for taking care of the arrangements for me, Drew.”

  “I’m glad I could help. I wish there was more I could do.” He felt a needle prick of guilt in the pit of his stomach. I wish there was more I hadn’t done.

  “I think Tal would do much better if he didn’t have Laurent about all the time,” Drew said when he and Madeline had gone up to their room, “but he’s a wily fellow, our Frenchman, and knows when to play up to his hostess. I can’t imagine he doesn’t know she is the only reason he’s still here.”

  “Poor Tal.” Madeline kicked off her shoes and stretched out on the bed. “This must be awful for him.”

  “There’s no love lost between them,” Drew said. He shed his dinner jacket and tie, not caring that Eddie immediately pounced on the tie and carried it under the bed. “I can’t say I blame Tal in the least for suspecting him. I feel the same way.”

  “But Laurent was on his yacht, being questioned by Scotland Yard, when Billy was killed,” Madeline said. “I don’t know of a better alibi than that.”

  “Very convenient, if you ask me.”

  “Well, it’s not as though he set up the interview. He couldn’t have known Inspector Endicott would have come just then to give him an alibi.”

  “Ah, but you forget, he wasn’t alone.” Drew sat on the bed and removed his shoes. “There was that woman, Mrs. Something-or-other, on the yacht with him. He had his alibi all along.”

  Madeline propped herself up on one elbow, frowning. “But we all heard those barrels fall. How could he have pushed them over and still been on his yacht?”

  “I don’t suppose he could have.” He hesitated for a moment. “I’ve been wondering too about this bout of food poisoning the maid has.”

  “Josephine?”

  “Mrs. Ruggles absolutely will not allow for the possibility. Not in her kitchen.”

  “But what else could it be? Dr. Fletcher examined her.”

  “True,” Drew said, “but if the food was spoilt, then why was she the only one to become ill? And if the doctor was expecting food poisoning, then naturally that’s what he would see. A small portion of arsenic would produce the same effect.”

  Madeline’s eyes widened. “You don’t think someone was trying to kill her, too?”

  “Not kill, but perhaps put her out of the way for a day or so.”

  “But why?”

  “I don’t know,” he said, shoulders slumping. “Only it seems rather a coincidence that it should happen just now. Perhaps I’m just making something of a perfectly ordinary occurrence.”

  She took hold of his sleeve. “I don’t like being here, Drew. We ought to get Carrie and Nick and go back home now. Billy thought this was all fun and games and now he’s dead. I don’t want—” She stopped, forcing a smile. “No, never mind. We’re going to figure this out. And no, Carrie and I aren’t going home without you and Nick, so don’t even say it.”

  “I’d feel better if you did,” he admitted, “but if you’re going to stay, you stay with me from now on, eh?”

  She put her arms around him and pulled him close. “I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.”

  Thirteen

  Will Holland’s funeral took place the next day. It was a small gathering in the circle of trees in the meadow out beyond Farthering Place—Tal and his mother, Drew and Madeline, and Carrie on Nick’s arm, pale but clear-eyed. As he had at Alice’s funeral, the vicar spoke gravely and yet not without hope. For those who put their trust in Christ, death was not the end but the beginning of the adventure.

  Drew felt his throat tighten at those words, remembering how Will had been eager for an adventure of his own. The mystery of the pearls had been fun enough, but having a real murder case to solve was much more interesting. And now . . .

  They should have all gone home, Carrie and Nick and Madeline, too. Will should have gone with them. He should have gone and stayed there until the case was solved. And then he should have gone back to America and gone to university and played American football and gotten himself a sweetheart and a little tiger-striped convertible and then lived to see a son of his own do the same.

  “It’s not right,” Drew said.

  Tal had been silent before the service, and now, as the others were moving away from the graveside, leaving behind the mound of newly turned earth, he came up to Drew, his voice low, torment in his eyes. “It’s not right,” he said, echoing Drew’s words.

  Drew patted Madeline’s hand that rested on his arm. “Excuse us a moment, will
you, darling? We’ll be along shortly.”

  She nodded, gave Tal a sympathetic glance, then hurried to catch up to Nick and Carrie and Mrs. Cummins.

  “Where does it end?” Tal said once she had gone, his mouth taut and his body coiled, ready to snap. “It doesn’t make sense. The police say he was killed because he saw something he shouldn’t have. But my father’s in jail. It’s not as if whoever was in this with him can continue on with the smuggling and everything else.”

  “No doubt they shut down everything once your father was arrested,” Drew said, “but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a trail to follow back to his accomplices, whoever they are.”

  Tal raked a hand through his hair. “I can’t take this much longer. Mother’s trying her best, but I can tell it’s tearing her apart. Why do the police have to be so deuced slow?”

  “I’m sure they’re doing everything they can. We just have to—”

  “Just have to be patient?” Tal snapped. “Just have to let them do their jobs? Just have to what?”

  “Look here, old man, I know what you mean. It seems like they’re doing nothing and all the while people are dying. It just takes time.”

  “They ought to make an arrest,” Tal said as he stalked through the grass. “My father wasn’t in this alone. And he’s not the one killing people now. The police ought to make another arrest before we’re all murdered in our beds.”

  “And whom do you suggest they arrest?”

  “That rotten Frenchman, for one,” Tal said, his eyes flashing fire. “A baby could see he’s up to no good, him and that Adkins brute he keeps with him.”

  “I don’t know why you don’t send him off, to tell the truth,” Drew said, glad the unctuous cur hadn’t insisted on accompanying Mrs. Cummins to Farthering Place. “I don’t like his being in the house. Clearly you don’t, either.”

  Tal’s mouth turned down in distaste. “Mother doesn’t think it would be ‘kind’ to send him away when the police haven’t found anything against him, and my father hasn’t said he’s involved in anything underhanded. The oily devil plays up to her monstrously, and she can’t even see it.”

  “He has been a friend of your father’s and hers for some years now. It would be rather a scandal if he were sent packing at this point.”

  Tal gave him a grudging nod. “And that’s the only reason I don’t send him off myself. Will’s murdered and then we ask Laurent to leave? It would be seen as proof of his guilt, no matter what the police do, and likely would damage his wine business. If by some chance he’s not involved in all this, it wouldn’t be very fair to him, eh? No matter how great a swine he is.”

  “I suppose you’re right. Innocent until proved guilty, eh?”

  “True enough. But if your chief inspector were to put him and his man both in chokey, I’d sleep sounder, I can tell you for certain.”

  “He’d like nothing better, I’m sure,” Drew said. “But either Laurent is as innocent as he claims or he’s been extremely clever about keeping his hands clean on this side of the Channel.”

  “The police are too soft on him, if you ask me. Hold his feet to the fire, and he’ll squawk quick enough.”

  “They can’t very well do that, you know. Not without evidence.”

  “Right,” Tal said, a sneer marring his face. “Two murders aren’t quite enough.”

  “It’s a bit hard for them to arrest a man they were interviewing at the time the last murder was carried out, don’t you think?”

  “Maybe he didn’t do it,” Tal considered, “but he could have had it done. Come on, Drew, you know that sort of thing happens all the time. If the police won’t do anything about it, why don’t you?”

  Drew blinked, startled into a low laugh. “Me? Come on, old man, you know I haven’t any authority here. I don’t like Laurent any better than you do, but I don’t have anything but my own personal distaste to hold against him.”

  “And Adkins?”

  Drew frowned. “I’m not quite sure what to think of him. Clearly Scotland Yard think he’ll lead them to something important if they’re patient enough.”

  “And who else will be dead by then?” Tal rubbed his eyes with both hands. “Oh, never mind. Never mind any of it. Maybe it would be best if you all went home now.”

  Drew stopped where he was. “What?”

  “You heard me. I don’t want anything to happen to anyone else. You’d all be safer here at Farthering Place.”

  “You’re most likely right. We just didn’t want to leave you and your mother on your own at Winteroak. Plus I’m more likely to turn up something there rather than here.”

  Tal shook his head. “No. I appreciate your trying to help out, but I should never have asked you in the first place. It’s not your responsibility.”

  “I’d like to help out all the same.”

  Tal looked at him for a long moment, a sudden coldness in his eyes. “Truth is, Drew, you’re worse than useless.”

  He stalked off toward the house, and Drew could do nothing but watch him go. Worse than useless. It was true, wasn’t it? He’d accomplished nothing at Winteroak House but let Will Holland get killed. If the case was too much for Birdsong’s people and Scotland Yard to boot, who was Drew Farthering to presume he knew more than they did?

  He swallowed down the tightness in his throat. Instead of heading back to the house, he turned the other way and looked out over the familiar meadow, down to the village below. He could see Holy Trinity among the other buildings and remembered the centuries-old engraving in the pulpit: “Woe unto me if I preach not the gospel.”

  Woe unto me, he thought, if I abandon my own calling. It was the same, wasn’t it? Turning his back on the task he’d been given, whether or not it was appreciated, whether or not he saw the use in it, was not his way. He couldn’t stand one day before God and say not that he had tried and failed but that he hadn’t tried at all. If only just one thing in this entire muddle made any sense.

  “Drew?”

  He started at the voice, a voice he hadn’t expected to hear again, at least not here and not now. Then he turned. “Tal. I thought . . .” He frowned, studying his friend’s face. “I thought you’d gone.”

  “I had no place saying what I did, Drew. This whole business has me reeling, and I guess it’s easiest to strike out at whoever’s closest, eh?”

  “I know you’ve had a rough go of it.”

  Tal exhaled heavily, the pain in his eyes nearly unbearable. “I just . . . I need to know what’s going on, what happened to Will and Alice. I don’t know where to start or where to turn.”

  Drew hesitated a moment, but there was only one place he knew to go in time of trouble. Only one.

  “I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t believe God was with me.” He smiled just the slightest bit. “I’ve found He doesn’t mind if we come to Him after we’ve made a complete shambles of things. He just wants us to come.”

  “And you think He cares about the nasty little messes we make?” Tal asked. “The ones we barrel straight into without a thought of Him and then come sniveling to Him to make better?”

  There was no bitterness in Tal’s tone, only an honest questioning and perhaps a hope that it might be true.

  “I do,” Drew told him. “For reasons I can’t even begin to understand, He loves us and wants to walk beside us, even when we walk through places so dark we can’t see Him.”

  Tal said nothing for a long moment, and then he looked away. “I wish I were as sure as you. I wish I could make sense of even one thing that’s happened this past week.” He took a quivering breath. “I suppose there’s a lot I ought to think about. Please, Drew, come back to Winteroak. Help me figure this out. I didn’t mean what I said. Forgive me, will you?”

  “Nothing to forgive. You’re absolutely right.”

  “Really, I am sorry. I didn’t—”

  “No, it’s true what you said. I’ve been useless.” Drew shook his head. “But maybe I’m just stubborn enough to ke
ep trying anyway.”

  “Good,” Tal said. “Very good. I want whoever’s behind this to pay for what he’s done. I want to know what sort of wretched creature could have killed Will and Alice just because they happened to be inconvenient. I want to look into his eyes and tell him exactly what his greed and selfishness have done.” He clenched his hands into fists. “I want to help you however I can.”

  “The best help you can be, Tal, is by trying to think of anything, no matter how small, that might be a clue. Anything unusual. Anything that doesn’t fit into the regular routine. Anyone around the house who isn’t acting quite as he or she normally does.”

  Tal huffed. “Don’t you think I’ve tried? The police have asked again and again what I knew and what I noticed and why I didn’t realize what was happening. There wasn’t anything to notice in particular. Except poor Alice . . .” His voice quivered, but he steadied himself and went on, “After she went, there were police everywhere, with Will nosing around after them. There wasn’t much I noticed at all by then. I couldn’t think of anything more than Alice was dead and my father was a dope smuggler.”

  “I know. But maybe you could think again. Anything’s worth checking into at this point. It’s usually the small things that end up being the best clues.” Drew tapped his waistcoat pocket. “Like that scrap of label I found a while back. I still don’t know where it goes or if it has anything to do with anything, but I’m keeping my eyes open.”

  Tal nodded, a burning eagerness in his eyes. “Right. I’ll see what comes to mind.”

  “But not just this minute.” Drew turned him back toward the house. “Come on, old man. I’m sure our housekeeper Mrs. Devon has some good strong tea waiting for us. That’s enough to worry about for today.”

  “You’ll come back to Winteroak? You won’t abandon the case?”

  “No.” Drew clasped his shoulder. “I’m not much of an abandoner, I’m afraid. Never have been. Now come along.”

  There were few things more comforting than Mrs. Devon’s tea and sandwiches and the “nice bit of cake” she always seemed to have ready on difficult occasions. Afterward they went back to the Cummins house.