Georgette Heyer

by Why Shoot a Butler?

  Corkran, one eye on Joan’s pale, anxious face, chose to be flippant. ‘Robbed? Of course he was. I bet a bob you find out that he was making off with the family plate. I say, where is this damned draught coming from?’ He looked round and saw that the door was standing ajar. He made as if to get up, but Fountain was before him.

  ‘Don’t bother, I’ll shut it,’ he said and walked heavily across the floor towards it. He glanced out into the hall before he shut the door, and Anthony, observing this, said suspiciously that he supposed that fellow Collins was prowling about as usual.

  Fountain looked annoyed, but shook his head. ‘No. But we’d better not talk so loud. Naturally the servants are agog with curiosity.’ He glanced at Amberley. ‘Can’t blame ’em, can one?’

  ‘I think,’ said Amberley slowly, ‘that I might steel myself to the pitch of blaming a servant whom I found listening at keyholes.’

  ‘That’s Corkran’s tale,’ said Fountain rather angrily. ‘All moonshine! I don’t hold any brief for Collins, but…’ He broke off, and reverting suddenly to his jovial manner began to talk about the coming ball.

  The door opened softly and the valet came in carrying a tray of drinks. A chill, a feeling of uneasiness, seemed to enter with him. Fountain’s voice sounded forced; Joan’s laugh held a nervous ring. The valet moved noiselessly across the pile carpet to a table against the wall and set down the tray. He went out again as softly as he had come in. Amberley noticed that he shut the door with quiet firmness behind him.

  He looked across at Fountain and said directly: ‘You don’t like that man?’

  The others showed some surprise at this sudden, unconventional question. Fountain stared back at Amberley, the laugh dying on his lips. He shook his head. ‘No. Not much. Shouldn’t keep him, only that my uncle wished it.’

  ‘Do you know of any enmity between him and Dawson?’

  ‘No. Don’t think they hit it off particularly well, but I never saw anything of it.’

  ‘You don’t think that – Collins had anything to do with it?’ The question came from Joan.

  ‘No, Miss Fountain. I only wanted to know.’

  ‘Well, he hadn’t,’ said Fountain. ‘I happen to know that he was here at the time the murder was committed.’

  ‘You’re quite sure of that, I suppose?’ Amberley said.

  Fountain gave a laugh. ‘’Fraid so. He does look a typical villain, doesn’t he? I say – ought not to joke about it, you know. You were going to tell us just how you found Dawson’s body.’

  Amberley’s account, his cousin complained, did not err on the side of sensationalism. It was very brief, even a little bald. He stressed no points and advanced no theories. While he talked he was aware of an atmosphere of almost painful anxiety. It did not come from Felicity, frankly thrilled; nor from Corkran, still flippant; but Joan sat with her eyes fixed on his face, a haunted expression in her own; and Fountain, impatient of Anthony’s interruptions, jarred by Felicity’s evident enjoyment, listened intently, his cigar held unheeded between his fingers, its long ash fallen on the floor at his feet. That he was honestly upset by the murder nobody looking at him could doubt. He wanted to know everything that Amberley could tell him and again he pressed the question: ‘Are you sure you passed no one on the road?’

  Amberley’s story, shorn of all decorative detail, did not take long to recount. A silence followed it which was at length broken by Corkran. He proposed cheerfully that he and Fountain and Amberley should play a three-ball game of golf next afternoon to get rid of the taste of the inquest.

  Fountain did not want to play; so much was apparent in his quick headshake. ‘You two play. I shall have to go to town.’

  ‘Will you? What for?’ asked his step-sister.

  ‘I must see about engaging a new butler,’ he answered shortly. ‘I spoke to Finch’s Registry Office on the telephone today. I’m afraid it may be a bit of a job. Servants don’t like coming to such an isolated place. And then there’s this dreadful business. Puts them off, you know. Bound to.’

  ‘Oh, my godfathers, does that mean we’ve got to have Collins gliding about the place indefinitely?’ groaned Corkran.

  ‘I must get someone. It isn’t Collins’ work and he doesn’t like doing it.’ Fountain saw that his cigar had gone out and threw it away. He made an effort to shake off his evident depression and got up, suggesting a game of snooker.

  He marshalled them all into the billiard room, quite in his usual manner, nor was any further reference made to the murder. Yet for all his laughter, for all Corkran’s airy persiflage, Amberley was conscious of that vague sensation of discomfort which seemed to brood over the house and which Anthony had tried ineffectively to describe.

  He was not sorry when the evening came to an end, but the visit, little though he might have enjoyed it, had given him something to think about. Silently he cursed himself for his rash, unaccustomed quixotry in shielding by his silence the girl he had found beside the murdered man’s car.

  It was not she who had fired the shot; of that he was convinced. But her presence had not been accidental, nor had her agitation (he was convinced) been entirely due to finding the butler’s body. She had given him the impression that she was suffering less from shock, or from horror, than from bitter disappointment.

  It looked like being an interesting case. There was the girl, a lady, who had so evidently gone to meet the butler; there was Fountain, shaken by the news, plainly aghast; there was Joan, frightened, nervous of the house, nervous of the valet; there was Collins himself, impassive yet oddly sinister, listening at doors, as anxious as his master to hear all that Amberley had to tell.

  Nothing in that, Amberley reminded himself. Why should they not want to know every detail? Yet he could swear that something lay behind, something obscure that would not readily be disclosed.

  He determined to look into the butler’s record. He had little expectation that anything would come out at the inquest. Whatever the butler’s secret was and whoever held the key to it, were mysteries which would need a deal of solving.

  Nor was he mistaken. The inquest next morning provided the sensation hunters who flocked to it with very little to interest them. The doctor and the gun expert were dull witnesses, and the most hopeful witness, Amberley himself, disappointed everyone by giving his evidence in a dry and exceedingly succinct manner. No one came forward with a startling disclosure; no one seemed to know of any secret in Dawson’s life, and no one knew of anybody who might be supposed to wish the butler out of the way. The jury returned a verdict of murder against person or persons unknown, and the case ended.

  ‘In fact, sir,’ said Sergeant Gubbins afterwards, ‘it’s a queer case, and do you know why, Mr Amberley?’

  ‘I can think of several reasons, but by all means tell me.’

  ‘It’s because there ain’t nothing queer about it, sir,’ said the sergeant darkly.

  Mr Amberley regarded him enigmatically. ‘You ought to go a long way, Sergeant – if you’re lucky.’

  ‘Well, sir, it isn’t for me to say so, but I won’t say you’re wrong,’ said the sergeant, much gratified.

  ‘But you will have to be very lucky,’ said Mr Amberley gently.

  The sergeant looked at him suspiciously and pondered the remark for a while in silence. Having considered it carefully he said with some indignation: ‘It don’t surprise me to hear you make a lot of enemies, sir. Not that I’d be one to take offence, because I know you will have your joke. But there’s a lot of people mightn’t like the way you have of saying things. Now if I didn’t know you like I do, I wouldn’t tell you what I’m going to. But you gave us a tip or two over that robbery case we had when you were down here, and freely I admit it.’

  ‘Yes, you made a bit of a mess of that, didn’t you?’ said Mr Amberley. ‘Still got that chuckle-headed inspector at Carchester, I notice.’

  The sergeant grinned. ‘He’ll be getting promotion soon. Maybe I will too.’

  ‘What fo
r?’ asked Mr Amberley, interested.

  ‘Solving this murder case, sir.’

  ‘Oh!’ said Mr Amberley. ‘Well, don’t let me waste your time. You run along and solve it.’

  ‘That’s just it, sir. I thought that you, having a bit of a knack of hitting on things, in a manner of speaking, and making a sort of hobby of it – well, what I thought was, I might do worse than tell you what’s puzzling us.’

  ‘You might, but if you imagine that I’m setting up as an amateur detective…’

  ‘Oh no, sir, nothing like that. Though when you spotted it was Bilton had those diamonds I must say that I did think to myself that you were fair thrown away in your profession. Of course, you happened to be present when the theft took place, which was an advantage we hadn’t got. Still, I will say it was a very neat bit of work, Mr Amberley, and we were all very grateful to you, because it was touch and go whether we called in the Yard or not.’

  ‘Just like this case,’ nodded Mr Amberley.

  ‘You’ve hit it, sir,’ said the sergeant. ‘It’s the chief constable. He’s what you might call – well, a bit timid. Now when I said that there wasn’t anything queer about this case, what I meant was, it’s all straight on the surface. Nothing known against Dawson, no enemies, no women, been in service at the manor for years, everything above board. Well, that ain’t natural. Take it from, me, Mr Amberley, when a man gets himself murdered there’s always something behind, and ten to one he’s a wrong ’un. Setting aside women, that is. Now in this case there’s only one thing that looks a bit fishy.’

  ‘Do you wear glasses?’ asked Mr Amberley suddenly.

  ‘Me, sir? No, I do not.’

  ‘You should.’

  ‘Not me, Mr Amberley. I see as well as I did when I was a two-year-old.’

  ‘That’s what I meant. Go on.’

  ‘Blessed if I know what you’re driving at, sir,’ said the sergeant candidly. ‘Well, this fishy thing is the money Dawson had put by. It all goes to his sister. She’s a widow, living in London. He hadn’t made a will, so she gets it. And there’s a tidy sum by what one can make out.’

  ‘I always imagined butlers made a bit on the side.’

  ‘Some do and some don’t. But I never heard of one who made as much as Dawson did. As far as we can make out he’s got a matter of a couple of thousand laid by. Spread about, too. Make anything of that, sir?’

  ‘Spread where?’

  ‘Post Office Savings Bank here, them War Loan Certificates, and a bank at Carchester. Looks funny to me. The inspector doesn’t make much of it. Of course, people do get ideas into their heads about spreading their money about, but what I’d like to know is how did he come by so much? Always paying in money he seems to have been.’

  ‘How much at a time?’

  ‘Well, not a great deal, sir, but steady. I could let you have the figures.’

  ‘Yes. Or rather, no. You’d better not.’

  ‘Colonel Watson wouldn’t object, sir, if that’s what you’re thinking. Not as it’s you, if you understand me.’

  Mr Amberley’s saturnine smile appeared. ‘The question is, Sergeant, am I on your side?’

  ‘Beg pardon, sir?’

  ‘I’m not sure that I am,’ said Mr Amberley. ‘I’ll let you know when I’ve thought it over. Meanwhile, I want some lunch. Good hunting!’

  The sergeant was left to stare after him in great perplexity. The chief constable, Colonel Watson, who presently came hurrying out of the courtroom, found him scratching his head meditatively. ‘Has Mr Amberley gone, Sergeant?’

  The sergeant sprang to attention. ‘Just this minute gone, sir. He’s in one of his funny moods.’

  ‘Oh, you’ve been talking to him, have you? Very irregular, Sergeant, quite out of order. I suppose Mr Amberley didn’t throw any more light than he did in his evidence?’

  ‘No, sir. Mr Amberley went off highly humorous,’ said the sergeant heavily.

  At Greythorne only Felicity evinced much interest in the result of the inquest. Sir Humphrey, although a justice of the peace, deprecated the introduction of such subjects into the home circle, and Lady Matthews had already forgotten most of what it was about. But when Amberley met Anthony Corkran at the clubhouse that afternoon he found that worthy agog to talk the matter over. In company with the Fountains he had been present at the inquest, and he expressed himself much dissatisfied with the result.

  ‘Is that the end of it?’ he demanded. ‘D’you mean to tell me there’s nothing more going to be done?’

  ‘Oh no, there’s a lot more to be done. Find the murderer, for instance. Look here, there are several things I want to ask you, but first I want to play golf. What about it?’

  ‘Absolutely all right with me,’ Anthony assured him. ‘Might think out a solution on the round, what?’

  The course was a long one with a fair amount of trouble on it. Mr Corkran warned his friend that it was imperative to keep straight and pulled his first drive into a clump of gorse bushes.

  ‘Thanks, Anthony,’ said Mr Amberley. ‘Example is better than precept – every time.’

  It was past five when they finished the round, and the light had already grown very bad. They found the clubhouse rather empty, as was usual on a weekday, and they had no difficulty in securing a corner to themselves. Over the first half-pint of beer, Anthony would discuss nothing but his tendency to pull, embellished by illustrative anecdotes of fatal pulls on half the golf courses of England. But when he had taken Amberley from Sandwich by way of Wentworth and Hoylake to St Andrews he at last ran dry.

  Amberley allowed him to brood over the afternoon’s round for a few minutes, while he sent for more beer. When this came Anthony roused himself from his absorption and of his own accord abandoned the subject of golf.

  ‘This ’ere murder,’ he said. ‘What about it?’

  ‘Not enough. That’s the trouble. What is Brother Basil afraid of ?’

  ‘Ah, you noticed it, did you? Blessed if I know. Jolly sort of atmosphere about the place, isn’t there? The sooner I get Joan out of it the better.’

  ‘When is the wedding, by the way?’

  ‘Next month. As far as I can make out, I look like being a fixture there till then, or practically. I was supposed to be pushing off after these fancy-dress revels – I say, why do women get all unhinged when it comes to fancy dress? Even Joan’s definitely insane on the subject. I ask you, Amberley, do I look the sort of silly ass who’d do well as Faust?’ Frank shook his head. ‘Of course I don’t. A dance is all right, but why drag in the fancy dress? However, that wasn’t what I was going to say. Being a fixture. Well, I always meant to push off on Thursday, but apart from Joan wanting me to stay a bit longer, Brother Basil’s all for it.’

  ‘Pleasure of your company, or funk?’

  ‘Funk,’ said Corkran positively. ‘The man’s all chewed up with it, and God knows why. All I know is that he doesn’t want to be left alone at the manor. It’s since the murder that he’s got the jumps to this extent.’

  ‘Do you know anything about him?’

  ‘No, not much. Nothing much to know. Good family, public-school man, and all that sort of thing. Always been fairly well off, I gather, on account of old Fountain making him his heir. Naturally I’ve gleaned a bit from Joan, in the way of conversation. As far as I can make out Brother Basil’s led a comfortable sort of life, no worries, or debts, or riotous living. Ordinary bonhomous sort of chap. Simple Pleasures and Athletic Ideal, you know. Shoots, hunts a bit, quite a stylish bat, I believe. He’s keen on all outdoor sports. Devilish healthy. Had me out before breakfast to bathe when I stayed with him down at Littlehaven. He’s got a bungalow there – rather decent, except for the damned boat.’

  ‘What damned boat?’

  ‘Motorboat. According to Basil you can cross the Channel in it without being seasick. Well, I didn’t cross the Channel, so perhaps that accounted for it.’

  Amberley laughed. ‘Not a good sailor, in fact.’

&n
bsp; ‘The world’s worst,’ said Corkran. ‘Anyone can have the super motorboat as far as I’m concerned. Joan, too. She bars it completely, which feeds Brother Basil stiff. He and she don’t hit it off particularly well, you know. Though according to her things were fairly all right till the old man died. She swears it’s something to do with the manor. Of course, the truth is she doesn’t like the place, so she’s got it into her head there’s something wrong with it. Then, on top of that, there’s Collins.’

  ‘Yes, I’m rather interested in Collins,’ said Amberley. ‘Were he and Dawson the only survivors from the old régime?’

  ‘Oh Lord, no! Practically the whole staff’s the same. There’s a housekeeper who’s been there since the year dot, and the cook, and a couple of gardeners, and a whole bevy of skivvies – I don’t know about them, by the way. They may have changed since old Fountain kicked the bucket. But the hardy perennials all stayed put. You see, Brother Basil was no stranger to ’em. Old Jasper seems to have been very fond of him; always having him down to stay. So they all knew him and seem to have liked him. I tell you, there’s no data at all.’

  ‘I begin to think there’s something in what the sergeant said,’ remarked Amberley. ‘Queer case. Nice little holiday problem.’

  ‘Well, if you want a Watson, don’t forget me, will you?’ said Corkran. ‘And talking of Watson, do you remember Freddy Holmes? Chap with freckles in the Army Class?’

  ‘In Merrill’s House? Yes, what about him?’

  ‘I’ll tell you,’ said Corkran, drawing his chair closer.

  The conversation ceased from that moment to have any bearing on the murder, but became frankly an interchange of school reminiscences. It lasted for an hour and might have lasted for three had not Corkran chanced to catch sight of the clock. He then fled, having promised to fetch his betrothed from a tea party at least half an hour earlier.