Fifteen Sixteen Maids In The Kitchen: A Grasshopper Lawns whodunit

by EJ Lamprey

  ‘Or,’ William promptly countered, ‘Colonel Mustard is a full-blown nutter snatching at any opportunity that offers, and we’re all at real risk anyway.’

  ‘We won’t make any dramatic accusations,’ Donald suggested peaceably. ‘Just the kind of questions that would be asked at any murder mystery. One of them is a killer. Whether he or she did it on purpose or in a moment of madness, everyone getting leery is more likely to trigger another incident.’

  ‘True.’ Kirsty was looking extremely harassed, and William leaned forward intently.

  ‘It could help. Think on, everyone here had been told who they were to look out for. The Catt was dead a couple of hours later. In theory both Diane Bagger and that Goth should be aware of when she left the hall, and if she left alone. There were two people watching every person here, when did you ever get a witness situation like that?’

  Kirsty walked restlessly to the window and stared out at the streaming rain. ‘Okay. Okay. But I can't do more than take notes, I can't be involved in any way, or you could get your killer and it would still be thrown out in court because the resident polis officer was acting inappropriately.’

  ‘Excellent!’ William rubbed his hands together with satisfaction. ‘We should grab Grant first. That’ll prepare the ground for the others, and we can get him briefed on the situation.’

  ‘I like Grant, you ken I do.’ Kirsty looked more worried than ever. ‘But he’s a writer you only really knew online until we met in Tenerife. He’s not a lifelong friend. How do you ken he didn’t do it? She was quite a sexy piece. They’d been having a flirt, Edge mentioned that. Say it went wrong, he lashed out. We don't ken him that well! For that matter, could he even play the part if he knows what’s really going down?’

  ‘Fine.’ Donald ignored William’s obvious frustration. ‘So we treat him like the others, but I agree we see him first. We do have to stop him telling them you’re the real deal, apart from anything else, or if he has told anyone we need to rethink strategy. For that matter, he can be our practice run. At least if we do mess it up we can confess, and I’d sooner trust him than any of the others.’ He smiled up at Kirsty, his blue eyes crinkling. ‘We’ll do Stuart next, for the same reason. But I promise we won’t mess it up.’

  ***

  Edge followed Vivian wearily to the kitchen for what seemed at least the tenth time in the interminable evening. Donald had quietly drawn them aside to explain what he and William were going to do, borrowed Drew for what he called vital duties, then borne Grant away to give his testimony.

  Vivian briskly packed her little tea trolley with mugs and filled the first of her four thermos flasks from the hot urn. ‘Easier if we move the whole lot through, don’t you think? No-one tramping back and forth to the kitchen, and we don’t run our legs to stumps serving them.’

  ‘Agreed. I’m extremely glad I never was a kitchen-maid. This week could kill me.’ Edge bent to retrieve Vivian’s biscuit tin from a lower shelf. ‘Probably literally, unless we can find who did it before they lash out again. No wonder the guests all think it’s a stunt. It beggars belief.’

  ‘She wasn’t a nice woman, but there’s a huge gap between disliking someone and wanting them dead. Are you okay? Not too shocked? You won’t be able to say again that you’ve never seen a dead body.’

  Edge shuddered. ‘That I won’t. Although it was Kirsty who actually went up to her and checked she was dead. I’m suddenly glad I never joined the police. That’s two professions I’ve seen the downside to tonight.’ She managed a smile and Vivian nodded briskly at her.

  ‘Catering is a killer on the legs. Put milk in this last flask, then we’re all set. I’m a little worried about Stuart. He wasn’t in the hall at the time, I know that. And he uses the library for smoking.’

  ‘He was in the drawing room. I was watching the doors most of the time, as it happened. If he had done it, been in the library and left without me noticing, you’d think he would have hurried straight back to the hall, not gone into another room without a soul there to vouch for him. Are you really worried about him?’

  She couldn’t help but sound slightly disapproving and Vivian sighed. ‘You don’t understand, he’s been trying to chat to me all evening and I think he took the huff when I kept including others in what we were saying. He’s much shyer than you’d think. He was feeling a bit overwhelmed, he told us he was.’

  ‘So he killed the Catt creature because she chased him to the library when he wanted to be alone? Nonsense,’ Edge said bracingly. ‘He’s spoiled and was having a little sulk. Men who’ve never married are decidedly odd.’

  Vivian, fitting a sugar bowl carefully onto the trolley, turned her head to stare at her. ‘I can’t believe you said that. Donald has never married!’

  ‘And Donald is very odd indeed! Oh, I adore him, you know I do, but I’m not blind to his faults. He spent the best part of sixty years concentrating on number one, and he has his moments. Anyway, I’m not saying anything against Stuart in particular. I’m just saying you don’t know him and you have a very comfortable relationship with William, most of the time.’

  ‘On his terms.’ Vivian could look very mulish. ‘I’m getting a bit fed up with my kids asking pointedly if we’re going to formalize things, and hinting that I’m a gullible fool when I say we’re happy the way we are. I’m frankly not happy with things the way they are, not any more. I sometimes think I’m the only person who thinks marriage means something. You used to.’

  ‘Thirty years ago if you wanted to be together, you got married. I was always going to marry James, he was utterly conventional. I’m not sure I would have married Alistair, though, that was entirely his idea.’

  ‘You loved Alistair!’

  ‘Yes I did. Marriage seemed almost superfluous.’ Edge hesitated, then in an attempt to defuse Vivian’s stubborn resentment pushed on. ‘We were completely besotted. If that had ever changed, all the pieces of paper in the world wouldn’t have patched that over or kept us together.’

  ‘It isn’t a piece of paper.’ Vivian was suddenly fierce. ‘I hate that phrase. It’s a declaration that a man loves a woman enough to suggest a binding contract, and she loves him enough to agree. Stuart seems to be the only person who feels the way I do about that. William says marriage is the fastest way he knows to ruin a good relationship, and okay, he had a foul divorce, I accept that, but don’t I have any say? The fact that he won’t even consider it, when he knows it matters to me, makes me feel very insecure.’

  Edge shrugged helplessly and Vivian turned her attention back to the trolley, her mouth set in a hard line.

  ***

  The coffee trolley was in brisk demand, especially when Martha found the drinks cabinet and triumphantly brandished a bottle of Scotch just as Grant reappeared looking slightly thrilled by his interrogation.

  He was escorted by Drew, who was, he explained cheerfully, an acting constable. ‘Not my first time, either. Mr Butler, could you come on through?’

  Stuart, standing alone and turning an unlit cigarette over and over in his fingers, nodded abruptly and strode in the direction of the drawing room.

  ‘They’re good, as good as the real thing.’ Grant gratefully accepted the offer of a dram from Martha Smith, and tipped it into his coffee. ‘William fixed me with such a stare I nearly confessed on the spot, haha! I did like our pretty little police expert, but she was quiet as a mouse. Pity. She could grill me any day.’

  He half-turned his head to wink at Edge and moved away from the coffee trolley to join her, dropping his voice to a murmur. ‘I know, don’t worry. William said not to tell people she actually is with the police. I think he was a little disappointed that she wasn’t playing the part more but Donald is doing a lovely job as an amateur detective. I didn’t know he used to be an actor. It could be fun if he did Poirot for one witness, Charlie Chang for the next, that sort of thing, eh?’

  Edge smiled weakly. ‘Who was he for you?’

  ‘Sherlock Holmes, of cou
rse. Elementary. Nearly called William ‘Watson’ at one point. I hadn’t any idea you were going to add a murder theme. Good fun! I was a little sorry I had a cast-iron alibi.’

  ‘That’s suspicious in itself,’ Vivian said severely, overhearing. ‘He with the cast-iron alibi is always the killer. Don’t you read whodunits?’

  Grant laughed out loud, delighted. ‘Well, I was talking to the lovely corpse, you know, right before. I’ll miss her. What a cleavage! Will she re-join us when the case is solved? Anyway, Martha Smith joined us and Ms Catt hastily decided she had to be elsewhere. No love lost between them! Martha’s an interesting woman. She was telling me about an autopsy she watched in Mexico when the alarm was sounded. We’re each other’s alibi.’

  Vivian glanced across at Stuart, who had just returned from the drawing room and was looking a little awkward, and smiled. He hesitated, then flashed his quick smile and joined them.

  ‘I’d ask for coffee, but I think I’ll be bouncing off the walls tonight as it is. It’s been a long evening.’

  He wasn’t the only one looking tired. The lighting in the big hall wasn’t very flattering, even with Donald’s expert tweaking. Aubrey was flipping idly through the CDs next to Donald’s music centre while the Three Tenors provided a muted background, shadow scoring deep in his lean cheeks. Diane was half-dozing in a chair by the fireplace, her lovely mouth drooping. Zoe was perched on the arm of another chair and frowning over her phone as though willing it to work. Vivian, Grant and Stuart were with Edge in a loose knot around the coffee trolley talking idly. She wished sharply she could take the other fireside chair and join Diane in a catnap. Even if the interviews were only taking up to ten minutes at most there were still three to go, then tidying up ready for the morning. Stuart brushed her as he reached forward to pour himself a cup of milk and broke her weary reverie.

  ‘So which detective did you get?’ She managed to make her voice light. ‘Grant was telling us Donald was Sherlock Holmes for him.’

  ‘Oh, Sherlock for me too. Who else would he be?’

  ‘Charlie Chang.’ Grant was quite firm. ‘I’d love to see him calling William his ‘number one son’. Did he deduce where you were?’

  Stuart shrugged. ‘I made it easy. I told him.’

  Grant looked a smiling question and Stuart added, slightly reluctantly, ‘I was in the drawing room. I was feeling a bit out of place, you know. You lot all talking about books and atmosphere and writing stuff.’ He looked restlessly at Vivian. ‘I felt left out. Silly, I know. ‘

  ‘No alibi!’ Grant said joyfully. ‘Vivian, that has to trump my rock-solid one!’

  ‘I’m probably Stuart’s alibi. I was watching the doors some of the time, as it happened.’ Edge smiled apologetically at Grant, who frowned.

  ‘That makes it difficult. Is this going to be a locked room mystery? Those are never as much fun.’

  Martha Smith, making a beeline for the urn as Drew escorted her back from her interview in time to overhear the exchange, was brisk. ‘Stuart could have nipped out through the library French doors and in through the drawing room ones. Easy as pie. And Grant, you forgot to tell them you went off to get an extra jersey around that time. For someone who spends a fair amount of time in these parts you certainly do feel the cold.’

  ‘So I did. Was it then? It must have been. That puts me back in the running. Thanks, Martha!’

  She nodded at him and poured herself coffee. ‘I told Donald he has to do other detectives, and he obligingly switched to a very passable Poirot. I like him. I’m going to do what you did, Grant, Scotch in my coffee. And then, game or no game, I’m for my bed. It’s been a long day.’

  ‘I couldn’t possibly have used the French doors, they’re all permanently locked,’ Stuart protested a little plaintively, but she ignored him and tipped a generous dram into her coffee mug.

  ‘I’ll sleep like a log tonight,’ she remarked with satisfaction, and glanced round the room over the lip of the mug. ‘Who’s still to go? That Drew lad took Aubrey back with him, so that must be nearly all of us now.’

  Zoe, giving up on her phone, rose gracefully and sauntered over to join them. ‘I still have to be grilled. Maybe Donald will strip-search me, that could be mildly fun. I’m bored now.’

  ‘Aren’t you always?’ Edge asked tartly and instantly regretted it.

  Zoe’s heavily shadowed eyes rested on her briefly, then the younger woman curled her lip. ‘Not always. If there’s anything actually interesting going on, I’m quite the life and soul of the party.’

  ‘That must make a lovely change,’ Vivian was sweetly polite. ‘We really must find you something interesting.’

  Zoe turned the brooding look on her. ‘I wish you would,’ she said simply.

  Stuart choked, then hastily excused himself to go outside to smoke under the portico over the front door. ‘Pneumonia, here I come.’ He glanced disconsolately at the streaming windows. ‘Bloody rain. I was hoping to get out into the glen tomorrow and check on the deer, do a bit of a head count. If this keeps up all night even the Landie won’t cope with the mud. I’ll take you, if you like,’ he added to Vivian, ‘if you can escape your kitchen duties for an hour or two. The glen is beautiful and red deer are magnificent in their natural habitat.’

  Vivian nodded and smiled and Zoe said something mocking under her breath as Stuart headed for the front door. Grant stepped in hastily. ‘So you and I think Diane still have to be interviewed. Do you have an alibi?’

  ‘I have no idea when the murder is supposed to have happened. I had just come back inside from having a cigarette when the alarm sounded.’ Zoe glanced round the room, thinking back. ‘The corpse tottered out of the room a few minutes before I went, though. La Bagger was talking to our gigantic host. Aubrey was nowhere in sight, nor was my fellow smoker, the dreary Stuart. You were trotting off up the stairs, presumably to get that thrilling cardigan you’re wearing now, and Martha was attacking the drinks tray. Vivian was sitting in a chair looking as if she wanted to go to sleep, Donald was staring out the window at the rain and Edge had vanished with the two newcomers, presumably to set the murder scene. It looked much the same when I came back.’ She smiled faintly as Grant’s mouth opened. ‘I’m a writer. I notice, I record, I soak up situations. Don’t you?’

  ‘I find people more interesting to listen to than watch.’ He added in an effort to keep conversation going, ‘I’ve never read one of your books, but I imagine you favour the perspective style?’

  Whatever she might have replied was interrupted by Drew coming to collect her for her turn and Aubrey, looking a little flushed, his mouth set, joined them at the urn.

  ‘I just wanted to say goodnight.’ He sketched a humourless smile as he nodded round the group and glanced across at Diane, who was now frankly nodding in her chair. ‘I was in my room hoping to sleep off a migraine when the hullabaloo started, and I’m ready to drop in my tracks now. Ladies, Grant, we’ll meet on the morrow. Until then, a fond adieu.’ He headed towards the stairs, his shoulders a little slumped with weariness, as Stuart reappeared from outside, his skin glistening with a fine layer of moisture.

  ‘It’s still a monsoon out there.’ He wiped fretfully at his cheeks. ‘Never seen rain like it. The track will be washed out for sure. Is Aubrey off to bed? I hate to break up the party, but I think I’ll have to follow suit, especially if I’m to be hauled out at the crack of dawn to help unblock the gully.’

  ‘I’ll go up with you, while I can still walk in a straight line.’ Martha put her cup down with a slightly unsteady hand. ‘I’m not sure I entirely approve of a murder mystery at a writing retreat, but it certainly got us all talking on the first night. Good night to you all.’

  She took Stuart’s arm firmly and marched him towards the stairs, with one last wryly-helpless glance over his shoulder at Vivian.

  Edge smothered a yawn and screwed her eyes up to look over at the grandfather clock near the door. ‘Eleven! Is that clock right? It feels much later.’<
br />
  Even as she said it the clock whirred arthritically into life and wheezed out eleven subdued clanks. Diane started convulsively, and pushed herself out of her chair to come across to join them.

  ‘I’ll need coffee if I’m to stay awake. How much longer, do you have any idea?’

  ‘You’re the last to go, any minute now. I’m sorry, this hasn’t been much fun.’ Edge grimaced apologetically and Grant said, with undimmed enthusiasm, that he was thoroughly enjoying himself.

  ‘Grant’s quite right. It’s very interesting,’ Diane said politely, and bent to fill her mug from the vacuum flask faucet. Edge laughed and gave her a quizzical look as she straightened and Diane’s sombre face transformed as she giggled involuntarily. ‘Okay, but I’ve been up since five this morning! I live in Dorset, you know, so getting up to deepest darkest Scotland meant changing trains three times. Maybe next time set the murder on the second night!’

  ‘Ms Bagger? They’re ready for you now. Please bring your coffee,’ Drew added cheerfully as Diane made to put her coffee down. She followed him away with a little ta-rah wiggle of her fingers to the others. There was no sign of Zoe, who had presumably gone straight upstairs, and Vivian’s jaw stiffened as she concealed a yawn.

  ‘Go to bed,’ Edge was firm, ‘I’ll finish up here. No, really. You can be up early overseeing breakfast while I sleep in, how’s that for an offer?’

  ‘Gratefully accepted. Good night, Grant, it’s lovely having you here, I’m looking forward to catching up with you during the week.’ Vivian kissed him lightly on the cheek and disappeared towards the downstairs suite.