Betting on Death

by Megan Mollson

  The family didn’t need me interfering, so I spent the next hour working. I updated the casebook with the disappointing details of the Finney case. There was a letter from Paula Dennis suggesting that we come and investigate a mysterious sound in the attic. I smiled fondly at the note, appreciating both her eagerness to see Will again and her support of our agency. I also hoped that this correspondence meant that she hadn’t been as crushed by the sour words of her tea guests as I had been.

  Finally, Will was able to extricate himself and join me in the library.

  “How fun that the boys are able to visit your family overnight,” I said, hoping Will would offer some details of the circumstances.

  Instead, he shrugged. “They think it’s an adventure. Mother and Father were thrilled, of course, to have them stay the night. Once the boys are a little older, I’m sure they’ll be happy to stay without Jane here.”

  I snatched the opportunity. “Is your sister all right?”

  The eyes Will turned on me said that he’d noticed nothing. Men, I sighed.

  “When I saw her yesterday, her spirits seemed a bit low. I was hoping that there isn’t anything wrong.”

  Will sat up from where he’d flopped. His eyes moved back and forth and he rubbed his chin. “She didn’t say anything to me.” He thought for another moment. “Now I’m curious, Rose. Do you mind if I go and get Jane and bring her in here?”

  “Of course not,” I said primly, though I cheered internally.

  My partner pushed himself from the chair and loped out of the room with determination in his stride. Not five minutes later, he was back with his sister in tow.

  I looked the pair of them over, looking as I always did for some detail that would mark them as siblings. And, as always, I found nothing. Jane was of average height and slightly rotund after having two children in short order. Unlike Will’s brown hair and eyes, her hair was raven black and her eyes were a light blue-gray. If I didn’t know their parents, I would have questioned that these two were related. However, they were an exact mix of their parents’ features and there was no room for doubt. It made me wonder what my sibling might look like had my mother lived long enough to produce one.

  “Come on, Janey,” Will wheedled as he flopped back into his chair. “Something’s not right. Why won’t you tell me?”

  Jane’s open expression closed immediately. In fact, she looked as though she might make a run for it at any moment.

  “I’m sorry to pounce on you like this,” I stepped in. “It’s my fault, really. I mentioned to Will that you seemed out of sorts and he was concerned. We only want to know if there’s anything we can do to help.”

  Her eyes searched her brother’s for a moment and she pursed her lips. Finally, she sighed and slumped a little. “Ned’s been having a hard time at work.”

  “A hard time? What do you mean?” Will asked sharply. He was always very protective of his older sister and was poor Ned’s harshest critic.

  Jane pulled her handkerchief from her sleeve and dabbed at her eyes. Considering that she had confessed only that her husband was struggling at work, I found this odd.

  “He hasn’t been making as many sales and so his commissions haven’t been as good as they usually are.” She sniffed, refusing to meet our eyes.

  Clearly, things were worse than she was saying. If the mention of low sales could start her crying, there was more to the story. I tried to imagine what would happen if my husband wasn’t able to bring home as much money as we needed. Surely, both of us would be on edge and have short tempers due to worry. Had they been arguing? Or was Jane worried that she’d lose her home? After growing up at Maple House, which was in a greatly reduced state, she was certain to care passionately about proving that she could keep a good house.

  Will, however, pounced, hackles raised. “Has Ned been cruel to you? Has he hurt you or the boys?”

  Jane rolled her eyes. “Will, you’re being melodramatic.”

  “Has he?” Will looked ready to run to the door and track down Jane’s poor husband at work. I had to hide a smile at his protectiveness. While Jane was clearly annoyed by it, I found his behavior rather sweet.

  “No, of course not. He’s been a bit… moody lately, but not violent.” Will relaxed and Jane offered him a watery smile. Then she sighed. “He’s even been working extra hours, but nothing seems to help. I’m worried what will happen if this continues. It would be awful to have to leave our house and find a smaller one. The boys have friends in the neighborhood and little Ned just started school. The last thing he needs is the upheaval of moving away from what’s familiar.”

  “If things aren’t so bad, why did you stay here last night?” Will pressed.

  The tears began running down her cheeks again. “We had a terrible row yesterday when Ned came home for lunch. The maid had been to the butcher’s and he said our bill hadn’t been paid in almost a month. I asked Ned about it, since he likes to handle all our accounts, and he grew so angry.”

  Will puffed visibly and Jane put out a hand to his knee to calm him. “Don’t be silly, Will. We called each other names, but that was all.”

  Despite Jane’s attempts to reassure her brother, I wasn’t convinced. Little Ned would have been in school yesterday, it having been a Tuesday. We’d gone to visit Mrs. Finney early in the day and returned just after luncheon. Jane must have been so upset that she went and took Ned from school and then came to her mother’s house. That sounded like far more than a simple name-calling spat to me.

  “I feel I should say something to Ned,” Will was insisting. “He has no business treating you terribly if he’s to blame for his poor performance at work. Say, why don’t you invite me over for supper one of these evenings and I’ll let him know he’s not to treat you this way.”

  “You’ll do no such thing!” Jane got to her feet. “I’m a grown woman, Fitzwilliam, and you are not going to meddle in my marriage. Do you understand me?”

  “I’m not meddling,” Will argued. “You’re my sister and I have every right to look after you.”

  Jane threw her hands up in the air. “This is why I didn’t want to tell you why we stayed over. I knew you would want to take action. Will, I do not want you to say anything to Ned. He’s a proud man and has had to suffer enough of your suspicious glares over the years. If you confront him over this, it will make things worse. Now, promise me that you will say nothing to him.”

  She waited for her brother to give her a grudging nod before she made an excuse and left the library. Will slumped back in his seat broodily.

  “I hate it when she treats me like a child,” he grumbled.

  I felt that I needed to stand up for Jane. “She does have the right to conduct her marriage as she sees fit. If she doesn’t want you interfering, you need to respect her wishes.”

  “I know you’re right,” Will sighed, “but it’s awful having to watch my own sister being so unhappy. You thought she was unhappy, didn’t you? I don’t mean just moderately displeased with the world, but as though something is deeply wrong.”

  “I agree with you,” I admitted. “Unfortunately, if Jane doesn’t want to share more details with us, there’s nothing for us to do. We can’t force her confidence.”

  Will made a sound that was halfway between a grunt of agreement and a groan of annoyance. He lifted one shoulder to signal his agreement, then pushed himself to his feet and began to walk back and forth across the library as though he couldn’t sit still any longer.

  “Will, you can’t get involved if Jane doesn’t wish it. It will only push her away. You can be a good brother to her and give her opportunities to open up if and when she so desires.” I watched him, eyebrow raised. “Are you going to be able to let this go? Or are you going to cause a problem?”

  “You’re the one who brought it up,” he argued.

  “That’s true, but even I recognize that there are times that we shouldn’t pry.” I watched him pace a few more moments. “What are you going to do?�
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  My partner sighed dramatically. “I’ll let it go.”

  “Good. Let’s talk about some business for a while.” I reached for Paula’s letter. “I’m afraid that our only offer for employment is from Miss Dennis again. She reports a mysterious noise in the attic.”

  Will stopped in his tracks, his eyes wide. “Don’t you dare respond that we are available! I can’t take investigating another case around the Dennis house while their daughter moons at me.”

  My mouth gave the weakest of smiles. “Unfortunately, this is the only possible case on the horizon. You don’t suppose that Mrs. Finney is correct about her silver, do you?”

  “I don’t see how she could be. There’s the same number of silver pieces there. How could something go missing and the number of items remain the same?”

  It was my turn to slump. I didn’t have an answer to that question, and so, our only case was officially closed.

  Chapter Five

  Father was home for supper that night. He was a bit touchy when I asked him about the Meriwether case and I gathered that the police were making little headway. This was understandable when one considered the sheer number of people who had motive to kill him. Father explained that if the killer came in through the back alley, he or she would likely have gone unnoticed by the neighbors. It’s possible that no one saw or heard anything.

  No wonder Father had such a short temper these days.

  After we ate, I made certain that he was settled beside the fire in the parlor with his favorite book and a glass of sherry.

  “Aren’t you staying, Rose?” he asked when I walked to the doorway. “I thought you would be anxious to finish ‘The Turn of the Screw.’”

  “I’ll be back shortly. I have a question for Harrison about a case we’ve been working on.”

  “I hope you have better luck with your case than we’ve had with ours,” Father huffed before reaching for the newspaper.

  I smiled at him outwardly while inwardly thinking that we might not even have a case. This was the very last thing I could think of to try and understand why Mrs. Finney thought the silver was missing. If there was anyone with inside knowledge about the intricacies of silver, it would be our butler, Harrison.

  He was sitting in the butler’s pantry, putting dishes away in the exact order that he so rigorously required. Yet, as soon as he saw me, he put down the glassware from supper and turned to me.

  “How may I help you?” he asked, his voice as formal as ever.

  I looked him over and thought again of how well suited he was to his position. I’d come into contact with many butlers over my nineteen years. They were typically middle-aged men who possessed an unshakable dignity even when dealing with the most undignified situations. Harrison was particularly nondescript. He was average height and weight. His hair was mostly gray, though he was going bald on top. Even his eye color was somewhere between gray and blue, which made them entirely forgettable. It was as though he’d put himself together with the sole purpose of not drawing attention.

  “Please, don’t stop working. I know you’re ready to retire for the night. I was hoping to ask you some questions about a silver set with which one of our clients is experiencing trouble.” I perched on one of the stools that stood against the wall.

  Harrison put the glasses in his hand back in their places on the shelf and said over his shoulder, “I’d be glad to help, if I can.”

  “Thank you,” I replied, resisting the urge to wiggle with relief. “Our client is a very elderly woman whose memory comes and goes. She is in the possession of a silver set that she believes came from the Medici family in Italy in the 18th century.”

  Harrison paused, his face clearly displaying how impressed he was by this. That expression told me more about the value of the silver set than anything I’d seen or heard so far.

  “Our client insists that pieces have gone missing. However, she showed us the set and we counted them. Every fork and spoon is accounted for. Mrs. Finney, our client, was having difficulties remembering who we were. Still, she insisted that pieces were missing even though we pointed out to her that the number hadn’t changed. She even held up two forks that looked exactly the same and told me that they were different.” I felt my frustration rising as I recounted the story. I sighed and asked, “Do you have any ideas as to what she might be thinking?”

  The older man used the cloth thrown over his shoulder to shine a spot on a serving tray as he considered. “When you say that the two pieces looked the same, do you mean the design? Or did you also mean the color and rate of tarnishing?”

  I sat up straighter and cocked my head. What did our butler suspect? “I suppose that I meant the design,” I spoke slowly, trying to remember. “Why do you ask?”

  “This is just a guess, mind you,” Harrison hedged, “but it’s possible that the pieces are being duplicated and replaced.”

  I sat back against the wall, stunned. The idea would never have occurred to me. “Why would someone do that? It seems like an enormous amount of work.”

  “For most silver sets, it wouldn’t be cost effective. One would have to smuggle out the pieces, pay a silversmith to create new ones from less expensive materials, and then smuggle the new pieces back. However, with an antique set that belonged to a famous family, I would imagine the effort would produce a large payoff.” Harrison put the last piece aside and came to take the stool next to me. Somehow, since we were on his turf, sitting together didn’t feel strange. I doubted that I’d ever sat next to a butler before in my life. Yet, in this setting and with this conversation, I hardly gave it a thought.

  I tapped my chin. “What would it cost to reproduce the set?”

  “It’s difficult to say,” he shrugged. “If the new pieces are steel with silver plating, they would each cost a dollar or two to make.”

  My eyebrows raised. A dollar or two was still a very large sum of money. “The set has almost a hundred pieces!”

  Harrison crossed his arms and leaned back, nodding. “However, the Medici set would be worth as much as a hundred times that amount.”

  A low whistle escaped me that my very proper grandmother would have taken me to task over. I shook my head in amazement. Then I recalled one of Harrison’s earlier questions. “Why did you ask about the coloration of the two pieces?”

  “Sterling silver has a slightly yellowish cast that silver plating doesn’t. It isn’t always easy to spot, particularly if the pieces are polished regularly.”

  My ears pricked up as did my heart. I could hardly believe that I was hearing a possible solution to this case. “Are there any other noticeable differences?”

  “Some people say that sterling silver has a different smell than silver plating.” Harrison scratched at his chin in contemplation.

  Something suddenly made sense. I snapped my fingers. “That could be why Mrs. Finney noticed a difference that no one else did. This silver has been in her family for her entire life, so she has used it for years. Pieces that have been replaced would look different and possibly smell different to her and still look normal to everyone else. Is there a way to test the pieces without damaging them?”

  Harrison sniffed, “Oh, yes. That’s easy. Fill a basin with ice water and submerge the pieces. Silver conducts heat and cold much better than steel.”

  I felt my whole body lighting up with excitement. “So the real pieces would be cold much faster than the false ones. Oh, Harrison, thank you so much!”

  He smiled at me like a teacher whose student had mastered a difficult subject. “I’m glad to have been a help. Please let me know if there’s anything else I can do.”

  ***

  My mind was buzzing after my tete a tete with Harrison in the pantry. There was so much to wonder about now. Before, I had been unable to accept that Mrs. Finney was simply old and confused. She had been so earnest in her belief that something was wrong. Now, there were new possibilities for me to consider that hadn’t existed before. They waited impatiently
for their turn as I mulled each one over carefully.

  If someone was going to all the trouble and expense of making false pieces and slowly exchanging them with the real ones, it must be a member of the household. No one else could come and go with a bag full of silverware without raising suspicion. It also had to be someone who knew that he had plenty of time in which to trade the pieces before selling the set.

  The question that I needed answered was: who? Would a servant in the house be ambitious enough to pull off such a heist? Would a servant have the capital to invest in having the forged pieces made? My instinct was to suspect the members of the family, but I couldn’t rule out the servants just yet.

  Of course, Mrs. Finney would be above suspicion. She had no reason to draw attention to the problem. Or did she? I chewed my lip as I tossed and turned in bed that night, unable to turn off my thoughts and fall asleep. Nothing came to mind, so I gladly put that question aside. I knew Mrs. Finney was widowed, so I would need to find out who besides her son and daughter-in-law were in the house regularly.

  Finally, long after the clock struck midnight, I decided to return to the Finney’s house the next day and try to interview the staff. I refused to give the matter any more thought and finally drifted off to sleep.

  Poor June had a time dressing me the next day. I was too excited to stand still for long and she kept having to trail after me, attempting to button my shoes or finish pinning my hair.

  “Please stand still, Miss,” she begged finally. “I’ll never have you looking proper if you don’t stand in place for two whole minutes put together.”

  I stopped trying to reach a hat box that was just beyond my outstretched fingers and thought about what I’d been doing. My mind had been whirling all morning and I’d completely ignored the struggles of my maid. “I’m sorry, June. I wasn’t thinking.”

  She gave me one last look of warning and bustled about fixing all my loose ends. It was torturous to have to stand in one place and keep my mind off the case, but every time my mind wandered, my feet began to wander, too, so I had to put it out of my thoughts. I made myself watch June intently in the mirror, concentrating on each of her movements so that she might finish as quickly as possible.