“Although the murderer might,” I added, seeing the look of complacency that was spreading across his features. “Your turn may come tomorrow. Saturday’s corpse works hard for a living. That would exclude everyone else but you.” I paused to let it take root. “However, let’s not anticipate. The obvious candidate for tonight is Sir George. I can’t think of anyone in the country more loving and giving. I wouldn’t mind a guinea for every charity he supports. You must have seen his name on the horse troughs.”
At that moment Sweeney wouldn’t have known a horse trough from an elephant. He was thinking about Saturday’s corpse.
“We have a duty to warn him,” I went on, raising my voice. “Sir George Holdfast, Sweeney. His life is threatened.”
He had stopped fidgeting with his ear. He was tugging at his lower lip now.
I said, “Do you hear?”
He said, “Do you suppose it could be referring to one of the servants, sir?”
“What?”
“Works hard for a living.”
“Sweeney, I despair of you. I don’t believe you heard a word I was saying. Do you possess a dressing gown?”
“No, sir.”
“Never mind. Pick up the candle and follow me.”
Few places are so drafty as the corridor of a country house by night. The candle was blown out straight away and we had to pause to reignite it. Holdfast’s bedroom was around a turn and at the end. I stepped out boldly. Anyone hearing my tread could have been in no doubt that my purpose was urgent. Sweeney padded barefoot behind me, doing his best to keep up and guard the flickering flame.
I halted at Holdfasts door and instructed Sweeney to knock. There was no reply from within, so we entered.
“Nobody here,” Sweeney intoned in a voice of doom.
“I can see that,” I said tersely, flinging open the wardrobe. The suit George had worn that evening was hanging there among the others. “No obvious sign of foul play,” I commented in the reassuring manner of Scotland Yard, though my heart was pounding a knell. I looked into the cupboards, under the bed and out on the balcony. “He could be anywhere in the house or grounds.”
“Do you think we’re too late, sir?” Sweeney asked.
I said phlegmatically, “I think we are justified in ascertaining which of the guests are where they should be, in their bedrooms.”
Sweeney’s eyes gleamed in the waxlight. “Sure and if anyone is missing, we’ll know why. We’ll be arresting the murderer tonight and putting a stop to his crimes, sir.” His voice positively throbbed with expectation.
Without another word I strode out to the corridor and stopped at the first door on the right, which I knew to be Pelham’s, and thrust it open. Bed springs creaked and Marcus’s voice demanded, “What the deuce . . . ?”
Sweeney held the candle high.
“Merely making sure,” I announced. “You may go back to sleep.” We withdrew and closed the door.
We ignored the room opposite, the one formerly occupied by Osgot-Edge. Sweeney, a veritable bloodhound now, trotted ahead of me and grasped the handle of the next.
“One moment,” I cautioned him just in time as I saw which door it was. “I think it would not be wise to make a sudden entrance here.” In my mind’s eye I saw Sweeney hanging by his heels from the beam while Miss Dundas prepared to eviscerate him with her hunting knife. “Better knock and wait.”
Presently the lady’s voice sang out clearly from within, “If that is who I think it is, I’m honored by your gallantry, sir, but I’d rather fend for myself. I wouldn’t care to repeat what happened last night.”
“As you wish, my dear.” With a look at Sweeney that defied him to put any construction on it, I gestured to him to move on. Isabella Dundas was in her room and that was all we needed to know. There remained one room to check—Amelia’s—and the attentive reader will recall that I had originally plumped for her as my principal suspect before succumbing to the theory that Bullivant was responsible.
Sweeney stationed himself on the step outside our hostess’s door and gave me a doglike look.
“Leave this to me,” I told him, reaching for the handle, but it turned before my hand made contact.
The door opened six inches and a face stared out, the broad, ruddy-cheeked face of Sir George Holdfast. He looked at me as bold as a cabman and spoke my name.
And I spoke his. For the moment I had nothing to add. Sudden death was so much the vogue in this house that I’d mentally killed him off. It was like seeing a ghost.
He asked, “Is everything all right, sir?”
I said, “That is a question I should address to you. You weren’t in your bedroom.” And even as I spoke, the mystification cleared. He was barefoot and wearing a nightshirt. What an old goat! No sooner had he waved goodbye to his wife than he was partnering Amelia at cards, trumpeting every hand she played and buying his ticket for a mattress jig.
“Were you looking for me, sir?”
“Out of concern for your personal safety, George,” I told him. “I had reason to believe that your life is threatened, and when I walked into an empty bedroom I feared the worst. Obviously I need not have worried. Lady Drummond is within, I take it?”
He lowered his voice. “Yes, sir, but things are not as they appear.”
I said, “Save your breath, George. You and I are men of the world and Sweeney wasn’t born yesterday.”
His face twitched as if a wasp had stung him. “Sir, the reason I’m here is that Amelia invited me to come.”
I said acidly, “Bully for you!”
“No, please allow me to make this clear. She isn’t entirely convinced that Bullivant committed the murders, and she reasoned that I—with my reputation for supporting good causes—fitted the epithet loving and giving.”
“Which you obviously do. I’m sorry we interrupted.”
“Sir, you interrupted nothing!” The old hypocrite’s motives were as spotless as the bottom of a birdcage, but he would insist on justifying his tumble with our winsome hostess. “What I am trying to say is that Amelia blames herself for these tragedies. She feels that if she hadn’t invited us to Desborough to shoot, none of this would have happened. In spite of your reassurances to the contrary, she is fearful of yet another dreadful event tonight, and for her peace of mind I was persuaded to pass the night in here upon a made-up bed on the ottoman, where I shall come to no harm.”
I gave him a penetrating look and said in a voice that only he and I could hear, “That remains to be seen.”
His eyes widened and I saw the first spark of doubt there. He whispered, “Surely you don’t suspect . . .” He pointed over his shoulder.
“George, I wouldn’t be in your shoes for all the tea in China.” It was an unsuitable thing to say because he wasn’t wearing shoes, but it made its point.
“Oh, Jerusalem!”
Just then Amelia called out, “Georgie, darling, I’m getting cold like this. There’s a wicked draft.”
He clapped a hand to his face. The fruits of passion had suddenly turned sour. In desperation, he asked me, “What can I do?”
“Not much to please a lady, if I’m any judge.” Cruel, I admit, but it was rather galling to hear Amelia call him to her bed. More helpfully, I added, “Make an excuse.”
To my utter surprise and confusion, he did. He turned and informed Amelia, “It’s His Royal Highness, my dear. I believe he has something of a confidential nature to impart to you. He has recommended me to return to my room, so I’ll wish you good night.” With that, he stepped into the corridor, dipped his head in some kind of salutation and moved off at speed towards his bedroom.
“Shall I make sure he comes to no harm, sir?” volunteered Sweeney, quick to seize on a chance of bodyguarding as a change from looking into bedrooms.
I nodded. Holdfast had to be prot
ected. Sweeney handed me the candle and set off in pursuit.
Events were moving with bewildering speed, like a lantern show that is running out of time. Next, I heard a movement from inside the room and Amelia looked around the door, her black hair hanging free like a gypsy girl’s. “Bertie, you’re dressed.”
I said, “I haven’t been to bed.”
“Do come in. Corridors are so public.” She grabbed my free hand and drew me firmly inside and closed the door. She was wearing a silk kimono like the young ladies in Mr. Whistler’s pictures. It was quiveringly clear that she was unconfined by other items of clothing, but as you will have perceived from my reference to fine art I meant to keep my thoughts on a higher plane.
“What a lark!” she gushed. “What on earth did you say to George to get rid of him? Never mind. I’ve had some fizz, so you’ll have to forgive me if I’m too forward. Or would you like me to send for some more?” Her eyes gleamed.
It’s no secret that I excite the fair sex to an exceptional degree. I’m used to them becoming quite giddy in my presence. Whether this interesting effect arises from my Royal blood, or the cut of my clothes, or my blue eyes, or the charm of my personality is not for me to say; whatever its origin, I cheerfully accept it as a fact of life.
I suppose I had better give you the reverse of the coin: I’m readily aroused by a pretty woman, sometimes too readily for my own good. This time, I meant to keep myself in check, for this pretty woman might also be a murderess. “Thank you,” I said in answer to her offer of champagne, “but I’d rather have a cup of cocoa, if you would be so kind. And more of those sausage rolls.” While she rang for a maidservant, I placed the candlestick on the mantelpiece, picked up a poker and attended vigorously to the fire, which had burned low.
She said, “I’m going to blow out the candle. I love the firelight, don’t you?” She came so close as I crouched on the hearthrug that she nudged my shoulder with what I shall politely call her hips. She said, “What a splendid flame! I shall warm my knees.” She parted her kimono to reveal as pretty a set of pins as you would ever see. “Bertie, this is such a surprise! I didn’t think it possible that you would visit me like this.”
“Why not?”
“After our talk in the garden today—or is it yesterday now?—I thought you had decided I was to blame for all the horrid things that have happened.”
I said in all sincerity, “Yes, I spoke too harshly. I came after you to apologize. I came up here to explain, but your brother said you wouldn’t wish to be disturbed.” On an inspiration I added, “This is the first opportunity I have had to make amends.”
“How gallant.” She put a hand on my shoulder and slid it over my collar, letting a fingertip stroke the curls at the back of my neck, a pleasant sensation were it not that my knees wouldn’t support me any longer in the crouching attitude.
I stood up and she took it as a cue to move towards me, almost nose to nose, saying, “Do you feel safe with me now—or would you care to search me?”
Such temptation! You’ll be encouraged to learn that I resisted. Well, to be strictly accurate, her maid knocked and she went to the door to give the order. I took the opportunity to seat myself in an armchair and take out my cigar case. “You don’t mind if I smoke?” I asked her when the door was closed again.
She gave her permission, of course, and made some remark about the cold, so I told her to find a shawl, or something, to which she said coquettishly that she knew better ways of getting warm and ran across the room to the fire and pulled the kimono fully open, stretching it out like a flag. I had the draped view from the rear, I must hasten to emphasize, but I was still subjected to the shape of her body behind the silk silhouetted by the flames, and very provoking it was, I can tell you.
To subdue nature, I made a performance of lighting the cigar. I was reluctant to speak in case she turned about and gave me the front view. But she wrapped herself up again and said, “Bertie, in case you are wondering why, the reason I invited George to my room was because I’d abandoned hope.”
I couldn’t resist a chuckle at that.
She said solemnly, “I had better rephrase that. I didn’t dare hope or aspire to a visit from you. Oh dear, I confess that I have been thinking of it constantly, ever since Monday night when I came to your room with the news that Miss Chimes was dead and you appeared for a moment to misinterpret my reason for being there. But it seemed so unthinkable, so open to censure until . . .”
“Until this evening when Alix left,” said I, matter-of-factly, to help her out.
“Well, yes—and you appeared anyway to suspect me of murder.”
“I suspect everyone,” I told her genially.
“But mainly me?”
Ducking that, I said, “I can’t think why a lady would invite a number of old friends to her house and kill them one by one.”
“She wouldn’t and she didn’t,” said Amelia. She hesitated, and then added in a small, tight voice, “But she’s guilty, and ready to confess.”
Every muscle in my body tensed. “What?”
“Yes. A confession, Bertie. Do you want to hear it?” I glanced rapidly about the room, suspecting a trick, looking for the hidden weapon that she meant to kill me with the moment she had told me the truth.
She approached and leaned right over me, with her hands on the arms of the chair, her face within inches of mine, the faint fumes of champagne on her breath. “I plead guilty to desires of the flesh, Bertie.”
“Oh.”
“There! I’ve said it.” And having said it, she flopped into my lap like a Channel swimmer who has reached the shore.
I was quite unable to prevent it without risk to each of us from my cigar. She pressed her face against mine as I shifted my legs to accommodate the rest of her anatomy.
I would like it to be known that even under this extreme provocation I endeavored to keep my detective duty paramount. I said, “Is that all?”
She didn’t answer. She was unbuttoning my waistcoat.
I persisted, “Is there nothing else that you meant to confess?”
She answered, “There is nothing else. Please don’t cause me to weep again. This has been such a wretched, ill-fated week, but tonight I want to forget all the horrors we have had to endure. You have been a tower of strength, Bertie, so resolute and so manly.”
“Decent of you to say so,” I remarked, caught slightly off guard.
Her hand moved inside my shirt. “Please take me to bed,” she murmured.
I was fast succumbing. There are limits to every man’s resistance and my limits are shorter than most. In ordinary circumstances I wouldn’t have held out for half so long. It’s not in my nature to disappoint a lady. However, I had one more card up my sleeve. “What about the cocoa and sausage rolls?”
She giggled. “I told the maid to leave them outside the door.”
That giggle was irresistible.
And now in the interests of decorum we move forward in time by an interval I am unable to document. I lost track of time, and when I might have consulted my watch it was still in my waistcoat pocket somewhere on the floor across the room.
Amelia said, “Do you mind cold cocoa, or shall I send for some more?”
I said, “I’ll take it cold. I’m devilish thirsty.”
“No wonder!” She went to the door and picked up the tray and carried it to the commode on her side of the bed. “Sugar?”
I propped myself up on one elbow, mainly, I confess, to look at her in the pink, and a sublime spectacle she was. “Sugar—yes.”
I was feeling agreeably fatigued, as one does, and relaxed, so it says much for my vigilance that I spotted what she was doing. She had a bottle in her hand and she was pouring a pale liquid into one of the cups. You may imagine what I immediately suspected.
My first impulse was to shout, “Poiso
n!” and snatch it from her, but some instinct made me decide on a less dramatic course of action. I sat back submissively against the pillows and allowed her to hand me whichever cup she selected. I then asked her if she would fetch my cigar case from my jacket.
She said with a smile, “I do believe you enjoy seeing me prance about the room in a state of nature.”
“Emphatically.”
The moment her back was turned, I leaned across and switched her cup of cocoa for mine. Cruel, do you think? If it was poison, it had been meant for me. If it wasn’t, no harm would come to her.
She climbed into bed. We each had a sausage roll and drank our cocoa. I found mine slightly bitter to the taste and added some sugar.
Presently I found myself slipping down in the bed. My eyes were heavy-lidded.
Amelia said, “Aren’t you going to smoke a cigar after all?”
“No, I feel drowsy now, uncommonly drowsy.”
“That’s good,” she said. “We should both get a good sleep. I took a large dose of chloral with mine. It’s a habit, I’m afraid. I had trouble sleeping after Freddie died, but this stuff really knocks me out. Sweet dreams, Bertie.”
CHAPTER 17
Normally I am one of the charmed few who can wake refreshed at the crack of dawn unable to fathom why the rest of humanity prefers to linger in bed. So it was puzzling, not to say infuriating, for me that Friday morning to find that lifting a leg off the mattress was a feat to be equated with tossing a caber. I made a number of attempts and, shameful to relate, dozed in the intervals.
By degrees I dimly registered that the cause of my lethargy must have been the chloral hydrate I had swallowed the night before. The taking of sleeping drafts is, I gather, a widespread practice among the fair sex, but I have never had any truck with it. So when at the umpteenth attempt I succeeded in getting a foot to the floor, my mood was thunderous. Nor was it helped by the discovery that Amelia’s side of the bed was empty; she, it appeared, having had no difficulty in getting up.
Mother naked, I stumbled across the room and looked into her dressing room, which felt like the North Pole, and revived childhood memories of winter mornings in Buckingham Palace. The balcony windows were wide open.
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