Crowned and Dangerous (A Royal Spyness Mystery) (22 page)

“That’s interesting.” Darcy looked at us for confirmation. “It sounds as if he had some kind of medical condition that had reappeared. He’d had an operation and now he needed a second one. Maybe that’s why he came over to Ireland, because he knew he was dying and he wanted to be alone.”

S
TILL
D
ECEMBER
4

A lot has happened today but we seem to be getting somewhere at last.

Zou Zou and I are brilliant! I think I might actually like her.

We stared at each other, digesting this news. It was Darcy who voiced the conclusion we had all come to. “But if he was terminally ill, why might this doctor—if indeed he was the murderer—bother to kill him?”

“Perhaps he had decided to change his will and one of his relatives in the States decided to kill him before he could do so,” Zou Zou suggested.

“That’s one thing we haven’t done,” I said. “Asked the local postman if any letters had come from America recently. It’s my experience of village postmen that they are terribly nosy and he might well remember where the letters came from.”

“Good idea,” Darcy said. “We should follow up on that. Of course, we have no way of knowing what telephone calls he received.”

“The exchange would know,” I said. “I wonder if the local police followed up on that, or if we’d be allowed to do so.”

“Now that they know Roach was traveling on a false passport I think they will have to start a proper investigation,” Darcy said. “We can make suggestions as to the directions that investigation should take.”

“Tactfully, of course,” Zou Zou said and we smiled.

“I still think the most important figure in this is Mickey, the manservant,” I said. “The whole case against Lord Kilhenny hinges on his testimony. He claimed nobody else visited the castle. But now we know that a doctor visited recently. He claimed he overheard the argument that afternoon and then a scuffle that evening. But what if there was no scuffle? What if he is actually the murderer? What if he made sure Lord Kilhenny’s fingerprints were on the club?”

“But what possible motive could he have?” Lord Kilhenny asked. “He has just lost a well-paid job. Jobs are not easy to find these days.”

“If he really was a manservant,” I said. “What if he really had some other connection to Mr. Roach and came over here to murder him?”

“What kind of connection?” Darcy’s father asked. “He was a low-class kind of chap. Roach wasn’t exactly top-drawer himself but he had money.”

“Precisely,” I said. “What if Mickey felt that the fortune Roach inherited should have gone to him?”

“The only fly in that ointment is, why did he wait so long?” Darcy said. “How many years was Roach here, Father? Four, was it?”

“Almost,” Lord Kilhenny said.

“So you want to murder someone but you wait four years?”

“I know,” I said as the idea crystallized in my head, “he knew that Mr. Roach was terminally ill. He didn’t expect him to live long. But when he lingered on for four years he decided to take matters
into his own hands, just in case Roach recovered. The doctor came, didn’t he? Perhaps he told Roach another operation might cure him.”

“Possible.” Lord Kilhenny looked at me. He had dark blue eyes like his son. He was still a very handsome man in spite of his wild, unshaven appearance.

I found his glance slightly unnerving, but went on. “So what we have to do is to make the American embassy check into Mickey’s background as well as Roach’s. Perhaps he’s here under an assumed name too. What we have to do is take a photograph of him and get his fingerprints to send to America.”

“He’s an unpleasant little weasel,” Lord Kilhenny said. “Do you think he’ll let you take his photograph and get his fingerprints?”

“We’ll do it by subterfuge,” Princess Zamanska said. “Georgie has a brilliant plan. Such a clever girl. We’ll go up to the castle and I will show him a photograph and ask him if he recognizes the person. He’ll take it and look at it, thus leaving us with lovely fingerprints. And while he’s looking, Georgie will take a photograph of him. Couldn’t be simpler.”

Lord Kilhenny scowled at her. “How can you be so bloody optimistic, Your Highness?” he demanded.

“Because it’s better than wallowing in self-pity,” she said. “I find that looking ahead and making a plan of action is the only way to cope with devastating circumstances. That’s how I managed to survive when I had to flee for my life after my beloved Peter was hacked to pieces by peasants. And your language is atrocious. I’m sure Georgie has never heard so many swearwords in her life.”

The ghost of a smile crossed his face. “You’re right. It has become atrocious. I apologize.”

“Apology accepted. And please call me Zou Zou. Everyone else does.”

“I hardly think I know you well enough for pet names,” he said.

“Alexandra, then. But none of this stuffy ‘highness’ business.”

“Very well,” he said gruffly. “In which case you’d better call me Thaddy.”

“Thaddy. Nice name.” She nodded. “Now we’re making progress, aren’t we? Splendid. So do you have a camera and film we could borrow? And a photograph? A nice big one?”

“I have a camera in my bag, as it happens. I’ll go and get it,” Darcy said. I realized he had brought a camera along to record a happier event that was supposed to have taken place. At least now it was going to be useful. As Darcy left the room Lord Kilhenny looked at the two of us. “Are you sure this is a sensible course of action? If this man really has just murdered his employer I certainly don’t want you and Georgiana confronting him. And Darcy and I couldn’t go, because he’d be suspicious and not want to talk to us.”

“We won’t be confronting him,” Zou Zou said. “We’ll be asking for his help. A possible line of inquiry we are following. He doesn’t know me. I can say with complete truth that I’m doing preliminary investigations on behalf of the barrister in Dublin. That is absolutely true and may unnerve him a little. And if he did kill his employer he’ll be secretly laughing at us for barking up the wrong tree, as the English would say. What’s more, we are not stupid. If he says, ‘Come down to the dungeons with me and I’ll look at the photograph,’ we won’t go.” And she gave that delightful tinkling laugh.

Lord Kilhenny got to his feet as Darcy came back, triumphantly waving the camera. “Very well,” he said. “I’m not sure what photographs I have that would fit the bill.”

“You have some newspaper photographs taken at race meetings, don’t you?” Darcy said. “Standing in the winner’s circle. That kind of thing.”

“Yes, but you can’t show him a photograph of me,” Lord Kilhenny said testily.

“One of the other people in the photograph—that’s who they’ll ask about,” Darcy said. “You must have pictures of being presented
with a cup, or talking with officials. This Mickey creature won’t know who they are.”

Lord Kilhenny nodded and we heard the heavy tread of his feet going up stairs. We sat looking at each other. “Well done, Zou Zou,” Darcy said. “I don’t think we’d ever have got him to talk without you. Now at least we’re onto something with the doctor.”

“And proof that Mickey lied about one thing,” I said.

We looked up as Lord Kilhenny returned. I noticed that he had combed his hair. “This one might do,” he said and handed Zou Zou a photograph. It was a press picture showing him shaking hands with another man while several others looked on.

“Perfect,” Zou Zou said. “Now we need to wipe it completely clean to get rid of all fingerprints.” She took out a white lace handkerchief, picked up the photograph and began to rub diligently. “There, that should do it,” she said after a while. “If there are still fingerprints on it they will be smudged while Mickey’s will be nice and fresh over the top of them. Well, let’s get on with it. It will be dark soon and even I don’t like the thought of creeping around the estate in the dark with a murderer on the loose.” She stood up, holding the photograph by the handkerchief. “Coming, Georgie? You have to show me the way. Camera, Darcy, please?”

Darcy reacted sharply. “You two ladies are not going alone without me.”

“You can’t come with us,” I said. “He knows you.”

“He saw you before too.”

“But he didn’t know who I really was. I told him I was working for an investigator in London, remember. And when he hears that Alexandra is working on behalf of the barrister, he may be seriously rattled.”

“He might also find another weapon and club you both to death,” Darcy said.

“Don’t be silly, darling,” Zou Zou said. “This will all be conducted on the doorstep. I understand there is still a policeman on
guard at the main gate. He’ll be within shouting distance. Nothing to worry about. You would be of more use going into the village and finding out at the post office whether any letters have arrived from America recently.”

“I don’t like this,” Darcy said, but his father nodded. “Let them go. I’ll stand and keep watch in the trees where I can’t be seen.”

Darcy sighed. “Very well. I suppose it has to be done. The sooner we have help from the American embassy, the better. But I don’t think you should let it be known that we’ve found out Roach was not his real name. He may already know that. He may not. Either way this isn’t the right time to divulge.”

We nodded.

“Ready?” Zou Zou looked at me. I stood up, taking the camera from Darcy. “Don’t worry. We’ll be fine.” I gave him what I hoped was a reassuring smile.

The rain had stopped as we left the lodge and the sky to our west was streaked blood red, dramatically outlining the bare bones of the trees. We crossed the kitchen garden and found the little door in the wall beneath the ivy. Then we made our way to the castle through the woodland. Again I experienced that feeling of extreme watchfulness, as if every creature on the estate was alert. I marveled at Zou Zou’s sangfroid until there was a rustle in the undergrowth nearby and she grabbed my arm.

“What was that?” she whispered.

“There are deer on the estate, so I’m told,” I said, glad that for once I was the brave one.

When we set off again I noticed that she kept closer to me. The castle loomed over us, its stone glowing pink in the rays of the setting sun. We followed the path around the castle wall to the front where the driveway ended in a circle of gravel with a fountain playing in the middle. I glanced back along the drive to the main gate but could not catch a glimpse of the Garda who was stationed there. Maybe this was a good thing, I decided, or he might have come to
stop us. But I would have found it more reassuring to know he was close by.

The front door was up a flight of stone steps.

“You stay at the bottom where he can’t see you and you can take a good picture of his face,” Zou Zou said.

She went up the steps and waited until I had found a position where I could focus the camera on the front door. Then she gave me a thumbs-up sign and tugged on a bellpull. We heard a jangle echoing inside and waited. And waited. Zou Zou had almost decided to turn away and give up when the front door opened with an ominous creaking sound, such as one hears in horror films. Mickey stood there and reacted with surprise.

“Who are you? How did you get in here past the constable at the gate? If you’re a reporter . . .”

“Of course I am not a reporter,” Zou Zou said in her most autocratic voice. “I am here on behalf of the barrister in Dublin who is to represent Lord Kilhenny. He wanted me to ask you a few questions. You are Mr. Roach’s manservant, are you not?”

“Would I be living in this dump if I wasn’t?” he said cockily, but his eyes darted nervously and I could tell he was rattled.

“Naturally you will be called to testify,” Zou Zou continued. “That should be no problem as long as you tell the truth. Now if you could just answer a couple of questions, please.”

“You’d better come inside,” he said.

“No, thank you. Here will do perfectly,” she said. “I have to show you a photograph and I want you to see it in good light.” She held it out to him. “Please take a look at this. You see the man standing behind Lord Kilhenny. Do you recognize him?”

He took the photograph. I focused the camera lens on him and as he looked up, I took the picture. Then wound on the film and took a couple more for good measure. I tried to make sure that my hand wasn’t shaking, which wasn’t easy. After one brief glance he handed the photograph back to Zou Zou.

“Never saw him before in my life,” he said. “Is he the guy you suspect of killing my boss?”

“Let’s just say he is a person of interest,” she said.

This time I did see a flicker of amusement cross his face. It was fleeting but definitely there. He does know more, I thought.

“Thank you. I’ll report back that you have never met him,” she said. “And I also wanted to check something else you said. I am told that you said Mr. Roach had no visitors.”

“That’s right.”

“But it seems that his doctor came to see him.”

The surprise on his face was obvious. “His doctor? Well, yes. But that’s not a visitor, is it? He had tradesmen arriving all the time, delivering groceries and meat. He had a barber come to cut his hair. But that’s not proper visitors. Yeah, a doctor came when he wasn’t feeling well.”

“An American doctor?”

“That’s right. His doctor from back in the States was making a trip to Ireland so he stopped by to check on the boss’s health.”

“And where is he now? Would he be available to testify?”

“To what?” Mickey’s voice rose. “He was here and back in the States long before Mr. Roach was killed. So please tell your barrister guy that he’s wasting his time and energy. It’s just as I told the Garda. Nobody came to the house that I knew of. The only person was Lord Kilhenny and he and Mr. Roach got into a fight that very afternoon. The guy is as guilty as hell. What more can he possibly need to know?”

“I’m not privy to the direction the investigation will be taking,” she said haughtily. “But we will be checking on some other people who were seen near the castle recently, as well as Mr. Roach’s telephone logs.”

“What does any of this matter when Kilhenny’s prints were the only ones on the club?” he demanded.

He stepped toward her and I took the opportunity to snap another picture as the setting sun highlighted his face.

“Interesting, that, don’t you think?” she said, standing her ground and eyeing him calmly. “A club that has been in existence for several thousand years and yet has acquired only one set of fingerprints during that whole time?”