Crow's Inn Tragedy (29 page)

And Anthony, capitulating as he kissed her eyes and her trembling lips, confessed that he thought it was.

THE END

Annie Haynes was born in 1865, the daughter of an ironmonger.

By the first decade of the twentieth century she lived in London and moved in literary and early feminist circles. Her first crime novel,
The Bungalow Mystery
, appeared in 1923, and another nine mysteries were published before her untimely death in 1929.

Who Killed Charmian Karslake?
appeared posthumously, and a further partially-finished work,
The Crystal Beads Murder
, was completed with the assistance of an unknown fellow writer, and published in 1930.

The Bungalow Mystery

The Abbey Court Murder

The Secret of Greylands

The Blue Diamond

The Witness on the Roof

The House in Charlton Crescent

The Master of the Priory

The Man with the Dark Beard

The Crime at Tattenham Corner

Who Killed Charmian Karslake?

The Crystal Beads Murder

“A crime of a peculiarly mysterious nature was perpetrated some time last night in a block of flats called Abbey Court.”

Lady Judith Carew acted furtively on the night of the Denboroughs' party. Her secret assignation at 9:30pm was a meeting to which she took a loaded revolver. The Abbey Court apartment building would play host to violent death that very night, under cover of darkness. The killer's identity remained a mystery, though Lady Carew had a most compelling motive – and her revolver was left in the dead man's flat…

Enter the tenacious Inspector Furnival in the first of his golden age mysteries, originally published in 1923. Though there are many clues, there are just as many red herrings and the case takes numerous Christie-esque twists before the murderer can be revealed. This new edition, the first printed in over 80 years, features an introduction from crime fiction historian Curtis Evans.

“Annie Haynes does, in
The Abbey Court Murder
, what all writers of mystery stories aspire to do, and so few carry off successfully… It is a first-rate story… the plot thickens with every page, leading us on to the final climax in a state of unfluctuating interest.”
Bookman

St. Peter's was rapidly becoming the church for fashionable weddings; but even St. Peter's had seldom been the centre of a larger or more fashionable crowd than was assembling this warm April afternoon to see Lady Geraldine Summerhouse married to the man of her choice. There was the usual gathering of loiterers round the door and on the steps of the church; while the traffic in the street was impeded by the long line of private carriages and motors setting down guests.

Two men came round the corner of King's Street, walking quickly; the sightseers brought them to a standstill.

“Hullo, what is this?” one of them exclaimed. “Oh, I see, a wedding. Well I suppose we shall get through somehow.”

Both men, though they wore the conventional frockcoat and silk hat, had the look of travellers, or colonials, with their thin bronzed faces. The foremost of the two had reached the last line of waiting spectators, and was just about to cross the red carpet that was laid up the steps of the church and under the awning. The policeman put up a warning hand, some guests were alighting, another car took its place before the kerb. A group of maidservants, with baskets of flowers, stood immediately before the two strangers. The man behind turned his head idly as a big dark man sprang from a car and handed out a tall exquisitely dressed woman. Together they came up the steps and passed close to the stranger, but the beautiful eyes did not glance at him, did not note the change that swept over his face.

He, looking after them, caught his breath sharply, incredulously. Then as they passed into the church he leaned forward and touched the arm of one of the maids.

“Can you tell me the name of the lady who has just gone in?”

The maid looked a little surprised at being spoken to, but the tone was unmistakably that of a gentleman; there was an obvious desire for information in his expression; she answered after a moment's hesitation:

“That was Lady Carew and Sir Anthony, sir!”

“Sir Anthony and Lady Carew,” he repeated in a musing tone, a curious brooding look in his light eyes. “Not Carew, of Heron's Carew, surely—mad Carew as they used to call him?”

“Yes, sir. He is Sir Anthony Carew, of Heron's Carew.”

“And she, who was she before her marriage?”

There was something compelling about his gaze. The girl answered unwillingly:

“She was his sister's—Miss Carew's—governess, sir.”

“Ah!” He turned away abruptly.

His companion leaned forward:

“Are you going on, old man? Hang it all, if you stay here much longer we shall be late for our appointment, and then—”

“I am not going on.” The first man's tone was decisive. “You can manage by yourself, Jermyn. Perhaps I may join you later.”

His friend looked at him and shrugged his shoulders resignedly.

“Well, you always were a queer sort of fellow. We shall meet later at Orlin's, I suppose. So long, old man.”

He disappeared in the crowd. The other scarcely seemed to hear him. He kept his place in the forefront of the spectators, his eager eyes seeking amid the shadows and the dimness of the church, for one graceful figure. He did not notice that the other man had turned, and was now waiting behind him. At last the service—elaborately choral—was over, the organ pealed out the Wedding March, bride and bridegroom with their attendants came forth, and still those light eyes kept their watch on the interior of the church.

The guests followed, some of them found their carriages without difficulty; others stood waiting in the porch talking and laughing to one another. Sir Anthony and Lady Carew were among the first to come out. Their footman touched his hat:

“If you please, Sir Anthony, something has gone wrong with the car; it is just round King Street. Jenkins can't get it to move. Shall I call a taxi?”

“Yes, no. Wait a minute.” Sir Anthony looked anxious. The big green Daimler was his latest toy. He turned to his wife: “I must see what is wrong myself, I won't be a moment, Judith, or would you rather go on at once?”

“Certainly not. I would much rather wait. I hope it is nothing serious, Anthony.”

As Lady Carew smiled, it was noticeable that the whole character of her face altered. In repose it was cold, even a little melancholy, but the smile revealed unexpected possibilities, the big hazel eyes melted and deepened, the mouth softened into new curves. She stood back a little as Sir Anthony hurried off, a tall graceful-looking woman in her exquisite gown of palest grey chiffon velvet, with the magnificent sables that had been her husband's wedding gift thrown carelessly round her. Against the neutral tints of her background, against the deep tone of her furs, her clear delicate skin looked almost transparent. Her face was oval in shape, with small perfectly formed features, the eyes were remarkable, big and haunting, of a curious grey blue in the shadows which yet held yellow specks that shone in the sunlight, that danced when she laughed. Set under broad level brows, they had long black lashes that contrasted oddly with the pale gold of her hair.

One woman paused as she passed.

“How perfectly sweet Peggy looked, Lady Carew! Quite the prettiest bridesmaid of them all.”

Lady Carew's smile lighted up her face; she was obviously pleased as she murmured some inaudible reply.

The pale-eyed man was just behind her now. As she turned aside again he stepped out of the crowd and touched her arm.

“Judy!”

An extraordinary change passed over Lady Carew's face as she heard the voice, as she turned and met the man's gaze. Every drop of blood seemed to recede from her cheeks, leaving her white as death; only her eyes looked alive as she stared at him, even her lips were blue.

“You!” she said slowly in a hoarse whisper. “You!”

“Yes, I.” The man placed himself a little before her, so that in a measure he screened her. “At last I have found you, Judy!”

“But you—I thought you were dead.” Her eyes were strained upon his face in an agony of appeal.

“So I should suppose,” the man said roughly with a short, hard laugh, his pale eyes burning with an inward fire as they wandered over the lovely face, the graceful svelte form of the woman before him. “But I am not dead, Judy. On the contrary I am very much alive, and—I have come home for my own, Judy.”

“Your own!” Judith Carew repeated, slowly. Her face was like a death-mask now, but the eyes—the big, luring eyes—were living as they focused on the man's bronzed face, as they drew forth some dreadful meaning. She gave a low hoarse sob. “Your own—my God!”

The pale eyes grew suddenly apprehensive, but the harsh tone did not soften.

“You know what I mean well enough. When shall I find my Lady Carew at home to me, Judy?”

“Never.” She shot the word out quickly. “You shall never enter my husband's house. I will kill myself first.”

Sir Anthony was coming back. They could see his tall figure towering over the heads of others, here and there he was stopped by a cheery word of greeting; they could hear his laugh. The pale-eyed man looked at the trembling woman.

“I must see you again and to-day—where?”

She shook her head. “I don't know,” she said with difficulty. “I have told you you shall not come into his house.”

Sir Anthony was on the top step now, only a few paces away. A tall woman in an outré costume of vieux rose had stopped him; the two were laughing and talking like old friends.

The echo of his light laugh, the sound of a careless word made Judith, waiting in her misery, catch her breath sharply.

“Go!” she cried. “Go! He must not hear. I forbid you to tell him now.”

The sullen fire in the pale eyes of the man watching her leapt to sudden life, then died down swiftly.

“If I go now, you must see me—later. Look.” He drew out his pocket-book and scribbled an address upon the first page: “42 Abbey Court, Leinster Avenue, 9.30 to-night. There!” He tore out the leaf and thrust it into her hands. “If you fail me, Judy, you know the consequences.”

She pushed the scrap of paper mechanically into her glove; he turned and disappeared in the crowd.

Sir Anthony caught a momentary glimpse of him as he came up, and looked after him curiously.

“Who was that, Judith? He looks rather an odd customer, as if he had seen life in some queer places. But what is it, child?”—his tone turning to one of apprehension—“You are ill—faint?”

Lady Carew forced a smile to her stiff lips. “It is nothing. It was so hot in the church,” hesitatingly, “and the scent of the flowers is overpowering,” she added as a passing waft of sweetness from the great sheaves of Madonna lilies that stood in the nave reached them. “I shall be all right directly. What was wrong with the car?”

“Nothing much,” Sir Anthony said carelessly. “Jenkins soon put it right, but you can't wait here. Monktowers said he would send his brougham back for us. Ah, here it is!”

He helped her in carefully, and to her surprise gave their own address.

“I can't have you knocked up, and the reception is sure to be a crush,” he said in answer to her look. “I am going to take you home, and make you rest, or certainly you will not be fit for the Denboroughs' to-night.”

The Denboroughs'! Judith shivered in her corner; she was deadly cold beneath her furs. Lady Denborough's dinner parties were among the most select in London; her invitations were eagerly sought after; it had been a tribute to the furore that Lady Carew's beauty had excited that she, who but two years ago had been only Peggy Carew's governess, should have been included.

How far away it all seemed to her now, as she laid her head back on the cushions and tried to think, to realize this awful catastrophe that had befallen her. The dead had come to life! All that past, that she had believed buried beyond resurrection, had risen, was here at her very doors.

Through the shadow of the carriage, she glanced at Anthony, at the dark rugged profile, at the crisp dark hair with its faint powdering of grey near the temples, at all that only an hour ago had been so intimately dear, that was now, as it were, set on the other side of a great gulf. Her heart sank, she felt sick as she thought of the other face with its bold good looks. It was impossible, she tried to tell herself despairingly, that this thing should really have befallen her, that there should be no way of escape. Sir Anthony watched her anxiously.

As the carriage neared their house in Grosvenor Square, she sat up, and drew her furs around her with a pitiful attempt to pull herself together.

Sir Anthony helped her out solicitously. As she paused for a moment on the step, a man passed, gazing up at the front of the house.

Lady Carew caught a momentary glimpse of the big familiar figure, a mist rose before her eyes, her fingers closed more tightly over that piece of paper in her glove as she swayed and reached out a trembling hand to her husband's arm.

With a quick exclamation of alarm, Sir Anthony caught her, carried her over the threshold of their home.

“Judith, Judith, what is it, my darling?” he said, bending over her.