Enter Pale Death (37 page)

“Leave it to me. Bodyguarding is something I’m trained for, your ladyship,” Joe said. “The first thing is to plan ahead—never
wait for the exchange of fire. Go straight for the enemy as soon as identified, disarm and incapacitate him. I’ll go and renew acquaintance with Miss Joliffe—we have met before on a few occasions. I’ll try to ascertain whether her intentions are peaceable.”

He drifted into the hall where the guests were being allocated footmen and maids to take them to their rooms. Stepping forward, he said, “Thank you, Norman, I’ll take Miss Joliffe upstairs. The Lilac Room was it?”

He grabbed Dorcas’s bag and led the way upstairs to the guest room halfway along the corridor.

“Rather more suitable accommodation than last time, I think you’ll find,” he said, showing her inside and closing the door. “Smaller than the Old Nursery and not so versatile but I’m sure you won’t mind that.” She kept her distance, white-faced and silent. Joe put up an ironic hand, as if to ward off an advance. “No, don’t consider giving me a hug, Dorcas. Apart from Truelove, who treats me as your godfather or something—well, he thinks whatever you’ve told him to think—it’s not generally known that we have a relationship of any kind. Let it stay that way. I’m working. Trying to solve three unlawful killings for one of which you are in the frame. Yes, I’m afraid there are those in this house who would very much like to put the blame for the death of Lady Truelove on you. They see you as an unimportant figure, unconnected and dispensable. They wait to see you being carted off by me to the Yard in cuffs, the arrest photographed by a news magnate who has a convenient camera to hand and a convenient hand to operate it. You may have caught a glimpse of the McIvers’ maid photographing the horse parade? Avoid her lens. Mungo McIver, I believe, is intent on reinstating the reputation of the Minister for Reform in the corridors of Westminster.”

“Westminster?” she asked sharply.

“The House. Where a strong cross-party faction sees him as the saviour of British politics. The only man with the will and
ability to recognise and counter the threat of European aggression. He’s a man whose reputation must be protected at all cost.”

“A man particularly popular with a coterie of industrialists in the Midlands whose factories are poised to roll out ever more armament, I think you once told me, Joe. Did you know that’s how Lavinia’s father makes his millions? He provided the wherewithal to take on the Kaiser in the last lot. If Herr Hitler or the Russians were to turn nasty, he’d be a very busy man again.”

“It had occurred to me. Poor, generous old Papa must be a little exercised by the rumours that his son-in-law has bumped off his daughter. I do wonder what his next step might be? Denunciation? Or support and a swift crushing of the rumours by some means or other? Move an innocent pawn into the front line to take the rap? I won’t let that happen! Tread carefully, Dorcas. Better if we keep our distance from each other, and don’t give them an opportunity to cry collusion, I think.”

“Joe! Supercilious know-it-all! I don’t need your collusion, thanks! I had nothing to do with that woman’s self-inflicted death, neither did James and that’s what I’m doing back here. I’ve come to help him prove it!”

“I wonder what persuasive measures he employed to convince you it would be a good idea to revisit the scene of the crime? What did he offer you, Dorcas?” Joe’s voice was heavy with hurt and suspicion.

“You don’t imagine I
want
to be here, do you? I’ve heard the rumours circulating against James. They’ve been orchestrated, you know. You’ve got that much right. Someone wants James discredited or even behind bars. Someone may even have arranged Lavinia’s death solely for that purpose. Smacked her on the head with a horseshoe? It would have been easy enough to arrange. I could have done it myself. I’m grieved for James—none of it was his fault and he’s got troubles enough without all this sinister back-stabbing.”

“So—you’re here to do a little clearing of names? Sleuthing again, Dorcas?” Joe was relieved and almost amused.

“Not any longer apparently! I hadn’t expected to find Scotland Yard in residence! You know your presence here confirms everyone’s darkest suspicions? A policeman of your standing doesn’t turn up to investigate an accident. You’ve muddied the waters and now, with people on their guard, I shall never get at the truth. James’s wife was hateful and she’s made poor James’s life a misery. She lived in a slough of unhappiness and was determined that everyone close to her should join her in it. I’m glad she’s dead.” She concluded her tirade with a defiant, “
We’re
glad she’s dead.”

“I could wish you hadn’t lied to me about your part in all this,” he said stiffly.

“So do I. I’m sorry. I should have known better than to tell you I was miles away at the time—you always find things out. I
was
here that night. We thought the least fuss, the soonest mended. No point in involving others. After all—it was her choice to confront the horse. A thoughtless, suicidally idiotic thing to do. She knew the animal was dangerous, Joe. She took me on a hike round the estate the day before.” Dorcas cringed at the memory. “We inspected the stables but didn’t go near—what was his name?”

“Lucifer.”

“She told me he’d almost killed two of the grooms and was about to be put down by the vet. A huge waste of money, Lavinia reckoned. I asked her how many guineas. No idea! She knew nothing of the cost of things—just assumed she was paying the bills. James was to blame, of course, as the stallion had been his selection. But she intended to save him from his folly.”

She fell silent, seemingly wondering if she had said too much.

Joe kept her focussed, sure that he was getting close to whatever had triggered the unlikely death. “How did she propose to do that? Tell me exactly, Dorcas.”

“She claimed she had the skill to tame the brute. ‘I’ll have him eating out of my hand and following me about like Mary’s little lamb, you’ll see!’ she bragged. Then, sneakily, she slipped in the suggestion she’d been working towards. Her real plan. ‘Unless, of course, Dorcas, you’d like to have the honour? Here’s a wonderful chance to show off those skills with animals everyone—including James—claims that you have. I dare you, Dorcas Joliffe, to parade the stallion in front of the breakfast crowd tomorrow morning, trotting at your heels like a good hound. I dare you!’ She said the words again!”

Joe grimaced, picturing Dorcas’s embarrassment at the juvenile challenge. “Lord! What on earth did you say?”

“I’m afraid I made a bad situation worse. I spoke my mind. I said the last dare I accepted had been twelve years ago. It had resulted in a smacked bottom and a week’s gating from my grandmother. A punishment which vastly outweighed the offence. But it taught me a useful lesson. Dares are set by callous schemers to trap the naive. I told her to grow up.”

“Thus sealing the wretched woman’s fate.” Joe sighed.

“Don’t be silly! She sealed her own fate! Are you deliberately missing the point? It was
she
who planned
my
death or injury. I thought you’d have managed to work that much out! She was setting me up for a lethal encounter with that animal.”

“That animal? Are you telling me you couldn’t have worked your magic with him? Was Lavinia’s suspicion right? Have you been deceiving me all these years?”

A scornful smile greeted his lightly delivered question. “You and many others. But I never made the mistake of deceiving myself, Joe. I don’t enter into negotiations with a rabid dog or a horse that’s put two grooms in hospital. There was something about the whole business with this Lucifer that bothered me. Joe, I never set eyes on him so my opinion is probably worth little but it all sounded a bit strange to me. James couldn’t understand it
either. The horse had an impeccable pedigree and he’d personally checked him over. James knows his horses. Suffolks are good-tempered beasts. Well, we all saw them nibbling babies with great good humour at the parade.”

“Good-tempered until someone abrades the soft tissue at the edges of the mouth using the emery board from a box of matches or the serrated edge of a half crown. Something you might expect to find in any man’s pocket.”

Dorcas gasped. “How cruel! That’s malice aforethought, isn’t it? Who would do that?”

“Malice is the right word exactly. It was done by someone who had no feeling for the horse and who had a grudge against its owner. Are you aware of a man living and working on the estate who had good reason to feel aggrieved? The Green Man?” Joe lifted an eyebrow, watching her reactions.

“Oh, him! The rat-catcher! Creepy man! He was watching me and Lavinia as we did the tour. She didn’t seem to mind—she even waved at him. I can’t imagine why James puts up with him. He told me he’d given him notice to leave … Oh! There you are! That’s the reason, isn’t it? What are you waiting for, Joe? Go out and bring him in!”

“Listen, Dorcas. Sit down. I’ll make this quick.”

She listened intently as he told her of Adelaide Hartest’s evidence and sketched out a ruthlessly edited version of Goodfellow’s death. He made no mention of the letter or of Phoebe Pilgrim. He’d leave James Truelove to tell his own tale.

The old Dorcas was with him again as she frowned with concentration and responded with quick understanding. “Stoat’s liver, you say? Yes. That would do it. But you’re wrong, Joe—you don’t have to be a Horseman to know that. The gypsies have the knowledge too. But they don’t bother to wrap it up in cat’s urine, rabbit’s blood and toad bone—all that’s just so much abracadabra. Whatever else, it’s not magic! No—first catch your stoat! That’s
the vital bit. Goodfellow! He styled himself ‘gamekeeper’ you know. He shot birds and he trapped vermin. The kind who enjoys killing creatures. I saw a row of pathetic little corpses he’d caught and mounted on osier spikes along the edge of the wood where it meets the wheat field. Out in the open. Anyone able to identify a stoat could have helped himself and no one would ever have noticed.”

“It’s chilling to hear you say so, Dorcas.” Again, Joe was assailed by a thought he had instantly to suppress. He forged on: “But someone would then need to be close enough to Lavinia to persuade her—or trick her—into using the horse bate—substance B, let’s call it—instead of the attractant.”

“Or someone could have entered her room during the night and simply exchanged samples. Well, you can eliminate James—he chose to spend the night over in the Dower House where his mother lives. He wasn’t creeping about the corridors with his pockets full of rotting livers.”

“I had wondered why he should choose that particular night to distance himself from his wife’s room,” Joe invited a comment. “Sounds very like someone setting up an alibi to me.”

Again the challenge in her eye as she spoke: “You’re right. It was. But you have the wrong reason. It was a deliberate choice. To avert any suspicion of hanky-panky with an unaccompanied female guest. Me. You know what these large households are like for gossip. But you can eliminate me as well. I never left the Old Nursery where the witch had stuck me for the night. It’s right over the other side. I would have had to walk miles of corridor and probably got lost en route looking for Lavinia’s room. It’s obvious, isn’t it? Are you losing your grip, Joe? Her maid did it. Quiet little thing but well-spoken. Her name’s Grace. Why don’t you just ask her? It was probably a half-baked reprisal for some ticking-off, some fancied slight or, at best, a hideous misunderstanding. Being maid to Lavinia would give anyone a hundred
reasons for wishing her ill. She’s done the world a favour—don’t be hard on her. Put on your stern face and she’ll come clean. Then we can all go back to London and get on with our lives.”

Joe stared at Dorcas as though seeing her for the first time. Was this the girl he’d worried about for seven years? His charge? His delightful but tormenting responsibility? A pawn, casually pushing another pawn forward into the firing line? The young woman facing him was confident, argumentative and unyielding. She needed no help. She was flying by herself. She was leaving Joe behind, floundering in her slipstream, without a backward glance.

“And you can produce independent confirmation of your whereabouts during the crucial hours?” he asked with deceptive mildness.

A flash of scorn for his policeman’s phrasing cut him to the quick.

“I wouldn’t like to think I had to,” she said, turning away from him dismissively.

“Protecting Master Alex? Or is he protecting you? What sort of arrangement have you come to, the pair of you?”

“How on earth do you …?”

“I’m a detective. I’ve been detecting. I know that you spent the night of the murder holed up in the Old Nursery with Alexander. He came along at one o’clock, straight after snooker, still in evening dress, seeking admittance. You let him in and locked the door. Read him a bedtime story perhaps and he emerged at dawn to creep back to his own quarters.”

“Joe, you know too much and understand too little. Leave me now.”

“I understand everything. Well, nearly everything. I can’t be certain which particular story you told him but everything else.”

Dorcas looked up at him, shocked eyes seeking to read his mind.

“Young Alex was confused,” Joe went on constructing his theory, “at odds with his surroundings, targeted by older, successful—and critical—male guests, falling over themselves to give him the fatherly advice he so clearly lacked. It can’t be easy being the heir-but-one. The spare wheel, the afterthought who shows himself unsuited to modern life. Alex did what he’s been known to do before when squashed and belittled. He stumbled along here to seek the safety of his familiar old nursery, his own bed, the one he used before life got too much for him. Sadly there was no longer a comforting nanny in residence to make it all better. Just a fellow victim of the Truelove arrogance. He must have been quite surprised on this occasion to find you occupying it, thanks to a spiteful ploy of Lavinia’s.”

“You’re guessing all this.”

“No. Knowledge of you and knowledge of him helps me to stitch together more solid evidence from Rose, the upper floor maid. Very observant girl. She noticed that both beds had been slept in. Your guest bed and the nursery bed. Alex’s old bed had golden hairs on the pillow. Yours had dark ones. There was no trace of any other … um … intimacy, as far as Rosie could make out, and she’s got a seeing eye for these things.”