Murder at Maddingley Grange (19 page)

“Just a minute…” spluttered the resident sleuth as his raw material started wandering off, “I haven't…wait…if you'll just…”

“Derek…” Sheila crossed to her husband's side and held out her hand. “You can't force people to cooperate. Come on— leave it till tomorrow.”

Derek studied the hand as if suspecting it of concealing vital evidence then, his face black with disappointment, grudgingly followed the others. Fred and Violet wrangled briefly and Fred disappeared. Violet sat down on the bottom step.

“Can we retire too, miss?”

Bennet was supporting Gaunt, who was very heavy. Laurie only half heard. She was watching with rapt attention Martin and his carriers as they disappeared along the landing. Her gaze intensified. Became almost beseeching. She chewed her lip; her fingers were screwed into the damp palms of her hands. Then a door closed. Rosemary appeared on the landing returning to her own room and Laurie's pulse and heartbeat returned to something approaching normal.

“Miss?”

“What? Oh, yes—of course…” said Laurie. “Do you want a hand?”

“A hand?” Bennet seemed offended, even alarmed. At the very idea her voice became quite gruff with emotion.

Laurie said: “Good night then,” and watched them stagger off. She felt a sudden concern as to Gaunt's ability to cope in the morning. A butler who could not remain upright without solid support at two-thirty A.M. was not a butler who was going to be zipping around with tea and toast at eight.

Ah, well, thought Laurie, as she toiled upstairs, I can always give a hand. If truth be told she would much rather be doing that than going round with a strained smile making pointless conversation. Then she remembered she was planning to take Derek's place as victim. But a change of role need not alter matters. She could be murdered just as well washing up in her old frock as she could while wearing some showy outfit and playing games on the lawn.

Entering her room she noticed the square of white paper on her bedside rug, picked it up and threw it into the waste basket. Feeling quite pleased with herself at this symbolic casting off of whatever simperingly false persona Simon's hat had lumbered her with, Laurie climbed into bed and was just falling asleep when a sudden startling revelation presented itself. She sat up, staring into the darkness. She had recalled what it was about Bennet that had seemed so strange. It was not the awful gown or boatlike slippers. It was the fact that the maid's attractively swelling bosom had completely disappeared.

At last the squat, gyrating figure on the checkered floor came to a halt. Mother stood, cruciform, staring up at the gilded roof. Then she lowered her arms, appearing less gross; her face all-comprehending. She beckoned and Violet, knees cracking, struggled to her feet. Muttering “About time,” she joined the old lady and made to help her upstairs. But Mrs. Gibbs resisted and shuffled off toward the back of the hall.

She wound her way between the wood and leather Cromwellian chairs and skirted the table holding the now empty copper jug before pausing by a low-arched wooden door. She put both hands on this, resting her left profile, puckered up in vigilant attention, against the center panel.

“Listen…
down there…”

Violet listened. At first she could hear nothing but the sluggish shifting of her heart. Then the faintest sound, hardly more than a vibration on the air. Something clammy, like a cold damp membrane, wrapped itself around her face and neck. The vibration intensified, almost thrumming, then changed character. Became a fluid gurgle, like water going down a drain, then suddenly stopped.

After a moment's silence there was a starveling cry of great deprivation followed by much weeping. Then, just as suddenly, nothing at all.

“E's given up,” said Mother. “Gone off.”

“I should think he has,” said Violet, grateful and relieved. “This hour of the morning.” Her hands and feet were frozen.

The two ladies made for the stairs, leaving behind them a moping silence smelling richly of plums and black currants with just a trace of sandalwood.

N
ext morning in the middle of breakfast, to everyone's complete astonishment, Derek announced that he was prepared to be the victim after all. The party (with the exception of Martin and Laurie) was sitting around the dining-room table. The posies and smilax had given way to a pretty flowered jug holding sweet peas and gypsophila. On the armoire four silver chafing dishes rested on heated trays. The dishes held kidneys and bacon, scrambled eggs, kedgeree and sausages. There was also cold boiled ham, a wisp of croissants for the lily-livered and iced fruit juice. Everyone had helped themselves to something with the exception of Fred who had helped himself to everything. Now he polished his plate with a bit of bread, swallowed the crust and burped.

“Better out than in, eh, Simon?” A cool smile. “I must say you certainly know the quickest way to a man's heart.”

“Straight through the chest wall, I believe.”

“I said,” repeated Derek, spacing out his words, “that I have changed my mind about being the victim.”

“How do you want to be done then, Sherlock?” asked Fred.

“Not up to him, is it?” asked Mother, unrolling a croissant and tucking a kidney and a scrap of mustard inside. “Up to Dead-Eye Dick. Whoever he is.”

“Quite so,” agreed Derek. “But I warn him or her that I do not intend the task to be an easy one. It will be very much a case of first catchee monkey and I shall be extremely alert, I can assure you. Hide and seek's the name of the game. Also I'm setting a time limit of one o'clock. If I'm still alive then, I shall regard myself as the victor rather than the vanquished, and someone else must become the murderee.”

“You better watch where you're hiding,” cackled Mother, adding a dollop of quince jelly to the croissant and putting the whole contraption in her mouth. “There's a ghost on the trot.”

“A ghost…
” Derek put down his teacup. A ghost would make things absolutely perfect. And more than make up for the butler not having a hump. Eyes shining, he urged elaboration.

“It was behind that pointy door,” said Violet. “In the hall. Where does that lead, Simon?”

“The cellar.” Simon, who had felt briefly concerned for his guests' peace of mind following Mother's startling pronouncement, realized he need not have bothered. Intrigue and excitement were plentifully displayed but not the slightest trace of alarm. “What did it look like?”

“Can't see through wood,” said Mother, flakes of pastry flying about. “I'll go down for a shufty when I've finished me croyzant.”

“But,” demurred Sheila, “you won't be able to see anything during the day, will you? I thought ghosts were nocturnal. Like bats and things.”

“Float up anytime,” said Mother. “As the spirit moves 'em.”

“Do you think”—Gilly sounded wistful—“we might see it too?” He blushed as he spoke, his Adam's apple bobbing.

Violet shook her head. “You might hear it, though. I did last night. It was crying.”

“Alas poor ghost,” murmured Simon. Then, feeling the real objective of the weekend to be rather slipping out of focus, he steered the conversation back to Derek's new idea. “Actually my sister said last night she wouldn't mind changing places with you.”

“Tell her excellent,” said Derek. “And that one P.M. is cutoff time.”

“What is your character?” asked Rosemary, daintily forking in some scrambled egg. She was wearing very wide trousers in floaty chiffon printed with pansies, and a pale-green silk blouse with a sailor collar. “I mean—which of us would have a reason for killing you?”

“I am the local bank manager.”

“Loathed by one and all then, I shouldn't wonder,” said Simon. “Certainly I, as Kit Fanshawe, poverty-stricken tumbledown artist in love with your daughter Felicity, would be a front-runner.”

“I am Felicity,” cooed Rosemary, eyes shyly on her plate.

“I shall proposition you then in the bushes.” Simon winked across the table.

“P'raps we'd all better say who we are.” Violet reached out for the Georgian coffeepot. “So we know where we stand.”

Gilly was Herbert Pottle, the village solicitor, and Violet, Ada Bloggs, cleaning lady at the Vicarage. Sheila was Lorelei la Rue, a West End musical-comedy star staying at a local hostelry and in hot pursuit of Kit, Mrs. Saville was the rector's wife and Fred (Mrs. Saville choked on her Earl Grey) was the rector. Mother would play Miss Featherstone-Gough, eccentric dog lover and hippophile.

“I thought,” said Mrs. Saville, when she had quite recovered, “that you were Mad Betty stroke Black Tom the soothsayer.”

“Well, I ain't.”

“But you told us—”

“No, I never. 'E did.” Mother looked sharply at Simon. “Our proper rioter. Young Kit and caboodle there.”

Before Simon had a chance to reply—he was going to say an educated guess—Derek produced a Meerschaum and said:

“I intend to cross-question the butler after breakfast and get to the bottom of our nocturnal drama.” A leather pouch appeared. “I fear it may prove to be a three-pipe problem.” Then, packing in the tobacco with the calm assumption of permission that so infuriates the unaddicted, “If no one minds?”

“You go ahead, squire,” allowed Fred. “What I always say is—where there's smoke there's salmon.”

“Well,
I
mind,” said Mrs. Saville. “Most of us are still eating.”

“Ay up, Derek,” said Fred, “you're on the tapis.” Then, waving a marmalade-coated knife at his fictional spouse, “You behave yourself, wife, or I'll give you what for in the vestry.”

Mrs. Saville rose grandly to her feet. “The weather at least is proving clement…I intend to walk in the grounds.” She gave her host a freezing glance. “I will not be taking part in your childish charade, Simon, and assume you will adjust my payment for the weekend accordingly. Rosemary?”

“I'll catch you up, Mummy.”

“I would like you to come now.”

“In a sec. Just finishing my coffee. It's so delicious.” Rosemary's glance at Simon was positively burning with congratulatory approval. He felt he had not only made the coffee but climbed barefoot up a stony mountain and harvested the beans.

Mrs. Saville stuck the waiting out until Violet said: “Would you rather change with me, dear? And be the cleaning lady?” whereupon she marched off to be seen several minutes later making a hippoesque progress across the greensward.

“Daft lummock,” said Fred. “No offense, Rosie, but she can't take a joke, can she, your mam?”

Rosemary looked as though she didn't know what a lummock was but if she did and had one handy Fred would rue the day. She turned her attention once more to Simon who smiled sympathetically. How attentive and assured he was. So unlike poor Martin, getting everything wrong at dinner last night and then falling down the stairs.

“You'll have to convey my apologies,” Fred persisted. “I haven't had your fine start in life. You see”—he assumed an expression of grotesque melancholy— “I come from a broken home.”

“Fancy.”

“Yes,” continued Fred, his face gathering into jovial creases of anticipation. “Me dad were terrible at do it yourself.”

Violet yelled that were a new one on her and no mistake, then asked Derek what he'd got in his pipe, moose droppings?

“Bulwark actually. Holmes got his from Bradley's in Oxford Street. Not there now, of course.” He struck another match to revivify the noxious Meerschaum and dropped the match, still smoldering, on an embroidered place mat. “All the old places have gone. It's almost impossible to get a really good black shag these days.”

“I think I can help you there, squire,” said Fred
sotto voce
, winking. “Bombazine Jones.”

“I haven't heard of that. Is it good?”

“Unbelievable, mate.” Fred opened his wallet and passed over a small white card. “Talk to you later.” He tapped the side of his nose. “Mum's the word.”

“Perhaps, as the victim,” said Gilly, “it might be rather fun for you to carry this.” He reached into the inside pocket of his orange, red and cream striped blazer and produced a gun.

Reactions varied. Gasps, hisses, and whistles (Mother). Fred ducked, then pretended he'd done it as a joke, and Rosemary gave an affected little hiccup and squeaked: “Is it real?”

“Oh, yes. It's a—”

“A Major Fontaine, I think you'll find.” Derek's certainty had a supercilious tinge. He took the gun with a great show of nonchalance. “Nineteen thirty-six. Short range—about fifteen meters. Metal-jacketed bullets.”

“Really? I thought it was a Baby Browning.”

“A common error. I have published a pamphlet on the small arms of this period. You'll find a copy in Brize Norton library.”