Murder At Plums (25 page)

He stared Rose straight in the eye.

It was two o’clock by the time Erskine entered the room, distinctly grey in the face.

‘Now, sir,’ said Rose. ‘Somebody thinking it was you again?’

Erskine smiled wearily. ‘A very careless murderer, we must think, who twice gets the wrong man. No, Inspector, I do not know where all this leads, but for some reason someone wanted Jones dead, and chose my house to perform the deed.’

‘Why would he do that, sir?’

‘He could be sure of finding Jones here, surrounded by many other people, presumably. Had he gone to Jones’ house he would have been noticed.’

‘It would suggest a familiarity with the layout of your house, sir. He had to be sure he could escape somehow.’

Erskine shrugged uninterestedly. ‘He might have been standing behind the door, Inspector, as we rushed in, and simply stepped out to join the crowd.’

‘Risky, wasn’t it?’

‘He seems to be a risk-taking murderer, Inspector,’ said Gaylord drily. ‘In any case most of our acquaintances in Plum’s have visited this house before.’

The door burst open. ‘Beg your pardon, sir, caught someone trying to sneak out of the house.’ Police Constable Wilson, red-faced with excitement at having a possible murderer inside his grasp, dragged the unfortunate man in.

Erskine frowned. ‘Haven’t I seen you before?’ he asked slowly, just as Auguste, tired of banishment to another room, entered behind them exclaiming, ‘But you, I have seen before.’

In the early hours of the morning the intruder was back in his lodgings a shaken man. He gathered he had very nearly been arrested for two murders and an attempted third. That man who turned out to be the chef at Plum’s had recognised him as one of his waiters there. And he had thought he was a good actor.

But he was happy. Gaylord Erskine had recognised him. True, that was because he had given him the order of the sack all those years ago, but doubtless that was because he wasn’t any good. They seemed to think he hated Gaylord Erskine. He couldn’t seem to make them understand that Erskine was his hero. To have risen from so low to his great achievements. Hamlet, and Prospero next. He knew now he would never make an actor, not a real actor like Erskine, but he didn’t mind now. He was happy at being a juggler in the music hall. Just so long as he had time to follow Erskine’s career. He’d had another scare too. He’d seen his Uncle Arthur. That brought back memories. Memories of his refusal to enter the army as his father had insisted. Of his leaving home. Of his early days on the stage. The struggle! The hardship! But would he go back? Never. Just so long as he could keep on seeing Erskine. Murder him? The idea was ridiculous . . .

Sergeant Stitch took it as a direct insult that Rose had developed the habit of taking a Frenchie with him on his investigations. Too much of this Sherlock Holmes reading if you asked Stitch. Not that Rose did.

‘You’ll be surprised,’ said Rose with relish as the butler took them into the entrance hall of Jones’ St John’s Wood home.

It was not the home Auguste would have chosen. More like an art gallery. A monument to Rafael Jones.

They walked up the staircase, where the ladies in distress draped themselves companionably along the walls, and along the corridor adorned by their drooping Pre-Raphaelite sisters. Rose carefully turned his eyes away. Seemed to him the Greeks never wore any clothes. What if it rained?

‘And here,’ said the butler reverently, ‘was
his
studio.’

Rose looked once more at the portraits round the walls,
each face displaying a curious sameness, a pleased satisfaction with the world – and Rafael Jones by inference.

‘Why didn’t he sell them?’ asked Rose.

‘These are the first sketches, sir,’ said the butler, shocked at this ignorance. ‘Lady Warwick, sir. Miss Terry—’ Jones had not captured Ellen Terry’s beauty at all, thought Auguste. This complacent matron was not Ellen Terry. No wonder she had not wanted to buy it. There was nothing of the free spirit, the enchantment that she bestowed on everyone. Here she was reduced to a biscuit-tin prettiness.

‘Almost as though he disliked all his subjects, isn’t it?’ commented Auguste.

‘Liked ’em younger,’ said Rose shortly, thinking of Rosie.

‘The master’s private library is upstairs,’ said the butler, a gleam of humanity in his eyes, having caught the words.

The library was an imposing sight, for the book-lover.

The butler hesitated. ‘Now he’s dead, sir, I should tell you I believe some of these books are false, Inspector.’ He was dying to show them. He pressed a button and the whole front swung out to reveal a most interesting collection of ladies with nothing at all in common with the studies in his studio.

Rose looked grim. ‘Nasty, very nasty,’ he said.

‘Children!’

‘I don’t know so much about his blackmailing others,’ said Rose. ‘Seems plenty of scope for
him
to be blackmailed himself though. Not only Rosie, but these – things. Rosie’s not the only one then. Tells us a lot about him but not much about the case, unless you think one of Jones’ girls could have got into Erskine’s house and shot him.’

‘It seems as though Sir Rafael were killed because he knew too much about the Colonel’s death,’ said Auguste worriedly.

Down in the studio again, Rose breathed a sigh. ‘Cleaner down here. Even if it isn’t exactly my sort of picture. Isn’t that Mrs Salt?’

Auguste looked at the picture on the wall. ‘Undoubtedly flattering as regards her girth.’

‘The fair Juanita. She doesn’t look an unwilling sitter. On the contrary. She looks like the cat that licked
la crème
, as you might say, Monsieur Didier. I wonder now . . .’

Emma Pryde sniffed. She blew her nose very loudly and turned her back on Auguste.

‘Very well, me old cock, if you’re so superior being a detective you’re not needed here.’

‘But Emma, be reasonable, was it not you who first said something odd was going on at Plum’s?’ Implored me to investigate?’

‘Ploored,’ squawked Disraeli.

‘Are you going to tell me what’s happening?’ she demanded.

Auguste looked at her implacable face and decided unspoken rules might be bent a little.

‘Like the Macbeths, they are,’ announced Emma dogmatically, having listened impatiently. ‘She forced him on to do it. I can just see her as Lady Macbeth.’

‘For money or for passion?’

‘Well, she wouldn’t have a passion for Worthington, would she?’ said Emma scathingly. ‘No, I think she wanted the money.’

‘And the passion was for Sir Rafael,’ said Auguste eagerly. ‘He scorned her, and so she killed him. She hid behind the desk until Salt shielded her, and emerged when everyone’s attention was on something else and—’

‘There’s only one thing wrong with the theory, Auguste,’ said Emma, sampling the
blanquette
with enthusiasm.

‘And that is?’

‘It wasn’t Jones who took our Juanita’s fancy. It was Gaylord Erskine.’

Mrs Mildred Worthington frowned. Once again she saw that inspector from Scotland Yard climbing the steps to her front door, thanks to some judicious peeping through the curtains. The problem was, nobody would
know
it was Scotland Yard. Everybody would think him merely a tradesman at the wrong door. It had been such an enjoyable day hitherto. She had spent an agreeable hour at the London offices of Messrs Spence, Harcourt and Beaver this morning, discussing her inheritance. She would be not merely comfortably placed, but now a very rich woman. It was sad about poor Mortimer of course, but there were compensations. And after all, there had been all the upset of the inquest, when she had to display herself on a public witness stand, then the funeral, another ordeal, and then the tasteful funeral party back in Mortimer’s Warwickshire home. Yes, there had been a lot to do one way and another. Now she was ready to begin enjoying her new-found wealth. A yachting cruise to the Mediterranean perhaps. She would apply to the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company tomorrow.
And
a butler. She would have a butler. She nodded her head in satisfaction.

The only drawback was that Mortimer had been murdered. It made her an object of great interest at her At Homes. Attendance had increased tenfold. The flaw was that Inspector Rose seemed to be visiting her with annoying regularity.

‘Did you know Sir Rafael Jones, ma’am?’ Rose carefully balanced his hat on his knees. No offer had been made to relieve him of it.

She pursed her lips. ‘No,’ she said shortly.

There had been an unfortunate occasion when she had
approached him to paint her portrait, only to have him refuse, almost rudely. It was a pity he was dead; he wouldn’t refuse now that she’d inherited all Mortimer’s money.

‘Did your brother-in-law talk of him at all?’

‘I saw little of my brother-in-law, Inspector, and he never talked of Plum’s or of his acquaintances there. I knew
of
Sir Rafael. Who could not? Is it the feeling that he murdered my brother-in-law and then committed suicide?’

Rose was taken aback. This was a possibility he had not considered. He did so briefly and discarded the idea.

‘Your brother, ma’am, do you see a lot of him? Mr Salt?’

‘When he is in the country, Inspector. You know that he is a famous traveller and archaeologist.’ She beamed. His exploits were a major topic at her At Homes.

‘Hasn’t he got a new expedition coming up, ma’am?’

‘Yes indeed, Inspector.’ She paused. ‘Happily now, I am in a position to ensure that it goes ahead.’ It gave her double pleasure in that once again Juanita would be beholden to her and have to be polite. Juanita was not what she would have chosen for Peregrine, and in their younger days Juanita had made her opinion of her sister-in-law painfully clear. Since then an uneasy truce had reigned for Peregrine’s sake. But now, thanks to a murderer, the scales had tilted firmly into her lap. It was a good day in Blackheath.

Sir James Prendergast, knighted for his services to exploration, crossed one elegantly trousered leg over the other in one of the comfortable drawing rooms of the Travellers’ Club, admiring his reflection in one of the gilt mirrors.

‘Ah, poor Salt,’ he said, pressing the tips of his fingers together. ‘You wish to know the reason for our disagreement, Inspector. Certainly. We disagreed about the source of the Wampopo River, Inspector. I reached it first, poor Salt arrived stewing through the jungle ten days later, after I had left, and vowed he had reached it first. The world chose to accept my version. The correct one, as it happens. I am afraid these African chiefs aren’t always to be relied on. Salt approached one way, I another. Baulked of his laurels as a traveller, he decided to turn his attention to the world of
archaeology, and hared after Schliemann to help him with his excavations at Troy. Alas for Salt, when Schliemann died, Salt thought his crown would pass to him, but unfortunately for Salt, though not in my view for archaeology, it passed to Mr Arthur Evans. Two years ago Arthur Evans acquired the site of the Minoan palace of Knossos, on the island of Crete, or rather half of the site. Dear Peregrine was not pleased.

‘Fate then intervened on Peregrine’s side with another of these wars between the Greeks and Turks, and since then there has been little chance of buying a bunch of grapes in Crete, let alone a piece of land. Nevertheless, a month or two ago things began to quieten down and Salt, so the rumour went, wished to buy the other half – if only he could raise the money. Then he planned to go there ahead of Evans and start digging. Unfortunately, Inspector, he did not find the money.’ Prendergast’s voice trailed off, as he looked at the Inspector quizzically.

‘I gather from all the talk, Inspector, that the late Colonel Worthington was some kind of relation to Salt. So do I take it, Inspector, that that happy eventuality has now come to pass for dear Peregrine?’

‘He could have done it, Mr Didier, or rather
they
could,’ said Rose with a rare excitement on his face. ‘Touch of the Macbeths, like your lady friend said. Mrs S goes into the Folly and calls to him, out comes the old Colonel – Mr Salt pops out from behind the gallant Captain’s statue and shoots him. Into the garden, and into the house to join the others as they rush in to find out what’s happened. But Rafael Jones sees them, lets them know he’s seen them, and so he has to go, too. So they lure Jones upstairs, kill him, and one of them hides in the room till there’s a chance to emerge, shielded by the other one. When we went into the room we were all too busy looking at the body to want to search at that moment.’

‘And Erskine?’ asked Auguste gently.

Rose paused. ‘Mrs Salt’s been rejected by the gentleman perhaps – what better than to play all those tricks on him? After all, he didn’t die, and yes, it acted as a red herring to
distract us from their real purpose – killing Worthington.’

‘It is possible, Inspector,’ said Auguste. ‘Very possible. Except for one thing – what you say could apply not only to Salt and his wife, but to the General and his wife, to Mr and Mrs Preston, to Mr and Mrs Erskine even, to Mr and Mrs Briton, to Lord and Lady Bulstrode.’

‘The trouble with you, Mr Didier, is that you see too many imperfections.’

‘This is true, Inspector,’ said Auguste, pleased. ‘But for a maitre chef it is essential.’

‘All the same, I think that’s the recipe I’ll work on,’ said Rose firmly.

The General paced the room. ‘Planning a campaign, Arthur?’ asked Alice mildly.

He smiled. ‘Not now, my dear, Merely thinking about Plum’s.’

‘The murder, you mean,’ said Alice composedly.

‘Murders, my dear. More than one now.’

‘No, murder. After all, it all stems from Colonel Worthington’s death, does it not? Do they think we might have done it, Arthur?’

He inclined his head. ‘It might have passed through their minds,’ he admitted.

‘With good reason,’ said Lady Fredericks placidly.

Mr and Mrs Preston were attending a function at the home of Mr and Mrs Archibald Tucker, next door to the family butchery business in Wandsworth, and doing their best to look as if they were enjoying it. After all, Cuthbert Tucker, prospective Labour candidate for Her Majesty’s Houses of Parliament, did provide a husband, if not the ideal son-in-law.