Murder in Pug's Parlour (24 page)

‘Oh, I think he was all right,’ rejoined Rose blandly. ‘You just take my word for it, Mr Didier. Now, as to Mr Edward Jackson—’

‘How is he, Inspector?’

‘You’ll see right now.’ Rose got to his feet and led the way down to the housekeeper’s room. ‘He’s had a nasty blow on his head, and cuts, but as I said, the wig saved him. But he’s a clever lad, that one; he’ll go along with us. He knows there’s someone out to kill him, and that’s why he’s locked up here. We’re going to smuggle the lad out of here, back to his aunt in Maidstone for a while. Only myself, Sergeant Bladon, Constable Perkins and the two nurses know he’s come to, and I put the fear of God into them two about the consequences if anyone else knew. Now you know, too, Mr Didier. I’m taking a chance on you. Edward here thinks you’re okay.’

A pale, bandaged, but still sharp-eyed Edward Jackson
peered up at them. ‘You’ll maybe get more out of him than we can,’ remarked Rose. ‘Don’t think much of the police, do you, lad?’

Edward gave a weak grin.

‘So you can’t tell us, lad, who hit you?’

The boy looked anxious. ‘Didn’t see nothing, Mr Didier. Just remember coming out to look for food. Then nothing else.’

‘You saw no one?’

‘No one, Mr Didier.’

Rose sighed. ‘Not helpful. Now lad, we know you was with Mrs Hartham at the ball. You took a message to someone. Now think hard, lad. What you heard the lady say, and what exactly the message was.’

‘Flower. I took a flower, and some sort of message about being cross.’

‘What? Try again, lad, come on, one last try.’

The boy obediently tried again. ‘Wilde. She told him to think about Mr Wilde’s story.’

‘Don’t seem much like an invitation to the last dance to me,’ muttered Rose to himself. ‘Well, go on. What happened when you went back to her?’

‘She was standing there, laughing, waving her fan about,’ said Edward in adolescent disgust for the ways of womankind. ‘There was a group of men standing round her—’ He stopped short, and a look of fear came over his face.

‘Go on, go on, Edward,’ said Auguste firmly.

‘She was saying something about secrets, giving away people’s secrets.’

‘Secrets, eh?’ said Rose thoughtfully. ‘Talking of secrets,’ he went on conversationally, ‘I remembered where I seen you before, lad. Cleveland Street, wasn’t it? A year or two back. You were the one they called Jimmy. Very sought after, you were, very.’

‘Don’t know what you’re talking about,’ said Edward, after a quick glance to size up his enemy.

‘That’s all past history, son,’ said Rose comfortingly. ‘Don’t have no worries on that score. But what I want to know is, maybe there’s someone you recognise here that was known to you from those days.’

‘No,’ said the boy. ‘No, there ain’t.’ Wide-eyed he stared at Rose and Didier until his glance fell.

‘Useful chap, Cricket. Keeps track of me suits and boots.’

Rose remembered His Grace’s verdict on his valet, as he looked at the weak-looking individual in front of him.

‘Like your job, do you?’ began Rose, pleasantly enough.

Cricket simply nodded, eyeing him warily.

‘Wouldn’t want His Grace to know, would you?’

‘Know what?’ ventured Cricket carefully.

Rose smiled almost cosily. ‘Don’t need to play games, do we, Mr Cricket? He used you to sound out the other valets and ladies’-maids, didn’t he?’

Cricket was white, but said nothing this time.

‘’Course I don’t know how you did it but I’ve little doubt you persuaded the valets to cooperate. Acted as go-between. Collected the material. Paid them off.’

Cricket found his voice, albeit a squeak. ‘I didn’t.’

‘Didn’t you? What, may I ask, was your role then?’

Cricket eyed him, clearly counting up the risks. Then he decided that of murder outweighed that of blackmail. ‘I used to sound them out,’ he said sulkily. ‘But they handed the stuff straight to Greeves. Didn’t trust me, Greeves didn’t.’

‘Can’t think why not,’ murmured Rose.

Solemnly they filed into the ballroom, decreed by the Duke as the most suitable room for an inquest: Archibald Tong, baker; Edward Tibbins, druggist; Leonard Gander, grazier, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, took their seats for the second time in ten days for an inquest into sudden and violent death. They were acutely aware that the body they had just viewed had but days ago been watching the proceedings from the spectators’ benches wearing a large purple-feathered hat. Jacob Pegrim took his seat: it had taken him some time to become accustomed to being a policeman and judge rolled into one; before the demise of Archibald Greeves nothing more exciting than a collection of old pots dug up on Jim Gubbins’ West Field had presented itself. Even then it had never in his wildest dreams at the Swan hostelry occurred to him that His Grace and Her Grace would be sitting in front of him in their own castle, respectful, deferential, while he presided over a second death in the house. And soon there’d be a third, so they told him. He was The Law, he told himself. Yet he was essentially a modest man, and he evaded His Grace’s eye as he surveyed his temporary kingdom. Nevertheless he had to impress this Scotland Yard fellow with the way things were done in Kent.

The innocent occupier of his thoughts sat gloomily next to Sergeant Bladon. It had not been an easy couple of days.
Mr Hartham had been at him every two minutes demanding justice, that somebody be arrested,
anybody
, a servant naturally. It had been difficult for Rose to dissuade the Chief Constable from ordering the instant arrest of half the kitchen staff, beginning with Auguste Didier. He had to make long and slow explanations to which the Chief Constable listened with scant interest and rising impatience. It was pointed out that should there be another death when Didier was safely in custody, His Grace’s ire would undoubtedly fall directly on the Chief Constable; a present duke being a greater threat than a soon-to-be-absent Mr Hartham, Auguste Didier remained at liberty.

Pegrim was easy on Ethel. After all, he knew her father and had known Ethel since the day the old Rector christened her in the little grey stone church at the top of Hollingham village.

‘Now, Eth – er, Miss Gubbins, you made the sandwiches sent up to the deceased.’

Ethel was paralysed with fright.

Eventually she managed to confess she had.

‘Duck. And where did you get that duck from?’

‘From—’ Ethel’s voice became inaudible.

‘Speak up, my dear.’

‘From the kitchen.’

‘From the kitchen. You mean the duck was just lying about on the table?’

‘No—’ she said, quavering. ‘The leftovers had all been put in the larder by then.’

‘And you went to the larder to get it?’

‘Oh
no
,’ said Ethel, shocked. ‘I’m a housemaid. I wouldn’t presume.’ Her voice wavered again, and her glance slipped to Auguste. He nodded encouragingly. ‘It was – Mr Didier – he gave it to me. But,’ her voice gathered strength, ‘he just went straight in and brought it out
and carved it off and gave it to me on a plate. Ever so quick. He didn’t have time to—’

‘To what, my dear?’ said Pegrim blandly.

‘To put poison in,’ declared Ethel stoutly.

Auguste closed his eyes at this double-edged help from Ethel.

Two of the jury wrote on their pieces of paper – ‘cook’.

‘Do you know what aconitia looks like?’ asked the coroner.

‘No,’ said Ethel doubtfully.

‘Did you know it is extracted from a common garden weed and is completely colourless, once extracted?’

‘No,’ said Ethel again. ‘But he didn’t anyway,’ she added defiantly, if inconsequentially.

In love with him, concluded all the ladies in the court.

French Casanova, thought all the men of the court, with a variety of emotions ranging from fatherly protectiveness to lechery.

Rose gave evidence of a technical nature, including confirmation of the presence of aconitia in the sandwiches, and the amount of time they had lain undisturbed outside Mrs Hartham’s room.

‘How did they get there?’ asked the coroner puzzled. ‘Who put them there?’

Rose stared stoutly ahead. ‘The lady herself, Mr Coroner. I understand they were a signal.’

‘Signal?’ repeated Pegrim, puzzled.

‘That – ah – the lady was ready to receive visitors.’

‘But, as I understand it, it was one-thirty in the morning. Visitors?’ said the coroner, completely flummoxed now.

‘Of – er – a clandestine nature,’ said Rose, his face the colour of his name.

From the Duke’s best leather chair, Mr Hartham’s face suddenly bleached. The Duke’s guests kept their eyes
resolutely away. One and all were appalled. This was a matter that should not be touched on, far worse than murder. This broke the bounds of public decency.

‘A lover,’ breathed the coroner, eyes gleaming, before he recollected his duty and the company. He hastily bent his head over his notes and reassumed his judicial air. ‘She was a married lady, Mr Rose. You realise what you are saying?’

‘Yes, Mr Coroner,’ said Rose stolidly.

The Duke, suddenly alert, diverted his thoughts from Hoo Wood and the newly created clump to its right where he had been mentally counting the possible Saturday bag. Dammit, suppose – that letter – suppose that idiot Scotland Yard fellow had got the wrong end of the stick . . .

The Prince sat immobile, staring ahead, apparently impassive. He cast his mind wildly over the chances of the Kaiser or Kaiserin reading of the dark doings at the Towers. No chance now of it remaining a sad case of food poisoning so far as the press were concerned, after this evidence. He would be recalled. His career in ruins. Better to bluff it out. Deny it. The police could have no proof he visited Mrs Hartham’s room. There was none. He had seen to that.

‘
Nein
,’ he replied to the coroner’s first question. Already hesitant over how to address a prince, this staccato answer, combined with Prussian aloofness, nonplussed Pegrim. He cleared his throat and sought to regain authority. ‘So you deny you were anywhere near the deceased’s room that night.’

‘I do.’

‘This message which the deceased sent you by way of the footman. What was it?’

‘That she wished the last dance of the evening with me.’ Eight centuries of diplomatic lying stared Jacob Pegrim in the face.

After a welter of evidence, the jury fastened on to the one
concrete fact before them. When they brought in their verdict of murder by persons unknown, once again they added a rider condemning the carelessness of the cook. Jacob Pegrim blenched, having forgotten to instruct the jury more carefully than last time on the finer points of their duty, but something that might have been a smile twitched at the corners of Egbert Rose’s mouth. It was speedily removed when faced with a righteously indignant Mrs Hankey.

‘Now that that’s settled, Mr Rose, I’ll trouble you for my bottle of aconite back.’

Hartham, face pale but resolute for his duty, completed arrangements for the removal of his wife’s body for burial in rural Hertfordshire, where, he hoped, probably in vain, that few would be privy to the details of a Kentish inquest. With his departure on the Friday, an air of relaxation permeated the house; it returned to normality or as far normal as the presence of the police, and one boy nigh unto death, could make it. Albeit it was the climax of the best weeks’ shooting of the season, there were signs of impatience from the imprisoned party. It was time an arrest was made. Any arrest, though both His Grace and Her Grace had their own reasons for wishing a certain amount of care taken as to who should be selected.

Meanwhile, the Duke busied himself with the enjoyable task of choosing the guns for the morrow’s grand shoot; the best drive of the season it would be. Closeted with his keepers, he viewed with pleasure estimates of a bag of thirty brace of partridge and one thousand pheasant. Never mind if the stocks did get depleted; a good bag tomorrow would rid minds of murder, restore his popularity with the village, too, with the extra beaters to be employed. It would not make him popular with mothers, but that was of little
import. The Duchess busied herself with the task of supervising the huge picnic lunch. Arrangements were made with Hobbs for the erection of a marquee large enough for the accommodation of the resident party and family together with the extra guns invited to join them from the Kentish hierarchy. With an anxious eye on the weather, the Duchess pointed out to her Maker that He owed them a fine day at the very least in exchange for all the inconvenient thunderbolts He had tossed their way recently; she made clear to all the ladies that they were expected to attend. With her usual sweet smile, perhaps with a touch of determined frost in it, she negotiated a menu with Auguste.

Were it not for the fact that the Duchess could see no earthly reason why Auguste should have wished to rid the world of Honoria Hartham, Her Grace would already have taken steps to ensure his employment ceased at Stockbery Towers. However, as he was an excellent cook and reflected on the glory of the Towers, she was determined that Christian charity should grant him every chance. His Grace, not so farseeing as his wife, had expostulated with the Chief Constable at the non-arrest of Auguste Didier, and when with some stumbling it had been made clear that Inspector Rose of the Yard (His Grace’s request) had been instrumental in at least delaying Didier’s arrest, he turned his ire on him: ‘Dammit, man, biggest shoot of the season coming up. Don’t want half the county poisoned off with wolfsbane by a lunatic cook.’

‘I doubt that will happen, sir,’ replied Rose firmly.

The Duke glared. He was not satisfied, that was clear.

Rose sighed. ‘I’ll have one of the Maidstone men watching every step he makes, Your Grace,’ he offered.

The Duke grunted. After all, Didier had prepared the best pâtés and pies he had ever tasted. And where was he to get another cook for the grand luncheon at this short notice?

Rose was, privately, a deeply worried man. Friday evening found him again in the schoolroom, staring into the fire. He preferred this room to the study he’d been allotted with its Chippendale chairs and elegant escritoires. He felt at ease in its homely atmosphere; liked the view on to the herb garden and the apple tree outside its window. The room disciplined his mind into concentrated thought, as though the ghosts from its previous use still hovered over it. It had not been easy this time to fight off Naseby and the Chief Constable. They had been out for blood. Only a firm statement that he needed two days more, and that he would name those responsible if events went against him, had stayed their hand. Faced with this ultimatum and with the knowledge that they could only produce a case of opportunity and not motive against Didier, they had capitulated for the moment. But the weekend had to produce a solution. Rose had sounded a great deal more confident than he was.