Murder Most Malicious (8 page)

“Douglas, a modicum of patience, if you will,” Mr. Giles counseled. “I'm sure the inspector has his reasons for being reticent on the matter. However, we all have our reasons for wanting to know the truth. Vernon is a valuable member of this staff, and a decent bloke all around. I don't believe there is a one of us here who has ever had a gripe against George Vernon.” He aimed a significant glare at Douglas, who could not always make the same claim. “And as for Nicholas Hensley, why, the senior staff such as Mrs. Sanders, Mrs. Ellison, and myself remember when he worked here, before Lord Allerton took him on as his valet. Mr. Hensley is family, and so is Vernon. So please, Mr. Phelps, Miss Shea, if you know something of consequence, do not leave the rest of us in the dark.”

“The imagination is always more detrimental than the truth,” Mrs. Sanders added.

Mr. Giles turned to her as if she had just imparted the greatest wisdom. “Indeed.”

“All right.” Mr. Phelps dragged a chair from against the wall over to the table. “Make room for us.” Loud scraping filled the room as the others scooted aside. Mr. Phelps held the chair as Miss Shea primly sat, then brought another one over. Once situated, he leaned over the table in a conspiratorial hunch. “The cleaver
was
found.”

Gasps were followed by exclamations of “I knew it” and demands as to where the item had surfaced. With all the drama of stage actors, the valet and lady's maid once again traded knowing looks and nods. In fact, Eva believed they might have missed their calling. Her patience was wearing thin when Mr. Phelps gestured to Miss Shea, and said, “I'll allow you to do the honors.”

The woman moistened her thin lips, dragging out the moment until Eva wanted to scream. Then she said, “Beneath a floorboard in the room shared by Vernon and Mr. Hensley.”

Another barrage of gasps followed. Eva remained silent, her mind reeling. What did this mean? That one of them had attacked—perhaps killed—Lord Allerton?
Vernon or Nick?

She rejected the notion. It simply wasn't possible. Someone else must have planted that cleaver in their room. When or how, she didn't know, although the servants' bedrooms were never locked, so anyone in this house might have found the opportunity to sneak in.

“Why was Mr. Hensley sharing with Vernon anyway,” Douglas asked, and several others nodded their concurrence with the question.

“Well, certainly
I
shouldn't have been expected to share my room with him,” Mr. Phelps replied, “even if Hensley does technically outrank me as the valet of a marquess. I am, after all, valet to the master of this house. As such I have always enjoyed a room to myself. I saw no reason to change that now, even temporarily.”

Mr. Phelps's arrogance and the smugness of his tone penetrated the veneer of gentility Eva had cultivated over the years, and she wished nothing so much as to throw something—for instance, the kerosene lantern in the middle of the table—against the wall for the simple satisfaction of watching it shatter. “How can you go on so?” she demanded. “Have you no compassion at all?”

Even as she confronted the valet, she knew her anger wasn't truly directed at him, but at the situation, the awful revelation that her childhood friend—they
had
been friends of a sort—might be implicated in a horrific crime.

“I am merely explaining the situation to Douglas, who did ask, Miss Huntford.”

Eva clamped her lips around the point she longed to make, that if Mr. Phelps had observed proper etiquette by allowing the marquess's valet to room with him, Nick might not be undergoing questioning at this moment. Might not be a . . . She could barely bring herself to think the word:
suspect.

An argument wouldn't have done anyone any good. But she did have a question. “Mr. Phelps, you are among those of us who received the Christmas boxes in question. Can you think of any reason why you or any of us should have been singled out?”

His upper lip curled in disgust at the reference, and for this she could not blame him. “Indeed I cannot, Miss Huntford. I believe perhaps it was random. That whoever performed the dreadful deed disposed of . . . of the . . .” His lip curled again, baring his teeth. “The
you know what
. . . in the first boxes available.”

“But were they the first available?” she persisted. “Does anyone know what order they were placed in?”

“Why, I believe they were switched around multiple times,” Mrs. Sanders said, “as members of the family placed their gifts inside. There's hardly any way of knowing which boxes sat where on the shelves at any particular time.”

“There must be some way to figure out why some and not others.” Eva let her chin sink into her palm.

“There is,” Mr. Phelps said flatly. “By allowing the inspector and his assistant to do their job and staying out of their way. And by not pestering the rest of us with silly questions.”

Her mouth dropped open on a huff. Of all the rude, condescending . . . She counted to ten to regain her calm, and immediately noticed Connie trembling and breathing so rapidly Eva feared she would hyperventilate.

“Connie, are you all right?” she whispered across the table.

Connie stared back like a startled doe before abruptly pushing to her feet. The talking around the table ceased and all eyes turned to her.

“Is something wrong?” Mrs. Sanders asked with a perplexed frown.

“N-no, ma'am. I . . . I need to use the water closet.”

“Go on, then.”

Connie hurried off. Eva watched her go, wondering. Then she, too, vacated her chair. “She didn't look well. I'm going to go see if she's all right.”

“I think that's a good idea.” Mrs. Sanders's mouth flattened a moment; then she added, “She's a nervous sort, that one. I don't wonder this has upset her.”

Eva knocked on the door of the water closet. When no answer came, she knocked again. “Connie? It's Eva. Are you all right, dear?” More silence. “Are you ill?”

Not a sound came from within. Had the girl passed out? Both puzzled and mildly alarmed, Eva tried the latch. It moved easily beneath her thumb and the door opened into the tiny and quite vacant room.

“That's odd.” Listening, she heard the murmur of voices from the servants' hall, and the continued banging and clanking from Dora in the scullery, but no sound of Connie's voice. Down the narrow corridor, dusty shafts of light poked through the window in the courtyard door. She hesitated, doubting the day had gotten any warmer. Still, she didn't stop to don one of the cloaks hanging on pegs near the door. The sooner she found Connie, the better.

It didn't take long. Connie stood beside the coal chute, although
standing
was something of an exaggeration since the girl had her arms wrapped around her middle as she leaned, half-bent at the waist, against the stones of the house.

Eva wrapped her arms around herself, too, in an effort to stave off her shivering. “Connie, what on earth are you doing out here? Dear, what is it?”

Connie lurched upright, seeming ready to bolt away. Merely a response to being caught unawares, Eva reasoned, but she stepped into her path anyway, ready to catch her if necessary.

“It's nothing, Miss Huntford. I . . . I just . . . needed some air.”

Eva eyed her suspiciously. “Well, now you've had it. Let's go back inside, shall we?”

Connie made no move to go.

“Surely you don't intend holding up the wall all afternoon.”

“I . . . no, miss. I . . .”

“Connie, come now. Something is terribly wrong and . . .” She thought back to the moment Connie had transformed from merely nervous, to use Mrs. Sanders's word, to out and out panicked. For surely it had been panic that made the girl lie about needing to use the water closet and instead brave the chilling temperatures.

Vernon. And Nick. Yes, it had been the announcement that the missing cleaver had been found in their shared bedroom that drove Connie into the cold.

“You're worried about Vernon and Mr. Hensley, yes?”

“I . . . well . . .” She fidgeted with her apron, her cap, a strand of hair that hung loose. “Who isn't? Aren't you worried?”

Yes, she was, but at this point she hadn't enough information to warrant panicking. Did Connie know something Eva didn't?

Of the two men, George Vernon was the one Connie knew best. In fact, the girl barely knew Nick at all, so surely the prospect of his being charged with a crime wouldn't have such a drastic effect on her. One might even term her reaction. . . passionate.

Ah, a budding romance, Eva guessed. But there was something more here. She glimpsed it in the wariness of Connie's expression, rather like that of a fox who knows the hounds' snapping teeth will soon be in its flesh.

“Connie,” Eva said as gently as if the maid were a five-year-old child, “perhaps I can help you. Do you know something about all this, something you should tell me?”

Connie's eyes filled with tears. She raised a hand to wipe them away, and what Eva spied peeking out from the edge of the girl's sleeve prompted her to seize her wrist.

“Dear heavens, Connie, where did you get that bruise?”

 

Phoebe listened silently while Eva filled her in on what had occurred below stairs. They stood at the end of the hallway that linked the morning room and solarium to one of the back staircases, where Phoebe had asked Eva to meet her to compare notes from above and below stairs.

“And the bruises on her wrist, my lady. Connie tried telling me she got them cleaning out Lady Wroxly's hearth, but I'd swear those marks were left by fingers. A vise grip, my lady.”

Phoebe felt her eyes widen. Another set of bruises? Could it be a coincidence that both Julia and the chambermaid sported such marks at the same time? It seemed highly doubtful. “Did she mention Lord Allerton at all?”

“No, my lady. Nor did she mention Vernon. But it was the news of the cleaver being found in Vernon's room that sent her running scared.”

“From what I understand, Mr. Hensley has been staying in that room as well.”

“Yes, but Connie barely knows
him.
” Eva blushed faintly, just enough for Phoebe to perceive it.

“True. Do you believe Vernon could have bruised Connie's wrist like that?”

Eva shook her head. “I don't, my lady. I don't believe he has an aggressive bone in his body. I would practically stake my life on it.”

“Practically?”

“We can never fully know someone, can we? Never know what they're capable of until we've seen them in a dire situation.”

“No, I suppose you're right. I fear . . .”

“Yes, my lady?”

“Eva, do I have your word this will be kept in the utmost secrecy?”

Her maid drew back with a hand to her breastbone, as if greatly offended. “Of course, my lady!”

“I'm sorry. I should not have asked that.” Phoebe seized Eva's hand and drew her into the recess of a nearby window. “Connie is not the only woman to have been recently seized in so ungentlemanly a manner.”

Eva gasped and reached for Phoebe's hands. Her shawl fell away, and Eva's gaze dropped to her forearms, exposed by her three-quarter sleeves. “My lady! You mean to say someone dared lay his hands upon you—”

“No, not me. I cannot say who, for that would be betraying a confidence. And please do not try to guess. But I will tell you the name of the brute in question.”

At that moment the door to the morning room burst open and Miles Brannock strode into the corridor. He looked right and then left, and upon spotting Phoebe and Eva, started toward them.

“My lady,” he said with a nod before turning his attention to Eva. “Miss Huntford, we'll need to speak with the housemaid again. If you wouldn't mind relaying the message downstairs.”

“Connie? Why? What's happened?” It was Phoebe who spoke, knowing the constable could not ignore her questions as easily as he might Eva's.

“I'm afraid I cannot discuss—”

“The details. Yes, we know,” Eva said.

“But you've already questioned Connie,” Phoebe persisted.

“New questions have arisen, my lady.”

Phoebe was about to inquire—adamantly—as to the nature of those questions, when another figure stepped from the morning room. Eva's color rose again, as it had done moments ago, and for the same reason, apparently.

“Nick—er—Mr. Hensley.”

Phoebe caught Eva's slip. She had called the valet by his Christian name. But then, he once worked here as a footman. Except that had been before Eva was hired as a lady's maid....

Constable Brannock nodded again. “Miss Huntford, you'll have Connie sent up?”

“Yes, yes,” Eva agreed absently. She waited until the constable went back into the morning room before she said, “Ni—er—Mr. Hensley, what happened in there? Can you tell us anything?”

He raked a hand through his hair. “It's not looking good for Vernon, I'm afraid.”

“What do you mean?” Eva asked.

Phoebe felt the weight of the valet's gaze on her, as well as his palpable hesitation. She said, “Mr. Hensley, I may be a daughter of this house, but I assure you I am no wilting flower. You may speak freely in front of me without fear of causing me any undo distress.”

Eva frowned and looked about to protest, then evidently gave in to the idea that Phoebe was no longer a child. “Go ahead, Mr. Hensley. Please tell us what you've learned. And how Connie is involved, for I've already figured out for myself that she is.”