Rules of Murder (18 page)

“Perhaps we should just pop up and ask him,” Nick said.

“Brilliant.” Drew leapt to his feet. “And I know just what to say. ‘Pardon me, Mr. Rushford, sir, but we’ve positively trodden on every duty we have as your hosts by stealing your private diary. Now that we’ve rummaged through it, we’d like you to answer a few questions. Never mind the head wound, this will take only a moment.’”

Nick gave him a sour smile. “All right. All right. It was just a thought.”

“And have you thought, my good man, how you’ll get the thing back into his room without his knowing it’s been gone?”

“Well, not as such.”

“Lovely.”

“Can’t the maid take it in when she takes Mr. Rushford his dinner?” Madeline asked. “Under a napkin or something?”

Drew shook his head. “I don’t want any of the staff to know what’s going on here.”

“All right,” she said. “How about Mr. Dennison? He could sneak it in, couldn’t he?”

Nick’s eyes widened.

Drew grinned. “Oh, that will be marvelous. He’ll be delighted to know what we’ve been up to, despite his efforts to civilize us, won’t he? Perhaps you’d like to tell him, Nick, old man.”

“Fine.” Nick squared his shoulders, chin held high. “I’m not afraid.” He paused for a second. “Or, even better, we could try a new scheme I’ve just devised where we keep this all to ourselves for now. Then
I
could toddle up to Rushford’s room with a pile of new books for his amusement, just happening to toss them onto the dresser where the diary was in the first place.”

“That might work, unless he’s missed it already.” Drew thought for a minute. “Unless you were to accidentally toss a few behind the dresser and just happen to find the diary when you retrieved them.”

Nick nodded. “I knew you were the clever one of the lot.”

“Yes, and good thing, too. Don’t expect me to cover your petty thefts after this.”

Nick saluted. “
Oui, mon capitaine.
I shall see to it
tout de suite
.”

“Carry on.” Drew returned his salute, then turned to Madeline. “Now that’s taken care of, tell me what you’d like to do this evening. I’m afraid there’s not much in the way of entertainment here in Farthering St. John, but we’ll think of something.”

“I thought Mrs. Pomphrey-Hughes was having her musical evening tonight,” Nick said.

“Isn’t there something you’re meant to be taking care of just now?” Drew asked.

“I’m sure you’re most especially invited, old man.”

“Well, I don’t think our Miss Parker would very much enjoy that, do you?”

“Why not?” Nick grinned in the most annoying fashion. “Mrs. Pomphrey-Hughes is known for her soirees. She once had Florence Easton sing Santuzza’s aria from
Cavalleria Rusticana
right there in her drawing room. I’m given to understand it was quite a triumph.”

Madeline’s eyes lit. “I heard her sing in New York once. She was wonderful.”

“I don’t think there’s any such triumph scheduled for tonight,” Drew told her. “I mean, you can’t expect a Florence Easton in Hampshire every week.”

Nick’s grin grew more annoying. “Perhaps not, but isn’t Miss Pomphrey-Hughes expecting you?”

Drew glanced at Madeline, who was listening with rapt interest and narrowed eyes at the mention of a Miss Pomphrey-Hughes.

“Bah, I don’t know why she should. If they sent me an invitation, I’m sure I had Denny send regrets some time ago.”

Nick’s expression of deep concern was more annoying still. “Oh, but your poor Daphne—”

“She is not, nor has she ever been,
my
poor Daphne. I doubt she has ever thought so, anyway.”

“Could have fooled me.”

“Any display of interest, I can assure you, Nicholas, has been manufactured by dear, sweet, acquisitive Mrs. Pomphrey-Hughes and no other. I’m sure she’s a great reader of the classics and well aware of that ‘truth universally acknowledged.’ And knowing me to be single and in possession of a good fortune, who better to mend my most piteous want of a wife than her own daughter Daphne?”

“Don’t you like Daphne?” Madeline asked.

Drew shrugged. “She’s all right, I expect. Decently attractive girl and all that. Then she has to open her mouth and spoil everything.”

“Well, her head
is
as empty as a balloon,” Nick said, “but much more fun to play with.” He nudged Drew. “Remember that time you took her to see
Othello
?”

Drew rolled his eyes. “Good heavens.”

Madeline looked from him to Nick and back again. “What happened?”

Nick smirked. “He told her it was a comedy, thinking she’d know better and laugh at the remark. Afterward, he asked her if she had enjoyed the play. She owned that she had but said it never got to be all that funny.”

Madeline stifled a laugh. “That was
very
bad of you. The poor girl.”

“She’s been to school, hasn’t she?” Drew protested.

“Perhaps she had mumps that day,” Nick offered.

“You’re both very bad,” said Madeline, and Drew tried to look contrite.

“Well, darling, if you’d like to risk one of the Pomphrey-Hughes’s musical evenings, I would be quite pleased to escort you. They invite most everyone, so I don’t think they’ll mind if we pop in.”

“Oh, that’s all right. It’s nice to have a quiet evening at home sometimes.”

“There is a cinema in Winchester, if you’d care to motor up there. I believe there is a new film playing. All-star cast or some such.”

“It’s not that awful thing with Lucy Lucette, is it? If it is, there’ll be a line round the block since she’s disappeared.”

“No, I don’t think she’s in it. And there’s a lovely little French restaurant nearby for supper later on.”

“That sounds wonderful. Let’s do it.”

“Oh, jolly nice,” Nick put in. “I love the cinema.”

Drew glared at him, and he cleared his throat.

“Ah, yes. Yes, I love the cinema, but I’ve got to get this diary back, you know, and I’ve just remembered some business I must see to here that will take all evening.”

“Oh dear, what a shame,” Drew said. “Are you sure it can’t wait?”

“Well, of course, if you insist.”

Drew lifted one eyebrow, and Nick rapidly recanted.

“No, better not. All play and no work and all that.”

“Are you sure you hadn’t rather spend the evening with Miss Pomphrey-Hughes?” Madeline asked Drew, all innocence. “With your Daphne?”

Drew answered her in kind. “Well, yes. Yes, I would. Thanks for being so understanding about it. Denny,” he called, “lay out my eveningwear.”

Madeline immediately took Nick’s arm. “How would you like to take me to the movies tonight?”

Nick positively beamed. “Oh, rather!”

Drew shoved him out of the way. “Clear off, you. Now look here, Miss Parker, are you coming to the cinema with me or must I resort to violence?”

“Your charm has won me, sir. To the cinema it is.”

It was almost midnight when Drew and Madeline returned to Farthering Place. A fast drive in the cool night air had put a glow in Madeline’s cheeks and an extra brightness in her eyes. Dash it all, she was fetching.

“Oh, that was wonderful. The poor baron. What a tragedy! And Garbo was divine as the ballerina.” She sucked in her cheeks and leaned her head back in seductive languor. “If only I could be so beautiful,” she mourned in a heavy Swedish accent.

He shook his head. “I like women with a little softness to them. Surely with her money she could afford a few hearty meals.”

She squeezed his arm, laughing. “She was glorious and you know it. Next you’ll be saying Barrymore can’t act.”

He stopped short. “No,” he said, lifting one cautioning finger in mock reproof. “I may say he’d do better with some fewer nights at the pub, but never,
never
will I say he can’t act. I saw him do Hamlet in London when I was, oh, seventeen, I suppose. Gave me a new appreciation for the Bard.”

Madeline’s face turned abruptly sober, and he pulled her closer to his side.

“What is it, darling?”

“Oh, nothing.”

“It most certainly is something,” he said. “Come now, tell me. Even the confessional could not afford better protection for your secrets.”

“It’s silly of me, I suppose, but I got a postcard from Carrie and Muriel. From Stratford-upon-Avon.”

“Did you?”

“Muriel especially told me to keep my eye on Adorable Drew.”

“Oh dear.”

“And they wanted to know if we’d heard about Lucy Lucette’s disappearance.”

“Nothing but.”

Madeline sighed. “I don’t know. I always wanted to see Stratford—Anne Hathaway’s cottage and where the Globe Theater once stood and all the other sights we had planned. I suppose I’ll never see them now.”

“Nonsense. Once we get things here sorted out, we’ll drive up to Stratford and see all the touristy places and perhaps even a play or two. Nick can come along as chaperone and low entertainment for the journey.”

She laughed. “I don’t know if Aunt Ruth would approve of him. Of course, she didn’t really approve of the three of us girls knocking around Europe alone, either. I don’t dare tell her what’s happened here. Not now. She’d probably row herself across the Atlantic to drag me back home.”

“She sounds rather formidable. But we wouldn’t want her to think these awful things happen here on a regular basis. Farthering is such a placid place and we never—”

A shriek pierced the night.

Drew and Madeline both looked up toward the darkened house. Then Drew ran up the steps and flung open the front door. He switched on the light in the entry and bounded up the stairs, only to be nearly knocked down by Anna fleeing for her life.

He caught her by the arms. “What is it? What’s happened?”

“I saw him, Mr. Drew! I saw him!” Her face was ghost white. “I
saw
him!”

“You saw who?”

“Him that was killed! Mr. Lincoln!”

“Don’t be silly,” Drew said. “What are you going on about?”

“I saw him . . .”

Madeline hurried up the stairs to them.

“Shh, Anna, it’s all right,” he soothed. “Whatever it is, it’ll be all right.”

Lights were coming on all over the house.

“Let’s go down into the parlor and sort this all out,” Drew said, keeping his voice low.

Dennison, in his robe and slippers, was waiting for them at the foot of the stairs. “Is there some trouble, sir?” The look in his eye was a harsh censure of the maid’s lack of decorum.

“Everything’s all right, Denny,” Drew said. “Please go up and see to it that everyone goes back to bed. We’ll look after Anna here. She’s just had a scare.”

“A rodent of some sort, sir?”

“Very likely, yes.”

“It wasn’t a rodent, Mr. Dennison,” the girl protested.

“Thank you, Denny,” Drew said. “That will be all.”

“Very good, sir.” Dennison bowed. “Miss.”

Drew hurried the girls into the drawing room and shut the door. “Now, Anna, tell me exactly what you saw.”

“I told you, Mr. Drew—I saw him! Mr. Lincoln!”

“Don’t badger her.” Madeline helped the girl to the window seat and sat her down. “Just take your time and tell us what happened.”

Anna took a shuddering breath. “I was finishing up the laundry, putting the linens in the upstairs bathrooms. That’s usually Beryl’s job, but she was up in the missus’s sitting room and listening to the wireless. Mr. Parker said he didn’t mind her doing it; it was what Mrs. Parker would have wanted. But I don’t know that I wouldn’t feel all peculiar-like up there now at night. I mean
after,
you know. It just wouldn’t seem right.”

“So you were upstairs,” Drew prompted.

“I was up in the back hall, putting away, like I said, and I heard something behind me. So I turned around and wasn’t anything there. So I go on, listening and not hearing anything, until I heard someone creeping about. I called out because sometimes Tessa, she does the washing up, and sometimes, bless her, she has pain all down her leg and has to walk it off before she can sleep, so I called out, ‘Tessa, is that you?’ But it wasn’t Tessa. So I called out again, ‘Is someone there?’ and the hall went dark.” Anna’s voice quavered. “Black as pitch it was, and then . . .”

“Then . . . ?”

“Then I saw him!” She burst into tears. “It was Mr. Lincoln, sir. I know it was.”

Madeline slipped into the seat beside her, putting a comforting arm around the girl’s shoulders. “It’s all right, dear.”

Drew paced in front of them. “Now be reasonable, Anna. You know it couldn’t have been Mr. Lincoln. Mr. Lincoln is dead.”

“Oh, but I saw him, Mr. Drew. He was lurkin’ down at the end of the hallway, down by the door to the lumber room. And then . . . then he just wasn’t!”

“Mr. Lincoln couldn’t possibly—”

“He was lurkin’!”

“Did you see his face?” Madeline asked.

“Oh, no, miss. I couldn’t see his face because he didn’t have a head!”

This brought another torrent of weeping.

“Shhh. Don’t think about that now,” Madeline said.

“No, you
must
think about it now, and sensibly.” Drew pulled a chair over and sat so he could look into the girl’s face. “If he didn’t have a head, how could you know it was Lincoln?”