The Peculiar Case of Lord Finsbury's Diamonds: A Casebook of Barnaby Adair Short Novel (The Casebook of Barnaby Adair) (13 page)

 “As it did in this case,” Barnaby murmured. “No one questioned Fletcher’s bona fides when, as Mitchell, he joined the house party.”

 Kitty nodded and drew in a deeper breath. “He settled in quick, and two nights later he opened the safe and took the diamonds. He showed them to me the following day. Absolutely fabulous, they were, winking in the sunshine.”

 Stokes asked, “Why didn’t the two of you leave then? You had what you’d come for.”

 Kitty snorted derisively. “We weren’t such fools. If we’d done that—just cut and run—suspicions would have been raised, his lordship might have checked his safe, and then there would have been a hue and cry over the diamonds, and quite aside from that cutting their immediate value to next to nothing, you’d have known who was responsible and you’d have had us in your sights. Fletcher and I were always careful to avoid focusing attention on us.”

 “That’s why he engineered the scene with Miss Finsbury and Culver that got him ejected from the house party,” Barnaby said.

 Kitty nodded. “Just shows what an artist Fletcher was—he needed to leave with an excuse no one would question, and there was Culver hovering like a dog over a bone with Miss Finsbury. The very Miss Finsbury his lordship wanted Fletcher to court. It couldn’t have been more perfect.”

 “So Fletcher got himself thrown out and left. All that was a part of your plan.” Stokes met Kitty’s washed-out hazel eyes. “When were you supposed to follow him?”

 “Not for another week or so.” Kitty paused, then said, “We talked about it and decided I would need to stay for at least a week after the house party. We didn’t want anyone connecting my leaving with him.”

 “So why,” Barnaby asked, “did Fletcher come back?” He remembered the second letter Fletcher had sent. “He wrote to you, didn’t he?”

 Frowning, Kitty nodded. “It arrived with the letter to Miss Finsbury, but all Fletcher said was that there’d been a change of plans. He said not to worry, that if anything this scheme looked set to be even better than we’d imagined. He told me he’d come and meet with Miss Finsbury and possibly his lordship, and that he’d meet me in the shrubbery when he was done and he would explain all then.”

 Stokes eyed Kitty consideringly. “Do you have his letter?”

 Kitty grimaced. “I burnt it. Too incriminating to keep it, not that it said much.”

 Stokes glanced at Barnaby, caught his eye, then Stokes returned his gaze to Kitty. Leaning forward, he rested his forearms on the desk and clasped his hands. “Miss Mallard, let me put one possible explanation of all the facts to you.”

 Kitty eyed him warily.

 “We all agree that Fletcher arrived here as a guest for the house party, and that subsequently he took the diamonds from Lord Finsbury’s safe—as per your original plan. But what if, during those days here, Fletcher met and grew enamored of Gwendolyn Finsbury. He still took the diamonds and went through with your scheme, but, when he got to London and had the necklace valued…perhaps he wondered if there was a better way forward. One that involved him bringing the necklace back to Gwendolyn Finsbury, spinning some tale that he’d found it in town, and using it as a means to get back into her good graces—and those of her father. And, of course, as reward for returning such an important set of jewels to the family, he would claim Gwendolyn’s hand. In such a scenario the letter he sent to you—which you subsequently destroyed—said something quite different. Fletcher told you he intended marrying Miss Finsbury…and where did that leave you? Angry, no doubt—furious, even. Perhaps furious enough to set that foot-trap on the path, and when he stepped into it, to beat your ex-lover to death.” 

 Kitty had grown paler and paler, but her eyes never left Stokes’s. Now, her face set, she simply stated, “No. That didn’t happen.” She glanced at Barnaby and her lips twisted in a scoffing expression. “It may not be how things are done in your world, but Fletcher and I had been together for more than a decade, living together and working together.” She looked at Stokes and her gaze was steady. “We might never have tied the knot officially, but it was the same thing.”

 Easing back in her chair, she drew a deeper breath, then went on, “And, if you please, what possible use would Miss Finsbury be to Fletcher? He had no money to speak of, and the Finsburys aren’t wealthy or his lordship wouldn’t be looking for a wealthy husband for his daughter. Fletcher was thirty-five. He’d lived life and was cynical to his toes. The chances that he’d had his head turned by Miss Finsbury—over a span of a few days at a house party—aren’t big enough to point to.”

 In Stokes’s experienced assessment, Kitty was speaking the truth. She was also an ex-actress. Still holding her gaze, he said, “Maybe it was you who wanted to move on and you had to get rid of Fletcher to do so. Perhaps, contrary to what you’ve told us, you were supposed to leave with him, or at least follow him back to London the next day, but when you didn’t show…he wrote those two letters. One to Miss Finsbury arranging a mysterious meeting to act as his excuse for returning to the house, and a second letter to you, asking you to meet him. Perhaps he brought the diamonds to help persuade you to return with him to town. But you didn’t want to continue with him and that life, so you trapped him on the path and—”

 Kitty stayed him with an upraised hand; this time her expression was all scornful disgust. “Before you suggest that I bludgeoned Fletcher—my lover of ten and more years—to death, just answer me this. If I was intending to break with Fletcher, who was I leaving him for?”

 Increasingly belligerent, Kitty looked from Stokes to Barnaby. Brows rising, she spread her arms and demanded, “Who? Lord Finsbury? Culver? Rattle? Or perhaps old Riggs? Admittedly he’d have me, but why on earth would I want to end up here, stuck in a country backwater, when with Fletcher I lived within a stone’s throw of Leicester Square?”

 Barnaby met Stokes’s gaze. For a woman of Kitty’s background, that last point was difficult to argue.

 But that left them with the question: If not Kitty, then who?

 “No answer?” Kitty prompted. When they looked at her but said nothing, she snorted and folded her arms. “It wasn’t me—get that through your thick skulls. I’m the very last person to have wanted Fletcher dead.” For a fleeting moment, emotion cut through her expression; she swallowed and banished it, then more quietly repeated, “It wasn’t me.”

 Barnaby straightened. “You said Riggs would have you—has he been pursuing you?”

 Kitty shrugged. “Just the usual—nothing I couldn’t handle. I had to butter him up to learn what Fletcher needed to know about the safe and the family and Riggs took that as encouragement, so I’ve been treading a little carefully where he’s concerned.”

 Barnaby ran his mind over their questions and her answers thus far, then asked, “You told us of the letter you got from Fletcher informing you that he was coming back.” He caught Kitty’s gaze. “When you got it, what did you
think
was behind it? What did you think was Fletcher’s new plan?”

 Kitty grimaced and slowly shook her head. “Honestly? I had no idea. Knowing Fletcher, even given what was written in the letter—he was always careful what he put in writing—it could simply have been that something had gone wrong and he was coming to fetch me away. I packed my bag just in case, but…” Kitty shut her lips and said nothing more.

 Barnaby studied her, then looked at Stokes. He couldn’t decide if she was telling the truth or was simply that good an actress.

 From the frustrated expression in his eyes, Stokes couldn’t either.

 In this case, jealousy had seemed the obvious motive to account for the passion behind the murder, but if not that…where did that leave them?

 Barnaby looked back at Kitty. “Why did you leave this morning?”

 Her gaze lowering to the desktop, Kitty lightly shrugged. “I’d had enough of this place. I had no reason to stay and you’ve taken Fletcher’s body to town. I wanted to see about giving him a decent burial—we’ve got enough put away for that.”

 Someone rapped on the door.

At Stokes’s terse “Yes,” Jones looked in.

“Mr. Culver and Miss Finsbury heard as how we’d caught Miss Mallard waiting for the coach and that she’s our prime suspect. They say they have something to show you that proves it couldn’t have been a woman did for Fletcher.”

 Stokes arched his brows. “Indeed?” After a second, he looked at Kitty. “I suggest it would be in your best interests for you to remain here while Adair and I check this evidence, which, according to Culver and Miss Finsbury, will prove your innocence.”

 Sitting back, Kitty waved them to the door. “By all means. I didn’t kill Fletcher and the sooner you believe that the better off I’ll be—and perhaps, then, you can find the real murderer.”

 Stokes rose and, with Barnaby on his heels, headed for the door. Somewhat to Barnaby’s surprise, Stokes paused on the threshold and looked back at his constable who was still standing guard behind Kitty’s chair. “Phipps.”

 When the constable looked around, Stokes tipped his head toward the corridor.

 Stokes stepped through the door, Barnaby followed, and Phipps brought up the rear, closing the door behind him. Duffet was still standing beside the door. Glancing down the corridor, Barnaby saw Jones waiting with Frederick Culver and Gwendolyn Finsbury where the corridor debouched into the front hall.

 Stokes looked at Duffet. “I want you to stay on guard here and make sure Miss Mallard doesn’t leave the room, no matter what excuse she gives. We won’t be long.” Looking at Phipps, Stokes’s expression hardened. “I want you outside the house. Find someplace to lurk where you can’t be seen from the office windows, but from where you’ll see if Miss Mallard tries to escape.” Stokes met Barnaby’s eyes. “She ran this morning—let’s see if, presented with the opportunity, she runs again.”

 Barnaby arched his brows but nodded. “If, despite all, she does run again, then she’s definitely not innocent. She might not have done the deed but if she’s anxious enough to bolt, she had something to do with Fletcher’s demise.”

 “Right.” His expression grim, Stokes looked down the corridor. “Now let’s see what these two have found.”

* * *

T
en minutes later, Barnaby stood alongside Stokes in an outbuilding beyond the shrubbery and stared at the small mountain of heavy farming equipment that had been lifted aside to gain access to the foot-trap.

 As the outline the foot-trap had left in the dust was plain to see, the obvious conclusion was impossible to deny.

 When Stokes remained silent, Barnaby stated it aloud. “No woman acting alone could have gained access to the trap.”

 Culver, standing to one side with Gwendolyn Finsbury and the estate’s old gardener, shifted. “That’s not all.” When Barnaby and Stokes glanced his way, Culver went on, “Penman here says that there’s a narrow trail through the wood that leads to the path from the village. I’ve been wondering how we—Gwen and I—could have missed the murderer returning to the house, but if he knew about the trap and got it from here, he almost certainly knew about the trail and he wouldn’t have needed to risk crossing the side lawn and possibly running into some of the guests.”

 Stokes nodded grimly. “Indeed.” He swung toward the door.

 “But there’s more.” When Stokes halted, Culver continued, “We looked in the croquet shed and Agnes’s hoop-hammer—actually a long-handled sledgehammer very like the one used on Mitchell—is still in there. It wasn’t the murder weapon.”

 Stokes stared at him with something akin to disbelief.

 Culver hurriedly added, “But the long-handled sledgehammer that’s part of the estate’s tools and that should be hanging on a rack in the barn is missing.”

 Stokes shifted his gaze to the gardener. “Who among the household would have known that there was a sledgehammer kept in the barn?”

 The gardener primmed his lips, but eventually consented to answer. “Only the staff. I can imagine his lordship might’ve known we’d have a trap hidden in the outbuildings somewhere, but he wouldn’t have known where, not without a lot of searching, and no way can I imagine he’d have known that we had another sledgehammer, much less where it was kept. We only use it for the fences and we haven’t done them in a couple of years.”

 Gwendolyn Finsbury put in, “The rack where the tools hang can’t be seen from the barn door—you have to go all the way inside, almost to the rear wall, before you see it.”

 Barnaby glanced at Stokes, who almost imperceptibly shook his head.

 Face set, Stokes looked at Culver, Miss Finsbury, and the gardener. He nodded. “Thank you. I don’t yet know what this means—how it will play out—but your help has been crucial.” With a swift glance at Barnaby, he continued, “Now if you’ll excuse us? Oh, and if you would ensure this building is locked and the key given to…” Stokes looked at Miss Finsbury. “Perhaps for the moment, miss, you would agree to hold the key. Just until we sort this out.”

 Gwendolyn Finsbury nodded. “Yes, of course.”

* * *

A
longside Stokes, Barnaby strode swiftly back toward the house. “Who the devil was it? A man, obviously, but was he acting with Kitty, as her accomplice, or is she not involved at all and the murderer was after Fletcher for some entirely different reason?”

 “Regardless,” Stokes said, and the tenor of his voice suggested anticipation was riding high, “you heard the gardener. It had to be one of the staff. Moreover, one of the staff who has been here for long enough to have had the time to stumble on the trap, the trail, and the sledgehammer.”

 “Ah—yes.” Barnaby felt his own excitement building; they were close, so close. “The gardener put his finger on it—whoever the murderer was, he had to have known the trap was there. He could only have learned the evening before that Fletcher—Mitchell—was planning to return. And while the staff’s time is not completely accounted for, none of them had enough
unaccounted
time to have spent hours searching to discover something with which to trap Fletcher.”

 “Exactly.” Stokes led the way up the front steps. Closing his hand on the doorknob, he paused. Then he grimaced and met Barnaby’s eyes. “Unfortunately, despite the gardener’s assertions, this brings Lord Finsbury back into contention.”