The Unpleasantness at Baskerville Hall (Reeves & Worcester Steampunk Mysteries Book 4) (13 page)

“Yes, but it’s half full.”

Reeves unscrewed the top of the atomiser and drained the perfume into the only empty vessel he could find — my cocktail glass.

“I’ll take the atomiser to the bathroom and fill it with water, sir. I suggest you lock the door while I’m gone.”

I locked the door after Reeves’ exit.

“You do realise,” said Emmeline with a girlish smile, “that if anyone
does
choose to search the rooms now, it won’t just be Pasco’s head we’ll be in trouble for.”

“The paint tin, you mean?”

“No, silly. You’ve just locked me in your bedroom. Lady Julia will be scandalised.”

I hadn’t considered this. As scandalous behaviour went, locking an unmarried, and unchaperoned, young lady in one’s bedroom outranked stowing an under gardener’s head in the wardrobe any day.

“We could hide under the bed and pretend we’re not here,” I said.

“I think people searching rooms tend to look there first.”

“Then I’d jump out the window and save your honour. You could say you heard a noise and thought it was Selden, so you ran into the nearest room and locked the door.”

“How would you explain why you were lying on the lawn with a broken leg?”

“I’d say I’d never seen this broken leg before in my life. It was already there when I tripped over it. Probably Pasco’s.”

Emmeline laughed ... until there was a knock on the door.

We both jumped. Emmeline emitted a strangled ‘eep’ and I was ankling it at full speed towards the window, before the reassuring voice of Reeves stemmed the stampede.

“It is Reeves, sir,” he said. “You may unlock the door now.”

I let him in.

“We’ll have to formulate some kind of door knocking code in future, Reeves. Two quick knocks followed by two slow ones means all’s well.”

“Very good, sir.”

I took the atomiser and gave it a test puff or two. A pleasing cloud of fine vapour was produced both times.

“Perfect,” I said. “Now watch this.”

I sprayed Pasco’s head in a fine mist, waited a second or two, then sieved on the flour. The flour stuck!

“Can you see anything, Reeves?”

“No, sir.”

“Are you sure?”

“Positive, sir.”

“I’ll add some more flour.”

“I would not advise it, sir.”

“Nonsense, Reeves. If it works for Serge, it’ll work for Reginald.”

I added more flour, then more water, then more flour.

“Should it look like that?” asked Emmeline.

It looked a mess, which was not how it was described in the book. Pasco’s head was covered in a sticky white goo.

“I think it might need time to settle,” I said, hopefully.

“It looks more like pastry,” said Emmeline.

We stood around the head waiting in a despondent silence. And then I sieved on some more flour. Then Reeves annoyed me with a lot of defeatist rot about giving up on the experiment, and I sieved on a lot more ... interspersed with generous sprays of water. We Worcesters do not yield in the face of adversity — even when that face is covered in pastry!

“Reggie,” said Emmeline, placing her hand on my tiring sieving arm. “I think that’s enough.”

Sadly, I had to agree.

“I shall write a stiff letter to the publishers of
The Girl in The Baklava
, Emmie. Mark my words.
”

Emmeline watched the corridor, while a gloved Reeves and I carried the incriminating pastry into an empty room at the far end of the corridor. I stashed the brush and paint tin in a dressing table drawer there. Reeves placed the pastry-covered head in the wardrobe. We then withdrew smartly.

“All clear,” said Emmeline. “Sorry, but I must dash. The maid’s running my bath. I’ll see you at dinner, Reggie.”

It was a dispirited Reginald Worcester that trudged back to his room. I’d even lost the will to get excited about socks, and, when I took a long and surprising sip of
Eau de Cologne
, it seemed to sum up my entire afternoon.

But we Worcesters can’t stay down for long. We’re rather like corks — always looking to spring back up the moment cruel fortune releases its grip. After an hour I could even see a silver lining to the
Eau de Cologne
incident — I’d have the sweetest smelling breath in the entire dining room!

~

It was ten to eight, by the time I trotted downstairs. Babbacombe was sitting in a hall chair by the door, cradling a shotgun, and looking pretty glum. I gave him an encouraging what ho, then proceeded to the drawing room.

“Good evening, Roderick,” said T. Everett. “What’s
your
take on this Selden crisis? Does he have a plan, do you think?”

“One would think he’d be looking for Dr Morrow,” I said. I then noticed that the doctor wasn’t present. “Where is the doctor?”

“He must still be in his room,” said T. Everett. “Everyone’s a little late tonight. Usually we’re all here by half past.”

“There are extenuating circumstances,” said Lily.

“I think Selden’s long gone,” said Henry. “That business with Pasco will have shaken him.”

Ida disagreed. “The maid told me that Pasco’s body has gone missing,” she said. “Berrymore sent the coachman to move the body this afternoon and he couldn’t find it! The maid’s sure Selden ate him.”

“The maid doesn’t know what she’s talking about, Ida,” said Henry. “There’ll be a simple explanation. One of the servants must have moved the body without telling anyone.”

“And there’s a policeman gone missing too,” said Ida. “The maid reckons he was dessert.”

“Ida!” said her father. “Could we talk about something else?”

“I agree,” said Lily. “I feel like we’re all standing around waiting for Selden to make an appearance.”

Emmeline floated into the room. It may be sappy, but I rather felt the room brightened. If there had been small birds present, they would have chirruped. Clouds — if one could fit a small brace of cumulus into a country house drawing room — would have parted.

“Just the person I wanted to see,” said Henry. “Everett and I have come up with the perfect moving picture for you.”

“You have?” said Emmeline.

“It’s a corker,” said Lily. “You’ve got to do it.”

“We’re going to call it the
The Perils of Poor Lily
,” said Henry. “It’ll be a quarry-based serial of cliff-hanging peril. Each weekly episode will end with you in the direst peril.”

“Tied to a railway track with a train steaming towards you,” said T. Everett.

“Or dangling from a cliff top,” added Henry.

I had to say this didn’t sound to me like a plum part.

“Goodness,” said Emmeline.

“But every week you escape,” said Henry. “Just when everyone in the audience is convinced you’re a goner, in rides the hero to save the day.”

“Can’t I save myself?” asked Emmeline.

“That would never play in the Midwest, Lily,” said T. Everett.

“So, I spend all my time getting into trouble, and then a man saves me?” asked Emmeline.

If I’d been Henry, I’d have stepped back a foot or two at this point.

“Audiences love a damsel in distress,” said Henry. “But you wouldn’t be an ordinary damsel in distress. You’d be as you were this morning — someone who’d see a Lizard Man and dive right in. The audience will love you. You’d be a free spirit, always getting into scrapes. But then, with five minutes to go, you get into a scrape that no one thinks even you can escape from.”

“And then a man saves me,” said Emmeline.

“Not just
any
man, Lily,” said Henry. “He’ll be a hero ... with a white hat. And there’ll be plenty of male villains you can bash.”

“You’ve been very quiet, Ida. What do you think of the idea?” asked her father.

“I think Miss Fossett was
born
to hang from a cliff. She has such stout arms.”

“I do not!”

“You do!”

“Of course you don’t,” I said, strategically placing the Worcester body in between Emmeline and Ida. “Oh, look. Here’s Morrow.”

Heads turned, and the doctor, looking a little flushed and out of puff, hurried in.

“Sorry if I’m a little late,” he said. “I lost track of time.”

Which was understandable in the circs. If Reeves started eating postmen and leaving their internal organs on the doorstep, I’d be a little distracted too.

Morrow’s arrival was swiftly followed by that of Lady Julia.

“Has anyone seen Robert?” she asked.

“I saw him half an hour ago,” said Henry. “He and Berrymore were checking all the doors and windows were locked.”

“But where is he now?” asked Lady Julia. “He should be here. He’s not in his room or the library.”

“It
is
an unusual day, Aunt Julia,” said Henry. “I expect he’s giving last-minute instructions to Berrymore.”

The dinner gong sounded.

“Where
is
Robert?” said Lady Julia, sounding a tad more annoyed than concerned. “He’s
never
late for dinner.”

Berrymore emerged, pushing open the double doors through to the dining room.

“Have you seen my father, Berrymore?” asked Henry.

Berrymore looked surprised. “I saw Sir Robert ten minutes ago, sir. I was under the impression he was on his way here.”

Thirteen

had to wait. According to Berrymore, Sir Robert had left the butler’s pantry ten minutes ago en route for the drawing room. Babbacombe, on guard in the hallway — with a clear view of the door to the servants’ quarters — had not seen Sir Robert emerge.

Even Lady Julia joined the party that followed Henry through the servants’ door in search of Sir Robert.

An armed footman, who looked liked a younger version of Babbacombe, was sitting in a chair by the back door to the garden.

“Have you see my father, Witheridge?” asked Henry.

“I ... don’t know, sir,” said Witheridge, looking decidedly shifty.

“Either you have or you haven’t, man. Which is it?” barked Henry.

“He told me not to tell anyone, sir.”

“
Who
told you?”

“Sir Robert, sir. He said he was slipping out for five minutes and if anyone asked I was to say I’d never seen nothing.”

Witheridge had a distinct ‘rabbit in the lamp light’ look.

“Are you saying he went
outside
?” said Henry.

“He took a gun with him,” said Witheridge. “I offered to go with him, but he told me to stay at my post.”

“This is ridiculous!” said Lady Julia. “Robert would never embark on some secret tryst minutes before dinner.”

“Did he say
where
he was going? Or why?” Henry asked Witheridge.

“No, sir. He just told me to keep quiet about it.”

A search party was swiftly organised. Two brace of shotguns were fetched from the gun room and passed around. I had one for about five seconds before Reeves appeared at my shoulder and insisted it was his job to carry it for me.

Witheridge and Babbacombe were ordered to stay behind and protect the ladies. This, not unexpectedly, raised the ire of Emmeline, who objected to being left behind, insisting the search party would need all the sharp eyes it could get.

“You’re not dressed for it, girl,” snapped Lady Julia.

Lady Julia did have a point. Billowy dresses and a couple of inches of heel were not ideal attire for scrabbling around in the dark.

“Besides,” I said. “Someone has to stay behind and protect Witheridge and Babbacombe.”

With lamps lit and passed around, the party left the back door and split up. It was twilight and rather misty. The mist was an odd species of mist, too — one could see patches of the denser stuff drifting over the lawns.

Henry and the others set off for the outbuildings, calling out for Sir Robert as they went. I decided to head across the back lawn toward the mire gate. If I were looking for a secret trysting place, that’s the spot I’d have chosen.

The mist thickened and cleared around us. One second Reeves and I were in a pea souper, the next we could see almost one hundred yards. And as the lawns began to drop away, I saw the most unnerving sight. There, through a gap in the trees, I saw a hooded woman in a long black dress bent over a shape on the ground. She was eighty yards away at the bottom of the slope. And as I held up my lamp, she turned and looked my way. And then she was off, legging it at speed towards the mire gate.

We gave chase. I didn’t trust the direct route. Another bank of fog was drifting in and the ground would be covered in scrub and spreading tree roots designed to up-end the over-hasty. And Reeves was carrying a loaded shotgun. So we ran the longer way via the Yew Walk. It wasn’t until we were within ten yards that we recognised the shape on the ground that the woman had been bent over.

It was Sir Robert.

~

“Is he dead?” I asked, having a pretty good idea as to the answer. He was lying face down on the ground and hadn’t moved an inch.

Reeves knelt beside him and felt for a pulse.

“Sir Robert is deceased, sir, but still warm. I would estimate his time of death as mere moments ago.”

We both looked through the mist towards the mire gate. The woman had gone. All we could hear was the distant hoot of an owl and the calls of the searching parties.