Chapter 22
Jennifer Walsdorf came into the library warily, like a mouse hoping the cat is not in the kitchen. Piper directed her to where Alec stood behind the big desk at the far end. He had decided to leave Lucy’s mother to Tom, being himself rather too close for comfort to that branch of the family.
While Tom, with impeccable courtesy and his most reassuring manner, seated Mrs. Oliver Fotheringay at the long table, Alec watched Mrs. Walsdorf approach down the long room.
Her black frock looked slightly out of date and as if it had been made for someone else.
Of course, all the female guests were wearing makeshift mourning, but she was a poor relation, probably making do with cast-offs at the best of times.
Very likely she wore cheap artificial silk stockings.
Under pressure of events, Alec had neglected to follow up the artificial silk stocking.
Anyone could have bought a pair, he reminded himself, bowing slightly to the anxious young woman. “Do take a seat, Mrs. Walsdorf,” he said. “I believe you’re in an excellent position to help us.”
“John didn’t kill anyone! That business of his being born in Germany, it doesn’t mean anything. I don’t know why Lady Eva wrote it down.”
“He told you about that.”
“Oh yes. He told me before we were married that he was born in Baden-Baden, and he told me today that Lady Eva knew. He only found out this afternoon, from you. It really wouldn’t have made any difference to us if she’d told people.
” She sounded as if she was trying to convince herself.
“Some people already dislike and distrust him just because he’s a foreigner, and the others don’t care exactly where he was born.
There’s simply never been any reason to mention it.
After all, he left Germany when he was only a few days old.
He hates the Germans for invading his country. ”
“Who can blame him? Actually, what I want to ask you about is whom you saw in the drawing room after dinner, where, I gather, you were pouring coffee?”
Mrs. Walsdorf confirmed all the names Daisy and Lucy had provided, and added Mr. and Mrs. Bancroft.
“John didn’t come,” she said reluctantly.
“He didn’t want to stay and drink port with Rupert, of course, but he still had one or two letters to write and then he was going to take them to the letter-box.
He went up to Lord Haverhill’s den again, as you were in here.
Surely Lord Haverhill must have seen him. ”
Alec hadn’t thought to ask. Anyway, he doubted the Haverhills had been in any state to notice. “Did any of the others come in late?” he asked.
“Just Rupert and Lord Gerald, and Lord Gerald didn’t stay for coffee. Is he … is he going to die?”
“I’m afraid the doctor thinks he’ll just slip away without regaining consciousness.”
“It’s awful! Who’s doing it, Mr. Fletcher? Is it a maniac? He might kill any of us next. I’m so afraid for Emily!”
“Your child? I don’t think you need be, Mrs. Walsdorf. These are not random murders.” Alec could only hope he was right. The last thing he wanted was a house full of panic-stricken people. They had held up pretty well so far, he acknowledged. For the most part, the
“nobs” were being stiff-upper-lip, while the servants went on with their work as if none of the horrors had anything much to do with them, in which belief they seemed to be justified. So far. “What about tea-time?” he asked. “Where were you then?”
“Pouring! In the drawing room. We usually have it on the terrace in the summer, or in the Long Gallery if it’s not nice out, but Lady Haverhill sent word to serve it in the drawing room.”
“Why is that?” So that she was less likely to be seen going to the conservatory? No, surely Lady Haverhill had not strangled her sister-in-law, poisoned her own son, and hit a noble guest over the head!
“Because of what had happened. Because it’s more formal.
I’d expected Sally to want to play hostess, but she sent a maid to tell me to pour.
Not that I mind pouring. I always do it for Lady Haverhill.
But that’s because her wrist and hand tire easily and she doesn’t want Aunt Maud to get ideas about taking over.
I’m sorry if that sounds catty, but it’s true.
Poor Aunt Maud has been looking forward for decades to being Countess of Haverhill, and now she never will.
Of course, Sally just enjoys telling me what to do and watching me do it. Never mind, it won’t be much longer.”
“Tell me whom you remember coming to tea.”
Almost all the guests had turned up at tea-time.
Unfortunately, there had been considerable coming and going, and Mrs. Walsdorf couldn’t remember who had come when, nor how long they had stayed.
“I’m sorry, but there are three doors,” she pointed out, “to the hall, the Long Gallery, and the French windows to the terrace. I couldn’t have watched them all even if I’d known it was important. I was kept pretty busy, too.”
Alec let her go. He and Tom went on to interview all those who had been cleared of the attack on Bincombe by her, Daisy’s, and Lucy’s evidence.
Asked about tea-time, several people mentioned a row between
Sally and Angela over the latter bringing her dog into the drawing room.
Flora Fotheringay had overheard Lord Carleton speaking most disagreeably, not to say cuttingly, to his wife—making her glad not to be married.
Mrs. Bancroft had drawn her husband’s attention to her mother, Lady Devenish, observing that she looked quite haggard.
Sally had had to speak sharply to Jennifer, who seemed distracted and had slopped some tea into a saucer.
Mrs. Henry Fotheringay had noticed Teddy Devenish, because she had had to admonish her elder daughter to stop making eyes at him.
Unfortunately, no one had any idea when these events had occurred. Most had not arrived on time and all agreed that people had been coming and going constantly.
The only two who had anything useful to report were Erica Pendleton and Julia Lasbury.
They had wasted (Erica’s word) twenty minutes on Teddy Devenish before his disillusionment with women ceased to be provocative and became boring.
They had ambushed (Tom’s word) the unhappy young man on his arrival in the drawing room a couple of minutes before the servants brought in the tea-things, prompt at quarter to five.
Teddy Devenish could not have poisoned Lord Fotheringay, nor assaulted Lord Gerald.
“But he still could have strangled his grandma,” Tom pointed out, “and Lady Devenish could have done the rest to protect him.”
Lady Devenish and Sir James, Lord and Lady Carleton—the latter with no known motive, Mr. Montagu and John Walsdorf all still belonged on the list.
Meanwhile, on one of his trips back and forth to fetch people, Piper reported that the night nurse had arrived.
The patient’s condition was unchanged, he said, Mrs. Reverend looked dead on her feet, and he had told her the Chief wouldn’t mind if she went straight to bed.
Considering what Nancy Fotheringay had done that day, Alec was surprised she was capable of standing.
Her stamina was as remarkable as her kindness.
A little later, Piper had brought in Sir Leonard. His four fresh constables had turned up at last. One at the lodge gate, one outside Lord Gerald’s room—what were the other two to do?
Alec tried to recall what he had wanted them for. Search for the weapon? Piper had found the cricket bat, for all the good it did them. “It would take an army to cover all the outside doors,” he thought aloud.
“Luckily these aren’t the sort of people who can sneak off across the park and disappear into the populace,” Sir Leonard offered. He was looking a little glassy-eyed.
“No. We’ll station one of your men in the conservatory. The doors are locked but there may be other keys around. I want it thoroughly examined in daylight. We could easily have missed something. The other chap had better patrol the house, to reassure people.”
“Most of them have gone up to bed, except those few you haven’t seen yet.”
“It’s past one o’clock, Chief,” Tom murmured.
“Lady Carleton, Ernie,” said Alec wearily. “She’s going to be upset if we’ve kept her up for nothing. All the rest we saw earlier. They can wait till morning, but give them my apologies.”
Lady Carleton entered accompanied by Ursula. “Since you won’t let me take my daughter home, I’m not letting her out of my sight,” she announced, wilted but still militant, “until you catch this maniac. She should have been in bed hours ago.”
Behind her back, Ernie Piper shrugged and rolled his eyes.
Alec gave him a resigned nod. “As you wish, Lady Carleton. Perhaps Miss Ursula can help us too.”
“I won’t have her badgered. She’s very sensitive.”
“I don’t mind, Mummy. It’s all too frightfully exciting for words,” Ursula enthused, not at all wilted. “The girls at school will be wild with envy when they hear I’ve been questioned by a real Scotland Yard ’tec!”
“Let’s start with you, then,” Alec said with a smile. “Tell me what you did at tea-time.”
“Mummy didn’t want to go down, because of there being a murderer on the loose. She didn’t want to go to lunch either, but Daddy made her. He said everyone would think one of us had killed Aunt Eva if we didn’t appear.”
“What nonsense, Ursula! As though anyone could possibly suppose such a thing.”
“That’s what he said,” Ursula persisted.
“Anyway, I was simply starving again by tea-time, and I’d just persuaded Mummy to ring for a servant and ask to have tea brought up to the room—hers and Daddy’s—when Daddy came in and said not to be ridiculous, we must go down.
Mummy wouldn’t go without him, so we all went.
We were so late I thought there might not be any cakes and biscuits left, but it was all right, there was plenty for everyone.
Sally even told Mrs. Walsdorf to send a maid for more hot water for the tea. ”
“Aunt Sally,” her mother corrected her.
“She told me to call her Sally, Mummy, because Aunt Sally sounds like a fun fair—you know, the thing you throw things at—and we’re the same generation even if she is a bit older than me.”
“Thank you, Miss Ursula,” Alec said, cutting off whatever Lady Carleton was about to say. “Now, what about after dinner?”
Ursula pouted. “Mummy made me go upstairs with her. It’s not fair, Alice and Mary stayed down for coffee with the grown-ups.
Then after a bit, Daddy came and said Lord Gerald had been attacked, and Mummy said she was going to try again to get you to let her take me home.
Then you said everyone should wait in the drawing room, so we did. ”
“Is that correct, Lady Carleton?”
“Yes, yes, but it really is most improper for a girl not yet out to call a woman ten years her elder by her christian name.”
“Never mind, Mummy, we’ll be calling her Lady Fotheringay after the funeral.”
“Ursula! And when have you attended a fun fair, I’d like to know?”
“Never,” her daughter lied promptly. “Some of the other girls talked about them. Is that all, Detective Chief Inspector? You see, Mummy, there was nothing to it. But what a story I’ll make of it when I get back to school!”
“Ursula, it is not a story we want spread about!”
Piper ushered them out, Lady Carleton expostulating all the way.
In spite of the girl’s obvious untruthfulness when it suited her, Alec believed her report. It exonerated her mother, but left her father completely unaccounted for at the crucial times.
Lord Carleton, Sir James and Lady Devenish, Montagu Fotheringay and John Walsdorf, Alec thought as he climbed the stairs towards bed, hoping Daisy was not sleeping too soundly She’d be pleased to hear the long list had shortened to five.
No, six. He kept forgetting Teddy Devenish, because the boy had been in the library when Bincombe was attacked.
He was still very much in the picture for his grandmother’s murder.
Alec could only trust it would not take another murder to narrow the six down to one.