Chapter 9
On her way to her bedroom, Daisy passed the door of Lady Tyndall’s sitting room. Or rather, she nearly passed it, but a moment’s hesitation was her undoing. She paused long enough to hear low voices.
She hadn’t expressed her condolences properly, she remembered, having been too busy organizing things. It would be bad manners to trot off to bed as if nothing had happened.
She knocked.
After a moment’s silence, Babs opened the door, her face impassive. “Oh, it’s you. We were expecting the interrogators. It’s Daisy, Mother.”
“I just wanted to—”
“Come in, Daisy.” Lady Tyndall’s voice was less feeble than Daisy had expected.
Her eyes were reddened, as if she had wept, but putting her feet up for a while seemed to have restored her somewhat, in spite of the shocking news of her husband’s death.
She reclined on a chintz chaise longue, a shawl around her shoulders and another across her legs.
The room was comfortable, though slightly shabby. Jack sat on the rose-patterned carpet beside his mother, holding one of her hands in both of his. As Daisy stepped in, he started to unfold his long length.
“Don’t get up,” said Daisy. “I don’t want to intrude. I just wanted to say how frightfully sorry I am. You must be wishing me at Jericho. I’ll move down to the Ravens in the morning—Alec’s taken rooms there.”
“Oh no!” Gwen started up from a low cabriole chair. “You mustn’t leave. I don’t know what we’d have done without you this evening.”
Daisy glanced at Lady Tyndall, who nodded. “Yes, do stay, Daisy.”
“You must,” Jack said impulsively. “We were just saying how glad we are that your husband is in charge, and if you go, we might just as well have a stranger nosing about.”
“Jack!” his mother chided.
He coloured. “Sorry, that didn’t come out quite the way I meant it. But you will stay, won’t you, Mrs. Fletcher?”
Babs said nothing. Her face remained uncommunicative.
“Do,” Gwen urged. “I’ve already told the maids to make up the other bed in your room for your husband. And they’ve prepared a couple of the unused servants’ rooms for his men. I hope that will be all right?”
“It’s very kind of you. I’m sure we’ll all be more comfortable here.”
“I’ll be glad to have the police in the house.” Lady Tyndall shivered and pulled the shawl more closely about her shoulders. “Surely while they’re here, no ghosts will walk.”
“Nonsense, Mother,” said Babs in her abrupt way. “I don’t pretend to guess what drove Father to do it, what skeletons from the past Mr. Fletcher is going to dig up, but you can be sure they won’t be parading about the house dressed in sheets.”
“I wouldn’t put it past Addie’s boys, though,” remarked Jack, turning from the fireplace, where he’d just added a log to the flames.
“If they dare!” Babs exclaimed.
“Addie’s not going to tell them what happened,” said Gwen, “so there’s no reason it should occur to them.”
“They’re bound to find out,” Jack said. “They can jolly well haunt their own house, though.”
Gwen’s brow wrinkled. “Why should they find out? We only told people there had been an accident.”
“Someone’s bound to talk,” Babs said grimly. “Since they don’t know the facts, rumours will be flying by morning.”
“Oh God!” With a groan, Jack hid his face in his hands. “If only I’d never thought of going to the Ravens. If only I’d never spoken to Gooch. I liked his wife so much, and it’s all my fault she’s dead.”
“Nonsense!” Gwen’s voice was unusually harsh. “It’s no one’s fault but Father’s. Goodness only knows what she can have said to set off his temper, but you know very well it never takes—took much. All of us suffered from it enough.”
Daisy saw that Lady Tyndall was once again looking quite ill. “I’m off to bed,” she said. “I can’t tell you how sorry I am. I know Alec will make things as easy as he can. Good night.”
As if there was the slightest chance that any of them would have a good night.
“I’ll see you to your room,” said Gwen, and they went out together. Closing the door, she went on. “Daisy, Martin hasn’t been talking about leaving, has he? Not that I’d blame him for putting as much distance between himself and us as possible.”
“I haven’t heard him say anything, but I haven’t really talked to him. Doesn’t he have to go back to work?”
“Yes, he was going to go back to Coventry tomorrow, whether or not he’d talked Father into . . .” Her voice faltered. “Whether or not he’d persuaded Father to let Jack take the job. I just wish he’d stay.”
“I expect he will if he can.”
“Won’t the police want him here?”
“I can’t see why they should. What happened can’t have anything to do with him, and he doesn’t know any more about the Gooches than the rest of us do.”
“No, of course not.”
“If he manages to stay, it’ll be for your sake.” Daisy tried to be soothing, if less than entirely truthful. Alec could hardly fail to find out that Miller, as much as Jack, Gwen herself, and Babs, had reason to want Sir Harold out of the way.
Mrs. Gooch’s death was the sticking point. However determined to dispose of the baronet, surely none of them would have murdered an innocent bystander?
Daisy squeezed Gwen’s hand. “Babs is right: It must be rooted in the past.”
“A blackmailing mistress! That would explain the whole thing,” Alec said with relief. Perhaps he and Daisy would be able to go home together tomorrow after all.
Miller frowned. “I’m not so sure.”
Alec resigned himself. “You met the Gooches, talked to them. Explain.”
“For one thing, they were well-off. Gooch told us how he’d made his money in the gold fields.
Even if he was exaggerating, why come all the way to England on the off chance of being able to wring a few pounds out of an old lover?
For all they knew, Sir Harold might have been dead, or penniless.
Or widowed, so that he didn’t care much if anyone knew he’d strayed as a young man. ”
“But he wasn’t,” trumpeted Sir Nigel. “That is, not dead, not destitute, and Lady Tyndall is still with us, I’m happy to say. Mind you, I don’t see why he should care so much—wild oats and all that—but obviously he did, since he killed her and himself.”
“No, those points are valid,” Alec said. “You have an analytical mind, Mr. Miller.”
“I’m an engineer.”
“However, it’s possible someone here let them know Sir Harold’s present situation.
It’s even more possible they were in hot water in Australia and had to leave.
I may have to get in touch with the police down there.
I don’t suppose you know which part of Australia they came from?
They have gold fields all over the place, I believe. ”
“He talked about Western Australia. Coolgardie and Perth.”
“Thank you. You said, ‘For one thing.’ What else?”
“Mrs. Gooch simply wasn’t the type. Blackmail is a really foul crime.
She may have had her fling in her youth, for all I know, but she was just a very pleasant middle-aged woman.
She and Jack got on like a house on fire.
Gooch was—is a nice chap, too. Otherwise Jack wouldn’t have invited them to the fireworks. ”
“Aha!” said Wookleigh triumphantly. “That’s the mark of the confidence trickster, isn’t it, Fletcher? Nice chap, pleasant manners, worms his way in, and before you know it, you’re in his clutches.”
Alec had to agree. “True, although I’d hesitate to say that one should therefore mistrust any nice chap with pleasant manners! Who was first to mention the Guy Fawkes party? Had the Gooches heard about it?”
“Yes. As a matter of fact, Mrs. Gooch knew about it from her youth. Jack ran into Gooch at the bar and Gooch mentioned that they hoped to join the villagers in the meadow to watch the fireworks from below. He asked Jack if there would be any objection. Jack brought our drinks and said he was going over to the Gooches’ table to assure her that they were welcome to watch from the meadow.
” Miller paused. “Actually, it was Mrs. Fletcher who suggested inviting them both to our table.”
Alec clenched his teeth, managing not to grind them. He could hardly hold Daisy’s undiscriminating friendliness responsible for the tragedy. “I hope she didn’t also suggest inviting them up to the house?”
“No, that was entirely Jack’s notion, and Gooch wasn’t keen. But Mrs. Gooch was thrilled and he gave in.”
“Typical pattern.” Wookleigh stubbed out his cigar and preened his whiskers. “He disarms suspicion by making an objection, easily brushed aside.”
“It’s possible, sir. Or perhaps he had no idea what his wife planned. Or—” Alec stopped as police boots sounded on the stairs.
They all looked, to see Constable Blount hurrying down. Alec went to meet him.
“Sir!” His voice was low but urgent. “Sergeant Tring says it can’t possibly be suicide! Somebody else shot the both of ’em.”