Chapter Fourteen
Lady Mary
“Let’s go over everything we know.” I tossed a ham bone into the corner of the kitchen, hoping that would entertain the dog for at least an hour.
“Do we know anything?” Marie asked. She poured three cups of tea and distributed them between me, Mr. Burton, and herself at the kitchen table. Dinner had been cooked, eaten, and cleaned, and only the three of us remained in the room.
I pressed my lips together. This investigation might not have started out smoothly, but that was no reason to diminish our efforts.
Burton tugged his notepad out and laid it next to his mug.
He was back in his livery, and the uniform’s pocket wasn’t quite as large as in his street clothes.
“The wife. Not only did she have a motive to kill her husband because he was unfaithful to her, but she, also, was stepping outside her marriage. She might want to marry her lover. Divorce is difficult. A dead husband is much easier.”
“She has access to metal files.” I tapped my thumb against the rim of the teacup. Mrs. Trent must have visited her husband’s factory on occasion. “And her sister’s house isn’t far from her own. She could have slipped out and returned home to kill her husband.”
“Trent was killed the night Mrs. Trent supposedly visits her lover,” Burton said.
I pursed my lips. “He was killed around four in the morning. She could have returned by then.”
“That could also explain why the authorities haven’t found any bloody clothes.” Burton blew on his tea. “She went upstairs to change and hid the clothes she murdered her husband in.”
Marie shook her head. “The servants might not have heard Mr. Trent down on the ground floor, but their bedroom would be right below the servants’ quarters. They would have heard her moving around.” She put a lump of sugar in her tea then passed the bowl to Burton.
“Not necessarily.” He sweetened his own tea and finally gave me the bowl. “If they heard anything in the middle of the night, they might have assumed it was Mr. Trent going to bed and rolled over and gone back to sleep themselves.”
“We are losing the plot in the details.” I blew on my tea. “Can we agree that Mrs. Trent had a motive and opportunity?”
They nodded.
“And let’s not forget the man Mrs. Trent is having an affair with.” Burton shook his head, blowing out a long breath. “I wonder how she and Driscoll Gray met. After her husband sued him?”
I reached across the table and tapped the notepad.
“Write this down. Gray has obvious motives, financial and romantic. He also has access to the murder weapon. A tin can manufacturer must have files falling out of his pockets. We need to know where he was at the time of the murder. Was Mrs. Trent still with him? Can anyone verify she was there at all that particular night?”
Burton looked up from his notes. “I’ll speak to his servants and those of his neighbors’. But at that time of night, or early morning, there isn’t much of a chance that someone saw him leave, if he did.”
“He would have had to take a hackney or awaken his own groom and driver.” I took a sip of tea and immediately regretted it. “Too hot.”
Southey looked up from his bone, made sure I wasn’t seriously injured, then turned his attention back to his treat.
I waved my hand in front of my open mouth. “Make sure you talk with the hackney drivers in the area and the local stablemasters.”
“What about Fenton Hicks?” Marie asked. “You said he seemed awfully bitter that Trent didn’t give him a bit of ownership in the company.”
I sighed. “The motives are easy to come by. Mr. Trent was not a well-liked man. We have too many theories and haven’t been able to rule any of them out.”
Burton raised one finger. “Hicks also has easy access to the murder weapon.” He raised another finger. “But we don’t know where he was at the time of the murder, either. Isn’t he married? His wife should be able to confirm if he was at home.”
“If she tells us the truth.” Marie lifted one shoulder. “If I was married, I’d lie to protect my husband. If I loved him.”
Burton arched an eyebrow. “That’s good to know.”
Marie frowned. “Why?”
“To know what your future husband can do without repercussion.” His lips slowly curled into a seductive smile.
My eyes flicked to the ceiling. The young could be so easily distracted.
“So you have several people to talk to,” I said, trying to get the conversation back on course.
“Mr. Hicks seems proud of the cannery. He all but pressed that tin of food into my hands. Would he kill the owner even if they had disagreements? With Trent gone, the factory might close. Hicks could lose his job.”
“Where is that tin?” Marie asked. “I’d be curious to try this preserved food.”
“I think Cook put it in the pantry. The very back of the pantry.” The distaste on the poor woman’s face had been palpable when I’d presented her with the tin.
Burton extracted himself from the bench seat and went to retrieve the canned food. He came back and placed it on the table.
“How does one get into it?” I peered at the can. It seemed to be made of one piece of metal, with a single seam running up the back.
Burton rummaged about in a couple drawers and came back with a knife. He dug the tip of the blade into the top and pounded the heel of his palm onto it, piercing the tin. He peeled the lid back.
Marie and I leaned forward. The brown slop inside must have been a stew of some sort, but not one that I could identify. When the odor hit me, I drew back. “I think not.”
Burton retrieved three spoons and passed them around. “Where’s your sense of adventure, Lady Mary?”
I have a grand sense of adventure.” My spine stiffened. “What I don’t have is an iron stomach.” I was all for trying new things but that didn’t necessarily include strange foodstuffs.
Marie dug her spoon into the tin, raised it to her mouth, and took a small bite.
She immediately spit it out onto the floor, her tongue working against her lips, trying to expel all of the substance. “No.”
Southey raised his head, considered us, then went back to his bone.
“That was disgusting, Marie. A lady’s companion, or even a maid, doesn’t spit her food out, unless done discreetly into a napkin.” I shook my head. I wondered if the girl even wanted to improve her station.
“I dare you to try it without spitting it out.” She pushed the tin my way.
I drew my shoulders back. “All right. Easily done.” Even if it was the foulest thing I’d ever put in my mouth, I would swallow it down with dignity. I was a lady. I’d been trained to accept the most unpleasant things with a smile on my face.
I dipped my spoon into the stew, hoped that brown lump was a bit of beef, and placed it in my mouth.
Marie and Burton watched me avidly.
I slowly chewed the bite and swallowed it down, dabbing my mouth with my napkin. “Cook has a secure job for a while.”
Burton grinned and dug in himself. After eating his bite, he shrugged. “I’ve had worse.”
Marie wrinkled her nose. “Where?”
“In the army.” He dug his spoon into the tin again. “Our rations were foul enough to have us running for the front line.”
Marie stiffened.
Burton put down his spoon. “I apologize. I didn’t mean—”
“It’s fine.” The girl forced a smile. “Let’s get back to the task at hand. We need to speak with Mr. Hicks’s wife.”
“Marie….”
I kicked Burton under the table and shook my head at him.
He needed to learn when to leave well enough alone.
And a woman thinking about her dead brother wasn’t in the right state of mind to appreciate a man’s wooing.
“Which leaves Miss Rogerson and the brother-in-law, George Platt. Peg said she was working that night. She also said she’d never been to Trent’s house, which seems to be a lie if that handkerchief you got from the Trent house is hers. ”
“There can’t be that many people with those initials,” Burton said.
“If it was her handkerchief, we also don’t know when it was left behind in that cushion,” Marie said, her voice subdued. She scratched at a mark on the table. “The footman says the study is only cleaned once a week.”
“It’s a good thing Mrs. Trent wasn’t at home to find Peg’s handkerchief,” Burton said.
I stared up at the ceiling. “Unless Peg wanted it to be found. A bit of revenge against her stingy lover by stirring up trouble in his marriage.”
“And if that didn’t work, would she progress to violence?” Burton frowned. “I have a difficult time envisioning a woman overcoming Trent physically to kill him.”
“Unless she had help.” There had been that doorman at The Red Chemise. Another one of her customers might also have been convinced to accompany her to Trent’s home.
Marie rose and placed her cup in the sink. “And that leaves Mr. Platt. Timothy at The Cagey Vixen says Trent’s brother-in-law was short on funds.”
“Timothy?” Burton pressed his lips flat. “Who’s Timothy?”
“A card dealer at the hell we went to.”
Burton didn’t stand but he seemed to grow taller all the same. “You went to a gaming hell this afternoon?”
Marie grinned. “And I won ten quid.”
I drummed my fingers. “I told you we were going to see an acquaintance. Mr. Cooke also mentioned Platt. Said he used to come to his clubs with that friend of his, Randall, until Cooke banned him. Apparently he was a bad influence.” Randall might have annoyed Cooke, but I was impressed.
A bad influence at a gaming hell. That wasn’t easy to accomplish.
Burton looked like he wanted to say more about our afternoon excursion but luckily he was smart enough to let the matter drop. “I thought we were looking at Platt for avenging his family’s honor. What does he have to gain financially from his brother-in-law’s death?”
“We don’t know yet.” That would depend upon his sister.
“If theft was the motive, the killer didn’t do a good job of it,” Burton said. “Some petty cash might have been missing from Trent’s study, but there was a gold ink well sitting on the desk that must be worth a pretty pence.”
“I was thinking a financial motive would be something on a grander scale,” I said dryly. “Did you learn anything at the courts of chancery?”
“That I would never want to be a clerk or attorney.” Burton grimaced. “Did you know they have records going back four hundred years?”
My body temperature rose. “Yes, but did they have records of Trent’s suit against Gray?”
“The file was thin,” Burton said. “Only a one-page filing initiating the suit. It mentioned nothing but the cause of action. No details.”
Southey started hacking in the corner. I kept my eye on him to make sure he wasn’t choking. “Had it been assigned to a judge?”
“Not yet. Apparently the courts are severely overcrowded and it can take a year or two before cases are heard.” Burton filled a bowl with water and brought it to the dog.
“But Trent truly was asking for fifty thousand pounds in damages. That amount would have to have ruined Gray. Now his company is safe, and his path to Mrs. Trent is open. He has the strongest motive in my eyes.”
I tried another spoonful of the tinned food. It wasn’t as horrendous as the first bite. It would likely improve if the stew were heated. Tinned food was a new invention. Perhaps in thirty years everyone would be eating their meals this way.
My stomach turned. I shoved the tin away. And perhaps not. “We have a lot of people we need to speak with. And still no one has mentioned why Trent may have wanted to contact me.” I smacked my palm on the table.
Southey abandoned what was left of his bone and trotted over to me. The dog truly was perceptive of people’s emotions. If only he could talk. Perhaps he could tell me who’d killed Mr. Trent.
I plucked up the can and placed it before the animal. He eagerly tore into it, using his long tongue to dig out the stew. “I suggest we all get some sleep. We have a lot of work yet to do.”
Marie stretched, her back arching, Burton’s eyes tracking the movement.
“Well, even without her husband to run the canning operation, I think Mrs. Trent will be fine.” She pointed to Southey shoving the now empty can across the floor.
“If all else fails, she can turn the business into a dog food factory.”