Chapter 12 #4
Barnaby glanced at Stokes, who stepped forward and stated, “Through all your interviews, you gave us the vital clues to piece together Armstrong’s movements and conclusively prove that only he could have killed Underhill in the orchard.
In essence, the locations of all the rest of you were either vouched for by someone else or could be proven by other facts.
What occurred was this. After placing the money in the vase, Armstrong saw that the vase was in line with one of the windows.
He also saw a collapsible spyglass sitting on the mantelpiece.
He borrowed the spyglass, and knowing he’d been told to leave his payment in the vase before eight-thirty and also realizing that, in this instance, his blackmailer wouldn’t want to leave as much money as he’d just placed inside the vase for a maid to accidentally come upon, after telling several people that he was going upstairs to his room to write letters, instead, Armstrong left the house via the side door and circled around into the band of trees that faces the house.
In doing that, he was noticed by Mr. Patterson and Vincent Underhill as they made their way to the stable.
Leith’s footprints confirm that, from the trees, he watched the vase through the library window and waited.
Eventually, as the five gentlemen who were in the library at the time can attest, Underhill came in, chatted genially to his guests, then crossed to the vase, ostensibly to straighten it.
In doing so, he removed the packet of money Armstrong had placed inside.
“From the trees, Armstrong saw Underhill go to the vase and remove the money. Immediately thereafter, Underhill went out for a stroll and left the house via the front door. When Underhill stepped outside, alone, and walked across the lawn under Armstrong’s eyes, Underhill’s fate was sealed.
To understand Armstrong’s overwhelming rage, you need to appreciate that, until that moment, he’d considered Underhill not just a good friend but a mentor of sorts.
Someone who, for decades, Armstrong had thought of kindly, and who he believed thought of him kindly. ”
“To realize that Monty was his blackmailer was a terrible shock,” Penelope stated. “And while that doesn’t in any way excuse what Frederick did, it does explain his violent reaction.”
“In short,” Stokes said, “in the grip of a towering rage, Armstrong seized the nearest weapon to hand, an iron garden stake, and stalked after Underhill as he strolled toward the orchard. We believe that, with the orchard’s grass so thick, Underhill didn’t hear Armstrong approaching.
Underhill was examining a hollow in a tree when Armstrong came up behind him and hit him over the head with the iron stake, killing him. ”
“Subsequently,” Barnaby stated, “Armstrong did his best to cover his tracks while also searching for his late uncle’s will, a document he couldn’t afford to allow to fall into anyone else’s hands.
He was convinced Monty had it and had hidden it somewhere.
On returning to the house, once again via the side door”—Barnaby tipped his head toward the younger crew—“with his return witnessed by Patterson and Miss Samantha Goodrich, Armstrong didn’t join the rest of the company on the lawns but instead slipped into Monty’s study and comprehensively searched for the will.
He even found the key to the safe and looked in there, but he didn’t find the will.
“He was frustrated, but not about to give up. On Tuesday evening, when Armstrong told Kilpatrick, who was leaving the house to walk to his home, that he was going upstairs to write letters, Armstrong went to Monty’s bedchamber.
He was searching there when Monty’s valet”—Barnaby nodded down the room to where Grimshaw stood with Gearing before the closed doors—“came into the adjoining dressing room. Armstrong struck the valet unconscious before he’d had a chance to see who the intruder was. And Armstrong continued to search.
“However,” Barnaby went on, “after that, with a constable on guard in the study and us interviewing in the library, Armstrong decided to lie low for the moment. But he grew increasingly concerned at what we might learn, and so he concocted a plan to offer us someone he hoped would be a believable scapegoat. He’d learned that after walking with her sister, Rosalind, and then parting from her, Regina Hemmings had been alone in the shrubbery at the time Armstrong had killed Monty.
Regina didn’t have an alibi for the murder, and so Armstrong decided to lure her to the orchard.
To do that—to separate her from Alison Waterhouse, with whom Regina was walking—Armstrong caused Mrs. Waterhouse to fall in the corridor upstairs and followed that by striking her sufficiently hard to render her unconscious, then he used news of her mother’s accident to send Alison flying to the house, leaving Regina to walk alone, with Armstrong, supposedly back to the house.
“But instead, Armstrong, who as we all know can be charming when he wishes, led Regina to the orchard, to where he’d set his scene.
Luckily, mere moments before, in the library, we’d discovered the vital will and realized the murderer was Armstrong.
Consequently, we set about hunting him down—and caught up with him just in time to prevent him staging Regina’s death so that it would appear to everyone that she’d committed suicide, presumably driven by guilt over having killed Monty. ”
“Only,” Penelope said, “we’d already established that Regina couldn’t have delivered the blow that killed Monty. She’s too short. But that’s what was behind the incident you all saw with your own eyes in the orchard this morning.”
They had, Penelope thought, covered every base and accounted for the facts the company knew in a way that spared Monty’s other victims.
“There really is little more to the tale,” Penelope stated.
If she saw relief visibly flow through several of her listeners, she gave no sign.
“As I said in my opening,” she continued, “this was a case illuminating the curse of ill-gotten gains. If on finding his uncle’s final will, Leith had immediately taken steps to share it with the family solicitor—as he should have done—there would have been nothing for him to be blackmailed about.
And if Monty hadn’t taken steps to collect his own ill-gotten gains—if he hadn’t stolen the will from Frederick’s bag, read it, and decided to use it for blackmail rather than deliver it to the proper authorities—he would be alive today. ”
“Both these men either have paid or will pay the price for making those decisions.” Stokes looked around the room.
“Frederick Armstrong is, even now, being taken from this house and removed to Bow Street. He will stand trial for the murder of Mr. Underhill, and he will be convicted. Of that, there is no question, no doubt.”
“Despite”—Penelope tipped her head—“or perhaps because of the curse of ill-gotten gains, justice will be served.”
With that, she graciously inclined her head to the company, and Barnaby and Stokes did the same.
Then, they walked straight up the room and out of the door Gearing rushed to hold for them and left the company at Patchcote Grange avidly discussing the events and speculating on the principle and prospects of the curse of ill-gotten gains.