Chapter 9 #2
“So?” Barnaby prompted as Stokes lifted a chair from beside the fireplace and carried it to the table.
Setting the chair beside the one Griselda occupied, Stokes sat, met Barnaby’s gaze, then looked at Violet—Miss Matcham—and the cook.
“As you’ve no doubt guessed, she—Tilly Westcott, Lady Halstead’s maid—was killed in the same way her ladyship was, smothered by a pillow placed over her face while she slept. ”
“Was anything different?” Barnaby asked.
“Not in the murderer’s modus operandi, but there was one significant difference, one Pemberton—the police surgeon—just confirmed.” Stokes glanced at Violet and the cook. “Was Miss Westcott in good health?”
“She was fit as a fiddle yesterday,” Cook said.
Violet nodded. “She was entirely well as far as we knew.”
“Would you say she was a strong woman?” Stokes asked.
“Strong as a horse, she was,” Cook averred. “She could lift and carry things that’d make my back ache.”
Violet glanced around the table. “Tilly was taller than me, strapping and rather raw-boned. So, yes”—Violet looked back at Stokes—“she was quite strong.”
Stokes inclined his head. “So Tilly was much stronger than Lady Halstead, and she fought back—that much is obvious. But the murderer still successfully smothered her.”
“So the murderer couldn’t have been a woman—not in this case.” Penelope glanced at Barnaby, then looked down the table at Stokes. “How likely is it that Lady Halstead’s murderer and Tilly’s murderer are not the same person?”
“Not very likely at all.” Stokes paused, then said, “So the murderer is a man, one strong enough to overpower a strong woman.”
“Any guess as to when it happened?” Barnaby asked.
“Pemberton says in the very early hours.” Noise reached them from the front hall.
Stokes rose. “That will be more constables. I’ll send them to ask around the neighborhood in case anyone saw anything, but given the time and the weather last night, I’m not expecting that we’ll have any luck.
” He walked out of the kitchen, leaving everyone else thinking; he returned two minutes later and resumed his seat.
“So how did he get in?” Penelope looked from Stokes, to Barnaby, to Montague, and Violet beside him. “Any ideas?”
Barnaby straightened. “That was one issue we never resolved about her ladyship’s death—how the murderer got into the house.” He met Stokes’s eyes. “There was heavy rain last night, just before midnight. If we search now, we might get lucky and find some sign.”
The winds that had whipped through the city the previous evening had been the harbingers of a storm with attendant downpour, and it was October; there were leaves everywhere.
Stokes looked at Violet. “When you first approached the front door this morning, did you notice any dampness or leaves, any sort of detritus, in the front hall?”
Violet shook her head. “The first time I went that way was when I let you and Mr. Montague in, but I wasn’t looking all that closely—I’m not sure I would have noticed.”
“And we’ve had too many people come in and out of the front door since to bother checking now,” Stokes said.
“But coming in via the front door—that would be a truly arrogant act.” Penelope looked at the cook. “Where’s the back door?”
The cook swiveled to point. “Over there. But”—she looked up at Stokes as he rose to his feet—“I’ve been through it this morning to fetch the boys to take Violet’s notes.”
“That’s all right.” Stokes headed for the archway into the back hall. “Barnaby? The rest of you, please stay here.”
Together with Stokes, Barnaby searched, but there was no sign of anyone with damp shoes going deeper into the house from the back door. Not even the cook had left any visible trace.
As they returned to the kitchen, Stokes grimaced. “No luck, so that’s the doors ruled out—”
“No—there’s a side door.” When they all looked at her, Violet explained, “There’s a door to a narrow alley that runs between the street and the mews.” She pushed back her chair. “I’ll show you.”
Montague rose and gave her his hand to assist her to her feet.
She thanked him with a smile that felt weak, then went around the table.
She led Stokes and Adair out of the kitchen, into the rear of the front hall, then through a narrow archway under the stairs.
Two turns and she halted in the short, dark corridor that ended in the side door. She nodded toward it. “That’s it.”
She stepped aside to let Stokes and Adair past. Stokes took one step down the corridor, then halted. Adair remained in the rear. “Light,” he said. “We need at least two lamps before we go any closer.”
Stokes nodded and turned to Violet. “I take it that door is usually locked?”
She glanced down the corridor at the shadowy panels. “Usually.”
“Who has the key?” Stokes asked.
“Lady Halstead has—had—a ring with the keys to all the doors. As far as I know, that ring is still in her dresser, where she usually left it. There’s a key to the side door there, and there’s a second one on the rack in the kitchen.
” Without waiting to be asked, she went on, “The door is only occasionally used, mostly for deliveries from milliners, dressmakers, and shops like Hatchards. Food goes to the back door, but other deliveries were directed to the side door.”
“When was it last used?” Adair asked. “Do you know?”
Staring at the door, Violet cast her mind back. Eventually, she said, “As far as I know, it hasn’t been used for several months, possibly not since last Christmas.”
Stokes nodded and looked at Adair. “Let’s get those lamps.”
They did, then, with Violet holding one and Montague the other, Stokes and Adair carefully started down the corridor toward the door, meticulously searching the floor as they went.
Inch by inch, foot by foot, they progressed down the narrow hallway.
Six feet from the door, Adair, searching to the left with Violet holding the lamp over his shoulder, shining the beam ahead of him, paused, then glanced at her. “Can you angle the light into the skirting? Into the crevice between the skirting and the floor . . .”
As she did as he asked, he crouched and peered, then reached out with one finger. “Got you!”
Stokes swung around to look. He studied the single brown leaf Adair held up, balanced on the tip of one finger.
Adair met Stokes’s eyes. “And it’s still damp enough to stick.”
Stokes quivered like a powerful wolfhound on a leash but paused to glance at Violet. “You’re sure no one has come through that door this morning?”
She nodded. “I’m perfectly certain.”
The smile that curved Stokes’s lips was more menacing than comforting. “So,” he said, “we now know that the murderer is a Halstead male who has a key to the side door.”
Stokes and Adair examined the door, confirming there was no evidence it had been forced in any way, then, as a group, they returned to the kitchen.
Walking ahead of the three men, Violet sensed a change in atmosphere, in them, as if previously they’d been unsure, uncertain, casting about, but now they’d caught the scent of their prey and were keen to follow the trail.
Their renewed determination spread and infected the others about the table as they resumed their seats and Stokes told the others of what they’d found.
Cook had withdrawn from the circle about the table but had made two fresh pots of tea; Violet sensed Cook was somewhat taken aback to find herself serving such company about her kitchen table.
Adair had introduced his wife and Stokes’s wife when they’d arrived; at the time, Violet had been too distracted to properly register the strangeness of their presence.
Yet both women had been sensible and supportive, and she’d been grateful for their warmth when all else about the day—barring only Montague’s presence—had left her feeling so cold. So isolated.
So alone.
They all paused to sip the tea Cook had dispensed. Violet could almost hear the thoughts whirling.
Then Stokes’s wife—Griselda, as she’d told Violet to call her—set down her cup, a faint frown tangling her black brows.
“What I don’t understand is, why kill the maid?
How could she possibly have been any threat to the murderer?
” Griselda looked across the table at Violet.
“Forgive me for asking, but she—the maid—couldn’t possibly have been in league with the murderer, could she? ”
“Absolutely not!” came from both Violet and Cook, who had retreated to stand before the stove.
Adair added, “And I would have to agree. I simply cannot imagine that Tilly had any hand in her mistress’s murder, much less Runcorn’s.”
“Which,” Adair’s wife, Penelope, said, “brings us back to Griselda’s question. Why kill the maid?”
After a moment, Stokes said, “Perhaps it’s something similar to what happened with Henrietta Cynster.” He glanced at Violet. “Another recent case.”
“Hmm.” Eyes narrowing, Penelope set down her cup. “You mean that Tilly had seen something or knew something that, while of itself of no particular moment, if put together with other information—”
“For instance,” Montague said, “the sort of information that might come out through Lady Halstead’s affairs being put in order.”
Penelope nodded. “Exactly—if put together with that, then what Tilly knew would assume much greater significance—”
“To whit, that it would point a finger at the murderer.” Somewhat grimly, Stokes nodded. “Yes, that’s what I meant. All things considered, I believe Tilly was murdered because she knew something the significance of which she had not yet realized.”
“He’s protecting himself,” Adair said. When they all looked at him, he went on, “All three murders can be explained by that—I don’t think we need to invoke any other motive.
He used Lady Halstead’s account to hide the proceeds from his recent and ongoing involvement in some illegal enterprise, and in order to keep that illegal association concealed, he killed first Lady Halstead, then Runcorn, and now Tilly. ”
Stokes regarded Adair for several moments, then nodded. Then he frowned, and his gaze shifted to Violet.
Before Stokes could ask the question clearly forming in his head, Montague placed a hand over Violet’s, where it rested on the table between them. “I think you must tell Stokes what you told me when I arrived.”
Violet looked at him; although she had to be aware that everyone else was now studying her, she held his gaze.
In response to the uncertainty in her eyes, he nodded encouragingly.
An instant passed, then, making no move to draw her hand from under his, she drew breath and looked across the table at Stokes.
“Mr. Montague called yesterday evening and told me of the progress of your investigation. Specifically, he told me that Mr. Runcorn had been murdered.” She paused when Stokes glanced at Montague and arched one black brow.
Unapologetically meeting Stokes’s gaze, Montague gently pressed Violet’s hand, and she drew another shaky breath, reclaiming Stokes’s attention, and continued, “This morning, when Mr. Montague arrived, I mentioned how unsettled I had been after learning of Runcorn’s death—that I’d felt rattled enough to push my dresser across my door before I fell asleep last night. ”
Montague felt Violet’s gaze briefly touch his face, then she faced Stokes again.
“This morning, when I moved the dresser back, I discovered the door to my room was ajar.” She paused to allow the ripple of shock that traveled around the table to subside, then went on, “It was most definitely closed when I went to bed, but this morning . . .”
Her hand turned beneath his, her fingers convulsively clasping his as she drew in another tight breath and raised her chin. “I suspect that if Mr. Montague hadn’t told me of Mr. Runcorn’s death, and I hadn’t felt frightened enough to block my door, then I would now be as dead as Tilly.”
Unsurprisingly, that declaration prompted a round of shocked and concerned exclamations.
Penelope caught Violet’s gaze. “I don’t suppose you know what you know, so to speak?”
Violet shook her head. “Rest assured, if I knew anything that might identify Lady Halstead’s murderer, and now Runcorn’s and Tilly’s, too, I would instantly tell . . . well, anyone and everyone.”
Penelope grimaced. Various murmurs of support and conjecture floated around the table.
Stokes had been frowning blackly at the table; raising his head, he rapped a hand on its surface.
When everyone quieted and looked at him, he grimly stated, “We now have three murders and a missing sum of cash, much of it likely ill-gotten gains. We have reason to suspect that the villain is a member of the Halstead family—not only was a man of a description that would fit several of the Halstead men seen in the vicinity of Runcorn’s office on the night of his murder, and also seen meeting the lady who removed the money in question from the bank, but we now know the murderer gained entrance to the house to kill Lady Halstead’s maid by using a key to the side door.
Most likely he used the same entrance when he murdered Lady Halstead herself.
” Stokes looked around the table, meeting everyone’s eyes.
“I think,” he said, “that it’s time we interviewed the family again. ”