Chapter 12 #2
“That,” Thomas went on, “brings me to Moran’s current projects—or rather his interlocking web of projects, which is really one gigantic project.
It involves constructing shorter railway branches radiating from the stations at Edinburgh, Glasgow, and York.
” Thomas grimaced. “My contacts don’t reach that far north, so I can’t report from anyone on the ground, as it were, but I understand this project—in all its various pieces—is in the very early stages of planning, and they haven’t even got to the point of approaching farmers to put lines across their fields. ”
“Historically,” Montague said, “it’s at that point—the actual laying of line—where difficulties arise.”
Thomas tipped his head. “The interesting thing is, when one looks at this project, the scope and intent of it, if one looks beyond the concomitant risks, it makes a great deal of commercial sense.”
“So,” Barnaby said, “likely another winner for Moran?”
Thomas waggled his head. “Possibly. But the one fly in the ointment is that, in being the principal backer, Moran was risking an extremely large amount on the project. He’s already put in an eye-watering sum, and if for any reason the project fails—or even just hits hurdles and progress slows significantly, as often occurs with such ventures…
” Thomas shrugged. “Suffice it to say that any other man would be staring at ruin.”
“Could Moran have weathered such a failure?” Penelope asked.
“Yes,” Thomas replied, “but the damage would be significant, and I don’t just mean to his wealth.”
Thomas met Barnaby’s gaze. “I dropped in on Randolph Cavanaugh and ran the project and Moran’s involvement with it past him, and he was as viscerally horrified as I.
Moran has risked an awful lot of his wealth on what amounts to a single throw of the dice—a single project that could hit major problems in so many different, unpredictable, and unknowable ways.
” Thomas shook his head. “To anyone who invests prudently, this is the very opposite of that. I’ve built an investment business based on taking risks, but I would never take a risk like that. ”
“What I’m hearing,” Penelope said, “is that on the one hand, the Earl of Moran forces his family to exist on the cusp of penury, while on the other hand, he’s been taking enormous risks with funds he presumably amassed from the earldom’s coffers, augmented with capital gained from previous successful risky investments. ”
She paused, then concluded, “In a nutshell, he’s been expanding his investing capital and actively pursuing risky ventures while simultaneously stinting his family at every possible turn.” She looked at Thomas and Montague, then at Barnaby. “Do I have that right?”
Montague and Thomas inclined their heads, and soberly, Barnaby said, “I believe you are entirely correct.”
“Essentially,” Thomas said, “he was robbing Peter to pay Paul, with Peter being his family and Paul his latest risky investment project.”
“That is, indeed, a reasonable summation,” Montague said.
Frowning, Stokes asked, “But does that get us any closer to identifying who killed him?”
When no one answered, Stokes looked at Curtis. “What have you learned?”
Curtis squared his shoulders and reported, “I managed to catch Nate Samuel last night. We had a good jaw about the earl.” Curtis dipped his head toward Barnaby.
“It seems the workers’ unions are well aware of that bill Moran was aiming to push, and Samuel had been delegated to find something—anything—they could use as leverage to persuade Moran to back off. ”
Almost eagerly, Stokes asked, “Did Samuel find anything?”
Curtis shot Stokes a commiserating look.
“No. And he’s tried. He’s turned over all the usual stones and asked all the usual coves who can tell you whispers of the nobility doing things they shouldn’t—things they wouldn’t want other people to know about.
However, there’s not a single rumor like that about Moran.
Samuel and his governors were quite disgusted, you might say, that the man seemed to have no exploitable secrets at all. ”
Barnaby humphed. “Not of the illegal sort, at least.”
Stokes sighed. “Investing in risky ventures is no crime.”
Curtis went on, “I asked Samuel if he’d heard of anyone else having a beef with Moran, and he said he hadn’t. As he assured me, if he had heard of anyone, he would’ve been around to speak with them right away, to see if there was anything in it his governors could use.”
Stokes frowned. “Is it likely that anyone from one of the workers’ organizations—not necessarily Samuel—took it upon themselves to murder Moran?”
Curtis shook his head. “You’re clutching at straws.
As far as I’ve heard, the union bosses have kept their push against Moran and his ideas to themselves.
” He shrugged. “Makes sense. Learning someone’s secrets in order to essentially blackmail them isn’t the sort of enterprise you tell the newspapers about.
And now, they’re just happy that he’s gone and grateful to whoever did the deed. ”
Julian shifted, and when everyone glanced his way and smiled encouragingly, he raised his chin and reported, “I spent today working through the jarveys who cover that area of Mayfair. I spoke to all of them I could find, and all said that last Monday night was pretty quiet, as Mondays often are, and they didn’t see anyone suspicious about Park Lane or any of the streets around Moran House.
” He paused, then confided, “I know lots of the locals, of course, the servants and grooms and such of all the houses ’round about, and I checked with them, too.
There were enough of them out and about—at back gates or going in and out of stables—to be sure, and other than the Samuel bloke Mr. Curtis spoke with, no one spotted anyone they didn’t recognize on the streets or in the lanes that night.
Samuel was the only person, stranger or not, wandering about in that area at that time on Monday night. ”
Stokes grimaced and looked at Penelope. “Am I right in thinking that, in Mayfair, between nine and ten-thirty is generally a quieter time of the evening?”
Penelope nodded. “The ton will have driven off to their evening’s engagements and not yet returned.
” She met Stokes’s gaze. “So yes, if the murderer had come to Moran House, clambered over the courtyard wall, killed the earl, then walked away, they should have stood out.” She tipped her head to Julian.
“One if not more of Julian’s sources should have seen them. ”
Stokes sighed. After a moment of cogitation, he said, “So with regard to the murder, we’re still left with the conundrum of the terrace door, which was open but should have been shut, and no evidence whatsoever that anyone came in from outside the house by clambering over the lane wall and, after murdering the earl, left via the same route.
In fact, all the evidence we do have insists that no one did. ”
“More,” Barnaby went on, “over the same period, all the family, including all the most likely suspects, were in the drawing room, in full view of each other.”
They were pondering those perplexing facts when Mostyn walked in with the news that dinner awaited their pleasure.
Penelope rose and waved everyone to their feet and toward the door.
To Mary, Curtis, and Julian, she said, “Don’t think of slipping away.
You’re as much a part of this investigation as anyone, and our habit when we reach impasses such as this is to put aside the investigation for the duration of the meal and fill our heads with conversation about our families and anything else that interests us.
Then, when we come back to the drawing room afterward, we return to the case with fresh eyes and open minds. ”
“Or so we hope,” Stokes muttered as he fell in with the other men, and they followed the ladies from the room.
As matters transpired, there was no shortage of topics to be discussed over the dining table, given that the children of the couples present were at the stage of growing up fast.
“You turn around,” Griselda said, “and they’ve somehow grown another inch! I swear Megan is going to be as tall as her father.”
Violet countered, “Martin’s reached the stage of running Gilda off her feet. And now he’s learned to throw a ball, I’ve had to move all the breakables into cupboards.”
“Hettie mentioned that there was to be a balloon ascension in Green Park in two weeks’ time.” Penelope looked around the table. “Shall we make up a party and take the children? I’m sure they’d enjoy seeing a balloon go up.”
Everyone readily agreed, and the date, time, and place to assemble was settled, with Julian invited to help with the younger boys and Mary encouraged to come along and stroll with the ladies.
“We’ll bring William and Alice, too.” Rose looked down the table at Julian. “They’re nearer your age and will help keep the little ones in line.”
Smiling, Griselda said to Mary, “With the children absorbed, we might get some time to actually catch our breaths.”
Eventually, with the dessert of chocolate-and-raspberry charlotte consumed and the plates cleared, the company rose and repaired to the drawing room.
Penelope sat in her accustomed place. She waited until the others had resumed their seats, then firmly stated, “We’re missing something—the piece of information that, if we knew it, would make sense of all else we’ve learned.
I suggest we begin again, but from a different perspective.
” She looked around and raised her brows.
“Who gains most from the earl’s death? Who was most desperate for any ease his demise would bring about?
” She held up a hand as a point they’d made a day earlier struck her.
“And what was the event that triggered our spur-of-the-moment, plainly not a planned killing?” She met the others’ gazes.
“No one picks up a bust sitting on a shelf and smashes in someone’s skull because they planned it that way. ”
“No, indeed,” Rose replied. “But as for who gains the most, surely that has to be Frederick Fitzhugh. However”—she tipped her head—“was he the most desperate?”
“Desperation,” Thomas stated, “depends very much on the individual’s state of mind.”
Knowing Thomas’s history and that it made him something of an expert on that subject, Penelope had to acknowledge that was true.
“I agree with both observations. However, Frederick was in the drawing room when the earl was killed, so he isn’t the murderer.
” She looked around the circle of faces; everyone appeared as puzzled as she.
“That’s what I meant by saying we’re missing something.
There has to be someone else who, for whatever reason—money, politics, or something else entirely—was desperate enough to do the deed and wasn’t in that drawing room. ”
Barnaby stated, “We’ve found no evidence of an intruder approaching the house, let alone gaining entry to it, whether to steal documents or with the intention of killing the earl.”
Penelope replied, “No intent, remember? The killing of Moran was a spur-of-the-moment act.”
Barnaby paused, then inclined his head. “All right. Let’s pursue the issue from that angle.
‘Spur-of-the-moment’ implies that some event in the immediately preceding period incited someone to murder the earl.
So”—he looked around the gathering—“what was that event? Given all our evidence indicates that the murderer was someone who was inside Moran House at the time, what occurrence compelled that person to act?”
They all glanced at each other, then Griselda looked at Barnaby and Penelope. “The dinner occurred.” Griselda turned to Mary. “Was the dinner that night in any way unusual?”
Mary frowned. “Not especially. Over the years that I was with her, the dowager occasionally arranged family dinners…” She paused, then inclined her head.
“But, yes, this one was a little different. She called it with only a few days’ notice and specifically insisted that everyone attend, including all the children, meaning her grandchildren. ”
Mary looked at Griselda, then met Penelope’s gaze.
“I wrote the invitations. The dowager’s hands are crabbed with age, and she can’t grip pens anymore.
And judged against previous occasions, the short notice was unusual, and although, in general, the children attend, the directive that they were to be there wasn’t customary, either. ”
Penelope narrowed her eyes. “We need to learn what was said at that dinner.”
“And,” Violet added, “if anything out of the ordinary happened.”
Mary said, “I wasn’t present, of course, so I’m afraid I can’t answer either question.”
“Hmm.” Penelope tapped a finger on her knee. “Which of the attendees is most likely to give us a straightforward and honest account without seeking to fudge to protect the family?”
“Imogen.” Barnaby met Penelope’s gaze. “None of the men would be reliable witnesses, and Cleome and Constance will try to preserve the family’s facade.
Admittedly, Imogen is unlikely to volunteer anything, either, but if we ask the right questions, even if she’s reluctant to reveal whatever it was that happened, she will answer truthfully. ”
Penelope nodded decisively. “That would be my assessment, too.” She looked at the others. “To learn the truth of what occurred at Moran House on Monday evening, asking Imogen is our best bet.”