Chapter 18
EIGHTEEN
Barely concealing his impatience, Detective Inspector Worrall watched Etta light the fire and sweep up the dust. The moment she rose from her knees, he thanked her punctiliously—with a glance at Alec—then escorted her and her dustpan to the door and shut it firmly behind her.
Turning, he announced, “Birtwhistle died of chloral hydrate poisoning. No question about it, Dr. Jordan says. A certain amount of alcohol in his system, but not excessive. He definitely didn’t have a heart attack or a stroke, and there were no symptoms of nux vomica poisoning.”
“Did Jordan say how fast he would have reacted to a large dose?”
“Normally within half an hour, but you know how doctors are—they always hedge things about. Some react slower, some quicker. Whichever, he’d have gone to sleep, drifted gradually into a coma, and then just stopped breathing.”
“So the first thing we need to know now is whether Dr. Knox prescribed chloral.”
“I rang up Dr. Knox, sir. His housekeeper says he had very few patients this morning and he’s on his way back here. Should be here shortly.”
“Excellent.”
Worrall looked gratified. “Then I rang HQ to report. You’re not going to believe this, sir. Leastways, you haven’t mentioned it: Seems a couple more blokes from the Yard just turned up to join you.”
“Tom and Ernie!” Daisy guessed.
“DS Tring and DC Piper.”
“Alec, why on earth did you bring them all this way when you didn’t even know there was anything to investigate?”
“I didn’t,” Alec said grimly. “The Super told me I could send for them if I found I needed them. He must have changed his mind and sent them helter-skelter after me.”
“But why?”
“When he rang me up at home, he sounded worried about you. I assume he considered three of us would be better able to protect you than one.”
“But Mr. Crane loathes me! I always thought he rather hoped I’d be the next victim of murder, or else get arrested for it. He must be suffering from softening of the brain.”
Noticing Worrall’s amused interest in this interchange, Alec said repressively, “Nonsense.”
“Not to worry,” Worrall said. “Probably just our Mr. Oakenshawe on the fidgets. He’s the deputy chief constable, Mrs. Fletcher, and hardly dare blink in case the Colonel damns his eyes— Beg pardon!
Tells him off for it when he comes back from the Highlands.
I wouldn’t put it past him to have rung up your Mr. Crane again and asked for more men. ”
“Not my Mr. Crane,” said Daisy. “But I’m glad Tom Tring and Piper are on their way.”
“They’ve been put on the train to Matlock. One of our chaps there is going to bring them up here. In the meantime, Superintendent Aves—the Matlock super—will have a man go round all the chemists in Matlock, asking about recent prescriptions for chloral.”
“Thank you,” Alec said with a sigh. “You’ve got things well under way. Depending on what Dr. Knox has to tell us, we may well need more men. In the meantime, Daisy, would you add a bit more detail to your picture of the household? Tell us about Mrs. Birtwhistle.”
“You know she’s American? By birth, at least. She may be a naturalised citizen. She and Humphrey met when he was in America. They married and he brought her back here to his childhood home, in the mid-Nineties, I think. She was devoted to him, I’d swear to it.”
“Hmm.” Alec looked sceptical. “Their son? Simon, isn’t it? How did he get on with his father?”
“Not particularly well, but I’d say it was just typical father-son conflict. He’s a would-be intellectual and he despised Humphrey’s books.”
“Oh? Why was that?”
“I suppose you have to know, but it’s something else that really mustn’t come out in public if it doesn’t absolutely have to. Humphrey wrote Wild West novels.”
“I like a good cowboy story meself,” Worrall admitted, “but I don’t recall any written by a Birtwhistle. Oh, that’s right. You said he used a pen-name.”
“Eli Hawke.”
“Hawke! Tells a good tale, he does. Or she does, should I say? Seeing it’s Mrs. Sutherby writes ’em.”
“They collaborated.”
“Just fancy! Never met an author before in my life, and here I’ve got two I like, one dead and one alive and kicking. So to speak.”
Not exactly felicitously phrased, Daisy thought but didn’t say.
“Simon fancies a literary life,” she continued, “which so far equates pretty much to a life of leisure. The extra money Sybil’s increased earnings has brought in helped to support him.
In fact, she suspected he might be dosing his father to keep him in the background. ”
“Aha!”
“But he was only a schoolboy when Humphrey fell ill. I told her I couldn’t believe he was sophisticated enough to think up such a complicated plot, far less carry it out.”
“I dunno,” said Worrall, “I’ve known a few pretty nasty schoolboys, and crafty with it.”
“In fact, now I come to think of it, he’s been away at university, so it was impossible.”
“That’s a point,” the inspector conceded, “far as the long-term sedation goes, but it doesn’t mean he wasn’t the one poisoned Mr. Birtwhistle in the end.”
“Thus, as I said before, killing the goose that laid the golden eggs. With his father dead, if Sybil managed to continue writing and selling the books, she’d have had no reason to give the Birtwhistles any of the proceeds.”
“For the use of the pen-name,” Alec suggested, “but you’re right, it would be a chancy business.”
Worrall wasn’t going to let Simon go so easily. “Inheritance,” he said darkly.
“I don’t know anything about that.”
“Never mind, we’ll find out.”
“Who else did Mrs. Sutherby suspect?” asked Alec.
“Myra. For much the same reason as Simon. I told you she’s some sort of cousin?”
“Of Birtwhistle? That is to say, not on the American side.”
“Of the Birtwhistles. Though she didn’t benefit so directly from the increased royalties, as she has a trust fund, she tends to go through her income gadding about, well before the quarter.
She’s in the habit of coming back to the farm till her next payment is due, so she has been taking advantage of their willingness to support her somewhat lengthy visits.
Or so I gather. On the other hand, she can’t have been more than fourteen or fifteen when Humphrey fell ill, and, frankly, she hasn’t the brains to have worked out about Sybil taking over the writing, or how it affected her, or what she might do about it. ”
“Bit thick, eh?”
“That’s one way of putting it, Inspector. Light-minded would be more accurate. As far as Sybil was concerned, part of the reason she was troubled was that she likes both Simon and Myra.”
“And Mrs. Birtwhistle?” Alec queried.
“She likes her and had no suspicions of her.”
“Ah,” said Worrall, “that’s worth noting that is, considering.”
Alec moved on. “Humphrey Birtwhistle’s brother and sister? Norman and Lorna?”
“Did Sybil like them? No, she did not. It’s hard to imagine anyone liking them. Did she suspect them? She didn’t say so.”
“I take it you don’t much care for them, either. Why not?”
“Bad-tempered, discourteous, grudging, and grudge-holding. Enough?”
“Enough to be going on with. Are you aware of any specific grudge?”
“Neither of them has yet got over Humphrey coming home, thirty years ago, to claim his inheritance. They’d settled in cosily together after their father died.
Humphrey had run away ten years earlier to America.
He told me he wasn’t much of a letter writer.
He led a fairly wild life in the Wild West.”
“Ah,” said the inspector. “That’d explain the books.”
“That’s right. Meanwhile, Norman and Lorna had no reason to suppose he was still alive, let alone that he’d ever come home to demand his share. It must have been a shock, but still to be muttering about it after three decades…!”
“Ah,” said Worrall again. Daisy tried to imagine him and Tom meeting and ah-ing at each other.
Tom would win as far as the expressive content of his favourite monosyllable was concerned, she decided.
“All the same,” the inspector went on, “it don’t make sense for them to decide after all this time to do away with him.
I can’t see they’d gain much from it, him with a wife and son. ”
Alec said a trifle irritably, “I hope we’re not going to have to wait for lawyers to produce wills and bankers to produce accounts. Daisy, you say Sybil didn’t suspect either Norman or Lorna of doping their brother, but can you think of any motive for either?”
“Darling, don’t tell me you’re asking for wild speculation?
” she teased. He frowned again. “Oh, all right. Let’s see.
The trouble is, I know practically nothing about how the household finances were allotted, and neither does Sybil.
Norman provides much, if not most, of the food, from the farms, which he’s in charge of.
Ruby and Lorna apparently share the housekeeping duties that aren’t performed by Betta and Etty.
I mean, Etta and Betty, who just come in by the day.
No, I really haven’t the foggiest about expenses or inheritances.
Ruby’s probably the person to ask, though talking about finances when her husband just died … Rather you than me.”
“That’s why women aren’t police detectives,” said Worrall pompously. Alec wouldn’t have dared. Not with Daisy listening.
However, a glance from Alec averted the tart comment hovering on her tongue. “No more family?” he said. “I doubt Etty and … the two maids are involved, though I’ll keep them under consideration, of course, and they’ll have to be questioned about anything they may have seen or heard.”
“They’re not here in the evenings. I don’t know what time they go home, but there are no servants helping at dinner.”
“So, the other guests. Presumably they can’t be involved in the long-term nastiness.”
“No,” Daisy said decisively. “They’re both here because of Myra, and she’s not long out of school.”
“Both after the same girl,” said the inspector, “sounds to me as if they’re more likely to murder each other than anyone else.”
“Did Birtwhistle forbid the banns, Daisy?”
“As far as I can make out, the only person who controls her actions in any degree is the lawyer who’s her trustee. She told me all he cares about is that she doesn’t overspend her quarterly allowance, poor girl.”
“Poor girl!” Worrall exclaimed.
“No one has really cared what she does with herself since she left school. I feel sorry for her.”
Alec wanted clarification: “No one, including Humphrey Birtwhistle, was or is likely to put a rub in her way if she decides to marry either—what’s their names? Carey or Ilkton?”
“Neil Carey and Walter Ilkton. I’d be surprised if there wasn’t a general feeling of relief that she’s off their hands.”
“No apparent motive there, then. Now, what about Mrs. Sutherby and Dr. Knox? You told Mr. Worrall last night that they’re ‘not really’ sweethearts. What exactly did you mean by that, Daisy?”
“They’re friends. I believe he comes to Eyrie Farm somewhat more often than his patient’s condition warrants, mostly to see her, though he’s welcomed by the Birtwhistles.
I can’t see that Sybil and Roger’s precise relationship has anything whatsoever to do with your investigation, even if I knew.
After all, Sybil asked me to … um…” She had to avoid the word investigate, which would set Alec off again.
“… To advise her, and Dr. Knox refused a death certificate. And he got you involved, Alec, by telling them about my august connection with the Yard. Neither makes any sense if they planned to do away with Humphrey.”
“We’ve already discussed Knox’s possible reasoning about calling us in. Doubtless it hasn’t occurred to you that Mrs. Sutherby could have involved you as a blind, that she may consider the rumours of your detecting abilities as a joke.”
“Certainly not!” Daisy said indignantly. “Any more than Roger considers the Yard’s detecting abilities a joke! Sybil was very much in earnest.”
“How well do you know her? I don’t recall your ever mentioning her before you told me about this visit.”
“Not very well,” she was forced to admit.
“She was a year ahead of me at school, and you know what a gap a single year can be at that age. In fact, I’d just about forgotten her existence since she left school, until she wrote to say she was going to be in town a couple of weeks ago and then lunched with Lucy and me. ”
“Just like that, out of the blue?” said Worrall.
“Sounds odd to me. I can’t see why they’d be working together.
Seems to me their motives clash. What I think—this is just a theory, mind!
—is either Mrs. Sutherby decided she could manage without the deceased and wanted all the proceeds for herself; or the doctor decided she’d never marry him as long as she was making her living with this writing business, but with the deceased out of the way, she’d have to take him. ”
Alec nodded. “Either would make sense. Sorry, Daisy. They have to stay on the list. Never mind, they have plenty of company.”
Daisy knew better than to argue. No one was ever stricken from Alec’s lists of suspects until he had solid evidence of innocence or, alternatively, solid evidence of someone else’s guilt.
Myra and Simon were undoubtedly still on it, along with Lorna and Norman, and probably Ruby, too, however certain Daisy was that she would never have harmed her husband.
Unfortunately, in the past Alec had occasionally proved correct about people Daisy could have sworn wouldn’t hurt a fly.