Chapter 5
FIVE
“You’re just in time for tea, darling.” Daisy gladly abandoned her battle with the recalcitrant household accounts. She always tried to cope with them herself but, as usual, she would have to ask for Mrs. Dobson’s help. “I’ll join you. Or would you rather have breakfast?”
“Mrs. Dobson’s making me a combination breakfast-high tea, bless her.” Alec had just got up. After leaving for work at the usual time yesterday, he hadn’t come home until the birds were breaking into their dawn chorus. “Then it’s back to work.”
“What’s going on?”
“Just one thing after another, culminating in a nightclub stabbing just as we thought we were done for the day. All the witnesses and suspects are night owls, so we are, too, perforce.”
In the dining room, Elsie was setting the table with an eclectic selection of tableware. “You’ll take your tea in here, madam?”
“Yes, please, Elsie.” Daisy waited till the ever-efficient parlourmaid finished her task and whisked out. “Alec, I simply must tell you the latest from Tommy.”
“You’ve heard from him again? It’s been a couple of weeks since you made the acquaintance of your Cousin Vincent, hasn’t it? But it’s your family’s business, not mine, thank goodness.”
“I was hoping for your advice, but if you’d rather tell me all about the nightclub stabbing—”
“Great Scott, no. I’ll be getting back to that soon enough. All right, go ahead. Has Pearson turned up an heir, or just another new cousin?”
“Another cousin, Raymond. He’s already on his way from South Africa.”
“South Africa!”
“When Tommy got the letter saying he was coming, he wired back immediately to tell him it might well be a waste of time and money, but by then he’d sailed from Cape Town. He’ll arrive in Southampton at the end of next week.”
“That doesn’t seem to call for my advice.”
“No, it’s the letter Tommy enclosed. The copy of a letter, rather. He wants to consult me before replying to it.”
“What on earth makes you think I have anything helpful to contribute?”
“You probably don’t. Talking about it may help me to work out whether I do.”
Sighing, he nodded acquiescence, but he cheered up when his meal arrived.
Mrs. Dobson had cooked for Alec’s mother before he and Daisy were married.
She was well aware of the needs of a hungry policeman and the tastes of her employer.
A ham omelette with fried potatoes was flanked with bread and butter, salad, and a plate of cold roast beef.
Rhubarb-and-strawberry tartlets, almond biscuits, and dark, moist gingerbread completed the spread, with a pot of coffee for Alec and tea for Daisy.
“Aaah!” breathed Alec and dug in.
Pouring herself a cup of tea, Daisy surveyed the offerings. It would be much easier to drop a few pounds if Mrs. Dobson wasn’t so good at baking as well as accounts. She took a thin slice of gingerbread and, to make it last, started talking.
“The letter is from a Mrs. Samuel Dalrymple in Jamaica. Her husband is a first officer in the Merchant Navy.”
Alec swallowed a mouthful and translated: “Mate of a freighter, since the war at least. He’s not illiterate, then, if he got his mate’s papers.”
“Illiterate? Why should he be?”
“I just wondered why she’s writing for him.”
“Because he’s off on a voyage, according to Tommy, and she doesn’t know when he’ll be back.”
“Must be a tramp steamer. No wireless? A small, elderly tramp steamer.”
“Pure speculation,” Daisy teased. Tit for tat: He had said it to her often enough.
“Not at all. Pure deduction.”
Daisy considered. “Oh yes, I suppose it’s reasonable.”
“What’s worrying Pearson?”
“Not really worrying. You see, Mrs. Samuel—Martha’s her name—wrote as soon as the advert was brought to her attention, because she wonders whether her husband is descended from Julian and Marie-Claire.”
“Obviously.”
“Yes, but the thing is, she was worrying that another man might be coroneted before anyone was aware of Samuel’s existence.
She wrote because she didn’t dare wait for him to come home before notifying Tommy.
And she asked him whether she ought to come to England right away.
That’s what’s got him fussing. He doesn’t think she should travel on her own—he’s rather old-fashioned that way—and he doesn’t know what to do with her when she arrives.
Given Samuel’s occupation, Tommy’s pretty sure she hasn’t got enough money for what he’d consider a suitable hotel for a lady on her own. ”
“Given Samuel’s occupation, is she a lady?”
“Whatever she is now, she’ll be a lady if her husband turns out to be the heir presumptive. In the meantime, she must be treated as such.”
“Why doesn’t he just tell her to stay in Jamaica and wait for Samuel’s return?”
“He probably will. The thing is, he’d like to get his hands on whatever information she can provide, as soon as possible.”
“Didn’t you say he’s had someone in Jamaica looking into the family history? Can’t he talk to her?”
“That’s a good point, darling. I’ll suggest it, though I’d be surprised if Tommy missed it. Perhaps the man is good at searching records but isn’t the type who’d be any good at interviewing.”
“Could be. We have plenty of those at the Yard.”
“So what should he do?”
“He could try to employ someone more appropriate—not easy at such a distance, I imagine. Or he could wait for his information until Samuel arrives. Or he could write to her asking for details, which might or might not produce useful results. Does her letter give any reason other than his name to believe her husband is a legitimate descendant of whatsisname—the black sheep?”
“Julian. No, the letter’s very short.”
“Well, that’s about all I have to contribute.” Alec finished off a tart, gulped the last of a second cup of coffee, and stood up. “I must be gone. Reports to be written and read before we go off in search of the creatures of the night. I’ll see you when I see you, love.”
Daisy went out to the hall with him to see him off, then returned to the office to reread Martha Dalrymple’s letter—or rather the copy typed by Miss Watt—in the light of Alec’s comments.
It was written in perfectly correct English, but not the formal language people usually use when addressing a solicitor. Either she had worded it herself, or with the help of someone equally unsophisticated. It was very short, conveying no more information than Daisy had passed on to Alec.
She found the appropriate family tree in her notebook and added Martha:
Julian Dalrymple m. Marie-Claire Vallier
***
Alfred d. 1900
James d. 1917
Samuel m. Martha
It was still more of a branch than a tree.
Turning to Tommy’s letter, Daisy considered its content from the point of view of Martha, rather than the lawyer’s convenience.
He was very likely right that she wouldn’t be comfortable staying alone at a London hotel, even if she could afford it.
Come to that, could she afford the passage?
Would the estate pay the fare without a better reason than his residence in Jamaica for believing Samuel might be directly and legitimately descended from Julian?
Had Martha failed to provide information about her husband’s ancestry because she hadn’t thought of it, because she didn’t know of any, or because there was none?
If there was none, if Samuel was not a legitimate descendant of Julian and Martha was aware of the fact, why would she have responded to Tommy’s agony column notice?
The only answer Daisy could think of was that she—or they—contemplated an attempt at fraud.
What nonsense! The possibility would never have dawned on her if she hadn’t spent so much time associating with policemen.
All the same, she had a lot of questions, and she really wanted to see the original letter from Martha.
Though she thought the more esoteric claims of graphology were akin to spiritualism, she did believe handwriting could sometimes provide a clue to character.
She dashed off a quick note to Tommy, saying she would like to talk to him.
Having wrested the twins from Mrs. Gilpin’s custody, she took them and Nana to post it, along with a couple of other letters.
With Bertha, the nurserymaid, pushing the double pushchair, they went down through the garden in the centre of Constable Crescent and by the footpath to Well Walk.
When they reached the pillar-box, Oliver had to be lifted up to push the envelopes through the slot.
Then Miranda had to be lifted to touch the beasts in the crest above the slot. “Look, Mama. Lion, ’corn, King George.”
“Unicorn, darling.”
“I not ’corn. I Manda!”
“So you are, Miss Miranda,” said Bertha, “and don’t you let anyone—not even your mum—tell you other. You’re not a nasty old unicorn, which from what I hear ain’t even a real animal! Begging your pardon, madam. Now then, Master Oliver, you naughty boy, you climb right back in this instant!”
Words failing to do the trick, Bertha picked up the child, put him in his seat, and strapped him in.
Daisy knew she was lucky to have such admirably competent servants, and all good-natured except Nurse Gilpin.
Even Nurse, while always ready to thwart her employers, was firm but fair with the children.
Other people seemed constantly to complain about their inability to find good servants.
Years ago, Daisy had started writing an article on the “servant problem” from the servants’ point of view, but what with one thing and another it hadn’t progressed very far.
She was glad she didn’t have to cope with a staff the size necessary to run a place like Fairacres. Why, she wondered, would anyone be eager to take on the job, unless the alternative was penury?
Such might be the case for Samuel and Martha, but Vincent seemed to be comfortably off.
What was more, he knew the difficulties of dealing with a large staff, if his hotel was as superior as he claimed.
Then there was the mysterious South African, so keen to be the missing heir that he sailed for England without waiting to hear from Tommy.
While Daisy mused, they had strolled back along Gayton Road and Well Walk.
When they reached the garden, Nana was released from her lead and the twins from the pushchair.
Naturally they all headed straight for the fountain in the middle.
A quarter of an hour later, Daisy cravenly let the nurserymaid take the damp twins upstairs to face Mrs. Gilpin’s wrath.
“Tell her it’s my fault, Bertha. It’s such a warm afternoon, they can’t possibly come to any harm.”
She took Nana round to the alley at the side of the house and let her through the gate into the garden.
The dog would soon dry off there. She was good about staying out of flower beds and not digging, though the thrice-weekly gardener had had to fence off the vegetable plot to keep her from eating his prized tomatoes as soon as they ripened.
As Daisy entered the house, her thoughts returned to Edgar’s heir.
Edgar, she was sure, wouldn’t care who it was as long as he was left in peace to pursue his lepidoptera.
Geraldine would fuss whoever it was, but probably wouldn’t make a great to-do about it unless he and his family chose to take up residence at Fairacres.
Would he be legally entitled to move in? Another question for Tommy.
The one who was absolutely certain to cut up rough, no matter what the result, was the dowager viscountess.
Daisy sighed. A hotelier or a freighter’s officer—it made no odds.
Her mother would find something to complain about if the angel Gabriel himself came down to Worcestershire to take over Fairacres.