The Casebook of Newbury & Hobbes (9 page)

Newbury shot his friend a stern look. “Charles. It’s Christmas Eve!”

Bainbridge nodded in acknowledgement, as if the date had only just dawned on the chief inspector. He glanced at his pocket watch. “Quite so, old man. Quite so.” He shook his head. “Well, Christmas or not, I’m afraid the situation here is rather grave.”

Newbury nodded. He was a young-looking man approaching his fortieth year, with jet-black hair and a hawkish nose. His eyes were a startling emerald green. He glanced into the open doorway behind Bainbridge. “Lord Carruthers?”

“In there. Dead.”

Newbury raised an eyebrow. “Indeed?” He shrugged out of his overcoat and scarf and handed them both to Bainbridge, who accepted them with a begrudging sigh. Newbury paused for a moment to examine the burst lock and splintered frame where the door had been forced, and then stepped over the threshold into the dimly lit room beyond. He took a moment to survey the scene. “The drawing room, then.”

“Yes. Not the most auspicious place to die.”

Newbury frowned, glancing round at the dusty stacks of books and trophies. “Oh, I don’t know...” Then he caught sight of Carruthers’s corpse, sprawled out on the floor before the desk and contorted into a shape that it was never meant to achieve in life. He turned to Bainbridge. “Ah. Well, perhaps not.”

He paced further into the room, taking in his surroundings. The room was panelled in dark oak, giving it a gloomy cast, despite the large sash window in the south wall that looked out over an expanse of lawned garden. There was a large wooden writing desk, a bookcase full of austere biographies and Dickens novels, and a chair in one corner, a newspaper draped haphazardly over one arm. There was a small occasional table beside the chair, a well-loved pipe and an empty white saucer resting on its surface. The room had a musty smell about it, of old books and stale air. It reminded Newbury of his study back in Chelsea, only lacking the specimen jars and other, more arcane trinkets.

Something trilled in the corner of the room behind the chair. Newbury glanced at Bainbridge.

“One of Carruthers’s little toys. We haven’t been able to work out how to shut the thing up.”

Intrigued, Newbury approached the chair. The noise sounded again, a kind of
tee... tee,
accompanied by a quiet mechanical whirr. Leaning over the back of the chair, Newbury peered into the shadowy corner. A strange brass object was moving about on the floorboards, its metal feet clacking against the smooth lacquer. It was about the size of a human head, but crafted to resemble a barn owl. Its metallic feathers shimmered in the reflected light of the gas lamps. Newbury watched it for a moment as it paced about, just like a real bird, its head twitching from side to side as it walked. After a few seconds, it turned its head as if to regard him, gears grinding as its glittering, beady eyes adjusted their focus, turning slowly to settle on his face. Then its brass wings clacked and fluttered noisily, and it began to trill again, shuffling off to hide beneath the chair.

Newbury looked across the room at Bainbridge. “What a marvellous little device. Seems almost as if it’s alive.”

“Hmm.”

Newbury grinned at his friend’s disdain. The older man looked tired and exasperated, and was clearly in need of a rest. He decided to press on. “So, before I examine the body, what can you tell me of the circumstances?” He indicated Carruthers’s corpse with a wave of his hand. “How did you come to find him like this?”

Bainbridge moved over to stand beside Newbury. He kept his eyes on the body while he talked, as if the dead man was somehow likely to move if he so much as dared to look in the other direction. “Well, it seems to me that he’s suffered a massive failure of the heart. The door was locked from the inside when the valet found him this morning. He’s been here since some time last night. Alone.”

Newbury nodded, urging the other man to continue. “Go on.”

Bainbridge cleared his throat. He frowned. “I’ll admit it doesn’t sit right with me, Newbury. He was a healthy man, in the prime of his life. He was only thirty-six, for Heaven’s sake. What should cause him to drop down dead in such a way?” He rubbed his hands over his face, sighing. “And then there’s the note.”

“The half-scrawled note on the desk, you mean?”

Bainbridge raised an eyebrow. “Yes, I thought you would have spotted it.” He sighed, as if in recognition of the fact that his observations were likely to be redundant in the presence of the other man. “Over here.” He led Newbury over to Carruthers’s desk, stepping around the contorted body, which lay heaped on a Turkish rug, a wooden chair overturned just beside it. He pointed to a sheet of crisp, vellum paper that was resting on the surface of the desk. “He must have been trying to write it as he died.”

Newbury stooped over to examine it. Bainbridge was right—it did look as if the note had been prematurely curtailed. The letters
B
,
R
and
O
had been scrawled untidily in black ink, printed hastily in capital letters with a shaky hand. This half-formed word was followed by a smudged black line that trailed off the page and across the desk, terminating at the lip of the desk as if the pen had been dragged violently across the surface. He noted that the leather writing surface had been severely scored where the nib of the pen had bitten into it, opening a large rent.

Newbury crouched, searching out the missing pen. It lay on the floor a few inches from Carruthers’s right hand. He reached for it, turning it over in his fingers. It was a fine specimen, crafted in Switzerland about a decade earlier. He touched the tip against the back of his hand. The nib was dry. The note had been written hours ago.

He glanced under the desk. There was a heap of shredded paper, bits of torn envelope, cream-coloured writing paper, and newspaper. It seemed almost as if the strange clockwork owl had been trying to build a nest.

Newbury turned his attention to the body, noting that the dead man’s fingers were stained with black ink. It was clear that Carruthers had been trying to scrawl a message on his notepad when whatever killed him had caused him to convulse to the floor, leaving the message unfinished. He was still dressed from dinner, although he’d obviously retired to the drawing room in his shirtsleeves, as his jacket was absent from the scene. His hair was blond and clipped short. His eyes had once been blue, but had now taken on a milky glaze. His skin, too, had developed a waxy sheen, and his face was twisted in a disturbing rictus. He had clearly been dead for some hours.

Bainbridge cleared his throat. “What do you make of it?”

Newbury, still crouching beside the body, looked thoughtful. “The note? Nothing, as yet.” He studied the corpse for a moment longer, before glancing up at Bainbridge, distracted. “What is it that you’re not telling me, Charles?” he said.

Bainbridge smiled, caught out. “I believe I have a measure of what that note could mean. Carruthers’s valet. His name is Brownlow. I’ve had him detained in the dining room for questioning. I supposed that Carruthers could have been attempting to identify his killer, if indeed it proves to be anything other than a natural death. The letters, see:
BRO.
The beginning of the name
Brownlow.”

Newbury stood. “Very clever, Charles.” He placed the pen carefully on the desk beside the note. “And it was certainly murder. Whatever made him convulse like that? His heart may have stopped, but it wasn’t natural.”

Bainbridge glanced down at the body. “Strangulation? I didn’t see any bruising to the throat.”

Newbury shook his head. “Poison.”

Bainbridge studied his friend for a moment in silence. It was the last thing he needed to hear on Christmas Eve.

The clockwork owl trilled again from the corner of the room —
tee... tee.

The moment stretched. Finally, Bainbridge sighed, rubbing a hand over his face. He smiled at Newbury, a wordless appreciation for the other man’s help. “Brownlow, then?”

Newbury nodded. “Brownlow.”

Together the two men left the drawing room—and the corpse—behind them, heading for the dining room, where Carruthers’s valet, Brownlow, was waiting patiently to be questioned.

* * *

The dining room was long and grandiose, dominated by a marble fireplace and containing exquisitely moulded cornicing, a large, austere portrait of Lord Carruthers on one wall, and a glittering glass chandelier that hung low over the table. By the door, a uniformed bobby was standing on watch, his hands tucked neatly behind his back. He stood to attention as Bainbridge and Newbury entered the room.

At one end of the table sat an aged man in a black suit. He looked haggard and drawn, his skin pale, his eyes rheumy and tired. He was wringing his hands nervously, glancing from side to side as if he expected someone to sneak up on him from behind. Newbury would have placed him in his mid-sixties. Although, judging by his wisp of white hair and his leathery, liver-spotted skin, he could have been much older. He had evidently been worn down by many years of continual service.

“Mr Brownlow?” Bainbridge asked, his tone authoritative, as the two investigators approached the seated man.

The other man looked up. “Yes.”

“We’ve come to ask you some questions. About the death of Lord Carruthers. My name is Sir Charles Bainbridge, of Scotland Yard.”

“Yes,” said Brownlow quietly, glancing down at his hands.

Bainbridge pulled out a chair and lowered himself to sit opposite the man. Newbury stood off to one side, observing.

“So, Mr Brownlow. You are Lord Carruthers’s valet?”

“Indeed. I’ve been with the family for many, many years.” His voice was reedy and high-pitched. He was clearly distraught. “I was with Lord Carruthers’s father before he died. I’ve lived in this house all of my adult life.”

Bainbridge nodded. “I can see this has all been a grave shock to you. Who else was in the house last night, besides yourself and Lord Carruthers?”

“Just Mrs Richards, the housekeeper, and Mr MacKinnon, the butler. Many of the other servants have been dismissed for Christmas.”

Bainbridge stroked his moustache. “Can you tell us what occurred when you found your master’s body?”

Brownlow looked down at his fingers, and then moved his hands underneath the table, as if suddenly conscious of his own nervousness. “It wasn’t until this morning that I discovered anything was awry. Lord Carruthers is...” he caught himself
“...was
an early riser by habit. Consequently, I have grown accustomed to retiring early, so to be ready to rise before my master each morning. Last night he dismissed me after dinner, around eight o’clock, and I went immediately to my room. I spent some time reading before taking to my bed around half-past nine.” He cleared his throat, glancing at Newbury, who was studying the man intently. “When I woke this morning I completed my usual round of preparations for the day, before looking in on the master at precisely eight o’clock. That was when I discovered his bed had not been slept in.”

Bainbridge leaned back in his chair, looking thoughtful. “What was your first reaction?”

“I know my master’s habits well. This was highly irregular. I spoke with Mrs Richards and she informed me that the last she had seen of the master was the previous evening, in the drawing room. I went immediately to the door to that room and found it locked from the inside. I knocked three times but did not elicit a response. I tried my key but found the master’s key was still in the lock from the other side. Fearing the worst, I shouldered the door from its hinges and found the master dead on the floor before his desk. I sent for the police immediately.”

Newbury stepped forward. “Did you touch anything in the room, Mr Brownlow? This is very important. Did you move anything other than Lord Carruthers’s body?”

Brownlow shook his head. He looked perplexed. “No. I’m sure of it. I didn’t touch a thing.”

“Then thank you, Mr Brownlow. I believe you are free to go about your business.” Newbury looked to Bainbridge, who frowned, confused, but nodded his approval, trusting Newbury’s instincts.

The valet got to his feet and shuffled slowly towards the door. Newbury pulled out a chair beside Bainbridge and lowered himself into it. Then, as if it were an afterthought, he turned around in his seat and called after the valet. “Mr Brownlow? Could you please see if Mrs Richards is available for interview?”

The valet nodded. “Of course. I’ll ask her to attend to you immediately.” He disappeared into the hall.

Bainbridge turned to Newbury, a question in his eyes. Newbury shook his head. “Bear with me, Charles.”

Bainbridge sighed, loudly.

Newbury stared thoughtfully at the fireplace, where the flames were licking hungrily at the yuletide logs.

* * *

Mrs Richards was a stout woman in her fifties, with dark brown hair scraped back into a tight bun, and a warm face that showed what Newbury deemed to be genuine shock and sadness at the death of her employer. She sat at the end of the table facing the two investigators, her hands folded neatly on her lap. She was wearing a long, blue, flower-print dress beneath a plum-coloured apron.

Newbury leaned forward, looking her straight in the eye. “So tell me, Mrs Richards. Who stands to benefit from the death of Lord Carruthers?”

The woman looked taken aback by the directness of the question. “To be honest with you, sir, I have little to no idea. As you know, the master was not yet married, and his father was buried just a year ago this last spring. There was a younger sibling once, a boy named Harry, but he and his mother died shortly after childbirth and the previous Lord Carruthers never remarried. I expect there is a cousin or an uncle who will benefit from the estate.” She shook her head. “I also expect my husband and I will be turned out before too long, once the answer to that question has been successfully ascertained.”

Newbury looked thoughtful. “When was the last time you saw Lord Carruthers alive, Mrs Richards?”

“Last night. It was just before ten o’clock. I was on my way to bed when I happened across Mr MacKinnon, the butler, who was taking the master a tray of tea. I offered to deliver it on my way.”