Murder in Pug's Parlour (17 page)

Slumber had not yet come to many of the guests and family bedrooms. In her bed Lady Jane lay awake and thought starry-eyed, not of marriage but of weddings; thirty feet away in the bachelors’ tower Walter Marshall tossed and turned, calling himself every kind of a fool and remembering the touch of Jane’s lips. The Duke and Duchess were each in their dressing-rooms, contemplating an unfamiliar night of connubial bliss. Lord Arthur dwelt with satisfaction on the future so carefully organised for himself. In her chamber the Honourable Honoria Hartham, clad in decorous white satin, awaited the arrival of her new lover. And at two o’clock, the door of Prince von Herzenberg’s chamber opened and he began to creep stealthily along the corridor.

In the fastnesses of her room, Edith Hankey, half roused from sleep by the sound of the bell, rolled over again in her bed, thankful that her days of answering such summonses were past. It was not unusual for the night bell to ring in the women servants’ corridor on the first floor, nor for it to ring so persistently. What was unusual, however, was the scream that ensued when the unfortunate housemaid arrived at the source of the summons.

It did not, from the second-floor guest rooms, permeate to Mrs Hankey, but Auguste Didier, in his tiny room above, and the twenty occupants of that corridor sat bolt upright in their celibate beds. By osmosis their alarm spread to the first floor, and thence to Mrs Hankey, who became gradually conscious that something unusual was afoot. In less chaste beds in the main house occupants hovered uncertainly. The social code did not provide for this eventuality.

Ethel was the first present on the scene. What she saw made her white to her lips and, for the second time in ten days, Mrs Hankey was greeted by a peremptory summons, this one delivered amidst the sobs of an underhousemaid.

‘It’s that Mrs Hartham – she’s – looking funny—’

Mrs Hankey rose without a word, donned her decent woollen dressing gown, seized her ipecacuanha and the nux vomica and hurried up the women’s backstairs. On reaching the second storey she collided with Auguste who
had investigated the source of the noise and found his Ethel white-faced but bravely coping with an obviously dying Mrs Hartham, and was on the quickest route back to seek Ernest Hobbs.

‘Mr Didier, what are you doing on the women’s stairs, might I enquire?’

‘There is no time for such nonsenses, Mrs Hankey. It is, I think, the same as Mr Greeves – the doctor must be fetched. His Grace is being notified.’ He brushed by her with no more ado.

Undecided for the moment whether to defend the inviolacy of the women’s stairs, but impressed by his face as well as his words that something was indeed amiss, Mrs Hankey let him pass. Stockbery Towers was not yet advanced enough to have invested in a telephone, and thus the groom was once more summoned to take the brougham to the village for Dr Parkes.

‘Oh my Gawd,’ said Mrs Hankey, as for the second time in ten days she was faced by a near corpse. Mrs Hartham lay half on her bed, half on the floor, surrounded by vomit. Her girlish face was contorted into a grimace of surprise as if in protest that her life, for which she had not ordained this end, should have played this cruel trick on her.

Mrs Hankey approached her cautiously and lifted one arm. ‘She’s going to die,’ she whispered flatly to Ethel who, now that responsibility had been taken from her hands, was weeping quietly. Mrs Hankey’s main thought was not sorrow for a woman she did not know even by sight, but by the certain knowledge that this did not bode well for Stockbery Towers, and with the good of Stockbery Towers she identified herself completely.

Ethel was weeping for Mrs Hartham. A woman she’d seen yesterday, laughing and smelling deliciously, wearing a pale blue satin dress with real rosebuds down its side and
long blue gloves to match, and satin slippers, slippers that would dance no more.

They could hear footsteps now: the ponderous ones of Hobbs, conscious of his position as steward; further off a pattering. Like little mice the lower servants were gathering at the door to the main house, determined not to miss what seemed likely to be an exciting event. Doors were cautiously opening across the way. Up the staircase from the first floor came the Duke, regally clad in a dark red Paisley silk dressing gown, followed by his Duchess, irritated beyond measure that she was obliged to reveal herself
en déshabille
, which, as it was her husband she was spending the night with, was by no means as elegant as it might have been in other circumstances.

His Grace was faced by Mrs Hankey at the door of the closed room.

‘What the devil’s going on?’ he grunted furiously. ‘Mrs Hartham not well? What’s everyone rushing around for? It’s the middle of the night, dammit.’

Mrs Hankey adopted suitably low tones. ‘Took, sir.’

‘Took?’ The Duke looked blank. ‘Ill, you mean?’

‘Dying, I fear, sir.’

The Duke gave a muffled exclamation, his face grew red and he pushed Mrs Hankey unceremoniously out of the way. Her Grace, her mind working speedily and mindful of the proprieties, pressed in quickly after him. Mrs Hankey’s lips closed in a tight line. She could hardly order His Grace out, but all the same . . . Visions of Mrs Hartham lying there – well, at least she was decently covered, but in her nightdress!

The Duke stopped still, as he took in the scene. ‘Honoria,’ he said in a strangled voice. He crossed over to her, and bent over her, his face white. Then he looked at the bedside table. His hand went out towards a plate of sandwiches lying on it.

‘Sir, I don’t think,’ faltered Ethel, ‘you should do that.’

The Duchess looked round, taking in her presence. Then: ‘The girl’s right, George. Leave her as she is. The police will want to . . .’ Her voice was unusually gentle. It was Honoria lying there convulsed in agony, Honoria, her greatest friend, with whom she’d shared so many secrets, so many confidences. Yet at the moment it might have been a stranger. Her concern was for her husband. She was the stronger of the two, and now he would need her.

‘Police?’

‘Well, George, it might not have been an accident.’

The Duke straightened up and turned to look at his wife. A look passed between them. Then he buried his head on her shoulder and, turning, she led him out of the room.

Dr Parkes’ examination was brief. By the time he arrived Honoria Hartham was dead. He had seen those symptoms in the same house ten days before, the contorted body, the agonised face. His face was grim as he stood up, the effort making him gasp a little. His Grace having left the scene, the doctor was obliged to make do with Hobbs, who speedily organised the dispatch of groom and donkey cart to the village to rouse Sergeant Bladon.

Then the doctor took Mrs Hankey back into the room. ‘Now, my good woman,’ he said.

She glared at him. She had never liked Dr Parkes.

‘These sandwiches.’ He pointed to the plate of wafer-thin sandwiches. ‘When were they made?’

‘Naturally,’ she said haughtily, ‘they would’ve been fresh made, just before the poor lady came to bed. When she asked for them. Naturally.’

He took the matter no further; that was for the police. It seemed clear enough that one of them had been the means of another speedy death. Save for the water flask and glass
by the lady’s bed, there was nothing else by which poison could have been administered.

When Sergeant Bladon arrived, Mrs Hankey felt on safer ground. She had his measure. PC Perkins was posted on the door, a job less to his liking than before. Before, he was amongst his own kind and had the occasional glimpse of Miss Gubbins to sustain him; now he was standing on thick carpet, staring at a window that looked out across the roof of the ballroom; along the corridor there were doors with gold-painted handles, and painted decorations which opened and shut, disgorging occupants like his mum’s treasured weatherhouse she’d won at a fair. Feminine draperies, the like of which PC Perkins had never seen before, floated by. Blushing, he kept his eyes on the floor. It had not been so when he arrived. There, to his delight, had been Miss Gubbins and though he tried to avert his eyes he could not help noticing she was wearing night attire under a thick blue dressing gown, with her hair down in plaits like it used to be when they played in the hayfields all those years ago. To his impotent fury that Frenchie fellow had his arm on, if not around, her possessive-like and was leading her back to the servants’ wing. It quite took his mind off what was going on in
there.

In
there
Sergeant Bladon and Dr Parkes were doing their best to quell Mrs Hankey, with His Grace standing grimly by, dressed now and determined to stay. He saw it as his duty. Honoria had been a guest under his roof – quite apart from other considerations. Bladon was writing laborious notes, watched with eagle eye by Mrs Hankey. He walked around to examine the plate of sandwiches several times.

‘It was in those sandwiches, of course,’ Parkes remarked gravely and importantly. ‘You’ll need to find out who made them.’

Bladon was annoyed. He cast a look at the doctor who had crossed his path more than once. He played golf with Naseby, and that was enough for Bladon. They had satisfactorily proved how Mrs Hartham could have poisoned the brandy, and it was galling to find the lady had escaped the consequences of this revelation to which Bladon had devoted so much time.

‘This ’ere water jug,’ he said to the doctor. ‘Poison – if that
is
how the lady passed over – get in that, could it?’

The doctor shook his head. ‘She could not have taken that much of the poison to kill her so quickly in water without noticing the taste. It could not so have killed her. Unless she chose to take it, of course.’ Bladon looked up quickly. ‘No, it had to be the sandwiches.’

Bladon obstinately bent down to examine the glass. ‘’Ere,’ he said in excitement. ‘Come and look at this. That’s not water in that glass, it it?’

The remnants of a pale liquid lurked round the bottom. The doctor sniffed it cautiously. ‘No,’ he said slowly, ‘it’s not water.’

Bladon was triumphant.

‘It’s wine, or champagne, perhaps,’ continued Parkes.

Dampened, the sergeant looked around. ‘No bottles here,’ he grunted.

‘Probably brought it with her from the ballroom,’ offered the Duke.

Mrs Hankey looked as scathing as she dared. ‘Not in the glass, Your Grace,’ she said. ‘That’s a
night
drinking glass.’

His Grace thought over the implications. He scowled. So there was somebody with her, he was right, dammit. And he knew who it was. The minx. Saying she was tired. Now what was he to do? If that Prince fellow poisoned Honoria he’d blast him with his own Purdey. Yet how could he let
Honoria down by speaking out. She still had a reputation, dammit. No, Laetitia was worth ten of her . . .

It was a short night. By the time Mrs Hankey reached her bed again, the housemaids were already up and stirring, yawning even more than was their wont. Ethel had not slept, and found it easier to rise with them than to exercise her prerogative and take that extra half-hour. Better to be busy than to think again of that white convulsed face, and turn her mind to pleasanter things such as how kind Mr Didier had been, how he’d understood how she felt about Mrs Hartham, how he had put his arm round her to comfort her – when they were out of sight of everyone, of course – and kissed her; he didn’t seem to mind that her hair was all down and she was in the ugly old dressing gown. It wasn’t his usual kind of kiss at all . . . He’d only kissed her like that once before, when on that never to be forgotten day he had taken her to London to the matinee of Mr Irving, and then to the Savoy to meet Mr Escoffier and they’d come home quite late, so that it was quite dark as they walked up from Hollingham Halt . . . quite dark.

Yet, as she got up and washed in her basin with the tepid water that one of the housemaids had placed outside her door, such pleasant thoughts faded, as she brought to mind what had been worrying her. The sandwiches. The doctor had asked about the sandwiches. And she had made them.

‘These sandwiches, miss. You usually make sandwiches?’

Sergeant Bladon was looking less like the fatherly figure she had always taken him for, partly because he had been up all night.

‘No, I—’

‘Can’t hear you, miss.’

She forced herself to speak. She was innocent. She
had nothing to hide. ‘No,’ was all she could manage.

Auguste was protective. ‘No, Sergeant Bladon, but everyone else had gone to bed. So when Mrs Hartham rang for some sandwiches, Ethel was the only one still up.’

Sergeant Bladon turned purringly to Auguste. ‘Ah, Mr Didier, so how come you know so much about it?’

‘Because I was there,’ said Auguste. ‘I gave Miss Gubbins the duck to place in the sandwiches.’

‘Oh did you, Mr Didier?’ Bladon beamed. ‘Unfortunate really.
Very
unfortunate, you might say. You being so – ah – closely connected with the demise of poor Mr Greeves.’

Auguste controlled himself with an effort. ‘Monsieur
le Sergent
, you know very well that the poison that poisoned Mr Greeves was in the brandy bottle, not in the luncheon.’

‘Oh I know that, do I, Mr Didier? Well, you may think I know it, but what I know ain’t going to count much longer. It’s the new man you’ll have to convince. First thing His Grace insisted on this morning is that this fellow from Scotland Yard comes down. He’s going to be attached to us for a while.’ Bladon was torn between relief that responsibility was now to be lifted from his shoulders, and irritation at this reflection on the Kent Police’s competence, even though it was one in the eye for Naseby. ‘He’ll want to see you, Mr Didier. You too, Miss Gubbins.’

‘Me?’ Ethel looked frightened.

‘You made the sandwiches, see.’

‘But, Sergeant,’ said Auguste impatiently, as to a child, ‘Miss Gubbins was alone in Mrs Hartham’s bedroom – why could she not have removed the sandwiches if they were full of poison which she had put there?’

‘Could have been a trick,’ said Bladon portentously. ‘To throw us off the track.’

Ethel dissolved into tears as the enormity of her position hit her.