02 - Murder at Dareswick Hall Read online

  ‘Shouldn’t someone go after her, Josephine?’ asked Cedric. ‘Shouldn’t you?’

  ‘Oh, she’ll be fine,’ snapped Josephine unkindly. ‘You men do make the greatest fuss about the littlest things. It was only some vegetables, for goodness sake. Her dress is hardly ruined. Her maid will see to her and she will be back in no time, you’ll see, wearing another wonderful creation.’

  Rose looked at her with surprise but said nothing. Meanwhile the baron was berating poor Crabtree, who was looking utterly dejected and being very apologetic as if the mishap had in some way been all his fault.

  ‘I say,’ said Cedric, when he had managed to snatch a few words with Rose in the dining room as they were having coffee, ‘have you heard the explanation that Josephine gave her father for disappearing from the house like she did? It’s a lot of old rot if you ask me. Josephine’s never been one for parties, at least not the sort that the baron wouldn’t approve of, that’s more Isabella’s game. Did she tell the police where she’d really gone? Have you been sworn to secrecy?’

  ‘No,’ answered Rose. ‘She didn’t want to tell them, especially when she heard about what happened to Lord Sneddon. Inspector Deacon was called out of the room for a few moments by one of the constables, and she took the opportunity to ask me what she should say. I suggested she tell them that she had eloped with Brimshaw and then thought better of it.’

  ‘You never did!’ Cedric looked shocked. ‘Let’s hope that the baron doesn’t get wind of that story or he’ll throw her out and the chauffeur too. Although,’ he looked over at the baron, who was being comforted by his eldest daughter, ‘perhaps he has decided to let bygones be bygones. You know, because she came back of her own accord. Perhaps he’d rather pretend that it didn’t happen. He’s dreadfully worried, you know, that we’ll have crowds of pressmen here tomorrow. We never did get hold of the duke to tell him about his son. His secretary was right, he was at death’s door. He died this afternoon without hearing the news. Perhaps it was a blessing. I say, I wonder who will inherit the title now. I wonder if he’s a suspect, you know, in Sneddon’s murder?’

  Chapter Thirty

  ‘Mr Crabtree, Mr Crabtree!’ Robert came running into the servants’ hall, narrowly missing bumping into Doris in his haste. The maid, having rather an eye for the young man, secretly wished that they had collided so that she’d have been given an excuse to clutch on to him. Instead, she contented herself with giving him a coy smile, of which he was, at that moment, totally oblivious.

  ‘Steady on, lad, you’ll be bumping into the table and having my pots and pans over in a moment,’ Mrs Gooden said. ‘And then where’ll all those breakfasts be? And they’ll be hungry too, ‘em upstairs. ’Ardly ate anything last night, they did, on account of the murder I reckon. Well, they’ll be wanting to make up for it today now that it’s all sunk in, you mark my words if they don’t. They’ll have empty stomachs the lot of ‘em. They won’t take too kindly having to wait for their breakfasts on account of it being on the floor.’

  ‘Have you seen Mr Crabtree, Mrs Gooden? I’ve got to speak with him, it’s urgent.’

  ‘He’s in his pantry. But don’t you run, I don’t want you upsetting anything or breaking anything and he won’t neither.’ But her words disappeared into thin air for Robert was already gone. She sighed and decided to take her frustration out on the unfortunate Doris. ‘And you, miss, you can stop going all gooey eyed over that fellow. I’m sure you’ve got work to do. You don’t want to have Mrs Hodges on your back again, now do you?’

  ‘Mr Crabtree, Mr Crabtree.’

  ‘What is it, Robert?’ asked the butler, looking up from his self-appointed task. ‘I’m counting the silver if you wonder what I’m doing. I want to make sure nothing’s gone missing. I don’t trust that Ricketts fellow as far as I can throw him, I don’t mind telling you. Light fingered I’d say he is, and no mistake.’

  ‘That’s just it, Mr Crabtree –.’

  ‘What! Catch the blighter pinching, did you? Wait until I get my hands on him, I’ll give him a piece of my mind.’

  ‘Mr Crabtree, he’s gone missing. He ain’t here, not in his room, that is. I looked around his door just as I were coming downstairs. He’s not there and his bed’s not been slept in.’

  ‘He’s scarpered! Well, that doesn’t surprise me at all. Right, you’d better give me a hand. We’ve even more reason to count the silver now.’

  ‘Hadn’t we better call the police? They were keeping ever such a close eye on him yesterday. Seems strange they just let him go like that.’

  ‘Oh, I suppose so,’ sighed Crabtree. ‘Though they’ll be back here soon enough anyway. I was just hoping that we might have had a couple of hours when we could have at least pretended that everything was back to normal, but apparently not.’

  ‘Sir,’ said Lane, hurriedly as soon as Deacon had walked into Dareswick police station. ‘I’ve just taken a call from the butler at Dareswick Hall. It seems that Ricketts fellow has gone missing. His bed hadn’t been slept in, so old Crabtree told me.’

  ‘Well, that’s hardly a surprise, Sergeant,’ replied the inspector, sounding relatively unconcerned. ‘He’ll have been picked up by one of our lot trying to make his escape. Hopefully they’ve discovered the blackmail stuff on him by now.’

  ‘But that’s just it, sir. They’ve all telephoned in and none of them have seen anything of him. He must have slipped through our fingers, sir.’

  ‘What!’ He had Deacon’s full attention now. ‘Get more men over there now. I want all the attics and outbuildings, follies and boatsheds searched with a fine tooth comb. No stone unturned, do you hear me, Lane?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I reckon he’s still on the premises though. He must be hiding from us. There’s no way he could have got away from Dareswick without our men knowing about it, of that I’m sure.’

  ‘He’s a slippery toad, alright. It’s possible that I may have underestimated him. But let’s get to Dareswick and see, shall we?’

  ‘Have you found him yet?’ Deacon asked the first constable he came to at Dareswick Hall.

  ‘No, sir, we’ve checked all the rooms in the house, even the ones that have been shut up, as well as the basement and the attics. There’s no sign of him. One man’s even been onto the roof to see if he’s hiding up there. We’ve spread out and are searching the grounds now. Wherever he is, he can’t have gone far. He’s here somewhere.’

  ‘Lane, I don’t like this,’ the inspector said, turning to his sergeant. ‘I’ve got a feeling something’s wrong. The sooner we find this fellow the better. Go and help them with the search, will you, I’d feel better if I knew you had your ear to the ground and were making sure they’re doing it thoroughly. I don’t want the man to make a run for it as soon as their backs are turned.’

  Deacon wondered into the study, rang the old bell pull and requested coffee. He then proceeded to flick through the notes of the interviews Lane had made in his notebook, pausing every now and then to scribble down a salient point on a separate sheet of paper. How long he was engaged in this task, he did not know, but the noise of a disturbance in the hall made him look up at the same moment that a wild looking Lane crashed into the room, his face white.

  ‘Good God, man, what is it?’ Deacon had leapt up from his seat. ‘You look as if you’ve seen a ghost.’

  ‘We’ve found him, sir. We’ve found Ricketts. He was in the little boatshed by the lake.’

  ‘Good stuff. Well, bring him in here and we’ll see what he has to say for himself. Did you find anything on him? Any blackmail material?’

  ‘I’m afraid I can’t do that, sir. He won’t be telling us anything. You see, when I said that we’d found him, I suppose it would have been more accurate to say that we’d found his body. He’s dead, sir. He’s been murdered!’

  Chapter Thirty-one

  ‘Rose, from now on I am not going to leave you for one moment by yourself,’ Cedric said, holding her hand. They were sitting on a bench in t
he rose garden, the day surprisingly warm after the cold of the day before. ‘It’s quite one thing to have one murder at Dareswick but to have two! We can’t cling to the notion that it could have been some strange madman who just happened to be in the vicinity, however much we might want to. Although I have to admit that my money was on that Ricketts fellow, which just goes to show how wrong I was. Your mother’s never going to let you see me again. She’ll think I’m a terribly bad influence or that my friends and family are the worst sort. They do seem to have a tendency to get themselves messed up in this sort of thing. You know, I bumped into that sergeant fellow, Lane, in the hall. He says there’s absolutely no doubt in the police’s mind now that the murderer came from within, so to speak. Apparently they had been watching Dareswick last night and no one from outside could have sneaked in without them having known about it. They were afraid Ricketts would try and make a run for it and they wanted to find out who else he and Sneddon had been blackmailing. It’s a pity they weren’t watching in the house rather than patrolling the various lanes and entrances to Dareswick. They might have caught the murderer in the act then.’

  ‘So they think he was killed last night, this Ricketts fellow?’ asked Rose.

  ‘Yes, either very late last night or in the early hours of this morning, just like Sneddon the night before. They’re busy doing tests and suchlike to try and narrow down the timeframe. Apparently they think he had most likely arranged to meet the murderer after everyone had gone to bed. Obviously he had in mind to do his own bit of blackmail.’ Cedric paused to sigh at the man’s stupidity. ‘His bed hadn’t been slept in. The police think that he’d arranged to meet the murderer in the old boatshed down by the lake because he was afraid they’d be disturbed if they met in the house, I suppose. Fancy being daft enough to try and blackmail the fellow. A jolly risky and foolhardy thing to do, I’d say. The man had already killed once.’

  ‘Or woman,’ said Rose, thoughtfully. ‘Did you find out all this from Sergeant Lane? He seems to have been awfully forthcoming.’

  ‘Well, from him and Crabtree. I rather got the impression from the sergeant that he was hoping that you would give them a hand like you did at Ashgrove.’ He held her hand more tightly. ‘I say, Rose, why don’t we do it together, solve the murders, I mean. Oh, I know I won’t be much good but I’ll be able to keep you safe while you investigate. I’ll be Watson to your Holmes.’

  ‘You’re right, Cedric. I’ve been putting it off rather, having a go at solving this case I mean. It’s because I think the truth might prove rather unpalatable. I’m afraid the murderer is going to turn out to be someone I rather like. But I’ve an awful feeling that there might be more deaths unless they are caught.’

  ‘That’s a girl. Right, so where do we start, Sherlock?’ Cedrick asked enthusiastically.

  ‘You know, just because I managed to work things out at Ashgrove doesn’t mean that I will here. It could have just been a fluke. I’m not sure I’ve got a knack for it.’

  ‘Well, I have every confidence in you and your abilities, Rose, I really do. And Sergeant Lane does too. It sounds to me like they’re pretty stumped by the whole thing.’

  ‘I suppose,’ said Rose, ‘that we should just go through everything that’s happened since we first arrived and what our impressions have been. I must say, I think the key to all this is Josephine. I’m not saying she’s the murderer, of course,’ she added hastily, catching the look on Cedric’s face. ‘All I’m saying is that I think she knows more about this business than she’s letting on. I think she may even have a very good idea who the murderer is. But it’s no use trying to ask her about it, she won’t say anything.’

  ‘You’re right. Hallam has been trying to get out of her what she was up to in London, and so has Isabella, I think. But she’s refusing to say anything. She’s shut herself up in her room and won’t come out. They’re both awfully worried about her.’

  ‘Surely the police managed to speak with her about Ricketts’ death?’

  ‘Yes, I think she spoke to them briefly, but probably she just told them exactly what we all said. I mean, we all retired to bed rather early last night, didn’t we? I think we were all feeling rather drained what with the shock of Sneddon’s murder and everything. I assume everyone took the precaution of locking their doors and went straight to bed, I know I did. I’d be jolly surprised if anyone took part in any midnight wanderings last night, wouldn’t you?’

  ‘All except the murderer and Ricketts, of course,’ Rose agreed. ‘I assume Ricketts had arranged to hand over the letters, or whatever they were, for a tidy sum.’

  ‘But why go to the trouble of killing the chap?’ asked Cedric. ‘Do you think Ricketts refused to hand over all the stuff or asked for more money, or something like that?’

  ‘No, I think the murderer probably always intended to kill him. Think about it, Cedric. If the murderer killed Lord Sneddon because of this blackmail business then he probably wouldn’t think twice about killing a servant. And the stakes were much higher this time, weren’t they? It wasn’t just that Ricketts had got hold of some information that could embarrass or humiliate them. No, he had in his possession a motive for the murder of Lord Sneddon. The murderer couldn’t risk leaving him alive. Even if Ricketts did hand over all the incriminating evidence, there was nothing to stop him from telling the police all about it afterwards, was there, especially if he thought he might get a reward. Or he might have decided to tell them about it next time he was arrested for something. Did I tell you that Inspector Deacon thought he was some sort of petty criminal? No, while he lived he was always going to be a threat to our murderer.’

  ‘Gosh, Rose, you’re right. I hadn’t thought about it like that.’

  ‘I doubt whether Lord Sneddon’s valet had either, otherwise he would never have agreed to meet the murderer in the boatshed, no, he’d have chosen somewhere much safer to make the exchange. He probably asked for a ridiculous amount of money or jewellery or whatever, and when he had received that he was happy to hand everything over and think no more about it. He can’t have seen the danger he was putting himself in.’

  ‘And so all the murderer had to do was just wait until Ricketts turned his back and then stab him?’

  ‘We’ll get nothing out of them, sir,’ said Lane, as soon as all the interviews were over. ‘Josephine Atherton refuses to tell us what she knows and none of the others have seen anything. I doubt anyone slept very well last night but, even so, they are sure to have locked themselves in. They won’t have ventured out so they won’t have seen anyone else creeping about when they shouldn’t have been.’

  ‘You’re right, Sergeant, I think it’s Sneddon’s murder we’ll have to concentrate on if we want to catch the murderer. I just wonder who else in this house Ricketts could have been blackmailing.’

  ‘And apparently he was stabbed from behind again, wasn’t he, sir?’ said Lane, ‘So it definitely looks like the same chap killed both Sneddon and his servant.’

  ‘It does indeed. In fact, the murderer was jolly clever. Ricketts was not only stabbed in the back but he was also crouching on the floor when he was killed, so the police surgeon thinks. The fellow was stupid enough to place himself in a very vulnerable position. Do you know what I think, Lane? I think our murderer dropped some of the money or trinkets that he had taken with him to pay off Ricketts. I think he did it on purpose to make the task of killing Ricketts that much easier.’

  ‘And of course Ricketts fell for it because he was exactly that sort of greedy, money grasping sort of scoundrel. His first instinct would have been to scurry around on the ground scooping the stuff up rather than putting his own safety first. Our murderer must have banked on that.’

  ‘Exactly,’ agreed Deacon. ‘And do you know what else that tells us, Lane?’

  ‘Oh, I think I’m right up there with you this time, sir,’ laughed the sergeant. ‘It means that not only was Ricketts killed in exactly the same manner as Sneddon but, just like last time, i
t wouldn’t have required much force if Ricketts was scrabbling about on his hands and knees. So what you’re thinking, sir, is that it could just as easily have been a woman who killed him, as a man?’

  ‘You know, Cedric, I think something was worrying Josephine even before we arrived,’ said Rose, as they wandered through the grounds. ‘She seemed awfully nice, but dreadfully preoccupied a lot of the time. Something was definitely distracting her.’

  ‘Hallam said she was awfully interested to find out who Isabella was bringing down with her. He didn’t give it much thought at the time. I say, do you think she was afraid that it might be Sneddon? Perhaps she still had some feelings for the blighter after all.’

  ‘Or perhaps he was blackmailing her too, you know as well as Isabella. Perhaps she had written letters to him that were compromising. Finding out that he was also blackmailing her sister could have been the final straw.’ Rose walked in silence for a while, deep in thought. ‘No,’ she said at last, ‘that simply will not do. When Sneddon first arrived she was just as shocked as everyone else to see him. In fact probably more so. I remember that she went very pale and looked as if she might faint. Hallam was most concerned about her if I recall. But do you know what? Something quite strange happened.’