‘We’re leaving,’ I told him.
‘You’re Persi’s bolter and the detective, I presume? I’m James Jerome, Lord Sinclair’s assistant.’ He gave a disarming grin and held his hand out.
‘I’m not a bolter,’ I retorted sharply.
‘No, of course… sorry, I’m being crass. Would you like to wait, gentlemen?’ He dropped his extended hand.
‘How long will Sinclair be?’ Swift asked.
‘I really don’t know. I can have a bite of lunch brought up if you wish.’ Jerome was the epitome of the good lieutenant; well spoken, pleasant in manner and form, probably capable of charming the birds from the trees. I didn’t trust him an inch.
‘We have an investigation to carry out,’ I told him curtly and walked off towards the stairs.
Swift caught me up in a few strides. ‘Lennox, that wasn’t helpful.’
‘I know, but I don’t give a damn, Swift. We’re being played for fools. If we can’t find any evidence, I’m leaving and that’s the end of it.’
Chapter 4
The pimply hall boy was lurking near the front door, I called him over. ‘Do you know where the Dell is?’
He glanced at the other footmen, then nodded mutely.
‘How do we find it?’ Swift pressured him.
The lad’s cheeks flushed as red as his jacket, he whispered, ‘I’m not supposed to talk. I just take hats and coats and put them in the cloak room.’
He was a placid looking lad, pale blue eyes with sandy hair and downy growth on his chin.
‘We’re investigating a suspicious death,’ Swift told him. ‘You’re obliged to answer our questions.’
‘But… but,’ the lad stuttered. ‘You can’t go wandering about without permission.’ His eyes flicked again to the footmen watching every move.
‘Just tell us,’ I said.
He turned pink, and leaned forward to whisper. ‘Cut southwest across the lawns to the big bushes, follow the deer path through the woods ’til you reach the tradesman’s road on the other side, then follow the track downhill.’
‘Right, come on, Swift.’ I strode to the front door, yanked it open and led the way out into the fresh air.
A few calls of ‘wait!’ followed us, as we exited between the white pillars of the portico and made an escape.
‘Slow down, will you, Lennox.’ Swift was breathless as we strode across the lawn.
‘Fine.’ I moderated my pace. The grass was wet, my leather boots showed dark splashes above thick soles, the sun shone between gathering clouds. The storm was still circling.
Swift muttered something, then said. ‘Look, Max was goading you. We can’t let him drive us away.’
‘Swift, you heard him. He said Lydia’s playing cupid and I’m being reeled in.’ I was angry and raised my voice. ‘Lydia probably exaggerated the accident to provoke Persi into calling us.’
‘Persi isn’t gullible, Lennox, as you very well know.’ He was walking with his hands stuffed into his coat pockets.
He was right about that, but I wasn’t ready to back down. ‘Someone’s playing games.’
‘Yes, to cover up a murder.’ Swift was very single minded.
‘We don’t know if it was murder,’ I snapped.
‘Then we’ll find out, won’t we,’ he retorted. ‘And there’s more than just the accident, there’s that parcel from Alaska.’
‘Hum,’ I muttered and made an effort to calm down. ‘Lady Millicent spoke about Randolph without any distress until the gun was mentioned.’
‘Yes, and Persi said they were upset in her telegram,’ he replied.
‘They were upset by the gun, but not anything else,’ I remarked.
‘No…’ He replied meditatively. ‘They weren’t, were they.’
We found a gap in the row of thickly grown bushes to enter a belt of woodland. The trees were mostly ash, beech and oak, with silver birch on the fringes. We followed a track with small hoof prints amid a layer of yellow and orange leaves; it was a pretty place, where squirrels gathered acorns and birds hunted beetles and bugs among the leaf litter.
‘Max was evasive,’ Swift continued. ‘No-one has explained how the gun and parcel relates to the death of Sinclair’s chauffeur.’
‘Perhaps it’s aimed at Sinclair,’ I remarked, which gave him something to think about.
We emerged from the trees to find ourselves in a landscape given over to simple agriculture. Fields and meadows predominated, with clumps of gorse and brambles forming islands of spiny thickets. Bleating sheep scattered as we walked across close-cropped grass to a narrow tarmac road.
‘The Tradesman’s route,’ Swift remarked as we stopped to look about.
‘Swift.’ I pointed down into the valley. ‘There’s a lake.’
It lay in a dip in the distance, a silver expanse partially obscured by specimen trees, their foliage turned bright with autumnal colour. There was a ruined castle on a promontory with a tower jutting into the water, it looked like the painting I’d seen in the hallway of the old wing.
‘It’s beautiful,’ Swift muttered.
‘And not far from the house,’ I remarked. We’d walked in a wide loop and now stood above the mansion, looking down.
We gazed for moments more, before a shout returned us to reality.
‘Stop right there.’ A man limped up behind us. ‘The house telephoned, Mr Trent has made checks on you. He said you’re retired from Scotland Yard.’ He was short and wiry, with sparse hair under an ill-fitting cap, he wore the house livery of black and red and had one leg shorter than the other.
‘Ha, they found you out, Swift,’ I said with a grin.
‘Who are you?’ Swift demanded.
‘I’m the gatekeeper for the tradesmen’s entrance, I am.’ The chap was out of breath. ‘I saw you from the lodge.’ He flicked a hand to indicate a small house away in the distance. I could see the outer wall and a modest wooden gate set between plain columns.
‘We’re investigating with Lady Penelope’s approval,’ Swift replied coolly.
‘Aye, but you should be authorised by Lord Sinclair…’ The guard squinted up at us in the sunshine. ‘Mr Trent has rules you know…’
‘Trent isn’t the law and I suggest you cooperate.’ Swift was in no mood for an argument. ‘Did you know Monroe?’
‘Ay,’ he replied with a nod.
‘And you’re um…? I encouraged him.
‘Hodges,’ he saluted, then grinned. ‘From Hereford, I am. Gone and got me leg twisted round in the war, Hop-along Hodges they call me.’
There wasn’t much I could say, but I returned the smile.
‘Did you witness the accident, Hodges?’ Swift continued in a friendlier tone.
‘Nope, I heard it though. Nasty bang, followed by a wallop. I came down here an’ found ‘im, or what was left of him.’
‘Was it instant?’ I asked.
‘Oh aye, I’d think he was gone in a flash.’ His eyes darkened. ‘A right mess he was. I went straight back to me lodge and called the house, then the police.’
‘Did you see anyone else in the vicinity?’ Swift questioned.
‘Not a soul,’ Hodges replied. ‘You goin’ to catch the blighter then?’
‘You don’t think it was an accident?’ I asked.
Hodges shook his head. ‘Monroe were too good a driver to die like that.’ He leaned forward. ‘But don’t you tell no-one I said so, or I’ll get me marchin’ orders.’ He stepped back. ‘Now, I’ll be off, before I say anythin’ else out of turn.’
He limped back up the road at a reasonable rate given the handicap.
‘He’s fearful,’ Swift remarked.
‘Not of us,’ I replied.
‘No, of Trent.’ Swift was thoughtful. ‘He didn’t believe the official version of events, either.’
I returned to the task. ‘The hall boy said to follow the road downhill.’ I indicated where the track ran towards sprawling woods.
‘The Dell,’ Swift said. We strod
e towards it, as the sun slipped behind massing clouds.
Shadows engulfed us as we entered the wood. It would have been a shaded place at any time, but it felt dark and sinister in the gathering storm. Toadstools sprouted from decaying stumps; lichen, bracken, brambles and ferns grew wherever a patch of light filtered through the high canopy. Dead leaves littered the road, ancient tree trunks crowded the tarmac’s edge as it twisted and turned downhill.
‘Humpback and narrow,’ Swift said, as we approached the bridge spanning the deep ravine.
‘Designed for horses and carts,’ I replied, glancing about in the gloomy light. I’d driven over any number of humpback bridges, or rather flown over them at speed. They were common in the countryside and usually rather fun, but there was nothing fun about this rank spot. I buttoned up my collar against the creeping cold.
We paused at the highest point of the bridge. Swift pulled a torch from his inside pocket and lit it.
‘He must have hit here first.’ He shone the beam at the left side of the parapet.
‘Strange, why here?’ I bent over to run my hand along where the car had gouged red paint into the dank green stonework.
Swift walked slowly forward, keeping the torchlight steady.
‘The car veered along the wall and smashed through it near the end.’ He stopped to gaze at the pile of rubble.
I moved to join him and looked over the broken parapet; chunks of shattered stone, white against black earth, had been thrown down the steep bank. ‘He must have been driving at speed.’
Swift stooped to peer at the road surface covered in a fresh fall of yellow and brown leaves. He swept them aside with his hand, then pointed. ‘He braked here, you can see tyre marks.’
‘If he flew over the hump, he’d have left the ground and skidded on landing.’ I stared at the traces of burnt rubber. ‘Perhaps he lost control.’
‘No, if he’d lost control, he’d have bounced off both walls,’ Swift disagreed. ‘He only hit the left side.’
‘Wet leaves can be as lethal as black ice,’ I reminded him.
‘How many motor accidents have you attended, Lennox?’
‘None, obviously.’ I’d seen a number of aeroplane crashes, I’d even been in one, but that probably didn’t count.
‘I was a bobby in London and I’ve examined enough of them,’ Swift remarked and paced along the bridge, directing the beam. ‘He broke through the wall then hit this log.’ He aimed the torch at a fallen tree by the roadside, the mass of splinters telling its own story. ‘That caused the car to catapult into the air and smash against here.’ He pointed at an ancient beech, its dark trunk riven by deep gashes, the exposed sapwood showing bright against the black bark.
‘Poor soul,’ I muttered under my breath.
We paused for a moment, trying not to imagine the hurtling vehicle crashing into the massive solidity of the tree. I sighed and sent a silent prayer to the man above, before turning back towards the bridge.
‘The police must have collected the debris when they removed the car,’ Swift continued, sweeping his torch in an arc across the ground. Scattered slivers of glass, metal and red paint chips shone in the light. Other, darker remains, lay mixed with the detritus and mud. ‘They’d have gathered evidence if there were any.’
‘Which means there wasn’t,’ I concluded.
‘There’s nothing here.’ He sounded dispirited.
I dug into my jacket pocket to find my own torch and aimed it at the intact wall opposite. ‘He swerved to avoid something. A deer, perhaps?’
We crossed to the other side, which was entirely unaffected by the catastrophic events.
‘He was a professional driver, he’d have run into an animal rather than risk hitting the wall,’ Swift countered.
‘So, someone stepped out in front of him.’
‘Impossible, he wouldn’t have been able to avoid hitting them. It would be suicidal.’
I had to agree; the road was too narrow for a car and a person.
‘What if they stood just behind the end of the parapet?’ I suggested.
‘If they had, Monroe wouldn’t have had to swerve.’
He was right, but we both leaned over the wall anyway.
‘Footprints!’ I exclaimed.
Swift shone his torch onto the mud. ‘They’re full of water, you can’t be certain.’
‘Somebody stood here, Swift,’ I exclaimed
‘It could have been the police,’ he tried to sound sceptical, but I heard an undertone of excitement in his voice.
‘No, look. There’s only one set. Someone stepped off the tarmac there,’ I aimed my beam at the sequence of hollows. ‘And they took two steps, turned to stand behind the wall, then walked back to the road again.’
‘We can’t prove anything. It’s impossible to take an impression; the storm has washed away any details.’
‘But it’s evidence, Swift.’ I was certain.
‘It’s muddy puddles, Lennox.’
‘Let’s search by the bridge.’ I stepped into the morass, my boot slipped and sank. I swore.
We slid and slithered down the bank among the bracken and moss until we reached the bottom. I was relieved I hadn’t brought Foggy, and not just because of the mud. He wouldn’t have liked it any more than I did.
‘No-one’s been down here,’ Swift said, as we peered below the arch of the bridge.
‘We’ll try along the bank.’ I turned and clambered along the edge of the ravine.
‘Swift…’ I stopped. ‘Look.’ I shone my torch onto a freshly broken branch.
‘It’s a stick, Lennox.’ He was unimpressed.
I picked it up. It was almost as thick as my wrist, about a yard in length and forked at the end to form a ‘y’. Bright splinters showed it had been snapped off a tree not long ago.
‘It’s sweet chestnut. It wouldn’t grow here, it’s too dark.’
‘Are you sure?’ He frowned.
‘Yes, of course I’m sure. We gather chestnuts for Christmas every year.’
He took a closer look, then shone his torch onto the surrounding trunks. I’ve no idea why, I doubt he’d recognise a sweet chestnut if it fell on him.
‘We should find out where it came from,’ he announced.
‘Well, it’s not from these woods. It’s too densely grown here.’ We climbed back up to the road, drops of rain began to spatter through the trees.
‘Wait, I want to try something.’ I stepped into the muddy footprints behind the parapet wall. I’d been thinking about how I’d cause a car accident in this confined spot without risking my life. ‘What if someone held a coat or jacket?’
‘So that it looked like a figure?’ He regarded me, his brow furrowed. ‘It’s possible, I suppose.’ He shrugged off his overcoat and hung it on the end of the branched ‘y’, then handed it to me.
I leaned over the wall and waved it into the road. ‘I think that would work. Monroe could have mistaken it for a person, he’d only have caught a glimpse in his headlights. His reaction would be instant.’
‘You’re right.’ Swift’s smile suddenly flashed in the grim light. ‘He’d swerve, but there would be nowhere to go. He’d crash into the wall as soon as he turned the wheel.’
‘Someone caused the accident! It’s murder Swift.’
‘It’s not proof.’ Swift preferred his evidence cut and dried.
The rain had turned into a downpour and was drowning out my words. ‘Come on. We’re in for a soaking, we’ll have to run.’
Chapter 5
‘Sir,’ Greggs swung the back door open. ‘It is raining, you are wet.’ He was a master of understatement.
I was too breathless to reply. We’d raced through the storm but were still drenched and dripping. My old butler ushered us into the rear hallway, a place as homely as the rest of the St Georges’ quarters; faded wallpaper, umbrella stand and a bunch of wild roses in a vase on a window sill.
We began shrugging off our wet gear.
‘And th
e stick, sir?’
‘It’s evidence,’ I told him.
‘Really, sir,’ he sounded unimpressed. He went off with our sodden coats, presumably to a boot room or some such.
‘We’ll examine it upstairs,’ Swift was keen. ‘Did you bring a magnifying glass?’
‘No. Didn’t you?’
Swift usually carried a complete detecting kit with him, despite being retired.
‘I was in London for meetings about the whisky,’ he replied.
‘Your rooms are prepared, sir,’ Greggs announced on his return. ‘If you’re like to come this way.’
A bare pine staircase ran up from the hallway, typical of servants’ stairs. The treads creaked as we traipsed up behind my old retainer.
‘What’s for lunch, Greggs?’ I was feeling distinctly peckish after the day’s excursions.
‘I’m afraid lunch was taken some time ago. It is almost three o’clock.’
‘What?’
‘Inspector Swift, your room, sir.’ He opened the door.
It led to a comfortable chamber as cluttered as the drawing-room below. The fire was lit, the windows had misted and the smell of wood smoke and damp hung in the air, but Swift seemed happy with it.
‘Won’t be a moment, Lennox,’ he said and went in.
‘Fine,’ I followed Greggs to the next room. It was similar to Swift’s, an oak-framed bed, a desk under the window, various small tables, a dresser and a merry fire with chairs set before it. ‘Where’s Fogg?’
‘With Mr Tubbs, in the kitchen, sir. Lady Millicent has cooked steak and they are waiting for it to cool down.’
I sat on the bed. It creaked. ‘I hope they’ve saved some for me.’
‘Should I prepare a repast, sir?’
‘Yes please, Greggs.’ I don’t even know why he asked, he knew I was starving.
‘It will be ready on the hour.’ He went off.
Swift entered without knocking. ‘Did you find it?’
‘Find what?’
‘The magnifying glass, of course.’
The Tomb of the Chatelaine: A 1920s Country House Murder Mystery (Heathcliff Lennox Book 6) Page 4