A Study In Scarlet Women

by Sherry Thomas

  “When Dr. Birch finally came and examined Mr. Sackville, he asked me whether Mr. Sackville used chloral. I said I’d seen some about. He said that if he’d had a better description of Mr. Sackville’s condition, he’d have brought strychnine. He and Dunn rushed off to Dr. Harris’s house, raided his dispensary, and came back with strychnine. But by then it was too late. Mr. Sackville, he’d stopped breathing several minutes before.”

  Mrs. Cornish’s voice quavered slightly at the end of her recital.

  “I have an unpleasant question that must be asked,” said Treadles. “Do you know of anyone who might wish Mr. Sackville harm?”

  “No!” The housekeeper’s answer was instant and fierce, the strongest reaction they’d seen from her this day. “No one. Well, certainly not anyone in these parts.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Cornish. I have no further questions for you at the moment,” said Treadles.

  Mrs. Cornish inclined her head, her breaths still noticeably shallow.

  “The next person I’d like to see would be Becky Birtle, the maid who found Mr. Sackville,” Treadles went on. “But Constable Perkins reported that Becky Birtle is no longer at this house. Can you elaborate on that, Mrs. Cornish?”

  “The whole thing upset the girl terribly. And the letter from that Holmes man even more so. After the inquest she begged to be let go so she could return to her parents. She’s still a child and I didn’t have the heart to say no.”

  There was a faintly mulish set to Mrs. Cornish’s mouth, as if daring Inspector Treadles to question a decision she’d made out of compassion.

  “Of course you were right to think of her, Mrs. Cornish,” he said mildly, rising. “Sergeant MacDonald and I will remove to the drawing room upstairs. Please inform Mrs. Meek that we would like to speak with her next.”

  Mrs. Meek, the thinnest cook Inspector Treadles had ever come across, turned out to be a much more voluble witness.

  “I think it was food from the pub—those two gastric attacks in April. You see Mrs. Oxley, who was cook here before me, she had to leave end of March to look after her orphaned nieces. Until I came, folks here had to make do with what the inn could supply. Now Mrs. Pegg at the inn is a fine woman and serves ample portions, but her food is a bit rough around the edges, if you know what I mean.

  “But me—before I came here, I worked at Mrs. Woodlawn’s Convalescent Home in Paignton. For ten years I did nothing but cook for ladies with the most worrisome digestions in the whole country. I’m proud to say that Mrs. Woodlawn’s was awful sorry to see me go—I helped make the reputation of her establishment.”

  “And your food agreed with Mr. Sackville?” asked Treadles, though that was obviously Mrs. Meek’s point.

  “I had no complaints. But then again, I didn’t cook very long for him, did I?”

  “I’m sure your work was most satisfactory. Now, if I may have your description of the twenty-four hours before Mr. Sackville was found comatose—and your account of the events of that morning.”

  Mrs. Meek took a long swallow of her tea. “Certainly. The day before was our half day. I was busy in the kitchen most of the morning. There was luncheon to be thought of and cold suppers for everyone, but we were also making jam that day—Tommy Dunn has a green thumb and we had strawberries and gooseberries coming in by the boxful from the kitchen garden. When the washing up from luncheon and the jam-making was done, I walked Jenny Price, our scullery maid, to her parents’ place. They are lovely people, the Prices. I had a chat with Mrs. Price. We had tea together. And in the evening we were sent back in the dogcart.

  “After dinner that night I made sure the kitchen was all tidylike and went to bed. I was in the kitchen again at six in the morning, as usual. Mr. Hodges was out, so I made Mr. Sackville his cocoa, and Becky Birtle took it to him.

  “A few minutes later she was back in the kitchen, all alarmed like. ‘Mrs. Meek, I don’t think Mr. Sackville is all right. He’s cold.’ My heart rather did a turn. ‘You don’t mean he’s dead, do you?’ I asked her. ‘No, he’s breathing. But real cold. Come and see for yourself, please.’

  “I was about to rush upstairs with her, but then I thought Mrs. Cornish ought to know. So I jogged down to her room. She was still in her dressing gown. She gasped when I told her what Becky told me and we all ran up together. And there Mr. Sackville was, like Becky described, still breathing but cold as a bucket of water kept in the cellar.

  “We opened the curtains for a better look. And I said to Mrs. Cornish that whatever it was, I didn’t think Mr. Sackville was going to make it. Becky started whimpering and shaking. Mrs. Cornish told me to look after her; she herself ran out for help.

  “I slapped Mr. Sackville a few times, took him by the shoulders and shook him, but he didn’t even twitch. Becky started to cry. I remembered then that Jenny Price was in the kitchen alone and that if I wasn’t there to supervise, she’d eat what I’d cooked for the master, or add goodness knows what to the pot. So I told Becky to come with me to the kitchen but she said she didn’t want Mr. Sackville to be all alone.

  “I went down to the kitchen by myself. I heard Mrs. Cornish coming back in and running upstairs. She came down after a while and said Tommy Dunn was gone to fetch Dr. Harris and she supposed there was nothing we could do except wait. I still had everyone’s luncheon to see to so I kept working, or at least I tried to. But every few minutes I’d stick my head out of the door and see if I couldn’t hear anyone coming.

  “When finally someone came, it wasn’t Dr. Harris but a different doctor. When he’d worked out that it was chloral, he shouted at us to get some hot water bottles next to Mr. Sackville so that he wouldn’t keep getting colder. We were in a mad scramble. Becky, that silly child, filled the pot with too much water and then she was crying again that it wasn’t getting hot. Jenny Price thought we were playing a game and almost got herself burned. Mrs. Cornish had to drag her out of the kitchen and lock her in her room.”

  This was a much more detailed and dramatic account of the events. Inspector Treadles found himself leaning forward in his seat, even though he knew the eventual outcome.

  “We tucked in several hot water bottles around Mr. Sackville. Then Mrs. Cornish took his pulse and said, ‘I can’t feel anything.’ That was when Dr. Birch and Dunn came pounding up the stairs with strychnine. ‘I can’t feel any pulse,” Mrs. Cornish said to Dr. Birch.

  “Dr. Birch rushed to Mr. Sackville. He felt and listened and held out his card case in front of Mr. Sackville’s nose. Then he let out this tremendous groan. ‘I might have been able to save him if only I’d known what was ailing him.’

  “He wrote down the time of death. Mrs. Cornish offered him tea and asked the rest of us to return to our duties. I suppose that’s what we’ve been doing since, carrying on.”

  “What did you think when you heard about the possible connection to the deaths of Lady Amelia Drummond and Lady Shrewsbury?”

  “I’m sure I’ve never been more amazed. But it couldn’t have been more than a coincidence, could it?”

  “That’s what we’re here to find out,” said Treadles, a faint note of apology to his voice. He sympathized with those whose lives were disrupted by the appearance of policemen—especially in a case like this, when it could very well turn out to be much ado about nothing. “Have you ever heard of either of the ladies?”

  “Never. I barely saw Mr. Sackville himself and I didn’t have anything to do with the post coming or going. Mrs. Cornish and Mr. Hodges will know more.”

  “Can you think of anyone who might have carried a grudge against Mr. Sackville—or wished him harm?”

  Mrs. Meek shivered. “No, not at all. But I’m the wrong person to ask—I’ve been here only a month and hardly stepped out of the kitchen.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Meek, you’ve been most helpful. If you could ask Mr. Dunn to spare a minute for us, it would be very much appreciated.”<
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  “Of course, Inspector.” Mrs. Meek rose to leave. But she turned around at the door. “Do you really think, Inspector, that there was foul play here?”

  Anxiety tinged her voice—but even more than anxiety, dismay. The dismay of someone fearing the shattering of innocence, fearing to find herself embroiled in the cold-blooded killing of one person by another.

  “We’re here because certain irregularities have been pointed out. Our goal is only to determine whether there is sufficient cause to warrant further investigation.”

  “I hope you’ll determine that it’s all just happenstance. And that Mr. Holmes who wrote the letter a mischief-maker with nothing better to do than rousing groundless suspicions and inconveniencing innocent people.”

  She spoke with surprising vehemence. After she left, Inspector Treadles and Sergeant MacDonald exchanged a look.

  “Do you think she might have a point, sir?” asked Sergeant MacDonald, gently blowing over his notebook page to help the ink dry faster. “This Mr. Holmes, from everything you’ve said, Inspector, sounds rather extraordinary. But you know how it is with extraordinary men. They aren’t always right in the head all the time.”

  There was most certainly something rather not right with Holmes at the present. Treadles liked to think that true genius couldn’t be easily obliterated. But with Lord Ingram so tight-lipped about Holmes’s actual condition, Treadles had little to go on except his faith that his friend wouldn’t waste his time by personally requesting a fruitless pursuit.

  “Let’s have a little more patience,” he said. “We haven’t even spoken to all the witnesses yet.”

  Whereas Mrs. Meek had been loquacious, Tommy Dunn was taciturn almost to the point of muteness.

  He had been working at the house for three and half years. Never had any trouble with Mr. Sackville or any of the other servants. For his half day he went for a walk and sat on a rock in a nearby cove and watched the sea until it was time for supper in the servants’ hall.

  “You have no family nearby to visit, Mr. Dunn?” asked Treadles.

  “I’m an orphan, Inspector.”

  “I see. Go on.”

  “I went to bed after supper. Was sweeping out the stables in the morning when Mrs. Cornish came running. I rode to Dr. Harris’s but he wasn’t home. Rode to Dr. Birch’s and fetched him. He needed strychnine so we rode back to Dr. Harris’s. When we came back it was too late. Mr. Sackville, he was dead.”

  With further prodding from Treadles, Dunn added that he knew nothing of Lady Amelia Drummond or Lady Shrewsbury, and could think of no one who might have wanted to harm Mr. Sackville. He had, however, noticed Mr. Sackville’s low spirits in the weeks leading up to his death.

  “His mind was somewhere else. Once I saddled his favorite mare. He stood there for a bit, holding on to the reins, and then walked off.” Dunn clenched his hands. “I should’ve asked what was the matter, even if it wasn’t polite. We lived in his house. We lived on his money. We knew he didn’t have no one else. And not one of us bothered to ask him if everything was all right.”

  This was the first emotional response to Mr. Sackville’s death Treadles had encountered. He gave the young man a moment to pull himself together before asking gently, “I take it he was a good master?”

  “The best,” said Dunn. “He gave me one of his own watches my first Christmas here—had it engraved with my initials, too.”

  “May I see?” asked Treadles.

  The watch Tommy Dunn produced was very fine, of comparable quality to the one Treadles had received from the late Mr. Morton Cousins, his excellent and much lamented father-in-law. And on the cover of the watch, a large letter D with a small T to the left and a small E to the right.

  “A very generous gift, indeed.”

  “And he gave me a new fob for it last Christmas, but it’s so fancy I only wear it to church.”

  “The others who were in his service, did they receive as handsome gifts?”

  “Mrs. Cornish got nice vases and picture frames. Hodges got silver cufflinks. And Penny Price got huge puddings and cakes that she didn’t have to share with anyone.”

  “Mrs. Meek and the young one, Becky Birtle?”

  “They ain’t been here long enough. Becky came in spring and Mrs. Meek even later than that.”

  They thanked him and asked him to fetch Hodges.

  Treadles had anticipated a trim, natty man, in the mold of his late father-in-law’s valet. Hodges, however, was wide-shouldered to the point of burliness—and his nose must have been broken a few times in his youth. But he was well turned out and when he spoke, he sounded much more polished than his smashed nose would have suggested.

  He couldn’t help the police with what happened during the days and hours immediately preceding his employer’s death, since he’d been away on holiday to the Isle of Wight. But he did confirm that Mr. Sackville had suffered gastric attacks for many years—“Since when he was in school, I believe.” He complimented Mrs. Meek on being a skilled and caring cook—“She was always conferring with me about how he looked and trying to ferret out what foods to avoid.” And he firmly declared that in five years of working for Mr. Sackville, he’d never had a harsh word from his employer—and couldn’t think of anyone who would want to harm a man who never gave any trouble at all.

  Treadles thanked him and requested that he convey word to Jenny Price that she was wanted for questioning.

  Hodges’s eyes widened. “But Jenny Price is a half-wit.”

  “Be that as it may, we still must speak with her.”

  Jenny Price wasn’t a young girl, as Treadles had assumed, but a heavyset woman in her mid-thirties. She looked worried when Mrs. Meek, who brought her in, left the drawing room, but her eyes lit with pleasure as she discovered the plates of biscuits, cakes, and sandwiches that had been laid out for the visitors from London.

  She moved astonishingly quickly—and polished off several biscuits before Treadles recovered from his surprise.

  “Ah, Miss Price, we have some questions for you.”

  She looked at him blankly while chewing on a piece of seed cake.

  Treadles tried again. “Jenny, is it?”

  She nodded.

  “Can you tell me anything about the day Mr. Sackville died?”

  “They took ’im away.”

  “Do you remember anything else from that day?”

  She shook her head.

  “Nothing at all?”

  Jenny Price, her mouth now full of anchovy sandwich, didn’t bother to respond. Treadles asked more questions about Mr. Sackville, life at Curry House, and her work in the kitchen. And managed to receive not so much as a mumble in response: Jenny Price had no more answers to give.

  Treadles and MacDonald admitted defeat and escorted her back to the kitchen. Mrs. Cornish happened to be in the kitchen, talking to Mrs. Meek. Treadles asked the housekeeper to show him the rest of the rooms belowstairs, to make sure that they did not make for easy entries.

  Mrs. Cornish agreed, but with visible reluctance. Treadles gave an apologetic nod—he wouldn’t want the police to inspect his home either. But suspicious deaths had a way of trumping the wishes of the living.

  The housekeeper’s private quarters consisted of a small parlor and an even smaller adjoining bedroom. Above the fireplace in the parlor hung a framed photograph of the staff—an older batch, before the arrival of Mrs. Meek and Becky Birtle. Another framed photograph, of a vivaciously pretty young woman, sat on Mrs. Cornish’s nightstand.

  Treadles nearly made the mistake of asking whether the young woman was a niece before he realized she was none other than Mrs. Cornish, from half a lifetime ago. It occurred to him that the housekeeper wasn’t that old now—likely younger than Jenny Price.

  “May I ask, Mrs. Cornish, why you gave a place to Jenny Price?”

  “Oh, I d
idn’t, Inspector. Mrs. Struthers—the former Mrs. Curry—she took Jenny in about ten years ago.”

  “And why did Mrs. Struthers make that choice?”

  “The Prices are yeoman farmers. Lots of men trudging about, especially during planting and harvest. And Jenny, well, I’m sure you wouldn’t, Inspector, but there are men who would take advantage of a girl like that. Her parents tried to lock her in her room, but she gets in a bad way if she’s locked up all the time.”

  Mrs. Cornish opened the door to the maids’ room. Two neatly made iron beds were arranged in the shape of an L. The one that presumably belonged to Jenny Price had a pair of slippers underneath. Inspector Treadles noted the bars on the window and the padlock on the door.

  “Mrs. Struthers offered to take Jenny in,” Mrs. Cornish continued. “She was a widow then and except for the man who took care of her horses and her garden there was no other man on the property—and he lived above the stables, not in the house. Jenny can only manage simple tasks, but she works hard and Mrs. Struthers didn’t have to pay her. In fact, to this day the Prices supply a good portion of the foodstuff that goes into the kitchen.”

  “But with Mr. Sackville’s arrival there were men in the house.”

  “At first there was only Mr. Sackville himself—Mr. Hodges came later. It was when we knew that the house had been let to a gentleman that I put the lock on the maids’ door—and the bars outside the window. I wasn’t so much worried about anyone getting into Jenny’s room as that she’d be lured out. But I needn’t have worried. Mr. Sackville wasn’t that kind of man—and neither is Mr. Hodges.”

  They were now in Mrs. Meek’s room. A photograph of her younger self sat on a desk. She had not been nearly as pretty as the young Mrs. Cornish, but she beamed with confidence.

  “I haven’t asked you this, Mrs. Cornish. What is your opinion of Mr. Sackville as a man?”

  Mrs. Cornish was taken aback. “He was a gentleman, of course.”

  “Many men are born gentlemen, but not all are worthy of that term.”