Murder at the Marlowe Club

by Kate Parker

  Lady Kaldaire eyed me closely. “So, you think it was two different killers with different motives?”

  “Yes.” I couldn’t think of a single reason that would account for two separate murders on different nights by a solitary killer.

  Lady Kaldaire rose and said, “Then we need to find these killers.” She strode out of the small butler’s office so fast I had to hurry to keep up. I followed her upstairs, back to the drawing room. I could see from the doorway that the women hadn’t moved since we left.

  Lady Kaldaire sat across from the duchess once again and took her hand. “You know that Theo lost his front-door key a few days before he died?”

  Lady Wallingford’s eyes widened. “You think that’s how the killer entered the house?”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s not true.”

  “Lulu…”

  “I knew how careless he was. When we found him—” she sniffed, “the first thing I checked was his key ring. They were all there.”

  Lady Kaldaire sat even straighter than usual. “Then why did Mathers lie to us?”

  “Out of loyalty. He doesn’t want you bothering me. No one does.” Lady Wallingford gave a weak smile.

  “For pity’s sake, Lulu, someone entered this house on two separate occasions and killed your son and his wife. Doesn’t that make you just a teeny bit anxious?”

  “And my baby boy was attacked,” came from a small voice behind me. I turned to see Dorothy seated in a high-backed chair in the corner. She clutched a handkerchief in one hand.

  Here was my chance to hear something honest in this house. “Lady Frethorton, would you like to tell me about it?” I said in my calmest voice.

  She rose and, as she walked out of the room, looked back at me with a sorrowful expression and said, “Come along.”

  Chapter Eight

  Lady Dorothy Frethorton led the way up two flights of stairs and then down a hall. She knocked on a door and then opened it. Inside I saw a children’s nurse holding a baby on her lap. She was trying to interest the baby in a brightly painted toy, but the baby only batted at it without much interest.

  “This is my baby, Lord Alfred,” Dorothy told me with an enraptured smile on her face.

  “He seems like a happy child,” I said. “Very handsome. How old is he?”

  “Almost ten months. But I wish you’d seen him before the attack. He was so much brighter. He’s stopped crawling and standing.”

  “That’s because he cries if he’s put down,” the nurse said in a stern tone. “He can’t develop his muscles if he’s held all the time. He’s been coddled too much. My lady, if we—”

  “He’s been through a terrible ordeal,” Dorothy said, sounding close to tears. She snatched the boy from the nurse’s arms and hugged him closely, nuzzling his little ear. “Oh, poor little Alfred.”

  “Tell me about the night your baby was attacked,” I said before the nurse had a chance to begin the lecture she seemed poised to deliver. I should have said “my lady,” but I kept thinking of her as Dorothy and not the Marchioness of Frethorton.

  “I’m a light sleeper. I was awakened by the commotion. I came up here to the nursery and found my precious boy on the wooden floor of the night nursery. He was crying. The nurse was also on the floor, blood pouring from under her head.”

  The poor night nurse. “Oh, dear. Was anyone else around?”

  The nurse seemed to have heard the story multiple times. She turned a disinterested face toward the fire and took up a poker to prod the flames to give off a little more warmth. As was true in most homes, the nursery received cast-offs. The shovel was dented and the poker slightly bent.

  “Yes. Theo was in the hall. He tried pulling me back, away from my baby.” Dorothy’s eyes took on a feral gleam as she held the baby tighter. The baby started to fuss and tried to squirm away.

  Had Theo seen the person who attacked the baby and the nurse? What was he afraid of, that he held Dorothy back from her baby? “Anyone else?”

  “Not until later. I had to get to my baby. He was whining so piteously. I had to help him. Don’t you see?” Dorothy’s voice rose in a wail.

  “Of course she does, Dorothy. Let’s go back downstairs.” Margaret, Lady Ellingham, hurried up to her and gently separated the young mother from her son. Once the nurse was in possession of the child again, Margaret linked arms with Dorothy and walked into the hall. Dorothy kept staring over her shoulder at her son. Margaret turned and threw an angry glance at me.

  I followed close enough behind to hear Margaret say, “You need to protect this baby, too.”

  So the baby’s mother was again in an interesting condition. Was she when her first child was injured? Probably. It had only been a month ago.

  No one was willing to tell Lady Kaldaire or me about that night except Lady Frethorton. And she didn’t seem like the most stable of witnesses.

  Who else had been in the house that night? Could Lord Theo have let him in? But why would Lord Theo have been upstairs near the nursery if he had a guest?

  I followed the two ladies back to the drawing room, despite Margaret’s apparent desire to order the door slammed in my face. I kept thinking of her as Margaret and not Lady Ellingham, probably because she was making her dislike of me so obvious.

  Both the duchess and Lady Kaldaire stared at me when I walked in.

  “I’m leaving now, my lady, if you want to walk with me,” I said.

  “Of course, Emily. Lulu, I’ll see you later. Thank you for letting us speak to your servants,” Lady Kaldaire said as she rose.

  “I said it would be to no purpose,” the duchess told her.

  “It was worth a try if we could discover how the killers came into your home. If we could, you’d be able to sleep more securely in your beds.” Lady Kaldaire gave her a pat on the shoulder and a sympathetic expression. Not an expression I often saw on her face.

  The duchess leaned over and clutched Lady Kaldaire’s hands. “Oh, Robbie, I appreciate your efforts. I know you mean well. But we’ll be all right. You’ll see.”

  We went back out into a drizzle as we followed the pavement around the park to Lady Kaldaire’s home. “I wonder who was telling us the truth, the duchess or her butler.” I was inclined to believe Mathers, the butler.

  “I would suspect Mathers was saying whatever the duke told him to say,” Lady Kaldaire said.

  “Then we’re no further along.” And I’d wasted half the afternoon when I could have been working in my shop, I didn’t add.

  “Not at all. We need to find out which gamblers and cocaine dealers Theo and Roxanne owed money to, and then whether they had a key to the house and whether they killed the couple.” Lady Kaldaire strode along, sounding as if this were as simple as planning a tea party.

  “How do you think we’re going to do that?” I all but snapped at her.

  “I have no idea, but you’ll think of something,” she said as we reached her front walk. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow, Emily.”

  She walked into her house, leaving me standing in the drizzle under my umbrella, shaking my head. What I wanted to do was scream.

  I knew that meant she was going to force me to find a way to get the answers she wanted under threat of telling my clients about my father’s disreputable family. With a deep sigh, I headed to the East End, where my father’s entire clan, or gang, or herd, lived.

  It made no sense to go back to the shop before I learned if the Gates gang could help me.

  I knew which alleys were dead ends and which led to my grandfather’s house, the headquarters of the family enterprise. I made my way there, my pace quickened by cold puddles splashing on my shoes and skirt hem, until I reached the family home behind the livery stables my grandmother managed.

  My grandmother answered the door. “He’s not here.”

  At least I was under cover on the porch. Before she could shut the door in my face, I said, “How are you, Gran?”

  “All right, I guess.”

 
; “Matthew sends his love.”

  “Oh, how is he? Is school going all right?” Her voice softened at the mention of Matthew’s name. As much as she had disliked my father’s late wife, she had recently developed a love for my younger brother. She was learning to tolerate me.

  “Being around other deaf students and being taught by teachers who can communicate with him is making a great deal of difference for him. He seems to be happy there, and he’s learning so much. But he can’t wait for a holiday to come home to eat more of your cooking.” As long as she treated Matthew well, I was willing to try to get along with her.

  “Hello, Emily. What brings you over here?”

  I turned around to see my uncle Thomas climb the porch steps. A younger version of my grandfather, today he was dressed in a conservative black suit with a gray vest and what could pass as a school tie. I didn’t want to imagine what confidence trick Uncle Thomas was playing.

  “I found a body yesterday morning, the body of an aristocrat.”

  “You didn’t break in to anyone’s house again, did you?” Uncle Thomas was grinning. That was how I’d found Lord Kaldaire, in his study in the middle of the night, dying, when I tried a burglary scheme to collect the money owed me for Lady Kaldaire’s hats.

  “No. I was cutting through a private park.”

  “That’s so much better.” He was broadly smiling now.

  “It was raining.” I glared at him before I continued. “It was Lady Theodore Hughes, known in the papers as the notorious Lady Roxanne. Her mother-in-law is the Duchess of Wallingford, a childhood friend of Lady Kaldaire.”

  He whistled before his expression hardened. “Don’t tell me that woman wants you to investigate another murder.”

  I nodded sadly. “Lady Theodore and her husband lived with the duke and duchess and apparently owed gamblers and cocaine peddlers money. Her husband, the late Lord Theo, might have lost a front-door key shortly before he was killed. Lady Kaldaire wants me to find out who these shady people are and whether they have a key to Wallingford house. She doesn’t want the duke and duchess murdered.”

  My uncle said what he thought of aristocrats in colorful language, ending with “Wait until your grandfather hears about this.”

  “Hears about what? Hello, Pet. How’s my favorite granddaughter?”

  I smiled. I was his only granddaughter among his well over a dozen grandchildren. My grandfather was dressed as an aging aristocrat in an ancient morning suit and top hat. I suspected he had been sitting in one of the big West End political or social clubs learning what he could to his advantage.

  He once told me he never knew what piece of information could turn into a valuable “enterprise.”

  He swept us all into the house, kissed my grandmother on the cheek, and had us sit at the dining room table where councils of war were held.

  After I told him all, he sat silently for a very long time. I knew I was in trouble.

  Uncle Thomas broke in first. “I tried to tell her we don’t get involved in selling drugs, and gaming is a fool’s business if it’s not rigged. Those hells are a totally different business. They are rigged. We may leave people poorer, but we don’t destroy them and take their lives.”

  I knew my question would not be popular with my father’s family. “Do you know who Lord and Lady Theodore Hughes owed for their pleasures? Anyone who is known for killing those who don’t pay up?”

  My grandfather continued to stare at me. Finally, he said, “We hear rumors about who is involved in the rough end of loaning to aristocrats, and we stay away from them. Now, I don’t mind you doing a little surreptitious entry or safe cracking or working a con to keep on the right side of that widow, but these people you’re talking about can be dangerous. Deadly dangerous. Don’t try to con them. You stay away from them and let Inspector Russell do his job.”

  “I’d love to. Inspector Russell would be able to find the killers if the Duke of Wallingford and his family would just cooperate.” I hoped I hadn’t blushed when I said James’s name.

  “He’s very capable,” my grandfather said as he patted my hand.

  I didn’t imagine there could be too many people who could gain from the deaths of Lord Theo or the notorious Lady Roxanne. Or would kill them for not paying up. “Are there a lot of people taking bets from wild young aristocrats in London who use drugs and do scandalous things and don’t pay their debts?”

  “Yes, but most of those who work the West End, supplying the wild children of the aristocracy, work for one man. Lucky Marlowe.”

  I nearly laughed at my grandfather’s words. “Is that really a name?”

  “That’s not his first name, but that’s what everyone calls him. Gives him a bit of anonymity from the coppers,” my uncle said.

  “Although he really doesn’t need it. He keeps his connection to the drugs and prostitution at arm’s length, and the coppers can’t find any reason to bother him,” my grandfather added.

  “He must have his gaming club around here.” I might as well learn what I could. It might help me convince Lady Kaldaire not to get involved later.

  “To fleece aristocrats? No, he’s set up as a private club in the West End. It looks respectable from the outside, but inside there is every sort of debauchery. Things I don’t want my granddaughter to ever learn about.” My grandfather shook his white head.

  “Everything there is available for a price,” my uncle added. “But there’s nothing there that you should spend your money on.”

  “And you don’t want anyone there spending their money on you,” my grandfather added. “So stay away. Tell Lady Kaldaire this is a step too far.”

  I shook my head. So far, I’d heard nothing that would help. “I have to protect my business, and that means convincing her she doesn’t want to go there.”

  “Doesn’t she have the sense to stay away from evil without anyone having to tell her?” my grandfather asked in a rising tone, giving vent to his exasperation.

  “Can’t you just tell her no?” my uncle asked.

  “She’ll tell my customers that my father is a criminal, and then I won’t have any customers. And no money to pay for Matthew’s schooling.”

  My grandfather looked at me sadly. “I’ll pay for that, pet.”

  “No.” I lifted my chin and thinned my lips. “My brother. My responsibility.”

  “Stubborn. Just like your mother,” my uncle grumbled.

  “She knew her own mind. That’s why you didn’t like her, isn’t it?” It was an accusation I’d long believed.

  “No, it’s because she treated my brother so badly.”

  Uncle Thomas and I stared at each other, anger washing over both of us.

  My grandfather was having none of it. “Stop this right now. Tom, you can’t know the inside of your brother’s marriage. Pet, we aren’t as ghastly as your mother made us seem.”

  I shook my head. “I’ve never thought of you as terrible, although you’ve taught me many skills I can never admit to in polite society.” I gave him a smile. “I love you all. You’re family.”

  Uncle Thomas reached over and patted my hand. “We love you, too, even if you are the stubbornest…”

  “Tom,” Grandfather used his warning voice.

  “Uncle Thomas, I don’t tell you how to run your business. Don’t tell me how to run mine. And as long as Lady Kaldaire can blackmail me with my father’s career, I have to go along with her crazy schemes.”

  I knew, somehow, Lady Kaldaire would find a way to have the two of us confront Lucky Marlowe. I just hoped the two of us would get away unscathed.

  Chapter Nine

  I didn’t have to wait long the next day before Lady Kaldaire came into my shop. She settled gracefully on the chair in one of the booths and took off her hat. “My maid is doing something different with my hair, so you may want to change the measurements for my new hat.”

  Her hair looked the same to me, but I obediently began to measure her head.

  “Have you gotten
any further with who might have killed Lord and Lady Theodore?” she murmured.

  I was grateful we didn’t have any other customers present. “I asked certain people, and they said if you wanted to look for excitement in the style of Theo and Roxanne—”

  “Emily, they are properly addressed as Lord Theodore and Lady Theodore.”

  “I bet their killers didn’t call them that,” I responded. “For excitement, they would most likely go to a man called Lucky Marlowe who has a club in the West End somewhere. And then I was warned not to look for such debauchery.” I tried to sound as stern as my grandfather had.

  “Why?”

  “I’m told the debauchery is beyond my imagination.”

  “Emily, I suspect your imagination isn’t as experienced as mine.”

  I decided not to argue the point. She had been married. I hadn’t. “Still, we shouldn’t go looking for trouble.”

  “Oh, we won’t go looking for it,” Lady Kaldaire told me as she turned around, messing up my current measurement. “I’ll ask Lulu where Lord Theo and Lady Theo gambled. Be ready to go over there with me when you close the shop today.”

  “Today?” I was not prepared to see debauchery directly after work. I had no desire to deal with debauchery ever. I wasn’t even sure what it was, specifically, but it sounded terrible.

  “Today. Now, please finish with the measurements so you can construct my new hat correctly.”

  I finished and wrote down the figures on the card I kept for her in a box with all my customers’ measurements. Since they changed hairstyles often, the cards were more a hindrance than a help. “I don’t want to go to this place, wherever it is.”

  Lady Kaldaire rose from her chair and said, “If we go early, we should be out of there before anything happens to bring a blush to your maidenly cheeks. Come to my house immediately after you close the shop tonight.”