I took a look around his pantry and I did not have to try to seem impressed. It really was pretty impressive. The glass-fronted cases were filled with ledgers ranging back for hundreds of years, all stamped with the date on their spines. The watercolour of the house on the wall above his fireplace was fine enough that it might have graced the morning room or breakfast parlour at Gilverton.
‘So,’ I said, ‘if you cast your mind back across those thirty years, what can you tell me about Mr Bewer’s last days and his departure?’
‘He wasn’t himself,’ Gunn said. ‘Not at all. He had never been a difficult man and no one knows a gentleman better than his valet. When he started on about the necklace it was quite out of character.’
‘He spoke to you about it?’
‘Muttered,’ said Gunn, ‘and I heard him.’ He looked as uncomfortable as he might, admitting that he listened to mutters and remembered them. ‘The curse, the death of his mother, his terror that his daughter-in-law would die before an heir had come along. He was never a man to be so fanciful. I think he was ill, if I’m to be honest. Not – I don’t mean lumbago or headaches. I mean I think his nerves were strained until they snapped. I think he was ill in that way.’
I nodded my understanding. It was a terrible betrayal for a valet to suggest such a thing as mental weakness in his master and I liked to hear Gunn so troubled by it. If he was not a gossip or a man who revelled in scandal, I could take anything else he told me that much more seriously.
‘Did you witness any of the terrible final quarrel between him and Mrs Bewer?’ I said.
Gunn was still again at that. He might have been reliving the memory, or perhaps he was just casting himself back over the years, tide after tide, until he remembered it: the scenes he must have tried so hard to put away from him.
‘The quarrel?’ he said, and he spoke haltingly. ‘The night that Mrs Bewer threatened to go out with the ruby on?’
‘That’s it,’ I said. ‘Were you there?’
‘He snatched it off her neck,’ he said. ‘I saw the weals. I went to help him dress and I heard her crying through the dressing-room door.’
I tutted. ‘And it was shortly after that he left for good?’
‘I helped him,’ Gunn said even more haltingly. Each word seemed as though it were being wrung out of him. ‘I packed.’
This case had been regrettably free of such moments but, as he spoke, I knew that finally some part of it was going to loosen. My excitement was like a little fish leaping inside me, flicking itself free with a shower of droplets and then plonking heavily down again. It was not exactly a pleasant sensation but since the thoughts accompanying it were so welcome and so overdue I almost enjoyed it.
‘You packed everything?’ I said. He nodded glumly, as if he knew what was coming and did not relish it. ‘And I take it you did not pack the Cut Throat?’ I said. He shook his head, just as glumly. ‘But did you pack anything big enough to contain it?’ I persisted. Another shake.
‘I don’t suppose you know of any favourite hiding place where he might have stashed it?’ I asked him, hope fading fast. ‘We know it’s not in the rocking horse because we looked and what we found there was nothing to do with Richard. It was a note to Bluey from his … Well, not his grandmother, actually, but it’s all rather a tangle and since it was written before he was born … Is something the matter, Mr Gunn?’
‘Not a thing,’ he said. He roused himself and said, more stoutly. ‘Not one single thing. Why?’
The honest answer would be that he looked as sick as a child swallowing castor oil, but no one wants to hear that of himself and so much of interviewing reluctant witnesses is buttering up, I have found. ‘Have you remembered a hidey-hole?’ I said. ‘Are you tussling with your conscience?’
‘My conscience?’ he said, ringingly enough for it to make a tiny echo. ‘My conscience is quite clear. I sleep the sleep of the just every night. I’ve nothing on my conscience.’
‘I only meant,’ I said, ‘that if you had remembered a likely spot you would have to choose between telling me or joining the treasure hunt and winning it for your own.’
‘I know of no likely spots,’ he said. ‘There are no hidey-holes in the castle that I ever heard of. Mr Bewer was bad with his nerves and then he left his house and abandoned his family and travelled all over the place. He sent letters, you know: Zanzibar and Aleppo and Beirut and—’
‘And?’ I said. ‘Aleppo, Zanzibar and Beirut we have heard of. Is there another place you’d rather not mention, Mr Gunn? Do you know for sure that the place you won’t mention is one we’d like to know about? What exactly are you hiding?’
‘Hiding?’ he said. ‘I – hiding? I’m not hiding anything. It’s not me who lost it. It’s not me who squirreled away a treasure. I’m hiding not one single thing. I was a young man in a household with many troubles. I witnessed distressing scenes. I helped my master pack and then I left there and came here and had no more dealings with any of them.’ He shut his mouth very firmly and crossed his arms over his chest as punctuation.
I let myself out, judging that nothing would open those lips again, and met the same little maid only now coming back with the extra coffee cup.
‘Too late,’ I said. ‘Not to worry. But you might fetch Mr Gunn a glass of brandy.’
‘Is he ill?’ said the maid. Behind her the kitchen door nudged open and I saw a cook in the same blue cotton as the girl, with a capacious apron tied over it, and a housekeeper in strict black with a bunch of keys at her waist. They had been listening and were clearly agog.
‘He’s not ill,’ I said.
‘Did you bring bad news?’ said the cook.
‘Unwelcome memories,’ I said.
‘And who exactly are you?’ the housekeeper put in, as well she might.
‘I’m … helping out along at Castle Bewer,’ I said. ‘With their new venture.’
‘Oho,’ said the housekeeper. ‘That would do it. Mr Gunn doesn’t care to be reminded of those days.’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I do appear to have rattled him.’
‘Good!’ said the cook. ‘Whether you meant to or not, if you’ve lit a fire under Mr Gunn you’ve done the house a favour.’
I thought about her words all the way home. Gunn knew something about Richard Bewer’s disappearance, that was for sure. He knew that there was one place on the grand tour, besides Aleppo, Beirut and Zanzibar, that he should be careful not to name. And he was not a good enough butler to be the butler at Mespring House. The housekeeper had almost said as much to a perfect stranger and Lady Annandale had hinted that his rise was in payment for some mysterious good deed done in the distant past. And despite what he had said about not knowing a thing about any hidey-hole, he had gone the colour of milk when I mentioned it.
I was still puzzling when I tramped across the bridge and through the gatehouse arch, interrupting the technical rehearsal at a very tricky moment and being glared at from the stage by both Macbeths, a couple of lords and all three murderers; the third murderer, on his first day as a thespian, just as withering of my faux pas as any of them.
‘Let’s stop now for luncheon,’ Leonard shouted from his perch halfway up the rake of wooden seats. ‘Since we’ve been so roundly knocked out of our concentration anyway.’ He stood and passed a weary hand over his brow. ‘We shall start again in one hour exactly. From right there. Act III, scene 3, “Alight, alight.”’ He gave me one final scowl and then took himself away, dragging his feet like the loser of the men’s doubles after forty games in the last set on a hot day. It was a bit much, in my opinion, since he had only been sitting there watching others working.
Alec, after some important-looking conversation with the other two murderers, jumped down from the stage and strolled towards me. He was wearing a soft-collared shirt of heaven knew what provenance, for I was sure Barrow would have given notice if Alec had tried to introduce such a garment into his wardrobe at home. What is more, the top button of the soft coll
ar was open and the sleeves were rolled to the elbow. His ordinary country tweed trousers did not look quite as peculiar as Leonard’s flannels or indeed as Billy Annandale’s bags, but otherwise he had dressed as one of them. I even thought his hair was flopping a little.
‘Any luck?’ he said. ‘Any answers?’
‘Lots of luck,’ I said, ‘but only questions.’ And I laid it out to him, as succinct a report as I had ever delivered, perhaps to remind him by my very briskness that he might be a bright young thing of the theatrical sort suddenly, but I was still me.
‘I just don’t know what any of it means,’ I concluded.
‘Really?’ Alec said. ‘I think it’s quite straightforward.’ I waited. Alec looked ostentatiously over each shoulder before he spoke again, like the baddie in a picture show. ‘Gunn took the ruby back to the Annandales,’ he said. ‘That bought him his start and secured him his advancement. They’ve had it all along. Lady Annandale’s protestations of ignorance are hard to swallow. Don’t you think?’
‘I don’t know about that. She seemed truly astonished by the tale of the curse and she is not one to let her mouth hang open easily. And what about the burglars?’
‘The Annandales sent them to throw the Bewers off the scent,’ Alec said. ‘That makes a lot more sense than Richard pulling strings from the farthest reaches of Empire, when you actually think about it.’
‘And speaking of the farthest reaches,’ I said. ‘Here’s a strange thing. Why did Gunn gobble the name he found himself almost saying? Aleppo, Zanzibar, Beirut and … he stopped himself saying a fourth one.’
‘Lisbon,’ Alec said. ‘That’s the other place that was spoken of in my hearing.’
‘Why would he get tongue-tied about mentioning Lisbon?’
‘Perhaps that’s where Richard died and he didn’t want to mention the fact.’
‘But how on earth would the ex-valet know where Richard died?’ I said. ‘And in fact—’
Alec interrupted me. ‘If he died in Lisbon, he was on his way back, wouldn’t you say?’
I knotted my brow and tried to bring to mind the globe I had spun for Donald and Teddy when they were small, as they planned their life’s adventures. We had not known then that none of us would be taking the tours our parents had enjoyed. ‘It does seem like a round trip, actually,’ I said. ‘When you really think of it. To Lisbon and then either to Beirut or Aleppo, then down to Zanzibar, and back to either Aleppo or Beirut and then Lisbon again. One way by sea and one way by land it makes a nice little tootle. But if we imagine him on one long outward journey, it’s a bit of a mess.’
‘But why would Gunn fear to mention it?’
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘I have no idea. And there’s no need to look at me like that. Let’s hear your brilliant explanation for Gunn suddenly clamming up, if they’re so easily to hand.’
Alec glared at me for a moment and I daresay my tone had invited it. I was unrepentant. It is far easier to listen and carp than endlessly to volunteer ideas to be carped at and Alec, in my estimation, took that easy path every time. As I watched him, though, an even less welcome expression than the glare spread over his face. He beamed at me with eyes twinkling and began patting his pockets. I groaned. Alec smug and patronising is bad enough, but Alec smug, patronising and talking at a snail’s pace in between fussing with his interminable pipe is just about unbearable.
‘What is it?’ I said.
‘Can’t you guess?’ he said. He had his baccy pouch out and was knocking his pipe against the wood of the bench so smartly that I hoped he would break it. ‘I’ll give you a clue. Who knew Otto was planning to hand over the letters from Richard to you?’
‘No one,’ I said. ‘And I don’t see how that’s a clue.’
‘Think about it, Dandy. Why should someone break into Otto’s room and steal her evening whatsit rather than her jewels?’
‘They were after the letters?’ I said. ‘But what does that have to do with Richard dying in Lisbon?’
‘And his itinerary not making much sense as a single journey,’ Alec said. He waited. ‘Oh come on! I’m practically handing it to you.’
‘Enlighten me,’ I replied, hoping that I spoke drily enough to take the joy out of it for him.
‘He went to Lisbon and died there. Aleppo, Beirut and Zanzibar were tarradiddles and the letters he supposedly sent home were fakes.’
I opened my mouth to pooh-pooh his words but realised that, as theories go, it was an excellent one. ‘But then who stole the letters last night?’ I asked instead.
Alec shrugged. ‘We must try to find out,’ he told me. ‘Does it make more sense to think that someone broke in or that someone already in the castle did it? There’s the question of the keys and how an outsider would know where to find them.’
‘Gunn knows the house,’ I pointed out. ‘Oh and actually – the very first night we were here Grant and I thought we saw lights in the lane. That would fit with someone creeping along from Mespring to … Hmm, but that was before we asked Otto for the letters.’
‘Perhaps, as soon as detectives were known to have arrived, it seemed inevitable that the letters would be subjected to scrutiny.’
I nodded uncertainly. ‘But I don’t think anyone at Mespring knew we had arrived until the piece in the newspaper this morning’.
‘Oh come now!’ said Alec. ‘Not upstairs perhaps. But don’t tell me there’s not fraternising between the servants. You’ve talked about it yourself. How the attempt to keep the story of the Cut Throat curse quiet by a change of staff failed so miserably because they all visit one another.’
That was not quite what I had said but I could not put my finger on why the discrepancy bothered me. I was too taken up with another problem. ‘Wouldn’t Otto have noticed that it was different writing?’ I said. ‘If someone faked letters from her husband after the first one from Lisbon?’
‘Now you’re just being disagreeable because I thought of it before you!’ Alec said.
‘I’m simply being thorough,’ I answered, grandly. ‘But very well, let’s accept your idea and take a good look at it from every angle. Richard left. The butler helped him pack. The staff was being sacked anyway, so Gunn secured a good position at Mespring by pinching their ruby and taking it back to them. Richard wrote from Lisbon before he died there. To cover up his death until the question of the ruby was too far back in time to be easily answered, someone – one of the Annandales, I presume – had friends who were travelling send back more letters to Ottoline to make her believe her husband was still alive. And they organised burglars to come and pretend to search for the jewel.’
‘Tell me what’s wrong with any of that!’ Alec said. ‘Except for the nitpicking point about handwriting. And anyway, I bet Richard went to the same prep school and public school as Annandale and was taught to write by the same masters. There’ll be nothing in it between their two hands.’
‘Annandale?’ I said. ‘Lord Annandale, you mean? You think he was behind all of this?’
‘Who else?’ Alec said.
‘It strikes me as a woman’s crime,’ I told him. ‘Domestic in scale, concerned with baubles, not to mention scandals. I’d be very surprised to find a man behind it, if I’m honest.’
Alec, reluctant to let go of his brilliant idea and needing Lord Annandale’s masculine penmanship to make it hold together, saw off my hunch with no more than a desultory wave of his pipe hand and so, as we set to, trying to think how to prove it, we left my hunch behind.
16
‘Minnie,’ I called, as she shot across my field of view minutes later, this time with an armful of cushions so high they almost obscured her face and put her in real danger of tripping over the dog at her heels. She could not possibly see where she was going. ‘Minnie, I need a quick word but let me help you.’
‘Oh, thank you,’ she said, dropping the lot on the passage floor and kicking some towards me. ‘I told myself if I tripped I’d have a soft landing, but yes please, Dan
dy. You take half.’
‘Where are we taking them?’
‘The chapel,’ Minnie said. ‘We’re going to have the lectures in there. It’s quite plain and there are no saints or anything so with luck the attendees will think it’s a schoolroom.’
‘Why are—?’
But Minnie was at that pitch of busyness and preparedness where she could not listen to an unnecessary word and she cut across me.
‘Between the teas, the need for the Americans to have a quiet sitting room to get away from the day-trippers and the need for Ottoline to have a quiet sitting room to get away from the Americans, this is the only place left. But the pews are torture so I’m grabbing cushions from everywhere and squashing pillows into cushion covers too, hoping no one notices.’
I had picked up the five or so that she had kicked towards me and we set off.
‘What I wanted to ask was if you had a telephone in a quiet room where I would be unlikely to be disturbed. Or rather to bother anyone.’
‘Only one phone,’ Minnie said. ‘And it’s in Bluey’s book room, where we’ve stuffed the ladies to get them away from the hurly-burly. But they won’t mind. Is it anything they shouldn’t overhear?’
Just, I thought, me telephoning the embassy in Portugal to ask about suspicious deaths thirty years ago. ‘How is Mrs Rynsburger after her ordeal?’ I said.
‘Oh in great spirits,’ said Minnie. ‘They’ve decided they would have been disappointed without a ghost. They rather suspect me of laying it on for them.’
‘You didn’t, did you?’ I asked, then I laughed to show I was joking as she gave me an old-fashioned look. ‘Well, in that case, I do want to ask about the keys in Pugh’s pantry and in Bluey’s room. Have they always been there, exactly where they are now? If someone came back who hadn’t been in the house for decades could he lay his hands on them?’
‘Back?’ said Minnie. We were at what I guessed to be the chapel door, an arched affair with no lock, I noticed, keys being on my mind. Minnie opened it simply by turning round and leaning against it, since her arms were full. ‘You think my father-in-law has come back? You actually think he might still be alive?’
Dandy Gilver and a Spot of Toil and Trouble Page 19