by T E Kinsey
I was only catching some of the tales, though, now that Maude, enlivened by the food and cider, was regaling me with tales of her own. Life below stairs at The Grange was a great deal more interesting than I remembered from the day I spent there and we were chuckling together as we plotted the downfall of the bullying cook, Mrs Brown, when the end of one of Lady Farley-Stroud’s stories brought us both up short.
‘…and so she just dived straight out the window. Still stark naked, of course.’
I nearly spat out my pie.
By the time we’d finished our enormous meals and a second cider each, we were full and sleepy and the walk to the car, though thankfully still rain-free, was a sluggish and slightly giggly affair.
Bert was asleep when we reached the motorcar and all but jumped out through the roof when Lady Farley-Stroud rapped sharply on the window. He hurried to let us all in and then drove us all back to Littleton Cotterrel with the sedate care demanded by his mistress.
We said our goodbyes and waved them off on their way up the hill to The Grange, and then went into the house where, still too full to move, Lady Hardcastle collapsed into an armchair in the drawing room while I put the kettle on.
Now that Lady Hardcastle was emerging from her winter-long funk and the days were beginning to get longer, life seemed altogether brighter again. In the week that followed our surprisingly entertaining market day adventure, we walked every morning and our conversations turned increasingly towards plans for the future and away from anxious analysis of the past. Birds were building nests, unidentifiable plants were poking blade-like leaves up through the soil, and spring was most definitely in the air.
‘They’re daffodils, pet,’ said Lady Hardcastle as I pointed out some of the unknown greenery. ‘They’re your country’s national flower. Surely you can tell a daffodil.’
‘Could be a tulip,’ I said, slightly sulkily. ‘Or a hyacinth. Bluebells. Crocus.’
‘Well, it isn’t. It’s a daffodil.’
We walked on.
‘I got a letter from George yesterday,’ she said.
‘Did you, my lady?’ I said. ‘Is he well?’
Colonel George Dawlish was an old friend whom we had met the previous summer when the circus he was managing had visited the village. There were “murders and mayhem” as the press had put it, but he had left in good spirits with the circus in fine shape, despite the carnage.
‘Very well indeed, it seems,’ she said. ‘I told you he was thinking about buying the circus?’
‘You did, my lady.’
‘He tells me that the sale has been completed and that he’s now the proud owner of Bradley & Stoke’s Circus.’
‘Oh, how wonderful,’ I said. ‘He’s keeping the name?’
‘He’s not sure. He says that the name was part of the sale and he thinks “Dawlish’s” is too difficult to say, so he might well hang on to it.’
‘Does this mean we get free tickets?’ I asked. I have always been inordinately fond of circuses.
‘I should bally well hope so,’ she said. ‘I’ll have stern words for the boy if we don’t.’
‘Can you ask him for his schedule? Please?’
She laughed. ‘I shall see what I can do. If he’s visiting anywhere nice, perhaps we could arrange to spend a few days nearby.’
‘Thank you, my lady,’ I said.
‘Speaking of visits, I wonder if Gertrude would like to come over for lunch.’
‘Would you like me to take a note up to The Grange, my lady?’ I said.
‘No, let’s think about it,’ she said. And then, after a pause, she continued, ‘Actually, yes, I really rather think I would. I never quite knew what to make of her when we first met her, but over these past few months she’s been comfortingly… what’s the female version of “avuncular”? Avunculus and… amita? Amitular? No, that can’t be right. I always was a duffer at Latin. But anyway, she’s been perfectly lovely and I should like to repay her kindness.’
‘Very well, my lady, you draft the perfect note and I shall carry it bravely up the hill.’
‘You’re a little trooper. But not today, I think – it’s Thursday.’
‘Can we not write perfect notes on a Thursday, my lady?’ I said.
‘I shall have you know that I can craft the perfect note for any occasion upon any day of the week, but Thursday is market day so she’ll not be at home. But tomorrow, definitely.’
‘Very well, my lady, I shall brush my best hat in preparation.’
‘You would wear your best hat to deliver a note, but not to take the air with your mistress?’ she said, haughtily.
‘Certainly not,’ I said. ‘Why would I waste my best hat on an old trout like you? Lady Farley-Stroud, on the other hand, is a proper lady.’
‘In very many ways,’ she said thoughtfully, ‘I really rather think she is.’
We reached home just as the postman was walking back down the path and exchanged cheery “good morning”s while I unlocked the door. The “country way”, we had been told many times, was to leave doors unlocked but after more than a decade of a life spent poking at the unpleasant things living under the nastier of life’s rocks, a locked door had become an unbreakable habit.
I picked up the letters from the mat and made way for Lady Hardcastle to come in and remove her hat and coat.
‘It’s quite the week for keeping in touch,’ I said handing over the letters. ‘I believe one of those is from Skins.’
‘The redoubtable Skins Maloney,’ she said, taking the letters with a smile of thanks. ‘Either bragging of the band’s continuing success or on the earhole for cash, I shouldn’t wonder.’
It seems our adventures of the previous summer had made quite an impression not only upon us, but upon the others involved. Skins was the drummer in the band who had become embroiled in the affair at The Grange and we had been following his progress after striking up a friendship one drunken, musical evening back at the house after everything had been wrapped up.
‘Ah,’ said Lady Hardcastle, reading the letter. ‘It’s all good news. Dates all over England, some in Paris… dah-de-dah… would we like to come and see them in London next month… oh, “and give my love to Flo”. Well, that’s all very nice. What do you think? A couple of days in London in April? We could call it a late birthday celebration for you – I haven’t forgotten it’s coming up. A night in a seedy club with the boys? Perhaps one of those silly shows you like?’
‘Silly shows, my lady? I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.’
‘What was that thing you and Harry dragged me to last year? “Whoops! Oh Crikey! I’ve Fallen in Love with the Flower Girl Again”? I love my brother dearly, but he’s got the most appalling taste in… well in most things, actually.’
‘You, my lady, are a frightful old snob,’ I said, and went to make a pot of tea.
The morning passed without further incident while Lady Hardcastle caught up with her correspondence and even tinkled a little at the piano – something she had not done very much since the shooting – and I got on with a few chores I’d been putting off. Lunch came and went and we were just deciding upon our plans for the evening when there was a ring at the doorbell.
I answered it to see an ashen Lady Farley-Stroud on the doorstep. I’d begun to think of her as a bit of a mischievous old lady with an ever-present glint in her eye, but the glint was gone, replaced by a look of panic and despair.
‘Oh, Armstrong,’ she said. ‘Thank goodness you’re here. Is Lady Hardcastle at home?’
‘She is, my lady. Please come in. You look like you could do with a sweet tea. Whatever’s the matter?’
She stepped in, looking curiously about at our somewhat Spartan decor. I took her hat and coat and conducted her through to the drawing room.
‘Who’s that at the door, pet?’ said Lady Hardcastle as I opened the door. ‘Oh, Gertie what a delight. Do come in, I was just–’
Lady Farley-Stroud fainted. I managed to get my shoulder un
der her arm to stop her from falling to the ground, but I was having trouble manhandling her towards a chair. Lady Hardcastle leapt up when she saw her guest falling, and winced visibly as the wound in her stomach gave a twinge.
We got the older lady into an armchair and she began to return to her senses.
‘I was just about to offer sweet tea, my lady,’ I said. ‘For the shock.’
‘Sweet tea be beggared,’ said Lady Hardcastle, firmly. ‘This lady needs brandy.’
‘Very good, my lady,’ I said, and went to fetch both.
I returned with a tray of tea, cognac and biscuits to find Lady Farley-Stroud returned to consciousness, but looking little better. Lady Hardcastle was fussing around her friend.
‘Here you are, dear,’ she said. ‘Flo’s brought some tea and brandy. Let’s get some of that down you and you can tell me all about it.’
Lady Farley-Stroud sipped at the proffered glass and began to look a little embarrassed.
‘So sorry, m’dear,’ she said. ‘Don’t know what came over me. Haven’t swooned since I was a girl. Feel very foolish.’
‘Nonsense, darling,’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘You look like you’ve had a terrible shock. Whatever’s the matter.’
‘Oh, Emily, it was terrible. Went to the market on my own. Left Denton behind – she’s been such a wet blanket lately, don’t know what’s got into her. Having lunch in the Hayrick, chatting to Mr Carmichael about the cattle he bought from us last week. Poor old chap was looking very ill but he said it was just a spring cold. He looked jaundiced to me, though, I’ve seen that before. So I took pity on the old chap and was just about to offer him a drink when he keeled over, face-down in his pie.’
‘Gracious,’ said Lady Hardcastle and I together.
‘They tried to revive him, but he was dead as a door knocker.’
‘Gracious,’ we said again.
‘We called the doctor and he said it looked like… like he’d been poisoned,’ said Lady Farley-Stroud as she fainted again, tipping the remains of the brandy over her dress.
We brought Lady Farley-Stroud round with some old smelling salts that I found at the back of Lady Hardcastle’s dressing table, and then let her sit quietly while I went to talk to Bert who was sitting outside in the motorcar. I asked him to drive up to The Grange to fetch Maude, and to stop off in the village on the way back and collect Dr Fitzsimmons.
Back inside, I freshened the tea while we waited for Bert to return. Lady Farley-Stroud was slowly restored to her usual self (I still maintain it was the tea and not the cognac which did the trick) and was soon admonishing us for making such an unseemly fuss. We were wary of distressing her again so we had to keep our curiosity in check, but it was a hellish task. How did they know it was poison? What sort of poison was it? When was it administered? Who could have done such a thing? Why would they do it?
By the time the doctor had examined her and given her into the care of her maid, I for one was definitely beginning to struggle to find things to say that weren’t connected to the sudden death of Spencer Carmichael. But we wished her well, promised to visit the next day, and sent them all on their way.
‘Things are definitely back to normal now,’ said Lady Hardcastle as we settled back in the drawing room to finish off the tea.
‘Murder and mischief, my lady?’ I said, brushing biscuit crumbs from my pinafore.
‘Mayhem and… and…’
‘Malarkey, my lady?’
‘Doesn’t have quite the same ring to it, does it, pet?’ she said.
‘Monkey business?’ I said.
‘You’re not helping, Flo,’ she said. ‘I think we shall have to settle for “misdemeanours”.’
‘Mucking about?’
‘Remember who protected you from the evil cows with her trusty walking stick, my girl,’ she said menacingly. ‘I might leave it at home the next time we face a terrifying bovine menace. But a mystery might be just what I need.’
‘Mystery, my lady.’
‘Yes, a mystery. Oh, I see what you mean. Yes. Mystery. Mayhem and mystery.’
We raised our tea cups. ‘To mayhem and mystery,’ I said.
The doorbell rang again.
‘Oh, who can this be?’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘I was just about to indulge in some wild and ill-informed speculation upon the murder of Spencer Carmichael and some inconsiderate soul comes ringing at the doorbell. Send them away with a flea in their ear for their impudence. Both ears, I say.’
The doorbell rang yet again.
‘Go!’ she said. ‘Be maid-like. Answer the blessed door.’
I went and answered the blessed door.
‘Ah, Miss Armstrong,’ said the bowler-hatted man on the doorstep. ‘Is your mistress at home?’
‘Inspector Sunderland,’ I said. ‘What a pleasant surprise. Please, do come in.’
‘Thank you, miss,’ said the inspector. We had been friends since the murder at The Grange, and although I had a strong suspicion that his call was not a social one, it was still a pleasure to see him.
I led him to the drawing room and showed him in.
‘Inspector Sunderland is here, my lady,’ I said, somewhat superfluously.
‘I can see that, pet,’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘Inspector. How delightful to see you. Do please come in and make yourself at home. Flo, I think we might need another pot. Tea, Inspector?’
‘That would be most welcome, my lady,’ he said. ‘I hear you’re up and about again.’
‘I am, yes. And quite relieved to be so. One can’t stay moping about forever,’ she said.
‘No indeed, my lady. But you were shot and left for dead, I think that might entitle you to a little moping.’
‘You’re very kind, Inspector darling,’ she said. She noticed I was still at the door. ‘Tea, dear. Quick sticks. The sooner you’re back, the sooner the inspector can tell us why he’s here.’
I hurried to the kitchen. I could hear them chatting in the other room, but I couldn’t quite make out what they were saying as I clattered about with the tea things. There were still a few biscuits left over from the batch I’d cooked that morning so I put those onto a plate and hurried back into the drawing room with the tray.
‘…with a grapefruit in his overcoat pocket,’ said Lady Hardcastle as I entered.
Inspector Sunderland chuckled. ‘You are a caution, my lady,’ he said. ‘Like a breath of fresh air you are. I must say it’s good to see you back to your old self.’
Inspector Sunderland was from Bristol CID and hadn’t endeared himself to us when we had first heard of him, having arrested entirely the wrong man in the matter of a hanging in the nearby woods. But we met him again after the tragedy at The Grange and came to know him, and to like him, a great deal better. He was a straightforward man who loved his work and treated us with a level of respect it was hard to find in the rest of the world. Of course, people respected Lady Hardcastle’s title, but usually only that. Inspector Oliver Sunderland valued her opinion, too. And mine for the matter of that.
‘Florence, dear,’ said Lady Hardcastle, ‘do sit down. You’re making the place look untidy.’
I sat in the other armchair.
‘Now then, Inspector, tell all,’ she said. ‘Would you think me altogether too grim if I were to confess that I do rather hope it’s to do with the murder of Spencer Carmichael?’
‘Well I never,’ said the inspector with another chuckle. ‘Am I to add clairvoyance to the list of your known talents?’
‘Oh pish and fiddlesticks,’ she said. ‘Gertie Farley-Stroud was here a little while ago, all at sixes and sevens and swooning like a mopsy in a penny dreadful. She told us everything. Well, everything she could manage between swigging my best brandy and passing out, at any rate.’
‘Ah, yes, I gathered she’d been there. So you have the gist of it, then?’
‘Farmer collapses in his pie, local sawbones suspects poison,’ she said. ‘That’s all we have.’
‘That’s the es
sence of it, certainly,’ said the inspector. ‘Local doctor… doctor…’ he consulted his ever-present notebook, ‘…oh, it doesn’t matter for now. Local chap, anyway. Old fellow, bit of a dodderer. He reckons it must be poison, but it’s not like any poison I’ve ever seen. There’s something not right there, I’m sure of it. I’ve sent the pie and the cider off to be analyzed anyway, though whether they’ll find anything, I don’t know.’
‘It’s absolutely charming of you to come all this way just to tell us,’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘I’m sorry Lady Farley-Stroud stole your thunder, but the thought is appreciated.’
‘Oh,’ he said. ‘I didn’t come over just to tell you, my lady. No, I’m sorry, I should have explained myself. You see, I’m rather tied up at the moment – we’re on the trail of a gang of bank thieves in the city – and I… well, I was going to ask you for your help with the pie-eyed farmer.’
‘Oh, Inspector, you absolute poppet,’ she said. ‘We were just saying how we could do with a mystery, weren’t we, Flo?’
‘You were saying it, my lady,’ I said. ‘I was merely mocking your stumbling attempts to remember the word “mystery”.’
‘You see what I have to endure, Inspector?’ she said. ‘Derided by a tiny Welsh mop-squeezer. Well, really. I ask you. Is that right for a woman of my station and distinction?’
‘It seems most inappropriate, my lady,’ he said. ‘I could have a couple of the lads run her down the station, if you like. A night in the cells might teach her some manners.’ He winked at me.
‘You could try, dear,’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘But they’d only get hurt. And who would make my breakfast?’
‘As you wish, my lady,’ he said. ‘But will you both help? I need someone I can trust to make the right enquiries while we’re busy trying to stop these lads from tunnelling under Corn Street, or whatever it is they have in mind this time. Someone with natural detective skills and a nose for crime solving.’
‘You know I’m going to agree anyway, Inspector; you can drop the soft soap.’
‘It’s no mere flattery, my lady. You might be undisciplined, untutored and prone to wild flights of whimsical speculation, but blow me if you don’t end up at the solution anyway. The pair of you have proved yourselves more than once round these parts. And after last autumn’s shenanigans I’ve a pretty shrewd idea that you’re no mere effete socialite and her timid lady’s maid, either. One hears things down at HQ. Probably things one isn’t supposed to hear. But I’ve pieced a few things together and I’d be honoured to have ladies such as you on my side.’