The Unpleasantness at Baskerville Hall (Reeves & Worcester Steampunk Mysteries Book 4)
Page 6
“Pasco must have,” said Henry. “That’s why he was killed.”
“But why lop off his head and hands?” I said. “Seems rummy to me. Why would a convict try to hide Pasco’s identity?”
“Dartmoor’s a notorious prison, Roderick,” said Sir Robert. “All the worst kinds of murderers are sent there. Chopping heads and hands off his victims is probably second nature to this villain.”
Sir Robert had a point.
“That’s true,” I said. “Consulting detectives call it modus operandi. Every murderer has one, don’t they Reeves.”
“So it is widely held, sir. Murderers are creatures of habit. Once they find a method that suits, they are loathe to try another.”
“There you are then,” said Henry. “This convict is an assassin used to tidying up after himself. All the more reason for him to be long gone from here.”
“Do you think the ghost was prophesying Pasco’s death?” asked Lily.
“I don’t think there was a ghost, Emmeline,” said Sir Robert. “I’ve talked with Henry about this, and we’re certain it was a servant’s prank. One of the younger ones. I imagine they are feeling much chastened by subsequent events, and I’m sure we will not see a reoccurrence. Best to put the matter behind us.”
“Well,” said Henry, rubbing his hands. “Tempus fugit. Let’s get changed and meet back here in ... thirty minutes? It’s a sunny day, and we have an important scene to shoot. Don’t want to waste the light.”
“Are you sure we’ll be safe?” asked Lily.
“Positive,” he said. “But I’ll take a shotgun along with us just in case.”
~
Sir Robert and all the houseguests, with the exception of Emmeline and myself, left for the quarry.
“Are you sure you won’t join us, Roderick? Lily? I can find parts for both of you,” said Henry before leaving.
“Maybe later,” I said. “I’d like to do a little sleuthing first. See if I can find Pasco’s head.”
“And I’m going to do a little sketching,” lied Emmeline extremely convincingly. “The Hall looks quite magnificent with the early morning sun upon it.”
Now all we had to do was steer clear of Lady Julia and we’d have the entire crime scene to ourselves!
“Time, I think, to learn more about this Pasco,” I said. “Where was he last night, and who saw him last?”
Eight
set off across the lawn in search of Trelawny, the gardener. Emmeline and I were better attired this time — in tweeds and walking shoes. I’d favoured a bold red tartan sock myself, but Reeves was adamant that an understated pastel was more suitable sleuthing attire.
We found Trelawny in the walled garden. He was a short, wiry individual with a weather-beaten face and a worrying shortage of teeth. I rather thought he had the look of a man who’d been aged for twelve years in an oak cask. He told us he was in the middle of forcing rhubarb. To do what, he didn’t say, and I thought it best not to enquire.
“Did you see or hear anything unusual last night?” I asked, getting right down to it.
“Only the storm, Mister Roderick. ’Twas a howlin’ an’ a thunderin’ all night.”
On to the next question. “What about Pasco? When was the last time you saw him?”
“That’d be sunset. We always stop work at sunset. I goes to me cottage, and Pasco ’e goes to the ol’ stable block for ’is steam. ’E’s a machine, you know? Sir Robert put a boiler in the ol’ stable block last year when ’e bought Pasco ’an Silas.”
“Silas?” I asked.
“’E’s another one of they machines. A right fancy one ’an all. ’E’s over the back now, mowing the lawn ... with his feet.”
Trelawny laughed to himself, a cackling wheezy kind of laugh.
“He’s one of the newer gardening models,” said Emmeline. “I thought I was seeing things when I first saw him. I asked Henry about him. He has all these attachments. Silas, that is, not Henry. He has these pronged cutters on his feet for mowing the lawn, and the same on his hands for trimming hedges.”
“Oo arr,” said Trelawny. “’E’s got boots for ploughin’ too, an’ for sowin’, an’ ’ands that can saw logs. Got ’tachments for everythin’.”
“So,” I said. “Where would Pasco have gone after he’d brought himself back up to pressure?”
“Nowhere,” said Trelawny. “That’s where ’e spends the night. ’Im an’ Silas together.”
I looked at Reeves. Had Pasco been in the old stable block when Reeves had been there this morning? Reeves raised an eyebrow. Whether one eyebrow signified ‘yes’ or a surge of activity in his steam-powered grey cells, I had no idea.
“Does anyone else sleep in the old stable block?” I asked Trelawny.
“No. Tom an’ Jethro sleep over the new stables. Dan an’ Jimmy sleep up at the quarry these days.”
“Right ho,” I said. “Thank you for your time, Trelawny. We’ll beetle off and have a word with Silas.”
“You can try, Master Roderick, but you won’t get no sense out of ’im. You can tell ’im what to do, but that’s it. ’E’s not one of they clever machines like Pasco. ’E just does what ’e’s told.”
“I believe I am familiar with the model, sir,” said Reeves. “It’s more of an intelligent tool than an automaton.”
“Not much of a conversationalist then?” I said.
“No, sir.”
~
“Well, Reeves?” I asked as soon as we’d moved out of earshot. “Were Pasco and Silas in the old stable block when you were there this morning?”
“Silas was, sir, but Pasco was not.”
“So, Pasco was probably killed sometime between sunset and four.”
“That would be my assumption, sir.”
“What about this Silas, Reeves? Did he look worried? Wave a saw at you and point tremulously at the woodshed?”
“No, sir. The model in question does not communicate. It does not even have a head. It is designed to work, not to resemble a human.”
“What about its attachments?” asked Emmeline. “Did it have any unusual ones? Like revolving axes? I’ve heard Henry and Sir Robert say that Stapleford’s a marvel with machines. He’s always coming up with new ways to modify automata for their moving pictures.”
“I did not notice anything unusual, miss.”
I wanted to have a look at this Silas myself. We followed the rattling sound to the back lawn where we found him mowing. It was fascinating, and not a little disturbing, to see him shuffling across the sward sending a shower of cut grass streaming in his wake. I’d never seen such sharp toenails.
“How does he do it, Reeves? Surely no blade could be that sharp.”
“I believe it is what is called a finger bar mower, sir. A steam-powered sickle bar is driven back and forth across a stationary finger bar, and the grass is cut between the blades.”
I watched mesmerised. Silas was the size of a child — a rather squat, headless child with large feet and hands. And a large single eye on a flexible stalk.
“Could he wield an axe, do you think?” I asked.
“Not with sufficient force to sever Pasco’s head, sir. This model is essentially a slow one, built for strength and dexterity. With a grasping mechanism attached it can lift heavy weights and open gates, but the arm lacks the speed to swing an axe with deadly force. Besides, the hedge-trimming attachment is more than capable of amputating a head. The wound on Pasco, however, would have been very different.”
I decided to visit the old stable block next. Had the killer stumbled into the old stable block looking for shelter, found Pasco and killed him? Or had Pasco heard a noise and ventured out? If there’d been a struggle on the soft ground there could be traces.
We quartered the area between the old stable block and the woodshed. There was plenty of evidence of the two dozen feet that had visited the woodshed after breakfast, but no obvious signs of a struggle. And there was a flagstone path between the stables and the shed.
Nothing.
“If the killer was this convict,” I said. “It might explain why Pasco was debagged. A man in a striped uniform is going to attract attention. He’d get a lot farther with new clothes.”
“So there should be a pile of prison clothes somewhere,” said Emmeline.
“Exactly,” I said. “I haven’t seen any. Have you?”
“No,” said Emmeline. “He couldn’t have burnt them — not with the rain last night. He might have buried them though.”
Reeves coughed. “There is a furnace that heats the copper boiler, miss.”
I looked at Reeves in awe. I may have the occasional issue with his eyebrows, but the man’s brain was immense.
We returned at speed to the old stable block and stood back while Reeves opened the furnace door.
“Any sign of a stripe?” I asked.
Reeves raked the embers with a rather lethal looking poker.
“No, sir. It is possible that the cloth has been completely incinerated. If Pasco was killed in the early hours of the night, there may have been time.”
Such is the detective’s lot. There are highs. There are lows. There are even times when one finds oneself wrestling orang-utans on dining room carpets. All one can do is dust off one’s brogues and press on.
I decided another look at the woodshed was called for.
“Do you know if they’ve moved the body?” I asked Reeves.
“I overheard Berrymore say that Sir Robert had not given him any instructions on the matter, sir. And that Pasco was to remain where he was until Sir Robert returned.”
“Ah, well, brace yourselves then. You don’t have to come in, Emmie.”
“Nonsense,” she said. “I saw it all earlier.”
Well, I certainly braced myself. A naked under gardener was disconcerting at the best of times, and this would be my second viewing on an empty stomach.
I opened the door, and peered in.
Pasco had gone.
Nine
looked at the log pile we’d moved earlier.
“He’s not been buried again, has he?” I said.
The three of us began moving the log pile, one log at a time, back to its original position. As soon as we reached the bottom layer we knew the answer. Pasco was not there.
“He was dead, wasn’t he?” I asked.
“He was certainly not operational, sir, neither could he have been repaired this quickly. He’d require new turbines, or a new torso. He’d also require his head reattached, and at least thirty minutes on the steam outlet.”
“Why would someone move him?” asked Emmeline. “We’ve already seen him.”
I may not have had my kipper breakfast, but my little grey cells were in mid-season form. “I see all,” I said.
“You do?” said Emmeline.
“Indubitably. That is the right word, isn’t it, Reeves?”
“I suspect so, sir.”
“Good. The killer has taken some risk in moving the body in broad daylight, therefore one can deduce that it is of vital importance.”
“Go on,” said Emmeline. “I adore it when you deduce.”
“So, although we thought we had seen all there was to see this morning, we were mistaken. There must be something about the body that we missed. And the killer has risked all to make sure that his, her — or, indeed, its — mistake was rectified.”
~
We sleuthed for another hour, checking all the outbuildings for any sign of Pasco.
“He couldn’t be in the Hall, could he?” I asked. “Is it possible to stroll through the servants’ entrance carrying a naked under gardener without attracting comment?”
“I would very much doubt it, sir.”
And I suspected it would be even harder to smuggle one through the main entrance. Claude ‘Cicely’ Sissinghurst had tried it once at the Sloths Club, and got nabbed in the back passage.
“Trelawny could have buried him in the garden,” said Emmeline. “That’s the only place I’ve seen where the soil looked disturbed.”
“I don’t think Trelawny’s the kind of chap who’d appreciate us digging up his prize carrots. A man who takes a firm hand with rhubarb is likely to cut up rough.”
“There is the mire, sir,” said Reeves. “If one is looking for a place to dispose of a body, the mire would suit admirably.
“Reeves, you are beyond compare,” I said.
“I think he gets brainier every day,” said Emmeline.
“What was it Stapleford said last night?” I asked. “Grimdark never gives up its dead?”
“His very words,” said Emmeline.
We all stood and looked toward the mire.
But, if Grimdark never gives up its dead, how were we going to find Pasco?
And then it came to me.
“There’ll be footprints,” I said. “If someone threw Pasco into the mire they’d have to walk through some pretty soft ground on the edge of the mire first. There’d be traces. We might even be able to get a grappling hook around the body and pull Pasco out.”
We ankled down the gravel drive and onto the raised causeway that was the track to Grimdark village. The great mire stretched out before us. It looked far more colourful in the sun that it had done yesterday. There were tussocks of yellows and bright greens, and a myriad of small pools of water — some of them gleaming in the sun, some as black as pitch.
And far in the distance was another light.
“Is that a fire?” I asked, pointing just below the horizon.
“It must be a large fire,” said Emmeline. “Is it in the mire or beyond?”
“It couldn’t be piskies, could it?” I said. “Our driver told us to beware of lights in the mire.”
“Piskies are a superstition, sir. That is a fire. A particularly large fire. Is the Quarrywood studio in that direction, miss?”
“No, the studio’s in the opposite direction,” said Emmeline. “That fire must be on the high moor. Henry says no one lives there. It’s desolate.”
For the next ten minutes we walked the mire’s edge — or as close to the edge as we dared venture (which wasn’t that close) — looking for footprints. Our attention wavered between the mire’s edge and that distant fire. What was it? A warning beacon to attract our attention? Or the convict drying out his clothes and trying to get warm?
“Over here!” cried Emmeline. “Footprints!”
I rushed over.
“Look,” she said. “There are lots of them, and they go right into the mire.”
I had hoped to find a distinguishable boot print — something one could trace back to its owner. But the ground went from spongy tussock to soft mud. Most of the prints were deep and the mud had slopped in from the sides leaving a series of vaguely boot-shaped holes stretching ten, twenty yards into the mire.
“It looks like a path,” said Emmeline. “Sir Robert said there were old paths across the mire, but none were safe as they shifted so.”
“I would not advise any attempt to follow the footprints, sir.”
“Don’t worry, Reeves,” I said. “Wild horses couldn’t drag me into that mire. Well, of course, they could, but I wouldn’t go willingly. And, thinking about it, if they were dragging me, wouldn’t they get mired first? They’d really have to push me and I don’t think wild horses are that good at pushing, do you, Reeves?”
“Quite, sir. I was wondering if you had noticed the gate on the other side of the track.”
I swung round. There was small wooden gate in the yew hedge opposite. It lined up perfectly with the path into the mire.
It was also, as we soon discovered, a well-used gate. The grass either side of the gate had been worn back to bare earth. There were dozens of imprints from all types and sizes o
f footwear.
We went through the gate into a partially wooded section of the grounds to the rear of the Hall. A path wound around a wooded slope and up towards the back lawn. The right hand edge of the path was bordered by a tall yew hedge. The left hand edge showed traces where a similar hedge had been, but there were only a handful of yew trees left and none of them had been trimmed for years.
I was baffled. Since the moment we’d arrived, everyone had told us how dangerous the mire was, and that no path was safe. And yet here was evidence of a well-trodden track between the Hall and the mire.
And at the other end of the track was a fire.
~
My stomach may have been rumbling but, for a consulting detective with the game afoot, that was a mere trifle.
“What’s the quickest way to that fire?” I asked Emmeline. “To the left or right of the mire?”
“I don’t know. I think this track bends round the north western edge of the mire, but I’m sure it stops at High Dudgeon Farm — that’s where Stapleford lives. I don’t know what the moor’s like after that. Stapleford says there are lots of small bogs all over the high moor.”
I preferred the idea of at least a part of our journey being along a navigable track.
“To the left it is then.”
We followed the track as it began its long arc around the mire’s edge. The moor on the left of the track rose and fell — rocky tors with the occasional stand of trees nestling in the valleys in between. On the right, the mire stretched out flat and treeless towards the higher moor on the horizon.
The fire still flickered and burned in the distance.
After half a mile, another path struck out from ours and headed towards a gap between two low hills on our left.
“That’ll be the track to the studio,” said Emmeline.
I half expected to see a zeppelin hovering over the distant horizon, but the sky was clear. There were no distant sounds either.
“How far is it to the studio?” I asked.
Emmeline shrugged. “I’ve never been there. I shouldn’t think it’s far.”
We pressed on. Our track was now heading east, and every step was bringing us closer to the mysterious fire.
“I wonder if it’s the killer burning evidence,” said Emmeline.