To Bridget’s astonishment there was instant compliance, and her party showed an unexpected interest in the tiny chapel and the Elizabethan beds and hangings. Only one more river to cross, she thought thankfully, as they arrived in the miniatures room at last. Here, too, everything went well. The hidden catch releasing the sliding panel over the entrance to the priest’s hole worked easily, and Charles II’s gift to Henrietta Tirle exercised its usual fascination. After several unobtrusive glances at her watch the moment came at which she felt justified in making a start for the ground floor.
“The house will be closing in ten minutes,” she announced, trying to be audible above the babble, “but the grounds are open until six o’clock if you care to walk round the gardens and try the maze.”
“Oh my! Suppose we can’t get out again?” enquired an anxious voice.
There was general laughter in which Bridget joined, and she was reassuring as she led the chattering crowd down the staircase and out into the courtyard. Here she indicated the way to the shop and the tea room, answered a few questions including a timid one about toilets, and after receiving some rather incoherent thanks stood watching a rapid dispersal through the north gate. With a sigh of relief she turned back into the house, and stood listening in the screens passage. After the tramping of feet and buzz of conversation the silence was balm. In a moment the half-hour would chime, and there would be the reassuring sound of Emmett shutting the gate, the first stage in the nightly return of peace and security.
The chimes rang out, faintly melancholy, and were followed in a matter of seconds by two heavy thuds as the big double gates were pushed home and bolted. Immediately after came the purposeful step of Bill Emmett crossing the courtyard on his way to secure the front door and the public rooms.
“Evening, m’lady,” he said, catching sight of Bridget. “Proper crowd it’s bin this afternoon. More like August than July, wouldn’t you say?”
Bridget agreed. “By the way,” she told him, “we may be rather late getting back tonight. We’re dining over at Fulminster.”
“Very good, m’lady. I’ll take a turn with the dog last thing, just to have a look round.”
CHAPTER THREE
Sometimes privileged persons were shown around Brent when the house was officially closed. They were usually invited by Giles Tirle, and were specialists in some field of architecture or art, but now and again a friend would ask leave to bring an interested guest. A fixture of this kind had been made for the following morning. A near neighbour, Sir James Mallaby, and an American senator and his wife who were staying with him were lunching with the Setons after a tour of the house.
The guests arrived just before eleven. Kurt Lessinger was tall, gaunt and clinically clean-looking, and his wife Saidie, a typically smart and purposeful American woman, both in their fifties. After the introductions Sir James begged himself off the tour.
“I’ve simply got to get advice from Arminel,” he explained. “An extraordinary blight has started up on some of my apple trees. No, don’t bother, Roger. I’ll soon run her to earth.”
“It’s vurry, vurry good of you to let us take up your valuable time, Lord Seton,” Kurt Lessinger said as his host departed. “My wife and I count in a vurry great privilege to visit you and Lady Seton in your historic home.” He beamed as his admiring gaze comprehended Bridget and the Elizabethan facade.
“We’re both delighted to have this opportunity of meeting you,” she told him. “My husband’s going to take you round: he knows far more about Brent than I do, and then well all meet again for drinks before lunch. Don’t lose all count of time, will you, Roger?”
It soon became clear to Lord Seton that the Lessingers were not merely enthusiastic, but unusually well-informed. An hour slipped away agreeably, almost unnoticed. Suddenly surfacing, he realised that he must speed things up.
“I particularly want you to see the miniatures,” he said, tactfully prising them out of a bedroom with interesting tapestries. “It’s quite a good collection. It used to be in the library, which was a better setting, but we moved it up here when we opened the house, for greater security.”
“Don’t you live in dread of burglaries with all these marvellous heirlooms around, Lord Seton?” asked Mrs. Lessinger.
“Security’s a bit of a headache, certainly,” he admitted. “Country house robberies are getting much too popular with the criminal classes. But you can’t hope to make a place like this completely burglar-proof. We just take all possible precautions, and hope for the best.”
“Do you have a night-watchman?” Kurt Lessinger enquired.
“No, we don’t, actually. We’ve got some valuable stuff here, but not on the scale of the great houses, of course. And a factor which weighs with our insurance company is that quite a few people live in various parts of the house — there are four different households, in fact.”
“All the same, I guess I’d be hearing noises all the night through,” Mrs. Lessinger said, as she went through a door held open for her by Lord Seton. “Is this where you have the love token King Charles II gave your lady ancestor?”
“It is. Over here, in this showcase, with a compromising note from His Majesty. History doesn’t relate her husband’s reactions — if he knew anything about it, that is.”
Fascinated, the Lessingers pored over this and other exhibits.
“Wal, Lord Seton,” Kurt said, straightening up, “I’ll say that guide book of yours is just one long British understatement. Why, if we had a house like yours back in the States… And didn’t I read about a priest’s hiding hole dating back to the first Queen Elizabeth?”
“You did. It’s built within the fifteenth-century outer wall, which is very thick. The entrance is behind a sliding panel, released by a spring hidden in the carving.”
He led the way across the room, explaining that a steep flight of steps led down to a little chamber measuring about five feet by four.
“If you could just go down to one knee here, Mrs. Lessinger,” he said, “I’ll press, and you’ll find you can shift the panel to the left, across the window recess, and look right down. We’ve fixed a light to come on automatically.”
“Now, if this isn’t just too cute,” she exclaimed, taking up her position.
There was a faint click, and the panel moved easily. Saidie Lessinger leant forward with keen interest. She remained immobile without speaking, and then stood up abruptly, a startled expression on her face.
“I’ll say it’s lifelike,” she said a little shakily. “But why do you have the figure in modern dress?”
The two men stared at her.
“Just one moment…” Lord Seton took a swift step forward and dropped on to his knees. Withdrawing his head again, his eyes encountered Kurt Lessinger’s. “I’m afraid there’s been an accident,” he said.
Lord Seton’s opinion of his guests rose further as he hastily escorted them to the private wing. Although badly shocked Mrs. Lessinger was controlled, and her husband only anxious to be of some use.
“Can the poor guy possibly be alive?” he asked.
“I think it’s out of the question,” Lord Seton replied. “You see, he must have been lying there since the house closed at half-past five yesterday afternoon… I can only say how appalled I am that Mrs. Lessinger and yourself have run into this situation… No, I insist on your staying to lunch with my wife, even if I’m tied up with the police, who’ll have to be notified at once.”
Against worrying background thoughts of legal liability and insurance cover, the prospect of having to close for the afternoon, he handed the Lessingers over to his wife with a brief explanation. Her horrified expression startled him, but she quickly recovered herself and concentrated on the visitors. Leaving them with her he hurried back to the miniatures room. Another look into the priest’s hole convinced him that the man was dead, but he decided that he must make sure before taking further steps. He took off his coat, backed into the narrow opening, and descended as if on a la
dder. At the bottom it was difficult to find a foothold without actually standing on the huddled body, but he managed to turn round, and leant forward to investigate.
A few moments later he re-emerged, his face set. Mechanically dusting down his trousers and putting on his coat, he stood staring unseeingly at his dirty hands, his mind moving rapidly. Then he turned quickly and went out of the room, locking the door and pocketing the key. Downstairs in his office he made the first 999 call of his life, and asked for Police.
“Crockmouth Police Headquarters,” came a voice in a matter of seconds.
‘Lord Seton, speaking from Brent,” he said calmly. “We’ve just found a man in our priest’s hole. He’s dead, and it looks as though his neck’s broken.”
“We’ll be over right away, my lord,” replied the voice, a trace of excitement discernible in the stock response.
Replacing the receiver, Lord Seton took up the house telephone. “Roger here,” he said when Felicity Tirle answered. “Come down to the office, will you? It’s urgent.”
He heard a sharp intake of breath before she answered that she would come at once and immediately rang off.
As he returned from hastily washing his hands they met in the passage. In response to the anxious enquiry in her face he indicated the communicating door into the secretary’s office. “Peggy’s got to be in on it, too,” he said, striding across the room.
As they came in Peggy Blackmore got up quickly, looking surprised.
“Something extremely serious has happened,” he told them both bluntly. “A dead man has been found down the priest’s hole. I think he’s broken his neck.”
The two women stared at him, speechless.
“I’ve rung the police,” he went on, “and they’ll be here in about ten minutes. Obviously we shall have to close this afternoon, and the immediate problem is the best way to set about it. What parties have booked?”
Peggy Blackmore gave a quick glance at Felicity, who seemed bereft of speech, and consulted a diary on her desk. “Three coaches from a distance,” she said. “They’d be difficult to contact as late as this. And one Blennerhasset.”
“I suggest we leave well alone until the police come,” Felicity said, abruptly coming to life. “We could ask them to put a man at the visitors’ entrance to answer questions and cope with the Press. We shall have newsmen swarming all over the place if we aren’t careful. They’ll soon start ringing up, anyway.”
“If the telephones were all switched through to me,” put in Peggy Blackmore, “I could give a stock answer to everybody.”
“I doubt if the Press can be fobbed off as easily as that,” said Lord Seton grimly. “Still, it’s a sound idea. I’ll ask the police to draft a bare statement, and you could say it was official. With any luck they’ll send Inspector Diplock. He’s a decent co-operative sort of chap. I absolutely agree that the more we all keep out of it the better.”
Felicity looked relieved. “But what about our own people this afternoon? Tea room staff, and guides and Emmett, for instance?”
“Better not to say anything until we know how much disruption we’re in for. If we can tell them everything will be back to normal tomorrow they won’t get so rattled. Good God, I’d forgotten Arminel for the moment. Will you find her, and tell her what’s happened? And by the way, who took the last party round yesterday? I could see a camera by the body, so it seems fairly obvious that the man came in as a visitor, and managed to slope off.”
“Lady Seton and Jane Willis,” Felicity said unwillingly.
Dr. Ross, the police surgeon, was a big man with formidably bushy eyebrows. He extricated himself from the opening in the panelling with difficulty, dusty and red in the face. His expression suggested that but for Lord Seton’s presence he would have commented uninhibitedly.
“The man’s dead all right,” he said tersely. “Broken neck, but I’m not committing myself about the cause of death until I’ve had a proper look at him. It’s impossible down there.”
“Can you give an approximate idea of the time of death?” asked Inspector Diplock.
Dr. Ross scowled at him. “Hardly a reasonable question under the circumstances, I should have thought. Rigor’s just beginning to go off, but how can I tell what the conditions are like in that place? Certainly not less than six hours ago, and Lord Seton’s told us that the body couldn’t have been there before the last lot of visitors had a look, at about five-fifteen yesterday afternoon. See here, you’re going to have quite a job getting him up. I suggest I go home to my lunch and my afternoon surgery, and come back in a couple of hours. There’s no point in my hanging around here.”
“All right,” agreed the Inspector. “Only don’t make it longer than a couple of hours. We’ll have taken some photographs and got him up for you by then.”
With a brief bow to Lord Seton, Dr. Ross made for the door, which was opened for him by a constable standing unobtrusively in the background.
“I’d be glad of the use of a telephone, my lord,” Inspector Diplock said, glancing thoughtfully round the room. “We shall have to bring in reinforcements. Perhaps while I’m contacting the Super, you would make arrangements for closing to the public this afternoon? I’m sorry, but you’ll understand that it’s unavoidable, the way things are.”
Roger Seton led the way, suppressing his annoyance at the feeling of being under authority in his own house.
Inspector Diplock’s reinforcements were considerable. By mid-afternoon the forecourt of Brent contained a whole assortment of official vehicles, including a mortuary van. At intervals Lord Seton flung down The Times and went over to the drawing-room window to survey the scene. “What the hell are they doing all this time?” he demanded at last.
Felicity Tirle, sprawled in an armchair, lit another cigarette and drew on it deeply. “Getting the body up must be tricky,” she remarked. “And I should think they took a lot of photographs for the coroner first, with somebody hanging on to the photographer’s heels.”
Lady Seton, a taut figure with head bent over her embroidery, gave a small shudder of distaste. Since the departure of Sir James Mallaby and the Lessingers after brief interviews with Inspector Diplock, she had said little, beyond insisting that her incompetence as a guide was entirely responsible for the disaster. Attempts by the others to challenge this conclusion had availed nothing. Returning to his chair, her husband sat looking at her unhappily for a few moments, before recovering The Times from the floor and crackling its pages impatiently.
An unmistakable sense of the police having taken over dominated the house. The main gate had been locked, and a stolid constable stood at the visitors’ entrance, confronting a growing crowd of disappointed tourists and curious villagers. In the house itself, the tension of its normal inhabitants expressed itself in various ways. Peggy Blackmore made valiant efforts to get on with her work, distracted by nervous dread of the next telephone call. Incredibly, the news of the dramatic discovery of the body had already reached the London offices of the national newspapers, and she was finding it increasingly difficult to parry the fire of leading questions. She suddenly broke into a sweat at the thought of the next morning’s headlines, and ripped a letter containing several mistakes from her typewriter. As she did so, the telephone rang…
Bill Emmett, looking worried, kept making pointless sorties from the caretaker’s quarters. His normal routine suspended, he seemed completely at a loss.
“Settle to something, for pity’s sake,” said his wife, who was doing some mending. “What’s happened’s no fault of yours. “’Tisn’t as though you’re an X-ray, to see what’s going on through stone walls.”
“’Tisn’t that, as you know very well,” he retorted. “It’s what’s bound to come out, once the police get to askin’ questions. How much longer’s Rosalie goin’ to be over to the tea room kitchen?”
“Till all the jam’s made. Lady A’s not having the day’s soft fruit for the shop wasted, just because there’s no visitors. Never wastes nothi
ng — not her time, neither. She’s stocktaking. The others is sitting round in the drawing room, Mrs. Pringle says.”
Muttering something about his workshop, Bill Emmett went out once more. As he came through the gate he distracted Lady Arminel, who lost count of her reserve of souvenir tea towels as she watched him.
At four o’clock precisely a macabre resurrection took place in the miniatures room. Sergeant Green and Constable Forbes mopped their brows triumphantly, and Inspector Diplock heaved a sigh of relief.
“You nip down and bring up the camera, and anything else that’s down there, Forbes,” he ordered. “Now then, doctor, we’ll get him on to the stretcher for you.”
Dr. Ross, disgruntled by the ban on smoking, advanced on the body without enthusiasm. Everything, the Inspector reflected with some satisfaction, had really gone according to plan. As soon as the doctor had made his preliminary examination they’d see if the chap’s name was on him, and then the body would go off to the mortuary, and Lord Seton would be told that he could open as usual tomorrow.
There was a purposeful step in the passage, and Inspector Diplock swung round indignantly, to find himself confronting Major Egerton, the Chief Constable.
“Afternoon, Diplock. Afternoon, Ross,” announced the new arrival, with a nod to other ranks present. “I chanced to drop in a Crockmouth, and heard about this rum business. Bit of a job getting him up, eh?”
Inspector Diplock, torn between disappointment at not being left to cope on his own, and relief at the appearance of a superior, began to enumerate the steps he had taken. “Before we moved him, sir, we —”
He was interrupted by a muffled booming which seemed to come from the bowels of the earth.
“Good grief, what’s that?” demanded Major Egerton.
“Constable Forbes, sir,” replied the Inspector, chagrined by the ludicrous effect produced by one of his men. “I sent him down to bring up a camera.” He strode across the room. “Can’t hear a word you’re saying, Forbes,” he called down with asperity. “Come up and make a proper report if it’s necessary… What? Well, pass up one thing at a time then, can’t you?”
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