Vital Secrets

by Don Gutteridge

  But Marc could not take his eyes off Hilliard’s sabre. There was no doubt that it belonged to Rick: the initials RH were visible even through the gore smeared all over it. Had the killer dipped his hands in the victim’s blood? Surely the founting of it from the wound could not have reached the haft on its own.

  “I’m damned glad you and Cobb are here. That jackass Spooner roused me from a rare erotic dream to inform me that the governor was near apoplexy—again, I must add—over the murder of some prominent American by one of his officers in a den of iniquity. Spooner had orders, duly passed along to me, to keep this mess contained. What he didn’t know was that Frank panicked after visiting Government House and beetled on down to the police station and blabbed it all to Chief Constable Sturges, who had fallen asleep in his office.”

  “An’ that’s like disruptin’ a hibernatin’ bear,” Cobb said gleefully. “It was me who took the brunt of his temper when he come fer me, though Missus Cobb herself was just comin’ home from one of her customers an’ managed to keep him from poppin’ the buttons off his vest.”

  “Which blow killed Merriwether, then?” Marc asked, suddenly hoping that there might be some explanation other than the obvious.

  Withers gave the question careful thought before answering. “Well, it seems certain the blow to the back of the head stunned him, and he must have tried to stand up before collapsing onto his back right here where you see him. That blow alone would eventually have resulted in his death, but I am compelled to say honestly—and will have to testify so—that the sword to the chest was the immediate cause of death. I can say this with certainty because the heart was still pumping blood when the sword-blade cut the aorta. You can see the consequences for yourself. In fact, the sword is imbedded in the floor under the body.”

  “But why would anyone crush the man’s skull and then savagely drive a sword through him?”

  “That’s for you to discover, lad,” Withers said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Looks like the governor may have forgiven you your apostasy. Among the orders he issued to Lieutenant Spooner, who as we know will obey them to the letter no matter how repugnant to him personally, was that you are to lead the investigation. Spooner’s charge is to keep things contained until you catch the murderer.”

  “That explains why my colonel was involved.” Marc was trying to take in what he was seeing and being told, while still trying not to think the unthinkable. “But how could all this have been managed in such a short time? Major Jenkin and I left Rick here with Tessa Guildersleeve no later than eleven-thirty or so.”

  “Whatever provoked this carnage didn’t take long to develop because we know the precise time it took place,” Withers said. “The actor who found the body—”

  “The fella who played the country bumpkin—Beasley,” Cobb said.

  “Yes, Beasley. He heard the scream and came running in here at twelve-thirty, according to that clock in the corner.”

  “What scream?” Marc said.

  “Tell Marc what we think we know,” Withers said, getting up and moving over to Tessa’s bed. As Marc watched him, he noticed several things he had not observed before: droplets and smudges of blood were scattered on the carpet in an irregular trail from the feet of victim to the settee, where more blood was smeared, one patch of which appeared to resemble a handprint. Had the killer wallowed in Merriwether’s gore, then gone back and sat on the settee to admire his handiwork?

  “I’ve only had a chance to talk to Beasley, so we’ve got just his version of what happened,” Cobb said. “But I gotta say he’s the only one of that whole bunch who ain’t gone bear-serk on us. The women are squallin’ like heifers with their teats tied, an’ that fella Armstrong’s as drunk as a skunk. The mute seems fine, but he ain’t sayin’ much, of course.”

  “Beasley heard Tessa scream at twelve-thirty?”

  “Well, you’ll need to interro-grate ’em yerself, but what he told Sarge an’ me when we got here a while ago, was a woman’s scream woke him up, an’ by the time he got himself awake an’ figured out where the scream’d come from, he found Ensign Hilliard standin’ over the body with both hands wrapped ’round the handle of the sword.”

  “But what was Merriwether doing in Tessa’s room after midnight?”

  Here Cobb glanced beseechingly at Withers, who grimaced and said, “It gets worse, laddie. Hilliard was seen going into the girl’s room with her about eleven o’clock, laughing and carrying on like lovebirds.”

  “That’s right,” Marc said. “Owen Jenkin left him there shortly thereafter and we rode home together. But Rick had promised the major he would do nothing dishonourable and, in fact, would stay no more than half an hour for a single glass of sherry.”

  “And he may well have kept that promise,” Withers said solemnly. “We found Tessa comatose on the bed there, and it’s possible Hilliard may have dozed off. The room was quite dark when Beasley entered it with a candle in his hand, except for the little swath of moonlight coming through the window and that stub of candle beside the bed. Cobb and I speculate that Merriwether must have come in a bit later expecting Tessa to be alone, probably with evil intentions on his mind.”

  “That makes sense,” Marc said, thinking hard. “We spent yesterday afternoon watching the actors rehearse, and all three of us saw Merriwether make an improper gesture while carrying Tessa in his arms. And, I must admit frankly, she seemed to approve of the assault, though her guardian, Mrs. Thedford, did not.”

  “And if it was almost dark in here,” Cobb added, “he mightn’t’ve spotted Hilliard dozin’ on the settee an’ …”

  “And forced his attentions on the young lady,” Withers said as delicately as he could.

  “And you think Rick heard Tessa scream for help, woke up, grabbed the ashtray—”

  “Or the butt of his sword,” Withers said. “It’s smeared with blood, too, so we can’t be sure.”

  “In either case he smashed the villain on the back of the head to prevent his ravishing the girl,” Marc said with a rush. “Which means he was justified in his actions. Tessa did scream, did she not? That’s the critical point.”

  “Loud enough to wake Beasley up at the other end of the hall,” Cobb said.

  “But why not any of the others?”

  “That’s easy,” Cobb said. “Armstrong was pissed to the gills in his room. When Frank got up here shortly afterwards, he went in to check on him and the old sot couldn’t remember what country he was in.”

  “But Mrs. Thedford’s room is next to this one, a thin wall away.”

  “That’s so,” Cobb said, “but she was asleep in that little bedroom on the far side of her … whaddycallit—”

  “Her suite.”

  “—with wax plugs in her ears, accordin’ to Beasley, who woke her up,” Cobb finished.

  “And Jeremiah is deaf.”

  “An’ the other woman, the one who played the connivin’ mistress, was stayin’ downstairs with the Franks.”

  “So you figure Hilliard bashed Merriwether’s brains in, probably because he had been wakened suddenly, was confused, heard and saw a young woman he was desperately in love with being assaulted by a large stranger clad only in a nightshirt—remember, Merriwether was almost six feet tall and powerfully built—and simply reacted as any officer and gentleman would have in the circumstances?”

  “I wish that were so,” Withers said sadly. “Then there would be some hope for Hilliard. But when Beasley got here, no more than two or three minutes after the girl screamed, Hilliard was stooped over the blackguard about to pull his sword out of Merriwether’s chest. And that, in any court in the kingdom, is premeditated murder.”

  It was simply impossible for Marc to accept this version of events. Hilliard’s passion and romantic folly might account for the reflex action of defending his lady’s honour by any means within his reach. But then to have drawn his sabre and, looking down into the face of Tessa’s disabled assailant, raise it ab
ove his head with calm deliberation and drive it through Merriwether’s chest—well, that was something he was absolutely certain Rick Hilliard would never do. Not even in the heat of battle. The very thought of such an ignominious act was monstrous.

  “I figured at first,” Cobb said, “that maybe one person banged on the noggin and another put the sword in. But there wasn’t enough time. Beasley come runnin’ from the end of the hall where the stairs are, so nobody could’ve dashed in an’ done the stabbin’ an’ run back out again without Beasley seein’ him.”

  “And the girl couldn’t’ve done it,” Withers said. “Even if she was faking being unconscious, she isn’t strong enough to have driven that heavy sword into Merriwether, not even in a rage. Besides which, she would’ve been covered in blood.”

  “Like the ensign was,” Cobb felt obliged to add.

  “Well, I’m going to question Clarence Beasley very closely, you can be sure. We’ve only got his word for all this.”

  “It seems the mute was on the scene shortly as well,” Withers said. “And Hilliard, of course.”

  “Has Rick said anything about this? Surely he’s denied it.”

  Withers fielded that query with reluctance. “He’s said very little. He’s fanatically worried about the girl, but I’ve given her a sleeping draught and put her into Madge Frank’s care for the night.”

  “He hasn’t admitted anything?”

  “All he says is that he fell asleep while he and the girl were sparking on the settee, and when he woke up he was standing over the corpse in the dark and wondering what had happened—when Beasley came in and found him.”

  “But surely he couldn’t have slept through a woman screaming rape and be uncertain whether he had hit Merriwether on the head, waited till he was flat on his back and then skewered him, while the blood gushed all over him? And, don’t forget, he also had time to go back to the settee, sit down for a spell, then get up and go over to retrieve his sword. And all this while sleepwalking? I don’t believe it for a minute.”

  Dr. Withers was standing beside the night-table that held Tessa’s little candle, a half-full decanter of sherry, and two empty glasses. He ran the decanter, unstoppered, slowly under his nose, then, very carefully, took a minuscule sip and let the wine roll over his tongue. “He may not have been sleepwalking.” He pushed his nostrils into each of the glasses. “Laudanum,” he said. “A lot of it. Enough, I’d say, to knock an elephant to its knees.”

  “But that means that both Tessa and Rick were drugged,” Marc cried, his hopes rising. “And there’s only one reason I can think of why that would happen. It’s obvious, isn’t it, that Merriwether slipped in here sometime yesterday—everybody in the troupe knew that Tessa took a glass of sherry before she went to bed after a performance—and put laudanum into the decanter. He couldn’t have known that Rick would be up here sharing the sherry with her when he first put the opiate into it. Later on, I’m sure he knew Rick was in Tessa’s room, and maybe he was inflamed with jealousy, and came across the hall, peered in, and found both of them comatose. And I’d lay odds that he decided then and there to have his way with the girl, and when she woke later, she would assume Rick had been her assailant. How she might have reacted, we don’t know, but Merriwether certainly knew how Mrs. Thedford would have taken the outrage. So the blackguard would be able to enjoy Tessa and have Rick take any consequences. All he had to do was snuff the candles out and set about the dastardly deed.”

  “Well, that’s plausible,” Withers said. “But how will we ever know what really happened if Tessa and Hilliard were indeed unconscious? And if they’d had more than a mouthful of this stuff, they would have been. Neither of them can give us rational testimony.”

  “In the meantime,” Cobb said, “we got a witness who swears he saw Hilliard with the murder weapon in his clutches an’ with the whole front of his tunic covered in blood. You’ll see it for yourself.”

  “And, alas,” Withers said with a sad shake of his head, “with his flies wide open.”

  “You’re not implying that Rick was the girl’s attacker? That’s preposterous.”

  When neither Withers nor Cobb responded to that assessment, Marc continued. “There must be blood on Merriwether’s privates!”

  “There was blood everywhere—on both men.”

  “Well, if there’s a court-martial, I’ll argue that Rick was drugged, dazed, provoked to his actions by the noblest of motives, and was therefore not wholly responsible for what he may have done.”

  “You gonna take out yer law-yer’s licence again?” Cobb enquired.

  “Even so,” Withers said, “it’s a stretch to claim that a befuddled man with altruistic intent pulled a battle-sword out of its scabbard and drove it unerringly through the centre of Merriwether’s chest so forcefully that it stuck in the floor under him.”

  “Damn it all, that’s what I’m saying!” Marc shouted. “Dazed or sober, my friend Rick Hilliard could not have done that. He had already saved the girl he loved from harm. He had maimed the assailant. What could possibly have incited him to such a senseless, despicable act?”

  “Maybe it was this,” Cobb said, holding his lantern high over Tessa’s bed.

  There on the white, freshly starched sheet was a bloodstain, no bigger than a virgin’s fist.

  NINE

  Having covered the body with a sheet and snuffed the candles, the three men went out into the hall.

  “I don’t want the corpse moved or anything else touched in there,” Marc said. “I’ll need to examine the room in the morning light. And we can’t have anyone who might conceivably have been involved going in overnight to tamper with the evidence.”

  Dr. Withers reached into his medical bag, pulled out a wad of sealing wax, softened it in his fingers, and pushed it into the slim crack between the door and the sash near the floor. “How’s that?” he said with a wink. “You’ll know if a mouse tries to break and enter.”

  Cobb was leaning over the sill of the hall window that overlooked Colborne Street. “Nobody’s come in here,” he said, dragging a finger through the thick dust. “Least not since the invasion of Muddy York.”

  “Unless the interloper was part monkey, able to climb vertical brick walls,” Withers added, “you’ll have to devote your attention to those people who were in this building from eleven o’clock onward.”

  “And if they’d tried a ladder under the girl’s window, it’d’ve been stickin’ out on Colborne Street like a roofer’s thumb,” Cobb said. “But I’ll check the alley an’ street fer any signs just the same.”

  “Someone could have hidden around the stage area and waited for his chance,” Marc said, grasping at straws.

  “Then how did the bugger get out again?” Cobb said. “Frank swore to the God of all Orangemen that the front doors an’ privy-exit were barred from the inside right after Major Jenkin left. And when he lit out fer Government House, he went out through his own quarters with his wife standing watch. Anybody leavin’ that way couldn’t’ve barred the door after them from the outside: when Sarge and I got here, those theatre doors were still barred.”

  Marc sighed.

  “An’ there’s no other way out of the theatre,” Cobb continued, “except through the tavern, an’ that door was locked with a slidin’ bolt by Frank before he went to bed, as usual.”

  They were now heading down the only stairs towards the stage and the tavern just behind it.

  “All right, all right,” Marc said testily. “It’s a long shot, I confess. Certainly we’ve got to focus on the actors first, though I’m not going to rule out Ogden Frank or his wife, or even Thea Clarkson: any one of them could have left their quarters, slipped through the barroom, unbolted the door behind the bar on this side of the stage, sneaked up the stairs, and been a party to murder.”

  “An’ sneaked back before Beasley got out into the hall, I suppose,” Cobb said. “An’ drippin’ blood all the way?” They had spotted no bloodstains on the hall carpet, but o
nly a thorough examination in daylight would settle the question.

  “They could have been in it together! The lot of them!”

  Withers pushed open the door to the tavern. “Might I suggest that we begin by looking at the obvious evidence first, then move on to the fanciful speculation?”

  They emerged into a well-lit room and peered over the bar at a most arresting tableau: two rather shortish men of a middle age, each uniformed, were wrestling over possession of a set of leg irons.

  “You are not gonna put this man in chains unless I say so!”

  “I bear the authority of the governor, and this man is now my official prisoner! I order you to release these shackles so that I may secure the felon.”

  Wilfrid Sturges, erstwhile sergeant-major in Wellington’s peninsular army and chief constable of the five-man municipal police force, gave a sharp pull on his half of the shackles and almost succeeded in wresting the whole from Barclay Spooner’s grip. Without outside intervention, there was no doubt as to which combatant would eventually triumph. Although both men were of slight build, Lieutenant Spooner, aide-de-camp to Sir Francis Bond Head, was a man whose aggressive movements and gestures could only be described as rigidly crisp but otherwise ineffectual, while Chief Constable Sturges was slimly muscular and deceptively quick, a tough little beagle of a man. Behind them, slumped in a captain’s chair with his chin in his hands, was Rick Hilliard. He looked like the sole survivor of a sanguinary battle.

  “Gentlemen, would you please drop those shackles,” Marc barked at the belligerents. “No one is going to put Ensign Hilliard in chains. I’m in charge of this investigation, and I’ll determine who’s to be labelled a prisoner and a felon.”

  Marc’s outburst distracted Spooner long enough for Sturges to recover the leg irons and stuff them into his overcoat pocket. “Thank you, Lieutenant. I was just attemptin’ to persuade Mr. Spooner ’ere on that very point.”