by Tessa Arlen
As they crossed the hall they came upon Mr. Haldane, who was marching across it toward the salon waving a late edition of the Evening News in his hand. “Germany has declared war on France!” he cried, his newspaper held aloft. “The German army has crossed the border at last—they have invaded Belgium.” He waved his paper at them most aggressively. “And, what is more, if the Germans don’t clear out of Belgium, we will declare war on them!”
Chapter Twenty
It was one o’clock in the morning. Mrs. Jackson, eyes tired and desperate to close, was sitting next to Lady Montfort in her bedroom as they assembled their carefully gathered clues in an attempt to discover which one of his friends had poisoned Mr. Bartholomew.
Before them on the table was a large square of white paper and in the middle was the list of seven poisonous plants. And arranged in clockwise fashion around the list were the slips of paper that had garnered handwriting samples from all the rosarians except those of Mr. Urquhart and Mrs. Bartholomew. Under each slip was written the name identifying the penmanship of its owner. And then off to one side there was a longer list of names of everyone staying in the house, including those who worked downstairs. Mrs. Jackson carefully drew a line through all the servants belowstairs. “None of their handwriting matches that on the list,” she said. “And one of the housemaids and the scullery maid can neither read nor write, and the other maids’ handwriting looks like a spider crawled across the page.”
“So now, Jackson, we have three names left on our list: Mrs. Bartholomew, Mr. Haldane, and Mr. Urquhart. Strange that you could not find a specimen of Mr. Haldane’s handwriting in his study, isn’t it?” said Lady Montfort.
“He has an Imperial typewriter, m’lady. Perhaps he uses that for his correspondence.”
Mrs. Jackson had let herself into the study after dinner while Mr. Haldane was still in the dining room, waited on by Mr. Evans. It had been an awful moment for her, tiptoeing around in the half-dark in a room that reeked of cigar smoke, which reminded her that she was trespassing in a very male preserve. The wastepaper basket was empty, but search as she might she could find no evidence of Mr. Haldane’s handwriting. In desperation she had tried the drawers of the large mahogany desk, even though it was counter to her years of training as a servant and her natural self-respect to do so. She was almost grateful that all the drawers and cupboards in both desk and filing cabinet were locked.
“And I looked for Mr. Urquhart’s scrapbook. It is no longer in the conservatory; he must have taken it up to his room.” Mrs. Jackson wrinkled her nose in concentration. “I did catch a glimpse as he turned pages. His handwriting looked similar, evenly spaced copperplate, but at that distance I could not be sure.” She had no intention of violating the privacy of either Mr. Urquhart’s or Mrs. Bartholomew’s rooms. “So the list of poisons could have been written by one of three people in this house, or maybe none of them at all.” It had occurred to her, although she would never dream of saying so as she was sure her ladyship was aware of this too, that the list could be as old as the book, written years ago by someone who had nothing whatsoever to do with the Haldane household.
“I can’t imagine that Mrs. Bartholomew would murder her husband; she appears to be quite devastated by his death.” This remark caused Mrs. Jackson considerable alarm; surely where murder was concerned everyone was suspect until he or she was proven innocent. And after all, husbands and wives murdered each other all the time, if they didn’t there would be very little to report in the more sensational daily newspapers. But she also kept this thought to herself.
“The only one of them who appears to have no knowledge of plants whatsoever is Mr. Haldane, m’lady. Mr. Urquhart has a considerable knowledge of both plants and poisons, and Mrs. Bartholomew is a horticulturalist, so she would probably know how to concoct poison from a plant.”
Lady Montfort did not acknowledge this reasoning. She was staring at the list of seven deadly plants with a frown on her face. Her fingers tapped rhythmically on the edge of the table, her lips pursed in thought.
“I have the strongest feeling that Mr. Urquhart knew what we were up to in the conservatory. Don’t you, Jackson?” She looked up, her eyes tired but her face still determined that they reason as much as they could tonight before they had any information on the contents of the blue bottle from Fisk & Able.
Mrs. Jackson acknowledged that she thought so, too. She had formed an even greater distaste for the elderly bachelor ever since he had instructed them on poison as he stood underneath the white-flowering oleander, his queen of poisons. She did not think it mattered that they did not know whether castor bean or oleander had been put into Mr. Bartholomew’s bottle of digestive powders, just so long as it was either of them. And supposing Fisk & Able replied that the bottle contained only slippery elm, ginger, and peppermint?
She fell into a brooding silence. We have to leave tomorrow, she thought, we can’t stay here if we declare war on Germany. His lordship will come over here and get his wife himself if she doesn’t return home.
In her view, everything pointed to Mr. Urquhart: his knowledge of poison, his continual administration of pills, tablets, and powders, and the fact that the elderly gentleman had kindly advised Mr. Bartholomew on powders from Fisk & Able to help him with his indigestion. Mrs. Jackson had been particularly repelled by the unattractive expression on the old man’s face as he had instructed them about witches because, coming as she did from Lancashire, which throughout the ages had been a witch-infested county, she despised such things and found his dabbling in the occult disturbing. It was not only a decidedly morbid activity but also a very un-Christian one and it offended Mrs. Jackson’s deeply Anglican sense of right and wrong, tenets by which she lived. It was right to go to church on Sunday and sing hymns, and to say one’s prayers if one remembered to at night. But it was wrong to try to contact those who had gone before, as it smacked of witchcraft and devil worship.
She sighed. “I am convinced it was Mr. Urquhart, m’lady. Everything points to him. But there is no motive I can perceive, unless he was driven by jealousy and wanted to eliminate his competitor, Mr. Bartholomew, in the production of the perfect rose.”
“Well if he did bump off Mr. Bartholomew, he was barking up the wrong rosebush.” Lady Montfort looked extremely tired and her voice was a little too terse. “Because evidently it was Mrs. Bartholomew who developed both those roses. What a joke they all are. That will teach them all to be so competitive with each other. Their best tea rose was not even bred by one of them. Perhaps that is why Mr. Urquhart poisoned Mr. Bartholomew—because he was a liar and a fake.” She leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes.
“I know you do not agree with me, Jackson, but I am convinced it was Mr. Haldane. He has a marked and unhealthy jealousy of his wife, who was clearly devoted to Mr. Bartholomew. Look at the way she carried on when she thought the white rose might be named after Mrs. Bartholomew. I know she was hoping Mr. Bartholomew would name his rose ‘Maud Haldane.’ And then when she was told that he had not bred the rose, but that his wife had, she didn’t mind in the least if Mrs. Bartholomew gave the rose her own name. So it would seem Mr. Haldane had all the motive in the world to have eliminated Mr. Bartholomew. There are so many reasons, actually, I can barely count them.” But she lifted a hand with her forefinger extended and proceeded to do just that: “One, to get Bartholomew away from his wife, who was clearly in love with him. Two,” her middle finger joined her forefinger, “so that he can secure a lucrative government contract for his Haldane’s Hearty Stew now that Bartholomew’s Bully Beef is in disarray, and three,” she waved the appropriate number of fingers in the air, “his conservatory is stocked full of poisonous plants. There is a plant toxicology and a list of seven poisonous plants, two of which—two of the most poisonous ones—are growing in his conservatory and are on the list. And not only that, he only has to have a meal or two with poor Mr. Urquhart to see that the man is a perfect victim to be framed for murder by poison wit
h all his little potions, tablets, and powders. And then there is the way that he intervened when Mr. Bartholomew died and got a doctor to write the death certificate for food poisoning from the kedgeree at breakfast. And of course he got rid of the cook, which was his greatest mistake, because here we are, investigating.” She has run out of fingers now that she has so many reasons to incriminate a man she has disliked since we got here, thought Mrs. Jackson.
“Good heavens above, he even made sure that there was fish on the menu for breakfast on the day his friend died. Don’t let’s forget that, Jackson.” She was so evidently convinced of her theory that she was waving her right hand in the air as if it held all the proof in the world that Mr. Haldane had painstakingly doctored Mr. Bartholomew’s digestive powders.
Mrs. Jackson lowered her eyes. She could not argue with any of this, but it just felt so wrong. Mr. Haldane was more than likely quite capable of murdering Mr. Bartholomew. But by poison? It just didn’t fit the man’s personality. If he had strangled, stabbed, or shot Mr. Bartholomew, it would have been far more in keeping with the type of man he was. Her ladyship could be so emphatic sometimes. She sighed again.
“And one last thing, of course,” Lady Montfort said. “Whilst Mr. Bartholomew was sprinkling poison on his breakfast kedgeree, Mr. Haldane had the perfect alibi: he was up in Manchester.” She stopped at the look on her housekeeper’s face. “I am so sorry, Jackson, I must be awfully tired. I can tell you have a theory, please tell me what it is.”
“I think, m’lady, that everything you have said rings true. All are incontrovertible facts and I agree with every one of them. But it is important that we identify the handwriting on this list.”
“But Mr. Haldane has all the motive in the world, whereas the other two do not.”
Mrs. Jackson did not sigh a third time, as to do so would be disrespectful, but she did certainly believe that Lady Montfort was prejudiced and was entirely grateful when she called their deliberations to a halt, at least until they had had more information from Mr. Stafford.
* * *
In the broad light of day, with the birds singing in the trees and puffy white clouds scudding across a soft blue summer sky, it was almost impossible to believe that they might be on the verge of discovering the identity of a cold-blooded poisoner, Clementine thought as she looked out of the window next morning. And it is quite amazing really, she thought, how a few hours of sleep put everything into proportion.
After luncheon they judged that hopefully Mr. Stafford would have had an opportunity to talk to either Mr. Fisk or Mr. Able and that it would do both of them good to go for a walk in the fresh air and discover if this was indeed the case. Clementine was feeling particularly buoyed up because Mr. Urquhart had agreed to show her his fascinating scrapbook on the evolution of the hybrid tea rose at tea time, which would give them the opportunity either to eliminate him from their list of suspects or to identify him as the murderer. Now everything hinged on the contents of the blue bottle.
* * *
“After I left you I went home and transferred some of the powders in the bottle to a clean meat-paste jar and was just in time to catch the last post before the post office closed yesterday evening, so it arrived in London by the midday post today. I went back to the post office half an hour ago and used the telephone there to confirm receipt.” Mr. Stafford addressed them both, as they sat on benches in the summer house, each of them hanging on to his every word. Mrs. Jackson was convinced she knew what he would say next and, judging by the smile on her face, so did her ladyship, but they listened in polite silence as Mr. Stafford enjoyed the business of relaying his news.
“Mr. Fisk said that as soon as they received the powders they knew exactly what compound they were looking at. As you had already surmised, there was slippery elm, ginger, and a little peppermint, in powder form, that they made especially for Mr. Bartholomew. And they also confirmed that something else had been added to it. But what it was exactly, he was unable to tell me. He offered to send the powder off to a chemist in London who would be able to analyze the contents and give us a clear idea of what exactly had been added to the digestive powders. And we are talking about poison here,” he added, grinning as he watched their very serious faces light up in innocent pleasure. “Because Mr. Fisk conducted an experiment with the bottle’s contents on a white mouse, purchased expressly for the test—his bill will be sent on to me—and the mouse died almost immediately with a barely visible dose from the contents of the bottle.”
Lady Montfort, with a look of pure joy on her face, said, “He was poisoned then.” The smile vanished. “Oh that poor man, what agony he must have been in. Who on earth could be so callously cruel and so terribly wicked to do something like that?”
“Someone with very clear intentions, someone unscrupulous, and someone with only their own interests at heart … and someone very dangerous,” Mr. Stafford answered promptly, his face as grim as that of Mrs. Jackson. These grave words spoken so seriously had their effect.
“Jackson, we must wind this matter up as quickly as we can. If Lord Montfort found out that I had taken you to stay in the house of a poisoner, he would never forgive me,” Lady Montfort said at last.
“I don’t think either of you should eat or drink anything at all in that house.” Mr. Stafford’s voice was somber and he looked at Mrs. Jackson with great concern. “Perhaps now would be a good time for you to turn this over to the Market Wingley police. Colonel Valentine could continue this investigation for you, since we have undoubted proof that Mr. Bartholomew was murdered by poison.”
Mrs. Jackson nodded her agreement. The thought of the elderly bachelor dropping belladonna into her afternoon cup of tea and then sitting there watching her behind his shiny spectacles as she died an agonizing death sprang immediately to the forefront of her mind. She looked at her ladyship, who had reached into the pocket of her skirt and drawn out the list of poisons.
“It would not take us a moment to decipher whose writing this is, and then we will have a full explanation for Colonel Valentine,” she said rather wistfully, and Mrs. Jackson understood that handing the matter over to the constabulary would most certainly not be her decision at this stage.
“We have not quite finished with the How, Jackson,” her ladyship continued. “Mr. Bartholomew had a bottle of what he believed were simple digestive powders. He overate at breakfast and sprinkled the powders on his kedgeree hoping to ease his discomfort. But how did the murderer put poison into his digestive powders?”
Mrs. Jackson couldn’t stand it any longer and forgot herself enough to interrupt her ladyship, not that she seemed to mind. “I think the murderer must have given Mr. Bartholomew a bottle of powders that had already been tampered with, m’lady. Someone who knew he suffered from indigestion and had recommended Fisk & Able’s remedies. And since Mr. Urquhart recommended the powders, Mr. Bartholomew would have been quite happy to have accepted a bottle of them from him.” She did not look at her ladyship as she said this, because she knew who Lady Montfort’s favorite suspect was, and to put forward an alternative might be perceived as contrary and, worse still, disrespectful.
“Mrs. Jackson thinks it is Mr. Urquhart and will tell you why,” Lady Montfort said to Mr. Stafford. So Mrs. Jackson explained her belief that it was Mr. Urquhart who was their culprit and not Mr. Haldane. She was clear and gave her reasoning in detail, with Mr. Stafford interrupting only to ask the occasional question. At the end of her considerable speech, Mr. Stafford threw back his head and laughed.
“Well, that’s quite astonishing,” he said. “What has become of that silent and very circumspect woman who always discouraged gossip and never recounted the business of others?” he said with evident admiration and not a little pride.
“She has become a detective,” said Lady Montfort with equal pride. “Even if she isn’t always willing at first to divulge her thinking, when she does, it is always worth waiting for.”
Mrs. Jackson looked quizzical at this p
oint and her ladyship smiled.
“But she is being polite, you see, for I have another theory. My favorite suspect is Mr. Haldane,” and Lady Montfort trotted out all her theories to back up her suspicions.
At the end of it, Mr. Stafford must have realized that his being there was not just to relate the story about the mouse that had died but in some way to adjudicate their thinking. He started to shake his head.
“So you are both working on the same theory that whoever put the poison in the bottle went searching for it in the orangery and bumped into Mrs. Wickham?” he asked.
And they answered that they were.
“Because if that is the case, Mr. Haldane did not have to wait for the orangery to be unlocked before he went on his search for the poison bottle; it was he who had told the head gardener to lock up the orangery. And Mr. Clark told me when he gave me the key that on no account was I to mislay it as it was the only copy in his keeping. Mr. Haldane had the other.”
Lady Montfort’s groan was rather histrionic as she rose to her feet. If she had cursed and kicked a small pot of pink geraniums, standing dangerously in her way, across the summer house, Mrs. Jackson would not have been in the least surprised. She turned her head away so as not to witness her ladyship’s downfall and also to conceal the look of triumph she could feel threatening to make itself seen. After inspecting the view of the surrounding gardens for defects, she glanced down at her hands in her lap and then stole a glance at Mr. Stafford. He was watching her. Then the lines at the corners of his eyes deepened. He was laughing at her. He knows that I have solved it, she said to herself, feeling a wave of such great happiness engulf her that she almost laughed with delight.