We gave each other the Detective Society handshake just as the bell rang, and I went off to lessons with the remaining suspects swimming about in my head.
Either Miss Hopkins and The One had done it, or Miss Lappet had.
And we had some new information to add to our suspect list too.
5
At lunch time, everyone was loudly distraught, even though Miss Tennyson had not been a popular mistress, and had not had a clique of favourites, like Miss Hopkins or Miss Griffin. When Miss Tennyson was alive, most people had thought her rather wet and foolish. But I was beginning to see that as soon as someone is dead, everyone else feels horribly guilty for not caring about them and goes wild trying to prove that they did. Everyone was afraid of the murderer too.
‘I sent a telegram to Mummy asking her to take me out of school,’ I heard one fifth former say to her friends as I passed them. ‘At this rate we shall have no mistresses left, and I don’t want to be the next victim!’
There were the usual rumours about how Miss Tennyson had died. It had happened in her boarding house, that much was known, so there was a popular theory involving a horrible shove down the stairs. Daisy listened carefully to all the gossip at the House lunch table, and then went off to find out the truth from King Henry. She came back fuming.
‘Veronal,’ she said briefly. ‘Overdose. According to King Henry, Miss Tennyson’s doctor prescribed it for her ages ago – she had trouble sleeping. Still, because it’s unnatural death it’ll have to be investigated. Oh, bother!’
‘What’s wrong?’ I asked, not quite understanding why Daisy was so upset. ‘Is it King Henry? Did she say anything important?’
‘The police are going to be called in, you chump. Imagine! The police! They’ll ruin everything. They won’t even interview any of the girls, only the masters and mistresses, because they’ll think we’re not important!’
‘Well, we aren’t important,’ I said.
Daisy narrowed her eyes and fixed me with an icy blue stare. ‘I am important,’ she said. ‘I’m the only one who’s been investigating this murder from the start – apart from you, I mean, Hazel. Sorry. Well, they’ll see! This is our school and no one has any right to go about bumping people off in it.’
‘But what if the police solve the murders before we do?’ I asked.
‘They won’t,’ said Daisy. ‘They don’t even know that they’re murders, or that there have been two of them! The police just think they’re investigating a suicide. But we know that Miss Bell and Miss Tennyson were murdered, and we know who the suspects are. Which means that we’re still the only people who can solve the crimes.’
I had to admit that Daisy’s logic made sense. Under the circumstances, in fact, the Detective Society had never seemed so important.
6
‘I declare this extraordinary meeting of the Detective Society to discuss the Case of the Murder of Miss Bell to order,’ said Daisy. ‘In the light of Miss Tennyson’s recent murder, we must consider the new facts in the case.’
It was just after toothbrushes. We were sitting in the airing cupboard, and I was taking notes.
‘All right,’ said Daisy. ‘What new facts do we know? Hazel, write down the list as I say it.
‘One: Miss Tennyson was murdered in her boarding house, with a large dose of Veronal. So the killer must be someone she knows, and who knows she takes Veronal to help her sleep. Miss Lappet fits that perfectly. On the face of it, The One is less likely, because as a man he wouldn’t be allowed past Miss Tennyson’s boarding-house matron, but it’s possible he sent Miss Hopkins to do it for him. King Henry told me that Miss Griffin keeps medical records for all the masters and mistresses in her office, so any one of our three suspects could have crept in and read Miss Tennyson’s.’
So far, this all seemed perfectly right to me.
‘Two: Miss Tennyson must have been murdered by her accomplice because she was going to tell the police about the crime. Do all three have a motive to work with Miss Tennyson? Miss Lappet is an easy yes. She could have combined forces with Miss Tennyson to knock out their main rival for the Deputy post. Then she’d be doubly eager to get rid of Miss Tennyson afterwards. Miss Hopkins and The One – well, you said it, Hazel. They would have known perfectly well that the Hop would have been sacked as soon as Miss Griffin heard – and Mr Reid too, for being the one who’s marrying her – so they might have killed Miss Bell together to stop the news of their engagement getting out, and then roped in Miss Tennyson as a scapegoat.’
I nodded. ‘And, you know,’ I said, ‘even though you were wrong about Miss Tennyson killing Miss Bell on her own, I think you were right about how the murder happened.’ If Daisy could admit that I had been right about some things, it only seemed fair that I do the same to her. ‘So that means we know how the murderer – or murderers – did it, and when they did it. We only have to work out who it was.’
Daisy beamed. ‘Absolutely correct!’ she cried. ‘Let the police do their worst! We have the most wonderful head start. Tomorrow, we follow our suspects until we learn the truth. And I absolutely promise not to jump to any conclusions unless you agree with me.’
On that note, the meeting was adjourned.
We had narrowed our list down to three suspects, and this time we knew we had to be careful. If we had not caught the real murderer by the end of the week, I decided, then we were no sort of detectives at all.
1
The next day, Tuesday, the police really did arrive. We walked down to school in a biting wind which left my face bright red and raw and turned the end of Daisy’s nose a delicate pink. Lavinia, in a cruel mood, tripped Beanie up and spilled her book bag open, and we had to sprint about catching bits of flying paper while Beanie wailed and Kitty comforted her and passing shrimps giggled.
We were brought up short by the sight of a policeman standing in front of Old Wing Entrance. He was in uniform, with a blue buttoned-up jacket and tall blue hat, and as we crept past on our way inside he seemed impossibly severe and awful. The guilt of what I knew we had done to Miss Tennyson went sizzling through me. For a moment I felt like the murderer.
We saw another policeman on the way to Prayers. He was much younger than the tall one at Old Wing Entrance, and he had a thin neck and spots all across his narrow cheeks.
‘Dreamy,’ whispered Kitty.
‘You’re desperate,’ Lavinia told her scornfully.
‘Quiet, girls,’ said Miss Lappet, on her way past. I flinched when I saw her. She looked worse than ever – red-nosed and with two cardigan buttons gaping open. She squinted at us all and said unsteadily, ‘Top buttons done up, if you please.’
As she staggered away, I breathed a little easier. I was still terrified that the murderer might secretly be waiting for the right moment to catch us and add us to their list of victims.
Prayers was very odd. Miss Griffin seemed determined to carry on as though nothing had happened, even though there were now two empty seats where Miss Bell and Miss Tennyson ought to have been. Everyone kept turning round and craning their necks to look at the gaps, and Miss Griffin gave all the turners and craners paralysing stares whenever she caught their eye.
Miss Griffin did mention the police, though. It would have been difficult not to. ‘I would like you girls to extend them every courtesy,’ she told us sternly, ‘while they carry out their investigations, which I’m sure we all hope will be completed as quickly as possible. The sooner this regrettable business is cleared up, the better. And now, the day’s notices . . .’
I saw Daisy looking at the spotty policeman thoughtfully as we passed him again on the way to Maths. She had her planning expression on, and I suspected that I was about to be asked to do something illegal.
Sure enough, while Miss Parker was writing out sums for us on the blackboard, and looking furious and stiff-haired as she did it, I was slipped a note which read:
At bunbreak go straight for the spotty policeman. I’ll do the talking – D.
/> This sounded suspiciously like there would be no time to collect our biscuits. I did not much like that. Tuesdays are Peek Frean bourbon creams, my favourite. They are even better than gingernuts.
Sure enough, as soon as the bunbreak bell went, Daisy seized my hand and rushed me out of Science, down the stairs and into Library corridor. The spotty policeman was standing next to the mistresses’ common-room door, watching the opposite wall with a slightly cross-eyed stare. I looked at him again, and was still unable to understand what Kitty saw in him.
Daisy, however, seemed absolutely charmed. She tugged at her plait until it came loose over her shoulders, dropped her book bag on my feet and then rushed up to the policeman with a very Kitty-like squeal of glee.
‘Oh!’ she exclaimed. ‘I’ve always wanted to meet a policeman!’
Before the spotty policeman had time to realize what was happening to him, she had pounced on his arm and was clinging to it, gazing up at him raptly. He started and a look of panic spread over his spotty face.
‘Good morning, Miss,’ he said awkwardly. ‘What can I do for you?’
Daisy widened her blue eyes at him. ‘I think policemen are fascinating,’ she said breathlessly. ‘All that work you do – it’s simply marvellous. Are you a detective?’
The spotty policeman coughed. A blotchy flush spread all the way up his thin neck to the tips of his ears.
‘Yes, Miss, I am,’ he said, and then blushed even more.
‘Oh!’ gasped Daisy. ‘It must be the most wonderful thing in the world. You must be awfully clever.’
‘Oh no,’ said the policeman. ‘Oh no, no, no, not me.’
‘Oh, but you are! It’s all round the school that you were the one who first realized that this might not be a suicide.’
The policeman’s skinny chest puffed out. ‘Is it?’ he asked squeakily. ‘Well, I suppose – see – yes, all right. At first we thought it was just your average – bottle of Veronal by the bed, scrap of writing on her blotter that read “I am so sorry to do this to you”. But I noticed something interesting. She was lying so nice on the bed, nightdress done up perfectly, hair brushed, but then there were scratches on her hands, and a little cut on her lip – as though she’d struggled. It didn’t add up, and I said so to the chief. Then we went to interview the lady who runs your Miss Tennyson’s boarding house, and she said someone came to visit her on Saturday, the night she died. A woman.’
My heart jumped. Had it been Miss Lappet or Miss Hopkins?
‘Oh!’ squealed Daisy, on cue. ‘How frightfully exciting!’
The policeman beamed at her. ‘Of course,’ he said, ‘you mustn’t tell anyone what I’ve just told you. It’s strictly confidential.’
‘Oh yes,’ said Daisy. ‘Strictly. But – strictly confidential, again – what did she look like, this woman?’
She asked it a little too quickly, and it suddenly sounded strange. I winced inwardly. Daisy tried to cover her mistake by adding, in her silliest voice, ‘I mean, was she all murderous?’
But even with her charm on, she had gone too far. The policeman blinked and flushed, and then seemed to come out of the spell Daisy had put him under.
‘H-here!’ he said, stammering. ‘What d’you want to know that for? You’re going to go round telling all your friends, aren’t you?’
‘No!’
‘You’d better not! This is very privileged information. Oh, I oughtn’t to have told you so much about it. Promise me you won’t tell anyone else I did? The chief’ll have me up for it.’
‘Oh, of course I won’t,’ said Daisy, being as reassuring as possible. ‘Don’t be so silly! I think you’re terribly lucky, being in the middle of it like that! Do you know—’
But at that moment a man came out of the mistresses’ common room and saw Daisy speaking to the spotty policeman. This man had a long nose, black eyes and thick dark hair slicked back from his forehead. He looked extremely official. In fact, I realized, this must be the police chief the spotty policeman had mentioned.
‘Rogers!’ the chief said sharply, his face crumpling up in annoyance. ‘Don’t talk to the young ladies.’ He gave Daisy a very nasty glare, and she stared back at him, unmoved.
‘Goodbye, Mr Detective,’ she said to Rogers, looking up at him through her eyelashes. With one more withering glare at the police chief, she said, ‘Come on, Hazel, we must be going now,’ and stalked away down Library corridor.
2
Daisy plunged along so fast that I could not keep up with her. I was still puffing along Library corridor when she reached the end and flicked round the corner into New Wing. There was a shriek, a thump, then a chorus of horrified gasps, and I heard Daisy’s voice, high with panic, crying, ‘Oh, I’m so terribly sorry . . . Oh, Miss Griffin – oh, oh, here, let me—’
I dashed round the corner and came face to face with a catastrophe. The corridor was absolutely littered with things – papers and exercise books, hairpins and bull’s eyes and pencils – all clattering and rolling about. Daisy, in her haste, had careened straight into the neat and tidy form of Miss Griffin. I gaped in horror.
Daisy was on her knees, frantically scooping things up again. Miss Griffin’s carefully set hair was disarranged and her expression was horrible to see. Everyone began to gather round, but Miss Griffin rapped out, ‘Move along, girls,’ and they all fled in terror.
I got down next to Daisy. She was sliding about over the tiles, picking up papers and stammering, ‘Miss Griffin, I am so terribly sorry, please believe me,’ but Miss Griffin did not look as though she believed anything much.
I picked up a letter, bending its corner, and Miss Griffin snapped, ‘Don’t touch that, Wong. Oh, out of the way, both of you, so you don’t cause any more damage.’ I could tell she was terribly angry. I had never heard her snarl at a girl like that before.
Daisy, trembling, presented Miss Griffin with the pile of papers she had already collected and we both shuffled backwards to begin scooping up the things from Daisy’s bag. Miss Griffin, meanwhile, knelt down in her impeccable tweed skirt and gathered up papers as though she was one of Deepdean’s maids. It made me burn with shame. I felt as if we had both let the school down terribly. Daisy kept stammering out how sorry she was, but Miss Griffin was in no mood to listen.
‘Wells, enough. This does not become you at all. Deepdean girls should accept the blame for their mistakes with the same grace and quiet dignity that they show in the rest of their lives. I do not expect to see my girls tearing about the school like barbarians. Quite frankly, I am disappointed in you. You may go.’
‘Yes, Miss Griffin,’ said Daisy weakly, and she curtseyed, though slightly lopsidedly, because she had the contents of her book bag loose in her arms. Then we both scuttled away, feeling like the smallest of small shrimps.
‘I thought I was for it,’ Daisy whispered to me once we were far enough down the corridor. ‘Oh Lord, though, look at the time. We shall be fearfully late for Art.’
We looked round once more, to make sure that Miss Griffin was not watching us (she wasn’t – she had just bent down to pick up something else), and then we ran for it.
I always enjoy Art. This is less to do with the Art itself, and more to do with the fact that to The One, Hong Kong is part of a magical, made-up place called The Orient; because I am from there, he thinks I must be a natural artist. He seems to imagine that everyone in Hong Kong lies about on bright purple divans, in rooms papered with that Chinese print you can get in Woolworth’s, with peacocks wandering about at our feet. Of course this is not true, and I am not a natural artist at all, but The One hasn’t noticed. So I copy Chinese dragons out of books I find in the library, and The One is delighted.
That day I was busily colouring in one of my dragons when I noticed that Daisy had stopped work and was scrabbling about in her book bag with an awful expression on her face.
‘Is something wrong?’ I whispered.
In answer, Daisy took her bag and tipped the whole thing up o
ver her desk. Pencils, rubbers and bits of string rained down, and Daisy began to hunt through them, picking each thing up and then tossing it aside again a moment later.
‘Hazel,’ she said, still hunting away frantically, ‘Hazel, I can’t find the earring.’
I went cold. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Of course I’m sure,’ Daisy hissed, gesturing at the contents of her bag. There certainly was no gold earring to be seen.
My last look back at Miss Griffin played like a film-reel in my head. She had been bending down over something small lying on the tiles, looking at it intently. I glanced at Daisy, and saw that she was having exactly the same thought as me.
‘What shall we do?’ she gasped. ‘Miss Griffin will put it straight into Davey Jones.’ Davey Jones is our name for Miss Griffin’s box of confiscated items. It sits in her office and we call it that because you know that once something’s gone in there you’ll never see it again. ‘We’ll never get it back. How will we confront our suspects if we don’t have the earring? Oh, Hazel, our beautiful case. It’s ruined!’
‘Well,’ I said, surprising myself by what came out of my mouth next, ‘if we need it, we’ll just have to get it back. We’ll go to Miss Griffin’s office at lunch and you can tell her that it’s a present for your mother, or something. It’s worth a try, anyway. After all, Miss Griffin likes you.’
‘She did until I ran into her half an hour ago,’ said Daisy. ‘But still, it’s an excellent idea, Hazel! Whatever has got into you?’
‘I want to solve the case,’ I said. ‘I want the person who killed Miss Bell and Miss Tennyson punished. You said yourself how important it was.’
Murder Most Unladylike: A Wells and Wong Mystery Page 14