Plum Duff
‘You are staring again,’ my guardian said. ‘It is neither polite nor ladylike.’
‘I cannot believe you said that,’ I said.
‘Good manners may be going out of fashion,’ he told me, ‘but they are still important if one hopes to be accepted in polite society.’
‘I am talking about your calm declaration that William did not kill Sarah.’
He twined the chain around his thumb.
‘Why should I not be calm? The house is not collapsing and there is not a pride of lions in the room.’
‘But William Ashby is dead.’
Sidney Grice raised his left eyebrow and untwined his thumb. ‘Then panic will not help him.’
‘But he was hanged because of you.’
He reached across to the wall and tugged the bell pull.
‘I like to think so,’ he said with an unconcealed smile. ‘Oh, I do hope we are having Spotted Dick today for it is the very king of puddings in my estimation. I cannot—’
I stood up and threw my book on to the floor.
‘Shut up,’ I said and my guardian blinked.
‘I beg your pardon?’
I picked up a fork and pointed it at him. ‘You are worrying about pudding in the same breath as you have admitted to me that you helped to hang an innocent man.’
Sidney Grice shook his head. ‘You excel yourself, March. Three factual errors in one sentence. Firstly, I am not remotely worried about pudding. I was merely making what I make so little of that you did not recognize it – polite conversation. Secondly, I believe I took two breaths in my last series of remarks to you. And, thirdly, William Ashby was a number of things – a schoolboy, a factory hand, an army cook, a shopkeeper and a husband, to name but five of them – but one thing he most certainly was not was innocent.’
The dumb waiter thudded into place and Molly came into the room to clear our plates, slide open the doors and serve us with two large bowls. Sidney Grice’s face fell.
‘Oh no,’ he said. ‘Plum Duff.’
58
The Angle of the Spoon
The pudding was stodgy, but almost anything would have been preferable to the soggy mess of reheated vegetables that Molly had cleared away. I looked at it.
‘Tuck in, March,’ my guardian said.
‘How can you sit there and eat after what you have just told me?’
‘I merely said that it was Plum Duff.’ He opened his hands innocently.
‘You too have excelled yourself,’ I said. ‘You have told me three things of which I can make neither head nor tail. Firstly, that Grace Dillinger is the most dangerous woman you know; secondly, that William Ashby did not kill Sarah; and thirdly, that he is not an innocent man.’
Sidney Grice swallowed and took a drink of water. ‘They are quite simple statements.’
‘Then perhaps you would be so kind as to explain them.’
‘Very well.’ My guardian dug his spoon into his pudding, but let it stay sticking out at forty-five degrees. He had a crumb on his chin. ‘Let us start with Mrs Dillinger. To have a husband stabbed to death may be regarded as unfortunate; to have a daughter stabbed to death looks like carelessness; to have a family friend stabbed to death is extremely negligent; add to that tally the killing of the alleged murderer of the two women and things are looking downright suspicious.’
He took his spoon out, and wiped it clean and rotated it slowly.
‘Is that it? The fact that this poor woman has had so many people close to her murdered makes her a suspect? Are you saying that Grace Dillinger killed all these people herself?’
‘Of course not.’
‘So what are you saying?’
‘Three recent discoveries changed my point of view,’ my guardian said. ‘That Ashby was a good boy at school, that he was a poor soldier and that he was not married. All of those things should have counted in his favour – his good character, his fear of blood and the fact that Sarah, who was presumed to be a living angel, was, in the eyes of society, a woman of no morals at all.’
‘So why were none of these things mentioned in his defence at his trial?’ I asked, and Sidney Grice nodded vigorously.
‘Precisely my point.’ He wiggled his spoon. ‘It is because he knew that those facts would only damn him more… What on earth is Molly up to now?’
In answer to his question Molly came clattering up the stairs and into the room.
‘Inspector Pound wishes to speak with you, sir,’ she announced breathlessly. ‘Lord, those stairs get steeper.’
Inspector Pound stood in the hall, holding his hat. ‘I shall not delay. I have to interview a man who claims that all his family have been killed by a phantom hound.’
‘It sounds more like a job for the supervisor of a madhouse,’ Sidney Grice said.
‘Or an exorcist,’ I said, and the inspector blinked slowly.
‘My superiors think otherwise,’ he said. ‘But I thought I would call in on the way and give you the news – not that it matters much now – I had a message this morning that Sir Randolph Cosmo Napier has been found.’
‘Where?’ my guardian asked.
‘At his ancestral home,’ the inspector said. ‘It is outside my area so the local police are dealing with him, but I thought you might like to take a look.’
‘Does he still claim—’ I began, but Inspector Pound raised his hand.
‘He does not claim anything,’ he said. ‘Sir Randolph Cosmo Napier is dead.’
59
The Mausoleum
The chapel stood in a clearing on the edge of the grounds, the great house only just visible through the mass of sycamores around us. A cheerful man introduced himself as Sergeant Crabbe and led the way.
The head gardener, he explained, had found the body. He had worked for the family since he was a boy and kept the area clear out of respect.
Sidney Grice paused to examine a rhododendron bush.
‘Spotted a clue?’ the sergeant asked.
‘Not unless you are the murderer.’ My guardian let the branch spring back. ‘From the way the sap is oozing, this twig was snapped less than five minutes ago and there is a smear of it on your right shoulder.’
We followed Sergeant Crabbe into a small chapel. The floor was dotted with moss and lichen. The two long sides were lined with raised marble tombs. Most of them had statues of knights and ladies resting on them. One had a dog curled at her feet. Some were bare. On one in the far corner with his arms crossed over his chest was the body of Sir Randolph. His face was grey and he had a deep wound in his neck.
Sidney Grice glanced at the body.
‘This is our man,’ he said.
‘We don’t get many murders out here,’ the sergeant said. ‘What do you make of it all, Mr Grice?’
My guardian puffed his cheeks and blew out.
‘Very little,’ he said. ‘Since this is not my case.’
‘Surely you could make some observations,’ I said and my guardian snorted.
‘The only thing that interests me is that Sir Randolph is dead, and therefore anything he may or may not have said to that troublesome priest is hearsay and inadmissible in court. So I can proceed with a writ for criminal slander, knowing that my reputation remains unsullied. Come, Miss Middleton. We shall be late for afternoon tea.’
Sergeant Crabbe opened his mouth, but Sidney Grice waved him away and went to the door.
‘Might I take a look?’ I asked and my guardian grunted.
Sir Randolph was still in the suit he had worn for his court appearance. It was soaked in blood but seemed otherwise undamaged.
‘The cut goes straight through his windpipe.’ I steeled myself to tip Sir Randolph’s head back, and the wound gaped wider. ‘And almost through to the spine. There is no blood on the ledge or the floor. So he was not killed in here.’
‘Obviously,’ Sidney Grice muttered. ‘Now, if you have quite finished playing…’
‘It is difficult to judge how long ago he died b
y the state of decomposition because the cold in here would have preserved the body.’
‘My mum could have told me that.’ The sergeant sniggered. ‘Except she would not be so unladylike.’
Sidney Grice put his hand to his eye.
‘There are no other obvious wounds or bruises… There is something greasy on his forehead,’ I said, but it was obvious to us all that I was floundering.
Then something occurred to me. I went back to the door and crouched to look behind it.
‘He was brought here six weeks ago,’ I said.
‘How can you possibly tell that?’ Sergeant Crabbe laughed, but Sidney Grice said, ‘Go on.’
I pointed to the floor. ‘Look at that.’
‘Moss,’ the sergeant said.
‘Middleton’s Liverwort,’ I said. ‘It was named after my late uncle, who was a botanist at Kew Gardens. It takes at least six weeks to grow to its full two inches. When the door is opened it grates against the floor and scrapes the moss off. There are two piles of moss behind it. The first is still alive and would have been disturbed when the gardener came in yesterday. The second is old and dead from when the door was opened to place the body here.’
‘You said at least six weeks,’ Sergeant Crabbe reminded me. ‘So it could have been growing for longer than that.’
‘We know that Sir Randolph was alive six and a half weeks ago when he saw Father Brewster, his parish priest,’ I said, and the sergeant clapped his hands.
‘Well, Mr Grice, you appear to have a rival. The good Lord may not have given you looks, miss, but he certainly gave you brains.’
I had managed to control my horror at the deeds of men many times, but I was sick of listening meekly to their insults.
‘What a shame he gave you neither,’ I said. ‘If Edward were here he would…’
Sidney Grice filled the sudden silence. ‘Miss Middleton is quite welcome to take over this case, considering that it is unpaid.’
I looked at them both and at the remains of the man. He had been a child once and now he was a pathological specimen.
‘Good day, Sergeant,’ I said.
On the way back I said, ‘Why would anybody go to the trouble of taking Sir Randolph there and laying out his body like that?’
‘Somebody is trying to play cat and mouse with me, March.’ My guardian sucked in and blew out through closed teeth. ‘He will find out soon enough, though, which of us is the cat.’
We fell back into our own thoughts.
When we had returned to more familiar streets my guardian said, ‘I was looking through some old Army Gazettes last night.’
‘Oh yes?’
‘I remembered reading something about your father a few years ago.’
‘He was often mentioned.’
‘I came across your name in the announcements. It—’
‘Please,’ I said.
Sidney Grice nodded and reached out and, for a moment, I thought he was going to pat me, but he put his hand lightly on mine and let it lie there all the way home.
Some people dream of having a cottage with roses. Every Sergeant Major I met was going to run a little public house by the sea when they took their pensions. Most officers were oldest sons and would retire to their family estates. Some would go on to run rubber or sugar plantations.
We were going to stay. We would have opened a school for the local children with a small dispensary for simple medical treatments. People laughed when we told them that. I remember Colonel Rees-James asking what the point was of teaching ignorant savages, and you said that they were not savages and, by the time we had finished, they would not be ignorant.
You controlled yourself so well but I could see how you felt. You were never angry but I was proud to see you angry about that.
60
Soot
My guardian sat and watched me pour our teas.
‘Why were you so uninterested in Sir Randolph’s death?’ I asked. ‘Surely it might have given us more clues about the murderer.’
‘Four reasons.’ Sidney Grice slid his eye outwards with one finger. ‘First, I have no financial inducement to investigate his death. Second, we do not even know he was murdered by the same man. Third, I would have to list myself as a suspect since I had everything to gain by his death. Indeed, I expressed the hope that his throat would be cut and—’
‘Yes, but you did not mean it.’
‘I never say anything that I do not mean.’ He swivelled his signet ring with his thumb. ‘And, fourth, the whole matter is distracting me from my true purpose – to prove yet again that William Ashby was a murderer.’
‘But you—’ I began.
Sidney Grice raised a hand to silence me. ‘I must have quiet while I think.’
He got up and paced across his study from the desk to the bay window, paused briefly to look out, spun round and paced back again. For the best part of an hour he marched to and fro and, having little else to do on that wet Monday evening, I sat in an armchair by the fire, warming my feet, flicking through an account in The Times of a series of garrottings on Waterloo Bridge.
‘I am still missing something,’ he said at last.
‘Your tea?’ I said, for it would be undrinkable by now, but he scowled at me and said, ‘There is something not right about this letter.’
‘Why is it so important?’ I asked. ‘And what is wrong with it? Inspector Pound vouched that William Ashby wrote it in his presence.’
‘I knew there was something wrong before I even looked at it.’ He reached the desk and picked the letter up. ‘But what?’ He took the letter out of its envelope.
‘Remember I said it held the key to the mystery? Well, I am still convinced of that.’ He unfolded the letter and read it out, though we could both have recited it by now.
DEAR MR GRISE
PLEASE HELP ME I AM AN INNASENT MAN
YOURS TRUELY
WILLIAM ASHBY.
‘Ashby was, for his class, an educated man,’ my guardian said. ‘His old teacher remembered what an exemplary student he was, and yet he produces an illiterate meaningless scrawl in an attempt to save his life. How would this letter help him?’ He reached the window and waved the paper in the air. ‘Cheap paper provided by the police. No heading or watermark. No…’ He stopped and held the letter closer. He clipped on his pince-nez. ‘Soot,’ he cried out.
‘You have found soot on the letter?’
‘No. We need some.’ He hurried to the fire and, oblivious to the heat, reached inside the chimney, his hand coming out black with a fistful of soot and his cuff quite ruined. ‘Hold the letter flat on the rug, March.’
I pressed it down by the corners, and my guardian kneeled beside me and sprinkled the soot all over it and the sleeve of my dress.
‘Molly will not be happy with the state of this rug,’ I said.
‘Molly can go and practise her curtsies on the bottom of the Thames. Let go of the letter.’ Sidney Grice picked it up carefully, tipped the soot from it on to the hearth, and blew, a black cloud billowing into his face and over his starched shirt. He sprang up, almost knocking the table over, and ran back to the window. ‘Turn up the gas light,’ he said and I twisted the valve, seeing the flame swell and the mantle glow orange then red then white on the wall. He hurried to it and held the letter up again. ‘See.’ His voice rose with excitement. ‘See the imprint of the other letter.’
I stood close by him and looked up. The effect was smudged and unclear but the words were unmistakeable.
FORTY TIMES IN ALL. I COUNTED EVERY CUT. SHE NEVER DID ME ANY WRONG EXCEPT FOR ONE THING. I SAW HER WALKING DOWN THE STREET. SHE
I did not need to read any more to recognize the letter.
‘It was the envelope that was wrong,’ my guardian said. ‘I should have spotted it straight away. It was slightly too big for the letter. It had been stretched by another.’
‘Which was taken out before it was given to you,’ I said.
‘Exactly,’ he said. �
�Look, March, at the well-formed letters and the punctuation. It is an educated hand. It is the hand of a murderer, the man who called himself Caligula but whose real name was William Ashby.’
61
The Windows of the Soul
I thought about my guardian’s words and said, ‘I thought you told me William Ashby was innocent.’
‘Then you thought wrongly. I said he did not kill his wife.’
‘But—’
‘The truth was there all the time.’ Sidney Grice sat back in his armchair. ‘If only you had looked into his eyes.’
‘But I—’
‘Forget all that windows-of-the-soul silliness.’ He flapped his hand. ‘The eye is a sensory organ. You might as well say somebody has innocent ears or a guilty nose as to say it of their eyes. What about my glass eye? Is it any more or less innocent than the other?’
‘No, but it is greener.’
‘No, it is not.’ He looked at himself in the mantle mirror.
‘In the daylight it is.’
‘It is not. Anyway, for you and the inspector to tell me that William Ashby had innocent eyes is childish drivel.’
‘I can see the logic in that,’ I said, ‘but—’
‘We will deal with all these buts another time,’ my guardian broke in, ‘when we are bored and have nothing useful to say to each other. We can, however, deduce something from watching a man’s eyes just as we can from observing his lips – whether he smiles or frowns, for example – what he does with his hands, feet, general bodily demeanour, et cetera.’
‘I cannot see the relevance of your point.’
‘I watched Ashby’s eyes’ – my guardian jabbed his finger at nothing – ‘when I interviewed him and at every point of his trial. I saw who he looked at and how he looked at them. He regarded you cordially, for example, and me with a degree of loathing.’
‘Do you blame him?’
‘I would have been puzzled if he had not.’ My guardian produced his pencil with the flourish of a magician. ‘I also observed Mrs Dillinger’s eyes when we met and during the trial. I noticed that she and Ashby spent a great deal of time looking at each other, but I mistook their meaning.’
The Mangle Street Murders Page 22