An Oxford Anomaly

by Norman Russell

  ‘Cologne,’ she said. ‘Dr Critchley wouldn’t let any of us have perfumes or pomades of any sort. But now that I’m my own mistress, I have whatever I like.’

  Aunt Arabella put the little bottle back on the table. Jeremy saw that it held a few novels, all published within the last few years. There was Dracula, and The Picture of Dorian Gray. And what was that third book? The Time Machine, by H.G. Wells.

  Evidently his aunt was undergoing some kind of physical and mental resurrection.

  ‘What do you think of your uncle?’ she asked suddenly.

  ‘Think of him?’ repeated Jeremy, startled by this unexpected question. ‘Well, I’ve always held Uncle Ambrose in high regard—’

  ‘No, no, I don’t mean that. I mean what do you think of his health? He’s only sixty-five, you know, but you could take him for eighty. He’s frailer than you’d think. I wonder how long he’ll last? He could drop dead at any moment. Or maybe he’ll see us all out. You never know. But one thing is certain, nephew, if your uncle does die within a reasonable space of time’ – she waved her hand with mock solemnity around the room – ‘all this will be yours!’

  Jeremy Oakshott said nothing for a while. He thought, what shall I do with it when it is mine? Pull it down? Sell it? One thing he would never do, he would never live in it.

  Aunt Arabella had begun hemming some towels, in the way of ladies of her generation. Beside her on the table were a large pair of gleaming steel scissors.

  Jeremy recalled the account that Dr Critchley had given of the event that had brought his aunt into the doctor’s confinement and care. ‘Miss Cathcart had become jealous of a neighbour’s young daughter, a girl of twenty-two. She envied the girl’s prettiness and liveliness, and also her intellectual ability. One day, while this girl was telling her about the latest book that she was reading, Miss Cathcart stabbed her in the back with a pair of scissors.’

  Jeremy excused himself, and left the room.

  On Tuesday morning, Jeremy Oakshott stood outside the forbidding gates of Oxford Gaol, talking to a cheerful man in his thirties, a man dressed in a threadbare pea-jacket, dungarees, and a battered peaked cap.

  ‘Now, Patrick,’ said Oakshott, ‘we all know that you’re not a real villain, but you stole wooden sleepers from the railway, and sold them to a not very scrupulous builder, and for that you got nine months. I’ve helped you all I can, and in that envelope you’ll find enough money to catch a boat back to Dublin. I want you to go straight from this moment forward, and if you do what I ask I’ll send you a money order in the post in a couple of weeks’ time to help you on your way. Will you promise me to keep to the straight and narrow way?’

  The Irishman’s eyes filled with tears.

  ‘God bless you, sir,’ he said, ‘you’ve been like a ministering angel to me. I won’t let you down. And when I’ve done here, I’ll go back home, and seek out an honest living.’

  The man drew a sleeve roughly across his eyes, and stumbled away.

  The warder had been watching them from a barred window beside the gates. Dr Oakshott had done well with Paddy Flynn. Paddy wasn’t a real villain, and there was every chance that he’d live a straight and honest life once he got back to Ireland. He wondered what had happened to John Smith, another of the good doctor’s cases, the violent thug who had twice got away with murder. One thing was certain: wherever he was, he’d be up to mischief.

  8

  A Murderous Night

  Ambrose Littlemore’s valet skilfully adjusted his master’s white tie, and then helped him on with his tail coat. For a man in poor health, with a slight curvature of the spine, the master made an impressive figure once he was dressed for dinner. The formal evening clothes seemed to give him a kind of renewed confidence in himself. There were times during the day, though, when he appeared to be assailed by sudden onsets of self-doubt. It was a valet’s duty to note these things, but never to comment on them.

  He glanced around the cavernous bedroom, with its old faded tapestries, soot-stained vaulted ceiling, and vast marble fireplace, above which hung an oil painting depicting Judith slaying Holofernes. The many candles in the apartment only emphasized the overall gloom of the place. If the truth be known, Mr Littlemore would be much more comfortable in one of those neat, cosy villas that were going up everywhere.

  ‘Is there anything else, sir?’

  ‘No, thank you, Albert. I’ll make my way downstairs presently.’

  Albert Stead left the room, and walked along a dark passage that brought him out on to a panelled gallery, from which he could look down into the entrance hall of Hazelmere Castle. He quite liked the ancient suits of armour standing on their plinths around the walls, and the shields and swords displayed on the panelling.

  He walked carefully around the great carved chair standing against the gallery wall. Mrs Tonkiss, the housekeeper, said it was a copy of the Coronation Chair in Westminster Abbey; maybe she was right.

  There were to be six, all told, for dinner that night. The Master, Dr Jeremy Oakshott the Master’s nephew from Oxford, a Colonel and Mrs Scott-James, Lord Arthur Farrell, and a Miss Jex-Blake. Miss Cathcart was slightly unwell, and had already had a light meal served in her room. The four guests were representatives of a couple of London societies. The Master contrived to look like a miser, but he was nothing if not generous.

  He had reached the great curving staircase leading down to the hall, but it was not his place to use that means of getting to the ground floor. Instead, he opened a narrow door in the wall, and descended a musty spiral staircase that took him to the kitchen passage. Various savoury smells came from the direction of the kitchen. Dinner would be served at seven, and because of the six covers to be serviced, he would have to join Mr Jevons and the two girls to serve. There was just time to have a word with Bob Freeman before donning a fresh pair of white gloves.

  He found Bob Freeman in the gun room, standing at the long barred window, and looking out across the front pasture. He could hear the roll of distant thunder, and knew that a storm was approaching. It had been close all day, but now there was a smell of rain in the air.

  ‘I can give you ten minutes, Bob,’ said Albert, ‘and then I’ll have to present myself at the pantry. What is it that’s troubling you?’

  Bob Freeman, a weather-beaten man of forty or so, dressed in a dark moleskin suit, turned from the window and produced a sheet of paper from one his pockets.

  ‘Here, Albert,’ he said, ‘read this. I should have shown it to the Master, but I didn’t want to frighten him. I can deal with this myself, but I want someone else to know about it in case I – in case something happens to me.’

  Albert took the paper and went over to the window to read it. There was a single candle burning in the gun room, but a bright moon high in the sky had broken through the scudding clouds, and its light was sufficient for him to read. It was a message, written in capital letters with a pencil.

  ‘A Fenian man is coming to the castle tonight to steal weapons from your gun room. He’ll come across the south pasture at ten o’clock, so be ready for him. I know about your cousin. You’ll want to strike a blow for him.’ It was signed: ‘Orange William’.

  ‘Fenians! You should have told the Master, Bob. What did he mean by those words, “I know about your cousin”?’

  ‘My cousin Eddie was working as a groom at the CID headquarters in London ten years ago last May, when those fiends set off a bomb that blew the place apart. Eddie was maimed for life. He died in the workhouse last year. I don’t know who Orange William is, Albert, but he struck the right note with me.’

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  Bob Freeman walked over to the gun-rack, and used a key from his own bunch to unlock it. He took down a rifle, and laid it carefully on a table near the window.

  ‘This is a lovely weapon, Albert,’ he said, ‘a Lee Enfield, and I’m going to oil it now, put the bolt in, and load it with a clip of bullets. When that Fenian man comes running across the
lawn there’ – he gestured towards the window – ‘I’ll be standing at the side door, and I’ll let him have it in the legs. That’ll bring the household running, and someone will send for the police.’

  ‘Are you sure, Bob? It’s not seven yet. Let me send down to the village for the constable. It’d be out of your hands, then.’

  ‘I want revenge for poor Cousin Eddie, Albert. When he died, he left a wife and four children behind him in the workhouse. I’ll stay here, as quiet as a mouse, and wait. Besides, I’ve a right to defend my Master’s property.’

  Albert Stead knew that there was nothing more to be done. Bob was the gamekeeper, and a fine shot into the bargain. Besides, it would serve the damned Fenian right if he lost the use of his legs for a while. Leaving the gun room, he made his way to the pantry.

  Jeremy Oakshott sipped the dessert wine that had accompanied the gooseberry tart, and looked at his fellow diners. The dinner for six had been a success, and the four representatives of Uncle’s charities were now fully at ease. Jevons, the butler, was well over seventy, but excelled at table service. Oakshott had seen the discreet hand-signals that the old man made to Albert the footman, and the two maids whenever it was time to remove a plate, or replenish a glass. Albert looked a little distrait, as though part of his mind was preoccupied with matters unconnected with serving dinner. Well, that was more than possible. People of his sort, like college scouts, had private lives, and private worries.

  Uncle Ambrose was talking animatedly to Colonel Scott-James, an elderly retired soldier with white side-whiskers. The Colonel’s wife was evidently confiding some domestic secret to Miss Jex-Blake, who sat beside her. Sophia Jex-Blake was dressed smartly but soberly in a dark silk evening gown, relieved at collar and cuffs with Brussels lace. Where one would expect to see a corsage, she wore a small gold watch attached to a ribbon. Her fair hair, parted in the middle, was uncovered. She had a round, pleasant face, and was blessed with a flawless complexion.

  Lord Arthur Farrell, representing the Ladies’ Samaritan Society, was an earnest young man in his thirties. He had spent most of the evening talking in low tones to his host.

  Oakshott thought, where have I heard that name – Jex-Blake – before? It had been only recently that he had heard it, but in what context he could not recall. He saw a vigorous woman in her mid-fifties, a woman who carried with her an air of quiet command. Why was her name so familiar?

  Yes! This was the woman who had helped to solve the mystery of Warden Fowler’s death at St Michael’s, working, so he had been told, in tandem with the prying, over-inquisitive Inspector Antrobus. She was a qualified doctor – both physician and surgeon; not a radical person, by all accounts; but she had persisted in pursuing her vocation, and was now rightly distinguished in her own profession.

  Oakshott listened to the rain beating against the windows of the dining chamber. The curtains had not been closed, and he could see the bright moon hurtling across the sky as it sought to free itself from the embrace of the black rain clouds.

  The dessert plates were removed, and a savoury of anchovies on toast was served.

  ‘You’re very quiet this evening, Jeremy,’ said Uncle Ambrose. It sounded like a statement; it was, in fact, a question.

  ‘Well, Uncle, I’m a little preoccupied with college matters at the moment, but I can assure you that I listened very carefully while Colonel Scott-James and Lord Arthur Farrell argued their respective cases. Like you, I can think of no worthier causes than theirs for you to support.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it,’ Uncle Ambrose replied. ‘I can tell you all now that I have already instructed my banker to make certain payments to both charities as soon as they receive my letter of consent – which will be sent to them in the next couple of days.’

  There were murmurs of approbation from the guests, and soon afterwards the company moved into the drawing room, where coffee was to be served. It was yet another vast chamber, its floor covered by faded Turkey carpets. It was well lit by four great chandeliers suspended from the ceiling.

  Oakshott looked at his watch. Twenty minutes to ten.

  ‘Uncle,’ he said, ‘Colonel Scott-James was telling me before dinner that he had served in India as aide-de-camp to General Ogilvy in Madras. Why don’t you show him the jewelled dagger that the Maharajah of Cawnpore gave to your father? The story behind that would be of great interest to all your guests, I think.’

  ‘I should very much like to see it,’ said the Colonel. ‘I met the Maharajah on a number of occasions. He was a very generous man, after his own fashion.’

  ‘The dagger? Now, where have we stowed it?’

  ‘Isn’t it in that Indian cabinet in your dressing room, Uncle?’ said Jeremy. ‘I’ll come with you to search for it, if you like.’

  Uncle Ambrose rose from his chair and left the room, followed by his nephew.

  ‘Tell me, Colonel,’ said Sophia Jex-Blake, ‘what kind of men are these native potentates? They’re disgustingly rich, aren’t they? Well, they must be, I suppose, if they can hand out jewelled daggers as presents.’

  ‘Yes, ma’am, they’re very rich, but very generous, when the mood takes them. The Maharajah of Cawnpore was very bountiful, you know, though a bit on the wild side. He tended to hit out at anyone or anything that caused him the slightest annoyance. I remember … Good God, what was that?’

  All those present in the room knew that what they had heard was a shot – or perhaps two shots – coming from the grounds. Colonel Scott-James rushed to one of the windows, and peered out into the rainy night. He found himself looking across the pasture that came right up to the terrace on the south side of the castle.

  ‘Damn this rain,’ he cried. ‘I can’t see much, but there’s an altercation of some sort going on out there. You ladies, stay where you are. Lord Arthur, come with me.’

  They stood on the terrace, oblivious of the driving rain, and watched as two men carrying flaming torches aloft, ran across the moonlit pasture and bend over a man who lay face downwards on the grass. One of the men, grooms from the house, shouted a single word, which they could just make out above the noise of the rain: ‘Dead!’

  ‘Oh, gentlemen,’ sobbed Bob Freeman, ‘I never thought to kill him. I aimed for his legs. Come through here, into the gun room, and I’ll tell you the whole story.’

  Colonel Scott-James and Lord Arthur Farrell followed him into the room. Bob Freeman tried to light a candle, but his hand shook so much that Lord Arthur performed the task for him. The shadows receded, and Jeremy Oakshott spoke.

  ‘Gentlemen,’ he said, ‘this man is my uncle’s gamekeeper, Robert Freeman. Whatever he has done tonight, he has done with good intent.’

  Out in the pasture, the two grooms had dragged the body into the shelter of the trees. One of them ran to them across the grass, and addressed himself to the Colonel.

  ‘Sir,’ he said, touching his cap, ‘that man was felled by two bullets. One hit him in the left leg, and the other went straight through his heart, as far as we can tell. Shall I send someone into the village to fetch the constable?’

  ‘An excellent idea, my man. Well done! Now, Robert Freeman, what is your account of the matter?’

  Despite the seriousness of the business, Jeremy Oakshott smiled to himself. Trust an old military man to assume command as though it was his right to do so! Well, perhaps it was, all things considered.

  ‘Early this morning, sir,’ said Bob Freeman, ‘I found a note pushed under that door, which is the side door of this gun room. It said – well, perhaps you should read it yourself.’

  Freeman handed the Colonel the note that he had shown earlier to Albert Stead, the valet. The Fenians again! The Colonel recalled the frightful events of 1884. In February, a Fenian bomb had gone off in Victoria Station. On a single day, 30 May, the CID headquarters had been attacked, as had the Carlton Club, and the home of Sir Watkin Williams-Wynn, the Member of Parliament for Denbighshire. And this game­keeper’s cousin had been one of the Fenia
ns’ victims.

  ‘Tell me what happened tonight,’ said the Colonel, in gentler tones than he had so far assumed.

  ‘Sir, as you can see, the side door to the gun room opens directly on to the terrace. So while the master and his guests were in the dining room, I took up a position just inside that door, and waited. I was holding one of the hunting rifles, loaded and ready for use. There it is, sir, lying on that table.’

  ‘Yes, a Lee Enfield, I see. A powerful weapon for a day’s shoot. Not something you’d expect to see in a country gun room. What do you hunt round here?’

  ‘There are plenty of deer in these woods, sir, and since the seventies there have been wild boar here. We used to have the old Baker muzzle-loading flintlocks here, sir, left over from the French wars. A wonderful weapon, sir. But the Master’s father replaced them all with modern Lee Enfields.’

  ‘Hmm… . Well, Freeman, that Fenian man chose a bad night for raiding, because there’s a moon out. Odd, that… .’

  ‘Yes, sir. Well, sure enough, close on ten, I saw the man running across the pasture from the trees, his head bent down as though he was trying to make himself smaller than he was. I opened the door – it opens inward – raised my rifle, and took aim.’

  Bob Freeman began to tremble, and it was an effort for him to stifle a sob.

  ‘I hoped to shoot him in the leg, sir, and bring him down. I squeezed the trigger, and the room seemed to shake with the noise of the shot. The man staggered, but remained standing. And then another shot rang out, and he fell to the ground.’

  ‘Another shot… . Could you have squeezed the trigger a second time? It happens, you know. Soldiers in the heat of battle often fire a second, or even a third shot, without realizing that they’ve done it.’

  ‘I don’t think so, sir. I’m not sure, though. Perhaps I did.’

  The Colonel strode to the table, picked up the rifle, drew back the bolt, and peered into the breech. He pulled off the magazine, and examined it carefully.

  ‘You did not fire a second shot, Freeman,’ he said.