Death at Epsom Downs

by Robin Paige

  The admiral, taking silence for consent, smiled with evident relief. “Well, then,” he said briskly, “the matter is in your hands. And of course, you shall have Mr. Murray’s excellent assistance.” He pulled out a gold watch and frowned down at it, then up to the clock on the wall. “Blasted clock is twenty minutes late. I’m afraid I must be off. His Majesty is at the Rothschilds’ today and wants to discuss some Club affairs.” He stood. “I’m sure he’ll be glad to know that you’re looking into this matter for us, Charles. He has the greatest confidence in you.”

  When he had gone, Charles allowed the silence to settle. Finally, he looked at Jack Murray, who was staring out the window. “It appears that there is more to this than we knew, Murray.”

  “It seems so, sir,” Murray said, turning. His face was glum. “But it’s just as likely that Badger was done in to avoid the payment of a debt, or because he’d crossed someone he shouldn’t.” He sighed heavily. “It’s happened before, sir.”

  “I imagine that there is a great deal of risk attached to the profession,” Charles agreed. “I don’t suppose you’d happen to know precisely where Mr. Day carried out his business.”

  Murray became more alert. “I do, sir. In St. James Street. Number Twenty-nine.”

  “And whether he had an assistant?”

  “There’s a clerk, sir, and a partner. The clerk is called Sobersides. The partner is named Baggs, Edward Baggs. Eddie, they call him.”

  “Mr. Murray,” Charles said, “you are a fount of information.” He rose and put on his hat. “I propose that we pay a visit to Number Twenty-Nine and see what we can learn from Sobersides or Mr. Edward Baggs, or both.”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Regal Lodge

  I love acting. It is so much more real than life.

  The Picture of Dorian Gray

  Oscar Wilde

  Try as we may, we cannot get behind things to the reality. And the terrible reason may be that there is no reality in things apart from their appearances.

  Oscar Wilde

  Kate was awakened at eight-thirty when Amelia brought a tray with tea and a copy of the Times, with a front-page story about the International Congress of Women, which would take place later that month at the Church-house, Westminster. The Countess of Aberdeen would preside, and delegates from various colonies and foreign countries were expected. Kate noted the date, June 26, and decided that she would attend. Perhaps there would be an opportunity to speak with interested women about her school.

  But important as the Congress might be, it was not topmost in Kate’s mind, for she had a great deal to think about as she sipped her morning tea. Her heart was filled with delight and relief at seeing Patrick. How strong and resourceful he had grown, and how handsome! But although he seemed happy enough, she sensed that he harbored more uneasiness about that horse—and perhaps more guilt over the death of his jockey friend—than he had been willing to show the night before. She hoped Charles would find a way to help the boy.

  But while Kate’s heart was full of Patrick, her mind was occupied with other things. There was the unhappy event of last night: Patrick’s discovery of the murdered man in the alleyway behind the Great Horse. But far more urgently, there was the intense and growing fascination she felt for Lillie Langtry—the Gilded Lily, Bradford had called her. Today she would make a concentrated effort to learn more about the woman—about the private person who must live somewhere within the actress. Under the guise of an interviewer for The Strand, she would probe as deeply as she dared, looking for the real Lillie.

  Kate dressed and went down for breakfast carrying a small notebook and fountain pen. She was shown to a smaller room adjacent to the dining room, wallpapered in a pale green flock, with green draperies over sheer curtains that softened and dimmed the light from the east-facing windows. French doors opened onto a flower-filled glass conservatory, and the sweet scent of jasmine filled the air.

  Lillie Langtry, dressed in an elegant blue shantung silk with chemisette and collar of ecru tucked net, was already at the table, reading a folded newspaper and breakfasting on dry toast and coffee. When Kate entered, she looked up and smiled warmly.

  “Ah, Beryl, good morning!” She gestured toward the sideboard, which was laden with chafing dishes filled with eggs, sausages, kippers, muffins, and toast. “Choose what you like, my dear. If you prefer something else, it can be brought from the kitchen.”

  “Thank you,” Kate replied, and allowed the footman to help her to an egg, a sausage, some fruit, and a muffin. As the footman held her chair, the butler appeared with a silver coffee pot, poured a steaming cup, and both withdrew.

  “You’re lovely this morning, dear,” Lillie said, glancing at Kate. She opened a brocade cigarette pouch and took out a cigarette, fitting it into an elaborately carved ivory holder. “Such a sweet little white dress. I do so like batiste for summer, although I don’t wear it myself, as I once did.”

  Kate smiled slightly as she stirred her coffee. “I trust you enjoyed your dinner with the Prince last evening.”

  “Oh, I did, very much,” Lillie said, “although we made an early evening of it.” She lit her cigarette with a match and took several puffs. “I was home and asleep by midnight.”

  This was strange, Kate thought, since she had heard Lillie’s carriage arriving in the gravel drive shortly after three in the morning. Or perhaps it was not Lillie’s carriage. Perhaps she had entertained a guest, and he was not arriving, but departing. Glancing up, she saw that the bruise on the actress’s cheek, while it was still evident, had been artfully camouflaged, and it crossed her mind that the softly filtered light in the room might be contrived to conceal the facial imperfections of a woman who would be fifty in a few more years. For an instant, Kate felt a fleeting pity for Lillie, whose face and figure were literally her fortune and who lived as a public spectacle. She must fret each moment that someone might take a critical view of the lines on her face, or find fault with the simplicity of her dress, or remark that her figure wasn’t what it had once been. But the pity flickered out in an instant, for Kate knew that Lillie Langtry had chosen to live in this way and could choose differently whenever she wished—if she were willing to pay the price.

  “And you, my dear Beryl?” Lillie asked, over her coffee cup. Her laugh was light. “I’m so sorry I had to leave you yesterday evening. I expect you were well entertained—although I daresay that it is a rare wife who goes off to a romantic supper with her husband when she is on holiday from home. Most wives of my acquaintance prefer to have supper with their lovers.”

  “Mine is a rare husband,” Kate replied, “whom I much prefer to a lover.” She buttered her muffin. “But I’m afraid my evening with Lord Charles was somewhat less than romantic. There was a murder in the alleyway and—”

  “A murder!” Lillie exclaimed. She put down her cup and pulled on her cigarette, her eyebrows delicately arched under the hair that was fluffed across her forehead. “Good heavens, how utterly delicious! Oh, my dear Beryl, do tell me all about it!”

  “There was nothing delicious about it at all,” Kate said gravely. “It was quite sordid, I’m afraid. One of the Newmarket bookmakers was shot to death in the alleyway behind the Great Horse.”

  “But your imagination must have been roused, certainly,” Lillie replied, the smoke drifting from her nostrils. “You have written about murders in your stories. As I recall, there’s a murder in ‘The Duchess.’ The man who attempts to sell the stolen jewels—he’s murdered, isn’t he?” She closed her eyes. “I can see it on the stage already, Beryl. It will be a thrilling play, full of drama and high morality.” She opened her eyes wide and raised one arm in a sweeping gesture. “The duchess’s stolen jewels are redeemed! The villain receives his just punishment! Cecil Howard will love it. He is always looking for the moral in every play he reviews, the nasty man.”

  Kate thought that very soon she should have to disabuse Mrs. Langtry of her mistaken notion that “The Duchess” was going t
o be staged—but not quite yet. “The difficulty,” she said, “is that fictional murders are quite different from real ones. There was a great deal of blood last night, real blood. The ground was soaked with it. And the victim couldn’t pick himself up when the curtain came down and go out to take his bows, or hear the applause of the audience, or read the reviews of his performance. He was dead, and his poor wife and children—”

  “Oh, pooh,” Lillie scoffed, resting her cigarette on a small silver ashtray and picking up her cup. “Bookmakers don’t have wives and children. They have mean little men who run after them with black books. That’s where they keep the names of the people who owe them money.”

  “This one had a wife,” Kate said. “He wore a wedding ring.”

  Lillie’s laugh tinkled merrily. “How like an author to observe such a thing, Beryl! Who, pray tell, was this poor bookmaker who expired in the alley? Perhaps I know him.” She laughed. “Perhaps I even owe him a pound or two.” She made a wry face and added, in a different voice. “In fact, I am sure I owe him a pound or two. I doubt there’s a bookmaker in town to whom I don’t owe something.”

  “His name is Day, I believe,” Kate said, putting down her fork. “He seems to have been called Badger.” Suddenly she was not very hungry, thinking of poor Mr. Day’s family gathered around a breakfast table where one chair was vacant and would never be filled. Whatever his occupation, he was a human being, who had felt love and anger and fear and—

  There was a strangled sound, and a crash of porcelain. Kate looked up to see that Lillie’s face had gone ashen. Her eyes were wide and dark. The cup lay broken on the table, and a splash of coffee stained the bodice of Lillie’s blue silk dress.

  “Lillie!” Kate exclaimed, putting her hand on the other’s arm. “Are you all right? Shall I call someone?” She reached for the small brass bell that sat on the table. “The butler? Or would you prefer your maid?”

  “No!” Lillie shook her head violently and sucked in her breath with a small gasping noise. She made a fist and held it to her mouth, coughing. “I’m—I’m fine. A mouthful of coffee just went the wrong way down.” She coughed again, and began to fan herself violently with her other hand. “Such a little thing, really. Don’t trouble yourself, please.”

  The momentary lapse into what had seemed to Kate like real emotion was almost under control and the actress had nearly regained command—but not quite. The rouge on Lillie’s cheeks showed as bright circles against the pallor of her skin and the hand at her mouth was trembling.

  Kate sat back. “I know that sometimes it helps to talk about things that distress us,” she said quietly. It was true, or at least it had always been so with her, and she spoke with unfeigned compassion. “I would hold anything you share with me in the utmost confidence, Lillie.”

  For a brief instant, Lillie’s eyes met hers. Her lips trembled and she seemed on the very edge of speaking. But then she stepped back from the brink.

  “There’s nothing to share, my dear,” she said, with an enormous effort at naturalness. She reached for her damask napkin and dropped it onto the small puddle of coffee, which was threatening to drip off the table and onto the floor. “I was . . . merely startled. You see, I know Mr. Day. Anyone who has ever placed a bet at the racecourse knows him.” She forced a careless smile. “He’s become rather a Newmarket fixture, and I must say that he’s taken a great deal of my money over the past few years.” She closed her eyes briefly and opened them again, wide. “But of course winning and losing is part of the game of racing. One doesn’t hold his successes against him.”

  Kate gave Lillie a sympathetic look. “Oh, of course,” she said, and added, tactfully, “I’m sure I would be quite startled if one of my acquaintances were to suffer a similar fate. Had you seen him recently?”

  Ignoring the question, Lillie glanced down at her stained bodice and pushed back her chair. “My, haven’t I made a right royal mess of myself,” she said with a shaky laugh. “I’ll go and change. And when I come back, you can ask me all the questions you like and write down every answer in that notebook of yours.”

  Kate watched her make her exit—an impressive one, under the circumstances. But Kate, and Beryl Bardwell, were left to wonder what secret connection had existed between Lillie Langtry and the murdered bookmaker. Her reaction had been so dramatic, yet so real. Was it merely surprise, or something more? Was she afraid? Of what? Of whom? Why?

  But Kate also knew that while Lillie Langtry might pretend to complete candor, the answers to these questions were not likely to come from her.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  In St. James Street

  Welshers, bookies who took your money but were nowhere to be found if your horse won, were without question the most hated of all racecourse crooks. If caught, they were usually subjected to a terrible vengeance by an enraged racing crowd. The treatment differed from course to course: at Catterick they were tarred and feathered, while at any course close to a river they were stripped naked and thrown into the water. More than one welsher was done to death.

  The Fast Set: The World of Edwardian Racing

  George Plumptre

  St. James proved to be a cobbled street only one block long not far from the Jockey Club and the Subscription Rooms, where bookmakers and racehorse owners assembled and called over the racing card on the night before a big race. Number Twenty-nine was a narrow, two-story redbrick building with a small plate-glass window set in the front, hung with heavy green draperies to prevent curious passersby from seeing within. On the outside of the window was painted Alfred Day, Racing Commissions in ornate black lettering trimmed and bordered in gold. A folded copy of the Sporting Times lay on the stoop where it had been tossed and a CLOSED sign hung crookedly across the front door. Charles pressed his face to the glass and peered into the dark interior, but he could see nothing.

  “They ain’t in th’ office, sir,” piped a shrill voice. “They don’t gen’rally open up ’fore noon.”

  Charles turned to see a ragged boy of ten or eleven. The rain that had succeeded the earlier drizzle had ceased, but there was still a fine mist in the air, and the boy’s hair and clothing were thoroughly wet. He was pushing a muddy wooden barrow into which a twig cage, bound with leather thongs, had been haphazardly set. The cage contained three twittering ferrets pushing frantically against the bars.

  Charles went back down the steps to the street, followed by Jack Murray. “You know Mr. Day, then?” Charles asked.

  The boy nodded vigorously, set down his barrow with a thud, and pushed his wet hair off his forehead. “If y’er ’ere to place a bet, sir, yer might go round th’ back an’ ring. Sobersides ’as a room upstairs. If ’e’s in, ’e’ll take care o’ yer.”

  Charles reached into his pocket for a coin. “Thank you,” he said. “Do you live nearby?”

  “Back there, in a room, sir, wiv me mother an’ brothers, sir.” Pocketing the coin, the boy pointed down a dark passageway between two brick buildings across the street. At the end of the passageway was a dingy courtyard, and yet another building.

  “I see,” Charles said. He looked down at the ferrets, which were scrambling over one another in their frantic efforts to escape. “I suppose you went out early this morning to tend your ferret traps, did you?” He paused. “I wonder if you saw anyone attempting to enter Mr. Day’s office.”

  The boy gave this question some thought, seemed on the brink of speaking, then hesitated. Charles found another coin and proffered it. The boy took it eagerly.

  “I wuz out at three, sir, ’fore the rain. Ferrets is ’ard t’ catch in the day. They sleeps then, down in their dens. So they ’as to be got before dawn.” He gestured toward the bookmaker’s establishment. “When I went out, there wuz two men comin’ round from th’ back, ’urryin’ like. Seemed odd t’me, sir, it bein’ the middle of the night, which is why I recollects it.”

  Jack Murray, standing behind Charles, stepped forward. “What kind of men?” he asked. “Gentlemen
?”

  “Oh no, sir, not gentl’men, sir,” the boy said, “not from the way they talked. But ’twas too dark t’see ’oo they wuz.” He picked up the handles of his barrow. “If that’s all, sirs, I’ll be on me way. Mr. Thatcher ’as promised t’pay well fer th’ ferrets, fer th’ match tonight.”

  Charles had never been to a ferret match, but he knew that the little creatures were set against rats, and wagers were laid as to how many they would kill. The caged animals were sleek and beautiful, and the thought that they would be used in bloody sport was utterly repugnant to him.

  “How well does Mr. Thatcher pay you to fetch ferrets?” he asked.

  “A crown apiece, sir!” the boy said proudly. “It’s a great deal more than ’e pays fer rats, which is wot I usu’lly sells ’im. When I kin, I sells ferrets, though they’re terr’ble ’ard to catch. Only thing that’ll get ’em into the traps is kippers.”

  Charles squatted down beside the barrow, remembering that he had seen ferrets sold on the London streets for a pound each. Mr. Thatcher was not overgenerous with his ragged young ferret-finder.

  “These are very fine ferrets,” he said. “Quite fat and amazingly strong-looking. I believe I fancy them myself. Would you take a guinea for the three of them?”

  “A guinea!” The boy’s eyes grew large. “Oh, yes, sir! ’Deed I would, sir!”

  Charles drew out his purse and fished through an assortment of copper, silver, and gold coins. He extracted a gold sovereign and a silver shilling and pressed them into the child’s hand. Then he picked up the wooden cage, set it on the street, and released the catch. The trio of ferrets pushed eagerly out, and were gone in an instant.

  The boy’s face puckered and Charles thought he might cry. “But I thought yer wanted ’em, sir!” he cried, holding onto his fortune as if he feared it might be taken away from him. “An’ now they’re gone!”