The Prisoner in the Castle

by Susan Elia MacNeal

  “Of course,” Durgin replied, taking the seat opposite. His eyes strayed to the picture. It showed a shadowy courthouse waiting room and a hopeless family—the man with his head in his hands and the woman with her face full of pain. Another woman peered over her shoulder as the courtroom door opened. “The plea was quite…something.”

  “Changing his plea in the dock!” Fullford moved a brass justice scales out of the way, so he could see the chief inspector better. “It’s insanity is what it is! You know he’s guilty as sin.”

  “And yet his plea makes the whole thing seem as if a clean conviction’s not a sure thing anymore.”

  “DCI Durgin, you must see how this puts us in a bind. All we have is circumstantial evidence. Of course they’ll try to pin it on the fiancée. She’ll deny it, but will it sow enough seeds of doubt to sway our case?”

  “I can’t say, Mr. Fullford.”

  “Then there’s the issue with Miss Hope—she’s our only living witness.”

  “I know.” Durgin’s voice was tight. He and his men had come upon Maggie after she’d shot Reitter in self-defense. After he’d lost six of his own.

  “I know you were there, Detective Chief Inspector,” Fullford continued, his tones gentler. “Don’t mean to dredge up bad memories. But where is she? We need to get her on the stand!”

  “She does very sensitive and special government work…”

  “No one is that special.” Fullford took off his glasses to clean them with an immaculate monogrammed handkerchief. “Besides, she was working with you and the Metropolitan Police at the time. I read the file—Peter Frain of MI-Five assigned her to the case, because of her connection with SOE.”

  “The thing is, she might not even be in the country.”

  Fullford put down his spectacles. “Well, even if she’s on the dark side of the moon, you’d better damn well find her and bring her back.”

  “I know, sir, but—”

  “Otherwise, the Blackout Beast has a damn good chance of going free.”

  Chapter Six

  As morning turned to afternoon, dark, swollen clouds edged toward the island, throwing shadows over the woods and hills. Maggie and Teddy, with the help of McNaughton and one of the castle’s ponies, brought Ian Lansbury’s body back to the game larder.

  The larder was an octagon-shaped sandstone outbuilding near the castle’s kitchen. Here dead animals were hung until the meat matured. The tiled floor was decorated in circles with deer vertebrae, and had a drain in the center. Racks with hooks were bolted to the high ceiling, while axes, knives, and saws hung from brackets mounted on the wall. A headless stag, Leo’s kill from the morning, was already on one of the hooks. Carefully, they laid Ian’s body down, next to Captain Evans’s corpse, on the marble slab used for butchering.

  Teddy removed his hat. As Maggie covered Ian with a sheet, she murmured, “Rest in peace, Mr. Lansbury.”

  “Rest in peace indeed.”

  She looked to Teddy. “Two dead in two days. I’m sure it’s not how they anticipated dying in this war—on some wretched Scottish island.”

  Teddy looked down at the two shrouded corpses. “When is the boat coming?”

  “Should be any time now,” Maggie replied. “I’ll go back to the house to clean up and change—and get things in order for the new captain. Let’s wait to tell the other inmates until we’re assembled for cocktails.”

  “Yes.” He sighed, then clapped his hat on. “This group of vagabonds needs a leader. Things fall apart, after all.”

  “Newton’s second law of thermodynamics,” Maggie murmured. “Works for people as well as objects.”

  * * *

  —

  The boat wasn’t coming that day. Mrs. McNaughton had taken the message from Arisaig House: Boat broken down. Needs new part. Will try tomorrow.

  No! Maggie reread the note, feeling helpless and frustrated. But they were on an island, there was nothing to be done—they’d just have to wait. Stay calm. It’s just one more day.

  “I’d like to reply to Arisaig,” she told Mrs. McNaughton. “Would you mind unlocking Captain Evans’s office for me again?” The housekeeper gave her a suspicious look. “It’s important,” Maggie assured her. “Please.”

  Sighing, Mrs. McNaughton reached for the key and then let the younger woman into the office. For a moment, Maggie stood on the threshold. She considered sending a message to someone—anyone—else. Her friend Chuck, or Sarah. David, at Number Ten. Detective Chief Inspector Durgin. Help, I’m being held prisoner against my will! she pictured herself signaling, on some blasted Scottish island in the middle of nowhere. Rescue me!

  But she couldn’t. Instead, she contacted SOE at Arisaig. “There’s been another death. Ian Lansbury. Please send a boat ASAP. Over.”

  Another one? The woman’s voice sounded gobsmacked. Copy that, Scarra, she amended. We’re doing our best. Arisaig out.

  Mrs. McNaughton was lingering in the doorway. As Maggie turned from the wireless, the woman started. “I didn’t mean to snoop, miss.”

  “No, of course not,” Maggie replied, smiling, not believing her for a moment. “Thank you, Mrs. McNaughton. I’m finished.”

  “Are you all right, miss? You look quite done in. Would you care for a cup of tea?”

  “No tea, but thank you.” Maggie’s wan smile flickered. “And you should know—Ian Lansbury’s dead.”

  “No!”

  “I’m afraid so. A terrible accident.”

  The housekeeper’s scarred hand crept to the tiny cross at her throat. “A Thighearna dean tròcair,” she murmured. A faint color stained her cheeks. “It means, ‘Lord have mercy on us.’ ”

  “A Thighearna dean tròcair,” Maggie agreed. Sighing, she left the office and climbed upstairs, through cold so thick it was almost visible, to take a bath, and then dress for dinner. Her room, one of many bedrooms off a long, chilly corridor, was a tortured mix of chintz and tartan, the centerpiece of which was a four-poster carved walnut bed bristling with ivy. At least there’s no taxidermy, Maggie had thought when she first saw it.

  On the nightstand was a lamp in the shape of the Roman goddess, the huntress Diana, topped with a long-fringed crimson shade. Next to the lamp were a broken bracket clock and a stack of books: Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca, Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre, and Richard Connell’s short story “The Most Dangerous Game.”

  The only art in the room was a gold-framed reproduction of Landseer’s work Deer Stalkers Returning. In it, a ghillie leads a pony through a hilly landscape, a dead stag tied to its back. Maggie hadn’t paid much attention to it before, but now she was struck by how similar it was to the way she and Teddy had transported Ian Lansbury’s body. She shuddered. Marching over to the etching, she took it down and turned it around to face the wall.

  She allowed herself a grim moment of satisfaction before she went to the bathroom. She hated it—the toilet in the shape of a throne with an antler horn on the chain pull. But at least there was a claw-foot tub with a ready supply of brackish water, even if the tub’s feet did look like they might start scrabbling across the room at any moment. But when she drew back the muslin curtain, she gasped.

  A severed stag’s head lay in the white enamel tub, dark red blood pooling and trickling down the drain. His eyes stared at her in accusation, tongue lolling at an angle. The smell was metallic and meaty.

  She clapped her hands over her mouth and did her best not to scream.

  * * *

  —

  McNaughton and Murdo were brought up to help dispose of the head and Maggie scrubbed the sticky blood from the tub, tears stinging her eyes. She felt surrounded by death—Captain Evans, Ian Lansbury, and now the stag…

  But who would do such a thing? she wondered. Could it be Leo? She’d ruined his shot, so had he played a nasty prank on her by putting the deer head
in her bath? She felt a strange detachment as she stood at the sink and scrubbed her fingernails in the brownish, freezing water, turning them scarlet with cold. She caught a glimpse of herself washing bloody hands in the mirror. Well, you’d make a fine Lady Macbeth, now, wouldn’t you?

  She dressed for dinner, again in her blue wool dress, pulling her hair back even more severely than usual. You’re a trained and experienced agent. There’s nothing to be afraid of.

  As she descended the long staircase with its nicked serpent-head banister, she gazed at the oil painting of Lady Beatrix Killoch, Sir Marcus’s wife. Interesting it’s not in the main room, Maggie thought. Why keep it hidden in the shadows? Still, Lady Beatrix, at least in her portrait, had been beautiful—in a severe, uncompromising way. She was blond and slim, with skin like marble, and eyes full of secrets. La Dame de Poisson-Tête, Maggie remembered Helene saying. Pish-posh, she looks nothing like a fish.

  Murdo was on a ladder, using a broom to clean spiderwebs from the corners of the first-floor corridor’s ceiling. His shirtsleeves were rolled up, and she glimpsed a skull and crossbones tattoo on one forearm. She and the castle’s caretaker hadn’t had much interaction since she’d arrived at the castle almost six months ago. Murdo kept to himself, for the most part. But Maggie had watched him from her window, a gun over his shoulder, heading off into the woods daily to hunt.

  “Hello, Murdo. Is that gum you have?” Chewing gum was an unheard-of luxury.

  “What we on the island call ‘gum,’ ” he replied, not meeting her gaze. “Codfish eyes. You can chew ’em all day if you want. Never dry out.”

  First a stag’s head and now a fish’s eyeball. Maggie felt queasy. “Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind.”

  “Might not be good enough for you fancy folk,” he muttered.

  “I tried my hand at fishing today, actually. Much harder than it looks.”

  “Well, not all of us can relax all day. Some of us have to work. Not to mention fight the war—would if I could.”

  The words stung. Of course, she couldn’t explain to him why she was being kept there, against her will. Could Murdo have left the head in the bathtub? She sighed again and continued to the great room. Maggie didn’t know exactly what time it was—she didn’t think any of the clocks in the castle had worked in decades—but the sun had already set and she guessed it was around six by the growl of her stomach.

  The western windows of the great room already had their blackout curtains in place and the electric lights were on. The mounted stags appeared to gaze down over Quentin, elegant in evening dress, fixing cocktails, Monsieur Reynard posed at his feet. “Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree” was playing on the wireless, its relentlessly cheery refrain echoing through the chamber.

  “Is that song always on?” Maggie asked as she entered the room. She was trying hard to smile and appear normal. Or at least not reveal how gutted she felt by the day’s events and how unmoored her conversation with Murdo had left her.

  “Last night we listened to the Glenn Miller Orchestra version, Miss Hope. This is the Andrews Sisters. I absolutely adore this song—in all of its iterations,” Quentin explained. “And how was your day?”

  As Maggie walked toward him, sidestepping the lion-skin rug, she imagined how Mr. Churchill might answer the question. “Er, challenging, Mr. Asquith. A challenging day.”

  “What happened to the arrival of our new fearless leader?”

  “Alas, he—or she—hasn’t arrived yet. Arisaig sent us a message that the boat needs a new part.”

  “Ah, probably not easy to procure this far north. Do you think they will arrive tomorrow?”

  “Let’s hope so.” Maggie approached the globe on its stand; it was outdated now, of course, with Germany conquering huge swaths of territory. As Quentin poured liquids from various bottles into a tarnished shaker, she spun the globe, contemplating how much the world had transformed, remembering the horrors she’d witnessed in Berlin and Paris. From the wireless and the newspapers they were given once a month, she realized the tide of the war seemed to be changing—the Allies had broken the Axis lines at El Alamein in Egypt; Operation Torch, the U.S. invasion of French North Africa, was ongoing; the Germans and Italians had invaded Vichy France; and they’d just received word about the Soviet counteroffensive at Stalingrad. And, still, she and the rest of them were being held prisoner on a remote island. Absolutely useless. Unable to fight. And now dying.

  “First one’s on me,” Quentin joked, handing Maggie a cut-glass coupe full of amber liquid. With so much darkness and not enough to do, he’d taken to making cocktails earlier and earlier in the evenings.

  She gave a tentative sniff. “What is it?”

  “ ‘The Forbidden Island,’ ” he declared with a flourish of one hand. “It’s rum, cognac, and Maraschino. I was talking to Mrs. McNaughton today, and she informed me this cocktail was a favorite of Killoch’s.”

  She sat on an overstuffed sofa and waited to take a sip until Quentin had finished making his own drink. “Do you know why this place is called the Forbidden Island?”

  “Yes, Murdo explained that, too. It’s because no outsiders were allowed to land on Scarra without express permission from Sir Marcus. It was quite the private kingdom.” He eyed Maggie. “By the way, and speaking of private kingdoms—have you been in the ballroom?”

  The castle’s ballroom was closed up; there was no reason to go there. “No, I haven’t.”

  “Well, we have,” Quentin said, pointing down to Monsieur Reynard. “And it’s…odd.”

  “This whole place is odd.”

  “No, I mean truly and extremely odd. Up in the orchestra gallery, there’s a thick velvet curtain.”

  “What? Why? It would only muffle the orchestra’s sound.”

  “So no one playing could witness what was happening down below is my guess.” He arched an eyebrow. “And there are dumbwaiters.”

  “Dumbwaiters?”

  “To pass food and drink into the ballroom without anyone entering. No waitstaff was allowed inside. Everything happening in there was kept utterly and absolutely private.”

  It took Maggie a moment, but then she understood what he meant. “Are you sure?”

  “I asked McNaughton, and he confirmed it.” Maggie’s face must have registered disbelief. “It’s true!” Quentin assured her. “The musicians and the staff never witnessed what went on during those balls—although of course they had their speculations. And, if you notice, all the windows are quite high up—there’s no way anyone could see in.”

  “Goodness,” Maggie responded. He’d finished making his drink, and they clinked glasses.

  “Enjoy!”

  Maggie took a tentative sip and grimaced. “Oh my stars, it’s—strong.”

  “Well, this is a house party, after all. Although a house party where all the guests are walking weapons, of course. Would you like something different?”

  “No—no.” Maggie took another sip. “Tonight I think I need it.”

  “We all do.” He settled in next to her.

  You have no idea. “So, what did you and Monsieur Reynard do today?”

  “We spent most of it reading—Scott’s Last Arctic Expedition—about living off the land and all that. Captain Sykes recommended it, back at Arisaig House. Not my thing, but there’s little else to do around here. And Monsieur Reynard seemed to enjoy it.”

  “So you’ll read about living off the land, but not actually do it yourself?” She permitted herself a smile.

  “Exactly!”

  “I went fishing with Mr. Crane today—” Maggie took yet another sip of her drink. “I’m beginning to think you might have the right notion. Not my idea of fun.”

  “Catch anything?”

  “No fish, alas.” Only a dead body. “Just—cold feet.”

  “Miss Hope, I can’t help
but notice you’re looking rather pale. What happened to you today that has you on edge?”

  I can’t talk about it, at least not until everyone’s assembled. Best to wait. “Well, Mr. Kingsley very nearly shot me with his bow when he and Dr. Khan were out stalking deer this morning. And then someone left a bloody stag’s head in my bathtub for me to find. Both incidents were upsetting, to say the least.”

  “A stag’s head in your bath?” Quentin’s jaw dropped. “Who would do such an execrable thing?”

  “Who indeed?”

  Quentin clutched Monsieur Reynard up to his chest. “I loathe hunting. Abhor it. My father adored it, though. In the thirties, he went stalking with Hermann Goering at Carinhall—Daddy nicknamed him Der Dick. Anyhoo, Daddy remembers Goering was always wondering what it would be like to hunt man.”

  “No!” Maggie felt queasy again. She set down her drink.

  “I believed him. Back then, old fatty Goering was definitely breeding a menagerie of forest creatures by mating moose and elk with European beasts—he wanted wilder, more aggressive animals for his hunts in the primeval forests of Białowieża. He had a zoologist named Lutz Hecht ‘back breeding’ the animals, trying to resurrect wild beasts we now think of as extinct. Lord only knows where they are with the program now….” Quentin shivered.

  Hunting man? Maggie thought. What is the world coming to? And yet, isn’t that exactly what war is?

  “Hello!” Anna was the next to arrive, a cairngorm brooch at her throat relieving the severity of her dress.

  “Welcome, Miss O’Malley,” Maggie called, relieved to change the subject from Goering’s stomach-turning pursuits. “Come, sit and have a drink with us.”

  “Thank you,” Anna said, choosing a moth-nibbled velvet-covered chair.