by Trow, M J
‘Go on.’
‘Well, about a month ago, Harriet went into Macclesfield alone – with Beddoes, of course, but the disgusting man finds a tavern and stays there until an agreed hour.’
‘You were not present, ma’am?’
‘No, I was … indisposed. When Harriet returned that day, she was excited, agitated. She danced and sang and chattered incessantly to me, to her mama, to her papa. She would give no reason for this new elation – she was usually so quiet a child – except that her life had changed and that she would never be the same again.’
‘From which you concluded …?’
‘I could not believe it at first. A young lady of Harriet’s refinement, the daughter of a clergyman, but I suspected – no more than that – that she had an admirer.’
Lestrade’s headshaking and clicking of the tongue were taken at face value by the strait-laced Miss Spink.
‘Pray continue, ma’am.’
‘Harriet became a different girl. She went into Macclesfield two or three times a week and each time she returned she was ruder, more unbridled. She refused to attend to her studies and took to the vilest habits.’
‘Habits, ma’am? Are you suggesting she was embracing the Catholic faith?’
‘Why no, Inspector. She … smoked.’
‘Smoked?’
‘Here.’ Miss Spink produced a tin of tobacco papers from a pocket in her voluminous skirt. ‘Shameful, isn’t it? A young lady of her refinement. The servants knew, of course, but we were at pains to keep it from her poor parents.’
‘And how do you account for the acquisition of this habit, ma’am?’
‘That man, that filthy beast whom she met in Macclesfield and whom she went on seeing in that clandestine way. It was he, I am sure, who introduced her to the habit … and Lord knows what else besides.’
‘I repeat, ma’am. Who is the man?’
‘I only saw him once. On one occasion I ignored Harriet’s insistence that she go alone to Macclesfield. I went with her. As we neared the park, I saw her signal to a figure in the bushes. It was only a split second, of course, because the figure vanished. I asked Harriet who it was and she laughed and said a friend. I could extract nothing more from her.’
‘Could you give me a description of the man?’
‘That’s very difficult, Mr Lestrade. He was large, big-built, wearing a long coat and a dark hat. I could not see his face. But I knew instinctively that he was a beast.’
‘Of course,’ Lestrade concurred, his tongue planted firmly in his cheek. ‘And you never saw the man again?’
Miss Spink shook her head.
Swallow burst in. ‘That Swinburne’s a right …’
‘Thank you, Mr Swallow.’ Lestrade stood up sharply, gesturing to Miss Spink. Swallow coughed awkwardly.
‘I am to join Mrs Wemyss in Congleton, Inspector. Please treat all that I have told you in the strictest confidence.’
‘Of course, ma’am. Would you be so good as to ask Mr Beddoes to see me presently?’
Miss Spink floated out in a profusion of dignity. She tossed her head disdainfully at Swallow and glided across the hall beyond him.
‘That one needs a bloody good …’
‘Quite so, Inspector,’ Lestrade interrupted him again.
‘Ee, that Swinburne,’ Swallow returned to his former topic. ‘’E’s sittin’ there, gettin’ cats to sink their claws into his legs. Bloody weird, I call it.’
‘Bloody weird most of us call it, Inspector. But it is hardly a police matter.’
Swallow shrugged.
Beddoes began by being far from helpful. Trouble at t’Vicarage was something he rather revelled in. A man of his class, he was no deferential tenant and it was clear that he had no time for the carriage folk whom he served. Yes, he had taken Miss Harriet on several occasions into Macclesfield. Yes, he had noticed a change in her mood, but that didn’t surprise him. All carriage folk behaved badly to him. They upbraided him, looked down on him, ignored him. So the girl was going off the straight and narrow. Typical. Nothing about the gentry surprised him. A man? No, he knew nothing about a man. But then, he had spent his time in Macclesfield at the Rose and Crown, so he wouldn’ a seen nowt, would ’e? But then, nothing about the gentry surprised Beddoes.
It took Lestrade some little time to elicit this slim information, as Beddoes was broad Cheshire and Lestrade wished at more than one point for an interpreter. But as Beddoes rose to go, he threw out a remark which he considered unimportant. To Lestrade it was vital.
‘A pedlar?’
‘Aye. On’t morning of Miss Harriet’s death, it were. Soom bloke comes round to sell brushes.’
‘What did this man look like?’
‘Oh, I didn’t see him very close. I’d just come from t’school. Big bloke ’e were. ’Ad an ’at.’
‘An ’at?’
‘Aye.’
‘Beddoes, where is Mrs Drum?’
‘Vicar give ’er notice. She’s off t’Macclesfield this hour since.’
‘On foot?’
‘Nay, I took her t’station at Rainow, seein’ as ’ow I couldn’ go mysen.’
‘Get your trap, man. We’re going after her.’
‘It’s t’Vicar’s trap.’ Beddoes was suddenly astonishingly solicitous for his employer. ‘Besides, y’ve got yer own.’
‘Inspector Swallow has borrowed my trap to pursue his own enquiries. I am commandeering the Vicar’s in the name of the law.’ Then, more forcibly, ‘You wouldn’t want to be accused of obstructing the police in the course of their investigations, would you, Beddoes?’
The odd-job man grumbled and muttered as he scuttled to the stables behind the house.
‘Y’ll not catch ’er now,’ he shouted as the trap swung down the gravelled drive out on to the open road. ‘T’train from Rainow leaves in ten minutes.’
‘Use your whip, man. You’re wasting time.’
They did catch Mrs Drum. So desolate had she been while waiting in the cold drizzle at Rainow station that the stationmaster had taken her into the shelter of his office and given her the proverbial cup of tea that did not really cheer. Consequently, while the garrulous Mrs Drum poured her heart out to him and he poured tea into her, she had missed her train. Lestrade had found her, still sipping tea, still in the stationmaster’s office. She was not, however, terribly helpful. Lestrade’s forthright questions brought her out of her mood of self-pity, but her description of the travelling salesman was vague. He was a big man, she said, but his face was partly hidden by a muffler and his voice distorted accordingly. She thought he had piercing blue eyes, but under the rim of the hat, it was difficult to tell. As to the death of Miss Harriet, Mrs Drum had been in the kitchen, it being the maid’s day off, preparing dinner. It was about half past three. She remembered that because she heard the hall clock strike, but the hall clock was notoriously inaccurate. Safer to say it was between three and four. Mrs Drum had heard a roaring noise, and then the screaming started. By the time she reached the top of the stairs, it was too late. What was left of Harriet Wemyss lay blazing on the carpet. Shocked and sickened, Mrs Drum had thrown water on her and all the blankets she could drag from the beds. The smell, she said, was awful and the memory of it would remain with her always.
Lestrade gave the ex-housekeeper time to recover. It had been perhaps half an hour later that Mrs Wemyss and Miss Spink had arrived, followed almost immediately by the vicar. Mrs Drum had sent Beddoes for the police, but they arrived later still.
‘I can’t understand how it happened, sir,’ sobbed Mrs Drum. ‘It’s unbelievable.’
‘The travelling salesman,’ said Lestrade. ‘What time did he arrive?’
‘I suppose about half past twelve, sir. I told ’im we didn’t need brushes but ’e insisted on seeing the lady of the ’ouse.. I told ’im Mrs Wemyss wasn’t in, but Miss ’Arriet come downstairs and took ’im into the drawing room.’
‘What did you do?’
‘I got on with
my work, sir.’
‘Did you not think it odd that Miss Harriet should deal with this pedlar herself? Was it not usually your duty?’
Mrs Drum had clearly not thought along those lines before, but she acknowledged that that was in fact the case.
‘And what time did this pedlar leave?’
‘I don’t know, sir, I was in the kitchen most of the day and you can’t see the front door from there. I suppose Miss ’Arriet saw ’im out.’
‘The pedlar used the front door. Was that not unusual?’
Again, Mrs Drum had not thought of that. Again, she concluded that it was.
Lestrade thought now that he knew how the murder was accomplished. And he knew who – or at least he had a description of the man. But he needed to prove it, and to that end he took the protesting Mrs Drum along with the complaining Beddoes back to Wildboarclough Vicarage.
He was in time to see a cab leaving with Watts-Dunton and Swinburne and he thought he heard a superfluity of whip-cracking, but he couldn’t be sure. The Reverend Wemyss was somewhat peeved to see the return of Mrs Drum, but Lestrade assured him it was necessary and she would not be there long.
It was nearly dark now and the housekeeper and the policeman ascended the stairs by the light of an oil-lamp. Lestrade once again insisted on overriding the Vicar’s newfound aversion to naked flames. Harriet Wemyss’ body had been removed to Congleton mortuary, accompanied by Swallow and one or two curious cats. Lestrade viewed the landing area where Mrs Drum had found the blazing girl. There were bad scorch marks on the carpet, through to the floorboards underneath. They formed a visible trail from a door down the corridor towards the dead girl’s bedroom.
‘What is that room?’ asked Lestrade.
‘The Chapel of Ease, sir,’ replied Mrs Drum, showing signs of being overcome once again at standing on The Very Spot Where Poor Miss Harriet Died. Lestrade opened the door on to a conventional, middle-class lavatory, complete with blue-flowered porcelain bowl. Much to the distaste of Mrs Drum, he peered into the pan. There was a coloured film floating on the water, he noticed, as he lowered his lamp towards it and burn marks on the wooden seat.
‘Has this lavatory been used since the accident?’
‘Why, no, sir. Inspector Swallow told us not to touch or move anything. There is another on the other side of the house, as well as the privy in the yard.’
Lestrade was grateful that Swallow was enough of a policeman for that.
‘Stand back, Mrs Drum, you are in for another shock.’
Lestrade poised himself, then flipped a lighted match into the pan. It exploded with a roar as a column of livid flame ripped upwards, illuminating the room, the landing and the terrified Mrs Drum.
Lestrade threw towels over the fire and it died, slowly, reluctantly.
‘Is that the noise you heard, Mrs Drum, before the screaming started?’
Mrs Drum was standing back against the wall, visibly quivering, nodding silently the while.
‘In the kitchen you would have not heard the cigarette – the furtive, clandestine cigarette that Miss Harriet was smoking – hit the water. But it wasn’t water, Mrs Drum. Or at least the surface of it was not. It was petroleum spirit, instantly inflammable to a match or a lit cigarette. The poor creature must have gone up like a torch, and in her shock and agony, must have rushed headlong towards the sanctuary of her bedroom. But such was the power of the flames that she never got there. Not in this world.’
By now, the Reverend Wemyss, startled by the noise of the flames and the cry of terror from Mrs Drum, had joined the couple in the almost total darkness on the stairs.
‘Come, sir,’ Lestrade said to him. ‘You and I must have a little talk.’
It did not unduly bother Lestrade that in telling Wemyss all he knew he was betraying an implied confidence to Miss Spink. His priorities were right, he felt sure. What was domestic tension compared with murder? The Vicar of Wildboarclough listened with an evertightening lip to the whole sorry, bizarre story. He could shed no light. He knew of no man. He assumed that Harriet’s increased visits to Macclesfield were due to an increasing interest in the newly extended lending library. It had never occurred to him that his daughter had become a libertine and that she had been seduced into the ways of the devil by an anonymous ‘seducteur’. He would not tell his wife – the further shock would kill her. When she had overcome her immediate need for Miss Spink, he would dispense with the woman’s services – Miss Spink’s, that was, not his wife’s. Dorothea had after all been ‘in his service’, so to speak, for too long. Miss Spink had not been vigilant. She had known Harriet’s secret and had said nothing. It was tantamount to murder. Even Lestrade fleetingly contemplated issuing a warrant as accessory, but he guessed that the governess’ conscience was sentence enough.
The night at the Vicarage was cold and gloomy. A morbid stillness lay over the whole house. At one point, Lestrade fumbled with a lucifer to light a cigar, but he had to admit that the sudden flare of flame in the house of death seemed unfitting, blasphemous almost. He blew it out and huddled beneath the blankets, chewing the tobacco instead. The cold water in the morning and the iced coffee and cold ham did nothing to cheer or warm him. He ate alone. Even the maid came nowhere near him. He could not find his grief-stricken host to say his farewells. He trod finally on one of the cats and left.
Dr Marsden was in mid-surgery when Lestrade found him.
‘Breathe in.’ The instruction was issued to an elderly gentleman stretched out corpse-like on a bed in his consulting room.
‘I can’t be of much help, Inspector.’ The doctor blinked at his visitor through a screen of cigar smoke. Ash dropped sporadically on to the patient’s stomach, causing him to wince somewhat. ‘Shock or first-degree burns or both were the cause of death. Oh, it’s all right,’ he coughed through the fumes, noting Lestrade’s concerned glance at the patient. ‘He’s deaf as a post. We’re quite alone.’
‘I was trying to draw your attention to his colour, Doctor. I believe he may have died.’
‘Good God.’ Marsden brought his hand down sharply on the chest of the recumbent form. ‘Breathe out, man!’
Lestrade was relieved to hear the patient gasp and cough.
‘Could I ask you a delicate question, Doctor? We are, after all, men of the world. In our professions we both see humanity in all its most naked forms.’ He was rather proud of that line.
‘Do.’ Marsden forced the old man over so that his nose buried itself in his trousers. The look on the doctor’s face evinced surprise that the patient could do this.
‘Where would you say the worst burns were? Where was the point of impact of the flame?’
‘Bum,’ snapped the doctor.
‘Doctor?’ said the policeman in surprise.
‘No, no, I’ve lost my cigar.’ Both men peered into the hair of the old man and their eyes met above his head. ‘Ah.’ Marsden recovered it from the collar of his patient’s shirt.
‘It was the rectum that received the full force, I’d say. The burns on the upper torso, upper limbs and head were less severe. It must have been the inflammable material of her dress that proved her undoing.’
‘The rectum, then,’ repeated Lestrade, making for the door.
‘Bum!’ roared Marsden.
‘Thank you, Doctor. I am aware.’
‘No, no. I’ve lost my cigar again.’
Lestrade was sitting in his office when the letter arrived. He had his feet in a bowl of hot water and a towel over his head. For three days he had lost all sense of taste and smell. For three nights he had not slept. Sir Melville McNaghten had told him to go home, but he was too busy. The ever-solicitous Miss McNaghten had sent him hot toddies and cordials. Lestrade had responded with alternate shivers and fevers. In his bed at night he felt himself consumed by the flames which in seconds had engulfed Harriet Wemyss. In the day, he felt as dead and cold as the man in the Chine.
It was unquestionably another letter in the series he realised, a
s he laid the towel aside. A click of his fingers brought Constable Dew with the goose-grease. He looked at the grey slime in the cup and sent Dew away. A mourning letter – the third such he had received. The same untraceable postmark, the same untraceable typewriter. The same untraceable verse.
It almost makes me cry to tell
What foolish Harriet befell.
Mama and nurse went out one day
And left her all alone at play …
And see! Oh! What a dreadful thing!
The fire has caught her apron-string;
Her apron burns, her arms, her hair;
She burns all over, everywhere …
Lestrade slammed his fist on the desk. He was being played with. This was a game of cat and mouse and he didn’t care for it. Three murders, scattered over the country. Bizarre, vicious. What were the links? The common factors? Poetry of a sort, sent to the Yard. Sent to him. Lestrade had come to regard whoever was out there doing these thing as a personal enemy. This was a duel of wits and so far, Lestrade had come off second-best.
Three of Spades
‘I do think Dew will do, sir,’ Lestrade was saying.
‘That’s easy for you to say, Lestrade,’ McNaghten was answering, ‘but this new chap is damned clever. His references are excellent. Dew is all right, but he’ll never amount to anything. No finesse. No style.’
‘But Eton, sir? A copper from Eton?’
‘Oh, I know it’s not the usual recruiting source, but you mustn’t be an inverted snob, Lestrade. He may not have had the advantages of the Blackheath crammer, but you mustn’t hold that against him.’
‘I’ll try not to hold anything against him,’ said Lestrade reaching the door.
‘Bandicoot?’ repeated Lestrade.
‘Yes, sir.’
‘You can’t be serious.’